#then his tutor almost hurt his sister before she was even born

[sadlynotthevoid]

Because of that dream I had (mentioned in this post), I headcanon that og!Cale's only fear that applies to himself are teachers. All his other fears implies other people being the one who suffers, but he's deeply scared of teachers.

He's teacher-phobic like some people are clown-phobic and like some little animals are afraid of humans. (Or I to spiders)

In my mind, that's the actual reason he abandoned his studies. He had a whole conversation prepared to convince his father that he could do self-study and have Ron or Hans test him every some months. He was so ready to have to present a whole list of arguments when he ditched his classes.

Instead, Deruth just agreed to it almost immediately. Cale was so shocked that he forgot to tell him about the self-study part.

A few days later, he heard some people talk about how "the young master's behaviour got worse and worse" and how "he refused to have any education at all". Then they mentioned how Bassen was so dedicated in comparison.

So he decided that this misunderstanding was quite useful and let it be.

Anyways, I headcanon this so strongly that sometimes I forget it's not canon.

Everytime I read a highschool AU where og!Cale is skipping classes, I'm like "yeah, I would do that too if I were him". Then I remember that that's not canon, not even in the fic. He's just keeping with his "trashy" persona.

(Although, if the fic doesn't contradict it, sometimes I keep going with my reason instead).

[truthorconsequencesrp]

WADE SOLOMON

CHARACTER NAME: wade solomon FACECLAIM: jake weary AGE: 31 GENDER/PRONOUNS: cis man ; he&him BIRTHDAY/ZODIAC: july 28th, 1991 ; leo OCCUPATION: part-time housekeeper at DUDE MOTEL & APARTMENTS ; part-time farm hand at MILKWEED FARM HOW LONG HAVE THEY BEEN IN T OR C: six months NEIGHBORHOOD: vista la verde SONG THAT SUITS THEM: daytona sand by orville peck

TRIGGER WARNINGS: drugs ; suicide attempt

ABOUT

wade was supposed to be perfect. an upper-middle-class family with two beautiful and talented daughters and the parents thought that three was the magic number — wade was going to be it. his mother should've known he was going to be trouble from the second she held him in her arms and he wouldn't stop screaming his head off, though. his life was mostly planned out from even before he was born with no room for error, no place for straying. his sisters followed the map and came out on top, wade was going to be next. school, college, career, marriage, kids, happy life — a foolproof plan that his folks stuck to and which wade was supposed to follow, too. none of it worked for him though. 

he had trouble at school. nothing really interested him, he always half-assed things because none of them could keep his attention for too long. science and math were too complicated, books were often too hard to read so he never took a liking to english either. art was okay and he was kind of good at it but you also had to show up to school and that was too much to ask from wade. if he showed up, he was stoned, if he decided to skip, he drove somewhere secluded to get stoned. he didn't have any friends and most of the people at school thought he was a freak so it’s not like there was a lot keeping him there. 

his senior year of high school, his father ran for governor. that, of course, brought a lot of attention to the picture-perfect family that wade didn’t fit. wade’s sisters were in their junior year at yale and harvard. wade was failing pretty much everything. they were almost engaged. wade couldn’t even remember the name of the guy that kissed him for the first time because he was so drunk. they were going to become doctors or lawyers. wade had no idea what he was going to do. his parents tried to fix him. they got him private tutors, talked the principal into giving him a chance, kept telling wade that if he doesn’t clean up his act there will be consequences. they never thought to take him to see a therapist and that only happened when wade tried to kill himself on christmas day when he was 18. he told his parents that it was an accident and that he didn’t mean to hurt himself and they believed him. they put him on medication and then told him to really get it together or else. 

wade always wanted to leave anyway. his hometown always felt like it was suffocating him, more than his own faulty brain ever did. so before they could do anything, he decided to leave on his own. he graduated, barely (and probably only because his parents paid for it; a waste of money, wade always says), emptied his account, packed up his car and just drove. it was week after graduation and he didn’t even say goodbye to anyone. he sent his family a postcard from boston a month later, fuck you thick in red ink on the back of it, in handwriting that didn’t even look like his own anymore. the same day he left and drove to portland, figuring that another huge city will make him feel like he belongs somewhere.

it felt liberating, to finally be on his own. while he never really had any plans for his life, he knew he always wanted to leave — leave and go places, see things. he’s spent eighteen years in a house he hated so the idea of not having a house felt good to him, felt free to him. there’s no career called a little bit of everything but that’s exactly what he did. a small job here and there, anything and everything, from working a cash register to fixing radiators. it was a surprise to see how quick wade was able to pick up a new skill, but it made sense since he was going to be paid for it. he’d sleep in his car, at some random person’s couch, a motel room, even a homeless shelter when he had to. but he was fine. he could do whatever he wanted, go wherever he wanted, spend his time and money whichever way he pleased. after having his parents do everything to control his every move, it felt good to have that.

he didn’t like staying in the same place for too long, it made him feel restless. he needed to go further, he needed to see more. portland, new york, toronto, nashville, houston, phoenix, las vegas, los angeles and every small town in between; wade would pull up a map, scribble some track on it (he still keeps it old school, none of that google maps shit) and follow. sometimes he’d stay a week, other times he’d stay for six months. vegas made him stick around for a year and a half and he almost ended up with a normal life (he had a steady job working the register at target, actually paid rent at the place he lived at and there was a guy who was getting really serious about him) but then the restlessness came back and soon enough he was on his way. it felt good to leave everything behind and it felt good to know that there were new things waiting for him again.

drugs that weren’t weed came surprisingly late for wade, considering his lifestyle. he was 25 and at some musician’s party in la when he tried cocaine first. he moved again soon after but then started running with a crowd that did drugs a lot. he graduated from weed few times a week to blow every weekend, or more. he tried other things, too, every party he went to crazier than the night before. it was the start of a dirty habit that wade can’t kick at this point. 

big towns started tiring him out, especially when he realized that small towns were just as easy to navigate as the capitals. he traded chicago for rockford and then traded that for a town with a single street. he still made sure that all the places were close enough to the big ones, just so he didn’t have to drive for hours to get high, but the five-thousand-people towns suited him best. especially if he changed them like gloves.

another thing he changed often was names. wade isn’t the name his parents gave him (he’s always hated it, sounded so grown up, so stuck up, everything that wade wasn’t), solomon isn’t his family name, and by now he’s given himself at least thirty, both first and last. sometimes, he’d pick something new the second he crossed a state line, sometimes he’d go from name to name for each town he stopped by. sometimes, he’d pick something as simple as john or jack, other times he’d become anderson or xander. he can’t write for shit but he’s good at telling stories and each name has one. he picked wade on the spot when he came to T or C six months ago and someone asked for his name for the first time, the last name came later, from the bible in the motel room bedside table.  

he was going to leave — this wasn’t meant to be a permanent location, just somewhere to stop by and so after a week in town, he packed up his car and went on his merry way. the very same day he crashed his car, cracked his skull and broke an arm just outside city limits. that itself kept him in town for few more weeks and once he actually settled in, he changed his mind and decided that yeah, maybe he can call this place home for a while now. it’s been six months since — he’s picked up a few jobs here and there, sleeps where he can, gets high when he has the money to spare, tries to actually have friends. in the back of his head, he’s planning another escape because the restlessness has never left and a part of him is dying for a change of scenery. surprisingly enough though, it’s become kinda hard to leave.  

EXTRA: pinterest ; playlist 1 & 2

(adrian, 26, gmt+2, he&him)

[idontknowmyownmind]

OKH AU

Soo I was reading a Oushitsu Kyoshi Haine | The Royal Tutor fanfiction titled The White Lily of Granzreich by AntaresScorpii. I got quite attached to Leonhard since I watched the anime and read the manga. He is so innocent, bright, and cheerful I want to... hurt and ruin him. *whisper softly*

Reading the fanfiction, I can't help but also imagine my version of the story in this verse.

In mine, Leo is a girl with the name Leiya. Unlike Leo who got kidnapped for days or weeks tops, she got kidnapped for almost a year.

Surely you can imagine what she might experience as a kidnapping victim, especially as a girl.

Someone rescue her.

When they were on the run, something happened that made Leiya get a dagger slit across her eyes, making her blind.

She covered her eyes with a blindfold after that.

At that point, she only remembers her time as a captive and has hazy memories before that, the only clear memory is about her name.

She found out that she is carrying a child.

It's dready for her but she also doesn't want to get rid of the child.

With all the trauma she got, she still thinks clearly enough that the baby inside her is innocent and has nothing to do with whatever happened to her.

Her rescuer houses her and helps her throughout time.

The rescuer has something like an orphanage but not really an orphanage? They help those who are in need.

Since Leiya doesn't remember anything, she lives with them.

When her baby is born, a boy, she is happy but also dreadful. Afraid that the baby will look like whoever his father might be. Even though she can't see him, which she feels remorseful for feeling glad about.

The others reassure her that her baby is her copy but different gender, which is true.

She is actually afraid that she can't love him, unable to give him the love she deserves from his mother.

But she is glad that despite that, she is able to love him unconditionally.

She is also surprised to find out that she will still love him even if he looks like his father.

The search from the royal family never stops but after a year, it's not as intense because when they find who abdunced Leiya, she is not there and the kidnapper talks as if she's long dead.

A year or two after her rescue, the first who found her is Eins and Ernst when they walk around the town in disguise.

It starts with a crying, lost little girl.

Ernst approached her and asked what's wrong and the little girl said that she's separated from her sister and she needs to find her because her sister is blind and needs her help.

They offer to help her and ask what her sister's name is and she answers that her name is Leiya.

Eins finger twitched but doesn't say anything because he thinks it's just a coincidence.

They found Leiya with her back facing them while shouting the little girl's name.

Eins heart feels heavy, because from the back, despite the appearance, she looks like his baby sister.

She shout Leiya's name and when the girl turn around, Eins feels the world stop around him.

That's his sister. A sister he failed to protect two years ago. A sister he thought dead. But she is here, nagging around a little girl he doesn't know. Despite not close to any of his siblings, he know their voice and he know that she is his Leiya.

When the little girl tells her about them, she looks up and they see the blindfold. They remember the little girl saying that her sister is blind.

Leiya introduces herself and when Eins says his name, a little hope in heart that she recognizes him, but she loses in her mind.

When Ernst snaps her out of it, she sheepishly says that his voice is familiar.

Eins is not dumb to not speculate that she might lost her memories. Because why wouldn't she come back to them if she remembered?

The girls bring them to their home with the little girl leading them while chattering non-stop.

They found out about the baby, not really since he's already 1 or 2 years old, when he ran or wobbled to Leiya while calling her Mama.

Their first thought would be it's just a kid that might think of her as his mother if not for him basically a copy of her.

Eins is not stupid and naive to think that nothing were happened to her all those time, but it still weight his heart to found out that it's true.

Eins and Ernst don't tell the others immediately. Spending as much time with her to get to know her again before Eins sure that it's time for the other to know.

The kid somehow took a liking to him and called him uncle which gave him a strange feeling, a good strange feeling.

When the others were being told, there was shouting, tears, and everything.

Eins explained everything he knew about her condition and situation and made a plan to bring them one by one to not overwhelm her.

When it's Victor's turn, the first time Leiya heard his voice she cried. She can't explain why, she just said that his voice is familiar but different from the others and it hurts. She feels like she misses his voice but also feels angry.

[writemekpop]

Lipstick On Your Collar (Part 1) | Nakamoto Yuta

Pairing: Nakamoto Yuta x Reader

Summary: Till death do us part... But what happens when he cheats?  

Genre: Husband!Yuta, Angst

Word Count: 1.9k

Warnings: Infidelity, Sexual Content, Body Image

Gif: @yuthereal​

Part 1 ⭐| Part 2  | Part 3 | Part 4

“Ten more minutes, then it’s homework time, alright?” you called to your two older sons, eight and four years old. Caught up in their wooden sword fight, they didn’t even look up.

You smoothed your hand over your face, eyes bruised from lack of sleep. Between your banking job and your three kids, sleep was a rare thing.

Just then, you felt a waft of chill air. Yuta strode in through the front door, his feathery black hair in disarray.

“Hey babe,” you called, shoulders relaxing.

Your husband had this calming presence, your island on a rough ocean. Your chest ached for Yuta’s warmth. You hadn’t hugged, kissed… touched in months.

“Hi, Y/n. We need to talk,” Yuta deadpanned.

You picked up your baby daughter Ayumi. She needed her nappy changed. Bad.

“Alright. What’s up?” You placed her on the changing mat, blowing your fringe out of your eyes.

“I mean in private.” You saw that Yuta’s face was stretched and white. A knot curled in your stomach.

“Nappies?” You lifted your hand. He begrudgingly handed them over.

“Y/n. This is serious.” Yuta’s voice quivered like a taut string.

“Can’t you see I’m busy? What is it?” you snapped. You instantly regretted it. Nowadays, you were always on the edge of an explosion.

“Okay. Fine. I’ve… messed up. And I’m sorry, and I didn’t mean it, but… it’s happened.”

You bin Ayumi’s old nappy, then pull her into your arms. “Is that all? Look, if you’ve broken something, we have insurance.”

“This isn’t a bloody plate! I’ve- I’ve done something awful.”

“Right. Well done. Anyway, I have to help the kids with their homework.”

“Just look at me, Y/n! I’m trying to fucking tell you something!” Yuta’s yell turned your head.

Yuta’s eyes were red-rimmed and wide, like he was in shock. “I… cheated on you, Y/n. I slept with someone else.”

Your heartbeat slowed to a crawl. Instinctively, you pulled your baby close.

“Who is she?”

“Diya. From the school.”

Your lips went numb. You put Ayumi down in her rocker and started rinsing plates in the sink. “How long?”

“Just once. It was a mistake, I swear… it’s just, she was there, and… I didn’t plan it!”

Your chest folded in on itself. While you were kissing your babies to sleep, Yuta was kissing someone else.

“When was it, Yuta?”

“The… day you… went to stay with your sister.”

You’d never forget that day.

It was a few weeks after Ayumi was born. You couldn’t seem to get out of bed, let alone be a good mother. So you’d escaped… just for a day.

While you were breaking apart, Yuta searched out another woman.

“Where?” You picked up the cutlery, letting the hot water scald your skin.

“Her apartment. We met up after work, and one thing led to another… I swear, that was all.”

Images burned into your mind, like a flashed camera. Yuta’s fingernails scraping the back of her neck, like he did to you. Their naked bodies gyrating, sweaty, the smell of sex saturating everything…

Your throat convulsed in a retch. For a second, it was like a brick was hitting your chest.

Then, everything stopped.

You felt a curtain dropping. You didn’t have time to deal with this. Not now. As quickly as they came, the feelings slowed. Drooped. Vanished.

You looked down. You were clenching a table knife so hard it had drawn blood. You let go.

Everything blurred. You felt like a kid again, staring up at yourself from the bottom of a pool.

Your voice was a croak. “Obviously, we’re not telling the kids. My parents are coming next week – so we can’t tell them either.”

You dried your hands and looked up at Yuta. His mouth was hanging open, like a cartoon character’s. It was almost funny.

You continued speaking, bunging toys into a basket.

“If you want a divorce, tell me now, because we’ll have to borrow money. For tonight, I’ll take the bed, you have the couch.”

“What the hell, Y/n?”

You jolt and look up. “Fine! You can have the bed.”

Yuta grabbed your shoulders, knife-cheekboned and wild. “I don’t care about the fucking bed! I just told you I cheated on you. Why aren’t you mad?”

You stared at his hands on your skin, like you didn’t recognise them. Yuta spotted your gaze, and slowly let go.

“I’m really sorry, Y/n. I want to fix this. But you need to let me in.”

You looked into his chestnut eyes and frowned. Why was he being so obnoxious?

Slowly, you spelled it out. “You cheated on me. It was with our kids’ tutor, while I was sick. You’re sorry. You won’t do it again. Now can I go and make dinner?”

Yuta blinked. Slowly. Then, he gulped and gave you a slight nod. “Yep.”

You pushed past him, and called out, “Whoever helps mummy with dinner gets ice cream!”

You ushered your eager kids towards the hob. You didn’t look back, but you felt Yuta’s gaze on the back of your head. Stunned.

------

You plastered on your brightest smile all throughout dinner, whilst laying out bedding on the couch for yourself, even whilst tucking your children into bed.

Now, you were sitting in your children’s room, with the lights out. You’d just finished reading their bedtime story. They were fast asleep.

Finally, you let the iron screen lift from your heart. Instead of fighting it, you bared the most vulnerable part of yourself.

It was a memory: you were in Paris with Yuta on the first night of your honeymoon. You were in a mid-range Travel Lodge – the best you could afford – with rain pelting at the windows.

You had woken up at 11AM, tangled up with Yuta from your cuddling. You’d talked, worried, agonised about it, but you’d never had sex with him before.

Yuta opened one sleepy eye and felt your body with his hands, as if he was checking if it was there. You tingled with lust to the tips of your toes. Suddenly, you knew the moment was right.

For once, you didn’t care about your tummy that you always tried to hide, you didn’t care about your thighs which rubbed together when you walked.

You didn’t think about anything, except the feeling of Yuta’s slow kisses, the feeling of him inside of you, the feeling of his hands reaching to the very ends of you.

You were in a hazy, golden pool of completeness. As you gasped your worries, apologies, in each other’s ears, you became whole in a way you’d never known before.

Then, the memory shattered. And in its place, before you could stop it, was the image that was burnt into your eyelids.

It played over and over again, the trailer to a movie of your shame. Yuta in her apartment, the thumping of the bedposts, him between her legs, her exclamations of ‘yes!’, that were only echoed by him moaning her name…

You screamed silently into your fist.

You knew the real reason Yuta cheated on you. Whatever excuses he made, it wasn’t a mistake or a drunk one-off.

You grabbed the soft flesh around your waist. This was why. You thought of the nights you’d told him you were too tired, that you weren’t in the mood. That was why.

You couldn’t even blame Yuta. He was only compensating for the fact that his own wife would never be attractive enough, good enough, just enough for him.

The tears rose up your throat, making your head pound and your cheeks stretch with sobs. You wanted nothing more than to drown yourself in these tears, though you knew they wouldn’t wash the pain away.

Then, you caught a grey glimmer in the darkness. Your youngest boy, Nico, was wide awake and watching you with saucer eyes.

“Hey baby… go back to sleep,” you whispered, quickly smoothing away your tears.

“Are you crying, mummy?”

The softness in his gaze was like a punch in the stomach. You choked down another wave of tears. “No, sweetie, I’m fine. Go back to sleep okay?”

Obediently, he closed his eyes. You didn’t deserve such beautiful children.

You were doubled over, silent in the darkness. You pressed your palms into your eyes, so hard they hurt, and forced the tears back.

You couldn’t even make your husband love you.

What hope did you have with your kids?

------

Three days had passed since that terrible night.

It was 10PM, and the house was unusually quiet.

You and Yuta were sitting at the far edges of the couch, the Netflix episode you never missed playing on the TV.

Both of you were pretending like nothing had gone wrong.

“So… how was work?” Yuta’s cautious voice broke the silence.

You sighed and shook your head. “Just get me a drink.” You couldn’t be bothered with this charade. But at least you could drown your feelings.

“Are you sure that’s a good-” Yuta began.

“Just get it.”

He returned with a whisky, with two ice cubes. Your heart twisted. “You remembered?”

“How could I forget my wife’s favourite drink?” Yuta gave you a thin smile, and for a second, you forgot to ice him out. You smiled back.  

That was two whiskies ago. Now, the gap between the two of you on the sofa had shrunk.

You were laughing so hard your eyes were teary.

“Do you remember, Y/n? Your shirt was on backwards, my pants were on the other side of the room, we were moaning so loud half the theme park could hear us!”

You dried your eyes, sighing. “I bet we scarred a few kids for life that day…”

Yuta’s lip curled up in a smile that sent your heart racing.

You looked down. Subconsciously, your hand was massaging Yuta’s denim-clad knee. You retracted it.

“God, we really knew how to have fun, didn’t we?” You could barely remember the time before you had your three children. It was rose-coloured.

“I mean, Disneyland was nothing. Remember Taeyong’s attic? The nightclub bathroom? I could go on…”

“Ahh!” You mimed blocking your ears. “There are kids in the house, you know!”

In doing so, you lost your grip on your whisky glass, which was balanced on your knee. Yuta grabbed it before it fell, and his hand was suddenly on your thigh.

He let go, and you cleared your throat.

That was hours back. Now, you were having difficulty sitting straight. You’d lost count of how many whiskies you’d downed.

You grabbed Yuta by the shoulders and shook him. “Look! Let’s just get it out of the way. ASAP, straight, completo. No regrets.”

For the first time in ages, your blood was running warm with more than alcohol. The worn denim of Yuta’s jeans was pulling your gaze southward.

“Get what out of the way? You’re not making sense, Y/n.”

You pulled the pin out of your hair and let it fall over your shoulders. “The big three-letter.”

Yuta looked at you, still bewildered. “What?”

“SEX.”

The glass fell from Yuta’s hand.

To be continued…

Part 1 ⭐| Part 2  | Part 3 | Part 4

[spiltscribbles]

Prompt: remus and lily as siblings or half siblings or biological family in any capacity pls 🥺

Oh God!!! Baby!!!🥺🥺😭 This is such a favorite AU of mine!! I’m literally— sorta— writing a To All The Boys I’ve Loved Before AU right now and they are the bestest siblings in that!!!  They share a little sister and they are just so cute!! And Petunia is conveniently off in university oaiwefjoiaswejfiogreghoij And I just love Remus and Lily both so much it hurts!!! And so I wanna spit out a bullet point Ficlet at you! And I’m not even sorry just because I love you so endlessly for tossing this into my inbox foiwaeifmkaeoirfgjieoarujoidkioweajgh 

So like in my head, becs that Voldy bitch doesn’t know how to actually world build, the Muggle born children who get their Hogwarts letters, are also invited to join this like support group for ordinary folks with magical children. It’s like a thing that’s held in the Ministry of magic over in London once a month, and the parents are taught about the Wizarding world while their children kind of go to this separate room to intermingle and read Hogwarts; A History with one another, and just vibe, because pure bloods and those close to that have always sorta known one another and such, so this is a nice way for the Muggle borns not to feel so excluded.

So the thing is, obviously Lyall was a wizard, but also we all know I don’t fuck with him lmfao. So I picture that after he leaves for the final time when Remus is around nine, and finalizes the  divorce with Hope, she— being the bad bitch that she is, just marches to the ministry with her half-blood, werewolf son, and demands to learn everything about the world he’s part of, because she refuses to let him be deprived of anything. 

Eventually she becomes one of the tutors for the adult section because she’s such a quick study— being a professor herself back in Cardiff and just being an all around bombshell tbh. So one day, in February of 1970, there’s this ginger haired, northerner who stumbles in with his daughter who looks so much like him that it’s crazy— dimples and smile and upturned nose. Though she has her mother’s eyes, who had past away when she was only seven from a freak car accident.

And when he first shake’s Hope’s hand, he’s like kind of mind boggled over how beautiful she is, and thinks that maybe all wizards just put on some sort of charm to look unearthly, till he finds out that she’s as Muggle as he is towards the end of his visit. And he is just entirely love struck tbh.

And for the next couple months or so, he kind of just yearns from afar, and then spends the ride home to Cokeworth listening to Lily’s excited chortling about her friend Remus who’s apparently a half blood and who likes the same treats as her and knows how to draw things so amazingly, and it isn’t until like May, when he ambles to the other room and realizes that Remus is actually Hope’s fucking son, and he already knows that she said she began this group after separating from her husband who was a wizard himself. So Lily’s father— Nate— quite literally just shoots his shot and asks if Lily would like to get ice cream with her new friend since Petunia won’t be coming back from there Grams’s house till late, and Hope sorta smirks from over the kids’ heads because she sees exactly what he’s doing and is impressed that he’s finally done something for fuck’s sake.

And like obviously they fall hard for one another, and they probs get married like Lily’s second year at Hogwarts.

Wait, just Lily’s you ask??

Yes my beautiful duckling,  because plot twist!! (We lovee plot twists!!!)

In this AU i picture that McGonagall kind of visits during the summer months leading up to the children’s first year at Hogwarts, just to give them some supplementary readings and answer the questions for their future schooling, and when Dumbledore tells her about Remus’s full situation with his lycanthropy and all, she does some research, and figures out how Beauxbatons is much, MUCH more accommodating to “dark” creatures, and she’s already pretty chummy with Hope and knows that she’s actually a French citizen herself, the daughter of Algerian immigrants. So Remus technically has the possibility to attend Hogwarts or Beauxbatons, and so Hope and Remus talk on it long and hard, and she knows he’s already become fast friends with Lily and their thick as thieves with one another, but it’s also just so much safer for him.

So the week before Lily is set to go off to King’s Cross, they fly over to France and they get Remus settled in his dorm abroad.

I think while they’re away, Lily and Remus actually somehow become closer, because their parents are still dutifully dating and neither of them are all that familiar with their surroundings, so they send one another so many fucking letters through that first term, that the owls of their schools always give them the dirtiest looks lmfao. And they really catch on like a house on fire, like it’s one of those relationships that is just innate? Like you know when you have a best friend you guys kind of just slip into one another lives? Like even when you don’t talk for a while or whatever, it’s just natural<3 <3 

So neither of them ever spend the hols of winter or spring in Hogwarts/Beauxbatons, becs that’s when they really get to vibe.

They tell one another the different cool charms they’ve learned, and hate that they can’t show them with their actual wands yet. And they watch all their favorite films and almost adopt this secret language that’s only the quirk of their brows and twitch of the lips, and Petunia hates how freakily attuned they are with one another and sneers at them for being such freaks in all aspects. Also in this AU Lily fucks off from Snape wayyyy sooner, because instead of having to deal with that nasty, bigoted, slime ball she has the cutest and funniest and most amazing bestie in Remus!

And before Hope and Nate exchange vows in the winter of their second year, the little family of five go to this tiny park that’s all lush grassland and a shiny jungle gym and a pair of swings tucked away by trees, and they sit at this picnic table, and Hope— with her steady, ever buoyant voice, explains to them why she and Remus decided to send him to Beauxbatons instead of Hogwarts, and Petunia is like gawking in fright, and Nate looks sort of distressed, but Lily just cocks her head and shrugs her shoulders, because it’s still Remus— her closest companion Rem— and nothing could change that. So she takes his hand from where it’s fiddling with a splintered piece of wood on the tabletop and she squeezes it tightly, watches him glance up at her with the late summer wind billowing in his tawny curls and the fear in his honey eyes, and she simply tells him that it doesn’t matter. And Lily will never forget the way his features spasm at that, going suddenly loose and bright and thankful, and then Nate probably tousles his hair and kisses Hope’s temple and shyly asks how they should accommodate once they move in with one another.

And that park becomes sorta special tbh.

It’s in that alcove with the swings and trees where Lily and Remus go when things are becoming too much, or they would just like to escape the world by one another’s side.

It’s where they tried their first cigarettes that Remus had gotten from an older bloke in Beauxbaton’s when they were thirteen and feeling adventurous. And where they go to listen to the releases of their favorite albums, and when Remus told Lily that he’s gay for the first time before leaving to both their fourth years and it’s like one of those spots they both think of and feel golden.

Oh God! Imagine how cute of a celebration that Nate and Hope hold for them both becoming prefects!!! Hope and Nate definitely insist on some sort of summer todo! And they invite their friends and all that jazz and OMFG what if Lily’s wearing some sorta powder blue sundress that matches Remus’s oxford shirt and they both are grimacing in all the photos and are just not thriving foieajfoierjgiearfoijsdkgxh But like they would be doted on rotten that whole day! This is so cute! OMFG! And this probs means James became Prefect as well and so Remus gets to tease her when he sends her some sort of congratulations letter and she’s totally blushing and trying to hide her grin, and Lily retaliates by kicking his ankle tbh bahaha 

Okay also now I’m thinking of like Lily’s like fifth year, and her Muggle studies class is doing some sort of seminar to see if these idiots can actually survive in a totally Muggle area without a lick of magic, so like it’s spring hols, and guess who she’s partnered up with??? 

Cookies for you because we all know she had to work with James and Sirius lmfao!!! 

And she’s totally still trying to hide her crush on James— who’s nearly always leering and winking her way— and she might actually punch Sirius’s face simply because he’s such a smug bastard, and being from a working class family like herself, she’s like always ready to fight preppy rich boys tbh

So James and Sirius decide to plan out the simulation in her house that’s right outside Cardiff and Remus is cackling the entire morning before they’re set to arrive because she’s so pissy about it lmfao

Okay so like obviously the boys end up taking the port key and land in front of her place and it’s Remus who answers the door, still painted with humor because Lily was just screaming about “if Potter brings that insufferable snitch here I’ll bloody shove it up his arse” and James is immediately on the defense because Lily’s only ever talked about her sister and brother who live with her at home, and this dude is golden where she’s pale and has curls over her straight hair and just, obviously they’re not related by blood at all. And for his part, Sirius is like *Oh! Oh! Oh! Pretty!!! Pretty boy!! Muggle boy? Pretty Muggle boy!* 

But Remus obviously knows who they are straight away, so he like waves them inside before rounding to the stairs and calling for her to stop clogging the toilet or something else mortifyingly embarrassing, and Lily promises to put like pickles in the next set of face masks that they do because she knows how fucking allergic he is to them, and she wants her chuckles damn it!!  

“Potter— Black,” is how she greets them with a derisive sort of glower that Remus can completely see through, so he has to excuse himself while laughing over to the kitchen. “You’ve met my delightful brother I see.”

And James’s entire posture relaxes and he’s back to grinning like a dope, and the only weird part is that Sirius has got on the very same face, *Pretty Muggle boy is Evan’s brother* So like they are both scary levels of elated, rip.

But sucks to be Sirius because Remus leaves after that to meet up with a friend from town who’s also the best dealer tbh, and  so he has to deal with James’s awful levels of flirting with Lily while they scrounge up their itinerary to send their professor for the seminar type thing, and he doesn’t even have a pretty distraction XS

But Lily does force Remus to come along with her on the trip to London because “On God, if I spend a day alone with those bellends by myself I will punch a wall” 

And it is literally the worst, but best double date/first date that’s full of Sirius and James fucking up with everything— including asking some poor Tesco employee where are their fudgeflies and giving a homeless man a hand full of galleons and James’s snitch somehow ending up in the meaty hands of some kid at the tube. But also tbh it’s hella cute when Lily lets James give her his jacket when they’re walking along the Thames and it’s getting chilly, and when Remus lets Sirius share his stick of cotton candy and they both sorta stare at the sugar on each of their lips.

But then they go to some tiny museum, and while they’re looking at a impressionist piece, Sirius is totally trying to show off to Remus and is explaining how he could turn the bench their sitting on into a really nice bouquet of Lupins, and in the middle of his stupid showboating, Remus lightly corrects him on some facet of Gamp’s law, and Sirius freezes— shocked still— and he’ sort of gaping like an idiot, before Lily stops his blustering with a scoff “He’s a damn wizard also you arse.”

And Sirius is floundering for the rest of the evening, and he has so many questions, but they all die on his lips every time he glances over at Remus and he’s just smirking at him with this electric glint in his golden eyes

So obviously when they’re back at Hogwarts he pesters Lily every second of every day about Remus, and why he’s not at Hogwarts. “None of your fucking business.” And asking where Remus goes instead. “Beauxbatons, thankfully far away from you.” and he asks her about a thousand other questions that Lily either scoffs at or simply cuffs him around the head for daring to even try getting his address.

And she pokes fun about the situation to Remus and tells him how much more of an idiot he’s acting like, and how hilarious it all is. And she’s shocked when he responds to her letter merely by saying, “Hah- he’s cute.”

And so obviously she shoots back a reply that’s a letter of all his worst traits, mainly that he’s an arrogant toerag, and that he’s a posh idiot who could probably live off his inheritance for three lifetimes without blinking, and about how he doesn’t date anyone for longer than a couple months, and how he’s practically brothers with James bloody Potter, and yet again, Remus just tells her, Hah- he’s cute, before mildly moving to talking about his latest charms paper and how he’s been asked to be their DADA’s professors TA next year, and how Andrew keeps trying to try again with him but Remus would rather poke his eyes out with a spork.

So Lily is totally fuming when she recognizes that she’s lost and begrudgingly gives Sirius Remus’s info, after telling him lowly and with her most menacing glower, “IF you fuck around with my brother I will murder you without a flinch.” And she’s quite literally five feet nothing to Sirius’s broad, six-foot frame, but he knows that she could do it with a snap of the finger, and he promises that it’s not just a gag on his end. And Lily actually believes him.

So Remus and Sirius begin writing to one another a sickening amount, like so steadfastly that it gives Lily a complex whenever she finds Sirius waiting at the Owlry every Wednesday morning for the bird that arrives with two letters tied to it’s leg, one for each of them.

And God, one time, right before they let out for summer hols, Lily accidentally takes the one marked for Sirius— and holy christ!!!, She did not need to know just what exactly her brother has been getting up to in the sex department of things— like she legit contemplated using a memory charm on herself JFC

And Sirius probably ends up on their doorstep again in late July, with James at toe, and somehow their is a small harmony painted between the four of them, and it’s by Christmas of sixth year when James and Sirius begin talking about how amazing it’ll be when they’re actually in-law brothers, and Lily blames Remus for everything when she’s pretending to be cross over it, but then James puts his arm around her shoulders, and she sees how gentle Sirius is when he twines his fingers into Remus’s own, and it feels good, feels right. 

It feels like something that can be forever.

Send Me A Prompt/Chat With Me💜  |  My Wolfstar FIC Masterlist

[windtraces]

i'm thinking about my genshin ocs again and wanna talk about them but idk who to talk about or what to say so... basic rundown and if anyone wants to ask? i added at least one new one (who is repurposed from an old oc)

acier sterling- fontaine, geo vision, sword user. his attacks deal with metal instead of rocke. almost fanatical devotion to fontaine's military/guard/police/whatever because his mother died in childbirth and his father, who was also military, deserted when he was a kid, so he was raised by the state. has a horse named argent who he nursed back to health and loves

ikshan- sumeru, anemo vision, catalyst user. was born Plagued By Visions. he can see the future, can't turn that off, and has some limited past visions too. afflicted by the Thousand Winds of Time. will laugh hard at any joke. vision came from his bf, who was an akademiya researcher whose death he foresaw but at the time he was trying to suppress his visions. took the vision shell and it became his vision, just as he foresaw. currently part of the rtawahist darshan because even though he does Not use stars to see the future, it's the best they have and he can predict when an experiment is gonna hurt someone

sigismund blumenthal - mondstadt, hydro vision, catalyst user. man who was sickly as a child and went blind due to that. studied stuff anyway with tutors. at one point on a trip home from sumeru was separated from his escort by a hilichurl attack, found a seelie, and it led him back to his caravan. seelie has stuck by him ever since and is his "seeing eye seelie". he studies seelie, magic theory, and magic history. likes teaching magic

faolan angurvadal - khaenri'ahn, visionless, sword user. currently lives in liyue and helps run a commune with his totally-not-boyfriend. left his family because of Pressures. descendant of a black serpent knight, his older brother was supposed to take oaths similar to theirs but died so then it fell to him to take those oaths and he just couldn't. ran away. has a cool sword. makes shields, has a dog named stinky.

manette "mannie" desrosiers - fontaine, cryo vision, sword user. an actual pirate. high femme lesbian. fled fontaine because her noble family arranged a marriage she didn't want, became a pirate captain. weaponizes femininity to keep out of trouble. mostly wears black. very peppy and cheerful, cares a lot about fairness despite being a literal pirate.

kuroha - inazuma, electro vision, sword user. kitsune who was captured by the fatui and used as an assassin. escaped relatively recently and returned to inazuma, smuggled in before sakoku decree ended. very traumatized by the experience.

zelig ecklund - mondstadt, anemo vision, sword user. diluc's cousin, his mom was crepus' sister. in the adventurer's guild. studied swordsmanship behind his dad's back and ultimately saved his life with it, which is where he got his vision. left on a trip to natlan about a year before in game events and just got back, does Not know what the Fuck is going on in mondstadt, so normal and so confused.

[nestasgalpal]

Walk me through it [Nessian fic]

Fixing ACOSF part 5

Masterlist | AO3

Summary: Cassian accompanies Nesta to the cottage in the Mortal Lands where she and her sisters used to live, so she can get closure.

Tagging:  @gwynriel​ @rhaenystargaryn​ @clolikescloquetas​ @amelievrstr​ @t8astr8ng @wanderlustlastsforever @saltydreamcollector​ @lordlorcan​ @esrahiba​ @queenestarcheron​ @ko0mbayamylord​  @jemstan300​ @nessiantrashh​ @mothergwyn @poisonus-bloom  @loveadora  @frosted-crackers​  @mireillemystique​ @pataytayo​ @968sunflower968​ @caram267​ @jainadurron​ @darkshadowqueensrule​ @amphiptree​ @finae-bookshelf​ @niytavia​ @brainlessfruit​ @dontgetsalmonella​ @messyhairday-me​ @sunsummoner​  @chosenfamily-valkyriequeens​ @wannawriteyouabook​ @psychoticminx​ @misswonderflower​​

N/A: Sorry I erased the comment about Feyre painting the cabin in Illyria but I didn’t get what that had to do with anything lol.

Nesta’s heart thundered as she laid a hand against the cold wooden door. Claw marks still gouged it.

“Tamlin’s handiwork, I take it?” Cassian asked behind her.

Nesta shrugged, unable to find the words. She and Elain had rehung the door after Tamlin had broken it. Their father, his leg wrecked beyond repair and unable to bear weight, had watched them, offering unhelpful advice.

Her fingers curled into a fist and she shouldered the door open. Its rusted hinges objected, creaking, and a dusty, half-rotten scent swarmed her nose. Her cheeks heated. For Cassian to be here, to see this—

“Just a brute, remember?” He stepped to her side. “I’ve lived in far worse. At least you had walls and a roof.”

Nesta hadn’t realized how much she needed to hear those words, and her shoulders loosened as she stepped into the cottage proper. In the chill dimness, broken only by rays of sunlight, she frowned at the ceiling. “This house used to have a roof.” The damage had let in all manner of creatures and weather—the former had made themselves comfortable, judging by the nests and various scattered droppings.

Nesta’s mouth turned dry. This horrible, awful, dark place.

She couldn’t stop her shaking.

Cassian laid a hand on her shoulder. “Walk me through it.”

She couldn’t. Couldn’t find the words.

He pointed to a long worktable. One leg had collapsed, and the whole thing lay at a slant. “You ate here?”

She nodded. They’d eaten here, some meals in silence, some with her and Elain trying to fill the quiet with their idle chatter, some with her and Feyre at each other’s throats. Like those last meals they’d had with her in this house.

Nesta’s stare drifted to the paint flaking off the walls. The intricate little designs. Cassian followed her stare. “Did Feyre paint that?”

Nesta swallowed, and managed to get out, “She painted every chance she got. Any extra coin she managed to save went toward paints.”

Except for that one time she saved enough to get flower seeds for Elain.

Her two sisters had somehow found a way of keeping themselves entertained. Feyre spend every minute she could out of the house. She had to go hunting for food, but even in the summer and the spring, when they had plenty, she made excuses to be away from them. Isaac Hale had been there to help her get distracted, but Nesta knew Feyre didn’t find time for him just for the sex. Feyre had wanted to be far from them, sitting in the meadows, practicing knots or whatever she did when she went away.

She only stayed in the cabin when she had paint. She had found happiness in that —and so had Elain in her little garden.

As much happiness as they could, in a place like this.

But Nesta never did. She had never wanted to.

She had barely wanted to survive.

As if he had felt the air around her shift, Cassian took a step closer, his chest close enough to her back that Nesta could feel the heat he irradiated in the bare skin of her nape. He was there for her, to be a pillar she could lean against if she needed to —to support her.

A calloused hand brushed against hers, the touch so soft and careful, Nesta almost didn’t feel it. He gave her hand a tug, but Nesta didn’t take it. Not yet. Only when she really needed his touch to bear what they were doing in this place, she would take his hand. She would try to do this on her own first.

Cassian aimed for the bedroom. Nesta followed him, and gods, it was so cramped and dark and smelly. The bed was still covered with its stained linens. The three of them had slept here for years.

Cassian ran a hand over the painted dresser, marveling. “Feyre really did paint stars for herself before she knew Rhys was her mate. Before she knew he existed.” His fingers traced the twining vines of flowers on the second drawer. “Elain’s drawer.” They drifted lower, curling over a lick of flame. “And yours.”

Nesta managed a grunt of confirmation, her chest tight to the point of pain. There in the corner sat a pair of worn, half-rotted shoes. Her shoes. One of them was bursting at the toe’s seam. She’d worn those shoes —in public. Could still remember mud and stones creeping in.

She had asked for new ones, and that had leaded them into an argument too. Feyre didn’t understand the shame Nesta felt when she walked around wearing that in her feet —as far as she knew, Feyre didn’t even remember what their life used to be like before that village; she had known nothing else. But Nesta had, and even while they starved, she still refused to let go of the life she had once enjoyed. The silks, the pearls, the luxuries she had been surrounded by when growing up. She hadn't been raised but rather crafted by her mother and tutors to belong in palaces and great halls. No, she had been forged to thrive among dozens of other rich heiresses who shared her same goal. She had become that. And then, her world crumpled down to become this.

There were wholes in the lower parts of the rotten wood panels big enough for a small rodent to get inside the house that hadn't been there while her family inhabited the space. Nesta felt sick in her stomach, just as she had when she came inside the cabin for the first time and realized it was likely to be the place where she died. No castle and no prince awaited in her future.

She had never found a way to explain to Feyre what it was like for her. Nesta was quick with words, fast coming up with the perfect answer to make everyone wary of her, make them stay away. But when it came to opening up and risking showing vulnerability, she realized, she had never learned how to do it.

She could only hide. She could only hurt.

And Feyre never made it easy either. It was so hard for Nesta to talk to her —to anyone, but specially to her little sister. Whenever they clashed against each other, she felt judged by someone who didn't even know her. Every time, Nesta let pride win and burn bridges between them, instead of trying to explain herself to a person who wouldn't even wait and listen before she decided Nesta was too much of a brat to deserve the benefit of the doubt. Feyre never considered that there might have been a reason for her to feel and act the way she did, even if it was not the right path. Because Feyre couldn't come up with any, and fooled by her own pride, thinking herself smarter because she was able to function and Nesta was not, she concluded that there wasn't a reason in the world for Nesta to just let time consume her instead of stepping in.

She hated that, and resented Feyre for years. Because they were the same. Two side of the same coin battling to stay on top once it fell to the ground. For years, Nesta felt like the only way to win, was to make sure Feyre lost.

Every day, it grew bigger —her resentment towards her. For being able to overcome difficulties she could not. Towards their father, who saw his daughters fight one another and starve and didn't get up from his chair once to try... anything. And resentment towards herself. She got carried away by it, every emotion she felt mixing together and forming a ball of anger in her guts that burned so violently that Nesta could no longer tell what was going on.

She saw red all the time, and burned with it. Burned anyone that dared come close.

Lost in her memories of how fighting had been more abundant than food, Nesta almost forgot Cassian was there too. Her eyes had gotten caught up on the torn shoes. They were such a perfect example of how her life used to be —how they had so little, that every single thing could become the reason for a night's worth of arguing... Nesta told him the story.

"Deep down I knew that saving the money was more important, that those boots could last a few more weeks. That would give Feyre time to get more money. But I pushed the logic down and picked the fight regardless" She had hated that those shoes had been a working pair to their new family standards when not so long ago only the finest leather slippers touched her feet.

Nesta looked around the room, to the bed she and her sisters had shared. “That bed in there … I was born in that bed. My mother died in that bed.”

Her mother’s death. She remembered that as well. Too vividly still.

"My father refused to send men into fae territory looking for a cure for her". And just like him, Nesta had refused to help when they lived in the cottage. Had refused to do what she thought was a servant’s work, thinking that death was better than the shame of loosing her status. "I hated him for that."

She had been so mad at him for not even trying, that she thought she ought to do the same thing. If their father didn’t do anything, she would do even less. To her, Feyre had been only collateral damage. She was willing to sacrifice her little sister’s safety for her own. That’s what she had seen others do with her before. It had been so wrong —but Nesta hadn’t realized it until it was too late for all of them.

She hated her younger self, now that there was nothing for her to do. Now that her sisters no longer needed her to step in.

She hated that she had been so wrong, so blind.

She hated that she failed at being smarter than the adults in her life.

She hated how much time and effort she had put into hating her father and not caring about Feyre only for them to be the ones saving her in the end. How was she supposed to find peace, when she had spend years being consumed by the anger his passivity ignited in her, only for him to finally be there to help when she needed him the most? How did everyone expect her to be able to deal with that when she had failed miserably at simpler tasks?

Nesta wanted to forgive her father. To forgive him and be hugged by him. Nesta wanted to finally have by her side the father she had so desperately needed her entire life.

But when he came to her and proved that his love was true and knew no limits —that he only needed a second chance, he was killed before her eyes. How could she forgive him now, when he had died before she got a chance to let him know that she understood. That she had done the same thing to others, and she understood. She knew. And she was willing to give him the second chance he wanted to do everything again, but this time right.

Her heart thundered, and she walked out of the room, back into the main space. She didn’t mean to, but she looked toward the dark fireplace. Toward the mantel.

Her father’s wood figurines lay atop it, thickly coated with dust and cobwebs. Some had been knocked over, presumably by whatever creatures now lived here.

That familiar roaring filled her ears, and Nesta’s steps thudded too loudly on the dusty floorboards as she approached the fireplace. A carving of a rearing bear —no bigger than her fist —sat in the center. Nesta’s fingers shook as she picked it up and blew off the dust.

“He had some skill,” Cassian said quietly.

“Not enough,” Nesta said, setting the bear back onto the stone mantel. She was going to vomit.

No. She could master this. Master herself. And face what lay before her. Only then she would be able to face what she had left behind —her past.

She inhaled through her nose. Exhaled through her mouth. Counted the breaths.

Cassian stood beside her through all of it. Not speaking, not touching. Just there, should she need him. Her friend —whom she’d asked to come here with her not because he was sharing her bed, but because she wanted him here. His steadiness and kindness and understanding.

She plucked another figurine from the mantel: a rose carved from a dark sort of wood. She held it in her palm, its solid weight surprising, and traced a finger over one of the petals. “He made this one for Elain. Since it was winter and she missed the flowers.”

“Did he ever make any for you?”

“He knew better than to do that.” She inhaled a shuddering breath, held it, released it. Let her mind calm. “I think he would have, if I’d given him the smallest bit of encouragement, but … I never did. I was too angry.”

She finally voiced it —Why she had behaved like that for so many years. Cassian probably knew already, but she had needed to let it out. She had been angry. She had felt abandoned. She didn’t know what to do to keep floating against the current like her sisters did with her hobbies and new-found friends in the village.

Nesta only felt anger at everyone and everything.

“You’d had your life overturned. You were allowed to be angry.”

“That’s not what you told me the first time we met.” She pivoted to find him arching a brow. She could go back and picture that day. He was a giant in her hall, tall even among the rest of the fae Feyre had brought with her. A dormant part of her human conscience, an instinct, reminded her how dangerous his kind was. But she had never felt intimidated. Not by him. Not really.

Just a worthy opponent.

“You told me I was a piece of shit for letting my younger sister go into the woods to hunt while I did nothing.”

“I didn’t say it like that.”

“Yes, you did.”

Cassian’s gaze pierced through her. She squared her shoulders, turning to the small, broken cot in the shadows beyond the fireplace, thinking he wouldn’t reply.

“Can I still take that back?” Cassian was halted where she left him. The space was not big enough for them to be far from each other, but it certainly felt like it. A chill breeze came through a chink in the wall behind her, fluttering the bottom of her cloak and finding there the bare skin of her ankles.

Would you forgive me? He was asking. Or maybe not. Maybe he simply wanted her to pretend his words had never left his lips. Can we pretend it didn’t happen?  She only had to turn around and face his burning gaze to know, but she didn’t.

Yes, Nesta wanted to tell him. Please, go back and never open my eyes to make me see what I did to my sister. Don’t let the truth of my actions ever get to me.

Nesta had always been aware of everything surrounding her, always known who she could trust, who was a tool for her to use, what buttons to push to get what she wanted from others.

She had always known, she had always seen.

Now, standing in the space where she spent some of the worst years of her life, a period of time full of hunger, cold, screaming and resentment that still hunted her, Nesta would beg on her knees for a chance to be oblivious for the first time in her life —To not see. To not feel.

“Why would you want to?”  She asked instead.

Cassian didn’t come closer. Nesta wasn’t sure if she wanted to know. Standing here, in this ramshackle space where she still had to control her breath so she didn’t break down and become a crying mess, Nesta didn’t know if she was actually ready to discuss that.

To come back to face her ghosts was hard enough.

Nesta found a spot in the half rotted wood wall in front of her and locked her eyes there, not blinking, holding the tears that wanted to form in her eyes. She wasn’t ready to remember what had happened shortly after Cassian came into her house asking for her help. Her life was already almost too much for her to handle before Tamlin took Feyre, and that’s what they were trying to get closure for today. Not what had happened next, when the Inner Circle of the Night Court entered her life.

The thought threatened to make her breath erratic again, but Nesta remembered the exercices Gwyn had found for them and kept it under control. She mastered it and reminded herself why were here. Nesta forced herself to breath. Her lungs didn’t cooperate. Her mouth dry. She inhaled slowly and then exhaled the cold air. Once. Twice.

“Because I feel like that first meeting shaped everything else after, and I don't like what it did with it."

"It did nothing." It hadn't been that first encounter what had led her into the mess she was, nor had it anything to do with her choices back when they lived in this cabin that felt smaller and smaller with each of Cassian's words. She didn't want him to make excuses for her, she should have done more, and that was a fact she had already accepted.

"No, I did. I said that to you, and then the rest followed me."

"What does that have to do with this?" she vaguely waved her hands at the surrounding space. The room that had once been her house.

"Everything." he answered "Feyre wanted a peaceful meeting, you know? She wanted to do the talking, and for us to behave, and I couldn't hold my tongue. I fucked up, and only lately I've realized the damage my words actually caused.”

In the quietude of the room, his voice was a thunder. Nesta turned to face him and finally met his eyes, that were screaming for a chance to explain. But explain what? She already knew what she had to make up for, and didn't see what Cassian or the people who accompanied Feyre back to the Mortal Lands had to do with her past.

“I only thought of you as an extension of your sister.”  She was curious to know when that had changed for him. She remembered the exact second the illyrian Commander had stopped being just her sister’s friend to her, earning a place of his own in her heart “I heard Feyre’s story, felt her suffering, and forgot you were a person too. You were entitled to your fears and to make mistakes as we all are, and I had no right to call you out there, when I knew close to nothing about you, and who you were. I didn't see that you had been a kid too, and your family's wellbeing wasn't just your responsibility, just as it wasn't Feyre's. I had no right to get involved in that unresolved issue between you, and I feel like when I did... I kind of gave everyone permission to do the same, and feel entitled to an opinion that weights as much as Feyre's and yours do in the matter. If I could go back…”

“You can’t” Nesta cut in. She wouldn’t let him, because if she wasn’t allowed to, then none of them would. It wasn’t fair.

Cassian still didn’t move, his presence painfully obvious. Cassian didn’t miss the shaking of her hands, but said nothing about it. She tried to put some of her usual icy rage in her eyes, but couldn’t. She tried to hide the excruciating pressure in her chest, the ache in her heart, but couldn’t either.

“I know you blame yourself for not being a caretaker and provider for your sisters, Nes” he started again when she didn’t go on “I know you already blamed yourself before we met, and I know I... we only made it worse, pushing you down thinking we were being good friends to Feyre. We actually hurt both of you in the end. I can’t speak for my friends, but I can speak for myself and tell you how sorry I am for not seeing that sooner. For not seeing you. And for making this" he looked rround towards the cot, the dinning table and the room they had just been into "worse than it already was.” The floor creaked under his weight when he took a step towards her, next to the cob. “You were barely older than she was, it wouldn’t have made a difference if it had been you in the woods. The three of you were too young to take that role”.

Then whose was it? His father? That's what she had thought for most of her life, but now... what about his leg? The pain he endured just by walking outside? She was the oldest, she should have done more, and she knew that. She didn't want them —Feyre— to just forgive her and pretend it had never happened. Because if she had done something more back then, then their live would be different now, for better or worse. She didn't want people to pitty her, and to tell her that she was an innocent and blameless soul.

"Why can't you just let me take accountability?"

"To take accountability is good, and I'm glad you are ready to do so, because you have to, in order to move on." He took her face in his hands taking one last step closer, their bodies almost touching “But I think we've let you think everything that happened to your sisters could have been avoided if you had been the one carrying the bow, and that's simply not true.” His thumb brushed over her cheek “What no one told you, Nesta, is that surviving is not only about getting food and water, or even a roof. I would know about that.” He chuckled softly, trying to lighten up the atmosphere around them in the dimness of the room ” Feyre is a great huntress, she didn’t need you carrying the bow and shooting the arrows.” Nesta would have died on her first winter hunting, both of them knew that. “You were needed as an older sister, and that doesn't equal being a provider for your family. She needed your support and care when she came back from a long day looking for food. A family.”

Enough tears to make a new sea had been shed by both her and Feyre in her art studio not so long ago. Feyre had asked for that exaclty: an older sister who had her back. And Nesta had promised she would try.

Nesta didn’t really know how to use or control her powers, and Feyre had surrounded herself with fae strong enough to never need Nesta to save her again.

But Cassian was right. That was not what Nesta could offer her little sister anyway, and that was not what Feyre needed from her either. That was not what she had ever wanted from her father, either. In the end, it all came to the four of them failing at being a family.

Feyre needed had needed that as much as Nesta did.

She was ready to be that from now on.

When she didn’t answer, Cassian stayed quiet, allowing her once again to get lost in her thoughts as long as she needed to, but wary at the same time, in case she drifted back to the dark ideas that so frequently starred in her nightmares.

Nesta freed herself from his grip and went back to the cot, running a hand over its cracking wood frame. Splinters snagged at her fingertips.

Her father’s body crawled up on the chair, the small fire burning until late at night so he wouldn’t freeze under the shabby blanket he used to keep himself warm… Nesta could picture it clearly when she looked at the cot again. “He’d drag it in front of the fire every night and curl up there, huddling under the blankets. I always thought he looked so … so weak. Like a cowering animal. It enraged me.”

That was the issue, the whole point of coming to the cabin. Her soul needed to face this chapter of her life like her lungs needed the air she breathed to keep her body alive. Nesta had to find a way to cope with the matted of feelings, nightmares and emotions —with the contradictions that formed in her heart.

It was always about him in the end. Her father. Their relationship.

She wanted to forgive him. She was sure of that. But there was still so much anger, such immense feeling of abandonment inside her that hadn’t been cured in time. He had been there for her in the end, and somehow that was even worse, because now she couldn’t even despise him for his cowardice. He died for her before he could face the consequences of his decisions, as she was trying to do now. He died, leaving his daughter with even more guilt inside. Because now she finally knew he did love her enough to get up from his chair and try anything, but was gone before she got a chance to do anything with that.

Her father had finally done what she needed from him, and she couldn’t even thank him. Tell him that she forgave him and ask him to forgive her back for all the times she picked on him. Tell him that she loved him, that she was grateful and his effort had been worth it.

“It …” Her throat worked. “I thought him sleeping here was a fitting punishment while we got the bed. It never occurred to me that he wanted us to have the bed, to keep warm and be as comfortable as we could. That we’d only been able to take a few items of furniture from our former home and he’d chosen that bed as one of them. For our comfort. So we didn’t have to sleep on cots, or on the floor.” She rubbed at her chest. “I wouldn’t even let him sleep in the bed when the debtors shattered his leg. I was so lost in my grief and rage and… and sorrow, that I wanted him to feel a fraction of what I did.” Her stomach churned.

He squeezed her shoulder, but said nothing. Nesta didn’t talk for a moment, and Cassian put an arm around her to press her body against his, hugging her without a word. The warmth from his chest felt almost too good. She needed it, and also the calmness of his heartbeat.

“He had to have known that,” she said hoarsely. “He had to have known how awful I was, and yet … he never yelled. That enraged me, too. And then he named a ship after me. Sailed it into battle. I just … I don’t understand why.”

“You were his daughter.”

“And that’s an explanation?” She rose her chin to look at him and scanned his face, the sadness etched there. Sadness —for her. For the ache in her chest and the stinging in her eyes.

“Love is complicated. But he loved you.”

“I can’t for the life of me understand why.” she answered.

Nesta didn’t even have to think the words, they came out of her mouth before she even realized what she had said.

Cassian had told her that once last year —that he couldn’t understand why her sisters loved her. That simple sentence, said by him so casually in the middle of the street, followed her home and helped her already overwhelming self-loathing bring her even lower. Nesta had often wanted to know if he went over his words as frequently as she did after that night and the following months. She wondered if the confession he had made hunted him too.

Nesta had come to the conclusion that it didn’t torment him one bit the moment he came to her apartment to pick her up and take her to Feyre’s new mansion by the river. She was convinced at that moment that he actually couldn’t come up with a single reason why Feyre and Elain still wasted their time on her.

Yet he was here, so she wasn't alone whilst facing her past. He was by her side now, not giving up on her no matter how badly she screwed up.

Cassian opened his mouth to say something, but whatever he was about to say, she didn't want to hear it now. It didn’t matter how he felt back then, she only cared about the present. And he was by her side. He was being a friend, apologizing for things he regretted that Nesta herself hadn't even consider, but somehow made sense.

She forgave him. Because she knew what it was like to crack under pressure and be hurtful towards people you care about when you don’t know how to help them and become desperate.

And Cassian somehow could read through her too, as he closed his mouth, his lips pressed tight.

Both of them let the unspoken words float between them, saying nothing, only looking at each other. Nesta was not perfect and he wasn’t either —there was no need to be perfect. Not right now. There were so many things they had yet to find the courage to discuss, that Nesta didn’t care. Looking into his hazel eyes, Nesta found the reassurance she needed that they would talk about it, with time, and that was enough.

They would talk about every unsaid thing between them.

They had all the time in the world.

The forgoten room reappeared around them at some point, as if they had been somewhere else when they got lost into each other’s eyes.

She studied the calluses already building across her fingers and palms. She made herself meet Cassian’s gaze again. “I didn’t just fail Feyre by letting her go into the woods. There were plenty of other times. I feel guilty.” Nesta said the words aloud for the first time. It was a clear feeling, as much as she hated it. She had finally found the one comprehensible spot in the mess that was her heart. Using that, she could pull the thread until she untangled the whole thing. It would take time, but it was a first step. Maybe there was hope for her after all.

Guilt. She felt guilt. She would work on that.

“Have you ever told her this?”

Nesta snorted. “No. I don’t know how.” That was still a problem.

He studied her, and she resisted the urge to squirm under the scrutiny. “You’ll learn how. When you’re ready.”

“How very wise of you.”

Cassian sketched a bow.

Despite this house, the history all around her, Nesta smiled. She pocketed the carved rose. “I’ve seen enough.”

He arched a brow. “Really?”

She clenched the wooden rose in her pocket. “I think I just needed to see this place. One last time. To know we got out. That there’s nothing left here except dust and bad memories.”

He slid an arm around her waist as they walked for the door, again surveying all the little paintings Feyre had squeezed into the cottage. “Az won’t be back for a little while. Let’s go flying.”

“What about the humans?” They’d run screaming in terror.

Cassian gave her a wicked smile, opening that half-broken door for her. Leading her into the sunlight and clean air. “It’ll add a little spice to their days.”

[tsushimanoonryo]

Drabble: Chiyoko pt. 1

The fox was hurt. No. The fox was dying. 

It was a little thing, still only a pup. Something had gotten to it-- perhaps a wild boar by the look of the wound on its side-- and it lay in the grass gasping for breath as it bled out. It was alone, perhaps abandoned for dead by its mother and it made the boy weep to see it.

No, he thought, sniffing as he wiped away his tears. I am samurai. I will not cry over a fox.

But at ten, Hiroto Shimura was not yet a samurai. He was well on his way to becoming one, though. For as long as he could remember, he spent every day with his tutors for hours learning the martial way and the code of bushido. He would spend afternoons with his older brothers as well, sparring and practicing archery under the watchful eye of their father, the jito of Tsushima. And sometimes he would be allowed to travel to Omi village to train with his friend Kazumasa, the son of Lord Sakai, a boy who was younger than he was but already as tough as an ox.

Hiroto strove every day to become strong like they were. As the youngest Shimura boy, he knew he would never inherit the title of jito. But he could become a strong warrior and a great retainer for his eldest brother if he trained his mind and body. He knew from his lessons that a good samurai had control of his emotions so he willed himself to stop crying over the fox.

He had half a mind to leave it in the grass. Nature would deal with it as it always did. It hurt his heart to see the fox pup struggling to breathe, but that was the way of things. As a samurai, he would be expected to face death head-on every day without fear. Leaving the fox to its fate would help strengthen his resolve and grow as a warrior.

Hiroto turned to leave, but stopped as he heard the fox let out a rattling breath. His mind raced back to something his mother had told him once. Foxes were messengers of the kami. Inari had blessed the Shimura family with wealth, rice, and many, many sons (although the kami had yet to give his mother the daughter she so desired). If this fox was one of Inari’s messengers, leaving it to die could have dire consequences for Hiroto’s family. A samurai was also expected to show mercy when it was appropriate. Perhaps this was just such an occasion.

So he turned, scampering back to the fox. It looked pitiful, lying there in the grass struggling to breathe. It didn’t resist as Hiroto gingerly picked it up and cradled it’s frail body in his arms. His nursemaid would be annoyed that he’d gotten his kimono bloody, but he would worry about that later. For now, he needed to get the pup somewhere safe and figure out how to care for it.

………………………………………………….

His brothers had teased him when they saw him trudge back to Castle Shimura holding the dying fox pup. Once his mother realized what he was holding, however, she’d scolded them and athen led Hiroto to the family altar. They lay the fox down before it and said a few prayers to the kami before sending for a healer to help with the animal.

“You did a good thing, Hiroto,” she told him gently. “You never know when Inari is watching.”

The healer did not think the fox was going to make it. It was too young and too weak from blood loss. He did what he could at the behest of Lady Shimura and her young son, but he did not have any confidence that the pup would recover. Yet recover it did.

Despite the odds, the fox grew stronger by the day until it was able to walk on its own. Hiroto took it upon himself to care for it and the pup quickly became attached to him and he to it. But that was dangerous. As supportive as his mother was of caring for the fox, she warned him that eventually he would have to let it go.

“Your pup is a wild animal, my sweet one,” she said. “You will have to let her go back to her home eventually. A castle is no place for a fox and Inari wants their messenger back.”

………………………………………………….

After a month, it was clear the fox pup was fully recovered. Hiroto could avoid the matter no longer and with a great sadness in his heart, he scooped the fox up in his arms and returned to the patch of grass outside of the castle where he’d first found it.

“I wish I could keep you,” he said, setting the fox down. “But hahaue says you are a wild animal and must return to the forest.”

The fox pup sat on her haunches and cocked her head as Hiroto spoke. It was almost as if she could understand him, but he knew that was impossible. Foxes were smart, but they could not understand human language.

“Thank you for letting me care for you,” he said, bowing to the fox, even though he knew it was a bit ridiculous. “Please tell Inari to look favorably on the Shimura family in the future.”

The fox made a chirping noise at him, but did not move to leave. Hiroto stared at it for a moment before reaching out a hand to stroke the fox’s head. She nuzzled into his hand, making a pleased sound before hopping away. She only stopped to look over her shoulder once and then disappeared into the nearby brush.

It seemed too abrupt of a departure. Hiroto had bonded with the fox pup while caring for her and to see her bound away without hesitation broke his heart. She is a wild animal, he reminded himself. Hahaue told you that.

But this broken heart would be a lesson too. People would come and go throughout his life. Some of these departures would be more permanent than others. If he was to be a good samurai, he would have to deal with those losses with a level head and a mastered heart. So he took a second to steel his resolve then turned to make his way back to the castle.

………………………………………………….

There was a large commotion when he arrived. Maids were running back and forth, digging through chests that hadn’t been opened since long before he was born. Some of them, he thought, might not have even been opened since before his parents’ marriage.

“Haku,” he said, pulling on the hem of his nursemaid’s yukata as she rushed back. “What’s happening?”

“Go find your mother,” Haku said impatiently, as she dug through a chest of old kimono. “She can explain. I’m busy right now.”

Had any of the other servants spoken to him like that, Hiroto would have been angry and put his foot down. But Haku had built up a lifetime of goodwill by being otherwise kind to him, so he swallowed his frustrations and wandered off to his mother’s chambers.

He could hear her speaking to someone through the shoji doors before he entered.

“Hahaue?” he called out. “May I come in?”

“Yes, my sweet one,” she answered. “Please do!”

She sounded excited and Hiroto furrowed his brow as he slid the door open.

A young girl was kneeling in front of his mother. She couldn’t have been more than five years old. She looked to be a peasant, all rough and ragged and dirty. But even through all of that, he could tell she was an exceptionally beautiful child. Too beautiful to be the daughter of a peasant. The girl smiled brightly when she saw him, which just made her loveliness all the more apparent.

“Who is this?” he asked.

“I don’t know, Hiroto,” his mother answered. “We found her on the grounds of the castle and she won’t speak. Either that or she can’t.”

His mother’s cheekbones flushed pink as she looked at the little girl. There was something twinkling in her eye, although Hiroto could not tell what it was.

“I sent your brothers to ask around the nearby villages and hamlets to see if someone is missing a daughter,” she continued. “Although I fear the poor thing may be an orphan.”

Her tone of voice sounded more excited than pitiable and suddenly Hiroto understood his mother’s excitement. She’d wanted a daughter for years, but was only able to bear sons. It was not uncommon for samurai families to adopt children from the peasantry to raise to the samurai class. And to see a child this lovely toiling in the fields would be a shame; her face was much more suited to nobility.

“I’ve spoken with your father about her already,” she said. “If we can’t find her parents, or if we do and they are willing to part with her, we can keep her here and raise her as our own. We can more than afford another mouth to feed.”

Hiroto thought his mother was speaking more to herself than to him. He would have no say in whatever his parents decided.

“My lady,” a servant said, poking her head into the room. “The bath is ready. And we’ve found your old kimono from when you were a girl. The seamstresses are ready for whatever alterations you want us to make.

“Perfect,” Lady Shimura said. Then she turned to Hiroto. “Will you take our guest down to the baths while I meet with the seamstresses?”

“Yes, hahaue,” Hiroto said with a dutiful bow.

He motioned to the girl to follow him. She only stared up at him smiling and made no move to stand up. So he reached down to grab her hand and lead her to the baths. She was silent the whole way, looking around at everything and smiling. 

“You’re not simple are you?” he asked. She made no reply.

There was an attendant waiting for them at the tub who helped the girl undress. Hiroto averted his eyes bashfully, never having seen an unclothed girl before. But something caught his eye to make him turn to look for her.

“That scar,” he said, pointing rudely. “Where did you get it?”

On the girls’ torso was a large, puckered scar. It looked like a puncture wound. Like someone had stabbed her with a spear. Or like she’d been gored by a boar.

“Young master,” the attendant scolded. “Don’t point like that. This girl may be your sister soon. You must be kind to her.” Properly chastened, Hiroto closed his mouth and dropped his hand to his side. But it was strange. A wound like that should have killed a girl her age. It still looked freshly healed too. It made no sense for her to be as healthy as she was. If she were truly an orphan, she would have had no one but herself to clean and care for the wound.

He furrowed his brow and shot her a look, only to find that the girl was staring right at him. Something gleamed in her eyes, making her look far older than five years old. When the bath attendant turned away, she slowly raised a finger to her lips, beckoning him to be silent. There was something intelligent in the expression and suddenly Hiroto felt bad for asking if she was simple. Then he was shooed away from the bath as the attendants took over cleaning the child.

………………………………………………….

“No one claimed her, hahaue,” his eldest brother said. “No one even seemed to recognize her.”

“The kami have smiled upon you, Ayame,” their father said. “It seems we’ve been blessed with the daughter you’ve always wanted.”

Lady Shimura was so overcome with emotion that she couldn’t speak. She only sat holding the freshly-washed girl in her arms while tears of joy streamed down her face.

The mood was jovial as the Shimura family welcomed the girl into their fold, although Hiroto couldn’t quite let himself relax. There was something strange about the girl and the rest of his family was too blind to see it. The girl was harboring a secret, although it didn’t seem like a dangerous one. But Hiroto was only ten years old and if his parents and older brothers didn’t see anything wrong, then he supposed he would keep his mouth shut. But he couldn’t forget the glint in the girl’s eye down at the baths.

“What should we call her, hahaue?” his second eldest brother asked. “She needs a name.”

Lady Shimura stopped for a second to think.

“You are so lovely, little one” she said, looking down at the girl in her arms. “We should call you Chiyoko.”

“Chiyoko Shimura,” Lord Shimura said. “That’s a good name. Auspicious, even.”

“Chiyoko,” the girl repeated.

Everyone in the room grew silent. It was the first time any of them had heard her speak.

“My name is Chiyoko.”

[vampiresuns]

Aelius Anatole Radošević De Silva

Anatole has changed a bit as a character since i was around the first time, so he’s getting re introduced. His open to make friends.

art by @elizastarkart​

Name: Aelius Anatole Radoševic De Silva. He has two surnames because his mother is latina. He is a mixed Latine-Slav, with family that is all latine, vesuvian, and slavic. People he’s friend’s with call him Anatole (russian/greek pronunciation, he doesn’t acknowledge the French one). Only people he has a strictly professional relationship with, and his uncle call him Aelius.

‘Aelius’ means sun, while ‘Anatole’ means sunrise. He’s fully aware of this, he chose his name himself.

His nicknames are:

‘Nana’ is the most common nickname, and the one most people use.

His mother calls him Lilito, Nana, Nanito, Toly, Tolito, Tortolito.

His father calls him Lily or Lilu.

Toly, Tolytoly or Tolito are nicknames used by his maternal grandmother, his aunt, and his Vesuvian family.

He will not mind if you want to call him Toly, but you cannot call him Lily/Lilu if you’re not his father.

Asra came up with Nanatole, which he doesn’t like but lets Asra call him anyway. Asra also came up with Nana Banana and that is absolutely forbidden.

Family: on his father’s side both the Radošević, who are slavic (yugoslavic, specifically), and the Cassano, a prominent Vesuvian family who has had a hold of the Consulship for years.

On his mother side, the De Silva.

His father’s name is Vladislav, but everyone calls him Vlad, he’s an alchemist, a polymath, and works in what is most similar to biochemical engineering. He has one bother, named Valeriy, who you, however, might now as Valerius. Vlad’s biggest personality trait is being head over heels in love with his wife, and adoring his son more than he thought it was humanly possible to care about someone.

His mother’s name is Louisa De Silva (if you want to add her mother’s surname, it’s Lascal). The L-o-u spelling was a registry mistake she never changed. She moved half across the world while her native country suffer a military-civilian dictatorship to study Medicine. She swore never to go back as long as vestiges of said dictatorship remained in the country. She has two sisters: Paris, who lives in Vesuvia, and Alma, who remained with her parents out of her own choosing. Her medical experience include having been a volunteer war doctor. She didn’t change her surname when she got married.

The Radošević (pronounced Radozheveech) and the Cassano have been entangled families by friendship for generations upon generations, with some marriages between them. Notoriously: Vlad and Val’s father married a Cassano, Matilda, and his bother Mircea, Anatole’s great uncle, also married a Cassano: Florentino. Mircea’s brother and Matilda Cassano died when Vlad and Val were children still, so him and Florentino brought them up.

The Radošević are an overall eccentric family (think the european Addams family), whom are noted for: one, their self-sufficiency/self-preservation, which comes out in a very ‘eccentric people of the world unite’ manner. They appreciate people with character. Two, their leanings towards trades/professions, they do not conceive not doing anything (work hard to play hard). The Cassano, while sharing the quirk, they add the zest for life. It’s like they grabbed the Radošević and told them “you have forgotten how to live and we will remind you how.” Both of them are ridden with racially ambiguous bastard you cannot kill in any way that matters. They simply refuse to. Someone (either the courtiers or Lucio) compared them to roaches, they took it as a compliment.

This will tell you a lot about Anatole’s character.

On a last note, Anatole’s an only child. He has a good relationship with his parents, albeit marked by a sense of distance, solely because he was privately tutored from age 15 and on, which required him to travel a fair share. He was an argumentative teenager, but always cherished whenever he could see his parents. The older he gets, the closer they all become.

Favourite Food: Cake

Favourite drink: Coffee, in general.

Favourite Flower: Iris

Birthday: Nov 1st

Age: 29 (I calculate his age as if he had been born in 1991)

Zodiac:

Sun: Scorpio

Moon: Virgo

Rising: Libra

Mercury & Mars: Scorpio

Venus: Virgo

Patron arcana: Strength & Ace of Swords

Strength

Upright: inner strength, bravery, compassion, focus, Reversed: self doubt, weakness, insecurity      

Ace of Swords

Upright: breakthrough, clarity, sharp mind, Reversed: confusion, brutality, chaos

MBTI Type: INTJ-A

Gender: Transmasculine, but Nonbinary. Uses He/Him pronouns only

Orientation: Identifies as NBLM.

LIs: Julian, Muriel, @ilyamatic​‘s Andrico, @thelazaretmakesmesad​‘s Vishal.

“The sun-like strategist with a solution for everything, and a whole lot of hope in the future.”

More details under the cut!

Physical appearance:

art by @lesbianarcana​

5′4. As you can see in the sprite down below, while he’s slim but with muscle, out of doing a moderate to high level of physical activity. The man has a nice waist and inherited his mother’s hips, which he’s very proud of. He likes his legs and his butt the most about himself

Dark brown eyes, long eyelashes. His hair is naturally black, but he dyes it blond.

Has a mole over his right eyebrow, on the left side of the bridge of his nose, and on his left jaw. He has freckles.

An horizontal scar on his nose, which he got by getting hit with a wooden scaffold square in the face. His nose wasn’t broken out of sheer dumb luck. He has a smaller cut on his cheekbone, which was done by a fencing sabre which lacked the proper tip protection/button. It was done onto him by someone else.

The nose scar is how he met Julian before the plague, as he was the doctor which cured his face.

He has several tattoos:

Right arm: A rapier on his inner forearm. Over his elbow he has a black work band, and over it the words ‘THE SUN IS MY UNDOING’ in all caps, circling his arm.

Left arm: a snake wrapped around his forearm, near to the wrist. The Odyssey quote ‘let’s have a toast to the incompetence of our enemies’ under the inner crook of his elbow, and a floral half sleeve.

Chest and Torso: AMOR OMNIA VINCIT over where his heart is supposed to be. He has laurel leaves on the base of his waist.

Legs: ‘o serpent heart hid with a flowering face‘ in his upper, inner thigh, like really up his left inner thigh. A floral anklet on his right ankle.

Languages Spoken: Too many. He speaks nine languages.

Magic Specialities: His magic is connected to both light and languages (it is a play on words with ‘logos’) so he is both adept in photokinesis — he is able to create and manipulate sources of light — and language related magic — which includes incantation and language manipulation. He learns languages as a faster rate than most people, and while he cannot speak or literally understand a language unless he learns it, his magic allows him to intuitively grasp the meaning of words that are being spoken to him.

This capacity also makes him very good at recognising hidden intentions in people. This is not an ability that he broadcasts having, and when he later succeeds Valerius as the Consul, it is something which aids his diplomatic work but he keeps private.

His words tend to carry more weight sometimes because of his magic, something which he can’t always control — it depends on many factors — so he tries to choose his words carefully and with consideration.

His familiar is a Raccoon, named Antu.

Occupation: While he did study magic and is in touch with his magic, he studied politics, diplomacy and international relations. By trade, and out of will to help people, he is a political analyst and, later in life, a Statesman.

Personality/Trivia:

Willpower or Stubbornness? Depends how you look at it. Passionate, generally devoted, hopeful, independent and sometimes defiant. He is a people-oriented introvert. Competitive, but not aggressively so.

Smarter than he gives himself credit for. Overall charming, even debonair.

Curious by nature, hates having his decisions taken for him.

He is proper, sometimes even distinguished, but he is feral. A firm believer in being kind and compassionate with people, until you cross him one too many times, then nothing will make him taint his vindictive wrath.

Is he humble? For the most part. His humbleness comes from knowing his own limits and knowing he’s not infallible. He does have, however, a good deal of pride in himself and trust in what he can do, and he doesn’t like being underestimated.

He’s not particularly loud, though when the chatterbox is on, then it is on, specially if he’s nervous. He is often never still. 

He’s known he has ADHD since he was seventeen.

Likes dancing.

He fences, almost every Radošević fences/sword fights, and he will let you know at the slightest chance. Which can be either him simply being hyper-fixated in fencing, him flirting, or him letting you know that if the occasion rises, he’s armed.

Friend shaped, lover shaped if you’re daring enough.

He wrinkles his nose when he doesn’t like something.

Speaking of which: he doesn’t like abuse of power, the Court, injustice, supremacists of any kind, unkind, hurtful and selfish people in general; he doesn’t like red meat (he says it tastes like metal or dirt), narrow minded people, incompetence, specially when displayed by people in positions of power, and purposeful apathy.

A mastermind archetype, but he draws his power from connection. He does not conceive a life not lived with others.

A bit of a bastard, he enjoys a good laugh.

He plays the piano and the harp, he sings, he cannot draw, he’s a lightweight when it comes to alcohol (which doesn’t really stop him), he likes the opera because he likes watching other people’s drama without being dragged into it, and his favourite season is winter. Also likes playing chess, reading, coffee, flowers, a well tailored outfit, learning, languages, the sea, mysteries, winter, a well laid argument, collecting quills, music, winning, knowing he loves and is loved in return.

When he was 7 he bribed his dad for more dessert, and he ate so much he vomited. His sweet tooth hasn’t gone anywhere, it is alive and well.

Perceptive little bastard, will knife cat you for the sake of it. He has a way more present sense of humour than what he comes across.

Would call himself a ‘trans masculine Mary Poppins’.

He is closest to his parents, his uncle, my other ocs Leonore, Medea and Sabine, his cousins Amparo Cassano and Milenko Radošević, Natiqa, Asra, Portia and Nadia.

If he liked women, he would be paired with Nadia. The possibility both terrifies and fascinates me.

@ilyamatic​, @viviae​, @gaybirdwrites​, @arcanaprentiss​ @apprenticeofcups​

[lov3nerdstuff]

Voluptas Noctis Aeternae {Part 5.6}

*Severus Snape x OC*

Summary: It is the year 1983 when the ordinary life of Robin Mitchell takes a drastic turn: she is accepted into Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry. Despite the struggles of being a muggle-born in Slytherin, she soon discovers her passion for Potions, and even manages the impossible: gaining the favor of Severus Snape. Throughout the years, Robin finds that the not quite so ordinary Potions Professor goes from being a brooding stranger to being more than she had ever deemed possible. An ally, a mentor, a friend... and eventually, the person she loves the most. Through adventure, prophecies and the little struggles of daily life in a castle full of mysteries, Robin chooses a path for herself, an unlikely friendship blossoms into something more, and two people abandoned by the world can finally find a home.

General warnings: professor x student, blood, violence, trauma, neglectful families, bullying, cursing

Words: 5.1k

Read Part 1.1 here! All Parts can be found on the Masterlist!

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Dancing with the boy turned out alright, he didn't step on her feet like most of the others and they didn't speak much besides what was necessary for the task at hand. The afternoon went by otherwise eventless, blending into evening, and once they were free to go, Robin thanked her partner for practicing with her, he returned the favour, and they headed their ways as all of the other students did. Hopefully, Robin thought, she wouldn't have to do this again next year. Even if it had been relatively bearable by chance. Still, she had felt uncomfortable in the overall situation, and she preferred not to be forced to dance with strangers again, no matter if they were actually okay or not.

During dinner, which followed almost immediately after the dancing class, Robin's worry about the potions professor returned to nag at her mind even more strongly than before. Once half of the meal had passed and Snape still hadn't shown up, she started to actually feel nervous.

"What's up with you, Robin? You look like I feel before an exam." Cas asked with a frown as she sorted the mushrooms out of the stew on her plate.

"Was dancing that bad?" Jorien added, and quirked an eyebrow at Robin on the bench opposite to her.

"Dancing was fine, it's not about that." Robin mused, still frowning. "Well, actually it is. Snape was supposed to teach us, but McGonagall had to do it instead, because he was indisposed. According to her."

"Probably he just didn't feel like dancing." Cas replied easily, and pushed her mushrooms onto Robin's plate. "I mean… imagine Professor Snape dancing! Especially with any of the students. I mean, I can't even picture it in my head, and neither can he, probably."

"I can picture him dancing with Robin, actually." Jorien replied with a shrug directed at her blonde friend. "But I do see your point. He probably simply bailed out and Professor McGonagall had to come up with an excuse."

"Robin doesn't count as a student!" Cas rolled her eyes and finally dug into her second serving of now mushroom-free stew.

"I am a student though, you know that, right?" Robin chuckled, as the girls' words served to dim her nervousness back down to an underlying worry. They very likely were right, Snape really wasn't someone who would take on something like teaching his students to dance if he could help it. He had probably just bailed out indeed. But that wasn't like him at all… he didn't bail out on any responsibility, ever. And then, why wasn't he at dinner now? C'mon, Robin, it was just a meal. He'd missed them before. She rolled her eyes at her overreaction, even if that didn't make the worry go away.

"Of course I know that you're a student, technically." Cas sighed dramatically. "But in my mind, you're just more of a… replacement professor, who happens to be our adopted big sister, who happens to be our roommate, who happens to be a mentor, who happens to be our friend. Like, an adult friend. Who's not an adult. You're just…"

"Robin?" Jorien suggested with an amused smile.

"Yes! You're just Robin, that's what you are." Cas finished with a grin. "You're Robin."

"Thank you for that observation." Robin couldn't help laughing now, as she shook her head to herself. "I am Robin indeed."

For the rest of dinner, they talked about the two younger girls' potions homework and how they both had no idea where to find books on the essay topic, seeing as the library didn't offer any more than what the textbook did. And since Robin had basically forbidden them to rely on the textbook ever since she had started tutoring them last year, it was for her now to find a solution to the thereby caused issue as well. Short of any other ideas that would not take more time than they had, she lent them one of her own books for now and promised that she would give them an elaborate crash course on the topic tomorrow.

Once dinner was over, or at least once it was acceptable to leave, Robin said goodnight to her roommates and made for the potions classroom without any detours. Stupid worry… it just wouldn't leave her alone, even as her reason tried to convince her that she was being ridiculous.

As always, she let herself into the room when she found it locked, but this time all there was behind the heavy door was darkness. That hadn't happened in a long time, usually Snape was here at this point, or at least in his office. But the door to the office was closed as well, and Robin only noticed the faint light seeping through the gap underneath it once she approached it with reluctant steps. Something was off today, there was no use denying it.

Careful for once, she knocked on the door before pulling it open, but then let herself into the room anyway. Only one single candle was lit, a large one on the desk, but it sufficed to see the entire room. Snape was sitting right next to it, bent over some paperwork with a grave expression that was only partially hidden by a curtain of raven hair.

"What do you want?" He asked without looking up, without even a hello. Robin's brows furrowed, and her heart did a funny little squeeze that was more painful than pleasant. He looked upset, if not straight out angry. Distraught, in a unique way she couldn't pinpoint, and it troubled her in return.

"I always come by at this time, don't I? For work, studying, coffee…" She replied in a quiet voice, which yet she tried to give a calm touch. "Is… everything alright?"

Now he did look up at her, with a dark and frustrated glare that made Robin's heart skip another beat. "Just perfect, isn't that quite obvious enough?! Now go and pretend to care somewhere else, I have work to do." He snapped and crouched back over his work while Robin's eyes stayed glued to him the entire time. Something had upset him deeply, that much was obvious, and while she knew that he would never talk to her about it if she asked, the desperate wish to comfort him still flared up in her chest with a very much inappropriate urgency. It wasn't for her to comfort him, if even for anyone at all, but to see him like this, troubled and hurting in a way she couldn't explain but definitely feel… it just pained her equally. Maybe she could at least do something about it.

"What work do you have to do? Maybe… I could help you with it." Robin suggested carefully, cautious not to let her own hurt seep into the tone of her voice. He didn't need to deal with her compassion on top of everything else right now, it would only upset him more. And she had helped him with work before, after all.

"Grading essays, preparing classes, answering letters from pathetically clingy parents, restocking the infirmary's potions, cleaning the laboratory, filing in new ingredients… would you like for me to continue wasting my time by listing tasks or will you just leave already?! The paperwork alone will take all night to do, even without you distracting me!" If Robin had ever heard someone yelling in a quiet voice, this was it. And it was both terrifying and heartbreaking at once. "I don't need help, especially not yours."

"Okay…" She breathed in return, and looked down to the ground in honest defeat for once. "Sorry that I bothered you." With that she turned on her heels and made for the door to the hallway instead of the classroom. Just as she wanted to let herself out, his voice stopped her once more.

"Ignore what I said, please. Today simply is… not a good day." He stated in a sigh that conveyed just how much he was actually trying to talk to her in a friendlier tone and Robin's heart ached for him a little more.

"I know. I'll be back tomorrow." She replied as comfortingly as she could without slipping into straight out sympathy, then stepped into the hallway and quietly closed the door behind herself. Leaving him like this was more painful than expected.

Her heart felt like it had been wrapped in devil's snare as she sauntered through the hallways more or less aimlessly. She had never seen Snape so honestly upset before. Angry, yes, but not distraught. It worried her deeply, and she just couldn't help the urge to try to make it better somehow. He didn't want her help though… or rather he didn't need it, as he'd said. But maybe Robin wouldn't listen to him this time. Maybe, for once, she would take a calculated risk and do his work for him, not with him.

The idea didn't leave her mind as her feet carried her towards the infirmary on their own accord. Snape had helped her, had literally saved her in her darkest moments so many times already, and she had every intention to return the favor now. Sure, helping her was part of his responsibility as her professor, and it definitely wasn't expected of the students to care for their teachers in return. But that exactly was the point. Robin didn't want to be just another student, any random recipient of an authoritative and one sided construct of assistance. She wanted to be his friend, truly and honestly, and even if he didn't want to be hers in return, she would still be his. This attitude had worked out for her for the past half of the year at least, ever since she'd so boldly told the people at the conference that she was his friend indeed. Doing some of his work now might not be an acceptable thing for his student to do, but for his friend it was perfectly alright. And while the chance that he would be furious about it was presumably as high as the chance that he would simply accept it silently and move on, both ways would result in him having to do less work. That, to Robin, was worth taking a risk for.

Once she reached the hospital wing, she got Madam Pomfrey to write her a list of how much of which potion was needed, simply by saying that she was here on Snape's behalf. It wasn't a lie, not even a half truth, and it got her what she wanted soon enough. With the list, she made for the laboratory in utmost determination that she would go through with this. He would definitely be mad that she used his lab without permission, even if she also planned on cleaning up and sorting out whatever he had previously mentioned. But he had no say in her decision to help him.

Once she'd lit up the candles, locked the door behind herself and dropped her backpack in a corner where it wouldn't bother her, she finally got started with the tasks at hand. She knew the lab better than any other room inside the castle by now, so it really was nothing to her to gather all necessary ingredients and supplies she would need for the three potions she would now have to make for Madam Pomfrey. It was nothing extraordinary, all three being ones she'd made to Snape's contentment before, and the only true nuisance was the time they would have to simply simmer over medium heat. Robin used that time to clear the table she currently wasn't using, thus to put back various jars and bottles into their rightful places. Some of them were new, she could tell by the date on the labels, but seeing as they at least were labeled in the first place, it was easy to file them into the correct places in the shelves.

Then, once she'd finished that and done some other minor cleaning that wouldn't immediately get messed up by the work in progress again, she started writing new labels for the potions she was currently making. She'd done that way too many times before, it was an easy but dreadfully mindless task, and she wondered if the entire potions stash in the infirmary had her handwriting on it by now. The thought made her smile to herself.

Eventually, way after midnight as far as Robin's watch told her, the first potion was ready. It looked quite perfect, as far as she could tell, and she prayed to whoever was listening that it was okay indeed. Making a mistake now would be an absolute disaster, and she'd rather screw up her OWLs than fail at this right here. Preferably neither though. But the potion looked, smelled and tasted exactly like it was supposed to, and thus she went ahead to bottle and label it. Still, she felt somewhat nervous. Maybe she shouldn't have done this by herself after all. No. She took a deep breath; she knew what she was doing, knew it to the last bloody detail by now. Maybe not the very much advanced potions and techniques they usually worked on in the evenings, but this she had down to the very science it was. So no time for self doubt, not right now. This was bloody routine!

Within the next hour, she finished up the other two potions as well, with the very same result of actually believing it had turned out perfectly, but still with a small hint of doubt on her mind. At last she could get started on cleaning the laboratory, as soon as all the small bottles were safely placed into a box. Cleaning really was one of the easiest tasks, a mere few spells she had memorized long ago to keep her own space tidy, and that was it. She was done with everything she could do in terms of helping him. And yet she still felt like she hadn't actually made anything better for him at all. What she had done was treating the symptoms, not curing the disease, if one could even use a bad metaphor like that in this case.

As she placed the finished potions in a prominent place on the table closest to the door, she thought that maybe she should at least explain what she had done. And why. Thus she fetched a piece of paper and a ballpoint pen out of her backpack and wrote a note, for she wasn't brave enough to tell him face to face tonight.

'I filed the new ingredients, cleaned the lab and made the potions Madam Pomfrey was missing. I'm not stupid enough to believe that I'm free of errors though, and while I do think that the potions turned out correctly, I would still prefer for you to take a look at them before delivering the stash to her. Or tell me to deliver them, of course. I apologise for using the lab without your permission, and for disregarding what you said, but I thought that being mad at me would be preferable to being quite so miserable.

You might not need my help, or anyone's at all, but that doesn't mean that you don't deserve it.

Robin'

With a sigh she dropped her pen onto the table, as she realized that whatever she could possibly write wouldn't get any better than this. Thus she placed the note on the box, grabbed her backpack, extinguished the candles with a mere look at them, and finally left the laboratory to lock the door behind herself. Well… she would have to wait until morning to see if she was in trouble now.

It was nearly two thirty in the morning at this point… but Robin knew that Snape wouldn't be done working for another few hours. Chances were high that he would come by the lab eventually, and she didn't want to be here when he did. Thus she made for the only place she knew where she could find something to cheer her up that wasn't Snape or potions; Robin went to the kitchens.

After a little chat with Buttercup, which was actually quite helpful in terms of cheering up, Robin summoned the usual Twirl out of her backpack to exchange it for a few pieces of cake, which the other elves in the kitchen already were almost finished preparing at this point. Well… seems like Robin was predictable in one regard at least. When she came into the kitchens at night, it was most definitely to bargain for some cake.

Today, instead of the usual chocolate cake, she got one with spices, almonds and orange, and only fairly little chocolate. Right… it was only one more week until Christmas. She didn't mind though, cake was cake in times like these and she would gladly take whatever she could get. Even if chocolate would have been preferable.

After saying goodnight to the house elves, Robin took her pastry back into the dungeons. She didn't feel like having so much company, and as sweet as Buttercup was, spending time around her was always quite exhausting. Thus she made her way through the hallways silently, intending to return to her common room that would surely be deserted by now. That plan dissolved into thin air when she rounded a corner, and almost ran into a wall of black. Robin stood frozen to the spot, clutching her plate in both hands in front of her, and simply looked up at Snape with wide eyes in a nervy expression. Of course she had to run into him. What kind of day at Hogwarts would it be if not the most unlikely things happened on a regular basis?

He stood so close to her that she could see all the small details of his face despite the darkness, the buttons on his robe almost touching the other end of her plate, but he didn't make an attempt to move away as he held her gaze with a fairly similar expression to the one Robin wore herself. No trace of the annoyance or anger she had seen him portray hours before.

"Cake?" She asked in a quiet and unfortunately also rather insecure voice, but mostly blamed herself for not thinking of anything better to say.

"Only if you would be willing to share." He replied in a quiet calm, and when Robin nodded in return, he led her back down the hallway towards his office without another word. The silence lingered as they sat down at the small side table like they usually would at the beginning of a work night, not the end of one, without even lighting any of the candles in the moonwashed room. The silence lingered while they each enjoyed a piece of the cake, not bothering with cutlery or such fancies, and it even lingered long after the pastry was history. They didn't need to speak; it was comfortable just like that, a peculiar kind of mutual understanding between them said more than words probably could have. It was an apology, an explanation, a reassurance, and undoubtedly also a form of comfort.

"You did not ask." He finally spoke up, after what seemed like hours of silence, and Robin was surprised by how calm he still seemed to be.

"Sometimes even I remember my place." She replied with a small shrug and a half smile, assuming that he was talking about the fact that she hadn't inquired about his reasons for being so upset earlier. "And even if it was anywhere near appropriate for me to ask, I believe to know you better than to try."

"I wouldn't have told you, had you asked." He simply stated in return, and Robin had to smile for some reason.

"I know. I have to tell you everything you want to know, and you don't even have to speak to me at all if you'd prefer not to. That's just how it is, and it's okay." She sighed softly, positively, calmly. The room slowly grew darker as the moon traveled past the window's reach.

"It seems oddly unfair, does it not?"

"Life isn't fair." Robin shrugged. "It's a game everyone plays by different rules."

"So if I asked you to explain to me why you did my work despite me explicitly telling you not to, would you be following your rules or mine when answering?"

Robin's stomach churned as the elephant in the room was finally addressed. "Depends on the perspective. I would answer because I want to answer you, as a person, not because I feel like I have to answer to your position. But since I answer anyway, you might just as well take it as whichever fits better to your own rules."

"I prefer your honest intention over any seemingly more appropriate one. So tell me, why did you deem it a good idea to help me even when I said I didn't need your help?" The way he asked still was only reflecting a sense of calm, of honest interest in what Robin would say, and she had to see that he truthfully didn't seem to be mad at her after all. That was both relieving and frightening at once. Had he been angry, she at least would've known what he thought.

She might as well tell him the truth now. Part of it at least, the part she had tried telling him before. "You might not need help, I know for a fact that you don't, especially not from someone like me. But you still deserve for people to care enough to want to help you nonetheless. It's an act of kindness, not an act of necessity."

"And you care enough?"

"Why else would I spend my entire night doing your work and still risk getting yelled at for doing so?"

"I have absolutely no idea, but please, do enlighten me."

"As hard as it might be for you to believe, I actually like you. And it made me sad to see you so upset." Robin rolled her eyes in that exaggerated manner he usually made use of, thinking how 'liking' him was probably the understatement of the century. But he didn't need to know that, it was enough that she was being this honest already. "My means to make you feel better were limited though, very limited, and they would have been absolutely non-existent had I listened to what you said. But I wanted to help you no matter what. Because yes, I do really care about you, if that wasn't obvious enough already."

For a moment the room remained quiet; Robin looked at Snape in the sincere belief that she had gone too far in her honesty, while he looked down at his own hands on the table with a serene expression that gave away nothing at all. Robin found it very hard to breathe suddenly.

"Thank you." He finally said, and looked up to meet her gaze with a startling rawness that went beyond any facade. Just him, no pretense. A spark of electricity started with a pang in Robin's heart, then rolled through her like a wave in a raging storm. Gods, she should not feel like this. She shouldn't…

"Any time." She replied after a moment, cutting off her own string of thought with a small smile that hopefully didn't let on any of the raw emotions she had to keep to herself at all costs. Because even if the room was only lit by moonlight, it sufficed for them to see each other over the small distance of the table, and it sufficed for Robin to have to force herself not to stare. She saw him indeed.

A few seconds passed, and his expression was back to the one he usually wore around Robin these days. It was far from the small glimpse of deep honesty she had seen moments ago, but she didn't mind at all. Hell, she even was glad that he was back to the normal composure and neutrality she could only see through shallowly or in small doses. She didn't think she could handle it another time, to stand at the edge of the bottomless abyss that was his true self, without taking the leap. And that was something she could not allow herself to do, no matter what, because it would break every wall that guarded the deepest corners of her being; those stupid emotions she both loved and hated with the strongest passion. But she would remember that look on his face though, even if she never got to see it again.

"The potions turned out quite excellent, in case you would like to know. And the laboratory is as spotless as it hasn't been in years." He commented after a while, leaning back in his chair with an eyebrow raised at Robin. Saving her from her thoughts as always.

"Good." Robin's smile widened ever so slightly as she focused back on the moment. "I was hoping it would take a little work off your shoulders instead of adding to it."

"It did. Otherwise I would hardly be here."

"So, I take it that your bad day got a little less bad after all?" She asked with a crooked smile and a hopeful expression, making a guess she hoped was correct. He seemed to be feeling better at least.

"Indeed."

"I'm sure it was the cake." Robin couldn't help the joke, and raised her eyebrows at him with a small smirk. If he was feeling better already, maybe a little humor could do the rest.

"Obviously it was the cake…" He drawled with an unimpressed expression that was so obviously badly feigned that it looked entirely intentional, and it was followed by another not-smirk that was almost a real one.

"Maybe I should share my cake with you more often, then. Not only when you've had a day that leads McGonagall to make the dramatic announcement that you're indisposed."

"Did she, actually?"

"She did. But most students believe that it was an excuse she came up with to cover up that you didn't want to teach us dunderheads something as pathetic as dancing."

"Good. Let them believe that, it's preferable to them knowing the truth."

"I had no intention to correct them." Robin shrugged, but then her smile dimmed down as she thought of the past day. "I hadn't believed so myself though, you know… No matter how much you dread teaching something or someone, you've never bailed out of anything for as long as I've known you. I just couldn't see you starting to do so today."

"And yet you did not ask for my reasons."

"We've been at that point already… You said that you wouldn't have answered anyway."

"Indeed, I wouldn't have."

"So?"

"So what?"

"Why do you bring it up again? What's the point in stating that I didn't do something you didn't want me to do in the first place?"

"Does there have to be a point?"

"There usually is with you. You hardly ever do something that's pointless. You always have a reason."

"Do I now?" He lifted an eyebrow at Robin in amusement, but instead of a smirk his lips formed a smile. It was actually quite a beautiful sight, even if oh so rare.

"At least you pretend that you do." Robin shrugged in return, with a mirroring smile that lit up her face on its own account.

"You spend too much time with me if you figured that out."

"Would you prefer for me to pretend that I still believe you to be who you pretend you are?"

"And where would be the point in that?" Now he raised both his eyebrows at her in question, and Robin couldn't help laughing. "Actually, I would prefer for you not to pretend at all."

"As if I would. As if I could." She rolled her eyes with a huff. "I don't even pretend to myself that I have even the slightest idea who you actually are."

"What do you mean by that?"

"I mean that I am well aware that I don't know anything about you." She stated calmly, with a small smile. He really had no idea where she was going with this, and she liked that quite a lot. "I know you, but only ever a little better than you want me to. I know nothing about you."

"You already know me quite a lot better than most other people."

"Maybe, and that is quite overwhelming to think in itself, but it's not the point."

"What is the point then?"

"The point is that I respect that you do not want me to know, be it for the sake of appropriateness or any other. Which is why I usually don't ask about your personal matters. Or about your reasons." She finished with the same small smile, but with a pointed expression directed at Snape. Now he surely must get what she was doing.

"Sneaky." He gave her a small glare that wasn't actually backed up by anything of substance though.

"You distracted from my question about your stating of my lack of question, and I merely led us back to it." She shrugged innocently. "If you're gonna be sneaky, I can be too."

"You certainly can. Consider me impressed."

"So?"

"So what?"

Robin groaned and leaned her head back to stare at the ceiling in mostly feigned annoyance and a little real one. Did he really want to go through this entire conversation again?! But she had to admit that he was good at evading topics he didn't want to talk about. Maybe she should just give in and forget about it. Would probably be the best idea.

"You know what… nevermind. It doesn't matter." She sighed and finally turned her head back to look at him, only to find that he wasn't sitting in his chair anymore. Instead her eyes followed him over to the desk to her left, and she watched how he snatched a piece of parchment out from under a large stack of books before returning to sit across from her at last. Then he placed the paper in front of her, and Robin could identify it as a fairly short letter at last. The moonlight was long gone, but it was slowly starting to dawn, and the new light sufficed to make out the words on the page.

"What's this?" Robin asked before her eyes would be tempted to simply read, and intentionally kept her gaze locked with his to avoid just that.

"My reason."

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[just-let-us-love-you-darling]

Abbe

Picrew Here [x]

Name: Abbe

Age: Born sometime in the late 14th century

Height: 160cm, or 5ft 3 Inches

Race: Turned Vampire

Gender: Trans Male

Pronouns: He/Him *Thinks it’s hilarious when people mistake him for his sister.

Abbe is a vampire, and Adelaide’s twin brother.

About the twins.

Born into a noble family in the late 14th century, the two often found themselves left to the care of their family’s staff or tutors, rarely seeing their parents unless it was required that they attend something. Thanks to their absent nature and the twin’s almost identical appearances, their parents constantly got the two mixed up.

Hurt by how little their parents cared, both soon took to dressing in identical outfits at all times, and using this as a chance to play pranks and cause trouble for everyone around them, something which only alienated them further from everyone else. Unfortunately, due to their parents neglect and the twin’s lack of trust in anyone other than each other, when it finally came time for them to be introduced to the rest of high society, both quickly rejected any and all attempts to interact with them, even going so far as to join forces and torment anyone foolish enough to try and intrude on their relationship. 

Angered by their behaviour, their parents made plans to separate the two, not knowing that both were listening in on the conversation.

Terrified of the prospect of being taken away from each other, the twins fled in the middle of the night, and would not be seen again for another 30 years. 

Much to the shock of their last living relative, when they returned, both appeared to be trapped permanently in their late teens, their features even more doll like than they had been as children. Even their bond seemed to be stronger, the two often behaving as though they knew what the other was going to say before they said it, their movements and speech eerily in sync, as they greeted their relative as if they had never left.

Though both refused to say what had happened over that 30 year period, they willingly confessed to them that they had been turned into vampires on their 18th birthday, and had only returned out of curiosity over what had happened to their parents. After learning that they had died three years earlier in a horrific carriage accident, both were visibly disappointed, but showed no signs of sadness or loss, Adelaide even mentioning wistfully that she wished they’d been there. Something that their relative wisely chose not to comment on.

Despite being unnerved by the knowledge of what they had become and the worrying implications of Adelaide’s words, their relative decided to leave the family fortune and legacy to the twins, rather than letting it die with them. 

A few days later, they passed peacefully in their sleep, and the twins sold the family estate and vanished again, shortly thereafter.

Together, the two have been traveling the world ever since, using their name and their ever growing fortune, to do as they please. Strangely, no one can ever seem to recall what they looked like after they leave.

About Abbe.

Abbe is the more mellow of the twins, but definitely still has a bit of a sadistic streak. He finds the plights of humans to be bizarre and tends to watch on in amusement as his sister toys with them, often finding himself joining in to make things more interesting, though he doesn’t derive quite as much joy from it as she does. Much like his sister though, he too finds it immensely entertaining that people are both entranced and unsettled by them, all at once, and never gets tired of helping his sister encourage these feelings for amusements sake.

Having forgotten what it was like to be human, and having not had many positive social experiences with anyone other than his sister, when he was human, Abbe has quite a bit of difficulty understanding human behaviour and feelings, and has taken to eagerly watching and playing along as his sister messes with people, curious as to how they will respond. 

Up until he met his darling however, he’d never had more than a passing curiosity and amusement over such things.

Abbe is a mostly obsessive yandere, though he can be quite manipulative if he feels the situation calls for it. He and his sister will happily stalk his darling to learn about them and see how they interact with the world around them. With his sisters help, he will find ways to worm his way into his darlings life, manipulating things until his darling finds themself trapped in the twins orbit, with no escape.

His darling wont even notice that anything is off, until the twins practically permeate every part of their life. Perhaps they never will.

Once Abbe has his eye on someone, neither twin is going to let them escape.

*Edit. Added Height

[hello-nichya-here]

Rough Draft of Fire Warrior (Fake Kemurikage) Headcanons

Note: Hi Nichya! I am currently writing a long fic dealing with how post-Imbalance Avatar would go for the Fire Nation Royal Family and their close friends and I was wondering if you could please look at my headcanons and critic them? Cause I don’t want to engage in the usage of stereotypes, or bad writing in general, especially since I am writing about characters with mental illness. Also, I have been trying to send you an ask about lighting bending for the past couple days, and it keeps on not getting through to you. Considering my asks only had trouble getting to you around the same time you very recently IP banned that one dumbass who tried roasting you for liking Azula, could it be you accidently banned me as well (I am using a coffee shop to upload this)? If so can you please unban me for your answers to my asks have enriched my understanding of Avatar greatly. Thanks!

Here is the ask: How would you write Azula and/or The Fire Warriors teaching Zuko lighting and smoke bending (as part of their reconciliation/rehabilitation) while Zuko teaches them the true meaning of fire, the dragon dance, and the philosophy behind lighting redirection? Cause I thought part of Azula’s and Zuko’s reconciliation would have been teaching each other the bending/skills the other one was lacking, uplifting each other instead of trying to compete with each other or hurt each other. But canon is what it is.

Anyway, my headcanons are down below

Starting from left to right I am going to list the names, backstory, and mental illness(es) of the non-Azula Fire Warriors:

Beam (DID plus avoidant personality disorder)

Born in 84 A.G., as the second child of three, and the only daughter of an upstart noble and a stay at home mother, Beam was expected to marry into nobility considering how well her father had done selling steel to the Fire Nation Navy and the fact that she had inherited her mothers’ good looks.

But Beam, for a lack of better words, was often detached from reality and quickly became a source of shame for her family. For Beam would often drift out of reality into her own little world whenever confronted with large amounts of stress. 

And what causes stress in Beam? Being around strangers, especially large numbers of them like parents’ hosted one of their frequent parties in an attempt to move up in Fire Nation High Society.

In fact, Beam started wearing her distinctive hairstyle plus dye in an attempt to avoid having people come to her much to her brothers and parents displeasure. And when that didn’t work, she started to wear masks such as those based on the dark water spirit or the dragon emperor.

On a side note, the only thing that really helped Beam was firebending, where she had a natural gift. However, due to her performance issues, whenever her brothers and/or parents came to watch, she always messed up her routines, leading them to cancel Beam’s lessons when she was 16 in order to focus on making Beam marriageable. 

This caused Beam to despair and undergo a nasty episode in which she wholeheartedly believed she was the dark water spirit and almost killed her older brother, who was “obviously” the Dragon Emperor. Said brother also happened to be the one who suggested her parents cancel the firebending lessons and make Beam a proper woman since he was going to get married soon and didn’t want his fiance’s family to revoke the marriage contract once they better got to know his “weirdo” of a sister.

The above incident was the last straw for her parents, who had her involuntarily committed after coming to the “conclusion” that nothing would fix their “madwomen” of a daughter.

Aiko (Clinical Depression)

Born in 87 A.G. as the unexpected last daughter of a merchant and a very low level noblewomen, life has always been a struggle for Aiko. Her mother had her in her early 40s after unexpectedly getting pregnant and giving birth to Aiko prematurely. Aiko and her mother barely survived but her mother ended up suffering from postpartum depression, hurting their mother-daughter bond.

Aiko grew up seemingly loved, but in reality she was always sad. And no amount of gifts, such as some of the best firebending tutors in the land, could ever make Aiko happy for it appeared from Aiko’s pov that her mother never wanted to do anything with her while she happily gave her love and time to her oldest two kids, who were both boys and going to join the war effort. 

That and she was relentlessly bullied in school for her demure size; one day she tried standing up for herself by getting into an impromptu fight with her main bully, but she accidently badly burned her due to being actually quite skilled in firebending. While Aiko managed to avoid jail or getting into trouble, the trauma of almost killing some made Aiko withdraw further into herself much to her parent’s grief.

Her brothers were the main positive thing in her life, for they were understanding of her and didn’t really push her that hard…except in firebending where they were the only people she felt safe enough after her incident.

However, things took a turn for the worse when her brothers finally joined the army and died in the very same maneuver that Zuko talked out against as a 13 year old. And in her grief, Aiko tried hanging herself though the noose broke just before it went taunt and she ended up knocking herself out.

And when she woke up, she found herself in the asylum….

Chyou (Bi-polar disorder)

Born in 84 A.G. as the adopted child of two low tier Hu Xin Provinces (colonial) nobles who were unable to have kids of their own. Her parents tried their best with Chyou, but she was a very difficult child to raise, for, in their perspective, one moment Chyou was a hyper energetic girl who was all too willing to do anything to achieve her long-term goals and whims. Goals that included being the best firebender in her school and being a proper noblewoman. And whims including a desire to shave half her head though that particular fulfilled whim didn’t really harm Chyou for she liked the hairstyle and kept it much to her parent’s dismay. 

But in other moments, Chyrou was a heavily depressed girl, who couldn’t even be bothered to get out of her bed no matter how hard her parents tried to encourage/bribe/threaten her. 

However, these “cycles” were just subtle enough that with her parents covering for her, Chyou could pass as a normal kid…that is until one night, she overheard a conversation between her parents talking about how much Chyou looked like her mother’s sister. Confused since she thought she had no blood relations with either of her parents (they told her she was adopted from a young age since Chyou doesn’t share that much in common with either with her parents), she confronted them and the told Chyou her true origin.

Chyou was in fact the love baby of an Earth Kingdom soldier and a Fire Nation noblewomen who was Chyou’s “mother’s” sister. While the Fire Nation is progressive in terms of gender roles, it is against the law for Fire Nation noblewomen to copulate with the males of the other nations. 

For Sozin’s reasoning was that the strong men of the Fire Nation could civilize the demure women of the other nations while the barbarians’ uncivilized blood could easily overwhelm the wombs of their wombs. Wombs that were needed to make sure their great nation would never lack loyal citizens. In reality, due to the patriarchal nature of inheritance and property ownership, Sozin feared the colonized enemy would marry into Fire Nation nobility and basically overthrow him once their numbers reached critical mass.

But getting back on track, it wasn’t discovered that Chyou’s real mother was having the baby of an Earth Kingdom soldier, let alone she was going to elope with him. So the Fire Nation tried to capture the soldier and kill him, but he ran off. However, after allowing Chyou’s true mother to give birth, the Fire Nation had her killed off. But, Chyou’s Aunt and Uncle took pity on Chyou and successfully begged the authorities to let them raise Chyou as their own kid.

Chyou’s Aunt and Uncle begged for Chyou’s forgiveness and she gave it to them…though she later had a manic episode that caused her to sneak out of her Aunt’s and Uncle’s house to search for her father, hoping she would get to meet him.

It took several weeks and all of the tracking and survival skills she learned in school, but she found the last place her father inhabited. But when she knocked on the door, her bio grandma opened the door and, once Chyou explained who she was, told the “lying ashmaker to get away from me and never come back unless you want to die” in addition to telling Chyou that her father died during General Iroh’s march to Ba Sing Se. 

For Chyou’s bio grandma never knew about her son’s relationship with Chyou’s mother, let alone that he was going to have a child with her and thus thought the young firebender was punking her…not that it would have made a difference for after she couldn’t even bury her son due to him being completely burned to ashes, she developed an intractable hatred towards the Fire Nation and especially firebenders. And that hatred wouldn’t dissipate even if her own granddaughter was one of those “ashmakers.”

Heartbroken at the rejection, Chyou then fell into a serious depressive state and was going to kill herself until she was apprehended by June and returned to her family, who had been paid by Chyou’s parents to find her before the colonial authorities did. For if the “mixed breed” had been found going “back” to her Earth Kingdom family, Chyou would have been killed for her “genetic disloyalty” caused by her parentage.

And when Chyou kept uncontrollably talking about her failed trip, Chyrou’s parents made a hard decision and had her temporarily involuntarily committed since they would rather have her suffer at the asylum (as well as get help for her myriad of issues) than have her rambling expose her “genetic disloyalty” and have her brutally executed, making all their pleadings to allow them to raise her pointless.

However, bigoted political hardliner healers in the asylum saw her history and decided unilaterally that she was a threat to society and so manipulated her record to make so she had died, leaving Chyou’s Aunt and Uncle (who were pretty old) heartbroken to the point they died within a couple of months of each other and turning Chyou’s temporary stay into a permanent stay.

Chyou, depending on whether she is having a manic episode or depressive episode, oscillates between believing her Aunt and Uncle haven’t given up on her and believing that they have finally given up on account of being a disgrace due to her mental issues and bloodline.

Zirin (Oppositional Defiant Disorder with mild Conduct Disorder)

Born in 85 A.G. as the only daughter of some minor nobles who live in Caldera City. She has ODD, which manifests in her explosive temper, which her parents tried solving by doing everything, including getting her training in firebending, which Zirin has a natural aptitude in considering she became a master by 16.

But despite her parent’s best efforts, her anger still didn’t really subside, leading up to an incident where she burned a highly sought out suitor for rubbing her the wrong way, leading her reputation to sink and make her unmarriageable, making Zirin worthless in her traditionalist parents’ eyes.

Zirin offered to join the Fire Nation military so she could be useful, but her traditionalist parents said no since the military is not the proper place for a young noblewoman. So they had her involuntarily admitted to the asylum…

Ting (Schizophrenia)

Born in 82 A.G. as the daughter of a minor Fire Nation noble and an Earth Kingdom commoner (that her father took a liking to) who lived in Yu Dao, Ting on the surface supposedly lived a charmed life. But her life was anything but charmed, for she didn’t not inherit her mother’s slim face and body, but had the stout body and face of a typical Earth Kingdomer. Meaning that it would be next to impossible to marry her off to another noble family for even in the colonies, there was a preference for Fire Nation traits among the nobility.

Not helping was just after Ting was 6, she would suffer periodically from hallucinations of her father whenever she messed up in school or in court, often having her speech deteriorate into “incoherent” babbling (ex. Ting asking “him: to stop hitting her) and often fighting back against a person who wasn’t there.

Obviously, this was just another thing that made Ting a massive disappointment in her father’s eyes.

So upset as his “mistake” Ting’s father often beat up his wife and daughter and seeing how Avatar takes place in fantasy land 19th century Asia, there was no one who they could turn to. In fact the only reason why Ting was “tolerated” was because she was an elite firebender, who naturally excelled at Sozin Style firebending due to her rage and self-loathing caused by her “madness.”

Thus, even if Ting was unmarriageable, she was likely going to have a good career in the Fire Nation Army. That is until one night when Ting was 16 witnessed a really bad argument between her drunk parents that ended up with her father breaking her mother’s arm.

Enraged and having enough, she fought her father and ended up badly burning him in public as he tried to escape her. 

The authorities then restrained her and tried to put her on trial, but horrified at what she had done, she had a severe episode that made the authorities doubt her sanity.

So sensing an opportunity to save face and not have his dirty laundry aired, Ting’s father authorized the colonial authorities to ship Ting to a homeland mental asylum for “treatment” damn well knowing they would most likely never let Ting out. And he had authorized Ting’s involuntary committal at the dead of night so Ting’s mother could not disapprove.

Gamon (Higher Functioning autism)

Born in 83 A.G. to two high functioning autistic former soldiers living in Hama’s village, Gamon would have been raised in a loving family. That is until her parents one night disappeared during a full moon and never came back (they were captured by Hama and tortured to death but the little shred of humanity left in Hama caused Hama to leave the baby alone despite wanting to spite Gamon’s pleading parents). So Gamon was given to her next of kin, who were mid tier nobles. 

It turned out that Gamon’s mother was once a noble, but renounced it so she could join the Fire Nation Army due to her special interest being the military alongside firebending. This had caused Gamon’s maternal grandparents and Gamon’s Uncle great shame and had also caused them to disown Gamon’s mother. And the sad thing was that despite Gamon’s mother wanting to reconcile, her parents died just after she got pregnant.

So when Gamon’s Uncle and Aunt got a hold of her, they promised that they would raise her into the proper noblewomen Gamon’s mother should have been.

And they were very harsh in doing so, making sure Gamon took to heart what her tutors told her what was necessary to do to be the perfect noblewomen. However, lightning struck twice, and Gamon developed a special interest in both firebending and military history, which she hid from her Uncle and Aunt by practicing firebending in the morning before either of them woke up and reading military history at night after they had gone to bed.

Gamon managed to hide it until she was 15 years old, where, after being suspicious of Gamon knowing an obscure military battle that took place during the start of Azulon’s reign while also giving pointers to a boy she was courting, they had one of the maids spy on her and report to them.

This, combined with Gamon’s symptoms such as her stimming (she likes to rub her knuckles because she likes how they feel) plus her social awkwardness (no matter how hard they drilled her, Gamon always floundered in noble get togethers), made her guardians give up her.

And not wanting a repeat of what happened to Gamon’s mother and the resulting loss of face, they had her involuntarily committed to the asylum and washed their hands of her.

***

1 - I absolutely loooooooooooove the idea of Zuko and Azula teaching each other, and it could start with Zuko playcating Azula by letting her bend again (which he knows she desperately wants) by making it clear she’s going to have to do it his way - seeing fire as a source of life, not just death. They’re likely to end up fighting a few times because of course, but it would mostly work out as intended, and Azula would then teach him what she knows.

2 - Zuko sharing what he learned from the dragons (while still keeping the secret) with the people who needed to learn it the most is what he should have done from the begining, especially with his sister, and it fits with his new goal of guiding his nation towards peace and showing them that this idea that war and destruction is “the Fire Nation way/culture” is absolute bullshit.

3 - It’s hard to say how “accurate” your portrail of mental illness is since I’m seeing just “your notes” so to speak, but it looks like you’re in the right path. Just be sure to remember that, while mental illness and disabilities do play a huge part in someone’s personalities that is not ALL of their personalities and you’ll be good to go.

4 - I recommend you either retcon some of the most ableist bullshit the comics pulled (like Zuko straight up abandoning Azula and not thinking about her until he needed something from her, not noticing the clear signs of abuse she was showing, all the times he and his friends physically assaulted her when she wasn’t doing anything, and him taking her on a mission knowing nothing about her condition) or make the characters realize just fucked up that was and then genuinely trying to be better.

[bad-at-names-and-faces]

Epilogue

chapter 34

chapter index

December 1st, 1864

Dear Inga,

I’ll be mailing this letter when we arrive in Portsmouth tomorrow.  I can’t believe it’s December already. The weather is so mild this far south, though I never would have guessed we’d see any nice weather on this trip, as rough as the waters were in the North Sea.  To think, there was already snow on the ground when we left Arendelle last week! 

I would really like to stay in England long enough to see some of the country, but we’ll be booking passage on the first steamship out.  I suppose I should look on the bright side, that we’ll be settled by the new year.  A friend of Father’s has arranged for us to stay with his family for Christmas, so I don’t need to worry about doing anything for that.  I hope the holiday preparations are going well in Arendelle, though I am very sad to be missing it. 

 With love,

Elizabeth

P.S. I just want to thank you all again for the wonderful party before we left Arendelle.  I’m sure you’ll object again that it was mostly Halima’s work, but it was so nice to see everyone there.

Elizabeth sighed, looking out the porthole of their cabin at the distant lights on the coast of England as they sailed along. Normally, she didn’t mind sailing, but this trip felt so terribly bittersweet.  There were so many possibilities where they were going, and she would see so many things that she had only read about, but she had really started to feel at home during those few brief months she had been in Arendelle.

“We’ll have an early morning,” Lars reminded her as he finished changing, “please come to bed.”

“I haven’t written to your mother yet,” she smiled.  “I thought of some things I forgot to ask her to bring with her from Corona.”

“She’ll be in Arendelle for another month; you can write from the inn tomorrow.”

“I am feeling rather tired,” Elizabeth admitted, turning down the lamp as she walked to the bed.

***

Lars dressed and quietly left the bedroom. A cold sleet was coming down outside, but the kitchen was warm.  It had been fairly mild when they first arrived in Boston more than a month before, and Elizabeth had been convinced there wouldn't be a real winter, but they had a thick layer of snow for Christmas, and the temperature had been below freezing nearly every morning for several weeks.  

Susan, the girl they had hired to help around the house, had already arrived, and she had even prepared some coffee for Lars to drink before he left for the stable. It wasn’t that long of a ride to the office they had rented, but the sleet made every minute feel like an hour.  There was almost no work so far, but the assistant keeping up the office in Washington had started forwarding all of the mail, which mostly consisted of a handful of applications for Arendelle travel visas.  The previous evening’s mail had been brought in, and there were a few official notices, plus the bundle that had been forwarded, and finally he noticed a letter personally addressed to himself, and opened it.

January 7th, 1865

Dear Lars,

Inga told me that Elizabeth has been writing, and I realized that you’re only getting official correspondence from us right now, so I thought I’d fix that.  I can’t say I’m as good at writing personal letters as my sister, but I hope you don’t mind getting another letter.  I won’t bore you with official updates and announcements, since I know we send them to everyone.  

There was a lot of snow last night, and everyone was outside enjoying it all morning, then we all packed into Hudson’s to warm up, then back out.  Do you get snow there? I know it’s much further south where you are.  If you’re not too busy, write back, because I’m curious what they actually have you doing there.  

The week after Christmas was quiet, with no business and just the family at the castle.  Things are picking up again this week, but Father is going to be taking me, Anton, and Peder up to the mountains for the first ice harvest in another week.  We’ll only be staying a week or two up there, and then the rest of the winter I’ll have to spend most of my time with the tutors if I want to be allowed to do the naval training trip in the spring.

Stay well!

Frederick

Lars placed the letter in his bag. Elizabeth would like to read it, and Frederick hadn’t included anything that he would mind being shared, and he’d write back after dinner and send it out in the morning’s mail.

***

Elizabeth looked up.  “A valentine? Lars, you didn’t have to get me anything!”

“There was a shop full of them, I couldn’t help it,” he laughed, sitting down next to her on the sofa.

“But,” she sighed, “I have nothing for you.”

“Of course you do,” he replied, kissing her forehead.

“What do you mean?” she asked blankly, then looked up at him and got his meaning.  “Oh!” she giggled, lightly punching him.

***

Elizabeth looked up from the letter she was reading out loud, and sighed.  “This is dated two weeks ago, so Inga must already be up North.  She promises she’ll write to me when she gets back to Arendelle next month, but she didn’t say whether she’ll get any letters up there.”

Lars nodded. “It won’t hurt to write, if you want to. Is it any different from writing to your father while he’s at sea?”

“That’s true,” she smiled, looking out the bedroom window.  She set the letter on the nightstand and started fastening the front of her corset as Lars began to help with the back.  Today was the first day of spring.  It was still chilly, and the locals said it was likely to stay so through most of April, but at least the sun was up early. Elizabeth had again started waking up at the same time as he woke up, so he no longer had to leave the house while she was still asleep.

“I got a telegraph from Mother,” Lars said as he gingerly laced the back of her corset, “and she’s on a steamship arriving next week.”

“Oh, that’s wonderful news!” Elizabeth smiled, “she’ll be here for your birthday, too!”

“Yes,” Lars replied quietly, gently tying a bow at the bottom.

“Are you sure you can’t get it a little tighter?” she pouted.

“Absolutely not,” he chided her, holding her shoulders and kissing her cheek. “It’s not going to fall off, and…”

“I know, I know,” she sighed.

***

April 25th, 1865

Dear Inga, 

How are you doing? I feel very restless right now, and I hope you don’t mind that I don’t want to talk about anything serious, because around here they’re only talking about the President’s funeral and all that horrible business.  

On that note, Lars has carried the letters from your family on his trip to the capital.  He’s missing his own birthday, though of course it’s perfectly understandable.  It’s only me and his mother right now, though Susan still comes in during the day to help out.  Lars should be back in a day or two, and we’ll celebrate then, but I do feel bad, since he’s twenty-one now.   This evening I made his mother tell me stories about him as a child, and it sounded delightful. I tried to ask about the day he was born, but she said she was too tired and that I should be getting more sleep. Obviously, I didn’t mean about Lars in particular, just in general. I’ll need to know what it’s like eventually, right? She knows this, and I suppose she doesn’t want to scare me with details right now. I’m sorry I’m being so vague.  But, she’s certainly right that I should get some sleep while I can.  I hope everything is well with everyone there. 

With Love,

Elizabeth

***

“Elizabeth, have we met a Mr. Curtis?” Lars asked, looking at the envelope that had come in the mail.

“No, you haven’t met him,” Elizabeth said casually, looking up from the sofa.  “I haven’t met him, either, exactly, but I wrote to him while you were gone last month.  He’s a ship builder, and you were talking about contracting with ship builders here.”

“Oh,” Lars hesitated, “I did say I would do that, didn’t I?”

“Do you mind that I did? I’m sorry I forgot to tell you, but so much was going on.”

“Not at all,” he said as he opened the envelope, “and it looks like he wants to have us over.  You’ll need to come with me, of course, to keep me from looking like an idiot.”

Elizabeth smiled, looking out the window. “Oh, good, your mother is home from visiting Mrs. Wirth.”

0o0o0

“Are you sure you’re up for this?” Lars asked as they came to the large lawn of Mr. Curtis’s house.  “It’s rather hot today, and I really don’t want you-”

“Your mother is here, and there are plenty of seats in the shade.  It’s not like I’m going to be on a train for twenty hours like you’ve been doing lately.”

“True,” he replied, “and I promise I won’t be away from you this summer.  At any rate, please don’t feel the need to act as a hostess today. That’s for Mrs. Curtis to take care of.  We’ve given them a contract for a new ship, and they’re throwing a party in honor of the Queen’s birthday.”

“So that’s already been approved? The contract?” 

“It’s in transit.  The sooner Mr. Curtis gets started, the sooner Arendelle can have the ship.  We’ll worry about the details later.”

***

July 20th, 1865

Dear Inga,

We received the invitation to your birthday party next month. It sounds like a wonderful day you have planned.  Obviously, we can’t be there, but hopefully we’ll be able to send you good news before then.  As always, I look forward to your letters.

I wish I could travel back there for the summer. The weather last summer was so pleasant, but it has been so unbearably hot and humid here.  Our neighbors all seem to be traveling to the shore or the mountains, but Lars is worried about being too far away from a doctor right now, and he assures me it’s worse in the city at his office, so in the meantime I’ve spent most my time in recent weeks in the shade in our yard.

With Love,

Elizabeth

***

The baby was cooing softly in Elizabeth’s arms when Margit Nilsen quietly entered the bedroom.  The afternoon sunlight was peaking through the curtains, keeping the room from being completely dark.

“I have so many letters to write,” Elizabeth fretted from the bed, “as soon as the baby’s asleep, I want to get up.”

“You still need your rest,” her mother-in-law scolded her.  “Lars will write to everyone, don’t worry.  Nobody expects you to be writing letters yourself so soon.”

“It’s been three weeks,” Elizabeth sighed.  

Soon, the baby was asleep, and her mother-in-law gently picked him up and set him in the cradle in the corner.  “There, dear, now you should rest, too.”

“I’m going to get up in just a minute,” Elizabeth protested, closing her eyes for just a moment before falling into a deep sleep.

Margit quietly closed the door and sat down next to Lars at the table.

“You’re going to tell me I should sleep, too, aren’t you?” Lars sighed.

“If you’re tired, you should,” she told him, “but, no, that wasn’t what I was going to say.”

He looked up.  

“You still haven’t told her about Anna, have you?”

***

“We missed your birthday, but we can have a party on your anniversary!” Lars’s mother announced as he returned home from his office.  Elizabeth had dressed up and tried something new with her hair, which Lars thought looked rather nice on her, and the baby was asleep in the cradle. 

“I hope you didn’t think I’d forgotten when you left this morning,” Elizabeth smiled.

“I...  I’m going to pretend that I remembered what day it was today,” Lars laughed, coming over to sit next to her.

His mother went into the kitchen to check on how dinner was coming along, leaving the two of them alone.  

“I didn’t get you anything,” Lars confessed, “I really wasn’t kidding that I forgot what day it was. I’m sorry.”

“You have a lot going on now,” Elizabeth reassured him, touching his cheek. “Remember, you can tell me anything.”

***

October 2nd, 1865

Dear Lars,

Sorry I haven’t written in a while, but Inga has been telling me that you’re all doing well. I know you’re probably tired, Mother and Father always are with a new baby. Everything is fine here, basically.  We’re supposed to be getting another visit from a certain person from Corona in a few days, but I’m not sure if I’m supposed to tell you that.  It’s not an official visit.  

Anyhow, I said I wouldn’t bore you with official announcements, but you probably saw that they’ll be sending me to the naval academy in Corona at some point, but nobody can agree when.  Our Admiral says he would be perfectly happy to set up an academy here, but obviously that would take a while, and there are only a few of us right now.

I’ll stop here because I’m sure you’re quite busy.

Stay well!

Frederick

***

Elizabeth sat with the baby in the chair by the front window watching the first snow of the season, thinking about how it was almost December again, and they had left Arendelle a year before. The baby was fast asleep, but she was comfortable and he was warm, and she felt no need to move.

Her mother-in-law brought her a cup of tea, then poured one for Lars, sitting down next to him at the table. They could hear Susan in the kitchen preparing something for dinner.  Lars sat reading the evening paper, and finishing the front page, did his best not to make noise turning to the second page, since the baby would nearly always wake up if the paper rustled.  He started to take a sip from his cup while he was reading, but set it back down abruptly and stared at the page, whispering something to his mother, who looked surprised.

"What is it, Lars?" Elizabeth asked, briefly glancing over, then returning her attention to the snow and the sleeping baby. Lars handed the folded newspaper to his mother, who brought it over to her.

Elizabeth took the paper, and skimmed over a few headlines about nothing astounding, then gasped, stopping herself before the baby stirred.

“Inga said there might be news soon, but nothing about marriage- did you know anything?”

"I thought I might hear something about their officially courting, certainly, or maybe even an engagement,” he muttered. “I suppose I’ll see tomorrow if any messages arrived since I left this afternoon, but they completely ignored any suggestions about getting a telegraph set up.  I dropped the topic this summer since it just sounded like I wanted faster congratulations about the baby.” 

Elizabeth stood up, handing the baby to her mother-in-law.  “I need to write to her!”

***

Lars sat down at his desk, opening the diary to December 15th.  He realized that it had now been one year since they’d arrived here.  He was growing to like this office, but there was increasing pressure to move everything back to the capital now that things were settling down.  He would need to consider that carefully: he could always spend time on the train, traveling back and forth, or they could all move South, and spend less time apart.  But then he remembered the constant threat of malaria, and what if there was another outbreak of Yellow Fever? That wouldn’t do at all.  

He heard someone ring the bell at the front door, and he got up to answer it himself.  With all the uncertainty about whether this office would be permanent, he had never hired an assistant, but there were so few interruptions that it really didn’t matter.

Opening the door, he saw a young man in a heavy winter coat, thick hat, gloves and scarf, even though the weather had gotten mild again for the last week or two.  

“Hello, I’m looking for the Ambassador.” The young man spoke through his scarf, looking directly at Lars with dark brown eyes that almost matched the bridge of his nose.  

“I’m the Ambassador,” Lars informed him.

“Oh! I’m sorry…  am I supposed to call you Your Excellency? I think that's what I read.”

“Just call me Mr. Nilsen,” Lars laughed, remembering how fastidious he had been with titles not that long ago. “Come inside.  You’re not from around here, are you?”

“No,” he said, coming inside.  He rubbed his chapped hands after he’d stuffed his gloves in his coat pockets, “in fact, I only got off the train two days ago. First thing I bought was this coat.  I’m not used to cold weather.”

“Where are you from?”

“Louisiana,” he explained, finally taking his scarf off, “and now you’re probably going to laugh at me for wanting to visit Arendelle if I can’t handle the cold.” 

“It’s quite pleasant there in the summer,” Lars offered, “but you do have me curious.”

“Well, I’ve always heard stories about it, and I started saving up my money while New Orleans was occupied, doing any odd jobs that I could. And now, I’m ready for an adventure, just for myself.  A few of my cousins went out west this summer, but I wanted something different.”

“I hadn’t realized the stories of Arendelle were that widely known,” Lars admitted, “but I’d be happy to get you set up with a travel visa, and answer any questions you have.”  He motioned for the man to sit down next to his desk.

“Thank you, Mr. Nilsen,” he said, taking a seat, still wearing his coat and hat.  “I found a few books at the library yesterday, but I’m sure they don’t tell the whole story. The books certainly told a different story than the ones I heard from the master’s family.”

“Oh?” Lars said, retrieving the papers from his desk.  The man seemed amiable enough, and Lars was interested in hearing some more about his interest in Arendelle.  He hadn’t even mentioned the fjords.  The handful of people he’d seen so far coming in person for visas had talked about nothing else. Besides, Lars didn’t get much conversation when he was at work these days.  “Were they…were they from Arendelle?”  

“Oh, no,” he laughed, “in fact, I didn’t really hear any nice things about Arendelle from them, but that makes me all the more curious to see the place for myself.”

“It’s a beautiful place,” Lars said, half listening as he started to organize the paperwork for a travel visa.  He glanced at the first space on the form. “I’m sorry, I realize I never asked you your name.”

“Right, you’ll need that,” he smiled, “John Westergard.”

Lars felt his stomach drop.  It could be chance.  It could be anyone. He needed to keep calm.

“Westergard?” Lars tried not to be obvious as he looked the other man up and down.  There was no resemblance, not even some quirk of his nose or the shape of his earlobe, to any member of the royal family of the Southern Isles. But the name, still, the name must have an explanation. “That’s an unusual name…”

“I’ve been thinking about changing it. It’s not really my name, you know how it is.”

[hallefms]

𝐜𝐡𝐢𝐜𝐚𝐠𝐨’𝐬 𝐯𝐞𝐫𝐲 𝐨𝐰𝐧 𝐇𝐀𝐋𝐋𝐄 𝐅𝐎𝐑𝐓𝐄𝐍 𝐡𝐚𝐬 𝐛𝐞𝐞𝐧 𝐬𝐩𝐨𝐭𝐭𝐞𝐝 𝐨𝐧 𝐦𝐚𝐝𝐢𝐬𝐨𝐧 𝐚𝐯𝐞𝐧𝐮𝐞 , 𝐰𝐢𝐭𝐡 𝐚 𝐬𝐭𝐫𝐢𝐤𝐢𝐧𝐠 𝐬𝐞𝐦𝐛𝐥𝐚𝐧𝐜𝐞 𝐭𝐨 𝐑𝐘𝐀𝐍 𝐃𝐄𝐒𝐓𝐈𝐍𝐘 ! 𝐲𝐨𝐮 𝐦𝐚𝐲 𝐤𝐧𝐨𝐰 𝐭𝐡𝐞𝐦 𝐚𝐬 @𝐡𝐚𝐥𝐥𝐞𝐟𝐨𝐫𝐭𝐞𝐧 𝐨𝐫 𝐡𝐢𝐭𝐭𝐢𝐧𝐠 𝐭𝐡𝐞 𝐟𝐫𝐨𝐧𝐭 𝐩𝐚𝐠𝐞 𝐨𝐟 𝐭𝐦𝐳 𝐚𝐬 𝒖𝒑𝒄𝒐𝒎𝒊𝒏𝒈 𝒔𝒊𝒏𝒈𝒆𝒓-𝒔𝒐𝒏𝒈𝒘𝒓𝒊𝒕𝒆𝒓 𝒉𝒂𝒍𝒍𝒆 𝒇𝒐𝒓𝒕𝒆𝒏 𝒇𝒍𝒂𝒔𝒉𝒆𝒔 𝒑𝒂𝒑𝒑𝒂𝒓𝒂𝒛𝒛𝒊 𝒂𝒕 𝒂𝒘𝒂𝒓𝒅 𝒔𝒉𝒐𝒘 𝒂𝒇𝒕𝒆𝒓 𝒑𝒂𝒓𝒕𝒚. 𝐚𝐜𝐜𝐨𝐫𝐝𝐢𝐧𝐠 𝐭𝐨 𝐭𝐦𝐳 , 𝐲𝐨𝐮 𝐣𝐮𝐬𝐭 𝐡𝐚𝐝 𝐲𝐨𝐮𝐫 𝐭𝐰𝐞𝐧𝐭𝐲-𝐭𝐡𝐢𝐫𝐝 𝐛𝐢𝐫𝐭𝐡𝐝𝐚𝐲 𝐛𝐚𝐬𝐡 . 𝐲𝐨𝐮𝐫 𝐜𝐡𝐚𝐧𝐜𝐞 𝐨𝐟 𝐬𝐮𝐫𝐯𝐢𝐯𝐢𝐧𝐠 𝐧𝐞𝐰 𝐲𝐨𝐫𝐤 𝐢𝐬 𝐮𝐧𝐜𝐞𝐫𝐭𝐚𝐢𝐧 𝐛𝐞𝐜𝐚𝐮𝐬𝐞 𝐲𝐨𝐮’𝐫𝐞 𝐫𝐞𝐛𝐞𝐥𝐥𝐢𝐨𝐮𝐬 , 𝐛𝐮𝐭 𝐛𝐞𝐢𝐧𝐠 𝐜𝐫𝐞𝐚𝐭𝐢𝐯𝐞 𝐦𝐢𝐠𝐡𝐭 𝐡𝐞𝐥𝐩 𝐲𝐨𝐮 . 𝐭𝐡𝐢𝐧𝐠𝐬 𝐭𝐡𝐚𝐭 𝐰𝐨𝐮𝐥𝐝 𝐩𝐚𝐢𝐧𝐭 𝐚 𝐛𝐞𝐭𝐭𝐞𝐫 𝐩𝐢𝐜𝐭𝐮𝐫𝐞 𝐨𝐟 𝐲𝐨𝐮 𝐰𝐨𝐮𝐥𝐝 𝐛𝐞 𝐩𝐚𝐫𝐭𝐲𝐢𝐧𝐠 𝐚𝐭 𝟐 𝐚𝐦, 𝐥𝐨𝐮𝐝 𝐥𝐚𝐮𝐠𝐡𝐬, 𝐚𝐧𝐝 𝐤𝐚𝐫𝐚𝐨𝐤𝐞 𝐧𝐢𝐠𝐡𝐭𝐬 𝐨𝐮𝐭 . ( 𝐜𝐢𝐬 𝐟𝐞𝐦𝐚𝐥𝐞 & 𝐬𝐡𝐞/𝐡𝐞𝐫 ) + ( 𝐦𝐲𝐚, 𝟏𝟗 , 𝐬𝐡𝐞/𝐡𝐞𝐫, 𝐩𝐬𝐭. ) 

triggers will be tagged and marked accordingly as they come up but here’s what to look out for: alcohol tw, drugs tw, abuse tw, shooting tw, hospital tw, death tw, grief tw

𝐒𝐓𝐀𝐓𝐒

𝐅𝐔𝐋𝐋 𝐍𝐀𝐌𝐄

halle caroline forten

𝐍𝐈𝐂𝐊𝐍𝐀𝐌𝐄𝐒

hal and hals

𝐁𝐈𝐑𝐓𝐇𝐃𝐀𝐘

april 11, 1997

𝐇𝐄𝐈𝐆𝐇𝐓

5′5″

𝐀𝐆𝐄

23 years old

𝐆𝐄𝐍𝐃𝐄𝐑

female

𝐏𝐑𝐎𝐍𝐎𝐔𝐍𝐒

she/her

𝐎𝐂𝐂𝐔𝐏𝐀𝐓𝐈𝐎𝐍

singer/songwriter

𝐋𝐀𝐍𝐆𝐔𝐀𝐆𝐄𝐒

english, italian, french, spanish, and mandarin

𝐎𝐑𝐈𝐄𝐍𝐓𝐀𝐓𝐈𝐎𝐍

bisexual

𝐅𝐀𝐂𝐄𝐂𝐋𝐀𝐈𝐌

ryan destiny

here’s her current home

𝐁𝐀𝐂𝐊𝐒𝐓𝐎𝐑𝐘

𝐀𝐋𝐂𝐎𝐇𝐎𝐋 𝐀𝐍𝐃 𝐃𝐑𝐔𝐆𝐒 𝐓𝐖

halle forten was born in CHICAGO ILLINOIS on an unusually warm day in april

her mother was an ALCOHOLIC and her father was a DRUG ADDICT and although they were both incredibly skilled with their respective crafts...the same could not be said about them being good parents 

𝐄𝐍𝐃 𝐀𝐋𝐂𝐎𝐇𝐎𝐋 𝐀𝐍𝐃 𝐃𝐑𝐔𝐆𝐒 𝐓𝐖

𝐀𝐁𝐔𝐒𝐄 𝐓𝐖

her mother was the more abusive of the two, her constant alcohol use and consequent promise to quit caused her to have intense periods of blacking out and then withdrawing to the point where she’d take it out on her children albeit emotionally, verbally, or worst of all physically. her father on the other hand managed to simply exist in the household, unless he was going on rampages through the house of breaking things it causing physical and/or emotional scars to his children

𝐄𝐍𝐃 𝐀𝐁𝐔𝐒𝐄 𝐓𝐖

halle grew up in the neighborhood of WASHINGTON PARK not exactly known for being the hamptons of chicago so everyday was like trying to navigating a battlefield

thankfully, or maybe sadly? halle wasn’t alone in this fight she was the youngest of five, two sisters, and three brothers, for the most part they were all extremely close, they fought like any other siblings, but knew the evils the awaited them if they drifted apart

despite all this, halle had an extremely close bond to her older brother, she told him EVERYTHING and he trusted her with his life it was obvious to anyone that the two of them were inseparable 

although his protectiveness, did manage to get in the way of their relationship at one point, i’m getting ahead of myself, first i have to set the scene with halle’s high school journey

although halle wasn’t necessarily handed golden keys to receive a sound education, she didn’t let that stop her, she was determined to make it out of washington park if was the last thing that she did, and she worked her ass off to make sure that dream would become a reality

and so in turn halle became an HONOR ROLL student, she her homework on time, she aced her tests, and she even helped tutor her peers on the side for extra money, her parents didn’t exactly have the biggest expendable income after all, things went fairly well for her academically

socially, is where halle would stumble a little bit, she wasn’t exactly the friendliest person, and even when you managed to break down her barriers, it was likely you’d be cut off shortly afterwards, she was extremely uncomfortable with being so vulnerable she mostly stuck to just socializing with her siblings and their friends

eventually, she maintained a solid friend group, one where she didn’t feel judged or felt the need to isolate herself, although she’d often do so for periods of time for seemingly no reason, and she CLUNG to them closely, secretly being afraid of being LEFT BEHIND, and although she wasn’t a SUPER AGGRESSIVE person if you ever had the audacity to mess with her friends, you could expect threats from halle, and she WOULD follow through with them

then came the obligatory part of high school where her friends would seek relationships and find some mediocre high school boy who could barely take care of his basic needs, and then SOMEHOW question why halle herself wasn’t in a relationship

and this would continue to be her stance UNTIL he came along, with his stupid smile, goofiness, and eyes that twinkled, to turn her world UPSIDE DOWN

and some despite ALL ODDS in halle’s mind he choose her, the only issue is due to home life, halle was unsure was healthy love looked like, she wasn’t aware that love DIDN’T have to hurt

remember how i told you that the protectiveness of halle’s brother would come in the way of their relationship? here’s where that comes into play. he stepped in when he saw the LENGTHS that halle was going to sustain a relationship, and she told him he had NOTHING to worry about, this lead to a series of arguments that halle would end up winning, but that would cause a GIGANTIC rift in their relationship 

𝐒𝐇𝐎𝐎𝐓𝐈𝐍𝐆, 𝐇𝐎𝐒𝐏𝐓𝐈𝐀𝐋, 𝐀𝐍𝐃 𝐃𝐄𝐀𝐓𝐇 𝐓𝐖

A WEEK LATER, her brother would be rushed to the hospital in critical condition where he later died, the story goes he was walking home late at night, and he was randomly shot at in the arm and in the chest, halle ran to the hospital desperate for a last minute reconciliation with her brother, he held her hand before taking his last breath, and their parting words to each other where ‘I LOVE YOU’, her brother’s gunman was never identified or arrested 

𝐄𝐍𝐃 𝐒𝐇𝐎𝐎𝐓𝐈𝐍𝐆, 𝐇𝐎𝐒𝐏𝐓𝐈𝐀𝐋, 𝐀𝐍𝐃 𝐃𝐄𝐀𝐓𝐇 𝐓𝐖

this only CEMENTED the fact that halle NEEDED to get out of washington park, she became more isolated than before, and ended her relationship, she was even more determined than before to excel at school

𝐆𝐑𝐈𝐄𝐅 𝐓𝐖

through her grieving halle found an OUTLET in music, compressing her pain and hurt into song lyrics, and allowing herself FOR ONCE to be vulnerable, she even recorded her FIRST album on her bedroom floor, with a shitty headphone mic, her heartfelt lyrics, and only a vague grasp of music production

𝐄𝐍𝐃 𝐆𝐑𝐈𝐄𝐅 𝐓𝐖

halle eventually GRADUTED as VALDECTORIAN of her class and applied to NEW YORK UNIVERSITY she had the grades and a perfectly curated college essay that guaranteed her acceptance into the school of SCHOOL OF ARTS

the only reason she applied to NEW YORK UNIVERSITY is because she knew that she wouldn’t be able to get DISCOVERED by staying in washington park nor would she be able to FURTHER her education, desperate to finally get her escape one night without telling ANYONE, including her siblings, she booked a flight to NEW YORK CITY and never looked back

college life took her by SURPRISE but she knew this was her CHANCE, she knew she had to keep the same drive that got her OUT of washington park

FINALLY after only a semester in college, and lots of behind the scenes work, she signed a contract with a NOTEABLE music label, and began reworking the album she wrote on her bedroom floor a year or so ago

she released her FIRST studio album and it was a HIT, in all honesty it was an OVERNIGHT SUCCESS, halle’s recognition was something so NEW to her, she had never put herself in the SPOTLIGHT always much preferring the background, but remembering the hardships and trails that she’d faced, she EMBRACED the newfound attention 

halle would go on to win an award for BEST NEW ARTIST and in her acceptance speech she shed light on the hardships and struggles she faced and thanked the driving force that got her out of her situation HER BROTHER

SINCE THEN halle has begun working on her SECOND studio album and has started a CHARITY to help children of abusive households, and a separate CHARTIY focusing on helping families who have lost children to neighborhood violence

halle has especially been more social since her high school days, but still carries her AGGRESSIVE streak and will stand up for herself and her beliefs no matter the cost, she’s truly found herself and is able to be vulnerable with others almost to a fault, but that doesn’t mean you will win her trust easily, that is still something you’ll have to fight for, but once you earn it she WILL go to bat for you NO MATTER WHAT

HOWEVER halle is still EXTREMELY UNACCUSTOMED to her fame and often does things that paints her in a less than flattering light

𝐏𝐄𝐑𝐒𝐎𝐍𝐀𝐋𝐈𝐓𝐘

𝐙𝐎𝐃𝐈𝐀𝐂

aries sun, gemini moon, gemini rising

𝐀𝐋𝐈𝐆𝐍𝐌𝐄𝐍𝐓

chaotic good

𝐌𝐁𝐓𝐈

isfp-a

𝐄𝐍𝐍𝐄𝐀𝐆𝐑𝐀𝐌

type 9w8

𝐓𝐄𝐌𝐏𝐄𝐑𝐀𝐌𝐄𝐍𝐓

sanguine

𝐇𝐎𝐔𝐒𝐄

slytherin

𝐋𝐎𝐕𝐄 𝐋𝐀𝐍𝐆𝐔𝐀𝐆𝐄𝐒

in order: words of affirmation, acts of service, quality time, physical time, and receiving gifts

𝐏𝐎𝐒𝐈𝐓𝐈𝐕𝐄 𝐓𝐑𝐀𝐈𝐓𝐒

adaptable, adventurous, affable, affectionate, ambitious, amusing, attentive, brave, bright, calm, caring, charismatic, charming, committed, courageous, creative, decisive, dependable, determined, diligent, direct, driven, easy-going, efficient, engaging, enthusiastic, extroverted, flirtatious, forthright, frank, fun-loving, funny, gregarious, intelligent, knowledgeable, lively, logical, loyal, mischievous, neat, objective, observant, open-minded, organized, outgoing, passionate, persistent, playful, practical, pragmatic, protective, quick-witted, rational, realistic, reliable, responsible, romantic, self-confident, sociable, strong-willed, and trustworthy

𝐍𝐄𝐆𝐀𝐓𝐈𝐕𝐄 𝐓𝐑𝐀𝐈𝐓𝐒

abrasive, aggressive, aloof, analytical, argumentative, arrogant, assertive, avoidant, belligerent, blunt, bossy, calculating, callous, cautious, competitive, condescending, confrontational, critical, cynical, deceitful, defiant, destructive, detached, discreet, dishonest, dramatic, evasive, explosive, foolhardy, grumpy, guarded, harsh, headstrong, impatient, impulsive, insensitive, intimidating, irrational, judgmental, melancholic, narcissistic, negative, opinionated, outspoken, perfectionist, pretentious, private, quick-tempered, rebellious, reckless, rude, secretive, stubborn, temperamental, thoughtless, unemotional, vain, and violent

𝐂𝐇𝐀𝐑𝐀𝐂𝐓𝐄𝐑 𝐈𝐍𝐒𝐏𝐎

i’d like to say she’s a weird amalgamation of characters i liked in media i’ve consumed, and although he relates more to some characters than others this is an incomplete list of my influences

p.s. you can click on the names of a charatcer to see a gifset of them that reminds me of halle <3 <3 <3

𝑱𝑨𝑫𝑬 𝑾𝑬𝑺𝑻 ( 𝐕𝐈𝐂𝐓𝐎𝐑𝐈𝐎𝐔𝐒 ) , 𝑱𝑶𝑵𝑨𝑻𝑯𝑨𝑵 𝑩𝒀𝑬𝑹𝑺 ( 𝐒𝐓𝐑𝐀𝐍𝐆𝐄𝐑 𝐓𝐇𝐈𝐍𝐆𝐒 ) , 𝑴𝑨𝑹𝑪𝑬𝑳𝑰𝑵𝑬 ( 𝐀𝐃𝐕𝐄𝐍𝐓𝐔𝐑𝐄 𝐓𝐈𝐌𝐄 ) , 𝑺𝑯𝑨𝑮𝑮𝒀 𝑹𝑶𝑮𝑬𝑹𝑺 ( 𝐒𝐂𝐎𝐎𝐁𝐘-𝐃𝐎𝐎 ) , 𝑷𝑯𝑰𝑳𝑳𝑰𝑷 𝑱. 𝑭𝑹𝒀 ( 𝐅𝐔𝐓𝐔𝐑𝐀𝐌𝐀 ) , 𝑴𝑶𝑹𝑫𝑬𝑪𝑨𝑰 ( 𝐑𝐄𝐆𝐔𝐋𝐀𝐑 𝐒𝐇𝐎𝐖 ) , 𝑺𝑶𝑶𝑺 ( 𝐆𝐑𝐀𝐕𝐈𝐓𝐘 𝐅𝐀𝐋𝐋𝐒 ) , 𝑮𝑾𝑬𝑵 ( 𝐓𝐎𝐓𝐀𝐋 𝐃𝐑𝐀𝐌𝐀 𝐈𝐒𝐋𝐀𝐍𝐃 ) , 𝑱𝑨𝑵𝑬 𝑳𝑨𝑵𝑬 ( 𝐃𝐀𝐑𝐈𝐀 ) , 𝑴𝑬𝑹𝑬𝑫𝑰𝑻𝑯 𝑮𝑹𝑬𝒀 ( 𝐆𝐑𝐄𝐘'𝐒 𝐀𝐍𝐀𝐓𝐎𝐌𝐘 ) , 𝑵𝑨𝑻𝑬 𝑨𝑹𝑪𝑯𝑰𝑩𝑨𝑳𝑫 ( 𝐆𝐎𝐒𝐒𝐈𝐏 𝐆𝐈𝐑𝐋 ) , 𝑨𝑵𝑫 𝑻𝑰𝑵𝑲𝑬𝑹𝑩𝑬𝑳𝑳 ( 𝐏𝐄𝐓𝐄𝐑 𝐏𝐀𝐍 )

𝐖𝐀𝐍𝐓𝐄𝐃 𝐂𝐎𝐍𝐍𝐄𝐂𝐓𝐈𝐎𝐍𝐒

𝑹𝑶𝑴𝑨𝑵𝑻𝑰𝑪

𝑬𝑿𝑬𝑺 𝑶𝑵 𝑮𝑶𝑶𝑫 𝑻𝑬𝑹𝑴𝑺. 𝐎𝐍𝐄, 𝐓𝐖𝐎, 𝐓𝐇𝐑𝐄𝐄, 𝐀𝐍𝐃 𝐅𝐎𝐔𝐑.

𝑬𝑿𝑬𝑺 𝑶𝑵 𝑩𝑨𝑫 𝑻𝑬𝑹𝑴𝑺. 𝐎𝐍𝐄, 𝐓𝐖𝐎, 𝐓𝐇𝐑𝐄𝐄, 𝐀𝐍𝐃 𝐅𝐎𝐔𝐑.

𝑭𝑹𝑰𝑬𝑵𝑫𝑺 𝑻𝑶 𝑳𝑶𝑽𝑬𝑹𝑺. 𝐎𝐍𝐄, 𝐓𝐖𝐎, 𝐓𝐇𝐑𝐄𝐄, 𝐀𝐍𝐃 𝐅𝐎𝐔𝐑.

𝑭𝑹𝑰𝑬𝑵𝑫𝑺 𝑾𝑰𝑻𝑯 𝑩𝑬𝑵𝑬𝑭𝑰𝑻𝑺. 𝐎𝐍𝐄, 𝐓𝐖𝐎, 𝐓𝐇𝐑𝐄𝐄, 𝐀𝐍𝐃 𝐅𝐎𝐔𝐑. 

𝑺𝑲𝑰𝑵𝑵𝒀 𝑳𝑶𝑽𝑬. 𝐎𝐍𝐄, 𝐓𝐖𝐎, 𝐓𝐇𝐑𝐄𝐄, 𝐀𝐍𝐃 𝐅𝐎𝐔𝐑.

𝑺𝑳𝑶𝑾 𝑩𝑼𝑹𝑵. 𝐎𝐍𝐄, 𝐓𝐖𝐎, 𝐓𝐇𝐑𝐄𝐄, 𝐀𝐍𝐃 𝐅𝐎𝐔𝐑.

𝑷𝑹 𝑹𝑬𝑳𝑨𝑻𝑰𝑶𝑵𝑺𝑯𝑰𝑷. 𝐎𝐍𝐄, 𝐓𝐖𝐎, 𝐓𝐇𝐑𝐄𝐄, 𝐀𝐍𝐃 𝐅𝐎𝐔𝐑.

𝑻𝑶𝑿𝑰𝑪 𝑹𝑬𝑳𝑨𝑻𝑰𝑶𝑵𝑺𝑯𝑰𝑷. 𝐎𝐍𝐄, 𝐓𝐖𝐎, 𝐓𝐇𝐑𝐄𝐄, 𝐀𝐍𝐃 𝐅𝐎𝐔𝐑.

𝑼𝑵𝑹𝑬𝑸𝑼𝑰𝑻𝑬𝑫 𝑳𝑶𝑽𝑬. 𝐎𝐍𝐄, 𝐓𝐖𝐎, 𝐓𝐇𝐑𝐄𝐄, 𝐀𝐍𝐃 𝐅𝐎𝐔𝐑.

𝑷𝑳𝑨𝑻𝑶𝑵𝑰𝑪

𝑺𝑸𝑼𝑨𝑫. 𝐎𝐍𝐄, 𝐓𝐖𝐎, 𝐓𝐇𝐑𝐄𝐄, 𝐀𝐍𝐃 𝐅𝐎𝐔𝐑.

𝑹𝑶𝑶𝑴𝑴𝑨𝑻𝑬𝑺. 𝐎𝐍𝐄, 𝐓𝐖𝐎, 𝐓𝐇𝐑𝐄𝐄, 𝐀𝐍𝐃 𝐅𝐎𝐔𝐑.      

𝑮𝑶𝑶𝑫 𝑰𝑵𝑭𝑳𝑼𝑬𝑵𝑪𝑬. 𝐎𝐍𝐄, 𝐓𝐖𝐎, 𝐓𝐇𝐑𝐄𝐄, 𝐀𝐍𝐃 𝐅𝐎𝐔𝐑.   

𝑩𝑨𝑫 𝑰𝑵𝑭𝑳𝑼𝑬𝑵𝑪𝑬. 𝐎𝐍𝐄, 𝐓𝐖𝐎, 𝐓𝐇𝐑𝐄𝐄, 𝐀𝐍𝐃 𝐅𝐎𝐔𝐑.

𝑩𝑬𝑺𝑻 𝑭𝑹𝑰𝑬𝑵𝑫. 𝐎𝐍𝐄, 𝐓𝐖𝐎, 𝐓𝐇𝐑𝐄𝐄, 𝐀𝐍𝐃 𝐅𝐎𝐔𝐑.

𝑪𝑯𝑰𝑳𝑫𝑯𝑶𝑶𝑫 𝑭𝑹𝑰𝑬𝑵𝑫. 𝐎𝐍𝐄, 𝐓𝐖𝐎, 𝐓𝐇𝐑𝐄𝐄, 𝐀𝐍𝐃 𝐅𝐎𝐔𝐑.

𝑵𝑬𝑮𝑨𝑻𝑰𝑽𝑬

𝑭𝑹𝑰𝑬𝑵𝑫𝑺 𝑻𝑼𝑹𝑵𝑬𝑫 𝑬𝑵𝑬𝑴𝑰𝑬𝑺. 𝐎𝐍𝐄, 𝐓𝐖𝐎, 𝐓𝐇𝐑𝐄𝐄, 𝐀𝐍𝐃 𝐅𝐎𝐔𝐑.

𝑬𝑵𝑬𝑴𝑰𝑬𝑺. 𝐎𝐍𝐄, 𝐓𝐖𝐎, 𝐓𝐇𝐑𝐄𝐄, 𝐀𝐍𝐃 𝐅𝐎𝐔𝐑.

𝑭𝑹𝑬𝑵𝑬𝑴𝑰𝑬𝑺. 𝐎𝐍𝐄, 𝐓𝐖𝐎, 𝐓𝐇𝐑𝐄𝐄, 𝐀𝐍𝐃 𝐅𝐎𝐔𝐑.

if any of these interest you feel free to message me! i have ideas for all of them that i’m always ready to share! also feel free to mix and match any of the plots above a good influence who has an unrequited crush but is also his roommate? sounds like content to me, a friend with benefits turned best friend turned exes on bad terms we love to see it! and if none of these seem interesting to you fill free to check out halle’s wanted connections page!

[briagiovanna]

Just a little background into OC Bria and how she met Giorno.

Bria was a member of Passione, joining when she was very young. Being a natural born stand user, she was assigned to the body guard squad and worked closely with the young Bruno Bucciarati.

She was born to an Indian immigrant mother who had fled after falling pregnant out of wedlock, knowing the implications of what would happen, her mother joined her brother who had already established himself in Rome.

Life would not be kind to Bria's mother though, as it turns out, her brother is heavily tied to the mafia already through his wife, and after Bria was born, her mother started working for them and was relocated to Naples after a few years.

Falling into a life of addiction and prostitution, her mother succumbed to her circumstances when Bria was 12 leaving her to fend for herself as her relatives weren't willing to help much.

She joined the gang soon after her mother's passing to pay off her mother's outstanding drug debts.

She was quite an unkempt child, she had the best intentions though, but didn't care much about her appearance or her life in general before meeting Bruno.

At first, they annoyed each other, her being as brash and rough around the edges as she was, and him being as mild and well put together as he was, they were opposites.

As they worked together and got to know each other though they became very close. What Bruno first perceived as brashness was seen as tenacity now, and what Bria once thought was blandness was now viewed as politeness. They really started appreciating each other's traits and took on more and more missions together.

Her stand ability existed prior to joining Passione, but she developed act 2 of the stand on a mission in which she almost got herself killed to protect Bruno.

They found that they had balanced each other out, and by the time Giorno had entered the gang, they were more like brother and sister, and even shared a house.

When Bruno brought Giorno into the gang, Bri was taken with how handsome the young man was, and by how polite he was. By this time, due to Brunos influence Brias mannerisms had improved, and she started taking care of herself.

In the beginning, she and Giorno spoke every now and again, she was slightly more talkative than he was, having already built warm relationships with the members, and she would make a concerted effort to include Giorno in conversations and activities, knowing from past experiences that loneliness hurts a lot.

Her relationships with the other members of the squad were warm and familial in nature, bonding with Fugo when he tutored her and later Narancia, with Abbacchio she shared her love of classical music. She would have the most cursed conversations with Mista and Narancia, and the three would often annoy Fugo for fun.

During the events of Vento Aureo, she played a large supporting role, and alongside Giorno, made sure that the arrow fell into the correct hands, managing to restrain Diavolo for long enough, almost to her demise.

When she found out that Bruno was in fact gone, she was devastated, inconsolable, and it slightly strained her relationship with Giorno. She felt that because he didn't tell her when he first realised, she was robbed of a chance to properly thank Bruno and say goodbye, but she knew that she was just projecting her feelings of abandonment onto Giorno, not wanting to accept that Bruno had been the one who accepted his fate and had sworn Giorno to secrecy.

Giorno was patient with Bri though and gave her the space to process her grief, looking out for her under the ruse that she was part of his special guard, he accepted her anger, which fizzeled out and just became grief. Bria opened up to him on his 16th birthday, realizing that he was also hurt by what happened, and she felt bad for him, never having celebrated a birthday before, so she bought him a gift and wanted to celebrate with him.

After about 6 months it's revealed that Abbacchio, Bucciarati and Narancia actually did make it, Giorno using his requiem power of resetting damage to zero on their wounds. The trio were being protected in a hidden part of Giorno's villa. Yet again, Bria is furious at the lies, this time she almost attacks Giorno but is restrained by Bruno and Abbacchio in the last second. She storms off being disillusioned by all of them, and goes to her mother's gravesite crying, feeling the same kind of loneliness she felt before joining Bucciarati.

A cloaked Bucciarati goes to talk to her and tries to explain his reasoning, she seems to understand but doesn't seem to forgive anyone.

Soon after she moves out of the house that she and Bucciarati shared and retains her position as Giorno's guard but interacts with everyone only when spoken to, and refers to Giorno only as Don Giovanna, refusing to call him anything else regardless of how much he asked her not to.

After a while of the new dynamic being established, towards April of 2002 Bria is approached by a man who soon claimed to be her father.

She doesn't trust him at all but entertains him pretending to accept his stories, but she actually wants to get to the bottom of why she's being sought out after all this time.

The others are unaware of her plan though, and are visibly worried.

It turns out that he just wanted to extort money from the mafia using her, and when she confronts him, he attacks her and drags her away, but luckily enough, she is saved by Giorno, Abbacchio and Mista after a short period of time.

After that, Giorno and Bria talked about everything, unpacked their feelings about the various things that happened and were inseparable thereafter.

Giorno always sought out her company, and being in his presence was the only place that she felt completely safe. They brought out the best in each other and soon took their relationship to the next level, becoming the power couple to rule Passione with benevolence.

It wouldn't be long before Giorno proposes and they get married on September 30th, 2008.

They end up having 2 children, Giordano (born 10 December 2010) and Gia (born 1 May 2013), who are both stand users as well.

[thesvenqueen]

With All My Love

Rating: M Pairing: Kristanna (as if it would be anything else) Also on AO3

Previous Chapters: (Prologue One Two)

{Chapter 3}

Hours could’ve passed, Anna isn’t sure nor does she care. 

All she knows is the sun has set, on the day and on her future. 

She hasn’t moved from her spot on the bed, curled up on her side as she stares at the wall. Gerda had come by at some point, announcing dinner, but still she didn’t move. Her stomach was in knots, the thought of food made her queasy. More than anything, she wouldn’t be able to sit across from her sister after this. To look at her after what she had done, what she had deemed a necessary deal. 

Her tears have dried now, eyes swollen and puffy from the time spent sobbing into her pillow. The pain still sits deep in her chest, rests heavy on her heart. 

Two months.

Two months and she would no longer be Anna of Arendelle. 

Her identity and life would be stripped away, taken in favor of bettering ties with another kingdom. It may seem to benefit everyone; Arendelle, the Southern Isles, Prince Hans, but not her.

No, this was from a benefit for Anna. This was a robbery.

Robbery of her life, her being, her own self. Everyone else’s opinions had been considered, down to the prince she was set to marry, but not hers. Oh no, her own thoughts were not worthy of such consideration. 

She squeezes her eyes close, no tears left to spare but the memory of “You get no say” makes her ache. 

Queen or not, Elsa had no right to make such an important decision without consulting her, without even asking if she wanted this. 

For months she’d let the decision sit, only giving Anna weeks to prepare for her betroval. Once again, Anna had been deemed unworthy and was last to know of what the future held for her now. 

Sick twist of fate to be born a princess, part of a royal family but be seen as hardly anything at all. Not even family, not even a sister.

Nothing more than a pawn, nothing more than a spare used to benefit the kingdom.

But she was more than that, more than just a spare and a princess to be auctioned away.

She was Anna. 

Though no one seemed to care about that. No one ever did. Even when she was younger, her thoughts and feelings were never considered, always pushed away in favor of others instead. It was always what others deemed best and though her parents claimed to have her best interests at heart, they had a funny way of showing it.

Anna hated history, and had for many years now. She could not despise anything more than having to read over battles from hundreds years past, of political moves made to better kingdoms that no longer existed. What she did want to learn more about was gardening. Wanted to become familiar with the different types of flowers, how and where they grew. Even how to manage growing crops as well, a little dream to grow her own garden some day if not help Gerda in the castle’s own garden. 

She’d voiced her feelings once, only once, as her Father had huffed a laugh at her, giving a speech how she’d benefit more from knowing our past then such commoner things. 

Then there were the languages. French, Latin, all of them really, she never could grasp. They were interesting, sure, but Anna never could manage to master any. Struggling still to even hold a comprehensible conversation with her tutor. Cooking was more of what she wanted to master. The art of making bread, learn how to make tarts with her favorite jam. Create the perfect roast that she could be so ever proud of. 

There had been a time she’d tried to sit with Gerda, to learn with her while she could, but someone had found out about such things. Her parents had been sure to fill her day from beginning to end to make sure she wouldn’t have the time. 

She wanted to read more stories, hear the adventures that were being told across the land, not ones of great war battles. She wanted to ride her horse more for fun and less pointless council meetings that never included her. She wanted so many things, she wanted to be her own self. 

She wanted to be Anna, but she never could be. 

Never would be now. 

Her future was set to continue to be molded and bent into someone she wasn’t, to live as someone else entirely for everyone else’s benefit. Forever told what to do, directed on how and what way, without ever being asked “What is it you want?”. 

This wasn’t living. 

Not even close. 

~.~

What do you want?

~.~

Anna opens her eyes slowly, once more staring blankly at the wall before her. 

There had been one person, only one, to ever ask what she wanted.

Had asked her what she dreamed of, on her thoughts and ideas of everything. Took the time to know her, to question her on her favorite things. Asked why she loved sunflowers so much, where she watched the Northern Lights from, why she loved fairy tales so much. 

Only one person ever truly, really, wanted to hear who Anna was, what she wanted. 

~.~

I don’t know.

You have so many opinions of chocolate, and yet, you can’t tell me what you want?

That’s different.

How? 

I get a say in that. I don’t get a say in what my future will hold. It’s complicated

Nothing complicated about it. It’s your future, you should hold as much say as anyone else.

If only it was that simple.

It is. What is it you want for your future? 

~.~

Dread fills her as she glances to her writing desk, an unanswered letter waiting for her response. 

K had never met her, didn’t even know her name, but took the time and letters to know her, to truly know who Anna was. 

He loved her. Not the molded princess she was for everyone else, but just her. Just Anna. 

Now he would never get to know Anna truly. Never get the chance to meet her, see who she was behind the words on the page. 

They’d never get the chance to meet. 

It was over, finished before it could even begin. 

She sits up then, her stomach twisting at the thought of having to respond to K. To tell him what is to become of her. 

How was she to tell him, the man she loved, that she was destined to another? One that she did not love, did not care for as much as him, and had to leave him behind completely. That this bond was to be broken, never to grow and blossom as Anna had dreamed it could. 

Still wrapped in her comforter, she slides off the bed, slowly making her way to her desk. 

The thought of asking to be friends, to continue to write even with her departure comes to mind but is shaken away. In her heart, Anna knows she could never be just friends with him, that her heart would be with him for the rest of her life. 

Writing to him, countries away, married to another man that wasn’t him would be painful. More so than breaking it all together. A gentle reminder with every letter of what they had, of what they could have been. 

Anna sits in her chair, hands shaking as she looks over the familiar handwriting. 

The Gods were cruel for this, for giving her such a glimmer of happiness to simply snatch it away. She was almost thankful for never seeing K’s face, for now she wouldn’t have to imagine the hurt that would come across it as he read her next letter. 

Her heart clenches at the thought of his pain, matching her own if not more so. The thought of him being completely devastated, hurt over these twisted turn of events brings a sob. 

Truly, she didn’t know what would have happened if they met. Only the idea of finally being able to see who K was, to be able to say to him in person how much he meant to her. Now though, now that chance to see where they could’ve gone is snatched away. 

Anna can’t leave him the dark, knows that what she is about to write will break them both, but it must be done. 

With shaky hands, she grabs her quill and blank parchment, looks down at the blank paper and can’t even think of where to start. The words do not seem to come.

It will be a long letter, she is sure of that. Apologizing over and over of how she regrets this more than anything, how she should have fought harder, been stronger as he told her she was. She thinks she has failed him now. 

She wonders if she should still offer to meet before it all falls apart. If they should have one final moment together face to face before life draws them in separate ways. It will hurt, she knows this, but they still owe it to each other to know who they both truly are. 

To know the face and name behind the years of letters shared. 

That goodbye would be cherished more than one final letter. 

Anna leans her head to her desk, another sob escaping her as she does so. Such a cruel twist of fate this has become. 

If only she’d met him sooner, if only she’d gotten the bravery to do it years before. Who knows where they would be now, if they would be together now formally, this betroval forgotten all together.

If only she had taken that chance. 

A thought comes to Anna then, an idea that seems far out of reach and yet within grasps. She sits up, quill still in hand, but she taps it upon her desk as she thinks.

Yes, yes there was a chance. A chance now that she could take to make amends for what has come. It would be risky, but as Anna thinks it over, the plan coming together so clearly, so vividly now, she sees the risks becoming lower and less so.

She’d need a few days, if that. Gather the essentials to assist in her plan, to make sure to douse any suspiciouns before she went through with it. Play the part just a bit longer.

Yes, Anna thinks, a small smile forming on her face, this could work. 

She looks back to the parchment, taking a breath. 

She’ll do it, she will risk it to be with him. To take that chance of being herself, of taking control of her life. The words come then, confident and sure, and she writes with haste:

K,

I have been informed by my sister that I have been betrothed to another, against my own wishes and desires. I tried to be strong, to fight for myself as you have so often encouraged me to do but she would not budge. It has been decided and agreed upon that in two months time, I shall be married off to another.

You asked me before what I wanted, what I saw for my future. This is not it. I want my own life, a house for myself to cook, to bake, to tend to a garden in the back filled with flowers and all the crops we could manage. Maybe some animals, chickens or ducks as well. I want to be myself and not a person everyone else wants me to be.

More importantly, I see you. I see you in every aspect of my future and I want it. I want that future with you and nothing else. To be able to sit beside you up in the mountains, finally able to see the views you’ve talked so much about. To aid you in your business, make friends with the villagers you know, sit close by the fire in your cabin under a fur blanket.

I want you. 

More than anything, I want to have the chance to have a life with you and I’m willing to risk so much to have that with you. 

I have a plan, one that would only take a few days to set and create but one that I am sure will get me away from here and into your arms. 

All I need, all I ask, is for you to say yes. 

It is a chance, a risk I know but I am willing to do it. I love you more than anything else, more than this life I have here. 

She hesitates, then, Anna sitting back for only a moment to consider her next words carefully. 

If you do not feel the same, if you do not wish to take this chance I would understand. If this letter is the end, if I never hear from you again, I will respect your decision. Just know that these three years, these letters have brought me more comfort than anything or anyone else. You, K, have been the only bright spot in my life and for that, I am forever grateful. 

You have made me better through just your comforting words. 

I will await your response before going further. I love you, more than anything, I love you with all my heart.

With all my love,

A

There is no time to reread the letter, so Anna quickly folds and stuffs the letter into the envelope. She seals, quickly scratches a K onto the front and for a moment just stares.

This was it.

She was giving him a chance, laying her heart on the line for him. Pulling the letter to her chance, she closes her eyes and hopes to God to get the response she yearns for. 

Anna makes quick work getting dressed. She chooses a dark purple day dress, grabbing her black cloak for good measure. She braids her hair, tucks them inside and draws the hood over her head. It is late in the evening now, no one set to be up this hour yet she still moves slowly down the halls to the kitchen. 

She pauses outside the door, listens for any sign of movement just on the other side. But it is still, all quiet in the night and Anna gently turns the knob and pushes the door open. 

It’s empty.

Quickly, she moves to the back door, opening and closing it as softly as she can.

The night air is cool and brisk, sending a chill up her spine. She looks around, checking to be sure that no one was out on the grounds, no guards patrolling the walls. 

Seeing nothing, she darts towards the familiar back corner. 

She slips over the wall, crickets replacing the birds from the day before to greet her as she moves into the forest. 

It’s haunting at first, the darkness within the forest is overwhelming but Anna knows the way. Could walk it blindfolded if needed so she makes it to the familiar Oak in no time. 

She comes up to the trunk, the hole within it’s base just at eye level and stops for a moment. 

Anna looks back to the letter gripped tightly in her hand, then back to the hole. It was high time she took control of her life, she thinks, starting with this. She furrows her brows as she steps forward and places the letter inside.