#thorn specifically but there's no tag for her | Explore Tumblr Posts and Blogs

hottpinkpenguin · 3 months

Note

For event:

Alfie Solomons with

A - “Ask me to stay” + N - not good enough

Please. Thanks

A/n: hiiiiiii, i realized after i wrote it that i got over-excited and forgot the quote (the trope is there though!!) but i like this too much not to post it!

Alfie Solomons X Fem!Reader

Word Count: 2229 Tags: angst, steam, canon-divergence, swearing, misogynistic themes

Alfie Solomons was a man of many vices and few virtues. He’d gone to great pains to ensure that.

Usually this fact was one he lived proudly. He lived violently, lavishly, and with reckless abandon. Spent his money foolishly, shot his pistols carelessly, and slept with women thoughtlessly. This earned him a larger-than-life reputation in Camden Town. It impressed his employees, amused his business partners, and irritated his enemies. Alfie Solomons was a thorn in the side of propriety, and he loved it.

That changed quickly after meeting you.

Alfie wasn’t entirely sure when that change happened - he couldn’t finger a specific moment or blame any particular feeling - but he had realized some time ago that the man he’d spent his entire life growing into was suddenly a hindrance.

And it had never been clearer than now.

“Mr. Solomons, I am not a man prone to jokes or levity, especially in moments as grave as this.” Your father was sitting across from Alfie, his back as straight as a whipping rod, hands splayed on the small kitchen table between them. He was taller than Alfie remembered, with shrewd dark eyes that bored straight into him. The absent smile of regret slid off Alfie’s face when he snapped back into the moment, dragged out of wistful reverie.

“No, n-no sir.” A stutter? Alfie Solomons had never stuttered a day in his life, but here he was, reduced to a stuttering, sheepish shadow of himself in your kitchen. He could hear the slightest creak of a floorboard outside the kitchen door - no doubt you and your three younger sisters listening intently to the near-midnight conversation about your future.

“I must admit, Mr. Solomons, I am utterly perplexed. My daughter is a young woman with no means, very few prospects beyond that which marriage will afford her. It is my understanding that she intends to pursue a life in the church, in fact.” Alfie’s heart froze to solid ice in his chest. A nun? My god, what was this woman doing to him. Alfie Solomons swore silently to himself that he’d die before he saw you don a habit and wimple. The mere sight of that alone would kill him.

“Yes sir, yes, I understand. I understand well.”

Your father’s eyes narrowed as it was rather obvious that Alfie Solomons did not, in fact, understand at all.

“She is a good girl, but plain and modest in both looks, prospects, and background. Surely a man of your… stature-” your father’s voice pressed down on this word with distaste “- would have his pick of eligible brides.”

Alfie stifled a chuckle, recognizing that it would do him no good to appear cocky or dismissive of your father’s concerns. Your father was right on all accounts: Alfie Solomons was a gangster, a womanizer, and a criminal. You, on the other hand, were… well, words failed Alfie when it came to describing you, but to say you were everything that he was not was an understatement of the worst kind.

He settled on what he hoped was an appropriately chaste nod. Your father leaned back slightly in his chair, eyeing his eldest daughter’s apparent suitor with bald antipathy. Alfie wasn’t used to people - especially other men - regarding him so openly. It made him uncomfortable in a manner he was quite unused to, as if he was being truly seen for the first time in a long time. He squirmed slightly in his chair, clearing his throat and fidgeting with the wide-brim of his best hat, something he’d had commissioned specifically for this occasion.

The silence between the two men was widening into a chasm. It was more than you could take. Suddenly unable to stop yourself, you leapt up from the crouch you’d been in for the last half hour, eavesdropping from the stairwell with your mother and younger sisters. You launched down the stairs, despite your sisters grabbing at your nightgown. Your mother gasped as you flung open the kitchen door, almost unseating Alfie in the process. Your kitchen was as modest as your future prospects, and with the three of you crammed into the space it was mighty tight. The added pressure of your nearly-dashed hopes, your father’s broad disappointment, and Alfie’s hopeless attachment to you turned the meager room from cozy to positively stifling.

“Papa, please! I love him! You can’t keep me from him, I won’t let you!”

Childish and painfully simple, not nearly the eloquent protest you’d been mulling over all day. And a lie to boot. If push came to shove - as it so often did with your father - he could very much keep you from marrying Alfie Solomons. Your cheeks reddened in embarrassment at your outburst.

Alfie, for one, thought you’d never looked more perfect. Your eyes sparkled in the dim lamplight, your hair was undone and slung over one shoulder in a lazily constructed braid, small curls breaking free around your temples and forehead. Your skin flushed with the unseasonable warm of the September night in Camden Town, those beautiful pillowy lips he couldn’t get out of his head parted and pink. If he was a coarser man and the situation less important, he felt sure he’d grab you and pull you onto his lap right then and there, bystanders and naysayers be damned.

“Saints above, m’dear, come away and cover yourself!” Your mother had been only a few steps behind you. Unable to step fully into the kitchen, she settled for tugging on your arm. Your blush deepened to a shade of red bordering on purple as you realized you were standing in nothing but a summer-thin nightgown. Alfie’s gaze hadn’t made its way far enough from your face yet to take in the ample expanses of skin on display, but your father was glaring daggers into the opposite wall, his jaw set so tight you wondered his teeth didn’t break.

Appropriately embarrassed, the element of surprise now lost to you, you bowed your head and let your mother tug you out of the kitchen. Your mother - a soft-souled romantic at heart - made gentle soothing motions against your back as silent sobs began to rack through you. You climbed the stairs in a fog, your sisters scattering at your mother’s insistence that ‘the show’s over, girls’. With each step higher, you felt certain that the future you’d imagined for yourself with Alfie was destined to be nothing more than a far-flung dream.

The kitchen had sunk back into a tense silence, however for subtle reasons not quite clear to Alfie, your father seemed infinitely more disquieted by your scene than he’d have expected from the sour old puss. Those gnarled, knobby hands that had, until just a moment ago, been laid out like piles of kindling on the table all evening were suddenly clasped together and fidgety. Your father seemed shorter, his spine bowing under an invisible weight. Against himself, Alfie Solomons found himself leaning forward with a hint of concern.

“Sir? Are you quite alright?”

Your father’s gaze had lost none of its venom, although behind that mask of derision was a spark of emotion.

“How did you manage it, Mr. Solomons?” The question was as quiet as snowfall in winter. Alfie almost had to ask him to repeat it.

“What, sir? Manage what, sir?” More stuttering. Gods be damned, Alfie Solomons was a mess. The image of you bursting into the kitchen, all softness and outrage and girlish desire, had tied him into knots.

“My eldest daughter is many things, Mr. Solomons. A diligent student, a kind voice to her sisters, a steadfast helper to her mother. A pious child of God.” (Alfie struggled to keep himself from breaking into an impish grin, knowing that if your father had any inkling of the enthusiastic midnight rendezvous the two of you indulged in frequently that he most certainly would not dub you pious.) “And a passionate spirit, I confess. Yet… that part of her is… locked away.”

Alfie found himself nodding, his memory dragging him back to the first few weeks of your acquaintance. You’d been all business - all ‘yes, Mr. Solomons’ and ‘right away, sir’. But he’d seen that fire in you, the same fire your father spoke of. It simmered deep in your eyes and bubbled up when you laughed. It had sent Alfie to the brink of madness to come so close to something he wanted so badly and to be denied it. But with diligence, patience, and focus - all virtues that Alfie Solomons had gone to great lengths to rid himself of - he’d finally won you over. He’d finally found that the fire inside you burned wild and free. You were raw and open and unfettered with him now. A gift he’d kill for. Hell, he’d die for it too.

“But not with you, apparently.” Your father’s voice trailed off into quiet. Alfie wondered what he was meant to say. He settled on a noncommittal grunt of agreement.

“How that came to be, I find myself unable to hazard a guess…” Another probing gaze, the kind that made Alfie squirm. “And perhaps I wouldn’t like the answer. In fact, I…” Your father stopped suddenly, clearing his throat and straightening his crisp Sunday jacket. A ridiculously formal choice for the occasion, Alfie thought, although he realized he could hardly cast stones as he looked down at his freshest suit, newest hat, and shiniest shoes. It seemed both of them had understood the importance of this night, and of the things that hung in the balance with their words.

“I am quite shocked to hear myself say this, Mr. Solomons, and I urge you to leave quickly lest I reconsider. But yes. You may marry her.”

Alfie wondered if he’d finally drank himself into madness. This surely was a dream, a whiskey-addled fever dream. He gaped openly at your father, stammering out nothing more than shocked noises.

“You don’t have my blessing, although I won’t stand in your way.”

The door to the kitchen burst open again, and in you came once more, squealing and flying into a pair of outstretched arms. Alfie smiled as your father engulfed you in a surprised hug. You were bouncing on your toes, peppering the side of his freshly shaved face with kisses and earnest expressions of ‘oh thank you Papa! Thank you!’ Alfie was glad to see that you’d thrown on a housecoat and pinned up your hair in a style more akin to what he was used to seeing you wear. He didn’t trust himself around you with that just-woke-from-sleep blush on your lips.

Always trailing behind you, in rushed your three sisters and your mother, exclaiming and clapping their hands as if it were a jubilee. How the entire family - plus Alfie Solomons - managed to fit into that pint-sized kitchen was nothing short of a miracle. Hugs were exchanged, and Alfie kissed so many hands he wasn’t sure who’s high-pitched voice was talking to him anymore.

It wasn’t until he felt your familiar weight balancing on the toes of his boots that he felt himself begin to swim into reality. Without thinking, he wrapped his arms around you tightly, lifting you up off your feet into his embrace. You squeaked with joy, your soft hands finding their way to frame his face. Tossing all rules of propriety to the wind, your lips connected with his in a defiant, joyful, and soft kiss. You were warm under Alfie’s hands, and he was glad that no one but you could hear the groan of need he let loose as he tasted you on his tongue. For a moment, he let himself lose time in your mouth, hands resisting the urge to roam across your backside and around the swell of your hips.

A pointed throat cleared, bringing Alfie Solomons down from the high.

“As I suggested, Mr. Solomons, a timely exit would be a wise decision.”

Despite his generally somber countenance, Alfie could detect the faintest note of happiness in your father’s words. A confident declaration you’d made earlier that week drifted back to Alfie: Papa loves me, Alfie. He’ll have no choice but to say yes when he sees how in love we are.

Alfie hadn’t believed a word of that back then, but he was grateful for your prescience. With a broad smile and a swelling heart, Alfie nodded graciously to your mother, sisters, father, and lastly to you, his bride-to-be, before making his exit. He donned his cap on the front steps outside your door, not minding the oppressive warmth of a sticky night even under his three layers of wool suit.

You stepped halfway out the door to wave shyly as Alfie retreated into the night, his feet barely touching the pavement beneath. He turned back more times than he could count to see you still standing there, bathed in the streetlamp’s light. He rounded the corner at the end of your street with the warm realization that, in a few weeks time, there’d be no more goodbyes from front stoops between the two of you. Only goodnight kisses - likely much more than that, if Alfie had any say at all - as one of you would turn down the bedside lamp, turning off the light on another happy day together in a future neither of you were sure would ever come to be…

#peaky blinders requests #peaky blinders imagine #peaky blinders fanfic #alfie solomons requests #alfie solomons fanfic #alfie solomons imagine #alfie solomons #alfie solomons x you #alfie solomons x reader #alfie solomons x y/n #tom hardy x reader #tom hardy x you #tom hardy x y/n

126 notes · View notes

gh0st-author · 6 months

Text

dress.

pairing: William James Moriarty x reader summary: Oh, tempting William was so deliciously amusing for you to do. To kindle the flame you knew was dancing behind his eyes, to fuel it in its confines and observe him attempting to conceal it and thaw it out.

tags: fluff, very suggestive (nothing explicit but it is heated)

warnings: as i said it is very suggestive, they also unalive a nobleman

A/N: so this wasn't originally meant to be posted, it was just something in my drafts, but since it happened to be William's birthday today i thought i might as well finish it. so happy birthday Liam here's your cake

Another glance in his direction, across the crowded hall. Another hidden smile from him. You knew you shouldn't; this game you were playing was too perilous, too dangerous. You weren't supposed to goad William like this. But you simply couldn't resist. Usually, you or Albert were the ones who found themselves at these events, because as the oldest brother he had too keep up the appearances most often, but this night was different. Tonight, William was present as well. He was right beside his brother, a picture-perfect gentleman, charming and captivating. It was an incredibly rare occurrence as he preferred to work behind the scenes, not really drawing attention to himself more than necessary. And unlucky for you, all your attention happened to be on him tonight, despite the risk of it endangering the mission. But it was too addicting. The music too sensual. The candlelight too dim. The perfumes too intoxicating. And the game you presented him with too enjoyable. Another taste of your wine. Another brush of his gaze. You needed to make sure that no one was the wiser to the desperation building beneath your skin. You were dancing around an open flame, stretching out your body above it, hoping to not get incarcerated by the proximity. Still, you couldn't be blamed, it was so rare for you to see your lover adorned so dashingly.

It was all subtle. Your glass against your lips. Your tongue lightly catching the droplets soaking them. His intense glance catching the act. And it was fun, so incredibly amusing to for once toy with him like this given the chance, to slowly gnaw away at his immaculate control that he prided himself on so and wore like a mask. You still remembered the words you whispered to him in the darkness of your bedroom earlier today, the memory of them flashing through your mind making your lips stretch into a devious grin. This is a secret, but my gown for tonight... it was bought specifically with you in mind. Much more than wearing it, I am anticipating what you will do with it later tonight after we return. You could still feel the tremble that raced down William's spine, could still hear his low, tortured groan and uneven whisper of: Do not tempt me, darling. Being aware of the effect you had on your lover and feeling the desire simmering between you too was heady, to say the least.

Alas, no matter how much you wanted to give into your desires, you were a performer, both for him and for the Lord you were tasked with distracting tonight. And a performer had to play her role outstandingly. Your secret moments and glances would have to stay just that— secret. For no one could know you were affiliated with him. You were just another face in the crowd, an unassuming bejeweled rose without thorns. These glimmering banquets were your battlefield, your wit and your charm your weapons, which you brandished flawlessly with every new job you were assigned by the brothers. Meeting William and working with him only served to hone them more— a simple touch here, a sweet whisper there, and your targets were putty under your fingers, ready to follow you wherever you wished. Which usually happened to be their untimely but deserved demise at the hands of you or one of the others from the group. And for as long as they and William had any use of you, you would continue to play your part in their plans without a fault.

Deciding against continuing this game between you two for now, you downed your glass and set out to find your target— Lord Brownlow. He was a local aristocrat rumored to kidnap young ladies from such events and traffic them on the black market. In other words, a perfect target to be bewitched and disposed of by you. After a quick search, you found him, surrounded by numerous important individuals. Even from where you were standing you could see his false smiles and his calculating glances to the women around him. Your act already in place, you sauntered over to him, gown swaying with your movements, your practiced smile of awe and admiration plastered on your face. "Lord Brownlow, a pleasure to meet you."

You were a novelty, a new interesting toy for him to play with. The conversation flowed from your lips effortlessly, each word a careful trap meant to ensnare the Lord's attention, to keep him guessing and wanting more. Each move a thought-out maneuver to entice him and cloud his judgment. You listened to his stories attentively, smiled and nodded when expected, and stroked his ego when he so wished. And what an ego he had. He was so filled to the brim with his own self-importance that he steered you around forcing you into a conversation with any noble he could, no doubt to brag about his own status and to show off how well off he was. Still, you participated beautifully, never letting your true nature show.

After who knows what number of nobles, he turned to you, still keen on continuing. "Do you mind if I introduce you to another one of my acquaintances?

You smiled at him mindlessly, feigned admiration painted across your features. As if you were truly interested in anything he had to say, hanging onto his every word. "None at all, Lord Brownlow. Please, lead the way."

Pleased with your apparent high regard for him and your respect, he hurriedly led you through the throngs of people, seeking out the aforementioned noble. Your gaze darted around, attempting to pinpoint the person in question. Only when his gait hastened with renewed purpose, having found who he was searching for, did you manage to catch a glimpse of the man that had caught his eye.

And...

Oh, well, who would've thought? It seemed that tonight was indeed your lucky night, for he was leading you straight to the object of your obsession tonight. You briefly considered the possibility of William having arranged this beforehand, but the look of delighted surprise on his face as you and the Lord neared him convinced you otherwise. So, a lucky coincidence it seemed. Or a fate-given opportunity? No, of course not. Even though it might not have been planned for him and the Lord to converse like this, it was far from a coincidence. You knew William and him were acquainted, but by the genuine eagerness with which Lord Brownlow was leading you to him, it seemed as if William took the phrase 'keep your friends close; keep your enemies closer' quite literally. Always aligning and governing his pawns, that cunning mind of his.

The Lord halted right in front of him, proudly puffing out his chest. No doubt, hoping to impress you with his arsenal of connections— with his importance. "This is Lord William Moriarty. Second son of the deceased Earl Moriarty. We met a short while ago and happened to become quite familiar with each other."

William turned to regard you fully, his scarlet gaze bright but betraying nothing. As you stood before him like this, you felt weirdly exposed, despite the opulent gown— or maybe exactly because of it. You arrived separately so as to not raise any suspicion so he didn't have the chance to admire you from up close. His face was a perfect polite mask, but you knew he was drinking up your visage like a man starved. Everywhere his gaze touched burned so pleasurably you never wished for it to stop. In fact, all of this silence and patience, waiting and pining in anticipation, made you more eager— made you crave more. You wanted him to trace wherever he looked with his hands, his lips. Your own hands were shaking from holding back from touching him.

Acting like the perfect pawn you were, you buried your need deep beneath your vast experience in lying and deceit, using it as a cover to dampen the inferno in you, and held out your hand courteously for him to kiss. Not a trace of a woman currently longing, yearning, craving. "I don't believe we have been acquainted, Lord Moriarty."

Never taking his eyes off yours, he raised your hand to his lips, leaving it there much longer than necessary. The kiss was almost a promise— or a threat. You weren't sure which. "Indeed we are not, I would have remembered a woman as stunning as you are."

You fought your instinctive pull to draw closer to him, to see just how close you could slot your body against his. To get lost in his knowing gaze. Instead, you chose to slowly pull your hand away and giggle behind it. "Oh, you flatter me, my Lord. I am sure someone of your caliber has ample choice of ladies aiming for your attention."

The smile he gave you was pure serpentine curling of the lips, the look in his eyes pure hunter regarding his prey. "I assure you, my attentions lay elsewhere."

My attention is only on you, his look seemed to say. Your heart stuttered in your chest, beating so loud you were afraid he and Lord Brownlow could hear it. So careful. They had to be so incredibly careful. They were threading a fine line, one misstep and it could all come crashing down around them.

"His attention is only always focused on his work, he never entertains the women around him." Lord Brownlow sighed, seemingly unaware of the building tension between you and William. A perfect figure of an older gentleman concerned for the youth, as if he was giving sound advice out of genuine benevolence. "Honestly, Lord Moriarty, you should follow your older brother's example. Now, Lord Albert knows how to entertain a lady. It's not a good idea for a noble gentleman such as yourself to always keep his head in the books."

William diverted his attention from you to the Lord, chuckling gently as if this entire meeting was just a pleasant interaction. A born noble navigating the labyrinth of high society magnificently. The irony was not lost on you. "I will keep your words in mind, Lord Brownlow."

It was getting harder and harder to keep focused with him so close, yet thoroughly out of reach. It was due time for you to leave and initiate the next phase of the plan. Deciding that one last stunt was in order, you grabbed your target's hand, feigning interest in him, but you were only looking at the man in front of you. "Lord Brownlow, I am sure Lord Moriarty knows how to entertain himself. What do you say we make our way to the dance floor." You ran your hand down the front of your dress as if showing it off, but in truth, you drew attention to the way the corset hugged your curves. "After all, I just bought this dress today, it would be a shame for me to wear it and not be seen dancing in it."

It was a momentary weakness, a flash of that fire in his eyes gone instantaneously, almost as fast as it appeared. Oh, he looked so composed yet his self-control was frying at the edges, unraveling thread by thread with each passing moment. He, too, played his role of a respectable noble magnificently, only the slight sharpening of his gaze and an almost imperceptible sly curling of his lips betraying his rapidly waning restraint.

You offered him your most innocent smile. "Please excuse us, Lord Moriarty." Your words were the sweetest nectar, a saccharine phrase dipped in venom. Another one of your baits successfully eaten, another one of your hooks digging into flesh. You suppressed your giggle as you gave a parting bow and pivoted to twine through the dense crowd with Lord Brownlow, embracing him and slotting yourself into a waltzing position. Oh, tempting William was so deliciously amusing for you to do. To kindle the flame you knew was dancing behind his eyes, to fuel it in its confines and observe him attempting to conceal it and thaw it out. Once again, this game you were playing was dangerous, but you were addicted to the thrill, and you suspected he was as well if the looks he was throwing your way as you glided around the room were any indication.

You felt his eyes on you even as you danced, gossamer and silk flowing around you in mesmerizing patterns. Even as you coyly slipped the slow-acting poison in the Lord's drink while no one was looking. Even as you silently snuck out of the room, vanishing as a phantom, before it took effect. You wouldn't be present when it all happened. A ghost, a shadow, leaving no trace behind. Exactly as William wanted.

Only when you finally arrived at their manor, obscured by the inky darkness of the night, did you let yourself breathe. The still air of your and William's bedroom greeted you pleasantly and you slowly made your way in, haphazardly discarding your numerous jewellery on the desk nearby along the way. Your body was still thrumming with adrenaline from a successful mission, but even more than that it was brimming with something deeper— more desperate. William and Albert would soon return to the estate now that the ball had been interrupted, and the fire that you had been suppressing the entire night threatened to burst out. You had no doubts he felt the same. The fun dance you two have been trapped in the entire night has finally reached its conclusion. The most delightful reward or the most delicious punishment— you wonder which one awaited you upon his arrival.

After what felt like an eternity, slow footsteps sounded in the hallway, unmistakably making their destination known, and the door creaked open almost soundlessly. Your spine tingled as he entered the room, yet you didn't spare him a glance, pretending to busy yourself with removing the accessories from your hair. "I assume everything went according to plan?"

His answering chuckle was accompanied by the rustle of clothes as he discarded his suit jacket. "Everything unfolded beautifully. No one seems to understand how the poison ended up in poor Lord Brownlow's drink." He threw you a conspiratorial grin. "After all, they were all too preoccupied later by the documents a servant managed to uncover in his room, detailing all his atrocities."

You nodded. The tension in the room was palpable, but neither of you wanted to interrupt this tentative stalemate you found yourself in. You were both content to wait the other out— another quick round of your game, this one much shorter and much less torturous. Only when the last accessory left your hair, the mass of it unraveling down your back, did you glance in his direction. "I seem to require some assistance with my dress"

With one hand you threw your hair over your shoulder, body trembling with anticipation as he leisurely made his way to you. It was almost agonizing really, the unhurried way in which his hands traced your arms and shoulder blades down to the corset, leaving in their wake a sea of goosebumps. His lips ghosted over the skin of your neck. "You looked ravishing tonight. I didn't have the opportunity to tell you sooner." His fingers made quick work of the lace and countless hidden clasps and buttons of your corset. "That was quite an ordeal you pulled."

You laughed, a little breathless. "Don't speak as if you didn't enjoy it."

William's lips pulled into a grin, lightly nipping your skin. "You wicked thing, I'm inclined to believe you enjoy tormenting me."

You gasped, leaning back closer to him. "Is it truly torment if I give you exactly what I promised?"

"After the torture you put me through I think I deserve at least some recompense for your actions." As you felt the dress slip from your shoulders, silky fabric sliding down and pooling around your feet, his lips caressed the skin of your shoulder. "And I must say the reward for my patience will be worthwhile indeed."

Delightful reward it was for tonight it seemed.

#moriarty the patriot #mtp william #mtp x reader #william james moriarty #william moriarty x reader #yuukoku no moriarty #william moriarty #yuumori #ynm #william james moriarty x reader #mtp

186 notes · View notes

mysticstarlightduck · 4 months

Text

Late Writeblr Intro!

Hello, friends!

I figured it was about time I made an actual blog intro of my own since I forgot to make one when I started this blog last year. Better late than never, lmao!

Pls, reblog, like, and/or reply to help boost the blog! 💕

Let's get started:

Personal Stuff! 💜🩶🖤

My name is Anna/Anya but you can call me Mystic, Ducky, or just Anya on this blog! My personal nickname is Ani and I adore it (:

I am an Asexual woman (my pronouns are she/her!) and I'm also personally an atheist who puts my faith in the spirits of Mother Nature, though I respect all other religions equally!

I'm Gen Z and Latina (Brazilian). I was raised bilingual (Brazilian Portuguese + English) and I love learning languages - currently, I'm working on learning French and Spanish! Career-wise I am studying in college to become a character designer and hopefully animator, as I want to pursue a career as an artist and writer! I also wish to have my WIPs published in the near future (:

Some fun facts about me!

My favorite shows are Critical Role, Game of Thrones, Castlevania, The Legend of Vox Machina (animated series), Star Wars, Voltron, The Dragon Prince, Avatar the Last Airbender, Legend of Korra, and DC Comics content, as well as many more lmao. I love watching movies and series!

My favorite Vox Machina characters are Vax'ildan and Percy (:

I am a younger sister 💖

My hair is short and curly (pixie style, similar to the haircut Rapunzel has at the end of the Tangled movie!)

I adore listening to music, especially songs that can inspire me to write my WIPs! Playlists are a huge part of my writing process and something I really enjoy making.

I'm currently rereading Shadow and Bone (+ Six of Crows) and I am always looking for more good dark fantasy/historical fantasy books to read so book recs are always welcome! I also am a huge fan of the Percy Jackson series and Trials of Apollo (by Rick Riordan), though I'm usually more of a gritty/dark fantasy fan (like Game of Thrones)!

I have three dogs and two cats!😺🐶

I know how to play the piano, though I haven't done that in a while because things have been chaotic for me, but I'd like to start playing regularly again in my winter vacation.

I have worn glasses since I was 5 years old and have terrible eyesight without them (and some days with them, lol, so bear with me).

My friends and I are doing a DnD campaign every Sunday, where I play as a half-elf rogue named Aeryn (he/him). I'm adoring this adventure so far, it's so fun!!!

I love to bake and am rather good at it, but am a painfully average cook lmao (some specific recipes I make are actually rlly good, but it depends a lot on my mood and the 'alignment of the stars' lol)

I want to learn how to knit/crochet! 🧶

I'm a theater nerd and love musicals (:

About my Writing!🏹⌛

I write fictional works mostly in the genre of fantasy (high fantasy/epic fantasy/dark fantasy/historical fantasy/urban fantasy, etc. You name it!) and science fiction (space opera/cyberpunk/superhero, etc).

My works usually revolve around themes such as epic quests, secrets, adventure, rebels fighting an oppressive system, sibling bonds, acceptance/respect, outcasts, and much, much more! I love fluff and whump equally, and though my stories tend to focus on serious topics (or at least darker/heavier themes) within a fantasy/sci-fi setting, I like to have a good bit of humor, lighthearted fun, and comedy to my stories to lighten up the mood!

My main WIPs:

Song of Thorns

🌹WIP Intro: (here)🌹

Genre: dark fantasy, medieval fantasy, adventure/mystery, dark fairytale, eldritch horror (mild)

Style: Standalone (possible Trilogy)

Tags: #wip song of thorns #song of thorns

Short Summary/About: "A peasant girl moves with her siblings from her struggling seaside village to the kingdom's glittering floating capital, but after her older brother is kidnapped, she ends up discovering the dark, bloody secrets hiding behind the long-lasting royal family of the town and must team up with a young dhampir thief, the exiled prince, and a lonely druid girl to save the dying kingdom from this web of lies".

Supernova Initiative

🎇WIP Intro: (here) 🎇

Genre: space opera, adventure, exploration, laboratory whump, heist, thriller/mystery

Style: Episodic book series with an overarching plot (each chapter/group of chapters equivalent to an episode in a TV series)

Tags: #wip supernova initiative #supernova initiative

Short Summary/About: "A young intergalactic thief and his crew are captured after a heist gone wrong and forced to accept a strange deal - complete a mission for the Junction, retrieve important missing files, and get their freedom back. All the while that is happening, Jack Tithus, the protagonist, finds himself trapped as a test subject to an immoral, and elusive, man known as the Director."

Enchanted Illusions

💀 WIP Intro: (here)💀

Genre: Victorian fantasy, adventure, mystery, gothic fantasy, dark fantasy, crime-solving

Style: Possibly a trilogy

Tags: #wip enchanted illusions, #enchanted illusions

Short Summary/About: "On a magical setting inspired by Victorian times, a group of strangers and outcasts must work together to thwart a powerful secret organization and stop a murder spree that could lead to another civil war between myths and humans."

Of Starlight and Beasts

✨⚔️WIP Intro: (here)⚔️✨

Genre: medieval fantasy, epic fantasy, adventure/quest, dark fairytale, sword and sorcery, prophecies

Style: Book Series

Tags: #wip of starlight and beasts, #enchanted illusions

Short Summary/About: "A young knight in training and an amnesiac star mage embark on a quest to prevent an ancient prophecy from coming to fruition as a vengeful sorceress queen's army marches relentlessly onto their land with the intent to destroy all their kingdom has built."

The Last Wrath

🔥⚔️WIP Intro: to be made...⚔️🔥

Genre: dark fantasy, warfare, political intrigue, espionage, adventure/quest, medieval fantasy, whump

Style: Book Series (currently on hiatus)

Tags: #wip the last wrath, #the last wrath

Short Summary/About: "In a land torn by an ancient war between two sides of a continent, a mageborn girl finds herself trapped amid the bloodshed after her past comes back to haunt her and her family. Now, stopping the war may be the only chance she still has to survive."

Tales of Wilted Flowers

🥀WIP Intro: to be made...🪻

Genre: RPG-inspired fantasy, high fantasy, adventure, fairytale, epic quest, heist story, whump, light fantasy

Style: Trilogy (currently on hiatus)

Tags: #wip tales of wilted flowers #tales of wilted flowers

Short Summary/About - "A group of youths rejected and betrayed by society in many different ways come together due to unexpected circumstances and must rely on each other to prevent the kingdom's corrupt Head Sorcerer and the King from reviving an ancient evil."

Realms of Loss

🍂WIP Intro: (here)🍂

Genre: dark fantasy, warfare, medieval fantasy, high fantasy, ancient times fantasy, Viking-inspired, prophecies & curses

Style: Book Series (currently on hiatus)

Tags: #wip realms of loss #realms of loss

Short Summary/About - "In a continent destroyed by the fall of the Old Gods, and trapped in an endless toil for survival, a cocky young prince discovers his role in an ancient prophecy after his brother, the King, is murdered and assassins come for him too. Running away into the forsaken land beyond the walls of his kingdom, he'll have to learn to be a leader and save his people as a dead, murderous God awakens."

Mutant Inquiries/Open Secret Files

🤖 WIP Intro: to be made..🤖

Genre: superhero, cyberpunk, futuristic, dystopian, science fiction, urban fantasy

Style: Episodic Series, still in development

Tags: #wip mutant inquiries #wip open secret files #mutant inquiries #open secret files

Short Summary/About: "In a dystopian, high-tech future, a group of mutant teenagers become vigilantes and crime fighters to rebel against the oppressive government regime and survive their crime-ridden city."

I have a few other smaller-scale WIPs I occasionally, less frequently work on, such as Lies Untold and Jade Ruins, but those up above are the main ones that I wish to publish. I've also got a big, secret extra WIP I'm working on for fun and will share it with you guys soon!

#writers on tumblr #writers #writeblr intro #blog intro #wip intro #writeblr #writing #writerblr #my wips #character writing #writing community #writers of tumblr

111 notes · View notes

sexcromancy · 7 months

Text

young adult, new adult, and fantasy fiction: the audience of a book is who reads it

title clumsily based on the purpose of a system is what it does.

before we begin, I want to focus a bit on defining our terms. young adult, new adult, adult, science fiction/fantasy, speculative fiction, contemporary romance - all of the terms I will use in this post are created by marketing companies and readers, and all of them have fuzzy and subjective applicability to any given book. there is no objectivity in cataloging, which is the lens through which I approach knowledge organization projects like this. there is no definitive answer to what any given book or genre "is", because these categories are not fixed values. instead, their values are expanded and developed by what gets placed in which category, by whom, and what criteria they base that decision on. that's what I want to discuss.

to provide some context: debates over age categories and who is reading what books for which age ranges currently dominate discussions among publishers, authors, librarians, and readers. ages of characters in YA are skewing up, sales are slowing down. young adult as a category has existed for 50+ years, but it is currently undergoing some growing pains. here's one more article for good measure. new adult is a term created by the publishing industry in 2009, which developed in fits and starts despite multiple bestselling authors publishing under the category. oh well. in 2015, sarah j mass published her new book, a court of thorns and roses, which is widely regarded as a turning point for the popularity of new adult (more on the classification of ACOTAR itself in a moment). NA stalled out for many years, but has recently very quickly grown in popularity, especially for romance readers on booktok. some of the most popular books listed under new adult on goodreads are colleen hoover's it ends with us and it starts with us, ali hazelwood's check & mate, and rebecca yarros' fourth wing.

I want to look at two of these currently very popular authors as case studies to really dig into what new adult has come to mean.

in this 2014 interview, SJM discusses her currently running throne of glass series and the upcoming release of ACOTAR in 2015. she notes that the book is intended for "a slightly older YA crowd (aka steamy times ahead!)". earlier in the interview, she dodges a question about whether throne of glass will be YA or NA by saying she appreciates her teen and adult readers - if I had to guess, the label was still too new and publishers didn't want to alienate anyone. in 2023, I can't find anything on her website or bookseller sites that specifically identify the series (or any of her series) as YA, NA, or adult. however, Goodreads (which relies on user generated tags and is, to put it lightly, a mess wrt information organization) firmly classes ACOTAR as YA - almost 9k tags in young-adult and ya (lack of authority control is just one aspect of the mess), as opposed to about 3.5k new-adult. the thing is, though, ACOTAR comes up in essentially every blog post and article I read on the definition of new adult. it is a flashpoint in the discussion: it either did or didn't restart the term, it is or isn't too sexually explicit to be classed for teens, the writing is filled with young adult tropes and this does or does not matter. the answers to these questions aren't particularly important to me, but it's very interesting to see how people are attempting to draw those boundaries. I took a quick census of how SJM's series are classed in my library system. her throne of glass series is uniformly shelved in YA; ACOTAR is mostly YA with a few copies in adult, and her newer crescent city series is mostly adult with a few copies in YA. I do think that any discussion of ACOTAR is partially colored by this divisive relationship to the new adult category itself, so I'd also like to bring in a much newer book facing similar conversation.

if you follow this blog you might already know that I have an entirely non-neutral relationship to ali hazelwood; I love her books both as books and as cultural objects deserving of study. previously, she published three adult romance novels and a set of adult romance novellas, which all fall firmly and inarguably into those defined categories, based on age range and content (I have an argument for the love hypothesis being a horror story, but that's a different conversation). last year, she published her newest book, check & mate, as a young adult romance. it was widely marketed as such by the young readers imprint at putnam. however, on reading it, I (and many goodreads commenters) were surprised to find that it aligned more with some hallmarks of new adult. the characters are out of high school, and the challenges and growth moments are more focused on evolution, rather than coming of age. one blog post I read made the argument that YA is about high school firsts and NA is about adulthood firsts. this is amorphous, partially because there is no real one life path into adulthood by which to judge this, so let's switch focus to something more concrete: sex. in each of Ali's adult novels, there are a few explicit sex scenes. they're not as explicit as other romance novels, but they're definitely not fade-to-black. in check & mate, characters have sex, but it happens entirely off-screen and any discussion is fairly chaste or, at most, relying heavily on implied content. this is a real disconnect to me. much of NA lit (ACOTAR included) is quite sexually explicit. among those most popular NA books on goodreads, there are many books that get marketed specifically for their sexual content (spicy🌶️ to the tiktokers, smut to everyone else). to me, this cements check & mate as a YA novel - if she was going to write a book with explicit sex, like her others, she could've. she's mentioned in interviews that her chess novel concept originally featured older characters, and she aged them down once she realized what kind of story she wanted to tell. to me, it is telling that moving from adult to YA creates more clumsy caution around the handling of sex, as opposed to SJM, whose books "aged" upwards over time.

another interesting example I've noticed in the emerging NA space is how the age category intersects with genre. YA as a category has a pretty expansive genre playing field - we've all read YA fantasy, contemporary romance, historical fiction, action/adventure, issue novels, etc. NA so far seems pretty exclusively limited to romance as a main focus, especially in the most popular offerings as discussed above.

I've seen many a tiktok alleging that despite the drawn out fight scenes, extensive lore, and huge interconnected web of characters, the ACOTAR books are not "real fantasy." even more so for the fourth wing books. I've seen these books compared to Tolkien, as if to say, well, if you didn't invent a language, you're not really on the same level. that's entirely unfair, imo - plenty of fantasy doesn't engage at that level. but there is a wide array of contemporary fantasy I do think we can contrast with ACOTAR and other popular NA series.

we've discussed some of the hallmarks of YA and NA as categories: the age range of characters, coming of age, explicit sex for NA. i'd add fast-paced, immersive writing, especially in first person or close third, because so much of the appeal described on booktok is a book sucking you in completely. now, i want to bring up a few books that, on the surface, might check several of these boxes: dune by frank herbert has an 18yo protagonist, and the first book is very much a coming of age story. eragon (christopher paolini) and the name of the wind (patrick rothfuss) focus on a young person coming into their magical abilities through school/mentorship, a similar setting to many YA series. mistborn (brandon sanderson) and game of thrones (george r.r. martin) both have prominent protagonists that are 18 or younger when the story starts. of all these series, only eragon has young-adult as its most popular age-related tag on goodreads, and eragon was, at the time of release, very specifically marketed to and shelved in young adult in bookstores and libraries. some of these books have explicit or non-explicit sexual content, but only GOT has even close to as much as your average NA novel (to my knowledge).

i am not alleging that any of these books should be classed as YA, necessarily. but the glaring difference in their marketing and readership does point to one thing: these books are largely about men, and they are all written by men. i am not the first person to point out this gender gap in fantasy writing, and i don't have anything particularly new to say about it, except to bring it back around to my original point. none of these novels "are" adult fiction, and plenty (plenty!) of teenagers read them, in an interesting reversal of the trends in YA. who is making the decisions about where these books go, and why? what can we draw out about the books and their marketing? how is the future of "adult fantasy" shaped when these are the benchmarks by which we measure new entries?

i did also look into a few of my own favorite sci-fi series by women to see how they ranked by similar parameters. parable of the sower by octavia butler, featuring an 18yo protagonist and sexual content, has no age category at all in the top 20 most popular goodreads tags. it's in adult fiction in every library in my system that owns a copy. ive seen gideon the ninth (18yo protag, and yeah lets go ahead and say explicit sexual content) on YA shelves in bookstores, but its adult tag on goodreads is more popular, and almost every library in my system has it in adult. in my opinion, these books are important in rejecting the "women write YA, men write adult" narrative around speculative fiction, but they're not necessarily an exception to a different trend. it is not difficult for me to think of more adult scifi/fantasy books by women, because i actively seek them out. however, almost every single one of them has a protagonist under 25, as is the case with so much of the adult fantasy written by men listed above. last year, i read the adventures of amina al-sirafi, by s.a. chakrabotry, which was (i believe) the first non-contemporary/realistic fiction book ive ever read with a middle aged mother as the main protagonist. the book club at my library branch, mainly composed of middle aged and older women, read it, and expressed such genuine joy and excitement over a fantastic, adventurous book featuring a woman they saw themselves in. representation really does matter, and it matters to everyone, not just young people. but that's a different soapbox.

young readers are extremely picky. i've watched many a teenager (or younger) browse the YA section and turn up their noses at books with a cringey cover, an overly dramatic blurb, or just because. marketing books to teens is hard. booktok is an incredibly powerful marketing tool and divisive social force. it skyrockets an author one day and by the next week, other accounts are tearing that same author to shreds. in this environment, its no surprise that the sensationalized books - extremely good or extremely bad, blatantly sexual, shocking, consumable - become flashpoints of discussion. who should be reading ya? who is it for? what is inappropriate for young teenagers to read? what is inappropriate for adults to read? i think about these topics a lot, especially as what the publishing industry terms a "gatekeeper" - i'm a children's librarian; i control the access teenagers in my community have to these books. i take that role seriously, and i want to be thinking deeply about the books i put in my YA section and who will read them. our decisions, about where we class books, how we label and present them, how we discuss them: that is part of what dictates what genre and age classification a book "is", in addition to marketing.

#okay.... been working on this on and off for months but im finally fucking finishing and posting an essaY!!!!#2k words on genre classification lfggggg #please let me know what you think.... very open to thoughts esp from people who read these areas !!!!#ok to reblog btw :>#frames

102 notes · View notes

lillythecoolest · 10 months

Text

Random Omori x Reader hcs! (Post Mari Accident)

Warnings: Death

Trying new content!

•Sunny isn’t very used to having parters. You might even be his first partner! He might not express it verbally, but he loves you very much. You’re probably the person he’s the closest too. He loves to get hugs, please give him hugs. Even though he doesn’t ask, he’s probably too scared to ask. He only likes affection from you, though. Remind him of Mari, but ofc not in the sibling way. Ew. But anyways, he tries his best to comfort you when you need it. Even if he needs it more. Sometimes he’ll invite you to go out with him and have picnics at Mari’s grave. Just reassure him you love him, he needs it.

•I’m not sure how you got Basil to warm up to you, but once you as him out you’re now his comfort person. You and Polly of course. He loves nose kisses, actually any kinds of kisses, no matter how red it makes his cheeks go. He also likes laying under trees with you, sitting in the sun until he falls asleep. He’s honestly an angel to you, dedicating a specific section of his garden to you.

•Dating Hero is very bittersweet, so be gentle with him. He tries as hard as he can to make sure you know he loves you, because he feels like he didn’t reassure Mari how much he loved her. He doesn’t talk about Mari much, but when he does it’s usually of his past memories with her. But other than Mari, he is the sweetest man ever! He does everything for you, even un-needed things. He’s very romantic, cooking you dinner and even teaming up with Basil to give you flowers.

•Kel is imperfect, but he’s all you could ever want! He’d love to play basketball with you, and if you don’t play he’d teach you! He’s very chaotic, sometimes almost burning his house down from trying to boil water. But he’s well meaning of course! He’s always got his arm wrapped around your shoulders, and brags to his friends about you. He’s one of those people that tries to do something smooth like handing you a rose, but he’ll accidentally cut his fingers with the thorns.

•Aubrey was difficult to warm up to, but once you did, she never let go of you. She always tags along with you or makes you tag along with her. She’d rather not tell anyone, but if anyone finds out she’d probably threaten whoever exposed it. She might not say much, but she really loves you. She doesn’t talk about Mari much because she thinks it makes her look weak, but if she ever does your relationship would only get stronger.

•Mari too because why not! She’s very sweet to you, always trying pick up lines but ultimately failing. If you go to see her and Sunny’s performances she’d be so thankful! She loves to kiss you aswell, and she also loves bantering while at picnics.

#omori x reader #omori hero #omori sunny #omori basil #omori kel #omori aubrey #omori mari #sunny x reader #basil x reader #hero x reader #kel x reader #aubrey x reader #mari x reader #lillythecoolest

199 notes · View notes

elegantsplendour · 1 year

Text

Of Blossom and Betrayal

Summary:

AU: Green victory, the realm called for a new queen after Queen Helena's demise

Seraphina Tyrell did not belong to the worldly realm of Westeros; a lone child conceived of loyalty, love and devotion. A beacon like her attracts the darkest of souls, in the darkest of times.

💌 Aegon II Targaryen and Aemond Targaryen

Warnings: manipulation, abuse of power, mentions of rape, slight underage, dub con, violence. Specific warnings will be added at the beginnings of each chapter.

Cast

Chapter 1

Prologue: Highgarden

Tag list: @purple-writer8 @vhagarswar @femmechaotic

Other friends: @boundlessfantasy @arcielee @qyburnsghost

Let me know if you want to be added to the tag list!

Lord Lyonel Tyrell was a man of honour, loyalty and vigilance. Succeeding in remaining neutral, assuring his family’s survival and maintaining the influence of his house in one of the bloodiest war since Aegon’s Conquest, if not of all of Westerosi history, was an accomplishment that many of his position had dreamt of.

Loyalty? He laughed bitterly at the memory of the bright and confident smile on his long gone brother Bryan’s departing figure to King’s Landing to serve under Prince Daemon Targaryen.

Be loyal to no one but his family, his loved ones.

It was the code he had lived by since Bryan’s unexpected tragic demise at the hands of Rogue Prince himself, a man his poor brother, the innocent messenger sent by King Viserys, admired and sworn loyalty to, fourteen years ago.

Lyonel remembered the day the news of his demise reached his father, the former lord of Highgarden.

People sing that there were six stages of grief.

Shock, denial, anger, bargaining, depression and acceptance.

But when it came to a devoted seventy two year old father, the grief ended in the very first.

Two days later, Lyonel, the second son, whose ambitions never surpassed the allure of marrying Lady Jayne Lannister and sampling the finest wines and sugary with his beloved, inherited the legacy he had never been prepared for.

The Targaryens will always do what’s best for the Targaryens.

Those were his late father’s last words.

To survive the Targaryen rule, Lyonel played by their rules. Schemes, betrayals, deceptions and bloodshed? He did not shy away from them. He bore the burden so his family, his people, didn’t have to.

With his hands on the cold balcony, Lord of Highgarden bathed the fresh air of flowers, the peaceful chirping of insects, the giggling of young maids and the distant melodies from the small folks returning to their homes after a long day of labour.

This was his empire he defended.

One of loyalty, honour and love.

His beloved Jayne, her arms wrapped around his waist.

Seraphina, his precious jewel, his sweet little rose, the one and only fruit of his and Jayne's love's many attempts at blooming.

His Lancel, Bryan's illegitimate offspring, whom he had taken under the Tyrell bloodline, a fierce and honorable knight, a fine protector, his heir.

“Lord Ormund has written again,” Jayne rested her head on his shoulder, her golden curls soothing his skin as much as his mind, “The letter touched me, the words he’s chosen, the sincerity of his voice. He truly desires a betrothal between his first born and Seraphina.”

Jayne traced her fingers on her husband’s cheeks, “He wishes to introduce them in King’s Landing.”

“King’s Landing?” Lyonel frowned deeply, “It should be fit for them to present themselves to Highgarden, especially when Phina was the one who treated their wounded bodies in the woods, risking the slaughter of the ruthless Northerners.”

Jayne swallowed hard as she recalled the turbulent times of the war.

Although negotiations, strategies and armies kept the castle away bloodshed and dragon fire, the walls were not impenetrable to whimpers of loss and screams agony from the highborn’s well acquainted soldiers calling the Rose without Thorns to their rescue, even at the interdiction of her parents.

Every time the Rose sneaked away from safety, the Lord and Lady of Highgarden sobbed while the peasants and soldiers rejoiced. Her empathetic smile, attentiveness to their wounds and of course, the herbs and food she had carried with her ignited the flicker of hope in the darkest times.

One fateful day, Seraphina stumbled upon two injured knights bedecked in green armor, hidden in the woods—Ormund and Daryn Hightower, gasping for air, on the brink of death from the Battle of Tumbleton.

As Seraphina returned with the blood stained figures of the castle, Lyonel and Jayne’s anger and fear exacerbated.

Highgarden had remained unharmed because of its neutrality that their naive daughter had just broken.

Yet, the gods seemed to show them mercy, perhaps in honor of the lives House Tyrell defended. The Blacks remained oblivious to this act, which could be seen as a declaration of allegiance. Instead, Seraphina’s uncalculated move of benevolence eaned House Tyrell a favourable position in the new Targaryen court: an intimate alliance with the most influential house beside the new king.

As Lyonel contemplated the offer in silence, Jayne squeezed his hand, “Daryn is a handsome, brave and honourable young man. I recognized the look on his face when Seraphina brought him back from the wild,” she pressed a kiss on cheek, “It’s the same way you looked at me years ago, lord husband.”

Lyonel’s gaze softened as he enveloped his wife into his arms with a light chuckle, “Your jest on formality never cease, my love. If the young Hightower truly feels the same about our daughter as I did to you twenty five years ago,” he cupped her cheeks, “Then, perhaps, that boy deserves her hand.”

Jayne held her husband tightly, relishing his scent and warmth. In a world cruel as this, she thanked to the gods everyday for granting her a man of his devotion, wisdom and strength.

“To King’s Landing then?”

“To King’s Landing,” Lyonel nodded before rolling his eyes, his never dying youthful side emerging, “Where the drunken king will be holding a foolish lavish pageant while his people starve. Seven bless the poor girl he will choose as the new queen.”

Jayne laughed wholeheartedly before tending to his arm, returning to the warmth of the interior, “You know, fate favoured us immensely,” she whispered with a mixture of gratitude and anxiety, “If we had agreed to the Kinslayer’s proposal in marriage-“

Lyonel suddenly gripped the touch of her hand, “Thank the wisdom my father and brother had bestowed me. Never trust a Targaryen. The rumours of…” disturbance and disgust written all over his face, “Lady, now a Princess, Cassandra Baratheon’s screams of pain echoed through the Red Keep on her wedding night. I cannot imagine-“

He buried his face in his hands as he sat down with his wife next to the fireplace.

Jayne brushed his hair with adoration, “Don’t overthink about the past, my love. Phina is about to marry a good man.”

The lord smiled as he lifted his head to face his beloved, “Everything I risked, I fought for, it was worth it. For you, for her, for Lancel, and for our people.”

Jayne kissed him passionately before whispering, “You are too good for this world, Lyonel Tyrell.”

As the stars gracefully pirouetted around the moon in the embrace of the night's darkness, and with the imminent date of embarking on the journey to King's Landing drawing near, the wheel of fate began its inevitable revolution once more.

#aemond targaryen #hotd #house of the dragon #aegon targaryen #aegon targaryen fanfic #aemond x oc #aemond targaryen fanfic #aemond fanfiction #aegon ii fanfic #dark aemond targaryen #aemond targaryen x reader #aegon targaryen smut #aegon targaryen x oc #aegon targaryen imagine #aegon targaryen x reader #aemond the kinslayer #aemond one eye #hotd aemond #alicent hightower

213 notes · View notes

lucydoodlessometimes · 8 months

Text

the Lunar secret weapon and the King's best kept secret, one Carswell Thorne!

original au

Au-specific character info under the cut

Thorne knows his full name here, which means he could track down his birth records and thus parents- if he wasn't convinced there was no point, as they voluntarily submitted him to die. so.

He braids his hair in much the same way that cress wraps hers around her wrists as stress relief. I didn't find a good way to draw it, but its there.

Thorne is more unsure than in canon in this au, but he is very interested in making cool romantic moments (as opposed to Cress, who was very interested in having them but rarely tried to make them.)

he has a little Thorne! just as eager and cheerful as little cress, but a bit more utility-focused. He quickly got bored of the background work slog, even as a child, and thus programmed little thorne to take over lots of the early searching, filtering, and sourcing of the research Sybil often asks for.

the haircut cress gives him post-satellite is, admittedly, rather good for a newly blind woman.

However, if you have functioning eyes, you can probably tell that it is godawful.

Fortunately, Cress also manages to pick up an escort body for Nansi, who delights in fixing it for him.

(on that note, I think I might change up her look from Iko's even though it doesn't really make a ton of sense? mostly because I want to. Talk me out of it in the tags)

Thorne gives Cress her eyedrops and is very extra special careful about it because he doesn't wanna mess up this thing he's got going on in her direction. He's worried about her!

I made a pass at a butterfly outfit here- I confess, I'm very excited for the blue "dress"

(I may or may not let it be a dress, I think that futuristic sci fi can accommodate a man in a dress so it's really just whatever I wanna draw that day and whatever i think he looks good in)

either way, i let the butterfly sleeves instead take on a capeish feel, as I don't think the draping feel works as well on this kind of jacket. Future changes may occur!

His satellite outfit was kind of meant to give this yucky hospital gown feel, as I imagine Sybil to be rather,,,,, uninterested in the fashion of her little tool.

That's all I got! hope you enjoyed and feel free to add on <3333

72 notes · View notes

sarandipitywrites · 7 months

Text

nine people i'd like to know better/get to know me tag

ok so i've gotten a few of these in the last few days, so we're doing this all in one post!

before i get into this, i'll pass on the (optional) tag to @cowboybrunch, @notwritinganyflufftoday, @i-can-even-burn-salad, @innocentlymacabre, @starlit-hopes-and-dreams, @dyrewrites, @daisygrayce, @ceph-the-ghost-writer, @loopyhoopywrites to answer... any set you want? or all of them? mix and match? plus an open tag!

from @aziz-reads (answers for her character Lena here):

Last song I listened to:

Last thing I watched: I've actually watched something since last time! I watched Hazbin Hotel AND I saw The Big Lebowski for the first time 😊

Last book I read: Last one finished? A Court of Thorns and Roses. Most frequently reading? An Unkindess of Ghosts (a reread)

Things I'm currently obsessed with: writing (always), Jak & Daxter (and the current draft of DRDW, by extension). Not specific music as much lately, just... needing music in my earholes at all times lol

from @owlsandwich (answers here); @ahungeringknife (answers here); and @blind-the-winds (answers here):

Last song I listened to: (the song changed while I was answering these lol)

Currently watching: currently? Nothing! I kind of binged Hazbin Hotel and I didn't have anything lined up next lol

Spicy/savory/sweet: savory! Especially if also crispy 😋

Relationship status: in a relationship - been with my partner for 10 years 😊

#tag games #nine people you want to get to know better

56 notes · View notes

ask-mobile-iterator-project · 9 months

Text

Intro Post

This blog focuses on my Rain World OCs involved in the "Mobile Iterator Project" AU. ^_^

The “Mobile Iterator Project” (MIP) is a project created and directed by an Ancient named "No Cost Too Great" (NCTG) with the stated goal of supporting standard iterators in their productivity, maintenance, and longevity, so that they can operate at maximum efficiency, even after the inevitable mass ascension. ‘MIP Units’—iterators under the project—are created puppet-first in the "MIP Development Center" and later assigned to Local Groups, where their structures are built to support the Iterators around them. Uniquely, their personalities are heavily based around singular, specific Architects (Ancients) who donate their memories and qualia. The exception to this is TWR. In total, there are 99 MIP Units, with IDs ranging from 01 to 99.

(This AU strays pretty far from the themes and canon of both Vanilla Rain World and Downpour, so please keep that in mind!)

⚠️Importantly, here are some warnings for sensitive content that may appear in the posts:

depictions of trauma and mental illness

heavy themes of manipulation (including memory manipulation)

depictions of emotional abuse

dehumanization

depictions of dissociation

identity struggles

medical malpractice/abuse, experimentation

child endangerment

generally dark themes

violence, physical abuse

infrequent body horror

When sensitive content comes up, I will leave a warning before the cut and tag as "sensitive content"!

Characters:

Starlight Symphony (SLS) she/her, [bio]

Frosted Briar (FB) she/they, [bio]

Glimmering Seafoam In Sunlight (GSIS) she/her, [bio]

Thorns Without Roses (TWR) she/they, [bio]

Perpetual Umbra (PU) they/them, [bio]

Legacy Of Famine (LOF) she/any, [bio]

*These are not all of the characters, just the main 6 that are open to receiving asks.

How it works:

Please specify who you are asking the question to, for example: (to SLS), (to SLS and FB), (to any), (to all), (to admin)

If you don’t specify, I’ll just pick myself. Though, sometimes, I might have another character answer too, if I think it might be interesting.

For admin asks, my friend’s overseer might want to add stuff too, so don’t be surprised if she shows up. For simplicity's sake, assume all admin asks are addressed to potentially both of us.

Additionally, I might add commentary sometimes, which I’ll tag with #admin commentary. My friend might do that too sometimes, so #overseer commentary for her.

I’ll do my best to answer your asks, with varying art quality, though I won’t answer all of them. Jade might answer some of them too, primarily the ones regarding, FB, as she knows them way better than I do.

We will sign off at the end of each post, denoting who handled the “broadcast” (ask.)

[Broadcast handled by admin], [Broadcast handled by overseer], [Broadcast handled by admin and overseer]

There is a light roleplaying/interactive element: The in-universe framing device for the questions is broadcasts being sent to the iterators, hence the ask button’s title. There may also be some occasional meta shenanigans.

I will be answering some questions from curiouscat rather than tumblr, and I will crosspost to twitter, too. This is probably too much work, but whatever. The askblog will be the main source of my attention, though, so posts will come here first.

Boundaries/Rules:

Please don’t ask questions related to your own OCs, because I don’t know them.

Please try to break up multiple questions into separate asks.

Nothing NSFW or suggestive.

No “magic” asks (like turning the characters into different things)

You can send items if you want, though

Please keep in mind that Frosted Briar is, for all intents and purposes, basically a child.

Rules may change as things go along and we figure stuff out!

Non-Ask Posts:

Occasionally, I may post content related to backstories and worldbuilding and stuff unrelated to asks. This will be tagged with #mip logs.

Tags:

#silly: for silly stuff

#angst: for angsty stuff

#dubiously canon: usually used in tandem with silly, but for anything that has questionable characterization

#sensitive content: content that may be triggering or upsetting

#mip worldbuilding: asks/posts related to worldbuilding

#mip lore: asks/posts related to lore!

#mip ask: in-universe asks for the ocs.

#admin ask: asks directed towards the admin/overseers

#guest appearance: asks where characters outside of the main 6 appear.

#mip logs: non-ask posts that build upon the lore/worldbuilding

#ooc: update posts, rule posts, etc.

#meta: hehe

#admin commentary: commentary from the admin (luna)

#overseer commentary: commentary from the overseer (jade or clover)

#overseer assistance: for when the overseers help with the process

#fanart: reblogs of fanart!! :D

#admin art: reblogs of luna’s, jade's or clover's art of the characters

#luna art, #jade art, #clover art: self-explanatory

#old: from the sls ask blog, consider it non-canon

#mobile iterator project, #rw mip au: self-explanatory

post is tagged with most of these

Main Admin: Luna, @mewguca

Overseer: Jade, @fauxbia

Overseer: Clover, @cloverlady

Thank you for reading!

For additional information on my OC usage permissions, please read my carrd

101 notes · View notes

simplegenius042 · 1 month

Text

WIP Wednesday, My WIP as Stock Photos and OC NSFW Chart

Tagged by @noodlecupcakes @direwombat @socially-awkward-skeleton @voidika and @imogenkol

Invited to participate if I so wished by @la-grosse-patate for the WIP as stock photos.

Tagging @inafieldofdaisies @cassietrn @adelaidedrubman @shellibisshe @aceghosts @josephseedismyfather @icecutioner @derelictheretic @shallow-gravy @strangefable @rhettsabbott @josephslittledeputy @cloudofbutterflies92 @skoll-sun-eater @carlosoliveiraa @g0dspeeed @wrathfulrook @afarcryfrommymain @strafethesesinners @turbo-virgins @raresvtm @softtidesworld @starsandskies @ladyoriza @florbelles @minilev @yokobai @thewanderer-000 @omen-speaker @justasmolbard @alypink and @thesingularityseries + anyone who'd like to join.

WIPs for The Silver Chronicles and Life, Despair & Monsters and a stock photo recreation of my original WIP Wings And Horns. The specific WIPs I'll be looking at for the former two is the main FC5 fic Silva's Hope and my HOTD fic The Thorned Crown Of Iron Thrones. Also NSFW chart for Nadi Sinclair. Read below the cut:

It would be an understatement to say that Silva has a rocky and complex relationship with many characters in Silva's Hope. From her disdain towards Joseph to the overall romantic tension between her and Faith. However, the most complicated comes with her closest allies; that being Kamski Neon (the closest she has to a living remnant of her Tumultite past and Irene's father) and Gavin Turquoise (a lawyer she had befriended as one of her first friends in Hope County). Kamski, while he definitely considers Silva his top priority and cares for her, also doubts her decisions on numerous occasions, gaslights her and has gone out of his way to go behind her back or even outright sabotage Silva for "her safety". Gavin on the other hand doesn't really consider her a friend and more as a little social and psychological study he wants to keep around to pick apart, intentionally applying pressure on her triggers (without outright setting them off... yet). Here we'll focus on Gavin, from his POV when meeting Silva at the Jail in the Henbane:

When he stepped outside, the blaring sun blinded him with its shine and hounded him with its heat.

Once his eyes adjusted, he analyzed the state of the jailhouse courtyard. He grimaced at the damage, a frown set on his face at the bodies of the deceased and wounded, both allies and enemies, strewn about the dirt and grass.

Gavin had half-a-mind to be thankful to Charles for his permission to leave Schrödinger in the doctor's office. No child, especially his charge, should witness the results of a war.

He exhaled through his nose, wearily stepping over the bodies. Most would be burned anyway, especially the Angels, the poor bastards. A few Cougar fighters might get buried, though it's more than likely they'd be sharing a pit alongside a Peggie. He'd have to keep Schrödinger inside when that came to pass.

He expertly strode past the fighters that were doing head counts, singling out the dead from the unconscious. Deep blue scanned the scattering crowd, until he locked onto two figures out by the open gate.

One was Sheriff Whitehorse, the man he's been co-leading with ever since they picked him up from one of Faith's herds walking the "Path". Quite the advantageous decision, as his authority and trustful demeanor, combined with Gavin's charisma and organization skills, put a stop to the constant treachery.

The other was a surprise; Silva Omar, a suspicious and unordinary woman, now deputy, who consistently sought him out for companionship ever since they met. A rather unique opportunity he took advantage of, to gain her trust and dig out her secrets, while under the guise as her "friend". A tenuous process, but not unsatisfying. Though not enough.

If only I could get that close to Joseph Seed. However, Gavin had already buried his grave there when he targeted Eden's Gate. Not that he hadn't enjoyed the slander.

He noticed Silva was struggling to walk straight. Her dark hair tied in a loosened braid tail, the telltale slivers of silver dye running down the appendage. Her attire covered her skin, gloves not showing an inch of flesh. Dirt stained her clothing, Whitehorse dutifully supporting his deputy's side, guiding her towards the jail.

She was also dazed and unfocused. He decided to adhere to the role of a concerned friend, and paced up into a jog towards both sheriff and deputy.

Gaining closer, he could see the exhaustion written on Silva's face, breathing ragged and grey eyes fighting a familiar glaze. There was a bruise already darkening above her brow.

"Sheriff is she al-?" Gavin cut himself off as he put on a mask of shock, "Silva?"

Silva squinted at him, and familiarity etched into her expression, and weakly uttered out, "Gavin? You're here?"

Her speech seemed slurred, too soft for the likes of her. It wasn't her neutral low nor was it her recognizable bluntness. He angled his head in a tilt to better see her eyes as they struggled to remain open.

He was alarmed by the green glazed sparkles that shined in her eyes. She's met Faith, he deduced. Silva was a cautious person, and intelligent at that. He doubted she went up to smell a Bliss flower in spite of the cult's frequent use of them.

He attended her unoccupied side, glanced to Whitehorse and stated, "Let's get her inside for treatment."

Whitehorse nodded in agreement, "My thoughts exactly."

Supporting Silva, Gavin and Whitehorse were able to work swiftly in getting Silva past the gate. He gave a signal to Virgil, who gave a quick nod in understanding as he started to call out to two Cougar fighters to get the gate closed.

Gavin took note of the state of Silva's attire. He furrowed his brows when he noticed the dark bloodstains that seeped into her coat. His eyes wandered over her body, concerned over the potential loss of his favorite person to study, searching for any dire wounds.

His eyes laid on the stained knife strapped to her belt and the handgun splattered with specks of red. He internally sighed, realizing the blood didn't belong to her, and that she must have joined the fight at some point while he had been inside.

Chatter came their way, the crowd of Cougar fighters out in the jail's courtyard as their attention shifted to them. Or rather Silva.

Gavin raised a brow, listening in to the indistinct words that circled around the fighters as gossip ignited like a wildfire once again.

Here's the stock photos I have for my House Of The Dragon fic The Thorned Crown Of Iron Thrones and my original work, Wings And Horns:

Rules: describe your WIP in stock photos, the dumber the better.

THE THORNED CROWN OF IRON THRONES (LIFE, DESPAIR & MONSTERS [HOUSE OF THE DRAGON])

WINGS AND HORNS (ORIGINAL WORKS)

And have an NSFW chart for Nadi Sinclair from my Far Cry 5 and Call Of Duty Modern Warfare WIPs:

Template below:

#wip wednesday #series: the silver chronicles #wip: silva's hope #far cry 5 #oc: silva omar #oc: gavin turquoise #earl whitehorse #call of duty modern warfare #oc: nadi sinclair #faceclaim: aïssa maïga #series: life despair & monsters #wip: the thorned crown of iron thrones #house of the dragon #original works #wip: wings and horns

23 notes · View notes

cookiesupplier · 10 months

Text

Every Rose Has It's Thorns - Part One

pairing: Ricky Olson x ofc (Talia)

warnings/tropes: slow burn, soulmates, strangers to enemies to lovers, betrayal, angst, fluff, smut, language, betrayal. (potentially more to be added?)

summary: In a world where soulmates inexplicably receive a tattoo that will match that of their soulmate the moment they turn eighteen years old, being famous and covered in very visible tattoos can make finding your true soulmate a questionable fate. Not that it is any easier for the soulmate in question. Thus is the fate for Ricky and Talia. Sooner or later, however, life is bound to collide, but what will happen when it does?

author’s note: Part ONE, as usual unbeta'd and will just throw my jumbled words at you and ask you to love them. I don't know how long this series will be yet, I am playing by ear to having a feel for this story and where it will take me.

tags: If you would like to be added feel free to ask, please let me to know whether to this list specifically or in general.

Talia forever would hate the day she learned about soulmate tattoos. Well, marks, they weren’t really tattoos as far as she was concerned. Just because they were intricate images like tattoos, some of them anyway. Some of them were nothing but simple stick figures that little children could draw, the reason that everyone called them tattoos was because they were artwork that was permanently inked to a person’s skin and could never be taken off. Unlike real tattoos though, no needle needed to be taken to your skin for them, there was no ink, no pain, no healing. Everyone got their mark.

On your eighteenth birthday, at the exact moment you were born, your mark appeared. If you were born at five thirteen in the morning, or exactly a minute before midnight, that was the moment that your mark was going to appear. You couldn’t predict what it was. You couldn’t predict where it would be. There was no rhyme or meaning behind them.

Some people used to think that there was an emotional meaning connecting the pair with the tattoo. However, Talia found that hard to believe when there were people that had literally poop emoji as their soulmate tattoo on their ass, out there in the world, oh yes, they were out there, she was well aware. Her cousin, Gemma’s best friend, was her soulmate tattoo. The poor girl, Talia actually hoped that she didn’t find her soulmate if there was truth that there was something linking them emotionally with that emoji, because no.

Not everyone found their soulmate, not everyone wanted to. Some people actively avoided looking at their soulmates because honestly, it took the surprise out of life, and where was the fun of that? The joy of falling in love, and the hope and thrill of putting your heart on the line and wondering, is this the person? Is this the person that fate had chosen for you, the one you were meant to be with?

Talia would never know that feeling.

She knew who her soulmate was the very moment her mark appeared, and the shock that she felt was something that she couldn’t even put words to. Seeing that tattoo appear, one that she knew. One that she’d seen on fansites of one of her favourite bands more than once, and in the same place.. If it wasn’t in the same place it wouldn’t have been him. If it wasn’t in the same place she wouldn’t have been in the position she was in now. If it was just the same image, and not the same place, it would have just been an uncanny coincidence.

This wasn’t just some uncanny thing.

It was real.

Problem was, it was all over the fansites, and Talia had never kept it any secret how much she loved Motionless In White. Especially Ricky Horror.

So when the day she turned eighteen came and she turned up with the exact tattoo that all the fansites claimed was his soulmate tattoo but he always refused to confirm, what famous person would confirm and have millions come out of the woodwork claiming to be their soulmate? Well, it was safe to say, she was ripped apart by so many people that she at least used to think were her friends.

Her true friends, all these years later, were down to three. Three people that in no way would ever bag on her for the rose tattoo that not so innocently sat on her neck, and none of them dared mention anymore.

Years.

Talia used to try.

Despite the cruelty of those around her treating her like some psychotic obsessed fangirl that had gone and gotten the tattoo on her birthday just to fool the man into being with her. She’d loved going to concerts, not just to try and meet Ricky, despite the assumption, but also for the music, thank you very much, but yes, for Ricky. How could she not want to meet the man whose very soul was marked on her skin for the rest of her life? Whose life had been marked with hers longer than hers had been marked with his…

There had been close calls over the years, when she almost got to meet him. The closest had been the time when she’d actually managed to get a VIP ticket to a concert. Sure it was two states over, and she had to fly there and take some time off work, but the fact that she’d managed to save up, and get the ticket at all.

Ava, Jordan and Kyle had all helped her. The three people in her life that had never, not once, ever questioned that mark on her skin and who the other person on the other end was.

Even her family had made her wonder if she was a little insane for thinking that Ricky Horror was her soulmate. Her mother had been so obvious in her effort to placate her, never once did she feel like her family thought that maybe, just maybe, did they believe her. Her father actually suggested she get medical help more than once. Not surprisingly though, there were therapists that did specialise in the effects of the soulmate bond and sometimes delusions that could come from them. The day her father made her appointment with one of them though, was the day she decided to move out of her parents house.

Thankfully Ava had a spare room and was more than happy to split rent with her.

Oh, and that VIP ticket that she got?

She didn’t make it there in time.

One thing happened after another that night, and you could call it a disaster of fate, and in hindsight, she should have seen it coming. Maybe it was a product of fate. Maybe the whole thing with the soulmate tattoos were always going to be wrong and hers was just sitting on her skin to taunt her.

First, her client appointment ran late, and if she had tried to end it early so she could make it to the airport in time, she would have risked losing her job. Not that it would have mattered considering her flight had been delayed anyway, and then by the time they were finally about to board they cancelled it and had to get her onto a different flight. A different flight which meant she didn’t even get there in time to get into her VIP meet and greet in time.

She got to go to the concert.

She got her VIP merch.

After all that, beaten down with the day behind her, her hotel booked and not needing to be at the airport for the flight home until late the next day, she decided to wait to see if she could catch them after the show.. Until she saw him, finally. The smile lit up her face as she saw Ricky pass them by.. Talia had wanted to say something, but when they were actually talking to the fans she was stuck behind some idiot and blocked out of the way, and by the time she managed to elbow her way through, they’d already been ushered on by security.. Not that it mattered when he saw one of the people he was with. His new girlfriend, hand in hand.

It had been an amazing night.. But one that had ended with her in heartbreak.

That was the night that was the beginning of the end for Talia’s attempts to meet Ricky. After so many trips to see their concerts, and try to see him, this last one, this VIP trip, was when she saw him walking back to his tour bus with his new, pretty girlfriend. He was smiling at her so bright, holding her hand between them.

It wouldn’t have killed her as much, except he looked so happy.

Sure, Talia had no doubt he’d had girlfriends before, she’d dated guys, but Ricky had never been open on social media about any of his relationships. This girl though, he was very vocal about. Talia, she couldn’t destroy that, soulmate or not.

Not everyone wanted their soulmate, not everyone wanted their soulmate. She supposed she couldn’t blame him, he was famous, that had to be hard, after all, nearly every single person that knew who her mark connected her too thought she’d was just some psychotically obsessed fan. Why wouldn’t he?

So life moved on.

Talia moved on.

However, if she had to endure one more pathetic attempt to set her up on a blind day from her mother, her brain might explode. Ever since she’d given up on her soulmate tattoo, not that she’d talked to mother about it in years, her mother’s attempts to interest her in someone else had only increased. Now though, the moment the inevitable subject of soulmates came up, she never knew what to say. More often than not, the date came to a dead stop then and there just from what he said even before she could open her mouth. Too many people went on blind dates in hope of meeting the one. She knew she wasn’t that person, and there was no second date then.

Sitting at her desk and looking up from her sketch patch when her phone started going off repeatedly, she was working on a new piece for one of her long-time clients, he was slowly working on a full tattoo sleeve and this was the next addition she was designing, provided he liked what she worked up. He hadn’t yet, but there was always a first time.

Trying to ignore the alerts on her phone to focus wasn’t going to happen, but she needed to take a lunch break anyway. So she set her pencil down, picked up her phone and set to go make herself a cup of coffee.

When she saw who the messages were from, she glanced up to the front of the tattoo palour to one of the culprits, Ava.. she was right there at the reception desk, flicking through a magazine like she didn’t have a care in the world, typical. Shaking her head with a smirk as she opened the messenger app to her friend groups chat to see what the three of them had been gossiping about back and forth.

Kyle: Hey guys, we’re still on for tonight? Jordan: Party girl, you still in? Ava: Oh, I’ll get her there, she’d got her head in her work, like usual today, you know her. Jordan: Oh come ON, TALIA! BIRTHDAY GIRL! Kyle: T, Darling, I did not agree to double shifts to get the night off for you to BAIL! Ava: Kyle! Cool your jets, she’ll be there!

It had been a few moments since the last message, she knew they’d been planning on taking her out to a bar for her birthday for weeks, she hated going out on her birthday, she hated it. It always reminded her of the fucking tattoo on her neck. It shouldn’t. Everyone talked about soulmate tattoos on their birthday. Counting down the years and remembering how they felt when they first saw theirs, or when they first met their soulmate.. When all she wanted was to forget she ever got her mark at all.

She understood Kyle’s frustration though, he was a nurse, and sometimes getting time off for a night out was difficult for him. Kyle and Jordan were fucking lucky, they were soulmates, two of her best friends, known each other since they were in diapers, had been joined at the hip since middle school. The biggest worry they’d ever had was if they were soulmates at all. When Jordan had gotten his mark two months before Kyle, they’d agreed if Kyle didn’t have the same, they wouldn’t care, and lo and behold, two months later, sure enough, Kyle did.

It was actually scary really thinking about it, the way the marks worked.. How if you got your mark years before your soulmate, they could be out there and have no idea. She was younger than Ricky by years, and she wondered sometimes what he must have been thinking, how he must have felt. Some people never met their soulmate, some people never got the chance, and it wasn’t by choice. You knew when you lost the choice, if your tattoo changed from black to white on your skin, then it meant your soulmate had died.

Talia’s of course was still very much black. Not that it mattered. Ricky was out there, not looking, and neither was she. He was happy with someone else, and who was she to ruin that for him.

After she pushed the button on the coffee maker she looked back down to her phone and tapped out a message on her phone.

Talia: I’ll be there Ky, be prepared to die by shots.

#motionless in white #miw #miw band #motionless in white fanfiction #miw fanfiction #miw fanfic #motionless in white fanfic #ricky olson fanfic #ricky olson fanfction #ricky olson #ricky olson x ofc #original female character #soulmates #tattoos #soulmate au #fic: every rose has its thorns

64 notes · View notes

lizzybeth1986 · 5 months

Text

Rose Gold

Book: The Royal Romance

Pairing: Hana Lee x Kiara Theron

Rating: PG

Word Count: 4, 304 words

Content Warning: Mention of Gun Violence, Character Injury.

Summary: Six months after King Liam and Queen Esther's wedding, Hana and Kiara take their next big step as a couple.

A/N: Set in the P&Tverse. Since P&T spans the timelines of Books 2 and 3 (the Engagement Tour and the Unity Tour + Liam & Esther's wedding), most of this fic takes place after the series is meant to end, and there are references to things that happen there that aren't canon.

The first half of the fic, however, takes place just before the group reunites with the MC and Drake at the safe house (TRR3, Ch 1).

I've borrowed a few elements from Hana's own engagement to the MC in the books: the rose gold ring, the coin throwing ritual at the foundation and the proposal at the lake.

Tagging @hanaleeappreciationweek for Day 5: Romance, @choicesficwriterscreations for FoTW and LGBTQ Archive, and @choicesmaychallenge24 for Hera: Marriage

October 14th, 2017. Half past Midnight.

Foolishness. Sheer foolishness.

The voice inwardly chiding her right now sounded suspiciously like her mother; for that reason alone she was desperate to ignore it.

But what else would one call an impulse to jump out of a car that could take her in complete secrecy to the city's best safe house, only to race to Argyros and Sons - Cordonia's premier jewellery store - for a gift she wasn't even sure would be accepted...a promise she wasn't even sure its intended recipient would want?

"Looking for something specific, Your Grace?"

Surprised, Hana looked up from the case displaying an assortment of glittering diamond rings. The eyes that met hers in a speculative survey were ocean-blue, marked by wizened crow's feet. It was at the tip of her tongue to correct him (Lady Hana, sir!) when she spotted the Twitter feed on the iPhone in his hand.

News sure does travel fast around the Capitol!

But no sooner had that thought left her head, than the riptide of memories began to flood her.

The Homecoming Ball. Hors d'oeuvres. Speeches. Fireworks. Announcements. Please welcome Esther DuPont, Duchess of Valtoria, and Hana Lee, Duchess of Krysanthe. Cheers. Expectant Gazes. And then...

Darkness. Gunshots. The acrid taste of fear.

Hana bit back a grimace. How long would memories of tonight haunt her? How long would it be before she heard people address her by her new title, without memories of the violence that followed?

She held her handbag with a sudden death-grip, forcing herself to breathe. To push forth happier, sweeter memories.

Unbidden, comes the one memory that had managed to keep her sane this night.

Her laughter.

Sharp. Raucous. Loud. Jarring against the tinkling sounds of cutlery and glassware, as far away as one could get from the soft, windchime quality of delicate laughter, that every female courtier was taught to emulate.

She thought she'd known love until that moment, fool that she was. Thought that no matter who she dated, no matter how distant she'd be from those memories of the social season - Esther would somehow remain her first and forever love.

Until she had taken that one fateful look at Kiara's wildly joyous face, heard her cackle - the kind one would never normally dare to do at court - and realized with piercing clarity that if she were to compare her feelings for these two women, they would be nowhere close.

Her love for Esther had all the subdued warmth of a crackling bonfire. But these newfound feelings for Kiara?? They made her feel like she was plunging herself headfirst into a raging volcano.

Something within Hana had trembled violently in that moment; some premonition that felt searing in its finality.

Kiara was the one. She was all Hana had ever wanted, without knowing it; all that Hana would ever want, from now till eternity. The one in whose arms she would want to stir awake, every day for the rest of her life.

Kiara Thorne, or no one. Kiara Thorne, or lifelong loneliness.

The phrase rang in her ears like a verdict: final, eternal, unchangeable.

When Hana opened her eyes, she found to her consternation that they were blurry from unshed tears. Quickly blinking them away, she noted dully how different the rings on the display now looked.

Certainly she must have moved to another part of the store without knowing. Where before she'd seen glittering, brilliant, ostentatious diamonds, set in white gold and platinum...now she saw stones nestled in the embrace of a warmer, almost blush-toned metal.

Rose gold.

The metal that was all the rage in her mother's birthplace Bethulia, for its delicate shimmer and soft pink hue. Mama had told her often enough in her childhood that their barony's love for it went far beyond just the colour...that her mother - Hana's Nanimaa - loved it for being such a perfect union of gold, silver and copper...

A whisper of a memory of Nanimaa, the one time she'd ever seen her. At a fountain, glowing from the glimmer of abandoned coins.

It took her less than a minute to find exactly what she didn't know she'd been looking for. Had you asked the jeweller about her, he would have told you that the newly appointed Duchess of Krysanthe had chosen her ring with the greatest confidence. The confidence of a woman who had probably wooed her beloved, confessed her love, basked in the joy of being loved back.

A confidence Hana didn't feel.

When she returned to the limo, she was greeted with the sight of a pensive Liam, rubbing the frown between his brows absently with his fingers. A telltale muscle jumped inside his jaw.

"Any news?" Hana whispered, almost dreading the answer.

"Yes," his voice was grainy from exhaustion and guilt. "Three people injured. Bastien, Esther's press secretary, and...."

"And?" Her voice had gone small and high, that a fearful child's.

"And Lady Kiara. She was..."

Hana blinked once, then blinked again. Liam's mouth was moving, yet no sound seemed to come out. All that she could hear was a low, keening noise, like a muffled siren...or like the moan of a woman in terrible pain.

Kiara. Kiara. Kiara.

May 12th, 2018. Afternoon.

"How far from the palace are you taking us?" Kiara asks, her voice alight with laughter.

"Not even outside its gates," Hana replies, grinning. Kiara looks down at their fingers laced together, palms almost touching.

They've been together for just six months, and still somehow, the lines on Hana's palm feel as familiar to her now as her own. Without even looking she can conjure up the memory of the heartline on Hana's left palm at a moment's notice - long and deep, starting from her index finger, suggesting she would be a wonderful lover with a very fruitful love experience - and her marriage line, stretching from one end of her palm all the way to her ring finger...suggesting friendly in-laws.

(The thought of luring Hana to marry her under the premise of palmistry is sounding more and more tempting by the minute)

Involuntarily - perhaps to stop herself from checking her trouser pockets once again for that tiny box she took from her vault today - Kiara's hand tightens around Hana's.

Can she dare to hope that fortunate beloved could be her?

She steals a glance in Hana's direction, noting with alarm that her fingers are trembling in Kiara's hand.

"We're here," she says, her voice suddenly small and quivering against the gurgle of water in the courtyard fountain. It's been a palace fixture for several decades now - ornate and imposing - a legacy from King Liam's formidable grandmother, the late Queen Mother Cassandra. According to Kiara's father, the woman had married into the family as a young princess from Monterisso, and for her foreignness alone was expected to be crushed by the strictures of the palace and the expectations of her people - yet in a decade's time she had somehow became the most imposing figure there! There was very little in the palace that didn't have her stamp of approval first.

As they come closer, Kiara sees the one thing Queen Mother Cassandra may not have predicted when this fountain was built - the glimmer of coins, all gleaming in the sunlight like they were minted just yesterday.

Her own smile begins to tremble on her lips, even as she notices Hana swallow a telltale nervous lump in her throat. For the first time since they have gotten here, Kiara notices that Hana's other hand is fisted around something. Something that could very likely be the same coins they just saw in the fountain.

She takes that hand gently in hers, knowing now how nervous Hana must feel; knowing that if they complete the ancient lover's ritual that she so hoped to do today, there will be no going back. She uncoils Hana's fisted hand, finger by quivering finger, watching her face as her breathing quickens. She smiles again - a smile more aimed at reassurance than amusement.

"Are we going to do what I think we're going to do today, ma moité?"

For several seconds, Hana doesn't respond. The three coins in her hand (Heavy. Ornate. Engraved with apples. Ancient) are proof enough. The answer, when it finally comes - almost like it is torn out of her throat for fear that Kiara's feelings may not match her own - is barely audible.

"Only if this is what you want too."

Gold. Silver. Copper. Tossed in one after the other in an ancient lover's ritual - one that Kiara knows only because she'd learned about it from her mother, who'd had friends in Bethulia where this ritual was most popular. Maman and Baba themselves had done it on a trip there when she was a teenager, still squirming over her parents' ability to still act like swoony romantics in their (and this would be said well out of their earshot) "fucking forties!".

Wiser now, Kiara feels the same anticipatory tingles that her parents must have felt back then.

This ritual wasn't for the faint of heart in ancient days. You did it only when you were certain. When you looked at your lover and knew that a life without them wasn't a life worth living.

Well, Kiara muses as she watches a hundred emotions flit in a second over Hana's face, I think I've known that long enough. I've known ever since I saw you fight your father in Shanghai, even when you knew it would cost you everything. Since that one moment, I've been yours.

Planting a tender kiss on the corner of Hana's mouth, she takes the coins. "Ready when you are," she whispers softly.

Hana swallows again, her eyes glistening and moist and relieved all at once. In a silk pouch that dangles from her wrist, she fishes for three coins identical to the ones on Kiara's palm. She breathes deep once, twice, three times.

Kiara links their free hands, grips them tight as they turn their backs to the fountain. Hana looks up, a question in her eyes.

"For friendship!" Kiara says, tossing the copper coin into the fountain. Faint memories of something that almost feels like another lifetime glimmer and fade in her memory. Applewood, sipping water, giggling over their favourite fruits and flowers. The Beaumont Bash. Watching from the sidelines as Hana did the verbel equivalent of ripping out Olivia Nevrakis' spine at the Coronation Ball.

Hana takes out the silver coin, and waits for Kiara to holds up hers'. "For love?"

Engagement tour. Fearing Hana would hate her in Fydelia, but never understanding why that should suddenly matter. Standing with her against a bridge in Paris, each mourning their lost loves.

Finally learning what love really was, when she opened her eyes and truly saw Hana for the very first time.

Kiara nods, touching her forehead to Hana's. "Par amour." Their coins splash in unison in the water.

Her girlfriend lets out a watery giggle as she takes out the final coin, glittering and golden on her palm. Her voice breaks a little as she tosses it behind her. "For...bel- belonging".

Kiara's own sigh releases in a shudder as she lets the final pledge sink in.

There were very few places in the world that truly felt like home to Hana. Not the place where she was born, not the barony that could have been her legacy. It took her months to even find comfort or security in her future in Cordonia - much less belonging.

Without a moment's thought, and without releasing the golden coin in her hand, she cups Hana's face and kisses her. Hana shudders and buries her hands in Kiara's hair, her lips trembling against the unspoken promises in her lover's.

"For belonging," Kiara says it like it is a vow. "And I don't care how long it takes - I give my word right now. I'll never let you feel like you have lost your home. Ever." Another kiss - this time on Hana's temple. "I hope you will always find one. In me."

Hana's smile is warm and dreamlike, her eyes closed as if to savour this moment, her fingers playing with Kiara's curls. She barely notices the sound of Kiara's gold coin landing in the fountain. "I love you, Kiki."

Kiara chuckles at her teasing use of the nickname, brushing Hana's nose with her own. "Together forever?"

Their hands, now free, close around each other. "Together forever."

It's quiet now, except for the sound of collard doves, the rustle of leaves and branches in a light breeze, and their breathing. The air smells of wildflowers, citrus and a subtle floral scent that Kiara knows to be the perfume Hana has been using for months. Orange Blossom. She grins as she remembers. It's a scent Hana has often loved to wear, just for her.

Hana's thumb feathers lightly over the ring finger on Kiara's left hand, almost as if to commit the bare space on it to her memory. Kiara doesn't miss that gaze - bright-eyed and soaked in longing - and how it mirrors a need she has felt ever since they landed at the Capitol last week.

Kiara swallows. She had wanted to take things slow, she really did. Woo her, bathe her in every luxury possible, make this trip even more unforgettable than Hana could ever imagine, and then spring this surprise on her - like a kirsch-soaked cherry topping on an already very tempting Black Forest Cake.

But...but that gaze of Hana's has always been Kiara's undoing.

Simply, she says, "come with me."

Puzzled, Hana looks up. "Where?"

"To Lake Sôse," Kiara whispers, wasting not one more moment and grabbing her hand. Hana lets out a nervous, slightly incredulous laugh as she allows herself to be pulled along.

Kiara isn't sure why she's suddenly rushing this. When she thinks of the elaborate plans she'd been constructing all week - chocolate-dipped strawberries and champagne at one of the Capital's premier restaurants, flowers everywhere, a proposal at the hedge maze with a picture together by the swing to commemorate the occasion - she wants to laugh. She isn't even sure why Lake Sôse was the first place she'd thought of just now.

She takes a deep breath, and grounds herself. Uncommonly impulsive though it may be, her decision has been made. There is even a part of her that seems to prefer it to happen this way!Kiara has never been one for last minute changes of plan...but ever since she fell in love with Hana, she's learned to expect - and enjoy - the unexpected.

It's only when she sees the shine in Hana's eyes that she realises why her mind took the turn it did.

Lake Sôse. The one place Hana Lee has always chosen for solace and comfort. The one place in the Capitol where she felt the most at home. It had been here, Hana told Kiara once, that King Liam had told her his plans to appoint her Duchess of Krysanthe. It was here, hours later, that she'd shared that momentous news with her best friend Esther; where Esther - herself aglow with love and a newfound purpose - hugged Hana and told her that the world would now be Hana's oyster.

She'd brought Kiara to this lake for the first time the day after King Liam and Queen Esther's wedding, following a night when the queen herself had been kidnapped, and Hana had joined the king's entourage to rescue her.

A night that Kiara - in constant fear of losing her forever - had recklessly kissed Hana. In public. In front of the entire court. Braving gazes of teasing approval from Kiara's parents, and near-murderous glares from Hana's. The night everyone outside of Hana's friend circle finally realized the two were a couple.

Kiara remembers the day after that like it was yesterday. Something must have changed fundamentally in Hana that night, because the fear seemed to have gone, and with it the compulsive need for hiding and subterfuge and constantly looking over her shoulder. It was as if Hana had faced what she'd thought was the worst thing that could happen to her, and realized she really was strong enough to face that fear.

You're my safe place among people, Hana told her that morning, her fingers lacing through Kiara's. The one I feel most at home with. I want to bring my safe space..to the place in Cordonia I've always felt safest in.

It is afternoon, and the yellow crocuses behind them exude a warm, buttery golden glow in the sunlight. Hana lets out a breathless, incredulous laugh. "You seem like a woman in a very huge rush today, Lady Thorne."

Kiara's own laughter in response is high-pitched and halting. She tries to hide the moistness of her palms as she makes a blind grab for the small velvet box in her purse. "Believe me, this wasn't the way I'd planned this to go at all."

Intrigued, Hana's eyes follow Kiara's hands, and her eyes widen as she recognises the familiar deep blue velvet, the embossed silver lettering on top. Argyros and Sons.

"Is that --"

"Yes," Kiara says, clearing her throat, "I'd been planning this. All week. It was going to be romantic, elaborate, I was going to sweep you off your feet. Just like I'd planned to ask you out seven months ago."

Hana lets out a watery giggle. We all know how that turned out, don't we, qīn'ài de? Kiara can almost hear her saying.

But the humour stops almost immediately when she looks at the box again, and suddenly Hana seems too still, too shocked...too far off from how Kiara hoped she would react.

Kiara lets out a deep breath, then lets the words gush out of her. She's too scared to stop, too terrified to think - the fear that she may be doing too much too soon is so overwhelming that she knows if she stops she won't be able to bring herself to do this for a long, long time to come. The humiliation would be too strong.

"I'm not one for impulse. I never have been. I've never felt comfortable with anything if I didn't have a plan for it first."

Kiara gives herself a moment to half-smile at the irony of it all. Approaching Hana Lee with a smile and a bottle of water, after that first eventful bite of a Cordonian Ruby was definitely an impulse. So were half the things she had done with Hana since. So will many, many, many of the things they may wind up doing together, if (if!) this leap of faith works in her favour.

She looks up at Hana to see if she's laughing at the memory too. She isn't. In fact, Kiara isn't even sure Hana's reacting yet to what she's saying. Perfectly still, her eyes never moving from the box, so wide that they would go bloodshot if they were widened any further. Kiara swallows, and finds that her throat feels suddenly, inexplicably sore.

"I could never tell what it was about you that changed all that. I still don't. All I know is that...around you, Hana, I feel so much more brave. To let go of the need to plan and organize. To not be too afraid of what will follow - whether it goes in my favour or not. I find myself not just willing, but eager, to trust my gut."

Kiara's eyes search every inch of Hana's face as she opens the box, revealing the ring inside. It's a gorgeous piece, all platinum and sparkling diamonds. The smaller stones form a cluster around a massive one, leading the viewer to believe they are seeing a glittering snowflake, fallen fresh from the heavens.

Kiara had known the minute she saw the ring that it was the one. That it would remind them of the first time they confessed their love. Of their very first date, of the first time they shared Hana's cup of homemade hot chocolate. Of why the two of them will always love winters.

Hana's fingers move, trembling, towards her mouth, her face suddenly flushed. She remembers it too.

"Hana Lee," A frisson of fear slithers down Kiara's spine. "Will you marry me?"

When Hana finally opens her mouth, several seconds later, Kiara has to strain to hear her voice.

"I - I -" her eyes dart away from Kiara as if she's just remembered something important - her beautiful bronzed skin suddenly a little drained of colour. The next few words, she says in a "I.... I'll be back. Give me five minutes? I...just remembered something."

She leaves without waiting for an answer.

Kiara sinks into the grass, covering her face in her hands.

What have I just done?

All the way back from her room in the palace to the lake, the pouch hanging from her wrist feeling only a slight bit heavier, Hana cannot stop mentally kicking herself.

"You fool! You imbecile! Bèn dàn!!" Hana curses herself as she speeds up her sprint into a run, "What happened to your tongue? What kind of reaction was that?? What will Kiara think?"

Her mind now sprints miles ahead of her feet, racing in panicked ferocity over the possibilities.

With any luck, Kiara could still be waiting - puzzled and perhaps a little worried. Or she could be actively panicking, the way she does (on very rare occasions) when a plan goes terribly wrong.

Or...or...

Hana holds the silk pouch from her wrist in a deathlike grip as she speeds up towards Lake Sôse. Or.

The thought of that lovely, open space completely devoid of Kiara, of that beguiling combination of rose and jasmine emanating from her favourite Dior J'adore perfume, makes Hana's stomach drop to her feet.

It isn't until she sees that that heartbreakingly familiar figure of Kiara's, hunched over the grass, that Hana allows herself to breathe.

Kiara is there. Shoulders bent, head buried in her hands, almost stumbling as she tries to get up when she sees Hana.

Morose. Defeated. But still there.

Without another thought, Hana rushes into Kiara's arms, almost knocking her off her feet.

"I'm sorry, I'm so sorry," Hana whispers against her hair. "I wasn't trying to run away. I really had to get something. For you."

Kiara pulls back to look into her eyes, and when she does Hana's heart twists at the sight of unshed tears. "I thought I'd scared you off."

Hana's own laughter quavers, pitched high in disbelief. "I've just pledged myself to you this afternoon, body and soul, at the palace fountain. This -" she lifts Kiara's left hand to her chest, her thumb caressing the empty space on her beloved's ring finger " - just makes it so much more real."

Kiara's arms wrap around her, pulling Hana flush to her. Hana can feel Kiara shake as she giggles in response. "...you mean to say that I'd have saved myself so much stress if I'd just remembered those coins."

"Yes, qīn'ài de, a thousand times yes." She cups Kiara's face, pressing their foreheads together. "Place that ring where it belongs, Kiki. I can't wait to see it on my finger."

Hana holds her tight until Kiara's breathing becomes slower, calmer. She raises her newly-adorned hand for Kiara to see - marvelling at how the ring really mimics the glow of a snow crystal in the winter sun.

When they part, shyly, reluctantly, Hana begins to fiddle with the silk pouch.

"Here's what I'd gone to bring."

Kiara's eyes brighten at the sight of the box in her hand; a wave of warmth floods through Hana in anticipation of her response. Kiara gasps the minute she opens the box, revealing a delicate, intricately carved rose gold ring, flanked by small diamonds on all four corners, cradling a bigger one at the center.

"Rose gold," Kiara murmurs in wonder.

"Yes," Hana brushes her fingers over Kiara's knuckles. She'd told her once, long ago, how revered that metal was in her home province Bethulia. How Bethulian jewellers and goldsmiths and young women swore by the rosy hue it exuded. How it was a perfect amalgamation of three precious metals - all highly valued in the province. How tied it was to their folktales and bridal rituals.

"Copper..silver...gold." Kiara's tears glitter like diamonds before she lets them fall. "For friendship. For love. For belonging."

Hana smiles, her hand still stroking Kiara's cheek. "You remembered."

Kiara rolls her still-moist eyes, trying hard not to sniff - it would take out all the humour in this situation. "It's hard to forget a ritual we'd performed just ten minutes ago, ma moité."

"I'd planned to give you this ring a week from now," Hana says, shaking her head at her own impulsiveness as the ring she'd chosen on a fanciful whim so long ago, now finds its home. "I've been holding onto it for far too long."

Kiara caresses the stone on her own finger lovingly, admiring the way the rose gold glows on her skin. When she speaks, her voice is breathless in anticipation. "How long?"

For several minutes, Hana's only response is to pull Kiara back in her arms again. Her hand slides slowly, almost with a tinge of regret, down the dip of Kiara's waist on her left side. The wound that had once served as a constant, searing reminder of so much (of her vulnerability, of her inability to run from pain, of what she'd once considered her failures), has healed in more ways than one - only a faded scar that Hana never fails to kiss, now remains.

"For seven months," Hana's voice shakes at the memory, "Since the night after Homecoming Ball."

With a choked sob, Kiara enfolds Hana into her arms, almost as if she'd want to absorb her into every cell of her body. Fervently, reverently, she presses her lips all over Hana's face - her eyelids, her cheeks, the bridge of her nose, all the little-known, barely-noticed parts of her. It takes her a while - perhaps too long, in Hana's opinion - for Kiara's lips to meet hers, but she welcomes the sweet torture of waiting.

"Mon cœur," Kiara says between kisses, "ma raison de vivre."

When they part, the two women keep each other's hands interlinked, one left hand over the other. Neither of them will remember how long they stay at the lake; only that they never want this joy, this warm afterglow of seeing their dreams come true...to end.

The empty spaces on their ring fingers, over which they'd each stolen such secret, hungry glances today, now bear the mark of their lovers. Now bear the most tangible signs of their love, their memories, their promises, their commitment.

Together forever.

Translation:

Ma moité - a romantic endearment in French, meaning "my other half"

Qīn'ài de - Mandarin Chinese for "my dear"/"darling"

Bèn dàn - Mandarin Chinese cuss word that means "stupid egg!"

Mon cœur - French endearment, meaning "my heart"

Ma raison de vivre - French for "my reason to live"

References for Hana and Kiara's engagement rings:

Kiara:

(Source: Maxine Jewellery)

Hana:

(Source: This article on engagement rings, but the actual pic itself came from Blue Rose Photography)

#hana lee #the royal romance #the royal heir #the royal finale #hanaleeappreciationweek #HLAW #HLAW 2024 #HLAW Day 5 #HLAW Day 5: Romance #series: petals and thornes #lizzybeth1986 #content: fanfic

30 notes · View notes

umbracirrus · 25 days

Text

Snippet Sunday!

So, @hircines-hunter tagged me in a snippet sunday post before, and yeah, I think I can do that :3 Done quite a bit of writing over the past few days for anyone but Elyse who is who I'm wanting to write for right now😭

Here's a bit of chapter 3, possibly chapter 4 of Tempest!

--------------------

Brynjolf, I'm alive. Somehow. A dragon attacked Helgen when I was scoping the town out… I would have been done for if not for a soldier seeing me alive in the rubble, apparently. I'm not in the best way at the moment. Burns and broken bones. Currently in the Temple of Kynareth in Whiterun, the priestess here has been tending to my injuries. I don't think I'll be in a state suitable for travel for a while. I'll be staying in Whiterun for the foreseeable future. I am sorry to ask this of you, but could you send me the belongings which I had intended to collect from Riften? I desperately need clothes. My own clothes specifically. I appreciate that I've been given some spare clothes from the temple to wear… but they smell terrible. And don't fit. Don't forget the armour either… you know the one. I've got the blade with me still, thankfully. Take care of yourself and the guild. You'll do great as the boss, Bryn. T.

Thorne had felt almost hesitant handing that letter over to the courier alongside a small bag of coin which Danica had kindly given to her after she had mentioned wanting to send a letter to her family. The priestess didn't need to know that the 'family' which she was talking about was the Thieves Guild. And thanks to her decision to distance herself from them… well, they weren't really her family now anyway.

All that she could do now was wait for a response, ideally with her belongings accompanying it, and hang around Whiterun. Danica had told her not to venture too far from the temple, just in case her injuries were to flare up any, so she had settled on sitting on a bench under the tree just outside the temple, picking flowers from around the bench and fiddling with their petals. It did, admittedly, frustrate her that she could hear a preacher of Talos crying out from nearby, but she did her best to try and ignore it by instead focussing on the sound of flowing water.

After a short while of hanging around there, she suddenly snapped to attention when she heard her name being called out, and frantically glanced around until she noticed Farkas descending the stairs leading to Jorrvaskr in the company of another man… who didn't half look similar to him. A brother or something?

"Thorne! It's good to see that you're out of the temple," Farkas grinned as he made his way over to her, grabbing the wrist of the other man in the process. "How are you doing? Injuries any better?"

"I… I'm okay, yes. Still some problems and pain, but… I'm getting better," she responded, noticing how the man in his company was now giving her a scowl. He really didn't seem friendly in the slightest. "Who is…?"

"Oh! This is my twin, Vilkas," he stated, giving Vilkas a playful nudge with his elbow. "Don't mind him. He isn't too friendly with anyone until you get to know him."

Vilkas made a quiet grunt noise as he shook his head. "We've got a job to do, Ice Brain. Come on."

Farkas frowned, then let out a sigh as Vilkas started walking away without another word. "Sorry about him. We'll chat again when I'm back, yeah?" He began to walk away, trying to keep pace with his brother. "And do consider what I mentioned the other day about joining us when you're feeling better!"

#meg has done some writing #skyrim #skyrim fanfiction #fic - tempest #skyrim oc thorne #vilkas/oc #what a great first impression for your future gf vilkas lol-

12 notes · View notes

infizero-draws · 1 year

Note

girl what do you feel about kris' and noelle's relationship in snowgrave i want to know

OK OK. first of all thank you for specifying "in snowgrave" because if you just said their relationship in general i would literally never stop talking.

second tho, im really bad at putting how i feel about character dynamics into words because often there's just soooooo much to be said and different ways of looking at it and i get overwhelmed if i try to make some all-encompassing analysis. so let it be known that whatever i say here is not the full picture and there's so much more i could say.

putting this under the cut because i already know im gonna talk for way too long:

that being said oughghghhgh. where to fucking begin. i'd say the most fascinating (and disturbing) thing about their relationship in snowgrave is the weird romantic undertones. the fact that you have to pressure noelle into the idea of riding the ferris wheel with KRIS instead of with susie, her actual crush.

one of the most overt symbols of this weirdness is definitely the thorn ring. i know it isnt the only ring you give to noelle to equip, but this is the one that's mandatory for the snowgrave route. in order to do the route, you have to make KRIS give NOELLE a RING. a ring that literally HURTS HER TO WEAR. if that isnt a metaphor for a forced relationship i dont know what is

however perhaps the most damning and obvious one is of course this option:

i would say something about this myself but @/sorrybutiforgothowtomakecontent's tags on another one of my posts really summed it up:

im also aromantic so this really resonated with me. but yeah just going back to the first point they make. you literally HAVE to say "we're something else" in order to do the snowgrave route, which seems to make it pretty clear that this kinda subtext was intended. snowgrave can only exist with kris and noelle being "something else" because that's literally what snowgrave IS.

my favorite way to view snowgrave is through the lens of an arranged/forced marriage. again, the ring. it just feels so gross, especially because it's not just a regular marriage but an abusive marriage. snowgrave is abuser simulator (2021). im sure i dont need to explain that part

but the thing is, SNOWGRAVE IS NOT JUST ABOUT NOELLE and that's what makes it SO BAD. not only is noelle being forced to go through all of this, but KRIS is being forced to be the one who does it to her! kris clearly is EXTREMELY upset about snowgrave judging from the constant opportunities to choose more "normal" dialogue and abort the route, and from afterwards when they meet back up with ralsei and susie:

kris, under no circumstances, wants to do ANY of this. but they literally do not have a choice. snowgrave isnt kris manipulating noelle, it is US forcing kris into manipulating noelle. no one is winning here. they're both traumatized, and kris physically cannot even talk to their friends about it or show the true extent of their hurt. it SUCKSSSSS

and when you consider the idea that kris and noelle's friendship may have become strained specifically due to dess' disappearance, and kris possibly having something to do with that with the bunker and whatnot..... well now you're just forcing kris to hurt their friend AGAIN, when in the normal route this could've been their chance to finally reconnect. ahghrhgrhghh

going back to the marriage stuff, it's just so uncomfortable to see these two forced together like this. noelle is in love with susie. we dont know kris well enough to know if they have a crush on anyone (or if they get those kinds of feelings at all), but that doesn't matter. the fact is these two are likely not romantically interested in each other at all, and they are being forced together BY THE PLAYER. and it's horrific. (and even if one or both of them felt that way, this is still entirely wrong. they do not get a choice here)

@/hellspawnmotel's tags on this comic of hers will always haunt me, bcuz like. yeah. this is it:

there's also the fact that kris is naturally kind of a goofball; they're a prankster, especially it seems when it comes to noelle, as can be seen with the stepping off the button thing or the many, many examples from their shared childhood brought up by noelle.

but in the snowgrave route, kris drops this entirely. all of the alternate dialogue options to abort the route, which are very likely FROM kris, are very genuine and apologetic. kris is scared they're going to lose their friendship with noelle completely because of what you're making them do, and it's like they panic and all of their usual goofiness and sass is just dropped for genuine emotion. it's really sad to see honestly, esp in a full snowgrave route where you know that their efforts will be in vain.

OH OH ALSO. can't believe i haven't mentioned this yet. the fact that NOELLE KNOWS SOMETHING IS GOING ON WITH KRIS. THAT'S one of the things that really makes me insane.

noelle goes through ALL THAT, seemingly AT THE HANDS OF HER FRIEND....... and yet. she knows that something is wrong. she KNOWS kris, and she knows that they don't act like this. you'd think she would instantly cast kris off, it would be the right thing to do, but she doesn't. because she knows that something is off.

i cannot stress enough the fact that noelle is the ONLY one who seems to have noticed just how strange kris has been acting. sure other characters comment on kris seeming off or doing something they usually wouldn't do, but it is NOELLE and NOELLE ALONE who takes such notice of it and decides to actually DO SOMETHING ABOUT IT.

"i have to figure it out" is a mission statement, it implies that noelle (at least in the snowgrave route), is going to actively try to figure out what's going on with kris, WHICH IS CRAZYY and i feel like not enough people are talking about. not even kris's own mother has fully realized something's wrong. like she says, noelle seems to be the only one who's noticed just how off kris has been acting, and the only one who might try to understand and help them. genuinely makes me insane thinking of where that might go in this route oaugurhghh

im gonna stop here because im exhausting myself but. in conclusion I LOVE CHILDHOOD FRIENDS GONE WRONG!!!!!!!!! FAVORITE TROPE EVER!!!!!!!!!!!! anyways read this comic (all 3 parts) and you'll get it

oh also "kris, why are you wearing my watch?" still makes me go fucking insane

#i genuinely could talk about these two forever. favorite dynamic in deltarune hands down #they're my favorite characters individually so the way that snowgrave intertwines their stories #noelle's strength and kris's possession #into this horrible thing of being forced to force someone else to kill and make them think THAT'S what true strength is. augurgrghhrgh #they genuinely make me insane. i need to see more of them NOWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWW #not art #asks

87 notes · View notes