#yeah it's ad douxie

[generalallxsanjishipper]

Some incorrect\extremely correct quotes for my EXTREMELY FAR AWAY IN THE FUTURE ADP FIC (and in part in TIALAMYDK LMAO)

***

Alice *after entering Douxie's mind for several minutes, on the floor*: Oh, wow. Your brain is a disaster

Douxie *also on the floor*: Yeah, I know

Alice : Ever thought about doing drugs?

——

Zoe: Casperan. 

Douxie: Ashildr.  

Zoe: Clumsy dumbass. 

Douxie: Angry Chiwawa. 

Claire: *confused* What are they doing? 

Archie: Insulting contest. 

Claire: Ah. 

Zoe: Old Man. 

Douxie: Dwarf. 

Zoe: Flat ass.

Douxie:  Useless Half Lesbian

Zoe: Knucklehead

Douxie: Mosquito

Zoe: Peter Pan

Douxie: *Suddenly grinning* Pinky pie. 

Zoe: EXCUSE ME?

Douxie: HA! *Claps hands with a smug face* I WON! 

Zoe: HOW DID YOU JUST CALL ME?! I'M GONNA FUCKING END YOU! 

Alice: Now, now… 

——

Douxie: Hello, my name is Failure, and you're watching my life crumble into pieces.

Douxie: *waves his fingers and sings like he is in a Disney Channel intro*

——

Simon: Why are you on fire?

Douxie: This is just how my day is going.

——

Douxie: Everybody shut up, please! I'm thinking.

Zoe, patting him on the back: Well, don’t think too hard. I wouldn’t want you to hurt yourself.

Douxie: Oh, for the bloody sake, Ashildr!

——

Jim: I’m here for the cult stuff.

Alice: How did you find us?

Jim: I saw your ad on craigslist.

——

Alice: To be honest, I'm kinda pissed that I'm not asleep in bed next to the love of my life in a cottage with no obligations other than watering my vegetable garden.

——

Archie, looking at Douxie, Alice, Simon and Zoe: Okay, so I need to become a therapist faster.

——

Simon, on the phone: Oh, hey man… Sorry for accusing you of murder last week.

——

Alice: Someone take me to art museums and make out with me.

Zoe: But they said not to touch the masterpieces.

Alice: Well somebody's got to pin the artwork to the wall.

Douxie, on a mic that he brought by himself: This is Douxie, those idiots are fucking around in the East wing again.

Douxie:*drops the mic on the floor and leaves, muttering about being a third wheel*

——

Zoe: Mom liked to say ‘you can be part of the problem or part of the solution,’ but I happen to believe you can be both.

——

Jim: Who's in charge here?

Zoe, shrugging: Usually whoever yells the loudest. So, me.

——

Barbara, seeing both Douxie and Alice on wheelchairs: I hope you have an explanation for this.

Alice: We have three, actually! :D

Douxie: Pick your favorite.

——

Alice: *venting endlessly to Simon about her week*

Simon, every once in a while: *in a monotone* Wow, that is so wild.

——

Alice: Yeah, well I've never died so how do I know that Gods or... God are real.

Nari:*appears*

Alice: WHAT THE FLIP

Athena:*appears too*

Alice:*looses her flipping mind*

——

Zoe, to Claire: Well, one of us has to be wrong and it’s not going to be me.

Claire:

Claire: Yes, it's you, actually.

——

Alice, *talking about Zoe*: She's the girl of my dreams!

Douxie: You say to most of the girls that they are the girl of your dreams.

Alice: I have a lot of dreams.

——

Douxie: The next time I open up to someone, it'll be my autopsy.

——

Simon: Sorry I can’t be emotionally vulnerable with you, it'd ruin the mystery.

——

Zoe, *talking about one of her first meeting with Douxie*: And then he ran into my knife. He ran into my knife several times.

Jim: You mean you stabbed him?

Zoe: He ran into my knife.

Douxie: She ran into my knife, too.

——

Zoe: I don’t even have time to tell you how wrong you are.

Jim: Okay?

Zoe: …

Zoe: …

Zoe: Actually it’s gonna bug me if I don’t, so...

——

*Zoe and Alice are texting*

Zoe: Your ass is like…

Zoe: Spacious

Alice: WHAT

Zoe: Sorry, I didn’t want to say fat because it might trigger your ED

——

Bastard number 1:*sarcastically, while leaving* I hope you all make it to adulthood.

Jim: That’s... a great prayer.

Simon: A needed one.

Douxie: A needed one indeed.

——

Simon: I will send my army to attack!

Simon: *makes roaring noises*

Simon: *releases a dumpster of raccoons*

Jim, next to his Vespa: WHOA

Jim: THEY WERE YOURS????

——

Zoe, singing to the tune of I Kissed a Girl: I killed a guy, and I liked it-

Douxie, whispering: Should we call the exorcist?

Alice, also singing: The taste of his cherry chapstick.

Simon, appalled, but looking apathetic: Call the exorcist.

——

Zoe: Alice and I are no longer dating.

Alice: Zoe, that’s a horrible way of telling people we’re married.

——

Zoe: Hey, quick question. How petty am I allowed to be?

——

Alice: What if the person who named Walkie Talkies named everything?

Alice: Pregnancy tests are Maybe Babies.

Toby: Socks are Feetie Heaties.

Jim: Defibrillators are Heartie Starties.

Douxie: Nightmares are Dreamy Screamies.

Claire: Stamps are Lickie Stickies.

Zoe: I hate you guys so much.

——

Alice, looking through their clothes: Has anyone seen my top?

Simon, grabbing his mint gums without looking at her: Zoe's in the kitchen.

[alastorsbride]

I have no inspiration 😭😭😭 so here's a copy (and edit) of chapter 2 or A Diary of a sinner. (Btw it's like 11pmish and I can't sleep 😅🤭 this chapter going to be short sorry 😔 could someone please request anything? I'm so bored and I got no ideas!!! 😭😭😭😭😭😭😭

Chappy 2

𝑯𝒆𝒂𝒅𝒔 𝒖𝒑:

Nim is Y/N's demon nickname, short for Nightmare Damsel. Also, I'm adding other characters in this story from Vox Machina and the reader is Hisirdoux Casprians twin sister, Douxie is also married to Zoe.

▅▄▃▁▁▁▁▁▁▁▁▁▁▁▁▁▁▁▁▁▁▁▁▁▂▃▄▅

Gunslinger Percival de Rolo III (human brother)

Cassandra De Rolo (human sister)

Gnome cleric Pike Trickfoot

Barbarian Grog Strongjaw

Gnome bard Scanlan Shorthalt,

Half-elf druid Keyleth

Half-elf rogue Vax'ildan (elf brother)

Half-elf ranger Vex'ahlia (elf sister)

(Ignore the list of the creature the characters are, it's just so I have an idea of who's who because my memory kinda sucks.💀)

───✱*.｡:｡✱*.:｡✧*.｡✰*.:｡✧*.｡:｡*.｡✱ ───

Previously on The Diary Of A Sinner:

I sighed silently. Vlad and Vanellope never left my mind. I could never stop thinking of them. They were only 9 and 10 years of age when I died. I wished I could've lived longer.

I suddenly got the feeling of being followed. 'Hmmm. Who's wishing to die now?' I thought. I changed my course and walked down an alley, and then turned around and got in a defensive position with my twin daggers ready.

"I know you followed me. Not quite wise." I spoke menacingly and threatened.

"Ooh, come on Nim, you wouldn't hurt an ol' friend, would ya sweets?" A familiar traditional Brooklyn gangster voice called out.

I twisted my daggers backward, and they disappeared in F/C smoke. I scoffed.

"Don't try me, Dusty." I spoke.

The voice laughed. "Yeah, it might be a good idea."

I chuckled. The voice wrapped his arm around my shoulder as if we were the best of friends.

"Well, I'd love to stay and chat to catch up, but unfortunately, I have to go." I shook my shoulder out of his grip.

"Well, hopefully I'll see you later then? Hmm?" And the voice got a phone call.

I left down to a small looking shop called Gilmores Shop.

"Hey guys," I called to the group gathered around the bar lobby. chatting or doing whatever.

"Nim!" A short male gnome spoke.

"What's up?" Vax asked twisting his knives in his hand.

"Nothing. Just ran into an old friend." I spoke.

"Y/N. What happened? You smell like blood." Percival asked, not believing me.

Right. I forgot that after Dusty chatted with me, I'd gotten into a fight with a couple of demons, won and then got myself cleaned off.

"Nothing to worry about. I'm fine." I said, casually.

"Uh huh." Percy muttered.

I rolled my eyes and grabbed a drink. This was my turf. And I can do whatever I wanted.

"Seriously, I'm fine. Like always. Are you forgetting who I am? Or do I have to remind you?" I threaten sternly.

"No, no, just... Nothing nevermind." Percival spoke.

"That's what I thought." I said.

"So... Nim... When is your brother coming back?" The little elf girl asked.

"Not for another six months. Pike."

I̶ t̶h̶o̶u̶g̶h̶t̶ h̶e̶r̶ n̶a̶m̶e̶ w̶a̶s̶ P̶i̶e̶ o̶r̶ K̶i̶t̶e̶ i̶n̶ t̶h̶e̶ s̶e̶r̶i̶e̶s̶ I̶ d̶i̶d̶n̶'̶t̶ k̶n̶o̶w̶ h̶e̶r̶ n̶a̶m̶e̶ t̶i̶l̶l̶ I̶ l̶o̶o̶k̶e̶d̶ i̶t̶ u̶p̶ 💀

"Oh thats too bad. I had a question for him."

I just shrugged. I had a suspicion that she liked my brother, Hisirdoux. But I'd already told her he was married to Zoe like a hundred times before.

✧○ꊞ○ꊞ○•̩̩͙✩•̩̩͙○♡๑•୨୧ ୨୧•๑♡○•̩̩͙✩•̩̩͙○ꊞ○ꊞ○✧

So sorry the chapter is so short, I hit a writers block 😭

So I recently red a very good book called Radio By Your Side [One-Shots] by @Mad_and_Twisted (on wattpad) and I love the one shots so much, the only thing I didn't like was being left on a cliffhanger and that the One Shots wouldn't be a story.

And a reminder? :

So I'd decided to write this book from One-Shots and combine a whole bunch of them to 'make them my own' so that I don't copy from the author cause there's a ᏞϴͲ of authors who don't like it. But I don't really care if ya'll copy off of me, just as long as y'all credit me in the end. ☺

Also, I might not write this story for long, just a heads up. Sorry but when I get writers block for a long periods of time, and then get 'cured' I stop writing whatever it was before I got the major writers block illness. 😭😭😭

Also! I'm now officially grade 12! 🥺😨Exams are done for me but my sister who's in grade 8 still has exams to do... 😥 but I should have more time on my hands to write!

That is... If I get cured of this writers block...

Grade 12 is going to be so hard when I graduate, like I've traveled so much and never stayed at 1 school for long but then when I came here, i was in grade 7, so I wasnt really sad, but then when I got to grade 8 and up to now, it's like, I'm saying goodbye to everyone. I'm not going to be able to see them or even talk to my friends again and if I do, I'll be ᒐᙀᙅКƳ if that happens.

But I still have to say goodbye to all the relationships I've made these past 6 years. And when I move out, like I'm so used to hugging and kissing my mom and dad before leaving the house and before going to bed that after I'm moved out I won't be able to do that. I'd have to get my drivers license, drive from wherever im at to my parents home, hug and kiss them goodnight/goodmorning and then drive back home.

Sorry I just put that all on you guys it was just going through my head at the time.

Thank you and have a good day/afternoon/night stay safe (and if it's bed time for you, good night, sweet dreams!🤗)

Again, so sorry.

[escape-from-arcadia]

Me reading new chapters of All is Fair in Love in War be like:

[mitamicah]

Getting cozy with the second prompt of #DouxieAppreciationWeek 🤗

@moppetwithamanbun @einahpetsyarcip @ohfuzzbuckets

Today’s prompt is Found Family :3 

and I guess I am commited to the colour-themed sketches now x’D 

[daydream-believin]

ok but,,,, douxie,,, and reader,,,, making out ;)

(i need a fic p l e a s e)

magenta makeout

summary: still feeling the rush of a performance, douxie takes you backstage, or well, under the stage, to give you a little attention.

warnings: this is def the spiciest thing ive ever written, that being said its not n/s/f/w per se, but uh, makeout, biting, handsy doux, uhhh, yeah

a/n: ask and you shall receive, but o/////o o/////o o/////o

your world was a bright, neon magenta. all the lights were bright, quite literally turning your vision rose colored, and yet it still somehow managed to be dark in this corner under the stage. dark enough to feasibly conceal you and your boyfriend to a certain degree, but you supposed that’s probably why he dragged you down here in the first place.

douxie’s hands gripped your waist. his fingertips dug into your flesh with how tightly he was pulling your bodies together, it almost hurt. his lips were just as rough against yours. a bit sloppy, but you loved that. the feeling of his lips moving in tandem with yours was driving you wild. with an troublesome grin, douxie bit down on your bottom lip and pulled at it gently. cheeky.

you retaliated by separating yourself from his mouth, moving down just below his jaw. douxie could feel your hot breath against the sensitive area and shivered. he felt your nose brush against his neck before he felt the sensation of your tongue. doux let out an adorable squeak as you gently bit down, and you apologized with your tongue as you began sucking the tender skin, surely leaving behind a little purple bruise. you moved further downward to right above his collarbone, making sure to drag your teeth along his flesh. douxie was vocal in his appreciation.

the music was so loud. but that was good. it concealed the embarrassing noises. but lucky lucky you, you’re close enough to still hear every sound that left his throat. you moved back up to meet his lips, stifling it in the moment.

your lips pressed firmly against his, but that wouldn’t do at all. you snaked your hand up to drag you fingers through his scalp, in turn dragging out a guttural moan from douxie’s lips. which gave you the opportunity to slip your tongue past his teeth. your noses were squishing a little too close together, so douxie tipped his face in adjustment ever so slightly, before meeting your tongue with his. he tasted like mint, as he slid his tongue over yours. hmmm, he must have popped one in his mouth before his gig. don’t want to coat a mic in bad breath. douxie let you push your way into his mouth, letting you think you’d won, before he started sucking on your tongue. your grip on his hair tightened. and as much as you both enjoyed this, you were out of air.

as you both reluctantly pulled away, gasping for air, your breaths mingled and you noticed some fog. the music had changed, some stomping here and there, the next gig had started. but the magenta lighting was there to stay it seemed. no matter. the fog added to the atmosphere. not that you two even acknowledged any of it, you were too wrapped up in each other. douxie took a few steps backwards, confusing you at first, until he sat down on a large unused amp (a speaker? you weren’t too sure nor did you care). doux beckoned you back to him, and as you obeyed, he took you by the arm before pulling you into his lap. you got comfortable straddling him and wasted no time as you began snogging once again.

you never actually intended for it to get this heated. at least not why you where still here, backstage after a gig, while his friends where still around, waiting up for him. you couldn’t help it. douxie just looked so pretty. all cleaned up for the performance. well, clean wasn’t the word. sexy? the point is no one can blame you for taking your sweet time when an incredibly hot punk rocker pulled you into a semi-private space for the express purpose of kissing you. you.

he smelled the cologne his bandmate sprayed on him earlier. douxie wasn’t one for stuff like that, but his friend had insisted he “smell like a rockstar” as they put it. you weren’t minding that at all though. you thought douxie always smelled like a rockstar, just by virtue of it was him. he disagreed, thinking you thought a little too highly of him.

but that post-gig adrenaline high had gotten into the rocker, if it wasn’t evident by now. douxie was dripping in confidence. which had made him a little bold, as repeatedly captured your lips with his. his hands roamed down your sides, over your ribs and your waist, before giving your ass a squeeze. you were a little surprised at this, douxie rarely got this handsy, but it was a welcome surprise.

your lips moved together like a delicate dance, fluid and practiced. not always graceful, but immensely beautiful. douxie’s touch was the most familiar thing to you. you couldn’t get enough of it. your saliva mingled with his, your lungs breathed in his air. you could stay like this forever. unfortunately, forever was cut short as doux broke the kiss.

but he wasn’t done by any means. doux returned the favor from earlier, leaving a mark on your pretty neck. you didn’t think he’d let you leave here without one did you. you let out a little moan as he nipped at the flesh. a grin spread across douxie’s face. he looked up at you, hazel eyes sparkling. you flushed, as if you hadn’t just spent all this time stuffing your tongues down each other’s throats. you averted your gaze, tracing the tattoos on his shoulders. a shiver ran down douxie’s spine. he took a deep breath.

“darling?”

you nodded to him.

“there’s something i wanted to tell you tonight.”

normally words like that would provoke anxiety, but you had a good feeling about this. “yeah?”

“i— i love you.”

your eyes were saucers. you? he loves you? how in deya’s grace did you get so lucky. how did you pull this off??

douxie didn’t take your lack of response too well, “i— uh, don’t worry, you don’t have to say it back,, if, you’re not ready... or—“

“i love you too.” you cut him off.

“hisirdoux casperan i love you too.”

douxie’s face lit up like christmas. “you do?”

“i do.” the grin on your face hurt.

bzzz bzzz douxie’s back pocket interrupted. he grumbled as he checked the phone. it was his bandmates, wondering where the hell he was. his brows scrunched together in annoyance. it was so cute.

“ah, it looks like we’ve got to go back and join the others, my love.”

you giggled at the emphasis he put on that new pet name. new butterflies joined the ones already in residence in your stomach. you could get used to that.

“awww, but i was having so much fun.” you teased.

you left the venue, away from the light. but you still felt magenta.

[i-want-it-thaaat-way]

Tales of Arcadia - We Don’t Talk About Merlin (It got a little long so I added a cutoff :) hope you like)

Jim: We don’t talk about Merlin, no, no, no.

We don’t talk about Merlin! But-

It was a few years ago-

Toby: Just a few years ago!

Jim: We were getting ready to fight the army of Gumm-Gumms-

Toby: Yes, an army of Gumm-Gumms!

Jim: Merlin strolls in, brews a potions, and then-

Toby: TROLL JIM!

Jim: Tobes, you telling this story or am I?

Toby: I’m sorry Jimbo go ooon!

Jim: Yes, he made me into a troll!

Toby: Made of stone and blue!

Jim: Said it was the only way to win-

Toby: Was it really truuue?

Jim: Now somehow I’m human again!

Toby: Not really sure how but anyway-

Jim and Toby: We don’t talk about Merlin, no, no, no- We don’t talk about Merlin!

Claire: Hey-! Found Merlin’s tomb and woke him up to fight Gunmar-

Said he fought Morgana and he used a spell against her-

He sealed the Eldritch Queen away, in doing so his power drained-

Shh-shh-shh!

Barbara: It’s a heavy weight having kids as trollhunters-

Merlin showed up at the house and left it in disaster-

Somehow convinced Jim to go and make a drastic change-

But he’s still my son the same

Krel: sssSEVEN FOOT FRAME!

Glowing staff in his grasp!

If you piss him off enough-

Your next breath could be your last!

Yeah, he knows all things-

With magic powered green!

Jim, Toby, Clarie, and Krel: We don’t talk about Merlin, no, no, no! We don’t talk about Merlin!

Steve: He said he didn’t know who I was, and that was just MEAN!

(Oh no!)

Aja: Never actually met him, too busy being a queen!

(Oh no!)

Strickler: Left a mess for all of us that no one could have foreseeeeen!

(Oh no!)

All: Bit of a jerk and so none of us are too keen!

Douxie: He took me in when I was just a kid

And taught me what I need to succeed-

I waited centuries to do what he needs-

But he’s left me alone…again

Claire: Blinky and AAARRRGGHH!!! are on their way!

Archie: Called Douxie his son-

Then he turned into dust

Leaving sorrow anew-

And a plan to follow through!

It’s almost like he’s still here…

Eli: Um…Merlin

Yeah, about that Merlin-

I really need to know about Merlin-

Give me the truth, and the whole truth, Merlin!

Krel: Hey Aja! Your boyfriend’s here!

All: Time for dinner!

(Complete chaos)

[taags-old-account]

Steve: Who the fuck added me to a fucking group chat?

Eli: >:O language

Jim: Yeah watch your fucking language

Toby: OKAY WHO TAUGHT JIM THE FUCK WORD?

Steve: 'The fuck word'.

Douxie: Are you stupid? You guys use the f word all the time

Eli: Oh my god they censored it

Aja: Say fuck, Douxie

Krel: Do it, Douxie. Say fuck.

[talesofarcadia78]

Our Time || One shot

Summary: Douxie’s remembering the good old times. 

Warnings: angst, mention of character death, that's it I think?

Word count: 1,735

Everything was set. The lanterns were hung up on the trees nearby, providing light to Douxie for the night. The campfire was crackling just a couple of feet away from the round dining table and chairs that Douxie had set up not too long ago. The plates were also ready on the table, waiting to be filled with food.

Douxie magicked up a bouquet of roses, and placed them in the vase that was in the middle of the table.

Suddenly, he heard a twig snap behind him. He quickly spun around, staff and bracelet ready, only to see Archie looking up at him in his cat form.

"You seriously thought that I was danger?" Archie questioned with an eyebrow raised.

Douxie magicked his staff away and deactivated his bracelet, "Hehe… yes."

Archie rolled his eyes at his familiar's response, "Do you not remember that you put a ward around this whole area?"

Douxie just shrugged and went back to doing last minute preparations.

After a few minutes of silence, Archie cleared his throat to gain Douxie's attention.

"Yes, Arch?" Douxie asked, turning his gaze to the cat.

Archie pointed to the two figures in the distance heading towards them.

Douxie's eyes widened at how time flew by quickly. He didn't even have time to get changed!

He quickly got behind a tree and used a spell he had recently learned, and changed into a black dress shirt (sleeves rolled up of course), black pants and shoes, keeping his signature skull necklace.

He stepped out from the tree to see Archie fly away. His eyes wandered around until they landed on both you and Jim getting closer. You were wearing a stunning black A-line lace dress that went down to your knees with half laced sleeves and beige heels.

You were blindfolded as Douxie had requested Jim to do to you so you had a surprise.

Douxie could hear you complain to Jim how you didn't like being blindfolded. Jim just rolled his eyes at your antics and told you that all would be revealed in a matter of moments.

Douxie walked up to you two siblings and took you from Jim.

"Thank you, Jim. I'll take her from here," Douxie smiled and took your shoulders.

"No problem, Doux! Tell me the end result!" Jim waved and walked off.

"Douxie, where in the world am I?" you asked.

"Shhh. Be patient, love. All will be revealed," Douxie reassured.

After a few moments, the blindfold on your eyes was taken off.

You took in your surroundings. The trees were decorated with lanterns, a dining table was set and a campfire was already lit. Everything was beautiful.

You spun around to see Douxie holding out a rose for you to take, which you, without a doubt, accepted.

"Shall we, m'lady?" Douxie inquired, holding his arm out.

You nodded and you let him take you to the table.

~~~~~

Douxie had prepared f/f for dinner, and for dessert, an apple pie.

Now, the two of you were quietly sitting on a blanket at the campfire, leaning on each other.

"Love?" Douxie asked.

You hummed in response, letting him know he had your attention.

"Remember the first time we met? I had spilled a drink on the ground in the cafe and you rushed to help," Douxie remembered.

"Yeah," you nodded, memories flooding back.

~~~~~

You anxiously tapped your feet on the ground, waiting for your order to arrive.

You were in a big rush.

Mom had called to tell you that Jim was in the hospital. You knew that he was the Trollhunter, so he had gotten a lot of injuries, though, he didn't need to go to the hospital to get them treated, so you knew that this was serious.

Abruptly, you heard a crash from behind you. You turned around to see a drink had spilled all over the floor. The waiter was already on his knees, trying to clean it up.

You got up from your seat and ran over to help him. You kneeled in front of the guy to hear him faintly say, "Fuzzbuckets". You saw a faint sky blue spark come from his hand.

A wizard.

You placed a hand on his arm, making him look up into your e/c eyes. You mouthed ‘no’ and shook your head, telling him not to perform the spell. He stopped and sighed before cleaning up the mess the old fashioned way with your help.

After helping him, you returned to your seat.

Just when you were about to leave, getting fed up of the wait, the same waiter you had helped rushed up to you, order in hand.

"Hey! You were the one who helped me with the spill a couple of minutes ago, right?" he asked.

"Yeah," you nodded and then added quietly, "And the one who stopped you from using magic as a shortcut."

You smiled and took your order from him. You headed out but got stopped by the same guy.

"Hey, I never got your name. I'm Hisirdoux Casperan, but you can call me Douxie," Douxie winked and held out his hand for a handshake.

"Y/n, Y/n Lake," you replied, shaking his hand. "I'm really sorry, but I really need to go."

He nodded understandingly and waved goodbye.

As you walked to the hospital, you opened the bag that had your food in it, as well as a note. You took it out and read it:

Hey, stranger, who I probably got the name of!

I was wondering if you would grab a bite with me tomorrow at the cafe. 4 pm sharp.

Don't be late.

Yours truly,

Hisirdoux Casperan.

You smiled. You had finally found a fellow magic wielder.

~~~~~

"Then, the time when Jim got a bit overprotective of you when you were at the bookstore."

"A bit?"

"Okay, extremely overprotective of you."

~~~~~

The sun was shining high in the sky, your hair moving along with the gentle breeze, and a nice cup of coffee in your hands while you and Jim made your way to GDT Arcane Books.

Jim opened the door to reveal Archie, Douxie's familiar lying on the ground near the fireplace.

"Hey, Archie!" you greeted.

"Hello," Archie called.

You turned your attention away from the cat and to Jim, who was looking around in suspicion.

"Jim, what is it now?" you asked, placing your hand on your brother's shoulder.

"It's just… why does this store seem so… magical?" Jim inquired.

"Because a magical being owns the bookstore," you replied.

Jim nodded in response.

"Hello!" a new voice spoke.

You turned around to see Douxie coming out of the back. From the corner of your eye, you saw Jim's gaze harden at the sight of the wizard. He pulled you a bit closer to him.

Overprotective brother mode switched on.

"Hey, Doux. Did you call us in for some help?" you inquired.

"Yep! There's only so much a 900 year old wizard can do by himself," Douxie nodded.

Douxie told you and Jim what he needed help with.

Jim was sent off to get some supplies from around town, to his dismay. He wanted to keep an eye on you and Douxie, but alas, he had to go shopping.

Before Jim had left, you heard him send a death threat to Douxie.

"Don't do anything funny with my sister, Casperan. I won't hesitate to slice your head off with Daylight."

Your eyes widened. You knew Jim didn't like Douxie, but you didn't know that he hated him so much to actually threatened him.

Geez. He's way too overprotective.

You made your way over to Douxie as soon as Jim left the store.

"Don't mind him. He's just overprotective," you told Douxie.

"Uh-huh," Douxie nodded slowly.

~~~~~

"We know each other so well, made so many wonderful memories, we've spent so much time together," Douxie sighed. "And I want to spend more time with you."

You turned your head towards him, silently asking him to elaborate.

Douxie moved away and got up. He lent you his hand, which you accepted and followed suit. He took a deep breath and got down on one knee.

"Y/n, love, we've been through so much together. Good and bad. Sad and happy. And I'll continue to. You made me the most happiest man when you became my girlfriend and I thought I couldn't be any happier. But today may prove me wrong," Douxie expressed.

You gasped and clasped your hand over your mouth as Douxie took out a golden ring with embroidery and held it out.

"Y/n Lake… make me the happiest man in the world. Will you marry me?"

You had tears in your eyes at this point. Douxie looked at you with hope, love, admiration, and so much more as he waited for your answer.

"Yes."

Douxie's eyes lit up like a child on Christmas morning, and quickly got up. He grabbed your waist and brought you close. He leaned down and softly kissed you as he slipped the ring onto your finger.

~~~~~

Douxie stared at the photo of you two on your wedding day. You were wearing a short lace white dress and beige ankle strap heels and Douxie was wearing a white dress shirt, black tuxedo, black tie, black pants and a rose attached on the left as you two stood in front of each other, hand in hand while Douxie was kissing your forehead.

Douxie placed the photo back and glanced down at his wedding ring. It was simple, a silver band with swirl embroidery as you had the same, but gold. He remembered the feeling of your hand in his. Your giggling. Everything. But alas, ever since you had passed in battle, he couldn't seem to bring any of those memories back.

Tears formed in Douxie's eyes as he remembered the good times.

Suddenly, the door opened to reveal Jim and Claire.

"Hey, Teach. What were you--" Claire started before she noticed the tears streaming down his face.

Douxie wasn't going to cry but as soon as he saw the wedded couple, he couldn't help himself.

Jim and Claire rushed over to Douxie and enveloped the wizard in a hug, attempting to comfort him. He sobbed into Jim's chest as Jim ran his hand through his hair and Claire rubbing Douxie's back.

Nothing was going to be the same without you.

[ewritesfanfics]

Day 1 : Battle of the Bands

@krexieweek

https://archiveofourown.org/works/36841528 

Douxie had figured the Battle of the Bands would be just about the same as it always was. There are a few serious performers, which he’s happy about, it’s always great to see blossoming young talent. Then are some … bumbling but emphatic performers, which he can appreciate if not for their talent, then for their gumption. Well, one, whose performance partner has a … pan flute? He doesn’t see those around much these days. Then, of course, there are the ones who joined just for the fun of it, and though they aren’t always great, it’s always a good sight to see people having honest fun while participating in music even if they lack skill. And yes, he is categorizing them and Steve differently, because Steve is … well, he and … he wants to say Eli … are a one-of-a-kind act. And finally, there are, as always, those who decided to join for solely the prize money, and Douxie can only roll his eyes. Those people lack the soul of the event, and their music always sounds far too plastic and manufactured.

And then, there is the ever-puzzling and socially inept but positively endearing genius Krel Tarron.

He’s had quite a few run-ins with Krel over the past couple of months, and every time Douxie ended up sitting and talking with Krel during his breaks at the café, the boy just got weirder and weirder, and Douxie grew fonder and fonder. With every detail he lets slip as their talks became longer and deeper, his story got more complex and ever stranger, and his sister never helped cover this up. Aja, the few times she’s been either with Krel or with Steve while Douxie’s been on shift, just added to it. Then again, this is Arcadia Oaks he’s talking about here, so really, they’d have been more out of place if they were completely boring and normal. And besides, he can’t really talk here about ‘not normal’, considering he’s a 900-year-old wizard from Camelot who plays rock music on the weekends and works two minimum wage jobs.

At this point, Douxie considers himself and Krel to be close, and Douxie’s heart doesn’t do a weird tap dance in his chest every time he sees Krel, no sir. Close enough to just choose to hang out together. It was at one of these the other week that Douxie had discussed Battle of the Bands with Krel. When he’d handed Krel the flyer, he’d looked genuinely excited, and Douxie’s been looking forward to witnessing his ‘lively disc-jockey moves’ ever since.

And so, when Krel enters from the wings, nervously taking his place, Douxie elbows his way to the front to have a front-row seat. Once there, he waves, trying to get his attention. When he finally catches Krel’s eye, he gives him a supportive smile and a thumbs up – a gesture he had to teach Krel, as apparently this is not a gesture commonly seen in Cantaloupia, which yes, Douxie knows is fake, but Douxie himself can’t exactly go up to people and say he’s from Camelot, so who he is to judge – and Krel returns the smile as just the tiniest bit of tension leaves his shoulders.

“Yeah, tear it up Aja!” some kid cheers, and immediately the tension returns.

We can’t have that.

“You got this DJ Kleb! Show us what a real DJ can do!” Douxie cheers.

Krel seems to latch onto that cheer. He takes a deep breath, seeming to get into the zone as he places the headphones over his ears, and then, he starts.

And when he starts with an eccentric mash of animal noises, Douxie can’t say he is exactly surprised, letting out a quiet, fond chuckle because really, what else should he have expected? And while the general consensus is negative, people either completely silent or murmuring about how it’s weird, Douxie can appreciate the eclectic music, and not just because it’s Krel – when you’ve been around for nine centuries, you’ve heard it all, and he’s certainly heard worse things. It has several layers of beats and indicates a well-thought-out artistic thought process behind it.

And then there’s also Aja just chanting the word ‘dance’ over and over again.

Douxie can’t tell if it’s supposed to be part of the show or not.

Krel looks around at the audience, uncertainty creeping over his face, and Aja goes over to him to say something. Douxie wonders for a second if he’s going to need to take some matters into his own hands when Aja goes back to her previous position, and Krel turns off his track.

And what he puts on in its stead blows Douxie away.

Bass-boosted electronic music thrums in his chest and as the people around him start to cheer, Douxie can’t help but let out a whoop himself. Aja adds vocals as Krel gets into the music, energized by the new enthusiasm from the crowd, and Douxie can honestly say Krel’s giving his band a run for their money. The crowd around him is growing wilder by the second, and he’s certain the cheers and the music can be heard across the city.

As DJ Kleb continues to play, Douxie makes his way toward the area beside the stage.

He makes it to the side just as Krel and Aja are exiting the stage.

“DJ Kleb!”

“Douxie!” Krel responds, running up to Douxie, vibrating with the same energy as a worked-up puppy. And then, much to Douxie’s surprise, he finds himself with his arms full of over-excited teenage boy, Krel having flung himself at Douxie once it arms reach. He’s not complaining, of course.

“So, what did you think?” Krel asks when he pulls away after squeezing the air right out of Douxie.

“You absolutely smashed it up there! Ash Dispersal Pattern has had a couple of acts here and there that had the potential to rival us, but you’re the first one I’ve seen that could actually steal the win from us.”

“You really mean that? I did good?”

“Good? Krel, you were nuclear!”

“He’s right! You rocked, you rolled! Aja, I have some notes,” Stuart says, coming up to the group of three.

Krel glows under the praise, his face lighting up, and Douxie melts.

He’s too cute.

The young lady he’d met a few weeks ago, Claire, starts yelling something up onstage. He figures he should watch her too, but he wants to finish up with Krel first. He has some other business to discuss.

“So, what’re you planning on doing later after the show’s done?”

“Oh, uh, we’re leaving,” Aja says, sadness tinging her words, and Douxie freezes at those words.

“Leaving?”

“We, well, we’re actually leaving Arcadia today to return to our home country,” Krel says, eyes going to the ground.

Douxie’s heart sinks.

“Oh. That’s too bad …”

“Yeah …”

Dammit, I can’t let this end this way …

“Well … does Cantaloupia have cellphone service?”

Suddenly, the ground shakes, an even greater tremor than those preceding, and from the direction of the canal, a towering inferno erupts, and the sun begins to turn red.

The Eternal Night …

“That’s not summer weather, is it?” Aja says grimly, gazing up at the vortex.

“Definitely not,” Douxie says.

Screams ring out, and Douxie sucks in a sharp breath at the sight of the Gum Gums. It’s been nine centuries since he’s seen any, and he must say, he hasn’t missed them.

“Do you think it’s Morando?” Krel asks Aja.

“Whatever it is, it’s not Akiridion.”

The two pull out glowing blue protractor-like items, which transform in their hands into a blaster and a sword, respectively.

Well, I was certainly right about there being something strange about these two.

“I’m not sure what ‘Akiridion’ is, but I can certainly tell you those are not that.”

“Do you know what on Earth these things are, Douxie?” Krel asks.

He’s struck with indecision, unsure of how much to tell, when there’s a crash from behind them.

He turns just in time to see a bunch of the Gum Gums advancing towards them.

He springs into action.

“Solluxia!”

A bright light shines from the palm of his hand, and the Gum Gums turn to dust.

“What was that!?” Krel gasps.

“I dunno what’s up with you two and the blue weaponry, but you’re not the only ones around here with a secret.”

“Magic! That’s magic! Are you a wizard?” Stuart gasps, stars in his eyes. “Oh, I’ve always wanted to meet one, ever since I found out about them during my short stint at Area 49-B!”

So, he’s an extraterrestrial, then, if Kubritz took him back to 49-B.

“49-B? I suppose you’ve met Kubritz then, huh?”

“You know Colonel Kubritz?” Krel asks.

“Not by choice.”

Definitely not by choice. In her crusade, Kubritz has gotten tangled up in far too many magical matters, and every time Douxie has to fix what she’s mucked up, and every time he shows up, she starts yelling about dissecting him. Unfortunately for her, Douxie has 900 years of experience outrunning violent mobs, assassinations (that one was mostly when he was in Arthur’s court … and a couple of revolutions), and the law. So, he’s got her outmatched on both her legal approaches and her illegal approaches.

Behind him, both Aja and Krel jump into the fight, and in front of him … well there had been a Gum Gum. Now there’s just a tall, glowing, blue … person. Who doesn’t look like any magical creature he knows of, but who does look like she’s super pissed and about to kick his ass.

“Zadra! Thank Seklos you’re here!” Aja calls out, Krel and her running back to Douxie. So, they know her. Well, at least that gives Douxie a measure of protection from the very tall, very scary lady.

Immediately her attention turns to them, Douxie all but ceasing to exist.

“This is not our fight! We must return to the mothership! The citizens of Akiridion 5 need you!”

There’s another loud crash, followed by roars and screams, and he can see Aja and Krel both come to the same conclusion.

“So do the people of Arcadia,” Aja says.

“Yeah, what she said.”

The two run off, and Douxie follows close.

“Akiridion 5?”

Krel and Aja exchange a look before Krel responds.

“Our home planet.”

It takes Douxie a moment to process that. But once he does, well –

“That actually makes so much sense.”

And then Stuart yells out from behind, “Look out!”

Above them, a large truck descends from the sky, and Douxie, internally already wincing at the force it’ll take to stop that thing, readies his spell.

Only for Jim, looking more trollish than last Douxie saw him, to leap through the air and slice the vehicle in two with the Eclipse Blade – Douxie can vaguely remember the schematics Merlin drew of for it while working on the amulet, and he must say, it’s far more impressive in person.

“Is that Jim? He looks so much more blue!” Aja says, and then both siblings call out, “Ah! Trollhunters!”

“Jim!” Douxie calls out, catching the Trollhunter before he can get very far.

“Huh?”

“You may have Gunmar handled, but you’re going to need more than just Claire’s shadow portals to fight Morgana!”

“Wait, you know about Morgana?” he gasps.

At that moment, another vehicle comes flying towards them.

“Subsisto momentus!”

A large blue sigil appears in front of his outstretched hands, and blue surrounds the projectile. The car stops in midair, momentarily suspended, and then, after maneuvering it away from them, Douxie drops the spell. The car falls to the ground, the crumple zones doing exactly that, and the engines catch fire upon getting crushed.

Jim turns and gapes at him.

“You’re not the only person in Arcadia with secrets. I can’t say I’m anywhere near her level of sorcery, but considering we had the same teacher, I’m probably your best bet against her without Merlin himself.”

“Actually, we’ve got Merlin, he’s down in Trollmarket facing her right now!” Claire says, running up to them.

“Wait, you went and woke him up!? And he didn’t come and get me!?”

“Less talky, more fighty!” Toby yells.

“My lieges, it’s a distress signal!” Zadra says.

“From where?” Aja asks.

“Home.”

“We need to get back to the ship,” Krel says.

“I'm going to go find Steve to say goodbye!”

Aja takes off, but Krel hesitates.

“Krel?”

He marches up to Douxie, a determined look in his eyes, and doesn’t stop until there’s not even a foot of space between them.

“I do not know if I will ever get to see you again. So, in case I cannot, I do not want any regrets. If Aja gets to say her goodbye, I do too!”

That’s all the warning Douxie gets before Krel grabs his shirt and drags him into a scorching kiss.

The world stands still, and Douxie’s eyes slip closed. His hands come up to cup Krel’s face, and Krel lets go of his shirt to snake his arms around Douxie’s torso, pressing in closer. There is no Eternal Night and Krel doesn’t have to leave. Here and now, it’s just the two of them, locked in an embrace. Douxie’s chest fills with warmth, and giddiness gathers in his stomach, because this is happening! Holy fuzzbuckets!

The need for air breaks their lips part, but neither goes far, instead choosing to rest their foreheads against each other, Douxie’s own arms, smoothing over Krel’s shoulder to drape behind his head.

“Well now I really don’t want you to leave,” is all Douxie can manage. He had been upset before but now he can already feel the telltale sting in his eyes.

“I have to,” Krel responds, his voice wavering, “But I promise, I will not stop until I find a way to contact you from Akiridion 5. Now, you have to promise me you will not die.”

“As long as you do the same.”

And so they part, Krel running after his sister with Zadra and Stuart in tow, and Douxie turning back to the fight with the Gum Gums, swallowing down the lump in his throat. He has to believe that Krel will find a way.

He takes a steadying breath, then takes off to go aid his master against Morgana.

[freyaxx]

Krel: Who the fuck added me to a fucking group chat? Aja: >:O language Toby: Yeah watch your fucking language Jim: OKAY WHO TAUGHT TOBY THE FUCK WORD? Claire: "The fuck word"? Douxie: Are you stupid? You guys use the f word all the time Toby: Oh my god he censored it Claire: Say fuck, Douxie. Krel: Do it, Douxie. Say fuck.

[archies-litterbox]

of poison, forest floors, and terrified wizards

Summary: Out all alone on what was meant to be a simple errand, collecting herbs for Merlin, Douxie is downed when some pickpocket throws a fistful of black powder in his face - a magic surpressant and poison to wizards, he comes to find out the hard way. Unable to move or use his magic, as attempts to do both cause nothing but agony, the moppet has no choice but to rely on the slim hope of someone finding him before the poison overtakes him.

A/N: This is my first toa fic! I’ve spent the past year mostly just doing fic for witcher, so this is a nice change of pace :) I had fun with this! I thought about what would happen if there was some sort of substance in TOA that acted as a poison/magic surpressant to wizards... and ofc it turned into douxie whump (but it’s moppet!douxie which is even more painful :( ). Enjoyyy!

[CW: Hurt/Comfort, Whump, Poisoning/Sickness, Temporary Paralysis, blood mention (but no bleeding)]

---

All Douxie had been sent out to do was collect some herbs for Merlin. It wasn’t even in the uncertain ground like the Wild Wood, but a patch of forest he’d been sent to fetch ingredients from countless times. It should have been a simple enough task for the moppet, which is why he hadn’t woken Archie from his afternoon nap - which he was taking on Douxie’s bed - to have his familiar accompany him. And truly, the task itself was simple; it didn’t take Douxie very long at all to go into the woods and find a patch of the plants Merlin told him to fetch - something about a potion ingredient, the apprentice vaguely recollected.

Indeed, he found it without any trouble, but when he felt a figure speed past his back and steal away the little pouch of herbs he’d collected before speeding off into the woods, that was when the trouble started.

The rational part of him (which said exactly what he’d reckoned Archie would be telling him right now) told him just to pick more, but it was overshadowed by how downright insulting this woodland pickpocket was! Before he’d been taken in by Merlin, conning and using slight-of-hand to his advantage was one of his only means of survival, so to not only be stolen from, but in a way so lacking in cunning? The audacity!

It was the principal of the matter that sent him running after the thief, darting this way and that until he was lost in the thick of the woods, focused only on tailing the pickpocket.

“Hey! Stop!” Douxie panted, “You’re stealing from a master wizard!”

That didn’t seem to entice the thief to stop.

“Well… his apprentice, anyway!” he added for reasons unsure to even himself. Maybe honesty would help?

Well, thanks to his trusty, gangly legs, he caught up to the thief and got close enough to grab their wrist, and he thought it would be smooth sailing after that.

Yeah! Alright! I’ll just get my herbs back and deal with this thief and -

The thief turned around and threw a handful of black powder in his face.

Fuzzbuckets.

Douxie squeezed his eyes shut as soon as he felt them sting, coughing into his elbow to hack up the charcoal tasting powder that flew into his mouth and nose. That little trick stopped him in his tracks, but he wasn’t deterred. Not mentally. He still wanted to try to catch up… 

...but his legs wouldn’t move.

No matter how badly he wanted - demanded his legs to obey him, they remained tense, frozen in that position of one in front of the other.

What?

One terrifying moment later, they did move. But not into the sprint he wanted to take - no, to do something worse: to buckle underneath him and send him falling onto his side against the forest floor. 

And he couldn’t get up.

No matter how much he willed his body to do it, he couldn’t get up.

It was like when he’d have nightmares and he’d realize he was having a nightmare; it took forcing his body to toss and turn and shift from side to side as much as he could to rouse him back to the realm of the fully conscious.

But he couldn’t even do that. He couldn’t rouse himself from this nightmare because he couldn’t push himself up.

Wait.

No.

He couldn’t move.

Nearing complete panic, he internally begged and pleaded to find some sort of mobility, but his limbs grew numb by the second, and wherever he still had feeling, it ached - utterly, reprehensibly ached. Not only that, but it was cold. So, so cold, despite the warm atmosphere of the summer afternoon that hung around him so tauntingly.

He’d never felt more scared in his life. Not even being threatened at swordpoint by Sir Galahad and his men, knowing that he’d be killed for something like a measly alley trick, was as terrifying as this - not even that made his blood run cold (literally, it felt like, as well as figuratively) like this did.

And he was sure that was clear to the thief he’d tried to catch. They stood over him, and he couldn’t see their face from where his head lay on the ground, cheek against the grass, but with his glassy, wide eyes flickering between straining to look at his poisoner - because that’s what this was, a poison -  and darting around wherever they could look without him moving his head - because he couldn’t even do that - as black strands of hair lay loose on his cheek because he couldn’t lift a hand to move them, he was sure looked every bit as terrified as he felt.

The thief laughed. Laughed.

“A master wizard’s apprentice, eh?” they spoke, their voice dripping with mock fascination that made Douxie wish that someone, anyone would come to help him, “And your great master never told you to pick your battles? He must not have, if you felt so inclined as to chase me all through the woods for a plant you could have just picked a little more of. It was right in front of you, after all.”

The realization which dawned on Douxie would have made his blood run cold if it didn’t feel like it already was. They’d pickpocketed him because they counted on him pursuing them, even to the point of ending up in the thick of the woods, far away from where Merlin or Archie expected him to be - far away from where they’d know to look for him.

Douxie finally tried to shout for help, but his throat was just as tense - as frozen as the rest of his muscles, and his jaw was too tight to open as much as he’d need to scream. All he could do was gasp and force shuddering breaths in and out of his lungs, which was still a trying ordeal - too trying for something like breathing to have been.

“Trying to scream? Really?” the poisoner-thief asked as if it was an absurd thing to do in the moppet’s position (which it wasn’t), “Next thing you know, you’ll try mustering a spell.”

Against his better judgement, for trying a spell couldn’t have been a good idea if his own assailant was suggesting it, he tried to force a little magic to his fingertips.

It burned. Oh, sweet heart of Avalon, it burned. His hand hadn’t even hurt this badly after he’d botched a lightning spell and scarred his wrist in the process.

Douxie wheezed at the sensation, and the thief laughed again.

“Oh, this is rich!” they exclaimed, “this has already paralyzed you hand and foot, and you thought some conjuring would help? What do you think this was made to diminish, Apprentice of Ambrosius?

Douxie couldn’t even think of a swear worthy of this (“fuzzbuckets” was too tame), his mind still flooded with fear and his hand still aching from his botched magic attempt. How had they already known he was Merlin’s apprentice? Sure, he’d mentioned being an apprentice to a master wizard, but he wasn’t that specific.

But he wasn’t worried about that as much as what this implied about his magic, and what this - whatever it had been - was doing to it.

“This,” His assailant bent down and held up their fingertips to his face, showing him the black powder on them. “Seeps away your magic. Or poisons it, or diminishes it, or eats away at it - I’m not a poet, and apt synonyms aren’t my strong suit.”

They stood back up all the way, and Douxie wanted to plead, but the words wouldn’t come out. They wouldn’t even form. This - he couldn’t lose his magic. Not on something as measly as an herb collection.

“All of this-”

They gestured to his paralyzed, twitching form.

“Is just a side effect. A byproduct of attacking your magic.”

Douxie tried curling his hand into a fist. Not only were his muscles so weak that he could only curl his fingers for a second in what looked more like a spasm than a conscious movement, but grabbing the wrong end of a knife would have hurt less.

The powder-tosser winced mock-sympathetically.

“Shame, really. I hoped the master wizard you served could be the one to deal with this.”

For a moment, in his agony, he wished he was. Douxie squandered the thought as quickly as it came up, hating himself for conceiving it. He couldn’t wish this on anyone, least of all the wizard who saved him, who plucked him off the streets.

But why couldn’t he save him now?

“Ah, well.” They reached down to Douxie’s face and put a strand of hair behind his ear.

Douxie wanted to cry.

“S’pose you’ll do. It’ll be a kick in the teeth for him anyway, when you don’t come back from your little errand after hours and hours, and by the time they send out a search party…”

The smugness and certainty in their tone made Douxie whimper, the first vocal noise he’d been able to make in all of this, after naught but wheezing and gasping. Where was he going to get dragged off to? The Wild Wood? Were they in league with trolls, hoping to get an edge on King Arthur? Or were they a bandit, hoping to take all his goods off of him (which weren’t much, unless they counted the black cat fur on his vest) and keep him in some rackety shack until a ransom note made its way to Merlin?

(Would he even pay it, considering Douxie’s incompetence?)

“Well, they’ll find you right here, I’m sure, but…”

Douxie could hear them mock-wince again, and their implication was worse than anything he’d assumed in the moments before. He couldn’t hear the rest of their sentence over his own panic that, combined with the poison, made his head swim.

He wasn’t going to be taken anywhere.

He was going to be left here, to - to - to - 

His panic pushed him to try his magic again on impulse alone, and it felt like both his hands were on fire. His throat, as tight as it was, finally let him groan through his teeth.

“An exercise in futility, little wizard.” his attacker taunted, “In fact…”

They took his bracelet - only three fingers wide at this point in his training - right off his wrist, which made him squeak as he tried, tried, tried to shake his head, and threw it into a bush in what was both further assurance of his powerlessness and an insult to injury.

“I would say you should try to get comfortable…” 

They stood up and took a few steps back, leaving the little field of vision Douxie had from where his head lay on the ground.

“...But I suppose that would be another exercise in futility.”

He heard the poisoner-thief run off, their footfalls fading as the pounding of his racing heart, which drummed against his ears in sync with their steps, drowned out the noise until they were out of earshot.

He was alone.

He couldn’t move, some poison was seeping away his magic - his very lifeforce - and tensed his body up so rigidly that he couldn’t even scream, and he was alone.

If he could’ve, he would have curled up into a ball as small as he could make himself in hopes that the dangers of the woods and the dire circumstances of his situation would pass him by.

If he could’ve, he would have screamed, even though he knew he was far away from the earshot of anyone who might have come looking for him by that patch of herbs where he said he’d go, and he knew that Archie, who could have tracked his scent here, was still sleeping because, in his arrogance, he hadn’t thought to wake him.

If he could’ve, he would have dragged himself to his gauntlet, wherever it had been thrown, because even if it wouldn’t have done anything to get him out of this, at least he wouldn’t have felt so helpless, even though helpless was exactly what he was.

But he couldn’t.

All he could do was squeeze his eyes shut and feel his tears run down the bridge of his nose as his lips contorted into a grimace, the only two things he could do with his body where the movement itself didn’t outweigh how badly he wanted - needed to do it.

All he could hope for, against hope itself, was that he’d be found here.

Before all that could be found was his body.

---

He wished he could just sleep.

The grassy ground underneath him was soft enough, and his position on his side could have been comfortable enough. Maybe it would have helped pass the time until the poison ran its course, whatever that entailed.

But whatever this was, it didn’t even grant him that luxury. Whether it was an effect of the poison or a product of his own adrenaline and terror, Douxie was wide awake.

Not only that, but after what might have been an hour or two (judging by the sunlight’s reflection off the dewey grass), his body would periodically twitch because of the poison. Sometimes his leg would kick out like a dog, or his shoulder would seize up to the point where it touched his ear, or his hand would ball into a fist.

But his poisoned body didn’t care which of his movements were voluntary or otherwise - it stung all the same. Not like the horrific burning that came with his attempts at magic, but a grating, awful ache right down to his bones. The spontaneous twitches never let him even come close to unconsciousness, and maybe that was a good thing - every breath was more or less of a laborious gasp, a conscious effort of his, and if he’d lost consciousness and stopped forcing them in and out of his lungs… he didn’t want to imagine it.

He wished his panic would quiet enough for him to get bored laying here - he would have preferred it to this, and it would have made sense, considering that he was stuck staring at the same blades of grass and patch of trees that he’d been staring at for the past hour.

And they weren’t even particularly interesting trees or blades of grass, not that they would have distracted him very well if they were.

He wondered if anyone had started looking for him by now. Maybe Merlin was growing impatient without the ingredients he asked for, and maybe Morgana had started to wonder why “Little Douxie” hadn’t come back to the castle.

He wondered if Archie had woken up from his nap and noticed Douxie’s absence yet. If anyone could insist that someone go out and search for him, it would be his familiar. He didn’t want to delude himself by thinking it would help though.

He wondered the importance of those herbs he was collecting before. Were they really that important to whatever Merlin had been working on? Were they worth chasing that thief down? Were they worth all of this?

He was pulled from his thoughts when a shadow cast over the grass he’d been staring at - the shadow of a creature flying overhead and hovering above him.

If he could’ve curled into himself, just to look as small as possible, he would have. What if it was a vulture, waiting to scavenge him? What if it was a monster, or a winged troll, here to carry him off to some trollish nest in the Wild Wood? None of the thoughts that came to mind were soothing by any means. As the creature swooped down, all Douxie could do was squeeze his eyes shut and hope he wouldn’t be harmed any further.

Even when the figure landed in front of him and stepped closer and closer, he didn’t look at it. It wasn’t until he could feel it’s breath on his face, one of the only sensations of the past few hours that didn’t hurt, that he opened his eyes.

A face of black fur greeted him.

And yellow eyes.

And a round pair of glasses.

Archie!

He couldn’t even say the word, but a sob escaped his throat - a sob of relief? A sob of terror that this might have been the start of an onslaught of hallucinations, the first of which being a sign of rescue? He wasn’t sure. Either way, all he wanted to do was reach up and pet the cat-dragon familiar, or hug him and not let go, but he couldn’t. His arm felt like it weighed half a ton, just like the rest of his limbs.

So, he sobbed. It was all he could do.

“Douxie!” Archie cried.

Merlin’s apprentice could hear the worry in his voice as he stepped back a few paces, his ears back and his wings to his side. Of course, he’d shifted into his dragon form - he must have been able to track Douxie’s scent like that. But Douxie hated the thought of his familiar being in danger because he’d flown here. He was already suspicious enough as a black cat, since they carried the notion of being bad omens. What if he’d gotten taken down? He wasn’t worth that!

Douxie was too relieved - yes, he chose relief, not terror, because that’s all he could afford - to think about all of that though.

“Douxie, I’ve been looking for you! What’s happened to you?” Archie asked, “Merlin expected you back hours ago!”

The first thing that came to mind, despite everything, was an apology for his absence - an apology he couldn’t even say. He couldn’t even say what happened to him, not like -

A spasm cut off from his speeding, scrambled thoughts - a large one in his left arm (his right was still mostly underneath him) that reached all the way from his fingertips to his shoulderblade, forcing his hand to ball into a fist, his arm to fold so tightly that his fist touched his shoulder, and his shoulder to tighten so much that his shoulder pressed to his ear.

The sound of agony ripped from his throat was the closest to a scream he’d gotten yet.

Archie looked horrified, and Douxie could only imagine what the sight of him was like - black strands loose from his bun strewn over his face, his eyes puffy and tear-ringed, his lips contorted in a pained grimace. He imagined he looked as pitiful and helpless as he felt.

(In fact, he didn’t have to imagine it. He could faintly see his reflection in the lenses of Archie’s glasses, and he was right in what he pictured, save for the addition of smudges and speckles of that powder still on his face, the black splotches of dust contrasting his color-drained skin, pale as death.)

His arm relaxed again after a few agonizing moments, letting his hand fall in front of his face and leaving a throbbing ache down to his bones, and Douxie tried to collect himself. He had to tell Archie what was wrong. He had to try. If Archie knew, he could fix it. He could get Merlin to fix it. Right? Right.

“P-” he started, trying his absolute best to form words despite the constriction in his throat and lungs that barely let him breathe at all, “puh- poi-”

His own wheezing cough cut him off.

“Poison?” Archie asked, getting it right much to the little relief that Douxie could manage. He nodded - at least, as close to the motion as he could accomplish - and tried to hum a “mhm” of affirmation, since trying to talk hadn’t exactly worked. Far from it.

Archie stepped forward and sniffed his face. He immediately recoiled, his big eyes widening, and Douxie was proven wrong for thinking he couldn’t be more terrified.

“Oh, dear.” His eyes glanced to what must have been a few more clumps and speckles of dust on the ground, “Ohhh, not good. Not good at all.”

No. Archie couldn’t be scared. If Archie was scared for him, then this was so, so much worse than he thought. How could it possibly be worse?

Douxie squeaked out a whimper in fear, and Archie’s attention snapped back to him (as if it could have been anywhere else).

“Douxie, don’t worry.” he said, “You’ll be alright.”

Archie was never a good liar, much to Douxie’s dismay. If Archie was going to hide the truth to soothe him, he at least would’ve liked it to work. His immediately telling Douxie not to worry had the opposite effect of what was intended; it showed him his worry - his terror - was entirely warranted, which was the exact thing he didn’t want to know. Even if all he said was “You’ll be alright.”, the fear that seemed to bristle through his fur was indication enough of the contrary.

Archie’s eyebrows, indicated by the grey patches in the fur above his eyes, upturned as if in dread.

“...But I need to go.”

NO!

If Douxie could have screamed the word and reached out to hold Archie, he would have done it right at that moment, but all he could do was whine like a kicked puppy, his eyebrows raising as his head shook - an unconscious movement, minute despite his desperation.

“Douxie, Douxie, listen.” Archie said, softening his voice, “I can’t carry you back to the castle. I wouldn't be able to fly carrying you anyway, but especially not with your-”

Archie got cut off by another one of Douxie’s spasms - this one made his left leg curl up so tight that his thigh touched his torso, causing the apprentice to nearly involuntarily hit Archie with his knee, which the cat-dragon barely dodged.

“-that." Archie said, "Not with that.”

Douxie saw the sense in that, despite his panic. He did, he did, he did.

But - 

He sobbed again.

-But he didn’t want to be alone.

Sweet heart of Avalon, he didn’t want to be alone. 

The worst of his pain and terror wasn’t from the paralysis, or the aching, or the random twitches, or the burning that came from trying to use his magic, or even the tightness in his throat and lungs that robbed him of speaking or even screaming; it came from being alone in this - from wondering if anyone would come for him, or find his body; it came from knowing that there was nothing he could do but lay there, at the mercy of nature, the poison wracking his body with every beat of his heart, and the determination (or lack thereof) of someone else to find him.

And when he opened his eyes to find Archie there, all of that went away - all of that fear that told him he’d die alone here. He didn’t want it to come back. He would’ve rather the poison take him right now.

“I just need to go back to the castle and bring Merlin here. He’ll know what to do.”

Archie put his paw in Douxie’s limp, open palm. All Douxie wanted to do was hold it, and he so desperately hoped the next twitch would be in his hand so he could.

“I won’t be long. I promise.”

But what if it was too long, even if he hurried?

What if Merlin was too late, even if he hurried?

What if it took too long to convince his master to come here? Would the fact that he’d been poisoned and needed help be enough, or would Merlin refuse because it served Douxie right for his insolence?

(No, no, he wouldn’t do that. Merlin said that mastery over magic was mastery over life, and he had to learn how to live. He couldn’t learn to live if he died here in the woods.)

What if… 

What if this killed him before Archie came back?

...No.

It wasn’t the same this time. Douxie wasn’t lost here, hoping against hope that someone would find him. This was hope - someone knew where he was, and help would come. He could handle a little bit more fear for that hope, he knew.

So, fighting the grating, awful ache in his bones, Douxie closed his hand around Archie’s paw and put on as brave a face he found himself able to muster, nodding as much as he could while causing as little pain to himself as possible.

He didn’t trust much in this - not even his own body to keep fighting the poison - but he trusted Archie, and he trusted his promise.

His familiar gently pulled his paw away before slipping it under the side of Douxie’s head, lifting it a little off the ground. The little apprentice was confused for a moment, until Archie reached behind Douxie’s head with his mouth. He could hear the sounds of the woods stifle as fabric came over his ears, warding off the now-coolness of the woodsy air around his head as Archie pulled the hood of his vest over his head and gingerly laid it back down.

Ah, he got it now - it was a little comfort, a little shelter from the world.

And of course he took it, hoping his eyes conveyed his gratitude.

He kept up his brave front as Archie turned away from him, something Douxie could tell he’d done reluctantly, and flew off. It wasn’t until he couldn’t see his familiar anymore - until the sight of the cat-dragon vanished behind the treetops - that he let it fall and shatter.

He just had to keep waiting. That’s all he had to do - wait and trust Archie to come back with Merlin. He knew that.

But he could still feel new tears come down his face.

---

Douxie wished he could see the sunset from where he lay. It would have been beautiful, he knew.

The spasms subsided a little while after Archie flew back, leaving Douxie limp on the ground - still unable to move without hurting himself or try to use his magic without thrusting himself into agony - with a lingering pins-and-needles sensation in his hands and feet that felt like it was crawling up from his ankles and wrists.

(Honestly, Douxie still wasn’t sure if the spasms had truly subsided for good, or if this was just a rather long interval between them. He hoped it was the former. The spasms never hurt any less as they went on, and he was so, so tired of the pain.)

Archie still hadn’t come back with Merlin yet, obviously, and at this point, it seemed like Douxie was fighting off his doubt more than the poison. At least he knew what the poison was doing to him - he could feel it every waking moment. But Archie… Douxie didn’t know what had happened to him, and he wouldn’t unless he came back.

(No, until he came back. Douxie had to keep that certainty alive in his mind.)

But how was he supposed to know that his familiar hadn’t taken a tumble? That he hadn’t been brought down by some witch hunter’s net? What if Merlin was being stubborn about coming for him? What if he’d been busy in another row with King Arthur?

...Indeed, he would have loved to see the sunset - to at least try to let it distract him from the tornado of worst case scenarios in his mind.

But he couldn’t.

For a bit, he tried distracting himself by thinking about how Merlin might’ve reacted to him being in danger - to hearing that he’d been poisoned. He sort of liked imagining how scared he’d be, for he preferred fear to indifference. The mental image of his master dropping whatever book he’d been flipping through and rushing to follow Archie… it was a comforting one, as strange as it might sound. That fear meant he mattered.

But Douxie soon grew tired even of that. He hoped he might’ve ran into a patch frequented by fireflies. Those would at least come low enough to dip into his line of sight, and they were always so beautiful, like stars visiting earth for a night before going back to the sky…

Douxie grew cold again at some point. Not just cold, but damp. Since it hadn’t started raining, fortunately, he rightly assumed that it was sweat. Perhaps he was finally sweating this out, like a fever, but that was too good, too fortunate to figure. This was another progression of the poison, he was sure. Just like…

Douxie noticed something in his left hand that lay in front of his face, something wrong…

Oh, sweet heart of Avalon.

His veins were black. 

Hoping, begging, praying to be wrong, he pushed through that dreadful ache in his arm so he could pull it closer, but it only confirmed his suspicions - his dread - his terrors.

The veins in his wrist, in the creases of his knuckles - they weren’t deep blue anymore, just barely visible underneath his skin, but as black as that powder that got blown in his face. Ink could be coursing through them right now, and he’d have been none the wiser.

In that moment, Douxie was proven wrong once again for thinking he couldn’t be more terrified.

He gasped as much as his throat and lungs let him, and he didn’t stop gasping. But then his chest -

No no NO!

-his chest started to seize up.

He fought the growing tightness in his chest with every breath, forcing each one in and out like a wheeze, but it wouldn’t go away. He couldn’t tell if it was from poison or panic, but it wouldn’t go away. He’d even started coughing, which was inevitable, but the black splotch that splattered into his hand terrified him all the more.

This was it. He was going to die here. He was going to succumb to this. He’d never come back to the castle - to Archie, to Morgana, to Merlin - from a trivial herb picking. Archie would come back here, but all he’d find was - was - was -

“HISIRDOUX!”

Douxie burst into tears.

He could recognize the voice of his master - his father - anywhere, but he was so, so scared that it was a hallucination. The fear in his voice already sounded so foreign, coming from the great and powerful Merlin Ambrosius, and if the sound of his voice and his footsteps coming near him came only from his desperate imagination, then he’d - he’d -

A hand gripped his shoulder and turned him onto his back. Finally, he could look up at the sky, aglow with sunset, but his glassy eyes only saw Merlin kneeling down at his side, and Archie flying above him.

The terror in Merlin’s eyes was the exact opposite of comforting, but Douxie didn’t get to see it for long before Merlin conjured a damp cloth and wiped off his face what had to have been the rest of that poisonous powder. He hadn’t realized how flushed he’d been until that moment, when that rag felt so cold against his cheeks.

Merlin finished wiping off Douxie’s face and made the cloth disappear. Douxie missed the coolness on his face. He wanted it back.

“Hisirdoux, say something!” he demanded. But Douxie couldn’t - didn’t Merlin think he would’ve already been screaming his lungs out if he could?

“D-” he choked, “Da-”

He hacked up another throatful of black phlegm, whimpering as the violence of his cough made his torso curl up. Merlin dodged the cough, but put an arm under Douxie’s back before he could fall back.

An apology lay at the back of his throat - one he didn’t know the reason for, even if he could’ve said it.

Merlin brought his other arm behind Douxie’s knees and lifted him like he weighed nothing (and he probably didn’t weigh much to Merlin, being the gangly moppet he was). The edges of the plating of the master wizard’s armor dug against him uncomfortably, but it was the least discomforting thing about this, overshadowed near-completely by the comfort that came just by being held. But he was still scared - if more of that powder was on him, and Merlin touched it by holding him, then -

He stifled a cough, and his leg kicked out unconsciously like a thumping rabbit’s foot. He didn’t realize how badly he’d been tremoring until it was contrasted with the steadiness of Merlin holding him.

Yes… steadiness, safety - two things he’d wanted to cling to more than anything since all this had started. And now, he had them. He had his familiar, and he had his father.

His head, still covered with the hood of his vest, lolled back uncomfortably without any support, but he felt something soft push against the back of it- it was actually Archie, though Douxie couldn’t see it - until the side of his head lay against one of the shoulderpieces of Merlin’s armor, cushioned by the cloth of his hood.

He sighed as much as his tightened chest would allow.

He was so scared.

Douxie was still so, so terrified that Merlin couldn’t save him after all; that he’d die tonight; that he’d never use his magic again; that he’d never get to become a master wizard or get his own staff to wield; that he’d never again get to go back down to the marketplace and talk to that pretty girl who frequented the shops.

(What was her name? Zelda? Zona? Zola? Zo-)

He felt something warm settle on his abdomen - Archie had turned back into a cat and curled up on his tummy, purring as he nestled where Douxie’s legs curled.

At least, despite everything else he feared, he didn’t have to be terrified of being alone anymore.

---

Douxie wasn’t sure if Merlin used a portal, or the relief of being found by his master had finally let him lull out of consciousness for the length of the time it took to be carried back, but the next thing he knew, he was in Merlin’s study. Despite the fluttering of his eyelids, he could recognize the shelves, the desk, and the stained glass window letting in the last light of day.

Home.

He was home.

No matter what happened next, he was home.

“Douxie!” He could hear Morgana’s voice shouting his name in worry, followed immediately by her fast-approaching footsteps.

“Mmh…” Douxie whimpered. It wasn’t clear whether or not the noise was just a pained whine or an attempt to try saying her name - not even to Douxie himself. He couldn’t see her very well, but he could tell when she’d come to them, stepping to the side as Merlin walked forward to his desk.

“Is he alive?” she asked.

“Somehow, yes.” Merlin answered. Douxie hated that “somehow” and the fear it brought, but it was just a little more to add to the onslaught of the past hours. He could just add it to the pile, he supposed.

In the middle of the room, Merlin’s big desk was empty, so the wizard laid him down on the surface, having him lay flat on his back with his hands at his sides, his legs straightened out, and his head facing up. Now, he could fully see Morgana, the sorceress he’d come to see as something of a big sister just as he came to see Merlin as a father, looking down at him. Her face was upside-down from where she stood over him, but he could still see her upturned brows and glistening eyes, and the way she clasped her hands close to her chest so they didn’t even touch him. He hated that look of worry on her face. Seeing Morgana - always fearless, always grasping for more from the world than what others had permitted, always steadfast in her ruthless ambition - look so scared for him… 

...It was worse, if such a thing was possible, than when he saw how scared Merlin was for him, and there was so much he wanted to say, but he was still just focused on trying to breathe as deeply as he could.

Archie got off his abdomen and sat next to his head, gently headbutting his temple before putting a paw on his forehead. It was a little comforting, almost enough to distract Douxie from realizing that Merlin wasn’t at his side anymore.

Almost, though. Not enough.

Douxie tried turning his head to the side, but Archie gently kept it still with his paw.

“He’s just finding a spellbook, Douxie.” he assured, immediately knowing what the apprentice was trying to turn his head for, “He’ll be right back.”

Morgana looked down on the little scene and closed her eyes for a moment, as if to quell her tears, before opening them again.

“You shouldn’t have held him.” she warned, turning her head to wherever Merlin stood now, “You know what that can-”

“I’m well aware.” Merlin interrupted from wherever he still was, “And you know I’ve little concern for that.”

Douxie didn’t understand. There was still so little he understood about whatever was doing this to him, and he didn’t know how to ask about it - he couldn’t.

But apparently, his upturned brows and whimpers of confusion were enough to indicate - at least to Archie - how lost he was.

“Douxie, that powder - it’s called Draining Dust.” Archie explained, “It’s a magic suppressant, and… a poison, as you know by now.”

“Witch hunters would put this in shackles.” Morgana said, finally speaking to him, “To nullify wizards’ and witches’ magic on their way to the gallows. Or the stakes.”

“Trace amounts, yes.” Merlin came back into his view, an open spellbook floating near him with a signature green aura around it, “Pinches of it, cast in the metal. It would suppress the wearer’s magic as long as it was on their body, with a few side effects. Fatigue, headaches, nausea…” he started listing as he flipped through the pages.

Douxie remembered the handful of the stuff that had been thrown in his face. That was far from a few pinches. And those side effects he’d started listing - they sounded tame, menial compared to what was happening to him now.

“But direct contact with raw powder…” Archie started. Douxie knew he was hesitant to finish that sentence, and it wasn’t hard to assume why (but it was terrifying).

“It’s deadly.” Morgana said, “Few wizards have ever survived inhaling or digesting it. More sadistic witchfinders have used that to-”

“Morgana!” Merlin snapped, urging her to leave off. But she didn’t.

“He should know!” she snapped back, “It’s already in his bloodstream, old man. It’s killing him, and he deserves to-”

Douxie started crying again at Morgana’s brutal honesty, as if this all weren’t brutal enough. His eyes squeezed shut as tears streamed down his temples, but when he opened them again, it was darker, like he was looking through a veil. The sight made him want to cry even harder.

It was in his tears.

Oh, sweet heart of Avalon, the poison was in his tears.

It made sense now, why Morgana was so scared to touch him. His own body fluids - his blood, his tears, probably his sweat soon enough - were turning poisonous from this. The only reason Archie was still touching him was probably because he wasn’t a wizard, but a familiar, and this wouldn’t affect him so badly.

(It actually very well could have affected Archie for the worse, but watching Douxie endure this without any comfort would have been worse than any poison.)

“It’s not killing him.” Merlin denied as if he was trying to convince both Morgana and himself, “His death is not certain. If it were, I would have already placed a sleeping spell on him by now.”

Douxie clung to that little hope and tried to watch Merlin scan for the spell he’d been looking for. Merlin had a way to fix this, of course he did; it’s as he said - he would have already put Douxie to sleep to grant him some peace if he didn’t.

Douxie watched his master’s page flipping stall as his eyes scanned over one particular page. His face fell - a minute, near-unnoticeable change in expression, but one that made Douxie’s pounding heart sink.

“Merlin?” Archie asked, “Have you found something?”

Merlin said nothing at first, only taking his place by stepping right to the table’s edge, coming right to Douxie’s side.

“I’ve found a spell to expel the poison and it’s remnants,” he explained, still only scanning the book, “But purging it from his body when it’s progressed this far will be…”

His eyes fell on Douxie’s.

“...quite excruciating.”

But Douxie was already so, so tired.

Not physically - the combined force of the poison and his own adrenaline warded off any chance of fatigue - but in his heart. He was so tired of being scared. Of being in so much pain. He didn’t want to do it - he didn’t think he could…

...But he remembered something Merlin said to him before.

“If there is a universal truth in this world, it is that struggle is the flame which forges one’s soul into steel.”

Well, if there was something tougher than steel, that’s what his soul would become.

Because wizards were strong. Brave. Unrelenting to pain or fear. That’s how Merlin was, that’s how Morgana was, and that’s how he would be.

He put on a brave face - as brave as he could possibly muster in the face of what he’d endure - and nodded. He could do this. He had to do this.

And he would.

The green aura around the spellbook faded as Merlin set it down. Archie lifted his paw from Douxie’s head and stepped back a few paces.

“Morgana, keep him still.” Merlin said, “His thrashing may cause him to injure himself.”

Morgana nodded and brought her hands up, an unsaid apology in her eyes. Seconds later, Douxie felt warm, gentle heat around his wrists and ankles. It didn’t hurt, but it was unrelenting. He didn’t test the bonds, lacking the strength or any actual will to do so. Still under a sort of paralysis, he wasn’t scared of being pinned down, for he knew it was just a precaution; he was just scared of how bad the pain would be in order for restraining him like this to be necessary.

The precaution was far from unwarranted, he came to realize in the coming moments.

Merlin hovered one hand over Douxie’s chest and the other over his abdomen. Douxie watched him say some incantation, but he didn’t catch the words. He was too busy bracing himself for the pain as he saw the green aura of his master’s magic out of the corner of his eye, glowing above his torso.

Before Merlin even got to take a breath after the incantation, the pain started.

And no amount of bracing could have prepared Douxie enough.

The sudden agony in his torso ripped the breath from his lungs. He thought - hoped it would start small and get worse and worse, like a simmer that got hotter and hotter, but instead it was like a pot of scalding water got poured over his chest. No, even that would have hurt less. This… it started at the surface, but it bled deeper and deeper under his skin, and then -

Oh, sweet heart of Avalon.

-then it started to spread.

In moments, as if searing agony itself coursed through his veins, there was nowhere on his body that didn’t burn, not even his fingertips or the tip of his pinky toes. If he could feel it, it hurt, and it hurt unlike anything he’d ever felt before.

As the agony overrode his paralysis, he thrashed against Morgana’s magic that kept his wrists and ankles in place, arching his back one moment and curling forward the next.

It hurt to breathe. It hurt to try to open his eyes. It hurt to keep them squeezed shut. It hurt to try to hear the voices of those around him - Morgana trying to tell him to be strong, Archie trying to soothe him, Merlin repeating the incantation. It hurt even to think - the pain, blinding and deafening, flooded out all other thoughts.

For a moment, like a fire burning so hot it feels cold for a fleeting beat, he stopped feeling the searing, searing agony.

But the moment was too, too fleeting before it wracked him again.

Finally, finally, he screamed.

It was a raw, shrill, agonized thing. He felt it come up from the base of his throat, and when Douxie realized, through his hysteria, that he was actually screaming, not wheezing or whimpering or anything he’d had to settle for tonight, he couldn’t stop. He screamed for all the torture of the day, all the fear of being alone, all the panic and terror and despair that he couldn’t let out in the woods, tense and spasming and paralyzed. 

All the screams that couldn’t come out before, when his throat was so tight that it barely let him breathe, came out right now, bursting at the seams of his pain-delirious mind.

He didn’t stop screaming until he finally felt Merlin’s magic let off.

Even then, his screams settled only into groans and wails until the burning across his body finally cooled; until the pain weakened from a searing sensation all over him, like the most brazen of fires, to a low ache, like the embers of a dying camp flame.

Once he fully stilled, which took a few more moments, Morgana’s magic came off his wrists and ankles.

Finally, he came back to his senses and see Merlin, Morgana, and Archie still around him. Archie looked relieved and nuzzled the side of Douxie’s head. Morgana smiled a shaky, hesitant smile - still so foreign to see from her.

And Merlin…

Well, he seemed as difficult to read as usual, but at least he no longer had the expression on his face of a man watching his apprentice die. Traces of relief lay there, and Douxie gladly took them.

So… was it over?

Douxie groaned and lifted his arm. It didn’t hurt to do anymore - well, it did, but more like a soreness left in the wake of heavy lifting, a residue of what happened than a symptom of it. He brought it up to his face so he could see his wrist.

His veins were blue again.

Sighing, he let his hand fall on his face and wiped away some tears - lifting it to see they were purely clear, like before - before letting it slide off his cheek and fall limp next to his head.

“Master…” his voice was so little, so hoarse, “‘s it gone?”

“Every bit, Hisirdoux.” Merlin said, putting his hand on Douxie’s shoulder, “It's over.”

He sounded weary. Douxie hoped that spell didn't take too much from him.

“Mm… my magic… 's it gone too?”

Merlin’s eyes said he wasn’t sure himself.

Douxie sought to answer the question on his own and willed forth his magic. He felt his fingertips thrum with the life of his sorcery. Lifting his hand again, he saw little specks of light, blue and true. It didn’t burn anymore, but it felt warm and gentle, like a heartbeat. His heartbeat. Exactly as it always felt.

He sighed. Not shaky, not fighting to keep his breathing level - a tired, relieved sigh. Despite how sore even the muscles in his face felt, he smiled a little smile.

“Thank you…” he said, “If you all hadn’t… I’d be-”

Merlin moved his hand from Douxie’s shoulder to his forehead.

“Don’t pay that scenario any mind, Hisirdoux.” Merlin urged, “You’ve survived, and although you and your magic have been weakened, both will fully recover.”

Douxie’s little smile fell.

“Wha… what about the poison? It couldn’t just be gone.”

“That it can.” Merlin assured, taking his hand off Douxie’s head, “As brutal as it is to the wizard affected, an unaffected wizard with strong magic can eradicate it from their body and return it to it’s untarnished condition.”

...Well, that was that, and Douxie wouldn’t question it. Besides, he remembered something.

“Mmmy bracelet… I lost it. That - they took it off. It’s in a bush out there.”

“I can see that. That’s alright.” Merlin said, “It can be retrieved.”

“And… and I'm sorry.” He said to Merlin’s subtle but obvious surprise, indicated by a little raise in his eyebrows.

“What for?”

“I… the herbs.” he answered, “I couldn’t bring them back. They got stolen.”

“It’s alright,” Merlin said, “They aren’t a rarity, you know.”

...Douxie sniffled.

“That… they only snatched those plants so I’d follow them deeper into the woods. So I’d get lost. So they could throw that dust in my face and - and leave me there, knowing I’d gone further into the forest than… than anyone would’ve looked, and I wouldn’t be found.” 

“But you were found, Douxie.” Archie said, “They weren’t counting on you having a dragon that could track scents for a familiar.”

Douxie’s voice started to break.

“I should have left it alone - I knew I should have left it alone. There was more right there, I should’ve-”

“Hisirdoux, cease this.” Merlin said in a tone that left no room for insistence, “You must grant yourself some relief in you and your magic’s survival. I won’t have you fret over something as menial as a handful of herbs, so-”

“But Master-”

“-Don’t “But Master” me.”

Douxie sighed. That statement didn’t leave any room for argument. It never did.

Finally, a little normalcy tonight.

Morgana put her hands to the sides of Douxie’s head. After she’d been so scared to touch him this whole time, the feeling of her fingers against his temples, brushing his hair away from his face, was a final, true assurance that the poison had been well and truly purged.

“Sleep, Little Douxie.” she soothed, “I promise you’ll wake.”

He couldn’t tell if she cast a sleep spell in that moment, or if this was from his own fatigue, but he obeyed without hesitance as he was finally lulled away from the realm of the conscious and fell into slumber.

---

Merlin looked down at the boy lying asleep on his desk, the color slowly trickling back into his face as his chest rose and fell in deep, steady breaths. 

“He’s a brave little moppet.” Morgana said as she kept her fingers against the sides of his head, her voice hushed despite the fact that the boy’s exhaustion had lulled him into a deep slumber, and he’d sleep like a stone until morning no matter what.

“...No, he’s not.” Merlin denied, “Not for this.”

Morgana snapped her head up.

“He’s just gone through more torment from that powder in one day than either of us have in all our lives!” Morgana she contested, “Not even you have endured effects that brutal from Draining Dust.”

“To be brave requires a choice - being faced with the ultimatum to either run and give up, or face your fight.” Merlin said, too proverbial and righteous-sounding as he stood over Douxie, “A choice was the exact thing he didn’t have in this. Perhaps if he’d been withholding something from that assailant, even with the threat of this, then it might be different. But as it is, even if he’d wanted to succumb to this before Archie had found him, his adrenaline hadn’t let him.”

“Maybe so,” Archie started, “but when I found him there in the forest, and I told him I’d have to come back with help, he was terrified of being left alone again. I could tell. But he put on as brave a face he could have. He chose that for himself, at least.”

“He did the same thing moments ago, when you told him how much that spell would hurt.” Morgana added, “He may not have had a choice in enduring this, but he did choose to steel his nerves when faced with every reason not to, and there’s bravery in that, old man.” She crossed her arms. “Even you have to admit that.”

Merlin almost found it endearing, seeing them both try to defend his apprentice’s honor when they felt it threatened, and maybe he could’ve seen the bravery they saw, if he’d been looking at anyone else.

But as he looked down at Hisirdoux… that’s all he saw. Hisirdoux. His apprentice. His son. His gangly little moppet who tended to cause more messes than he cleaned up, but smiled like the embodiment of joy itself.

If daylight decided to make itself corporeal and walk among humans for a while, Merlin wouldn’t be surprised in the slightest if it took the form of Hisirdoux Casperan.

So, the sorcerer didn’t see bravery when he found Hisirdoux writhing and gasping on the ground in those woods, he didn’t feel bravery when the boy trembled in his arms, and he most certainly didn’t hear bravery when the boy wailed and screamed his lungs out as that poison was taken out of him, black tears streaming down his face until they became clear again.

No, if Douxie had been brave, pride in that laid nowhere in Merlin’s mind. 

After all, when fear for his son’s life flooded his mind, and hatred for whoever did this to him flooded out that fear, where, pray tell, could pride reside?

Morgana kept looking down at Douxie as he slept.

“How could you risk that?” she asked Merlin.

“Risk what, Morgana?” he asked, “Be specific.”

She snapped her head back up.

“You know what I’m talking about!” Morgana almost shouted, stifling her volume so the sleeping moppet wouldn’t hear, ““Eradicate” my foot, old man. I know the spell you used. You didn’t use a spell of eradication, you used a spell of transference!”

Arhcie had been staring down at his own sleeping familiar, but he snapped up when he heard that word, “transference”. First he looked to Morgana, then to Merlin.

“You told him it got destroyed, but you just - all you did was soak it up like a sponge!”

“Merlin… is that true?” Archie asked, obviously afraid that after all of this, Douxie would wake up without his mentor - his father - because he’d taken the poison for him. The little apprentice left without a master would never stop blaming himself, no matter how hard Morgana and Archie tried to tell him it wasn’t his fault.

Merlin sighed, an affirmation without words or nods.

“I spent the years since it’s conception,” he started, “building an immunity to the dust and its properties. It was too big a risk, potentially having a weakness to something so daunting - something I’d seen subdue and poison countless wizards. Too high a risk - a threat to the greater good.”

“So… the poison’s not having any affect on you?” Archie asked, stepping around Douxie to approach Merlin, “It’s not… he couldn’t have gone through all of this just to lose you.”

“And he won’t.” Merlin assured in confidence, “Much more than a handful of that powder would have had to be thrown at him to have any severe affect on me. No, this won’t need more than a night of rest to fix. Besides, what’s the good in spending all that time building up an immunity to Draining Dust if not to make use of it? A waste of time and tolerance built.”

“You couldn’t have known it wouldn’t...” Morgana said, “You couldn’t have possibly known you’d survive taking all of it like that!”

“I didn’t.” Merlin snapped.

Morgana’s eyes widened, as if everything about what the boy meant to him fell into place.

Because he hadn’t worried about his survival - the matter didn’t even cross his mind, not when he could still hear Douxie whimpering in pain with each page of that spellbook he skimmed. No, he only concerned himself with the likelihood that it would save the boy, his only worry being about how badly it would hurt Douxie when he’d already had to go through so much senseless, ludicrous torture.

Merlin always prioritized the “greater good”, some vast, staggering, intangible concept that encapsulated so much - the lives of thousands, the wellbeing of millions, the good of humanity.

But when he found his son writhing, hurting, suffocating, dying, he found he couldn’t spare any more regard to the “greater good” in that moment than he would a layer of dust on one of his books. If saving Hisirdoux’s life meant casting aside the greater good, then there was no question about it - he’d let the greater good rot.

It didn’t matter to him if his magic would’ve been permanently diminished by extracting the poison, or even if it killed him. Cast the greater good aside - the greatest good was the life in Hisirdoux’s eyes, and by all the heavens, he’d protect it.

And thankfully, he did just that tonight, at the cost of neither his life, his health, or his own magic. And that was the greatest good he could have asked for.

With another sigh, relieved that Morgana chose not to pry, Merlin looked down at the boy, still sound asleep, laid out on his desk. He put one arm under Douxie’s back and the other behind his knees, picking him up just like he did when he found him in those woods.

But this time, instead of trembling in his hold, Douxie made a little noise and unconsciously put his arm over Merlin’s shoulder, snuggling closer, if it were possible, to the master wizard.

Yes. he thought. There’s no greater good than this.

Morgana put her hands over her mouth and looked at the two of them as if the sight was something adorable, and Merlin huffed. Archie took his same spot curled up on Douxie’s abdomen.

“I’m taking him to his room.” he said, hushing his voice even though he knew the moppet wouldn’t wake, “And I’ll let him sleep in tomorrow morning. He needs to rest.”

The sun had set sometime during the painstaking ordeal, but torchlight along the walls of the castle made it easy to take his sleeping apprentice back to his room even once night has fallen. After using a simple spell to swing the door open while his arms were in use carrying the boy, Merlin walked in and used another little spell. The green aura of his magic glowed around the blanket on Douxie’s bed as he folded part of it over using his magic, providing room to lay Douxie down on his bed with head nestled right in his pillow’s usual dent. Once Archie stepped out of the way, Merlin reached over and laid the blanket back over him.

Douxie stirred a little, but only to turn from his back onto his side, his back to the wall and his front facing Merlin. Once the boy settled again, Merlin tentatively reached behind his head and let his bun loose so it wouldn’t get tangled if he moved around too much in his sleep. He doubted it would, considering the exhaustion and soreness in his muscles would probably enticement enough to stay still, even unconscious, but the gesture couldn’t hurt.

Archie crawled right underneath one of Douxie’s arms and nestled against his chest, and the moppet unconsciously held the bespectacled cat a little tighter.

And that was Merlin’s unspoken cue to leave Hisirdoux to rest for the night, so that’s what he did. He needed rest too, after all - his built-up immunity may have saved his life, but the poison, like everything else in the onslaught of the evening, left him weary.

Tomorrow, a search would begin.

Tomorrow, Merlin would find out who was behind this.

Tomorrow, the greatest and most powerful wizard in Camelot would not relent until he found the monster, human or trollish, who almost killed his son.

But tonight, Hisirdoux lay curled up in his bed, sound asleep as he kept his familiar close. Tonight, his life was saved.

And tonight, that was enough.

[rikalovesrice]

omg i loved your ROTT fic so much!! I love how you added so much more to Bellroc, Nari, and Skrael. And all the found family ahhhh! Really, really well done i could gush about it forever lol The ending made me cry. But also I am curious about a couple thing like I'm still not super clear on who the Great Eternity is and how he fits into everything. But still, Elylam and Nari were so sweet ToT

Anon, you're such a sweetheart oh my goodness <3

So what I hoped to get across was that Elyolam was for the good guys what the Arcane Order was for the bad guys: the catalyst. There's so much more to Elyolam that I wanted to explore, but I had to remember that I was rewriting a movie, not a 25 episode season lol So for the sake of time, he remained a sort of elusive character in The Eternal Day. But I wanted to drop hints wherever I could that Elyolam has always been deeply involved in the series. It's why I didn't skirt around the fact that he literally knows about everything that's happened in the ToA franchise. He knows all about Jim's adventures, the Akiridions, Douxie's 900 years of shenanigans.

And it's why I included him saying, "It's the reason your paths were crossed." He's always been looking out for the heroes and has always had a hand in things. In fact, I headcanon that Elyolam was the one who gave Merlin the idea for the Amulet in the first place. Though whether or not it was through a dream later half remembered (like with Jim) or because Merlin was aware of who the Great Eternity was (like Luma), I haven't decided on yet.

A part of me kinda likes that he didn't appear much in the fic despite being such a pivotal character, creator of the universe and all lol Really keeps him enigmatic. But it yeah, it would've been nice to expound on him a little more. It was quite satisfying to showcase a bit his power in the last chapter haha

I'm so glad that you still enjoyed the fic T_T Bless and thank you so, so much, dear Anon.

[tenebrius-excellium]

If I’m honest, the Rott intro was already a red flag for me that this probably wasn’t going to be a good movie. It was done fast, and they simply used clips from the shows with lots of people in them who nobody knew except if they had already watched ToA. I mean, the character designs are overwhelming upon first view. Remember how they used the entire first episode of Trollhunters to get us accustomed to Blinky’s six eyes alone? Now, how is a new viewer supposed to deal with Aja & Krel’s designs on top of that? They are pretty intense. And what about characters with multiple forms of appearance, such as the Akiridions, Changelings, Archie, Jim? The creators were lazy and used complex, previously established material instead of simplifying the plot summary for all audiences.

Look, here’s what they could have done: 

Narrate it as if Blinky wrote the Brief Recapitulation of Troll Lore No. 48.

We could have had beautiful, symbolic drawings like these:

And I mean, they totally could have reused the existing art that we only ever saw in tiny glimpses, such as in books, or on walls. Imagine Jim as a stick figure walking across the page...sort of how Dreamworks did the Croods’ intro with Eep’s narration. It would also stress how much history the Guardians of Arcadia have already made. History that is worth being written down in troll lore. 

Apart from that, I personally think they should have kept Douxie’s response to Jim’s question “Am I still the Trollhunter”. “It doesn’t matter, we have friends” was the answer that Douxie found to be true for himself, and they could have built off that to create his leadership arc and Jim coming to peace with himself. 

And yeah, we really kinda needed to know what happened to New Jersey. Blinky was literally their Elder, and last we knew, trolls can’t survive long without a Heartstone. We needed New York, not a fictional “Metro City”. It was so lazy.

Anyway, adding that to the ToA Rott fix-it fic :)

[escape-from-arcadia]

Zouxie Week 2022: Day 4 - Motorcyles

"She's Beautiful"

Read on AO3

Douxie sat behind Zoe, the two of them precariously balanced on the bike. Wrapping his arms around her waist, he leaned forward slightly, resting his head on her shoulder and tucking his knees up. “Is now a bad time to mention that I’ve never been on one of these before?” She ignited the engine silently with a wave of her wand. “It’s like riding a bike. You were a newspaper delivery boy back in the 40s right?” He nodded as she slipped on a pair of black gloves. “It’s just like that, just a bit different to steer. And lucky for you, you’re not the one steering.” “Still not sure if I should be comforted by that.”

A/N: Late submission because I was in finals purgatory. But I'm back with a short thing for Day 4, and I'm currently writing Day 5.

Word Count: 1693

Tagging: @moppetwithamanbun and @emsprovisions for Zouxie Week 2022!

----

“She’s beautiful.”

“Douxie, are you sure this is a wise idea?”

“Oh, Archie, I’m certain of it. I think I’m in love. I’d pour my life’s savings into her to make sure she’s well and cared for.”

“You’re ‘in love’ with a strange contraption.”

Douxie swept his hand over the leather seat and turned back to a humanoid Archie with an astonished look on his face. “She’s a BMW, thank you very much, Arch. And a beautiful one at that too,” he gushed. He knelt down to examine the motorcycle and all of its nooks and crannies. “The new 1924 BMW R32.”

“There’s a hell of a lot of power in her. She’s got a 494 cc boxer twin. Nice shaft drive too. She can run nearly 60 miles per hour, which is kinda crazy when you think about it. With the new braking system, one should have less trouble stopping her. But you don’t look like the type who’d be able to take her out on the streets and manage not to crash.”

The wizard looked up, laughing. “You sure sound like you know your onions-” He gasped. A woman with short mousy brown hair, a streak of pink tucked behind her ear, and bright blue eyes looked down at him. Her arms were crossed, the sleeves of her shirt rolled up and a cap pulled low over her face. In her pockets were a few different sized wrenches, one of which seemed to be engraved with Elder Futhark runes. Despite her demeanor, she looked at the young man with a friendly smirk.

“Zoe! You work here?” Douxie chatted excitedly as he stood, readjusting his unbuttoned waistcoat. He stumbled upwards, and Archie caught him before he slammed into the young woman. As he stepped forward for a hug, Zoe backed away, raising her grease covered hands cautiously.

“Watch the grease-”

His face fell while Archie cleaned his glasses and put them back on. The latter’s golden eyes widened in disbelief. “Merlin’s beard. It really is you, Ms. Ashildr!”

“Yeah, yeah, it’s me, alright?” She rolled her eyes, but there was no bite to her bark. A genuine smile played at the corners of her lips as she looked on at the two before her. “It’s sure been a while, hasn’t it?”

“A while?” Douxie waved his hands furiously, causing nearby men examining other motorcycles to cast a glance at the trio. “Zoe, we haven’t seen you since…it must’ve been 1889? In Paris? The tower they put up there! Yes, we visited the new tower, and then we went back across the channel, and we lost track of you..I thought you were still in England! In fact,” he added, pointing to himself and Archie, “we only got here a few weeks ago.”

Archie groaned, “And that is why I’ve been telling him not to try and spend all his meager savings on a motorbike.” He caught a glimpse at the look in the witch and wizard’s eyes and groaned again. Waving them off, he straightened his tie and turned towards the other bikes in the shop. “I’ll take a look around for anything remotely affordable. If not, we’ll just go grocery shopping.” He cast a knowing look over his shoulder. “If you two get into any trouble, I’m expecting salmon for dinner, Douxie.”

While Douxie let out affronted noises of astonishment, Zoe laughed. She took Douxie’s hand into her own, fingers calloused and still covered in grease, guiding him outside of the shop. He felt heat flushing his cheeks, turning his face towards the ground.

Stepping outside into the busy Chicago street, Zoe handed him a blackened cloth to wipe his hands on and stuffed hers into her pockets. He nodded sheepishly, eyes still trained on the ground as he cleaned his hands. She raised an eyebrow. “Not that chatty anymore? Are you really this shy after not having seen me for a few decades, or are you just mad about me making a jab at your driving skills? Or rather,” she chuckled, “the lack thereof.”

“Ha, ha, very funny,” he shot back. He snuck a quick glance. She looked incredibly confident with her arms crossed like that. Very pretty. Her eyes met his. He quickly turned his gaze across the street to a very attention-grabbing and not at all boring law firm office. “And I’m sure you’ve got excellent driving skills.”

“I can get from point A to point B in one piece,” she shrugged, looking at a woman dragging her child away from an ice cream parlor. “I’ve been a menace on the race course.”

With a jolt, Douxie turned to her excitedly. “You’ve been racing?”

She nodded, trying (and failing) to not come off as ridiculously proud. “Raced under the name Xander on a few different Harley-Davidsons. Won a few times too.”

“I missed a lot, haven’t I?” She nodded in response, smiling wryly. His brow furrowed slightly. “It’s been so long, Zoe. I haven’t heard from you in ages.”

“Tell me about it.”

“No, seriously.” She turned and met his gaze. His face was strangely unreadable, unusual for someone as vocal as Douxie about his emotions. There was a strange combination of worry and relief in his eyes, but also something else that Zoe couldn’t quite place. “I haven’t heard from you since before the turn of the century. And during the Great War…Zoe, I wasn’t sure if you were even alive.

Realization struck her across the face. Her joking manner fell away. “Oh, gods. Douxie, I-”

“Arch and I came to the States looking for a fresh start after the war. It’s taken us so long because England is in shambles.” His voice cracked as tears came to his eyes. “The war devastated us. I fought because, for some stupid, stupid reason, I thought I could find you there. I spent years on the battlelines, fighting to survive, not only for England, but also for you. If I made it out of that war alive, I wanted to find you. And yet, I found you here, four, five years later. In the States. Zoe, I almost didn’t recognize you because of your accent. It was your wand that gave it away.

“You couldn’t even be bothered to write a letter? To try and find us?” He was growing angry at this point, years of worry and dread boiling over into frustration. “Why did you disappear after Paris, Zoe? Where were you? Where did you go?”

She knitted her eyebrows, making to argue back, but then she paused. She sighed, nodding and stepping to the side as to let a customer into the motorcycle shop. Her eyes lit up, and she turned back to her old friend.

“How about I take you for a ride?”

“Zoe, don’t change the topic,” he moaned, “please.”

“I’ll explain it to you, if you get on the bike.” A rebellious smile. “We can take the R32.”

-

“To be completely clear, Casperan, if this thing comes back with so much as a scratch, my boss will kill me.”

“I don’t know why you’re telling me this. You’re the one who snuck it out of the shop in the first place. Not to mention that you’re driving.”

Zoe laughed, “Right. And it’s your job to keep us from dying.”

Douxie sat behind Zoe, the two of them precariously balanced on the bike. Wrapping his arms around her waist, he leaned forward slightly, resting his head on her shoulder and tucking his knees up. “Is now a bad time to mention that I’ve never been on one of these before?”

She ignited the engine silently with a wave of her wand. “It’s like riding a bike. You were a newspaper delivery boy back in the 40s right?” He nodded as she slipped on a pair of black gloves. “It’s just like that, just a bit different to steer. And lucky for you, you’re not the one steering.”

“Still not sure if I should be comforted by that.”

The engine sputtered a little, and she made to give it a whack before thinking better of it and tapping it gently with her wand. Pink sparks flew from the metal as the R32 came to life. She looked over her shoulder at him. “Just hold onto me, and everything will be fine.”

He hesitated before finally nodding, and she took off down the street.

It was magical. The bike was made by very human hands, but the speed and the exhilaration of it all brought out a euphoric feeling Douxie hadn’t felt in ages. It was like when he first made fire in his hands from the energy around him. His nerves crackled, and he felt his soul being pulled forward to an unknown destination.

Yet, at long last, he finally felt like he was home.

Zoe masterfully made her way out of the city and onto the roads beyond alongside the Illinois River. For a time, they were quiet, simply basking in the thrill of being on the road together after decades apart. The motorcycle thrummed as they kept driving to the point where the road met the sky.

They’d keep driving, and driving, and driving.

At one point they’d stop, the bike having run out of gas miles ago, fueled only by Zoe’s magic and will.

They sit on the side of the road, looking out over the river. And for hours and hours, they’d talk of the things they’d missed, the moments they had lost, time they could have spent together wasted apart.

Here, where the road met the sky, Douxie would look at Zoe. Her laugh and charm. He was still slightly resentful. But as they spoke and the daylight faded away, he felt his heart warm, the long quiet embers catching aflame once again.

Sure, she had grown into an American accent and slight rasp. Her once long brown hair was cut short. But she still laughed the same way. She still punched his arm playfully and knitted her brows together when he teased her for her height. She still had lightning in her eyes, bright as her wit.

She was beautiful.

[mysteriesmuse]

A/N fabulous idea I had as a knitter myself so just a smigget of adorable Douxie stuff in a very rapid unedited spit-stream of words (I’ve written too many essays lately in college lol) amidst this fall season slowly, slowly approaching.

Just imagine finishing off knitting a nice sweater. Maybe some cables added in for texture or just the simple texture of bumpy purls underneath your fingertips. Its done up in whatever colors or color you desire and you’re just estactic to have it all done. The sleeves, finally, are a perfect length at the wrists and the ribbed collar done up so fine. it’s fresh off the knitting needles and you’re delighted in wearing it and showing it off with the slight chilly breezes in the sunny afternoon.

You meet up with Douxie that afternoon. (just delighted to show off all your hard work. You deserve it afterall!) Upon entering the bookstore he comments it, “Why Y/N, you look mighty cozy. Did you do this yourself?” As a matter of fact you did and he’s a solely beaming just impressed at your handiwork and how could he not smile back when you give him the proudest toothy grin, you look like the most adorable thing. And . . . that sweater does look might comfortable . . . “Yeah, don’t you love it!”

Hisirdoux is letting out breathy chuckles, shaking his head slightly. Of course, none other than you would go straight to ‘love’ as the primary adjective. and of course he knows that you want him to say yes. So who’s he not to oblige a very pretty girl smothering him in a beaming smile?

“Course’ Love, I just love it.”

You’re giggling out a “Right!” Extending your arms out wide in front of you to admire the handiwork once again.

You honestly can’t believe it’s done and turned out so well.

Doux‘s eyes are shining looking down at all the designs and patterns adorned over your arms and chest dwarfed somewhere inside, “You look pretty snug in there,” he laughs.

“Oh absolutely,” you comment throwing a hand in the air to dismiss it as fact.

Douxie’s inching closer coming to ‘get-a-better-look’ fit lanky form towering over your own. “Want to touch?” floats out of your mouth as you carefully extend a wrist out the for him to reach.

”Yea . . . “ he adds. Hands coming up to your shoulders rubbing his thumbs across the fabric and design. Wow, can he really feel the heat coming off your little body. Terribly tempting That is.

Meanwhile you can feel the ghost of his fingers pressing in through the fabric into your skin.

Temptation be damned. . . “Fuzzbuckets. By Mordraxs Miracles you’re an absolute snuggle bunny!” Douxie exclaims pulling you into his chest and rubbing his cheek again the top of your head, you can feel the hair getting frizzy. but you fall into a fit of giggles and clutch back arms around his torso and back around to his shoulder blades.

“I guess I am a little bit of a cuddle bug. . .”

Bonus: “I’d say more than a little bit love’.” Douxie chuckles feeling a slight nuzzle of a nose into his shoulder; looking down and seeing you just melting into the embrace.

[nikibogwater]

Adding onto the cartoon hug thing: what do you make of the on-screen toa hugs? (Douxie and Archie, Jlaire, etc)

(Here's the original post for those who haven't seen it yet)

Ooh, this is a fun question!

So, ToA was at a major disadvantage when it came to animating hugs because close contact is a lot harder to portray accurately in CGI--that's actually why a lot of hugs in animated movies/shows look stiff and unnatural. Getting two 3D character models to properly squish together in a natural way is pretty difficult (from what I understand), and then you have to think about things like contact shadows and clothing folds--it's a lot. So in order to animate a Really Good Hug in CGI, you'd probably need a lot of extra time to work on those few frames. And in the case of ToA, time/money was limited. So the majority of the hugs in ToA did, unfortunately, have that stiff, somewhat awkward look to them (at least for me).

...Except for this one:

(This one was probably easier to get right because Merlin is wearing armor--no clothing folds to worry about!)

But also just like, the way Douxie moves during this hug feels so natural it's almost cathartic. He starts with his face turned to the side, but then as he begins to cry, he turns it into Merlin's shoulder, and we see his hands move on Merlin's back to cling a little tighter. And the way Merlin reacts??? How he initially seems surprised by the sudden contact, but almost immediately accepts it, bringing his hand up to cup Douxie's head like that????? DUDE, THIS HUG FEELS SO REAL AND WARM EVEN THOUGH IT'S GOTTA BE UNCOMFORTABLE WITH THAT ARMOR AND THIS WAS ABSOLUTELY THE POINT IN THE SHOW WHERE I CAVED AND STARTED WEEPING HYSTERICALLY.

*ahem.* Pardon me. So yeah, overall, I'd say ToA isn't really great at hugs, but that's not something I can fault it for, given the difficulty of the task and the time/budget restraints the animators were under. But that one hug between Merlin and Douxie at the end of Wizards is easily one of my absolute favorite animated hugs of all time, so I thought it was worth bringing up as the one exception in the series.

Thanks so much for the ask, Non!

*Edit: Forgot to give Honorable Mention to this Jlaire Hug:

That was a good one too. 💕