#I’ve been wanting to get into reading published works again for a while now
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Why do I ever trick myself into reading published books anymore???? Because the common theme is boredom in comparison to all the fic I’m used to reading 🙃
#arden spews#published vs fanfic#reading#fandom#listen to me#I’ve been wanting to get into reading published works again for a while now#maybe find a new fandom to obsess over#yknow#the usual bs#BUT EVERYTHING IS SO POORLY DEVELOPED#it’s irritating#how can these stories be published#when nothing makes a lick of sense#It blows my mind#and I don’t think this is about me being a former pretentious English major spewing#this is me having spent so many years in fandom where writers write want they want#And THAT is the difference#ugh#now I gotta try to convince myself maybe I’ll find another good book since the first was a let down#crosses fingers
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For The Very First Time - Emily Prentiss
Masterlist
Summary : Emily always thought she'd end up with a man, however it's a woman that makes her heart beat faster.
Warnings : set during season 16 (spoiler free), alcohol consumption (be careful with your alcohol consumption!), questioning sexuality, happy ending, maybe some grammatical mistakes as English is not my first language, tell me if you see some or if I missed any warning.
Word count : 3.1k
French version (will be published today at 6pm)
Song inspiration : 10x better by Marielle Kraft
Emily Prentiss is nose deep in her Sicarius files. She re-reads every piece of information, searching for a detail she and her team might have missed, in vain. She runs a hand through her grey hair, sighing; she looks once again at the first page when you interrupt her reading.
“Excuse-me, I’ve waited until the last minute but I’m closing now and I’m going to ask you to leave, please.”
“Oh my God, sorry !” Emily apologises while glancing at her watch. “I didn’t see the time. You could have told me earlier, I would have understood.”
“Don’t worry, I had to clean everything behind and I noticed you were busy.” you reassure her with a gentle smile.
“That’s an understatement though it’s not an excuse. I’ll be more careful next time.”
“Are you working on something important ?” you ask as she packs her things in her bag.
“You could say that, yes.”
“Where are you working ? If you don’t mind me asking.”
“I’m an FBI agent, more specifically I work with the Behavior Analysis Unit.” she informs, standing up.
“I get why you were tearing your hair out then” you joke.
“Stress comes with the job.”
“Not to the point of losing your beautiful hair I hope. I mean, I’ll probably be doing just the same at one point, this job is taking all my energy, though it’s clearly not the same. I’m not afraid of coffee beans.”
“You’ve been working here for a long time?” Emily questions.
“Since the opening, I’m the owner. I used to work in insurance and then, one day, I just decided to stop everything and open the café I had been dreaming of for years.”
“It was a good decision. I like this place a lot.” She sincerely compliments and it warms your heart.
“Thanks.”
“I’m gonna leave you alone. I wouldn’t want to make you work even later. Sorry again.”
“No worries.”
You start taking the coffee cup and the small plate when you hear the doorbell ring. You wait for the door to close when Emily’s voice resonates one last time in the café.
“By the way, I’m Emily.”
“Y/N. Come back whenever you want.”
Emily gives you one last smile before leaving the café. You watch her leave through the window before closing the main door and finishing your cleaning.
After that night, you don’t see Emily for weeks. You live your life as usual but you can’t deny you wish you could see her again. Emily has managed to get in your mind with one single conversation. Therefore, as soon as you end up seeing her again sitting at a table, you can’t help the smile on your face. Emily has at least three files spread in front of her and a pen in her right hand. Like last time, she goes through the different pages, a desperate expression on her face. You serve another client before coming to her.
“It looks like you need another coffee.” you say, making her raise her head.
“I need more than this.”
“Are you getting anywhere?”
“Slowly. Too slow for certain people.” Emily sighs, rubbing her neck.
“I’m sure you’ll find all the clues you need.” you softly tell her and you put your hand on her shoulder, making her heart beat faster. “I’m bringing you this coffee right away.”
Emily doesn’t move until you come back, still in shock because of your touch. Once you’re back, you give her her new cup of coffee and a small plate with a chocolate donut.
“I thought you’d need some sugar, too. It’s on the house.”
“You didn’t have to.”
“I want to.”
Before you can add something else, you hear one of your employees calling for you. You smile at Emily then you go see your employee.
Just like last time, all the clients have left, except Emily. And just like last time, you leave her alone whilst you do almost all the cleaning. The second you come back to her, Emily hears your steps and raises her head up before you can talk. She looks at her watch and sighs.
“I didn’t pay attention to the time. Again. Sorry.”
“Oh, don’t worry.” you smile, taking her dishes.
“Do you need help?” Emily asks. “It’s the least I could do to thank you for your patience and the donut - it was really good, by the way.”
“Thank you and I only have to wash the floor and your table and I’m done so no need.”
“I insist. Besides, it’ll get my head out of this case.”
“As you wish.”
Emily takes the broom while you wipe the table.
“Do you often work late?” you ask, interrupting Emily in her task.
“More than I’d want to but it’s for a good cause.”
“And isn’t it too complicated with your personal life? I mean, I guess you have a lot of work to do and you have to travel quite regularly.”
“It can be complicated. My ex was also an FBI agent and even if it was nice because he could understand how busy our life could get, we ended up breaking up because of this. He was kind, it just wasn't working. It’s a bit more complicated to have a lasting relationship when there is distance.”
As you understand Emily’s last relationship was with a man, you feel dumb for thinking you could have a chance with her. Though, you quickly remind yourself she could be just as attracted to men as she is to women. However, you have to keep in mind that you might have zero chance with her.
“I get it but for me, it used to work with my ex. We broke up because our relationship had run its course, not because of the distance. I think that with the right person and the right efforts, it can work.” you genuinely admit.
“What’s his job?”
“She is a stewardess.”
Hearing you correcting the pronoun, Emily is embarrassed and yet, a part of her is also… reassured? She’s not sure why.
“Oh, sorry, I shouldn’t have assumed-”
“It’s okay.” you promise.
“You haven’t found someone else since?”
“No, I’ve been single for a year now so you can make me work late, I don’t mind.” you laugh.
“I still feel a bit guilty.”
You keep cleaning up as you get to know each other. Rapidly, you start laughing together. Emily is fascinated by you, she hadn’t felt this kind of connection with someone so quickly. She can’t stop asking you questions, she wants to know as much as possible about you. Once the café is completely cleaned, Emily is disappointed. She wishes this moment would never end.
“It was nice talking. We should do this more often.”
“Yeah, we should.”
“Maybe somewhere outside this café. What do you think?”
At your sentence, Emily stops functioning normally. Are you flirting with her? She can’t tell if you are though, she is sure of one thing: she wouldn’t mind it if you do. You give her your phone number, bid her goodbye then you walk to your car while Emily watches you leave, a million emotions running through her body.
As the weeks go by, you meet each other several times. At first, in public, in a park, at the movies, at the restaurant, then, one night, you invited her to finish the evening at your place and you discussed until late in the night.
Emily yearns for those moments with you. She always wants to be with you, listening to your voice, making you laugh. She doesn’t understand what’s happening to her. At first, she just thought she found a rare friendship but the more she thinks about it, the more she wonders if her feelings are only platonics. However, because of her work, she doesn’t have the time to question herself so she just juggles between her professional and personal lives.
You invited Emily over for dinner. Emily is nervous about it though, she’s excited to see you, especially after the stressful day she’s had. She wants to relax and she knows with you, she can.
As you finish making the sauce, Emily knocks on your door. You open it and let her in. Right away, Emily inhales the smell coming from the kitchen.
“Oh my God, it smells so good.” she compliments as her mouth waters.
“Thanks! It’s the last recipe I learned at my cooking class. I hope you’re hungry.”
“Now more than ever!”
You give Emily a big smile before dragging her to the kitchen. As a way to whet her appetite, you make her taste the sauce and Emily thinks she’s never tasted anything better. Your cooking might compete with Rossi’s, though she’d never tell him.
After eating your supper, Emily’s stomach is perfectly full. You finish the evening sitting on the couch, a glass of red wine in your hands. Emily talks about her work and her team. She tells you some anecdotes and it makes you want to meet them even more. They seem to be important for her, to be her family. Whilst Emily is talking, you tenderly admire her as your bodies get closer and closer without both of you noticing.
As soon as she looks up, Emily realises how close your faces are. Despite her, her eyes look at your lips. You see it and smile before breaking the distance a bit more. Emily doesn’t back up. Quite the contrary, she lightly leans in, only leaving a few inches between your lips. You’re about to press your lips on hers when a ringtone breaks the tension. Emily takes a step back and takes her phone, finding a new message indicating that there will be a meeting first thing in the morning with Miss. Davis, the attorney general.
“Nothing bad?” you question, frowning.
“No, just some information for a meeting tomorrow.”
After her sentence, there is a heavy silence between you two. This sudden interruption brought you back to Earth and you don’t know if you should act like nothing happened or try to get closer again. Embarrassed, you clear your throat before replying:
“You should go, then. I feel like you don’t sleep a lot and I wouldn’t want to be the reason why you’ll sleep at work.”
“You’re right. I’m gonna go,” Emily accepts and she stands up from the couch. “I had a great time tonight. We should do this again, at my place. Although, I can’t promise you a diner as good as yours.”
“As long as it’s made with love.”
Upon hearing your last word, Emily doesn’t know what to add. She wonders if your sentence was innocent or if you were implying something. She is an outstanding profiler and yet, you manage to make her lose her composure. And so, she simply says goodbye to you before leaving your apartment.
On the way to her home, Emily can’t help but think back to your evening together and the moment you almost kissed. If her phone hadn’t rang, she could have an even more delicious memory than your food in her head. Before that night, she hadn’t realised how much she wanted your lips. As she thinks more about you, she ends up imagining a future with you where you’d be together and for the first time in her life, she’s not reluctant to it. She’s even delighted about some domestic moments, the same moments she used to get bored of in her previous relationships. She knows with you she won’t get bored. It’s different. What she feels for you, in spite of the fact that she might not fully understand it, already feels easier, more pleasant.
You might be in Emily’s mind more than she’d like to, the fact is, she has a case to solve. Indeed, when Emily is in her office, she’s professional. Sometimes, you find your way to her thoughts however, Emily doesn’t let you distract her. Still, her thoughts become louder and louder and Emily feels like she’ll explode. She needs to talk to someone, even if it’s the last thing she wants to do.
At the end of the day, someone knocks on her office door, getting her out of her head. She invites the person in and Tara appears.
“I wanted to say bye before leaving.”
At her sentence, Emily looks at her watch and discovers it’s almost 8:00 P.M. She sighs before looking up to her colleague.
“Tara, I’d like to talk to you before you leave.”
“Sure. Is it about Sicarius?” Tara wants to know before sitting in front of Emily.
“No, it’s… personal. Rebecca is the first woman you date, right? Before, you only dated men.”
“Yes, I did. Why?”
Tara stares at Emily, confused as Emily searches for her words. Never had Tara seen her in this state.
“How did you understand you wanted to be with Rebecca when…”
“When I had never been attracted to women before?” she finishes with a smile, finally getting where this conversation is leading. “First, now thinking back, I know I’ve been attracted to more women than I thought. As for Rebecca, it was just… natural. We met at a meeting and we clicked instantly. I admit I didn’t understand what was happening to me at first. Suddenly, I found myself wanting with her what I wanted with my exes, the only difference is that this time I found the right person. Why this question? Did you meet someone?”
“You could say that,” Emily admits, avoiding Tara’s gaze. “Nothing is done, but I never felt this before. You know, when I was younger, I did everything to fit with kids my age, even if it meant making stupid mistakes. My relationships never really worked at first so I drafted a list for the ‘perfect man’ and whenever the man I thought I loved didn’t fit those criterias, I’d break up with him. The rare times a man checked the boxes, I would always search for a flaw. I always felt like something wasn’t working. I never knew if it came from them or me but those relationships never worked and those men always seemed more attached to me than I was to them.” Emily confesses, sighing. “The fact is, there was always a problem then I met her. Just like for you and Rebecca, we clicked instantly and it seems natural. I don’t feel like I’m playing a role and the more I think about her, the more I realise she fits everything I want in a relationship, even things I never thought about before. But… I don’t know…,” she says with hesitation, “I never imagined myself with a woman and yet, with her, I wouldn’t mind it. For the first time, I see a relationship with someone and it seems… peaceful. It’s ten times better than I thought. You know what I mean?”
“I totally get it.” Tara confirms with a big smile. “She really caught your eyes, didn’t she?”
“You have no idea. But I don’t know what to do. I know she likes women and I think sometimes she flirts with me but I don’t know.”
“You should talk with her. Trust my experience and update me.”
Emily hasn’t stopped thinking about her conversation with Tara and she rapidly understands she’s right. Thinking back, Emily knows what was missing in every of her relationships: she never liked those men, no matter her efforts to like them. Emily also knows the feelings she has for you are more than real so, she decided to invite you over so you can talk.
Yet, once you’re at her place, Emily can’t bring the topic up. She does everything to avoid it. Emily always struggles to talk about her emotions as she learned dealing with them after the fact. However, once she sees your face brightens while you speak about the new things you want to do at your café, she only wants one thing and it’s to act emotionally and kiss you right now. You keep explaining the last baking recipes you want to add when Emily mutters:
“I want to kiss you so much.”
“What?” you exclaim, furrowing your eyebrows and with an ounce of hope.
“Huh… sorry, that’s not what I meant.” Emily apologises, blushing.
“Oh… okay.” you say before marking a pause and getting closer to her. “If it can make you feel any better, I wouldn’t be against it. I’ve been wanting to kiss you for months.”
“What held you back?”
“I wasn’t sure you were attracted to women.”
“I wasn’t sure about it either then, I met you and everything became clearer.” Emily admits, looking deeply in your eyes. “Since I was a kid, I knew I was different, but still I never understood why. And the minute we met, I understood why. I’m a lesbian and… Oh my God, it feels so good to say it out loud!” She screams, joyful and you lovingly look at her. “ I never thought I could be so at peace with who I am.”
“I get it. Realising who you are is never easy, even less when you realise this at our age but it’s so liberating. I’m happy you accepted yourself,” you state, taking her hand in yours.
“I still have some questions, but I think I’ve done the hardest part.”
“Well, I’d be happy to accompany you on this journey, unless you’d rather do it alone, which I wouldn't mind.”
“Did you forget the part where I want to kiss you?”
“Oh no, I still have it in mind.” you chuckle, “though I also know sometimes we need to be alone to unpack all of this. So, I’d understand if you didn’t want a relationship right away.”
“Quite the contrary, for once, everything is easy and I want you. I’m 100% sure about this and I’m not afraid of committing with you.
Determined, Emily puts her hands on your cheeks and gets closer until her lips touch yours. You smile while kissing her and one of your hands finds its way to her grey hair and the other to her waist. Whilst you keep kissing, Emily’s heart is about to explode in her chest. This kiss is the best one she’s ever had. This kiss is soft and yet, ten times better than all the ones she’s shared before. She could kiss you until she can’t breathe anymore and for the very time in her life, Emily knows she’s found the right person for her. In the end, the idea of the perfect man didn’t exist, simply because it was a woman, because it could never be anyone else but you and you’re ten times better than she imagined.
Masterlist
#marie swriting in english#criminal minds imagine#criminal minds fic#criminal minds#criminal minds x y/n#criminal minds x you#criminal minds x reader#criminal minds fluff#criminal minds fanfiction#criminal minds fandom#emily prentiss fic#emily prentiss#emily prentiss fanfic#emily prentiss fanfiction#emily prentiss x reader#emily prentiss x female reader#emily prentiss x y/n#emily prentiss x you#emily prentiss one shot#emily prentiss fluff#emily prentiss x fem!reader#emily prentiss x fem reader#emily prentiss is a lesbian#emily prentiss imagine#Spotify
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Hey :) I was wondering if since it’s a leap year you would maybe write a oneshot or blurb or smth with James Maguire x reader (maybe like Quinn!reader from your series??) where she proposes on the 29th of February bc it’s a tradition that comes from Ireland?? I just think it would be so cute bc he just totally wouldn’t see it coming and I’ve never seen anyone do it in a fic before
Leap Day (James Maguire X Quinn!Reader)
Masterlist
Request Something!
Summary: You, the girls, and James are now well into your twenties. Life is perfect, except for one little thing that’s been on your mind. After taking with your friends about it, you figure you should take matters into your own hands.
A/N: won’t put it on my series masterlist, but this could be seen as an epilogue of sorts to the fella series (even tho it’s not finished yet lol) but obvi it can be read as its own thing. Also im american so sorry for any terminology and such i get wrong. reader, james, and the girls are obvi aged up
***
If you had told your younger self that you and your friends ended up staying in Derry after finishing school, she would’ve thought you lost your mind. All she thought about was graduating and leaving home, traveling the world, and escaping her pain-in-the-ass sister Erin and somewhat crazy family.
But if she saw the life you had now, she’d probably understand. Because you had everything you truly wanted.
You had a nice little job close to your flat where you managed a bookstore. It was a quaint shop that became a frequent stop for some of the local teenagers. Erin also stopped by every now and then to boast about what she had already read.
When you weren’t working, you were with your friends. You were a bit more tame than you were in your adolescence, but that all usually went out the window when Michelle got a drink or two in her. Which happened often.
But the best part of your day was when you’d go home to see your boyfriend of many years, the love of your life, James Maguire.
“So, what’s goin’ on with you and him, anyway?” Michelle asked as she messily poured everyone a glass of wine. Every now and then, you and the girls got together for a night to get drunk and catch each other up on anything that happened since the last time you’d gotten together. For some reason, you and James were a bit of a hot topic tonight.
“What d’ya mean, Michelle? You know what’s going on with us.” You laughed, taking your wine glass from her.
“I mean, when are the two of you getting hitched? Has he even popped the question to ya?”
“Believe me, Michelle, you’d all be the first to know if we got engaged.” You said a bit glumly, downing your drink and waving your glass around for Michelle’s attention to fill it again.
“He still hasn’t asked you?” Clare asked with an incredulous look. From the start, she had been a big supporter of your and James’ relationship. If it was up to her, you’d probably have a few kids and a house in the countryside by now. “You’ve been going out since we were sixteen! And you just turned twenty-five a few months ago, didn’t you?”
“Yup.” You responded, popping the ‘p.’ “Nine years and no ring.” You held your bare hand up to prove your point. “But I don’t mind too much. As long as we’re together, that’s really what matters.”
“Aw, that’s sweet.” Clare cooed.
“It’s shit.” Michelle countered.
“Michelle’s right, Y/n,” Erin said, grabbing a crisp from the bowl in the middle of the table. “You’ve been waiting for James to propose since we finished at Our Lady Immaculate; admit it.”
“Have not!” You laughed at the absurdity of your sister’s sentence, but the looks everyone gave you made it die down. “Okay, maybe a little. But not seriously! It was just like a dream, you know? Like Erin thinking she’ll get published or Granda thinking Ma will actually divorce Daddy.”
Everyone giggled, except for Erin, who was grumbling about your little jab.
“Be serious, Y/n!” Clare laughed, patting your hand. “You’ve been waiting for him to ask for a long while.”
You looked down at your glass, swirling the wine around with a sigh.
“Maybe a bit.” You answered quietly. It hadn’t really nagged at you too much until recently. After all, you had been together for almost a decade, and everyone else around you seemed to be getting engaged or married. You loved James; truly, you did. But it felt like you were missing out a little. “But I’m fine with waiting.”
“The question is, Y/n, how long are you gonna have to wait until he actually does it?” Erin asked, leaning forward to stare at you. You shrugged, not really knowing the answer and not really wanting to respond.
“You might as well ask him, Y/n!” Your cousin Orla said with a grin. She was always an optimist. “He might just be scared you’ll say no!”
“You know, now that you say it, that’s probably why he hasn’t asked yet,” Michelle said, taking a sip from her wine glass that had been filled more graciously than anyone else’s. “After all, James is a pussy.”
“Don’t call my fella a pussy, Michelle!” You reprimanded, yet you still laughed along with everyone else.
“I can call my cousin what I want. And the fact is that he’s a pussy!”
“You know, that’s not a bad idea, really,” Clare said when everyone’s chuckles had died down. She gasped. “This is a leap year! You could ask him on the twenty-ninth!”
“That’s next week, Clare.” You said a bit nervously. Of course, you’d marry James in a heartbeat. But the thought of proposing, especially so soon, made you a bit sick to the stomach. Now you realize why James probably hasn’t asked you yet.
“It’s either next week or another four years, Y/n,” Michelle said with a teasing smile.
You gulped, feeling everyone’s eyes on you. As you thought about it, you had to admit that it wasn’t really a bad idea. Sure, you had less than an ideal amount of time to plan everything out. But you could probably get something small but nice together.
“Okay… Who’s going ring shopping with me?” The girls squealed at your question, getting up to surround you in a drunken group hug.
***
It was the twenty-ninth, and you were a nervous wreck. The ring weighed heavy in your pocket as you paced around your dining room. Dinner was sitting waiting on the table, and you were playing your little speech of love over and over in your head. All you needed was James, who should be home soon. But as the minutes ticked by, you wished the clock would freeze so you could have more time to prepare for this.
“Darling, I’m home!” James called out as he opened the door, and you realized you were out of time. You skipped out to the front hall to greet your boyfriend.
“Hi, Jamie.” You cooed, giving him a hug and kiss on the cheek before stepping away so he could hang up his coat.
“Sorry I’m a bit late, needed to finish some things at the office.”
“Oh, that’s okay, hun.” You waved your hands, both to dismiss his unneeded apology and to get rid of some nervous energy.
James gave you a quick peck before walking off to the bedroom to change, leaving you to overthink a bit more. You wanted tonight to be perfect. James deserved nothing less than that.
To pass the time, you grabbed a candle and placed it in the middle of the small table, finding a lighter to light the wick.
“It’s so nice to be home,” James murmured as he walked over to you, arms slinking around you to pull you close to his chest. He buried his face into your neck, leaving a kiss or two before taking a deep breath. “Dinner smells good.”
“Thank you, Jamie.” You turned your head to kiss his cheek before pulling away from him. The two of you sat down and started putting food on your plates.
You talked about anything and everything, James leading most of the conversation, which you were grateful for. You felt that if you had to talk too much, you’d either stutter too much or end up spoiling your surprise. James held your hand most of the time, playing with your fingers absentmindedly as he talked about something amusing that happened at work.
Eventually, your plates were clear and your cups were empty. James was finishing up a story about something a few of his lads had done while they were all watching some sports game you didn’t know much about. You knew that now was your time.
“Jamie?” He hummed, perking up at the sound of his name.
“Yes, love?”
“I love you.” You didn’t really know how else to start.
“I love you, too, N/n,” James said, smiling as he squeezed your hand.
You took a deep breath, about to give the speech that you’d been preparing in your head.
“I’ve known that you were the one for me since we were fifth years. Probably since I first saw you at the bus stop. That’s probably crazy, knowing something like that so early and so young… But it’s true.” You laughed, thumb sweeping over his knuckles. “These have been the best years of my life, being with you. And it might be a bit selfish of me, but I want more of them.”
“Y/n…” James whispered, tilting his head. “What are you saying, darling?”
“We have a bit of a tradition here.” You say, wiggling your hand from James’ grasp and standing up. “Ladies’ Privilege, Bachelor’s Day, whatever you fancy calling it. Where on Leap Day, girls can propose to their fella.” You stuck your hand in your pocket, fiddling with the ring. “And seeing how it’s Leap Day now, and I have a ring and all, I guess there’s just one last thing to ask.”
James’ expression turned even more stunned when you got down on one knee, now holding the silver band up in front of him.
“Will you marry me, Jamie?”
In the few seconds of silence after that question, you could feel your heartbeat in your ears. He looked at you stunned, and you desperately wanted to know what was going through his mind. How long would you have to kneel on the ground for him to give you an answer?
But then he smiled brightly, and all your worry slipped away.
“Of course, I’ll marry you!” James slipped out of his chair to join you on the floor and grabbed your face, giving you a long and deep kiss. You gripped his curls in your free hand, the other resting on his shoulder. When he pulled away, he let out an airy laugh. “I never thought I’d be the one being proposed to.”
“Well, there’s a first time for everything.” You giggled with him as you slipped the band onto his ring finger. “Happy Leap Day.”
“Happy Leap Day, indeed,” James said before kissing you again.
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The cost of dreams
I decided a while ago that I would pursue publishing. But with constant critiques of my process and myself as a writer I feel like I’ve run my well dry. I no longer feel like I have a story to tell or that when I do come across something, I no longer feel that I’m good enough to tell that story. I have come to a point where I don’t write at all now.
I naturally have high standards for myself and as I worked to improve my craft and began to follow new authors who have gotten deals or have been agented, I’ve begun to feel like I’m not good enough. Like I’ll never get my work to be as good as my faves or that I’m too slow in my writing process, that’s why I’m not querying yet. Just spirals of thoughts that shoot at one’s confidence.
I felt like I was doing everything that a person who wants to be a professional writer should do. Have a set writing routine(write every week or have set word count goals every month), outline(not that there aren’t professional writers who are amazing pantsers but this was what I felt like I needed to do), and constantly pick at your story until it’s “perfect”.
I’m constantly worrying about what is my most authentic work, if all my work needs to have a big meeting, whether I should write contemporary, because a” good writer” can write in all genres.
I should just be able to handle the pressure and keep pushing. Writing isn’t always fun and if it’s my dream maybe there just need to be some sacrifices. Idk, maybe I’m just rambling.
I really don’t know what to do.
there are only two choices: you write, or you don't. if there's something you love as much as writing (not something you might love or have to search for, but some skill or occupation you enjoy just as much and gives you as much fulfillment), then go do that thing. you'll be able to write at the same time. maybe not as much, but you'll figure it out. if there's not, then the choice is made for you. you keep going, and all you can do is try not to look too far ahead. just look at the words as they arrive on the page and try to forget the big picture.
also, i don't know very many writers who publish in multiple genres. i don't even know very many writers who create narrators who aren't just self-inserts. most writers just write the same thing over and over again and package it in different ways. and if people like it, they keep selling it. remember that when you publish, you're creating a product to be sold. publication is a small thing that seems bigger than it is; the work is always what's important. finding joy in the craft is what's important. if you've lost that, your job is only to find it again. it can be your sole occupation, what you devote every second of your life to. there are few things greater than the pursuit of self-joy.
i'm sorry you're feeling this way though. i feel the same thing about 50% of the time, sometimes for months on end and sometimes just briefly. all the writers you're seeing with all their successes feel it too. i used to think there were a lot of things i could do with my life, and that if i put my mind to it, i could do anything. but the truth is that i can be okay at a lot of things that make me feel mildly accomplished, or i can try to be exceptional at one and find meaning in it.
but if none of this tracks, go read the books you're seeing deals for. read the book you're most envious of and see how bad it is. maybe not objectively, i mean it's probably decent, but i guarantee it will be flawed. or boring. or poorly written. or it may make you go, "how did this get published?" or, "i could do this better." most of this feeling you're having is fear that you're not good enough, and the way to face that fear is to read stuff that sucks. one of two things will happen: you'll feel better about yourself, or you'll find a book good enough to teach you something new. as your writing improves, as you acquire more accolades, the former becomes far greater than the latter, until one day you're dying to read writing that kicks your ass.
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IYHM ask replies (thank you!!!)
❤️ Anonymous asked:
hey there just wanted to ask about your book, is there a way of purchase that benefits you most?
hello! this is so thoughtful omg, thank you so much for asking. preordering the book at all is a huge help! more preorders mean there’s a better chance more retailers will want to stock the book, and also lets the publisher know that my work (and hopefully, this kind of story) is something readers are interested in.
i don’t think there’s a specific method of purchase that would benefit me particularly, but i do think this is a lovely opportunity to support an independent bookstore by preordering through them! or if you don’t have the means, requesting it from your local library is always an option.
but again - preordering the book, no matter where or how, means so much. barnes & noble is currently having a 25% off all preorders sale until the 27th, if that interests anybody! i’ve been trying to read more prose novels so i may peruse their collection myself. happy reading!
❤️ u-u-h asked:
Do you know which retailer gives you the largest percentage of the purchase?
i believe it’s all the same! i think the main difference in terms of sales is that hardcovers have a higher return - but i’m not hung up about that, so please get the format you prefer! i will actually not begin to get royalties until a certain number of copies have been sold (i don’t know if “earning out” is a concept exclusive to publishing but i’m happy to talk about that another time), and that’s something out of my control so i can only hope the book does well.
all that is to say, no need to worry about the place of purchase! but i’m so touched by this question. thank you! 🥺
❤️ Anonymous asked:
will there be a chance to pre-order a signed copy of your graphic novel?
my cousin adores your artwork and while i was already going to order a copy for her, i was wondering if ordering a signed version would be possible in the future to order 2 copies; the non-signed for myself and the signed for her. (instead of what i planned which was reading the copy i ordered for her after she read it lol)
omg that’s so sweet of you! HMM ok i looked into this, and i think this is something that can be coordinated with a local bookstore? i think i’d have to come in to sign their stock, and then those signed books could be shipped out. i’ll look into it more but that’s the impression i’m getting!
❤️ ecurps asked:
Congrats on getting published! =D
❤️ Anonymous asked:
congrats on finishing the book🎉‼️‼️ i am so happy and excited for you 💗❣️❤️💕❤️💞💗❣️ ive been following your account for quite a while now and im sooo excited to read it i just cant wait ‼️ wishing u a very successful 2023 👍
thank you so much!!! 😭💖💕🌸✨ AHHH i can hardly believe it myself... i’ve been a hot mess since the cover reveal! i’ve worked on the book for so long that having anyone else perceive it is exciting and terrifying at the same time. it’s like i’m releasing a child into the world haha! but i’m so grateful to everyone for the warm response, and for waiting so patiently. i hope i get to keep making stories like this for a long time ❤️
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Sorry I haven’t been posting. I’m just tired and I don’t have a lot of down time any more so it’s been hard to get anything done.
And to be 100% honest I just haven’t been feeling The Interlude Inn fic I’ve been working on. It’s not going the way I had envisioned so I’m lacking the motivation to continue writing it. I do plan to finish it eventually.
I have been working on something new though that I should be posting soon. I’ve been reading a lot of hybrid fics lately (send recs please) so I’ve been playing with this idea.
It’s a Yoongi black cat hybrid story. I’m going to publish the entire thing in one post (if Tumblr doesn’t freak out) that way I don’t have to worry about chapters and posting updates. I’ll post a small teaser below the cut.
Thank you for everyone’s patience and to those that have reached out I really appreciate you!
Teaser Below for new Yoongi Hybrid Fic
Warning-Teaser contains mentions of violence, guns, assault
“Just thought I’d stop by. Maybe we could go to that diner on Main. Like old times.”, he smiled.
You don’t know if it was the warnings or what, but this definitely didn’t feel like all the old times when Jungkook would show up at your door in the middle of the night wanting to go get chocolate chip pancakes with you while you both told corny jokes and laughed until the waitress finally had to kick you guys out. This felt darker, sinister even. Only made worse when you noticed the piece of black metal clinging to his hip that he tried to hide with his leather jacket. Jungkook had always been against violence especially anything that included weapons. You remembered when he first started training for the agency and had to learn how to assemble and use a gun. He despised it, almost quitting because of it, but he knew it was for the better of the hybrid community. If he really had quit the agency like Namjoon said then he would’ve had to turn in all of his weapons so the fact that he had one on him made your uneasiness all that more prominent.
“Yeah let me go grab my purse!”, you exclaimed trying to get away from him now realizing something was up. He grabbed your hand stopping you from going any further, “No need Y/N. I’ll pay.”
“Oh well at least let me go get dressed. I don’t want to go out looking like such a slob.”, you chuckled quickly bolting up the stairs before he could stop you again.
In your room with the door closed you frantically searched for your phone wanting to call Namjoon or the police or anyone for help.
Finding it lying on the floor you grabbed it quickly searching your contacts. In your frazzled state you failed to hear anyone creep up behind you until it was too late and you felt the cold metal against the warmth of your forehead.
A strong arm pulling you close against a body much bigger than yours.
“Y/N, put the phone down. You don’t want to do that.”, Jungkook growled in your ear.
“Why are you doing this?”, you asked slowly tossing your phone on the bed. “You were against abuse towards hybrids just like me and Namjoon. Now you work with the worst in the business?”, you questioned him.
“Look, I really don’t want to have to hurt you. I still care about you Y/N. That’s the only reason I didn’t just kill you the other night and take Yoongi then. Tell me where he is and I’ll let you go.”
You shook your head, “I don’t know. They took him this morning.”
You could hear him scoff as he pushed the tip of the gun against your forehead a little harder making you flinch in fear.
“Y/N, I won’t ask again. Where did they take Yoongi?”, he shouted.
“A shelter in North Provence. That’s all they told me.”, you spit out.
You cried tears of relief when you felt him pull the gun away before throwing you down on the ground.
“Thanks Love.”, was all he said before sprinting out of your home.
#bts#yoongi fanfic#yoongi x reader#min yoongi#yoongi angst#bts fanfic#yoongi fic#yoongi x y/n#bts x reader#namjoon#jeon jungkook#jungkook#kim namjoon#bts fic#bts angst#bts yoongi#yoongi au#hybrid#bts hybrid au
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Let me rage part 2
Summary; Finally reunited Valtor and (Y/n) can get back to conquer the magic dimension. (Y/N) gets to meet the Trix and shows why she is Valtor’s right hand. Deciding to infiltrate Alfea she meets the Winx, and becomes an important player in this battle.
This work is also published on AO3 under my username Acourtoffanficsandfeelings, if you prefer to read it there.
Continuation of Together again, and second part of let me rage.
A/N; First, I am incredibly sorry for the delay. I was having an intense writer's block for a certain part in this chapter and didn’t really know how to continue.
It seems that to this day Valtor is still a beloved character, and this fic still gets kudos, and comments. And that motivates me to write. So even if it has taken a while I hope I’ve managed to write a chapter you’re all very happy to read, as I did my best to make it as long as possible to make it up to you guys. While writing this chapter I concluded that this part of the series will be 3 chapters instead of the original two, as I felt it would have the story flow more.
Also because I hope this way to fetch out the character of the reader more, to give her some emotions, and struggles, while still remaining an badass amazing villain lover. And to show you some more moments between Valtor and (Y/N).
So I want to thank everybody again for sticking around,and reading this after my long absence, and if you just found the fic and this was already out when you found my fic, I hope you also enjoy everything that I’ve written so far.
Monday morning. Idle chatter could be heard filling the classroom as some of the Alfea students were waiting for their new teacher to make an appearance. A teacher who was ten minutes late. When the wooden doors started to creak, and announced the arrival of somebody the chatter slowly faded out, and silence filled the room. “Sorry class, I know I’m late, but as I’m sure some of you would agree with me, this school can be quite a maze.” The students, including the famous Winx, watched as the new teacher made her way towards the desk, and placed her bag on it before turning around to face her students. “Hello class, I’m Professor Whiteshade, and I am your new teacher specialized in Enchantix.”
While she was introducing herself (Y/N) could feel the eyes of the students observing her. They took in the white floor length dress that she wore, with the black belt across her waist. She could feel their eyes looking at her blond hair that was so pale it almost looked white when the lights hit it in a certain spot. It had been pulled into an intricate bun to keep the hair out of her face. (Y/N) didn't like the look she had currently on, but there have been worse faces she had turned into.
One of the students raised her hand, gaining (Y/N)’s attention who smiled at her. “Yes,-” She glanced down at one of the papers on her desk, pretending not to have seen Bloom before. Valtor had shown her some of the winx in his scrying orb and explained the most important facts she needed to know: like the fact that Bloom was the fairy of the dragon flame. “Bloom, is it?” The red head nodded, before asking her question. “Not to be rude professor, but why are we now suddenly getting this extra class in our curriculum?”
“Not rude at all, and an understandable question at that. I understand you’re not looking forward to more homework, so I will try to keep it at a minimum. As you all are well aware there is a new threat trying to conquer the magic dimension.” (Y/N) voice got serious as she looked across the room, seeing multiple defeated faces of the fairies who’s home had been affected by Valtor. A good person would have felt bad when she looked at those faces, but (Y/N) knew that sometimes things had to be destroyed for a new world to rise again. A world in which she and Valtor ruled the magic dimension.
“Headmistress Feragonda has asked me to come to Alfea, and teach and guide you students as you learn more about Enchantix in these troubling times. From the information I’ve gotten, two of you have already received your Enchantix.” (Y/N)’s eyes found those of Aisha and Stella, whom she gave a reassuring smile. “You should be proud of yourselves for earning your Enchantix, despite how grave the situation was in which you’ve gotten them.” (Y/N) focused on the class again. Aisha’s and Stella’s expression grew dark as (Y/N) could see the memories of those moments come back to the girls.
“Enchantix isn’t easily gained, it requires great sacrifice. I know of fairies who’ve nearly died in their efforts to earn their Enchantix. And sometimes you need to sacrifice your own happiness and choose to do what’s right because not everything that makes you happy is right.”
~~~
“Are you sure this is the only way?” (Y/n) asked as she looked at the beaten and locked up form of professor Whiteshade, who was currently lying unconscious on the floor. “You know that there is nobody I trust more with this than you.” (Y/N) felt Valtor place his hands on her shoulders as he stood behind her. The two of them were standing in front of Whiteshade’s cell, which was located one floor above Griffins, where Valtor had told her his plan regarding Alfea. “We need to have an inside source, and find the hall of enchantment. They will notice if I or the Trix slip by but they won’t notice you.” (Y/N) rolled her eyes, knowing he was right, but not really agreeing with the plan.
“I’ve only just returned to you, and you wish to have me leave again.” She muttered, feeling rejected. Valtor quickly turned her around, guiding her by her shoulders. One of his hands grabbed her chin gently between two fingers, and tilted her head up. “That is a cruel thing to say, for you know that is not my intention. I’ve missed you with all my heart, and I dislike this plan as much as you do, but there is nobody I trust more with this than you. And the sooner this is over with, the sooner you can return to me.” Valtor said as he looked into her eyes, and pressed a brief kiss on (Y/N)’s lips.
A sigh left her lips afterwards as she enjoyed the closeness between them for a moment, knowing that she would have to part from it again so soon, and then she relented. “Alright, I’ll do it.” Valtor smiled at her as he slowly released her from his hold. (Y/N) turned to look at the real professor Whiteshade again, as she whispered a spell, closing her eyes. As soon as the spell had crossed her lips the shadows around them in the room seemed to twist and turn as they started to glide across her body. Through the glimpses of shadow Valtor could see her clothing change from the black dress she wore to a red sundress. Her (Y/H/C) turned into the lightest of blondes. And when the shadows moved away, and (Y/N) opened her eyes, even her eye color had changed.
She looked almost identical to the professor Whiteshade in the cell, only the trained eye would spot the differences. A mole that wasn’t there where it usually was, a scar that wasn’t there, perhaps a bit more weight on the arms or legs. (Y/N) had always been able to manipulate the shadows, to make things seem different from what actually, but only small things like books, trinkets or furniture. But during her years with Valtor he had taught her to think bigger, to practice her spells, and now she was almost able to place the spell on almost anything. For everything in the shadows is not what it seems.
~~~
It had been two weeks since (Y/N) had arrived at Alfea and she was annoyed. She knew she was doing important work for Valtor, passing along information from the room of enhancement to Valtor, but those types of things took time. It turned out that Alfea had finally invested in a librarian who took her work seriously. Although it wasn’t difficult for (Y/N) to charm Barbatea, and learn all about the library. But it also meant that Barbatea knew every nook and cranny, and would know it if things disappeared. So (Y/N) was forced to make copies of some of the lesser important spells, and tried to find substitutes for the more important books and scrolls. (Y/N) was particularly proud of the erotic romance novel she had managed to look like an ancient spell book. Now she just hoped that nobody would open the book.
After spending seventeen years as a statue, her powers were still on the weaker side. Each week she felt her power grow, and Valtor had helped her by sharing his power. But from the moment she had woken up she had used her magic continuously. Pretending to be Griffin when anybody would try to contact her to keep up the appearance that Cloud Tower was still standing. Or that one time they had intercepted a call from Feragonda to King Radius to ask how things were regarding the fountain, and King Radius had replied that; everything was quiet but they would keep an eye out for anything strange and notify her when they did. And now, (Y/N) had to continue to keep up the appearance as professor Whiteshade, and keep the illusions of the books going even if she wasn’t anywhere near them.
And on top of all that she had to actually teach the students something about Enchantix. The first couple of days (Y/N) had mostly placed the focus on introductions in the class, and to Enchanctix, telling what she knew of Enchantix, but she was running out of information. So one day she had made a parkour course for her Enchantix students, before letting them race the others. To make the students see how much stronger they would become if they earned Enchantix, and why it came with such a heavy price.
But the thing that kept (Y/N) going was the fact that she knew Valtor was growing stronger every time she sent him something through the shadows. And Valtor also seemed to know when to say something to her, even when he couldn’t speak with her.
~~~
It was dark in the library, most of the Alfea students were in bed, as were most of its teachers. Barbatea had just wished (Y/N) goodnight, after (Y/N) had promised the librarian she would lock up behind her, but just wanted to research one more thing before her class tomorrow. (Y/N) had turned off the lights, preferring the light from the moon shining through the windows. (Y/N) always waited half an hour after everybody had left to make sure that Barbatea wouldn’t just reappear.
When the half hour had passed (Y/N) slowly rose from the chair she had been vacating, and she closed the book she had been reading. From her bag, which was filled with her students' homework to keep up appearances, she grabbed a gardening book that she had taken from the greenhouse earlier today. After placing it on the table right next to the one she had been reading previously, she placed her hands on top of the books, one on each. (Y/N) closed her eyes, and tried to focus. “Mirror image.” She whispered as she felt her magic move beneath her hands. The headache that had been slowly growing bigger these past week, grew stronger with the new spell she casted.
When (Y/N) opened her eyes she let out a sigh of frustration. It almost looked like the spell had only taken half effect. The title of the spellbook had been transferred to the gardening book, but the flowery cover could still be seen underneath.
(Y/N) lifted her head to look at the ceiling as she took another deep breath, trying to soothe the headache, and focus on the shadows she was already controlling. Her image of professor Whiteshade, and covers of around fifteen books she was trying to keep up, while focusing on creating a new one. If she focused, she could feel the shadow connecting the books together, although weak as it was, it was there. (Y/N) tried to imagine Valtor standing behind her, his hands on her shoulders, placing a kiss on her lips as she had her head tilted backwards. And his words he had whispered to her long ago that fateful day; that she was strong, that she was capable of anything, as long as she remained by his side.
“I miss you.” (Y/N) confessed to the quiet library, with only the moonlight and the shadows as her company. It had been two weeks of no contact with either Valtor or the Trix. And after only a week with Valtor,before she had gone to Alfea, after being stuck in stone for seventeen years felt like a short time to be together again. But (Y/N) also knew that they would have all the time in the world together once Valtor and her conquer the magic dimension.
Thinking with their end goal in mind (Y/N) returned her attention back to her task at hand. “Mirror image.” She said again, and this time when she opened her eyes, she had two identical books. Or at least when you didn’t look too closely. Perhaps a tear wasn’t in the place it always was, and maybe the letter R was a different font but didn’t look out of place at first glance.
(Y/N) stood up and placed the duplicate copy back in the place it belonged, before grabbing the original and walking to a shadowed corner of the library, a place where the moonlight didn’t reach. (Y/N) squatted down and waved her hand, the shadows twisting underneath into a calm whirlpool of shadows. She imagined Cloud Tower, more specially Valtor’s desk, next to the scrying orb as she pushed the book into the shadows, and dropped it.
(Y/N) stood back up again, and went to turn around when she heard a small thunk, and something hitting her ankle. The shadows had gone quiet again, no longer moving as their mistress had no longer any use of them. But that wasn’t what caught (Y/N)’s attention, for she had expected them to be quiet. No, on the ground near her ankle she saw a small circle with something sticking out of it.
After picking it up, (Y/N) made her way towards the window. In the moonlight she saw she was holding onto a ring with a small note attached to it. Before (Y/N) studied the ring she opened up the note. It was a small letter, one that would sometimes have been tied to the foot of a bird. The only message on it was; As promised. Two days.
(Y/N) turned her attention towards the ring. It was a ring that was on the wider side. The first thing that caught her attention was how blue it was. When she looked closer she recognized the blue to be some type of coral, from andros more specifically. The whole inside of the ring was made of polished blue coral, the sides inlaid with gold to give it a more delicate effect. A smile came on (Y/N)’s face as she brought the ring to her chest and held it there for a moment.
Seventeen years ago Valtor had promised her all the jewelry her heart desired when they were rulers of the magic dimension. (Y/N) had mentioned how her sister had gotten a ring from Andros, which had used coral instead of diamonds, and how she had always wanted a ring like that. And how some corals from Andros were worth more than some of the most expensive diamonds. So that was why her sister only had one small part of her ring infused with the coral. In response Valtor had promised she would have the most beautiful ring of Andros one day, even prettier than her sisters.
(Y/N) remembered how Aisha hadn’t been in class today as there was another attack on Andros. Seemed like Valtor had remembered his promise. With a smile (Y/N) placed the ring around her, or rather professor Whiteshade’s, finger. She tore up the paper and threw it in the trash, making sure nobody would be able to read it, and even then it couldn’t be traced back to her. With renewed strength (Y/N) made her way out of the library, and towards her bedroom.
~~~
That had been two days ago. It was now Saturday, and everybody, teachers and students, were free to do as they pleased today. But (Y/N) had been on edge the whole day, just waiting for something to happen. She kept herself busy by making sure all her shadows were still where she needed them to be, and keeping her head ache to a minimum. But she did all that from the solitude of her bedroom. (Y/N) was in the habit of keeping her curtains almost closed, not a fan of the burning daylight.
Her attention was pulled when the small streak of light that came from the crack in between the curtains turned dark. Opening her curtains she could see storm clouds gathering above Alfea as it started to rain. If (Y/N) hadn’t suspected something was amiss, the fact that the magic barrier was going up was a definite sign.
Relief and excitement coursed through (Y/N)’s body. Relief that her stay in Alfea would finally be over, and excitement to know the future that will be waiting for them. (Y/N) stepped out of her room and ran into professor Palladium and professor Wizgiz who had also been residing in their chambers. The tree of them ran up towards one of the rooftops, knowing that Faragonda had gone there to activate the barrier. “Miss Faragonda!” Professor Palladium called out to her, gaining her attention.
“Brace yourself. The lighting is bewitched, and clearly the work of Valtor.” Faragonda warned them as she turned to look back in the sky. Up in the storm clouds the mark of Valtor had appeared, whenever the lighting struck it grew brighter. Faragonda turned her attention back to the professors at her side. “Keep your eyes open, be prepared,-” “Look, he’s using the witches from Cloud Tower.” Professor Wizgiz said, pointing towards the storm cloud. Professor Wizgiz was right. From the storm clouds, they’re hands outstretched came the lighting that had previously been in the clouds. The lighting struck the magical barrier, and with Valtor controlling them the magic of the witches was a lot stronger than they’d normally had, making the barrier fall apart.
Faragonda turned back around to face her colleagues. “Alright, get the girls. They’ll need our help, and we’ll need theirs.” Faragonda said with confidence before she was hit with lighting from behind. Luckily with everything going on it just seemed like professor Whiteshade stepped away from the blast to protect herself, and certainly not because she didn’t feel the need to catch the headmistress. (Y/N) had to give credit where credit was due, and Faragonda quickly got back up again. “Alright, you two,-” Faragonda looked in the direction of the professor's Palladium and Wizgiz. “Gather all the fairies and prepare for battle.” The two professors ran off as the barrier fully broke, and tiny glittering pieces fell down the sky.
Then Faragonda looked professor Whiteshade in the eyes. “Go to the library and don’t let any of the information get into the wrong hands.” (Y/N) turned to walk towards the library when she heard Faragonda call out her lover’s name, which made her stop in her tracks. Faragonda was way too focused on Valtor who came down from the sky to notice that she had stopped.
Valtor landed with two feet on the ground, arms folded together in front of his chest. “We meet again, Faragonda, it has been a while.” Valtor smiled as he tilted his head slightly sideways, almost as if he pitied the woman standing in front of him. “You’ve grown old.” He added chuckling. For the briefest of moments (Y/N) saw his eyes go over Faragonda’s shoulder in her direction, before returning towards the furious headmistress.
“You’ve bewitched the girls from Cloud Tower.” She accused before throwing a spell at him in her anger. Valtor managed to easily catch the spell with his hand, before throwing it back in Faragonda’s direction, which managed to hit her in the chest. Faragonda flew backwards towards the edge of the roof, hitting the brick wall. She landed close to (Y/N), who was now calmly inspecting the spectacle. Now that Faragonda could see that professor Whiteshade had remained standing, (Y/N) could see the clogs in her head turning. “I’ve always been known to be rather persuasive.” Valtor said, walking closer towards them as (Y/N) slowly started to make his way towards him. “No, no!” Faragonda muttered, almost shocked, as realization slowly started to dawn on her. “Or should I say, we are very persuasive.”
“I suppose we are.” (Y/N) chuckled, as she let herself drop the image of professor Whiteshade for a moment. With each blink of Faragonda’s eyes a different person was standing next to Valtor. One moment in her place stood the professor, then Griffin, and then King Radius , and with the next blink shadows circled around the woman standing next to Valtor, revealing the woman lying behind the shadows, beneath all the false faces she created. A smile on her lips that Faragonda knew all too well from many years ago, then the professor was back in place but the smile still remained. “Well, as fun as this little reunion is, I was under strict orders to make sure the information in the library would not fall under the wrong hands.” (Y/N) told Valtor, who matched the smile on her face.
“Well then, you better get going. Faragonda and I have a lot of catching up to do anyway.”
#imagine#imagine valtor#valtor x reader#winx club valtor#valtor imagine#winx valtor#winx baltor#baltor#winx club#canon divergence
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Break | ksj (m)
☾ Pairing: Witch!Seokjin x cursed!reader
☾ Summary: Seokjin has been at your side for the last few years. He’s your closest friend, and the one person you don’t think you can live without. But what happens when you discover that he might be the source of the curse he’s been trying to help you escape from?
☾ Word Count: 18,990
☾ Genre: Supernatural, smut, angst
☾ Rating: 18+ Minors are strictly prohibited from engaging and reading this content. It contains explicit content and any minors discovered reading or engaging with this work will be blocked immediately.
☾ Warnings: Death and implied accidental murder of a sibling, childhood trauma, creepy vibes, heavy angst, a lot of internal monologue featuring angst, physical and verbal abuse from members of the town toward reader, sometimes confusing mentions of magic systems, explicit language, explicit sexual content including vaginal fingering, nipple play, oral (m. receiving), rough fucking from behind, dom/sub dynamics if you rEALLY squint, subspace/blacking out post sex, unhappy and ambiguous ending!!!!!!
☾ Published: May 22, 2023
☾ A/N: Hi hello this is one of the most random things I’ve ever written. I made a last minute choice to nosedive into this fic at the last second, which was certainly a choice. While it’s not my favorite work because of how hard I struggle to write it, I have a feel people are going to like it regardless and I shouldn’t be so hard on myself about it. Once again, Hali writes way too much for a small project and doesn’t even dip into the lore the way she wanted to! Thank you to @here2bbtstrash who was the amazing beta on this and fixed easily over 200 errors that I made while rush typing this. I handed this over unedited and unread from myself and they put this through the wash to have it in tiptop shape!
❀ A/N 2: M created their own Little Hut rhyme and I have opted to feature it here for reader’s enjoyment:
Little hut, little hut
Killer dick game
Little hut, little hut
All men is the same
Little hut, little hut,
Murdered your twin
Little hut, little hut
Time to fuck Jin
❀ Disclaimer: All members of BTS are faces and name claims for this story. This is entirely a work of fiction and by no means is meant to be a projection, judgment or representation of real-life people. Any scenarios or representations of the people and places mentioned in works are not representative of real-life scenarios.
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Seokjin is good at holding grudges. Even as a child, his mother always said he had a tough time letting things go. He never knew how right she would be. His mother’s words are all he can think about as he storms through the dark of the forest, shadows whispering about him as he looks for the lone hut in the very dark of the woods.
Little hut, little hut
Hidden in the wood
Little hut, little hut
Up to no good
If his parents could see him now, he knows they would be broken. Tear-streaked and shaking, a lost boy alone in the woods and drowning in anger so hot that the ground scorches beneath his feet. Looking for a salve. Looking for vengeance.
Little hut, little hut
Alone in the gloom
Little hut, little hut
Silent as a tomb
Blood witches are dangerous. Seokjin knows this, everyone knows this. A blood witch is the reason why his parents are dead and he is storming through the darkness in the throes of madness. But Seokjin is only thirteen and full of pain and desperation, vowing to never let something happen like this again. If he has to use a devil to defeat a devil, he will.
Little hut, little hut
Across the dark stream
Little hut, little hut
Wait for the scream
A dark stream wends its way through the trees. Seokjin gets a running start and jumps across the whispering waters. When he lands on the other side, he waits. It took a lot of searching to find someone to tell him how to find the witch in the woods. No one comes here, especially not in the dead of night on Beltane.
They say only evil comes from the little hut in the woods. Seokjin knows now that it isn’t true. Evil comes from anywhere and everywhere, even from the people that one least expects. Evil killed his parents. Evil is why he is alone, crying on the edge of the stream, waiting for the sound of a banshee's call.
He hears it then. A one-note wail, thin and high-pitched. His blood goes cold and the fight in him nearly goes out at the sound. His heart begins to pound so loud that it’s all he can hear, the thundering beat of panic and terror as he realizes what he’s about to do.
“Little hut, little hut,” a voice that he cannot see calls to him. There is no hut that Seokjin can see. Only omnipresent darkness, cloying the air in front of him. A tingle skitters over his arms and he becomes acutely aware of another presence there with him in the dark. “I call to thee. Little hut, little hut, come to me.”
Seokjin blinks rapidly a few times and sees the outline of a hut in front of him. It has a blurry shape like it’s really the idea of a house. It’s so shadowed and opaque that he’s not entirely sure if it’s really there. He walks toward it anyway, one foot in front of the other, looking at the hut.
If a home could be a phantom, he thinks this is what the hut is. There is a vibrational pull here, a dull buzz in his veins as he gets closer and closer to where the blood witch lives. His stomach turns and his instincts beg him to leave. There is evil in this place. He knows it. Can feel its oily presence like a poisonous slick in his veins.
A door - or rather what he imagines is a door shape - stands open in the hut. Inside is eternal darkness like Seokjin has never seen before. The buzzing in his veins has become stronger, an itch he can’t scratch. A ringing in his ears.
Sometimes to beat evil, you must use evil. So Seokjin steps into the house despite all the reasons he should turn around and run. Because he is alone, he is in pain, and he needs some sort of penance. Justice.
So he asks the blood witch for a favor.
Little hut, little hut
Hear my strife
Little hut, little hut
Ruin this life
-
When the rock hits you right at the top of your spine, you know it isn’t an accident. All the same, you spin on your heel and look at the edge of the lake where the kids are skipping stones. They squeal and look away from you, huddled together as they giggle and look over their shoulders with frantic and excited faces.
You clench your fists and keep going. What can you do to a group of kids? Tossing them into the lake while you’re an adult seems unfair, though it certainly crosses your mind. It isn’t necessarily their fault that they were taught to have such hate in their hearts at a young age, after all.
So, you keep going, grinding your teeth as you march up the slope toward the main pathway that cuts through the park, gravel crunching beneath your feet as you quicken your strides to put distance between you and the cackling children. You’re not positive they won’t throw another rock at you, and you think that it might send you over the edge.
Early preparation for the Beltane festival is in full swing all over the park. There are trucks unloading carts and piecing together stalls, vendors and contractors with clipboards walking through spray painted grass with city officials, and a giant maypole waiting to be constructed.
Living in a town of witchy folk can be fun, you suppose. The only downside is that most of the witches in your town despise you and think you’re an abhorrent blight to the earth. If killing and sacrifices hadn’t been outdated and frowned upon, you’re sure they would have stuck you to an altar as a child the first time you showed signs of being a leech.
Leech.
It’s an unkind thing to call witches who siphon magic. It isn’t something you can control - it isn’t even something you were born with. Most witches who siphon magic are born that way. A sort of magical defect in the way they interact naturally with the world.
Most think of siphoners as a plague to the witch community. Thieves and monsters who can only feed on magic to make magic, a perversion of the natural balance of things. The way you look at it, witches who siphoned aren’t really any different from the natural order of the world. All living things need an energy source: food for animals, sun for plants, bacteria for amoebas. It isn’t different, really.
Perhaps you would not be so kind to leeches, though, had you not began your existence as a siphoner at thirteen years old.
It isn’t a night that you enjoy remembering, but it is certainly a night you can’t seem to forget. One moment you could command your magic like most other witches. Most, because you were a blood witch with raw talent and a powerful relationship with the earth’s energy.
Blood witches were as revered as they were feared, witches who needed no spells. Who could use the magic within them instead of their connection with the earth to conjure. To blood witches, all other witches were leeches, really. You didn’t tell that to your coven, though you thought about the irony often.
Your blood magic had vanished, though. It happened while you lay asleep in your bed, pressed up against your twin sister. Twins were a special thing in covens, a rarity in the magical order of the world that was seen as a good omen. There was a connection you shared with her deeper than the connection to your own magic, a bond that rooted the two of you together. That made you seek one another out for comfort.
It had been storming that night and you had sought out the warmth of her bed and the vanilla sugar of her hair to soothe your nerves. You didn’t like storms and thunder very much, but she was wide awake in her bed, watching out the window as purple lighting cracked across the sky and thunder shook the house.
You’d slipped into her bed without a word and she stood guardian over you, hand tucked in yours as she watched the sky light up. You remember her laying down next to you after the storm passed. The warmth of her breath on your cheek as she fell asleep. The hum between the two of you, soul recognizing soul.
She’d been dead by morning, magic siphoned and drained dry in the middle of the night.
The memory of it is metallic in your mouth. You head toward your apartment, hands tucked into the pockets of your jeans, head down. Beltane always makes you think of your sister. Makes you think of the morning you woke up on your thirteenth Beltane to find her cold and dead, magical signature gone. Severed. Torn away from you.
Losing your ability to generate magic was only second to losing your sister. You still feel adrift fifteen years later. Moving through the world with a piece of you missing. Two pieces of you, if you count the fact that you can feel the magic around you but not reach for it. You never reach for it, though you suspect that no one believes you.
Except maybe Seokjin. But even he doesn’t know the story of how you became what you are. All he knows is that you can’t create your own magic, and yet he’s never shamed you for it. Never turned his back on you, or berated you or bullied you.
That sort of kindness is a rarity in your world.
Your small northeastern town is easy to navigate. There’s not much that happens that doesn’t immediately become the knowledge of all citizens, and there’s not really a way to get lost unless you’re a tourist coming to visit the country's spookiest and most magical town. The locals are pretty firm believers in magic, but the out of towners don’t really believe. They just want camp and kitsch.
It’s busy season, the streets filled with people buying decorations to celebrate Beltane, restaurants full of tourists trying out local fare between going shop to shop. The festivals always draw a big crowd to your corner of the world, making it easier for you to blend in with all the rest of them. It almost makes you feel normal when someone doesn’t recognize you and immediately scowl. Sometimes you can even get away with eating at places that wouldn’t normally serve you, the workers too busy to really look at your face and see you.
A few people have taken pity on you outside of Seokjin. Namjoon and Jimin would never turn you away, always welcoming you with open arms, a warm cup of tea and free books for as long as you like at their bookstore. You’re not technically allowed in the metaphysical store on Fourth, but as long as Yoongi is working, you can walk through the rows and rows of crystals, grimoires, spices and charms. Seokjin is where you’re really home, though, his bakery a place of safety and fresh-smelling sugar cookies.
It’s where you go now, sticking to the shop windows and away from the tourists flowing all over Main Street like ants. There’s a line stretched out the door when you get to Magical Moon Bakery, and Jungkook looks helpless behind the counter as he nods while taking an order, wide-eyed and terrified.
Seokjin is at the delivery counter, flour staining his cheek and brow as he nods politely and hands a box of cupcakes over to his customer. As though he can sense you, he lifts his head and swivels, eyes scanning until they land on you, immediately shining. Your stomach leaps the way it often does around him, especially when he breaks out into a beautiful smile and jerks his thumb at an apron.
You roll your eyes. You’re not technically an employee at the bakery, but you help often enough that you tease Seokjin sometimes that he should start paying you. You never mean it, of course. Your reward is his unearned and unlikely friendship, and the fact that his friends have taken you in even when other covens have turned their backs on you.
Perhaps if he’d grown up here he’d hate you. It’s a thought you have often, even when you’re pulling the loop of a lavender apron over your head and tying it around your waist. You can’t imagine Seokjin ever hating you for no reason, but sometimes you wonder if he had the influence of the other kids of your town if it would be different.
“Can you take over the order counter?” he asks, the blush on his face the only sign that he’s getting a little frazzled. You nod and he winks at you, leaning over to press a quick, chaste kiss on your cheek. “Worldwide best friend.”
“Mhmm,” is the only response you manage to string together, flustered by his proximity.
It’s no secret that Seokjin is one of the best looking men in town. Even among witches, who are unnaturally beautiful to begin with, he stands out. Dark, silky hair swept back off of his forehead, dark eyes with a spark of caramel right around the pupil, lips full and lush like Aphrodite, and a face molded from the finest clay, glazed and perfected.
Loving him isn’t hard. He’s as kind as he is beautiful, and Seokjin is silly. Able to make you laugh and draw you out of the melancholy that is permanently affixed on your person. It’s been that way since you met in your early twenties right after he moved to town, and you’re grateful for it.
Even if loving him is pointless. He can never be yours - would never want to be yours in that way, anyway.
So you settle for less. Settling for crumbs is what you’re good at. What people think you deserve, being the little leech that you are.
No one you’re serving at the bakery knows you’re a leech, though. All they know is that they are eager to try the best baked goods in town, wondering at the menu as each item has a list of things it’s good for. Rose scones to make someone fall in love, marshmallow fluff cupcakes to soften the blow of bad news, gumdrop cakes to summon rain.
Everything on the menu has a charm to it, both literally and figuratively. Seokjin is wildly creative in his carefully crafted menu, and he imbues magic in everything he makes from the eggs to the whipped frosting.
Being here is nice. Jungkook grins when he sees you behind the counter, happy for the help. He still gets overwhelmed behind the till, and he’s more than happy to step back and chew his lip nervously when he processes a discount wrong. You’re up next to him before he can ask for help, typing on the screen while gently walking him through it again.
Jungkook is a good kid, an elemental witch who is prone to cause rainstorms when he gets stressed. For now, he is a bottle of sunshine, thanking you shyly and letting you know that he saved you a bag of butterscotch cookies in the back.
“I put in a little extra sunshine,” he promises. By that, you know that he means magic. To give you. You open your mouth to scold him but he shakes his head furiously, long, wavy locks shaking. “I wanted to do it. Please don’t yell at me.”
That gets you. It’s hard to be mad at him, especially when anger is likely to set him off into a rainstorm. Jungkook’s round eyes are pleading and he pouts, a tactic you know he has learned from his boyfriend to use as a weapon. You think about sending Taehyung some choice text messages but instead, thank Jungkook for the cookies and continue to help him.
This is what keeps you going most days. The unfettered kindness that Seokjin and his friends show you. None of them are locals to town, but they had formed their own coven a little at a time, a circle under the broad umbrella of the town's overall witch population.
Covens are difficult. You’re both in and not in Seokjin’s coven, an unofficial member by friendship. But you don’t practice anymore - won’t let yourself - so you’re on the outside looking in most weekends and during spiritual times of the year.
But by witch standard, you are a part of the covenstead of the town, the larger collective of witches who are loyal and responsible for one another, all answering to the high priestess. Who has begrudgingly let you stay as a member of the covenstead for the sheer fact that you’re her niece and nothing more.
When the rush of customers and crinkling to-go bags slows, you lean against the counter and reach a hand out just as the door to the back swings open. Seokjin has a glass bottle of soda ready for you, and he blinks in surprise when he sees your hand ready for it. You’re a little surprised as well. Though you have no magic on your own, you still sometimes predict things before they happen. Or at least, your instincts do.
“It’s freaky when the two of you do that,” Jungkook comments, eyes bouncing between you and Seokjin as the older hands you the bottle. “You’re always so in-tune.”
“She’s a witch,” Seokjin snorts, leaning against the glass case of mostly empty dishes as he takes a swig of his own. “Divination and all that is sort of what we do.”
“Yeah, but it only happens with you.”
You don’t meet Seokjin’s eyes as you swig from the bottle, the carbonation fizzing on your tongue. “I can’t help it that I inspire magical abilities,” is Seokjin’s answer. Always deflecting. You're grateful for the way he rolls with the punches, easily accepting the way others talk about you two as an item so you don’t have to. “Plus, even witch-adjacents have the ability of foresight.”
What he doesn’t say is that even in your dishonored position as a siphoner, you can get sensations and feelings. While you can sense magic and you’re still in tune with the world around you, Jungkook is right: you only have this sense of knowing with Seokjin, like there is a tiny string of fate connecting the two of you.
When it’s time to close down the shop, you help the two of them out. Seokjin goes to the back to begin batching things anew: fondant, bread, frosting - anything that he can let sit overnight or prep while the lights are out and he’s gone home. You focus on cleaning with Jungkook, letting him put on a pop playlist while he sings along, siren voice lulling you into a steady rhythm.
Part of you wants to ask what they’re doing for Beltane. Celebrating the holidays use to be your favorite, threading flowers through your hair, blessing your hearth and home, weaving new spells of prosperity and happiness alongside your sister. Now you don’t participate in any of the rituals with the others.
Most of the time, you celebrate alone in your room. Mark the points of the elements and the compass on your bedroom floor alone. Sit in front of a single candle, watching the flame flicker as you draw your circle of salt, murmuring blessings. It isn’t a powerful place of practice and you have no alter to command, but it's something. It’s yours.
Instead of asking, you follow Seokjin and Jungkook out of the door on the promise of dinner. It is the one thing that does feel like a ritual you’re allowed to participate in, holding chapel at Seokjin’s dining room table and elbowing with Jimin and Taheyung to reach for the food piled high.
Evening sky stretches overhead as you walk between Seokjin and Jungkook. You cast your eyes upward, watching the gray clouds float by. Seokjin throws an arm around you, pulling you in close and squeezing you to his side. He smells like vanilla and sweet orange from making his tangerina vanilla cakes for Yoongi. You breathe in his scent, letting it wash through you like a balm.
His arm presses a little too hard on the bruise where the rock from earlier nailed you, and you hiss, reaching behind your head automatically to adjust his hold on you.
“What?” he asks, lifting his arm and slowing his gait. Seokjin’s face is picture-perfect concern, mouth tilted downward, a crease in his brows. Before you can explain, his hands are pulling at the collar of your shirt. “You’ve got a welt here, what the hell is that?”
You smack at his hands and step away from him, pulling his warm fingers from your shirt. “It’s nothing.”
“Whenever you say ‘it’s nothing’ it's always something. Why do you have a lump on the top of your spine?”
Dancing away from him, you grab Jungkook who grunts, mouth full of corn chips as you shove him between you and Seokjin. More unhappy noises come from the youngest as Seokjin grabs for you but you squeak and use Jungkook’s broad body to block him again.
“Yah!” Seokjin yells, reaching both arms around either side of Jungkook to grab you. He manages to get one of your arms, pulling you toward him - and by default, Jungkook - and keeps a firm grip while you swat and fight back.
“Nooo!” Jungkook howls between the two of you, adding to the chaos as he shoves both of you away from him. “Stop using me as a battering ram! I’m going to drop my chips! Guys!”
“Tell me why you have a wound!”
“It isn’t a wound!”
“It’s a type of wound!”
“Ugh let my arm go, hulk!”
“Stop hissing at me like a rat!”
Jungkook drops his bag of chips and lets out a long, forlorn wail. “My chiiiiiiiiips!”
After a struggle, you manage to shake Seokjin off of you, taking a few steps back as you huff angrily, fists at your side. Seokjin sidesteps Jungkook who is pouting and looking at the ground, wavy bangs falling in his eyes as he stares at the spilled corn chips. Seokjin makes it worse by stepping on them, earning a shriek from Jungkook that goes ignored.
“Did someone hurt you?”
A rumble rolls through the sky from up above. You cast your gaze upward, looking at the clouds that are a little more swollen than they were a few minutes ago. You can sense the static in the air, a promise of lightning if you don’t diffuse Seokjin’s anger quickly.
Similar to Jungkook, Seokjin is sensitive to the elements. Where Jungkook has an affinity for the sky and the rain, Seokjin has a lot more skill with fire. Still, Seokjin is a powerful witch and his rage on more than one occasion has disturbed the sky and the lake in the middle of town.
It’s partly the reason he works so hard on never getting angry.
“It’s nothing, Jin,” you answer softly, eyes pleading. You desperately want him to drop it. Part of you is honored that he cares, but the other half of you can’t bear the way he looks at you. “Please drop it.”
“Someone hurt you. Again.”
Thunder echoes across the sky. Jungkook looks upward. “That isn’t me, even though I am mad about my chips.”
“Jin, it isn’t a big deal. Please.” You glance upward, thunder rolling again. “You’re going to make it rain.”
“I’ll make it do more than that when I find out who did it.”
“They were just kids, Jin. You can’t-”
He swears loudly and there’s a flash of lightning above your head. It makes you think of that night with your sister, laying in bed to let the storm pass. You clap your hands over your ears and squeeze your eyes shut, automatically crouching to make yourself small.
Behind your shut eyes, you try not to let the memories come. Try not to imagine the vanilla scent of her hair, warm hands on your skin turned cold the next morning. You block out the screams, the way your mother shoved you away and your father yelled and yelled and yelled.
Above, the thunder stops. The rain doesn’t fall, and the air pressure returns to normal. Shivering, you crack an eye open to look at Seokjin, terrified at what you might find. His anger is so rare but flips on a dime, catching you off guard any time it happens.
Jungkook is murmuring in Seokjin’s ear now, voice hushed and urgent. Seokjin’s eyes become unfocused as he nods, Jungkook’s hands grasping the older’s biceps firmly. When Seokjn’s eyes find yours over Jungkook’s shoulder, they’re fathomless. Endless pools of black and something else that you can’t decipher as he murmurs something back to Jungkook, who steps away.
Licking his lips, Seokjin offers you a hand. “I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to frighten you. I’m sorry.”
You swallow thickly. Reach out a tentative hand. “It’s okay.”
“You know I would never hurt you?”
Of course you know that. You aren’t afraid of Seokjin or the power he holds. You aren’t afraid of what he can do. You are afraid of the memories that nip at your heels like a pack of jackals, waiting for you to grow weak and fall before they attack. You are afraid of the way that it makes you feel when he cares about you.
“I know that,” you murmur, letting him pull you to your feet. “It’s just the thunder, that's all.”
His smile is soft. “I know, I’m sorry.” He squeezes your hand. It’s a perfect fit, your palm in his. His skin buzzes with magic and you’re careful not to take any, always keeping your guard up so that you can never siphon again. “Let’s go home, yeah?”
-
Home isn’t the small apartment on the west side of town that you keep by yourself. Home is Seokjin’s two-story house in the suburbs made of brick and mortar. It’s the crowded dining room with eight chairs pulled close to the wooden table and a chandelier full of burner candles and incense. It’s Seokjion’s cat familiar running yowling down the corridor as Yoongi’s maine coon chases it, hissing.
Home is seven witches who don’t care that you can’t generate your own magic, all of them laughing and pushing empty plates toward the middle of the table where Namjoon collects them with a snap of his fingers, the cutlery lifting and stacking neatly with the soft click of ceramic.
Bloated and overly satiated, you lean back in your chair, sighing heavily. Yoongi is next to you, quiet and staring off into space the way that he often does. Next to him, Jimin and Namjoon have their heads bowed together whispering, a blush flushing across Namjoon’s wine-glazed expression and tops of his ears.
Namjoon and Jimin strike something in you. A longing that tugs at your heart strings, drawing your gaze to the man sitting on the other side of you. Seokjin is leaning back in his chair, arm stretched over the back of your seat as he yawns mid-conversation with Hoseok.
Seokjin is barely touching you, but just the warmth of his arm is enough to make you dizzy. It’s barely there, just against the top of your back. You lean into him a little, resting your head on top of his arm. He maneuvers his hand to scratch the top of your head lightly. It feels so nice that your eyes flutter shut, letting him play with your hair as the noise in the room drifts to a dull buzz.
In another life, you think that this touch could be something more. Sometimes, you let yourself wonder if it is. Let yourself pretend that maybe Seokjin’s lingering gaze and lingering hand is more than the platonic affection he has for you.
It’s a silly dream.
When the dishes are washed and the others have said their goodbyes, it’s just you and Seokjin leaning against the counter in the kitchen. He has a glass of wine, sipping it thoughtfully as you put the cork back in the wine bottle. When you meet his gaze, you see something there. Hesitance. Anxiety.
Seokjin chews on his lips and swishes the wine in his glass. The red arches elegantly along the sides of the glass, slowly dripping back down to pool in his cup. You remember once at a winery you could measure the legs or something when swishing wine in a glass to learn some small factoid about the wine, but it’s far from your memory now.
“What’s wrong?” you ask, taking a sip of your own. It’s a strong mulled wine with notes of cherry, you think. “You look nervous.”
“I wanted to talk to you about something.”
Your heart beats hard once. Then twice. Speeds up. Instead of answering right away, you take a sip of your wine, mind running through all of the things you think he might say. Maybe this is it, he’s going to tell you that you can’t come around as much. That though you’re his best friend, you have to stay away from his coven.
Instead, Seokjin says, “You know I’ve looked into your situation.” You wince when he says it but he pushes forward, leaning off the counter as he grows eager. “You said you weren’t always a siphon, that you could control your own magic as a child. I’ve been researching similar cases, and there is a lot of evidence that supports that it might be a magical block.”
“Jin.”
“Look, I’m happy with the way you are. There’s nothing wrong with you. But I know that you aren’t happy with it.” His jaw flexes. “And I care about your happiness. I just… Yoongi and I have been reading up on rituals to release magical blocks, and with Beltane in a few days, we thought…”
Warmth bubbles in your chest. You know how much this means to him, trying to help you. To free you from the burden that you carry with you wherever you go. This is not the first time he has brought up trying to figure out your ailment. Your situation. And though you’re glad he cares about you enough to try, there is something humiliating about it.
“You don’t have to decide tonight,” Seokjin murmurs. You look up at him and his gaze is soft. Vulnerable. “But if you want us to try, we discussed it. And our circle is strong enough to try it on Beltane.”
Licking your lips, you nod once. “I’ll think about it. Thanks for thinking of me.”
“I’m always thinking of you.” You give him a look and he smiles, a little sad. “What? I am.”
“Stop trying to be charming. I’ll only say yes if I want to.”
“I have no doubt about that. However, it is impossible for me to stop my charm. It is a natural gift.”
You roll your eyes. “Along with your insufferable humor.”
“There is nothing insufferable about me. Especially with Yoongi around.”
You don’t push the argument. Seokjin grins again before opening a drawer in his kitchen, pulling out a small, cloth bag. There’s a green ribbon tying the top of it shut, and you smell the herbs inside of it immediately: cedar, bay leaves, mugwort.
Seokjin holds the bag out to you and you frown, taking it. It’s weighted with crystals. You squeeze the bag a little, feeling the crunch of crystal fragments and herbs. There is a vibration that travels from your fingers up your arms and you feel a sense of solid warmth.
“A protection bag,” you deadpan. “Really?”
“Hmm?”
“I don’t need this.”
“The welt on your neck says otherwise.”
“Please stop!” Your voice is loud in the empty kitchen. He pulls up short, leaning against the counter and watching you with wide eyes, lips parted slightly. You sigh deeply and close your eyes for a moment, calming yourself before you open them and say, “I don’t mean to yell, it’s just - it’s hard when I feel like all of you coddle me. It’s humiliating.”
“It wasn’t my intention. I’d never want to make you feel that way.”
“I know.”
You do know. The intentions are good, but you can’t help the raw, venomous edge of frustration. It makes you feel less than, this constant need to help you. To do things for you.
“I don’t want to be a problem that everyone feels like they need to solve. There’s more to me than being the covenstead’s leech.”
“You know that isn’t how we think of you.”
You give a frustrated noise. “Then please. Let me ask for help when I need it.”
Seokjin is quick to catch the protection bag when you toss it back to him. He nods silently, eyes fixated on the floor. It feels like a hot stone has been dropped in your stomach, burning and weighing you down. How quickly a good dinner has turned sour, how the light air between the two of you has gone cold.
“Thank you for dinner. And for looking into a way out of this,” you gesture wildly to yourself. He nods, but there’s no mirth in his face. “I’ll see you tomorrow?”
“Yeah of course. Let me know about… you know.”
“Yeah. Yeah.”
That night, you have trouble sleeping, just like that night when you were thirteen years old.
-
The back door to Shadow Metaphysical opens, creaking as Yoongi sticks his head out. His long hair is styled behind his ears and he’s in a soft-looking black sweater and jeans. He smiles when he sees you, gentle and kind as he opens the door a little wider, beckoning with his head to enter.
Slipping through the back door, you enter a dark office. It’s only lit by candles spread over various shelves and desks, and a few hovering candles near the ceiling. It’s warm and cozy, and you spot Yoongi’s familiar napping on the chair pulled up to the desk where a computer shows some sort of accounting system.
Yoongi leads you to the front of the store. It’s closed for the evening and he has receipts and cash laid out on the counter as he balances his drawer for the day. The shop has tall ceilings and is lined with rows and rows of dark shelving. The lighting here is not powered by candles or magic, but rather golden cafe lighting strung on the ceiling.
Shadow Metaphysical is one of your favorite places. It smells different each time you go in, the magic and the herbs and the spells inside of its four walls shifting with the energy of its employees and customers at all times. Today, it smells like night rain and crackling lightning.
Wordlessly, Yoongi gestures at the shelving, signaling to do whatever you need. He busies himself with going back to counting bills, head down and trusting you not to steal anything. Not that he would care, as he’s always emphasized he has no problem not taking your money.
Still, you always pay him, especially since he lets you in after hours where no one can yell at you for being inside. The covenstead has barred magical stores from siphoners, convinced that they would cross the threshold and drain the shops of magic.
It isn’t true, though you can feel the ebb and flow of open magic sources around you. You’re not here for magical purposes, specifically. There are things you can buy yourself and keep in your apartment to ground you to the earth, and there are still rituals and practices that you keep up with, even as your connection is severed.
As you pass rows and rows of books on rituals, you think about Seokjin’s offer to help you figure out your block. It wouldn’t be the first time you tried and failed to figure out what happened. With magic, the point of origin is always the key to any spell. The how and the where of your condition are important elements to figuring out the solution, but no one really knows the how and the where.
Your friends don’t have full clarity on that night. You’ve never told them in explicit detail of how you woke up, full of your sister’s magic. The town calls you a kin killer and a leech, so you’re sure they know enough to know the source of your hesitation is violent and personal.
Still, you slow as you pass a grimoire. The runes on it shine gold when you pause, winking at you, begging you to touch it. You feel the whisper of the spells of dozens of witches inside of it, their phantom fingers brushing down your arms. Your spine. You shiver and look away from the book, pressing on to the herbs section.
It would be nice not to feel the lure of power. Not to feel the itch and the cunning voices of magic begging you to use them use them use them use them-
“Stop,” you growl out loud. You don’t know who you’re talking to - yourself, the magic in the store, the universe. Taking a deep breath, you gather your wits and complete your shopping, moving with a robotic pace around the store to get what you need.
At the register, Yoongi gives you a wary look as you set things down on the counter. He takes his time scanning them, glancing at you occasionally. You can sense he wants to ask a question, dark eyes lingering a few times. That’s the thing about Yoongi, though. He’ll never ask, he’ll just wait until you give up.
Which you do, sighing and saying, “Ask.”
His lips twitch as he bags a few jars of thorns. “How often do the books in here talk to you?” You level a stare at him and he rolls his eyes. “I can hear you. And every time you’re in here, it’s like they all turn to look at you. Is it often?”
“Yeah,” you admit. “Since it happened, there’s always been a pull or like magical objects to taunt me.” You chew your lip and rub your sweaty palms on your jeans. “It’s worse around the sabbat holidays.”
“Stronger magic.”
“Yeah.”
“Did Jin explain what ritual we talked about?” You shake your head. He pushes over a paper bag filled with all your things and you hand over your card. As he swipes it, Yoongi explains. “Two smaller rituals wrapped into one. Namjoon found a really old binding ritual that was used to form a bridge between multiple rituals.”
“So like when you chain spells together,” you offer. “Impressive. I guess that would be used for improving upon old rituals?”
“Yeah, exactly that. Seokjin had been doing some research on magical blocks and shit, and found one that locates a point of origin of the block whether it’s internal or external.”
“External?” He nods. “Like a curse?”
“Yes. Any reason anyone would want to curse a thirteen-year-old?”
Yoongi phrases it like a joke and chuckles. But you don’t laugh, stilling as you think about his question. Your immediate answer is no, at thirteen there was certainly nothing you could have done to be cursed. But you think about your parents, thinking about the fear revolving around their gifts for blood magic, think about the way they were always regarded with equal parts fear and reverence as coven leaders.
Curses aren’t common. It would take a coven of extremely skilled witches to curse someone, but it could take a single very skilled blood witch to toss one. Hexes aren’t long-term and are far more manageable, but you think about the way your power vanished, the way you bled your sister dry.
The misery you’ve faced since, the loss of your parents shortly after, the hatred from the covenstead.
“Holy shit, you don’t think you’re cursed, do you?” Yoongi’s question brings you out of your daze. All of the amusement has been wiped clean from his expression, eyes deadly serious. “Who would curse a child?”
“People were really afraid of my parents,” you admit. “My mom used to lead the covenstead here, you know?” That surprises him and you nod, chewing on the inside of your cheek. “Yeah, before my aunt. She isn’t a blood witch. My mom was and led the covenstead until um - my sister died.”
“I never knew that. No one talks about it.”
There is a question there. Yoongi won’t say it outright, but you sense the curiosity nonetheless. You feel your throat constrict a little as you murmur, “She stepped aside when my sister died. It was more political than anything, but no one talks about it out of respect for my aunt.”
“But still, to curse a child?”
“There was…” You think back to the time when you were thirteen. Those days are painted so painfully when you think about them that it is hard to remember anything else. “My parents were involved in the Trials that were going on at that time. Hunting Dissenters.”
Yoongi’s face darkens. “I see.”
“They had a lot of enemies. So maybe… I don’t know.”
For a few moments, Yoongi doesn’t say anything. He busies himself with packing away the rest of the till and waving his hand, dousing all the lights in the store with ease. There’s a little pang as he does it, such simple magic that costs him nothing. That you have no access to.
“Well,” Yoongi sighs, a little awkwardly. “Think about it. If - and it’s unlikely - that someone cursed you, you’ll know if we go through with the ritual.” He pauses and levels you with a look. “It is dangerous though. So consider the risk before you agree, hmm?”
You nod and thank him. He leads you out of the store and gives you an awkward smile goodbye. Never affectionate, but always polite and warm nonetheless.
Sunset-purple skies stretch above you. It smells like fresh rain and earth outside. Town is quieter now that the evening crowd has finished dinner and gone home or back to their accommodations for the evening. You pass places with patio seating and small diners tucked between stores, wary eyes of the workers following you as you walk down the sidewalk.
No one says good evening. Some don’t look at you at all.
Curse.
The word weighs heavy on you. You’d never considered that your condition could be from a curse before, but now that you think about it, you can’t stop the thoughts racing through your mind.
The Trials had been a scary time for witches, Dissenters leaving covensteads to start their own, dark and forbidden spellwork becoming more and more popular among covens. Your parents - especially your mother and her sister - had been a huge part of cleansing the covenstead from witches who practice dark magic.
Especially the few blood witches.
You had been a blood witch, though. Like your sister, like your mother. People had always been wary of them, which is why your mother worked so hard to get rid of the Dissenters when she was the head priestess.
They give us a bad name, she would say darkly when you and your sister asked why she was getting rid of witches like you. Like her. In times like this, we have to work extra hard to prove we aren’t evil.
And then you bled your sister dry. Drained her magic until she couldn’t fight you back and you woke up to that feeling of her cold hands on your overwhelmed skin. Your mother had never really looked at you the same after that, stepping down as the high priestess immediately.
You suspect she protected you in the only way she could. Disallowing you to use magic of any sort, placing hard restrictions on how you could live, outlawing you from spaces where you had grown up. It was better than death.
At least, you used to think so.
Yoongi’s words weigh heavy on you as you sit in your apartment alone. You don’t bother to put the TV on, knowing that you won’t be able to pay attention to anything. Magic always comes at a price, and two rituals wrapped into one is going to take a toll.
And yet, you think about getting to the bottom of this sickness, this curse. This inability to do anything but steal magic, to leech off of others. You think about how your magic used to feel, the way you could command fire with a snap of your fingers or make stars fall from your bedroom ceiling.
An ache settles in your chest as you lay back on the couch and close your eyes, throat tight and eyes burning. You have been without magic for so long. Part of you thinks what's a little longer? But deep down, you crave it. The spark, the life, the touch of magic.
You want to be able to enter stores without the itch underneath your skin, an addiction you can’t cure nor divulge in. You want to be able to be a part of a community again, to do rituals with Yoongi and Jungkook and Seokjin. You want to be able to help him in his bakery, imbuing his scones and cupcakes with love and a little spark of something extra.
Tears flow hot on your face. You know what you want, and you know that it’s going to cost you to get it. You know that to do this, you’ll have to be open and honest, because there are only two possible options for your magic block: you are cursed or you have a mental block.
It’s hard to know if being cursed as a result of your parents’ policing is worse than potentially having an internal block, an innate refusal to do magic because of what you did.
That night sits at the back of your mind like a stone, sinking sinking sinking. Pulling you under as you think about it in explicit detail. Maybe you simply killed your twin. A horrible accident, but perhaps it was just you. Your magic. Your fault.
And your magic had fled because of it, a self-inflicted punishment.
Before you’re aware of what you’re doing, you have the phone in your hand, sniffing and wiping your tears with the back of your hand. Your face feels swollen and sticky with tears and overwarm and it’s hard to get a breath as you press the phone to your ear, listening to the ringing.
Seokjin picks up on the fourth ring, his voice cheery. “What, did Yoongi forget to let you in the store?”
“No.”
“I’m coming now,” Seokjin says, completely forgoing humor when he hears you sniff, hears the waver in your voice. “Are you home?”
“Yeah.”
“Did anyone hurt you?”
“No,” you hiccup. “I’m just really sad and I don’t want to be alone.”
“I’ll be there in ten. Do you want to stay on the phone?” You shake your head and let out a little sob. Something about knowing he’s coming over to be with you cracks your resolve a little more. You realize he can’t see you when he prompts, “Hey, you there?”
“Sorry, no. Drive safely, please.”
“For you? Anything.”
Despite your tears, your mouth wobbles into a weak smile at that. It makes your heart squeeze just a little, underneath all the hurt.
It doesn’t take him long to let himself in the apartment. You can sense him before he even gets to the stairs leading up to your unit, his crackling energy like a beacon to you. When he opens the door with the key you gave him, he fills the space with static, magic snapping and tinged with worry.
Magic always belies how Seokjin feels. Like now, as he rushes across the apartment, he is lightning, all energy and anxiety popping and snapping as he sits on the couch next to you, pulling you into his chest.
Seokjin is warm and smells like vanilla and sweet orange from the bakery. It’s soothing. You close your eyes and clutch the hem of his shirt, resolve cracking the rest of the way as he becomes your anchor as you drift out to sea, holding you so that you can be lost in the overwhelming feeling of loss without getting too far.
He doesn’t tell you not to cry. He doesn’t ask what’s wrong. Seokjin leans back on the couch, pulling you into his lap, holding your knees so that he can hold you. One hand rubs your back and he rests his chin on the top of your head, leading you to use the crook of his neck as a place to hide - and turn into a waterfall for your tears.
This is what you love about Seokjin though. He doesn’t pry. He just lets you use him, lets you cry it out and he waits.
When the tears begin to dry and you find it easier to breathe again, you shift away from Seokjin and wipe your face. He smiles down at you, eyes glittering and expression so fond that you find yourself staring blankly into his face.
“I’m sorry,” you sniff. “And thank you for coming.”
“Anything for you.” You hate the way it makes your heart flip when he says that. You start to pull away from him to sit on the couch properly but his arms constrict you, keeping you to him. You frown but he asks, “I want to know what happened, if you’re ready to talk about it.”
Seokjin is so close his breath fans your face. You look up at him. Silky, long lashes that you could individually count with your proximity, beautiful tan and smooth skin with a glow all witches have, strong brows that you always thought made Seokjin’s face the perfect balance of boyish and beautiful.
Your heart starts to speed up and your mouth dries out with the way he looks at you, intense and searching. Suddenly you’re afraid if he looks too hard, he’ll see down to your core.
“I- yeah. I need some water,” you croak, pulling away. He lets you go this time, unaware that what you really need is space between the two of you, a barrier so he can’t see. So he won’t know. “Turns out sobbing makes you thirsty.”
Before you can get all the way to the kitchen, there’s a soft clink accompanied by a full glass of water on your counter. You glare at Seokjin over your shoulder and he winces and shrugs in apology.
As you gulp down mouthfuls of cool water, you wonder how to word exactly what you’re upset about. How you’re tired of existing in the world without your magic but you’re also unsure if you want to know the truth about why your magic left you.
Seokjin is iffy on the details about the night your sister died. He’s never asked you explicitly for the story before, but if you want to go through with finding out the root cause of your block, you know you’ll be exposed. To him. To all of them. To his coven.
The desire to be one of them is so strong that it makes your knees weak as you walk toward the couch. You sit abruptly on the couch arm, staring into the distance as you drink the rest of the water. You want to join them so much, to celebrate the sabbat holidays, to feel the rush of a closed circle of magic and yet…
Would they accept you if they knew you killed your sister? You’re not so sure.
You look at Seokjin. He waits patiently, watching you with soft eyes. Moonlight seeps in through the blinds behind him, wreathing him in silver light. He looks like a god, then. Of shadows, of night, of mystery. This best friend of yours who you love so much and who has loved you indiscriminately when he didn’t have to.
“I talked to Yoongi about maybe doing the ritual,” you start slowly. Seokjin nods, encouraging you. “And I think I came to the conclusion that I want to do it. I’m tired of feeling everyone’s magic pull at me, like a vice that I have to ignore every day. And I’m tired of wanting to do things I used to, to feel the world around me. But most of all, I just want to be a part of something. A part of a coven, a family.”
Understanding paints Seokjin’s face. He reaches a hand out and takes yours, giving you a firm squeeze. “You know even with no magic, you’re our family, right?”
“It’s different.” He starts to protest but you shake your head. “I want to be in a coven and to feel the power of a circle. I want to celebrate and do rituals with you, I want to be a part of something magical. I can’t do that like this, not without the fear of draining everyone.”
He nods. “Of course. We’ll have you either way, you know? We’d still welcome you like this.”
“But I’d never be able to close your circle.” Seokjin nods. He knows the truth of this. “But this ritual requires truth, and there’s some things about me that I’ve never talked to you about. Things about the night I… I could no longer do magic. I want you to be informed, to know what we might find if we do this.”
“Only if you want to tell me.”
“A coven and a working circle requires trust and honesty. I can never be one of you if you don’t know me completely.”
He nods. “That is true.”
“I’m going to tell you about the night that my sister died.” He squeezes your hand and nods, but says nothing else. “My sister and I were twins, both blood witches. Unusual enough for our parents and the covenstead to be incredibly proud of us, but not unusual enough for people to be afraid, you know?”
“Twins… That’s incredibly powerful.”
“Yeah,” you agree, throat tight. “We were really fond of the connection too, you know? It was nice to always have someone to rely on who was my perfect balance. We were never-” You take a breath. “Neither was more powerful than the other. There was never any jealousy or overpowering the other. We were always evenly matched.”
“Whenever it would storm,” you continue. “I would go lay in her room. I hated storms but she loved them. I did this countless times up until we were thirteen. I don’t know… Jin, I don’t know what was different that night. I think back to it every single day, what did I do differently, was there an object I touched, a spell I used? And I come up with nothing. But on Beltane when we were thirteen, it was storming. We’d already finished the festival and our parents were out doing their duties and I went and I fell asleep in her room and… and I woke up…”
For a moment, you can’t get the words out. They get trapped in your throat and you stare, unseeing. You imagine the lightning against the window. The warmth of your sister's hands. The tree tap tap tapping against the window with the strength of the wind.
“I drained her in the middle of the night,” you whisper. It’s out now and you can’t stop, can’t look at Seokjin’s face to see his reaction. “I went to sleep as normal and when I woke up, she was freezing and lifeless and I felt more powerful than I ever had before. Like I was this magical battery charged up and sparking.”
For a moment, you pause and look at Seokjin. You expect to see horror or disgust or a variety of negative emotions, but he’s still watching you. Fond. Waiting. No judgment. When he sees you staring, he gives you a tiny smile and a squeeze of your hand.
“I’m still listening.”
“Aren’t you…” You trail off and shake your head. “I killed my sister. Are you not horrified?”
He frowns then. “You didn’t kill your sister.”
“Yes I did.”
“You weren’t born a siphoner, how could you possibly predict that would ever happen? You didn’t get in that bed with her and then leech her magic, no matter how much it must feel that way. It wasn’t your fault, though I know hearing me say that doesn’t make it feel any less true in here.” He reaches forward and taps your heart lightly. “There is nothing I can say to ease the pain and guilt of that, but what you’re describing to me isn’t the tale of a murderer. It’s the story of someone who had a freak accident, which is more common among the magical community than one might think.”
“I don’t know what happened,” you admit, a tear escaping your eye. Before you can wipe it though, Seokjin’s thumb is there, swiping across your face and collecting it. You watch with wide eyes as he cups your face, looking at you with so much something that your head spins. “But in the morning, I was alive and she was dead. And my parents and everyone else hated me for it. That’s why they treat me the way they do. That’s why my mother stepped down as high priestess, why my parents were driven to grief. Why I’m alone.”
“You’re not alone. Not anymore.”
“How can anyone accept me like this?”
“Because it isn’t what defines you. We are not made up of only the things we do and the things that happen to us, and I promise you, this is something that happened to you.”
“But why? Why me?”
“I don’t know,” Seokjin admits. “But we’re going to find out, okay?
“What if the others don’t want me?”
“They would never,” he’s quick to say. He’s still holding your face, wiping tears from your eyes. “And if they did, I don’t care. I’d do the ritual myself, just to prove to you that this burden you carry isn’t your fault.”
You crack a grin, despite the dark topic. “Yeah? You’d try and do a circle for you?”
“I would walk through fire for you.”
You pull your face out of his hands and shove him a bit. “Fire is your favorite element, Jin. That’s not impressive.”
His laughter fills the room and he tugs at your hands. You grapple with him as he tries to pull you down, your ache forgotten as you laugh and squeal. “Yah! Let me try and be poetic! It was the first thing that I could think of.”
“You’re a witch, you’re practically impervious.”
Seokjin overpowers you and pulls you down against his chest. Suddenly you’re very close again, your palms pressed against his chest, the thrum of his heartbeat vibrating through your fingers. You make a surprised sound as he looks up at you, gaze a little darker. A little hazy.
Gently, Seokjin reaches up and brushes his fingers across your chin. It’s featherlight and more intimate than you expect, making you blink in surprise. You’re frozen, limbs stuck and heart racing as you watch the corner of his mouth twitch upward. Suddenly the moment feels different - this feels different.
“Not impervious to you though.”
When he says it, you don’t answer at first. You think you imagine him saying it. That suddenly this has blurred into a fantasy of yours. Perhaps you’re actually asleep, soothing your pain with dreams of Seokjin. Of being like this with him, pressed closed and intimate with his gaze burning.
“What?” you whisper back, unable to string together a better response.
He doesn’t seem offended though, huffing a laugh. “Fire might not get to me,” he says. “You certainly did, though.”
“I don’t…”
“We’re practicing honesty because you’re right. If we’re going to lift this block on you and let you join our circle, there can’t be secrets between us. There’s so much to tell you, but I need you to know before we do this how I feel.”
“How you feel?”
“Yes. As the leader of our circle, it’s my duty to be honest with you and to give you an out. I don’t want you to cast our first circle and suddenly be able to see - feel - how I feel and then there’s no way out.”
“I don’t understand.”
“I’d walk through fire for you - hey, stop laughing at me! Because you are an amazing person. But I would also do it because I have fallen head over heels for you. Chaotically so. Painfully so.”
This is a dream. It has to be, because there is no way that Seokjin is lying under you, face so close to yours, hands gripping your forearms, and staring at you like that, gaze dreamy, smile on his face.
“It’s not a dream,” he laughs, making you realize you’ve said it out loud. “Or perhaps it is a dream and I am once again imagining that I am the hero to your tale, a knight saving you because he likes you and you will let me because you like me. But that would be a silly dream, because you have always been the bravest person I know and you have always refused to be saved.”
“You like me?”
“I do. And it’s okay if you don’t like me back. But I wanted you to know before you step into a circle with us. The others know - can see it light up inside of me every time we cast. But I didn’t want to surprise you with that. Not with this, not when it’s about you. It would have been cruel.”
Seokjin could never be cruel. The word cruel doesn’t even exist in the same plane of existence as this man. This witch who has never done anything but ask if you need help. Who simply enjoys baking things for the community and its visitors, filling every good with magic. A little extra something to make their lives more manageable, more fruitful.
This man, who would have you even as you are in his coven of witches. Even if a circle couldn’t be drawn and salted correctly. Even if they have no use for you. This friend, who has heard what you’ve done - or didn’t do - and looks at you all the same. Doesn’t see a monster or someone terrible, doesn’t see someone capable of murder.
The very thought of Seokjin loving you even as you are is enough to send a shiver through you.
“You know why I thought I was dreaming, right?” you ask him. Seokjin shakes his head, watching your every move. “Because I have dreamed of you saying that often. It was always a comfort to me when I was sad or my longing to have you was intense. I just thought I never could. Wasn’t worthy of it, wasn’t-”
Seokjin moves faster than you can finish your sentence. He surges forward, hands skimming up your arms roughly to cup your face and pull you down to him. He presses his lips firmly to yours and anything you were going to say vanishes, thoughts a wisp of smoke.
Sparks fly quite literally. Seokjin’s magic crackles and you resist to pull it in and consume it, too distracted by the soft feel of his lips. It’s just an innocent press of mouths at first, making your head spin as you realize you’re kissing Seokjin.
Then, he pulls away to look at you, face aglow. You’re a little breathless and reeling when you open your eyes to see his grin.
“You’re worthy of so much more,” he whispers.
There’s no time to respond as he pulls your lips to his again, this time kissing you properly. He tastes sweet, like one of his meringue treats. The slide of his plush mouth against yours makes you dizzy. He sucks your bottom lip between his teeth, nipping slightly and you become ravenous.
Your tongue brushes against his teeth and he makes a throaty sound, opening up to let you deepen the kiss, tongue sweeping against his. He’s a slow kisser, dragging his tongue against yours and letting you fall fall fall into him.
Seokjin’s hands slide from your face down your shoulders and past them, stopping only at your hips where he squeezes. Your stomach flips at the contact and you twitch a little bit, grinding down into him as his kisses go from languid to a little needier.
“Fuck,” he gasps, head tilting back. “Don’t do that.”
“Do what?” you ask, mouth going to his jaw. You press wet kisses there, messy lips followed by your tongue, leaving a spit-slick trail. His skin makes your tongue tingle, magic vibrating.
He slips his hands under the hem of your shirt and digs his blunt nails into your hips. “You know what?”
Grinning, you bring your mouth up to his. Slowly, you lower your hips so you’re pressed flush to his, rolling them again, this time painfully slow. Your breath catches in your throat at the slow-drag friction, the feeling of him shivering underneath you.
“That?” you ask, breathless against his mouth.
“Enough,” he hisses.
The world spins. Seokjin grabs you and in a single, swift movement sits up and stands, carrying you with him. You squeal, hands shooting to grasp at his shoulders as he walks toward your room. He kicks his shin on the coffee table as he stumbles with you, balance off with the added weight.
He curses loudly and you can’t help but laugh, clapping a hand over your mouth when his sharp gaze snaps to yours. His eyes are dark dark, hungry and fathomless now as he raises a brow. “Yeah, you’re laughing?”
“Sorry.”
“No you’re not.”
“No, I’m not,” you admit.
“You’re gonna be.”
A wild thrill shoots through you as he carries you to the bedroom. You forget how strong he is, muscles flexing as he shifts you again, careful not to drop you. It makes you feel giddy, but you squeak in a moment of terror when he drops you unceremoniously on your bed, the brief moment of freefall startling.
You land with a huff and he grins down at you as he stands up against the edge of the bed, knees squeezing your legs together as he reaches behind his neck to yank at his t-shirt. You watch, slack-jawed as he pulls the material up and over his head in a way that is somehow hot, as benign as it is.
Seokjin is all gold and tan planes, body perfect in the low light of your room as he tosses his shirt. You take a second to admire his broad chest, dark nipples pebbling in the cool room. Dark hair trails from his belly button and vanishes in the waist of his jeans.
Seeking warmth, you reach for him. He leans forward, pressing his palms into the mattress to hover over you, knees placed on either side of your thighs. His muscles jump when you brush your hands up the softness of his stomach toward the harder muscle of his pecs.
It feels like the sun is trapped underneath his skin, burning its way out of him as your fingers explore. You’ve never touched him like this, slow and reverant and full of unbridled desire. He watches you, drinking in the way you take him in. The way you take your time.
“You’re beautiful,” you murmur, looking up at him. His ears turn red and he rolls his eyes. You grin, dragging your hand up to rest over his chest where his heart thuds wildly beneath your palm. “I mean here, idiot. Yeah you’re hot too, but you’re beautiful in here.”
Unreadable emotion flits across his face. Something like joy and pain - the pain of wanting to hear that for so long, waiting for the admission. You understand the same pain of desire filled so unexpectedly that it hurts.
Seokjin kisses you again and this time with intent. He shifts and slides a knee between your legs, pressing up to the apex of your thighs. You groan and lift your hands, sliding them through his hair. The strands are silky soft and long. You twist your fingers at the nape of his neck, pulling him to you as the kiss turns messy.
Whatever this is between you is more magic than you’ve felt in years. You feel breathless as he kisses across your jaw and toward your neck, sucking harshly on the soft skin underneath your ear. You whine and he chuckles, hot breath hitting your ear.
“Why don’t you do that thing you love so much, hmm?” he asks, nipping your ear lobe. “Are you shy now? Don’t wanna grind on me?”
You do want to, but you hesitate. He encourages you, taking a hand and skimming down your waist to your ass, sliding under and squeezing your cheek as he lifts your hips in a motion to grind against him. The friction is good but not nearly enough and you let out a pitiful sound.
“Come on,” he urges. “Do it right, then.”
Fuck. Fuck.
You grind your cunt on his leg properly, planting your feet on the edge of the bed for leverage as Seokjin’s mouth ravages your neck. You’re lost in him, letting your mind go a little empty as you seek friction, needing to relieve the pressure throbbing in your cunt.
Arousal gathers in your stomach and you feel yourself slow-drip into your panties, so turned on by the sudden confidence Seokjin has when kissing you, when telling you to move. This is a side of him you’ve never explored and you dive in head first.
One hand leaving his hair, you grab his hand that’s on your ass as he continues to nip your collarbones, tongue laving over the sting of his bite. He lets you lead him by the wrist, and you guide his hand between your legs where you press his fingers to your zipper.
“Please,” you rasp. “I need more.”
He sinks his teeth into the top of your right breast, tongue tasting your skin. “Is that so?”
“Please. You said you’d walk through fire for me.”
His laugh is loud and he buries his face in your neck. You can’t help but laugh too, pausing your greedy hands in exchange for mirth. “Yeah,” he agrees with a chaste kiss to your throat. “I did say that, huh?”
“Yes, so gimme.”
“Yah. Of course I am.”
Years of friendship have erased any ability to feel awkward with Seokjin but for a moment, you’re afraid it’ll be weird, touching one another like this. Seokjin has no such qualms, unbuttoning your pants and yanking them down your legs with ease.
When he comes back up to lean over you, he doesn’t slot a knee between your legs. Instead, his fingers press firmly to your clothed cunt, a curse falling from his mouth as he feels how damp you are. You’re hot all over and yet you feel hotter still as he circles his fingers gently over your clit.
“Fuck,” you sigh, lids fluttering closed. “Feels good.”
“You’re fucking drenched, all from a little kissing huh?”
“And grinding,” you add.
“Yeah, like a hungry little vixen, huh?” You nod, biting your bottom lip as you get lost in his lazy ministrations and pressure on your clit. It’s relieved some of the ache, but not nearly enough. “I can see on your face you already want more.”
This time, Seokjin doesn’t make you ask for it. He hooks a finger in your underwear and pulls them to the side. Immediately you feel cold air against you, but he’s quick to slide his fingers up and down your wet folds, slicking them up to trail back up and circle slowly around your clit.
“Damn you’re fucking wet,” he curses. He leans up a little, eyes fucked out. “Take the rest off for me, baby.”
Baby. It shivers through you and you comply, though a little haphazardly. It’s hard to remove your shirt and bra with the way his fingers are slowly pressing your clit, making you thrash and gasp.
As soon as you lay back down, no shirt and no bra, Seokjin is leaning forward, tongue darting out to flick against a stiffened nipple. You let out a loud moan and he hums in response, attacking his mouth to you and sucking. Fuck it feels good. You arch off the bed and his fingers leave your swollen clit to slide down your sticky mess to circle your entrance.
Gently, he sinks in a single finger. Your eyes roll back a little, pussy fluttering as he strokes your front wall. You’re tingling all over, buzzing with pleasure as he slowly fucks you with his finger, mouth busy plucking at your nipple with his teeth.
You’re lost in it, melted into the bed as Seokjin plays you like a well-tuned instrument. The heel of his palm presses against your clit, providing just enough pressure as he fingers you to send the room spinning on its axis.
He tongue-kisses across your chest, mouth ravenous against your heaving gasps as he finds your other nipple. The tip of his tongue circles, making you keen and squirm underneath him. He watches you with dark eyes, teasing the aching bud before nipping you lightly.
“Sensitive,” he mumbles, dragging spit-slicked lips against your breast. “Can you take another finger?”
You nod eagerly, hungry to be filled. Your orgasm is starting to build slowly, worked up by the way he mouths at you, by the way Seokjin’s fingers reach so deep, pressing against your g-spot as he sinks another into your heat.
“Shit,” you pant. “That feels so fucking good, Jin.”
“Mhmm.” He brings his mouth up to yours and your tongues tangle, teeth clinking together as he fucks you harder, the wet smack of your pussy against his palm loud. “Tight fucking pussy,” he pants, pressing hard against your front wall. Your heels dig into the bed as you try to keep up with the pleasure blooming in your stomach. “Gonna need to fuck you open a little if you’re gonna take me.”
If you’re gonna take me.
The promise of more has you rolling your hips up to meet his hand. He lets you fuck yourself on his fingers, dropping his gaze to look between your bodies. Your thighs and his stomach are slick with your juice, leaking around his fingers uncontrollably.
When Seokjin introduces another finger, you hiss. The stretch is hard and it burns. He doesn’t keep thrusting right away, letting your cunt stretch around his three digits. But he’s pressed up against your soft spot, making you see stars as he puts unrelenting pressure on your nerves.
It feels like insanity, the way he does this to you. The way Seokjin buries his face in your neck, your chests pressed together to provide friction against your teeth-marked nipples as he starts to build up a pace again, thrusting.
“I’m gonna come,” you whisper, hands grabbing frantically at his sweaty shoulder blades. Your thighs are shaking and it’s hard to get a breath in. Your voice quakes as you gasp. “Fuck, Jin I’m - ah ah ah.”
“So come,” he says, as if it’s that simple. He puts weight behind the hand fucking you, quickens the pace. Presses so fucking hard you think you might blackout. “If you’re gonna come, then do it.”
And you do. Just like that, nails digging into his shoulders, eyes squeezed shut and teeth clenched, you come around his fingers. He fucks you through it, breath hot in your ear. Your knees squeeze around his hips until you’re spent, collapsing against the mattress, boneless.
Seokjin retracts his fingers. The sudden feeling of being empty makes you huff in protest and he laughs, lifting his face from your neck. You pout up at him and he kisses you again before leaning upward, straddling your legs.
Your eyes zero in on his hands as they undo the top of his belt. His hand is covered in a wet sheen, cum-slicked and sticky. He doesn’t care, popping up the belt and pulling down the zipper of his pants. You grow eager, leaning up as he pulls the waist down, revealing the dark briefs that do nothing to hide how hard he is.
With no warning, you reach for his clothed cock, squeezing firmly. He hisses and drops his hands, jeans only pulled halfway down his thighs. Seokjin tips his head back and moans at the ceiling as you lean forward and mouth at the damp spot on his briefs, tasting salt.
“Fuck,” he swears and you grin, pressing and holding the flat of your tongue to the cloth to wet it. “You’re a little slut, huh?”
You hum in agreement. Fingers dancing up his thighs, you pause at the elastic band, looking up at him through your lashes. “Can I?”
Seokjin tucks his bottom lip between his teeth, eyes half-lidded. He nods, watching and dazed as you peel the elastic down his hips slowly. You lean forward as you do, pressing a soft kiss to his hip bone. He twitches and sighs in response.
You look at his cock as it bobs against his stomach, brown tip smearing precum against his navel. You lick your lips and drag your hand up, fingers gripping his velvety shaft. He’s thick and heavy in your hand as you grasp him firmly, stroking upward.
“Oh fuck,” he whispers, hips twitching. You grin up at him, swiping a thumb over the crown of his cock to spread the wetness down his shaft. He hums, entranced. “More.”
You don’t have to ask what he means. You lean upwards, pulling the tip of his cock toward your mouth. You slide just the tip into your mouth, suckling generously and running your tongue along the slit. His hand slips to the side of your neck, resting there but not doing anything. It’s a comforting weight as you take him in your mouth properly.
Seokjin is art above you. Chest flushed, mouth open, eyes closed. If you didn’t know any better, you’d think he was on his knees at worship. It is a sort of worship, the way you sink down on his cock, lips stretched wide, drool dripping down the side of your mouth and running down your jaw and neck. Is it not the spirit of loving him moving through you? Is this not heaven, looking up at him and seeing someone that has chosen you over and over again?
No pagan ritual in your life as a witch has felt like this. You swallow around him, eyes watering as you choke on his length, pulling back a little to catch your breath. Your hand squeezes him at the base, slick with your spit and his precum. Your mouth is wet and swollen as you lick the underside of his shaft, never looking away from his face.
“Fuck that mouth,” he sighs, eyes opening and looking down at you. He squeezes the side of your neck a little, fingers right against your throat. “Come on,” he murmurs. “I can’t hold out if you keep going. How do you like it?”
Instead of answering him, you pull off of him with a sloppy, wet noise. You make a show of running your tongue along your lips before turning around and crawling up the bed, wiggling your ass a little. Seokjin groans as he sheds his jeans and briefs the rest of the way.
The bed sinks when he crawls behind you. You go down on your elbows, ass up high. He smacks each cheek firmly with both hands, making you yelp as he grips the stinging flesh, squeezing. “You have a good ass.”
“You have a nice dick.”
He laughs loudly at that. Seokjin’s hand skims down to your thighs, grabbing them and pushing them open. You sink a little lower on the bed, face pressed to the sheets and letting your eyes shut. The hair on his thighs sends a shiver up your spine as his legs brush against yours, hands roaming and squeezing your hips, your butt, your thighs.
“You’re fucking perfect,” he mutters. His hands come back over the globes of your ass and sink toward your wet cunt. You moan as his thumbs peel you open, pressing around your clenching hole. “Shit.”
The bed bounces as he moves again and then your eyes are snapping open, fingers twisting in your sheets when you feel the flat of his tongue swipe up your pussy. He hums in delight and you’re reeling, trying to catch your breath as he licks at you.
“Just wanted a taste,” he says, more to himself than you. He sucks your clit into his mouth, flicking his tongue over it a few times and you nearly crumble right there at the unexpected stimulation. He slow-licks up to your hole, tracing it once before retracting his mouth. “I have all the time in the world for you to come in my mouth. Right now I just wanna feel you.”
“Yes, please.”
Your breath gets stuck when you feel the head of Seokjin’s cock catch your entrance. He’s thick, and even though you’re dripping down your thighs and stretched from his fingers, the pressure of him sinking into your heat slowly sends you moaning like a wanton whore, unable to stop the sounds escaping your mouth.
Seokjin is precise, hands holding your hips firmly until he’s fully seated in your cunt, your walls fluttering around him. You feel so full, his cock reaching deep enough to feel in your gut. When he pulls all the way out, you think something is wrong, but he fucks back into you hard.
“Oh shit,” you gasp, feeling the full weight of him spear you. “Holy shit.”
He doesn’t say anything but he grunts, setting a slow but deep pace. His hips snap into you with force, your knees spreading a little bit wider. He leans into it more, moving his hands to press into the small of your back. The full force of his weight pushing your hips into the bed as he slams into you makes you dizzy.
An orgasm starts to build deep in your stomach. You claw at the bed, breaths coming out in a hiss. Seokjin grabs one of your hands, pulling it backward to pin it against your lower back before doing the same to the other. You’re completely pinned under him, pushed so far into the mattress you think you might fade and vanish into foam and sheets.
Nothing here matters but the way he fucks into you, unrelenting, heavy, precise. He says your name and it rolls off his tongue sweeter than any pastry he’s ever made. Your orgasm creeps up on you, shaking and thunderous. It feels stronger than before, a pressure that makes you start to shiver, feet kicking under him.
For a moment, he slows, pulling off you a little. “Okay?”
“Keep going,” you beg him, voice high-pitched and strange to your ears. “Please don’t stop, I’ll tell you if I can’t take it.”
That’s all he needs. He redoubles and this time, changes his direction, hits that spot inside of you head on with his cock and you think you’re going to pass out. You become lifeless under him, unable to do anything but take it. The wave of your orgasm builds and builds and builds until finally, it breaches.
You come for a second time, no noise coming out of you. It’s all white vision and squeezed thighs and ringing ears. You think you feel something like a bolt of lightning, a snap of power so strong as you clench around Seokjin that you taste static in the air.
It’s hard to know how long it lasts. One moment you’re shaking and the next, you’re drifting, feeling weightless and exhausted. The weight of Seokjin’s touch keeps you tethered and from straying too far, but you’re somewhere in between nonetheless.
Slowly, reality drips back to you. You think you may have dozed a little, your eyes dry as you blink them open. Seokjin is lying next to you, arm wrapped around you and eyes closed. He’s not breathing deep enough to be asleep, confirming it when his eyes open, sensing your gaze.
A smile lights up his face and you smile tiredly at him. Your cunt aches and your legs and arms are sore from being pinned, and you’re still a little shaky. Thoughts of your orgasm make you twitch, post-sex tremors that you can’t escape.
“Hi,” you rasp. “Did I fall asleep?”
“I think you blacked out.”
“I- what?”
“I sort of…” he frowns. “There was like this electrical snap when I came. You clenched me so fucking hard I just… let go. I think we sort of had a magical orgasm.”
“A magical orgasm.”
He grins. “Just say thank you for the witch orgasm.”
“Ugh.” You smack his chest and he laughs hoarsely.
It did feel like that though. Like a crackle of energy, like being struck by a storm of electricity and heat. You feel tired and heavy-limbed, but you feel sticky and sweaty too. “I need a shower.”
“Mhmm. I was waiting for you to come to.” He starts to sit up. “Come on, I’ll shower you. Then we need to sleep. We have to prepare you for your big day.”
“My big day?”
Seokjin grins as he reaches a hand for you. There’s a spark again when you touch and you hesitate, feeling the well of his magic there. It hums in him, a thunderhead of power and fire. He sees your expressions and softens. “You can’t hurt me.”
“You don’t know that.”
“Baby, I just fucked the everloving shit out of you and you know what you didn’t do?” Your brows pull together and he smiles. “You didn’t pull an ounce of my magic from me. I think you’re a lot better at control than you think you are.”
Licking your lips, you nod and let him pull you from bed. You are good at control. You had to be after your sister. It’s something you’ve practiced nonstop, the unconscious control of your desire for magic. Even when you sleep, you wake up often, fearful of losing your grip on yourself while you slumber.
It hasn’t happened yet. And as Seokjin leads you to the shower, you think… maybe it never will. Especially if the ritual goes right. Especially if you can get your magic back.
Perhaps for the first time since you were thirteen, you feel a sliver of hope. When you look at Seokjin and you feel your heart stutter, you know that even without your magic, you’ve found something.
-
“Oh for the love of the land,” Yoongi groans when you appear in the basement of Seokjin’s home. “Look at the two of you.”
Everyone swivels to look at you and Seokjin, who are hand-in-hand. You freeze, pulling up short to take in the candle-lit room and the six other men who are all looking at you with equal parts happiness and a little bit of amusement.
You shift from foot to foot and chew your lip. Suddenly you want to turn tail and run back up the stairs and away from the watchful eyes of your friends - of Seokjin’s coven members. But Seokjin holds your hand tight, tugging you down the rest of the stairs into the gloom of the room.
Perhaps gloom isn’t the right word. The room is much too warm and smells of sage and thyme, a good feeling if not a little overwhelming. Outside this house, there is an entire festival going on at the park. The covenstead witches were furious when Seokjin let them know that he and his six would not be participating this year, as they had private matters to attend to.
It’s common for covens to use the holiday for something specific. Perhaps to bless a witch in need, or to strengthen a spell, or to defeat some evil. You remember that night that your parents left you alone for Beltane duties to fight and remove Dissenters, and how that turned out for you.
Magic hums all around you. It’s in the sigils on the ceiling of Seokjin’s sanctum and it’s in the ley lines that you can feel now more than ever as the veil between worlds thins. Each member of the coven has magic humming in their veins, a sort of signature taste and feel to it. You sense Yoongi’s deep shadows and Namjoons vibrant green, taste Jimin’s clean water and feel Hoseok’s pure air. Taehyung and Seokjin are the flickering flame that fills the room with light and heat, and Jungkook’s crackling storm greets you in the corner.
It’s hard to imagine where you fit in with them. But they don’t have a blood witch, who is all of these things wrapped into one. You know that they support you. The eight of you have gone over the ritual what feels like a hundred times at this point, perfecting it and making sure you know it inside and out.
The two rituals are wildly different. One to seek and find the source of your pain, led by Yoongi and Hoseok. Yoongi’s shadows and connection to the other side will help seek answers and provide clarity on whatever signs and hints come through the vision you’re supposed to have, and Hoseok’s strength with air will help keep you protected and clear of any negative energy.
Then, a small spell to build a bridge between the two rituals that Namjoon will handle with Jimin. Namjoon has it down to a science and has previously used it to link spells, and his affinity for earth will ground the entire circle. Jimin’s skill with water is to help guide you from ritual to ritual with ease and clarity.
It’s the second half of the ritual that’s the most demanding, which is why it’s Taehyung and Jungkook conducting the destructive half, breaking whatever stands between you and your magic. Two warriors meant to sever your block or the target of your curse, whichever it may be.
And it’s possible that you’re cursed. You have briefly spoken about what that means. About what to do. It will most likely mean something damaging and life-threatening for whoever did curse you, if you forcefully try to shatter it instead of finding the cause.
But there’s also potential for you to be harmed if the two of them try to break it and it’s too strong. It’s a risk that you have to assess in the moment, which is terrifying. You want to do it anyway, and you’re happy to find that they support you. That they’re there for you.
Coven members already, really.
All seven of them are dressed to perform a ritual. Dark robes, anointed element symbols in dark ash on their brows. Yoongi has a small circlet around his head, making you pause and tilt your head as you glance at Seokjin. He sees your confusion and smiles. “Yoongi is our high priest tonight,” he murmurs. “He will start and end the circle so I can be here with you.”
Yoongi is blushing and looking up at the ceiling when you turn back to him. For him to step up and hold the circle as the beginning and end is a huge risk on him. He’ll be providing the most magic and taking on the most risk second only to you, all so that Seokjin can move freer and have more control.
“Yoongi is a very powerful witch, as you know,” Seokjin murmurs, steering you to the center of the room. “He holds circles for a lot of our rituals when we feel he’s better suited.”
“Which is often,” Yoongi mutters at the ceiling where he keeps his gaze.
“Yah, shut up, hag. Everyone get in their places.”
Seokjin puts you in the very center of the room. There is a pentagram chalked in powder, but there is no glow to it, no light to signal that it’s being used. He squeezes your shoulders and you look at him, wide eyed and afraid. His smile is warm and a little nervous, but he leans in and kisses you once.
“Trust us,” he says. “This will be hard on you. But we’ve got you.”
“Okay.”
“Don’t break the circle,” he reminds you. “If you have to break, do it when Namjoon is at the middle part and before we start the second ritual. He will open the circle a little, but it’ll be just for a moment before the second is started and locked.”
“Right. Ten second escape if I need to.”
“You only have that window if we need to stop. Once we start the second, there is no stopping until the full ritual is complete.”
“Got it.”
“Good luck,” Seokjin whispers and kisses you on the brow. “I’ll be right here.”
With a deep breath, he steps to the side and grasps your hand. The two of you stand alone in the middle, you and your anchor. Silence settles over the room. You haven’t been in the middle of a circle since you were a little girl receiving her first welcome into the coven. You had done that with your sister by your side and your mother at the head of the circle.
Now, you’re with Seokjin, with Yoongi at the head of the circle. Yoongi doesn’t really make eye contact with you, but you sense his calming aura even from where he stands at the first point of the circle. He rolls his shoulders and closes his eyes, lifting his palms upward. “I stand at north, the beginning and end, start this circle, spirit ascend.”
You feel the ripple of magic in the room. Fire crackles at Yoongi’s feet, making you flinch. You watch as the red flames lick toward Hoseok, who is quick and light as he murmurs, “I stand northeast, to cleanse and protect, continue the circle, spirit to the next.”
You watch the flame as it sparks to life, moving clockwise around the room. Every time a member joins the circle, you feel the power thrum through the room, the pentagram beneath your feet beginning to glow. The flame comes all the way back around to Yoongi and he closes it, eyes opening and looking right at you.
Yoongi looks different than before, eyes shadowed and full of stars. “Begin,” he commands, voice like a thousand whispers.
A little spike of fear goes through you as Hoseok begins to chant. You recognize the Latin immediately but your unpracticed ears lose trace of the meaning. It’s picked up slowly in the room and you feel your palms slick with sweat as the light of the pentagram pulses beneath your feet, the flames flickering around the feet of the coven members.
Yoongi’s voice picks up the chant like you’ve never heard him before. It’s uncanny and you lean into Seokjin, who squeezes your hand and looks down at you.
“It’s okay,” he whispers. “This happens when he leads a circle. Veil is thin.”
Nodding your head, you turn to the front again, feeling the itch to pull power from the circle, to draw their magic into you. There’s so much of it filling the room, an open tap of water spilling into the sink. You dig your teeth into your bottom lip, worried that you won’t be able to resist, worried that you’re going to pull from the magic and-
A wave of dizziness hits you. You gasp and bend over, hand circling your middle as though you’ve just been punched. Seokjin’s hands are on your back but you can’t hear him, a high-pitched ringing drowning out the sound of his voice. For a second, you’re lost in the sensation of having the air sucked from your lungs and the whine in your ears getting higher and higher.
Just when you think that your ear drums will burst, the ringing stops. There is a hushed whisper filling your ears and you still can’t catch your breath. The room spins a little and when you look up expecting to see Yoongi, all you see is dark trees and a blurry shadowy… building. Something.
The whispers creep up on you. There are so many of them, hundreds - no, thousands - of voices brushing against you, dragging their fingers along your skin, touching you, hissing, singing, screaming. It’s like nothing you’ve ever experienced and their words are jumbled, sliding over one another.
Terror begins to claw at you. You try to remain calm, remembering that these are not the voices of spirits or something evil. Hoseok is commanding this ritual, an element of purity and guidance. He won’t let anything bad happen to you.
With faith in your future coven member, you try to focus on the voices. Try to decode them. Namjoon warned you that the messaging might be confusing. That you might not follow or understand what it’s saying. Symbols, images, key words. You need to reach for anything that seems like something, that can point to the origin of your block and follow it.
Yoongi’s presence presses at the back of your mind. It startles you at first, to feel who you know is innately Yoongi. You follow the press of whatever he’s doing and you catch a few words that fly by you: little hut little hut. Little hut little hut. Little hut little hut.
Unsure what it means, you cling to that. Little hut. It means something… you remember something about it. Yoongi’s presence fades away, satisfied that you’ve picked up on whatever it is he sees or senses.
Flipping through memories, you try to remember why a hut might mean anything to you. There were no huts by your town… nothing that you can remember no one you know of.
Little hut, little hut.
One memory sticks with you. Your sister playing in the background, hopscotching to a little tune that Mila down the street whispered to her about a witch in the woods.
Little hut, little hut
Hidden in the wood
Little hut, little hut
Up to no good
Yes, you think. A rhyme about a witch who lived in the woods. More thing than witch, really. A shadowy being that took the shape of a hut, a creature of magic and curses that could be found in the darkest part of the woods when the veil is thin.
Little hut, little hut
Alone in the gloom
Little hut, little hut
Silent as a tomb
You see it now. The blurry shape of a house that’s not really a house. The witch in the wood was a blood witch once, it was said. A witch who had long since dissented and practiced arcane magic, following a path that led her here. That led her to this. A thing of the woods.
It occurs to you the weight of the appearance of her. This hut in the woods. Yoongi’s flippant remark about you being cursed is suddenly real.
Dread drops down in your stomach like a weight. You can’t hear anything beyond the rhyme, the chant to find the witch of the woods. You’re cursed, you realize. All the fear that your condition was self-inflicted, that it was your fault, that this was something you did.
This is something that happened to you, Seokjin had said.
And he was right. Someone cursed you - did this to you. A child.
Out there in the world, there is someone responsible for the death of your sister. Someone who took your magic, who turned you into a leech. The reason for your family's pain, the reason for them throwing you away. For your father and mother being driven mad, for the town turning against you.
You think about the rock that hit you just days ago. Thrown by a child taught to hate you. Taught that it was okay to hurt you because it was you. The town siphoner. A witch who couldn’t make her own magic, a parasite.
Anger wells up inside of you and you latch onto the rhyme swirling around your head, clawing through it. This is the thread you must follow to find your curse giver. This is the clue.
Little hut, little hut
Across the dark stream
Little hut, little hut
Wait for the scream
Dully, you are aware that Seokjin is next to you. You see him from the corner of your eye but it’s not Seokjin at all. Well - not as you now know him. This Seokjin is younger - a teenager by the looks of it. He’s not doing anything except staring out into the darkness. He fades in and out like a bad TV picture, glitching and blurring. But you know it’s him.
His face is different though. Twisted in grief and pain, a frozen picture of angst. You imagine this is what you looked like when your sister died, a tableau of hurt and hate.
Little hut, little hut
I call to thee
Little hut, little hut
Come to me
The Seokjin in front of you fades away. You reach out for him but your hands cut through empty air and darkness. He’s not really there and you have a hard time grasping the meaning of this. The voice sounds almost like Seokjin but not quite. Not as mature.
Young Seokjin doesn’t show up again. You can feel the real Seokjin somewhere in the mess of the vision and the darkness, but you can’t hear him. Can’t see him. There is only the omnipresent darkness of the hut and the whispers of voices.
Little hut, little hut
Hear my strife
Little hut, little hut
Ruin this life
There’s a flash of lightning. A storm in the darkness, splashes of purple and blue electricity. You cover your eyes as you hear thunder, low and soft somewhere. Across from you, your sister appears. She’s a fraternal twin who looks nothing like you except in the eyes. Your eyes look right back at you.
She’s the same age she was when she died. When you took her magic away. When you were cursed. She looks the same age as the apparition of Seokjin, and you try to understand. To make the connection from what you're seeing as the lightning lances again like it did that fateful night.
The rhyme keeps circling in a hurricane of whispers.
As the ritual comes to a close, the vision begins to fade. You’re no better off than where you started and in a panic, you reach for the vision of your sister. You just want to hold her one last time, to feel the warmth of her skin.
But she isn’t real and she fades as Hoseok’s chanting falls to a murmur and then to a whisper, the air returning to normal. You can breathe again, and as you look up from where you’re bent over, you see Seokjin kneeling on the ground in front of you, holding you by the shoulders. His face is swimming with fear and concern, gaze searching.
Seokjin looks so much like his younger self. He’s matured into his face and is a handsome man, but he was a cute teenager. His face now is full of love and concern, but you think about his face in your vision. Twisted in pain and years.
Little hut, little hut
Hear my strife
Little hut, little hut
Ruin this life
You straighten up suddenly, knocking him over on his ass as you do so. It feels like you’ve been slapped as you stare at him, a sudden buzz in your ears as you stare and stare and stare. The ritual comes to an end and Namjoon opens the circle - a foot in the door, more like - and begins to start his spell for Taehyung and Jungkook to weave the new ritual into the circle.
Without thinking about it, you dash for the edge of the circle. Seokjin yells but you’re fast, surging between Namjoon and Jimin where the door exists. Namjoon’s head snaps to look at you, eyes wide and mouth open.
“Close it and close the circle,” you pant.
“I-”
“Close the fucking circle!”
Seven pairs of eyes look at you then. They hesitate for a moment, the flames around them wavering. You can feel the power licking at their heels and something like rage shudders through you. You don’t know where to channel it yet and you begin to pace as Namjoon recloses the circle and turns to Yoongi.
Slowly, Yoongi begins to finish the ritual. They work backward from Yoongi to Jungkook to Taehyung to Jimin. You don’t look at them, wringing your hands as you pace back and forth, heart reaching a wild beat.
Images fly by. The hut, the whispers, Seokjin’s face, the thunderstorm, your sister.
The narrative isn’t straightforward. You don’t quite understand the rhyme, or its function, but the second half sounds bad, sounds perhaps like a plea. A bargain. A need for a curse. You recall the thunderstorm on the night of Beltane, the way your sister watched with wide eyes while you sought her out. You think of Seokjin’s affinity for fire and storms, the way he can command thunder just by being upset. You think of his face, so full of pain and hate.
Finally, they finish the circle. Seokjin rushes to you, hands outstretched and a question on his mouth but you jerk away from him.
“Did you curse someone?” you demand, making him pull up short. He opens and closes his mouth. The silence in the room is deafening. You can hear your own heartbeat, pulse throbbing in your ears. “Seokjin, did you curse someone?”
“I… what does that have to do with-”
“Little hut, little hut. Hear my strife. Little hut, little hut. Ruin this life.”
Three things happen then. The first is Seokjin’s confusion as he shakes his head, lost as to why you’re repeating a rhyme back to him. Then a flicker of memory followed by the drain of color on his face. He straightens up, blanched and shaking his head back and forth as he takes a step away from you.
“No,” he says and takes another step back. “That’s not right, I didn’t curse you.”
“What did you do?”
“I didn’t curse you,” he says again. He seems lost in it though, like he’s saying it to himself. Yoongi takes a step toward Seokjin and he holds out a hand, warding Yoongi off. “I cursed the witches responsible for killing my parents. I didn’t curse you.”
“You cursed someone?” Taehyung hisses from across the circle. “And you never thought to mention it in preparation for this?”
“Shut up, Taehyung,” Seokjin snaps. “I didn’t curse her. I did go into the woods that night to find the hut witch and I cursed the people responsible for killing my parents. I didn’t even know you then.”
“Did you give a name? What did you say?”
“I didn’t know their names!” He answers, frantic and looking at you pleadingly. “I didn’t - no. I remember it, I shared my blood with her, to show the memory. I saw their faces, but I didn’t know their names. We were -” his voice cracks and he clutches his hands against his chest, tears in his eyes. “I was so afraid when they came. We’d been going from town to town, trying to get away. My parents wanted to go back home, overseas. We just had to get there and then these witches, they came and blew down the door and they killed them.”
“So you cursed them based on a memory?”
“Yes,” he insists. “Baby, I didn’t curse you. How could I? How would I?”
Little hut, little hut
Hear my strife
Little hut, little hut
Ruin this life
“Seokjin.” You say his full name, voice ringing and calmer than you feel. Your stomach is in knots and you feel your mouth water, hinting at the nausea working its way up your throat. “Did you ask the blood witch in the hut to ruin the lives of the witches who killed your parents?”
“Yes.”
“Were your parents Dissenters killed on the night of Beltane?”
A long stretch of silence takes up the space between you. You stare at Seokjin and he becomes a stranger. Become another person on the street that looks at you with hate. Another face in the dozens of the town who don’t care if you exist.
When Seokjin says nothing, it says everything. The final piece of information slots its way in and you feel like you’re going to crack open like an egg and spill out. Gooey and yolk-yellow.
“That was why there was a storm,” you whisper. “Because you were angry and upset, wherever it was that you were. And you cursed my family. Not my parents. Our entire family. That’s why I lost my magic and siphoned my sister to death. That’s why my parents were driven to madness and their eventual end. It’s why everyone hates me. You cursed me with ruin.”
“I…” Seokjin shakes his head but can’t make the words come out.
There is no way out now. You get everything picture perfect for the first time. It’s the perfect curse, really. Driving your family to ruin in different ways. Pushing you, the final member of the family, to the person you would eventually fall in love with, to the person that cursed you.
You can’t break it. Not knowing that it’s most likely at the cost of Seokjin’s life. Giving his blood to the witch was a terrible thing. She used it to cast the curse and likely to bind it to him. Which means if you want your magic, you must kill Seokjin.
Instead of standing there to consider the possibility, you turn and run. He tries to run after you but someone stops him. He has his coven to comfort him for what he’s done and you have nothing and no one. Just how you started.
Your runaway is messy. Tripping over thresholds, slipping down stairs. Night stretches over the world and the air is thrumming with energy. You think it would be so easy to tap into, to take and take and take the magic around you that echoes from the Beltane festivals. Would anyone even notice if you took a little?
Still, you don’t. Hot tears blind you as you stumble into the woods behind Seokjin’s house. It’s not the best shortcut when you’re distraught and overcome with tears, but you think you can get to your apartment building by memory alone.
Around you, the world grows darker and quieter. Eventually, all you can hear is your ragged breathing and sniffling as the tears freefall. Something prickles on your skin and you slow your tangled escape to look around you.
The woods are unfamiliar. At least, they seem darker and hazier, like you’re somewhere that looks like the woods behind Seokjin’s house but isn't quite right. You’re more careful as you move forward, one foot in front of the other.
A breeze cools the back of your neck. It makes you shiver, feeling more like a finger running down your spine than the actual wind. A whisper of noise wisps by you and you stop, frowning. Trying to grasp the words as they float by, indiscernible.
You start walking again, following the sound of a voice that is always just a little too far ahead. A little too soft spoken for you to make out the words. When you do manage to catch up, you hear a soft little rhyme.
Little hut, little hut
Hidden in the wood
Little hut, little hut
Up to no good
Little hut, little hut
Alone in the gloom
Little hut, little hut
Silent as a tomb
Little hut, little hut
Across the dark stream
Little hut, little hut
Wait for the scream
Something like a high-pitched wail rings out behind you. Your limbs lock and goosebumps explode over your arms and legs as you slowly crane your neck to look in the direction that you came. There’s no clear path, just tangled trees and darkness.
A soft buzz tingles along your skin. You sense the magic, static that you can’t hear but you can feel and taste on your tongue. Slowly, you turn back to face the direction you’re walking. There is a tiny little stream in front of you, trickling and black.
Carefully, you step over it. Your hands quake. Sweat gathers on the nape of your neck and your upper lip, your mouth trembling as you see the vague shape of a hut. Or perhaps it's just the idea of a hut, with a hole for a door that looks endless. Void. Dark.
You think about your sister. See her face swimming in front of you, so full of life. Then it drains of color as you bleed her dry and steal everything from her. Every drop, turning her from a beautiful girl full of the sun and the sky into a husk.
You clench your fists.
Vengeance can’t bring her back. Vengeance can’t make them love you. But it can take away this fucking hurt inside of you, the pain that you have carried for so long that it feels like a wound that will never close. So you decide to take a page out of Seokjin’s book.
“Little hut, little hut,” you whisper, voice shaking. “Feel my ache. Little hut, little hut, make him break.”
#seokjin smut#jin smut#jin bts smut#seokjin angst#jin angst#jin bts fanfic#seokjin bts fanfi#kim seokjin smut#jim seokjin fanfic#jin x reader#jin you#minors dni#minors do not interact
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I have never seen asks from writers themselves so here are some words from a writer to a writer.
I am the type of writer who likes to torture her characters with constant angst and the kind of reader that gets bored when the main couple gets together too soon. I am like, "Oh, so what now? We should await an upcoming tragedy at least...right?". So I like the fact your characters can't seem to take a break from intense moments haha. We love our characters, but we also appreciate a rough journey from which they come out stronger. I, also, like flaws. I like the realism thrown into their personalities (but not necessarily on the worldbuilding. Always depends on the book genre), making them do all kind of embarrassing or any kind of mistakes, because we are writing about humans. My protagonist will be likable by me when they fail a lot, not when luck comes banging on their door, making them special. So, I love how not only Y/N has flaws but Jungkook also has a right in them. Readers sometimes like the male character to be flawless and the protagonist is always excused but that's unfair. If I were Jungkook, perhaps I'd react a lot worse and that is to be expected. So, Jungkook is a nice balance of a flawed human and a perfect friend. We have different type of flaws and traits depending on each of our social roles. He raises standards while remaining humane. And that's how you write characters realistically.
So, I've read about your opinion on keeping your plot yours and not be affected by what the readers want to read and I couldn't agree more. End it the way you want, 'cause that's the thing with uploading books online; people think they have a say on your work. Traditionally, if this was written and published, people would have it completed on their hands, only capable of giving feedback, not orders on how to end it.
Lastly, I really like your writing style. I like details on expressions, actions and thoughts, even body language and you always deliver. I loved the last chapter, it was a break from the smut and to me, that's another smart way to keep the events going ;) Otherwise, we'd go back to the same type of chapters. Keep up the good work and always write for the pleasure!
-K (In case I write again, I'm leaving my mark haha)
I’ve been planning to respond to this ask for the longest time ever and I’m sorry I only got to it now 🥺
This is (hands down) one of the loveliest messages I’ve received in a while. It’s so precious to hear nice things from anyone, but it’s rare to hear it from another writer. I’m aware most of us can relate to things some readers might not & I’m very grateful that you’ve reached out to me! It truly means a lot and it’s like a piece of calmness to my heart 🪷
Just huge thank you that you get it! There’s nothing for me to add, you’ve written it all 💘 Once again, thank you! And I do hope I’ll hear from you again K!
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Your opinion on "Love is a battlefield" comic ? I rly see some ppl on tumblr call a nice guy or incel cause of this.
I’ve been wanting to talk about that comic for a while so thank you for asking me this. So I got the lost adventure comics a month ago and I enjoyed them very much. When I got to this specific comic I suddenly remembered that everyone found it problematic so I was glad to finally read it myself to see what the problem was.
So if some of you haven't read this comic it's about Aang and Katara, where Katara pressures Aang into a training session to see him firebend. Aang thinks Katara wants to talk about their kiss right before the invasion, but is disappointed to see it’s not. Katara actively tries to avoid talking about that, so she starts attacking Aang so he would fight back. Aang locks himself in a rock like he does in the finale and tells Katara he doesn’t want to train, until he gives in, firebends the rock like a volcano almost hurting Katara. After which he just storms off.
I’ve read a lot of ATLA comics and some of them do have moments where the characters are not themselves. But, never have I seen a comic that mischaracterizes the characters as bad as this one. Genuinely, does Aang seem like someone who would get angry and lash out with his bending? Forget the avatar state, that’s when he is so consumed by rage he loses himself. I’m talking about Aang getting casually angry and actually bending in anger? Looking at the show Aang gets angry multiple times, in the great divide, in the finale, the chase, just to name a few…and never ever does he use bending in anger, EVER, except in The Desert because he is so consumed by his rage about losing Appa. The whole The Desert episode highlights how Aang is not himself, that’s why it’s so impactful, because Aang is a complete opposite of who he usually is. Outside of that episode, Aang never uses his bending in anger, ESPECIALLY at people he cares about.
And even more importantly, is this writer trying to tell me that after the storyline where Aang learns to fire bend and hurts Katara in his recklessness, he is so traumatized by that he swears off firebending completely, doesn't want to use it ever again until he discovers fire is not meant for destruction and he just needs to learn to control it...after all that YOU WANT TO TELL ME AANG RISKS HURTING KATARA AGAIN WITH FIREBEDNING BECAUSE HE GETS MAD???? WHAT IS THIS WRITER SMOKING. Talk about character assassination because what the hell is this? How was this ever approved? Two episodes before this comic is supposed to take place Aang tells Zuko “now I know you understand how easy it is to hurt the people you love”…he accepts Zuko because he admits he needs to control his bending so he doesn’t hurt anyone unintentionally…and you want me to believe 2 episode after this Aang almost hurts Katara unintentionally with the element he was afraid to use again for 2 seasons?? Truly, I do not understand how this got published.
Now, as obvious as it is that Aang is out of character in this comic a lot of people don’t notice that Katara is very much not herself either. BECAUSE THAT IS NOT KATARA PEOPLE! Katara, the most gentle and caring member of the Gaang, who has spent the entirety of the Bitter Work episode telling Toph not to put too much pressure on Aang and try positive reinforcement and a gentle nudge in the right direction to teach him…STARTS THROWING ICICLES AT AANG WHEN HE SAYS HE DOESNT WANT TO TRAIN AND IS VISIBLY UPSET???? She sneaks up on him, splashes water on him, laughs at him and then proceeds to attack him to force him to train. Oh yeah, that’s definitely Katara right there…this writer definitely knows the characters…
I don’t know who wrote this comic, I heard it’s a ZK shipper? If this was written by ZK shipper it suddenly makes sense because they wrote Aang exactly like Zuko would've behaved. Zuko is the one who’s known to lash out in anger and firebend at people he’s angry at, NOT AANG. Now, I can’t confirm nor deny this claim, again I don't know who this writer is, but I need them to sit their ass down and watch the damn show and never touch these characters again.
#my two favorite characters#my babies#butchered in one comic#how did this happen?#avatar the last airbender#avatar: the last airbender#atla#avatar#aang#kataang#zuko#katara
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you’re such an incredible writer, so i only imagine u read extensively too. i’ve noticed ur ao3 bookmarks are empty, but i’d love to get a list of your favorite titles whether it’s zutara, other fandom or traditionally published works.
I do indeed read a lot. The past few years I have read much less fanfic and have focused on original stuff, but I have actually been able to read a few fics in recent times because my brain didn't want to write, I did have a bit of Zutara burnout I think so no Zutara recs here (yet).
But if you, like me, enjoy some Dramione, then, for starters:
anything by phlox (Slowly Toward Desire is my favorite)
Amateur Cartography by worksofstone
A Darker Blue by skitter (legitimately cannot believe this fic didn't blow up, one of the best Dramione fics I've read and that fandom has a ton of good shit, so like. wow. skitter also has a Zutara! I have not yet read but it's on my list and I'm already sure I will love it)
Lights Out by Phoebe
I used to read every pairing under the sun in HP but as I said, haven't read as much fic lately, but two others are Blood & Gold (a Tomione, by the legendary ObsidianPen) and The Wilderness (Luna/Ginny) by speechwriter. If you try nothing else on this list, try The Wilderness. That fic is high art. It blew my entire goddamn mind, my god. I also highly recommend anything by PacificRimbaud (esp. the Paneville)
*cracks knuckles* now for some original stuff:
The Liveship Trilogy by Robin Hobb altered my brain chemistry
Scholomance Trilogy by Naomi Novik. I mean, okay, I worship Naomi generally, so I was shocked to discover it took me a while to get into these. Read the first, thought 'meh', came back to it again later, liked it better, second and third proceeded to BLOW me away
NK Jemisin's Broken Earth trilogy. In case you want a nice dose of a darker twist on Earthbending and an exploration of prejudice.
Juniper & Thorne by Ava Reid for your Gothic horror needs
Lost Boy and Alice, both by Christina Henry. Dark fairy tale retellings, so you know I'm there. She does them so well.
The Burning series by Evan Winter. It has dragons and a dual-sword wielding badass, in case you need those itches scratched
If you want some good published romance (I tend to like fanfic for pure romance stories tbh so I'm usually pickier here) that has some fanfic vibes, I enjoyed Act Your Age, Eve Brown by Talia Hibbert
If you want dark Zutara vibes, my go-to rec and one of my favorite series is The Poppy War trilogy (I will never get over #rinezha)
I wouldn't say I adore The Legendborn Cycle series, but I still like it, you can tell the author has roots in the fan/fanfic scene I think, and again, I think it has some Zutara vibes. Tracy Deonn 100% had to have been inspired by Zuko for her character Sel, I'm convinced. And her take on the Arthurian legend is really unique and creative.
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Hi! Good morning/night. I have a request for Dalton if you still take them…? The idea is that he and the fem reader have a secret relationship and no one knows, and one day Chris and Y/N’s roommate, Annie walk in on them making out? It’s ok if you can’t just a suggestion. Cheers!
A/N: OMG obsessed with the fact that Annie was a part of this, thank you so so much for your request!! Also I did NOT expect this one to be over 4k words, I don’t know what happened I’m so sorry 😭 hopefully it's not unreadable but pls let me know what you think!
Word Count: 4.5k+
Warnings: language, mentions of blood, heavy make out, characters texting, fluff
MASTELIST ✩ SEND ME A REQUEST
Behind Closed Doors
Y/N could tell Dalton was nervous, his foot was constantly tapping on the floor while he waited for the list to be published. Professor Armagan was hosting an art show and she was going to select only a few students to bring their best pieces to show off their talent, and the students that made the cut were supposed to be announced by 3 PM, it was now 3:30 PM and he had been refreshing the school page for the last 30 minutes.
“Dalton, you need to relax” Y/N came up behind him and started rubbing his shoulders, feeling all the tension melt away “Just take a deep breath with me” She started the breathing exercise that helped her feel better when she was feeling anxious or stressed, hoping Dalton would mimic her, but instead a loud puff of air came out of his mouth as he kept refreshing.
“She said she would publish the list-”
“By 3:00” Y/N interrupted him “I know, baby. Just give her a little bit of time, maybe she forgot” She said, going around his chair and sitting on his lap.
“She didn’t forget, she reminded us today”
“Well, maybe she’s busy then, I dunno” Y/N was brushing his soft hair to give him some comfort, and she could tell it was working “But you losing your head over it won’t make it happen faster. We’ll just have to wait, together”
He nodded and took a deep breath, trying to relax just as his girlfriend said “I’m just nervous, this would be a great opportunity for me and I really want to get in”
“I know, and you will. She’s gonna post that list and you’ll see your name on it”
Dalton appreciated her hyping him up, she was his number one fan and he loved her for that “Thanks, although you’re only saying that because I’m your boyfriend”
“Well, I might be a little biassed here-”
“You can be biassed”
“But you’re like the most talented artist I’ve ever met, and I’ve met plenty of artists” She said, making Dalton blush “I understand you’re nervous but we both know how amazing and talented you are and how much Armagan loves your art”
Dalton’s smile grew bigger. He took a quick look at her lips and slowly leaned in to give her a kiss, but a sudden tone coming from his computer interrupted them, notifying him there was a new post on his student dashboard. His heart started to race as he noticed an email from his professor come in at the same time.
They both paid attention to the screen as Dalton’s shaky hands opened both notifications, quickly reading through the event description and scrolling down to what he’s been dying to find out. He had been holding his breath the entire time, but when he finally made it to the list he let out a sigh of relief when he read his name at the very top.
“I’m in!” He exclaimed excitedly. They stood up and Dalton immediately pulled her in for a hug, slightly lifting her up “I can’t believe she chose me”
“I’m so proud of you, baby” Y/N said kissing his face repeatedly “I knew you’d make it”
Dalton finally pressed his lips against hers, all the stress of waiting leaving his body once in for all “I’ll probably have a lot to do until the art show” He whispered when he pulled away.
“That’s okay” Y/N said before going back to their previous position.
Dalton read the email again, this time paying close attention to the description so that he could start getting everything ready for his big day. The announcement listed ten art students, and Dalton was the only sophomore that made it, the rest of them were seniors and that for sure boosted his confidence a little bit, but at the same time he felt more pressure since the other students probably had more experience than him. The description stated that each student could bring five existing pieces and three new ones, so he had to start working right away.
He had exactly three weeks to get everything done and Y/N was aware that this would take up most of his free time, and even though it made her sad that they wouldn't spend as much time together she was okay with that because she knew how much it meant for Dalton and she couldn’t be any prouder.
Dalton started working on his new art pieces the very next day, running to his dorm as soon as his classes ended so that he wouldn’t waste any time. He would usually wait for Y/N and then meet Chris and Annie somewhere for lunch, but it looked like it would be just the three of them for a few weeks.
The four friends have known each other since the very first term, immediately hitting it off and spending a lot of time together, but Y/N and Dalton have been in a secret relationship for the past 4 months so for that period of time they had been making excuses to cancel on the other two and have some alone time. There wasn’t exactly a reason for them to hide their relationship from everyone else, but they wanted to wait a little longer before letting their friends know, mainly because they didn’t want them to feel weird around them just because they were now a couple, but they were planning on telling them… eventually.
Y/N, Chris and Annie were currently walking down the street as they tried to decide what to have for lunch, something that always took a lot of time and deliberation.
“What about pizza?” Y/N asked, looking around at the restaurants surrounding them and spotting her favourite pizza place.
“No, we’re not gonna have pizza again” Annie complained “Let’s try something new, there are tons of options here”
“Annie is right, I can’t eat pizza for at least another month” Y/N huffed annoyed that both of her friends rejected her suggestion.
“Oh, why don’t we eat sushi? Let’s take advantage of the fact that Dalton isn’t here to say no”
“What does Dalton have to do with that?” Chris asked, giving Annie a confused look.
“He never wants to have sushi”
“No, that’s Y/N” Chris clarified pointing at Y/N, who was shrugging her shoulders ready to apologise.
Annie’s eyebrows came together “No it’s not, Dalton is the one that immediately says no to sushi and suggests fucking pizza, literally every time”
“Dalton likes sushi”
“So why does he-” But before she could finish her question, Y/N interrupted her.
“Guys it doesn’t matter, let’s grab something quick so I can bring Dalton some lunch” Y/N pulled out her phone again to look at the time, hoping he wasn’t starving yet.
Annie raised her eyebrows at the way Y/N was constantly checking her phone now that Dalton wasn’t there “Why would you bring him lunch?”
“Because! He’s gonna be busy and I’m a good friend, unlike you guys, apparently”
They both scoffed at the same time “Alright then, we should probably get something easy to bring back to his dorm” Chris suggested, Y/N and Annie agreeing with her. They ended up having Subway and finding an empty table to eat their food, catching up on their mornings and the usual ‘update’ (gossip) on people they will never meet or talk to.
“What’s with the art thing anyway?” Annie asked.
“It’s an art show, basically they get to show off their pieces to who knows who to who knows what” Chris explained, and Annie immediately turned to face Y/N, expecting her to elaborate a little bit more.
“Yeah, pretty much”
“Good for him!” Annie exclaimed “And when is the art show?”
“In three weeks” Y/N replied. She was eating faster than normal so that she could be back as soon as possible “And he needs to finish three whole new paintings so he’s gonna be very busy until then”
“So does that mean we finally get to watch horror movies without feeling guilty?”
“Yes!” Chris seemed really excited at the idea “I could crash with you guys in your dorm and we can buy tons of food”
Chris and Annie kept talking about a movie night, but Y/N stopped paying attention as she texted her boyfriend.
Y/N: Do you want me to bring you some lunch? We’re at subway :)
Dalton: Yes please
Dalton followed that message with a cute selfie of him posing in front of an empty canvas, a blushed face and his hair pushed back, making Y/N smile and blush instantly.
Dalton: I haven’t even started and I’m already having a full on crisis
Y/N giggled at her phone with a pink tint appearing across her face, making the two girls look at her.
Chris tried to look at Y/N’s screen, but she immediately brought it up to her chest to hide it from her “What?”
“Who are you talking to?” Chris asked in a teasing tone.
“No one”
“C’mon! We won’t tell Dalton”
“What?” Y/N’s eyes widened as her mind started racing, worried her friends knew something about their relationship and she’d have to explain herself.
“Well, it’s pretty obvious he likes you” Annie replied, giving her a suggestive smile.
Y/N sighed and stood up “No he doesn’t and I think I’m gonna get going, I have a lot of work to do”
“Yeah me too” Chris said. The three friends left the table and Y/N made her way to the counter to get Dalton’s lunch. She already knew his usual Subway order so after buying his food, they went back to campus. Once they stepped into the building Chris went back to her dorm while the other two found Dalton’s.
Y/N knocked on the door and immediately yelled “Hey, I’m here with Annie” Making Annie look at her with a confused look on her face. They waited a few seconds and Dalton finally opened the door.
“Hey” He greeted the girls and moved to the side, giving them space to come in.
“Oh we’re just here to drop off your food”
“Yeah, sorry” Y/N whispered, giving her boyfriend an apologetic smile.
“Right, I’m busy anyway” He joked as he reached for the bag Y/N was holding, taking it in his paint stained hands “Thanks bab- uh- Y/N”
Y/N blushed but was quick to reply, not wanting to give Annie a reason to tease them “Sure dude, good luck with your project" She waved him goodbye and grabbed Annie’s hand to drag her away.
“So... what was that?” Annie asked as they left the building.
“What?” Y/N pretended to have no idea what she was talking about.
“What is going on between you and Dalton?” She had a devilish look on her face, determined to find out what was actually going on.
“What do you mean? There’s nothing between us”
“Really? Cause that seemed a little-”
“Annie” Y/N rushed to interrupt her, knowing that the pressure of an interrogation might make her confess “He’s just really stressed out about the art show and you know how Dalton is when gets like that”
“Mhm, I guess but I don’t know Y/N”
“If something was happening I would tell you, but there’s nothing between us” Y/N said in hopes of making her stop asking questions, and luckily it worked but that didn’t stop her from asking Dalton later that day.
Dalton felt bad for the little slip up that caused all the questions, he apologised to Y/N a million times but she didn’t blame him, it was an honest mistake. So the rest of the week Y/N tried to make it less obvious, not staring at her phone as much and not going to his dorm unless she was alone, and she was going there a lot. It wasn’t a big deal to keep it a secret anymore but they decided to wait at least until the art show was over, the last thing Dalton needed right now was their friends constantly asking him questions about his love life.
There was officially one week until the art show and Dalton was nearly done with his second picture, just finishing up the last few details as he tried to decide what he’d do for his last piece. He had planned on doing different techniques and using different materials for each one, so the last one would probably have to be charcoal and thankfully he was pretty familiar with it, but as he looked around everywhere in his room he realised he was out. He was getting stressed out again, he needed to start right away and didn’t want to waste any time in going all the way to town to get the charcoal he liked to use, but he knew Y/N was still there.
Dalton: Is there any way you can bring me a box of derwent charcoal set?
Y/N was finishing up her lunch as she read Dalton’s message, immediately thinking of an excuse that would work on her friends.
“Y/N, are you going to the halloween party?” Chris asked her, pulling her out of her thoughts.
“Uhh- sure, when is that?”
“On halloween…” Chris said in an obvious tone.
“Right. Yeah, I’ll be there”
“Cool, so let’s decide on our costumes, we want to have enough time to plan them” Chris suggested.
“We might want to do matching ones, there’s gonna be a big prize and I heard the group costumes have a better chance at winning” Annie pulled out her phone and started scrolling on pinterest.
“You guys should look into it and let me know, but I’m gonna head out”
“Okay, let’s go” Chris said, ready to grab her things and walk out.
“No! You guys should stay, I don’t wanna interrupt your lunch just because of my poor time management” The two girls looked at her with lines forming between their eyebrows, not really knowing what Y/N meant by that “I forgot I have an assignment I need to turn in by 4:00 PM so I’m just gonna run to the library, but I’ll see you guys later” Y/N left the restaurant and discreetly looked behind her to ensure she was alone.
Once she bought the box of materials Dalton needed she went back to campus, trying to be as fast as possible so she wouldn’t hold her boyfriend back, running up to his dorm and knocking on his door.
“You’re my saviour” Dalton said as soon as he opened the door, pulling her into his room and giving her a quick kiss “Thanks baby”
“Of course” Y/N replied, happy she could help and happy to see him again “So how is it going?”
“I finished the second one just 10 minutes ago” Dalton pointed at the canvas as he took the box from Y/N’s hands.
“So I’m on time?”
“You are, don’t worry” Dalton struggled a little to open his charcoal, so he just gave up and made his way to his backpack and pulled out a pair of scissors to cut the box open.
Y/N got closer to the newly done picture to admire it better “I love it” She whispered with a big smile.
“Shit” Dalton dropped the scissors and immediately took his finger into his mouth.
“Are you okay?” A worried Y/N ran up to him to check his finger.
“Yeah” Dalton replied, taking his finger out and showing it to Y/N, a little bit of blood running down his hand “I think I grabbed it by the blade on accident” He chucked to lighten the mood as Y/N examined the small wound.
“You’re gonna be fine, it doesn’t look like it was too deep, just gotta clean it up” Y/N looked up to him and gave him a comforting smile “Where do you keep your first aid kit?” Dalton pointed at his dresser and watched as Y/N took it from one of the drawers.
He was now sitting on his bed and she was kneeling in front of him, carefully grabbing his hand and looking through the little box.
“This might hurt a little” She whispered before rubbing alcohol, applying gentle pressure to stop the bleeding. Dalton was looking down at her with loving eyes, not even paying attention to the wound on his finger anymore. After a few minutes she covered it with a bandage, softly kissing the tip of his finger before getting back on her feet "As good as new"
“Thank you, baby” He whispered, looking at the bandage.
“Do you feel better?” She asked him.
Dalton nodded and wrapped his arms around her waist, pulling her closer to him making her stand between his legs “Yes, thank you” He repeated looking up at her “Although it still hurts a little bit”
Dalton faked a sad look on his face and Y/N squinted her eyes at him “Really? And I suppose a kiss would definitely make you feel better”
Dalton nodded and pulled her once again, this time making her sit on his lap “I suppose it would” He replied with a growing smirk.
Y/N wrapped her arms around his neck, bringing him closer and finally pressing a kiss against his lips. It slowly became more intense, the air in the room heating as her hands moved to his hair and his hands were travelling down her body, squeezing her flesh every so often. They were too into it, the world around them completely disappearing until the bedroom door suddenly slammed open, making Y/N and Dalton jump away from each other.
“We know you’re busy right now but-,” Chris and Annie froze completely, their eyes widening at Y/N and Dalton as their faces turned a bright red “...Y/N?” Chris whispered.
Dalton immediately got on his feet and quickly walked to the door “Jesus, can you knock?”
“I knew it!” Annie yelled before Dalton could shut it and lock it. Dalton turned to look at Y/N, who was hiding her face in her hands.
A muffled “Oh no” Came out of her mouth. Dalton sighed and walked towards the bed, sitting next to her and softly rubbing her back.
On the other side of the door Chris and Annie were looking at each other, a shocked expression painted on their faces. They walked away without saying a word and went upstairs to Chris’ dorm, taking the lift ride in complete silence, but once they closed the door behind them they started talking about what they just saw.
⋆ ★
“It’s okay, we’ll talk to them” Dalton whispered.
“I know” Y/N sighed loudly as she collapsed on the bed “I just… I didn’t wanna have to explain myself”
“You don’t have to, it’s our relationship”
“Yeah, I know it is but they’re my friends and I didn’t think they’d walk into us almost-”
“It’s their fault for not knocking”
Y/N chuckled as her hand fell on Dalton’s cheek, using her thumb to clean the lipstick stain on his face “Well, maybe it was for the best. You still have a lot to do and I have a fake assignment due at 4, so” She joked, making Dalton laugh. She left the bed and looked for her backpack “I’ll go talk to them”
“Wouldn’t it be better if we both did?”
“No, I’ll handle it” She said, opening the door and smiling at Dalton, who blew her a kiss to encourage her.
Y/N figured her friends would be in the dorm upstairs, so she slowly walked there as she carefully thought of what she was going to say. She wanted to tell them the truth, but the fact that they didn’t have a real reason to keep their relationship a secret for this long made it hard.
She knocked on the door and took a deep breath, slowly letting it out. Chris opened the door and stepped to the side without saying a word, making Y/N sweat like never before.
“There’s a reasonable explanation for this-” Y/N began, but she didn’t really know where this was going “Uh-”
“So I was right?” Annie asked.
“Annie!” Chris threw a pillow at her “Y/N, we’re sorry, we should’ve knocked”
Y/N nodded slowly, appreciating her for apologising “Yeah, you should’ve”
“But…” Annie urged her to continue.
“But I’m sorry for not telling you guys”
"Is it like a fling situation?"
"What? No, we're not a fling" Y/N quickly replied a little offended at Annies assumption.
“So why didn’t you say anything?” Chris asked.
“I don’t know” Y/N sighed before continuing “At first we didn’t wanna tell anyone in case, you know… it didn’t work out but then it was just easier to keep it a secret, and we didn’t want you guys to feel weird about us being a couple”
“We definitely wouldn’t have felt weird at all”
“We also didn’t want you to be weird about it, like asking a million questions” Y/N staring at Annie.
“So for how long have you guys been together?” Chris asked, wanting to move on from how nosy Annie was.
“Uh- it will be 5 months in a couple of weeks”
“Five months?” They asked at the same time.
Y/N didn’t think it mattered for how long they have been together, but apparently it did “I think it’s my turn to ask some questions, like why were you guys in Dalton’s dorm?” She asked, crossing her arms as she waited for an answer.
“We wanted to invite him to the halloween party and see if we could get him to dress up with us” Chris explained.
“Okay, and most importantly, why the fuck didn’t you knock?”
“Dalton is never doing anything interesting, so we didn't think it mattered”
Y/N scoffed “What the fuck guys? That’s my boyfriend you’re talking about”
They both rolled their eyes but laughed at the situation. They proceeded to apologise to Y/N, who forced them to buy Dalton lunch for the rest of the week as a peace offering for bursting into his room without knocking, ensuring they would never do it again.
⋆ ★
Dalton sighed, flicking his collar up once more, carefully bringing the wide end of his tie to the left side of his body and over the narrow end, staring at himself in the mirror as he held the two ends together. He tried looping and tucking and pulling for the millionth time.
“Ugh,” He huffed out in frustration, pulling it loose again.
It was finally his big day and he was almost ready. Everything he needed was done and delivered to the art hall on campus where the art show would take place, his hair was properly styled, the ironed white button-up shirt looked neat and the suit fit him perfectly, but the tie was really holding him back. He sighed one more time before stepping closer to the mirror and trying again, but failing and tossing it to the floor when he realised it looked worse than before.
Y/N knocked on the door and quickly fixed her hair before Dalton opened it “Hey” He whispered as he looked her up and down, admiring her beautiful outfit “You look beautiful”
Y/N blushed and gave him a shy smile “Thanks, you too” She entered his room completely and closed the door behind her. He then pulled her in for a hug, wrapping his arms around her tightly “Are you ready?” Dalton smiled down at her and just nodded in response “Where’s you tie?”
“Not happening”
“Why not? It’ll look amazing”
“Cause I can’t figure out how to tie it” He replied, frustrated as he remembered what he just went through.
“Let me help you” She whispered. Dalton sighed before scanning the floor, reaching for the tie once he spotted it and handing it to Y/N “Come here, baby”
He moved closer to Y/N, allowing her to finish up his look. She put the tie around his neck, biting the corner of her lip in concentration as she easily tied it for him. She tightened the knot to make sure it didn’t look loose “Is that okay or is it too tight?”
“That’s perfect” He replied, pulling her in for a kiss “You’re always here to save me”
“Shut up”
“No, really” His hand started to softly caress her back “You’re the reason I made it out alive these past three weeks, you got me lunch almost every single day and then you forced our friends to buy it for me, you brought the materials I needed, you stayed here with me to keep me company even late at night so I wouldn’t go insane… thank you, darling”
Y/N blushed and tried to hide her face in his chest “I’m definitely not the reason but I’m happy I could help”
Dalton leaned in to place a kiss on her head, taking a moment to inhale her scent “Y/N?” He whispered and she only hummed, but he nervously repeated himself to get her to look up at him “I love you” He spoke so quietly that his words were barely above a whisper, declaring that those words were only meant for Y/N to hear.
Y/N’s heart skipped a beat, it was like she could feel fireworks exploding inside of her “I love you” She replied, trying hard to pay attention to his every move so that she could remember this moment forever.
He kissed her again, but this time it was so full of love that nothing else mattered to any of them, even the nerves of his presentation disappeared.
Chris and Annie arrived shortly after and the four of them left for the art show. The art hall was full of artists exploring the big space, stopping from time to time to examine someone else’s art.
Y/N could feel Dalton’s hand sweating against hers, giving it a squeeze and a soft smile to comfort him.
He eventually left them to speak with Armagan and a few other people that were with her, Y/N assumed they were important as most of the art kids seemed to recognise who they were but he would probably be busy for a while, so they decided to explore with everyone else.
“Dalton is so much better than everyone else” Chris whispered as someone explained their painting to a group of students.
“Oh, for sure” Y/N replied proudly.
“Of course you agree with me” She teased.
“Well I’m here to support my boyfriend, so yeah I agree” Chris and Annie rolled their eyes at the same time “What? This is literally your fault, maybe if you had knocked-”
“We get it, and we regret it, trust us”
#dalton lambert#dalton lambert x reader#dalton lambert fic#dalton lambert imagine#dalton lambert x you#dalton lambert fanfic#dalton lambert imagines#dalton lambert fluff#insidious the red door#ty simpkins#insidious 5#insidious
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No Room to Breathe~ Harrison Gray
Chapter 2
This a fan translation so it is definitely not 100% accurate. I do not own anything related to Ikemen Villains. Support Cybird by buying their amazing stories!
No Warnings for this part
Part 1 | Part 2 | Premium End | Epilogue
(Hm, Maybe, no, even if he is...)
(--Are we the exact opposite?)
My heart flutters as I remember hearing that lovers who are compatible are those who are similar.
(Every time I acted differently from Harry, Harry… looked down.)
(And…)
Harry didn’t touch me last night even though we slept together.
(If you are disappointed…what should I do…)
Harrison: “Hey, are you ready to go out yet? I managed to finish it, but…”
Kate: “Ah, I finished changing, but my hair is…”
Harrison: “Give it here. Let me do your hair. I’ve always wanted to try it.”
Kate: “Eh?”
Harrison came around behind me and clumsily tied up my hair.
Harrison: “…Hey, help me out and raise your arm a little more.”
Kate: “Ah, yes. Like…this?”
The handcuffs jingle as I move my hand and Harry’s breath touches my neck.
That one small gesture made my heart jump.
Harrison: “Hmm, it’s done… but it’s really clunky, did you want to try again?”
Kate: “I’m fine with this. I’m glad you did this for me, Harry.”
Harrison: “Pfft, yeah? Well, okay, you’re as cute as ever.”
Harrison: “Besides, this…. I can figure out later.”
With a quick kiss on the nape of my neck, Harry stood up.
Harrison: “Well then, we should get on with the Ferris Circus. Let’s go.”
Kate: “Yes!”
(Maybe he was kind to me because he noticed that I was upset?)
(…That’s what I really, really love about him.)
Of course, I wanted the mission to be a success, but I didn’t want to put Harry in danger.
(Never do something to hold him back. Alright, let’s read Harry’s actions and act!)
We headed to the inn where the Ferris Circus group was staying.
Oliver: “You guys! You came here looking for the key, I’ve been looking for it since then, but I still can’t find it…”
Kate: “Don’t get upset. Thank you for looking for us, Oliver.”
Oliver: “So, why are you here?”
Harrison: “I have a request. For now, could you please let me meet the leader?”
Oliver took us to the back room where the leader was.
His protruding belly shaking, the leader greets us cheerfully.
Ferris Circus Leader: “My family caused you trouble last night. So, what do you require?”
Harrison: “I work for a publishing company, and I have a business trip tomorrow. I want to find the key as soon as possible.”
Harrison: “So I was wondering if you would let us search with you.”
Harry lied steadily, and the leader nodded exaggeratedly.
Ferris Circus Leader: “Of course! I’m rather sorry to have put your hand out of commission.”
(…He’s very friendly. I don’t think he’s doing anything wrong for the children.)
However, as I spend more time with Crown, I began to understand clearly,
That evil sometimes takes on the appearance of a good person.
The moment we got permission to search and left the room, someone hugged my leg.
Ferris Circus Child: “Big brother, Big sister. Hello.”
Kate: “Ah, you had bumped into me earlier.”
Oliver: “This is Lionel. Don’t ask me if I’m playing with these two people.”
Kate: “Ahaha, yeah—”
Was about to say “okay”, and then I gasped.
(That was my decision, but knowing Harry, he would have gone looking for information right away.)
Harrison: “…”
Harrison: “Okay, let’s play. After we play for a little bit, can you take us to the tent?”
Lionel: “Yup, yay!”
Kate: “…Harry, are you sure?”
Harrison: “Ah, it’s okay once in a while.”
After playing for a bit, we decided to look for the key inside the tent under Oliver’s guidance.
(Of course we need to find the key, but we also have to uncover the secret behind the crime.)
Oliver: “Hmm, maybe it didn’t fall off after all… that’s weird…”
Harrison: “Aah, what’s the box over there?”
When Harry raises his arm to reach for a box on the shelf, Oliver jumps.
Like he’s afraid of being hit.
(…It’s like he’s being beaten on a daily basis.)
Oliver: “Ah… um, that was….”
Harrison: “…”
Harrison: “…are you having fun?”
Oliver: “Eh?”
Harrison: “Do you enjoy working here?”
Oliver’s eyes flickered in response to Harrison’s question, then he blurted out.
Oliver: “It’s fun to work! Oh man, I’ve been passed around from place to place, having no redeeming qualities.”
Oliver: “But, now. Coming here? I found the meaning of life. Hehe…”
Oliver: “…But. But being forced to do thing that I can’t face the heavens—”
(…I knew it!)
Just as we were about to uncover the truth, Oliver suddenly looked up.
Oliver: “Wow, you’re a good actor aren’t you? I’m a performer you know.”
The big smile on his face is to prevent us from going any further.
Harrison: “If you say so, then it must be so…”
Harrison: “We can’t help those who are not prepared to be saved. Just remember that.”
--Outside
We split up with Oliver and proceed down the hallway, looking for the key.
Kate: “…Looking at Oliver’s behavior, it’s clear that something is wrong with him.”
Harrison: “Yeah. All we need is to suppress the scene or have some physical evidence and we can move quickly—”
Just as Harry was about to say something, a thumping sound was heard from the other side of the hallway.
(……I wonder what.)
Kate: “…Harry.”
Harrison: “Ah, let’s go. Kate, stay close. Be more careful than usual…--”
As we walked toward the direction of the noise, I saw the shadow of a person in the warehouse.
Ferris Circus Leader: “It’s all about the free food! What do you mean you were so busy playing that you forgot to do your job?”
Who was at the end of the leader’s whip?
(……Lionel!)
Lionel: “I’m sorry, I’m sorry…”
Ferris Circus Leader: “It seems like you were also dragging your feet with your “work” the other day. That’s why you failed to steal anything!”
Harrison: “…stealing. Now that’s black.”
(Gah, he’s going to die like that! We have to go help him soon.)
(But, can I move however I want?)
For a moment, I envision a future where I move in the opposite direction and hold Harry back.
(What would Harry do? Harry--)
Lionel: “Agh… it hurts. I’m sorry…sorry…”
(…)
Kate: “…Harry, I’m sorry for doing something selfish. But…”
Harrison: “Hmm, Kate?”
I jumped out and hugged Lionel with my still connected arms.
Lionel: “…….Big sister…?”
Kate: “It’s alright now. It was scary.”
Ferris Circus Leader: “Pfft, haha! You fell for it.”
Harrison: “…Kate, Up!”
(…!)
When I looked up, I saw a large cage falling from the sky.
I immediately pushed Lionel away and Harry and I were locked in the cage.
Kate: “Mm.”
Harrison: “…Did you deliberately use a child out to lure us in?”
Ferris Circus Leader: “Yes, that’s right. I knew you were coming to do something.”
(Why?...There was no reason to be suspicious.)
Ferris Circus Leader: “Ordinary people don’t own guns. And it’s even less likely if you’re a woman.”
I realized that the gun I keep in a holster strapped to my leg has been discovered.
(I’m usually careful not to be noticed, but I’m distracted by the handcuffs…)
Ferris Circus Leader: “Besides, people who have committed murder, even once, can easily recognize their own kind.”
Ferris Circus Leader: “Are you guys hired killers by the police or people with a grudge?...Well it doesn’t matter.”
Ferris Circus Leader: “After tonight’s show, I’ll teach the two of you a lesson and kill you.”
Kate: “…ah”
Ferris Circus Leader: “Oh, yeah. It’s no use calling for help.”
Ferris Circus Leader: “These children are puppets who follow my will. They won’t do anything I don’t want, hahaha!”
Lionel: “…”
The leader and Lionel disappear from view, and the area is filled with silence.
(It’s all my fault that I was noticed and that this happened.)
Kate: “I-I’m sorry… If I’d followed you, Harry, you would have been able to make a calmer decision.”
Kate: “I was trying not to cause any trouble, but I acted on impulse…”
Harrison: “Trying not to cause trouble?”
Kate: “…Because we’re opposites.”
Harrison: “Maybe so. Being connected with you made me realize that.”
Kate: “…”
Harrison: “But, I don’t think that’s bad or a nuisance.”
Harrison smiled and gently pinched my cheek.
Kate: “…?”
Harrison: “There are things that can be solved just by being with you.”
Harrison: “Look, here’s proof.”
Oliver: "...both of you."
Kate: "Oliver, why are you here?"
Oliver: "Lionel called the guys over."
Behind Oliver, many of the children who work here came to help.
Oliver: "...Honestly, this has happened many times before. But Lionel called me out of desperation..."
Lionel: "B-big sister protected me. It's the first time anyone has done something like that. That's why..."
It must have been so scary to jump out of the cage where you were tied up and try to help.
Kate: "...Thank you, Lionel. Thank you, all of you."
The children worked together and helped us out of the heavy cage.
Oliver: "Big brother, you seem pretty relaxed. Did you already have a plan to get out of here?"
Harrison: "Well, yeah."
Harrison: "But, there are other important things we need to do too."
Harrison: "I thought this rescue was your cry for help. You need help, right?"
Lionel: "...uh,... yes."
Lionel: "Please, please help me..."
Harrison: "I mean, what should I do, Kate?"
Kate: "There is only one answer. Let me take care of that."
Harrison: "As expected of our excellent fairy tale master."
Harrison: "Well then--"
Harrison / Kate: "The counterattack has begun."
Part 1 | Part 2 | Premium End | Epilogue
#ikemen villains#ikevil#ikemen villains translation#ikevil translation#harrison gray#ikevil harrison#ikevil harrison gray#ikemen villains harrison#ikemen villains harrison gray
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Taking a break + future WIPs!
Hello all!
First and foremost, I just want to say thank you again to everyone who has liked/reblogged/commented/read Phantasmagoria.
I’ve said that Phantasmagoria was very personal for me, and in many ways, it was kind of a way for me to express feelings I’ve spent the better part of the last two years working through following my Mom’s death. Everything that Y/N describes as happening the night her mother died was real — it’s what I lived through on September 10th, 2021, shot for shot.
So thank you for allowing me the space to channel a lot of that heartache and grief and for being so kind and supportive. I was very apprehensive about sharing Phantasmagoria, not just because of the heavy subject matter, but also because in a way, I was making myself be vulnerable and that’s something I’ve always struggled with doing. The overwhelming response has been so positive and so fucking kind, and I don’t think you all realize how much it has meant to me.
Everything I write — everything I do, I do for you. So thank you, from the bottom of my heart.
That said, Phantasmagoria ended up being almost 50k words long, so I’m SPENT. This month is quite busy for me at work as well, and I’m writing a ton for my job, so I need to take a bit of a breather.
I will still be around, answering asks and reblogging my lovely friends’ works, because I truly love interacting with you all; but as of right now, I will not be publishing any new content. Also might fuck around and try to make my theme more aesthetically pleasing (how do y’all do that thing with the custom font???)
BUT, have no fear; I can’t stay away from my notes app for long, and while I’m gone, I’ll be planning out/finalizing things for some of the things y’all have been waiting for.
Tentative priority list of Peach’s WIPs:
Seasons in Love (Sanemi x Reader college AU)
The Great War: Part I (Giyuu’s Bundle of Joy)
Rengoku emergency request for @renhoeku
Kinktober (Werewolf!Sanemi • Vampire!Giyuu • Human Rengoku x Siren!Reader)
Take care, get sleep, and above all: stay horny, my darlings!
🤍🍑🌸
#demon slayer#kimetsu no yaiba#sanemi shinazugawa#kyojuro rengoku#giyuu tomioka#kny#kny x reader#kny fanfic#kny sanemi#kny kyojuro#kny giyuu#kny fic#demon slayer fanfic#demon slayer fic
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Ok since last posting I’ve fallen prey to getting foaming at the mouth angry at my phone screen again but I want everyone to fucking shut it about the dehumanization of Russians.
Are those Russians apparently suffering real world systemic oppression in the room with us right now? Are they in air raid shelters underground? Are they maybe in the basement of their apartment buildings instead, praying this won’t become their grave if the building gets striked and collapses above their head? Are they already dumped in an unmarked mass grave, hands tied behind their back and body charred after the enemy soldiers attempted to burn the evidence of their crimes? Or does their heart still beat and does it sink every time their loved ones don’t answer the phone?
You are so quick to jump to the defense of poor Russians being a little sad :( when those evil Eastern Europeans are being mean to them online, but you don’t give a shit about the dehumanization of Ukrainians. None of you will even attempt to grasp the utter horror of Russian government (!) media outlets publishing articles and broadcasting TV reports openly calling for genocide, denying the existence of Ukrainians as people and Ukraine as a state, equating Ukrainians to parasites and vermin and completely reducing our lives to nothing; even blatantly using such terms as “De-Ukrainization”.
Westerners can at least claim ignorance even if it’s a pitiful excuse but this is what Russians are exposed to daily and they choose to avert their gaze and dont look at entire cities being leveled to the ground, people forced to survive in conditions your mind would not be able to conjure up, spending sleepless nights listening to explosions and artillery fire in basements, risking their lives to go outside to find dead animals to eat or to bury the bodies of their deceased loved ones outside because they have started to decompose. Instead of listening to Russians crying about how they’re being victimized look up stories of people who were lucky to survive and escape Mariupol and every time you feel a sense of nausea at the utter horror these people have seen you better keep fucking looking. Look up the official United Nations independent investigation report describing cases of rape of children as young as 4. Read about the abduction and mass deportations of thousands (!) of Ukrainian children, either orphaned or taken forcibly from their parents, whose living family is heartbroken and inconsolable, holding on to what little hope they have of getting them back home from God fucking knows where in Russia. Look up filtration camps and torture chambers set up by Russian soldiers. This is what dehumanization does, it convinces you no human life was lost because those weren’t even humans. And it is working in Russia right now because most Russian people feel perfectly fine and cozy at home and to them being dehumanized means people being mean to them on Tumblr apparently. Or forcing them to confront the reality of how their inaction is what allows for all this inconceivable suffering to continue.
Be thankful you and your family are certain to see the light of day tomorrow and you have not spent the past year having to cope with your home being devastated by a genocidal war while knowing this could have just as easily been you every time you see another person mercilessly tortured, raped and killed for simply being Ukrainian, and shut the fuck up
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Kissed Mirror
{Jimin X 'Dom' Reader 18+}
→ Warnings: Marking & biting, Mirror play
→ Rating: 18+ Minors are prohibited from engaging and reading this content. It contains explicit content.
→ Genre: Teasing
→ Summary: Jimin Is finally home after being on tour for two months. In missing him so much You decide to go visit as soon as possible. When you get there he's on his phone and not talking to you. So. You pull a stunt to make him focus on you instead.
→ Word Count: 2 450
Disclaimer: All members are face and name claims for the story. This is entirely a work of fiction and by no means is meant to be a projection, judgment or representation of real-life people. All works are purely for entertainment purposes.
Published: 6/26/23
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Pulling up to the same old apartment I always visited. The clouds left the grounds in a shadowed haze. My mood, feeling similar. Tall trees surrounding the building, starting to bud with life. Intense wind shaking the branches, bringing cold through layers of clothing. In seeking something other than this cold day, I walked up to the apartment complex. To find my warmth and shelter.
“I’m here!” I called out. Walking inside the tall black door, lined with sleek silver. Walking through the doorway, the bitter sweet smell of roses filled my senses. The house was rather empty. Other than a few suitcases and a pile of clothes by the living room. The lights were all off, white sheer curtains swung wide open. The place was quite dark due to the limited sunlight and zero lights. Finally I was greeted by Jimin, flopped out on the leather couch. As he scrolled his phone.
“Hey, what are you doing here?~” He smiled wide, meeting my equally joyful gaze. His kind eyes hid behind his cheeks. Getting up to greet me with a sigh, Swiping a hand through mocha colored hair. Few pieces dangled untamed in his face. His silver hoop earrings spotted among the strands of hair. Sure he was on his day off, lazing around at home. With remains of travel supplies stacked in the living room. But not without style. Jimin met me in front of the door, Standing in front of me with his arms wide open. “Cmere.”
He demanded adorably so. I fell into his embrace. His soft tan sweater comforted me like a warm blanket. Again the smell of rose’s. Jimin’s warm hands holding me. Feeling like a weight had been taken off my shoulders from a single touch. Not wanting to let go. Feeling a hot puff of air by my ear.
“I’m glad you're here. Aish, sorry. I’ve been so tired. ” Jimin yawned, covering his mouth with a silver ringed hand. Letting me go he grabbed one of my hands, lazily dragging me behind him. Back to the leather couch. Past all the other white furniture. “Sorry about the mess, don't mind it.. I haven't had the chance to properly go through everything since the tour.”
He placed a chaste kiss on my lips, guiding me to sit down with him. Jimin was nearly folded in half beside me. The arm closest to me swung around my shoulder. The other held his phone, he had probably gotten from a sponsor. Jimin’s tired eyes scanned the screen as he swiped up repeatedly. Tired eyes with remains of makeup on, followed the motion. Leaning into him a little closer, I saw it was the Weverse app he was on. So Jimin was scrolling through millions of ARMY posts. The whole while he scrolled, his plump lips held a soft smile. Though he looked exhausted. Jimin told me he got home two days ago. But by the look of his place, and eye bags. It seemed more like it was late last night…
I had caught up with their new content and often saw ARMY’s posts. Edits of the members and so on. Every edit I seemed to stumble upon was of Jimin. Which made me miss him more.. Now I finally get to see him and he’s not even talking to me. Here I am watching my amazing boyfriend stare at his phone. Though, It’s work related.. I’ll just enjoy the silent company. So I pulled out my phone and scrolled uselessly. I’m sure he’ll wrap up in a bit. I did just barge in after all..
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
We sat together here in almost complete silence. Other than Jimin yawning or me trying to break said silence. Scrolling on our phones? After not seeing each other for nearly two months? I was starting to get a little aggravated. Just as anyone would. I had asked him to tell me about the performances every now and then. He’d say ‘in a minute’ everytime. It's now been an hour. I knew what he was doing was work related, technically. But ARMY could wait.
“Jimin?” I called out his name. A ting of sass escaped past my lips.
“Hm? Yes love?” Jimin replied, Tilting his head up a little. Shaking stray hair strands from his view. Eyes still on the screen.
“Put down the phone?” Finally I asked. Waiting.
“Hang on one second I promise.-”
“Too late.” I slid onto his lap.
“Woah, hey-”
(spice)
I latched a hold on his phone before his hands flew back from me. Before he knew what I was up to. My free hand balanced myself on his lap. A little.. lower.. than I expected. Jimin twitched from the sudden contact. At that moment I stole his phone. Powering it down with a smug grin.
“I’ll make you get off of it.” I met his gaze, those doe eyes didn't seem so tired anymore.
“Ha.. you're challenging me?” Jimin tilted his head to the side. Inhaling sharply. A sly grin formed across his lips as he stared me down. Oh fuck.. He leaned closer to me, tracing one of his hands down my spine. Resting at my lower back. Pushing me into him. I was the one shaking now. Jimin, once again in possession of his phone. Releasing me, let a smug grin grace his lips. Leaning by my ear he whispered. “We both know it won't end well for you if you tease me.~”
“But, You can keep trying if you want. I’ll decide when I'm done on my phone.” Jimin sassed leaving a small pout behind. He flopped back to his original place on the couch among the few fluffy pillows. Bringing myself forward, my chest resting upon his. Slowly breathing across his neck. I shot a glance past his chin. Jimin was biting the inside of his cheek, presumably avoiding my gaze. My eyes quickly locked onto my next target with a little grin. Sliding my hands down his chest, over his sweater. Again my gaze drifted back to him. I flipped up the hem of his sweater and ran my cold hands slowly across his abs. Jimin flinched a little from the sudden touch from my cool hand. “You feeling me huh?”
I could tell his jaw clenched at the motion. Hovering my hand around there for a moment. Feeling his muscles. Moving my hips over his thighs. Jimin’s light denim jeans hugged them perfectly. Perfectly enough for me to tell he was enjoying this. Upon realizing this, My gaze flew up to meet his. Still staring at his screen. Holding his bottom lip in a small bite. Pink started dusting his cheeks. Continuing to stare I could almost see the blush intensify. I wouldn't be surprised if he was a little backed up from being away for so long… Jimin was reacting way more quickly. Almost instantly.
“L-listen, It’s a waste of time. Just stop messing with me.”
“Really?” I asked mockingly. His eyes were now slowly drifting their attention to me through rapid blinks. Those beautiful eyes I could get lost in. But now isn't the time. My hands wander further under his sweater.
“It wont work. Baby, just stop, I'm trying to work..” Jimin started sounding a little irritated with me. Grabbing my wrist, halting the hand that had been about to reach his chest. Once my hand was held down, I could feel Jimin’s heartbeat. Beating fast in his chest. His body, getting warmer by the second. I let a small grin tug at the corner of my lips. He set the phone down and attempted to shake me off. Pulling my hands out from under his sweater. But he still wasn't saying no. “What has gotten into you? Aish.. Ok ok what.”
“If you really want me to stop, why haven't you stopped me?” Now seeing you all worked up makes me all worked up. I ran through my fiery words. I sat there still on his lap. I flopped my head on one of Jimin's lean shoulders. Fanning my warm breath on him. As I left small kisses across his neck.
“F/N? Are you really ok?” Jimin asked with a sigh, bringing a kind hand to my back. Sitting in silence calming myself down. Inhaling his sweet scent through kisses. All the while soft moans left his lips. I turned my lips into his neck. Pausing for a moment. “Hm? Is everything ok- AGHh!~”
I bit down. Strongly enough to have certainly left a mark. A moan ripped through Jimin’s throat. His body jerked beneath me.
“What are you.. Mng~.. doing. Ah..” Jimin breathed out all over the place. He had enjoyed that more than I was expecting. I’ll use this to my advantage. I continued kissing Jimin’s neck, slowly getting more aggressive. His nails began to dig slightly into my back. “Ok. seriously. please.. Stop..ah..”
He clawed at the back of my shirt. Trying to ‘pull’ me off. Ignoring his whines I continued leaving kisses and marks. Jimin’s hips slowly started moving with mine. Tiny moans and grunts strung out from his mouth. Biting a spot close to Jimin’s ear he stopped his hips.
“F/N d-don't leave marks. The guys will see them.. Ahh. seriously come onn.~” He whined again. Hands sliding up to hold my shoulders. I finally pulled back from his neck and faced him. Face bright red, his shoulders rising and falling from loss of breath. Damn he looked fine. Jimin’s doe eyes scanned mine. Both in hunt of an answer to what it was the other was thinking. Jimin grabbed the hem of his sweater. “Alright alright. You win. I put my phone down. If you.. want to leave marks at the very least do it where no one can see. I don't want the guys to see them..”
After his statement his sweater had been whisked off his form. Showcasing his lean muscle for full display. Mocha colored hair strung about as he pushed it back. The waistband of his boxers now visible. His light denim jeans desperately trying to contain his excitement. My mind in a haze, My hands flew to his waist as I leaned into him again. Leaving soft kisses across Jimin’s ear. Grinding my hips onto him. Doing as he had asked, I kissed his collarbone.
“Ngh- more~” Jimin whined again. Though whining would often bother me. Somehow he made it sexy as all hell. I left stronger kisses leaving darker marks. Jimin’s moans started getting louder and louder. While he slowly got less embarrassed, focussing more on the feeling. That’s when I had an idea. As Jimin was slowly getting more comfortable with these marks, the feeling of me being in control. I removed myself from his form. Getting up and wandering off to his room. “F/N Where are you going? Don't leave me like this~ Dont stop~.”
Jimin cried out from the living room. Slowly footsteps approached behind me. The reason I ran to his room wasn't the comfy bed alone. Rather. The full body mirror he had by the closet. Pulling the mirror a little more in front of the bed, sitting on the end of it. Just then he met me in the room. His lean form showcasing small buds of pink blossom, the result of my hard work. The one larger bite on his lower neck, somehow making me excited. I knew now that Jimin was not going back to that phone anytime soon. I patted the empty space on the bed in front of me with a smile. He flopped down with a sigh, back facing me. I wrapped my legs around his waist instantly. Sort of ‘locking’ him in.
“Ah- What are you doing?”
“ Look ahead~ ” I whispered slyly in his ear. He scoffed until he met his own gaze in the mirror. The gaze in question full of sharp desire. Instantly his hand skimmed over the marks I had been leaving behind. Again Blush flooded his cheeks. Oh fuck he’s so cute. “Oh, wow.. I can see where you’ve kissed me.”
Jimin would usually never let me leave marks on him due to constant camera work. Everything involving ARMY. So I was very surprised how much he was enjoying it right now. Leaning onto his back, tracing his hips as I leaned my head back into his neck. Hot breath fanning him once again. Feeling his body shiver slightly under my touch. Jimin’s gaze was focused straight ahead toward the mirror. Watching both him and I enjoy this heated moment. Sliding my hand down between his thighs. Jimin was hard as all hell. He was enjoying looking at himself in this state. Begging.
“Continue. I wanna watch you mark me. ahh.. Please. Don't stop. Mng~”
(Two days later Jimin’s POV)
“Alright! That’s practice wrapped up for today!” Namjoon called out to everyone. We all sat down on the hardwood floor chugging water, out of breath. All dressed in shorts and T shirts un-like the weather outside. I seriously didn't think we would be doing this so hardcore again so soon. Lying down on the floor arms and legs wide open like a starfish, staring at the bright lights. Sets of footsteps through piles of chatter left the practice studio. Until it was nearly dead silent, besides the huge whirring of the fan. I sat up running my hands through my sweaty hair. In need of a good shower. Getting up with a grunt gathering the last of my things and walking toward the door.
“Having fun huh?” Yoongi inquired.I jumped in response. I didn't even realize he was here. I thought I was alone.
“Having fun? I mean yeah?” I agreed, confused. Yoongi snorted at me.
“What?! What’s funny?”
“If you're trying to hide the fact you have a partner. You might wanna not wear a white shirt to practice.” Yoongi strutted up to me, bag swung over his shoulder. Leaving me alone in the mirror filled room briefly. I looked in one of the many mirrors.
“My tattoos.. You can see them through-” There they were. The remaining hickeys. As well as my face filled with heated blush. I ran out the door after him. “WELL IF YOU'D MIND YOUR OWN BUSINESS HYUNG!”
Yoongi looked back at me with a shrug. Meeting up with the other members in the hall. Their eyes scanned my form as I stood arms wide out. A few were shocked while most of them laughed. I stood there defeated.
“Well, Jimin you’ve been busy since the tour huh?” Jungkook snickered at me.
“Shut your yaps you loners.”
*Yoongi gave Jimin his sweater to cover up*
A/N: Lots of BTS ones to go!
#bts fic#bts x reader#fanfic#bts fanfic#jimin x reader#bts jimin#park jimin#bts jimin fanfic#jiminshiii#jimin park#bts#bts smut#jimin smut#jimin spice
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