Kissing Headcanons Part 7 (Lyney, Neuvillette, Wriothesley)

Previous parts here: 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6

Wriothesley's part is mildly suggestive. Very mildly.

(Reader's gender is not mentioned)

Lyney’s kisses are playful yet charming. He really enjoys sneaking a kiss on your cheek when you’re least expecting it just so he can watch you grow flustered from the sudden act of affection. Mirth dances in his violet eyes as he chuckles at how shy you get when his soft lips press against your cheek. It strokes his ego to be able to get such a reaction out of you with a simple kiss, and he gently teases you about it and pulls you close just to prolong your flustered reaction to his proximity. You’re so wrapped up in keeping up with his flirtatious teasing and playful kisses that you don’t notice the rainbow rose pinned to your front until after Lyney leaves.

The magician also likes to act like a gentleman towards you when he feels particularly romantic. When the mood is right, Lyney gently takes your hand and kisses the back of it while giving you a cheeky wink and a flirty comment about how mesmerizing you are. He loves how this makes your heart skip a beat, so he makes sure to kiss the back of your hand more often. He’s not doing this just to mess with you, but because he genuinely wants to express his feelings of love. Lyney is also fond of giving you kisses in public, but if you are too shy to kiss in front of a crowd, then Lyney holds his hat beside your heads to block you both from view of any onlookers while he gives you a sweet kiss on the lips. The magician is naturally a very physically affectionate person, so he uses any excuse he can to place his hands and lips on you practically anywhere he deems appropriate. You’re the person who holds his heart, and as such, you’re deserving of all the love and affection he can give you at all times. If you’re not into PDA, Lyney tries to respect your comfort and holds himself back, but he hopes you will make up for this deficit by giving him lots of loving in private. He’s just that smitten with you.  

As excellent as Lyney is at flustering you with kisses, you have come to learn that he gets equally as flustered, if not more so when you return the favor. If you spring a surprise kiss on his cheek, he blushes and stares at you with wide eyes, for once at a loss for words, but the ensuing grin spreading on his face tells you that he loves this kind of attention from you and wants more. Give him a surprise kiss on the lips, however, and Lyney’s heart will do somersaults in his chest. He’ll be so flustered that he tries to pull down the brim of his hat so you won’t see how red his face is, especially if you laugh at his embarrassment.

One of Lyney’s favorite types of kisses to receive from you are what he calls “good luck” kisses. Before a major show, Lyney asks you to give him a kiss to serve as a good luck charm so his and Lynette’s show will go without a hitch. When you oblige, Lyney feels a burst of energy and is motivated to give the show his all. Maybe it’s coincidence, or your kisses really do have some sort of magic to them, but you notice that Lyney’s shows tend to go much more smoothly after getting a kiss from you.

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Neuvillette is inexperienced with kissing and initially finds the concept a bit peculiar. After meeting and sharing his first kiss with you, only then does he finally understand why humans often depict kissing as a magical moment in literature and music. Neuvillette harbors deep emotions of love and affection towards you, but he finds himself lacking the proper words to articulate how he feels. That was until he got to kiss you. Kissing gives him a nonverbal way to relay the full extent of the depth of his love for you, as well as feel how much you love him in return. It’s indeed a very intimate and almost magical experience in its own right, or so he believes.

His kisses are simple and are never fierce or aggressive. It’s unlikely you’ll get a passionate or heated kiss from him outside of the bedroom since Neuvillette prefers them to be soft and sweet. His feelings for you are tender, and he thinks it's only right to express them through equally gentle kisses. He presses his lips to yours in a chaste and slow kiss that he holds for a few moments before parting to give you a rare, gentle smile and a gaze full of gentle affection. Neuvillette likes to brush his fingers through your hair or along your cheek while he kisses you, his touch light and careful, almost as if he’s tracing his fingers over porcelain. There’s a fear in the back of his mind that he might hurt you. He’s not human unlike you, and comparatively possesses greater strength. This fear is partially one of the reasons he kisses you so gently, the other reason being that he has a gentlemanly disposition and enjoys a more tender and sweet expression of affection.

Neuvillette’s favorite places to kiss you are on your lips, but also your forehead and hand. He kisses your forehead if you’re feeling tired or sad as a way to comfort you, though he also does it when he thinks you are cute while talking about the things you love or while chatting with the Melusines. As for kisses to your hands, the Iudex likes to give you those whenever he makes a promise to you. It’s as if he’s sealing the deal with a kiss on your palm, thus making the promise more real. However, he also kisses your hands as a gentle coercion to get you to take breaks if he thinks you’ve been pushing yourself too hard. All his kisses exude a sense of gentleness and care because that’s exactly how Neuvillette feels about you.

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The Duke prefers to kiss you only in private. Though he’s well-respected in the Fortress of Meropide, Wriothesley is well aware he has a few enemies, and he doesn’t want anyone to hurt you as a way to try and get to him. As such, he reserves all his affection for you when you’re alone together. He exchanges short pecks with you throughout the day when he gets the chance, though his preferred way of kissing you is to press his lips firmly to yours in a heated make-out. Wriothesley tends to wrap a strong arm around your waist or press a palm on your back to pull you flush against him while his lips capture yours in a long, deep kiss that leaves both of you breathless.

His kisses aren’t rushed, but they can be intense if he’s been craving you throughout the day. Wriothesley deepens the kiss by cradling the back of your head and angling it just right so he can slip his tongue inside your mouth more comfortably. He feels a strong desire to be as close to you as possible, to hold you in his arms and kiss you senseless particularly when he’s been missing you or if he’s feeling frisky. He gets quite touchy during such moments; his hands rub over your back and card through your hair while he trails kisses from your mouth to your jaw, and then lower still to your neck. You are like a drug that soothes all his worries, and he simply can't get enough which is why he can be a bit clingy if he hasn't seen you for a while.

The Duke can also be a bit of a menace when his playful side rears its head. As if the heated make-out wasn’t enough to leave you flushed and breathless, there are times when Wriothesley playfully nips at your lips and carefully takes your bottom lip between his teeth and gives it a gentle tug. It’s really hot in the moment, and he loves how your eyes cloud over with bliss when he does that, but the aftermath of his actions can sometimes be a problem. Your lips swell from the kissing and biting Wriothesley subjects them to, so it becomes very obvious just what you were doing with him in his office, which could potentially sabotage the secret of your relationship. You can only glare at him as he calls on Sigewinne to come and treat your lips to reduce the swelling, all the while looking more smug than apologetic about the fact. At least he has the decency not to leave hickeys on your neck when you’re not in the bedroom.

Aside from the heated make-outs, Wriothesley likes to get cheek kisses from you as a morning greeting or right before the two of you part ways to start your day. It gives him married couple vibes and a sense of domesticity he didn’t know he craved until you became lovers. Getting a kiss on the cheek from you brightens his day, and he walks around with a pleased smile on his face. The other inmates and guards notice the Duke’s smile, but they can only guess what made him so happy so early in the morning. Only Wriothesley knows the truth, and he looks forward to the end of the day when he will get to spend more time showering you in kisses.

I'll gladly walk right into the Fortress of Meropide myself, but in my defense, Lady Furina should be insulted that the majority of her people couldn't even make that guess as quickly as I did.

They're all pretending it's tricky, because that means they're delighted when they figure out the answer, which means they're delighted by her

Anyway have fun trying to thaw the frost in Wriothesley's heart or whatever, because I'm saving all my sympathy for the poor Melusine whose job it is to write one of these riddles for every single Steambird edition. (If the front page is boring, Furina flips straight to the puzzle section, and if she's unimpressed, heads will roll.)

William Shakespeare and Bisexuality

Now, I would like to preface this by saying that we couldn’t possibly know how William Shakespeare himself would identify, and obviously the term “bisexual” was not coined and used until much later. When discussing historical figures sexuality, it gets very tricky with labels. However, if we look at whether or not William fit into the category “bisexual”- that is to say, if he was attracted to two or more genders- that is a question we can attempt to discuss.

Due to the rampant homophobia of society, traces of anyone that wasn’t heterosexual were attempted to be scrubbed away. That combined with the extreme lack of information about Shakespeare’s personal life means that it isn’t likely we will ever find a blatant “I like guys” confession. Shakespeare did, however, explore many gay themes in his works. Though of course straight men can explore gay themes, even modern day straight men are just getting into that. Back then, in a society where being openly gay was heavily looked down upon, not to mention many men didn’t even write strong female characters? It seems… unlikely that a straight playwright would have so many gay themes. And let’s add in his sonnets- my favorites! 1 through 126 are dedicated to the “Fair Youth”- often called Mr. W.H. This man is suspected to be Henry Wriothesley, the Earl of Southampton. A lusty, bisexual earl, whose initials were reversed to protect his identity. He was the dedicatee of Venus & Adonis and other poems. However, this hasn’t been proven and people also say W.H might not even be the Fair Youth in the first place. Because we don’t have super solid evidence for either, I’m just going to refer to the Fair Youth as that.

The famous sonnet, Sonnet 18 (Shall I compare thee to a summer’s day) was included in these. Yep, one of the most famous romantic sonnet was possibly written as a love letter to a guy he liked. Now, of course, these could have been written from the viewpoint of another person, not Will himself. But one, I doubt it, and two, like I said, writing 126 gay sonnets as a straight guy? Seems pretty sketchy. I’m on to you, Bill.

Let’s look at some especially convincing sonnets- I’m personally gonna skip 1 through 17, because they are literally all. About. Kids. William really wanted the Fair Youth to have some kids so his beauty would be preserved. It’s all he talked about until Sonnet 18. Sonnet 20- the basic idea? Something like, “you’re super hot like a girl. You have a dick, though. But I don’t care that much.” This sonnet is kinda sexist, but it gets the point across. He also calls the Fair Youth “the master-mistress of my passion”, which honestly seems like something you would call your genderfluid lover. This one is very hard to deny- it’s obvious what it’s about, and it would make zero sense of it was written from the viewpoint of a women- plus, it’d still be pretty bisexual. And if you bring up it could be another man’s viewpoint- see above.

In sonnet 26, he calls the Fair Youth the “Lord of my love”, which is honestly super sweet. In sonnet 30, he talks about being super depressed (basically, I’m paraphrasing here,) but then goes on to say that when he thinks of the Fair Youth, he is able to recover. Honestly? Same, Will, thinking of cute people always helps me out of a depression spiral. In sonnet 40, he says love a lot. He also begins to talk about how the Fair Youth and Will’s mistress are sleeping together, which makes him sad, but he forgives him. In sonnet 53, he says “describe Adonis, and the counterfeit is poorly imitated after you. On Helen’s cheek all art of beauty set, And you in Grecian tires are painted new.” If you can’t read the Early Modern English, here’s No Fear Shakespeare’s translation: “If an artist tries to depict Adonis, he’ll wind up creating an inferior imitation of you. If he were to paint Helen as beautifully as possible, he would again wind up with a picture of you, decked out in Greek costume.” In my mind, it is pretty gay to describe your crush as prettier than Adonis and Helen, two bangin’ Greeks. Helen literally started a war cause she was so pretty. So that’s a pretty nice compliment.

I know what some may be saying- “Jane!” You cry, “I’m sure these are just platonic, no-homo love sonnets!” But are you, dear reader, telling me that Sonnet 18 is platonic? That “Lord of my love” is platonic? That calling the Fair Youth “love” repeatedly platonic? Are you honestly telling me that, were these not about a man, and instead a woman, you would still call them platonic? If but a woman was called “Lady of my love”, people would be swooning and saying how romantic it was. But the moment it’s gay? All romance is evaporated. This, readers, is heteronormativity- the idea that being heterosexual is the norm, it’s the base, that people are “hetero until proven otherwise.” This viewpoint makes people act like we need 5 eyewitness to William Shakespeare sucking a dick to truly call bisexual (not to mention that most people ignore the idea of bisexuality, but we’ll get to that eventually.) Instead, look at William like a blank slate- he obviously loved women, the Dark Lady sonnets (all sonnets after 126), prove that. But, as a Certified Bisexual myself, I can say that just because I like girls doesn’t mean that I don’t like guys. And just scrolling through, we can see there's definitely some attraction between the narrator and the Fair Youth. Now, yes, this all depends on if the sonnets are written from William’s viewpoint. People claim them to be a writing exercise, though this doesn’t explain the 17 sonnets solely devoted to begging the Fair Youth to have kids. If it is a writing exercise, why are all of them seemingly told about the same person from the same point of view? As a writer, that seems… strange. Not to mention the fact that Shakespeare seemed to find these very private, and though I’m sure most artists don’t publish their exercises, the fact he didn’t want them to be known at all is strange. Writing about gays a a straight man back then would be weird, but writing sonnets to a gay lover? That’s how you die, sir.

It is the opinion of most scholars that these sonnets are autobiographical. If this is true, which I and many other, smarter people believe, than this is the closest we get to and insight on his personal life and, more importantly (at least, for this essay), his sexuality.

“Alright, Jane, if this is all so obvious, why isn’t it fact?” Well, dear counter argument, due to previously-stated heteronormativity and the fact that we don’t have any rock solid evidence, we can’t say anything for absolute sure. Not to mention the fact that many people often ignore bisexuality as an argument. If you say “William might have been a smidge… gay,” people can jump in and fire back “But he liked women!” This bisexual erasure isn’t only annoying and hurtful but also makes this whole issue more mysterious than I think it needs to be. Bisexual men often like women. Bisexual men often marry women. William Shakespeare’s attraction to women isn’t a counter argument to his bisexuality, it’s just showing that he definitely played for one team, and most likely the other! Another issue is that people act as though a bisexual historical figure is amazing. The idea that LGBT people have existed before modern labels. Shocking! But that’s an idiotic statement. People haven’t gotten gayer, the world has gotten clearer. People stopped hiding, and started inventing communities and identities and started to be proud. There are so, so many LGBT people throughout history- you just have to try and spot them. Acting as if we are a modern invention is hurtful and erases our rich and history and identity. If there were gays in Ancient Greece, then I’m sure as Hell there were gays in the 15th century. We didn’t take a break.

As stated before, we probably will never be able to say for sure, until I either go back in time or see him in the possible afterlife. Both of those, by the way, are in my top 5 goals of life. Regardless, the evidence we currently have seems to make a pretty convincing case, and we might even find more evidence as time goes on! A couple days ago, I was listening to a Podcast, Shakespeare and Contemporary Theory. They had one on q*eer theory, so obviously I had to listen. A woman who works at a Pennsylvania and was writing a book on q*eer theory was talking. I really enjoyed the episode, and I especially like this quote: “If Shakespeare’s work isn’t q*eer, I don’t know what is.” She also mentioned that to read his work as only straight is to “misread the plays and misread the historical moment.” If you want more information on the subject (and told by a smarter person), I beg that you check it out. If you take anything from this essay, take this: Shakespeare’s work was, at least, filled with gay themes. And when you are in the 15th century, putting gay themes in your plays and writing 156 gay sonnets? It doesn’t scream heterosexual.