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thatdeadaquarius · 1 year

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it's almost 4am i can't get this out of my head holy shit.

reader whose original body is a literal eldritch forest deity and speaks in hymns (bonus points: after we isekai into said og body, we mix slang into it).

the acolytes have to break their fucking necks just to talk to you eye-to-eye, and the only thing they can make out of what you say is something equal to tablets bajillion years old already.

or that reader is constantly cussing and the acolytes just nod along not understanding whatever this 15ft tall eldritch horror is saying.

-🫀

ELDRITCH HORROR READER. I LIVEEE, NONE OF U UNDERSTAND, THIS IS SO DEEPLY AHHHHHH

I LITERALLY JUST SHIMMY STIM IN MY SEAT WHEN I THINK ABT THIS TOO LONG LMAO

i LIVE AND BREATHE for when we look like eldritch horrors but are just people lmao

IF I HAVEN’T RUN U OFF, 🫀 MY HEART, MI CORAZON <3

U HAVE A BEAUTIFUL MIND DESPITE BEING A BLOODY HEART

☆

Sun: Gender Neutral Reader (they/them only), Eldritch!Reader

Planet: Misc. Genshin AUs

Orbit: some headcanons, tiny scenario

Stars: a little bit of Zhongli, Xiao, Ganyu, Ningguang, Keqing, and the adepti

Comets & Meteors: Content Warnings: Light Description of Body Modifications/Body Horror-esque, Light Description of Eldritch Horror Creature, Reader has a Non-Human Body,

& Trigger Warnings: Eldritch Monster, Light Body Horror, Non-Con Body Modifications (Wake up as a monster, described as positive).

FUCKING LOVE THIS GIF, AND THIS SONG AND ARTISTTT

hey so here’s a song to listen I was listening to while writing this, chose the instrumental bc it was less distracting!

👉👈 hope u like :)

you just come into Teyvat from either Enkanomiya, the straight up Abyss/Dark Realm or even Celestia/Light Realmunder that glowing mushrooms tree in the Chasm, or like, ooo even by the upside down Barbatos statue 👀

and its great bc ur like- “omg Teyvat ooooo, ahhhh”

meanwhile the animals/magical creatures/beings nearby like shakin in their boots

literally no matter what land type their in, water, air, etc. they’re all bowing (despite the hooves, the paws, the flippers, the wings,) hell, even the bugs?? Might be bowing???

and you were slow to wake up wherever you were, so it took you a second to really process-

plus it just felt so weirdly, natural?

Not like walking on 2 legs no, but more like, how swimming feels but without the act of doing it?

you realize you’re… hovering.

wow, guess you can do that now,

your pretty much crowned with every flower from the regions of Teyvat, and a few from other Realms like Celestia, Abyss, and Enkanomiya, etc.

you have extra limbs, you feel them shift like you’ve had them all your life, even tho you do smack urself a few times with them lmao (new hand-eye coordination is hard)

and you realize u can see elemental traces/elements of beings, even plants, all the time now?

It isn’t until you look into a pretty still pond that you see what you look like,

you’ve got more eyes

I mean u thought you’d just be one of the twins, or ur own person if somebody asked u what youd look like isekaied to Genshin Impact, not what looks like the elemental god of the fucking continent

but you don’t look bad! actually you think you look kinda neat!

You’ve got like this coat of many draping vines and plantlife, glowing coral poking out near the top that’s around your throat, and- is that- tiny waterfalls?? Running down your nature cape too??

the many gemstones and ore of this planet form your legs, strong and taller than even regular human guys back on Earth, you’re like what? Eight? Nine feet? (about 245cm, or 2.5 meters)

You’re head… it’s like a dragons skull?? You’ve got these black horns flowing out from the top too that fade to a golden glow, like a crown nearly, theyre draped with what looks like strings of primogems??

oh and your extra eyes are symmetrical that’s good!

tho it does seem like you got this handy hood included into your cape of much nature to flop onto your head

where your heart should be, there’s two bursting stars circling one another, one of pink, purples and light blues, the other of gold and blue, oh hey, the wishing stars for standard and character banners!

and if you like mushrooms, at least one of every kind in Teyvat’s countries/regions is looking cool on ur cape, and if you like bugs, the cool ones like the rhino beetles from inazuma are being cute little buddies on ur stuff too

and like in the gif, every step you take overfills with life, except it stays and doesn’t wither like above, and it also does that glow bit that some places in Sumeru do/Enkanomiya

You CANNOT be missed no matter where you walk, and your sort of constantly feeling like you’ve drank 3 energy + 5 espresso shots of coffee

but in a way that makes you sort of full? like full on life… and like you could be even bigger, and taller, if you willed it

♤

k but the adepti felt ur presence coming in hot from literal mountains away

Cloud Retainter, and Guizhong, had set up inventions long ago to sense the Original of Teyvat, just in case, because some signs of prophecy of your return had begun to show in their lands

Zhongli especially knew you were close to come after another major sign was met, the corruption after the Archon War, and the ravaging of the land by the fall of Khaenri’ah’s “metal beasts”

So when you finally walk your way into Jueyun Karst, the adepti are already waiting, Xiao, Ganyu, and Zhongli as well,

Luckily Ganyu, with Zhongli’s help or advice, convinced the adepti to share this meeting with the Qixing as well like Keqing, and the Tianquan herself

It was a momentous occasion after all, but you were just now feeling the need to maybe nap a little after nearly, what was it, 2 weeks worth of constant walking?

wow this new body had literal stamina for days

you arrived late into the night, around midnight, under a full moon, and they’re relieved all the signs are being met

◇

honestly the only reason you headed to Liyue was bc you knew it was the closest (the map of Teyvat was both familiar in the way it had been in game, but also on a deeper level, like walking around your house in the dark)

and u rlly wanted to be able to talk to somebody, bc u had no idea?? wtf you were??

honestly you thought the adepti/Zhongli would be a good bet bc they’d maybe tell u what creature u ended up as,

u did suspect maybe you’d ended up as some kind of god, but like?? none of the other gods looked like this???

and u see them all! up ahead in Jueyun Karst! Oh no! You really, really, really, hope they don’t think you’re a walking talking evil tree dragon thing-

…maybe you should wave?

◇

As you get closer,

Xiao’s back straigtens, Ganyu nervously looks at the ground, Keqing is trying to figure out where to look bc ur so tall, Ningguang has her hands respectfully folded in front of her and her facial muscles looks tensed for a fight almost, the adepti are shuffling nervously bc they’re not used to being the magically weaker/younger creatures in the area, and Zhongli-

Zhongli is no longer the mortal Zhongli.

Amber horns curl up from his head, long brunette hair with glowing gold tips flowing and loose, claws on display, as he stands in his finest and oldest lóng páo, black with gold detailing embroidered throughout, it details his deeds as Rex Lapis and Morax, the spears of his vanquishing gods across the front and back, he looks like a living painting

and although he looks as serene as if he’s about to sit down for some tea, the adepti can see the tremoring hands, the same he used to hide in his sleeves when he was genuinely intimidated by another god, usually the older ones he’d had to fight

but for the first time since the archon war, this was one he was going to welcome with open arms, and utmost respect, despite his position as archon forfeited

there’s a strange music in the air of the night as the animals and the bugs and creatures of the realm subtly make the beat, the god’s feet (of ore Rex Lapis hasn’t seen since he was a child, it was so rare to find) shake the earth of his land with each step, a deep quiet booming like a drum of war as they get closer

The God of All stops some distance away from them

…and the Huangdi of All, just waves. 💀👋

at Zhongli, the adepti, Xiao, the Tianquan, and the Qixing.

A long black limb with a rainbow shine like a crow’s wing raises, gives an ironically tiny wave of their clawed black hand,

and tilts their head, though a sort of greenery hood covering it

and speaks,

“ ˙˙˙ʎzɐɹɔ sı ʇıɥs sıɥʇ ¿ʍou ʇɥƃıɹ ɯɐ ı ʞɔnɟ ǝɥʇ ʇɐɥʍ ʍouʞ sʎnƃ noʎ op uɯɐp”

your voice is like singing, deep, high, like a choir trying to sing all at once to them

Xiao cringes a little in surprise, he was braced for your older speech just in case but it still caught him off guard, and unfortunatly, he gives a quick glance to Lord Rex Lapis,

he can’t understand any of that, and Ganyu and Keqing are in the same boat, but while the Yaksha’s only done passive studying in hopes of understanding you, the Lord of Geo had gone much further back in trying to make sure he could understand your words, should the day come, his library, even now living as a mortal, is extensive

the other adepti and Ningguang catch a few words, but it’s too,, simple really, to understand

the words have no context, they need more, but such is the ancients, they’re meanings simple and all-encompassing

Lord Rex Lapis bows deeply,

“We welcome you with open arms, our Huangdi. Please, feast your eyes upon the land with which I have wrought with mine own talons, for all is ever truly yours.”

the adepti announces for them all, voice giving away no nerves, Xiao can still understand him luckily, though he has greatly simplified himself for the sake of being understood by the ancient god of creation,

“ ˙˙˙ʞɔıʇs ɐ uo ʇsıɹɥɔ snsǝɾ ¡¿ılƃuoɥz noʎ uǝʌǝ ¿noʎ oʇ poƃ ɟo puıʞ ǝɯos ɯ,ı 'ǝʇnuıɯ uɯɐp ɐ ʇıɐʍ”

your voice is an energy through the air, and makes the trees nearby lean in to hear you better, the creeks and ponds of the area leave their beds a little to get closer, geo crystalflys emerge and begin to swirl around your natural body, perching on your horns, making it look even more like a crown

Xiao gulps.

Rex Lapis’ and Ningguang’s spines straighten further if they even can from the impeccable posture they were before, They share a quick glance…

…neither of them caught that one, only a few words, and Ganyu feels her shoulders drop as she gives up trying to hear you and understand as well,

you make a strange sound, a high humming, a deep confusion with some worry, the crystalflys buzz around you a little faster,

then point to yourself

...and make a peace sign. ✌️

it was going to be a long night.

☆

idk if this made any sense, and I sincerely hope that you at least liked what I wrote a little bit, sorry about the over description 😭 I just felt like it was very important but then I realized I hadn’t even talked about the language yet… anyway here u go LMAO

I hope it was alright, and I seriously love your idea, even if I didn’t take it in the direction you wanted/as cool as you meant!! :/

Thanks for the badass idea, i fucking love eldritch shit <3

☆

Safe Travels,

💀 ♒

♡my beloved♡

@karmawonders / @0rah-s / @randomnatics / @glxssynarvi / @nexylaza / @genshin-impacts-me / @wholesomey-artist / @thedevioussmirk

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saturnville · 5 months

Text

in the dirty south.

pairing: cowboy!coriolanus snow x black fem oc. warnings: old slang, sexual innuendo, flirting, sorta forbidden infatuation if you blink. shy!oc. content: while at a town fair with her family, delilah finds herself heavily infatuated with the new face in town. an: the people have spoken. cowboy!coriolanus is here. definitely called on my grandmother's southern roots for this so be prepared. I don't know who started cowboy!coriolanus, but all respect and credit to the individual who did. please let me know what y'all think of this!

tags: @snowlandsontopp @babyzzlove @hlstead @rosewine-5 @unicornqueen05 @thegabbyh @neeville @fastlikealambo @urfavesim to keep your spot on the tag list, you are expected to interact!

Outside visiters were not a common occurance the city. The town was small and everybody knew everybody. One would be a fool to think anything that occured in their lives wouldn't be common knowledge to the inhabitants of the town. She wished she had the same type of delusion.

Once every few months, the mayor of the town found it suitable to host a fair. Something to ease the growing tensions between the families and to usher in a type of fun no one had seen since the rebellions took place.

She wouldn't say she didn't enjoy the fairs, but she knew there were other ways to spend her time aside from handing out freshly baked slices of poundcake and a cup of milk, courtesy of her mother and grandmother.

"Delilah! It's time to go, baby." Her mother's voice was rough like gravel yet soothing like silk. Everyone called her comparison foolish, as they didn't understand. But, until they felt the way her words calmed their soul like a newborn being rocked by its mother, they never would.

Delilah hollered back, "Comin', mama!" She stood in front of the mirror--dingy and stained from being passed down from her great-great-grandmother, and so short that she had to stand on her toes to see her full outfit. Her hands swiped over the fabric of her dress. It was new; her grandmother spent 3 weeks making it. A corset dress as bright as the dust that left her shoulders exposed to the kisses of the sun. She smiled at her reflection and pushed her hair away from her face. She shoved her feet into her boots and ran down the stairs.

Delilah questioned if they arrived late or if everyone else arrived early in anticipation. She bobbed and weaved through the sea of black and brown with a smile on her face. Small "pardon mes" and "excuse mes" poured from her lips like water as she attempted not to knock anyone over with her basket.

She followed her mother like a lost puppy to their assigned tent. Right next to Uncle Turner's barbeque restauraunt and the bathroom. Perfect, she said to herself. Lucille dropped the basket against the wood table and began plucking out the tablecloth and napkins.

"Lilah, I'm gon' grab some pitchers of water inside Turner's. I'll be back shortly." Mama's lips turned upward with a soft smile. Delilah nodded and continued her setting up the table.

Beads of sweat gathered at her forehead and her brown skin stung under the gaze of a burning sun. God, she hoped they wouldn't be outside for 10 hours like they were the last time. She couldn't sworn she melted like an ice cream cone within an hour.

Delilah hummed a church hymn to herself and tossed the basket behind her. She plopped down on the ragged bench and crossed her legs just as her mother taught her years ago, folded her hands over her lap, and watched as people walked passed.

People watching was one of her favorite pasttimes. To her left was a young girl riding on her wooden rocking horse, squealing with glee. To her right was a group of young boys tackling each other to the ground as their mother hollered for them to quit roughhousing. Delilah giggled.

She raised her eyes and jerked backward when she saw a group of men walking past. Four of them to be exact. Three were familiar faces: Elijah, Malachi, and Ezra. The boys whom she grew up with. They used to sleep in the same bed together when their mothers worked at the restaurant late at night. But, there was another one she'd never seen before.

He was unfamiliar. There were a few white boys sprinkled here and there, but in her town, it wasn't a frequent occurance. He seemed comfortable, too, with a boyish smirk on his face as he made the boys' head fly back with glee.

She could tell his hands were strong by the way they latched around the harness that allowed him to control the beautiful horse he rode upon. She looked around and saw other women eyeing the stranger. Who was he?

The man slid off the horse and tied the harness against a stake, and followed the men as they approached her mother's tent. His eyes were curious as they examined his surroundings. Delilah brushed the loose curls away from her face and smiled. "Hi, boys."

A series of disgruntled greetings came from them as they padded around the bench to engulf Delilah in a hug. The stranger stayed in front of her, eyes narrow.

"Where's Mama?" Elijah asked. His green eyes searched for the middle-aged woman.

"She's in Turner's getting some water. Might as well help her while you're lookin' for her," Delilah suggested with a shrug. She could feel icy eyes on her. "She'll mess around and drop them tryin' to do the most. Go catch up to her."

"Delilah," said Malachi. "This is Coriolanus. We, uh, we go back. Old friends. We're gon' help, Mama, but Lilah, don't scare him off." Delilah met his eyes. "I won't."

The boys shuffled off to the restaurant to find her mother, which left Delilah in the presence of Coriolanus. It was unique. She'd never heard anything like it. It sounded prestigious, elite.

He was handsome. Messy curls underneath his hat. Strong stature covered by a thick long-sleeve shirt and vest. Her gaze dropped to his belt. Brown with a holster that held, what she assumed was, a fully loaded pistol. And his boots, worn, dirty, and scuffed, just like hers. A country boy.

"Delilah. Nice to meet you, Mr. Coriolanus." Delilah extended her hand slowly. Coriolanus turned his head to the side. Her hands were slender and her nailbeds were painted a blood red. His tongue danced over his tooth.

"No need for that, darling. Nice to meet you," he replied, gently shaking her hand. His hand was much bigger in hers. Calloused like he wrestled animals in the wilderness. Strong like they'd hold her body upright with ease. His eye contact was strong and he could feel it melting her chocolate orbs away.

When he spoke, she noticed that his accent was nowhere as thick as her own, but a southern twang was laced in his words. Almost like he'd been taught. "Where are you from?" To keep herself from getting weak in the knees, she decided to start setting out the serving ware for the cake. Coriolanus' eyes followed her every action.

"Up north," he replied shortly. "Got in a bit of a mess. Decided to come down south for a while."

Delilah hummed and pulled the lid off the poundcake. Its glaze glistened underneath the sun. Just like her. Coriolanus chuckled to himself. "Do you like it?" She looked up at him through her eyelids.

She was so beautiful. He'd seen his fair share of pretty women since being placed in a new District. But she, Lord, this Delilah was something different. She was short in stature with strong shoulders and hips that were not well hidden beneath her dress. She had a cute smile that was covered by full, cherry colored lips. And her hair, so coily and full in a bun upon her head.

Coriolanus ran his tongue over his bottom lip and nodded. "I like it a lot."

Delilah detected the tone of his voice and fought the urge to smile. "I'm glad that's the case."

It was difficult for Delilah to keep her eyes off Coriolanus. Where he moved, her eyes followed. When he spoke to another woman and charmed her with his smile and bright eyes, she felt a twing of jealousy hit. Then, she'd call herself foolish for even being the slightest bit possessive over a man she'd only known for five hours.

She did her best to keep herself preoccupied with the poundcake in front of her. It worked for the most part, until the bench wobbled by the weight of another. Delilah turned to her left and found Coriolanus leaned against the side. "Can I join you, pretty?"

Pretty. Delilah's body warmed as she nodded. Coriolanus swung his leg over the side of the bench and took a seat. His clothed thigh brushed against her exposed once, causing her leg to jump slightly. He noticed, but chose not to say anything.

"You enjoying the fair?" Coriolanus asked.

"Yeah. It's always a fun time. Plus the food is great, too." She raised her fork that held a piece of cake on it. "Have you tried the poundcake? My mama makes the best ever."

Coriolanus shook his head. Delilah gathered a piece on the fork and held it out with the intention for him to pluck it off, but she was shocked when his full lips wrapped around the edge of the fork. His eyes were trained on hers. A gasp fell from her lips.

He hummed softly. "Delicious." He prepared to spur her on further, finding amusement in her disheveled state, but was called back by Elijah. "I'm comin'!. Save some for me later, darlin'. I'll see you later, alright?"

Delilah nodded and bit her lip. "Alright."

He threw her a wink and walked away. He was far from done with her.

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recklessfiction · 1 year

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Keep an Eye Out As You Travel West

You see a church, you just keep on walking. Most are abandoned anyhow, nothing left in 'em but the hollowed out husks of their priests. The rest have been filled by now; old pretenders, zealots, and self proclaimed prophets snatching up any man fool enough to worship. And that's if you're lucky. There are older things, other things that have curled up amidst the altars of the Lord like worms in dirt. If you're wanting to do any worshiping, best do it out under the sky.

There're things that roam the dust, figures of men with eyes deader than any corpse and smiles as bright and pretty as a lady's. They come around sometimes, always trying to pawn off some bizarre thing; elaborate crowns made of rusted nails, gold lockets with strange portraits inside, letters that can't be read without getting a deep pounding in your head, and keys rusted with so much blood it'd be a wonder if they turned anything at all. Now, I've seen what comes for folks who trade with them and I'll tell you this. Wherever they got their goods, it sure as shit wasn't from here.

You'll be hearing now about the "Oil Baptisms," I'm sure. Black sea water dredged up from some abyss, thicker than any water I've ever seen and you can smell it long a mile away. They say it gives people "the sight" but of what I can't say. All I know is that once you start smelling that briny shit on the wind, the screaming don't start long after.

Be careful what deals you make out here. There're plenty of strange folk who would be more than glad to work you down to the bone and long after, too. Work is work, crops need harvesting, graves need digging, meat needs carving, and idols need worshiping. Watch your words and read your contracts, else you might just be stuck washing the feet of the righteous until doomsday.

Best stay indoors once night comes, that's when a lot of the "families" start movin' out. They take to the roads, long lines of them, a parade of the ugliest sons of bitches you've ever seen. In the daylight, their skin never fits quite right and stinks to high heaven but once the sun dips past the trees, they start taking it off. They move from place to place, sloughing off their decayed flesh and stealing new off any traveler they come across. Lock your doors and put out your lights before they coming knocking on your door, asking sweetly, "Do you have anything I could wear?"

I am of the opinion that the woods ought not be traversed by folk who ain't been called there. Keep to the roads and towns, there's enough foul mess there if it's strangeness you're looking for. But what's in the woods has always been in the woods and if you pass the treeline with no business being there, well. The woods will give you business.

While a useful tool, a gun won't save you from drowning in the bathtub of a family of fanatic prognosticators, or from having your skin torn clean off by the night sky. Keep your ears up for any kind of protection you can get and learn to speak well because a lot of smart talk can get you out of a whole mess of trouble.

Keep on moving, friend. If you're looking to survive this trek, don't stop for anything, not even to bury the dead or feed the starving. It ain't worth what'll catch you, cause there's always things waiting for a fella to slow down so's they can get their claws in faster, deeper. You wanna be stuck here, in the fields and the dirt, under the big sky while hymns are burned into your skull? No?

Then keep on moving.

#southern gothic #gothic americana #midwest gothic #american gothic #horror #Christianity #religion #religious horror #can you tell i've been playing a lot of red dead redemption lately #im on a cowboy kick #what to do #my writing

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drunkwhenimadethis · 3 months

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In the white lucid morning, glowing still with rain and winter scent, I committed myself to you again, secretly, in silence. Love—eternal, devotional—rose its perfumed head. Calm ecstatic hymns drown out the emptiness that I had, up until the last moment, been perceiving as caused by you. And warm sensations rise like spring river water thawing out to wash over the pain I had thought you were giving me. Regardless of the black countryside and your wild snorting horse and your endless drawing of swords, I will no longer permit a dark word against you, I will not allow my inner flock of vultures to hunt hungrily for your decay. For you alone I am not who I once was. For you alone I find no joy in battle. For you alone I wait for the dance of war to dwindle. I recognize and protect your weaknesses which call for such rigid strategies, I see the logic in your once incomprehensible stance. I love you also when you wear that mask of blood and when you disguise your heavenly scent with bad behaviors. There is a cost that comes with loving a soldier of this world. Our land is full of thunder and you are the one I watch shyly, recognizing, awe-overflowing, that you do not want to fight but it is all that you know, and so go. I remain here, affections transforming into humble duty, preparing your ointments and your stew. I will remain alive feeding on meat and memory’s warm liquids, listening to the musical tones of nature, imagining that it is your harsh voice somewhere over the mountain ranges that commands the winds to move in such a magical direction.

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mambalae-s · 1 year

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fallen glory — ushijima wakatoshi x reader

wc: 3.2k words

cw: god! wakatoshi x nymph! reader; unprotected sex; breeding kink; size kink; wakatoshi is a big boi; reader is described as a black woman; degradation; manhandling; ; creampie; not proof read; if i’m forgetting anything please let me know!

notes from author: please, if you’re under 18, do NOT interact with or read this post. i will block you.

there are legends among mortal towns, the tellings of stories passed on by flesh and bone. a god, mankind will utter through shrouds of smoke, beneath fire-lit nights of centuries old, where the stars would even hold their breath to hear the words of divine destruction. a god so mighty and fearsome that wields power in his breath alone, that the earth would tear herself apart and offer her burning heart, that she would so desperately beseech her master that this mere sacrifice would be enough to please him. mankind would sing those sorrow-filled ballads of flaming rivers that sputtered brilliant embers, so brilliant in their dying glory that venus herself would weep and beg for mercy.

and this god, oh, this righteous and almighty god, his heart would mirror the depths of darkness. how cruel, this god, that he would beckon the tempests and the floods to destroy and ruin the earth, that he would paint wars and famine across endless seas and planes until there would be nothing left of man. when he bestows his wrath on bellowing thunders and rips the heavens asunder with magnificent lightning, he holds no mercy for the weak and unfaithful. his eyes behold, and his left hand cast their judgement, and the earth can do nothing but wait with bated breath as the universe stands still around her, powerless, and without charge of the pestilence that would next consume her and wipe her filthy soul clean once more.

oh, but who could imagine the divine’s demise at the hands of a damsel?

let these words not travel far, lest they spread across continents and reveal him for what he is. let the world not know of his mortality, of a heart that quivers before summer-touched evenings and sings wretched hymns of manly lust and desire. of his visits to the holy garden, they must not learn, even less should they know of the soul that resides there — the very same that would tame the tempest, and incite a hunger so ravenous and feral only to quench it all the same.

he’s here; you know without even looking, and your intuition tells you that he knows that you know. you don’t need to look behind you to know that wakatoshi’s watching you, eyes of gold and olive that stalk you like a hunter. he takes in every part of your image as a devotee does with visions. the droplets of water that glisten across dark brown skin, the sheer white fabric that clings to your full mounds and ass, barely doing anything to conceal your perked nipples, or the dip between your plush thighs. by the heavens, you truly are a vision of sin and desire — one that held the key to destruction between two-toned lips and written like scriptures among dark coils of hair akin to sacred vines.

“well?” you sigh, sinking further into the pond. the cool water kisses your skin with a tenderness that washes away the day’s searing heat. goosebumps rise across your body and you lull your head to the side, and that’s when you see him, your god come here to visit the garden of eden. “will you just stand there or are you gonna join me?”

how brazen, you must’ve sounded, irreverent as if you knew not the god who’d walked into your sanctuary. yet you knew all too well who he was, and you knew what he’d come for. you knew that, just with the sight of your body drenched in water, you could unravel this benevolent god and reduce him to nothing but a man lost in desire. since the first day he found you here on a lonely spring’s afternoon so many years ago, you’d somehow wrapped his tongue between your teeth and poisoned him with pleasure untold so that he would return time and time again. he reminds you of a lunatic, seeking the taste of your nectar like a man who knows nothing else, and you’d become his drug and his achilles heel, the very thing that could unwind this god and render him to nothingness.

the waters part to make way, welcoming wakatoshi into the pool as he comes close to you. his body presses against yours and he leaves no room between, so greedy in the way his fingers dip into your waist and burying his face into the crook of your neck to take in your scent. you reach up one hand to wrap into his long, jade green locks, and you pull him closer to you, eager to feel his lips leaving soft kisses across your skin.

“i can’t stop thinking about you…” he grumbles into your jawline, hungry and impatient. his fingers wrap into the thin fabric of your gown, nails digging into your flesh as he pulls you closer, pressing his hard cock into your ass as if he wants it to disappear between it. “fuck, what are you doing to me?”

you can’t help the soft moan that escapes your lips, though you know there’d be no sense trying to. coyly, you reach for one of his hands and bring it down to your pussy, pressing his palm flat against it and pushing yourself further against his length. “nothing, darling.” the words that leave you are teasing, almost to test him — accentuated by your sugary laugh when his fingers begin to peel your dress against your skin without you needing to tell him. “it’s you who keeps coming back here on your own accord.”

his fingers dip between your thighs and your knees buckle a bit when they brush against your pussy. you’re wet, wakatoshi discovers your slick already pooling into his hands despite him hardly even touching you. tauntingly, he caresses you, pools your slick along his fingers as he so barely slides them between your swollen cunt to hear the hiss that slips out of your mouth.

“look at you,” he chuckles, condescending. “so needy already, hm? do you want a god’s cock to defile you that badly?”

he’s baiting you, drawing on your words like a puppeteer, you know it. only touching you ever so slightly, giving you the smallest taste of what he knows you want, yet he wants you to beg for it. he wants you to throw yourself unto desperate abandon and give yourself up to him. and it’s working too damn well. greedily, you try to sink yourself down on his fingers, but he quickly stops you with a hand around your throat. frustrated, you whimper. “wakatoshi…” you keen. “for god’s sake, stop toying with me already!”

his teeth sink into your neck suddenly, the sensation of his lips sucking on your flesh causing your pussy to flutter. “nngh…” overcome with weakness, your head falls back against his chest, and your eyes are forced to behold the behemoth of a man behind you; the glistening droplets that slide down olive skin and the furrowed lines atop his expression. his lips part on breaths heavy and weighted as he squeezes his fingers tighter around your throat, and your own breath catches beneath his grip. you’re left wanting, needing the very air he robs you of, needing him inside your core, needing him and everything he’d give to you.

ah, you think bitterly, i’ll lose this war again today.

“you know what i want to hear from you, little one.” wakatoshi’s words ghost against the shell of your ear, causing you to shiver, heat coursing through each pulse despite the chill of the water. he takes his hand from your soiled thighs and brings his fingers to his mouth, and you watch with eyes glazed by lust as he sucks your juices from them and groans. “hurry…” he huffs. his cock twitches against your ass impatiently, his balls almost ready to burst and bury themselves inside your tight little cunt. “you know i don’t like waiting…”

those words so heavy and fogged over by hunger, you know he’s teetering on the very edge of snapping, letting you know that you’re not the only one who wants the other. he makes slow, intentional work of licking his fingers clean and he sees the way your inhibitions snap behind your eyes, revels in the whimper that leaves your lips as your hands fly to remove your dress all on your own. your breasts fall freely for him to see them glistening under filtered sunlight and of sight of your pursed nipples causes his length to twitch hungrily against your ass.

“please…!” inhibitions abandon you, your pride lost on the incessant pulsing between your legs. you need him to fill you, to ravish and demolish you — you’re aching now, impatient, craving him, “please, toshi, i need you inside me… now!”

you see the very moment wakatoshi reaches his limits and he snaps.

a yelp escapes you as he hoists you up, spinning you around to lock your legs around his hip. his lips crash into yours, mercilessly pushing his tongue into your wet cavern like a beast as he drinks you in. he feels your moans rumbling through his chest and he responds in kind, the space between you non-existent and your body flushed against him.

“that’s a good girl.” whimpering, you claw your fingers into his back as if holding on for dear life. “that wasn’t so hard, was it?” you want to curse him for toying with you, want to shut that filthy, irreverent mouth of his but your mind is too cloudy to give anything but sweet pleas of his name. drool pools from between your lips as he draws his tongue along your neck, suckling and biting every inch of skin. you’ll bruise blue and purple, you know it, but you can’t bring yourself to care. you want him to mark you, want him to possess your body and soul.

your fingers tangle into his tresses of green hair and you pull, causing him to hiss against your neck. “enough already, wakatoshi..!” despite your harsh words, you know they sound like nothing but muddled pleas to him. he’s so much bigger than you, it’s hard to forget he still has control over you — the way his large palms squeeze your ass, the way your body has to sit just above his hip, it’s hard to forget that fact.

“just fuck me already! you act like you don’t know the things you do to me, haah, like you don’t know how much you make me want you even— nngh, even when… you’re not here…”

ah, but how unfair of you, isn’t it? how can you accuse him of such things when really, you’re the one who does this to him? how could you not know that your visage haunts him day and night? that he dreams of taking you over and over, of pumping your hole full of his seed until your tummy would swell? that even then, he’d keep filling you up, keening to hear those sweet, filthy cries of his name over and over? you must know what you do to him; he growls against your skin, sinking his teeth into your collar and causing you to cry out and pull against his hair. “then tell me what you want, darling…”

frustration bubbles within you like an erotic poison as you glare down into emerald orbs. have you not been clear enough for him? what prayers would it take to satisfy this insatiable god? for him to finally give himself to you and abandon all else? you’re already powerless here in his hands, your dress reduced to a soaking bundle that wraps around your waist where his hands palm your bare skin. the tip of his cock only barely touching your core, and you can do nothing but wait until he sinks you down unto it. struggle as you might, your need couldn’t be fulfilled until he wills it, until he finally lets in and use you like you want to be used.

“i want you to take responsibility…” pettily, you huff, eyes narrowing further at the coy grin that sits on his mouth. even with his flushed cheeks and your spit coating his skin, he looks up at you, waiting for you to finish. “i want you to destroy me and fuck me senseless. i want you to force me to take every drop of seed and use me until your fat cock empties out everything inside me.”

wakatoshi hums, pleased, it seems, by your words, though he knows he wouldn’t have been able to hold off any longer even if he hadn’t wrung them out of you. oh, the things you do to him without even knowing that turn him into a wild beast. he all but eagerly lines up the head of his throbbing dick to your entrance, and the warmth of it is already so welcoming as he parts your pussy lips, teasingly rubbing your clit.

“take responsibility, hm?” he purrs against your skin as you whimper, soon forcing out the loveliest scream of his name as he brings you down in one swift motion. he watched your eyes roll into the back of your head, drinks in the way your lips fly open as his length spreads you apart. his own eyes narrow and he clenches his teeth — your tight walls squeeze around him so deliciously, so small and delicate as they clamp around the intrusion. “such a pretty, fragile little doll, aren’t you? fuck…!”

god, he hadn’t even fully sunken into you yet, and already he felt himself hitting the tip of your cervix, pressing deeper and deeper and causing your entire body to convulse as drool pours from your lips, fat tears pooling on your waterline. your orgasm wrecks your body in waves and you tremble, already fucked too weak to even support yourself. helplessly, you fall limp into wakatoshi’s arms, neck lulling back so that you’re forced to look up at the god above you, forced to watch his face contort in mortal pleasure as your hole continues to needily suck him in.

“aww…” he coos at your pathetic form. he brings one hand to cup your messy cheek while the other continues to support your weight, pushing a thumb into your open lips. almost mindlessly, you latch unto it and begin sucking. “already? kitten, i’ve hardly done anything to you yet.” even then, wakatoshi wants more from you. he wants to fuck you senseless, break you to nothingness until you couldn’t think of anything but him inside you. so he pushes, deep past your walls until he fully buries himself inside you, his tip so deliciously hitting your womb. you squeal and tighten your legs at the sensation of him bottoming out of you, dig your nails deep into his arms as if to ground yourself from slipping further.

“w-wait…! please, toshi—!” you cry, though your words are lost on him, drowned by his heavy breaths as he presses his lips against yours, pleas swallowed up while your body shakes. “i only just came, i’m— nngaah! ‘m too sensitive, slow down— fuck! ahh!”

despite your begging, wakatoshi doesn’t give you a moment to recover. he sets a relentless pace of pounding into you, pushing deeper and deeper, the sound of his balls clapping so filthily against your slick not yet enough to hide each honey-coated wail he forces out of you. “you said to… hnngn— take responsibility, didn’t you?” roughly, he wraps his hand around your throat and forces you to look up at him, all so he can take in that beautifully fucked expression you wear, teardrops lining your lashes and your mouth wantonly gasping for air. “that’s exactly what i’m doing, darling. isn’t this what you wanted?”

“yes..!” you can’t deny it. lying to him would be no use, it’s too late to try. your body’s already betrayed you for the pleasure he gives you, your battered hole pulsing around him with each thrust as he stretched you impossibly wide. “yes, wakatoshi..! fuck! i wanted you to fuck me n use me just like this!”

he chuckles, sinful and ungodly, as he releases his hold on your throat to place it around your waist and pulls you down, over and over, repeatedly until your body can do naught but fall to his mercy. “haah..! nngh….! fuck, fuck, fuuuck!”

“that’s it, kitten, just like that.” oh, heavens help him, he already feels himself beginning to waver, his hips staggering as he drives into you. he’s so close, his cock twitching viciously inside your beaten pussy, so close to exploding and filling you up. “take everything, you hear me? i’m gonna cum deep inside your filthy little cunt, and you better take all of it. gonna breed you again and again.”

“mhn! mhn! mhhn!” you’re far too gone to even understand the words he growls at you, far too gone to care for much else other than the sensation of him breaking you apart, or for the prayer you let escape your corrupted heart. “do it..! do it, waka…! let everything out and cum inside me, please, please, please!”

oh, how good did it feel to be at his mercy, to let him ruin you time and time again, at his beck and call. beneath his hold, you release all senseless moral and surrender to the wicked hunger of a being far greater than you. without warning, your body convulses beneath your pleasure as your second orgasm crashes over you. it rips through every vein in your body and releases itself from your core and you scream, your mind gone blank as you cream and squirt all over him. the very coil wound so tightly within your gut breaks like a tidal wave and pushes you off the edge, and after a few more harsh thrusts, you’re granted your reward.

wakatoshi grunts and gasps as his cock bursts his cum inside you, near panting as he pulls you flush against his hip and forces every drop into your delicate womb. his fingers dig deep into your doughy flesh, moans falling from him like a man needing air. he’d spent every last drop inside of you, his chest heaves on the aftershocks of pleasure, but gods be damned, he isn’t through with you yet. you, crumbled against his chest and fucked positively dumb, he hadn’t yet had his fill of you.

“h-hey, wakatoshi, what’re you—!” your startled shout goes unheard by the god as he forces you off his cock, only to bend you over rear up against the edge of the pool. shivers involuntary wreck your body, your whole clenching and your form already weakened by him. “please, i can’t take anymore, lemme rest a little— gaah!”

he silences you quickly by pushing his fingers into your stretched hole, pushing his cum back inside you as your walls object, already far too sensitive. “didn’t you hear me?” he grins, though you can’t see his expression from behind you. so, he pulls you up by your neck, grinning as he towers over your small frame. oh, how feeble and defenseless you stood before him, your legs couldn’t even support your frame, and it was all because of him.

“i said i’d make sure to fill up this tight little cunt. i’m not just done with you yet.”

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hopefullygettingtaller · 5 months

Text

When The Amazing Devil wrote "You will scream, 'I won't forget you' but I'll cover my cold ears, It cannot be a lie if no one hears. 'Cause although you say good day to me, I know I don't belong. And although you hold my hand and say I love you, you are wrong. 'Cause love does not exist in this garden, there's no feeling. And you say the words so often that I barely know the meaning. And when the flowers are rotten and all cannons shot, I'll scream but you won't hear, 'forget me not'" and when they said "Pray for me, oh children, pray for what I've done, I'll haunt the very wrinkles of your skin" and when they yelled "God made all man in his image, Honey I'm no man, I'm what's left when children go to war" and when they cried "The cracks you made, I filled with mortar, a broken pot can still hold water" and when they whispered "These hands are growing old, they're running out of things to hold" and when we all weeped with them "If I'm good will you come back, If I'm good will you come back to us" and when they scribbled "Let foul men band and heed your hum for that ancient hymn you heard me strumming's nought but fumble-falls and guns and tumbleweeds, love run. It's nought that rum won't solve though some would harm you, none, not one, no one would raise to you a hand nor thumb, not while by you, I stand and hum" and expected people to just go on about their days, and when they said "If I have to be who I was (You're not) Do I have to be who I am" and then they said "'Cause I will suffer silence for the strings you tune. And I'll withstand what's written for the writer in you. Write me well, my love, write me weird, write me willing, write me well." And when we all sang "Shoulder the sky (I can't wait to show you how much) Open those eyes (I know you can be, just let the rain come) There's a kind (Let the rain come down, darling) (Can't you hear it howling) Of calling" and when they made me freeze right where I stood with "Back then, I wasn't hopeful. But now my ink's blood red, not black. And I'll blink like ripping envelopes in the hopes that you'll write back" and BACK TO BACK they wrote "Cause I'm between that just-one-more and drank-too-much again" "And I promise you I'll write I love you with my fingers on your sleeping hand" "And when I think I'm fine you'll visit, and then you'll happen to me, happen to me all over again" and then had the audacity to say "And I'll sing silence, and ask my glass of wine for guidance. I might not make it tonight" and then "They'd paint your eyes with sunsets (my saints, my sigs, my upsets)" and ON TOP OF THAT "You're not a coward 'cause you cower. You're brave because they broke you, yet broken, still you breathe." AND SOMEHOW WROTE "'Cause I'm not trapped with you, you see. you're the one who's trapped with me." IN THE SAME FUCKING SONG ALONGSIDE "Sometimes I fall to pieces just to see what bits of me don't fit" then decided to break some hearts with "We didn't talk, we made universes out of bitten lips and broken hands. You said I love you less than when it all began, and I said fewer cause I make jokes to show how broken I really am" and then they were both the man their fathers never were and more than what their mums told them to be. And then there was the utter heartbreak of "If I don't make it back from where I've gone, just know I've loved you all along" being repeated for an entire outro. AND THEN THERE WAS "Remember me I ask, remember me I sing. Give me back my heart, you wingless thing." with "Think of all the horrors that I promised you I'd bring, I promised you, they'll sing of every time you passed your fingers through my hair and called me child. Witness me old man I'm the wild." "How bold I was, could be, would be, still am. By God still am" AND THEN THE SHEER FORCE OF THE LINES "Welcome to the storm, I'm thunder. Welcome to my table bring your hunger"

AND EVERY TIME THEY COMPARED THEMSELVES TO THE SAINT OF THE PAINT THAT WAS LEFT IN THE POT, YOUR ANGEL ELLIPSIS, YOUR DEVIL OF DOTS, THE HEARTBREAK THAT ACHES FAR TOO MUCH TO BE SHUNNED, ALL THOSE LETTERS UNSENT, AND THAT GARDEN UNGROWN, THE CAPTAIN OF COURAGE THAT YOU'VE ETERNALLY LACKED AND THE JESUS OF WISHING TO CHRIST YOU'LL COME BACK AND SO. MUCH. MORE.

"This here is not make up, It's a porcelain tomb. And this here is not singing I'm just screaming in tune" ARE YOU KIDDING ME "You try so loud to love me, I cannot seem to hear" and "'Cause If we join our hands in prayer enough, to God I imagine it all starts to sound like applause" IN THE SAME ALBUM WITH "And these plates they smash like waves (place your hand in mine) And on the wind, it howls (how long can this last?)" AND "'Cause these plates, they smash like waves (Place your smile in mine) And the wine stains, hide the tears (Why stay? Hide the-) But that breathing you hear, don't mistake it with sighs. Don't you realize, they're just battle cries, my dear?" And then, when they said "And you, you follow philosophies, but me, I laugh, I choke. 'Well hello my hollow Holofernes' I wink but you don't get the joke" and while we were all busy processing, they reminded us "Your eyes aren't rivers there to weep, but a place for crows to rest their feet" AND DON'T EVEN GET ME STARTED ON "I chipped my teeth on every joke you cracked" In this essay I will-

#the amazing devil #joey batey #madeleine hyland #I WILL FOREVER MOURN THE FACT THAT I CANNOT PROCESS THESE LYRICS AS WELL AS THEY DESERVE TO BE UNDERSTOOD BECAUSE I'M NOT A NATIVE SPEAKER #I AM NOT NORMAL ABOUT THIS #I CAN NEVER BE NORMAL ABOUT THIS #THE FACT THAT I WROTE MOST OF THESE FROM MEMORY

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miasmaghoul · 8 months

Note

miasma i have been yearning for mean rain and the most well-behaved mountain you have ever seen. (he's on his knees.) will you indulge me? )

oh man rain's real mean you guys :(

(cw for slapping, spitting, a little blood, piss and rough oral. all consensual, dont worry, mountain is SUPER into it)

It's an ache Mountain can't describe that brings him here.

On his knees in Rain's room, fully dressed with his legs spread as far at they can go. He keeps his arms folded together at the small of his back and his eyes forward, watching dust motes float through the beam of silvery light pouring from an open window. The sun had been up when he first knelt, but Rain's space was meant for moonlight.

Mountain doesn't know how long he's been here, truth be told, and it doesn't matter. That ache demands he stays put regardless, forces him to stay still and silent. It makes him wait for something he can't put words to. Makes him yearn, makes him itch in a place he can't quite scratch. It makes him want.

And so, he waits.

And waits.

When the door finally creaks open, he thinks it's the holiest of hymns.

Rain slips into the room with a fluid grace Mountain could never hope to replicate. He moves like water, his lithe frame draped in the gauzy fabric of a flowy white top he'd no doubt stolen from Cirrus. It suits him just as much as the skin-tight black pants he's paired with it, as stark a contrast as his dark, loose curls are against his pale skin. Bathed in moonlight, he looks like something out of a dream.

Mountain would worship him always, if he could get away with it. Would lay himself bare for Rain to observe, to inspect. He'd endure agony, ecstacy and everything in between if it meant earning Rain's touch, his attention. If it meant pleasing him however Rain saw fit. He'd give anything, give everything.

Rain closes the door, and does not acknowledge him.

The ache grows.

Mountain doesn't move. Doesn't dare to so much as breathe too loudly, lest Rain become irritated and shove him out the door. He can't risk it, not with the singular sort of need that's been eating at him all day. He listens, though. Tracks Rain's careful footsteps as he makes his way across the room. He's in no rush, ever casual as he clicks on a bedside lamp and rifles through a drawer.

Mountain's cock stirs in the confines of his jeans. He's gone from soft to hard and back again more times than he can count during his endless wait. If he glanced down, there would probably be a stain on the light denim. He couldn't help it, but he knows Rain won't approve.

Hell, that's half the reason he wore these particular jeans.

"How long have you been here?"

The words cut through the silence like a razor, smooth and sharp. Mountain shivers with them, hungry ears finally blessed with the first hint of what he's been craving. He shrugs, eyes still locked on the bedroom door. He can practically hear Rain's eyebrows scooting upwards.

"You don't know?"

Mountain shakes his head. If he had to say, it would be something between five hours and a hundred years. He'd wait a thousand, if Rain asked him to.

Behind him, Rain hums. It's a pondering sound, as though he's wondering whether or not Mountain is worth his precious time. It makes his stomach hurt. He wants to beg Rain to let him stay, wants to plead with him to soothe the ache in his gut. Wants to grovel at his feet until Rain sees fit to relieve him of his need.

But Rain hasn't given permission to speak, so he doesn't.

Again, Mountain waits. Stoic at a statue despite the stiffness in his jeans, the stabbing pain in his knees and the tension in his back. Everything hurts.

He hopes Rain makes it worse.

It's ages before Rain moves again, before his boots thud against the hardwood and the other ghoul reappears in front of him. Mountain keeps his gaze resolutely forward, his eyeline even with Rain's torso. The fabric of his top sways in a nonexistent breeze, more than a few of its buttons popped to expose the creamy skin of his chest. It's speckled with bites and bruises, evidence of what, exactly, he'd been busy doing while Mountain waited his turn.

"Have you been just like this?" His tone gives nothing away. If anything, Rain sounds...bored. "On your knees for me?"

Again, Mountain nods. Rain hums once more, that same sound of almost dismissive contemplation. He brings both hands up, idly twists one of his rings, and the rustle of his shirt brings with it the scent of the lake on a summer evening. It's accompanied by a waft of spiced woodsmoke, and Mountain knows exactly who had been busy fucking up Rain's perfect skin.

"Are you growling?"

Mountain mutes himself immediately - he hadn't even realized he'd started. He didn't mean to, he swears it, but even if he were allowed to speak he knows Rain wouldn't want to hear it. He chews on the inside of his cheek and hopes his remorse is evident in the way his shoulders sag just a hair.

"Let me guess," Rain lilts, reaching out to fiddle with a loose lock of auburn hair by Mountain's ear. Even the ghost of his touch is electric. "You need me."

He makes it sound like a taunt, and Mountain's stomach burns. He nods again, slow and deliberate. Squares his shoulders again before Rain can chide him for his posture. The other ghoul huffs out a sigh.

"How pathetic," he chides, and oh does it sting. "Sitting here for hours when you could have been making yourself useful."

Long fingers cup his jaw and Mountain lets his gaze be guided upward. He finds Rain watching him with mirthless cerulean eyes, his mouth set in a hard line. Mountain gulps even as his cock throbs, and before he can stop himself,

"I'm sorry -"

He hears the slap before he feels it, a sharp backhand that makes his head spin and his chest tight. The sting hits soon enough and Mountain bites his lip, hoping to draw blood that he can offer in penance. Rain grips his chin in that same cruel hand, guides him back, and Mountain can already feel the fuzz creeping into the edges of his mind with the look on his stunning face.

"Lucifer, you're pathetic," Rain scoffs, dragging his other hand through his own stylishly disheveled curls. "And here I thought you were going to be good for me."

I will, Mountain wants to scream. I'll be good, I'll be so good, please -

"I suppose I'll just have to put you in your place."

Mountain can't help the way his eyes slip shut at the merciless tilt to Rain's voice. The one he only uses when he can tell exactly what sort of cruelty Mountain craves, when he wants to belittle and shame. It settles heavy in his gut, makes him just dizzy enough that Rain has to give him a little shake to bring him back.

"Eyes on me," he orders, and it's an easy command to obey. Mountain may be edging towards hazy, but focusing on Rain keeps him grounded enough to maintain his pose. The hand on his jaw threads into his hair instead, grips a nice handful. "Show me your tongue."

Mountain does - of course he does - despite how dry his mouth feels. He opens wide and lets that pink appendage hang down over his chin. Rain's hum carries more weight now, the slightest hint of approval enough to make Mountain throb. Rain yanks him back by the hair, makes him suck air through his nose, and leans over him, eyes sparkling.

"You look thirsty."

Mountain can't hold back the groan that bubbles up in his chest when Rain spits directly onto his tongue.

"Don't you dare swallow," Rain threatens before Mountain can so much as move his tongue. He wasn't going to. He knows better.

It's tempting anyway.

He curls his tongue instead, makes a nice little home for Rain's generous gift. Rain releases his head with a derisive snicker, standing back with his arms crossed.

"I think you enjoyed that a little too much," he admonishes, eyes squarely fixed on the wet spot Mountain can feel on his thigh. Less than an inch from the head of his sore, ignored cock.

He's so hard. Always is, for this. Rain probably won't even let him cum, if experience tells him anything - or maybe he'll make him cum over and over until he's empty and weeping. Either way, the suffering is what matters.

Mountain twitches when the toe of Rain's boot presses into his thigh, a hair's breadth from his throbbing length, and it's work not to swallow the mess on his tongue.

"Someone's excited," he taunts, nudging the swollen ridge of the head less than gently. Mountain gives a fervent nod. "You were messy before I even walked in, weren't you?"

He applies more pressure and Mountain pitches forward just enough to accidentally drool Rain's spit onto his own shirt.

Oh shit.

Rain's next slap is expected, and somehow all the worse for it. Same cheek, same hand. It cracks through the room with a sick echo, and Mountain tastes iron.

"Useless," Rain sneers, unceremoniously shoving two fingers into Mountain's mouth to wrench out a gag. When he pulls them back they're tinted pink, and watching Rain lick up his blood and saliva makes every inch of him sing. "All you're good for is making messes, isn't it?"

Mountain sniffles, eyes wet at the corners, and nods. Rain rolls his eyes.

"Use your words," he says as though Mountain is very stupid. His cock spits against his thigh.

"S-sorry Rain, I didn't -"

"Sorry who?"

Mountain shudders.

"I'm s-sorry, Sir," he breathes, shaking his head. "I didn't mean to make a mess, I -"

"Liar," Rain interrupts, and Mountain gives him a bewildered look. "I know you came here because you want to be a wet, filthy mess."

Mountain can't stop staring up at him. He doesn't want to.

"In fact," Rain croons, reaching for his belt, "I think you want me to make you one."

His intention is clear as crystal, and the moment it settles into Mountain's skin he bites his tongue. He swallows thickly, trying his best not to sway as he watches Rain slip his belt from its loops and toss it aside. Silently, Mountain hopes Rain plans to use it on him later. He grips his own arms tight behind his back while the other ghoul unzips, every inch of him twitchy and quivering in anticipation.

"What do you say?" Rain asks, low and sultry over the splash of his own piss.

Rain's only half hard when he pulls himself out, maybe less, but it doesn't matter - any time he gets to see Rain's cock is a blessing, as far as Mountain is concerned. Rain gives himself a few languid strokes, pushes and pulls his foreskin the way he knows Mountain likes best. Makes him drool. He fattens up so quick, gets nice and stiff right where Mountain can see but can't touch. Anyone else would want to stay soft for this, but Rain?

Well, there are advantages to being a water ghoul.

Rain cants his hips just enough to slap the head against Mountain's cheek once, twice, three times. Enough to leak a little bead of pre and leave a sticky spot behind.

"Say please," he commands. Mountain feels so very dizzy.

"Please," he manages to slur, barely a whisper. Rain snorts.

"Say it properly," he smears the tip over Mountain's lips just because he can, and Mountain's eyes roll back at the scent of him.

"Please, Sir," he breathes, staring up with heavy lidded eyes, "please...please get me wet. Get me messy."

Rain offers an unkind smirk, milks out one more bead of pre that slides onto Mountain's lip. He doesn't lick it up. Hasn't been told he's allowed. Rain pulls back, takes a deep breath, and aims.

"Whore."

The first drops hit Mountain's knee, impossibly hot, and then a perfect golden arc hits him square in the chest. It forces a wave of the deepest sort of shame through him, makes his stomach flip and his balls tighten up. Mountain gasps when it really starts to soak in, and he can feel real tears gathering in his lashes when Rain smiles down at him.

"Th-thank you, Sir," Mountain gasps, fighting every muscle in his core that's trying to make him pitch forward. "Thank you."

Rain hums, pleased, directing the stream wherever he likes until Mountain's shirt is well and truly drenched. He feels like he's burning from the inside out, like his brain is leaking out onto his thigh and soaking into stained denim. He's panting by the time Rain's done, watching in a daze as he pushes out the last few squirts, lets it dribble out to speckle Mountain's thighs.

"Open," he orders, and like the good boy he is, Mountain does.

Rain shoves his still-leaking cock down his throat with no hesitation, and Mountain chokes on it just enough for the tears caught in his lashes to track down his cheeks. Rain purrs, smearing them all over with mean thumbs.

"Gonna put this mouth to good use," he drawls, "and you're gonna take it."

The way he says it is completely at odds with the punishing pace he sets. Brutal thrusts that stab at the back of Mountain's throat, sure to leave a bruise. Every one answers the call of that singular ache, and in no time at all he's floating. Lost in the gross, wet sound of Rain taking his pleasure and the slap of his balls against his chin.

Maybe later Rain will sit on his face and he can well and truly drown.

Mountain hopes he does.

#miasma's work #the band ghost ficlets #ish #its a lil long lmao #mountain ghoul #rain ghoul #mean rain #sub mountain #mountain/rain #mountain x rain #mountrain #these two are such pissboys you cannot convince be otherwise #dont worry tho rain gives him the normal kind of shower later #I HOPE YOU LIKE IT RICO SORRY THIS TOOK SO LONG ♡♡♡♡♡♡

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secret-smut-sideblog · 4 months

Text

(sooo thought I should probably masterlist these so here you go, have fuuun) nsfw in red, pg-13 in ourple

Oneshots

Devourer - (astarion x f! reader) Your beloved vampire has gotten very comfortable with you. But you wonder of he's been holding back some of his more supernatural tendencies...

Bloodlust - (astarion x f! tav) Tav invites her bloodthirsty friend out for some late night reconnaissance, both of their cravings being fed...

Lay on Hands - (astarion x f! tav) In the early hours of the morning someone cant keep their hands to themselves...

Pulling Strings - (astarion x f! tav) Tav has caught on that her favorite vampire doesn't enjoy touching or being touched by others. But she has a suggestion to possibly help that piques his interest...

Satiated - (astarion x f! dark urge) With Astarion starving in the Underdark his bloodthirsty friend sees his hunger, knows it quite well. And with a promised death in their future, seeks to help him sate himself...

Cold Comfort - (astarion x f! dark urge) Finally reaching Moonrise Towers, she finds her urge overtaking her, taking an innocent life. Astarion seeks to keep her company through the long night...

Night Wandering - (gale x f! tav) After Tav's little magic lesson from her favorite wizard and the heat momentarily shared between them, she's feeling pent up. If only his tent wasn't directly next to hers...

Black Out Days - (gale x f! tav) Tav's pain rising to an unbearable level, she indulges in some found herbs to find relief. But her sanctuary is laced with some heated side effects...

Warm Company (halsin x f! tav) With her crush on the vampire tearing her heart, a large kind druid seeks to make her feel wanted...

You Know Me Too Well (gortash x f! dark urge) After the coronation, she can't get the familiarity he showed her out of her mind. She needs answers, and the Archduke is more than happy to indulge her...

Eyes on Fire (gortash x f! dark urge) The visage of the Archduke won't leave her, and itching for blood, his favorite assassin is about to pay the Lord a very welcome visit...

Miniseries

Pillow Talk (1/2) Tav innocently offered to help Astarion with his morning routine. But things get very close, and Astarion is shocked how her sweet face belies the sinful mouth she has...

Lover, Please Stay (2/2) Tav keeping him at arms length, Astarion makes a plan to woo her back into his good graces. But his hunger, for her and her blood, proves distracting...

Warm Water (gale x f! tav) 1/3 With one of Tav's love languages being physical affection, Gale tries to keep his touch hungry skin from her. The sirens call of her arms could overwhelm him, but he's far from the only one heeding her soft song...

Warm Honey (gale / halsin x f! tav) 2/3 Both druid and wizard seeking out her warmth, Gale makes a plan to win her affections. Yet both scent and sound could conspire to be his undoing...

Warm Blood (gale / astarion x f! tav) 3/3 With a sanguine competitor now circling with the large druid, Gale can no longer put off his advances...

Girl Talk Series

(astarion x f! tav, short and sweet smut, completed)

Girl Talk - One late night Astarion turned their conversation to a more sensual topic and was delighted to discover Tav lacked experience with men. Naturally he was more than happy to lend a hand...

It Will Come Back - Their shared night has been tormenting him, after staking his claim he found himself needing to be near her. And after a night of drinking, seeing her with someone else, he had to have her again...

Heat Signature - (karlach x tav) After nearly freezing to death Tav needs Karlach near. Very near, it seems...

Unpunishable - After Karlach spent the night with Tav, Astarion is feeling very normal about it. So normal that he needs her in his tent all night. Just to feed, he swears...

Child Of Dawn series

(gale x f! tav, slow burn, ongoing)

Nightcall

Non Believer

Dream Girl Evil

Let Me Follow

To Build A Home

Bedroom Hymns

Listen Before I Go

Many Hands

the girlypop... (aurum, my tav)

The Tav in question... (for reference)

AA Break Up Series

(ascended astarion x f! tav, drama and smut, completed)

We The Drowned

Take Me Back To Eden (shadowheart × f! tav)

Like Real People Do (halsin x f! tav)

I Should Hate You

Chokehold

What Kind Of Man (gale x f! tav)

Seven Devils

All I Wanted

The Moon Will Sing

Strawberry Wine (gale x f! tav)

As It Was

Astarion x Dark Urge

(astarion x f! durge, tenderness and smut, completed)

Dark Signs

Bite The Hand

Prey Drive

A Dangerous Thing

My Love Is A Dagger

Bloodcall

Little Miss Murder herself (my durge)

Distance

(astarion x f! plus fized tav, tenderness and smut, completed)

Part 1

Part 2

Part 3

Part 4

Part 5

Part 6

First Light (Prologue)

The Drow (indulgent prologue chapter)

My Portrait of Tav (I do be drawing..)

Tav Headcanons (being indulgent)

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cliozaur · 24 days

Text

One aspect of poverty that Hugo continuously emphasizes is the premature ageing of girls and women. This time, Cosette is described as having “the lugubrious air of an old woman.” It's truly heart-wrenching! Additionally, she bears a swollen black eye (from Mme Thénardier’s beating) when she meets Jean Valjean in the evening.

She is extremely anxious at the prospect of being sent into the darkness of the forest to fetch water: “she felt her heart leaping in her bosom like a big snowflake”—the metaphor is beautiful, but the situation is horrific. Cosette's ability to lie surfaces naturally because it's her only means of self-protection. In this, she is just like Jean Valjean. Les Misérables serves as a hymn to justified lying for those who lack other means to protect themselves, and sometimes, even survive.

#les mis letters #lm 2.3.3 #les miserables #cosette #jean valjean

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ceruleancattail · 3 months

Note

HAPPY (late) NEW YEAR!!!! I just noticed your requests were open and was wondering if you could do fluff with Azul? Like reader and Azul go to the beach for whatever reason and this is the first time reader sees his merform? And they just keep complementing it and saying just how cool it is and everything, idk if this is enough of an idea to be called a request lol, but anyway have a great rest of your day/night and remember to drink some water!

It’s ok- I was also late in answering this request, so we’re even anon! So sorry- this was honestly such a cute, adorable concept, thank you for your request!

The Sands and Your Hands.

Azul Ashengrotto x reader

The beach smelled like summer.

The salty breeze lapping at your cheeks, nibbling against your skin ever so lightly. Cerulean waves rocked into the shore, foam bubbling against the sand. The sound of the water a hymn, honouring all the wonders of the sea.

Hand interlocked with the male behind you, you both made your way towards the golden shore.

It was hard to stifle a smile when you stepped onto the beach, grinning at the way your shoes sunk into the sand. Feeling those little yellow particles crunched under your sole. You soon made short work of your shoes, kicking them off, if only to feel the softness of the sand underfoot.

A soft sigh blew right by you, uncertain eyes hidden behind lens of glass, twinkling with the sun’s glow. Always one step behind you, Azul walked with slow, tentative steps, carefully navigating his way through the sandy shores. He wasn’t too eager to come to the beach, but how could Azul refuse you?

You were ever so cute as you pleaded, eyes all bright, shimmering like pearls. You’ve spent your time weaseling through every excuse he put up, shooting them down one by one. Until Azul finally relented, if only to get you to stop. Honestly, you’ve been spending too much time with him in the Mostro Lounge.

Not that Azul hates it. It’s rather… pleasant to have some company whenever he’s working. Especially when it’s yours. Your voice, a smoothing potion engulfing his heart in a warm, tender embrace.

He hangs back, tossing his coat onto the ground. This wasn’t a planned trip, honestly. Azul would have preferred to have a mat, some refreshments and all the works. However, the moment he agreed, you grabbed some leftovers from the Mostro Lounge, and dragged him to the beach immediately.

Spontaneous, aren’t you? Despite himself, Azul’s lips slipped into a small smile. You just couldn’t contain your excitement of finally making him crack. Well, you might think you were the victor, frolicking merrily in the waves, but to Azul?

Tilting his head ever so slightly, Azul’s gaze takes on a softer, more gentle quality as he watches you laugh. Seeing you smile, joy-filled laughter echoing through the air like a siren’s sweet melody….

Anyone would agree that he was the true victor here.

His eyes meet yours, your mischief reflected within his grey irises. Before Azul could even blink, something cold pelted his arms. Your hands were outstretched, flinging seawater all over him. Cool droplets clung onto Azul’s skin, glittering like a string of pearls. Along with those wet splotches, were dark patches of black and purple, blooming across his skin.

Panicked, Azul yanks his sleeves down. A rustle of clothing as Azul did his best to cover up. Keeping that side of him out of sight. Out of your sight, in particular.

You were already so happy. Azul didn’t want you to stop, especially not because of him.

A weight pressed into his arm. Fingers deftly slipping into his sleeves, folding them up hesitantly. Raising his head, Azul came face to face with you. Shooting him a sheepish grin, you fold his sleeves back up, fingers lingering onto the dark splotches on his skin.

They were surprisingly smooth, chilling the very tips of your fingers. A refreshing chill. Pressing your wet palms against his arm, you watched in amazement as his skin changed, melting away into a deep purple.

Swallowing back a quavering breath, Azul whispers, as soft as the sea’s gentle breeze:

“Are you not scared?”

Your gaze flickers back at him, before you shrug.

“Well, it’s cool. It’s a… beautiful purple, really.”

Hands dropping down to his, you clutch at his palm. Fingers trembling as they wrap around his, clasping Azul’s hand within yours.

“Anyways, it was my fault that you got wet in the first place. Sorry, Azul.

I thought you’ll like the beach, but all I did was drag you to a place you didn’t want to go.”

Silence hung heavy in the air in between both of you, before a cough was choked out by Azul. An awkward one, forced out of his throat.

“Well, I wouldn’t say I didn’t want to see the ocean again. Bickering with you about this trip was… unexpectedly fun.”

Carefully, his fingers wrap themselves around a lock of your hair, tucking it securely behind your ear.

“I guess I was just afraid that you’ll be… repulsed.”

Like the rest.

Even though that part went unsaid, you heard it as clear as day. Squeezing his hand affectionately, you whisper to him.

As soft as the ocean’s kisses to the shore.

“I would never be repulsed by you. I… I like you. A lot, actually.”

A sudden warmth rushed to your cheeks. You could feel a tint of pink blooming, turning a deeper crimson with every passing second. Quickly, you avert your gaze. Doing your best to hide your embarrassment from Azul.

Unfortunately for you, a businessman hardly misses anything. A chill nibbles at your cheek, as Azul cups it lovingly. Gently easing your face back forward, coaxing you to look at him once more. His thumb caresses your lips lightly, the weight of his gentle touch lingering long after it moves away.

“What was that, darling? I couldn’t quite catch… whatever it is that you said.”

Frowning at Azul’s smug grin, you reply:

“You definitely heard whatever I said, liar.”

The faintest trace of a smirk danced across his lips, as Azul moved closer. Close enough for you to see your blush reflected within his eyes, to feel his breath, waft against your lips.

“Awww, now I’m a liar? How hurtful. And here I thought I heard you say you loved me.”

#twisted wonderland #twst #disney twisted wonderland #twisted wonderland x reader #twst x reader #azul ashengrotto #Azul #Azul ashengrotto x reader #Azul x reader #lucky potion🔷#I hope you don’t mind I didn’t write about his entire merform #because that would have involved dunking #the poor guy into the sea entirely.#As much as I wanted to I don’t think #he’ll give in to that too easily #Of course maybe if you asked really nicely… and gave him a little kiss….#maybe he would #maybe

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ms0milk · 2 months

Text

𝟏𝟔 | 𝐇𝐞𝐦 𝐊𝐢𝐬𝐬

ー✧ prince!bakugou x royal guard!reader

"This is so much worse than fury, and you rip your hand away from his to take a step back. You didn’t mean to. Bakugou stares like a dragonslayer, heartbroken."

cw blatantly suggestive, an accidental kiss and the panic that follows. bkg doesn't know why he's been looking for you. you couldn't be angry about it if you tried. laughter, bite marks, magic, a warm hiding spot. 8.1k

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A slap across the face and the spatter of blood that follows in an arc across fine rugs. Bakugou bleeds when he tries not to think of you. You are too easy to be with and too difficult to find.

Your prince and fragments of rehearsal fineries that you would beam at if you appeared in this frigid foyer– which he knows only because you’ve done nothing but smile at him for seven cursed days– storms towards warmer hallways. There’s nothing for it but to track you down. He wakes up and you are not outside his door. He eats and meets and eats again and you do not materialize behind him or emerge from shadowed corners to brandish a weapon when unpleasant lords are unpleasant. Are you still following orders or are you finally sick of him?

Bakugou pretends he is not walking quickly. A maid has pointed him in your direction. The waitstaff here has no particular affinity for either of you, so they’ve tried their hardest to answer his questions this week and be rid of Alderans for the day. After all, once he finds you he doesn’t bother anyone else until dawn.

Find is a strong word, the maid thinks as she chews a dry lip. You don’t seem to be hiding from him.

It's the busiest morning, second only to tomorrow’s actual ball, and Bakugou has spent the whole of it in dress fittings and board meetings and appetizer tastings. He was meant to rehearse the first waltz with Fuyumi but for four days in a row she’s had her hands full with final adjustments to royal rosters and seating arrangements. The king is home afterall. And he does not dote on his daughter.

Bakugou turns up a second staircase once he arrives in the center castle and barks at a guard, stationed and startled, in the doorway where he emerges. Shinsou clutches his chest and stares at the imposing prince, heavy but silent.

“Boo. You seen my captain?” Bakugou only half-waits for a response from the apprentice before following his intuition to the left. You like to hide in odd places.

“Yeah,” Shinsou breathes and finds his position again, “carrying her lunch to the catwalks.”

Bakugou grins and hopes you can feel him wherever you are, rolling his eyes.

She was in common clothes– I think, headed towards the throne room.

Haven’t seen her, sir.

Your Alderan? It’s freezing, she should request a jacket from the supply corps.

Five days ago he found you rehousing spiders in the rafters of the greenhouse much to the chagrin of delicate flowers. Two days ago he finally spotted you among a dozen soldiers all helping the blacksmith resilver the inlay of the soldier quarter’s door. Yes, he’d told you to leave his babysitting to Kirishima but he didn’t expect you to listen.

Yesterday, Bakugou caught you wandering through the ninth-story walkways, the walkways sculpted onto the side of the castle like wasp nests where the archers hide. Your fingers gripped the hem of your padded tunic, red with cold, and your back pressed flat to the white castle marble even as you craned to gaze the city and sea over the edge of the balustrade.

Your prince almost screamed when he glanced out one of ten thousand pale windows in his search when instead of the depressing gray sky, it was your braids whipping in the wind outside, several stories higher in the air than he would have liked you.

“Eyes!” He jerked the window open and stuck out his head.

“The marble is too smooth Highness, please stay inside.”

White pointelle curtains rattled on their rods with the ferocity of the afternoon wind. “Come now,” he’d barked. He swallowed a roar to keep from startling you off the wall. You turned from the view towards his outstretched hand and half a golden body out the little window, and smiled.

You smiled from the cobwebs when he asked you what the fuck you were doing in blue begonias. You smiled at him among the crowd when he mimed flexing from the gallery to mock the blacksmith. You smiled when he caught you practicing sword forms for bored children and again when he and Kirishima joined in. You smiled without thought and he warmed at the sight of it. He laughed.

He laughed when the florist shrieked over a clutch of spider eggs and he laughed when you hammered Aizawa’s door crooked in your distraction. He laughed when Kaminari tried to teach you to juggle apples in potion storage, and very softly he laughed when he found you asleep beside proofing ovens.

The castle’s vanity seeps into every orifice, it bleeds from the seamless walls and into seed-sized crannies. Family portraits, royal crests, kingdom’s colors, wards against death written in old Takoban like they think this is the only kingdom on the continent where people might live forever. Superstition and agitation nick the Alderan like thorns through cold blue hallways. He itches for forests. On the third floor of the East Wing there is a great open gallery. It presides over the grand staircase of the castle’s entrance so that an invading army couldn’t so much as piss over the threshold before the legion of soldiers that fit upstairs fired off their arrows.

It was only a matter of time before you found yourself a roost here, warmaster.

He knows where you are. He can hear the king shouting from an open door downstairs and crosses the entrance gallery, bathed in warm sunlight from its volley of windows. It takes him exactly as long to walk it as it takes stained glass heat to pink his shoulders and with a perfect golden hue he dips under a doorway to find you perched at the lip of a ledge. You’re always about to fucking fall off something.

You sit cross-legged behind a black railing, picking at the cup of fruit beside you. Your hair is getting longer, wilder, and your braids tumble with white ribbons as you follow the scene below. Two stories below the ballroom is awash in afternoon light and hundreds of potential floral arrangements with the king dead in the middle, roaring at artisans. Prince Natsuo is slightly behind him and his neck is an agitated red. You pop a berry in your mouth.

You were always going to love the catwalks– the thin system above important rooms that servants use to gauge crowds and light the tall candles. All of tomorrow it’ll be crawling with footmen and today it looks like it’s already been dusted in preparation, although it’s not meant to be seen. You sit comfortably in its shadows and watch.

Tension melts from his veins when he finds you and nothing replaces it, so Bakugou isn’t quite sure what he’s thinking when he slips inside to be closer. Jeanist taught him too, he can be quiet. You wipe juice from your lip with your thumbs and polish it with a lick. Your fingertips are purple. You run them through your hair to push the braids behind your shoulders and focus again on the agitated king and his crying arachnophobic florists.

“You stare like the best of ‘em,” Bakugou whispers as he drops behind you and cups a hand over your mouth in case you make a startled sound, although, you react before he actually finishes the thought or announces himself, and jerk forward to catch his gentle hand with your teeth.

King, prince, artisan, maids, seagulls, and dustbunnies pause their meeting to agree that a grunt did in fact come from the chandeliers and that they aren’t insane, before continuing their jury over the fate of the party decorations. A whiff of caramel is the only thing that keeps you from breaking the hand with your bite and just as quickly as you attempt to reveal the intruder through pain, you swing your arm around to cover the prince’s mouth before he gives away your position with a yelp or fireblast. The momentum flattens you both.

Maybe one day Bakugou will remember that you are filled with the same fire that he is, before trying to bother you. When did the urge to bother you even occur to him? Both of you, square on your backs to hide properly in shadows, are close enough for your hand to still be firmly planted over his face like a muzzle. He smiles first this time. You smell like blackberries.

Your prince wires his jaw shut when he laughs in the shadows to keep from kissing your palm. In the seconds that the king and his entourage fall silent, Bakugou can only just barely contain huffs from his nostrils and the wet at the corners of his eyes. You stare like always and he must have melted fast enough because horror and apologies haven’t tumbled out of you yet. His dragon’s nails have gotten longer. Loose and wild hairs frame the face he only ever knew as perfectly kempt and unreadable. He cannot stop finding new things to notice here on the itchy rug beside you and he’s grateful you have only covered his mouth because his firebrand eyes gleam when you succumb to your own smile. Immediately you hide it behind your own free hand to stay quiet and the pair of you swallow stupid mirth in the dark.

Where did his anger go? “Ow,” the prince rasps when he’s collected himself and pulls your hand into his.

“Excuse me, Highness,” you whisper back. Your smile still rattles him like a blow to the side of the head. What the fuck is it about you that makes his pulse drum? Bakugou rolls onto his back. If you were sick of him you probably wouldn’t lay so close.

He tilts his gaze back to you, “What are you doing up here?”

Watching, you mouth like you’re signaling him to shut up. You pull your hand away from his and look over your shoulder towards the ledge where roars and curses roll up from the king like crashing waves.

“Why?”

It’s as close as Bakugou has ever seen you come to rolling your eyes. You blink at him and press forward. Something horribly soft started to grow the night you helped him carry drunk friends to bed. Something like rot. It eats away at the strongest parts of him, the parts of him that are poised and beautiful and ready for war. It’s eating you too. The strongest parts of you that are silent and obedient and deadly.

You drag your body across the floor to be closer to him– so much closer– so close that your thigh practically drapes over his and you cup your hand to his ear so you can whisper an answer that he can’t even focus long enough to hear. Maybe the rot started earlier. Maybe he should never have picked a fight with you.

A sudden scream flies up from the ballroom and Bakugou reacts before you do, less to offer protection and more because he knows you’ll launch right off the walkway if he doesn’t hold you down, but still his hold is protective when the scream is followed by a pillar of white orange fire that flies high and soots crystals in the chandelier. It’s brief and scalding like a geyser and you are not strong enough to protest your prince tucking all of you under his chest in the interim. You smell like home, like forests like moss. The scent of the sea is finally falling out of your hair.

“In what world is this my responsibility?” the king seethes. His drop in volume is menacing and it echoes violently in the empty room, “pick your own fucking flowers, I have work to do.”

The ballroom doors are not meant to be closed or opened with such force and they scream louder than he can when he burns his way through, leaving the prince and his artisans in the cold and terrible hall. A ball in Takoba is an oxymoron. A malicious idea. Bakugou leans back on his arm to release you and sits up to watch Natsuo console his workers. The eldest Takoban prince wears patience well. Whose idea was this party? The same person who sent for Enji? Belligerent. Bakugou hasn’t seen the queen in weeks.

He grumbles before he turns to look at you, “Missed what you said.” But when he does finally look, you are so much Alderan that the cold of Takoba falls off his shoulders like frost. Maybe that’s why he’s been searching for you. The fire that only a life in his castle could stoke, ravages the blacks of your eyes. Even though you are silent, he knows what you’re thinking.

“Down girl,” he grins and kicks his legs out from under him to settle more comfortably. Flowers below are picked in whispered consensus and the room empties under your glare. The sun has started to set. The far wall of the ballroom is, in classic Takoban fashion, one long series of windows taller than most houses and the sea shines behind it in a trick of rolling warm shapes like smoke from a fireplace. You both linger at the edge of the shadows up on high. Bakugou watches you shamelessly.

“I will not attack the king.”

“Who’re you trying to convince?”

You think for a few seconds and turn to him with an awkwardly soft look that crackles into a smile too easily for you to be the same girl who grew up learning how to kill in his castle. Everything you do but fight is bizarre. Like blue fire, he cannot make himself look away from you.

“What’ll you do at the ball?”

“What do you mean?” The ballroom is empty so there’s no need to whisper but neither of you know how to talk to the other.

Bakugou cocks his head and doesn’t need to hope you know when he rolls his eyes anymore because he can finally do it in front of you. He crosses his arms, “Do you dance? I can’t think of anything else to keep you distracted enough to avoid assassination.”

But you are already distracted by something and he can see the moment you stop listening to him talk. All the better, he thinks. He might have just asked you to dance with him.

“Your hand Highness, I– mers–” and you reach forward to take up his bitten fist like touching him is suddenly the easiest thing in the world. Your fingertips are ice-cold. The rot spreads. “You startled me, I’m so sorry.”

Now Bakugou isn’t listening. You rub at the divots your teeth left in the side of his palm and press them like imperfections in pie dough. Your hands are so much more slender than his. So much rougher. Do you feel it too? The death of fury? How the ocean slowly laps at the bonfire until wood can no longer fight back? Do you remember the library like he does? He wants more than anything to sit in a nook and read for a thousand years in recovery from this trip. Is it a safe place for you, or has he ruined it? Do you miss home like he does? Or has he ruined that too?

“No. I’m sorry,” he admits before thinking. He startled you after all, but immediately he is silent with realization; breath holds in his lungs. Fuck, that’s not– you asked him so clearly not to do that. Is he incapable of leaving you with anything? You watch his fingers twitch for a moment like you can feel his heartbeat there and then look up at him and stare. He’s not sorry for sneaking up on you at all. That’s not what he meant.

Eyes was an apt nickname, if not a little mean. Bakugou has never envied telepaths before. How ignorant he was, to think of you as the bloody little girl in a velvet carriage. You hold his hand now with just as much strength as you did all those years ago; obviously it was strength and not desperation. You did not hang laundry to thank him. You did not catch fruit to thank him. You didn’t learn to fight the rain or windows or soldiers or the sea for your prince. It was only him, making magic for you.

“Never thought I’d hear a sheep apologize to the sheepdog.”

He startles a little, just a slight widening of his eyes, because you hold his hand up to see the ring of teeth clearly and cover your chuckle with the tips of your fingers.

“Callin me a sheep?”

“You are biteable like one.”

Do you know what you’re doing? Bakugou wonders as his own smile escapes the confines of horror. He snatches his hand back and leans against the black iron railing to face you. Quick wit, quicker draw, why do you hide such pleasant things under such a ferocious– the Alderan blinks and his face falls for half a second again in realization.

You blink back because you cannot read his mind, “Are you okay, sir?”

The same fire. If he stopped and thought for a single fucking second you wouldn’t have been the enigma protecting his home. You would have been a girl that he wanted very much, to talk to in his ceaseless boredom. He melts into a smile again and this time his teeth glint, “Don’t call me that.”

Winter really has arrived; the sun sets faster with each second and soon the ballroom below is a great orange pool. He was meant to rehearse the opening waltz today and the thought of you watching him, concealed, makes his ears hot. Florals drift up and up from their vases where they’re warmed in afternoon light.

You cross your legs and turn too, so that the prince isn’t just staring at a profile. “Are you looking forward to it?”

“To what?”

“The ball, Highness. Are they fun?”

“You’ve attended balls,” he grunts and scans his memory for the last party thrown in Aldera, although you don’t appear in the pictures his brain conjures up. “They’re fine. Loud.”

You nod. There are ten-thousand things he could think to ask you and a hundred more questions he knows that the answers will spur but sitting beside you in the dark without a threat to either of your lives is new and overwhelming. Your wild hair makes wild shapes.

“Fuyumi wants to dress you up.”

You don’t find that as funny as he does and you’re gawking when you turn from the view of the ballroom to look at him. He thinks you aren’t afraid of him– he hopes– but he knows you still won’t say what you long to for fear of sounding unprofessional. He’ll have to work on that.

“She gave up on Ochako years ago.”

“Is it a gown?”

“Takoban,” he rests his head on the metal too, enjoying all the scandalized expressions your pretty lips make, “frilly lace, the works.”

You consider this for a moment and make the shape of his name before swallowing it. One more time, “I see.” And you turn back away to think some more, about how to phrase something unprofessional. He’s teasing, he hasn’t seen the damn thing but for a moment your prince can see you so clearly, sewn tight into a dress made of sealace. You try to speak again, fail, and lean closer. Your breath is sweet from fruit and your bowl is empty behind you.

“I can’t wear blue for another second, Highness, I’ll hurl the tailor into the sea.”

Bakugou spits over the railing in amusement and huffs, a subdued panic, when he crosses his arms again.

“Highness please,” you chuckle, “I’ll get violent,” and you smile under the frown, which just serves to make you look even more like a dragon– like you’ll make good on your word– and less like an obedient footsoldier. How do you do it? What are you doing to him? Bakugou can only stare with a rough affection because if he tried to speak right now something might come out.

You run a hand back through your braids to settle them where you like them to lay. It’s draconic, regal, every way you sit perch and glare from the clearest part of any room. His mother calls it King’s Corner, or the Seat of the Queen, that perfect spot where you can see everything important without showing your back to a soul. That’s always where he finds you. That’s your secret. He pinches an ear between his knuckles to try and cool it down.

“Takoba’s lucky you aren’t a mage,” he manages. He has to look away to say it but he does manage, “should thank you for it.”

“I did try,” you don’t need to manage back. Proximity to him isn’t eating you alive. “And I don’t work for thank yous, thank you very much.”

When Bakugou was ten years old he celebrated his birthday in a parlor with boughs of cherry blossoms and sweets for which he never really had an appetite. He was doted on and he worked hard to deserve it so that anything he wanted to do that day, and any birthday thereafter, was his. You were not celebrated with cake. He wouldn’t know until years later that his mother brought you gifts and good food on your birthday because he could find you every day of the year at work somewhere in his castle. You did not fall ill, you did not fail, and on his birthday you, nine years old, practiced forms in the paths between spring orchards just downwind from the parlor. Jeanist was seated inside with him among the family’s guests. No appetite for cake. Bakugou only celebrated ten birthdays and you have never stopped breaking his heart.

“Tried what?”

You ruffle your own hair so you don’t have to look at him either because at least one thing embarrasses you. “Magic.”

“Magic.”

“It’s not funny,” you chirp at his flat tone and round on him with your legs crossed. He leans back when your voice comes out a bit louder than expected and his bitten fist aches when it clenches. “I would copy you.”

The rot makes him weak and useless and susceptible to your stare, but the rot makes you fearless.

“I used to watch you studying– when we were really little– when we were both supposed to be eating with everyone in the Hall. You used to,” you look briefly to your side like someone important might be watching you acting so casually and it dims that fire he needs in your eyes.

“Used to what?” he smiles. He knows you watched him, you must know that too. Finish, please finish your story, he wants to hear your voice tell you more about home.

“Used to watch you flail your chubby arms until sparks came out.”

When Bakugou laughs this time he tries not to hold anything back, if only just to douse you in oil and keep the fire alight. Fucking please, just talk.

“I used to try every night too!–” you laugh, slightly louder, “– wind up my arms tight and spin around my room after curfew– disturb the horses– pretend to be a dragon.”

“Your runty prince looked like a dragon?”

You grin, “My runty prince taught himself magic, didn’t he? What’s wrong with wanting to breathe a little fire?”

“I don’t breathe fire, dumbass.”

“You still make miracles. Ever seen a dragon?”

“Of course I have.”

“Have you ever sheltered from a spray of ethereal flames?”

He frowns and smirks, confused, as if to ask, why have you? And the flint tinder in the bright part of your eyes sparks white hot.

“Melting, crushing, it’s completely inescapable without a barrier mage,” you pull your knee up with a bit of theatrics and lean because with everything inside of you except for actual realization, you want him to listen too. “Pink and red, blue, green golden and white hot. Highness, has no one ever told you how beautiful your magic is? You make magic like a dragon, who wouldn’t want a blessing like that?”

No one would want this cursed fucking magic that prickles his palms with sweat in the dark for no other reason than because you are looking at him, when all he wanted was– he just wanted to see you– watch you, he didn’t need you to watch him back and now the fire of Aldera he keeps trying to warm beside will blast him all the way to the wick. This is the flattery he hears so much about from his blushing mother.

“‘s not special. My magic maims people.”

“So do I.”

He frowns deeper, “Not the same.”

“I worked hard to maim people, it’s not the same because what I do isn’t beautiful.”

“That’s not–” he doesn’t think that. Don’t think that he thinks that, “–work isn’t beautiful. War isn’t beautiful.”

“You’ve never seen war. Highness you make–”

“Fuck off,” he tosses at you like it’s ever worked before.

“I won’t.”

“Eyes–”

“– it’s beautiful.”

“I make bombs.”

“You make starfall.”

Bakugou stares. Rough affection, yeah right, he’s melting.

You fall back on your hips when you realize you’ve broken clear through the confines of professionalism and the embarrassment sets in quickly. Eyes dart sideways, chest and knees turn. Your embarrassment is a subtle grip on fraying rugs. What do you do to your heart to make it pull so strong in every direction? Is it a spell? One that makes him quiet and happy to wait for his silent guard to speak again. This must be how the queen feels. You turn fully back to the rising orange light of the ballroom below and your lips part before any words are actually ready to come out.

The first time you try to speak, he doesn’t hear you. Bakugou traces the path between your shiny scars with his gaze. One below your ear to the one at your eyebrow and down again, past an old cut in your cheek. You couldn’t douse the forest fire behind those lashes if you tried. Not under orders or oath. Not from embarrassment.

“What does it feel like?” You whisper, looking a great distance down past abandoned flowers.

Both of you have fallen closer to each other in the waves of your nothing conversation, so much so that your shoulders would press together if the rot just ate away a little bit more. Bakugou’s heart sinks into the ballroom. It plummets like a drowned man.

“Gimme your hand.”

This is a fucking mistake, but all your prince can see is the last time pure joy ever sailed across your face in an evening spent around your wonderful campfire. He caused and extinguished it with one spark thrown into your cupped palms, the last time you ever tried to make magic. “I won’t hurt you,” he rumbles even though it kills him to look at you now.

Your side of the catwalk begins to glow at the lips because the sun has set far enough to climb walls towards the ceiling. You glow with it. Pink in a thousand places, ears and throat, lips, because you’re thinking too hard about what it is to be a proper guard and how much it is probably not raising your voice to delight in magic that does not belong to you. The corners of your mouth tremble. Who was it that told you you talk too much?

“Is that an order?”

“No.” Of course not.

You study the details of the itchy rug for too long, in the new light at its edge. Bakugou used to hate hiding up here in the cold but it was the only place the idiot children his mother sent him here to entertain couldn’t find him. He couldn’t be happier now, now that no one but you can see just how hard he flounders without fury.

Your hips swivel back towards him in precise decision then you fold your knees neatly underneath them to get closer. A few white ribbons in your hair seem to catch fire as the sunlight climbs higher and the sun dips lower out an infinite distance. Every mile it is far, is a mile Bakugou can feel in measures of chill. If Aldera is at the center of the world, Takoba is the outer edge and you remind him just how blessed he is when his hand melts at your Alderan touch. You reach and pull both his fists into the space between your bodies from where they lingered in the air.

“Yes sir.”

“Don’t,” he breathes, watching all the shapes your fingers can make together. He’s a prince, this is ridiculous. He sits up tall and stretches his arms out so you don’t need to reach so far, and makes a safe place for your strong fingers, those calluses and scars, to rest atop his open palms.

“Don’t call me sir.”

You are looking at him and considering something about his face, or his words, who knows– one of your eyebrows twitches in decision. It’s remarkable how steady your heads are. You are sure of everything you do even when it’s destructive and disruptive and punishable by death.

Laid out plainly like this and stiller than either of you have ever been together, your fingers and wrists, your palms, even your fingernails are so much more delicate than his. Like if he closed his golden fists, you’d disappear. Compared to the princess you have the hands of a farmer, but not a single thought– past how each other part of your body might look beside his– is allowed to rattle through his head when you watch him, straight ahead, and smile.

“Okay.”

He clears his throat. He’s a mage and magic is easy. He’s not going to set off the sweat on the back of his neck. “Don’t be nervous,” Bakugou grumbles to the dark.

You grin and ghost a thumb over the warmth and damp of his open palm, “Who are you trying to convince?”

“It’s this stupid fucking magic,” he bites. A bead of sweat drips through his knuckles onto the floor and if he’s not careful he might take out half the castle. Prince and apprentice assassinate world’s most fucked up royal family– he can already see the dossier sitting pretty on his mother’s desk.

You’re suddenly in a wonderful mood and you sit up slightly at the beginnings of warmth under your fingertips. He can hear your knees squeak and count your heartbeats in the veins of your wrist that his own fingertips reach. Those eyes again– always your eyes. They’re colored like any normal pair anyone might ever see but he’s one of few people who watch the dragons. You must have watched them too, too long, for your gaze to become so similar.

It feels like any other second of Bakugou’s life. Setting fire to own hands and measuring the strength of his magic in reds and whites. It’s an ordinary moment for many whole seconds until your prince follows the beginnings of light up from his palms, to your starving and unabashed awe. The sparks bubble up as hungry fish would in a pond, and then jump, spit, between your fingers like cooking oil. Your touch is so gentle at first. You train and measure your own skill every day so that Jeanist’s recruits don’t lose varied limbs, but as your excitement wells up you spill a bit from your seams. You rise slightly higher and give him more weight to hold and your prince dissolves into a smile.

Four hands rest inside one another and fire from the dragons illuminates your hiding place.

“Highness,” you whisper and startle a thousand times at every new color Bakugou ignites between your fingers. You’re fully up on your knees now having risen higher and higher to watch his magic as best you can and Bakugou sits on the floor beneath you, rotting.

“Highness what,” he whispers back.

You abandon the thought and jump when a green sparkler squeals through the air between you, and when your prince thinks to pull away your fingers are already wrapped tight around every part of him you can manage. He could have done this for you a thousand times; your joy was always this simple, raw, and unjealous. Purple and gold soar across the highs of your cheeks and hug your jaw. It’s all he can bear, to love this smile and to know that his sweat is plastered across your hands and soaked through the cuff of your sleeves, and so he freezes with the realization and embarrassment and with your last words.

“Highness, thank you.”

He doesn’t have the wherewithal to speak yet. The smile he loves. The magic dies with his concentration and as the sun finally crests your walkway for its fleeting moments of warmth, Bakugou tries to muster something like confidence because you’re looking at him with a softness he didn’t realize you had. Is it overwhelming because he knows you could kill him? Maybe it’s because he’s never wanted to kiss anyone before.

Bakugou’s pomegranate eyes dart up to you, saying goodbye to the last of the light and something like sugar scalds his throat. That new thought is fleeting because your golden prince drains the life from it like a butchered animal– gods, can’t he leave you with anything?

“Told you I don’t bite,” he grins and swallows the last selfish thought to death, “that’s your job right?”

You beam before bursting into deep and hungry laughter in the sun-soaked air above him. Whatever. Bakugou supports you as you cling to his arms and struggle to stay upright in your laughter. You’re overflowing. He smiles and huffs, he can’t help that. He can’t help goosebumps either but you don’t need to know about those and he’ll never utter a word. He still needs to meet the dressmaker for alterations and finalize the appetizers, and make sure the kitchens send dinner to your door.

“Highness,” you breathe like a bird and try to collect yourself enough to stop laughing. You plop back onto your hips, “Highness–”

“Highness Highness,” he taunts. The sound of it will make his ears bleed. Bakugou palms for a handkerchief with one hand and lets you hold his other. You cling to the bite you left there. Your legs overlap. “This is ridiculous,” he chuckles when your joy almost folds you in half, “A real joke might kill you.”

“Let it,” you breathe, canines twinkling, and dip slightly closer, laughing, to press your lips to his.

It’s so easy, you don’t mean to. You are lightheaded in the warmth of the sunset, magic trembles across your sensitive skin and you only want to be closer. Just close enough to bury yourself in that place that is so safe and that fills you with such a horrible comfortable joy–

As Bakugou reaches inside his tunic for something you lean too close. Your chest falls over his lap before either of you remembers that it shouldn’t be like this, that there are a thousand other places your prince belongs and ten thousand rules you have engraved on the meat of your skull to keep comfort at bay. It’s so warm with your eyes closed and his smile tastes like cinnamon. He doesn’t pull away.

You only realize what’s happened after that smile falls dead against your lips. Venom and rage betray a soft exterior. He’s soft against your touch. He’s soft like he’s never fought a day in his life. Your hands hold his beautiful golden head right where you need it and in the quiet, your eyes open to blinding and beautiful sunlight.

A touch is all you wanted, gods know why– they’ll never tell you– and you draw your chin back an inch to breathe. Bakugou is staring violently and his eyes are more like targets now than cherry pits. Eyebrows wider, higher, than the sky, he stares like his heart has stopped. What happened? He doesn’t look like anyone but himself anymore. You freeze.

Prince Bakugou is staring at you until he’s not, on the itchy rug in the sunset of the great black catwalks, until his eyes close and he kisses you back. Soft, closed lips brush so hot they’ll leave a mark, they’ll brand you and everyone will know what you did. The doom spreads quickly. You have never been so graceless in your life as you are now, falling backwards out of his warmth and stumbling onto your feet. He’s still on the ground and you only know he is holding you because sweat drips from the fingers of yours that he clutches.

“Wait,” he gasps. This is so much worse than fury, and you rip your hand away from his to take a step back. You didn’t mean to. Bakugou stares like a dragonslayer, heartbroken.

You run. Before you can breathe or be reasoned with, before you hear him call your name, you turn and dash through the back doorway alone. If this were Aldera, where would you hide? The frozen air of the seashell castle whispers straight through your flesh as you, sprinting, stumble your way past the castle’s vanity. There is a nook in the wall of the principal staircase where only Jeanist can find you. There is a seat on a high window in the Great Hall that you can reach with a library ladder. There are two tiny battlements in the east corner of your queen’s castle without a real way to get inside and on any day but a lightning storm, you can wedge a hunting knife in loose mortar and climb the masonry over its edge to lay and nap and stargaze at the tallest point of the most beautiful kingdom. An ant couldn’t hide in Takoba. There’s not one dark seam for the bugs.

A guard barely moves in time to avoid being crushed under your boots because fuck this horrible waterlogged place. The ocean drips out of your ears like tears from a seashell, drop by drop because you picked a fight with the goddess and thought yourself lucky to live before you realized she had made a home for herself inside your heart. Now you laugh with your prince and you touch him happily and you spar with him and hold nothing back and you tell him how much his magic helped you to live.

Resisting the urge to kill him, fighting to win Mitsuki’s favor, the threat of blue fire and a mage you doused in the sea, it was all so much easier than this. It could have been that easy forever, what were you thinking?

“Y/n!”

You weren’t, that’s what being too content gets you.

When Bakugou calls your name again his voice cracks because you are so much faster than he is at slipping through corridors. There is nowhere to hide in this awful country. Why are you running? If you were just slightly calmer you might have known where you were but white windows will always look like white windows and Bakugou is not so slow that you can ever really outrun him.

You duck under a low wall and its hanging tapestry and emerge on the other side at the edge of a stretch of empty hall. Setting sunlight pours past ten silver vases and someone left a window open, so lace curtains flow around a pedestal with its silvery prize in the center.

“Y/n, please.”

Agony. This isn’t what you want. When Bakugou calls to you one last time you have no choice but to face him because he has never asked for anything before, and when you do, tears drip off the highest parts of your cheeks.

He lets the tapestry fall over his shoulder and stops at the front of the long, long room. Neither of you speak for an eternity besides the sound of breath being caught again, him at the edge and you in the center being swayed by cold air. His shaggy hair has been pushed back too many times in his rush to follow you and his eyes glow unobstructed. Bakugou’s broad shoulders fit too perfectly into his baubled tunic. It’s easier to watch him than to think.

When he leans forward, you step back, and he pauses like you might start sprinting again.

He doesn’t realize there’s something rotten stuck in the depths of your throat that keeps you from straying too far.

“I–”

“Don’t be sorry,” he begs, reading your mind. He’s never looked like this once in his whole life. He fell a step closer in his panic and when you do not run, his fists unclench from where they draw blood at his sides. “Don’t cry.”

You shake your head and he cautions another step. How can you ever go home now? How much longer can you survive here? The thought is suddenly and immediately overwhelming and Bakugou freezes again when you drop your head into your hands. It’s too much, you can’t believe how badly you want to hate him again and how much easier it would be than this.

“Y/n,” he whispers. His voice is candled ash. You know exactly how close he is even with your eyes closed because Alderan fire is unmistakable and you know too that he’s giving you a moment to escape.

“I didn’t mean to.”

Prince Bakugou’s magic-worn hands reach up from where he wires them and you snatch them both, and all their kiln-fired warmth, out of the air before he can touch you like you might break the first finger that moves. You don’t mean to bare your teeth either, you hope you aren’t, if you are he doesn’t care. Your prince stands above you, brows knit and eyes stupid with worry.

“Forget,” you plead in whispers.

He pulls your grip higher so that he can rest his palms under your ears. You aren’t doing anything but hanging from him. He moves easily because you do not stop him and he brushes his thumbs over stray hairs and their wild shapes. Silence is worse than his rage, but he’s trembling and his eyes never once look away from yours. He’s studying, contemplating something that continues to break his heart.

“Highness.”

Bakugou cups your jaw like it might bruise and tilts your head up just enough to kiss you. He could not care less about broken fingers.

His lips quiver and press just once to yours before pulling back, reconsidering, and dipping into you again. Your hold on his hands and his hands at your throat are melting, shaking, sweating. His chest swells above yours. You melt with him because you have lost your mind and push against the body you know can hold you. It can pull you from a current and throw you over its shoulder. Bakugou can lift you in strong arms, he can make you laugh until not even an order could compose you at your station.

You part your lips to be closer. He tangles his fingers in your braids so that you can take whatever you want. Your prince tastes like his favorite pastries, and Alderan peaches, and gold, he tastes like he’s fireproof.

Wet drips from your bottom lip in the mess of it all, before Bakugou tilts your chin in strong hands to catch what he’s missed. The slick of your tongues, a clicking of teeth, you want to eat him whole. He’s going to devour you.

He holds your face now to move you as he’d like– four feet tripping over each other to find a wall– and you grip at the patterns on his tunic between stolen breaths and steps stumbled backwards. Magic crackles where he touches you like he can’t control himself. His voice comes out with his gasps in growls because there is too much and nothing to say. You have forgotten apologies.

“Your hands” he breathes between nips for the softest warm parts of you, “cold.”

“The window–” but he kisses you again before you can finish. His hands are shaking, he is a starving dog and still he holds you like you’re going to break. You terrify him.

How long have you wanted this? There’s not enough focus left for your brain to turn its wheel and if there was you wouldn’t have pulled him so close. You suckle at his lower lip because his heartbeat tastes like home and he lets you dip inside again when you’ve had your fill. He fills you with himself in return. Wet, soft against you. It’s clumsier than sparring, and so much warmer.

At the end of cold hallways, where servants bustle and where there is still work to be done, the guard who barely survived your warpath ducks out from under the tapestry. He only wanted to check you were okay, but in the almost empty hallway Shinsou’s hand falls slack and his baton slips from it. It rings out against white marble and your heart stops beating at the same time as your prince. Your wheel groans in its new turning. The guard stares and you bristle.

You do not hear what Bakugou says in your panic but he does not let you go so easily this time. You will run, you’ll find somewhere to hide in this prison because that is your job and no one has ever done it better than you and there you will figure out what to do.

The last breath you take before darting away is shared in the sunlight with your prince, and just as you tip in a hint of escape Bakugou cups your cheeks one last time to keep you still. Your claws jump immediately back around his. He stares. His eyes are a study over every scar and warm flush, the violence of your sudden caught fear, even the parts squished and wrinkled in his hold. His magic vibrates unlit through your skin for one more second just one more second he takes to look and then he whispers,

“Okay.”

You take off the moment he releases you to deal with the apprentice and slip as best you can around a blue-tiled corner. Seedsized carvings raise their axes and little white waves fall. Sparks fight the chill on your jaw.

You forgo the seaside for fear of worrying your prince again. Manure pools around your pretty white boots because in the stables, horses don’t mind if you need to cry. The ocean swallows the last of the sun and you are suddenly a child again rinsing the blood from her face and into the hay and finding a dark place to hide. Every step is labor. Agitated white stallions complain to you in a line about their dinner and restlessness, and about chickens roosting inside uninvited, and about the woman who has sat here for hours and done nothing to help them.

The port city of Takoba shimmers at twilight under the hill that the stable looks out on. Its waters are silver and beg you to join them on all sides from their great distance. They have the advantage as you turn your back to the view.

When you amble towards the last empty stall, a figure drowning in blue is perched on a bed of straw. She is sickly beautiful and she stares like she hates everything she gazes upon.

“Majesty,” you startle and forget to take a knee.

Where you tread carefully in borrowed clothes, the Takoban Queen is happy to ruin her gown sitting up to her hips in straw beside a very plain horse. She runs a brush over the sheen of its black mane.

“Yes?” She sighs, defeated, until she turns to you and cocks her head like she might have expected someone else. Hundreds of translucent layers fall over themselves in her skirt like a flower and catch imaginary light for every inch that she moves. There is an ache so deep in your bones, chilled first then charred like dipping cold hands in hot water, you struggle to compose yourself. You cannot muster the question of why a queen might be hiding in the belly of her stables but you could guess.

“You were crying.”

“Please don’t tell Mitsuki.”

When will you be allowed to go home? The queen looks between her horse and the space you haunt above her, and pulls a second curry comb from the depths of her soft straw seat. “They’ll find you if you stand in the open like that.”

The day drags on like a dream you have made from picturebooks of Aldera and the man that you will never be free of, but queens don’t much mind if you need to cry either. You crumple into the spot she digs out for you in the straw and until it is too cold, the two of you sit quietly in shit together.

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tagged angels ✧.* @nnubee @nonomesupposedto @kotarousproperty @sveetnn @lunrai @km7474 @cathwritestragediesnotsins @idimmadontgiveashit @kooromin @k1tk4tkatsuki @litiri @kiwibao @sarcasticlittlebook @condy-wants-a-cookie @mysticalfridge @falling4fandoms @katanaski @romiinlove @cherripunch26 @acid-rain27 @bakugouswh0r3 @zukowantshishonourback @ultracrii @chandiewashere @screechingdreameater @when-you-are-just-done @levisbae2 @flyhighinthesky @thebluespacecow @mizzfizz @butterscotch-ripple-icecream @phoenix-draws77 @ltadoriyuujl @dreamingoftomorroww @optimisticprime3 @misscaller06 @the-omnipotent-phlowr @king-dynamight @sky-angel101 @faetoraa @sageandberries-png @king-explosionmurder @aqua5ky @idkwhatisgoingon24-7 @midnightprocrastinator @animeobsessed03 @sakurarr1122

could not tag for some reason :(

#a hymn to black water #i make good on my promises #this one really took it out of me- editing was an afterthought there might be more mistakes than usual #thank you for loving these weirdos #bakugou x reader #bakugo x reader #bnha fantasy au #mha fantasy au #fantasy bakugou x reader #fantasy bakugo x reader

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six-white-venus · 4 months

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sometimes i wonder if death is all i can write about.

every poem i recite seems mournful, like i'm preparing for a funeral that i'm somehow sure will happen. it follows me, the death. its stench. the sorrow. it follows me and i'm so sick and tired of it. somedays i even think of stopping writing altogether, because what's the point? every word i put down on paper will be pitch black anyway and it will scream and weep of the same old tragedies that will make everyone's ears bleed time and time again.

but then i remember.

i remember writing about soft smiles and booming laughter. i remember writing about tears being wiped away by patient fingers, i remember writing the words, "i love you, i love you, i love you," like a hymn, a prayer, like a holy scripture. i remember writing about you. you, with your garden of water hyacinths, tiger lilies, and grins that are a little too sharp to make a person feel comfortable (just like mine). you with your poems that feel like a beating piece of your heart, with your messy hair, boundless excitement, and fingers painted with the rainbow. i remember us: sitting cross-legged in places we shouldn't be sitting in, talking about everything and nothing and feeling at home with each other ("you're my family"). i remember writing about adoration, love and friendship. i remember, then: death is not all i write about.

my writing is not about death or sorrow at all, actually. my writing is a sweet caress of words singing,

"hey, can you hear me?

i just wanted to say:

i love you. i love you, i love you,

i love you and my dear,

you make loving so painless."

i write about love time and time again, i write about you, i write about us. huh. maybe in a way, i do write about death. with us, love lives and laughs and when we're apart, dies, only to rise up from the ashes brighter than the goddamn sun when you see me the next day and we both grin.

i write and it says, "hey, can you hear me?"

and you do, every time.

and you say, "i love you."

I want to yell at the top of my lungs, "i love you i love you i love you so fuckin much i adore you"

but instead, i smile and hold you close. Instead, i write my silly little letters and hope they ring a million times louder than my voice ever could.

#my writing #prose poetry #love #words #listen. I adore my friends #love resides in every breath they take #I'm just. I have a lot of feelings about platonic love #and how it's just so. unconditional #it doesn't even need to exist #if you think about it there's no tangible benefit #nothing except being loved #and that's so wonderful #loving just because you can. just because you want to #man i just.#nila this one's for you boo #mwah #writeblr #prose #friendship

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ceralmillkandstars · 1 year

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a beautiful ring pt 2 (namor x siren!reader)

excerpt: 500 year old god and a young, enchanting mermaid who acts like an absolute gremlin- she refuses to act any different in front of the man who could slice her in half. and he’s absolutely enamored by it.

welcome to part two :) thank yew for all of the support i’ve gotten from you guys so far. def slowly but surely buildin up here. part three is in da works as we speak, praying for some smoochy time cuz smut is my fav thing to write.

here we goooooo

You were raised to love the sea, but your home was the surface.

And by the gods did you need a shower.

Your back was sore, your hair stiff from the sea salt, and the slowly dying adrenaline rush was leaving your eyes droopy and body hunched over. Flying back to Chicago in the dead of night after returning from East Hampton’s beach killed you, your victory of stealing from a god seems meaningless when there is no more energy left to boost your own ego.

You found yourself surprised when you made it to your condo's doorsteps in downtown Chicago safely, in awe that you were just that good. Winding the prize out of your pocket, you gingerly look it over before laying it on your vanity desk, giving yourself a once over in the mirror after you beelined towards your room.

The east coast truly brought out the freckles under your eyes. You glowed, blowing yourself a kiss before trudging into the bathroom. Inhaling the crushed eucalyptus leaves affixed by twine atop of your shower head, you turn the knob as hot as you can stand, beginning to strip from the salty slip dress and undergarments.

A melody begins to hum from your lips, effortlessly wrapping yourself in a protective transfixion as you step into the shower. A groan mixing in with the angelic sound emits from you while the steaming water droplets pelt your back. You lean your head back, running your now goldless, godless fingers through your hair, gingerly tending to your scalp with lavender shampoo and tea tree oil.

You don’t quite know what you are, but you are too unique, too important, to not nourish.

Twirling your conditioner-soaked hair into a clip, you lather yourself with similarly smelling soap that reminds you of the tide pool you once bathed in as a girl, singing hymns that reminded you of the ocean floor you visited today. Twisting and swaying your hips to the song, you let the water turn ice cold once you cleaned yourself sparkling, your hair soft and relaxed, ready to be brushed and braided for the night. The frozen pellets encourage your fears, your inhibitions, the fear that you might have not been forgotten, swirl down the drain, the song coming to an end as you turn the dial off.

Lavender lotion, face oil, floral spaghetti strap and matching undies, french braids with rosemary elixir being soaked by your scalp- the perfect night.

Pizza would make it better, though.

You plop yourself on the bed, back on the mattress, legs raised and pointed towards the air as you dig for your phone to dial whichever place had stuffed crust and pineapple.

You are not alone, the moon murmurs to you, allowing a black sludge of dread to pool within you. Your body jerks up, and you cross your arms over your chest. Eyebrows furrowing and lips jutted, you scan your room.

My kitchen, my kitchen.

Who is in my kitchen?

If another absolutely rancid, stupid boy who couldn’t take the hint and throw away your condo key (you’d never admit that was your fault), you were drowning them. Even if you had to hull their unconscious bodies to Chicago’s murky waters to do so. Even if that’s never happened before.

That’s never happened before.

With a paling face, you slide off the bed and storm into the kitchen. Sometimes, you prayed that the moon would foretell you important information before such an event occurred.

“Listen, Chad, or Jason, or Elijah, who-fucking-ever, if someone ghosts you and doesn’t call you back that doesn’t give you authority to come into their home even if you have a key. I’m going to count to ten before I lay you flat on that countertop and remove your most important ligaments from your body because I am just so fucking tired- oh..”

Your fears did not travel too far down the drain while you showered. Your protection hum was not enough. In fact, the unease of being out of control slithered back up and wrapped itself like a serpent around your neck in a chokehold, for the moon did not whisper to you soon enough that he had followed you back home.

Your protection song was not enough. Usually, something so simple would cause an intruder to burst into a billion water droplets. Usually, you would have just come into the kitchen to discover a puddle and smile to yourself knowing that an idiot got what was coming to them. You did not need the moon to warn you of robbers, of shallow one night stands who can’t get enough of your hypnotic stares, of anyone coming into your home without permission.

And yet, this god stands in your kitchen, seemingly perplexed by your adornment of antique plates and cups poorly stacked in the open cabinets, not one of them the same. His fingers trace along adjacent jars, reading to himself each herb and spice labeled and put away on the wood shelf. You mirror his annoyed expression as his eyes wander near the sink, finding a ripped open, half eaten, chocolate bar.

“I wasn’t expecting company,” you murmur, taking soft steps towards the barrier of your kitchen. You find your fingers smoothing down the base of your floral tank top, giving an angsty stare towards the pair of matching panties acting as a second skin.

Well, at least it didn’t look like you were lying.

He did not change, his gold armor tightly affixed to his shoulders, spear tightly bound in his hands. The large, gold-plated necklace and larger than life pearls, other finely varnished necklaces stack upon one another and his curly, damp, yet neatly toppled hair with those earrings had your cheeks heating.

Very rarely does one of your stature, your nature, become seduced themselves.

Or so the moon tells you.

“Do those earrings hurt from wearing them all day, or does swimming in the water help with the weight distribution?” You blurt, cheeks red, back straight.

The god simply turns, giving you a slow once over. Quiet rage, curiosity swims in his eyes, a deadly demeanor flowing from him to you, you to him.

Exposing pajamas and random questions being unanswered won’t stop you from making his atoms implode with a whisper, for disrespect is a sour taste on your tongue.

Could you even kill him? Leave a scratch on his cheek?

Internally, you scoff. You won’t kill a god. You might steal from one, but it would be purely selfish of you to kill this man. The moon has whispered secrets of an underground world since you were a child wishing to sleep sooner, and it would be against your very nature to slaughter the man who leads a dream world.

So you continue on, filling in the bloodless silence as he turns to your dining table, “I like how you wear your oceanic garb on the surface. I think it’s neat.”

Is he going to take the ring back? Kill you? I mean, if you were him, you’d kill you if caught. Maybe you should go get it.

“I will not conform myself to the surface when I step foot onto this land.” The silky, calculated, deliberate cool tone reverberates around your home, the tranquil atmosphere melding into an eerie fog.

You pucker your lips, nodding.

The moon must be humored by your calmness before the very man whose spear could impale you before you could send another twinkle. Or horrified. Her daughter lackadaisical, wearing floral panties and a small, matching top in front of the serpent god.

He stares at you for a second longer, his eyes melting any confidence, any tranquility left in your body. A small girl with a knack for pretty things quivers before the god.

“I have heard rumors of the ones who are creatures of the sea. The creatures that can return to the surface world if they wish, full-bodied at their will. The creatures who can manipulate, who could conquer the world at their whim-”

“The moon does not wish me to conquer,” you bite, chin upturning. You turn, beginning to move towards your room. If you’re going to be interrogated, it better be with pizza.

A gasp pelts from you as his spear shoots out in front of you in a swift, presiding motion. The sharp metal kisses your cheek, the flesh of it nearly missing being sheered off.

Whiplash consumes you as you turn towards the god, face shot.

You guess it’s not the right time for pizza.

“The moon?” He quizzes, eyes narrowing, utterly fixated upon you. He observes as your chest heaves, your wide eyes staring down his spear, watching as you fight between looking at his face and that skillfully crafted weapon. There hasn’t been this powerful of a man so close to you before.

You gulp, nodding, wishing you could straighten your back, turn up your chin, more,“Yes, the moon.”

The spear slaps back to his side, and he moves away from you, continuing to contemplate your home. Your living room, your dining table, the half eaten dark chocolate bar sitting on the counter from the other night. Flowery, ethereal, a little messy. You strived to bring as much essence with you to the surface world as you could, finding incandescence in each piece you brought back to your condo. Stolen or not is long forgotten by now, all you know is that this is your home.

A god is looking around your home. Cheeks heated, you pray to the Mother to take the embarrassment and hope he is even the slightest bit impressed.

He strides towards the velvet couch, and you cringe as he sits. It’s unearthly to witness a sea god attempting to relax into your couch. It seems he feels the same way, unable to sit in an indestructible way, so he settles for resting his elbows on his knees, gazing up at you.

“Do you have velvet couches at home?”

It is not a request when he states, “tell me about your moon.’

“It is not my moon,” you begin, tiptoeing towards the adjacent couch. You grab a small throw pillow, shielding your peaking, freckled stomach as you sit down. Any wrong moves, any innuendos you’d fight him in your apartment would mean slaughter. The moon warns you of this as you cross your legs and force yourself to face the god. “She is simply the moon. She holds the energy to the waters, and water is within us all- no matter the level. I serve her and her me.”

His gaze gives away he is not satisfied with this information, and you shrug your shoulders. There is little information you wish to give away tonight, your growling stomach and fluttering eyes urging you to find a way to end this conversation and get this man on his way.

“What more is there to know?” What a teasing answer, and his brows rise in the slightest. You’re both struggling to keep your composure, this god used to his world bending to his will and your sleepy, angry hunger fueling whatever delinquency was about to arise.

“How do you serve her?” You nearly groan at that demanding tone, it’s what- midnight? There’s no food, emphasis on no food, in your stomach and you wish to curl under your freshly washed winter duvet to borrow away until the upcoming afternoon instead of being questioned right now.

“I am tired,” you feebly admit, voice soft like silk and edged glass. A fine balance for a soon-to-be tantruming moon child. You prayed to her to not let him see you act a fool after stealing his ring.

A fine price to pay for not being powerful enough. “Can we continue this conversation another time? You know where I live. I just want some pizza- what? Pizza is good.”

You nearly scoff at his grimacing complexion. Slowly deteriorating, your once gentle, feline gaze began to melt into a matching stare as he replied.

“The surface world food is vile.”

“Have you ever had stuffed crust pizza?” Gods, arguing was going to get you nowhere. What can you do to get this god to leave?

He is not leaving, child.

“How do you serve the moon?” He repeats, straightening his back.

He just won’t quit. You ponder how it turns out for someone to push his button; a fire ignites in your stomach at the thought.

“I’m in my undies right now, I’m hungry, I am exhausted, and I don’t even know who you are. Come back in the morning once I’ve eaten my vile food,” you spit, “and I’ll think about telling you all my cute little secrets.”

Incredulously, his mouth gapes open in the slightest before standing up, bolting to tower over you faster than you can recalibrate yourself. Before your gaze can linger on his thighs for more than a moment's notice, you find a tight grip on your jaw, cheeks squishing and your lips pursed in the slightest. Dread consumes you, and you feel the moon shake her head.

“You dare,” he begins, staring down at you as if you were less than the scum under his feet, “speak to me like this as if you did not steal what does not belong to you in the first place- siren.” You return the fever, glaring back at him, clenching the chair’s cushioning and pushing yourself to meet his face with yours.

“It was pretty,” you seethe, “and I am not a siren.”

He tuts, clenching your jaw harder between his thumb and forefinger, twisting your neck as though you were the ring you plucked from him in the ocean, “Little surface girls taking things that do not belong to them, claiming they belong to the moon.”

Mother forgive me, you silently beg, the rage allowing one last particle of energy to surface. You let yourself blow out a soft sigh that you hope, you pray, feels like peppering kisses all over his face and neck.

Peppering kisses turn into boiling beads of sweat pilling along his temples in mere seconds, your silent will urging his blood to cook beneath you. Boiling blood and a dark, unearthed lust surfacing in the form of a longing gaze and heated skin. His grip molding soft, lips parting.

“Return tomorrow, and I will answer your questions,” whatever sultry notes left in your voice bellow in his stomach, your eyes hooded, skin glowing as you summon the moonlight to cast against your goose bumped skin.

Bend to me by the order of the moon, bend to me and go home.

He longingly looks over your moon-kissed cheeks between his hand, down to your collar bones, the dip of your chest begging to pour out of your small tank top, tracing your navel with his eyes and they linger on the embroidered panties, your throw pillow long gone on the floor once you sat up fully to fight for yourself- for your pizza- tonight.

But because the way he was returning your devilish look, you might not be hungry for just pizza.

Bend to my will, sweet king. Let me continue my night, you may question me in the morning.

And then he has the audacity to reel back and laugh, letting you jerk away at the expense of your own mortification.

Heaven forbid, it didn’t work.

Dark red embellishes your cheeks, your nose, your neck and chest. Blotchy.

Your cooler hands find your cheeks, urging them to quiet, and you curl back into your chair. Looking down at your newly polished toes and back up towards him with pure fury, you couldn’t feel more humiliated.

The moon did not let you win.

There is no victory, no satisfaction when you are angry, she murmurs, synchronizing the gods movements as he lifts your chin again. It is gentle, testing. You are met with a curious, cautious, nevertheless impenetrable stare. His eyes travel between your cheeks, watering eyes, your pink, pouty lips.

“I will return in the morning, when the sun rises.” He promises with a nod, “hopefully you will be as enchanting as you are described in the books with a full stomach and long nights rest.” There is a soft laugh, the god not yet letting go of your face, observing the pink splotches of shame along your neck. “I did not think the definition of moon children would be so literal.”

You could not manipulate this man, and he is calling you a child.

You are too angry, too tired, too defeated to rebuttal that you are the goddess, the justice, the love and power of the moon.

He did not ask for his ring back when he let go of your face, gathered his spear, and took flight from your open balcony window, giving you another short, determined once over.

A loud groan escapes you as the transparent, pink-hued curtains sway with the wind.

You want to chuck that ring out of that very window, you decide.

Before you went to bed, you ate a whole box of stuffed crust pizza.

He kept his promise.

After failing to have a good night’s rest, tossing and turning, waking with cold sweats and dreams of cascading down a rabbit hole, you understand why your sleep was disrupted in the early morning.

There he sat, across from your bed in another lounge chair seemingly miniature while he shuffles about. He twirls one of your small shell in his hand, and it seems as though he took a good chunk of time out of his night to look through nearly all of your trinkets.

You sigh and roll over in your bed away from the man in the chair, pulling the duvet over your head. A groan reverberates through the sheets when you shove your face into the surface of the mattress.

This is not how you imagined your morning after East Hampton. You allow yourself to daydream for a moment, pretending you wake in the sun alone, stretch, cum with one of your previous vibrators, and make an omelet with the mushrooms you got from the market just the other day. Cheese and mushrooms and eggs, maybe a coffee, maybe a chai.

With a final groan to ground you, you flip the covers and force yourself to sit up. Your braids are tightly wound, the natural lighting from the window causing your hair to glow and your freckles to surface and sparkle. From your tank top, a large tshirt covers you, fabric folding over your stomach and thighs, barely covering your underwear.

Should you say hi? Should you act like he’s not there and get on with your morning routine?

You decide the latter, swinging your legs to hang off the of the bed and scoot for your feet to touch the floor. Your arms raise, and you stretch, looking towards the sky as you silently thank the moon for allowing you to see another beautiful morning, letting the gratitude bathe you.

He simply stares.

You let him as you wander into the bathroom to wash your face and brush your teeth.

There is no way you’ll be less than presentable in front of a god, you whisper to the moon as your examine your small closet. Your eyebrows furrow- you cannot remember a time you contemplated looking presentable for someone else.

You can hear the moon giggle as you contemplate wearing one of your prettiest dresses that you specifically use for full moon nights. Or the new moon? What kind of energy are you bringing into this conversation?

Energy, your lips quirk. May he be enamored, for it is not about the dress but jewelry that adorns you.

You place yourself in lacy garments, a shimmer of silver and a soft green, puffy-sleeved, translucent blouse and lightly washed, high-waisted jeans. Matching, lacy socks and a silver necklace with a curled shell.

Glamoured rings slide themselves onto your fingers, and you inspect the finery wrapped around your flesh with a grin. Silver and gold bands with crystals wired around them and dipped into moon water and rose oil bound to convey any man to serve you. Hopefully a god, too.

Gold glitter smears across your eyelid, your cheekbones and a tap on your nose. Clear mascara and brow gel brushes its way on as you glow at yourself in the mirror.

Wetting your hair and re-curling your golden ringlets with a serum, you place two pearly clips to push aside the front pieces of your hair on each side, framing your face in the most pleasing way.

Terrifyingly beautiful.

I am dreamy, I am translucent, I am a child of the moon.

With a deep breath and another prayer to the moon, you’re gliding out of the bathroom.

May the moon bless this day.

“I’m hungry,” you state as your feet patter towards him sitting in the chair, his body did not move an inch, now holding one of your hair clips. You stand in front of him, nearly at eye-level. Perplexed, angry, annoyed, curious, lustful- all the emotions you could sniff out as he gave you a slow, deliberate look over.

“Would you like to join me for breakfast?” You breathe, refraining from twirling your fingers together. Asking, not taking, was not a talent of yours. It makes you blush, makes you sweat.

“Tell me how you serve your moon while you eat.”

You find yourself agreeing with the slightest of smiles.

@angeli-fucking-cat <3

#namor x reader #namor x you #namor fanfiction #tenoch huerta namor #namor smut #namor imagine #mcu imagine #mcu fandom #marvel universe #marvel headcanons #marvel writing #marvel fanfiction #my wreck this journal #writing #i hope so so much u enjoy #again.. dunno where to go from here! lemme know how you feel #if u got ideas plz send them my way

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historia-vitae-magistras · 3 months

Text

Part Nine: Drownings

Chapter Directory: Here

Current Installment: You are here!

Author's note: Inspired by the 1950s short story "The Man Who Came Early" by Poul Anderson. I rewrote this seven times and had an unrelated mental breakdown. I'm still not happy with it but at least everything that was in the outline is in this version. No major trigger warnings for this chapter. Also on ao3 here.

Burial Mound, Cumbria

Matthew slid beneath the water, practically consumed by the dark concentric circles flowing out and lapping gently at the stone. They had built the spring like an inverted broch, no mortar, all perfectly fitted stone.

“No!” Arthur was whipping off his coat. The wool would only become waterlogged and drown him. His body was a spring, energy coiling from shin to shoulder, arms thrown up over his head to break the surface tension, anything to give him an extra boost to get and clasp his son to him. Toes off the ground, arms snatched him back.

“No!” Rhys was slamming him to the ground like he was a boy, and Mother was a corpse upon a driftwood throne. There’s scuffling. He flipped himself over, white-hot rage replacing whatever desperation was before.

“Let me go!” It was always English when they argued, a force of speech as effective as a spear point since the Angles.

Rhys drove down, rolled him over, face in the moss and clover of the Cumbrian soil beneath his face, the heart of him a thousand years ago and forbid him in a dead language. More loss. He wouldn’t take more loss. But his arm would snap if he struggled anymore.

“Rhys.” Brighid was pulling him off. “Rhys, let him go.”

“No!” He shot back at her. “Absolutely not—”

“You have too.” She looked gentle now, not fearsome. Herself, St. Brighid, not the warrior goddess mother left her to inherit. Soft clover, her prized cattle roamed rather than the wine-dark seas that thrashed her shores. Her hand released him.

Rhys was protesting, but he wasn’t fighting or wrestling. Arthur couldn’t hear him or Brighid now. Their voices were silent; Alasdair was on the ground, shed of his clothes, bleeding from a cut on his hairline. He almost snorted. Brighid would have had to strike him as hard as she could to stop him. Alasdair was saying something, mouth open to the French that was so familiar, calling after his favourite nephew. But his attention was gone now. The water spoke to him with Alfred’s laugh.

He dove.

—

Sometimes, when Matthew hasn’t slept, the ice starts whispering at home. Singing or whispering, luring him with cracks in the seracs as serpentine as a woman’s hips. It whispers about how much of him is already frozen. He can rest as much as he wants if he lays down and slips into blue-black waters. It sighs and tells him he can close his eyes, and everything will be all right. Tempts him. He’ll be so numb, but for a good reason. Everything would slide away, and he would be as empty as he felt. Sometimes, the ice sings.

And sometimes, he answers. He’s laid himself down into a gap in the pack ice for a nap so casually that the frigid water rushing over him feels gentle, not cold and cutting. Matthew has closed his eyes and let himself float away. He could emerge in a few months with the spring melt, float up, and return refreshed and rebuilt. Any absence unconsidered, and anyone who might have eventually noticed usually yet unbothered.

The spring sings like that, in a gentle burble instead of staccato groans but promising nonetheless. His brother’s laugh has gone quieter, disappearing under the water. The dry stone edge of the spring is cold under his hands, but the lure is louder, and the water is not so cold. Words his aunt sang drop from sounds flesh might make to the deep metallic of something like bronze clacking on stone. Like wind forced through chimes or a horn. The water sings like that, a hymn for the missing or maybe the mad, urging him on as he let himself sink and then swam down, searching for a bottom as he kept one hand on the round stone wall.

Then, the world was rotating. The light had gone so bright. Turning, he slammed against the stone, what air he had left bubbling out of his mouth and gurgling away. Fuck. He tried to twist and paddle up; he could swim like a fish, but something had snagged—no! Something had grabbed and hauled him up from behind. He must have been running out of air. His vision flashed red, even against his shut eyelids, and he broke the surface. Heaving, he groped for stone but found green and freshly cut wood boards. A woman looked down at him, a bucket fitted together of wood in her hand. Her hair was pulled out of her face in a crown of braids. The linen shift she wore draped off her shoulders and dipped below the neckline of her bodice, a style that had been popular when he was a child, but it was her eyes he’d locked on.

“Katya?” She looked a bit healthier than he’d ever known her to be, but her eyes were the same sky blue. Hope and harvest blue. He would have recognized her if he didn’t have eyes, though, because that part of him that was hers sang louder than the water or the shout coming from behind him. Something was pulling at his shoulder. He didn’t care. Matt pulled himself closer. He could smell summer wafting off her.

Her surprise turned to something tender, and her hand lifted to his face and beckoned behind him. Someone else was saying his name from his shoulder. He didn’t care.

“I’m not what you’re looking for yet.”

“Yes, you are.” He said. “I’ll always look for you.”

“But not yet.” She insisted. Pushing his soaking wet hair off his face. “Return to my dreams, wraith.”

“Katy—” He was being dragged away then. She didn’t look sad but hopeful.

“Swim.”

“What the fuck— DAD?”

“My sons and their cocks, I swear to God.” Arthur was griping, and Matt was spinning, looking for a handhold to climb the wall of the… was it a well he was inside of? It was not a spring; the water was too cold and too dark. He was shivering. Katya was there, happier than he’d ever seen her, and he was stuck here, pushed away, banished.

“Matthew!” Two hands on his face, making him look. His father was soaked but deathly serious. “Focus.”

“What?”

“Focus on your brother and swim.”

His father’s voice cut the panicked babble of thoughts, and he heard the laugh again. He sucked in the air and dove. If it was one thing he was, it was a good swimmer, reaching out and down, striving forward. He has never seen such darkness. Only the odd, purposeful tap on his calf keeps him in contact with his father. They don’t have much time before Arthur begins to freeze, or they burst for air. His lungs are straining, individual bronchioles tracing branches of pain through his chest when light shines. Harvest gathering greens, mostly, then woad blues and sparks of red like fruit. If only stained glass could flow and distort light like tide pools, it would look like this. He can’t tell which way is up then. He can’t breathe. He’s blacking out, hand reaching for his father’s tumbling form next to him as they fell rather than swam. The colours drained from the world, and rushing water froze, black and fractal.

Then he’s on his back, and his father is slapping him across the face. He jackknifes into consciousness. Dad’s there, dripping like a drowned rat. But his body is normal. No blood showed, no bones were broken, and strength flooded back into his extremities as his body staved off hypothermia in the much warmer air.

“What the fuck was that?” He gasped.

“Breathe.” Arthur is a bit frantic. They’re both shivering. “Focus.”

“Where are we?” Matt was so confused. He recognized stones, the well. But there were so many trees. The trunks were as tall as any he had at home, taller than anything that had been replanted after they’d been hacked from him to build the empire. The rainbow of smeared colour still danced in his eyes and his vision smeared.

“Not where.” Arthur was pale. “When. I haven’t had this many oak trees since before your brother was born.”

“When?” Matt practically gagged on a shiver and laid back down. “Was that—Was that the rainbow bridge? Like the sagas?”

“The— Rainbow bridge? Really, lad? You gawking at Kateryna was the single most heterosexual thing I’ve ever seen you do.”

The less relevant his sense of humour, the more fucked they were. But the blood rushing back into his fingers and toes hurt ungodly amounts. He lost focus again, the trees blurring into the low clouds like brushes into well-used rinse water, only revealing the buttresses of his grandmother’s pre-Christian cathedral in the foliage. Better than stained glass.

He’s lying there, aware of Arthur having gotten to his feet, but not other people, until there are voices. He sits again. A small caravan of wagons heaped with goods stands at the edge of the clearing, and his father is speaking with them. He can only make out so many words. He almost thinks they’re speaking Dutch for a moment, those fluid, almost gurgly sounds Jan makes when he’s happy and well fucked. His body feels so normal now, warm and boneless, like he’s eaten and slept so much he needs to sleep more. He’s supposed to be alert but can’t understand what’s being said. He tried to learn Beowulf by heart once when he was a boy. Before Jack was born and no one cared enough to call a strange creature at the end of the frozen world kin, he’d poured over the pages of an ancient cracked book bound in even older leather. His father has no such issues, understanding or being understood.

“Hƿelċ tīd is hit nū?” He recognized the word for time, but the man laughed and replied in a way that took Matt the logic of forming half-forgotten grammar into a sentence that might not even be the same. That is something for the priests.

More words. He only caught the last two. Ælfrēd Cyninġ.

He sat straight, lightning running down his back. Alfred. Ælfrēd. The pressure of normalcy pushed his consciousness from all sides, embracing that empty, silent despair of days and days. It filled him back with life, like warm water over the cold. Not so near, not so strong, but there. Alive. His brother was in existence.

#hws england #hws canada #the dangeld axe to grind: the viking age time travel au #my writing || cacoethes scribendi

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softsan · 2 years

Text

Eyes On Fire. (Pt. 2)

PAIRING: Aemond Targaryen & Fem!Reader

CHAPTERS: | 01 | 02 | 03 | 04 |

WORD COUNT: 3743

GENRE: Alternatively Universes/Canon Divergence, Alternative Ending, The Greens Win, Loosely based on the books/show, Made up House,

DESCRIPTION: After the Greens win the Dance of The Dragons, you a left alone navigating the dangers and woes of Kings Landing. You were one of the last survivors of House Vermillion with the expectation to restore your House to its former glory. Pressured to find yourself a husband, you unintentionally catch the eye of the dangerously, one-eye kingslayer—how will you ever survive amidst those who kill, those who take, and those who wish to eat you alive? Can also be read on AO3 here.

WARNINGS: Bodily Injury, Death, Graphic violence, Suspicion, Attempted murder, Murder, Poisoning, Possessive themes, Aemond in general

OPTIONAL PLAYLIST: New Eyes by Echos, Glass Heart Hymn by Paper Route, Nicotine Dreams by Laurel

The skies were mantled by clouds that resembled the color of ash. They rumbled disapproving, bucketing rain onto the Rhaenys's Hill and everybody who stood in the outer vicinity of the dragon pit. Aemond took it as a sign from the gods that this union wouldn't be fruitful, that it wouldn't prosper like his lady mother had exacted it to be. He made no bother to mask his smugness and presumptuous arrogance that this merger between houses would fall apart before it even came to be. After all, Aemond Targaryen was a dragon and wouldn't lightly bend to the will of others.

The Lady Cerelle Lannister followed him meekly, intimated by the rising pool of muddy water that sloshed at her feet, "The weather— " Her voice trembled, her golden curly mane drenched, "I think it to be safer if we were to head back?"

"Then go back to the comforts of your chambers," Aemond said without a lick of sensitivity.

His mother had intended for him to wed either Cerelle or her elder sister Tyshara from House Lannister. House Lannister had proven to be a loyal ally during the war against The Blacks and according to the Dowager Queen, they ought to be rewarded accordingly—and what better compensation than the hand of a prince?

Aemond cared for neither sister, finding them equally unspirited, their conversations unstimulating and dull. Helena noticing Aemond's indifference whilst also trying to appeal to their mother's desires suggested that Aemond take Cerelle Lannister out to see his dragon Vhagar. Aemond for once obliged. Helena, as good as her intentions were, was oblivious that the average mortal was frightened to the bone at the sight of dragons and that Aemond's outing with Cerelle would be adverse to his mother's cause rather than efficacious.

Vhagar's nostrils flared, the monstrous-sized dragon catching the scent of its rider approaching near. Vhagar's head reared against the iron door of the domed castle, easily escaping her dragon lair. Her steps towards Aemond quaked the ground while Cerelle Lannister was immediately thrown to her knees, her skirts collecting all the more water.

Aemond turned to Cerelle knowingly, her eyes enlarged, her jaw quivering uncontrollably.

"How do you like my beast?" He wickedly teased, walking to close the distance between him and Vhagar.

Cerelle didn't answer paralyzed with fear.

He brushed his hand against Vhagar's wet scales, leaning in to whisper something ominous in Old Valyrian. Vhagar's chest rumbled before she let out a roar that shook the very foundations of the dragon pit.

"Nyke knew ziry" I knew it, Aemond continued in Valyrian, observing how Cerelle had fainted, falling backward. "Nākostōbā-willed, se daor fit naejot wed nykeā zaldrīzes," Weak-willed, and not fit to wed a dragon. He remarked. Vhagar nuzzled her snout against Aemond's shoulder in agreement.

To find a wife that would accept Aemond for all that he was, the good—and most crucially the bad, would prove to be harder than his dear mother Alicent could possibly foreknow. Especially now, for he was intrigued by another. One whose ambitions matched his own, one that could help him restore his ancient house back to its former glory.

"Se hembar riñnykeā nyke maghagon naejot ūndegon ao" The next Lady I bring to see you, He promised to Vhagar, "Ziry'll sagon worthy naejot kipagon rūsīr īlva" She'll be worthy to ride with us."

Aemond's gaze drifted off into the distance, the Red Keep was but a dark shadow that loomed behind the hazardous downfall of rain. He wondered what you must be up to. Were you reading to his dear niece in one of the many libraries? or were you sweet-talking some brainless Lord for his coin? He swallowed the unjustified jealousy that arose at the very thought. Aemond's resolve hardening, you'd soon run into one another again. For he was starved, craving a moment with you no matter how fleetingly short it was.

You stared out to the endless blue, a sky that traveled limitlessly out to the horizon. The sun undisturbed by a single cloud shone down upon Kings Landing, offering a comforting warmth that had been sorely missed.

You absentmindedly played with a small vile of amber elixir, the antidote to your poison. Three days had come and passed without sight of Ser Harold Lansdale. He’d yet come to claim his antidote and would soon be dead within the next few hours.

You hummed. Perhaps you had misread Ser Harold Lansdale. Maybe he rather of died in the name of loyalty than pay for your forgiveness. You pursed your lips. A true shame, you could of really put his silver to good use. Hearing your chamber doors open, you discreetly slipped the vile into the hidden pocket of your gown.

“My Lady,” The serving girl apologized for the interruption, in her hands held a small parcel wrapped in a black and red handkerchief. The fine silk and dragon embroidery made you conclude it must have belonged to a Targaryen.

“Say what you must,” You hastened the girl, “I am about to head to the kitchens to ensure supper is ready to be served for her Majesty.”

The serving girl’s arms trembled as she brought forth the parcel wrapped in silk, “I was called upon to hand you this,” She offered no further context.

Without expressing your puzzlement, you gave the girl are glance over. You weren’t one to be intimated off—at least thus far. You’d purposely acted in such a way you’d be perceived as harmless... you but an innocent and well-meaning lady serving under House Targaryen. And yet, the serving girl was shaking, her eyes rung with fear.

“Thank you,” You accepted the parcel, taking note of how light it was.

The serving girl didn’t wait to be dismissed, almost stumbling as she tried to scramble her way out of your chambers.

You frowned, trying to decipher what you’d done to garner such a response. After a few seconds, you shook your head, it'd have to remain a mystery for now. You turned your attention to the black and red silk-covered parcel. You gingerly brushed the embroidered pattern. Had you done something that was deserving of a reward? You unfolded the handkerchief, to be met with velvet and paper. Confused, you near tore the parchment expecting it to be but wrapping, when your fingers suddenly froze. There was writing on the parchment...

You slowly began to read aloud the smudged ink.

My Darling Flower,

One which is deadly as one is beautiful. A violent delight I find myself besotted by. Alas, Dragons are unforgiving creatures and I declare your fate for the trader Lansdale too merciful for his doings. I do hope you admire my work off the city’s gates.

Your eyes widened as a surge of adrenaline ran through your veins. All good courtesy had been forgotten, you running unlike a lady out of your chambers in search of a window that overlooked the city gates. Your heart pounded in your chest, you had thought yourself to be alone that day in the gardens. How could you have been so careless? Your image? Everything you've thus worked for was now ruined.

Your hands grasped desperately onto the window’s frame as you pushed open the stained glass. You leaned forward, your dreaded stare falling upon a spiked head on display.

“Ser Harold Lansdale,” You whispered. Your eyes drifted to the rest of his body which lay on the ground below being feasted upon by crows.

You slowly returned to the paper, reading the last of the letter.

My silence is a gift in exchange for the cake I was promised. A cake I eagerly await.

Your mouth dried. It was Aemond Targaryen who had witnessed your facade crumble that day in the gardens. You let out a defeated breath. Out of all the Targaryens to be caught by, it just happened to have to be the most cunningly dangerous one out of them all.

From your Dearest Dragon.

At the very least, Aemond had the good sense not to use his name to sign off his letter. You tore the parchment in two, stepping towards the wall-mounted sconce. You burned both pieces getting rid of the evidence. Many letters that were passed by servants were intercepted by septons, and one could be flogged if the topic at hand was found either indecent or conspiring against the court. As the last of the note turned to cinders, your thoughts dwindled back to fretful serving girl. Had Aemond threatened her that his letter was to be delivered to you and you alone? And that if she failed or if the letter was confiscated by a septon she'd be sorely punished?

You watched the flame of the candlestick flicker. Your first impressions of Aemond were indeed correct—he'd bring you nothing but trouble.

You brought the velvet closer to the light, tearing the thin threads that had been sowed together to conceal something inside. Surprised, your breath hitched. Bundled in velvet was a silver pendant of a dragon. The dragon was covered in rubies and its tail spiraled like the Targaryen crest. For its size, it was remarkably light and held an immaculate shine. You couldn't help but admire the workmanship and the crisp cut of the metal.

You had never laid eyes upon something so breathtaking. Yet, you were plagued by suspicion. Why had he chosen to keep silent? Why had he gifted you something so invaluable?

You wrapped the pendant back in its velvet cover and hid the priceless necklace underneath your corset, in the secret pocket between your breasts.

What were Aemond Targaryen's true intentions?

The smell of freshly baked bread wafted throughout the kitchens. You wiped your brow, sweating underneath the intense heat of the furnaces. Supper was fast approaching and you were amidst the cooks, ensuring it would be served smoothly. You scrutinize the menu and thoroughly inspected each plate that left for the dining hall.

Each noble Lady with the exception of the few that had families that had fought for The Greens, took turns doing additional duties such as kitchen, washing, and spending. Queen Helena had favored you to overlook the kitchens, for you were considerate of her and her children’s tastes. You didn't so much mind either, finding kitchen duty preferable to washing duty and spending duty, (the responsibility of buying new furs, fabrics, and gowns) which came with its cautions to not overspend whilst simultaneously still satisfying the want for new garments.

Furthermore, with kitchen duty, you didn't need to concern yourself with King Aegon's palate as he rarely dined with his family. The injuries he had surmised during the war brought unspoken ailments and his meals were specially looked after by the maesters. You had equally needn't worry about Prince Aemond's tastes as he spent most of his days and night outside of the castle walls. That was until now...

"Prince Aemond feasts today with his niece and nephews," Lady Jeyne Merryweather, a beauty with fiery orange locks, a freckled nose, and doe eyes spoke. She had returned with an empty tray, the lemon tarts you'd prepared being well received.

"Does he?" You kept your eyes focused on the dough, adding a touch more flour.

Lady Jeyne Merryweather eagerly nodded, her lips curled unable to stifle her trademark for spreading whispers and hearsay, "The Dowager Queen Alicent has forbidden my presence and the presence of servants in the dining hall."

This caught your attention. Your eyes flickered ahead watching as Lady Jeyne stole one of the grapes from the bunch, popping it into her mouth.

"I heard the Dowager Queen is furious at her son Aemond," She spoke as if reciting a tale, using her hands to further express herself, "Her intentions were to arrange a betrothal between her son and one of the Lannister sisters."

"House Lannister," You mulled. They were a great house with an exceptional political standing, furthermore, they were one of the richest houses in Westeros. It was only fitting an arrangement was made to join their two houses, "I see no scandal, no need for privacy," You referred to the Queen Dowager's request for others to stay out of the dining hall.

"There is indeed a scandal," Lady Jeyne gleefully continued, "For Cerelle Lannister went begging to her father Jason Lannister to refuse any betrothal for her or her elder sister." Jeyne reached for another grape, "According to a knight of whom was assigned to the dragon pit, Prince Aemond near fed the poor Cerelle to his dragon."

You failed to disguise your shock.

"I know!" Lady Jeyne exclaimed, "But it's true! The Dowager Queen was red-faced and seething. A servant swore they even saw smoke come out from her ears," She giggled.

You rolled your eyes at the last comment, "So the betrothal won't go ahead?"

"I heard, the Queen Dowager is trying to salvage the relationship with the Lannisters offering her youngest son Prince Daeron as Prince Aemond's replacement."

You nodded. You had not thus far set eyes upon Prince Daeron as he was on a tour around Westeros, meeting lesser-known houses and forging new connections. Despite, this you knew of Prince Daeron's exceptional reputation. Handsome in looks, gentle in manner, and the most well-liked Targaryen among the three brothers.

"I was duly hoping to have married Prince Daeron myself," Jeyne Merryweather clasped her hands together dramatically, "Our children would be violet-eyed knights, that protected the realm," She let out a disappointed sigh, slouching down onto the table.

You let Jeyne carry on with her daydream. Both of you knew such union was improbable due to the status of House Merryweather, but it brought no harm to let Jeyne fantasize about what a life beside a Prince would be like.

"What kind of husband do you foresee for yourself?" Jeyne unexpectedly asked, "What husband would you want?"

You paused, "I'm not sure," You mustered, surprised by your honesty—not that you would have entrusted Jeyne with any other answer.

What husband did you want? The thought lingered. Alliances, wealth, and heirs... They weren't wants but needs for the survival of your House. You doubted your true wants mattered much at all in this society you found yourself in.

Aemond drowned his feelings with drink. The despondency, the resentment, and his mother's slap ringing in his ears. He had done more than she'd asked, he'd won a war for her. A war that only furthered his incompetent brother's accolades and not his own. Despite being a second son, Aemond was far more suited to rule than Aegon ever was. He was superior in both wits and strength. Aemond tipped the goblet of mead back, a droplet lazily dripping down his chin and neck. After the wars end the bannermen had been ready and willing to swear their allegiance to him in his brother's stead. Yet, his mother Alicent's stance stood strong, it must be Aegon on the throne and no one other.

Aemond laughed humourlessly. His little act of defiance, refusing to entertain his mother's intended betrothal had cost him a slap to the face. The force behind the hit great enough to snap the elastic of his eye patch, leaving the right side of his face on display. His grasp tightened around the frayed fabric which now sat in the palm of his hand. Aegon could flounce around and father bastards without so much of an outcry from their mother as long as it was kept out of the public eye. But Aemond couldn't deny a betrothal he deduced would neither bring him happiness nor prosperity to his House.

He drunkenly wandered about the castle, looking for the kitchens. His plans were to plaster himself with more drink. So much drink he'd ceased to remember the events of tonight.

You overhead a loud clatter, a cloaked figure stumbling inside the kitchens. The dark figure knocked over a stack of pots that were yet to be washed, slamming an empty goblet on the crowded table.

"You are not supposed to be in the kitchens," You placed down a bowl of cream, the wooden spoon still sticking up in the mixture, "Leave now before I call for the guards,"

The stranger stilled. It was as if the sound of your voice had brought him back to his senses.

Aemond tugged back his hood, his eyes zoning onto you. It really was you. His chest burned, thankful it wasn't just his mind playing tricks on him. You were alone standing on the opposite side of the table. Due to the suffocating heat that had risen in the kitchens, you had rolled up the sleeves of your dress, your face attractively glistened with sweat. Your heavenly crimson eyes, widened at the sight of his face, your mouth slightly parting. He was about to grin when he remembered the broken eye patch in his hands.

Aemond wasn't usually one to be self-conscious. However, the memory of the petrified looks others gave at the sight of his gnarly scar flooded back to him at this moment.

You studied his face, in awe of his scar. The jagged pink lines, the raised flesh, and a sapphire where his eye ought to be. Aemond suddenly covered his right eye, misreading your expression.

"Unsightly isn't it," He mumbled.

"I disagree," Your voice genuine, "I think it adds character to your face,"

Something inside of Aemond swelled, "You aren't afraid?" He studied you closer, daring to take a step forward.

"It'll take a lot more than a scar and a missing eye to scare the likes of me," You felt emboldened to reply.

Aemond's lip curled, slowly removing his hand. He circled the table before stopping beside you, "My Darling Flower," He finally broke the silence, the smell of liquor all the stronger.

You unintentionally shivered, they were the same words he'd used in his letter.

"Are you baking me a cake?" He observed the flour, butter, and milk.

You swallowed, in actuality were just practicing. You had no real concept of how a Winter Cake was made. You'd had hoped you could experiment with flavors, find a combination that worked and pass it off as the real thing.

Aemond pulled up a seat, leaning his elbow against the counter, "I was promised a cake," He sounded almost childish.

"Yes," You decided to risk it, "I'm making you a cake."

Aemond's eyes lip up, making his face all the more youthful.

"But I ask for your patience my Prince, it is still to be baked." You quickly added.

"I'm known for my patience," He wasn't. But for you, he'd be willing to wait.

You tried to ignore the heat behind his gaze, as you picked up the mixing bowl and continued to stir the cream. You added cinnamon and cloves and a dash of wine, praying to the gods that this cake was to his liking.

Aemond intently watched as you worked, noticing a decent-sized scar that ran on your outer hand, between your thumb and index finger. He recognize the wound to be a common one among those who wielded swords.

"You have experienced with blades, not just knives but swords too?" Aemond pried.

You considered lying, however, Aemond had already seen you place steel against Ser Harold Lansdale's throat, and thought there was no point in feigning otherwise.

"I can handle a sword, all Vermillion children can." You spoke, carefully retrieving the cake from the furnace, "However, I have a preference for half swords or daggers, unlike yourself," You referred to his sheathed Valyrian-steel longsword. You found the average longsword too heavy to swing about. Your talent and expertise relied on speed and you couldn't afford to be weighed down.

"Valyrian-steel is light and easy to wield," He commented as if he had read your thoughts, "I'll let you spar with it sometime," He added.

You bit the inside of your cheek, as much as it tempted you so, you couldn't go around handling swords without spying eyes. You had an image to upkeep.

You lathered the cream over the top of the cooled cake, before adding a handful of ripened blackberries on top. You made another quick prayer before slicing a piece. The inside looked soft, neither over nor undercooked. It wasn't until you had picked up the slice that you realize you had forgotten to set any plates.

"Ah," Your ears burned, "Give me a moment, I'll get a plate from one of the cupboards," You tried to bypass, Aemond to no avail.

He caught your wrist, his rough finger pads grazing against your skin. He effortlessly tugged you near, pulling your hand with the slice of cake to his mouth. Without warning, he took a large bite. You felt his lips and the gentle nip of his teeth against your fingers.

He lifted his stare, noticing how your eyelids beautifully fluttered. "Delicious," He smirked, taking another bite.

You told yourself to breathe. Reminding yourself, Aemond Targaryen was a Prince and a dangerous one at that.

"Helena was right, you do know what tastes people crave."

You brushed off his praise, merely thankful the "Winter Cake" was to his liking.

"You have a little something," You referred to cake crumbs on Aemond's chin.

"Here?" Aemond purposely missed the spot, you'd pointed to.

"The other side," You tried to explain.

He missed again.

You bit your lip, yielding against your better judgment, and wiped the crumbs for him. He noted the black and red silken handkerchief you used. The same handkerchief he'd used to wrap his parcel to you. The closer you were, the more you noticed, like the subtle split in Aemond's lip and the faint reddened outline of a hand on his cheek.

"You were struck," The words were no louder than a whisper.

Aemond's expression hardened, "A punishment for objecting against my mother." He sounded rather bitter.

Your thoughts floated to your earlier conversation with Jeyne Merryweather and how furious his mother Alicent was that her son had offended the Lannisters.

"I'm sorry,"

Aemond's look softened. A silence lulled between the both of you, you stepped away folding the handkerchief and putting it back into your dress pocket.

"You are?" He breathed.

Duty was a fickle thing. The things one does, the things one sacrifices in the name of family. You could understand Aemond's aversion to marriage and certainly a match with someone he didn't care for.

"Yes," You answered.

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