#and realise i am with the soulmate one | Explore Tumblr Posts and Blogs

moonchild1 · 5 months

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min yoongi fic rec list (Ⅵ)

she's back bet you didn't think i'd post another list this quick but since they've been building so much i figured why not soooo this week is yoongs and next week with be taehyung i've been reading alot lately so i wanted to share them asap so before my week gets hectic again i thought i'd post it, i honestly loved these ones i am exploring a little bit for with certain genres and i must say it like a whole new world i'm enjoying it and i hope you like them too. remember too always show lots of love and support to these amazing writers they dedicated so much time to writing these fics and they are absolute geniuses and deserve the world for sharing them with us so please follow them and take a look at their masterlists cause i will 100% guarantee that you will find your very own favourites there as well, leave the a little comment i know they will appreciate it so much and send them all the love in the world... i will reblog these through out the week and as usual minors do not interact i will block those who do.... happy reading everyone see you next week with taehyung's list and if you have anything you would like to share with me or you just wanna ramble about a fic you loved my asks are always open i love hearing from you🖤✨

a- angst s- smut f- fluff

series

stalemate by @shina913 f s a

↬"The truth is, I'm not afraid to take that gamble anymore...in the off-chance that I get lucky again and feel the way I felt when I was with you. I'd happily make that bet over and over."

oh, my darling by @yoongiofmine f s a

↬ starting your second semester at one of South Korea’s most prestigious universities should be stressful enough. Between juggling classes, good grades and a social life, your plate was full. Hoping to spice up your academic career, you thought it was a good idea to enroll as an assistant for your literature professor, whom you've held a very secret and very forbidden crush on for the past several months. What will happen now that you’re forced to work closely together? And what if your crush isn’t as one sided as you thought?

little bit of your heart by @/yoongiofmine f s a ft. jjk

↬You had everything you could ever dream of; the career of your dreams as a music producer, the best friends you could ever wish for, and a exes-turned-friends-turned-fuck-buddies relationship with Min Yoongi. You knew you and Yoongi would never move past that and you were okay with it. Until a friend from your past comes back into your life, offering to give you everything you deserve, everything Yoongi couldn’t. Will Jungkook show you what you’ve been missing? Or will the new guy threaten Yoongi enough to do something about it?

sinful lust by @oddinary4bts s a ft. jjk

↬ in an attempt to spice up your bedroom life with your boyfriend Min Yoongi, you suggest bringing another man into the action. Yoongi seems reluctant at first, but when you mention his friend Jeon Jungkook, he can’t deny his attraction. All that’s left to do is to convince Jungkook into participating...

after hours by @archivedkookie f s a

↬ staying after hours with Yoongi for months proves to be a mistake when your heart falls for him.

Vows by @hamsterclaw f s a

↬ You're five years into your arranged marriage with Min Yoongi, and he's never once retaliated for anything you've done to him. One day you realise you've lost your appetite for provoking him, and you set about trying to win his heart instead.

sutures by @farfromsugafanfic f s a

↬ There was only one thing you and Min Yoongi had in common that night. You were both brokenhearted. You only intended to be together for one night, but when you both end up in the hospital the next day you discover that you are soulmates. It could kill you to be apart. As you and Yoongi attempt to sever the bond between you, will another be formed?

and so it goes by @prodagustd f s a

↬ You and Yoongi have been hooking up, having dates and spending most of the week together for almost seven months. He was comfortable without a title, until the last two weeks, when you couldn't see him because of your busy schedule, Yoongi can't understand why he misses you so bad if your relationship is just sex to him. Or maybe he does, but he's too much of a coward to admit it.

collateral by @theharrowing f s a ft. jjk & knj

↬ Your ex-boyfriend gets in over his head working for the local mafia, and Boss Min has come to collect his payment: You.

till death do us part by @colormepurplex2 s a

↬ Marital bliss isn't always a guarantee, especially when you find yourself marrying into the family responsible for your own family's demise. Sometimes, marriage is just a game of kill or be killed. Even when there is love involved, bullets still hurt.

grey area by @blushoseoks s a ft. jhs

↬ you spent the days staring at your wrist and tracing the skin where your soulmate’s name would one day appear. the nights were for telling your wrist about your day, as if the person whose name would one day stain itself there, like red wine to a dress, could possibly hear you. for years you thought up countless scenarios, imagined numerous possibilities, formulated conversations and rehearsed them over and over, until your mouth ran dry. outcomes and conclusions performed in your head on a repetitive loop. but out of everything you thought up, out of all of the time spent towards thinking about your soulmate, about what could possibly occur, none of it could ever prepare you for what would actually end up being. none of it ever came close to the way it happened when you finally met him. and now, after it’s all been said and done, you were left asking yourself one thing, and one thing only: “was it really worth all of this in the end?”

isn't it romantic by @jeonqkooks f s a

↬ Many things in life have a polar opposite: left and right, night and day, yin and yang, you and Min Yoongi... Hopeless romantic meets gloomy cynic. The only thing you seem to share is a magazine column but even then, you still can’t seem to understand how Yoongi can be called ‘The Love Doctor’ when he is the antithesis of everything love represents.

Flux by @yoonia f s a ft. jjk

↬ One of them is your longtime secret crush, while the other is the man with whom you had shared many heated nights filled with lust and forbidden desire, forever kept as your biggest secret of all time. You had sworn that those sinful nights would end, and that your secret crush would remain a secret. (poly au)

mean yoongi by @jjkpls f s

↬ Min Yoongi asks you to take care of his plants when he’s gone. It doesn’t go as planned and well, he has to deal with your misbehaving ass.

pretend by @gimmesumsuga s a

↬ “You know what they say: the best way to get over someone is to get under someone else, right?” idol au infidelity

naughty little kitten by @jungkooksxo s a ft ksj

↬ Jin figures out that you’re super into the idea of Yoongi listening in on you two having sex. Yoongi is super into listening to you and Jin having sex. Jin invites Yoongi to come play with his naughty little kitten.

babydoll by @jungcock s a

↬ Your childhood crush, now famous and successful, comes to visit you while you’re drunk and have a lot to prove.

eleven months by @bratkook f s a

↬ it’s been years of yoongi living his routine life, accustomed to his pace of living, going with the flow and simply existing. until you come along. yoongi absolutely can not see the logic in the way you live, but he weirdly craves it. craves the feeling of not being afraid of not knowing what's coming, being able to just let the cards fall wherever they land. and maybe you can help with that.

pause by @whatifyoulivelikethat s a

↬ Life is like a cassette tape. It seems like it’s constantly repeating, flipped from side A to side B, and the songs can’t be skipped. You can only pause, rewind, fast forward, play after you’ve already heard the song. After you’ve already lived it. All Min Yoongi knows is his own tape, until it smashes right at his feet, and then he has to learn to dance to a different beat.

darksided by @eoieopda f s a

↬ It all started with a bad joke and a bottle of Tanqueray.

three squeezes by @nomnomsik s a ft jhs

↬ Yoongi is notorious for his grumpy and emotionless behavior as director of an upcoming company. Yet, it’s a mystery to everyone how manager Hoseok always seems to soften him up. The truth is that the two are actually engaged. Unknown to this fact, you happen to take an interest in Hoseok… and he does too.

one-shot

bad decisions by @jjungkookislife f s

↬ Jimin is desperate to get his apartment back to himself. He’ll move hell and earth, and even drop to his knees to beg you to take his brother, Yoongi, out of his hands. Who are you to say no to that pretty face and sinister grin?

breakfast in bed by @joonbird f s

↬ “Min Yoongi, a grumpy Ikea employee, is wondering who you are and why exactly you’re sleeping in the display bed at his Ikea.”

Tricks of the Trade by @stutterfly f s a

↬ The convenience store across the street from your apartment carries your favorite energy drink. That's why you frequent it. It's definitely not because you have a big fat crush on the owner you've been flirting with for the better part of a year. Of course your brand of flirting can also be misconstrued as bickering. When a strange man wanders into the store, he thinks you need a little nudge to embrace the strings connecting you. Next thing you know you're waking up in a body that definitely doesn't belong to you. You can't decide if it's the best or worst thing that's ever happened to you.

threads by @yoonia s a ft. knj

↬ Life is full of surprises, just like how people are full of secrets. Just when you had thought you have been lucky enough to have your life figured out, life decides to throw you a curve ball when you least expect it. And there is nothing you could do to avoid it, except to hope that you could hold your secrets as tightly as you possibly could before everything blows up into smithereens.

under the willow tree by @orchidyoonkook f a

↬ The town outcast shows up in the one place you find solace from it’s residents. The people you force yourself to fit in with, even though you never want to be anything like them. Will he ruin your only place of salvation, or become the most unlikely friend?

mami by kithtaehyung s ft. knj

↬ you somehow have a conversation with yoongi, and you tell your roommate about a date date.

the devil wears valentino by @orchidyoonkook f s a

↬ Having known him for years—from a small mistake on your behalf, and a favour on his—you’re one of the only people he seems to be able to put up with for company. Certainly the only one he’s half-way decent with. But what’s more surprising to you is that despite his name, reputation, and the fact he’s always joked he’d have killed anyone else by this point, is that he’s never once tried to cause you harm.

angel by @sailoryooons f s

↬ Yoongi never meant to keep coming back. You never meant to become Yoongi’s favorite. Being Min Yoongi’s favorite has dire consequences

a boy like you by @cinnaminsvga f

↬ for whenever you are feeling low, always remember that there is a boy you know who would lift the sky for you. {or alternatively: Min Yoongi loves you, though he never says it. He’s always been a firm believer in that actions speak louder than any words ever could.}

last nite by @tayegi s a

↬ This is a zombie apocalypse AU based on The Walking Dead, The Stand, World War Z, and elements of Attack of Titan

zombie bites by @luffles424 f s a

↬ Your friends have always been willing to assist you when you need a model to practice makeup on. And with the upcoming zombie film on campus is no difference. But something feels different this time, can a zombie movie be more than just a zombie movie?

heaven's winter by @jksangelic f s a

↬ your duty as the village daughter places you in line for the season’s Offering; a tradition not to tread lightly upon. as the snow falls slow and heavy, and the seraph awaits in the shallows of the mountain, you fail to realize what the winter has in store for you.

heavy sugar by @kinktae s

↬ The Roaring Twenties were a time of great economic wealth and social change. But beneath the jazz music and colorful speakeasies were mafia led organized crimes and bloodstained cash. You knew this well, but try as you might, you just couldn’t ignore the dark and enigmatic gangster whose eyes lingered on you from across the room.

all that holly, jolly shit by @daechwitatamic f s

↬You haven’t seen or heard from Yoongi since he broke your heart five years ago, laying out a logical list of reasons why you were better off breaking up. When a Christmas Eve blizzard traps you together for the night, you have no choice but to examine how few of those reasons are still true. And if they’re not… where does that leave you?

calling the shots by @chans-room f

↬ College basketball captain Yoongi

until death by @kpopfanfictrash s a

↬ Jade has always shaped the island of Kekon. Mined from the mountains, it enhances the abilities of Green Bone warriors who wear it and allows them protection from outside harm. No one understands these threats better than you do, second-in-command of the mighty No Peak clan. When a new danger appears, seeming to come from within, everything you once took for granted is called into question. Including the bonds you’ve made, some more dangerous than the others. None more so than Min Yoongi, head of No Peak and the only one capable of destroying your heart.

whatta catch by @aredheadedmess f a

↬ One, two, three strikes you’re out. When opposing opinions find you roughing it up with the university’s star pitcher, he makes it his mission to show that you’re wrong about college sports—and maybe your feelings about the player himself.

shatter me, embrace me by @95rkives s

↬you longed for him, yearning for love, yet all that awaited you was heartbreak.

you're losing me by @/archivedkookie a

↬ ❝ He’s losing you, and yet, he lets the flower die in front of his eyes instead of doing everything to save it. Alternatively, Yoongi and you are losing your love toward each other. ❞

spotlight by @back2bluesidex f a

↬ No matter how much you run away from Yoongi, Yoongi always comes right back to you.

all the wrong places by @mrworldwideshoulders f a

↬ After getting separated from your friends during a night out, you get stuck with a hefty bill – one that you can’t pay. So when a handsome, emotionless stranger covers your tab in a random act of kindness, you’re determined to track him down and pay him back. inspired by 24K Magic by Bruno Mars.

now we reign by @/oddinary4bts f s a

↬ when working on a collab together makes you and Min Yoongi seek comfort with the other, you discover there’s more to life than loneliness. Only, hurdles mark your path in Min Yoongi’s life, and it’s unclear what the outcome will be. Will you be destroyed by him and his world, or will you learn to reign over it, together with him?

stay by sugarwithtea f s a

↬ what happens when you get stranded in a remote town with no place to live except for a lodge owned by a dangerously handsome but annoying man? yeah, a lot.

when the stars align by @itskimtaehyung f

↬ With cuffing season approaching its end, you thought you had escaped the pressures of finding a boyfriend for the holidays. That is, until your friends set you up on a blind date that goes horribly wrong. This prompts you to enlist the help of your roommate, Yoongi, to fake a relationship so your friends will stop meddling in your love life. And it turns out Yoongi is a lot better at this romance thing than you originally thought...

egotstic by @pasteljeon s a ft. knj

↬ The timing was never right. He loved you when you were kids, knees scraped and cheeks red. You loved him when pimples bloomed across his skin, voice cracking and he found solace in the scribbled lines in his notebook. The stars never seemed to align for the two of you, but perhaps it was because you were meant for someone else.

on the court by @centerhaechan f

↬ As captain of your school's winning women's basketball team, it is only understood that you despise the men's basketball team and their captain. Your main rival, Min Yoongi, enjoys testing your patience while he attempts to lead his own team to a championship victory. Your coaches believe you both have problems with teamwork, and insist that working together will produce a promising solution.

sugar by @zehakoo f s

↬ desperately in need of sugar to make coffee in order to ease down your headache, you find yourself knocking on a strangers door who happens to be your best friend’s friend and the finest man you’ve ever encountered.

from the ashes by @fortunexkookie s a

↬ Someone is sobbing ugly, wrecked sounds that shatter the silence in the room. You need them to stop; it’s distracting and you need to focus. You need to clean the ash from his skin. You need to comb the knots from his hair. You need to dress his beautiful body in something befitting the king you know he is… but the sobbing is too loud, and your vision is blurry. It takes Yoongi wiping your tears away for you to realize that the gasping cries echoing off the stone are coming from you.

the dark by @/bratkook s

↬ your small town thrives on the occult, luring tourists in with endless themed festivities, but the only place you’re determined to see is the mysterious club that comes to life the week before Halloween. what makes The Dark so exclusive, and what secrets are they hiding behind closed doors?

Triplicity by @kainks ft. jhs

↬ Distance is a cruel thing, and when you find yourself going astray, they are there to help remind you of just where exactly you belong.

fermata by @jeongi f s

↬ fer·ma·ta: from fermare, it means to stay or to stop. min yoongi teaches you exactly how to let go.

private lessons by @dntaewithluv f s

↬ Your little sister finds it odd how you’ve been taking private lessons from her piano teacher for over a month now, but she hasn’t heard you actually play even once…

first love by @geniuslab f s a

↬You learn a lot of new things in your first year of university, including what it feels like to fall in love.

↬looking for other myg fics or the other bts members check out my library

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its-your-mind · 3 months

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ORV as textposts 39/???

[Photo ID - 10 images from the Omniscient Reader's Viewpoint manhwa with Tumblr posts pasted upon them.

The first image shows the backs of nine members of the main cast as they look toward the sun in the background. The text post is by Tumblr user daisies-on-a-cup and reads, "THEY DID IT THEY ESCAPED THE NARRATIVE!!! THERE IS A WAY OUT!!! THE STORY CAN BE ALTERED!!! YOU ARE NOT STUCK-THERE IS AN ESCAPE!!!! THERE IS A LIGHT AT THE END OF THE TUNNEL BUT YOU HAVE TO WALK TOWARDS IT!!!!"

The second image shows Kim Dokja in a suit with his hand on his hip. The text post is by Tumblr user yuridefender and reads, "i do love stories that start out with the protagonist going "hi! 👋😀 i am such a normal guy. the most average person ever. 😄 an average joe even. i have no friends or enemies. i spend my time reading books and sing to myself on occasions. nothing to see here! ^^" and it turns out that not only are they a liar but also the most fucked up person ever. and a cunt"

The third image shows Kim Dokja with a shocked face. Yoo Joonghyuk is clutching Kim Dokja's shoulder as he falls. Lee Hyungsung is behind Kim Dokja on the viewer's right, and Yoo Sangah and Shin Yoosung are running toward Kim Dokja and Yoo Joonghyuk from the viewer's left. The text post is by Tumblr user littlespoonsokka and reads "oh and btw the love was there and it changed everything. if u even care"

The fourth image shows Kim Dokja. The text post is by Tumblr user tomwambsgirl and reads, "being an unreliable narrator is inherently homoerotic". They reblogged with an addition that reads, "what do you have to hide? your sexuality?"

The fifth image shows Yoo Joonghyuk yelling dramatically. The text post is by Tumblr user fembutchboygirl and reads, "He's a cis man. He's transfem. He's nonbinary. He has 35 genders. He's a cis woman. He's a trans man. Gender, he barely knows her. He's transmasc. He's gnc. He doesn't know what a pronoun is. I didn t say his name but he popped into your head didn't he"

The sixth image shows Yoo Joonghyuk staring at Kim Dokja while he holds him by the throat. Kim Dokja is slightly beaten up and smirking back at him. The text post is by Tumblr user neilgayman69 and reads, "They have never canonically fucked. But also they have, and they should, and it would be a horrible idea."

The seventh image has Yoo Joonghyk hunched over in the foreground with Lee Hyungsung to his left and Shin Yoosung to his right. Kim Dokja is in the background with Yoo Sangah on his right and the viewer's left. He's facing Yoo Joonghyuk and the viewer slightly and is hunched over with a sword in his hand. The text post is by Tumblr user billypotts and reads, "stories about time travel are about two things. number one is inevitable tragedy. number two is seeing that inevitable tragedy and saying oh god I will make this right please even if I can't fix it I will try to make this right. also I lied they're about three things and third is obviously love"

The eighth image is a close-up of Kim Dokja with smile and dull eyes against a black background. The text post is by Tumblr user raylangivins and reads, "I love a character who's like "I know exactly who I am and I'm being very authentic about it" and then when you analyse his behaviour even a little bit you realise his self perception is completely selective and delusional."

The ninth image shows Han Sooyoung, Yoo Joonghyuk, and Kim Dokja. Yoo Joonghyuk is leaned over Han Sooyoung's back while Kim Dokja is slightly off to the viewer's right with a confused expression. The text post is by Tumblr user notsoni and reads, "Not soulmates but it always had to be them and they weren't destined to be together but they were doomed to be but also it took everything for them to get here and also it was never supposed to happen but also it always was and had to happen this way. Hope this helps"

The final image shows the members of Kimcom sitting around a garbage-can fire with drinks. The text post is by Tumblr user gothritsu and reads, "if theres no found family what is the God Damn Fucking Point". /End ID]

ID by @incorrect-web-novels tysm!!!

#listen these ones are all long all at once and I apologize #but I try to group them by VIBE #and these are all meta posts ya know #and meta posts get LONGE #so here we are #orv #omniscient reader's viewpoint #omniscent reader #omniscient reader webtoon #omniscient reader novel #orv spoilers #just in case!!#orv novel spoilers #orv novel #kim dokja #kimcom #dokhyuk #yoohankim #yoo joonghyuk

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nightgoodomens · 8 months

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I might be reaching here or am I…

Obviously the naked man conversation is meant to make us laugh BUT.

A lot of people are commenting about Crowley’s jealous face - I don’t think he’s jealous. This is the demon who said Aziraphale is too pure of heart to be anybody’s side piece, so he knows there’s something else going on.

But let’s talk about Aziraphale!

He gives Crowley this ashamed/embarrassed look as Crowley stares at him in confusion.

Aziraphale is a huge romantic. Aziraphale is definitely not a one-night-stand type. Most likely he’s a virgin. Most likely he’s the “save yourself for marriage” mentality like religion keeps on banging on about. Only with your soulmate!

So here he is, in front of a demon he knows that he is in love with, and is planning to spend the next days flirting with and dancing and confessing to him.

But right now someone is asking him if he’s shagging some random dude on the side. In front of his crush. In front of the love of his life. That he’s planning to make realise that they’ve been in love for a very long time.

Poor Aziraphale

#good omens #crowley #ineffable fandom #good ineffable omens #ineffable husbands #ineffable boyfriends #ineffable dumbasses #ineffable idiots #ineffable lovers #aziraphale #aziracrow

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violentdelightsandviolentends · 8 months

Text

Honey Girl. Chapter Four.

Chapter One. Chapter Two. Chapter Three. Chapter Five. Chapter Six. Chapter Seven. Chapter Eight. Series Masterlist. The Playlist.

Chapter Synopsis - You and Bucky deal with the fallout of Cora's reveal. What's that saying? If you love something, let it go...

Pairing - Dad'sBestFriend! Bucky Barnes x Female Reader - soulmate au

Age Rating - 18+

Warnings - cursing. angst. alcohol consumption.

Word Count - 5k

Author's Note - i can only apologise that this chapter took a little while!! my life is at a super weird place rn, so i'm just trying to find the time when i can. words cannot describe how incredible all of your support is for Honey Girl. the fact you all reblog and comment and send me asks means the world to me. love you all so much.

as always, reblogs, comments and feedback (even anonymous feedback) are immensely appreciated!! your reblogs are the only way to circulate my fics, which keeps me going <3

Masterlist. Inbox.

You can't breathe.

It's like all of the oxygen has been sucked out of the air, leaving it dry, brittle, sterile. Your lungs are burning, scratched like sandpaper. The backyard is spinning, like teenagers at a roller rink - all flashing lights and endless rotations.

You haven't taken your eyes off of Bucky, and he hasn't taken his eyes off of you. If you were thinking more logically, you'd probably realise that you've been staring at each other for too long, and it's starting to look a little suspicious. You don't care.

Your ears are ringing. It's like there's been an explosion, and you're scattered amongst the debris. Smoke, flames, rubble. A catastrophic detonation in your parents backyard.

A gentle hand on your shoulder snaps you back to reality. The music is still playing, everyone around the table is still conversing, the house still stands. No explosion here.

"Sweetheart?"

It's your Mom, clearly sensing your distress. She probably thinks you're upset with her, for telling Cora. You are, but that's not what's causing the pain in your chest.

"Come inside with me, baby girl. Let's get away from the noise for a second."

She grabs your hand and pulls you out of your chair, still none the wiser to the magnetism preventing you from breaking your gaze that's locked on Bucky's. She practically drags you inside, the cool air of the kitchen waking you up.

"Sweetheart, I am so, so sorry. Cora overheard the conversation we had earlier. I thought it was good news, so I didn't think to ask her to keep it private."

She looks like she's being eaten alive by guilt. Your bottom lip quivers, your eyes well up, and before you know it, there are warm, salty tears dripping down your cheeks.

"Hey, hey. What's the matter?"

You sit down on the tiled floor, back pressed against the cabinets. Curling your knees to your chest, you try to stifle your sobs.

"Everything's such a mess, Mama."

She drops to the ground, gathering you in her arms. She holds you as tight as she can, rubbing soothing circles into your back and whispering comforting words in your ear. Eventually, she pulls back to look at you.

"What's the matter, baby? I thought Stella's call was a good thing - that you'd be excited to go back to California."

You take a shaky breath before replying.

"It's just... I think - I don't, it's... it's so complicated."

She traces her fingers over your cheeks, your eyebrows, your nose. She dances her fingertips over your face, as if she's committing it to her mind forever. It brings back warm and cosy childhood memories of her doing the same thing to help you sleep. The two of you would snuggle up against all of your pillows in bed, tucked up and safe. She'd lie with you until she was sure you were dreaming, before kissing you on the forehead and sneaking out.

"Talk to me. We can figure it out. We always do."

"It's not that simple. I just... there's a lot going on, I guess. I thought it'd be an easy decision, but it isn't, and it's all I can think about, and it's eating me up because I'm so scared I'm gonna do the wrong thing -"

You cut yourself off with a sob, resting your head on your knees.

"I knew there was something bothering you, sweetheart. Why didn't you come and talk to us? Even if we can't fix it, we can listen."

"I thought I could handle it. I thought I could figure it out on my own."

"You don't ever have to carry stress like this on your own, baby girl. Ever. You hear me?"

You nod and lean into her, letting her rock you in her arms on the kitchen floor.

"I'm sorry again, about Cora. She means well, you know she does."

"I know. Doesn't feel like it sometimes, but I know."

A pause.

"Okay, sweetheart. What are we going to do now? Whatever you decide, we'll support you."

"Your Mom's right," your Dad says from the doorway. "Whatever you choose, we'll be right alongside you. No matter what."

He strides over to join the two of you on the floor, sandwiching you between him and your Mom.

"If you need help packing up and moving, we're here. If you need us to create an elaborate lie to tell Stella, we're here. Either way, you've got us."

You smile at him gently, leaning to rest your head on his shoulder. Regardless of what happens, you have two parents that love you more than anything in the world. That has to count for something.

"You wanna rejoin us outside, or are you too tired? No one will blame you if you go home."

"I think I'll go home," you murmur. "I don't wanna face any more questions for today."

"Bucky's just gone too. Said something about an early morning tomorrow."

You inhale shakily at the mention of his name. You know you'll have to face him sooner or later.

Your Dad stands and grabs your hands to help you to your feet, before doing the same to your Mom. They both hug you tightly before walking you out to the front door.

"Promise me you'll call if you need anything. Anything."

"I promise, Mama. Don't worry about me. I'll be okay."

"Do you want one of us to walk you home?"

"No, it's okay. I think I need the air."

"Love you, baby girl."

"Love you too. Both of you."

✵ ✵ ·　 ✵ 　　 * · ✵

You're halfway home when you decide to turn around. You need to talk to Bucky.

It doesn't take you long to figure out where he is. You can feel in your chest that he's close by, that he hasn't strayed far. He hasn't gone home, though. The Universe is pulling you in the opposite direction.

The beach.

You spin on your heel and start walking down the road, picking up pace as you go. You can feel rain in the air, threatening to spill from the clouds at any given moment. Before you know it, you're running, sprinting along the sidewalk in the direction of your soulmate.

You get to the small boardwalk and look out over the sand. The sky is grey as concrete, cold and unforgiving. You spot a figure in a worn brown leather jacket by the shore, and you know instantly. It's him.

You march onto the beach with your shoes still on, wrapping your arms around yourself to act as a shield from the wind. You left your jacket at your parent's house, too eager to get out of there in a hurry. The rain is suspended in the air, never quite reaching the ground. You know it's only a matter of time before the heavens open.

"Bucky!" you yell, practically bounding across the sand. "Buck!"

He doesn't turn because he hears your voice. He turns because he suddenly feels like he can breathe, which he hasn't been able to do for the last hour. He knew you were there before you shouted his name.

"Bucky, please!"

He spins on his heel and stops walking, waiting for you to catch up with him. You're sprinting, panting as you reach him. The ocean waves crash against the shore, dangerously close to his boots.

"Buck, just let me explain," you choke out, trying to catch your breath.

You finally stop running and look at him. He looks broken. His hair looks like he's pulled his fingers through it repeatedly, tear tracks staining his cheeks, lips bitten red. You've never seen him upset like this. It's the worst thing you've ever witnessed.

"There's nothing to explain," he begins calmly, trying to keep a lid on his feelings.

"There is, Buck. There is. I... Cora overheard me confiding in my Mom, telling her about a call I'd gotten, from a classmate at culinary school. It was just an offer - I haven't accepted anything! I never meant for you to find out like this, I swear. It's all just... it's all so fucked up."

He looks at you in disbelief.

"No, you know what's fucked up?" he asks, raising his voice. "Finding out that my soulmate is moving across the country from some alcoholic suburban mom at a dinner party!"

You've never heard him yell before. You don't like it at all. You gather yourself before replying calmly, determined to keep you emotions under wraps.

"I've been trying to find a way to talk to you about it, but I didn't know where to start. How do I even begin to explain any of this?"

"Maybe, I don't know - 'hey, Buck, I got a call and I'm thinking of moving thousands of miles away for my dream job,' would be a good place to start?"

"It's more complicated than that. I was trying to protect you."

"Protect me from what?"

"From blowing your life up for me!"

You stare at each other for a minute, both of you unblinking.

"What are you talking about?" he croaks out.

"You'd drop everything for me, Bucky, and I can't let you do that. You've worked too damn hard to let it all go."

He's dumbfounded, for a moment. Not because he doesn't understand. No. He's realising that you're right.

"I knew that if I told you straight away, you'd have persuaded me to let you come with, and I would have said yes. And then you'd regret it, and you'd resent me, and we'd be over before we've even begun."

When he doesn't say anything, you continue.

"The thing is, Buck, the selfish part of me would have happily invited you along. Me and you, in California, running a bakery? That sounds like a fucking dream. But I have to listen to the other side of me, the selfless part. And that part is telling me that you have worked too damn hard for too damn long just for me to take that all away."

You feel droplets of water on your face, and for a moment, you wonder when you started to cry again. Then, in the deep distance, you hear a crack of thunder. The rain begins to pour, both of you caught in a storm in more ways than one.

"You don't get to make a decision like that for me!" he finally responds, yelling to be heard over the downpour. "We're supposed to talk about these things! To figure them out together! That's what soulmates are - we're a team!"

"I can't think rationally around you, Bucky! It's like all logic goes out the window. I'm just so overwhelmed with-"

You stop yourself before the word comes out, but you both know what you were about to say. He feels it in his ribcage, the surge of emotion from you.

"-with how I feel about you. You're my forever, Buck, and I feel like -" a sob wracks through you, shaking your frame. "-like I've fucked it all up already."

Your tears mix with the rainwater, trailing down your cheeks. You watch as Bucky fights with himself, internally battling his feelings.

"You're not the only one fucking it up," he chokes. "You repeatedly told me we had to take it slow, but I just... couldn't help myself. I've never felt for anyone what I feel for you, and being away from you for even a minute is fucking torture. I moved us too fast, and now look where we are. We've become the equivalent of a married couple in a couple of weeks. No one can handle change that sudden."

"It's not.. none of this is your fault, Buck. I kept something from you, something big. I know it doesn't matter now, but I want you to know how hard it's been to not tell you. It was killing me."

"I felt it," he murmurs shakily, willing himself not to cry. "In my chest. You were so torn up about something, and I just couldn't figure out what it was. I should have pushed you more, but I was worried I'd push you away."

Your lip trembles as you watch him bite his own anxiously.

"I'm so scared, Buck," you whisper. "I feel so lost and so confused and like nothing makes sense."

"Me too," he whispers back, eyes never leaving yours. "I'm fucking terrified. Our worlds have been turned upside down."

"Is it... is it supposed to be this hard? Everyone makes it sound so easy."

"I don't know. Maybe the Universe heard that we were anti-soulmate and decided to be super tough on us. Cosmic karma, or something."

You choke out a laugh through your tears. The rain has plastered your clothes to your body, the salty wind chilling you to the bone. Without thinking, Bucky takes off his jacket and wraps it around you, unable to watch you shiver any longer.

"What now?" you ask quietly. If he wasn't standing so close, he wouldn't have heard it.

"Let's get out of the storm," he suggests, nodding his head towards the path home. "We can talk some more somewhere warmer."

You sniffle and take a deep breath, willing yourself to get it together. Bucky surprises you by linking your hand with his, warm fingers intertwining around yours.

He doesn't let go the whole way home.

✵ ✵ ·　 ✵ 　　 * · ✵

Bucky takes you to his house.

You haven't been here since before your Tethering. You walk in the door, and your knees threaten to give way.

It's overwhelming.

Everywhere - everything - smells like Bucky. His scent clings to every fabric, every upholstery, every room. There's pictures scattered across the mantelpiece, his handsome face staring at you wherever you go. The house is warm, cosy, and just so Bucky it makes your heart ache.

You walk over to the fireplace, taking a closer look at the array of frames adorning it. There's one of your parents and Bucky smiling, sat out on his lawn last summer; another of Bucky and his team of mechanics, stood proudly outside his garage. A small black frame catches your eye. You pick it up, and your breath hitches in your chest.

It's a picture of the two of you on the deck of his boat, the day after you found out you were soulmates. The wind is blowing your hair, billowing your shirts, sun beating down on your skin. You're both beaming at the camera, bright and blinding, completely content.

You're holding back tears as you put it back in it's original place.

"My favourite picture," he murmurs from somewhere behind you. "We look happy."

"We were happy," you whisper. Then, quieter, "We will be again."

A pause.

"You want something to drink? Coffee, cocoa? Oh, I have that tea you like, the apple one?"

"You do?"

"Yeah. I, uh, bought some last time I went grocery shopping. In case you stopped by."

"Tea sounds good. Please."

You stay stood in the middle of the living room while Bucky puts the kettle on the stove, worried that your wet clothes will ruin his couch. As if he's read your mind, he pops his head around the door.

"There's a load of fresh clothes folded on top of the dryer. Grab whatever you want, dry off a little."

You wander into the laundry room, sorting through the pile. You find a t shirt with his garage logo on the back in big, white letters.

J.B.B. Motorcycles and Automotives.

The blocky, bold font swirls across the black material. You run your fingers over it, tracing the curves and spikes of the typeface. It's something you've seen him in a million times. You inhale deeply as you slip it over your head, revelling in the way it smells like him. You grab some boxer shorts and slip those on too, glad to finally be warm and dry.

Bucky loses his breath when you walk into the room. He's never seen you in his clothes before, and for good reason. He's about to have a goddamn heart attack.

"Tea is on the coffee table," he chokes out. "I'm gonna change, and then we'll talk, yeah?"

You nod gently, settling into the cushions of his couch and tucking your legs underneath you, mug warming your hands.

When Bucky returns, he's in sweatpants and an oversized hoodie that you want to burrow yourself into. He takes his place, careful to put a little distance between you. Far enough that you're not touching, but close enough that you almost are.

"I'm sorry," you whisper. "I'm not good at this."

"Neither am I," he smiles gently. "It's my first time having a soulmate."

"Mine too," you laugh softly.

It floors you, his ability to always be able to comfort you. It's like a superpower, the way he always knows what to say or do to put you at ease.

"I think we got a little ahead of ourselves," he begins, careful to keep his voice low and deliberate. "I keep forgetting that we have forever. Literally. I was so eager to rush into this with you because I got excited. Don't get me wrong, I'm still ridiculously excited, but I'm realising now that our version of 'slow' wasn't slow at all."

"This whole Tethering thing makes everything so intense. There have been times where I honestly thought I was going to drop dead if you didn't kiss me."

"The feelings mutual," he chuckles.

You lace your fingers with his, never breaking eye contact, before addressing the elephant in the room.

"What am I gonna do about California, Buck?"

Your voice cracks just saying the word.

"Stella needs an answer, and I've upset you, and my parents are clueless, and I just - I don't know what to do. Tell me what to do. Please."

"I can't tell you what to do, honey," he soothes, running his thumb over the back of your hand. "And I'm not upset. I was, in the backyard... but I was mainly just blindsided. I kinda get it, you not telling me. I'm not sure what I'd do in your situation either."

"I just feel like both decisions are wrong. I can't win."

"Hey, hey. Look at me, pretty baby."

Bucky cradles your face in his warm hands, forcing your eyes to meet his ocean blue ones. You have to focus on his words, so you don't get lost in the waves of his irises.

"At the end of the day, it's completely your decision, and no one in the world can change that. But-"

He takes a deep breath, and continues.

"I think that you'll regret it every day for the rest of your life if you don't take the incredible opportunity that's been offered to you."

You take a second to process what he's telling you, your mind running at a thousand miles an hour.

"Are you... you're... are you saying I should take the job?"

"Like I said, it's your decision, but... yes. I'm saying you should take the job."

Your eyes well with tears, and you bite your lip to stop them from escaping. Inhaling carefully, you put your hands on his chest, feeling his steady heartbeat under your palms. He's calm. He's sure. He's collected enough for the both of you.

"What about us?" you ask, barely above a whisper.

"Like you said, baby. I'm your forever." Buck leans in, resting his forehead to yours. "We have time."

"All the time in the world."

You connect your lips to Bucky's softly, testing the waters. He kisses you back with so much feeling, tears slip from your lashes without warning. He's crying too, emotion mixing with yours, dousing you both.

You pull away and wrap your arms around him, curling yourself into his chest. He holds you as tightly as he can, knowing this will be the last time for a long time.

"So you'll go."

"I'll go."

"And I'll stay."

"You'll stay."

"And we'll be okay. No matter what, we'll be okay."

You and Bucky fall asleep in each others arms, cherishing the feeling of home one last time.

✵ ✵ ·　 ✵ 　　 * · ✵

The happiness is starting to seep through.

You're devastated to be leaving Bucky behind, but you're trying to look on the bright side. Sunny beaches, new people, your dream job. If you think about the positives for long enough, the Bucky sized hole in your chest hurts a little less.

You're packing up your bookshelf when your phone rings, scaring the life out of you.

"Bitch!"

You know who it is instantly.

"Hi, Lacie."

"Where have you been? Why didn't you answer my text from last night?"

"Shit, sorry. I've been packing. What's up?"

"We're going out tonight. Not just us - all the girls. We're throwing you a goodbye party!"

You groan inwardly, massaging your temples with your fingers.

"A party? Lace, I don't need a party."

"Babe, you do. You really do. It'll be fun! I thought you'd be excited!"

You take a deep breath, and remember what you've been telling yourself. Focus on the positives.

"Okay, fine. Where? What time? What should I wear?"

"I knew you'd say yes! Come to my place at like... six? We can get ready together, like old times! And wear something sexy."

She doesn't wait for you to argue, just hangs up the phone. She knows you too well.

You know it'll be good for you, to see your girlfriends - but the thought of all the goodbyes you're about to say breaks your heart a little more.

✵ ✵ ·　 ✵ 　　 * · ✵

"Okay, what the fuck is going on with you?"

You're sat cross legged on Lacie's living room floor, sharing makeup that's scattered across the coffee table. You sip your wine for a moment, trying to come up with an excuse. It's no use.

"I don't know."

"Bullshit."

You turn to look at her.

"What?"

"It's bullshit, babe. Something's going on. You've been given your dream job, and you're moping around like you just got broken up with or something. Why aren't you happy?"

There's no malice in her voice, just pure love. She adores you. You adore her. She's the one person with an outsiders perspective on all of this. So, you cut the act.

"I had my Tethering."

Silence.

She's processing.

"What?!"

"Yeah."

"When? Who? Where? How? Oh my God what is happening? Why didn't you say anything? Fuck, I'm gonna cry. I'm so overwhelmed right now, I'm so happy for you! Wait... are we not happy?"

"It's... complicated."

There's a lump in your throat, but a levity in your heart. A weight has been taken off you. Telling someone the truth has made you feel a little lighter.

"Who is it, babe?"

You take a deep breath, and look her in the eyes.

"Bucky."

Her jaw drops.

"Your... your Dad's best friend Bucky?"

"That's the one."

"Oh. My. Fucking. God."

"Yeah."

"Holy shit."

"Yeah."

"This is complicated."

"Yeah."

"Aw, babe."

She pulls you in for a hug, not caring about the makeup you're smearing across her shirt. You cling to her as tightly as you can, savouring your best friends comfort.

"Does anyone else know?"

"No. We decided not to tell my parents for a while."

"Shit. No wonder you've been so sad lately. You're moving across the country, away from the one person you're supposed to be near."

"It's really hard," you whisper, tears threatening to spill.

"I can't even begin to imagine," she murmurs, holding you close. "I wish you'd told me sooner. We could have talked about it."

"I know," you sniffle. "I thought I could handle it on my own, but I really can't."

"You're not on your own, okay? You have Bucky, and you have me. You can always talk to me about this stuff. God knows I talked your ear off about Cameron."

You laugh softly, thinking back to that day that feels both like yesterday and a million years ago.

"Where is he tonight?"

"Out with his boys. It's good for us to spend a few hours apart."

You smile at the happiness that's radiating off her. She's glowing, beaming in all directions.

"Thanks, Lace. I love you. You know that right?"

"Of course I do. I love you too. So much," she leans forward to kiss your cheek. "Now let's have one hell of a last girls night, shall we?"

✵ ✵ ·　 ✵ 　　 * · ✵

You've lost track of exactly where you are.

You know you're downtown somewhere, in one of the bars. This one smells like wood and whiskey, lowlit and smoky. You hit the cocktail bar first, then the one covered in leopard print, then the monochrome pink one. Now, you're here.

The six of you are sat at a booth, high heels tangled and legs intertwined under the table. The wood is sticky with lemon wedges from tequila shots, salt scattered across the surface.

"If you find any hot west coast men, will you send them my way?" Reese asks, nudging you with her shoulder.

"And if you find any hot west coast women, will you send them mine?"

Everyone laughs, the scent of perfume filling the air.

"Rosa, what happened to Aubrey? We liked her!"

"Caught her kissing my ex girlfriend. So now they're both my ex girlfriends."

"Jesus Christ."

"Man, that's rough," Lacie giggles next to you.

The other girls continue to talk about Aubrey's infidelity as Lacie leans to whisper in your ear.

"Have you said goodbye to Bucky yet?"

You nod.

"Yesterday. I stayed the night, we fell asleep together. Said our goodbyes in the morning. It was awful."

"Love you," she whispers, squeezing your hand under the table.

"Love you too," you reply, squeezing back.

"There's a table of super hot guys over there," Maggie observes, tilting her head in their direction. "Maybe we should conveniently dance that way in a little while."

You don't bother to look over, knowing that none of them will compare to your soulmate. The other girls seem interested, though, so you smile along with them.

"Babe," Sam hisses, kicking you under the table. "There's a hot guy at that table, three o'clock, that keeps staring at you."

You glance over, and your heart stutters in your chest.

Bucky.

His blue eyes pierce your soul, even from across the room. For a moment, it's only the two of you, all the noise forgotten.

You're snapped back to reality by Sam.

"Fuck, he's hot. If you don't want him, I do."

"You should talk to him," Lacie suggests quickly. "Why not, right?"

She's practically pushing you out of the booth, high school wrestler style. In another life, you think, she would have made a good football player. All five foot four of her.

You walk past his table, eyes still locked on him, and towards the bathrooms. You know he'll follow you. You walk to the end of the hallway and out of the door, into the fresh night air.

You feel him appear before you see him. You lean your body against the wall, head resting on the cold brick. Bucky stands in front of you, shirt stretched across his shoulders gorgeously.

"Hi."

"Hi, honey baby."

You smile softly at the nickname.

"What are you doing here?"

"I got dragged to a boys night. What are you doing here?"

"I got dragged to a girls night."

He laughs, and all the tension melts from your muscles.

"Thought we said our goodbyes. I didn't think I'd see you again before I left."

"Me too. But you know the Universe. It hates us."

"Cosmic karma," you whisper.

The two of you stand down the alleyway, looking at each other carefully. Neither of you wants to spook the other person. You'd processed your leaving, said your emotional goodbyes. And now he's here, standing in front of you. You don't want to have to do it all again.

"I should probably get back inside, before the girls get the wrong idea."

"Baby, I followed you to the bathroom. They've already got the wrong idea."

You chuckle, kicking at a rock on the ground.

"Yeah. I don't know how I'm gonna explain this."

A smile. A pause.

"I'll let you get back to your friends, then."

You lean up to press a kiss to his stubbled cheek.

"Bye, Buck."

"Bye, pretty girl."

You push off the wall and walk away towards the door. Suddenly, a warm hand wraps around your wrist, yanking you into a solid chest.

Bucky kisses you like a man possessed. There's nothing gentle about it - just pure, unadulterated passion. It's all teeth and tongue and nipping and biting, neither of you willing to be the first to pull away.

He walks you back into the wall, pushing you against the rough brick. You hike a leg up onto his hip as he grabs your thigh to pull you closer, desperate to feel all of you. Your hands are in his hair, around his neck, tangled in his collar, his shirt, his belt loops. Anything you can get your hands on, you grab.

A distant chorus of cheers break you out of your lust fuelled haze. A bachelorette party walks by, one of the women winking at you as they go. You and Bucky take a step away from each other, straightening out your clothes and fixing your hair.

"Promise me you'll call me if you need anything," Bucky murmurs, leaning to rest his forehead on yours.

"I promise," you whisper, almost against his lips. "Goodbye, Bucky."

"Goodbye, honey girl."

✵ ✵ ·　 ✵ 　　 * · ✵

The salty ocean wind whips through your hair, sun beating down onto your skin, some upbeat pop song humming from the radio. You keep your eyes glued to the road in front of you, begging yourself not to look back. You know if you do, you'll turn the car around and run straight back into Bucky's arms.

Let the happiness seep through, you remind yourself, gripping the steering wheel.

Let the happiness seep through.

tag list part one -

@lillytracy6996 @securegorgon @roostersforevergirl @povlvr @val-writesstuff @dreadfulxives18 @1deadpool26 @abbygraceasd @nyutasgirl @mavrellover91 @winterslove1917 @f-this42 @skewedcherries @noisesinthedark @kandis-mom @black-cat-2 @harrystylesandthegoobs @vladsgirlxx @h0nestly-though @arienotari @nash-dara @wandaneedstherapy @galaxy-dusk @justherefortheficandsmut @cremebruleequeen @cjand10 @buggy14 @avengers-fixation @blueberrybambi @beautiful-loserr @sarah1barnes @miss-rebel-without-applause @ragingrainbowshipl @shamrockqueen @savemeroman @jenn-f @8crazy-freak8 @daddyjackfrost @openup-yourmind @adangerousbalance @mandijo17 @daddylorianisastateofmind @rcarbo1 @casa-boiardi @spideegwen @navs-bhat @mssbridgerton @asuni921 @middle-of-the-earth @mfrnchsk

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thewriterwithnoplan · 3 months

Text

THE TRAITOR'S SOULMATE (2/2)

Summary: Humans once had four legs, four arms, two heads, and two hearts. For humanity's hubris, Zeus struck them in two. You and Luke Castellan are determined to find your way back to each other, but before that can happen, there are things the two of you need to do.

[Part 2 to The Hero's Soulmate]

Soulmate AU: You meet the future version of your soulmate.

Pairing: Luke Castellan x Reader

Word Count: 7378

Warnings: Canon typical warnings, swearing, I use the spelling 'mom' because the series is American but I - and I cannot stress this enough - am not American, she a long one.

A/N: I've loved reading your comments, thank you so much for all the support in part one. I hope you enjoy, because we all deserve a little Luke Castellan every now and then!

Masterlist

Amphitrite had been gifted a premonition and the world was all the worse for it. The dream had come from Apollo or perhaps the Oneiroi or whatever great heart pumped blood and Gods and monsters out into the world.

It did not matter to the Goddess from whom the vision came, for in this dream Amphitrite had watched her husband fall in love and sire a child to a mortal paramour. A precious boy that Poseidon might even one day love, with a taste for the colour blue and a heroism that would grow to rival his namesake. And for the Queen of the Seas, that simply would not do.

It would not be the child’s nor his mortal mother’s fault – she was not Hera after all – and so she would have to punish her husband for the blame would be his. But how was one to punish a King among Gods before his crime even came to be? Why to beat him at his own game, of course.

So, Amphitrite set out to sire her own demigod with the mortal man her husband would hate most. A devout catholic.

Amphitrite stayed with her mortal lover and their half-blood daughter until the girl was all but five. Far longer than the greater Gods were wont to spend with their offspring. But what a precious babe she had bourn and what a traitorous husband she had back home.

But fate and prophecies and soulmates were such funny things. Inciting chaos. Inviting paradox. Introducing dangers untold.

It took Amphitrite all those years – though seemingly short in her immortality – to realise her fatal error. She had been the one to leave Poseidon. She had been the one to sire a child. She had been the one to drive her husband to the surface and his mortal. And so, the blame was hers to shoulder.

Amphitrite decided that she would be a self-fulfilling prophecy no longer. It was time to venture back below the surface.

In a last fit of guilt, she bestowed her first and final act of mercy unto her mortal lover. She told him everything.

When finally, she had gone back to the sea to reconcile with her husband, the catholic man took his turn to bestow his first and final act of mercy unto his young demigod child.

Against all the teachings of his faith. He abandoned his young daughter at Half-Blood Hill. And let the devil-spawn keep her life.

The Spirit of the Hudson River never did learn to like you. You with your greedy hands, snatching debris from its murky waters. You and your strange sea creature friends who would not dare brave such pollution were it not for your presence. Your pile of war spoils tossed aside like children’s toys. Your strange little bubble of air on the sandy floor of the river, where you stowed your treasures and slept bracketed by water. Were it not for the pollution that slopped against the edge of the river as if it were trying to escape you, the Hudson River Spirit might have chased you and your sea friends and your collection of trinkets out of his waters. But as it were, you made a strangely amicable tenant for a demigod. So, as long as you paid your dues the spirit let you keep your little underwater oasis.

For your first years living there, you made your way in New York City by selling lost things dredged from your river home. Bikes and old weaponry and tarnished jewellery and buckets of coins from across the world. You were careful and you coveted your few precious belongings, but with the rivers bounty, you rarely went hungry.

By the time you were fourteen, you found you could venture further into the city without as many questions. You had met an odd assortment of people whilst selling the lost and unloved things of the river; all who knew someone, who knew someone, who needed another set of hands and so you offered yours. You babysat and cleaned, worked in delis and sandwich shops, helped old women with their groceries and young families mend their clothes. A retired teacher gifted you packets of schoolwork and with little else to fill your hours under the river you took to learning. Your numbers came easier than letters and reading always gave you a hard time but the activities she gave you each time you tended to her balcony garden gave you something to do when the sounds of the city kept you up at night.

All the while you followed Percy Jackson from the recesses of the Hudson. Shuffling your little bubble and its blessedly dry treasures up and then back down the river as he was bounced listlessly from school to school. Watching over him as the mythosphere tried desperately to barge into his little mortal life. Feral harpies that tried to snatch him into the air, great snakes that tried to sneak through air vents and all manner of underworld-born sea creatures that sought to pull him below. You had wrestled and dismembered and slayed them all. Adding their feathers and scales and great weapons to your dragons-hoard.

You were sixteen when you finally knocked on Sally Jackson’s door to introduce yourself. You had spent weeks working yourself up to it, planning your outfit and then fussing over each piece. All your clothes had been gifts and were often a size too big or printed with some generic tagline like Spread peace not hate!; or made entirely from yarn that the old woman whose meals you prepped at the start of each week had gifted you after she had taught you how to crochet; or like the dress you wore now, were sown together from thrifted fabric scraps and embellished with pretty shells and baroque pearls. You had planned the time you would arrive down to the minute so that her oppressive husband would be out, but the hour would not be so late as to make an unexpected visit threatening. You had planned to keep Percy safe while you were away from him by entrusting your friends Clarence the Crab and Emily the Squid to supervise him for the evening.

What you had not planned for was the possibility that Sally Jackson would be the most lovely woman you had ever met. You had been struck dumb by it the moment she opened her door and greeted you with a kind smile. Couldn’t your mother have chosen a mortal as gentle as she to be your parent? Alas, the Gods had never done a thing for you.

“Can I help you, lovely?”

You tried not to burst into tears as you asked, “Mrs. Jackson?”

“Are you alright?” She opened the door wider, leant out and scanned the corridor behind you. “Is there something you need?”

“No ma’am. I’m here about your son, Percy. His father sent me.” A good ambiguous statement that would pique her curiosity but let on nothing about the Gods. Allowing you to spin your tale – that you were Percy’s long-lost step-sister, come to reconnect.

“Poseidon?” Alas, the Gods had truly never done a thing for you. “Is something wrong? Is Percy, okay?”

“He’s fine Mrs. Jackson, I’ve been keeping him safe.”

She scanned the hall behind you once more, “You best come in.”

Over a cup of tea, you told Sally Jackson everything.

You liked your home under the river. For lack of a better term, it allowed you to remain liquid. You could follow Percy wherever trouble took him. You could stay up until the city grew quiet for that brief moment before dawn. You could train with the Hudson River Spirit, even if he only entertained you because he enjoyed winning.

You liked your bed made out of stacked wood pallets and a mountain of blankets. You liked your wooden chest of draws stuffed full of trinkets and weapons and the precious few items you owned. You liked this place that you had carved out with your own two hands.

But you also liked your home in the Jackson household. Where there was always music playing. Where it was always warm and dry. Where there would always be some blue-ified food in the oven or blue candy in the mason jars by the sink.

It became your job in the summers to babysit Percy, to keep him away from Gabe and from danger while entertaining his endless need for motion. You took him to art galleries (which he hated) and aquariums (which he loved), to craft fairs (which he tolerated because he liked the things you made) and swimming pools (which he only liked when he won your swimming races).

“What even is a soulmate?” Percy had asked you one day at the park.

“The person with the other half of your soul,” You scrunched your nose up, “Or well, that's what people say.”

“You’re saying I’ve been walking around with half a soul?”

“I didn’t say I believed them,” You rattled your water bottle in front of his face until he took it. “Stay hydrated.”

He frowned at you, “You don’t believe in soulmates?”

“Of course I do, but it's a little more complicated than that, kid.” You took the water bottle back and played with the cap for a moment while you thought. “Think of it like this. You can have two different puzzles that are cut the same way, right? So all the pieces from one will fit with all the pieces from the other. But that doesn’t mean they belong together, the picture doesn’t come out quite right because even though the pieces fit, they don’t necessarily belong to the same puzzle. Maybe that’s what it was like for your mom, like she couldn’t find the pieces that made up her picture and so she went with the ones that fit at the time.”

“You don’t think my mom and dad were soulmates?”

“I never met your father.”

“But he’s your dad too.”

“He’s my mom’s husband. Maybe my mom and dad are soulmates.” Percy didn’t seem to like that answer. “Maybe it doesn’t matter. Maybe your mom and my mom each have pieces that fit into your dad's puzzle but neither match his picture, or both. Maybe his picture is a year with your mom and a lifetime with mine and having you. Maybe he needs to collect all those little pieces at the right time when they’re the right shape or he’ll end up with a completely different picture at the end.”

“I kind of understand.” But he gave you a look that said he probably didn’t. “What picture are you making?”

You hid your smile behind the lip of your water bottle, “My soulmates about yay-high, pretty as a magazine cover with dimples and all. I’m collecting my puzzle pieces with you and your mom and this city so that I’ll have half of his picture.”

“If you know who he is, why don’t you just go find him now?”

“Still looking for some pieces, I guess.” You kicked a rock with the toe of your boot. “Souls are fragile. If you go rushing in and trying to jam the pieces in when they’re not shaped right just yet you could damage them.”

“What happens if you do that?”

“It’s probably harder to find each other in the next life. You’ll chip pieces away and your souls won’t fit right.” You shoved your hands into the pockets of your cardigan and pulled out a sandwich, you gave Percy the bigger half.

“Who taught you all this?”

“My mom used to tell me and well, I've thought about it a lot.” You tugged Percy by the back of his shirt so he didn't go stomping through a puddle, he glared. “But anyway, some people think it’s just fate. That you find your soulmate no matter what and it’s a perfect fit either way.”

“It would be easier that way.”

“Sometimes that’s just not how the story goes, kid.”

Percy thought that was the most important thing anyone had ever taught him, but he figured some of the other stuff you taught him came in handy too. You taught him the tricks you learned to work around your dyslexia. You taught him to skip stones and to not throw rocks at seagulls. You taught him to flip off the Empire State Building but only when his mom wasn’t around. You taught him to knit and do a cartwheel and make a good cup of tea to take his mother in the morning. You taught him to chew with his mouth shut and to sword fight with wrapping paper rolls. You taught him to braid hair and throw a punch and say all the swears in Ancient Greek.

And then one day, a Satyr came for Percy Jackson, and there was nothing left for you to teach.

You wrote Sally a brief letter of warning, picked your way through seven years’ worth of belongings and collapsed your life into a backpack. You said goodbye to Clarence and Emily with a brief promise to visit, pushed a final wave of pollution from the waters and thanked the Hudson River Spirit for his hospitality. He gifted you sixteen perfect round pearls and insisted that he never wanted to see you again. You spent the bus ride to Long Island threading them into a necklace made of fishing wire, tying off each pearl with your teeth.

It was a tentative tradition between demigod soulmates to exchange gifts upon their first meeting. So few and far between were the possessions of a half-blood that even the smallest bauble would likely mean the world. The practice had died out some over the centuries as the Gods received fewer offerings from mortals and turned to their children for sacrifices. Gift-giving to your soulmate as a demigod became all but synonymous with spitting at the feet of the divine and loudly proclaiming you would make offerings to your soulmate instead. A pearl necklace would be an excellent final addition to the collection of small gifts you had assembled over the years. Let the Gods weep at your feet and beg for scraps if they needed them so much, you would ignore them just as they had ignored you.

You arrived at Camp far sooner than you might have liked, a few hours past mid-day when hopefully the rest of your ilk would be occupied with meaneal chores and activities. You considered waiting at the crest of the hill for someone to notice you only to find a pine tree planted firmly at its peak where you might have stood. Instead, you make the alarmingly easy trek down to the Big House.

“Chiron!” He had always been your favourite of the two men, currently sat on the porch drinking juice and playing cards.

“Yes, my girl?” He barely spared you a glance as he shuffled his cards between his weathered hands. He stilled for a moment and then tossed his head back in the way a horse might toss its mane. “My dear!”

You raised a hand, halfway between a salute and a wave, “Nice to know I haven’t been totally forgotten.”

“Au contraire.” Mr. D stuck his nose up at you. “Which one are you again?”

“The little one that went missing some seven years ago,” Chiron stood as you climbed the stairs onto the porch. “How are you, my dear? Where have you been?”

“Shouldn’t you be at Yancy Academy?”

Mr. D’s eyes turned sharp in the way that had once made your friends whisper that some days, he was more maniac than man , “And how do you know about that little girl?”

“Percy Jackson is at Yancy,” You smiled at him, all teeth, “How did you think he survived long enough for your baby satyr to find him?”

“You have been protecting young demi-gods?” Chiron asked wearily.

“Percy Jackson is a full-time job, I’m afraid,” You tugged at the strap of your backpack, praying you could keep control of the conversation. You had a lot of time under the river to think and this was one of many things you had spent countless hours mulling over. Weighing and considering what story you would tell them – to tell the truth of both your parentage and put Percy in harm's way or to lie and balance your life on its sharp edge. “I found him in Manhattan, he was like a magnet for mythological activity. By the time I’d had enough of rebelling and wanted to come back to camp, I was protecting him from attacks every other week. He wouldn’t have lasted a month. I came back as soon as I could.”

No matter how many times you played it out in your head, the lies won every time.

“Kids.” Mr. D threw back the last of his juice.

“Perhaps you should settle back into the Hermes Cabin, dear.” Chiron smiled down at you, the corners of his eyes pinched, “You’ve given myself and Mr. D much to talk about. We’ll settle the issue of your paperwork tomorrow.”

“Of course.” You rustled through your bag, digging up a palm sized statuette that you set onto the table. “Before I forget, I brought you a gift Mr. D.”

“A toy,” He snatched it up. “Oh joy.”

“It’s you, as the mortals’ see you. It’s from the gift shop at the Met.”

“How kind of you, my dear.” Chiron softened, and you watched as even Mr. D’s temper seemed to ease, his hands gentle around the gift as he admired it.

An unseeing piece of plastic for the God who served as no more than a silent observer over the affairs of the camp. Let him choke on his ego, you thought as you left the pair to their discussion.

Cabin 11 was blessedly empty when you entered, but your old bunk was not. A pile of clothes was thrown haphazardly across the bedspread. You snatched a sleeping bag and a lumpy pillow from the storage closet and threw them down with your bag. If you could not have the bunk that had been yours at twelve, you would claim the corner that had been yours at five. As you shook out the sleeping bag and pulled out your belongings, you tried not to think of your bed of blankets under the river or Sally Jackson’s couch.

Instead you turned your mind to the Big House and the conversation that was no doubt happening within.

You had constructed a perfect image, if you did say so yourself. Grown in ways Mr. D could not have predicted but Chiron would insist he had foreseen. Still a rebellious young woman in the mortal sense, with your scuffed leather boots and ripped jeans. But the parts that had screamed ‘insubordination’ to the Gods were neatly tucked away. Your twin knives strapped to your forearms under the billowing sleeves of your crocheted top, your vicious tongue caged behind a sweet grin, your once sharp stare softened at the edges.

Once you had fashioned yourself so that the Gods could not paint you as a hero, now you fashioned yourself so that they might forget you were an enemy.

Let Chiron think you were a misunderstood wayward girl scout come home from her self-imposed quest. Let Mr. D think you were a stupid girl who had seen the world beyond the Gods’ protection and finally accepted that you needed them. Let them all think wrong. You had left to protect your brother and returned for one reason only.

“You’re here.”

You turned, and there he was, “Luke Castellan.”

He opened his mouth and then closed it, limbs jerking slightly as if he wasn’t sure whether to move toward you or stay put. He was almost certain you could hear the way his pulse was racing, his heartbeat clanging wildly in his chest as he searched desperately for a suave reply, but everything else seemed lack lustre when you said his name like that.

Your face twisted into something like anger and for a moment he thought he’d messed it all up before your lips curled and you practically spat, “I do like your scar.”

And then he was laughing at you, wild and bewildered and not the least bit contained. Before long you were laughing too, neither of you quite sure what was funny, just so wholly relieved as your chests were flooded with wonder and warmth.

It felt like fireworks and popping candy. Just as he had promised all those years ago. You resisted the urge to throw up on his Converse.

You might have been crying and he might been too but you weren’t exactly sure because one moment you were both laughing at nothing and the next he was on the floor with you. He held you like he had never held a single thing in his life, like he was lost at sea and you were the only solid thing for miles. He tucked your head under his chin and sucked in great forced breaths that you could feel beneath your cheek. Because he was warm and there and real. And that meant the last seven years, the better part of your life, hadn’t been for nothing.

You and Luke make your way to dinner side by side. You had spent the afternoon rambling about your lives, about your meetings with your future selves, about your home under the river, about his responsibilities as a camp counsellor and yours as your brother’s keeper. He told you about Annabeth and Thalia and the rest of his siblings, you told him about your parents and Sally Jackson and your sea friends. You gave him his necklace which he lets you fix in place at the base of his throat – you do not spend a moment too long running your hand up the back of his neck and through his curls.

He had been almost bashful when he gifted you a watch that matched his, inlaid with twin fragments of mother of pearl taken from the same shell – kind of like your soul had been, he had said. You swear you’ve never owned anything as precious. You let him strap it to your wrist as he tells you about spending a summer diving for it in the lake. And then softly, tentatively, he tells you about his quest.

Luke could have cried from the way you were looking at him alone, so very gently, like you could cradle him with your gaze alone. At a loss for words, you simply whispered, “I am so proud of you.”

His grip is iron-clad and you tell your next story with your face pressed into the side of his neck, pretending you can’t feel him shaking softly.

When you make your way to dinner you’re both glowing with the soft exhaustion of emotion. You all but lean against one another as you collect your goblets and fill your plates.

The other campers steer clear of you, content to leave Luke to chauffeuring the new kid around. You count yourself lucky, it was only a matter of time until one of the older campers recognised you.

You were almost to the end of the Hermes table – that perfect spot at the end where you might just have a chance of holding a private conversation after dinner – when Chiron interrupted you.

“Mr. Castellan, I see you’ve acquainted yourself with our newly returned camper.”

“That’s my job, sir.” You tried not to stare at the crooked smile he flashed the centaur.

“Perhaps you ought to show her how to make an offering,” Chiron says pointedly, “She’s been away for a long time, and it’s your responsibility to treat her as you would any other incoming Camper.”

Luke turned to you, his boyish grin still charming but the mirth leaking out of his eyes, “Of course. Do you remember how it’s done?”

“I do. Just not a lot of food to be spared in the mortal world.”

You squinted, the corners of your mouth pulled up in what Chiron would likely mistake for sheepishness. But Luke could see it in your eyes. How your anger had made you pointy in all the places someone your age ought to be soft. He wondered how all the jagged edges of you would feel against all the jagged edges of him. He thought maybe if the two of you were careful, you could make something smooth as sea glass and twice as pretty, together.

You dump a clump of mashed potatoes into the fire with an unconcerned flick of your fork. Luke lops part of his own meal on top of yours, you glare enviously at the reasonable portion he had left on his plate. You hoped the food would burn at the bottom of the braiser.

“Sorry, sir.” You mocked Luke. He stuck his tongue at you once Chiron had turned his back.

You hurried to snag the seat at the end of his table, sliding into place across from each other. You flounder for a moment, wondering whether to draw your legs as far under your seat as they will go or bask in the gentle brush of his knee against his leg. You settle for the latter and try not to evaporate under his gaze, as he stares at you even as you start eating.

Luke realised he’d spent too long staring when you all but groaned, “Don’t tell me I have to sacrifice my dinner to you too.”

He flashed you a grin, then tried to say as nonchalantly as possible,“Is that why you left? So you could enjoy a proper meal every once and a while?”

You stared at him for a long while, “You, future you, told me to leave, to find my brother.”

“Why would I do that? If you had stayed at Camp–”

“That’s almost exactly what I said to you.” You pushed your food around as you stared at a point just beyond his head, he thought for a moment that he could see the neurons firing behind your eyes, like a hundred tiny zaps of lightning, “But I’ve had plenty of time to think about it. And I think you were right to send me away.”

“I don’t think I’ll be hearing that very often.” He dodged the pea you fling at him with a grin.

“I think maybe if I don’t leave, I won’t become this me or do the things I’ve done and maybe that’s important for us or our future or some past you rewrote by telling me to leave.”

“Seems overly complicated.”

“I think it’s supposed to be complicated,” You couldn’t help but admire the quiet skill with which he wielded his cutlery, “If it were easy, we would find each other in every universe.”

He paused, knife aloft, “You don’t want to find each other in every universe?”

“It doesn’t matter what I want.” You speared a leaf of spinach onto your fork to hide your scowl behind as you said, “The Gods have made it this way to keep us separated.”

“We’re together now.”

“Which means they lost.”

Luke watched you for a drawn out heartbeat, then leaned over to transfer the perfect squares of meat he’d been cutting onto your plate.

You took a long moment to chew before you said, “So, your plan to send me after Percy worked.”

“I thought it was your plan.”

“I forgot to ask you whose plan it was.”

“I say it’s your plan.” He took a long pull from his goblet that left his lips tinted red.

“It doesn’t matter what you think.” You passed him a napkin before he could ask, “It’s what you will think.”

“Sure, Precious.” He smothers a laugh into the napkin at the way you scrunch your nose at him, “You know, because you're so protective of your food. Like Gollum with the ring.”

“That’s the stupidest explanation for a pet name I’ve ever heard.” But you’re damn near head down on the table as you laughed. “I definitely got the smarter half of our soul.”

“Then it was definitely your plan.”

You’ve still got a hand pressed to your face to conceal your smile when you say, “What about when I meet you? Any words of wisdom?”

“Try not to fall for me. I can tell you’re pretty charmed but it’s really not appropriate. I’m seventeen, and you’re what? Twenty-four?”

You launched your bread roll at him. You’re twice as incensed when he catches it whilst looking directly at you, “Asshole.”

“Smartass. See, two can play that game.”

Luke can’t help but think you’re just as pretty sneering as you are smiling, like no expression no matter how ugly could detract from your beauty. Maybe you’re like him, he scarcely dared to hope. Maybe you’re something better, another part of him whispered. The way you talk about the Gods and turn your nose up at them, and play their game only when it suits you.

You weren’t vengeful in the way he was. You weren’t the spitting vicious thing the Camp had liked to pretend you were when you weren’t around to prove otherwise. You were worse and better and everything he needed. You were a storm on the horizon, a snake coiled tight. You were better than just angry. You were disillusioned. Not a product of juvenile resentment but true wrath born of awareness. Not the wild foaming-at-the-mouth kind that he had imagined when he had first heard your name. But the dark carefully contained kind he had seen in the face you would grow into.

This, Luke thought, you were the start of everything.

It’s some weeks later when you stick your hands through the grating of the bunk above Luke as leverage to lean over him and croon, “Up and at ‘em, Pretty Boy.”

He pushed his face out of his pillow, curls sticking up at odd angles as he looked at you half-asleep, “What?”

“Remember? Training?”

“No,” He scrubbed sleep from his eyes, “What did you call me?”

“Sickly.”

“I don’t think that was it.” He propped his head up on a fist as he smiled at you sleepily.

It was so disgustingly cute that you had to turn your back when you said, “Just meet me there.”

Luke’s freshly showered and holding an apple core when he deigns to join you in the forest. He tossed the apple at you and you caught it without thinking. You fake gag at him as you throw it further into the forest.

You wiped your hands against his shoulder as you say, “I’m not sure if an apple core counts but that was dangerously close to an Ancient Greek proposal, Castellan.”

“I got hungry.” He shrugged. You squared off across the clearing, stretching as you warmed yourselves up for the ensuing sparring match.

“You’re going to have to do better than that.”

“Is this you rejecting me?” He landed an open hand on his chest and staggered backward. “You wound me, Precious!”

“Was that you proposing? Because I’m,” You wiped your hand again for good measure, scrunching your nose up, “Disgusted.”

“You would be honoured if I had just proposed to you.”

“You should be nicer to me.”

“And go easy on you just because you’re my soulmate? Unlikely.”

“Because, asshole, I’m the one who got you out of chores this morning, or have you forgotten already. You seemed rather grateful for your little sleep-in.”

He unsheathed his sword and twirled it round in his hand, “You’re a bad influence.”

“Like you weren’t ready to worship the ground I walk on when I told Chiron you needed to get my training up to speed.”

“Do you want me to tell you, you’re brilliant?” He pointed his sword toward you with that grin that made you want to hold him down just so you could admire it longer. “You’re brilliant.”

“You’re stalling.” You pull your knives out, one from your boot, the other from your belt. You miss your old clothes with their pretty sleeves and their personality, your camp shirt seems a poor trade in comparison.

“Stalling? Me?” Luke scoffed. “Never!”

“Don’t you have a counsellor meeting at half-past?”

“I do, so please don’t feel bad when you lose. I only have half an hour to wrap this up. You understand.”

“Who’s fault is that Mr. Just-five-more-minutes?”

He gasped in mock offence and lunged forward, his sword swinging at you in a great arch. You leapt back, out of his range, then ducked low and rushed toward him. Luke was quick, in a viciously smooth move he swept his sword at you again. You brought your knives together, bracing as the impact ricocheted up your arms. Admittedly, you were at a great disadvantage given that you were reluctant to throw a knife at Luke’s head – even though he’d demonstrated an impressive ability to swipe your wayward throws out of the air – and that he had an additional several feet of reach on you.

Luke feigned to the right, you lashed out at his left side and narrowly avoided his sword as it came down at you. He whistled slowly as both of you backed up to circle each other for a moment.

“You’ve got moves, I’ll give you that.”

And so the dance went on. Luke struck, you parried or slipped out of his blade's path with a flourish. You struck, Luke swung his sword and slipped around your blows. Finally, you found the chink in his precious armour. He fell back to his right foot when he deflected a blow. You jerked forward. You jabbed the knife clutched in your left hand toward him as you moved in with the right. Just as you hooked a foot around the back of his leg, Luke’s sword made contact with your left shoulder slicing through sleeve and skin. Luke fell backward with a sharp hiss, his sword flying to the side.

In the end you had laid him out flat in twenty minutes. Luke Castellan had spent the last seven years fighting to win. You had spent them fighting to survive. You supposed it didn’t hurt that the greatest swordsman to enter Camp Half-Blood in nearly three centuries was reluctant to let anything sharp or pointed anywhere near you. You secretly thought he might have been going easy on you for being his soulmate after all. You collapsed on the forest floor beside him, your chest heaving to draw in oxygen.

“I’m sorry about your shirt,” Luke huffed.

“Orange isn’t really my colour.”

He turned to you with a wink, “Oh but it is.”

You wave your hand through the air.

“I’ve gotten very good at putting broken things back together over the years.” He tried not to look at the line of stitching that ran from the ankle of your jeans to the rips at your knee. You tried not to look at his cheek. Instead you reached out and trailed your hands across his necklace where the pearls sat snuggly at the base of his throat.

“You’re wonderful.” He brushed his knuckles down your shoulder and they came away red. “Even covered in blood you’re the most wonderful thing I’ve ever seen.”

You groaned, “Sweetness, you can’t just say–”

“You call me Sweetness when you visit me.” He whispered it like it was his greatest secret. You traced up his throat to his cheek and pressed your thumb into his dimpled cheek. “You’re still being wonderful. I can’t think when you’re–”

“Wonderful?”

“Okay, Smartass.” He sighed up at the sky, then pulled the both of you to your feet, “Enough lounging, we need to get that cut checked.”

You let him dust the dirt from you and resheath your knives, one in your boot, the other in your belt. Silently revelling in the gentle way he tugs you this way and that. You were well on your way to the infirmary, shoulders bumping and fingers just barely brushing, before he spoke again.

“Where does it come from? The nickname.”

“Sweetness?”

He looked away from you and squinted off into the distance, as if you were suddenly too bright to look at, “Yeah.”

“My mom used to tell me this story about meeting her soulmate. She probably meant Poseidon, but at the time I thought it was about my dad,” The back of Luke’s hand bumped into yours again, his fingers catching yours, his gaze resolutely ahead but you were definitely holding hands. “She said it felt like swallowing lightning and gorging yourself on popping candy. Like sweetness.”

“You like popping candy?”

“It’s my favourite.” You gave him a queer look as if to say, it’s not yours, you utter heathen?

Luke laughed at you all the way to the Apollo Cabin as he listed all the reasons it was the sub-par candy option. Nonetheless, when you emerge from the infirmary, he unloads a fistful of little packets he’d pinched from the candy bowl when the Apollo kids’ hadn’t been looking.

“Who has sub-par candy options now, Sweetness?” You teased, your mouth crackling merrily.

“Keep calling me that and you can have all the terrible candy you want.”

“Try some,” You shoved a packet toward him, because if he kept saying silly things like that and looking at you the way he was you were liable to do or say something equally as stupid. “You’ve got half my soul, maybe it’s our favourite.”

“I don’t think they had popping candy when we had one soul,” He flicks the packet held between your fingers. “And aren’t you the one who says we’re puzzle pieces not halves?”

“You have been listening to me!”

“Hard not to.”

“Asshole.” You flashed your teeth at him.

“Smartass.” He said, but the bite wasn’t there. He was watching you again, in that way he did sometimes before he said something stupid that made you want to throw yourself in the lake or run back to Manhattan or do something equally as stupid, like kiss him. “You–”

You twisted your hand in the front of his shirt and jerked him toward you, the little sachet crinkling in your fist. For a heartbeat, you were both silent, an inch away and staring as if you could will the other to be the one to press forward. But then he closed his eyes and Luke Castellan was kissing you. Like lightning and popping candy. With all the elegance of two lovestruck teenage fools and all the heat of two people who knew they had all the time in the world but still couldn’t bear to waste a second of it. His hand held you by the chin and then splayed lightly across your cheek and tucked hair softly behind your ear. You were only just reaching for the mess of curls at the back of his head when someone wolf whistles.

“My favourite.” Luke grinned, licked his lips and then turned. Hands stuffed in his pockets and a big stupid grin stretched across his face, as he shouted at you, “Stay out of trouble.”

You flip off the Aphrodite kid who’d whistled at you, and hurried back to the Apollo Cabin. You and Luke Castellan were going to need a lot more popping candy.

You’re in the lake, encased in an air bubble, sprawled out side by side with your backs against the sand, when Luke tells you what he’s done. That mere weeks before your arrival he had done the unthinkable. He had robbed the King of the Gods blind and betrayed half the Pantheon in doing so. You weren't sure whether to laugh or cry.

You had simply laid there, silently, for what had felt like aeons to Luke but maybe that had only been because he had to keep reminding himself not to hold his breath. He wasn’t drowning. You weren’t going to turn him in. He hadn’t just blown his whole plan and his life with his soulmate in one fell swoop. He just had to keep breathing and wait for you to say something. He thinks that maybe your mother had passed on some divine knack for diplomacy as Queen of the Sea with the way you seem to turn the issue of his betrayal over and over in your head.

After a while, you reach your arm toward the bubble and the sky. For a brief, terrifying moment, Luke thinks you’re going to pull the lake down on him. When you don’t Luke spends another infinite second wondering whether he would just let you do it.

He tosses the thought aside and focuses on the coin weaving between your knuckles. Like magic, it appears and disappears around the bends of your fingers but it wasn't real magic, just you fidgeting. He pressed his lips together and tried not to think about you at the bottom of the Hudson River, flipping your coin and turning over the issue of your soulmate and your brother and the camp you’d left behind. What is it you had said? You’d had plenty of time to think about those things.

Maybe that's what you need now – time. He’s about to offer it to you, offer to swim his way back to shore so you can think, even if he'd probably drown on the way. He’d give you all the time in the world if he had it.

But then you finally speak, the golden drachma rolling between your fingers, “If you hurt my brother, soulmate or not, I will kill you.”

“I am your soulmate.” He insisted as the implication made his skin itch.

“You are.” Your smile was so gentle it almost felt sad. “So you understand that my love for him comes before my hatred of the Gods. If you have put him in danger wit–”

“We get married.” He blurted. “We have a future. I woke you, when you visited me. That must mean I win.”

“It means, if that’s the path we’re even on, if those people are even the versions of us that we become… maybe you don’t hurt Percy.”

“I won’t.” He swore and you weren’t sure how to ignore the half of your soul that lies so sweetly. “I wouldn’t.”

“Maybe.” You swallowed like you’d been chewing glass your whole life, and someone had finally offered you something substantial to sink your teeth into. “Maybe if we leave now, there’s a world in which I don’t have to pick between my blood and my soul.”

Luke was quiet for a long moment, “We could recruit him. You said it yourself, he’ll be more powerful than any of us.”

“He’s twelve.”

“He’s the son of Poseidon.”

“He’s twelve.”

“You were twelve when you left to protect him.”

“And look how that turned out,” Your grin was brittle, but he swore you were still the loveliest creature he’d ever laid eyes on. “I’m sat here planning to betray everything I was raised to follow.”

“You’re going to follow me?”

Your eyes traced the shape of his jaw, his nose, his scar. You looked pained, “I fear I would follow you into much worse, Luke Castellan.”

“I’m trying to lead you to something better.” He reached for your hand, took the drachma from your fingers, and pressed a slow, soft kiss to your palm. He smiled and there were dimples in his cheeks and tears in his eyes as he whispered, “We can try for better.”

“Leave Percy.” You pressed your fingers to his cheek, “Let him come to camp, let him join us when he’s ready.”

“You’re sure he’ll join us?”

“He will, I know it. We just need to let him see the Gods’ apathy for himself.” And you sighed. Luke wondered how many lifetimes your souls had seen, how many times you had searched for each other, how many times you had been torn apart. You sound ancient when you say, “You and I have seen more than enough.”

He turned his head and whispered in the scarce distance between you, “What do you propose?”

“We leave. As soon as anyone catches on, we take anyone who agrees with us and flee.” You brought his hand to your mouth and pressed your lips to his knuckles firmly, “We can plot your revenge and plan my new world on the way.”

Luke feels ancient when he promises, “Okay, on the way then.”

But he swears, as you lean forward and kiss him, that no matter how many times you do it this lifetime or in all the lifetimes until this story – of you and Luke Castellan – became ancient, it would still never stop feeling like the first time.

Like lightning and popping candy.

Tag List:

@emelia07 @star611 @7s3ven @kissingyourgrl @myxticmoon @shermanno @moonsficrec @soleilgrec

#luke castellan x reader #soulmate au #luke castellan #pjo luke #percy jackon and the olympians #pjo series #pjo show #percy jackson show #pjo #percy jackson #luke castellan fanfic #luke castellan pjo #luke castellan fic #luke castellan fanfiction

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crystalandbow · 4 days

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APHRODITE MESSAGES 💌

Hi!

Let's dive into your messages from Aphrodite

Intuitively pick a pile 👇🏻 and check the corresponding message to it! & I hope you enjoy the reading

PILE 1

1212, " I am sexy, I am divine", "affirm"

Y'all are fucking kings and queens and princesses. Just shut up, y'all pretty (inside out) asf.

PRIORITISE YOURSELF AND YOUR NEEDS.

Y'all be settling for bread crumbs and shit but stop! Like self worth where?

Stop hurting yourself for petty things/people and start to enjoy life. Celebrate yourself.

You could have a talent for natural healing powers so make use of it. The upright Queen of Pentacles can also signify someone involved in a nature religion such as a white witch. It can be an indication that you may have an interest in or a natural talent for Earth magic such as creating potions using herbs.

Connect with Aphrodite if you want to add more peace and calmness into your life. You might also have some (green flag) suitors that want to make you theirs.

" Confident " for some it is asking you to be more confident while for some it shows that you are confident in yourself & your abilities

Hope the reading helped. This is a general reading so Only take what resonates. bye see you next time!

PILE 2

"pours out their heart to us"

A change is coming your way.

What change you may ask,

You are now on the verge of releasing all that has been holding you back, you are now realising the value of something (your own worth, value of a person, time, effort, anything) and this is going to bring in a new flow of motion.

New love, new feelings or new passion could be anything but it's good!

You might be going through some tough times but you are very brave and standing high. And this new thing is your reward for trusting the universe. Keep slaying and working hard💪🏻

Hope the reading helped. This is a general reading so Only take what resonates. bye see you next time!

PILE 3

Y'all could be feeling tired, disturbed, pissed at everything (or something specific) we actually have very similar cards to pile two.

you have a new opportunity being presented to you rn / soon. this opportunity is brought to you by the divine itself. GRAB IT BITCH! this thing is important for you, it has a potential to grow and get big/ successful. depending on what the thing is it will show you its benefits/pros. it will likely bring you in contact with the right people/ your soulmates/ soul family.

how will you recognize it though? one sign could be your desire for wanting to go for it, you could be naturally talented too.

another message could be that you need to give out to people, help people, be a provider. this could be you providing guidance to people or money or hope/motivation, basically anything.

for some who have been thinking about sharing content online, this is your sign to do it! (and tag me/jkkkk)

Hope the reading helped. This is a general reading so Only take what resonates. bye see you next time!

PILE 4

Y'all seem confused and stuck? Like everything "looks" alright but doesn't intuitively feel right. You are unsure if it's you whose the problem or the other thing, something around those lines, yk?

not here to scare you but yall better be careful. Your intuition is on spot especially with that one thing/person.

If something/someone is giving you weird vibes and you can't figure out why then it's the universe trying to speak to you through your intuition. your intuition needs to be addressed, try to dig in deeper with "why" you've been feeling so.

Just be a Lil cautious, that's it ig.

Hope the reading helped. This is a general reading so Only take what resonates. bye see you next time!

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writing-for-marvel · 6 months

Text

Day 25: Body Worship

Mob!Bucky's Kinktober Honeymoon

Mob!Bucky Barnes × Wife!Reader

Summary: Bucky wants to prove to you how beautiful you are on the anniversary of the first time you met.

Warnings: strictly 18+, smut, sensual and romantic, oral (fem receiving), unprotected vaginal sex, creampie, hints at reader being insecure about her body, mentions a pocket of fat on her inside thigh

Word count: 2.5k

A/N: a special fic on a special day for me ❤️ dividers by me, please do not use. Banners by @vase-of-lilies

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Your hand grasps Bucky’s bulging bicep as he leads you back into your hotel room after having kept you occupied sightseeing throughout the day.

You thought it was suspicious how interested he had been exploring the old city, when you could instead be exploring each other as he usually prefers, but when you see the scene in front of you as you return to your presidential suite, it all suddenly makes sense.

Candles flicker in the middle of a formally set table, luscious red rose petals scatter the white tablecloth and floor, and where the extravagant leather couch had been this morning, now an elaborate blanket fort has been constructed. Soft violin music plays in the background as Bucky leads you around the room, allowing you time to take in everything which has been set up specially for you.

“Do you remember what today is?” He asks in what you assume is in response to a dumbfounded expression on your face.

You wrack your brain for what on earth you’ve forgotten - a birthday, anniversary, special occasion? But you come up completely blank. Slowly shaking your head, the tips of your cheeks heat up, embarrassed that Bucky has organised such a romantic night for something you’ve completely forgotten.

“Three years ago today was the first time I laid eyes on you, the first time we met.” He informs without an ounce of judgement to be perceived in his tone.

It’s hard to believe it was only three years ago you met the man you now refer to as your soulmate, it feels like you’ve known this generous and passionate person an entire lifetime.

Bucky holds out his hand, which you take without question, and pulls you into his broad chest, swaying in time to the orchestral music. You rest your head on his strong pec, feeling his heart beating just for you as his soft lips kiss your hairline.

“Never in my life have I ever wanted anyone more than I wanted you.” His voice sounds shaky, almost as if he’s choked up and trying to get the words out without sounding affected.

You look up at him through your lashes to find your devoted husband with tears in his eyes, gazing at you like his entire world is resting in the palm of his hand.

“My life has not been the same since I met you. I can’t fathom an existence without you; everything is brighter, bolder, more colourful when you're next to me. This night three years ago, I remember going home to an empty bed and thought it was strange how much my mouth was hurting. It was such a weird sensation. Then I realised, it only hurt because I’d been smiling from ear to ear the whole time I was with you.”

“You never told me that.” Tears are now welling in your own eyes, but you fight them back so that you can memorise the smile curving on Bucky’s features and the twinkle in his eye that you’ve only ever noticed when he’s looking at you.

“I knew that night you were someone I wanted in my life, in whatever way you would have me. It was like I could see my entire future laid out in front of me, all encompassed in one strong, stunning woman, with the most gorgeous, sparkling eyes I’ve ever seen and a brilliant smile that makes my heart leap out of my chest every single damn time. And here I am the luckiest man in the entire world that you chose me to be the one you trusted with your heart.”

He takes your hand while still swaying to the inflections of the string instrument, and presses the palm of your hand against his chest. His heartbeat is quicker than the pace you’re used to feeling while he’s resting, but the notion that his thoughts of you are the reason his body is reacting in such a way makes your own heart leap out of your chest.

“I would never give it to anyone else, my love.”

“Te iubesc pentru totdeauna [I love you forever]. I still can’t believe you’re all mine.” His smile is as bright and warm as the setting sun, and right now you’re Icarus flying fatally close.

But James Barnes is worth falling out of the sky for.

The words tasting sweet and sincere on his pillow soft lips when you kiss him. His mouth moves slowly, yet purposefully against yours, trying to convey his love for you in action, rather than just words. His hands cup your jaw, coaxing you to open up to him, his tongue dancing with yours in a display of his yearning need.

“I wanna give you the whole world.”

“You already have. You are my whole world.” This time it’s him who kisses you, with much more ardour and intensity, sweeping his tongue in your mouth. His hands slide down the length of your back and pull you flush with him, a moan escaping his lips as your hands tangle in his hair. He hasn’t had it cut since before the wedding, and the additional length allows you to tug on the ends nicely. “Let’s skip dinner and go straight to dessert, shall we?”

“You’re the only thing I’m craving tonight.” The hunger in his eyes certainly indicates he could devour you like a five course meal if he were so inclined, so who are you to stop him?

His large hands on your hips slowly turn you around so your ass is pressed against his front. They trace the curves of your figure gradually, taking his time, paying attention to every swell and dip of your shape which he has helped you learn to love.

Bucky zips down your dress, the material coming loose over your shoulders, and with a little shimmy, you’re almost naked before him.

“God, you’re so gorgeous. Let me show you how beautiful you are to me.”

Boys you dated in the past were only interested in one thing: seeing you naked. Though Bucky loves you bare and writhing for him, he first and foremost loves who you are; loves your soul. Being able to strip you off your clothes has always been a privilege to him, not a right.

His lips press gentle, feather light kisses along your shoulder as he rids you of your underwear, and all of a sudden you feel very exposed standing in the middle of the room, even though Bucky’s seen you naked a thousand times.

As soon as he turns you around again to face him, eyes brimming with nothing other than pure adoration and devotion, that nagging feeling of being on display evaporates. He loves you, has vowed to spend the rest of his life worshipping you, there is not a single inch of your body that Bucky Barnes does not love.

“Lay back for me baby.” Bucky requests, his powerful hands assisting you as you fall back into the blanket fort. “I got you.” He promises, ensuring you don’t collapse in a way that will result in you being hurt. The care in his touch, how gentle this burly, tattooed man is, as if he is handling a precious artefact he cannot afford to damage.

Though Bucky looks ready to take you right then and there, he starts out slowly, trailing kisses down your neck, covering your chest and breasts, tongue swirling around your nipples and sucking on both of them until they form stiff peaks, all the while whispering sweet praises against your hot skin.

“My beautiful wife. So fucking gorgeous. My Queen. These perfect tits. God, these hips, these fucking hips. And your thighs, they drive me insane. Just wanna be buried between them. Wanna give you everything, all of me. Gonna make love to you, darling. Make you feel so good.” His breath is hot against your skin, words of devotion whispered just for your ears as he places sweet kisses on the inside of your thighs, staring at your knee, and making his was towards your core, paying particular attention to the pocket of fat you’d forever disliked about your legs, but Bucky has always adored.

A moan escapes your mouth and your eyes roll back as Bucky’s strong arms hold your thighs apart and his lips close around your clit. It’s almost unexpected, with how he had been taking his time treasuring all other parts of you, but you feel a flood of wetness gush out of you at the intimate contact.

There’s a sense of power having a man as important as James Barnes lying between your legs, treating you like a queen, obsessed with bringing you to orgasm. But when Bucky looks up at you through his lashes as he suckles on your clit, you feel nothing but a rush of palpable love.

His tongue is experienced in those little lapping movements that have you throwing your head back, his strong hands gripping onto your thighs to keep you completely open for him. Bucky’s hips rut into the pillows and blankets below him as you grind your hips on his face.

You can’t even control the obscene sounds falling from your lips as Bucky continues to abuse your pussy, your hands flying to his hair as he leads you closer and closer to the edge of the ultimate high.

“You look so beautiful when you cum - show me.” The lower half of Bucky’s face glistens with your juices before he dives back into your folds, as hungry as ever.

You oblige, as you do every time your dangerously gorgeous husband requests this from you, it’s like his words themselves compel you to satisfy his order. Your back arches off the pillows, your whole body trembling as a devastating pleasure rips through you, it feels like burning sunshine radiates in your veins, surging with every pulse.

Bucky’s lips don’t let up their suction until your thighs stop shaking, only to switch his attention to your stomach, showering every inch of your soft skin with kisses as his hands knead your breasts.

You feel cold and empty for a moment as Bucky focuses on stripping off his clothes, but as soon as he looks back at you, completely bare and ready to finish what he started, warmth blooms in your chest.

“I’m so fucking hard for you, darling.” Bucky sits on his heels, thick cock in hand as he rubs his leaking tip through your soaking folds, humming at the sensation. A whine falls from your lips, desperate for him to fill you up, for you to feel so utterly full and satiated by him that you’re almost on the brink of insanity.

“Need to feel you Buck, please, I need you so fucking bad.”

He mumbles something in Romanian you don’t understand in response as he pushes his swollen tip inside you. You let out simultaneous groans as he slowly fills you up. As he bottoms out, he rests his forehead against yours. You finally feel complete with him buried to the hilt.

“Fuuuccckkk… a lifetime of that feeling will never be enough.”

You moan against his mouth as his hands intertwine with yours, pinning them above your head as his eyes brim with pure love. He starts off slowly, almost agonisingly so, pulling all the way out of you before thrusting himself inside to where it feels like he’s in your stomach, watching your face intently to your reactions as his cock kisses your cervix.

His bare chest presses to yours, caging you in, hearts thundering against each other as you move together to a relentless rhythm, an intoxicating tide of intimacy and pleasure. His gaze and touch are full of love, a contrast to the harshness of the underworld he was carved out of, but you know it’s you who makes him tender.

“That’s my girl, taking me so well aren’t you?” Your nails rake down his back as you feel your walls clench down on his member. The rhythm of his cock stroking your velvety walls doesn't let up as his lips attach to your neck, sucking your skin in a way that makes you see stars.

He understands your wants and needs better than anyone else, learning the formula for your gratification in a way that none of your previous partners ever tried to.

“Oh God, you’re so deep, Buck. Feels so good.” His hips roll into yours fluidly, hips circling and rubbing against your g-spot so effortlessly with every thrust. The pressure in your lower belly threatens to engulf you, drown you in a sea of pleasure, but it’s a demise you’ll embrace when Bucky’s making you feel like you’re floating on a cloud of pure bliss.

Your orgasm approaches fast, the look of complete desperation in Bucky’s eyes only bringing you closer to the edge. All it takes is Bucky whispering a phrase in his native language and another deep thrust for you to come apart on his cock.

You can barely breathe with the ferocity of your high, it feels like an entire waterfall of pleasure washing over you at once, overwhelming, brutal, but oh so good.

“I’m gonna cum so hard for you baby.” Bucky moans as your walls flutter around him. He looks the picture of utter sexiness, jaw hanging open, strands of hair stuck to his forehead with sweat and that contrasting warm fondness in his blown out pupils.

Your chest squeezes when it’s your name that his lips enunciate as he spills his large load inside you.

You’re the one making him feel this good. You’re the only person who he will ever share this intimate side of himself with again. The only one who gets to see his face as he comes undone, steel blue eyes boring into yours as if he wants to remember each and every detail of your face as you cum together.

Bucky collapses next to you, arm slung around your waist as you both catch your breath. You smile at him and he beams right back as you sweep a strand of hair from his eyes.

“God, I’m so in love with you. Can’t imagine spending my life with anyone else.” There’s a moment where he simply looks at you, as if trying to convince himself you laid beside him is in fact his reality, before he kisses the tip of your nose.

“You don’t have to imagine, Buck, I’m all yours, for the rest of forever.” You snake your arms around his torso and pull yourself flush against his broad chest, feeling him place a kiss to your hairline. “I love you.”

Bucky pulls a blanket over your intertwined bodies as you close your eyes, feeling completely content falling asleep beside the love of your life in a blanket fort.

💋 Join my Kinktober Taglist 💋

Mob!Bucky’s Kinktober Honeymoon Taglist: @tilltheendofthelinepal13 @kandis-mom @buggy14 @opheliastark @auntiegigi @alovecraft @cinnxbunny @zincxxx @cultofcarter @rose-alyssa @kaitlin013106 @wandas-gurlfri3nd @beautifulrare4leafclover @queenyamimarrero @littlerya @noobzandboobzandhooz @wanda2themax @lonelywolfheart @Kbananaclip14 @depressed-gays-of-marvel @ur--mommy @jollyfirebattrash @lauratang @casa-boiardi @raging-panda @nicoline1998enilocin @melsunshine @stinkerbelle007 @mememe7147 @happycat547 @matchat3a @Sirmeowertheruthless7 @Inlovewithficnalmen @katiemarsblog @irienanicole @buckyisveryhot @littleravengirl @whyamireadingthis @vase-of-lilies @Mrsrogers77 @saltyshluts @Wwhitewolff @buckysdogtagss @mylastnamesyuh @alexandria-fandom @andth3ywereroommates @avalongreene-09 @sargentbarnxes @keira324 @cherryschaos @missusbarnes-rogers @cherriesnwinee @Ellieangelbee @Shirayukiuzukaze @goldylions @elacinnamoon @buckysdollx @mrsmischief209 @capsbestgirl77 @its-just-smut-haha @ironmansson29 @Slutforderekhale @otome-loves-what @jacesswifey @winterslove1917 @black-mistress-of-evil @buckyscumwhore @purple-vegan

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kingkatsuki · 4 months

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Anyway, while I was gone I was thinking of this stupid idea with Bakugou (as usual)

Imagine your eighteenth birthday is when you find out who you’re bonded to, and this bond is created via telepathy. A connection opens between two souls, and you’re able to communicate with each other no matter where in the world you are. A connection that only becomes stronger as your relationship with your soulmate grows.

But of course, connections can be broken. The same way those dreamlike fantasies of meeting your perfect soulmate don’t always work— especially when your soulmate is Bakugou Katsuki.

The first time you try to communicate with him, he brushes you off. Telling you to “piss off”, that he doesn’t “need a fuckin’ soulmate”. It’s a time in his life that arguably he needs that connection with someone more than ever. But the feelings of inadequacy and inferiority he holds inside are at an all time high as he pushes everyone away, including you. Shutting the door on any hope you had of ever having a connection with him, of finding your soulmate.

You try again a few times after, watching all your friends develop their love and even meet their soulmates. Hating the green-eyed monster that appears when you realise how bitter you actually are— to be paired with someone that has no interest in you. Cursed to be one of the ones without a soulmate, to try and find a love with another broken person like you.

The conversations are always the same— his irritation for your very existence no match for the conversations you try to start. Making it abundantly clear to you that you’re a distraction, that he doesn’t have time for a soulmate. And yet amongst his complaining that you’ve opened the link at a bad moment, or that he doesn’t need you— he always answers.

So over time you find yourself starting to give up, wondering why you’ve wasted so much time on a man that clearly doesn’t want you. The connection going quiet as neither of you try to open the link.

Radio silence.

And what makes it worse, is your friends who have perfect connections pity you. One of the lost souls without a soulmate— which is why you’re prepared to join a special program. A program that can realign your connection— to tie your soul to another.

It’s unorthodox, an extreme measure that has an endless list of side-effects. You could end up with the more undesirable members of society, who’s connections have been severed before, or the ones that abuse the system for their own benefit— and if the second connection doesn’t work out you’re unable to claim a third. But craving that special bond with someone, picturing the perfect smiles and pickett fences it’s more than worth the risks. So you plan to do it— to sever your connection with your soulmate, and find a new one.

Someone who will actually love you.

But it isn’t until one night that you hear something at the back of your mind, barely a murmur as you shoot up in bed. Squinting as you try desperately to focus on the sound— another whimper. But you can’t seem to make out much else, as you realise that it’s the same connection that you thought was completely shattered all those years ago.

“Hello?” You feel almost stupid calling out, wondering if he even realised that you could hear him again— that you were there.

“Long time no talk, hah sweetheart?” He scoffs, a choked cough spills from his lips after as he winces in pain.

“You sound like shit— is that why you reconnected our bond at four am?”

“Must’ve called the wrong number, sweetheart.” He sneers, but you can almost hear the humour in his tone.

“Well luckily for you I’m going to break our bond.” You bite back as you’re met with silence on the other end, “So you won’t have to make the same mistake again.”

“You can do that?” He whispers.

“Yeah, they can reconnect me with someone else.” You murmur.

“They won’t be as good as me.” He manages to get out before another cough wracks through his body.

“I wouldn’t know, would I?” You scrunch your nose in irritation, “But at least they’ll want me.”

“Who said I don’t want you?”

It’s not until a month later that you find out the real reason he reconnected the bond that night. That it was the night that his heart stopped beating as he almost lost his life, his body shutting down as the only thing he could think to do was to call out for you.

#I’ve got a disgusting amount of soulmate ideas in my drafts #but some aren’t fully fleshed out #like I was thinking of computer programmed soulmates too #or like a lonely hearts club vibe where you can through cutting edge technology find a soulmate #think ready player one with the VR headsets #like those trashy dating games #and you fall in love in one of those fantasy worlds #LIKE BELLE!!!! ahhhh #but I digress #soft bakugou #I should tw:soulmates this cause I know how much some of you HATE soulmate tropes LOL

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luveline · 7 months

Note

Hi Jade! I wanted to request something with Prince Steve and his soulmate. I feel like we’ve started to see them warm up to each other but maybe we could see reader start to meet Steve’s friends and see that she’s got more people standing behind her? Like maybe Robin and Eddie teasing Steve about something embarrassing in front of her or I know she hasn’t shown up yet but I could totally see Nancy as like a lady in waiting/tutor to teach her all about proper manners but in the process she spills all these stories about Steve growing up?

thank you for requesting ♡ prince steve au fem, 1k

A knock at the door, an impatient huff. "Are you ready yet?"

"Come in, Steve."

He wedges into your rooms, a basket in his hands. "Why are you on the floor?"

"Can't tie my stupid shoes," you complain, dropping your hands down, knee pulled up, too warm for all the fuss.

Steve nearly drops the basket, he's that enthusiastic to help you out. He kneels by your feet and takes the laces of your shoes into his hands, pulling them tight, his eyebrows pinched tighter. "That okay?" he asks, pausing his loop.

"Yeah. Thank you."

"They didn't teach you how to tie your shoes back home? We need outreach immediately."

You laugh and lay back on the plush rug behind you. "It's the weird eyelets. You royals do everything weird. Like picnicking."

"So many points. These aren't eyelets, they're lace hooks. You're pretty much as royal as I am, or you will be in a matter of days. And," —he finishes tying your boot, pulling the other toward him with a small laugh— "Robin wanted a picnic. She's not royal. None of your points make any sense."

"You'll be a wretched husband."

Steve takes your hands and pulls you up into a sitting position. He doesn't let them go, transferring both into one so he has a hand free to straighten up your cardigan. "And you'll be a cherished wife."

Steve pulls you onto your feet. Together, you walk through the selenite halls of the palace to the prince's private gardens, where a gazebo the colour of the sky stands shading refreshments from the eager sun. Helping themselves to the hors d'oeuvres are a tall Eddie and a shorter partner in crime, Robin. Nancy lays out in the grass next to who you assume to be her boyfriend, a handsome guy with two books in his hands, still closed. He squints in the sun, waving as you and Steve approach.

"Hey!" he greets. "You're late."

"Don't get up," Steve jokes, waving back at him and Nancy, who's barely lifted her head. "Not like I'm anyone important."

"Very, very hard to find you important when you're wearing shorts," Eddie says.

Steve shrugs. "She likes them."

You realise belatedly and with horror that you're she. How does he know you like his nice shorts? Either way, his indifference so long as you like them makes you flush, leaving his side in search of a cold drink to drown yourself in.

"Did you bring the bat?" Steve asks Jonathan behind you.

"Hey, babe," Eddie says, offering you a glass cup set with pressed flowers in the sides, "you okay?"

"Is that lemonade?" you ask, pointing at one of the small water dispensers. Their glass shells shine with condensation, more ice cubes than liquid inside. It's a cloudy white with blood orange slices cut and garnishing the top, their juice seeping downward slowly.

"Sure is. Prince Stevie's favourite, as always. Don't know where the sudden love for oranges came from, do you?"

You've had a love for them since you got here and tried them for the first time. Oranges are expensive, and so the palace kitchen has them in abundance. Steve clearly noticed. "Wouldn't you know?" you ask. "Don't you choose his meals?"

"As if. I'm a glorified cleaning boy," Eddie says. He scoops a bagel covered in cream cheese and fresh cut salmon from a silver tray and takes a big bite. "Just stick around for the food."

"They won't let him back into the engineers workshop on account of his bad manners, he'll be a dishwasher forever," Robin says grandly, rounding the table to stand on your other side.

"Says you, lady's maid."

Robin was supposed to be a lady's maid. Sick gig, good pay, she had all the grades and none of the decorum, but Steve wouldn't let them get rid of her, and after an intense training program that taught her to wield a titanium blade longer than her arm as an extension of it, she was instated as his personal guard instead. They're all job hoppers —Nancy started as a lady's maid but now apprentices as a royal tutor, and her boyfriend worked for the palace's news room but now works under the sous chef.

You did anything you could to stay alive, and now your full time job is princess, so. You're not judging.

"What's Nancy's boyfriends name?" you whisper. "Jon?"

"Jonathan. I don't think anybody calls him Jon," Robin whispers back.

"She's lying. His name is Gordon." Eddie glares at Robin. "She's trying to trip you up."

A smack erupts through the air, chased by Steve's pleased whoop. "Yes! Baby, did you see that?"

"I'm not trying to trip you up," Robin says, "don't listen."

"She totally is."

"Baby?" Steve calls, yards away in the bluegrass, a bat held at his side. "Guys, stop harassing her. Jesus."

"We're not harassing her, Stevie, slow your roll. This is a common social phenomenon called teasing, maybe you've heard of it? You do it with friends," Eddie says, nudging your arm.

Friends, you think. Steve's looking at you, waiting for confirmation that you're alright. "I didn't see it, Steve. Do it again!"

Steve immediately jogs backwards, goading Jonathan into pitching another ball. He has a good arm, the ball soaring just right for Steve to curl back and send it wide across the green grass of the garden. It hits a long banner across the way, smack dab on its painted target as he'd aimed for, falling practically on top of the first.

It's an impressive arc. You clap your hands together and cheer, though the rules of this game escape you. You think it's supposed to be darts without sharp points, but you're more concerned with the lines of Steve's bicep as he rests the bat on his shoulder, his triumphant sun-kissed smile.

"Did you see that one, baby?" Robin asks.

"He's so impressive, isn't he?" Eddie adds, grinning.

Steve throws them the bird, his cheeks pink.

"That's an example of what not to do in a formal setting," Nancy says, her skirt moving like water as she puts her face in her hand, her elbow on her knee.

"You're getting good at this tutoring stuff," Jonathan says.

Steve meanders your way to beg a consolation hug (he puts his arm across your shoulder, muttering about mean friends and their unjust jokes). "They're the worst," he mutters, his hair brushing your ear, goosebumps erupting down your arms.

"I think they're nice," you say.

He hums in your ear. "You would. Wretched wife."

#prince!steve au #steve harrington x reader #steve harrington x you #steve harrington x y/n #steve harrington #steve harrington fic #steve harrington blurb #steve harrington drabble #stranger things x reader #stranger things fic #steve harrington imagine #steve harrington fanfic #steve harrington fanfiction #stranger things #stranger things 4

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patrophthia · 1 year

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red ears, and redder strings | theodore n.

pairing: theodore nott x hufflepuff!reader

genre: red string soulmate!au, fluff, slight humor, slight very slight angst, confused feelings, unrequited love but also not really?, not beta read

wc: 7.2k

this is a request ! thank you anon!! it’s so cute i loved writing this :>

there’s two OC, one of them is named mark, hufflepuff (based off of nct mark, i love that lil canadian guy) and elio. i also wrote theodore based off of nct’s jaehyun and sungchan hehe.

taglist: @mersmoon @pleasingregulus @l--absinthe

"I'm going to need a favour from you," I say first, his eye brows rising slightly at my words. "I need you to keep us being soulmates a secret."

"It's not you, I promise," I added quickly. "I'm sure you're a great guy, you're very handsome too but I'm just— I can't just let faith decide on who I'm going to spend the rest of my life with. It's like I don't have a choice with what goes on in my life; and I can't ... have that."

"So I'm begging you, please," I plead. "Please, don't tell anyone about what we are."

"I can pay you." I offered. And If Nott wasn't so caught off guards by how I was able to say the exact things he had planned to say 30 minutes before, he would've laugh at the prospect of being paid when he already had a fortune in his hands. "I don't have much but I could also do your work for the year, just don't," I pause, "tell anyone until I'm ready, please."

Theodore won't admit it but he feels impress. Because deep down, the Slytherin in him would've never been able to beg for something the way I'd just beg of him. And if he wasn't so taken aback by how I basically read his mind, he would've said something more coherent than: "Okay."

"Okay." I repeated his words, nodding. And even though he didn't audibly give me a reason to trust him on it, I knew that he meant it.

A part of me thinks that that must've been why we were soulmates because why else would I so blindly trust him on this secret of ours.

Tug. Tug. Tug. Blaise has been tugging at Theodore's pinky for the last five minutes now. Doing it over and over just to get a rise out of the brunet. But Theodore, quite honestly, couldn't care less as he watched the string tied around his pinky finger bounce with each pull of Zabini's hand.

Blaise, like the menace he is, enjoys bothering his best friend by pulling at the red string of his, but seeing as he couldn't actually see the string, the Slytherin has settled with just laying on Theodore's bed and repeatedly pulling at his pinky which sported the string instead.

"Honestly Nott, why are you so against finding your soulmate? We both know they're in this school so why won't you just make the effort to find them?" Blaise asks, pulling at his pale pinky once more. "Here I am, balls deep into finding mine and I find out that they're all the way in Durmstrang. Do you realise just how lucky you are?"

"Zabini stop," their other dorm mate, Elio, tsked. "Maybe he's just not ready to find them yet."

Blaise turns from his position on Theodore's bed to look at Elio. Retorting, "or maybe he just doesn't want to find them?"

"And that's okay," Elio replied with a roll of his eyes. "I'm sure he has a reason."

Blaise's attention shifts back to Theodore. "And that is?"

Theodore clears his throat, "I just don't want one."

Blaise squints his eyes, "uh huh," he lets out in disbelief. "Somehow I don't believe that."

"Okay," he murmurs, "I just don't like the concept of soulmates."

"And that's all to it?" Elio asks, fixing his tie as he listens into Theodore and Blaise's conversation.

"Yes." And when neither Blaise nor Elio seemed to believe him, he added. "And I'm tired of people pretending to be my soulmate despite the fact that I could clearly see they aren't."

"People have done that?" Elio asked, perplexed at the complex.

"For the right price people would do anything." Theodore mumbled, and when he noticed that Elio was heading out the door, he asked. "Where are you going?"

"I'm meeting Mark at the library," Elio says with a blissful smile. "I'll see you at dinner."

When Elio finally leaves, Blaise turns to Theodore with a dumbfounded look. "Mark?"

Theodore feels his pinky being pulled once more. "His soulmate."

On the other side of the castle, Mark watches as I throw my head on the table —albeit, dramatically, a groan slipping from my lips. Mark giggles, his nose scrunching along with it as he asks me what was wrong.

I lift my left hand up and into his line of sight, his giggles turning into a full blown laugh as my pinky pulls itself over and over in the same direction. "They're doing it again?"

"They're doing it again," I mumbled, lifting my head back up to look at my finger. "It's so annoying. I'm going to punch their face in the second I see them."

"That's a bit extreme," Mark says lightly. "Just tell them to stop doing it or something."

"Why do that when I can result to violence." I replied, tugging at the string as a sign for them to stop. "They do it all the time, it's so irritating."

"Well at least you know they're close by," Mark states, going back to his book. "Or else you wouldn't be able to even feel their pulls."

"Yeah." I nodded. "I guess that's something."

"What?" Mark asks, sensing a slight shift in the atmosphere. "Do you not want to find them?"

I shrug, "not really."

"Why not?" Mark follows up, abandoning his work completely.

"I just think that I shouldn't let the universe decide on who I spend the rest of my life with, is all," I say. "I want to make that decision myself."

Mark nods, humming, "I see where you're coming from." Understanding as ever. "But I also think it's nice that there's someone out there who will always be by your side no matter what, whether it be platonic or romantic, you know?"

"But that's not guaranteed, is it?" I counter. "I've heard stories where people found their soulmates but they didn't care for one another at all. I mean, at the end of the day, soulmates can't actually be soulmates if one doesn't reciprocate the other's feelings. So why try finding them at all if you're going to find out that they want nothing to do with you?"

"But what if they do," Mark argued.

"But what if they don't."

Mark sighs, "and if they do?"

"And if they don't—"

"Hi." I was cut off. "Shit! I'm sorry, I didn't mean to interrupt you," says Elio, eyes wide and apologetic. "What were you guys talking about?"

"Soulmates actually," Mark says with a smile, his pupils dilating at the sight of Elio. "Why are you here?"

Mark and Elio found out that they were each other's soulmate on the train ride over. Elio couldn't find his friend's carriage on the Hogswart Express and we were lucky enough to have empty space for the Slytherin.

"I wanted to see if you wanted to have dinner with me," Elio says. "And I also wanted you to meet my friends."

Who were, if I remembered correctly, Draco Malfoy, Blaise Zabini, and Theodore Nott.

"Oh," Mark glances at me, then back at Elio. "This afternoon?"

"Yeah," Elio nodded. And I sense that he wanted to add 'when else' but held back against it. "At the Slytherin table, Is that okay?"

"Sure," Mark says, nodding quickly. "I'll see you."

Elio breaks into a smile, bidding a goodbye as he turns on his heels. "You're coming with me," Mark says the second Elio was far enough to not overhear us. "No arguments."

Two Hufflepuffs sitting idly chatting with four well known Slytherins must've been a weird sight for anyone that passes by. But Mark was having a fun time and that's all that matters.

Or to me at least. Mark sat to my left, with Elio sitting opposite him. Zabini was on my right, with Malfoy in front of him; leaving Nott right in front of me.

"Are you taking potions?" Zabini asks, trying to make conversation, seeing as Mark and Elio were the only people in this table who actually knew one another.

"Yep," I replied, placing my utensils down. "Are you?"

"The four of us are," Malfoy snickered. "At least there's two more tolerable people in that class with us."

Glad to know Malfoy found Mark and I tolerable. "So . . ." I drew out, thinking of anything we could chat about. "What did you guys do this summer?"

"Blaise dragged us to Europe to find his soulmate," Malfoy answered bitterly.

"Oh." The better part of me was intrigued, wanting to know if he did find them. I turned to Zabini beside me. "Did you find them?"

"No," he says, a slightly disappointed look on his face. "Too many students at Durmstrang and too little time."

"Well there's always next year," I say, trying to encourage him.

Zabini hums in agreement. "What about you? Have you found yours yet?"

Elio called out my name before I could answer his friend, and when I turned to him, he held out a goblet filled with pumpkin juice for me to take. Reaching for the glass, I felt a tug at my pinkie but paid no heed to it as I took the goblet from Elio's hand. Resting it on the table, my eyes caught onto a twinkle of red glowing right in front of me.

With furrowed brows, my line of sight found its way to the seat opposing mine, and along with it, the person who took the spot. Red string wrapped around his left pinkie, just like mine. Glowing slightly under the candle light.

Realisation settles in as I slowly look up at Nott, taking in his blank wide eyed expression that seemed to be processing the same information as I was.

Just to be sure, my hand reaches upwards to rub at my eyes before my vision falls back once more to my left pinkie, then the red string that connects me to the boy right in front of me.

Theodore Nott was my soulmate.

"Can you pass me the salt?" Malfoy asks Nott from his side, causing the brunet to break out of his trance.

Our eyes met for the briefest second, unspoken understanding warming up within me. And when Nott shifts his attention to where the salt currently resides, the tip of his ears shined as red as the string tethering us to one another.

The Marauders map is a great stalker tool to have. I didn't have it per se, but I knew people who did and they were kind enough to lend it to me when I needed it. I owe Harry a favour for this.

My eyes glance between the footsteps on the map tagged: Theodore Nott, and the corridor in front of me. Trying to be as quiet as I could with each corner I turn, if I were to get caught chasing some guy who seemed to be coming my direction at eleven P.M at night then who knows the kind of punishment I would get.

Theodore was walking with purpose when I found him. He walked with enough purpose for me to need to jog after him just to catch up. A hand latches onto his wrist, pulling him into one of the many secret corridors Hogswart held.

"Hi," I said breathlessly, panting as I watched him decide between fighting or flighting. He seemed to have found me harmless, settling on just gazing down at me instead. "Just give me a second to catch my breath."

There were many things he didn't say, just observing as I tried to calm myself down. I noticed a few things then about him, he was tall, lanky even, his doe eyes and hair the direct contrast of his pale skin, and his jawline was sharp enough to cut through wood.

"Uhm—" I stood up to my full height and found that I had to peer up at him. Freakishly tall motherfucker. "—I'm not going to waste your time by beating around the bush, so I'm just going to spill it."

"Actually I needed to have a word with you," he murmurs. And I have to reel myself over because that must've been the first time I heard him speak.

"Well, I found you first so I speak first," I tell him with a tight lip smile. "You can speak after okay? Okay."

His eyes squinted and I could tell that he was frustrated with not being able to get his words in.

"I'm going to need a favour from you," I say first, his eye brows rising slightly at my words. "I need you to keep us being soulmates a secret."

"It's not you, I promise," I added quickly. "I'm sure you're a great guy, you're very handsome too but I'm just— I can't just let fate decide on who I'm going to spend the rest of my life with. It's like I don't have a choice with what goes on in my life; and I can't ... have that."

"So I'm begging you, please," I plead. "Please, don't tell anyone about what we are."

"I can pay you." I offered. And If Nott wasn't so caught off guard by how I was able to say the exact things he had planned to say 30 minutes before, he would've laughed at the prospect of being paid when he already had a fortune in his hands. "I don't have much but I could also do your work for the year, just don't," I pause, "tell anyone until I'm ready, please."

Theodore won't admit it but he feels impressed. Because deep down, the Slytherin in him would've never been able to beg for something the way I'd just beg of him. And if he wasn't so taken aback by how I basically read his mind, he would've said something more coherent than: "Okay."

"Okay." I repeated his words, nodding. And even though he didn't audibly give me a reason to trust him on it, I knew that he meant it.

A part of me thinks that that must've been why we were soulmates because why else would I so blindly trust him on this secret of ours.

Platonic soulmates. That's what Theodore and I decided on. Well not really, Theodore had brought up the idea of cutting our soulmate ties completely with a spell he'd found but the Hufflepuff in me couldn't actually go through with the idea so we decided on platonic soulmates. Or just classmates who are hiding a secret that would blow up in their faces if anyone found out.

Hogsmeade weekend came faster this year; Mark and I (along with four other Slytherins who'd found their way into our friend group) were lucky enough to make the trip.

It hasn't begun snowing yet, although the weather sure felt like it. The temperature was warmer this morning, which was why I found it unnecessary to bring my jacket, and now, in hindsight, I see that that was a terrible idea.

It was getting late, and the weather was not getting warmer at all. "Dude, are you okay?" Mark asks. Dude must sound weird to the other four pure bloods. But dude, to me, was Mark showing that he cared for me. "You've been shivering for the past five minutes."

"I'm fine," I say, a clear lie and we all know it. "I'll just cast a warming spell, don't worry."

Mark's brow furrowed, "are you sure? Here—" he shrugs off his coat, "—just wear mine."

I didn't have to look around to know that the four Slytherin were watching us. And under any other circumstances I would gladly take Mark's jacket, but that was a somewhat intimate thing to do. Especially in front of his soulmate, so, like the civilised person I am, I shook my head and cast a warming spell on myself.

"Dude stop being stubborn, you're literally freezing."

"And I look good doing it so just take your coat, Mark." I argued.

"Okay then." He sighs. "If that's what you want."It's not. Mark pulls his coat back on as he continues walking down the Hogsmeade streets with the rest of us behind him and Elio. "So where should we go next?"

A grasp on my elbow, takes my attention away from Malfoy's answer to Mark's question. I look down, finding slim hands holding onto me. My gaze trails upward to find Theodore who had halted both our steps as he shrugs off his coat.

The brunet nudges it forward, wordlessly offering it for me to take. And when I shook my head, feeling uneasy at the prospect of making him suffer the harsh weather if I did take his jacket. He insists: "It's fine," he says, nudging it forward once more, the red string on his pinkie clear as ever. "I run hot."

"And is cold blooded," Zabini snickered to receive a glare from Nott. I stifled a giggle, finally feeling at ease with the two of them. Zabini's demeanour seems to soften at my half assed attempt to hide a laugh, and tells me to: "Just take it."

Okay. Fine. I will take it. The cold was biting my ass anyways. I reached out for the jacket but was pleasantly surprised when Nott helped me into it instead. "Thank you," I murmured.

Theodore, or at least his coat, smells like a combination of things that I could only assume he likes; things like: the sea, books whether it be old or new, earl grey tea, bearded irises, and vanilla.

Nott only hums at my gratitude, listening back into Mark's conversation with Malfoy.

"You never did tell me whether you found your soulmate yet," Zabini says suddenly. "Have you?"

"No," I answered, and unlike earlier, he actually believes in this lie of mine. "And I'm not really looking for one either."

"Funny," Blaise says with a mischievous smile. "That's what Nott also said." Not exactly, but it was something along that line. "Are you sure you're not each other's soulmate?"

From the corner of my eyes, I spy the tip of Theodore's ears flushing. The pink contrasting his dark features adorably. His face showed no emotion, his brown doe eyes rolling with feign annoyance. "I'm pretty sure I'd know my soulmate if I saw them as often as I see her, Zabini."

"Wish it were that easy," I mumbled, adding onto the illusion of us not being tied to each other. "I'll let you know when I find out who they are though."

"Really?" He says testingly.

"If you're so invested in it then yes."

He smirks, "let's hope you keep your promise then, princess."

Little did Zabini know, his promise had already been broken.

Faith must've been playing some kind of sick joke. I knew that I'd be taking potions with the four Slytherin, but for me to be studying a love potion on the first day I had class with my 'soulmate' was just plain evil.

And I think, something along the lines of Professor Slughorn making Nott and I be the first to take a gander at the potion, to smell it and to describe what it smelled like to us, was even more cruel.

A glance at Nott, and another at the brewing pot in front of us, had me taking in a deep breath as I prepared myself for what's to come. I took a step forward, Nott to my side, and leaned forward to take a sniff at the potion.

The first round of scents were pleasant, home cooked meals, the smell of my clean room after a tiring day, my favourite snack and the likes of it. Then the second waft of the potion hits and I wondered whether it was what I was actually attracted to or what I was supposed to be attracted to since all I could smell was nothing but Nott.

Or at least the scent of his coat; sea salt, books, vanilla and a hint of his (what I think is) argan oil shampoo, which I assumed I could only smell because he was so close by.

"So?" Professor Slughorn egged us on with a smile. "Tell us what you smell."

Nott and I shared a look and I knew then that we could only smell one another. "The sea," I took the initiative to speak first. "Vanilla."

"Is that all?" Asks the Professor. "Is there a special someone you smell?"

Yes. Is what I didn't say, only shaking my head as I nudged at Nott's side for him to speak next.

"I'm sorry Professor but I couldn't really smell anything." Nott says barely above a whisper.

Professor Slughorn's furrowed his brows in concern. Did Nott not have something he loved? "Nothing at all?"

"Not really," the Slytherin murmurs. "I could only smell her."

Her?

Oh.

Me. I'm her.

Okay.

"Really?" Slughorn murmurs, clearly fascinated. "Well isn't that interesting?"

Nott only hums, moving away from the pot and as I turned with him, my eyes caught onto the pink tinged on his ears. Cute.

I couldn't even take a step towards my desk when Zabini swept me away, Malfoy by his side. Zabini smiles widely at my curious expression, and I wonder for a second if Nott has broken his promise and told them about our secret. Cautiously, I asked him. "What?"

"We need a favour."

"No." Was my first and final answer. Zabini only frowns, not the slightest bit faltering his quest. "I need you to steal Theodore away for a day." He says, instead. I shook my head, repeating myself, "No."

"Oh come on," Blaise pouts, "his birthday's this Sunday and we want to throw him a small surprise party."

"Which won't be a surprise if he was there," Malfoy adds unnecessarily.

"Why can't you be the one to distract him or whatever you're planning on making me do?"

"Because he'll suspect it," Malfoy answers with a roll of his eyes. "Nott's smart, he'll get suspicious of us."

"And he won't get suspicious of me?" I retorted.

"I haven't thought that through actually," Blaise murmurs. "But! We need all hands on deck to plan the party and fill it up with things he likes."

"And I can't help with that?" I ask.

Malfoy rolls his eyes. "What do you know about Nott?"

That he is my soulmate. But besides that, quite literally nothing. Okay. One point to Malfoy and Zabini, I guess. I sigh, slowly accepting my defeat. "What about Mark?"

"Mark's going to help us set up with Elio."

"Why can't you ask for the house elves to set it up for you?"

"Why can't you stop asking us questions?" Malfoy snaps.

I turn to the blond, my expression sour. "Hey you're the one asking me for a favour here, I don't think you can afford to be a bitch to me right now."

Malfoy rolls his eyes again, more attitude than ever. "So you're going to do it?"

"I never said—"

"Great!" Blaise cuts me off. "Have Theo out by ten A.M and have him back by six P.M, okay?" He says excited, and yet not loud enough for Nott, who had been sitting three desks away from our conversation to hear. "Okay! And if you guys do anything, please use protection we're way to young to have kids—"

"Oh fuck off." With a chuckle, Zabini finally leaves me alone, dragging Malfoy with him. With the two Slytherins no longer in sight, my eyes drift towards the only empty desk left and make my way towards it.

One, two, table passes, until I finally reach an empty seat and I find myself meeting eyes with Theodore. His face remains stone cold as ever, only looking at me blankly. He didn't have to say it for me to know that was curious about what his friends had said to me.

Setting my stuff down, I sat beside him and I found myself mustering up the courage to go through with Zabini and Malfoy's favour. "Hey," I start, Nott now giving me his undivided attention. "Do you want to go out this weekend?"

His expression changes for the slightest second that if I hadn't been watching him, I'd have missed it. "I thought we agreed on keeping it platonic."

"Yeah," I agreed quickly. "And that's not going to change anytime soon. Think of this as us bonding as platonic soulmates."

He guessed he owed me that, which was why he stood outside of the Hufflepuff's Common Room idly, waiting for me to come out and get on with our soulmates bonding day.

A smile came across my lips when I spotted him, looking as out of place as possible. "Hi," I said, going up to him. Theodore didn't bother replying, only standing tall as he waited for me to lead the way.

The ride to Hogsmeade was awkward —as to be expected from two people who knew little to nothing about one another. Theodore climbed out of the carriage first, offering a hand to help me off of the ride.

Before we began our journey, Theodore caught onto my wrist with his right hand, his left reaching for his wand and wordlessly, he casted a warming up spell on me.

"Thank you." I'd be lying if I said that it didn't have an effect on me. "So where should we go?"

His lips pursed, thinking. "You didn't plan anything?"

"Not really." This favour was a last minute thing, I didn't have time to actually plan things out. "I thought we could just walk around and look at things."

Theodore wasn't the easiest to read, but I knew from the shift in his features that he was judging me. He then nudges his head to the side. "Let's get you something to eat."

Theodore took me to a bakery by the end of Hogsmeade, the shop was heavily vanilla scented, people coming in and out every second. Nott ordered a vanilla danish, then another when he looked at my face.

I ordered my pastries, and reached into my bag for the sickles I needed. Before I could actually get it out though, Theodore was already pulling me to the side, mumbling a "don't bother" as the next customer made their order.

I frown, handing out the few sickles I owed towards him, he took a glance at my hand, then back to my face. "What did I just say?"

"I can't just let you pay for me."

He didn't say anything, but his expression alone suggests that he won't be taking my money anytime soon.

"Seriously, dude, I can't just let you pay for me."

"Let's go," Theodore deflects, taking a parcel filled with our purchases when the shop's clerk handed it out to us.

I followed after him, not before attempting to shove my money into his pockets and failing to do so when he shifted away from me. "You're being rude."

"Oh I'm being rude?" Theodore scoffs, and I think that that must've been the first time I hear real emotions in his voice. "For paying for you?"

"Yeah," I replied. "Paying for someone is only nice when they want you to pay for them."

"Well," he murmurs. "What's so wrong with me paying for you when you want me to pay for you."

"Don't gaslight me!"

Theodore smiles at my word, a small laugh bubbling out of him. "I'm doing no such things." And then, he adds in a mocking manner, "dude."

What an ass.

I led Theodore towards The Three Broomsticks, if he wasn't going to take my money then I'll just have to get him something in return. I ordered two butterbeers as he began unwrapping our pastries.

He handed mine to me and dug into his vanilla danish. A minute passes, the two of us eating in silence and I wondered if I should've just taken him to a movie instead, maybe then it'd be less awkward.

The butter beer arrives and I took a sip, wiping my lips with the back of my hand right after. "You have a little something—" my finger points towards my upper lips "—there."

He made quick work in wiping it off, eyes casting down as he turned his head to pick up a tissue paper. His red ears made a reappearance then, embarrassed as ever.

After we finished our meals, Theodore excuses himself as he heads towards the bathroom. I think then that this was the perfect opportunity; I called out to one of the shop's clerks and when they approached, I asked for the check.

The shop clerk, an elderly lady, frowns, "what are you talking about, love? Your boyfriend already covered it."

What? "I'm sorry, you must've gotten me mixed up with another table, I haven't paid yet."

"No?" She frowns. "The brunet, pale, about ye height—" the woman gestures over her head "—isn't with you?"

With me, yes. Boyfriend, no. "Did he pay?"

"Yes," she smiles, "just a second ago really."

If I could scream out of frustration I would. I glared at Theodore when he returned, he seemed to know what had happened as he walked with pride.

"You're not as smart as you think you are," he says, grabbing his things. "I knew what you were thinking."

"Well." I stood up, gathering my things as well. "What am I thinking right now?"

"What an ass I am." Smart ass.

"Lucky guest." I murmur.

"Is it now?" He replied testingly, taking my things from my hands.

I squint my eyes, looking at him threateningly. "I will destroy you, Theodore Nott."

"I'd like to see you try." The amount of stuff in his hands made him look ridiculous, walking out of the inn with little to no expression at all when he adds: "soulmate."

I returned Theodore to his friends by six, having snuck into the ladies room to send a patronus to Mark before doing so. Not a minute goes by when his patronus returns, a cheetah opening up its mouth to cheerfully say: "Okay dude, We're ready for you!"

I did what was asked of me and brought him to the room of requirements, Theodore trailed after me, clearly confused but never uttering a word about it.

Once we arrived in front of the door, I turn to meet his eyes. "Why didn't you tell me today was your birthday?"

He blinks. "It wasn't important."

"Your birthday isn't important to you?"

"No." He murmurs. "Why are we here?"

I push the door open, and it takes him a few seconds to realise what had happened. Elio jumps out, Mark by his side screaming as loudly as they could "happy birthday!"

Theodore stares at them for a bit before turning to me, "is that why you spent the day with me?" He asks first. "They put you up to this?"

If I heard disappointment in his tone, I didn't let it get to me. Mustering up a small smile, I push him towards his friends. "Enjoy your party, Theo."

Elio and Blaise swept him away, pulling him towards one of the corners where the snacks were placed. My expression must've been telling, of what exactly, I didn't know. But Mark seems to notice it, asking me in a quiet hush. "Are you okay?"

I nod distractedly. "Yup, why wouldn't I be?"

"I don't know," Mark frowns, "you look a little off."

I smile at him. Mark knows me better than I knew myself. "I'm fine," I reassured him, "just a little tired."

"Okay," Mark says, leaving it at that with a sceptical look. "Let's get you something to drink."

"Was today just a ruse to get me away from the castle?"

Theodore had found me an hour after we arrived, looking distracted as ever when he handed over a slice of cake he'd saved for me.

"What?"

"You didn't actually want to bond with me, did you?"

I thought over my options, should I lie to him or just let him know the truth. Deciding on the latter, I tell him: "yeah, Zabini and Malfoy asked me to—" the clench in his jaw caught my attention "—wait, are you upset?"

Truthfully, Theodore says, "yes."

To say I was baffled was an understatement. "Why? What's wrong? Do you not like the party?"

"No," he counters. "It's not the party, the party's fine."

A beat passes by, Theodore hesitating. And then, finally, he says. "It's you."

"Me?" Have I done something to upset him? "Did I say something—"

"I thought you wanted to spend the day with me."

"I'm sorry." I'm not sure why exactly I was apologising but it felt like the right thing to do. "But to be fair, you didn't actually want to spend the day with me, did you?"

He avoids my eyes and I knew then that things can no longer be platonic. "I think you should leave before I do something idiotic."

"Like?"

"Kiss you."

How does one respond to that? His ears aren't red this time round. The look on his face is torn between hesitancy and distress. And I was stupid enough to reach up to him, a palm cradling his face, meeting his dark eyes.

A second passes and when he doesn't make to move away, I stand up to the tip of my toes and press my lips onto his. Theodore leans down, easing the strain of my neck as he kisses back without missing a beat.

A bump of the nose causes us to pull back, looking at one another with wide blown eyes before a subtle glow catches our attention. Tied to our pinkies, the string glows red, a shot of spark passing from his end towards mine only for it to lose its light when none comes from my side to ignite it.

What the spark means exactly, I didn't know. But I will not spend another second waiting around to see what it might meant. "That was a mistake," I say quickly, gathering my things. "Goodnight, Theodore."

I didn't know why I didn't notice it at first, but as I walked away, slice of cake in hand; the feel of plastic beneath the cake caught me off guard. I bring it into my eyesight, a vanilla danish neatly wrapped with a note attached to its side.

It seems like you've got me wrapped around your finger. Do me a favour and don't let it linger.

Blaise had a theory. And that theory consists of his two friends who had yet to find their soulmates. Or so they say.

Gathered around the room of requirement were the same people who attended Theodore's birthday party, give or take five people less.

Blaise stands in the middle of the room, the rest of us lounging on the sofa as we watch him speak. "Come here you," he points at Theodore, then he turns to me, "you as well."

My nerves gets the better part of me, causing me to glance at Theodore for help despite knowing that we were both drowning in the same boat. Did Blaise know about us being soulmates? Did Theodore tell him about it? Maybe I shouldn't have trusted him so blindly.

"You two," he says loudly. "Have been lying to us!" And then, a few notches down, he adds, "I think."

My brows furrowed, feigning innocence. "How so?"

Like a magician, he lifts up his hand dramatically, then grabs Theodore's pale hand in it. And in my eyes, the string was as visible as ever. I think I know where he was going with this and there's nothing to prepare me for what's to come next.

"Pay attention to her fingers okay?" Blaise instructs. I feel faint, dizzy, all the adjectives for nauseousness as each second passes by. "Her soulmate pinkie to be exact."

This is it. This is when they find out and Mark hates me for the rest of his life because I didn't tell him I'd found my soulmate.

Mark frowns, his bottom lips caught in his teeth as he watches on sceptically.

Blaise pulls at Theodore's pinkie, the same exact motion he'd done on end for the last couple of months. And, just like it had before, my finger pulls to Theodore's direction. Blaise pulls at it again and the same set of motions repeats itself.

"Why didn't you tell us?" Elio spoke first.

"Well," I began, everyone's attention turning to me. "Because, it's not your fucking business." Mark stifles a laugh at my words. "Theodore and I chose to keep it a secret for a reason."

"And that reason is?" Malfoy chimes in.

I didn't have to say anything for Theodore to know what I wanted them to know. "We didn't want soulmates."

"And now?" Blaise follows up. "Do you still not want soulmates?"

"Honestly?" I say. "I don't know."

It takes Theodore five seconds to note Mark's arrival at the Slytherin table. And it takes him another three seconds to notice that I wasn't there with them.

Mark chats animatedly with Elio, not once pausing to explain my lack of appearance at tonight's dinner.

Maybe they've grown too fond of me, or maybe Blaise likes me more than Theo thought he did, because he was quick to ask Mark where I was. "Doll's, not having dinner with us tonight?"

"No." Mark didn't even bat an eyelash at the pet name Blaise used. "She caught a cold and asked me to bring her something when I get back."

Theodore eyebrow's knit together curiously. "She's not in the infirmary?"

If the people at the table noticed the hint of concern in his voice, they didn't show it. Well —everyone except Mark that is. A gasp falls from his lips, staring at Theodore with wide eyes. Did he fancy his best friend?

Mark catches himself, shaking his head as he explained. "She said that it was just a common cold and that it'll go away soon. She didn't want to waste Madam Pomfrey's time when she could be focusing on something more pressing."

And when Theodore's eyes narrows. Mark feels the need to clarify himself. "Her words, not mine."

Theodore stands up then, excusing himself as he tells Mark not to worry about me and that he'll get something for me to eat. Mark didn't even get a chance to remind him about my meds before he slipped away and into the kitchens.

Mark didn't stress over it though, something in him knew that Theodore would not forget my medications.

A set of knocks lands on my door, approximately fifteen minutes later. And with a groggy "come in" from my bed; the door clicks open, Theodore standing behind it with a tray of food floating behind him.

"Theo?" I rub my eyes, unsure of what I was seeing. "What are you doing here?"

"Mark tells me you're sick." Did he? "So I brought you dinner." That's ... nice of him to do.

Theodore stands awkwardly by the door, not stepping an inch into a room. A part of me wonders if he was a vampire, waiting to be formally invited in before he could actually do anything. "You can come in."

The tray of food floats over first, resting just on top of my bedside table. Theodore follows in after it, staying a few feet away from my bed. "Wait, who let you in? Through the barrels and stuff?"

"No one in particular." He says. "They left the entrance open."

That was the hufflepuff way of doing things.

"Well thank you." My palm lays flat on my bed, pushing all of my body weight to a seating position. "For this. I know you'd rather spend the night doing something more fun than doing Mark a favour."

Theodore frowns, coming over to my side. "Mark didn't ask me to do this," he tells me; his hand carefully reaching for my arm, the other pressing against the small of my back to help me sit up properly. "I just wanted to make sure you were okay."

My attempt to resist teasing him was futile, even sick and on the verge of dying, I still think that Theodore's reaction to things —if there was one that is— was adorable. "Awh, did you miss me?"

Theodore didn't bother to say no. He didn't have to, it was clear by the hesitant look on his face that he did miss me. Even if I'd only just seen him yesterday.

"You should eat," he says instead, the glimpse of his tinging red ears not missed by me when he handed me a glass of water. "Drink this, eat, then take your medications."

A roll of my eyes paired with an 'I know' has him standing straight. And somehow, I get the feeling that he thinks he might've overstepped my boundaries. Not knowing what to say —or do for that matter, I settled on telling him: "thank you, again. I really appreciate it, Theo."

Theodore hums and we could both sense that our conversation was ending, but, strangely enough, despite never knowing what to say in front of him, I can't seem to just let him slip away tonight.

A glance at the tray Theo brought, then another back at him, had me asking a question I might be regretting minutes later. "Have you eaten, Theo?"

His eyes fell down onto my hand, the floor, anything but my face. The corner of his lips twists, a small dent in his cheek barely hiding his attempt to bite back a smile. He knew where I was going with this. "No."

A shift to the side, a pat on the empty seat besides me. "Good." I say first. "We can share."

The string tied to our pinkie glows, and this time, unlike the first, the sparks meets in the middle, igniting brighter than it has ever done before.

Being sick gave me a lot of time to reflect. And even more time for me to realise that me saying 'I don't know' complicates things. Everyone seems to be walking around eggshells when the topic of Theodore and I came up and quite frankly I'm fucking tired of it.

Theodore likes me. We're soulmates. This should be easy. I know how I feel, I can make things work.

Like feels childish. Love feels too strong. Infatuated is what I'm not when it comes to Theodore. I care for him the same way he cares for me. That should say something shouldn't it?

What I recently learned about Theodore is that he takes up an entire table at the library. Just him alone, and the whole table that would usually host four students all because he works in a mess.

"Uhm—" he looks up at me. "—can I sit here?"

He nods and turns back to his book. Not moving a single thing to the side. I sigh, organising his mess to one side and making a mental note to tell him off about it later. But for now, I ought to get my feelings sorted out.

"I wanted to talk to you," I say first. Theo hums, signalling that he was listening to me. "Can you look at me, please?"

He looks up from his page and shoved his book to the side, giving me his full undivided attention.

"I thought about it and I don't want to be platonic soulmates anymore," I tell him.

He looks in thought. "So you came here to say that you want to sever the soulmates connection?"

"No!" I say quickly, eyes wide. "No, not that. At all."

He seems to know what was going to come next, the corner of his lips turning upwards but he stops himself, not wanting to get too excited. "What is it then?"

"I care for you," I tell him. "And if you still care for me, I want to give this soulmate thing a shot."

His eyes soften. "Of course, I still care for you." He replies. "And I'm assuming by care you mean love?"

I pursed my lips, going over what I wanted to say and being careful with how I choose to phrase it. Finally, I decided on: "Not love per se," I say first. "Just us taking a step towards it."

" 'course not," he replies. "Baby steps, right?"

"Right," I say, feeling awkward under his gaze. "Baby steps." And then, I added. "Now if we're going to make this soulmate thing work out we need to actually go out."

He nods. "I'll take you to dinner on Friday then."

"Sure." A smile creeps onto my face. "It's a date." The tip of his ears reddens at my words, cute as ever. "I can't wait to see your cute little butt then."

Theodore fixes me a look between amused and judging, he breaks after a bit, shaking his head with a small chuckle. Incredulously he says, "I can't believe I'm in love with you."

"Woah there dude, you're moving a little fast," I said with a small smile. "Slow it down a bit, will you?"

"Too late, my love." And if I had a small liking towards the guy, my feelings were definitely amplified by his stupidly dumb sense of humour. "I've already gotten your name tattooed on my buttocks."

— from bee: i havent wrote in so long, this was so fun!! i always love writing theo so this was just a blast hehe

notes/reblog/feedbacks are greatly appreciated!!

#theodore nott humor #theodore nott x you #theodore nott x reader #theodore nott x y/n #theodore nott x hufflepuff!reader #theodore nott fanfiction #theodore nott fanfic #theodore nott #theodore nott imagines #theodore nott fluff #theodore nott scenarios #Spotify #theo nott x reader #theo nott x you #🧳: my writing

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kurvinitty · 7 months

Note

wriothesley 👁️ 👁️ as your soulmate

( * ₊ 🦋◞ ˚ ) ⠀ ⪼ ⠀soulmate au drabbles. ( open )

tags. ⠀ ⪼ ⠀ 1.5k wc, reader works as an engineer, swearing lol, not proofread bc i'm eepy and going to bed now

notes. ⠀ ⪼ ⠀ listen to colors by halsey while reading this bc i think it fits rlly well !! anyway this may be ooc but do i care? no. i only care about he.

You can only see colour when your soulmate is with you and you’re touching. This gives a whole new meaning to them bringing colour to your world.

Who knew that out of all places, a prison would be where your world of grey would suddenly burst into bouts of colour?

As an engineer, you were stuck fixing & maintaining things more often than actually creating them. Your colleagues sometimes pitied you, as your already monotonous world made your job even harder. Those lucky enough to have found their soulmate are not only favoured by cupid’s bow, but also by whoever delegated your working tasks.

You wouldn’t lie — it pissed you off. Yet at the same time, you were aware that it was much safer dispatching someone who could identify a cable’s colour before installing them. However, that still did little to soothe your frustrations.

It’s also what had lead to you being stuck with more tedious tasks — maintenance and routine inspections. Despite all this, you still loved your job — and you’d be damned if your peers’ mocking pity would bring you down.

Ironically, it was due to them that you’d get what you were looking for all this time.

To beckon the call of help from the Fortress of Meropide was definitely not your field of expertise, yet you were still the one who answered. Due to the aforementioned reasons, it was also your first time setting foot on the premise. The prison’s damp walls added a chill to the already eerie atmosphere, and you now regret not taking your coat with you. The gardes were kind enough to escort you to the administrator’s office, saving you the pain of navigating this labyrinth on your own.

You flinch at the sound as the garde opens the door, holding it open for you to enter. Only now do you realise how tense you’ve been so far — the temperature undoubtedly having played its hand in it. Archons, you couldn’t wait to get out of this place.

With a thankful nod towards your escort, you step inside the room, Wriothesley already expecting you. Before you could fully enter, the man was already on his feet to receive you. Well prepared — as expected of him.

You have heard many things about the Duke, rumours both good & bad — but you’ve never had the chance to confirm them yourself. But now that you stand before him, you think you understand why everyone respected him greatly — no matter their personal opinion of him. At a glance, you could tell that an air of authority accompanied his every step, and you feel yourself subconsciously shrinking before the man.

Should he notice, he doesn’t say a word though. Quite the opposite, in fact, as he seems quite relieved when you finally arrive.

“You’re the engineer we requested, I assume?”

He speaks matter-of-factly, yet he also sounds… quite friendly? You didn’t know what to expect of the man, but you were sure it was closer to ice cold apathy, rather than the soft-spoken silk you experience now.

The first words this man had ever spoken to you, and you were already at a loss for words. Both because you didn’t know how to explain the situation, and also due to Wriothesley himself. While the first impression he made was better than expected, you were sure you’d somehow manage to piss him off in the next second. But then again, was it really your fault?

You clear your throat, fumbling over the words, before you settle on something to say. “Well, uh- yes I am.”

It’s evident how the Duke senses your hesitation and raises and eyebrow in question. Where he once looked at you in relief, his expression now falters and his eyes scrutinize you with suspicion.

Oh, you’re fucked.

Heat floods your body in embarrassment, your mind now drawing an even bigger blank as you desperately try to backtrack. “With that I mean— I am an engineer, but I doubt the work here will be within my expertise,” you sheepishly explain as the words escape your mouth in a single breath. What an absolute wonderful way to start off this interaction. “I am terribly sorry.”

You have half the mind to bow in apology, for an inconvenience that wasn’t even your fault. Doing your colleague’s dirty work was one thing, but your company being under staffed was a whole other issue.

But Wriothesley only shakes his head. Though you could swear you saw his face drop in annoyance for a split second, you felt like there was no need to worry when he next spoke. “It’s alright. I’m just glad there’ll be someone to look at it. This stuff has been giving me trouble all week already.” his hand moves up as he sweeps it over his forehead in exasperation, fingers combing through his thick dark hair. And for the Archon’s sake, you wanted to do nothing more to curse out loud when he did that. Even more so when you catch yourself examining his features more closely now, with your eyes lingering on his for a moment longer than they should. You wonder what colour his hair may be — dark, for sure — but there was only so much you could determine with a world full of grey.

You’re here to work, not to admire pretty men.

Pretty.

It took you more self-restraint than you’d like to admit to not slap yourself.

“Anyway, I don’t think we’ve been properly introduced yet,” the man continues, thus effectively pulling you out of your self-loathing session. His hand reaches out toward you, an invitation for you to reciprocate in kind. “Wriothesley.”

Surely, you wouldn’t be able to mess up a simple handshake, right?

You waste no time to clasp your hand in his & tell him your name, your dainty digits being engulfed by the rough and calloused skin of his own. And in that moment, you felt as if time had completely stopped.

It wasn’t due to the feeling of his skin coming in contact with yours. As much as one could sing songs about how the touch of your soulmate could invigorate & keep you warm for a thousand winters to come — it wasn’t the case for you. The catalyst for sure, but the event that followed was worth your song.

The moment your hand touched Wriothesley’s, you didn’t even feel it. The only thing you felt was the feeling when your world suddenly filled with colour. All it took was the blink of an eye, and you were in a whole different world. You stare at the man before you, your mouth hanging wide open while you were freeze in shock. There was so much new information to process, but your eyes & mind could only focus on him. You can’t exactly pinpoint all the new colours you see, but the first thing you notice is his eyes.

You weren’t the only one at a loss for words, and even if you tried — you could not pry your gaze away from holding his. His eyes don’t look much different than they did before, actually. They’re naturally blessed with a light colour, but now you notice all the different shades and hues within them. Does he know what colour his own eyes are? Do you know yours? For all you know, anyone you asked could have been lying to you so far.

You also notice how his pale face now gains the slightest bit of colour, and you wonder if he sees the same with you.

Honestly? If time would allow it, you’d stay like this forever. But of course, it’s the man you’re supposed to spend eternity with that would deny your wish.

“Let’s get started then, shall we?”

And he acts as if nothing happened.

You, on the other hand, are still in the process of digesting this experience. Before you knew it, his grip on your hand loosened, until it completely fades away and your vision is plunged back into an array of black & white.

“Wait, I—” The words slip out of your mouth before you could stop yourself, your body almost acting on it’s own accord to wrap your hand around his wrist again. Now that you’ve gotten a taste of this — of him — you desperately want your world to burn up once again, like a new hunger that begs to be satiated. Did he not feel the same? Did you just imagine it?

It seems like Wriothesley took notice of your crestfallen expression. He doesn’t back away, yet he doesn’t come closer either. Instead, he speaks — in a tone so beautiful & soft, you can scarcely believe it’s real.

“I think we’ve got more than enough time to talk later.”

#wriothesley x reader #wriothesley headcanons #wriothesley drabbles #wriothesley imagines #wriothesley fluff #genshin impact x reader #genshin x reader #genshin impact headcanons #genshin impact drabble #genshin drabbles #genshin headcanons #( * ₊ 🦋◞ ˚ ) ⠀ ⪼ ⠀ esther's works.

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krahk · 28 days

Text

Blood for Ruin

(Or, Alastor and That One Time He Got Drunk and Forgot He Tried To Make a Black Magic Agreement With a Radio Only For It to Come Back to Him in the Worst Way)

Pairings: Alastor x Reader (She/Her/OFC) as reluctant semi-soulmates via non-consensual deal (on both ends). No use of Y/N.

I understand he is aroace, but I couldn’t stop thinking about this idea so here it is.

Eventual smutty smut happening, but be kind dear god am I rusty.

_________________________________________

Exhausted was simply not what you were - you were so past that, your brain so fried out that you didn’t even know what word you were.

Because if you were seeing smiling figure-like shadows on the walls with long dark tendrils wrapping around your surroundings, and radio static from nowhere, then yea. You were fried.

But hey, it had been a crazy long weekend. You’d just spent the last 4 days cleaning up your hoarder of a great aunts shack in the Bon Temps bayou with the other scattered remainder of her family, rooting through about 4 unidentifiable rooms with confirmed animal carcasses and straight up trash-garbage piled to the ceilings. But since your mother died, any family connection at this point was appreciated, right?

‘Couldn’t be more wrong, but it’s too late now’, you think. It was way too late to back out now, you had something to prove. Your Great Aunt’s remaining son had called you ‘slicker’ because you lived in a town with more than one lighted intersection for Christ's sake. And because you used ‘whom’ in a sentence, that opened up an entirely new thrush of nicknames from your distant cousins. You wouldn’t be beaten down, you guys were almost all done with the cleanup anyway, the only remaining items being that of actual use or salvageable material. A couple family members had taken a few items home already, and since you weren’t particularly close with these relatives you weren’t about to ask for anything until-

Well until the little radio was brought out.

For some reason, the craftsmanship of this radio caught your eye. It was a beautiful dark wood, with intricate swirls carved around the speakers - the entire thing was shaped like a miniature church cathedral window. It was clearly vintage, basically a historical piece, you thought - and you did ask quietly if you could keep it. Your uncle fiddled with it to make it work but it needed some attention. It looked virtually untouched otherwise. It was a gorgeous piece, and it looked like it was a new acquisition to the deceased woman’s collection - there wasn’t a spec of dust visible on it. Your uncle figured it wouldn’t be able to pick up football (and also “why would I listen to football when I can WATCH it?”) he let you take it with you.

So you brought it back to your temporary home, the little motel at the outskirts of town (the only motel even close to the town) and set it on the little desk. And there it sat for 2 days before you finally dove in, trying to figure out what was going on with it. You had deduced it was likely the wiring, and after watching 5 or 6 videos on wiring repair on YouTube (good old YouTube) you were fairly confident a simple repair would take no time at all.

But things made in the 20s were a lot sharper, and more metal based, compared to the newer plastic models of recent years. So when you undid the back panel and attempted to unscrew a fastener around the side of the main component, you had successfully sliced your palm open on an errant piece of metal. And holy crow did it hurt AND gush blood immediately. Even though you had whipped your hand close to your chest almost as soon as you realised what had happened it was too late, there was a fair amount of blood that got on the inside of the machine.

Uttering curses, you’d rushed to the bathroom to grab a couple threadbare cloths and sop up some of the larger drops on the desk. Moving around the radio to the light, you had a clearer idea of where your blood landed. Palming one cloth in your wounded hand, your other one attempted to clean up the mess within the radio. Which is where you noticed the funny little symbols written on the inside of the back panel of the radio, which had lain facedown on the desk as soon as you had removed it. These little symbols looked like runes of some sort, unidentifiable to you. They almost looked like they were written out of blood themselves. It was clearly dried now, but the jagged nature of the strokes and brownish un-ink like material that was used to leave the symbols certainly looked like dried blood might look like on old wood.

You wiped your blood off the radio, and ran the cloth right over one of the runes, making it glow briefly with a green light. Maybe.

Well, that was what you thought you saw. But it was so brief you would have missed it with a well timed blink. The sun was setting, light streaming through the window in hazy little streaks, maybe you saw some prismatic effect? Or maybe, maybe you needed a shower and bed. Clearly if you sliced your hand open on a little radio you were tired. Sloppy coordination indeed. You reattached the back panel to the radio and decided to ignore it until you were in a better headspace.

Radio abandoned, you went and started to clean yourself up and get ready for sleep. But when the lights in the bathroom started to flicker, only to stay on slightly duller than before, paired with a strange static that scratched the inside of your eardrums, you decided to end your shower quicker than ever. Exiting the bathroom, you were chilled to realise that the main room had the same ambient experience waiting for you. And if you focused on the moving shadows from what you hoped were passing cars (electric, judging by the lack of engine noise) there was a solid larger mass lingering on the wall with the dresser and broken TV. One that looked like it had a smile, and glowing red eyes (from a car's tail lights, duh!). Yes, yes. Tired. SO tired.

Calling the front did not help, since the static was so loud when you lifted up the receiver you slammed it back down. Your own cell phone was still charging on the side table, flashing the little dead battery symbol to let you know you needed to be more responsible with your charging habits in the future. It could be another 15 minutes before it was ready to turn on.

So, obviously tired, it was time to attempt to sleep. Hopefully. If you were lucky. It wasn’t enough that the bayou was creepy all on its own, the evening took a sharp turn into scary-town after you started messing with the little radio.

Pyjama-clad and ready to sleep you decided that the hallucinations were exactly what you thought they were - hallucinations and nothing more. Nothing spooky, or supernatural, or dangerous.

But you had been wrong before.

It was the initial crashing sound of the motel room door hitting the wall that woke you up first, screaming male voices really kicking your brain into high alert as you scrambled out of bed. Ending up in the corner facing the opposite corner where the door was, you took in what was happening. 2 men, yelling at you for whatever you had - but you were screaming louder than they were, scrambling for anything in your grasp - just that stupid, fucking radio - but judging by the hot impact of a projectile hitting your chest they were not thrilled you weren’t immediately cooperating. Hand clenching around the radio’s cord you hit the corner and slumped down to the floor, lungs burning and immense pain taking over your consciousness. As your mind faded, you could hear the two men bickering, freaking out over the turn their burglary took. Oh, you being shot was an accident? Stellar. Your vision became hazy, it even looked like shadows were overtaking the men as their arguing turned into painful screaming. Whoever came to your aid was simply too late, though you could appreciate the gesture as you died.

You always thought that you would end up looking down at your dying body when the time came, but from the forceful pull downwards your soul felt, it was clear the afterlife had different plans for you.

Now you weren’t really sure what the hell, like actual, literal, hell, was going on. The impact you felt from your sharp tug into the afterlife, landing on a very detailed rug at what looked like the lobby of a hotel was one thing. The tiny radio following your fall shortly after, merely denting a corner of the wood with a loud thunk was another, cord still clenched in your hand. Oh good!

Dazed, you were immediately hoisted up and hugged - yes hugged - by probably the tallest women you had ever met, and the fastest talking one as well. Rambling about “welcome”, “hell rehab”, something or other about redemption - honestly the look of relief you gave the shorter woman who approached and reined in the other made her smirk as she introduced them in a much clearer manner.

Vaggie and Charlie. Vaggie was a resident of the hotel with her girlfriend, the owner and operator of this ‘Hazbin Hotel’, Charlie, both working at redeeming the souls of sinners and getting them into heaven. There were 2 residents, Angel & Sir Pentious, who were not present, a Janitor Nifty (currently wiping your landing spot with a cloth) the bartender, an angry bird-cat man Husk, and the host (also missing) Alastor. Your open mouthed confusion clearly made Charlie snap into attention (finally) because she finally morphed into a being that was capable of conversation.

“So, new to hell?” She inquired.

Well. Duh. “Um yes. I think I was just shot? Am I actually dead?” You asked, hopeful this was a very vivid nightmare.

“As a doornail!” She exclaimed, chipper with positive energy, “Not that doornails are dead, they don’t have souls like you or Angel but really-”

“Yes. You’re dead. And a sinner, which is why you’re here.” Vaggie cut in, patting Charlie on the back. Charlie smiled brightly and nodded at you.

“Yes, and here you can redeem yourself and hopefully make it to heaven! I have faith in our program.”

Oh god this was too much. The sound of a door opening and closing was faintly heard in the background, but that didn’t stop you from being a speedy spiral into mania.

“So. One, I’m dead. Two, why am I in hell I am pretty sure I was a decent human? I didn’t go to church, sure, but I had very little control over my working schedule. Three, is it supposed to be so freaking loud down here? I’m-“

Intense breathing interrupted - yes, breathing. It was the janitor, her one eye staring at you while she lifted the little radio. ”This is diiiirty” she semi-sang. A horrific giggle was lingering under her breath. You grimaced at her behaviour and dropped the cord immediately, avoiding any contact by proxy with this creature. What a creepy little -

“Did that come with you?” Charlie asked, looking confused as you answered with a nod. “Strange, usually possessions don’t follow a soul into the afterlife…” She trailed off, finger tapping her chin with a frown. Everyone turned to look at the manic janitor essentially vibrating with the radio in her hands.

“Interesting! What has inspired us all to gather this fine evening?”

”Alastor!” Charlie greeted an individual behind you. ”This might be our newest resident…she’s just arrived!” Her hands wildly gestured from you to whoever was behind you. You could see the shadow of the person on the floor, stretching into a long figure that looked vaguely familiar. You were certain your eyes were burning a hole into the carpet beneath the shadow. If the shadow was this frightening what exactly was behind you? The shadow appeared to smile wider as you stared at it.

“Hmm!” Alastor, you supposed, responded. “What an exciting new development why - Oh!” Something had caught his attention. He walked towards the janitor, and you glanced at the back of his figure as he walked past you towards the tiny creature. He was tall, very tall, and slender. There was an ominous presence around him, even the nature of his clothing was fashioned in a way that seemed off. It was unnerving. Broad shoulders tapered into a very slim waistline, his jacket flared out behind him in a style reminiscent of a different time. Head to toe red and black, which was also just…something else. But the other patrons also had an interesting approach to their wardrobes as well, save the 2 women. Maybe that was just…how it was here.

“Now where did you find this delightful little item, Nifty?” He said, his profile coming slightly into your view. Dear god, terrifying. You couldn’t even begin to describe his appearance. Chills ran down your back, and suddenly you remembered you were still in very thin pajamas.

“Eh-hehe a dirty radio sir!” She answered, thrilled with herself. “it came with our new guessst” her eye switching from the tallest, creepiest creature you had ever set your eyes upon to your gaze. You swear you could hear the bones crack in the man's neck as he fired his gaze to yours. You were trapped.

“Is that so?” He began to slowly walk towards you, the room filling with a static hum similar to what you felt in the motel room, your skin tingling as he got closer. It was getting harder to hear the others try and talk to the approaching figure, the hum was getting louder.

“And what,” he started, “are you doing with my Radio, my dear?” His eyes were radio dials at this point, sharp jagged teeth glowing alongside them as his head tilted in an inhuman manner, the cracking from before louder than before.

What? Oh for fucks sake. Fuck your backwater, bayou-residing, rude, nasty, hoarder family-

As your eyes rolled back into your head, your body went limp and you hit the foyer carpet. Hard. For the second time that night

Part One : Part Two : Part Three : Part Four

#Hazbin hotel #Alastor x reader #Alastor smut #Hazbin #alastorxreader #Alastor x off #Alastor x you #angel dust is the best supporting character #eventual smut #Alastor

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yoonsenji · 5 months

Text

Summary: their voice line! // part 2.

" She's mine, not yours "

Part 1 =

---------------------★

Genshin impact₊˚.༄

Character: Freminet, Zhongli, Furina, Heizou.

//Freminet ★

•CHAT: You.

" She told me that crying is a great way of getting rid of bad feelings, I have never been told such things... All my emotions pour out right infront of her, she didn't make fun of me... I feel much better after that, hence whenever I need someone she's the only one I can go to "

•CHAT: about 'Father' from you.

" I always believed that 'father' was somehow always right, but yet she prove me wrong most the time... She told me to do whatever I feel like, from that day my way of seeing 'father' change... "

•CHAT: Crush.

" Well... I like this one person... They're kind towards me... I feel safe around them, they're very supportive of my decision, around them... I can feel my confidence good up "

•CHAT: When it Rains.

" I don't enjoy when it rains... But, she told me to enjoy every moment of it tho, although I found it weird to enjoy watching rains... I guess some people have weird hobbies? "

•CHAT: Ocean water.

" You never know how deep those ocean water are... Do you? But if you don't take a chance you'll never be able to experiance the joy of the ocean water. That's what she told me... The first person to ever encourage me even when I fail over and over, it was her "

•CHAT: Special person.

" She's the type of person to encourage me and stay by my side even when I fail multiple times... Have anyone done that for you? To stay by yourside and encourage you to do what you love... Maybe that's why I always desire to be by her side. "

•CHAT: Comfort area.

" She doesn't force me to do anything unlike others who tried to 'help' me by forcing me out my comfort area... She... She tried to pull me out slowly and if she realised I don't feel comfortable she just stop. I just wish people respect my decision just like how she always did "

• CHAT: Crying.

" 'Father' doesn't allowed children to cry 'father' say's that crying is the product of weakness and emotions. I used to cry under the water so the ocean could cry with me... But, now I got someone... Someone who understands my feelings and cry with me "

• CHAT: feelings (Jealousy).

" whenever I see her close with Lyney I have a nasty feelings coming from my heart, Lyney and I are opposite of eachother... I'm afraid she'll fine someone better. But, I know that I'll never be able to find anyone better than her. "

• CHAT: Midnight.

" During midnight she would take me to her spot and we both would sit down and watch the ocean and the moon... She would told me everything about her day and stories, I often fall asleep but in the morning she always disappear, her jacket on me to protect me from the coldness of the night... Or it's either that she would be beside me sleeping as well... "

• CHAT: Pers.

" Pers is like a family to me... Often her and pers would play together, it's actually my first time seeing pers get along with anyone else but me "

• CHAT: Future.

" Why should I tell you...? Fine... I do plan on getting married one day... You don't need to know to who! It's a private matter "

------------------->

Lyney-

" I could tell that freminet like her alot! Although I'm a bit jealous of how good looking she is and how she acted towards my brother, guess luck run in the family! "

Lynette-

" Freminet like her I could tell... Anyone with brain could tell, those two are always by eachother side, it's weird to see them not by eachother side at this point "

//Zhongli★

• CHAT: Lover.

" Being so straight forward about my personal life I see... Since you have been honest to me I shall return the favour by being honest as well. I do not have a lover, although I am indeed fascinated by someone, well... I can't tell you their name, afterall I have already honestly answer one of your question "

• CHAT: Scents.

" You have good sense of smelling, one lady told me that this scent can increase the change of receiving love or complement from your significant other. It's a type of trick used by many sellers to sell their product, although I did indeed recieved a complement from them... I guess a lie can turn into truth as well "

• CHAT: the past.

" Although the memories I have shared with those who have long gone left this world will still be cherished by me, the memories I spend with her will forever be in my mind, I simply couldn't go a day without thinking about those memories. Still, I will continue to cherish the new memories I have create with her, promising to make them better each time I create a memory especially with them "

• CHAT: Life.

" For God like us life goes slowly for mortal like you life is fast... It isn't the smartest to simply spend your life lazily, so... Before you die you should find someone that you can cherish forever, spend the rest of your life with... Oh me? I have already found that person long ago, although I am not sure if they share the same feeling as I do for them "

• CHAT: Liyue.

" Liyue is the land of contract where contract is value and if you made one you cannot betrayed your own word... It's easy, although I do not remember making any contract with her, she have been staying by my side for years always accompanying me... It's fascinating on how one doesn't need contract to stay loyal to another individual "

• CHAT: Fate.

" War is apart of fate... No matter how much blood have to be shed you cannot out do fate it's self. If one fate is to die there is no escape, which is why I always have a close eyes on her... I'll do anything in my power to make sure that fate like that never cross her path "

• CHAT: love.

" I have once saw two old couple walking down the road of Liyue. I have seen them together when they were both youthful, such nice story... I wonder if mine will end like those two, inlove with eachother till death? Or a heartbroken love story? "

• CHAT: Future.

" I prefer to live in the present than the future nor the past, although the future will always appear the past is forever lost... I'm very careful around her I do not wish to make any problem to turn our relationship sour anytime soon, afterall one sour memory can ruin all of them "

• CHAT: Special time.

" Every time a full moon is present she'll force me to accompany her to watch the moon, I do think that it's beautiful but I simply can't even stare at it when she's around. It is as if my eyes are only set on her... I wish those memories would last forever "

• CHAT: Life of regret.

" One day she'll leave me... She's just a mortal with short life spam, unlike me... I just can't bear the fact that I'll have to be alone once again. Even the thought of her not by my side pain my heart... But, there is nothing I could possibly do to prevent such future "

--------------------->

Childe-

" Ah! The lady of Gold! I always see her with Zhongli smiling and giggling... They remind me of my parents being together, although both of them do not interact much when I'm around... Shame I wanted to atleast know more about their relationship! "

Hu Tao-

" Mister Zhongli and her are the best together! She's very supportive of us and our work. Oh god! I'm so happy to talk about her! Although mister Zhongli is a bit shy they both seem to get along just fine! I bet they will be in love very very soon! "

//Furina★

• CHAT: Lover.

" Hmm... Oh her? mon amour she always attend every trail! I love talking to her about anything! Always interesting and super fun to... I wonder if she would like to join my tea party again... It's not like she could reject such offer "

• CHAT: Trail.

" Whenever she talk in trail it's like a story unfolding it's self! Her voice is very calming and it feels like she's simply telling a tail...! Although she also lost some trail even a fail victory should be celebrated! "

• CHAT: Rain.

" It's raining again? Seriously? Ohhh... I wish she was here! Neuvillette doesn't allow me to visit when it rain since I might get sick... Who care? I'm the hydro archo, no sickness will ever seperate me from her! Although maybe the coldness might... Heh "

• CHAT: Performance.

" I only perform as a form of entertainment... And she would watch and correct my movements sometimes... Afterall I make no mistake that often! I should invite you when I get the chance! "

• CHAT: Water.

" I can't even think of being without her... All those years I spend without her was dark and lonely... The light of my life is her, I rather not go back to what I used to be... Afterall would you rather have a God that is nothing without the love of her life or A God with someone to love...? "

• CHAT: Order.

" I don't understand! I get that neuvillette is all about law but why can't I see her?! That's just talking control over my life! Ugh! It's not like I won't come back for years... Anyway I'm seeing her anyway one way or another! "

• CHAT: Sunny.

" So hot... Even water can dissolve at this point... Oh no! My love! She might melt if I'm not there... Ughhhh! Such an urgent matter! Tell neuvillette that I the archon is out to aid her people from melting like ice cream! "

• CHAT: Fatui.

" It's better to not keep such negative thoughts in head but... Fortunately for me... My dear can beat up any fatui! Afterall she's a fine fighter and lover... Even that girl would be on her knee upon seeing my love! I'm so lucky! See how strong she is? Do not mess with me, cause she say my pain is her's so mess with me you mess with her! "

• CHAT: Eyes.

" I was a bit unwell about how different my eyes are... Although I get praise for it, if felt as people were talking badly about it... Until she told me how unique it was... For the pass two hour she continued to praise me especially my eyes... I guess I'm special afterall! "

• CHAT: Tea party.

" The party is only held when I feel like it... Cake and tea any dessert you want I have it... From Liyue and also sumeru oh and I also have some from Inazuma... Although don't expect it to be good... How I get it? My darling always bring some back for me! Just for me! I guess I'm her favourite afterall! "

• CHAT: Hydro vision.

" If only neuvillette agree with me she would have a hydro vision already... I even send Letter to other archon not to grand my love any vision cause I want her to have hydro vision just like me... A soulmate should have same vision! But Neuvillette wouldn't agree with me! Saying she's not worthy something something... Ugh! Talking about it make me want to burst out... Just wait... She'll receive that hydro vision one day... "

------------------>

Neuvillette-

" I like her... Everyone around her are comfortable, if only furina stop pampering her with everything... She have been arguing with me to give her a vision yet I can't just agree... It's well known that the hydro archon favour her so it's unfair if she receives a hydro vision... I just know that furina will give her one anyway... Atleast she handle furina without any problem, other than that... I have nothing to say about her "

Arlecchino-

" The soft spot of the archon... Inorder to hurt the archon directly you just need to hurt the girl, although it is hard to capture her she's quite strong herself. But it won't be long till I get her, I'll take the gnosis and she'll be long gone... Afterall I can't have her following after me, a problem should be solved before it becomes to big to handle "

//Heizou★

• CHAT: Lover.

" Hm... Her? Isn't she just pretty? The first time I met her was like straight up from a romantic novel... Such girl like her approaching me is unbelievable... Although I won't like any competition so... Promise not to fall for her as well "

• CHAT: comission.

" Um... Well, the comission... It can be quite annoying but I always enjoy them since she would always be my partner! Inorder to make things fun you need the person you love the most to join you and things will get better. Am I right traveller? "

• CHAT: Justice.

" Justice is very important afterall how can I blindly let the law be destroyed infront of me right? Although... I might have made some expectations doesn't mean you are included traveller "

• CHAT: You.

" I can't stop thinking about them once again... Even at work they fill my mind which frustrate me at some point but... Their soft smile and touch I do miss it dearly, ugh! It's happening again. Quick traveller help me think of something else! "

• CHAT: kissing.

" At time I would hold hand with her but... Kissing? You must be joking, holding hand and cuddling I can understand but kissing her like nothing is wrong is just weird... You can't just kiss without thinking. I want this to be perfect for her, just like how things should be... "

• CHAT: Fish.

" Traveller! Would you like to go and catch some unique dish later? But they have to be alive tho... My love wanted to have a pet bug I think they're to lazy for energetic animals so a fish shall do it... So? Up for it? It can be our little hangout day to get to know each better? "

• CHAT: People.

" Most people think we're dating and each time I can't help but blush a little... But, unfortunately that isn't the care but I wish it was... I'm sure those rumours will be true in some week or years but just wait I'll get to confess one day! "

• CHAT: Sudden encounter.

" Whenever I encountered them suddenly my heart skip a beat... That should be a bad thing but I like the feeling. One time, I hide behind someone else when i suddenly see them, it was embarassing but... I just can't help it "

• CHAT: Assistant.

" Sometimes she wouldn't join me at work and talk about how good of a partner we were... I can't help but think that she secretly like me and I'd hinting that I should confess. Especially when she hold my hand at work, she definitely like me! "

• CHAT: Hair.

" I always enjoy it when she brush my hair or play with my hair, put me at ease but I always hate it when she stop... Everyday she would do my hair it doesn't matter how ugly it look I will always proudly walk around with it no matter what. Afterall would you make fun of the work of your lover? "

------------------->

Kazuha-

" Hm... I remember her and Heizou being extremely close together. I did bring it up one time only for Heizou to go red as a tomato... Guess you can say he did harbour feeling for the girl "

Itto-

" Ah! Her! Heizou and her are like bestfriend! Although most say they're in love I bet they are just so close that some people lost their mind! Although I do see them together always doesn't mean they're in love right? "

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