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mxlfoydraco · 1 year

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Hello! I'm getting back into fandom after many years and was hoping you could recommend the best (or most popular) drarry fics to come out in the last 5 years?? The longer the better! I'm having such a blast re-reading old favs and would love more to read! Thank you so much!

I was also away from the fandom the past three years, we share the feeling! I'll go for +100k and skip super well known examples (e.g., Grounds for Divorce)

Alucinatio by alexmeg (127k)

"It's... it's not good," Harry tells them lowly. "They've given him a month's time, only." There is so much he needs to explain, but his head is foggy and exhausted and he can't think properly, can't think of how to relay all that he's learned. "Have you heard of Alucinatio?" is what he starts with. "The Daydream potion," Hermione says. "The person who intakes it experiences very vivid and realistic daydreams of all they could ever want, but is essentially in a severely catatonic state out in the external world, incapable of any basic functions." Harry nods. "Somebody's given it to Malfoy." He remembers the tattered remains of a black coak wrapped around Malfoy. "I think it might have been Professor Snape." They take a minute to process that. "And... the cure?" Ron asks. "Tears of anyone the experiencer craves love of," Hermione answers.

I Do Not Love You by Writ_and_romance (228k)

In 2013, a carefully-designed Obliviation leaves Harry reconfiguring his life and identity without any memories of true love; an act that’s essentially erased Draco Malfoy from his mind despite a wedding band and shared home. In 2000, Draco had expected Pansy’s relationship with Luna to bring the Gryffindors a bit closer to his orbit of quiet, carefully pacifistic existence, but he never expected to navigate such a transparent embrace into a unit of family, friendship, and love. A mystery, two love stories, and a reminder that learning to love never has an end date.

Nor All That Glisters by @sweet-s0rr0w (110k)

Lonely and frustrated on house arrest, with no prospects for the future, Draco begins brewing Felix Felicis in an attempt to improve his lot. Just in the short term, of course. He isn’t a total idiot.

But before long he finds himself with a thriving business, a nice flat, some actual (albeit irritatingly Gryffindor) friends, and a very satisfying sex life. What’s more, no-one is hexing him in the street. And Harry Potter is single, and gorgeous, and giving Draco decidedly interested looks.

Stop taking the Felix? You must be joking…

Soup-pocalypse and The Great Curry Cataclysm by @norelationtoatticus (104k)

Eleven years after the war, Draco Malfoy leads a quiet, boring, and perfectly respectable life, thanks very much. Or, at least he does, until a sudden and very unexpected veela awakening causes him to throw soup all over Harry Potter in the middle of the Ministry cafeteria.

Every Hour Has Led to This by @sassy-cissa (105k)

Banned from the wizarding world and sentenced to live as a Muggle for ten years, Draco Malfoy finds his world turned upside down. Navigating the Muggle world becomes easier thanks to help from some unexpected strangers who become family. But when his mother insists Draco fulfil an agreement set when he was a child, he finds himself married and a father. Then a divorced single father. After the war Harry Potter found himself without purpose, until an unexpected offer changed his life. Playboy, Quidditch star, war hero – Harry seems to have it all, until a Quidditch accident ends his career. Lost and without purpose, Harry’s life is lonely until a surprising event brings him to Draco’s door…literally. Running parallel lives for nearly 10 years, when they reconnect both Draco and Harry find the passion for life that had been missing. A story of love and loss and how the best things in life happen in their own time

Pages of You by @wolfpants (101k)

Summer, 1980. Harry is floating between university and becoming a Real Certified Adult. He's not ready. He really isn't.

In a desperate attempt to have the Best Last Summer ever, he takes a casual job at his godfather's bookshop in London, starts an illicit pen pal affair with a wordy posh boy that he's catching feelings for, all while dealing with the son of Sirius's business rival, one Draco Malfoy, insufferable know-it-all extraordinaire.

A story about trying to figure out who you are, where you're going in life, and who you want to take along with you.

Notes on a resurrection by newleaves (126k)

It was never Draco’s intention to raise Sirius Black from the dead.

The Liars Department by @dorthyanndrarry (103k)

This is a story about Harry meeting up with Draco Malfoy four years after the war. And a story about Harry, well, not hating his job per say, but it's not like he has much to compare it to and it seemed fine. His whole life seemed fine. Then Malfoy came along with and his flashy suits and fast car making everything seem dull in comparison, and Harry... Harry couldn't just leave well enough alone.

Turning Leaves by @kbrick (112k)

Draco and Harry have a one-night stand that ends in disaster after Harry tells Draco he's unable to move beyond their poisonous past. So when Draco finds an unusual Time-Turner in the Department of Mysteries, he seizes the opportunity to start fresh with Harry. Only instead of fixing things, he keeps making them worse.

Bolts by @lqtraintracks (114k)

Harry joins the Hogwarts staff as the new History of Magic Professor, while Draco has already been teaching Defence Against the Dark Arts for the past year. When Samantha, a first year, is being bullied one day and throws a made-up Truth curse at her harasser, only to accidentally hit Harry instead, Harry becomes cursed to tell the truth, and not only that, he has to regularly tell it to Draco Malfoy. Samantha is clearly gifted, maybe the most powerful witch or wizard to ever come through Hogwarts, and yet she has no idea how to take the curse off. As they work to remove it—and also teach Samantha how to control a power that's becoming more dangerous by the day—will Harry's truths become too much to handle? And will whatever’s going on with Draco just make everything exponentially worse?

Freedom to be by @quicksilvermaid (169k)

Harry Potter is the Boy Who Lived. 12 years after the war, he's become the Boy Who Lived For Everyone Else. He has the perfect wife. The perfect house. The perfect job. The perfect friends. Only nothing feels perfect. Until one day he stumbles across a club called Release and begins a journey of self-discovery that takes him to a very different place.

By the Grace by @letteredlettered (139k)

Harry is an Auror instructor. Malfoy wants to be an Auror.

Two to Shore by Lamplighter (204k)

Harry and Draco meet in Madam Malkin’s and instantly take a liking to each other. Just kidding. They don’t, but Harry does get sorted into Slytherin, and they do become extremely good friends.

Way Down We Go by @xiaq (109k)

The war was over. Or at least that’s what the papers said. They’d been saying it, for months, as if people needed reminding. Maybe they did.

In which Harry and Draco both run away from their pasts and conveniently choose to hide in the same tiny American town. It's super.

Nyctophilia by prolonged_autumn (107k)

Everyone's back for 8th year, and Harry and his friends seem determined to spend their last year in school running around at night, hyped up on coffee and alcohol and Honeydukes candy, doing all the childish things they didn't have the chance to do before. Draco watches as he's always watched: from afar, quiet and bitter and hopelessly in love. That is, until Pansy decides she's had quite enough of it.

Make Yourself by @anyaelizabethfic (103k)

Harry just wants to be safe within the freshly painted walls of Grimmauld Place, with his friends around him. But when he hears Draco Malfoy has been spotted at the local soup kitchen, he can’t help but encourage a different type of stray to come under his roof.

Kept Man by @drarry (147k)

A downtrodden Harry Potter in a serious dry spell is looking to be a kept man, and a lonely Draco Malfoy responds to his anonymous ad. A perfect storm of lust, scandal, and maybe even love. A Daddy Kink Magnum Opus.

The Ordeal of Being Known by @lou-isfake (146k)

When Auror Potter is anonymously cursed with silence by being forced to hide his own voice inside his mind, there’s unfortunately only one person in the country with the qualifications to fix it: Certified and Licensed Healer Legilimens, Draco Malfoy, specialist in Mind Curses and Afflictions. It’s obviously a terrible idea, a disaster waiting to happen, but Draco’s never been able to back down from a challenge… especially from Potter.

Harry Potter and the Welcome to the World of Grey by @sobsicles (456k)

When Harry fails to keep his anger at bay and Voldemort possesses his mind, the events that follow lead him down a long road to realizing the world isn’t as black and white as it seems. Chaos, hilarity, and tragedy ensue with a Dark Lord being honest all the time, a rival becoming something else, and a world demanding to be saved. Featuring frightened Death Eaters, deep conversations with a monster, Pureblood traditions being ridiculous, and the fight to do the right thing with no true options. Harry’s life just gets more and more bizarre with each passing moment. ~~~ Or, the one where Harry’s life gets split in half, and he has to figure out how to bring it back together.

The Secret Keeper by @the-fools-errand (225k)

On Halloween 1981, Albus Dumbledore made a decision that would change the course of history, concealing Harry Potter’s survival at the hands of Lord Voldemort underneath a Fidelius Charm. But when Harry comes of age in the Muggle world, Dumbledore realises too late that the fate of the world may depend on a boy who has never held a wand. An unlikely team assembles to teach him everything he needs to know before the charm runs out, but only one of them knows the truth behind the Dark Lord’s return to power. If it were anyone else, Draco would have no problem turning them over to the Death Eaters, but there’s something about this certain bespectacled idiot that has him questioning everything he’s ever known. Will Draco seal the fate of the wizarding world by uncovering the Chosen One or will Harry save Draco from a fate of his own?

Dwelling on Dreams by @the-sinking-ship (135k)

Draco thought he could avoid Potter for the duration of his brief return to England. He’d stick to his schedule and be back home in Paris, where he belonged, in a few short months. No trouble at all. He had plenty to occupy him, what with the opening of the London branch of his successful apothecary, his innovative research, drinks with Pansy, a backlog of unread potions periodicals. Except Head Auror Potter is everywhere — in Draco's chair, at his door, in his dreams. All six feet of motorbike-riding, combat-boot-wearing, sex-hair-sporting Saviour of the World packed into one unfairly fetching uniform. Potter won’t leave Draco the bloody hell alone, won’t let him breathe, let him forget, let him sleep. Because no matter how fast Draco Malfoy runs, Harry Potter is always hot on his heels.

A Sword Laid Aside by @korlaena (128k)

When Draco’s cover is blown during a deep undercover operation and the Ministry is compromised, Ron takes Draco to the only safe place he can think of—Potter. Hiding out with a taciturn Harry Potter, who has been missing from the Wizarding World for almost two decades after a shocking fall from grace, is nothing like Draco thought it would be. Draco has to navigate dealing with this Potter while being hunted by Dark wizards and wanted by extremists in the Ministry. When things take a turn for the worse, Draco has to decide whether he's going to keep running or find a way to protect the world and the people he cares about most.

Changing Tides by @carpemermaidtales (109k)

Draco has spent half of his life spouting the things his father has taught him without much thought about how he feels about what he says. When he unexpectedly comes face to face with the Dark Lord, he grapples with the harsh realities of the world and struggles with his changing views on life. Instead of doing what’s expected of him fifth year, he joins Dumbledore’s Army and learns how to defend himself, how to make his own choices, and how he can be something greater than his father’s example as he grows into his own man rather than his father’s shadow. The choices he makes change both his and Harry’s fates, intertwining their paths until they converge.

Taking Chances by @gracerene (135k)

After the war, Draco disappeared and started over in America, vowing never to return to Great Britain and the fraught past he left behind. Unfortunately, when his mates convince him to sign up for an exchange programme for the last year of their Auror Training, Draco learns that he doesn’t have much of a choice in the matter.

Graceless Heart by @orange-peony (132k)

Harry is lost and broken after the war. He has gone to countless funerals, broken up with Ginny, moved back into Grimmauld Place—which feels darker and dirtier than ever before despite how much he tries to fix it. He feels lonely and desperate, but he won’t ask for help, and he still can’t cry.

When he agreed to help the Aurors at Malfoy Manor over the summer, he thought that he would be breaking dark curses. Harry never thought that he would actually spend his days sorting out dusty books with Draco Malfoy, or teaching him how to cook.

Little by little, as they begin to navigate their life post-war, Harry and Draco become intimate…in more ways than Harry could have ever expected.

Brave Though The Stars They Make Me by @dwell-the-brave (108k)

After the events at the end of his Sixth Year, Draco Malfoy has been kept all but prisoner in his childhood home, Malfoy Manor. Alone, terrified, and desperate for some way out, he begins to have strange dreams - dreams of Harry Potter. Are they a trick of his mind? Or are they a way to change his fate, and a chance at redemption?

Always Already by @aibidil (170k)

Harry and Draco are perfectly fine, separately minding their business in 2004, when the Unspeakables conscript them into service... in the First War against Voldemort.

Come for mutual pining and forced proximity in a 1980 hotel room, stay for young Sirius and philosophising about immortality and wormholes. And an eighties cowboy soap opera.

He Comes Like a Thunderstorm by @korlaena (140k)

Draco is doing his best to balance the life he wants to live and the life he’s forced to live. He’s nearing the tail-end of a long, post-war probation when Harry Potter crashes back into his life with all the grace of a charging Erumpent, breaking through his carefully constructed rules and routine. Caught up in a whirlwind of sex and lust, Potter unwittingly shows Draco that his life as an Incubus doesn’t have to be as lonely and unfulfilling as he thought, but how long can it last?

Close Behind by @oflights (134k)

To rescue Draco from the Underworld, Harry has to look forward. Unfortunately, Draco has to look back

where all the veins meet by @saxamophone (146k)

It's the summer of 1998. The battle is over, and Voldemort is dead, but Harry still has more questions than answers. Who is he without a piece of Voldemort's soul in his head? What is he supposed to do now? His friends try to help, but the only thing that can hold his attention—one of the only things that ever has—is Draco Malfoy, out on parole and weirdly hanging around the British Museum. As they keep running into each other, Harry sees that Malfoy is different, and he wonders if he can be someone else, too. Featuring rumpled band shirts, poker games everyone hates, fumbling sex, and a Harry going a little mental over how wands even work.

#drarry #drarry reclist #drarry fic rec #drarry fic recs #drarry fics #drarry fic #draco malfoy #hpdm #harry potter

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420technoblazeit · 1 year

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in my mind dean was always supposed to get older and become the new bobby. like ok you're a hunter, maybe a little new to the scene and still figuring things out. and you're tracking down a werewolf, easy case. except some things don't line up quite right and now you're thinking it might not actually be a werewolf. so you ask around a hunter's bar and they all say the same thing. go to this one bunker in the middle of nowhere in kansas

and you're like sure what the hell. you're stumped anyway, might as well check it out. maybe it's a weapons storehouse or something. but then you get there and there's a doorbell and a bee-shaped welcome mat out front and you're starting to think you've got the wrong place. the door swings open and there's this middle aged guy with a robe and batman pyjama bottoms. and he laughs at the look on your face and tells you to come in, he doesn't bite. not since he got that vampire cure, anyway. you're not sure what to make of that last part but he winks at you when he says it so you figure he's joking. maybe.

he gives great advice about hunting everything under the sun and if you stick around long enough he'll go on and on about how he saved the world at least five times. ok sure. you don't want to be rude so you just sit there and sip your coffee politely while he talks about some guy called chuck and how much of a bitch he is. and another guy who's aged a little more gracefully comes padding down the hallway in a metallica t-shirt and rolls his eyes. has he told you about tvland yet? ('i was just getting to that part!')

if you go to the basement you'll find shotguns filled with salt, wooden stakes, holy water, and demon-killing bullets for sale. and if you're lucky the witch who sells hex bags might be around. low-grade curses only, of course. you better leave the powerful stuff to the professionals. and she'll get in trouble if she gives you anything stronger, not that she can't be persuaded. a girl's gotta make a living after all and she's always encouraged eager new witches. it's worked out pretty well for her so far. and then a guy you swear is twice your height will raise an eyebrow at her and insist she only sell the weaker hex bags, please. you don't need any more witches in your coven, rowena. you've got plenty

pagan god giving you trouble? there's a man who swings by every once in a while who knows how to deal with those. give him some candy or a fun magic relic and he might help you out. it depends. he's a little picky about dishing out advice and he likes to play favorites. and if you've got a demon problem they can give you the number of a guy who swears up and down that he used to be the king of hell. but you've seen him walking around with a purse-sized terrier tucked under his arm and a dozen more following him so you're not really sure if you believe him

idk i like to think that dean got to grow old and retire. that doesn't mean he stops helping people, it just means he hangs up his coat and becomes an old man who rambles on and on about 'back in my day' and makes a dent in his leather armchair. there's a foosball table where the dungeon used to be and sam complains about beer bottles being everywhere and it becomes a safe haven for anyone still fighting the good fight. it's just that for dean and the rest of team free will the fight is over. they're done hunting now

#THIS GOT AWAY FROM ME BUT. i was thinkign about the spn finale and what i'd picture as a happy ending for tfw (mostly dean sorry. samgirls)#adn like. i dont think dean would ever give up helping people but i also think at some poitn in time he'd recognize that the way he views #hunting really does hurt him. n maybe eventually he coudl be convinced to take a step back yk? and be a little more hands off like bobby wa #and YES im givign rowena gabe adn crowley happy endings too. up to you to decide if htey live in the bunker now. (i think crowley does at #least once he abdicates the throne. he went full will graham and has like a hundred dogs n dean complains about how much mud they track in)#supernatural #dean winchester #castiel #rowena macleod #sam winchester #gabriel spn #crowley macleod #crowley spn #the pig squeals

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clanwarrior-tumbly · 4 months

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Arvin and kieran meeting a shy but sweet new girl with this team.

Tapu koko who through some magical shenanigans can't be more then a mile away from the girl with out falling incredibly ill.

A motherly salazle who has a charm that allows her to talk English

A blood moon ursaluna who's the girls main body guard and hes very protective

And a female iron valiant who acts like a big sister. Who threatens anyone that if they hurt the girl she'll cut them down

Gotta say I appreciate the addition of Blood Moon Ursa. Officially my fav gen 9 ground type <3

............

Arven

The moment he met you, he realized you were too nice for your own good sometimes...being the shy and sweet transfer student who winds up being his partner in many classes.

He might tease you from time to time, although he lightens up only after he realizes Mabosstiff likes you--which mean he has to like you as well and not accidentally be too rude.

During battle studies, you two have a match and he's shook when you suddenly bring out Tapu Koko.

Somehow you have a powerful Alolan Guardian deity wrapped around your finger...yet you never once bragged about it.

But Arven fully believes you have a Ditto or Zorua who just chooses to impersonate a Tapu, wondering when it's gonna drop the act.

Soon he finds out that nope, it's the real deal, and you have some strange connection that doesn't allow it to wander too far from you.

Otherwise, it falls violently ill and its magic abilities are weakened.

You're certain it was hexed by someone who wanted to punish it for its mischief, so you've been travelling around hoping to find a "cure".

And ofc that meant Koko had to abandon its duties at Melemele Island and become your Pokémon. It was reluctant at first, but quickly became a loyal friend to you.

Eventually Arven meets the rest of your team, including a female Iron Valiant that escaped from the crater and made herself your ally after saving you from trouble.

She's your literal knight in shining armor, acting like a big sister figure instead of an emotionless robot programmed to attack.

Oftentimes she comes out of the pokeball herself if she senses you're in any kind of danger.

Blood Moon Ursaluna is another bodyguard of yours....who is MASSIVE and utterly terrifying.

All you did was go to Kitakami on a school trip and you suddenly come back with an ancient Ursaring variant/evolution??

How tf are you picking up so many dangerous Pokémon?

Just when he thinks Salazzle is the only "normal" one on your team...

He finds out that she can actually talk, addressing him by name and asking what he was cooking one day.

For a split second he thinks her pheromones/toxins were making him hallucinate...until he sees you having a full blown conversation with her.

It turns out that she developed the ability to speak human language, using it to scare off a group of male Salandits who were threatening you.

At first, she only ever said random words she picked up from humans, but you taught her how to speak coherently and gave her some books...and now she's 100% fluent in English.

All in all, Arven finds your team very...diverse.

You don't really do many Pokémon battles, as they all act like your bodyguards/friends instead. But then again he's never been too battle-crazy either (unlike a certain girl he knows who'd give ANYTHING to battle Tapu Koko).

Kieran

Your personality kinda reminds him of his old self: shy and sweet, oftentimes hiding behind protective figures, etc.

Part of him kinda hated it, but he was good at hiding it.

Was instantly impressed by your Pokémon team, especially the robotic-looking Gardevoir/Gallade hybrid.

Although being a country boi he's bewildered about her LED eyes and her robotic trills, and is definitely not too thrilled about all Pokémon looking like her in some distant/potential future.

Tapu Koko leaves him bewildered, especially when you explained your connection to it while it roamed around the coastal biome, reminiscing about its home in Alola.

He's heard rumors of the Blood Moon Ursaluna back in Kitakami, not caring for it as much as Ogerpon, but he NEVER expected to see that someone like you could have tamed it.

During a battle, Incineroar's flames almost burned you, and your Ursaluna was enraged and knocked him out with one Headlong Rush. Completely unprompted.

Since then Kieran made a point to instruct the feline to be more precise with his fire attacks..lest he became weak.

You impressed the League Club with your talking Salazzle...but at first he believes you're just being irritating and distracting..

Until she talks to him directly, and he's like "...oh wowzers..so you can understand me????"

That's the most shocked anyone in the club has ever seen their leader...

Being motherly as she is, your Salazzle often asks how he's feeling and how Hydrapple is....and he usually shuts down and tells her to mind her business.

But after Area Zero's events, when she asked him again he broke down crying and the poison/fire lizard lowkey panicked.

She had to get you to calm him down.

Since then you two have become close friends, and while in the beginning he was envious of your unique team (that also reminded him of somebody else), he realizes you thought his Hydrapple and battle setups were unique, too.

It honestly made his day.

#clanask #pokemon x reader #pokemon sv x reader #pokemon scarlet x reader #pokemon violet x reader #pokemon arven #pokemon arven x reader #pokemon kieran #pokemon kieran x reader #female reader #tapu koko #salazzle #iron valiant #bloodmoon ursaluna #headcanons

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lovebunnie · 10 months

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who knew the cure to a hex was yuri love

#space.txt #what we do in the shadows #wwdits #wwdits spoilers #guidja

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ravenelyx · 1 year

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I love you in every timeline - Chapter 1: My Love Is As a Fever, Longing Still

← Prologue

Pairing: Sebastian Sallow x Fem!Reader

Words: 14.9k

Chapter Warnings: angst, Harry Potter characters appearance, no name usage for reader (only a few blank spaces), use of 2nd person for the reader, Sebastian is confused and doesn't know how to handle his feelings, and he's also struggling with his personality, veeeeery slow burn

Summary: "He couldn't risk being emotionally stuck somewhere he didn't belong just because his heart was grieving and crying out for a memory of the girl it broke and pieced itself back together for. He couldn't do that to you. He couldn't do that to himself. He couldn't do that to her". In which Sebastian, in his search for a cure in the Dark Arts, finds himself 100 years into the future and meets his most trusted companion's descendant (who looks far too similar to the girl he was once secretly in love with).

A/N: this is long, and more is to come. It's gonna be a very slow burn apparently, but I hope you will like it. Finally Chapter 1 is here, it's been a while. Also, as much as I love fanon! Draco and Pansy, I decided to follow a more canonical approach here, sorry. Again, english is not myfirst language so I'm sorry if I made any mistakes. Never am I going to write about time travel again,my brain hurts.

I also made a playlist inspired by this because why not.

You can find the whole fanfiction here on ao3

"My love is as a fever, longing still For that which longer nurseth the disease, Feeding on that which doth preserve the ill, Th’ uncertain sickly appetite to please." - William Shakespeare, Sonnet 147

You weren't her.

Then who the hell were you?

You briefly smiled at Sebastian and then turned back to the red-head, squinting. "Do you have the book or not?"

Ron gulped, avoiding your eyes. "It's probably in my dorm or something... I didn't have class, so I didn't take it with me."

"In your dorm, isn't that right?" Your eyes narrowed even more if that was even possible, and Sebastian was pretty sure you were about to hex him on the spot. Your leering didn't go unnoticed by either of the two Gryffindors and Hermione’s throat bobbed ever so slightly, eyes widening a little in alert.

"Well, as I said—"

"Here," interrupted Hermione suddenly, voice slightly squeaking. She looked into her bag and extracted her own copy of Winogrand's Wondrous Water Plants. "Use this in the meantime. I take notes on the book too, unlike Ronald here, so it should compensate."

You accepted the book, seemingly calming down a bit. “Thank you, Hermione,” you said, enunciating her name sarcastically as you shot the other boy a nasty look, and Sebastian couldn't help but feel a touch of schadenfreude as Ron hung his head low, cheeks as red as his hair.

“I said I'll give it back,” said Ron, scowling. “It’s not like you need it anyway. Sprout doesn’t even make us open books!”

You politely smiled at Hermione, your eye slightly twitching at his remark, before said smile turned into a sneer as you looked at Ron again. “Then what the hell is taking you so long?"

Hermione sighed softly, dejectedly, and Ron shrinked on himself, sending Sebastian an unconfident look. But that only seemed to propel you to continue.

"And most people do open books for Herbology, my dear Ron, but I don’t expect you to know that. You’re too busy trying to find ways to whine and beg others to help your lazy ass later when they have other, more important things to do.”

Sebastian saw it happen, in a gradual, torturous slowing of time. There was something about you, in the way your lip quirked up, in the way your brows furrowed, giving life to that crease. Something that you couldn't stop, washing over you like a tsunami, drowning any possible thought of rationality and empathy. Control, in that moment, was appearance and nothing more.

He felt, for a moment, afraid; chilling his veins until goosebumps raised on his skin: a thrill, as if she was there. As if he was watching her unleash that godly power in all her beauty.

You were still, hands clammy at your sides, as he could see you open and close them repeatedly, and you weren't gloating. It was different; like that thick, foggy feeling that floods your brain when your opponent misses a step whilst casting Protego, or opens their arm a bit too much, making it easy for a well-aimed Stunning Spell to pass through, and it makes your cheeks turn red and your chest flutter, and Sebastian saw that twinkle in your eyes as you ignored Hermione’s pleading look.

The same thrill that makes his heart tug when he inevitably, nimbly raises his wand back. When the spell goes right where he intended it to go, and the deaf sound of a wand hitting the floor fills his ears.

It was that innate human side that took pleasure in pain. That part that could turn from a lambent glow into a Fiendfyre if you're not careful. Or if you really put your mind to it.

But you weren't duelling.

Sebastian wasn’t sure what to make of the way with which you were slandering your — he supposed — friend. And in front of him, too. It made him slightly tremble, his lip slightly twitch. Part of him wondered if he was invisible, part of him felt a little too alert, part of him pitied the girl in front of him.

And while it seemed Ron and Hermione were just as shocked, they had a sort of weary gleam in their eyes. And any attempt at smoothing things over was futile. Hermione feebly tried to intervene. “Oh, we don’t need to go further—”

“You see Ronald, for a Prefect you should really put some thought into the impression you’re making on new students, not to mention the one you should give of our school—” you ignored her and sarcastically gestured towards Sebastian, who felt his breath hitch at the sudden spotlight put on him, “and yet, you’re always so comfortable acting like a dimwit . Pull yourself together and be responsible for once.”

Ron’s jaw fell open, completely at loss for words at your harsh words, and he shared a look with Hermione that Sebastian was able to understand completely.

What the hell just happened?

He couldn't agree more.

“I think you’re overreacting,” said Ron sternly.

“I think you’re disrespectful,” you replied just as eagerly.

“Alright, that’s enough!” said Hermione, putting herself between the two Gryffindors. “It so happens we have a guest here!”

Sebastian felt his heartbeat quicken ever-so-slightly as both you and Ron turned to him like you had just seen him for the first time. He shifted his weight uncomfortably; an attempt to get rid of that eerie shiver that ran down his spine as your incensed gaze fell on him.

That seemed to snap you out of it, and your cheeks flushed a bit in regret. “Fair enough...” you muttered, nodding at Sebastian. “Sorry.”

He nodded back, unsure about what to do as he shifted his eyes between you and Ron, letting them linger on your face each time he looked at you. Your nose had that same curve he always wished he could kiss, run his lips over with reverence… He shook the thought out of his head immediately.

“I should receive an apology as well,” muttered Ron, and Hermione nudged his arm as a warning not to add fuel to the fire.

"You have one day. Just one." You gave Ron an ultimatum, your tone sharp and, Sebastian thought, quite frightening. He hoped to never find himself in Ron's place. “And don’t expect me to help you ever again, I'm tired of it!”

You didn’t wait for an answer and began to walk away, only stopping briefly to look at the Slytherin boy. "I wish you the best of luck, especially if he— " you glanced at Ron again "—has to be the one guiding you through this maze they call a school."

Sebastian gasped and opened his mouth to reply, but his words seemed to be stuck somewhere between his throat and his tongue. He let his eyes fleet over your face again, heart beating out of his chest as he tried to make out your features, like in a dream.

"I hope we'll meet again soon enough." You forced a smile on your face that looked almost guilty and embarrassed, and with that, you were gone.

His eyes followed you until you turned a corner and vanished from his sight, thoughts racing at a hundred miles an hour — questions with no answers clouding his mind more and more each second. Who were you? Why did you look like her? And above all, why did you bear her family name?

Even after the theatricals that he had just witnessed, there was a certain hope in his heart: traitorous and wrong. A hope that she was really there, somewhere, waiting for him. A hope he immediately wanted to crush as soon as the image of your eyes and red robes flashed in the window of his vision again.

Sebastian Sallow was utterly, completely, absolutely losing his mind.

He was aware of the gravity of his situation — his body still spasmed uncomfortably every now and then as a result of having travelled through space and time — but, Sebastian realised, it felt more like a trance. A painfully aware and too tight reverie he couldn't find a way out of. After all, just the night before, Natty had asked him if he wanted to take part in Summoner's Court with her the next day, hadn't she?

And just a few hours after that, Sebastian had decided to try his last chance, opening the artefact that, he had believed, would bring him back to a time where her sister wasn't cursed — a time he could have avoided the disaster. And not just one at that.

He took a deep breath, willing the halls of Hogwarts to become brighter in his vision, more real. He was indeed in the future, he repeated himself, his ribcage evidently too small to contain the excruciating throbbing he felt in his chest. He had to accept that. He did. Probably.

“Bloody hell!” Sebastian heard Ron mutter as he also stared at the point from which you had just disappeared. “What was all that for?”

“Honestly, Ronald…” said Hermione curtly. “We’ll deal with this later.”

Still, Sebastian felt painfully calm at his situation: the sort of calm that he only experienced when he knew he was in trouble and couldn't do anything about it, or when he knew he was in trouble and had the solution for it lying in his hands, teeming down his throat like a treacly and old pint of Butterbeer, or a briquette of ice, whipsawed by the choice of safely travelling down his stomach and melt and leave him warm and satisfied or change direction and chill his lungs and cut his breath and bring him to a freeze.

What would Sebastian, a calm and collected person (and he believed he was, or tried, at least), do in a similar situation?

Two options came to his mind, clear and painfully bright.

To freak out completely until he was in shambles on the floor, addled and ready to break himself and cut the edges of his persona to fit into the new reality he now essentially belonged to, though he still didn't feel like it.

Or estrange himself from said reality, seeing it through lenses, analysing the world around him as if he weren't there until he found a way to go back, like a spectator, a reader. And he was indeed a reader.

In a way, the very core of one was tantamount to the other — both would completely destroy him. And Sebastian Sallow could not allow himself to be destroyed. Not like this.

But then there was another, the one Sebastian desperately willed himself to adopt, keeping his edges glued to himself and the lenses away from his perfectly working eyes.

The one he followed when everyone had lost hope for Anne.

And that was any option available, and every rational thought, even if the sound of them — or anything else, really — was still drowned by the loud pounding of his heart reverberating at the thought of the girl who just flipped his world upside down.

“What did you say her name was again?” Sebastian asked the two students, his eyes never leaving the corner you had just turned.

Ron and Hermione both looked at him with surprise; Ron opened his mouth with a scowl, as if about to make a snarky remark, but Hermione interrupted him, repeating your name calmly.

That was indeed the name.

And so he tried to be as rational as possible.

“Thank you,” said Sebastian quietly, lips parted, gaze musing. “I’d forgotten that just there.”

You were her descendant, a hundred years from his time.

Sebastian couldn't remember her having any siblings or cousins who bore her surname, but if you did, you had to have received it from a male member of her family, didn't you? She couldn't possibly have given you her name unless she married someone from her own bloodline, and Merlin, he hated that thought.

Or she had married someone else and decided to keep her own surname instead, and, once again, Sebastian knew — it wasn't his first thought, of course, but certainly one that plagued his mind — that he couldn't have been the one she had married, because if one thing was true about Sebastian Sallow, it was that he'd have burned down the world just to get her to take his last name.

His thoughts circled back to her family, but try as he might, he couldn't pinpoint any related members from whom you might descend. He was starting to feel dizzy and sure to be on the brink of collapsing under the amount of information he was trying to process, but then Ron and Hermione pulled him out of his trance by starting to explain the rules of the castle, the classes to attend and some basic information about the Professors.

"Defence Against the Dark Arts changes every year; they say there's a curse on the chair or something," explained Ron, having calmed down a bit, and half-smiled, "so you won't have to see toad-face for long."

"Toad-what?" asked Sebastian absent-mindedly, his head still teeming with disjointed thoughts and meandering ideas which, Sebastian was sure of it, would never find a proper abode.

"Our new Professor. You'll see what I mean when you meet her for the first time."

Sebastian nodded occasionally as he listened to them talk about the other Professors, such as Snape, the Potions teacher, and also the Head of the Slytherin House. Ron kept going on about how annoying he was, trying not to show how much he was afraid of him. "You don't have to worry, though: Slytherins get special treatment from him," he said jokingly.

Ron, Sebastian decided then, was a nice fellow. He found himself wondering why you had reproached him so harshly. He had half-a-mind to ask, then, about your behaviour — and why both the two Gryffindors seemed to be far less surprised about it than he expected. He decided against it.

"Wait, what do you mean, she won't let you use spells?" Sebastian frowned as they talked about 'toad-face', alias Dolores Umbridge.

"She's from the Ministry," explained Hermione. "After what happened last year, we're sure they're doing everything they can to keep the school under control and make sure no lies—" she stroked the word sarcastically, "—are spread among the students.

"I'll explain everything later. We should focus on more important things, like your academic persona and your education," she added, noticing his confused expression.

She was definitely Prefect and worthy of her role too, at least if you went by the typical clichés.

The hours passed, and there wasn't a minute when Sebastian didn't think of her.

And of you.

Because the more time he spent walking, the more his rationality seemed weak and pointless.

He thought he'd go mad, her memories spoiled by your oh-so-similar but equally different features. He saw your eyes looking at him back in the Scriptorium, as she was ready to take the Cruciatus Curse rather than cast it on him. He saw a Gryffindor sitting by him in Herbology, stealing not-so-subtle glances while tending to the mandrakes. He felt like his mind was splitting in half, frustrated and embittered and close to tears as you tainted his remembrances of her.

He needed to see you again, talk to you, ask about your life, your family, your past. He needed to know every thought behind your eyes, every subtle expression towards him that could mean you recognised him, that you were her, that you remembered him, remembered your time together, that you'd follow him in all his antics, in all his mistakes, in all his choices, that your actions meant more than your words.

That you loved him as he loved you — as he loved her.

Her.

Not you.

Because he didn't need to talk to you. Because indeed your recent actions spoke louder than words ever could.

Because no matter how much Sebastian fooled himself into thinking that he wasn't alone, stuck in a world that had gone on without him for a hundred years, that she returned his feelings the way he thought she did, that somehow you'd look at him and know that she was meant for him, that you were meant for him, you weren't her . You didn't know him. You could never know him as she did, and not because he wouldn't let you in — he'd run to you even now and lay his heart open if it meant finding a faint resemblance to what it used to be — but because he couldn't allow it. He couldn't risk being emotionally stuck somewhere he didn't belong just because his heart was grieving and crying out for a memory of the girl it broke and pieced itself back together for. He couldn't do that to you. He couldn't do that to himself. He couldn't do that to her.

At that moment, Sebastian made the decision to stay as far away from you as possible.

He snapped out of his thoughts as he reached the Great Hall. He hadn't noticed that it was already lunchtime.

"Do you think Dumbledore will make a speech to introduce him or not?" asked Ron, not caring that the Slytherin boy could hear him loud and clear.

"I don't think he'd just let it go, but I hope it won't be as big as last year's," noted Hermione.

"Those were two bloody new schools, Hermione. This one must be different."

He felt like a new Honeydukes product hitting the shelves for the first time.

It turned out the Headmaster hadn't made a speech to introduce him, and Sebastian almost would have preferred it if he had, because he felt like a circus monkey sitting at the Slytherin table with a hundred eyes staring at him like he'd just broken into their home and stole a particularly rare card from their Chocolate Frogs collection. He looked around at the other tables and saw heads turning away so quickly that he was sure he would be the culprit in a mass murder with a thousand broken necks. He sighed as a girl with dark hair and green eyes sitting opposite of him handed him mashed potatoes.

"Do you want to eat or not? No one poisoned your food just because they don't know you."

Sebastian glanced at her and accepted her plate, munching his food slowly as if he didn't quite believe her.

"I'm Pansy Parkinson."

"Sebastian Sallow."

"Sallow? Never heard of that name. What's your blood status?"

He almost choked on his food at her blunt question. What kind of uncivilised conversation was this? And the way she looked at him, waiting for his answer, he knew that that question alone could decide his entire future — hopefully a short one — in that House.

"I'm a pureblood like you, I suppose," he lied, lifting an eyebrow as he blankly stared at the girl.

"I see," said Pansy, narrowing her eyes as if not fully believing him. And Sebastian knew it was probably time for him to make up a story, a lie he could tell everyone in the indefinite amount of time he was to spend among them.

He had put a great deal of thought into what wanted to tell in the past hour — he could, after all, be anyone. Anyone he wanted.

He could change his past, he could avoid his mistakes, he could pretend to be a normal boy with a normal life. He could just be.

In the end, it didn't matter, because while other people might look at him and see only a picture-perfect new student with a thirst for knowledge, he would look at himself and see the boy who tortured his friend, the boy who murdered his uncle.

They might not know, but he would.

He kept the edges tight against his body, and decided to opt for a half lie that made it easier for him to play on and not forget any details.

He told her that he wasn't from the Highlands. He told her how his parents were Professors at another magical school but died prematurely, and left him to live with his uncle, a former Auror. And he told her about his timely death as well, omitting, of course, his involvement in it.

"When he died, too, I decided to move here," he concluded simply, hiding the tremble of his lips behind a glass of pumpkin juice.

Part of him expected sympathy from her, or at least a hint of hesitation; that look he had become so accustomed to whenever people came to know about his tragic tale or something along those lines.

Surprisingly — though, for some reason, Sebastian wasn’t surprised in the slightest — Pansy Parkinson didn't seem to care at all.

"Were your parents true purebloods or filthy blood traitors like the Weasleys?" she asked instead, clearly showing where her priorities lay, and it was enough for him to know that his earlier hope that there would be no more discrimination was merely a child's prayer.

"They have magic. That's the only thing you need to know." Sebastian cut short before focusing on his food. He noticed the familiar badge on her robes and silently thanked Dumbledore for assigning him to the Gryffindor Prefects instead. At least they never judged him, not even for dwelling with time and space like a bloody idiot — though he believed he had seen a gleam of reproach in Hermione's eyes as she'd uttered the word 'misadventure .

"All right, I believe you." She shrugged.

Sebastian wasn't convinced.

Pansy nudged a boy beside her, who looked at him with his piercing grey eyes. He was pale, with sleek blond hair so light it almost looked white, and also wore a badge. He reminded Sebastian of Ominis. That must be Malfoy.

"I'm Draco Malfoy," — it hadn't been so hard to guess, though now Sebastian thought he'd rather not meet him at all — "I saw you walking around today with that skint blood traitor and that mudblood Granger. You should have been assigned to us. It's not worth it to taint your blood status by associating with such filth," he spoke venomously, a mocking tone punctuating his sentences.

Skint blood traitor. Mudblood. He was exactly like those boors Sebastian so enjoyed thrashing in Crossed Wands when they had the guts to join. Perhaps he could do the same with him — blast him with Bombarda until his hair turned black (or he went bald; any of them would do).

Sebastian didn't know why he suddenly felt like defending the honour of two people he had met that same day, but he wished he could poison his food instead.

"Maybe next time you'll be considered fit for your assigned role. I suppose all that purity didn’t take you that far this time," he replied just as rudely.

Draco Malfoy made a weird face — a mix between stunned and angry and that half smirk that had begun to creep up his face as he had expected Sebastian to agree with him, and that had died on his lips but not yet fully, and the whole thing was so comical Sebastian had to hold back a snort. Because that was not (not in a million years, no matter how many artefacts he accidentally opened) going to happen, and when Draco Malfoy realised it, he seemed to have a hard time closing his mouth back to a dignified expression.

"I'd be careful if I were you, new student. I'm a Prefect!" he threatened, squinting his grey eyes and finally gaining enough control to curl his lip into a small smirk.

Spoiled bragger, Sebastian thought.

"And what exactly are you planning to do — take points away from your own House?" replied Sebastian, smirking back, enjoying how his face turned back to that ferret-like countenance.

"We share the same dormitory. Choose your words carefully." Draco Malfoy pursed his lips, his face becoming even paler. Sebastian wondered if he had even an ounce of blood in that body of his.

"We do indeed, so I suggest you sleep with one eye open," retorted Sebastian. Part of him knew that, logically, he should have been more mature about the situation.

But Merlin, he was starting to despise the brat.

(And the other part of him was still fantasising about that Bombarda-induced vengeance).

"You think you can scare me?"

Draco Malfoy snickered, and the line of Slytherins sitting on his side began staring at the two boys with piqued interest, wondering what all the fuss was about. It was quite unusual for two Slytherins to argue so openly, and even students from other Houses had begun to turn their heads towards their direction. Two big students beside Draco Malfoy snickered, too, as if on cue. Sebastian felt a wave of repugnance at how pathetic they looked.

"Definitely not, especially when you have your guard dogs next to you." Sebastian nodded at the two students mockingly. "Tell me, does your father pay them to be by your side? They can't be that stupid to volunteer to be in your presence."

The blond appeared to want to eat him alive, while the other two took a bit longer to fully understand his words before reproducing the same angry expression. Perhaps Sebastian understood your outburst: it was indeed gratifying to pour his disdain out. Though, unlike you, Sebastian didn't feel an ounce of regret.

"All right, Draco, enough of this," interrupted Pansy with a sigh, before giving Sebastian a hateful look. "He's a blood traitor like Weasley, and he'd better take care of his priorities."

Sebastian ignored her, focusing back on his food and already dreading the idea of having to share his Common Room and dormitory with people like that. Maybe he could sleep in the Undercroft for the rest of the year. He wondered if that place still existed at all.

Strangely enough, the aftermath was quite unsatisfactory, and Sebastian felt his cheeks warm up as he realised he had indeed acted like an immature git, stepping down right at their level. He stared at his half-empty plate, abashed.

The time passing, then, felt particularly chilly under his skin.

After he felt content enough with his lunch, Sebastian stood up, ready to meet the two Gryffindors again. He faltered a little as he looked around their table, his chest squeezing as he caught a glimpse of you. And not just a glimpse.

He watched you as you engaged in a happy conversation with a red-haired girl next to you: she scarily resembled Ron, so he deduced that she must be his sister. The two Prefects sat opposite you, and on your other side was a boy with messy black hair and round glasses.

Sebastian noticed how you tried to avoid Ron's eyes, only glancing up at him through your lashes from time to time before looking back at the girl, and he wondered if you would even apologise or if you were waiting for the red-head to do so. How proud were you? How much did you care? To which length were you willing to go for the people you loved? Sebastian felt a compulsive need to know it all, a new wave of hunger right in the pit of his stomach, completely empty even after his heavy, albeit displeasing, lunch, and ready to be fed by what all he could find about you. He needed to know every last bit of information, if it was the last thing he did in that new world.

That eerie calm chilled his bones again, moderately assuaging his desire, like a glass of cold water before supper. Sebastian realised he was stuck, so he had no rush to do exactly that. He didn't need to be greedy, to devour — though the idea was tempting indeed — and to gobble up every bit of you yet. He could feast, he could savour, he could indulge in his sumptuous meal like he deserved. And then he would find his way back, satiated beyond belief.

Now that would take his edges off.

He shook his head, derailing that tingly feeling running down his lower stomach before it nestled, and averted his eyes, instead noticing that barely anyone had left the Great Hall, and he was the only Slytherin standing. He quickly walked out of the room and rested against a column, wondering if he should wait for Ron and Hermione to finish eating and meet him, or if he should just go alone.

Sebastian decided to walk to the Defence Against the Dark Arts tower, to the Undercroft, praying it would still be there, untouched by other students. When he arrived, he saw the familiar clock, and his heart swelled in fear and anticipation as he took out his wand and flourished it like he had done so many times he practically relied on muscle memory alone.

The clock hands started to turn, and he breathed a sigh of relief as a door opened to the familiar room that he considered an analogue to his house. He stepped in carefully and looked around. The furniture hadn’t moved an inch in a hundred years, still in the same position that Ominis knew by memory. He wondered about him: if he knew Sebastian would one day disappear forever only to remain stuck in the future, if he had waited for him in that same room hoping for him to come back, or if he was glad he was gone after all.

Sebastian wondered if he would ever return to his time: if Ominis and Anne had been waiting for him their entire lives, getting old without him, and if they had hoped that they would one day see him again, and then he had another terrifying thought: what if he went back yet it was too late?

What if all of his pals were much older than him once he did? What if, upon his return, he discovered Anne still suffering the effects of the curse, or worse yet, already deceased? What if Ominis had been made to return to his family, where he would have either changed into one of them or been tortured and murdered? What if she had found someone else to fall in love and share the rest of her life with, or what if the perilous journeys she was compelled to take killed her and he had not been there to save her?

"Scourgify!" he declared, pointing his wand at various objects around him to clean them, wishing he could reproduce the same effect on his mind.

Once he was done, he sat down, leaned against a column, and put his head in his hands, breathing deeply and feeling his eyes burn.

The calm had gone, replaced by pure, utter despair and panic. It had only been a few hours since he'd found himself there, confused and startled, and he knew it would be many more until he went back — if ever.

If ever.

The thought cut at his lungs like sharp glass, drawing quiet and wet sobs. He didn't know whether the artefact could ever be repaired at all. He didn't know whether he could control it enough to go back if it was repaired. For all he knew, he'd find himself in bloody Mesopotamia, if he was lucky enough to survive another travel. Or he'd get stuck between time and space, forever embedded in the threads between realities.

Based on those thoughts alone, Sebastian felt like he should be grateful to have found himself still in Hogwarts, as safe as he could be, but he wasn't.

He missed his routine, his life, his friends. He had disappointed Ominis, but he would give anything to hear his voice now, even if he yelled at him, to see Anne even if she did not want to see him, to read their old letters over and over again, to accompany her on whatever adventure she was setting out on. Heck , he wanted to hear Headmaster Black's voice scolding him for his horrible detention record, listen to Poppy ramble about her dear magical creatures, see Garreth blow up his potions, and even wanted to hear Imelda complain about Quidditch being cancelled. He missed it all.

He spent some time there alone — he did not know whether it was minutes or hours — weeping silently to himself. His wrists copiously moved to his eyes in a weak attempt to dry his tears, which kept falling nonetheless, undaunted, wetting his cardigan and shirt and skin.

Sebastian had always prided himself in his capacity to bottle up emotions, to avoid the crying and instead channelling those goopy feelings into something more useful, like studying or spellcasting. That had backfired, and Sebastian had to learn, awfully, that doing that didn't mean those emotions wouldn't force their way out in a way or another, and after what had happened in the Catacombs, where his feelings had exploded in the worst way imaginable, he had reluctantly decided that crying alone was the best way to let them flow naturally. With that and everything that had happened to him within a few weeks, not to mention the previous events, he felt overwhelmed.

He hated it.

After drying his tears as best he could, hoping that no one would notice his glistening eyes or swollen face, he decided to leave the Undercroft and find Ron and Hermione again; they were to give him his timetable, as he would join their class starting the next day. That was before he abandoned them.

He stepped out of the room and froze in his steps. You were sitting on the ground just outside, back against the wall, focused on your textbook. You looked up once you heard a noise, and saw a dishevelled and surprised Sebastian staring straight at you.

"Oh, well, hello again, new fifth-year!" You smiled politely.

He cursed under his breath, turning his face away slightly and rubbing the back of his hand under his nose again, in case any stray tears were still present.

"'Didn't know about another secret passage in the school," you continued, apparently ignoring his actions, before muttering to yourself, "It wasn't on the Map."

"Map?" he said in a rough, unfamiliar voice, surprising even himself.

You examined him, a quizzical expression on your face. "Have you been crying?" you asked bluntly, raising your eyebrows in surprise.

Great job, Sebastian. Perfect disguise.

He felt his cheeks warm up, and he turned away again. "No... not at all." He cleared his throat, trying to find a way to switch up the conversation when his eyes fell on your book. "What are you reading?"

You frowned slightly, obviously not believing him, but understanding that he wasn't willing to talk about it, and looked back at your book. "My Herbology book. Ron gave it back to me at lunch. Finally, I’d say."

Sebastian paused for a moment, unsure whether it was appropriate to ask about what happened in the corridor, but then he felt that ache again, right above his navel, and the words slipped from his mouth without restraint. "Did you two—"

"Don't." You interrupted him and averted your eyes, staring down at the cover musingly. "Don't bring it up again. That was already embarrassing as it was."

Sebastian stayed quiet, his eyes never leaving your form. He would very much have liked to just plunge into your brain at that moment and make himself at home there.

Perhaps he needed to add 'Learn Legilimency' to his to-do list.

"How so?" he asked at length, quite stupidly, he realised.

"I lost my temper," you said simply, and forced your eyes back towards him. Your next words seemed to eject out of your mouth painfully, like they were unfamiliar to you, and it took a while for you to utter them. You sighed, "I— I suppose… I owe you an apology."

An apology never felt so forced and so sincere at the same time. "Oh, you don't have to—"

"I do. It wasn't the best impression I made of myself." Your lips parted as you leaned your head back on the wall. "I suppose I have to apologise to Ron as well — properly, I mean."

Sebastian stayed quiet, observing you curiously. Why were you telling him all that? "I... suppose," he uttered, not knowing what else to say. That appeared to be enough for you because you didn't even seem to acknowledge his words.

"He was looking for you, you know? Hermione, too. They said they needed to give you your schedule."

"Ah, yes, they mentioned that before," said Sebastian, glad to change the topic. "I’ll meet them promptly then, I was—"

"—Too busy hiding in a place no one else knew about," you continued for him.

That made him still in his steps, a chill running down his spine. Your eyes met: his open wide, yours unwavering and daring him to contradict your statement.

Perhaps the previous topic was way better.

"I just..." Come on, Sebastian, think!

"I just stumbled upon it!"

Usually he was one to conjure lies out of thin air, but being around you made his brain seem to melt. Sebastian thought that it was because he didn't really want to lie to you, or perhaps it was because, with the way your eyes pierced him, he felt as if you already knew all his secrets, all his lies, and you certainly wouldn't be fooled, not even if he made up a whole story full of intricacies and chapters worth publishing.

He knew, however, that the answer was neither, and it lay deeper than anything he was willing to admit to himself so loudly that he had to face it.

"Right."

You closed your book and stood up, facing him. He couldn't read your expression properly, but he felt his body start to uncharacteristically shrivel at the intensity with which you stared him down. He was in Ron's place.

"Strange, isn’t it? how the new student suddenly stumbles upon a secret room on his first day — a room not even Fred and George know about."

You had spoken that last part quietly, as if only to yourself. In fact, Sebastian didn’t know who Fred and George were at all. And, frankly, he didn't want to. "What can I say? I’m full of surprises," he replied smoothly.

"Or full of lies." You hadn’t missed a beat.

It was frightening how easily you had switched back to the girl he had met in the corridor. And he pitied it. And he liked it. And perhaps he was a fool for liking it, and an even bigger fool for pitying it. "I didn’t know it was illegal to be in this room," he said, scowling.

"Illegal? Oh, not at all. But certainly unusual for someone who has supposedly never set foot in this school before."

You took a step towards him, and he had to fight the urge to take one back himself. There was something wrong in the air — something goopy and misty and heavy, penetrating his skin like Mallowsweet fumes, inebriating and dizzying and frighteningly close to losing control. He had only felt it once, in Hogsmeade nonetheless. Electric and impatient, but, now, shrouded. That day, it had been galvanising. Now it was almost shy — almost… veiled.

"Hermione told me that she barely only took you through the first two floors. You're not even supposed to know about the classroom's whereabouts, and yet you seem all too comfortable with your surroundings," you continued, unaware.

He felt his heartbeat accelerate. Why did you have to be so inquisitive? Was he supposed to tell you the truth now?

Dumbledore’s voice came back to his mind: "...unless it's absolutely necessary."

"I don’t know what you're talking about. It was an accident, as I said," replied Sebastian in a poor attempt to reason again, knowing full well you wouldn't believe him.

"Certainly a convenient one." He twitched involuntarily, like he had just got a shock. The corners of your lips lifted in a sneer. "You are an interesting case... Sebastian, was it?"

He nodded hesitantly and narrowed his eyes, baffled at your countenance and your confounding words. An interesting case?

You shuffled on your feet in a nimble movement and pressed your back against the wall again, leaning onto it. "Don’t forget to show me that room sometime, too."

"And why would I do that?" Sebastian was growing impatient at your behaviour, while some part of him was thrilled at your nonchalance. The more you bantered with him, teasing him like that, the more he felt his stomach flutter. He hated himself for it.

He felt a sudden urge to leave. To run to his Common Room, or back into the Great Hall, where the noise cramming his ears would be enough to shut down each and any possible much-too-loud beat of his heart, as if the mere sound of those tiny pulses would beguile him into wandering proscribed feelings. A deceit of his own body he wasn't willing to face, not even through his love of the forbidden. The hunger and ache had to stay just that: mere curiosity, more about her and her family than you.

But he stayed in the silence of the corridor, with a loud pounding noise in his ears.

"Because it would be a shame if other people in, let’s see, higher power were to know about it, too, wouldn’t it?" You moved a hand through your hair to push it back, clearing your vision, and Sebastian watched as your locks fell around your face, a twinge in his chest. "Although I do believe Professor Flitwick would love to have another room for his choir practice. Is there a good acoustic in it?" You peered over his shoulder and towards the now closed door with a playful smile, clearly only teasing him, but the way the light fell on the tresses framing your visage was a bit too familiar to him. His mind stalled for a moment, and he didn't want those beats to stop anymore.

"Why do you care about this room so much?" Sebastian shifted his weight, now taking a step forward as well, and your eyes flickered down when you perceived the movement. Your lip twitched a bit.

"Why do you?" You simply replied, shrugging. "A secret room is a secret room. Don't you want to be a proper new student and get in good with the Professors?"

Sebastian felt his stomach boil at your singsong tone. "That seems to be more of a Gryffindor trait."

"Is it? And how much does a supposed stranger know about our Houses?"

His breath hitched and his resolve crumbled immediately at your quick retort. Sebastian warmed all over and stilled in his steps, feeling a bit too heavy on his legs. The image of the girl who lost her temper in the corridor was the one he had expected to evoke, pity even, yet she was nowhere to be found as your half-lidded gaze stared at him impishly.

"Besides," you continued, clearly feeding off his reaction with increasing confidence. "You should really get to know your Slytherin peers a bit more. Hopefully you won't become like them, but alas if you do, you'll end up snitching on this place yourself."

The thrill gradually disappeared, replaced by unadulterated annoyance. He found himself lowering his head, and he glared down at you, heart pounding in his ears. Your eyes stayed unwavering in his, though Sebastian noticed your crossed arms tightening marginally around your chest. "You can only wish to be like us," he hissed.

As you lifted an eyebrow daringly, he stepped forward again, finally free of that marbly perception that had spread through his body at your mockery, and towered over you. You tilted your head up, eyes never leaving his, the red and gold making them stand out in a way that only sent a new wave of anger through Sebastian's bones.

You could only wish to be like her.

"My dream in life."

Your voice rustled softly against your teeth, stretching with the smirk you wore, daring him to retort again. Sebastian felt it spread before he could even process your words entirely, burning through his guts all the way up to his trembling hands. That hunger. Craving. Ache. And something else — something that made the corners of his mouth tingle and his head tilt forward slightly more. He inhaled deeply from his nose, breathing out gratingly, air straining against his throat.

"Shall I serve as your future proxy and tell the faculty about it now?" you continued, voice glottal and purring, faring on the satisfaction of his heavy breathing on your face. "Might save you time ahead."

A low chuckle left his lips. "Even if you told the faculty about it, I could always pretend you were the one who showed it to me and kept it a secret all this time. After all, I am the new student, aren’t I?"

He grinned to himself as your smile fell slightly, squinting as you looked at him, but it only lasted a moment before you spoke again.

"And why, pray tell, would anyone believe that I would fraternise with a Slytherin enough to show said person a secret room?" You leaned your head on the side, and Sebastian’s heart jumped again. "And why would I turn myself in, given I would have, supposedly, kept my room hidden for five years?"

"It's my room," replied Sebastian lowly, instinctually, voice slightly trembling, blood rising to his head. Despite the height difference, he was starting to feel smaller and smaller every time you spoke, crushing his resolve word by word. It made him shrivel. "I knew it before. You're not welcome in it, nor is it any of your business."

"You knew it before," you repeated blankly, like you didn't care. "So you’re admitting to having learnt about this place already?"

What?

A heartbeat, a glint in your irises, and Sebastian's heart dropped pathetically as he realised he had given you exactly what you had been searching for — what you had wanted him to admit all this time. He shifted his weight back, leaning away from you. "No, I never said—"

"—I believe the Professors know about your true history — especially Dumbledore, you can't trick that one — so I know they won’t be fooled," you continued undaunted to shut each and every one of his possible retorts. "Plus, even if you told them that lie after I snitched on this place, they’d still let it go and take control of this room — Filch in particular. I won’t get into trouble just for keeping an insignificant room secret, but you would lose your special place."

His mouth fell open, for once at a loss for words. He could only stay silent as you threatened to reveal his hidden spot with that undeterred ragging tone of yours. Sebastian would usually brush off any threat against him, especially if it involved getting the help of teachers of all people — he was known for breaking rules on any occasion — but he couldn't ignore your words. He knew you had no idea how much that room meant to him; would you have cared if he told you? Would you have taken your words back? Why would he care if you had? He had promised himself to stay away from you, and that was exactly what he was planning to do. This conversation had gone on for too long.

"Who—Who says it's my special place?" Sebastian tried to salvage it, although his disingenuous and trembling voice betrayed him almost immediately.

"You reek of dust and humidity," you said with a satisfied smile, as if insouciantly waiting to shake his hand after your checkmate. "As if you've spent a lot of time in there just now. Also, no student in Hogwarts with more than a pea for a brain would ever refuse the comfort of a secret room no one has discovered yet."

You had deduced it... by his smell?

Sebastian had still been processing when you gathered your things and looked back at him, breaking into a genuine smile. "You look like you’ve just seen a ghost, and mind you, there are a lot of them in this school, so you'd better get used to it."

The corner of his lips quirked up against his will, heart gradually slowing down again. "Well, you did just threaten me in a way."

You chuckled — an unfeigned, carefree chuckle with no malicious hint — and shrugged. "I was never going to snitch on you, that would have been incongruous. I just wanted to see how this would go."

"I don't follow," he said at length, tilting his head slightly and raising an eyebrow at that. "Were you just playing with me?"

Sebastian didn't know why he had asked. It had been quite clear since you started talking that you had only run rings around him like he was a bloody amateur. He chewed on the insides of his cheeks in chagrin. You averted your eyes with a smile still on your face, and Sebastian wasn't sure whether to feel impressed or annoyed.

"Call it an investigation." You raised your hands in surrender. "I’m no Sherlock Holmes, of course, but..."

"Sherlock who?"

"He... Never mind." You shook your head, and looked back at him for a moment, biting your lip as if facing a conundrum. You sighed. "The thing is, from your perspective my threat should've appeared empty, or unfounded, because, as you said, the Professors would have believed that I was the one who showed you the room, as a more experienced student."

Sebastian listened intently, growing more confused the more you spoke. "Wait, so—"

"So, if you had nothing to hide and had really just found out about the room, you would've been less... defensive ," you explained, and Sebastian found no contempt in your voice: it was neutral, a bit excited maybe, but not mocking — perhaps only a little condescending, he noted bitterly. "Or, more specifically, you would have been defensive about me being out of line rather than about the room itself — more annoyed , I believe, at the fact that I got all up in your personal business uninvited."

The way you spoke, with unalloyed certitude and indisputable pride — though with an almost riveting aspect in your self-assurance, if he dared to admit it — seemed almost preposterous to Sebastian.

"Also," you continued, "if you had really stumbled upon it so easily, you would've been more shocked about the fact that no one else in the school had, wouldn't you?"

That actually... Made sense.

“What if I were just a new student who had accidentally found a room,” began Sebastian hesitantly, although he couldn't stop himself from being rather dazzled — and envious. And definitely ill at ease at your aptitude at reading people — him specifically. “And had completely panicked when another more experienced student threatened to reveal me as if I had done something horribly wrong?”

You looked at him, eyes shifting between his right and left one in a sequence. “Yeah,” you finally countenanced with a blithe nod. “That would have been perfectly plausible, too.”

Sebastian’s face fell, exasperated beyond measure. He suddenly felt a wave of lassitude wash over him and let out a world-weary sigh that earned him a small smile from you.

"Just know that you don't know me as much as you think you do," he said at length.

“I don’t know you at all,” you confirmed with a bright smile. “But I definitely enjoyed this. "

You pointed between the two of you, and Sebastian faltered, following your hand with his eyes for a moment before his gaze fixed on you again. "What?"

"It's just… I didn't lose my temper this time, and... well — it was sort of... nice."

Nice. The word you had used was nice. Sebastian found it anything but that: it had been humiliating to say the least. But again, he was the loser.

"You didn't lose your temper alright," said Sebastian, looking away. "Though we may need to get even on that."

Your eyebrows lifted and you broke into a giggle. "Yeah, perhaps. Even if I'm sure I'm not as much of a smooth talker when you’re not in… well… emotional distress."

To his own surprise, Sebastian smiled back, genuinely and widely and almost tenderly, letting his chest tingle freely and a little more than needed. "So you took advantage of me."

"That I did." You nodded at him. "It’s a pleasure doing business with you." And with that, you started to walk away, leaving him stunned but smiling in the middle of the corridor.

"Ah, before I go," you suddenly added, turning around and walking backwards, and his eyes shot to you once more; "last time I saw Ron and Hermione, they were near the Grand Staircase, on the second floor. If I meet them, I’ll send them to you."

You waved at him and turned around, walking down the stairs and disappearing from his sight.

[Read more]

Taglist:

@lovely-maryj @yuzuhasbae @mosf13 @rbfacee @prichuchan-blog @h0neeyy @lina-prongs @moonlightsolo @ninicol @gayandfairycore @nanako-sakura @epicy0n @shiro-from-cafeberry

(I'm having trouble tagging some of you, sorry :( )

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disgruntledexplainer · 3 months

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It's kinda fascinating looking at the differences between Ben's and Rex's approaches to combat. I'm not talking fighting style, I'm talking about how they carry themselves, and interact with their opponents and bystanders.

Ben 10 is motivated to heroics primarily by his dislike of bullies, though it can sometimes be masked by his love of the limelight. he sees his opponents as bullies, picking on people who can't defend themselves in order to make themselves feel more powerful. in fact, almost all of his major villains fall into this category, including Vilgax, Kevin 11 (before redemption), Hex, Charmcaster, the Highbreed, and Agreggor. When Ben approaches combat, he approaches it as someone intervening in a schoolyard fight. He gets in between the aggressor and the victim, transforms into one of his more intimidating aliens even if it isn't the right one for the job, squares his soldiers, looks his enemy in the eyes, and demands that they redirect their aggression. He even uses phrases like "why don't you pick on someone your own size". He doesn't usually harbor any real ill will toward his opponent, but he wants them to stop what they're doing immediately.

The story of Ben 10 is the story of a kid who got bullied through much of his childhood, who suddenly gained the power to stand up to the bullies for the sake of other kids, and adults as the case may be.

Rex's approach to combat is a bit more complex, because he basically has 2 varieties of enemies, and thus 2 "modes"; hero mode and soldier mode.

The majority of Rex's opponents are EVOs. These are normal, regular innocent people who have become monsters through no fault of their own. To Rex they aren't bullies, they aren't even enemies; they are just innocent, sick, scared, and extremely dangerous people. Rex wants to help them, and indeed he really is the only one who CAN. But he can't let them hurt anyone else. Rex is also very conscious of his position, the fact that to so many people he represents hope of getting out of this dark time. When dealing with most of his foes, Rex first aims a blow at his target to knock them back and hopefully stun them, and then if there are any people in immediate danger he checks in on them quickly to see if they are OK. He might try to get them out of the area before engaging, or he might delegate that task to a nearby providence agent or less powerful hero as the case may be, but he usually checks regardless.

If he is convinced that everyone around him is at a safe distance, the show begins. He turns his cockyness and snark up to 11 and begins making aggressive, annoying moves to try to focus his opponents aggression on him. He projects confidence to everyone who can see him, to assure them that yes, he has everything under control, and everything will be fine so long as they follow his instructions. He carefully gauges how much punishment his opponent can take and only uses that much to take them down, even if it extends the fight. He will try to stun his opponent and cure them if possible, and if not he will hold them off long enough for Providence to come in and contain them.

By dramatic contrast, his other opponents are typically not just villains, but actual irredeemable psychopaths, the kinds who will maim, torture, or kill if it suits their purposes, or even just because it amuses them. In this case, as soon as Rex realizes what kind of opponent he is facing he switches "modes" almost instantly. He will immediately try to lure his opponent as far away from a populated area as possible, and if that isn't possible he will task providence agents or minor heroes to move everyone out as fast as possible. Then he fully switches to soldier mode. When in this mode, Rex's goal is to take his opponent down fast and hard, using lethal methods if necessary. Every second his opponent remains standing is an opportunity for that opponent to kill someone, so he has to take them down without hesitation. Just look at the difference in how Rex treats everyday EVOs compared to how he treats his main antagonists, like Van Kleiss or Quarry. He goes straight for the kill, sometimes without even saying anything if the opportunity presents itself. This is the result of his paramilitary background and painful experience.

anyways, these are my thoughts.

#ben 10 #generator rex #rex salazar #fighting styles

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storiesbyrhi · 4 months

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Witch!Reader x Bat/Vampire!Eddie Munson Series Masterlist The Grimoire The Timeline

Warnings: canon typical violence, horror genre typical violence/some infrequent gore, swearing, animal death, no beta, death in childbirth (mentioned, not described), abusive parents, suicide, spiders/bugs, grief/mourning; light smut; warnings updated each chapter.

Synopsis: No witch has stepped foot in Hawkins since 1845, but when Vecna opens the ground and poisons the town, a voice begins to call to you. Have you been brought back to this cursed place to heal the townspeople’s wounds, to save a hexed bat that always finds its way to you, or to redefine your history with a reunion 150 years in the making?

Chapter Summary: A non-linear and incomplete series of vignettes. 3635 words.

I: Once upon a time

1986

Once upon a time, there lived a little witch. A very special kind of witch, in fact. Where her coven viewed the world in black and white, she not only saw shades of grey, but an entire rainbow of colours. Where her sisters saw an enemy, she saw an ally. Where the witches who walked the earth before her saw danger, she saw people in crisis.

Oh, yes, you are a very special kind of witch. The kind of witch to fight tooth and nail to heal a bat, save a town, and rip your memories from the locked away part of your mind straight back into consciousness.

When you were made whole again, you and Eddie slipped into a warm bubble of rosy oblivion. For hours, you didn’t talk, didn’t think, didn’t do much of anything except hold each other and press featherlight kisses to lifelines on palms and blue veins on wrists.

It would have been easy to waste days there. You could have withered away, happy at last. Alas, Eddie was far more attentive to your biology than you were, so you left the bed bubble and made your way back into the real world.

Here lies a non-linear and incomplete series of vignettes of that real world, once upon a time.

II: Did it foretell of fate?

1986

Eddie’s hair seemed to shimmer as you twirled a lock around your finger. “Your hair is more normal now, like, in the 80s, than it was when we met.”

He was upside down on the couch, legs running up the backrest, and head hanging off the seat. You were lying on the floor, face to face with him.

“Do you think it means something? Is it an omen? Did it foretell of fate?” he teased.

You rolled your eyes. “You make fun, but I know you are totally in awe of witchcraft,”

“Being awesome doesn’t make you immune to my wit,”

“I think it’s cute that you think you’re witty,” you mumbled.

“What was that?”

“I said be careful or I’ll turn you back into a bat,” you stated, loud and clear.

“You wish you were that powerful, but it takes at least three of you to do that.”

It made you think. As you sat up and peered off into the distance with glazed over eyes, Eddie huffed. You launched into action, pulling grimoires and moon dust, parchment and white baneberry out from boxes and bags.

To avoid being told to hush, Eddie left you to your work. He tried to distract himself with television. Then, with eavesdropping on Forest Hills. Eventually, his curiosity couldn’t be put aside.

“What are you doing?” he asked, leaning against the kitchen bench turned apothecary.

“I think I can do it,”

“Do what?”

Instead of an answer, Eddie got a sickly-sweet smile and a sly shrug. He knew what it meant instantly.

“I don’t want to be a bat!”

“Oh, but you were so cute,” you cooed.

He was nervous, despite having the upper hand. Witches may have found the cure to vampire death, but you didn’t keep the magic dust on you at all times. He could rip you apart before you had a chance to conjure witchfire. Still, he took a step away from you, trying to act casual.

“What are you actually doing?”

It was always fun to mess with him, you thought. But in this case, you were telling him the truth. “Seriously. I think I can turn you back into a bat. Not permanently. And not in the way the curse did. You’d still be you. You’d be in total control. It’s just… shapeshifting… really…”

Eddie thought on it for only a moment before deciding he still didn’t like it. “I don’t like it,”

“It could be useful,”

“It could go wrong,”

“Eddie, think about it.” You put the vial of bat claws down. “Sunlight didn’t burn you when you were a bat. That alone is enough reason to try.”

There was little function in it. Eddie didn’t see how being able to go out during the day as a bat would be any more advantageous than not going out at all. However, there was a sparkle in your eye he adored, and you had been right – he was entirely in awe of your magic.

“If it makes you happy, my little witch,” he resigned.

You beamed, wrapping yourself around him in the type of hug that made Eddie feel alive.

III: Glass houses

1986

“Too bad the library was destroyed. There so much I want to show and tell you about,”

“I have been watching the television while you sleep… I’m learning.”

You looked up at Eddie from where you were studying maps and ley lines. “Yeah? Equipped to walk out that door and be a twentieth century man?”

“Naturally. Watch.” Eddie stood from the couch and began to mime. He opened the door to an invisible refrigerator, pulling out a can. He cracked open the tab and chugged. He then pulled a face akin to disgust. “This New Coke is not as satisfying as the original!”

You burst into a fit of laughter, much to Eddie’s happiness. “Oh, shit, Eds. You might even be ready for the twenty-first century with that type of scathing satire.”

Eddie dropped back to the couch. “You may joke all you want, but I can hear what the humans out there are talking about,”

“And New Coke is what the residents of Forest Hills are concerned about? Not the huge craters running through the town center or the constant attacks from supernatural creatures?”

“They also spend a great deal of time talking about the Chernobyl disaster and how it never would have happened here in the U.S., and in the same breath lament the demise of the Space Shuttle Challenger as if it were not another manmade horror.”

You glance up at him again, his gaze is on the television screen. “We haven’t escaped that, you know…” Eddie looked to you, tilting his head. “The hypocrisy. The contradictions that are just so… human. Neither you nor I can look at the humans and judge them for being that. We aren’t better than them.”

There was a flicker of amusement on his face. The vampire in him disagreed. Eddie’s heart conceded, and at the very least he conceded that - “Those in glass houses,”

“Something like that,” you nodded. “What else have you learned about the world?”

“There was a war in Australia,”

“You mean the World Wars?”

“No. Although, I do know about those, and I’d like to hear more. But the one in Australia was human versus emu.” Eddie delivered it so casually that at first you thought he was trying another joke. When you didn’t reply, he looked to you. “Do you not know about the Great Emu War?”

IV: Without you, I’m nothing

1986

Eddie lounged on the floor, back to the couch and legs spread wide. You settled between them, letting him take you by the hips and pull you close enough that your spine was pressed to his chest. His hands found a resting place around your waist.

Candles lit and incense burning, you shuffled the tarot deck while speaking your intentions into the atmosphere. “I ask for guidance in making this decision. I need to confront my coven, but…” You paused, choking on a feeling. “But I don’t know how to do it. I don’t know what’s the smart thing to do.”

Laying out four cards in a row, you continued, “Option A is I go alone. Option B is Eddie comes with me.”

You felt Eddie’s hands move against you a little at the mention of his name. Turning to him you explain that the first two cards represent the pros and cons of option A, likewise the last two are the pros and cons of option B.

“And this one…” you said, placing a single card above the row of four. “…is the advice we seek.”

Eddie snaked his arms around you, resting his head on your shoulder. “Do we leave that to last?”

You nodded then took a deep breath in, holding it until you flipped the first card over. The Emperor sat on his throne, golden crown upon his head. “He represents structure and stability. He rules with force and strength, but is also a sign of protection. As a pro for me going alone, it’s signifying that the safety and stability of the coven won’t be jeopardised. I won’t be seen as a threat to anyone’s leadership or authority…”

“That seems to be a very valid point,”

“Yeah,” you agreed with Eddie as you turned the next card over. “Well fuck.”

Eddie picked the card up and studied it. “He looks… calm,”

“He is… He’s there by choice, or at least, by the choices he has made. He has a different perspective from his position but his future is short. This card represents surrender or sacrifice. Being a martyr. Sacrificing yourself for the greater good.”

Eddie put the card down then held you tighter. “Next one,”

“Next one is the pro of you coming with me.” A man wore a victory wreath and rode a white horse. “Six of Wands,”

“Is he a king?”

“No. But he has been successful in his adventure. His accomplishment is being celebrated by these people here,” you explained, pointing to the image. You consider the card. You don’t feel self-assured as it suggests, and cannot see a version of events that lead to public recognition, as it foretells. You move on.

You almost laughed when the Five of Wands was revealed. The people fought each other, sticks raised but no blows hitting, chaos ensuing.

“Violence?” Eddie guessed.

“No, pointless chaos. See how their weapons aren’t actually hitting each other? It symbolises a lack of purpose in the conflict. It represents how people come from different backgrounds or perspectives, or have different history, and that makes it hard to find common ground. It breeds tension and disagreement and conflict.”

There was a clear narrative forming, the cards guiding you in a way they never had before. You wondered if renegade fate had shared a helping hand yet again.

Hand hovering over the final card, the ultimate advice in the reading, you closed your eyes for a moment. Please, you thought, please.

“This one looks… important,” Eddie commented.

“Well, it’s one of the more detailed images,” you replied. A snake, a sphinx, Typhon and Anubis. An angel, eagle, a lion, and a bull. And at the center of all this rich symbolism was a wheel.

“Esoteric.”

You snorted, nodding. “Very. The Wheel of Fortune is so open to interpretation, but its core message is that life has a hum. It moves forward, in seasons or cycles. There is both good and bad. And there is little to do to stop any of this. Luck may play a part. As does our friend fate,”

“That does not seem helpful,”

“Not in terms of helping to make a decision between option A and B, but it does prophesise a turning point, so…” You shrugged, taking one last look at the hand before collecting the cards and shuffling them back into the deck.

Getting up, you walked around the space blowing out candles. Eddie watched you, recognising the expression on your face. He stood and opened his arms, inviting you to him. Like a moth to flame, you immediately stepped into his embrace.

“Have they told you a story?” he asked.

You looked up at him, surprised.

“You’ve told me before. About the cards. How not to read them in isolation. There is always a larger picture. A story.”

The feeling of regular forgetfulness was soured. It sent an icy chill of fear and grief through you. Every single thing you couldn’t recall would be scrutinised. Did I just forget that because I have lived hundreds of years? Or was that memory cut out of me?

“You’re coming with me,” you said definitively. “I’ll tell Kelsey I’m coming, but nobody else,”

“Okay,” Eddie whispered. He would have followed you anywhere.

Letting go of Eddie, breaking the hug, you looked at him. “This is dangerous. You understand that, right? You’ve never seen the real damage witches can do to vampires. Witchfire isn’t the worst thing they can yield anymore,”

“I know. But to… level with you…” Eddie was doing his best to pick up modern phrases and colloquialisms; it made you smile. “Without you, I’m nothing. If I die, so be it. I’d rather death than any sort of life separate to your.”

He pulled you back into him, pressing a kiss to your forehead, then a trail down the bridge of your nose, to your lips.

You kissed him back hard and felt yourself float as he picked you up and took you to the bedroom.

V: A benevolent spirit

1986

The intersection of science and magic is where you and Eddie often found yourself. A union between creatures who had never walked alongside each other often meant new discoveries in the natural and unnatural worlds. For example, a witch and a vampire walk into a graveyard…

“I recall you, on multiple occasions, dismissing superstition as myths,” Eddie tried to argue, pulling at the ill-fitting clothes he was wearing.

You had forbidden him from dressing in one of his new Walmart outfits, citing lore. “It is disrespectful to the dead,” you’d said, making him wear whatever was lying around the trailer. “Do you want to be haunted?” you asked him, now in the old cemetery out on the edge of Hawkins.

“Vampires can’t be haunted,”

“Are you sure?”

Eddie shrugged.

“Because that is a bad sign,” you noted, pointing at the wildflowers that were dying under Eddie’s bare feet. The rot was coming from him, drying out petals and killing the plants.

Eddie looked down, seemingly alarmed. Every step he took away from the decay only started a new outbreak. “Make it stop,” he demanded.

“I can’t,”

“But I’m not wearing new clothes!”

“No, but you did sit on the headstone when I told you not to. And refused to hold your breath when we came in. Actions have consequences,”

“I don’t have a breath! … This has never happened before,” he whined, speeding up to trail close behind you.

“You probably just never noticed before,”

“I would have,” Eddie said, but you both knew it to be a lie. Before you, Eddie wouldn’t have cared about graveyard etiquette. It was in a vampire’s nature to laugh at the laws of the here and the after. They existed somewhere between and beyond those states, cheating death and laughing in the face of life.

1836

The village had buried Faely at daybreak. She had died before her first birthday, born into the world with a sickness beyond the repair of witchcraft. Though, rules had been broken trying.

You held vigil that night, leaving an offering of rosemary at the cemetery gates, then sitting at the foot of Faely’s grave. Eddie had watched you, deciding if he should approach you or not.

“Here, where the dead rest, a witch will smell fresh roses when a benevolent spirit is near,” you spoke out loud. “But if it is something else, then the scent of death comes, as if none of these bodies were buried at all.”

Knowing you were speaking to him despite never turning around, Eddie moved. He knelt on the dirt next to you. “Something else being me?”

“Or anything malevolent,”

“I mean you no harm, little witch,” Eddie said quietly.

You looked over at him. You had yet to cross the line with him. No secrets or kisses yet shared. It would happen and you knew that, even then.

“I know.”

Eddie held out his hand.

The wildflowers already blooming around Faely’s grave were dying under Eddie’s presence. Yet, you let him entwine his fingers with yours and keep you company.

1986

Eddie watched you locate the oldest headstones in the cemetery as if you had some sort of innate homing device for them. You spoke to the dead and asked for permission to take some of their graves’ dirt with you. Small jars filled, you looked up at Eddie and smiled.

The lightning rolled in, splashing bright but silent bolts across the sky. You stood up, felt the lack of humidity in the air. No rain would fall. No storm would come.

“What is it?” Eddie asked, walking back through the grounds with his eyes firmly in the sky. “That’s not normal lightning,”

“No,”

“It’s happened before,” he remembered, the scene slowly losing its fogginess in his mind.

“Normally, I’d say twice is only a coincidence and three is a pattern, but… I guess this is what happens when we’re both here at the same time.”

When you passed back through the cemetery gates, you left rosemary. Sitting in the car, you looked up through the windshield to the dark and settled sky.

“I don’t think we should do this again,” you told Eddie. “I don’t want to know what the universe does if it thinks this is a pattern.”

He stifled a laugh but shut up quickly when you frowned at him.

“We have pushed our luck so much… Do you think fucking with it all is funny? Like being careless hasn’t ruined us before?”

“I know. I’m sorry. It’s… Of all the things to break the world, it is simply a vampire and a witch being near dead bodies at the same moment in time? That’s what makes it mad?”

You started the car and pulled onto the road. “There is nothing simple about a vampire and a witch doing anything together. Being anywhere together. We need to be more careful.”

1836

As spectacular as it was to watch, and no matter how comforting having Eddie with you to hold vigil was, lightning without thunder felt wrong somehow.

When you returned to the village in the morning, the coven had assembled. The light in the sky had caused anxiety. “Something against the laws of nature has happened,” Gillian announced. Her expression wasn’t one of fear, but it wasn’t set in certainty or peace either. “We need to be more careful.”

VI: The mess of you

1986

It was strange how you could miss something you didn’t know you had and lost. You felt so homesick for Eddie, so touch starved, and empty that rediscovering sex with him was making you cry. The first few times, Eddie wiped away your tears. That was short-lived.

You were on your knees, bent forward with your face hidden in your folded arms. Eddie’s hips collided with you at a mercilessly slow pace, drawing out both pain and pleasure from your insides. With each thrust, your tears came faster and faster. He ran his hand down your spine, the pressure forcing you to arch, contorting your body more.

He folded over the top of you, mouth to your ear. “Why are you hiding from me?”

The only response you could give was a string of babbling sounds. It felt so good. He felt so good.

“I want to taste your tears,” he whispered. Eddie kissed at your neck, scratching his teeth along the surface of your skin. “I want to see you cry.”

In a blink, he had you flipped onto your back, legs wrapped around his waist. His hands were clamped around yours, pinning you down. You couldn’t hide. Couldn’t cover your mouth. Couldn’t maintain any poise, even if you had wanted to.

The wetter your face, the harder Eddie fucked you. It was something about the mess of you, the release, the vulnerability. He set a perfect pace and didn’t let it fall until you were growling like an animal and begging for softness. Then, he gave you softness.

VII: Slit the throat of fear

1986

“I’m so…” How to quantify your emotions… “I don’t know. I don’t think there are words to describe… this.” You racked your brain for the right sounds and syllables. “And, I don’t want to say it wrong. I don’t want to make all these feelings seem smaller because there aren’t big enough words, you know?”

Eddie knew. He was going through the same process, except there was no imperative for him to come to an eloquent conclusion. He didn’t need to explain to anyone else what was happening inside his mind.

You continued, “Part of me wishes it was just anger. If I was just pissed off beyond belief that would be easy to handle. They would understand that. But… It’s not that…”

“You are sad,” Eddie said softly.

Hearing him say it made it worse. Your face pinched into a deep frown and he took you in his arms again. “It’s all so sad… This is fucking miserable for everyone,” you agreed, mumbling into the crook of his neck. “It feels like someone died,”

“Grief,” Eddie stated. “You’re in mourning. And grief has many faces. Misery. Hopelessness. Anger.” He wasn’t especially wise, but now armed with his memories of his human life, he spoke from experience.

You sat up and let Eddie’s words seep into your own understanding of the situation. “It’s not just different faces… It’s… different shapes. I thought this once before but it makes more sense now. This feeling, this grief, it’s been shaped by what I know, the betrayal and the hurt and the… fuck… the paralysing fear of what I have to do now… It’s shaped and sharpened it into a blade.”

Eddie considers your metaphor. “Well then, my little witch, let us use your grief dagger to slit the throat of fear and bravely face your coven, and the world if we must."

End Note: This chapter took me so long to write. I just couldn’t figure out how I wanted it to go, so a huge thank you to @courtingchaos who workshopped some ideas with me, ultimately leading to the little change of pace structure. Also thank you to @jo-harrington, @munson-blurbs, @vintagehellfire, @rip-quizilla, @pastel-pillows, and @word-wytch for giving me historical, fluffy, and tarot ideas. And @vintagehellfire, for the graveyard scene.

Full disclosure, “slit the throat of fear and be brave” is a lyric from Let Me Down Easy by Gang of Youths. I had already written the grief as a knife metaphor, and when I listened to the song again it kind of just fit.

For those of you who celebrate during the holidays - I hope it is joyful. To those that cannot or do not - I hope you have a peaceful time. I appreciate you all so much and will be thinking of you and this safe place we have built together. xo Rhi

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