Having a really in depth conversation about bandits and their lore and I just remembered why I liked this god forsaken series.

Considering who to put in charge of safeguarding the northeastern border of Pars against Turan and Turk before Shapur becomes a marzban and... There aren't... that many, are there? Those younger than Shapur are automatically out of the picture (Kubard, Daryun, Kishward), Bahman has been stationed at Peshawar for a long time by canon era so ?????, Kharlan, is he even a marzban ten years before canon? Even if he was, I associate him much more with the western half of Pars, if only because it would make it easier for him to coordinate with Hilmes in Lusitania (assuming no switcheroos happened like it did with Kishward, he was originally stationed at the southwestern border of Pars against Misr, but was plunked into Peshawar some time before canon).

That leaves us with... Manuchurh, Garshasph, Saam, Khurup, Khayr, and Khshaēta.

We all know what Saam looks like, estimated to be in his 40s, but here's what the other 5 look like (well we also know what Garshasph looks like too but just as a reminder):

Manuchurh:

Garshasph:

Khurup:

Khayr:

Khshaēta:

I... don't feel like Saam is a good fit for the kind of emotional beat I want to portray for one of the two pre-canon Turanian invasions (foreshadowed in chapter 2). So that leaves me with the other three. Three complete and total strangers of whom we know absolutely fucking nothing about.

Which narrows the six options down to five.

I think Khshaēta looks a tad young to have been marzban for too long, so I'm booting him out of the candidate list to make my life easier.

This leaves me with four.

I got nothing for Khurup and Khayr, we know nothing of them, but as for the other two... We know what Garshasph is like, which is, uh, kinda unpleasant, he might be a good candidate for what I'd planned, but also... Manuchurh, Nasrīn's father, Kishward's father-in-law. He purportedly had a beautiful voice and Andragoras made him do the court announcements and stuff bc of his pretty voice.

So basically, among the four candidates left, we only really know two of them.

...which one shall I pick, now?

Oh, I forgot what the emotional beat I wanted to incorporate was, it was Shapur maybe realizing the marzban in charge of the northeastern border may have been responsible for the deaths of his friends and the destruction of their village after the marzban lets slip about some “bandits or potential rebels who kidnapped people and caused unrest” which Shapur knows from talking to the clan before that the abusers or tormentors who felt entitled to their victims might have painted them that way to justify trying to hunt them down or avoid having to confront the harm they themselves have caused to their victims, and Shapur feeling... quite nauseated. Remember how Isfan immediately jumped into trying to avenge his brother in the manga. Remember how rash Shapur was even by the Battle of Atropatene. He won't do anything here, he can't, because Eihon (debuting in chapter 3! I still don't know whether the invasion would be chapter 3 or 4) has made sure to hammer the point home that doing so will only bring them doom, there's no way he can demand justice for a commoner village in the middle of nowhere who were branded as criminals.

He has to swallow his bile and work to repel the invasion. Feeling like he's failed his friends for not being able to protect them, give them a funeral, or even avenge them.

I know with this context it'd be easy for some of you to immediately pick Garshasph considering how much of an asshole he was during the siege but. What if. The emotional whiplash of it being Manuchurh. But also I could just pick Khurup or Khayr to avoid the headache altogether—

Prompt: ASL give Dadan a father's day card. (She threatens to kill them but she keeps the card)

hehehehe this is late BUT HERE WE GOOOOOO

bear hag tiger bandit dad mom

read on ao3 here

“Hey guys.” Ace started out of nowhere, as he and his brothers laid down, staring at the sky from their usual cliffside spot. “What even… is Dadan.”

A beat of quiet.

“A hag!” Luffy said delightedly, giggling as he rolled over to stare at Ace. “An ugly one! Or even a bear! Oh she’s a bear-hag! A bear-hag-tiger-bandit!” He then gasped dramatically, stars in his eyes. “DO YOU THINK SHE CAN HAVE CLAWS! AND FANGS!”

“No! Idiot!” Sabo thumped Luffy on the head without even moving from his position on his back. “Dadan isn’t a bear. Or a tiger. She is a hag though.” He nodded, as if he had made an excellent, proper point.

Ace groaned at his brothers. “No! I mean what even is she to like… us. Not anybody else.”

“What do you mean?” Sabo rolled over as well to look at Ace, who was staunchly refusing to look at anyone else and whose face was turning a brilliant shade of red.

“I mean… like she kinda watches over us right? Does that make her kinda like a parent?”

Sabo cocked his head to the side, thinking. “I mean… maybe? She does give us food and medicine sometimes.”

“NO! THAT’S NOT DADAN! THAT’S –“ Luffy was quickly cut off by a hit to the head from Sabo.

“The Mystery Doctor isn’t real, Luffy, its just Dadan in a shitty mustache.”

Luffy looked to the side disgruntled. “Hmph.”

“GUYS! Focus!” Ace finally rolled over to face his brothers, so now they were finally all looking at each other. “What is Dadan? A Parent? A Mom?”

“I never had a mom before! Or a dad! Is Dadan a dad? Or a mom?” Luffy chattered, jumping on the possibility.

“Neither have I. That’s why I’m wondering.” Ace ignored the latter half of Luffy’s comment. Sometimes it was better to allow him to ramble than to try to make sense of it all. “Sabo you had parents right? What were they like?”

“Shitty.”

“Well, duh. No shit. What else?” Ace prompted, Luffy finally having quieted about Dadan being a tiger-bear-dad-mom beside him, and both staring attentively at Sabo.

(Because, well. They were children who never really had a home beside each other. Dadan was the closest thing Ace ever got, Luffy never had more than spare moments when the bar wasn’t busy, and both never knew anyone that could have been called dad, or mom, or anything of the sort – no one who stayed that is.

Ace hated his dad, and loved his mom (and hated himself, for all that he did,) and Luffy simply didn’t think he had any parents to feel anything about.

Still, Ace wondered, and things that his brothers wondered about, Luffy wondered about.)

Sabo placed his hand on his chin as if to think better. “Well. If we’re figuring out what Dadan was closest to, my mom was kind of like… Eh. She just cared about appearances and looking pretty and shit like that.”

Luffy and Ace nodded as one. “That’s not Dadan.” Dadan might wear make-up and beads, but she was a mountain bandit who was never really seen by people other than her clan or her victims. She didn’t really care about stuff like that. Even if she did get pissed when they stole the lipstick she kept hidden in her back closet for war paint.

“And she cared about other kids more than me, and didn’t really bother me until I did something she or someone else didn’t like.”

“Definitely not Dadan.” Luffy and Ace nodded again. Dadan didn’t have any other kids and yelled at them all the time. (Though, that may be because they never did anything they were supposed to do. What did she expect? Chores were boring! )

“What about your dad? What was he like?” Ace prompted, tossing out the idea of ‘mom.’

“Shitty. He always yelled at me and called me names. He was mean about it though. Dadan just looks like she’s about to cry.” Sabo finished, still thinking hard. “I mean… my parents aren’t what everyone else says parents are like though? At least for the kids in Edge Town.”

“Yeah… dads are supposed to protect you right? And be big and strong? And leaders?” Ace questioned, bitterness tracing into his voice.

“And moms are suppose to like take care of you and bring you stuff! Like the Mystery Doc-“

“THAT’S JUST DADAN!” Both Ace and Sabo this time hit Luffy’s head, cutting him off.

“She just comes to check on us, then trips up all our traps! It’s not a Mystery Doctor! Just! Dadan!” Ace spit out.

Luffy whined as the three of them quieted, thinking over everything that they had just said.

Then, Sabo spoke the words that would seal Dadan’s fate.

“If Dadan is kind of like a dad…” She protected them, or tried to in her own way, and was the leader of the Dadan bandits. “And kind of like a mom…” She was the Mystery Doctor, as Luffy called it, and checked up on them while cursing them out in all sorts of nasty ways. “Then… is she a mom and a dad? Is that how that works?”

“Well. We only have one of her. She can be both.” Ace decided. Jungle life left no room for society to state who could or could not be what and… well…

Besides. Maybe mom’s were the protectors sometimes and the leaders, and maybe dads were the caretakers. Ace was pretty sure that could happen. Did happen. Roles were stupid anyway. Just do whatever the fuck you wanted. That’s how Ace and his brothers lived, anyway, how everyone should live.

But…

“Why were you really asking Ace?”

Sabo knew him too well.

“Some of the kids in Edgetown were talking about how they were getting their dads’ shit for Father’s Day or something.”

And Ace wanted to know if he should be making something for anyone (or just wallow in the hatred he had for his dad.)

If he had anyone to make something for.

Luffy doesn’t even question why Ace was lurking around Edgetown kids without them, and sits up with stars in his eyes.

“WE NEED TO MAKE A CARD FOR –“

“SHUT UP!!”  Twin fist slammed into a rubber head as Ace and Sabo cut Luffy’s idea off.

“HEY!”

Or maybe…

“Maybe he has a point.” Sabo hummed, thoughtfully, as they had all settled into the ground.

“What?”

“Maybe we should make a card for Dadan.” Sabo rolled out of the way of Ace’s fist. “No! Think about it! We get to tell her thank you for all the shit she tries to do for us and maybe she’ll stop yelling at us so often!”

Luffy and Ace looked at him as if he were an idiot.

Sabo felt vaguely insulted.

“It’d be super funny to see her face when we give it to her too.”

Luffy and Ace looked at him as if he were a genius.

Now, there was only one question left.

“How the fuck do you make a card anyway?”

-

Dadan woke up peacefully that morning, which was an immediate cause for her to reach for her knife under the bed and spring into action.

She never woke up peacefully anymore. Not since those three brats had taken to crashing the hut in the morning. Either something was wrong, or those brats were playing with her.

She was going to get more gray hairs than Garp at this rate.

Fuck.

Quickly, she scanned her room for any oddities, any thing that would tip her off to whatever the fuck was going on this morning.

Dresser. Mirror. Weapons. Window. Card. Window. Wall. Wea- Wait.

Card?

Dadan stepped closer to the piece of folder thick paper, lying on her dresser, and peered at it closely.

Hapy Father’s Day! It read, in the misspelt handwriting of a child who had previously learned to write well then gave up. It was in black ink, fancy looking, with a smear along the exclamation point and drifting off into the side.

Around it was jungle trees in crayon and something that might have passed as Dadan, if not for the lack of face, and the only visual characteristics being orange curls and red beads and sharp teeth and a angry look.

Curious.

Wait.

SHE WAS A WOMAN!

Damn BRATS!

She ignored the tears at the edge of her eyes and opened the card, knife set to the side.

Dear Dadan, the same handwriting as the front said, this time in dark blue, thickly pressed crayon. Hapy Father’s day. Thank you for taking care of us. Beside the note was a scribbled jolly roger, an S surrounded by crossbones as its signature. Besides that was another scribbly orange blob, this time marginally closer to looking like a person.

Beneath that, on the same page, was careful red print, again in crayon. The words were spaced out, as were the letters, as if the writer didn’t particularly know how many letters were in the word and was waiting for someone to tell them. It read Shitty Old Hag. Thank you for taking care of me. You are stupid but you are strong sometimes. Happy Fathers Day. – Ace

Besides that was some suspicious wet spots, hastily wiped away.  Dadan dabbed her own eyes as to not add to them.

Ace’s artistry skills were slightly better than Sabo’s at least. His version of her was most definitely a person, apparently sitting atop of a bear. She laughed at that, a little.

Her eyes skimmed to the next page, where a monstrosity of black and orange was red was scribbled out. She was vaguely sure it was human. Vaguely. It might have been a bear.

The yellow crayon writing had been outlined in careful strokes by someone clearly not the original writer. DADAN, it seemed to screech, YOU ARE THE BEST BEAR HAG TIGER BANDIT MOM DAD. MOUNTAIN BANDITS SUCK BUT YOUR COOL. – FUTUR KING OF THE PIRATES

Then, on the opposite side of the drawing, in bright orange, LUFFY.

These stupid, stupid kids.

Dadan wasn’t crying. She wasn’t.

Oh how she loved these kids.

She turned the card around one last time, to the message on the back.

This handwriting, graceful and in black ink, was one she recognized. Makino.

Dear Dadan,

I hope this gift doesn’t insult you too bad, the boys were so excited to do it that I just had to help them with supplies! They really do love you, even if they don’t quite grasp the difference between mom and dad. They told me they just decided you could be both. Isn’t that great?

Thank you for being there for our boys Dadan! Happy Father’s Day.

-Makino

Okay. Maybe Dadan was crying right now.

Oh, she hated the fact that she loved these boys.

“Shishishi!”

“Luffy! Shut up!”

THUNK!

Oh, she was going to kill them.

Dadan turned to the window where a top hat, a straw hat, and a quite obvious head of black hair was peeking out over the window sill.

“BOYS!” She raged, setting the card down with care before running to the window.

“RUN!” Came the terrified call, followed by laughter and joy as three boys sprinted away into the woods.

Dadan debated following them, before deciding she would rather they not see her teary-eyed face.

Ah.

She might not be the best parent, but she did alright at least. Enough to get a card on a holiday.

Dadan loved her boys.

She really did.

The Clouds and the Birds

(Title taken from an autumn haiku by Matsuo Basho)

Sesskaede is a crack ship that suddenly inspired me to write this.

Summary: the Priestess Kaede was eight and ten when she first met the infamous Sesshōmaru of the West. And despite only seeing him a handful of times, her fondness for the cruel demon does not disappear even after forty years.

Rated: T for mentioned and non explicit violence

---

In this autumn,

Why I get older?

The clouds and birds.

---Matsuo Basho (1644-1694)

>>>----------> ♡ <----------<<<

When Kaede was eight and ten and a fully realized Miko, she first saw him.

The most feared Dog Demon in all of Japan with hair the color of a moonbeam and an almost maidenly beauty standing as regal as the Tree of Ages.

He was Inuyasha’s half-brother, Sesshōmaru of the West. He had only known him by reputation, but seeing the demon stand in front of his brother, she did not need to ask him who he was.

“Are you so weak that a human woman was able to defeat you?” He spoke to the sleeping boy struck in the tree. He tugged on the arrow and held onto it even when the seal stung him.

Kaede readied an arrow, one of Kikyo’s, to kill the demon before he did anything else.

“Do not waste your arrows on me, girl.” The dog demon did not even look her way and Kaede did not heed his advice before shooting him.

The demon simply moves out of the way and laughs at her like she was some stupid little girl and ot the daughter of a famed archer and the protector of this village.

“Were you the one who sealed Inuyasha?” he asks as if she had not just shot an arrow at him.

“Nay, my sister did and only she can remove the arrow in your brother’s chest.” Kaede said.

“Half-brother.” The demon corrects. “Your sister must have been very strong if she could do this to someone stronger than the average half-demon.”

“No one, not even I, can ever come close to her.” Kaede said proudly.

The demon lord said nothing and left.

----

Kaede was four and twenty when she saw him again.

This time he had come hunting down the same pack of rabid dog demons attacking a small fishing village just on the other side of the forest where Inuyasha still slumbered.

He looked the same and she had just grown into a grown woman powerful enough to take on stronger demons.

He moved swiftly and with grace, he had no mercy for even for his own kind. His snow-white kimono seemed to absorb the blood and grime the moment it stained the silk. Silk from a demon silkworm was worth kingdoms as it was so incredibly rare.

His kimono and armor had torn and as such his chest and left shoulder were exposed. Had she been as a vulnerable as Kikyo, she would have blushed and fallen victim to the ridiculous notion that demons could love.

Sesshōmaru, as the demon lord of the West, seemed to have been one of the lucky few to afford such luxury while his brother had to make do with the common fire rat’s robe that grew alongside with him.

Kaede readied another arrow and kept her distance from the demon.

“You again. You must be very stupid to think a one-eyed priestess can kill a demon as strong as I.” the eternal youth mocked.

Kaede shoots to the mongrel trying to run away from the car age.

“I am no fool, Lord Sesshōmaru.” The young woman says proudly even though inwardly she was blushing like the stupid girl she was.

---

Kaede was thirty when she made the worst mistake in her life.

A simple excursion to the demon slayers' village had become a fight and out of nowhere a familiar gigantic dog  tore through the crowd of bandits like a knife through butter.

“It is dangerous for a mortal like you to travel alone.” He shifts back into his handsome and youthful form.

“I did not need your help.” Kaede collects her things and gets back on her horse. She had appreciated that he had saved her from men planning to r*pe her, but he did not need to know that.

“I did not need to stop this attack on a woman I have only seen twice, and yet here we are.” He rolls his eyes. He hated humans, everyone knew that, so why had he helped her?

“What makes I, a one-eyed Miko, so special that ye must come to my rescue?” she asks reminding him of that insult four years ago.

“You are tolerable, but not enough to tempt me.” He says and she snorts. “Despite your prejudice against demons and your lack of education, you do not repulse me enough to kill you, Priestess.” He says with a smirk when she rolls her eyes at him.

“Kaede, my name is Kaede.”

---

Kaede is fifty when he shows up at the burial place of a company of dog demons murdered by the Asano Clan almost seventy years past.

She had heard that Sesshōmaru’s father and spouse had been killed while the young demon was away. The demoness whom Sesshōmaru loved must have been strong and beautiful. Somehow, she does not see him with a weak and plain wife even if she were a princess or a demoness.

“Are you so desperate for my attention that you come to where my mate and comrades are buried?” he says anger in his voice making it apparent that he does not like her presence here.

“The burials of dog demons have been looted and the King of Asano asked me to make sure no one disturbed this one.” She said laying down her weapon on her lap.

“How thoughtful him.” Sesshōmaru says bitterly. “His grandfather murdered my mate and comrades as well as my father all because he couldn’t stand that his sister married my father and mother.”

“My condolences, my lord.” She said earnestly.

“I killed Izaburou and Izayoi erected this mausoleum for her husband and mine.” He continues his story.

Husband? Kaede had not assumed that Sesshōmaru was solely interested in women ---and most men all--- but her imagined rival --- a stupid thing that occupied her mind even though she had sworn a vow of chastity--- had never been a man.

“His name was Yusuke, Izaburou hated that I wanted men just the same as I wanted women in my bed.” He touches the name engraved next to that of the Inu no Taisho with such devotion that Kaede can’t help but feel jealous of the dead demon.

---

Kaede is eight and sixty when Sesshōmaru --- two and twenty-- entrusts her with his human daughter.

“There is no one else I can trust with Rin, Kaede.” He says when the little girl talks him into joining them for tea.

“I am honored, my lord.” She says respectfully.

“None, of that, call me Sesshōmaru.” He looks at her like she was her equal and deep inside those secret fantasies she once had about the demon before her let out a girlish giggle.

“It has been fourty years and you have finally given me leave to use your given name.” the old woman chuckles and the stoic demon purses his lips in embarrassment.

“And you are almost recognizable since you foolishly wasted your sister’s arrow on me, my friend.” He says which surprises the little girl trying to impress them with a tea serving ceremony.

“You shot an arrow at my papa?” Rin asked.

“Yes, I shot him when he came to try to unseal Inuyasha fifty years ago.” The old woman nods and Sesshōmaru winces when they hear Inuyasha barge into her hut.

“I can’t believe it, you, of all the people in Japan, came to see me?!” Inuyasha yelled at the unflappable demon.

“I am not the monster you think I am, Inuyasha.” Sesshōmaru rolls his eyes.

Magatsukami. On Yato’s attitude towards his job

I might be a little late for the party with this kind of analysis (I mean, magatsukami who? we only know Yatogami-sama, the god of fortune). Still, have fun with this one *throws another lengthy-ass post at you*

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It probably won’t come as a surprise to anyone that my favorite character in Noragami is the noragami himself. I mean, what did you expect? Yato is an excellent protagonist who holds the narrative focus really well and whose character development is interesting to observe. A lot of things can be and have been written about him, his relationships with Father / Nora /Hiyori / Yukine / Kazuma / Ebisu / etc. What I want to examine is his attitude towards his calling of a magatsukami, or god of calamity, throughout his known life.

Past

I think it makes sense to start from the beginning, i.e. from Yato’s childhood, when his job was nothing but a game to him. Father created him to “cull the heard” and named him Yaboku. He knew what Father’s wish was from the start, even before he got Hiiro as his instrument. Naturally, there’s nothing to say about Yato’s attitude towards his role as a magatsukami at this point – little Yaboku probably doesn’t even know the term.  Here, Father is teaching him how to be a god – in his opinion, anyway.

Rule #1: gods can do whatever they want. Father teaches by example: Yaboku can come and take anything on display in the market without paying for it; since no one can see him, no one will notice anything missing, and if they do, they won’t know who stole from them. A nice little lesson, isn’t it?

Rule #2: gods must fulfill human wishes. Father means his own wish, of course, but divine instincts show through, so Yaboku regards any request as a wish/prayer – like when his victims beg for their lives, for example. Except Father’s wish (or Yaboku’s own wish to make his father happy) is stronger, so those prayers go unanswered.

That’s how Yaboku starts fulfilling his role thinking of it as merely a game. What’s curious is that he seems to have had doubts about Father’s wish before the very first “game”:

But even if he’s had those doubts before, they are completely gone when Father praises him. After that Yaboku hasn’t given much thought to what he’s doing, cause the more ears he brings home, the more Father praises him, and what else can a child dream of?  And as a child he also asks his innocent questions that make your skin crawl – e.g., how come there was another human inside the belly of a woman he “played” with?

That’s how it was before a nameless shinki stumbled upon Yaboku – a shinki whom he named Sakura and who started calling him Yato by mistake. Sakura starts teaching Yato right away, probably without even stopping to think where he got those disturbing habits in the first place. It’s understandable though since she hasn’t been a shinki for that long. Sakura doesn’t know much about the Far shore, including things that are crucial to her survival – like how the water from a spring can heal her blight; it’s unlikely that the thought of a god having a parent who’s raised him to be way he was would have crossed her mind. But she has some very strong views of good and evil, and she starts conveying them to Yato as well, and with a nice and clear reasoning at that. Sakura doesn’t tell him that stealing is wrong “because she said so” – she explains that taking others’ belongings and disrupting the established rules of human interactions by doing so will lead to driving other people away and being left all alone. Unfortunately, she doesn’t have time to teach Yato the value of human life before he takes her to “play” with him instead of Hiiro.

Of course, Sakura is shocked that Yato’s used her to just up and kill an unsuspecting man, so she stings him and runs away. However, she comes back after her conversation with Tsuyu regarding the nature of the gods and keeps teaching Yato to love and have sympathy for humans. Nevertheless, the incident with the man who was dragged by his horse shows just how much Father’s lessons are engraved in Yato’s brain. The first thing to come to his mind is to slay the horse; luckily, Sakura is fast enough to tell him that he’s supposed to cut the rope,  so the man is saved and Yato gets his first show of gratitude from a living human (Father doesn’t really count). From this point on, Yato is not as keen to go and “play” with Hiiro, but he doesn’t abandon his games completely because he still wants to be praised by Father.

So Yato keeps “playing” with Hiiro while also helping out humans with Sakura. It’s the beginning of recurring future situations when Yato will have other shinki whom he won’t use to fulfill Father’s requests and simply disappear for a while to do his job as a magatsukami instead.

It’s pretty obvious that Yato has never got over Sakura’s death – he prefers the name she’s given him, and he also gives his new shinki a part of her human name. But there’s something else to consider. When Sakura explains to Yato what shrines are for, she asks him to be respectful towards any and every wish, and he remembers that.

It’s the same thing he tells to Rabo in “The clash of the gods of calamity”. It’s hard to pinpoint when exactly this extra takes place, considering the only historical reference here is the Toshima clan, which existed in 8-15th centuries, and there’s no way I can determine the time period by people’s clothes. Knowing that Yato was born in 10th century doesn’t help much cause it means that the events of “The clash of the gods of calamity” could take place anytime between 10th and 15th century.

Anyway, for a small extra like this, quite a lot of things actually happen in “The clash…”. Yato is seemingly working on his own now. For the usual payment of five yen he is asked to avenge a girl who was robbed and killed by a female thug from her own village. He and Hiiro come upon some ayakashi-possessed bandits while looking for that woman. They try to kill Yato but fail cause he kills them first, without hesitation or regret.

By the way, the “clash” of the gods of calamity isn’t that much of a clash, really – Yato and Rabo simultaneously slay the last gang member and that’s how they get to know each other. Well, sometimes that happens.

I find the next scene very interesting though. Rabo is pouring wine to Yato’s cup, not knowing that the latter has never drunk the stuff before since Father thinks he’s too young for that. As soon as Yato hears Rabo saying that if his father forbids then he really shouldn’t be drinking, he chugs down the entire bottle. It shows how Yato is already trying to defy his father, even if it is with small acts like that since he’s unable to do much else. And Hiiro calling him Yato and not Yaboku proves that at this point Yato is refusing to go by the name his father has given him and uses the one Sakura’s made up instead. And as they say, drunkenness reveals what soberness conceals; so when Rabo expresses the thought that Yato’s impressive battle skills could attract the attention of samurai, Yato says the same thing Sakura said before, adding a little more of his (or rather, his father’s) thoughts to it.

And yes, Yato actually finds the woman he was tasked to kill by the victim’s brother, and brought back a kimono. After all, the brother’s wish not so much about killing that thug as. It was about bringing back the kimono that was stolen from his sister’s dead body so that she may rest in peace. The drunken confession and the situation with kimono show that Yato, who was torn between Father and Sakura as a child, has learnt to compromise. He will be doing what his father demands of him and fulfill his role of a magatsukami because Sakura asked him to treat every wish with respect.

We don’t know what Yato had been doing for the next 300-800 years. Chronologically, the next event in his life we know of is the slaughter of the Ma clan, which happened sometime 200 years prior to the events of the manga. By that time, nasty rumors about him have been going around on the Far shore.

How true the rumors of Yato’s avarice were is hard to judge. Apart from the Bubble era, when his customers would pay him in thousands of yens, he is shown to only ever take 5 yen per wish. Granted, he’s had some side jobs as well since saving up for his shrine by granting wishes only is pretty much impossible. He’s tried to become a pop-idol, has sold rhinoceros beetles and Bishamon doujins, but even in those cases his prices, apparently, would always fall to 5 yen in the end (or maybe that’s the price he’s wanted to have and simply used the old marketing ploy of fake discounts).

Or maybe what Kazuma refers to as avarice is Yato taking the money for the prayers in person and for every one of them.  After all, renowned gods have a different approach to granting wishes.  They can’t possibly respond to every single prayer left at their shrines, so there’s probably no clear proportion to the number of prayers heard and granted in their case. People simply pray to them and hope that one day their wish comes true and the gods try to grant those wishes whenever they can, but unlike Yato, they don’t actually appear in front of their believers.

Anyway, when Kazuma pleads him to slay the Ma clan, who are turning turning into ayakashi en mass, Yato does ask whether he can actually pay for his prayer. But when Kazuma answers that he’d rather return his name to his mistress than become a nora, Yato agrees to grant his wish without down payment.

If you really think about it, Yato didn’t have anything to gain from this particular job. Suppose Kazuma keeps his word and pays later, so what? He’s a shinki, not a living human; is there any point in granting the wish of someone who can’t help Yato spread his name among the living? The way I see it, Yato shouldn’t care whether other gods or their shinki know about him, as for him the only thing that matters is to be remembered by humans. It’s also not a job from his Father that he wouldn’t have the guts to turn down. And yet Yato takes the request anyway without even telling Kazuma how much he’ll have to pay. Maybe he thinks that Kazuma can figure out on his own that the price is 5 yen; or maybe he doesn’t intend to get the money at all.

The thing that caught my eye in the scene where Yato slays the Ma clan is his reaction to their deaths. He starts cutting them as usual but then stops and doesn’t want to continue, so Hiiro has to persuade him to keep going.

This whole situation is probably an unwelcome reminder that he had to mercy kill Sakura, who also turned into an ayakashi. I actually find it curious how Yato seems to make a distinction between shinki and humans. If we go back to his childhood again, he used to kill humans without giving much thought to the fact that dying kind of hurts. But he instantly recognized that Sakura was a shinki and helped her wash away her blight for no apparent reason. In other words, he knew what compassion was (which Tsuyu also noted when Yato came looking for Sakura to Sugawara-no-Michizane’s shrine) but he only felt it for shinki, not humans. Sakura was the one who made him extend that compassion to humans, too (I’m starting to think that this post should be renamed into “1000 and 1 reason why Sakura is awesome and deserves more love”). What I’m saying here is that maybe, apart from being reminded about Sakura’s fate, Yato is unwilling to kill Bishamon’s shinki because he’s started to value human lives less than shinki’s once again. After all, killing people is his job , and he has to do that a lot. Sakura may have taught him compassion towards humans, but at this point she’s been dead for the second time for like 800 years or so. Yato may have relearnt to not feel sympathy towards humans who he had to kill in order to grant other peoples’ wishes. Killing shinki deliberately, on the other hand, is not something he usually does, unless it’s in a fight with another god.

Anyway, Yato does finish the job and slays every shinki of the Ma clan but one, earning himself both a mortal enemy and his first friend.

Four years later Kazuma seeks out Yato to repay his debt, which only increases my suspicions that Yato had no intention of ever taking the money for killing Bishamon’s shinki. He even fails to recall who Kazuma is and needs to be reminded. Naturally, Kazuma has to ask why Yato, who was rumored to delight in murders, decided to help him. Yato’s answer is curt: Kazuma made a wish, he granted it, end of story. Later, when Yukine asks the same question, Yato responds with “because I wanted to”. I think that he says that automatically to protect Kazuma, who also acknowledges at one point that Yato could have admitted that he he’d killed the Ma clan because he was asked to but opted to silently run from Bishamon instead. It’s obvious that Yato doesn’t tell the whole truth on both occasions. It’s possible that he decided to grant Kazuma’s wish because he’d admired Bishamon since he was a kid and even was somewhat jealous of her power, so he wanted to help. But his main reason had to be Kazuma’s loyalty to Bishamon. Even back then Yato couldn’t keep his shinki from leaving him, and Hiiro has never belonged to him fully – not only was she a nora, out of all her masters she served Father first.

The last episode from Yato’s past before the events of the manga worth examining is meeting Daikoku and Kofuku. It happens around 1900’s; Daikoku is turning into an ayakashi because he’s got mad at Kofuku for releasing their surrogate son shinki Daigo, thinking that it would be better that way. Kazuma refers him to Yato saying that the latter can cut anything, even separate memories from their owner. Yato, who happens to have only a regular knife, not a shinki, pretends to do just that. The circumstances of their meeting are interesting to me cause they solidify a certain trend. It’s ironic that Yato’s job as a magatsukami gave him his first healthy relationships – first his unlikely friendship with Kazuma, who then introduced him do Daikoku (and through him with Kofuku) when Daikoku also sought help from the god of calamity.

In short, here’s a picture of Yato’s attitude towards his job as a magatsukami before the main plot of the manga. In his childhood, he was a god of calamity for a specific person and thought of his calling as a game and a way to please his father. Then Sakura made him reevaluate his views of his responsibilities as a god. The time Yato’d spent with her was not enough to change him completely, but the foundation was made. We don’t know for sure if he started granting other people’s wishes on Father’s order or if it was his own decision to do what Sakura told him, that he needed to answer any prayer no matter what it was. But if the story with the kimono is indicative of what sort of work he’s been doing, then it means that, for centuries now, Yato has taken to granting wishes that had to do with punishing criminals. Maybe the reason he didn’t pity his victims was because they weren’t all that innocent themselves.

Present

Yato is introduced as a “delivery god” in the beginning of the manga. The fact that he is actually a magatsukami won’t be revealed until chapter 27, To be fair, Kofuku does mention that he is, in fact, a warrior god, so he’s killed people, but Daikoku corrects her and says that he doesn’t do that anymore. However, in the very first chapter, when Yato learns that his client Mutsumi’s trouble is bullying, he offers to resort to violence.

Judging by Tomone’s reaction, she doesn’t take him seriously even when Yato says that slaying is the only thing he’s good at and proceeds to ask Mutsumi to list the people whose heads he needs to take. As far as she knows, Yato keeps saying things like that but actually slays ayakashi, not people. Would he really have killed students to sort a problem like that? Considering that later chapters show him only going after criminals, I think not. It’s just that old habits die hard, I guess.

Chapters 27-28 show in detail what kind of jobs Yato does as a magatsukami. Both of these he gets from Father through Nora. What’s interesting (especially compared to the anime) is that he agreed on the first one on his own – he wanted it to be his last job with Hiiro before stopping to grant these kinds of wishes completely. It’s a prayer from a woman who thinks that her daughter’s murderer’s punishment is not strict enough. Contract killing is a pricy thing, so the woman offers Yato a wad of cash that he refuses to take and only accepts his usual 5 yen.

Yato could have taken the entire bundle, which would have solved his financial problems for some time at least. Or he could have chosen any sum other than 5 yen to symbolically detach this job from the requests he takes as a delivery god – but he didn’t. He refuses to accept the whole wad because the life of that criminal has no value to him, but he takes his 5 yen because, for him personally, this wish has the same worth as any other.

The second job is a serial killer who supposedly killed four people and buried them in his garden without ever being caught by the police. This time Yato does not speak with the client directly, so he asks Hiiro if the information is 100% accurate. I personally wouldn’t trust her on that, but apparently Yato finds her words – that the one who’s asked to kill the murderer was his own mother – convincing enough. Except this case turns out to be more difficult that the first. The target has a son, whose mother, according to Hiiro, was the guy’s last victim. Yato decides to go through with the task, but first he locks up the boy in the next room. And again, it’s not clear whether he even gets paid for this job since it turns out that the client is long dead and the second part of her wish was for Yato to find a place where her grandson could live in peace.  The difference in Yato’s behavior in this situation and “The clash of the gods of calamity” is significant. He  felt no remorse in “The clash...” when he was killing those thugs. Here though, he is hesitant at first, just like with Bishamon’s shinki, because he doesn’t want to leave a child fatherless. He only makes his decision when Hiiro implies that the kid is also in danger. And Yato still tries to at least not traumatize the boy by killing his father right in front of him.

And now we’re at the point which was mentioned in the beginning of this post. In Yomi, Ebisu asks Yato why he exists and Yato replies that his job is necessary because the Heavens fail at doing theirs. There’s evidence to that: just before this exchange Ebisu says it himself, that he’s heard Yato’s name in some oral traditions, and Hiiro earlier called the kind of work Yato does “the Yatogami miracle”. So Yato the god of calamity actually has (or at least had) followers other than Father, it’s delivery god Yato that doesn’t. Father and Hiiro also do anything in their power to persuade Yato that people need his job. Of course, he doesn’t like that he has to be kept prisoner to fulfill his functions. He seemingly only agrees to do what he’s told because it’s the best course of action for him at the moment and goes berserk when he realizes that Hiyori might forget him if he doesn’t go back soon. Nevertheless, Father and Hiiro’s manipulations combined with genuine gratitude from those who need “the Yatogami miracle” have an impact on him, which is evident in his answer to Ebisu.

Whether Yato likes it or not, his words about the cracks in Heavenly justice (or more specifically, “the holes in Heaven’s net”, which is supposed to catch all evil-doers) mirror Father’s opinion of the Heavens.  Father’s plan to simply kill people and thus diminish the number of those who believe in gods seems to be really flawed to me. So maybe he understood that, too, and chose a different approach. I’ve written earlier that we don’t know if Yato started granting other people’s wishes on Father’s orders or Sakura’s request. But I can imagine that it was part of Father’s plan. Originally Yato was forbidden from even talking to strangers. However, having noticed that he was changing because of Sakura, Father might have started to teach Yato to answer prayers of revenge/restoring justice – to show him how often gods don’t respond to people’s wishes before it’s too late and the only thing that’s left is revenge. Yato may not have given a lot of consideration to that, thinking that he was doing what any god should be doing – answering prayers to continue his existence. But the number of wishes like those only grew, and so the idea that he really was a “necessary evil”, as Father puts it, became more and more ingrained in his mind.    

Another important aspect of Yato’s attitude towards his job as a magatsukami is that, in a way, he has an addiction to it. The last time he returned to this field of work he was literally kidnapped and held hostage. But he’s never actively tried leaving Father and Nora before.

There are multiple reasons why Yato wouldn’t leave until he was told he was free to go. Firstly, he simply didn’t have anywhere to go. Sure, we’ve been shown that his previous shinki weren’t completely unconcerned about him – after all, they would come to Kofuku looking for him. However, since no shinki other than Yukine (except Hiiro) stayed with him for longer than a year, he probably wouldn’t have much commitment towards them. (The official translators actually raised an interesting question in their blog; at least, I never thought much about it before. As we know, it’s established that there are lots of gods who are born from small wishes and don’t exist for long but still manage to name a shinki or two. Kunimi’s first master was like that – he was a doll-like god with his own miniature shrine, born from a game. This wasn’t enough when the children who made him up stopped believing in him. When that god disappeared, the name he gave to Kunimi did not, so as long as Kunimi has a master, he will always be a nora. Here’s the question: how many of Yato’s shinki thought that he simply stopped existing and went looking for another master? Kofuku says that sometimes Yato would go missing for years,  so the shinki who got the -Ne name not long before he’d return to Father (you know, the ones that would come to Kofuku) were either eaten by ayakashi or found another master and became forever noras).

Secondly, Father and Nora provided him with food and protection from “wild” ayakashi, so Yato didn’t need to think of places to spend the night. After all, he wasn’t always so lucky as to find a large shrine with a roof like Tenjin’s; sometimes he would sleep besides statues of Buddha.

Thirdly, he couldn’t go against his father’s wishes. Even though he’s had other believers (how else his name would appear in those oral traditions Ebisu was talking about?) he is convinced that Father is his lifeline. When Hiyori saw Yato’s reaction to those who commit suicide, she thought he hated them because they throw away the lives that shinki would love to have lived. That is true, but it’s not the only reason. Unlike renowned gods, Yato is in the position of someone who could die any moment. Unlike humans though, he wouldn’t have a second chance as a shinki, or go to the afterworld where he already is – he would simply stop existing and no one would ever remember that he was there. To him there’s no difference between gods who don’t appreciate their immortal lives or suicidal people – from his point of view, they all willingly give up on something that he’s working so hard to gain.

And if he wanted to keep that something, he had to work as a god of calamity.

Fourthly, no matter how different Father’s and Sakura’s lessons and approaches were, the one thing Yato’s learnt from them both is that he needs to grant any wish. Not because someone has to do the dirty work when the Heavens are idle, not because they support his existence as a god – it’s something he has to do because it’s the right thing to do. It’s ingrained in his mind. Even the actual plot of Noragami starts when Yato decides to grant Hiyori’s wish, even though she’s never finished her sentence, and takes her 5 yen on his own initiative.

And we also shouldn’t forget that, even though it doesn’t concern him anymore, up to recently Yato still wanted Father’s praise. Father doesn’t say a single nice thing to him now, but that’s not how it’s been before.

On the other hand, Father keeps newspaper clippings of mysterious deaths caused by “the Yatogami miracle” the same way normal parents have keepsakes made by their children. Except that doesn’t make Yato happy at all.

Finally, Yato reveals one more important reason to Yukine after he’s released Nora and decided to become a god of fortune.

On the surface, Yato seems to be quite full of himself. When he does something impressive or, alternatively, other characters question his competence, he responds with “how long do you think I’ve been a god?” Yet none of the hundreds, maybe even thousands of other jobs he’s done would give him recognition comparable to his work as a god of calamity. Sure, people would sometimes give him beer or food as a tip for his “delivery god” jobs. But Rabo told him that his battle skills could win him glory among samurai. People would offer much larger sums of money for contract killing than for cleaning bathrooms or looking for missing pets, even if Yato wouldn’t take them. The more he killed, the more praise he would get from his Father.

I think this quote from FMA describes his situation perfectly:

Yato keeps saying that the only thing he’s really good at is slaying. No wander he would want to keep doing something he thinks is his strong side. Getting praise and gratitude from others is important, but every person has the need in self-actualization. His job as a magatsukami has been giving him exactly that – not just the chance to know that hi’s good at what he’s doing, but to see it with his own eyes. Kazuma may not have been too far off course when he said that Yato delighted in atrocities: even when he would occasionally have doubts in what he was doing (like killing Bishamon’s shinki or the serial killer who had a son), some part of him must have felt that satisfaction and pride of a job well done.

  In short, Yato’s attitude towards his job as a magatsukami is very ambiguous. It would give him protection from his enemies (ayakashi), food and shelter, the absence of which may not be lethal but is still notable.  It would also deprive him of the possibility to have autonomy in his actions, to move around freely and decide anything in his life. It would bind him to Father, the man whose magnificent child rearing methods are the reason Yato’s mental state alternates between that of a thousand-year-old god, a bratty child, or a rebelling teen.  It’s also led him to Kazuma, Kofuku and Daikoku and later Ebisu, and each of these encounters has brought something good to his uneasy life. It would always remind him that killing is the only thing he’s good at while showing just how good he is.

Future?

Yato found his will to stop doing the job of a god of calamity when  Ebisu showed him that making others happy doesn’t always mean granting others’ wishes. He saw that a god can have their own will, like Ebisu having his own wish to decrease the number of disasters in the human world by controlling ayakashi. He released Hiiro after being unable to do that for a thousand years. Whether he knew that a god doesn’t get to name a shinki they have once released is unknown, but what’s done is done – he will never “play” with Hiiro again.

However, “god of calamity” is not a mere description of his previous functions. A god’s “profession” is also their nature. Kofuku can cause a pandemonium by the sheer force of her aura alone. Ebisu, a god of fortune, is tremendously lucky (well, safe for being falsely accused and executed he is a pretty lucky god). The problem Yato currently faces is that when he was working as a magatsukami he didn’t think twice about how his actions would affect other people. But now he can’t get rid of the thought that even if he isn’t a divine assassin anymore, his nature as a god of calamity hasn’t changed, so he is the reason of all the bad things happening to the people closest to him.

Hiyori says to Yato that he’s been her god of fortune for a while. That’s nice and all, but all the problems that Hiyori’s classmates list have been caused by Yato directly or indirectly. The accident? If Hiyori hadn’t tried to save him from the bus, the accident wouldn’t have happened and she wouldn’t have become a half-ayakashi. The call girl accusations? Yato was the one possessing Hiyori’s body and giving his visit cards to anyone he could find. And the fact that he calls himself a “delivery god” even in original Japanese only exacerbates the matter. In Japan, house calling a prostitute is referred to as “health delivery”, so the reaction to his visit cards is understandable. And though the hospital incident has been staged by Father, he’s done that because he got mad at Hiyori for trying to lead Yaboku astray from his true path of a god of calamity. That’s quite the food for thought. Moreover, even though Yukine and Hiyori go out of their way to make Yato a god of fortune, even though he tries his hardest to achieve that, he can’t get away from being reminded of who he used to be.

To make Yato a god of fortune, Yukine suggests that he keeps doing what he’s been doing, only with a different goal in mind – slaying ayakashi, not humans, and do all that without being asked. But if his methods haven’t changeв, is there a chance that we’ll still see magatsukami!Yato again? I’m NOT saying that this is how the story will end, because it would completely undermine the message of this series. However, when Bishamon nearly killed Father, it was Yukine who decided to strike her when he saw Yato passing out; it was his hafuri power that sundered the Heavens. But Yato also felt something in that moment– something he hasn’t felt for a long time.

So… who knows?

P.S. if you have a Yato overdose from this post, please don’t blame me

Stories I’ll Never Write

I saw someone else do this and it was great, so 

Fantasy Desert AU: Reylux

About two desert tribes, the Skywalkers and the Palpatines, and a mage from far away.

Kylo and Rey are the fiercest warriors of their respective clans. Traditionally, to keep from tribal war, the strongest warriors settle disputes by combat. They stride into the circle with wooden swords or nothing at all, and fight each other into submission.

It’s the only time they get to touch.

They can't say tell anyone they enjoy each other, because that would anger everyone. After the sun sets, they sneak off to be alone together without the pressure from their grandfathers, but it's hard, and sometimes they almost get caught and have to abort. They go to bed lonely and wistful. 

One day, a ship lands at the nearest sea. Rey and Kylo travel there with a few pack animals and a few cousins from both tribes, to retrieve the goods they ordered. They wait on the beach as the ship’s crew unloads the rowboats. Several people in black velvet robes also disembark from the rowboats. 

Kylo exchanges an excited glance with Rey. It’s clear those are mages from a foreign land. No-one in the desert would wear such robes, that heavy cloth doesn’t breathe the way it should. Neither of them has ever actually seen a mage, since there's no reason for one to visit their tribes and no one would hire one, since that would upset the delicate feudal balance they have. Perhaps they’ll be treated to a display of magic!

The last mage exits the rowboat. They lift their heads, looking around like tourists as bandits on horseback surge out of the hills, screaming, riding hard toward the sea. 

Kylo and Rey both move to guard their people, but the bandits gallop toward the mages. They race to the boat on the beach, scimitars out. The mage with the blackest robes steps in front of the others, throws up his hands — and is beheaded by a bandit.

Kylo gapes. Mages are valuable, and these are clearly unarmed. Rey scowls, and they spur their own horses into action with loud shouts, dashing down to the beach.

The bandits claim another victim, the head of a second mage rolling on the sand, and the two warriors drive their horses to greater speeds. They reach the bandits as one raises his sword to take another life, and Kylo slices that bandit's head from his shoulders. Rey takes another bandit, stabs him and kicks him from his horse.

There's only two bandits left. One of them wheels his horse around and gallops off, and the fourth stabs at the nearest mage. He slices through the robe, and Kylo slams his horse into the bandit's, and Rey cuts the bandit's head off. The two remaining mages collapse on the sand, huddled together. Kylo stands in the saddle.

"He'll bring help. I should go after him. Stay here and help your people."

Rey shakes her head. "My people will claim both mages. Stay. If that sandrat brings any more thieves, we'll kill them as well."

Kylo can't argue with her logic. He wheels his horse around and looks the mages over. Their hoods have fallen back in the fight, and he can see them clearly. One has red hair, like a sun fairy. The other’s hair is 

a more natural black. They're both pale, white-pink like cactus flowers, and the one with red hair is holding up the other one. Blood spatters their faces and their robes, and darkens the sand at their feet.

"Please," one says, his accent thick, "help my friend. He's injured. We can pay you —"

"Rey!" Her people call out, one of them glowering. "What are you doing with that Skywalker?"

Rey's jaw tightens. She glances at Kylo, ignoring her relatives to wave at the sailors. "Unload our goods! We'll protect you!"

Kylo dismounts and gathers the dead bandits' horses. The bandit corpses he leaves on the beach. The water will carry them away, and the fish and sea predators will dispose of them. He leads the horses back to Rey, holding out one set of reins. "Here. Take one, I'll take the other."

The red-haired mage makes a distressed sound. "No! Don't separate us, I can heal him, I just need —”

"REY!" It's one of her uncles. He urges his horse closer, glaring at Kylo as he approaches. "You children have been at this too long. No more talking, Have these two mount, and they will return to the oasis with us. Mages are useful. We will each keep one."

Warriors Kylo and Rey might be, but they are not chiefs, nor elders. Rey bows her head. "Yes, Uncle."

Kylo says nothing. Rey's uncle cannot command him, but this is not the time to start an argument. Not when Rey is here, and he can still work with her without her grandfather's evil eye upon them. He assists the mages onto the horses, lashing the black-haired one to the saddle. The red-haired one mounts on his own, his black robes rucking up to show bare legs. Kylo frowns. They'll both burn in an hour. They need to hurry back to their territory.

The redhead speaks up, clutching the reins. “I’m Armitage Hux. That’s Dopheld Mitaka. We need to stay together, please.”

Rey shakes her head, ever so slightly. She cannot disobey. 

They take Mitaka and Hux back to the camp. Per Rey’s grandfather, Mitaka is quartered in a tent with one of Rey’s married aunts, who is trained in healing. Kylo’s grandfather orders Hux to stay with Kylo, both for safety and as punishment for Kylo’s willfulness. 

---

Hux is given a pallet across from Kylo in Kylo’s tent. This sort of life is much the same at the magic college, except washing and changing is done inside the tent. Hux sees much more of Kylo than he ever expected. That, coupled with Kylo’s interest in mages and kindness toward Hux, eases Hux’s fear that he or Mitaka will be ill-used. It’s worse.

They are not used at all. 

Mitaka is kept away from Hux, and Hux is not allowed to do anything but sit. He came here for a reason, an important one, but no-one will listen to him, nor even let him speak more than four words. Water, food, and clean, light desert robes are all brought to Kylo’s tent, and Hux can do nothing but accept them.

After several days of this, eating dates and nuts and flat bread and having nothing to do but talk with Kylo when the latter isn’t on duty, Hux offers to show Kylo a bit of magic.

Tactfully, he mentions that he saw how Kylo and Rey looked at each other out there on the beach; they clearly wish to communicate but can’t. Hux offers to show Kylo how to send messages to Rey with his mind, so the two of them may talk without even leaving their respective tents. Hux admits he can’t do it himself very well at all, but Kylo may have better luck.

They sit together, holding hands over a small bowl of water. Hux explains that his is related mostly to water. This sounds useless in a desert, but Hux lives on an island in the middle of the sea, where water is plentiful. He can summon fog, or clouds; with blood, he can change sand or dirt to water; he can influence waves or rain; he can purify liquids; and he can also draw water from anything that holds it. He can also do "simpler" things like telepathy, empathy, and scrying. He can't make others capable of using telepathy, but by holding Kylo's hands, he can guide Kylo through the meditation that may allow him to tap into his own magic.

Much to Hux’s surprise, it works.

It's painful to sit there, to hear Rey’s shocked surprise and warm pleasure. To listen to Kylo and Rey flirt with each other. Hux clutches Kylo’s large, calloused hands, stares into the tiny bowl, and realizes it hurts because he’s fallen in love. 

He knows Kylo loves Rey, so he's not going to try to get involved with Kylo. Maybe Kylo would choose Hux if he knew how Hux felt and Rey was okay with it, but Hux doesn't want to rock any boats. He needs to get to the capital, and he needs to make sure Mitaka heals up and can come with for the mission. Getting involved with Kylo — who is practically engaged, Hux can hear every loving word he and Rey say to each other — would be a mistake.

---

Two weeks of brief hikes and daily mental conversations with Rey, Hux asks Kylo for help. He’s assisted Kylo and Rey because he wants Kylo to be happy, and because Rey relays news of Mitaka through Kylo. He doesn’t say this to Kylo, his tentmate for a fortnight, but he does meet those clear brown eyes and formally requests assistance. Surprised, Kylo sits across from him on the thick carpets and listens.

Hux tells Kylo what no-one but Mitaka knows: that they crossed the sea to save Kylo’s country and help his king. Hux suspects the bandits were hired to assassinate the mages so they couldn't travel to the capital of the desert country. He and Mitaka need to go.

Kylo has come to respect Hux enough that he doesn’t laugh, but his skepticism is written all over his face. Giving in to his frustration at last, Hux grabs the small bowl, pours their precious water into it, and holds out his hands, palms up. Kylo hesitates, then slides his hands into Hux’s. Hux closes his eyes and opens that memory, the one with the Arch Mage, the planning. When he opens his eyes, Kylo’s face is grim. He pulls his hands away and exits the tent.

They start for the capital that night, Kylo, Rey, Hux, and Mitaka.

---

The journey is only a day, but it’s long enough for them to construct their own plan to reach the king. When they get to the capital, they separate. Kylo goes with Hux, and Rey goes with Mitaka, so each mage has a guard. When they're in position inside a shed outside the palace, waiting for the sun to go down, Kylo asks to speak with Rey. Hux agrees, and holds Kylo's big, rough hands. They shut their eyes, and Kylo reaches out to Rey. Their link is so strong now that they can practically see each other, which means Hux can see them, too. The way they look at each other, all that devotion. How they tell each other to be brave, and safe, and that they'll find a way to be together after this, when Hux is gone. 

Oh, they don't say that, they're too polite, but he's in their thoughts along with them. He can tell what they mean. Kylo doesn’t need Hux to speak to Rey, not anymore. They’re strong enough on their own. Hux should tell them. But if he does, he’ll never touch Kylo again, and he can’t bear that thought.

When they're done talking — when Rey is done kissing Kylo in her mind’s eye— Hux decides to ditch Kylo. He'll finish the mission on his own, and Kylo will be safe and with Rey, just like he wants.

It isn't hard to slip away when Kylo goes out to check the perimeter. Hux merely waits until he's briefly out of sight, then walks off in the other direction. He can't call down fog or clouds — too obvious in a desert town, too out of place — but he's had plenty of experience making himself unseen. He makes his way through the darkness to the capital building. They'll be glad to have Hux off their hands, they just have to get used to it.

He sneaks into the palace. There are guards, but Hux evades them easily. He knows one of them is rotten, but he can’t strike yet. He doesn't know which one will try to assassinate the king. The scrying told them only that it was tonight, and then their Order dispatched four members to bring word and protect. Now there's only Hux and a barely-healed Mitaka to complete the mission. Hux can’t fail.

He locates the king, still in the audience chamber. The balcony that runs along the top half of it is dark and empty. Hux crouches there and waits, watching. He uses what faint power he has to read the emotions of the guards and the king. So far, there is only boredom or pride or satisfaction. No-one with anxiety or bloodlust or deceit. But it IS today. It will come, and it will be someone trusted...

When the king sends away all but one of his guards, Hux thinks this is it. This is the moment —

"— and especially those desert barbarians," the king says. "Once we sell them to the Naftii and claim their oases, we'll make money like never before!"

His empathy is still active, the King's feelings clear as crystal, and Hux doesn't have one moment of doubt. The King speaks the truth. He will take Kylo's people and dispose of them like garbage, steal their freedom and sell them into servitude to fatten the crown's coffers —

Before he can stop himself, Hux is on his feet, his magic flaring into life, green as the island from which he hails. Bright green, poisonous green, tendrils shoot out, seeking water and latching onto the most plentiful sources, dragging it out of bodies as through cheesecloth.

The screams of the King and the one guard are brief. When Kylo appears on the balcony with Rey and Mitaka in tow, it's too late. The deed is done.

Rey and Kylo stop when they see the King's desiccated corpse. They glance around and see Hux at the balcony railing.

"Hux?" Kylo asks, disbelief echoing.

Hux doesn't answer until he's back on the first floor, the tiles swirling patterns around his feet. His deed can't be tolerated. Surely Rey will strike him down where he stands.

“Oh, Hux.” She shakes her head. "You helped us, but you've done something unforgivable. We won't attack, but neither will we assist. They’ll come for you, you're a fugitive now."

Mitaka is frantic for the truth. Hux is his friend! "No, wait, you can see his thoughts. He had a reason for this, surely. I'll go in with you and you can see for yourselves!" 

Rey is doubtful, but Kylo agrees. They grab hands quickly, all four of them, and then Kylo says, upset, "But Hux, what were you THINKING?!"

Their minds are open to each other, and startled, without control, Hux accidentally shows them what he was thinking.

He had to protect their people, but he had to protect Kylo most of all. And since it's telepathy, and because the thought is so strong, they can all feel what Hux was feeling, and they know it's true. All secrets are revealed: the planning, the King’s words, and Hux’s deepest, most shameful secret of all.

Hux is in love with Kylo.

Mitaka drops hands, this wasn't what he thought would happen and he doesn't know what to do. Rey is also partly shocked, partly embarrassed, partly saddened for Hux. Of course someone would fall in love with Kylo, Kylo is wonderful.

Kylo doesn't let go of Hux's hand, though. He holds on tight, even when Hux tries to pull free.

Kylo didn't know Hux felt that way about him. Hux is angry and still embarrassed, and he tries to pull away again, but Kylo just won't let go. He makes Hux listen. Hux cared enough about Kylo to want to save him, even though it meant trouble for Hux. Killing a king is serious, it's going to be difficult to explain to people, but Hux did it anyway — and Kylo won't abandon him.

Hux can't endure that, it's too much for him. Kylo really is perfect, and he's all Rey's, and this is the worst day of his entire life, and he wants to die.

He pulls again, harder, but Kylo still holds on. Kylo glances at Rey, and that's even worse, salt in the wound. She comes closer, and says quietly, unbelievably, "Did you know Kylo enjoys the company of men as well as women?"

Hux doesn’t understand — and then he does. His eyes widen and he moves to flee, but Kylo keeps him there, and says sincerely, "I didn't know you felt that way about me. That... changes everything."

Kylo feels so badly for him, Hux can sense it, and so does Rey and gods Hux can fucking feel them feeling bad, they're so close and they really mean it and — "I can't right now, please, Kylo! I can't! Let's just — Mitaka, fetch their people's leaders, we need them here when we're arrested for regicide. Kylo — later, please?"

They don't have much choice, someone is starting to bang on the door. Kylo reluctantly agrees. They let the guards in after Mitaka escapes, and sure enough, they're all arrested and imprisoned. But with the dawn, not only do Anakin and Palpatine come to the capital, but so does a messenger bird from the Order. Everyone has witnesses regarding the mission and Hux's character, and upon prompting, the surviving queen (by marriage, not an heir) reveals she knew of the king's plans, though she didn’t know how to countermand them, and shows them proof in the king’s own journals.

Hux, Kylo and Rey are all released. The journey back to their territory is quiet, with Anakin and Palpatine glaring at each other. When they reach the oasis, the elders decree that they have been foolish, and the two clans should feud no more. To prove it, they will allow the marriage of their honorable heroes, Rey and Kylo.

Hux wants to die all over again. He's happy for Kylo, but now that Kylo knows Hux's secret, even if Kylo sometimes prefers men, he can't stay. He sends Mitaka to ask the elders for help booking passage home.

The reply he receives is Rey and Kylo coming to him in his own temporary tent, granted by the elders since Hux is not a burden now but a hero.

They come in and sit on the pillows, the carpets warm beneath their feet. They block the only exit. Hux could crawl out under the tent flap, but Kylo takes one hand, and Rey takes the other, and he's trapped.

"No," Hux says.

"Please," Kylo says.

Hux shakes his head once, violently, and looks pleadingly at Rey. "He's yours."

Rey nods. Her hands are as warm as the carpets. "Yes. And he wants me. But I also want him to have whatever he wants. Hux, he wants us both. He wants you."

Hux can't find anything to say. He looks at Kylo, and the expression on Kylo's face is one Hux has only seen when Kylo watched Rey. Now, the same devotion is there, though tinged more with hope than with settled confidence. Kylo isn't sure Hux will accept this, that he will accept Kylo and share him with Rey.

Hux makes up his mind then. His hands tighten on both of theirs, though his eyes meet Kylo's.

He opens his mind and lets them see his answer.

THE END

P.S. It's "yes", and the three of them live happily ever after, and Anakin and Sheev can go suck eggs.

“don’t look at me like i’m a hero. you’ll only disappoint yourself.” For my stabby revolutionary Lavellan Lyanna? Born to a clan, but grew up in the shadow of Halamshiral. I’d love to see how she gets along with Taren and Theo. ❤️

Oh what a badass! I hope you don’t mind that there’s quite a lot of Taren/Theo in this and not a huge amount of Lyanna, I just thought this made a very excellent introduction line for her! Also I haven’t written them fighting together yet so that was neat.

--

“Who are we going to meet again?” Theo asked the question through a long, drawn-out yawn, stretching his arms over his head as they walked. The road was clear of travelers still, and a thin fog was being slowly lifted from the ground with the rising sun.

“Don’t you ever listen when I talk?” Taren scolded in reply, walking ahead of Theo. There was a brightness to his step, despite the fact that they had both only just woken from sleep.

“Not when it’s this early.” Theo grumbled behind him, shuffling in the way that he thought was more fitted to grogginess. Not that Taren would know anything about grogginess. Maybe all those mean spirited letters were on to something, and his brother really was some sort of insane demon who never needed rest. More likely though, it was the entire pot of coffee that Taren had opted to take for himself, after Theo had rejected the bitter liquid, that gave him his pep.

“Leliana only gave a nickname - “Fox” - but she claims some link to us.” Taren explained again, and Theo distantly remembered hearing the information before. He raised an eyebrow at “us”. Taren meant the Dalish us, not the Inquisition. The latter connection was a given for Theo, these days, but his inclusion with the former was more complicated.

“You mean the clan.” He countered quickly; not a question, more a reminder. Neither he nor Taren had been in the company of their clan since the breaking of the world began, but for Theo, the connection had been tentative long before that.

“Yes,” Taren replied, some of what Theo teasingly called his Keeper Voice breaking through in the remark, “that us.”

Theo sighed, it was too early for an argument. “So why are you bringing me?”

Taren shrugged. “I needed a scout,” he answered, “seemed like your sort of job.” Theo nodded along, already forgetting to listen to the answer to what he had just asked, as his mind attempted to wander away into sleepy daydreams again. Taren stopped and looked back at him, waiting for his attention to return; the bobbing of his head must not have been a very convincing response. “And you do have some connection to the clan, too.” Taren’s words were pointed as he linked one of his arms with his, keeping his gait quick as Theo stumbled to keep up. He was talking about himself, Theo realised with a pang of regret. Of course he hadn’t meant to exclude that.

“Did you know her?” He asked, letting Taren lead them on with his quick steps. It wasn’t that hard to keep up, his long legs could outpace Taren easily, if not for his endless supplies of energy.

“How would I know? All we have is a nickname.”

Right. He had said that. Did Taren not realise that it was still not even really dawn?

“Leliana thinks she could be a useful ally, and if the reports are right, I agree.” Taren was still talking, and Theo nodded along again, more of the information returning to his memory.

“Because she works for that elf you met in Orlais.” He had synthesized Taren’s explanation of the political machinations of Orlais into some few simple notes for his memory - elven revolutionaries were fighting against imperialistic nobility; everything was pretty much terrible, and it was mostly the shemlens’ fault. Taren had a somewhat more balanced view of things, one that took into account the relations of other countries, various historical battles, and all sorts of secret knowledge gained through complicated espionage. He appreciated that it was complicated, and if it wasn’t so early he might even have been willing to dedicate real intellectual thought to the discussion, but for his current purposes the categories “elven rebels” and “human jerks” made sense of things well enough. They were off to meet an elven rebel. He supposed that was indeed “his sort of job”.

“Didn’t sound like she works for anyone, from the report. But yes, she has a reputation.” Taren said.

“And you think you can get her to work for you.” Not a question, he knew exactly how Taren thought; and he knew Taren would be there anyway, even if he didn’t want the revolutionary’s help.

Taren shrugged. “She’s still a Lavellan.” Good old predictable Taren, putting on his Keeper Voice again.

The conversation was interrupted by the sounds of a violent commotion ahead. Horses neighing, shouted voices, and the clashing of steel echoed down the road, and a flock of birds lifted itself noisily from the trees. Theo and Taren sprang apart, each quickly reaching for their weapons. Taren cast a barrier over both of them while Theo nocked an arrow, and cautiously, keeping to the edge of the forest which lined the road, they approached.

The commotion was caused by an ambush of highwaymen, who had apparently jumped out to rob a caravan which traveled down the road. The victims of the attack appeared to be but simple travelers - refugees, probably. Theo saw pointed ears poking out of hoods, small bodies huddled behind larger ones. Two of the older looking travelers had shoddy weapons in hand, struggling against the bandits.

His throat tightened, anger flooding him as loosed his arrows at the attackers, catching one in the face before the brute could bring down an axe on a struggling civilian fighter. He wasted no time in joining the fight, aiming careful arrows at the gaggle of unlucky bandits. Taren had sprung to action as well. More protective barriers sprang up around the refugees without weapons, and roots and rock rose and shuddered from the ground under bandits’ feet.

Then as they fought, another entered the fray. She seemed to drop from the sky, two long blades flashing brightly in her hands. She moved quickly, zigzagging her way from one bandit to another, leaving them clutching bleeding wounds or lying motionless in her wake. One of the men ran, and Theo found himself in close combat with the large brute, wrestling against his arms to try to keep a blade out of his face. A couple stabs to Taren’s barrier over him had weakened it, another would likely break through. Their faces were close. The man was big and burly, with dirt-caked skin and wild hair. A sinister grin spread over the bandits face. Theo was taller, but not as broadly built, and his arms wouldn’t be able to hold back the blows for long. He shoved a knee into the man, staggering him long enough that he could attempt to draw his own short blade from his belt, but the bandit rebounded before he could land another blow, and he narrowly dodged a swing of his dagger.

Before he could dodge another blow, the fast fighting woman spun quickly in and out of view, shoving the bandit away, spinning around behind him as he struggled to keep his footing, and stabbing him in the back - a quick succession of stabs under the ribs - the bandit dropped clutching his wounds, tense, and then limp.

Theo took a couple steps back, catching his breath, and looked up at the woman who had come to his rescue. Bright red hair and eyes still narrowed for a fight. The rest of the attackers had fallen now, and Theo let out a breath. “Thanks.” He said to the woman, whose expression was changing now from a grimace to a proud smirk. “That was amazing.” He could have gotten out of it, of course, but credit where it was due: this woman could fight.

“Don’t look at me like I’m a hero, you’ll only disappoint yourself.” Replied his saviour casually, turning away from him to stoop over the now-dead bandit’s body, she rummaged in the man’s pockets, adding what coin was there to her own. As she went about pickpocketing the dead, a small fennec scampered over to her, following her and making circles around her legs.

“But you are one, aren’t you?” Taren stepped toward her, his eye scanning the scene. Theo looked again at the fennec. Oh. Fox. Taren went on talking, listing a few accomplishments that Theo again vaguely remembered from an earlier briefing. The woman stopped gathering spoils and stood to meet him.

“And who the fuck are you?”

Theo tried not to laugh at Taren’s expression. To anyone else, he seemed always to do a remarkably good job of staying calm, but Theo saw him twitch. He was really starting to like this Fox woman.

“Taren Lavellan,” he answered her with stress on the clan name and without giving his title. Not that he needed to, everyone in the world knew his name by now. But maybe he was spending too much time in Orlais, because it seemed to Theo that the words Taren chose when he met people always meant something.

“Oh.” She sounded surprised, eyes widening a little as she spoke, but Theo couldn’t tell if it was a happy sound. “No offence, but I expected you’d be taller.”

That time, he did laugh. He tried to stifle it with his sleeve, but it didn’t matter, Taren was laughing too. The woman’s smirk returned to her face, and her eye landed on Theo. He cleared his throat, banishing the rest of his laughter.

“Theo Lavellan,” he offered in introduction, “I uh, work for the Inquisition.”

“Lyanna.” Replied the woman with a curt nod. She returned her smirking gaze to Taren. “Can I help you, Inquisitor?”

“Actually,” Taren began with a smirk that mirrored hers, but it was amused, more than cocky, “I think we can help each other.”

Introductions over with, Taren broke the conversation to help the refugees return to their feet, and Theo heard him making generous offers of aid as he sent them on their way again. Lyanna was watching him work, the smirk not leaving her face even as her eyes narrowed again in careful consideration. Theo, meanwhile, watched her fox, and idly wondered where he could get one of his own. 

Adventures of Santal. Chapter 8: Aunt's Visit.

Your children are not your children. They appear through you, but not from you. You can give them your love, but not your thoughts, because they have their thoughts. You can give home to their bodies, but not to their souls. You are only bows, from which living arrows are sent forward, which you call your children.

     Santal starts training! Together with the rest of the children, under the guidance of experienced instructors, she enters the Jedi path of life. And this is not so easy. And it all begins in the Jedi Temple, where groups of younglings comprehend the Force, learn to wield a lightsaber and experience the world in all directions and aspects.

     The next day was almost the same. The only difference was that instead of history, there was politics, which many of her clan did not like. Santal herself was neutral about the subject.

     But in the evening something interesting happened.

     - Santal! - Landa ran up to the girl. - They are waiting for you at the gate. About two statues. Do you know those at the entrance where the stairs are?

     Sabura immediately jumped off, although she was tired after a long school day and wondered what awaited her. What a surprise? She even had time to think that it could be a trap. Suddenly someone again wants to give it somewhere, that is, sell it. Or take it somewhere. Or maybe even kill?

     While the girl was thinking, she did not notice how she got there. She had already prepared herself for the worst, even for a new encounter with the Evil Hat. But…

     - Santal! “It was my aunt and uncle.

     Not remembering herself, Santal threw herself into an embrace.

     - Santal, our girl! Well, finally we found you!

     Suddenly, the aunt pulled back, looked the girl up and down.

     - What are you wearing? The woman frowned.

     Santal was frightened. What did she do wrong?

     “Nothing,” she said timidly.

     - Nothing ?! Santal cringed. She did not like her aunt's tone at all. - Have you been enrolled?

     - Yes.

     - What?! - Elina screamed. - Just took it and enrolled? And the permission? Didn't they ask permission from us or you? So, what?

     - No, they asked me. More than once. I agreed.

     - Do not lie! Don't you dare cover them! I do not believe! You couldn't agree to that! They've already brainwashed you. Were in time, you bastards, but you did not notice anything. But we don't blame it at all.

     - Aunt, calm down. Nobody washed me anything. They only bathed in the bath.

     - Here you go. Something must have been mixed in. Well, they definitely did something.

     - Elina. - Nobi could hardly restrain himself from twisting his finger at his temple. - Can you hear yourself? I think you started delirious.

     Santal decided to change the subject, although she knew she would return to the old one.

     - And how did you find me?

     Nobi was quick to reply:

     - Taking all the money, a little from the savings that were, and also ...

     Then Elina interrupted her husband:

     - Quiet, quiet dear. I'll tell you everything myself. - And switched to her niece. - Taking all the money, a little from the savings. It's good that it was enough, otherwise I would have to borrow from the neighbors. We barely bought a ticket for the near future. I had to wait six hours for the flight. Then, when we arrived, they caught a taxi for a long time to take them to the Temple. And now we were simply not allowed there! - Elina again could not restrain herself and switched to screaming.

     "Of course we are not Jedi," Nobi replied.

     - What's the difference? Our niece is there, they don't understand, or what? Fiends! Don't they value family ties at all? They had to let me pass!

     “You wanted to say" us. "

     - Well yes. Okay, Santal, now to the cosmodrome and home. Just collect your things.

     With these words, the Letanka brought her niece into a stupor. She didn't want to leave. If my aunt had made an offer the day before yesterday, Santal might have agreed. But not now. When she began to explore the world.

     “Auntie… I… I… don't want to go home.

     - Sorry, dear, I misheard. It seemed to me, literally for a moment, that you said that ... Baby, you're wrong. You are still quite small and you do not know anything about life.

     - That's it! Therefore…

     - But still. Why tempt fate? Do you know why we protect you? Only here, with us, will you be whole. You, of course, do not yet understand this, but you will. So please listen to your aunt. The galaxy is very scary. Well, I'm not going to lie. And how much evil is around. There are so many doubts and temptations around. All sorts of hunters, bandits and other criminals! Giant slugs. Blue vampire. Crime is the entire underworld. O Strength, I will feel bad now! All in all, I want to say that the world outside Ryloth is very dangerous, cruel and scary. And on the planet itself, in our city there is a family that loves you. There aunt and uncle will be there. You will feel good with us. So to hell with the drama, listen to your aunt!

     - No, aunt. I cant. I feel like I must stay. - Santal spoke in short pauses, wanting to correctly express the idea. “And I see nothing wrong with traveling the galaxy. Here, listen.

     Elina frowned even more, turned purple.

     - Well, go travel. Get in trouble. Or let the villain tear or dishonor. I'm just an aunt, what do I know? Just how to feed, love, cherish. So leave me, I deserve it. Throw it all alone at the end of the day. But know, it will become clear later. I know better that you are better. And I'm smarter, I'm your girlfriend. Just me and Uncle Noby. Nobody else. All our lives we have fed and watered you like our own niece. Accepted as it is. You are always welcome in our house. The door is always open. And here is the unfamiliar Jedi Temple. What if someone deceives you there? One you will definitely be lost. I speak about this only out of love ... We will always understand and console! Safe only with us!      

     Santal listened out of habit to the end and continued:     

     “Aunt, you don’t understand, and by the way, you promised me a secret.      

     - Exactly! Listen ...      

     Elina just wanted to start when she changed her mind and took the girl around the corner. Making sure no one would hear, she said:     

       - You see. I thought not to tell anything at all. But it seems that this cannot be done without. We gave you Sabur's last name for security reasons. So that no one knows. Otherwise they would have found out, and we would have been quickly identified and killed. In fact, you are Santal Shang. You are Bastian and Adira's daughter. According to Twilek's' Santals'Abura Bastian Lia. You always knew that the hunters killed your parents. In principle, it was so. More precisely, this is our version. Because we don't know what to think. A month before what happened, Adira came to me and shared the news. She said that there would definitely be a girl and that she wanted to name her Santal. And you know, your mom was my best friend who saved me from slavery. And I made a vow to Adira that if something happens, I will take care of her. Adira, of course, denied it, they say, why, it is not necessary to take it to the extreme. But I insisted and took an oath.      

     And what do you want to repay? Black ingratitude. You have a home and a loving family. You will not be denied anything. No restrictions, just obey. And in the Temple, early wakes, constant study and no childhood await you. Then you grow up, you will have a teacher. And then the fun begins. You will go on missions with him. You will be told that you will help. In fact, you will take risks. The meaning of life as a Jedi is you never know when you're going to die. And you can die already on the first mission. Anyway, any of your missions can be your last. Unfortunately, it is impossible to see the future. You can live to be eighty or ninety. Or you can play the box at twenty.      

     And deaths are also different. You can die with honor or shame. So, I think your parents have a shameful death. To die even from a tough hunter is a shame. Or you can die in the alleyway, and no one will know what happened to you. Do you want it?      

      Santal never thought about it, and therefore did not find an answer. Elina brought her niece to her original place. And what was her surprise that several Jedi were standing nearby. Among them were Yoda, Adi Gallia, a black Jedi from the council and an even larger-headed one with a white beard.      

     - Well! Here you are, monsters! Know! First, your guards would not let me see my only niece. Second, you won't get it! Leave us alone!      

    - Woman, calm down. - said Adi Gallia. “We're not taking anyone by force. And Santal herself expressed a desire to study here.     

    - Not true! Not true! Most likely, you forced her! My baby has become a victim of your manipulations. You were brainwashed with these things.      

    The woman's eyes widened at such words.     

    - What's wrong? We don't do that. Santal made her own decision. She wants to comprehend the Power and help others.      

   “It's true,” the girl said. - It is very important for me. Perhaps I will find out more. Yes, I want to know a lot and perhaps I can solve the mystery of Bastian and Adira.      

    - How do you know? - the black man was surprised.      

   - I told! - Elina snapped. - Everyone knows this legend! The hunters killed and further, further. And I think they died because of you! You are to blame for everything!      

   At this point, everyone was dumbfounded. And Santal couldn't understand why. From the words of Aunt Elina, or from the fact that it was not a Jedi who spoke to the Jedi in such a tone.      

   “Woman, I don’t know why you think so of us, but your niece will be completely safe here. A happy future awaits her here.      

- Until he goes on some mission and dies! - shouted, straining, the Letanka.      

“If she tries, she will become a very strong Jedi and live a long time,” Gallia answered absolutely calmly.      

- Aunt, don't worry. I have already lived here one day. And I'm comfortable here. I'm new, but I'll probably get used to it. I met other children. And they treat me normally. They like me.     

 - Do you like it, Santal? - Elina grinned. - What nonsense? That's what I've always been afraid of. Honey, you don't know people at all. Oh my poor naive child! Well, what could you like? Naivety and sweetness? In just a couple of days?     

 - And you did not let me go anywhere further backyard. In recent days, I have seen so many things, with whom I have met. And I still want! I want to know the world. To help. It is very important for me. And I am very glad that I am Force sensitive. - For the first time Santal was angry with her aunt. For the first time I wanted to express my opinion.     

    “You see,” Yoda smiled. - She herself wants. She has a dream. She believes in her. Even at the meeting, she demonstrated loyalty to her principles and herself. She is polite, benevolent. I think the Jedi will come out of her.     

     - Understand. - Elina is already desperate. - I just want to save the girl. I want her well. I want her to live a happy, cloudless life, knowing nothing of denial. So that she does not know any troubles.      

    “Woman, we now perfectly understand what you want,” the black man answered harshly.      

    And Elina didn't even turn her ear. I switched to Santal.      

     - Okay, niece. Don't be stubborn, come with us. Aunt…     

    - No! Shouted Santal.      

     - What? - Elina asked half-suspiciously, half-disbelievingly.      

     - No! Aunt, you don't understand what's best for me. You know what's best for you. I'm not you!      

     - Santal, you are a traitor! - said the aunt loudly.      Everything inside the girl clenched.     

      - Why?    

      - Santal is smarter than everyone, intends to stay. Knows how to choose the environment. If you decide so, then so be it. Roll towards them! If you're sure, but first I'll give you something back! The woman waved her hand towards the Jedi, then tossed Santal to her mother's Padawan scythe. - Since you value communication with strangers who killed your parents, and not with those who raised you, who put their souls into you. If you want to repeat the fate of mom and dad. If you don't want an easy and carefree life. I want to save you! But you are smarter, and if so, then please, but keep in mind that I am issuing a waiver! Everything! You're not my niece anymore! But if you come to your senses, I will not accept you! I'll slam the door in my face! Survive on the street yourself! You will be sorry! You're an idiot! Come on, Noby.     

      The man looked at the girl with regret and went with his wife away from the Temple. A dumbfounded Santal was left to stand with her new family.      

     The girl seemed to have turned to stone. She watched, without taking her eyes, as two silhouettes left her. Red and green. They got smaller and smaller until they disappeared altogether. The stretched string in the chest area snapped. Santal imagined that she was running, running, as a bridge appeared in front of her. She wants to step, but the bridge collapses from the opposite end. And it doesn't just collapse. There is a fire. Conflagration! Everything, the bridge is burned. This path is closed. And never get through. Unless just jump over or fly over. Both the first and the second are impossible.      

     “Let's go,” Gallia called.      

    And Santal went, at first backing away, gradually shifting to constantly looking back at the place where her uncle and aunt had been just recently. Now they are gone. The girl even began to think, maybe she was in a hurry with the decision? Maybe we should try to find them? Catch up, talk again. But she was afraid, what if she would be lost again?      

     When Santal was about to change her mind, look away from the Order and confidently follow the Jedi, as Yoda said:      

    - Go.      

    For Santal, it was a signal, and she jumped off the spot and ran up the stairs. As I ran to the end, caught my breath, looked around. There was no one around who closely resembled her spiritual relatives.     

    - Aunt-ah! Aunt-ah! It's me, Santal. Your niece, who didn't want to quarrel. Sorry. Let's talk.      

   This time Santal acted smarter, remembered the road. And I walked so long that I did not notice how far I wandered. The girl called again, but received nothing in return. No response. Not a sound. Frustrated that everything had turned out this way, Santal was trudging back. As I heard:      

   - For help! Help! - The sound was so loud that it literally crashed into the brain.    

    Everything inside Santal shrank. The eyes fled. Where are they shouting? What happened? Where to run?      

    A few minutes later, relying only on her Jedi instinct, the girl was still able to find the source of the scream with half a sin. Some human woman was holding something to her chest while the being above her tried to take it away. It didn't look like those lizards from Devaron.      

   - Hey, you! Leave me alone! Can't you see that she doesn't want to give? Not ashamed, huh? Santal's voice was much bolder than herself.      

    The creature with many braids turned around and laughed.     

    - And what is this squeaker?      

     But Santal did not appreciate the joke. I tried to smile predatory to match the Evil Hat. This time, she completely concentrated, imagining a future picture, in order to repeat the same technique again on Devaron. And it worked! The man crashed into the boxes behind his back. But I didn't pass out. And he chased. Santal, of course, did not expect this. And, quickly turning around, she started. First to the right, and then, seeing the boxes and hiding behind them, back to the Temple. After making sure that the creature does not return to her or to the woman. 

     Fortunately or not, on the way back, she ran into that woman again.

     - Thanks. Thank you so much. I don’t know how to thank you. - Words of gratitude and flew from the lips. Hands folded into the castle were shaking. And the brown eyes were shining.

     "And her eyes shine," - thought the girl and added aloud:

     - That's enough for me, thank you.

     Just about to leave, they called her:

     - Wait. What's your name?

     Santal thought and answered:

     - I am Youngling Santal Sabura.

     - Are you a Jedi?

     - Yes. I recently became one. Santal rubbed the back of her head, feeling uncomfortable.

     “Strange, usually Jedi, especially young ones, don't go that far.

     - Do you know about us?

     “I've heard a lot about you. That you are helping people unselfishly. That you are the keepers of the world. And it seems to be true.

     Santal was bursting with pride that, as a Jedi for only two days, she had managed to make a positive impression, and besides, she had confirmed the reputation of the Order.

     “You know my name, but I don’t know yours.

     - I'm Rana Martez.

     - Glad to meet you. Well, I'll go if you don't need me anymore. Bye.

     Saying goodbye, Santal ran home in a great mood. Oddly enough, she did not get lost, although she went far enough. Maybe the Force helped?

     Santal appeared in the Temple, barely standing on her feet. Well, she was avoided today! The girl intermittently crossed the hall, simultaneously looking to the right and left with a wide smile on her face. Now this is her new home. There is no turning back. And the aunt made it clear. Therefore, she will not return and will try to forget, or from time to time will remember with light sadness those times when she was still small and carefree, wearing rose-colored glasses. Best time! The best time of life!

     Suddenly, for some reason, Santal thought again about her uncle. How is he? What is he doing now? What is he thinking about? About her, how is she about him? Or completely forgot how a dream? And why does she herself think of him? Who is he to her? None. Just the man that brought her to the Jedi. So, maybe he is not so much to blame? And does not deserve punishment? No. Even if the little one deserves it, it should be discouraging to steal and offend small children. Santal even imagined how she would grow up, become a real Jedi, and then she would show him! The girl promised herself that she would do so.

     But, despite the bloodthirsty attitude, Santal caught herself thinking that she did not consider the man a complete monster. If he was, he would have killed her on the spot. No questions or analysis. I wouldn't take it to other planets, try to sell it. The argument in favor of this opinion was the fact that he slapped her on the cheek, snapped her nose. So not very angry. Just harmful. Or maybe he was unhappy, although it doesn't look like. It is so? Or not? Okay, now it's not up to him. We need to focus on learning.

     And Santal Sabura, completely determined to the brim, went to the library to enjoy reading and preparing her homework.

     But this was not the only thought that occupied the girl's mind. He also analyzed all day from the beginning. And in the end it was concluded that she made the right choice. For the first time in her life, she had to choose, and she did it! And if she had left, she would not have been able to save the woman, she would have perished. She's great.

     Then it dawned on Santal: what happened today was a lucky coincidence. And how many more successful coincidences are ahead? Well, that's what she has to find out.

BL3 - Perspective pt.2

Part one: The “First” Vault Hunter

Back again with part 2 of my multi-part personal evaluation. Once again it will be under a readmore so those not interested don’t have to scroll far. This one is a bit of a dozy regarding Lilith.

Lilith and her struggle

This is one I genuinely feel upset with given we’ve known Lilith for a long time. She’s been established from day one as being very powerful and confident in herself and her abilities (albeit suffering from the sexism present in BL1). On top of that, she’s played a role in almost every single installment of the series in one way or another, really fleshing out her personality from her former player class to an NPC.  Borderlands 2 was where they introduced her as the mythical “Firehawk” an entity that struck fear into the hearts of bandits across Pandora, even unintentionally starting her own literal cult following. Yet, this wasn’t for sake of glory, Lilith is shown to be intelligent and strategic and though she wouldn’t know it yet, a leader in the making. This eventually shows up through the ending of the Pre-Sequel and further in with the Commander Lilith DLC for BL2.

It can be assumed that these were traits they wanted to keep from her original character profile in the first game, where she appeared to be split to the character we know and Tannis (See here: WARNING LOUD). Either way, Dr. Lilith Cashlin, whether that is still the case or not, is not your run of the mill NPC when it comes to the sake of intellect. She’s shown to have gotten away with faking her death twice, once as part of her origin and the second in BL2 to keep out of sight from Hyperion. Although we don’t know what she did to accomplish that, we follow with her echo correspondence with Roland (see here) and see that she’s been using her alias as a way to keep the Bloodshot Clan away from Sanctuary for Roland to focus on Hyperion. She as well as the other original VH had to deal with the aftermath of New Haven, an event that greatly effected all of them and made them more focused on saving the citizens that they’ve lived alongside. She genuinely cares for people and wants to do what’s right given the power she has, she understands she has a lot riding on her even if she’s still learning how to deal with responsibility.

In my opinion this makes seeing Lilith throughout the games a way of seeing her grow as a person and slowly get acclimated to being a woman of legend. At least that’s what I was hoping to see in BL3. It all seems to fall flat with her, becoming very little over a one-word catchphrase and her powers alone. Personally I feel the downfall of her started in the Commander Lilith DLC, where Sanctuary ends up overrun by Dahl (I’ll probably make a separate post on Sanctuary). After Roland’s death, Lilith stepped up to the Commander position for the Crimson Raiders, something she didn’t necessarily even have to do. While in position she even made the initiative of letting Tannis create a testing field for training the new Raiders in the The Form of Digistruct Peak. Now regardless on if it would be considered ‘canon’ or not, the idea that Lilith would like to have a training ground made for the sake of the Raiders very much shows she wants to build up a solid homestead for residents of Sanctuary to live in peace on Pandora. Something that honestly should have lead to them actually returning Sanctuary to the ground, and building it up further.

By them taking it away from her they essentially ruled out potential for more personal growth between her and the people of Pandora. She did what she could given the events but if anything it felt like trying to make the player accept the ship in BL3 as the next logical step. Her also naming the ship Sanctuary 3, three mind you, makes her character seem unwilling to accept mistakes from the past and just act like nothing has changed. Which was the whole point of originally having the sanctuary for New Haven citizens be named Sanctuary and not some blanket of New Haven 4. This gets further pushed by the lack of information between our flying city and the ship, and how or why Lilith gave up on the concept of an organized Crimson Raider military, reducing it to a more casual club status. Topping that off, neither Brick or Mordecai continue to follow under her regardless of their conversation at the end of BL2. The Commander title she was given really not being used for anything other than a DLC title.

People have discussed how poorly the scene was for her powers getting stripped away, but what really gets me is how Tyreen’s constant bashing over Lilith’s “Firehawk” title makes it seem like the writers know she can be better. Tyreen is never shown to have any fast way of travelling, so regardless of when they happened to arrive, Lilith could have easily gotten away. To begin with, she wouldn’t have been outside alone with the key in the first place. We have seen Lilith act strategically and plan further ahead in case of things going wrong, warning you of danger and even calmly talking you through while she herself was in danger. She had been through a lot through the events of the games and very well knows the various types of villains that come through the works, there was no reason for her to have her guard down. Once again just a victim of giving the villians excuse to have more to do with the storyline. Without falling Lilith’s character, Tyreen would have absolutely zero power to effect you during most of the game, which honestly is a failure on the potential of Tyreen too.

After taking her siren abilities, the writing makes the audacity to take away Lilith’s own personality and experience, rendering her almost nonexistent when it comes to basically anything in the game. Even Maya herself (who I will talk about on a separate post) refuses to let Lilith be present in battle, which is degrading when they both in canon were established to fight side by side together. Many of the VH in the series are not sirens, and yet are welcome to be present no matter the situation because the characters trust in their abilities. Lilith is headstrong, doesn’t take ‘no’ for an answer and wants to prove herself no matter the situation. This is just all thrown out the window for a Lilith that is complacent in people keeping her confined to the bridge of a ship. A ship that really could be managed by anyone (especially after Balex comes in).

Honestly, I don’t mind her getting her powers taken, even though i wish it to have been done in better, it’s not a bad story element. What I mind is that she’s never given a chance to prove to the player on how much she is worth regardless of them. She had done so much for the people of Sanctuary, she had the privilege of battling the Destroyer, she had faked her death twice, been captured by Hyperion and lost people she loved, but for what? The story gives her no way of proving her commitment, she doesn’t even get to hold a gun for a majority of it. She gets left on the sides only to be thrown around like a doll when she actually has a chance. Ava’s speech to Lilith after Maya’s death aggravates this more, because while Ava’s dialogue is very fitting given the situation, Lilith has never ran from anything the entire series other than in BL3.

In the end, even with her sacrifice it just feels hollow, because without her involving herself through the game, what was the emotion we were intended to feel for her? Because of her sheer incompetence through the story, the player ends up more or less feeling like ‘oh she did something i guess’ than actually having sorrow for her not being there simply because it was about the same when she was there to begin with. Roland’s death in the second game felt more impactful because he was constantly trying to get Sanctuary to a better point and when in battle, would actually fight with you to push you through. There was no need for special powers because the personality of a character just simply isn’t what they have, it’s what they do. Lilith deserved much more than that.

Once again I can really go on, but so far this is the longest one I’ve done. I really loved Lilith as a character and having her death not even leave an impact makes it really obvious how misused she was.

[ ObiRyū October | Day Seven: Origins ] [ @abyssaldespair ] [ Uchiha Obito, Suigin Ryū, Suigin ] [ Verse: White Hands of Healing ] [ Previous || Next ]

“...what’s on your mind?”

Tearing his eyes from the kamidana over the main hall, Obito instead looks to Ryū. She’s sat upon one of the settees, dressed in a warm yukata. The sight of her is still a bit of a shock. Though healed over, her scars are pronounced, and the blemishes of bruises still color her skin various shades of purple, blue, and sickly green. And though it was only a handful of days - a week at most - she was trapped in Root’s clutches, she looks so...gaunt. Always has she been pale, but now to a sickly degree.

It makes him angry...but also brings a feeling of shame.

“Just...admiring this place. It’s so…” He searches for a word. “...classical.”

That earns a soft snort. “It’s very old, yes...work started on it almost as soon as the first villagers arrived here with Eiko and Kazue.”

“...who?”

“Oh...have I never…?” Ryū pauses. “...those are my ancestors. The first of the Suigin line! There’s...some argument about who was really the first, given some...semantics.”

Obito can’t help but perk up. He knows so little of Ryū’s background. Crossing the room, he takes a careful seat beside her. “Would you...tell me more?”

“Are you sure you want a history lesson?” she softly teases. “I’m not sure if it would be very...interesting.”

“I’d like to hear more about your origins.”

“Will you tell me some of yours in return?”

That...gets him to hesitate.

Ryū gives a quick smile. “I know, I know...you can’t.” Sighing, she takes a moment to think. “...so, as the story goes...a very long time ago, my teacher, Suigin, was living in these very mountains. Humans hadn’t had chakra for very long, and a village in the foothills was ransacked by roving bandits. One woman named Eiko, pregnant and clinging to life, supposedly yelled so loudly for the gods to save them that Suigin heard her up here, in the mountains. So, she went to investigate, and found the aftermath.”

It’s then Ryū stands up, and Obito momentarily panics, doing the same to hover. She leads him to one end of the great hall, and then he realizes...the fusuma paintings are meant to reflect the story.

She gestures to a scene among the foothills, where a silvery serpent dragon hovers before a woman who reaches in desperation. “...Suigin asked her what had happened. She claimed that her husband’s warmongering had brought their enemies down upon their village while their men were away...and they were slaughtered. Eiko begged the dragon to save her, if only for the sake of her unborn child.

“Suigin decided to make the woman a deal. She would heal her wounds, and save her life...and bestow upon her some of her chakra. But in return, she would have to carry the sage’s message and task of healing. Then, she would return with like-minded humans, and rebuild. Eiko agreed...and left the ruins of the village.

“For four years, she traveled to various small villages, and bore the sage’s message alongside her daughter. Some became inspired, and traveled with her. By the time she returned to her village, several dozen people accompanied her, from all walks and trades. Suigin returned...and guided the people through the tangles of the forests...and into a beautiful valley, rich and warm.”

The next fusuma panels show the valley between the peaks, and Obito immediately recognizes it. A river runs along the vale’s spine...and as it goes, a village begins to appear.

“The people worked hard, clearing land for crops and livestock...and using the timber to build homes for themselves. Even a shrine was built near the peak crowned with the largest camphor tree...and it was for that tree that the valley - and its village - were named: Kusunokizan. Camphor tree mountain. And though it was never officiated, Eiko was looked to for guidance and leadership. And she took the sage’s name for her own...and became Suigin Eiko.

“...but…”

The valley suddenly darkens, and foreboding nestles in Obito’s gut.

“...Kazue, Eiko’s daughter, looked nothing like either her mother, or father. Imbued and saturated with the sage’s white chakra, her very appearance had been shaped. Pale, with white hair, and cloud-grey eyes, she was the first true heir of Suigin’s chakra. In her...the true power was awakened. But when she was six years old, Kazue fell deathly ill. The villagers, fearful for the bloodline, watched anxiously as Eiko struggled to save her daughter’s life. In the end...she succeeded. Kazue was cured. But...her mother had used the last of her strength. And with a whisper...she died.

“Kazue, left alone, was raised by the villagers as a whole...and trained by Suigin to master her powers and attain a sage state. By the time she was sixteen, Kazue had conquered her chakra, and was a full-fledged sage. And, like her mother, she traveled the world to spread a message of peace, and healing. She only returned once she was with child, having a daughter of her own. And when her daughter was ten years old...Kazue gave her life defending her from an avalanche while up among the peaks.

“And so began an eerie cycle. Every mother would have a daughter...and every generation, each mother would give their life for their child. And yet somehow, through the ages...no Suigin ever died before having a child to pass on the lineage. So, Suigin surmised that the family had fallen victim to a curse.”

“...curse…?” The word rings a bell, prompting a memory of the so-called curse of hatred within Obito’s own clan...were such things really true?

“When Eiko had accepted Suigin’s chakra, two feelings were strong within her, at war in her heart. One was the desire - above all others - to keep her child alive, and safe. The other...was a deep and furious hatred for her husband, whose greed and lust for power had wrought destruction to her and her people. Suigin theorized that these feelings - when given power through her chakra - took root within it...and infected their line through the unborn child. So, every mother - without fail - would make the same sacrifice again and again to protect their offspring. And in tandem, any love they found in another would soon devolve into hate, poisoned by seemingly outside forces. She also, over the generations, theorized that Eiko and Kazue’s souls were trapped in a cycle of reincarnation...as many of our line claim to have memories not their own.”

That perks his interest. “...do you?”

“...a few. They’re very...fragmented. But I know they aren’t mine. I don’t know if they’re just pieces of a dream, or if I really do have visions from my ancestors. According to Suigin, I’m one of Kazue’s sides of the coin. It’s gone back and forth since then. Over and over again, we’ve gone through this cycle, until it got to me. Like the rest, I did lose my mother...but the whole of the village with her, as well.”

“...what happened?”

“...it was the tail end of the third shinobi war. Most of Iwa had given up, but...a few rebel cells continued to try to find back doors into Hi no Kuni and regather momentum. A few were using doton techniques to try and find paths through the mountains. And with them...they found the valley, as it spans nearly from side to side. They thought...it would make for a simple path through. What they didn’t know was that the village was here. And when they found it, they...destroyed it, as we were technically a Hi no Kuni settlement. My mother tried to stop them, but Suigin was away hunting that night. We were...so unprepared. An entire platoon of shinobi...against a small village of civilians, and one healing sage. She did all she could, but...when she realized there was no hope, she used the last of her chakra to hide me away...before being killed.”

Hearing her tone fade, Obito gives her a glance. “...you saw it...didn’t you?”

A nod. “...I was so young...it’s one of the few things I can remember of her, now. Konoha shinobi saw the smoke rising from the mountain, and came to investigate. Once they found me, they took me back to Konoha, and...it was there was raised as a ward of the village for my unique bloodline. And now...well, here I am.”

“...quite the tale.”

“Mm...parts, I’m sure, have been a bit...twisted and lost since then, given it was so long ago. But Suigin was there for nearly all of it, so it’s hard to tell what’s true, and what’s just been exaggerated.” Glancing up, Ryū gives Obito a hint of a smile. “...so? Feel like you know me any better?”

“I guess so.”

“Hm...I could tell you of the owls of Kōri no Mori.”

“You mean Fubuki?”

“She’s one of them, yes. There’s more panels over here!” Taking Obito’s hand, she leads him to another section of wall. These feature the higher, snowy peaks around the valley. “So, when Kazue was training under Suigin, she wanted to test her endurance and survival...and so made her way up into the peaks where the snow never melts: a place we call Kōri no Mori, the forest of ice. During her trek, she came upon an injured owl, pure white. Sympathetic, she healed the creature, and then let him go on his way.

“But before she could finish her journey and return to the valley...she suddenly found herself surrounded by owls! Dozens and dozens, and some even taller than herself. They were an old clan that had lived in the mountains for hundreds, if not thousands of years, and they were grateful for her help. Though they did not know how to speak, they managed to convey their feelings, and the owl she’d healed - Seiten - decided to travel by her side and attempt to repay her kindness.

“Kazue took the owl back to the valley, and with Suigin’s help, forged a summoning contract. Even so, Seiten went with her on her pilgrimage, and when Kazue was attacked by a bandit while she slept, he snatched the rogue’s eyes and saved her life.

“Though his debt was repaid, Seiten agreed to honor their contract, and be summoned whenever she needed him. That began the tradition of each Suigin trainee - upon completing their sage training - going up into the mountains to find an owl companion to make a contract with. When I finished mine - just a few months before we met - I found Fubuki...and she’s remained with me ever since.”

“...huh. I’ve heard of clans carrying contracts through their bloodline, but never quite like that,” Obito muses.

“The bond between our clans is as old as the clan itself...an owl chosen to be a Suigin’s companion is considered highly honored. They take their role as our protectors very seriously. Which,” Ryū offers, tone turning a bit sheepish, “is likely why Fubuki is so...hard on you. She knows that there are risks with you coming to see me.”

For a moment, Obito thinks over the owl’s warning. “...yeah…”

“But I think your saving me from Root has helped change her view of you. At least a little.”

Obito, not so sure, doesn’t answer.

Looking around the hall, Ryū thinks for a moment. “...well, there are other random tales from notable women in my line, but...I’m not sure they’re as interesting as the rest.”

Hearing a hint of fatigue in her voice, Obito suggests, “Maybe time to take a break, instead.”

“I’m not that tired…”

“Maybe I just want to sit with you for a while.”

Sighing, Ryū gives in, letting him lead her back to their seats. Obito then brings her close, tucking his chin atop her head. To think...a line with such poor luck, and yet...always managing to make it through one more generation. How lucky they are for her to even live or exist, let alone to have met.

...but one thing irks at the back of his mind: the two-sided ‘curse’ she mentioned. The hate Eiko supposedly passed down. In all honesty, he can’t really see Ryū hating anyone. With all he knows of her, it seems impossible for her to ever get that angry.

...and yet…

If she ever learns the truth - ever comes to know all he’s done, all he will do - would she hate him? Her line is one of medics that stretches back nearly to the beginning of chakra within humans. Life and healing are their utmost priority...and how many has he taken? Or ordered taken through his underlings?

...what would she say if she knew?

Feeling her go lax with sleep against him, he looks to her thoughtfully. It’s clear she knows, at least, that he isn’t exactly a good person. Likely she suspects him to be some kind of missing nin. And yet...she persists anyway. Loves him anyway. Maybe…

Heaving a heavy sigh, he pulls her a bit closer, indulging in the feeling of her softness. She is all he cannot be...soft, and kind, and trusting...gentle, and hopeful. He has to wonder if she’ll ever realize what she really means to him.

...but maybe now is not the time.

Ever so carefully, he scoops her up in his arms, taking her up to the manor’s second level and laying her into bed. Eyes flicker over Root’s marks, and it sparks a few coals of anger in his belly.

...they’ll pay. But not yet. All in due time.

Instead, for now, he leans in and presses lips to her brow, hearing her hum happily. The anger quickly quells, replaced instead with a pleasant warmth only she can bring. Daring to smile, he retreats from the building, readying to teleport.

But as he leaves, he finds he’s no longer alone.

He’s only seen the sage once before now, and she’s still just as imposing. Rightfully so, he can’t help but feel...nervous in her presence. “...Suigin-sama,” he addresses politely.

Sprawled over the front garden, the dragon eyes him openly. “So, she has told you the tale of her origins, has she not? A curious story, indeed…”

“And it’s all true?”

The sage’s tongue flickers like a serpent’s, Obito unable to glean any emotion from her scaly, antlered face. “History has a way of changing with each retelling. I have done my best to remember and record the stories of those who bear my chakra. There may yet be...inaccuracies. But so too are there tales of rabbit goddesses of the moon...of a man who tamed chakra and forged nine beasts from the great Shinju tree. Many see these as more myth than truth...but who is to truly say but those who were there?”

“...do sages ever speak clearly, or does everything have to be a riddle?”

Amusement glints in her eyes. “...you humans are so amusing. So varied, and yet...in some ways, all the same. I speak as my thoughts form...don’t you do the same?”

Obito just deadpans. “...I should be going.”

A nod. “...Ryū will remain here to heal. Should you seek her again, it would be wise to come here first. I must clear a path for her back to Konoha after Root’s actions.” She looks to him, unblinking. “...remember what I told you, human.”

“...I couldn’t forget if I wanted to,” is his low reply. And with that...he disappears back into his Sharingan’s dimension.

Lost in thought for a long moment, Suigin then looks up to the manor: the windows of the master quarters. How far they have come...how much farther can they go? Time alone will tell...

     Oof, I'm a day late with this one Dx Still very busy, and I just...ran out of time. Gonna try to hop right to the next one and get it done before it gets too late.      So I wasn't exactly sure what to do for this one, and asking Meg got me the answer she'd been thinking about Ryū's background when she made this prompt, so...that's what I went with! Along with some somber fluff, and a little cameo from Suigin herself, lol      Anywho, I've still got lots to write, so that's all for now! Thanks for reading~

Elder Scrolls Legends: Isle of Madness DLC: plot and lore summary for those who don't have the time or the will to play it

All Elder Scrolls legends stories have are framed as stories told by Kellen, a traveling moth priest, and Nagh, his furry boyfriend (?), who really like to hear the man talk, in their long and perilous journeys across Tamriel to better pass the time.

Kellen, who has always till now narrated stories he saw on the scrolls he carries around, stories about the shezarine Forgotten Hero, this time decides to tell a different kind of story, one he remembers from a old journal he found long ago.

As of now, we have no knowledge of when exactly any of this happening. However, since they treat the Return to Clockwork City DLC, which is happening right during the Skyrim Dragon War, as old history, we can assume this is happening way late in the 4th era, perhaps even the 5th.

Anyway, Kellen decides to tell us the story of a new "hero."

Talym Rend. He was a spy for the empire, stationed in Morrowind, and the journal was his. He narrates of how his son, Nevos, had been struck by a terrible madness, and how no healer, no temple priest, not even the ashlanders could heal the boy. He so decides to venture into the shivering isles, home of Sheogorath, corner of the house of troubles, and petition for him to heal his son.

We don't know when specifically this is also happening either. Morrowind isn't a smoking ruin, and the tribunal temple is still the local religion, so it's not the 4th era. The existence of a united empire deploying troops in both Morrowind and High Rock might make us assume this is happening during the 3rd era, before the events of Morrowind, but after the warp in the west? The details are confused.

Anyway, Talym finds a strange door in Morrowind, and by passing it he reaches the fringes of Sheogorath Realm.

There, we meet our first supporting character.

Cyriel is a sneaky little shit. She distracts Talym with the prospect of some sick weapon, and warns him about the incoming fight with the gate keeper, only to steal his gold purse one second later by going "Can't Help Being a Gemini Shadow."

Talym so ventures into the fringe, and finds a garden of swords, growing from the ground, and among them, a axe specifically grown to kill the gate keeper.

He uses it to kill the mountain of a flesh atronach, only for cyriel to come out of the bushes to thank him for all the work he's done for her, and walking onto the gates of madness.

Reached New Sheoth, however...

And so Talym is out to seek glory to amuse the mad god.

First, he meets once again Cyriel. The cheeky bugger has gotten herself trapped in a trap and is now trying to extort Talym's help via deception and false humility, all of this at the No-Rats Camp, a giant camp whose owner, the eponymous Nervous Giant, is terrified by Rats and Skeevers. Talym manages to make him run away and saves Cyriel, asking for his purse back, only for Cyriel to vanish in the shrubbery once again.

Second, he meets the second supporting cast member of his adventure.

The Orc Bard Luzrah gro-Shar, a gentle soul, who incidentally has the menu theme stuck in her head due to a magical cave filled with colored grumites. You help her finish her song, and she warmly salutes him.

And then, he meets the most peculiar of men (man?).

A man with a split personality, Tavyar (Rayvat?) who believes one is constantly following the other with ill intent. Talym makes them notice that they are apparently the same person, only for the 2 to get enraged and attack together... as one?

Killed the knight (or was it the mage?), Talym is approached by Haskill, who tells him that Lord Sheogorath is most pleased with him, and will receive him now.

Talym, reluctantly, accepts.

And so it begins. The mad god has also managed to conscript Cyriel and Luzrah in the mission, Sheogorath promising one riches, the other bodily harm if they don't comply, and the unfortunate Threesome is now forced to do the mad god bidding.

First, they must instill the fear of the dead to a Khajiit bandit lord, who lord Sheogorath calls a slur while he's at it, who has killed many a hero before like the Hero of Dawn and the Red Avenger, and is now afraid of no enemy, especially the dead ones.

Talym, who at first tries to spook the Khajiit with some smoke and mirrors, is in the end gifted by Haskill with a powerful amulet, that can capture weakened ghosts to later unleash on unsuspecting victims.

The bandit lord is left, fleeing into the night, haunted by the ghosts of those he had killed.

Second, a Dunmer Baron in Morrowind, owner of several Kwama Egg Mines, and sworn enemy of a rich Betty Netch Herder. The trio must convince the man, who has always had everything handled to him on a silver platter in life due to his noble and rich birth, that he is more than a simple mortal, is to boost his ego to comical proportions.

Talym so disguised himself as a prophet, and calls the baron "the Prince of the Prophecy, whose words always come true." He so asks the Baron to make three statement, three wishes, and see how they will hold true.

The first, is asking for his Kwama to lay golden eggs, a task easily fulfilled by Luzrah (" Didn't I tell you guys other than a hard I'm also a superb painter?").

The second, is for his rival's bull netches, the most gentlest of creatures, to rampage on his farm, another task easily fulfilled by simply harming the farm's betty netches in front of the bulls.

And third, for a snowstorm to start despite it being Morrowind in the middle of a particularly hot summer, which is another task fulfilled by hijacking a local telvanni mushroom tower and using it as a catalyst for a overpowered blizzard spell.

After the 3 portents are fulfilled, the baron, mad with power, decides to use his newfound "powers" to smite down his rival in a duel, and, once done so, he decides that he is capable of flight, launching himself from a Cliffside before anyone, let alone a horrified Luzrah, who unroll then was having a blast at the Baron looking silly and believing such obvious bull, can stop him.

The baron falls to his death, and Lurzah leaves the party, disgusted with watch she and the others have done.

Now, more somber, the zany adventures they seemed to have till now come to an end...

Starts the second part of this story.

Talym and Cyriel reach the border between High Rock and Skyrim. A rogue Reachmen Clan, the Doomfang Clan, is trying to breach the mountains and establish a small colony in northern high rock, so to keep trade between the 2 provinces on a choke hold.

The empire has sent one of their best generals and spies, General Porcia, Talym old friend and superior during his time as a imperial spy, and his next and last target in order to save his son.

The situation is dire, but Talym would do anything to save his son, even betray a old friend...

So, he intercepts and kills one of her spy couriers, so to tamper with its informations, so to Plant false ones and make her doubt her ability as a spy master...

Only to discover the unthinkable.

The reachmen had perfected a weapon, terrible in its design. A poisonous gas, with no antidote, deathly and pervasive, soon to be unleashed on the imperial garrison, the Breton contingent, stationed there and lead by Porcia.

Cyriel is horrified. She says they must warn the imperial at once, that no one is worth the life of an entire army...

Only For Talym to rebuke her with force. He would sacrifice anyone, even 100 armies to save his son.

Cyriel is disgusted. She leaves, stops, gets his unopened satchel filled with gold, and throws it on the ground at his feet. And then she's gone.

Talym can't stop now, he only has 24 hours left to complete his task, and he's getting desperate. He decides to plant false evidence that a sacred flower growing in a nearby grow, sacred to Lady Mara, can be extracted and used as a counter cloud to the poison, knowing full well that it will most likely do nothing of the sorts and will doom them all to a slow death by gassing.

But, due to the death of the courier, the Reachmen have gotten more alert, and manage to capture Porcia. Talym is so forced to save his old friend, only to later lead her to her doom.

They go together to the sacred grove, where Porcia, believing the flowers to be their only hope, and that the priestess were going to die anyway once the reachmen decided to attack them to prevent the flower from being harvested (something that was never going to happen), orders her men to kill them and take the flowers with force, committing a massacre of pacifist Mara priests trying to resist the imperials as they took their sacred flowers.

The trap is set, the weight of her actions already resting heavy on her mind, Porcia orders a attack against the reachmen stronghold, knowing full well such a enclosed space would be perfect for the deployment of the gas. So, she orders all her men to converge in a narrow passage, and, once the poison cloud is released, she orders to release the sacred flower counter cloud...

And then...

The two gasses have a terrible reaction with each other.

Fire is unleashed on Reahcman and Breton alike, the entirety of the Doomfang Clan, warrior, men, but also women and children living in the stronghold, and an entire imperial legion destroyed and eradicated in a single night, explosions disfiguring and killing and maiming soldiers for life, or kill those lucky enough to get killed. Porcia, miraculously unscathed, perhaps a punishment, or a mercy by lady Mara herself, witnessing her actions and her consequences, becoming more from that day onward, in fear her words might one day again cause such terrible fate, such senseless deaths, for nothing, and thinking it was her fault, hers and her faulty informations.

When it was all Talym's fault instead.

The war criminal, because we can't have a elder scrolls legends story mode without the main character being a bloody war criminal, returns home, the conquering hero, ecstatic to finally see his some again, whole and-

But his son is gone.

And only a tomb lays in his place. A tomb Talym himself built over a year ago.

He doesn't understand. How did that happen? Sheogorath must have tricked him somehow, so Talym returns to the isles, his mind getting more and more deranged as time passes and the weight of his actions start making itself clear, all with actions and horrors for nothing, the man slipping more and more into insanity as he forgets who he is, as he sees normal trees coming to life, and mudcrabs talking and trying to sell him their wares, and strange... colored grumites... singing... the menu theme song?

Lurzah is back, during Talym darkest hour, for the friend that helped her with her own song, despite everything he has done.

She wakes him from his delirium, and tells him that the only way for him to heal, is to face his past, maybe with the help of a ancient orc song, so powerful that it can send you in a trance and let you fight your darkest self.

But that's not enough. He must learn the truth, he must find Sheogorath and demand answers. So Lurzah tells him or a mighty warrior, someone Sheo himself was afraid of, trapped in a ancient cell in cavern at the fringes of insanity... or perhaps sanity?

So, they enter the cell, and free its prisoner, who was no other than...

Haskill's evil brother?

Dyus, keeper of the records of Jyggalag, the prince of order, the last thing of Jyggalag left in the isles, for not even Sheogorath could bring himself to kill his last link to his past.

Well, his second to last.

For the sword of Jyggalag is somewhere to be found, and, by using it against Sheogorath, he too will be faced with the memories of what he has done, of what he was, and, perhaps, will be compelled so to tell Talym the truth about what happen to his son.

Talym finds the sword, and returns to New Sheoth, bidding one last farewell to Lurzah, who tells him there are no ill feelings between them, and who probably decided to go search for where the hell Cyrial has gotten herself into to get her out of trouble, thus starting a epic Orsimer/Bosmer bard/thief lesbian love story to span the ages.

(Or maybe not, this one can dream).

Talym reaches Sheogorath, amazed that the man is still standing after his ordeal, and that he has managed to find the sword of order of all weapons. Talym directs his sword against Sheogorath, and demands an explanation.

Which Sheogorath, in all fairness, does give.

Via mind fucking flashbacks of course, but big still count as a explanation:

Back then, when Talym was still a imperial spy under porcia, the Black Worm Cult murdered his "partner" (Never mentioned if romantic or work partner. Since we see no spouse to speak of I'm assuming they killed the guy husband and spy partner and Nevos is adopted), so he decides to infiltrate the black worm cult himself to dismantle it from within, despite Porcia insists that he should take a break and spend more time with his son.

Alas, tragedy strikes. The cult discovers what his going on, and puts Talym in front of a terrible test.

Prove his worthiness to the cause...

Via the trial of ruthlessness.

This is by far the most chilling fucking scene and match in the history of this fucking game.

Whatever you do, you cannot save your son.

The spell in your hand, blood sacrament, is a damaging spell, and both creatures are ready to attack. There are 3 ways to kill your son.

Even if you pass, one of the two cultists will assume you failed the test, and comment on what a shame it was, only to then have the creature attack the boy by itself.

Memories come back like a flood. He had asked Sheogorath to forget the terrible action he had to commit, to kill his own beloved son, only for him to manipulate his memories so he could come back to him, years later, and do his dark bidding again.

Sheogorath and if he wants to do it all over again, and let him make him forget all of his pain and misery rather than have to face it for the rest of his miserable life.

But Talym has learned his lesson now. He must not run away from pain, but must healthily deal with his loss rather than strike bargains with mad gods. He has learned to live with the truth and his past, no matter the pain.

He then asks if Sheogorath if he can say the same for himself.

Talym strikes him with the sword of order one, two, three times, each strike making memories of his past as the prince of order flood in Sheogorath's mind, the mad god first disgusted by his last self, later scared, and in the end defeated, begging Talym to stop, to take away the memories with him and return home, something Talym agrees only after having the mad god swear to not harm or retaliate on neither him or on Cyrial and Luzrah again, who were probably having wild lesbian sex in Lurzah's colored music cave as all of this was happening and Sheogorath started making rain flaming cheese from the skies as he pleaded for Talym to go the fuck away from him.

And so the story end. Talym returns to his empty home to deal with his grief, alone, and leave us a warning: "no matter what devil might try to bargain with you, memories and grief are important to us, and we should never give them away, no matter how painful they might seem."

The story ends, and we return to out travelers from the start, with Nagh obligatory sarcastic closing statement: "Jeez, man, Naagh is beginning to think you only know angsty stories, it's the 3rd time you made this one cry with one," as a city appears on the horizon.

Extract from Side Story Jiao

King Gaius took a few men with him and went to the plain used as hunting grounds by the Sarakhs kings—called the “Royal Hunting Grounds.” They were not dressed for hunting, but rather looked like an inspection team. However, Ortega did not care about that. He seized his chance when the king’s aide dropped his guard to talk to a subordinate and suddenly appeared before the king.

“Gaius! Murderer who usurped the throne of Auj Oule! I am here to avenge those who died because of you! Prepare yourself!”

The king’s aide stepped forward at once. “Your Highness, please stay back. …Don’t underestimate him, Nils. This man was once on Merad’s side. He is a rebel who is after His Highness’ life.”

The other man joined him. “Lin, there is no need for you or Gaius to dirty your hands. I’ll fight him.”

“Since that man ran away from our troops five years ago, he has been attacking various settlements, stealing provisions and lives alike. He is a beast who readily kills any person to survive. Aren’t you, ‘Kitarl chief murderer’ Ortega?” the aide called Lin said.

So they knew who he was. Or maybe this man was even the leader of the group who had attacked the Lutus.

“Indeed. We are just the same. And you, Gaius, you dragged brave men into countless battles in your greedy quest for power. The only thing that lies in your path is pain and loss. But while you were playing conqueror, you killed even defenseless little children! Didn’t you, Gaius!?”

Screaming, he raised his hammer and charged toward the king. Anticipating his attack, Lin quickly went around him and aimed at his side, but he blocked the hit with the hilt of his hammer. From up close, Lin looked like a young man. In his youthful eyes lurked an air of nobility and a strong resolve that spoke of past trials.

“I cannot allow a bandit to raise his weapon toward His Highness. You will atone with your death.”

“You’re just a puppy without fangs sucking up to people in power.”

“Who are you to talk? You were born in the noble Kitarl tribe, yet you abandoned your pride and dirtied your clan’s name like a filthy maggot.”

“You lot and your precious ambitions are what killed Elize!”

Hammer and sword clashed once, but as expected from his delicate figure, Ortega’s opponent was far weaker than him. Ortega felt that the young man had more than just his sword at his disposal, and indeed the man promptly started emitting mana from his mana lobe and relied on that power to repel the hammer. However, Ortega put all his might into a single strike that outmatched him.

Lin was sent flying. He went down on one knee and his breathing was laborious. From the way his face was twisted in pain, he must have broken a few ribs. After that, the man called Nils tried to take the offensive, but Lin held him back.

Ortega noticed the deep cut in his own dominant arm’s tendon. But that would not prevent him from seizing his chance. He paid no heed to his wound and approached the man who was standing still behind them.

“Gaius!” His right arm limp at his side, he readjusted his grip on his hammer with his left hand. “I once fought on Merad’s side and opposed you. At the time, you had vanquished Lars of Long Dau despite originating from a small clan and were outrageously calling yourself king of unification, but do you know what everyone thought of you? We all called you a scoundrel who disturbed the order of Auj Oule. And despite proclaiming you’d unite the country and quell internal trouble, tragedies are still happening. Merad was arrogant, but you, you’re nothing more than a fool toying with Auj Oule to extend your influence!”

He pushed his large body forward and closed the gap in an instant. But no sooner had he started moving than Gaius appeared past his guard, having drawn his long sword and sticking its tip at his throat.

“…I didn’t expect you to be able to draw such a long sword so fast.”

“Ortega of Kitarl,” Gaius spoke, putting his sword back into his sheath with ease. His eyes followed his every motion, but he knew Ortega would no longer attempt to strike him. “You have the rare power to communicate with beasts, and you control them not by force, but through your bond of friendship. Return to your clan and clear your name, then come back to me and guide this country in the direction you believe in as one of my men.”

“Wha… What?”

“King, what are you saying? This man is a vulgar bandit who even abandoned his clan! He is making a mockery of Auj Oule’s lineage. How could this man stand by your side?!”

“Lin, don’t speak. If your broken bones pierce your lungs, my healing artes will become ineffective!”

“Shut up, Nils! There were Long Dau people among his victims!”

Rather than the stinging from his wound, rather than the shudder he experienced as he remembered Gaius’ sword tip on his throat, it was the pounding of his heart that Ortega felt the most painfully. So that was it. That young man was the Long Dau’s…

It was true that he had survived by assaulting wounded soldiers and supply corps. Among those soldiers, there might have been refugees who joined the army looking for a place to move to. Maybe even little children like Elize.

“Do not worry, Wingul. This man will definitely become a help to you. I will wait at the capital. Come to my castle, Ortega.”

Not caring that they were now showing him his back, Gaius and his men disappeared to the north of the hunting grounds.

The Pain We Share

NARUTO

Pairing: Sakura x Sasori

Summary:

Ever since Sasori could remember, there were cuts and bruises on his body. In a world where Soulmates exist and any injury or pain was shared between the two, he grew up curious, then fearful, of what exactly his Soulmate was experiencing as a child, then annoyed, and even a little angry, when it begins to affect his life as he grows older. Then, one day, he meets a broken pink haired girl in the aftermath of an invasion against a renowned criminal organization and his world is turned upside down as she brings with her a darkness she was born into and was unknowingly trying to escape ever since. 

Chapter ONE

It was a wracking sort of pain that made Akasuna no Sasori stiffen. The action caused the tower of cards he had been building to topple over and Deidara, his partner, grinned at him in momentary triumph before he recognized the look on his face. The blond dropped his own deck and hurried around the table to his side.

"You okay, Danna?" He asked, and the clear worry in the teen's eyes filled Sasori with a familiar bitterness.

"I'm fine," he snapped. He lashed out to push the blond away, but the second wave of pain made him lose his balance and he fell back into his seat.

Deidara scoffed. "You clearly aren't fine, un," he said.

Sasori closed his eyes and placed an arm over his face. "Don't ask, then," he groaned out.

He could not see, but he felt the blond take a seat next to him. "Want some water?" He asked, then correctly took the silence to be a yes. He reached over the table towards his own cup. "Will you be fine for tomorrow?" He asked. "If we tell Pein now-"

Sasori bolted back up, glaring at his partner. "Don't you dare!" He seethed. He snatched the cup offered towards him and had to hold back the urge to empty it over Deidara's head. Instead, he chugged it.

Deidara raised his hands in mock surrender. "I won't, Danna," he said. "But you know he wouldn't take you off the offensive team if you insist." He glanced at something over his shoulder. "And also, I think it might be a little late, un."

Sasori followed the bond's line of gaze and rolled his eyes when he was just in time to see Hoshigaki Kisame and Hidan too casually look away. Uchiha Itachi, Kisame's partner, was also with them, but the raven was much, much better at it than them and he was already glancing out the window. Sasori, however, did not doubt for a second that all three of them had witnessed his bouts of pain but decided to appreciate the gesture anyway, simply because he was too tired to muster any more annoyance.

After all, most of it was reserved for his Soulmate out there, whoever it was.

"Must suck," Kisame offered sympathetically. The man plopped himself down in an empty spot on the couch.

Sasori rolled his eyes again. "What can I say," he said sarcastically. Then, to emphasize just how fine he was, he raised his hand and called upon the warm feeling within him. The power, known as chakra, answered and he willed it into strings, which he then used to gather the collapsed cards. The blue threads neatly cleaned up the mess and Sasori tossed the pack to Deidara. "At least it won't kill me."

Because it wouldn't, no matter how painful it might get, for the injuries that appeared on his body were not his, the pain not inflicted directly onto him.

Everyone had a Soulmate, but the chances of actually finding that Soulmate were very slim. The one hint they received was how any pain one felt, as well as any injuries obtained, were reflected on the other.

He was simply feeling whatever his Soulmate, whoever that maybe, was feeling.

"From the way your girl is throwing herself into injury one after another, I'm surprised she isn't dead yet," Hidan said. He wandered past them and vanished into the kitchen.

Some spent lifetimes searching for their Soulmate, but only a lucky few actually got around to meeting them, simply due to the sheer amount of people out there living all over the place. To most, it was merely a tickling thought at the back of their head, where they were aware that there was someone out there, but there were more pressing matters to focus on.

"Might be a guy," someone else said, and Kakuzu, Hidan's partner, appeared at the door moments later. He waved, then followed the silver-haired man into the kitchen.

That was not Sasori's case, though. His case was special because his Soulmate appeared to be very clumsy with two left feet at best, an abuse victim if they were unlucky and involved in something much more horrific at worse. He had never met anyone who hurt as much as he did through the link, and since the problem lay on his other half, there was not much he could do but endure it.

He could still remember glimpses of his childhood when the same bouts of pain had woken his screaming at night. At first, his parents had been there. He could remember his mother wrapping her arms around his shaking frame and his father whispering words of comfort.

Then one day, his parents had vanished but the wracks continued and suddenly he was alone and everything only felt worse as he tried to shield himself from the pain he really had no control over. He had only been four back then, too young to care for himself, and his grandmother had taken him in, where he had grown up ever since.

Sasori scowled and he slowly stretched out his limbs. The pain never lasted like an actual injury and wounds always appeared already scarred over. He checked over himself and noted that somewhere, somehow, it appeared as though his Soulmate had stabbed him or herself in the hand. He scowled, because did they not realize that when very they got hurt, he was heavily affected as well?

He tried not to think of how maybe someone else was causing these injuries, because how was he supposed to know?

Over the years, he had gotten used to the pain. Sometimes they took him by surprise, but as he grew older the daily doses of pain changed to strong bursts of it with periods of peace in between, and if he was careful, he could almost tell when they were coming. He managed to work his life around this, entered a special academy for chakra wielders, and graduated with top marks. He was one of the renowned prodigies of his generation, and it was not long before the Akatsuki, an elite force made up of the best of the best, invited him into their ranks when he was fourteen, an age that had surprised many. Itachi was the only one to have been recruited earlier than him at thirteen.

Said Uchiha glanced at his scarred hand. "I believe you should tell Pein about it anyway," he said quietly. "Just in case they return during the operation, so we know to be prepared."

"Bastard's right," Deidara agreed. "We've been planning this for months; wouldn't want you to trip up at a crucial moment because your Soulmate tripped down the stairs or something."

Sasori scowled because he knew they were right, but that did not make it easier at all. He cursed his Soulmate once again before he begrudgingly nodded. "I'll do that."

The Elemental Nation had once been five different countries that had come together under an alliance to unite into one state, or that was what Sasori often read in history books. Now, though, it was the most advanced, powerful nation in the area.

While it was still separated into five different areas, named Fire, Wind, Lightning, Earth, and Water after the old five nations, they functioned under a single ruling power made up of leaders from the five lands. The Akatsuki had been one of the first organization to be made up of members from different national backgrounds, and what had once been nothing more than a show of unity was now one of the biggest, most trusted security and defence organization known.

Sasori tapped at the power within him and summoned blue strings from his fingertips. They flew around his room, picking up his pouch and stuffing a handful of metal needles, senbon, into it. He flicked his fingers again and the pouch landed neatly in his hand.

Many years ago, mankind had managed to tap into their own lifeforce, and this power, which had been named 'chakra', had long become a necessity in life. There were many uses to it, and those who could wield it and mould it to their commands were simply seen to be superior to those who could not. It could be said that, in a way, one's ability to control it became one value within society.

Sasori himself was considered to be one of the best chakra users out there. His control was considered extraordinary even among those who prided themselves in this aspect, and while most channelled chakra into objects in order to manipulate them, he was one of the few who could summon chakra outside a medium and mould it to his will.

Even without his level of control, though, people found many uses for it. There were those who used it in their everyday lives, for something as simple as strengthening themselves for construction work or using it to enhance their vision for delicate crafts. It was used in hospitals to heal wounds and ease pain, sterilize and operate. A slightly uncommon number blessed with better control than others had unique abilities, ranging from being able to control certain objects infused with chakra from a distance to bending even the elements to their will.

And of course, criminals used it to commit crime and authorities used it to try and catch them.

The Akatsuki had always been small but effective, and as the tales of their successes and prowess spread they soon became known as the official law reinforcing group outside the knights, known as ANBU, and the civilian security force, run by the Uchiha clan. It's members usually worked in pairs, and outside of requested work that usually consisted of rounding up bandits and the likes, they also took on more powerful chakra users that the ANBU could not handle.

Sasori grabbed his cloak and threw it over his shoulder. He glanced around his room one last time before he headed out the door.

At the age of eighteen, Sasori, partner to Deidara, was one of the younger members of the Akatsuki. For the past four years, he had used his powers alongside his fellow members to help with policing their ever-growing nation.

Deidara, who was currently the youngest at seventeen, was a relatively new member though, only two years having passed since he was recruited. Sasori clearly remembered his partner before the blond had taken his place, and that thought alone left a trembling in his hands and a bitter taste in his mouth.

Orochimaru had been a member since before Sasori had joined, and the older man had acted like a mentor to him during his first few months. Known infamously as the 'Snake', he had not only been skilled in combat, but in the more research related aspect of investigations as well, and had dedicated a large part of his time outside of work looking into chakra and its relation to the human body.

It had only been a few months into Sasori's work with the Akatsuki when a group of people trafficking children was brought to light. It was Sasori's first-ever major job but everything had gone smoothly. They managed to rescue all the children unharmed, and while it was revealed that most of the kidnap victims had been orphans taken from the streets, work had been put into giving them food, shelter, and support, and an orphanage had been set up.

Orochimaru had offered to take over the role of managing the orphanage, and it had taken them too long to realize who his true intentions had been.

The man had been using the children at the orphanage as experiments for what he claimed to be scientific research into chakra. By the time there had been enough evidence to try and take him in, he had been long ready for them. He had already transported out many of his successful experiments to bases he had prepared years in advance. Itachi, who had caught up to him after the man had made his initial escape, had gotten into a messy battle with him and Orochimaru managed to escape with a sliver of his life. He had gone into hiding ever since only to reveal himself a year later as a new nation he called 'Sound'. He ran on organized crime and assassinations, and after months, years, of investigation, they had tracked down a major base of his. The Akatsuki had been given full rights to handling the case, and finally, after years of bubbling anger and planning and thoughts of revenge, they were executing a massive operation to take him down.

Sasori entered the main office of their base to see that only Itachi and Kisame were present. He nodded in greeting then took his usual seat at the table.

"Good morning," Itachi said politely.

The raven had once been heir to one of the biggest clans within the nation. The Uchiha, in fact, ran the entirety of the security organization that prioritized civilian safety. When the Akatsuki had recommended him for their ranks, no one had expected him to accept the position. It had caused a huge rift within the Uchiha clan but Itachi had shaken off all the protests and attempts to stop him. Though they were the same age, Itachi was a year his senior within the Akatsuki. He was an unparalleled user of fire, even among his clansmen who were known for fire manipulation. However, what made him truly stand out was what was known as the Sharingan. Rarely, chakra caused physical mutations to occur. The Uchiha were a clan that had managed to pass down this mutation until it became a family trait. The Sharingan affected the eyes of the Uchiha who had them and allowed them to cast illusions that directly affected their targets through eye contact. Itachi was talent, potential, skill, and birthright wrapped up in a single, deadly package.

Kisame grinned. "Finally, huh?"

The man, one of the oldest among them at age twenty-three, was skilled a swordsman as he was a chakra user. He had once been a part of a group known as the Ten Swordsmen that originated from the Land of Water. While during the warring ages decades ago, the Ten Swordsmen of the Mist had been declared one of the most dangerous groups of warriors, it now only existed in name. Still, those who were a part of it were all considered master swordsmen, and Kisame had been recruited for his ability to mould chakra with his weapons. From what he knew, he was also rather skilled in manipulating water.

Sasori nodded. "I can't wait to get my hands on that stupid snake," he hissed.

Itachi nodded. "I let him get away once," he said. The Uchiha had always blamed himself for Orochimaru's escape, even though everyone knew it had not been his fault. Itachi had been fifteen then. Orochimaru was much older and had years more experience on him and the raven had still managed to push the Snake to the edge. "It will not happen again."

Before the rest of them could say anything, the door was thrown open and Deidara marched in. "Morning," he called, then sat down in his chair next to Sasori. "So, who's ready to kick some scaly snake ass?"

Deidara was once a kid Sasori had put behind bars for causing several explosions in abandoned factories. No one had gotten hurt, though, and everything had changed once it was revealed that the explosions were caused not by bombs, but by the blond's unique ability to cause things he channelled chakra into to explode. The Akatsuki, looking for a member after Orochimaru had betrayed them, had taken him in. Sasori would never admit it, but underneath all the noise and annoyance that came with associating with him, he quite liked Deidara. At the very least, he was very entertaining to watch.

Sasori glanced around the room. The four of them would be the attack force. Kakuzu and Hidan had an emergency job within the capital to take care of, and they could not leave their own base unmanned.

"Zetsu returned from his scouting just before you entered the room," Itachi told them. "And it appears Konan will be offering us support. From what we already do know, Orochimaru is currently not within the Northern Base."

Sasori cursed under his breath. They had all known that this would take a long time. Orochimaru definitely had more than one base, and the possibility of him being in the one they decided to take down first was low.

"Sucks," Deidara muttered, appearing to mirror his thoughts. "It would've been nice to just get rid of him now."

"Still, the Northern base is a major one of the Snake hideouts," Kisame pointed out. "Once we take one, it won't be long before we manage to track the others; Orochimaru can't build bases as fast as we can destroy them."

Deidara grinned. "Ohhh, I like the sound of that."

Sasori nodded once, firmly, in agreement.

Chapter TWO>

Chapter List

35&40

Here we go under the cut because it is LONG!

35: How does your character behave around people they like?

Derormr is loud and boisterous when it’s nothing serious, at first to the annoyance of Horoth and the amusement of Ushwei but they both get used to it and even find it infectious eventually.

Ingda is basically the mum friend, makes sure they have enough food, checks if their weapons are in good condition and scouts ahead for bandits or anything else that’s suspicious. You know, the usual things a mum friend does.

Loueus is often the guy who gets excited to tell you what he saw while he was out hunting. If he’s quiet and brooding, something either scared him shitless or pissed him off beyond belief.

Lisnna will be talkative with those she likes, growing up in the court of Wayrest she often ignored the other, often very snobbish children by reading a book. She’s also tiny and built like a stick, though if someone insults someone she considers a friend in her presence she’s definitely going to threaten to burn their face off.

Gelor doesn’t really have a true friend, mostly because he’s a cult leader. Though with his followers, he is willing to discuss and debate how Mehrunes Dagon helped shape current events, largely from a political perspective.

Rena loves engaging in verbal spars with her friends or merchants she likes/respects. Sometimes sarcastic, dry and gunning for a good price but never malicious.

Kayesek loves sharing and exchanging stories of the fights he’s been in, usually with other warriors. Also, with those willing to listen, he’ll often tell them about the old Yokudan pantheon that he was brought up with.

Alusati likes talking about and potentially planning an exploration to an interesting location. Gets most excited about Dwarven ruins.

Yaznakh is often the one who’ll smack the sense into you if you’re going to do something stupid. A little overprotective but only because she lost a lot of friends in the Great War.

Mausis usually speaks politely to those he likes, only schemes and plans with those he knows he can trust.

Sonaire learned the best time she has with friends is take them to the local tavern, get absolutely plastered and then probably either start a bar fight or turn the patrons of the tavern into a motley crew of party guests.

Enron is often a loner, every time he’s gotten close to people, shit happens and they wind up dead. If he gets particularly close to someone and they get into an extremely dangerous situation, any sense of self-preservation goes out the window.

Riraisa as a Dark Brotherhood assassin, generally treats her friends like a family, a morally bankrupt family but a family nonetheless. Loves exchanging a snarky comment or two and if she’s working on a potion/poison will gladly explain what she intends on using it for.

Horoth prefers a quiet drink of Sujamma and doesn’t mind if friends join him as long as talking is kept to a minimum. If he’s in a tavern he likes keeping both ears open to rumours.

Thalas isn’t really close to anyone. Her personal vendetta against the Thalmor means she doesn’t want to drag any innocents into danger.

Athasai is only close to other vampires who hate Molag Bal or mortals open-minded enough to not immediately view him as a monster. Other than that he tends to keep himself away from civilisation.

Daro’adhi, playfully steals an object from her friends and will return it when either you finally notice or she points it out.

Ra’thri-dar usually challenges people he likes to a competition. If he wins he’ll be smug but if he loses, he’ll be salty.

Veesk was often vilified due to her appearance resembling that of the Veeskhleel or Ghost People tribe, who, in my stories were wiped out due to their traditions necromantic practices on other tribe’s dead and/or stealing the eggs of other tribes. Therefore, she’s extremely loyal to anyone she likes, especially the Dark Brotherhood.

Ushwei as long as he’s treated fairly and with respect he’ll give the same, often referring to other races as ‘Marsh-Friend’ or other Argonians as ‘Egg-Brother/Sister’

40: How does your character treat people in service jobs?

Derormr is a bard, you know he’s had to deal with shitty customers, he respects anyone in service jobs and might even pay a little extra if it’s especially hectic for them. Also greatly respects healers and even learned Restoration magic because of it.

Ingda grew up in a trading caravan, as a guard she’s had to stop angry customers as well as greedy thieves. So she treats them with respect and may even offer her blade if they want to pay for it.

Loueus prefers to keep things short and sweet, he greatly dislikes haggling and will get annoyed if a merchant tries to con him out of furs he knows are worth more. Since he lived free in a clan of hunters, he doesn’t really see government and law enforcement as an authority for him to listen to but does respect their laws whenever he has to go into town.

Lisnna also likes keeping it short and polite though she does haggle with a madwoman’s conviction if what she’s buying is either a spell tome or a book on history. Also respects other service jobs as despite being a pariah to many of the nobles she grew up with, most of the servants were nice to her

Gelor doesn’t really interact with people in service jobs, but when he does, he has a silver tongue. Since he also leads a cult dedicated to a god that nearly ended the world, that people are still very sore about, he doesn’t go into cities and towns often and when he does he doesn’t flaunt his status as a Mehrunes Dagon worshipper.

Rena is a woman who grew up poor on the streets, she learned how to haggle for the best prices possible and greatly enjoys the fun of outwitting someone in a deal. She also has a respect for teachers as she never got a formal education herself.

Kayesek prefers speaking with blacksmiths and often compliments them on their work.

Alusati generally just enjoys browsing a merchants stock, she’s learned after a few times that she’s no good at haggling. Plus she cooks for the group so she appreciates the work that chefs put into making a meal.

Mausis is basically a Hufflepuff, do no harm but take no shit, being a victim of racial prejudice hammered that point home for him. Basically, he’s polite to a service worker until they start getting snarky with him.

Yaznakh is a soldier first and foremost with a simple fighting style. However, she can tell if someone is trying to con her. So, she gets pretty damn annoyed at sleazy merchants and has respect for her fellow officers of the Legion.

Horoth is a prideful Dunmer and tends to look down his nose at basically anyone who’s not Dunmer regardless of occupation. He eventually mellows out and starts treating people with respect.

Riraisa once worked as an Alchemist before becoming an assassin, she knows what it’s like to work for people and have the importance of your job be overlooked. So, she has respect for most service jobs though as assassin also tends to avoid law enforcement like the plague.

Athasai doesn’t interact with people in service jobs often, his breed of vampire, the Bonmasu will be exposed under candlelight so he always cooks his own food far away from a tavern.

Thalas discreetly pays blacksmiths to let her fletch her own arrows she gathered on her own that way there’s little to no record of her being at the shop, other than that she might go to a tavern and generously tip the waiters. 

Enron isn’t really good with merchants, nervous around Imperial soldiers as an ex-Aldmeri Dominion soldier and likes discussing the uses of Restoration, Alteration and Illusion with other mages who provide services those magics are used for.

Sonaire used to rob anyone, including those in service jobs and was constantly pursued by law enforcement (albeit for good reason since she was a bandit). Since turning over a new leaf she doesn’t pick as many fights ad isn’t tempted to swing her warhammer at the first guard that looks at her funny.

Ushwei greatly admires craftmanship, especially if it’s made out of bone so he shows respect to those whose job it is to maintain structures such as city walls.

Veesk honestly doesn’t care much about those in service jobs.

Ra’thri-Dar considers himself above buying from butchers, he prefers to hunt and prep the meat himself.

Daro’adhi would probably steal from them if they’re an asshole but give to them if they genuinely need it.

This past month and a half was both a blessing and a curse for me. A blessing because, ohmygoodness, I found so many amazing books; and a curse because, well, I spent my time reading instead of doing things I should have done. For example: school. I am so behind on school because of these books, I kind of hate them as much as I love them. I have no regrets, though. These books were worth it.

The Lunar Chronicles

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Goodreads Synopsis: Sixteen-year-old Cinder is considered a technological mistake by most of society and a burden by her stepmother. Being cyborg does have its benefits, though: Cinder’s brain interference has given her an uncanny ability to fix things (robots, hovers, her own malfunctioning parts), making her the best mechanic in New Beijing. This reputation brings Prince Kai himself to her weekly market booth, needing her to repair a broken android before the annual ball. He jokingly calls it “a matter of national security,” but Cinder suspects it’s more serious than he’s letting on.

Although eager to impress the prince, Cinder’s intentions are derailed when her younger stepsister, and only human friend, is infected with the fatal plague that’s been devastating Earth for a decade. Blaming Cinder for her daughter’s illness, Cinder’s stepmother volunteers her body for plague research, an “honor” that no one has survived.But it doesn’t take long for the scientists to discover something unusual about their new guinea pig. Something others would kill fo

r.

I must admit, I wasn’t a huge fan of Cinder, but once I started Scarlet, I began to fall in love with the series.

Also, random fact, Thorne and I have the same birthday!

Cinder         |          Scarlet          |         Cress            |        Winter

The Wrath and the Dawn + The Rose and the Dagger

Goodreads Synopsis: One Life to One Dawn.

In a land ruled by a murderous boy-king, each dawn brings heartache to a new family. Khalid, the eighteen-year-old Caliph of Khorasan, is a monster. Each night he takes a new bride only to have a silk cord wrapped around her throat come morning. When sixteen-year-old Shahrzad’s dearest friend falls victim to Khalid, Shahrzad vows vengeance and volunteers to be his next bride. Shahrzad is determined not only to stay alive, but to end the caliph’s reign of terror once and for all.Night after night, Shahrzad beguiles Khalid, weaving stories that enchant, ensuring her survival, though she knows each dawn could be her last. But something she never expected begins to happen: Khalid is nothing like what she’d imagined him to be. This monster is a boy with a tormented heart. Incredibly, Shahrzad finds herself falling in love. How is this possible? It’s an unforgivable betrayal. Still, Shahrzad has come to understand all is not as it seems in this palace of marble and stone. She resolves to uncover whatever secrets lurk and, despite her love, be ready to take Khalid’s life as retribution for the many lives he’s stolen. Can their love survive this world of stories and secrets?

Everything was so beautifully written in these books, I wish I could speak as eloquently as they did in the books! The audio books were great as well, now I know how to pronounce everyone’s names.

The Wrath and the Dawn            |              The Rose and the Dagger

The Shatter Me Series

Goodreads Synopsis:

 I have a curse I have a gift

I am a monster I’m more than humanMy touch is lethal My touch is power

I am their weapon I will fight back

Juliette hasn’t touched anyone in exactly 264 days.

The last time she did, it was an accident, but The Reestablishment locked her up for murder. No one knows why Juliette’s touch is fatal. As long as she doesn’t hurt anyone else, no one really cares. The world is too busy crumbling to pieces to pay attention to a 17-year-old girl. Diseases are destroying the population, food is hard to find, birds don’t fly anymore, and the clouds are the wrong color.

The Reestablishment said their way was the only way to fix things, so they threw Juliette in a cell. Now so many people are dead that the survivors are whispering war – and The Reestablishment has changed its mind. Maybe Juliette is more than a tortured soul stuffed into a poisonous body. Maybe she’s exactly what they need right now.

Juliette has to make a choice: Be a weapon. Or be a warrior.

I’ve seen the covers to the books of this series everywhere these past few years but never picked it up. I eventually decided to borrow the audio books from the library and was so glad I did. The narrator did an amazing job, I was able to feel the emotions just by listening to the audio book, and trust me, this series had a lot of them. This is literally the most angsty series I have ever read. Edit: I just found out that there is going to be three more books in the series, and I just have to say: if anything bad happens to Kenji, I will start a riot.

Shatter Me             |            Unravel Me            |          Ignite Me

The Scorpio Races

Goodreads Synopsis: It happens at the start of every November: the Scorpio Races. Riders attempt to keep hold of their water horses long enough to make it to the finish line. Some riders live. Others die.

At age nineteen, Sean Kendrick is the returning champion. He is a young man of few words, and if he has any fears, he keeps them buried deep, where no one else can see them.Puck Connolly is different. She never meant to ride in the Scorpio Races. But fate hasn’t given her much of a chance. So she enters the competition — the first girl ever to do so. She is in no way prepared for what is going to happen.

I honestly loved Puck so much. And Sean. And Corr. And Dove. And Finn. I think it’s safe to say I loved everything about this book.

Flame in the Mist

Goodreads Synopsis: The only daughter of a prominent samurai, Mariko has always known she’d been raised for one purpose and one purpose only: to marry. Never mind her cunning, which rivals that of her twin brother, Kenshin, or her skills as an accomplished alchemist. Since Mariko was not born a boy, her fate was sealed the moment she drew her first breath.

So, at just seventeen years old, Mariko is sent to the imperial palace to meet her betrothed, a man she did not choose, for the very first time. But the journey is cut short when Mariko’s convoy is viciously attacked by the Black Clan, a dangerous group of bandits who’ve been hired to kill Mariko before she reaches the palace.The lone survivor, Mariko narrowly escapes to the woods, where she plots her revenge. Dressed as a peasant boy, she sets out to infiltrate the Black Clan and hunt down those responsible for the target on her back. Once she’s within their ranks, though, Mariko finds for the first time she’s appreciated for her intellect and abilities. She even finds herself falling in love—a love that will force her to question everything she’s ever known about her family, her purpose, and her deepest desires.

I already wrote a review of this book but I must have re-read it again like two times in the past month.

Alex, Approximately

Goodreads Synopsis: The one guy Bailey Rydell can’t stand is actually the boy of her dreams—she just doesn’t know it yet.

Classic movie fan Bailey “Mink” Rydell has spent months crushing on a witty film geek she only knows online as Alex. Two coasts separate the teens until Bailey moves in with her dad, who lives in the same California surfing town as her online crush.Faced with doubts (what if he’s a creep in real life—or worse?), Bailey doesn’t tell Alex she’s moved to his hometown. Or that she’s landed a job at the local tourist-trap museum. Or that she’s being heckled daily by the irritatingly hot museum security guard, Porter Roth—a.k.a. her new archnemesis. But life is a whole lot messier than the movies, especially when Bailey discovers that tricky fine line between hate, love, and whatever it is she’s starting to feel for Porter.

And as the summer months go by, Bailey must choose whether to cling to a dreamy online fantasy in Alex or take a risk on an imperfect reality with Porter. The choice is both simpler and more complicated than she realizes, because Porter Roth is hiding a secret of his own: Porter is Alex…Approximately.

Literally the cutest book ever, not to mention the numerous times cookies and churros were mentioned. I must have eaten like three pounds of sugar while reading Alex, Approximately.

What do you think about these books? And what books have you been obsessed with lately?

love, jane.

the unlost book nook | twitter | goodreads | instagram | bloglovin

What books have YOU been obsessed with lately? This past month and a half was both a blessing and a curse for me. A blessing because, ohmygoodness, I found so many amazing books; and a curse because, well, I spent my time reading instead of doing things I should have done.

Part 7

He'd borne his punishment with as muvh pride as he was able, knowing the children who made his life difficult were spemding their time in recuperation knowing he could easily harm them if they pushed him past tolerance. Even with his claws reduced to mere stubs, his peers had been alot more careful around him after that. Most of them, anyway. The garderner's son, a Golden Jackal by the name of Tabaqui, had taken to following him around when the pup was not working on tasks for his parents. Unlike the othwr children his little display of violence had apparently interested the older boy wherw it left others terrified. The most dramatic thing that the pup could recall happening before the fight had been an outbreak of the Bubonic plague following a particularly heavy rainy season(which had then been followed by a drought of all things vecause the weather in Bombay was nothing if not contradictory) but that that had been different. The bodies dropping A tiger cub enacting vengence upon those who had treated him poorly was far more predictable than a deadlt disease that struck without warning and had been responaible for takung the lives of four servant abs one of thw master's children. So, feeling he hed wanted to be associated with the tiger cub. He was not offering friendship. Instead he seemed content to be his talkative shadow. Lungri had no idea what to make about the strange vhange of evwbts, but as long as the pup left him undisturbed, he let him be. Following that incident he had started to pick fights of his own just to remind them of his prowess. He was no one's victim and if they wanted to scarw him thet would learn he wasnt one to be trifled with. In these moments he liked to pretend he was a deadly warrior king visting his revenge upon a clan of unruly bandits tht had invaded gis home. When he visited his wrath upon them he made it abundantly clear that if they nade any attempts on him again they knew he would not hesitate to show them exactly what had made his ancestors so deadly. In doing so he was giving up on the chance of friendship but it had always been an impossible goal anyway. He was better than them anyway, or so ge tried to convince himself. A part of him had briefly hoped things would change when his mom married a man who was outside the caste system. Tigers didnt usually form bonds outside of what they had with a parent. So, in the absence of the one that would normally form between a cub and their mother, he had hoped he could build one with his stepfather. As usual, he did not get what he wanted. The man had been friendly but he had gently informed the child that he wasnt qualifiwd to be anyone's father. The child in him wanted to tell him that in marrying his mother he had volunteered to be fathet by default. But you couldnt force someone to genuinely think of you as family. He would have already done so with his mother just in case she didnt feel for him what he felt for her. But his mother was not one incluned to abide by neediness. Demanding love and attention from her had never gotten him anything but cold anger and imposed silence. Why would the cook be any different? And if the behavior would only alienate gim further there was no point in seeking to begin with. It was logical to put it bwhind him. He was intelligent enough to recognize the futility in demanding something if the action did not earn him the desieef respomse. but beneathw the grudging acceptancw he seethed in anger. Adults were all the same. They diaplayed perfectly painted puctures of domesticity snd scorned hin when he wanted a piece of that to call his own. He may have solmnly accepted rhat the man would be father in name only, but in the aafty of his own thoyghts he cuesed the man for the rejection. He could have pretended to accept him as a son. Lungri was no mind readet. Instead he knew the man hadnt thought of him as sych at all and hed mentallu added yet another item to his bullet list of impossible dreams. But by saying he hadnt wanted to be "anyone's fathwr" in general instead of stating he hadnt wanted to be his father specifically he had unknoeingly presented himself as a target. It wasny his fault his stepfather hadnt wanted him so the blame lay instwad on the personal failings of the man who had married his mother. And he was more than happy to blame the adult rayher than himself for having done something to make the man dislike him. He prefered raging at othets in his head to rhw senseless repetitive wishes he had if he dwelt too long on hos lot on lifw. If he didnr aim those feelinga at external forces he would be thw ine subjectwd to them instead. And if he was the one to recieve all his bittwrness and anger he felt he would surely drown in the black morass of his emotions. His mother's status within the household had risen with her marriage(and lowered within society proper) but Lungri's position had not been affected. The man was not his biological father nor was he adopting him, which meant his caste remained the same. He was a herder, just as his grandfather had been beforw him. He had darkly observed that it was almost as if nothong had changed. He still recieved hust as little of the attention he wanted as he had always lacked. He had still been bren born handicapped, even something as relativelt small as a lame paw meant hr would be prevented from inheriting money or land by law. So upon learnibg he would not be forming any familial bonds with his step father, he chise to ignore the marriage and the cook himself outside work. It was a surprisingly easy thing to do. Perhaps the years he had spent maintaining a professional distance from his mothet made ignoring someone who shared no relation to him simple by comparison, or maybe he was kust givibg the man yge cold shouldet for denying him a familial tie hed always thought hed needed but thats how things were between himself and the man who was his stepfather. The cook was friendly but distant in returm. Strangly, the samr coulf be said of the relationship between the man and his mother. They worked together but they did not have the same sense of intimacy hed witnessed between ths gardener and his wife, the grass clipper. To his knowledge, neither his mother or the man she'd married had even seemed to sharw a bed. He tried not to question the arrangement out loud, but it was odd to say the least. When hed seen the cook embrace the man who tended the master's horse a suspicion had grown in his mind but he had opted not to ask hin outright, once his mother who had been with him ordered him to drop the subject. If he was right it had explained some things about his mother and stepfather that hadnt sat well witj him, but it also left him questions hed wanted answeting. Foremost in his mind was what kept them together if neorher party cared for the other in marriagable ways and what prompted their decision to get togethwr in the first place. Hed needed to talk to someone about it. Having no friends of his own and knowing his mother well enough to realize she would not answer any of his questions, hed brrn forced by necessity(all these secrets had left him fit to burst) to corner Tabaqui about it during dinner. The other boy was an entire year older than him and he had felt the disparity when those amber had looked at him increfulously, surprisef to learn the cub had honestly never heard of storied kf men who slept with men and wete caught by the authorities. Lungri hadnt anf had bitten yhe insi his hims. Out of all the sexual talk hed heard, it had been the British who had instigated it. His fellow wervants had never seen fit to discuss such subjects frankly without the master or one of his gueat's prompting them ob the matter. That wasnt to say rhe subject wasnt discussed. Or even that it wasn't broufht up somewhat frequently. The real difference was that moat seemed content to skirt around the acrua detaila, relying on euphimisms to get the point across while yhw English wetw generally quirw drynk ehen thwy brought it up and sometimes had a language barrier . Tabaqui hd onlu snorted at that, anf stolen a bit of the bread off his plare. The boy was hobestlt the most irrevalent person he knew, dismissive of cultural norms and people in general. Je chose to follow thr young tiger around when hr wasn't workinh because he found it amusing. Hw had settled down stealing a bit of his audience's rice and in a soft whisper casially spoke of the punishment q people, those of every religion he knew, were keen on leveling against those seen as sexually abnormal. He had found himself disturbed. Both by what had been described and how easily the boy spikr of such horrors, like an elderly woman discussing a friend's trouble with a rebellious daughter, he was simply too cheerful about the suffering of others to be entirely comfortable in his presence. Tabaqui hsd then topped it off with a casual memtion og men who married womwn to hide their identity like a performer might wear a mask. Lungri had decided from that point on he would not discuss matters with any especially dark answers with the other boy. He seemed to like it a little too much to be entirely comfortable.