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rheawritessometimes · 3 years

Text

In Bloom

{ Xiao x GN!Gardener!Reader }

{ Summary } Looking for flowers is more dangerous than it seems.

{ Warnings } Violence, Injury, Mention of Death, Not Even Proofread.

{ Notes } Reader runs on dumb luck and also is kind of like an ecologist or something. Reader is a bit of an airhead. This is probably the most serious fic I've written, with no jokes or additions stricken out. But yeah I just typed this out and didn't even read it over, so if it's bad... Just know this is just a little something while I work on longer garbage. Masterlist

{ Word Count } 2,112

Appealing to the Vigilant Yaksha was an easy, one could even say effortless, thing for you. You hadn't taken the almond tofu route as others before you had, instead, you left him some Qingxin flowers. These flowers did not come from the peaks of Huaguong Stone Forest nor the Mingyun Village, rather they were among the finest specimens you had grown in your garden. The translucent white petals were soft like velvet and entirely free from blemish.

Your small gift to the adeptus wasn't exactly intentional. In truth, you had left the flowers on the balcony of Wangshu Inn entirely by accident and when you returned to retrieve them they were nowhere to be seen. Instead, there was a pale man with dark hair leaning over the balcony. When you halted your approach, he turned his head towards you, indicating he had heard your footsteps.

Striking golden eyes seemed to gaze straight through you, sending a chill down your spine. His expression was entirely neutral, you couldn't get even a hint as to what he was thinking. Nothing about his outward appearance screamed danger, but the ominous aura you sensed made you take a step back.

"My apologies, I didn't mean to disturb you," you squeaked out, sounding a lot less confident than you had intended. You take a step backward, but couldn't bring yourself to tear your eyes from him.

"Don't apologize. You're welcome to stay," he replied after a few beats of silence, his tone sounding strained for a reason you couldn't discern.

"Um, okay, thank you," you replied politely, feeling it would be too awkward to leave now. It felt to you as though you were now trapped here for a little while out of social obligation. You stepped out towards the railing, deciding to at least enjoy the view if you had to stay.

The man didn't look at you, but you couldn't help but take in his appearance. He was objectively good-looking with bright amber eyes, dark hair with teal highlights, and his stoic expression. His clothing wasn't outlandish, but it's not the type you would commonly see on the streets of Liyue.

It took a while for the dark mask resting against the man's hip to catch your attention, but once it did you felt like a fool. It was not common knowledge, however, the fact an adeptus resided at the Wangshu Inn was not exactly a secret. One which you were privy to. The mask was the most obvious indication of his status as an adeptus. Not just any adeptus, not that any of them were anything to look down upon, but one of the Yakshas. The last of the five Yakshas.

"Alatus," the name escapes your lips as a whisper before you can think to stop it. Immediately your eyes widen, but before you could issue an apology the man just sighs softly. It doesn't sound particularly angered, but rather weary.

"Xiao. My name is Xiao," he says without turning to look at you. That's all he says before vanishing in a cloud of black mist and falling feathers of anemo energy. The mist and feathers are both quick to dissipate, leaving you standing with your mouth hanging open.

After that encounter, it had become a regular occurrence, at least once weekly, for you to pick one of the finest flowers from your garden and bring it to Wangshu Inn to leave on the balcony, or give directly to Xiao should he show himself. Most often you brought him a Qingxin, but occasionally you would substitute other flowers as not to end up plucking every Qingxin you had grown. You never picked the very best flower, either. Even for an adeptus you couldn't bring yourself to pick the best examples, rather letting them grow in peace for your prolonged enjoyment.

It wasn't until the third time you had come to the inn with a flower for Xiao that he was waiting for you on the balcony. Seeing the yaksha there made you pause, heart skipping a beat in surprise. He turned from his place looking out across the landscape to see you, certainly not as surprised to see you as you were him.

The way he looked expectantly at the flower in your hand has you realizing you had been standing there frozen. You moved, extending the flower out to him in offering. He took it delicately from your hand, looking it over for a moment.

"Thank you," he said softly, so quiet you almost didn't hear it at all. You could only nod stiffly in response. He scoffed at you before turning around again to lean against the balcony railing.

Just as it had the first time you met the yaksha, it felt wrong to just leave. So, you decided to survey the landscape of Liyue with him in silence. After the first few minutes, the atmosphere became rather comfortable between the two of you. Still, by the time he disappeared in a cloud of black mist and anemo feathers, neither of you had spoken a word.

This morning you were out early in the morning to explore the wilds of Liyue. You were no adventurer, though. Your purpose was to analyze the populations of certain flora and fauna. These were trips you made often to various parts of Liyue, wishing to preserve the life of endangered species, and always alone. Bringing people along to the locations of such rare organisms, be it plant or animal, was a dangerous thing. In many instances, rare means valuable and there are those who would do anything for some Mora.

Today you found yourself in Dihua Marsh to check up on the Glaze Lily population. Based on your counts, the number hadn't fluctuated greatly since your last visit, there were even a few new blooms. This brought you great relief, Glaze Lilies seemed to be somewhat of a symbol of Liyue and it would sadden you to see their wild population disappear, even if they remained in Qingce Village and at the Yujing Terrace. It wouldn't be the same.

Once you had sung a few songs to the flowers, not worried about anyone hearing you in this rather secluded area, you made your way back to one of the main roads. The long walks back to the harbor always ended up with you lost deep in thought, which wasn't always a good thing. Lost deep in your own mind, you didn't notice the slow advance of a small group of Treasure Hoarders until it was too late.

There was no time to run away as they surrounded you, it was unlikely you could have outrun them anyways. Fortunately, it didn't take very long for the Treasure Hoarders to discover you had absolutely nothing of value on you, and while they may be thieves it wasn't often a Treasure Hoarder was a murderer. Of course, they had roughed you up a bit before ultimately leaving you alone. There was a nasty scrape on your cheek and you were sure you would be bruised in the morning, but you weren't seriously injured.

By the next day, your muscles ached and bruises had appeared in various places on your body, but the scrapes had stopped bleeding and it was nothing that would stop you from bringing your usual offering to Xiao. You spent some time perusing your garden, looking for the perfect gift. You settled on a Silk Flower, there was some worry in your mind that Xiao would dislike it because they did grow right outside of the Wangshu Inn, but you hope the exceptional fragrance and color of this specimen would gain his appreciation.

Mindful not to fiddle with the flower as to preserve its pristine state, you worried the whole walk to the inn. Even if the adeptus wasn't present, if he rejected the offering you felt you would know. Maybe you would find the flower sitting where you left it on your next visit, or maybe Verr Goldet would tell you about the silk flower she found laying on the balcony. Your heart clenched at the thought and you couldn't help but wonder when you had started seeking the yaksha's approval.

You hadn't even realized you arrived at the inn until you were stepping off the elevator, lost in thought again. Shaking your head, you thought it would be good if you started paying more attention. Getting ambushed by again was the last thing you wanted, the next time it could be worse than petty thieves.

Pushing the negative thoughts from your mind, you climbed the stairs to the balcony you so often visited. Your muscles ached in quiet protest, but the pain was mild. Peeking over the stairs, you spotted Xiao.

For the first time, he was already facing you, leaning with his back against the railing. You wondered if he had spotted you on your way to the Inn, offering him a polite smile as a silent greeting. You extended the Silk Flower to him once you stepped out onto the balcony.

"What happened to you?" Xiao asked immediately, tone stern. He took the flower from you without even sparing a glance down at it. Did he not like Silk Flowers?

"Oh, um, I just bumped into some Treasure Hoarders yesterday. Nothing serious," you answered after finally processing his question, bringing your hand up to the scrape on your cheek without thinking. His frown deepened with your response and the adeptus crossed his arms over your chest.

"You were hurt," he pointed out bluntly. You felt small under his hard stare.

"Oh, it's nothing, um, serious," you assured him with a nervous laugh. He only furrowed his brows at your response.

"If ever again you find yourself in any danger, call my name. Adeptus Xiao. I will be there when you call."

At his words, your cheeks heated up. Was this some sort of special treatment, or did he offer this to anyone? It felt wrong to receive such kindness from an adeptus if it was only for you.

"Promise," he pressed when you didn't answer.

"Okay, I will. If I'm ever in danger, I'll call you," you agreed meekly, feeling a great weight put upon you under his amber gaze. He huffed before disappearing in his usual manner, and it was impossible for you to tell if he was upset with you.

The next time you visited the inn, Xiao hadn't appeared. This wasn't unusual, but the worry that you had displeased him seeped into your bones. You tried to ignore this feeling, going out often to check on wildlife populations and spending extra time tending to your garden. Keeping busy was the best way to take your mind off your worries and stay productive.

A week after your meeting with the Vigilant Yaksha, you were back at Dihua Marsh checking on the Glaze Lilies. You were sitting in the middle of the lilies, singing softly to the patch of flowers when the sound of shouting reached your ears. Looking up, you noticed two hilichurls accompanied by a mitachurl with a stone shield who was charging your way.

There would be no time for you to get up and out of the way, so you closed your eyes and braced for the impact. You could only pray it wouldn't kill you, but even if it didn't you would probably be unable to escape death by the hilichurls soon after.

The impact never came, instead, a gust of wind blew past you and you wondered if the mitachurl had somehow run past you. When you opened your eyes, you saw Glaze Lily petals swirl into the air, dancing around the familiar figure of the Vigilant Yaksha. The mitachurl was already crumbling to dust, returning to the Abyss with it's hilichurl companions.

Xiao turned to face you, mask dematerializing from his face and reappearing at his hip. When he extended his hand down to help you get up, you furrowed your brows wondering why he had been here. Was it incredible luck, or had he perhaps been following you?

Taking his hand, you let him pull you up onto shaky legs. He didn't let go, looking a little worried you'd fall. You finally looked up to his face, scanning golden eyes.

"Why are you here?" you finally asked, throat feeling a bit scratchy.

"I told you I would be there when you called."

His words only confused you further until it dawned on you, the scratchy feeling in your throat was awfully similar to that which came with yelling. Had you truly called his name without even thinking, without even realizing?

"Thank you, Xiao."

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miserablesme · 3 years

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The Les Miserables Changelog Part 3: 1987 Broadway Production

Hello, everyone! This is the latest edition in my attempt to chronicle all of the musical and lyrical changes which the show Les Miserables has undergone over the years. This time, we're going through all the changes between the musical as it existed on the West End around 1985-1986 and the revised libretto for the 1987 Broadway production.

In some ways, this is a much easier changelog to compile than the last two simply because it is much easier to find audio evidence of the show from this era than from its pre-1987 self. We have a full soundboard of the original Broadway cast as well as a very good quality bootleg of the very first Broadway preview, as well as several audios from the next few years which use exactly the same script. We also have an officially released Symphonic Soundtrack which almost (but not quite) follows this version of the libretto exactly. So no more relying on unclear bootlegs and speculation to figure out what was changed when!

Having said that, the changes in this production were MASSIVE. It's almost certainly the most extensive edit the show's libretto has received to this day. As such, this will be a very long edition of this blog. So make sure you have a bit of time on your hands before reading it! With all that cleared up, let's begin.

The first change literally can be heard as soon as the musical begins. The pre-Broadway show opens up with the same recurring motif also heard, for instance, at the openings of "At the End of the Day" and "One Day More". This music then transitioned to the instrumentals to the opening "Work Song". The post-Broadway libretto cuts right to the chase, with the opening instrumentals to the "Work Song" starting right up without any preamble.

One interesting little non-scripted change occurs later in the "Work Song", but only in American productions. For whatever reason, every American Javert from the original Broadway cast until the first Broadway revival sang "And I am Javert" instead of "And I'm Javert", for reasons that honestly baffle me. Again, the libretto retained the original contraption as far as I'm aware, and the West End production as well as later UK and Australian tours still used it as well.

The next change happens while Valjean is on parole. After Valjean pleads against the farmer underpaying him, this was the farmer's original response:

Do you believe

A yellow ticket of leave

Allows a criminal like you to earn full screw?

Since Broadway, his response is instead as follows:

You broke the law

It's there for people to see

Why should you get the same as honest men like me?

I much prefer this revised version. Though the information is essentially the same, it feels more dramatic, as well as feeling less awkward now that it is in the form of separate sentences as opposed to a single sentence spoken in three lines with pauses in between. Moreover, the phrase "honest men like me" as used here provides interesting foreshadowing for its more well-known usage in "Master of the House". One could spend quite some time analysing the implications of this recurring description, but this blog is long enough as it is so now isn't the time!

In the same number, originally the innkeeper's wife had the following remark:

My rooms are full

And I've no supper to spare

I'd like to help you really, all I want is to be fair

Since Broadway, her line has been slightly modified:

My rooms are full

And I've no supper to spare

I'd like to help a stranger, all we want is to be fair

I suppose "I'd like to help a stranger" sounds less slang-y than "help you really". Presumably this is why it was changed. I find the change of subject from singular to plural far more interesting. My hypothesis is that the writers wanted to make it clear than this is a communal grudge, not a personal one. Everyone around sees it as perfectly fair to deny shelter to a former convict, not just this one individual. I definitely prefer the revised line, but evidently the producers of the West End production didn't; that production held on to the original lyrics for more than a decade after they were originally revised! More on that in a later edition of this blog...

A more minor change can be heard during "At the End of the Day". Originally, Valjean asks the factor workers "What is this shouting all about?" The Broadway script changes this to "What is this fighting all about?" Much less trivial implications now. I'm curious as to whether or not a staging change may have accompanied this. Usually the two workers get into quite a bit of physical scuffle by this point, far beyond the realm of shouting. Did the original pre-Broadway production use more subdued choreography?

"The Runaway Cart" has some noticeable differences. After Valjean asks the townspeople for help, the original response was sung by the entire ensemble, and went as follows:

(SOLO)

Don't go near him, Monsieur Mayor

There's nothing at all you can do

(ENSEMBLE)

The old man is a goner for sure

Leave him alone

The Broadway libretto revised this into a sequence sung by one individual at a time with the following lyrics:

Don't go near him, Monsieur Mayor

The load is as heavy as hell

The old man is a goner for sure

It will kill you as well

A female ensemble member sung "The old man is a goner for sure" while a male member sung the rest. I sort of like it better as an ensemble piece (something that would be largely brought back in later years, as I'll soon discuss) although I think it's cool that it rhymes now. Having said that, I'm fairly confident that no one in the real world has ever actually used the phrase "Heavy as hell"!

An official change in the libretto occurred in "Who Am I?" but listeners to the original Broadway cast would not have heard it. While the pre-Broadway show had Valjean refer to "This innocent who bears my face", the revised libretto instead refers to "This innocent who wears my face". Perhaps a means of avoiding repetition, given that the word "bear" is used again later in the number? Regardless, Colm Wilkinson didn't actually bother to adapt to this change! He still sings "This innocent who bears my face" in the Broadway production (as well as the tenth anniversary concert; not until his 1998 stint in Toronto did he ever start singing the revised lyrics). Since every future Valjean (except Ivan Rutherford for some reason) sings "wears", I still see it as appropriate to mention here.

At the end of the song, Valjean's "You know where to find me!", used on and off in the Barbican previews before becoming a settled part of the production by the final pre-Broadway libretto, is once again removed for the Broadway show. However, the West End production would keep it for a few years - more on that later...

Just listening to the original Broadway cast, one might think Javert's "Dare you talk to me of crime?" becomes "Dare you speak to me of crime?" However, this seems to be a Terrence Mann-exclusive change. Every Javert after him reverts to the original lyrics (as did Terrence himself when he returned to the musical fifteen years later). I'm still making note of the change here for the sake of clarification.

An instrumental change occurs between "Castle on a Cloud" and "Master of the House". Mme. Thenardier's "You heard me ask for something and I never ask twice" was original followed by three bars of notes, then by six more bars of notes that are identical to each other. After the Broadway production, however, those six bars of notes grow increasingly more dramatic as they go on.

A very slight change happens during the preamble to "Master of the House". Originally one of the guests proclaims "Hell, what a wine" while the revised libretto instead has him claim "God, what a wine". Definitely more natural in my opinion, though not a huge difference by any means.

A few subtle differences exist in the "Waltz of Treachery" number. First off, Thenardier originally asks "Have we done for your child what is best?" The Broadway libretto changes "your child" to "her child". I personally like the original lyric better, as it goes back to the idea established earlier that Valjean is metaphorically bargaining through the spirit of Fantine. It's definitely not a difference that makes or breaks the number, though.

Towards the end of the song comes another change that cannot actually be heard by listening to the original Broadway cast. In the pre-Broadway show, Valjean used the line "Let us seek out a friendlier sky", while the revised libretto has him say "Let us seek out some friendlier sky". However, Colm Wilkinson once again doesn't bother to adapt to the change, and unlike the "Who Am I?" change he wouldn't learn it over time either. He continues to sing "a friendlier sky" throughout his on-and-off performances as Valjean, right up to and including his 2002 run in Shanghai!

After the bulk of the number comes a more significant change. Prior to the Broadway production, as was discussed in the last entry, the "Waltz of Treachery" was followed by about forty-five seconds of vamping and then this exchange in the tune of "Castle on a Cloud":

(LITTLE COSETTE)

We're going home right now, monsieur

What is your name

(VALJEAN)

Now my dear

I've names enough, I've got names to spare

But where I go, you always will be there

Nor will you be afraid again

There is a sun that's shining yet

(LITTLE COSETTE)

I'm going to call you my Papa

(VALJEAN)

I'm going to call you my Cosette

The Broadway libretto replaced it with just under twenty seconds of vamping, followed by a sequence in the tune of the "Waltz of Treachery":

(VALJEAN)

Come Cosette

Come my dear

From now on I will always be here

Where I go

You will be

(LITTLE COSETTE)

Will there be children

And castles to see?

(VALJEAN)

Yes, Cosette

Yes it's true

There's a castle just waiting for you

This is followed by another fifteen or so seconds of vamping, and then the humming duet between Cosette and Valjean carries on as before.

Arguably the biggest change in the entire edited libretto happens now. Whereas the number was originally directly followed by "Stars", things have been moved around so that it instead transitions directly into "Look Down". "Look Down" itself receives a lot of adjustments. First off, the number began in the pre-Broadway musical with a bar of music that was then repeated. The Broadway version only plays the bar of music once, and the sung part happens immediately afterwards.

Gavroche's verse receives some lyrical updates. Originally it used the following lines:

This is my school, my high society

From St. Denis to St Michel

We live on crumbs of humble piety

Tough on the teeth, but what the hell?

If you're poor, if you're free

Follow me, follow me!

The Broadway production rewrote that sequence a little:

This is my school, my high society

Here in the slums of St Michel

We live on crumbs of humble piety

Tough on the teeth, but what the hell?

Think you're poor? Think you're free?

Follow me, follow me!

Better lines in my humble opinion; "slums" conveys the poverty of Gavroche's community much more effectively than the original line, and phrasing the "poor" and "free" lines as questions is more dramatic than their original statement form.

The old beggar woman's original "You give 'em all the pox" becomes the less grammatically accurate "Give 'em all the pox" for Broadway, though I have no idea if the original "You" was part of the libretto or simply an improvisation. Since seemingly all actresses used that line for the first few years of the West End production, it strikes me as warranting a mention.

Right after this comes another change. In the pre-Broadway show, the argument between the beggar woman and the prostitute was followed by an exchange by a few individual beggars. All of the following lines were said by one person at a time, the first three being said by female beggars and the last one by a male beggar:

When's it gonna end?

When're we gonna live?

Something's gotta happen, dearie

Something's gotta give

The Broadway libretto changes this to an ensemble piece performed by all the beggars simultaneously:

When's it gonna end?

When're we gonna live?

Something's gotta happen now or

Something's gotta give

I really like the switch to a group effort, as it really emphasizes that the beggars are a community sharing the burden of poverty. It really feels like an epidemic to an extent that it doesn't when it's just a small conversation. Evidently the producers of the West End show didn't agree with me though, as they held onto the original sequence for more than a decade after the official change, and by that point it had already been largely reverted worldwide! More on that in a later blog...

Originally, the exposition about General Lamarque was given by a few random students (supposedly not specified in the libretto, but in practice portrayed as Combeferre and Feuilly). Some ensemble dialogue between beggars was put in between. Feuilly sings over the end of the ensemble's lines - but many have speculated that this was not intended by the writers, as the background music sounds super out of sync with his singing! Here's how the scene went:

(COMBEFERRE)

As for the leaders of the land

As for the swells who run this show

Only one man and that's Lamarque

Speaks for the people here below

(BEGGARS)

Something for a meal

Something for a doss

Something in the name of Him who died upon the cross

On the cross, come across

On the cross, come across, come across

(FEUILLY)

Lamarque is ill and fading fast

Won't last the week out, so they say

With all the anger in the land

How long before the judgement day?

Before we cut the fat ones down to size?

Before the barricades arise?

Fortunately, the writers of the Broadway libretto had the sense to change the purveyors of the message into people actually relevant to the show's plot, namely Marius and Enjolras. Moreover, the beggars' dialog was rewritten into a sequence that feels far less clunky to me. The background music was fixed to account for the solo singing (now done by Marius) overlapping the beggars' lines, so it is now perfectly in sync. Here's the edited exchange:

(ENJOLRAS)

Where are the leaders of the land?

Where are the swells who run this show?

(MARIUS)

Only one man and that's Lamarque

Speaks for the people here below

(BEGGARS)

See our children fed

Help us in our shame

Something for a crust of bread in Holy Jesus' name

(SOLO BEGGAR)

In the Lord's holy name

(BEGGARS)

In His name, in His name, in His name

(MARIUS)

Lamarque is ill and fading fast

Won't last the week out, so they say

(ENJOLRAS)

With all the anger in the land

How long before the judgement day?

Before we cut the fat ones down to size?

Before the barricades arise?

Much better in my opinion! It should be noted that David Bryant instead sings "these people here below", but as far as I can tell every future Marius (or later Enjolras - more on that later) sings "the people, which is the actually phrasing in the libretto.

One final change in Look Down: Gavroche now says that all of Thenardier's family is "on the make", as opposed to the original "on the take". A rather pointless change in my book, though it certainly doesn't hurt anything.

"The Robbery" is another heavily edited number. Thenardier's line after acknowledging Brujon, Babet, and Claquesous was originally as follows:

You Montparnasse, watch for the p'lice

With Eponine, take care

You've got all the hash, I've got all the cash

The Broadway show rewrote those lines into their still-current form:

You Montparnasse, watch for the law

With Eponine, take care

You turn on the tears, no mistakes my dears!

This changed lyric more naturally transitions the scene into the gang's actual plan, though the original is an interesting continuation of Gavroche's recollection of Thenardier once running a hash house.

Mme. Thenardier's response is also altered from the original lyrics:

Here come a student from our street

One of 'Ponine's peculiar gents

Our Eponine would kiss his feet

She never showed a bit of sense

Into the current ones:

These bloody students on our street

Here they come slumming once again

Our Eponine would kiss their feet

She never showed a scrap of brain

It's interesting how the edit shifts the focus from Marius in particular to the students in general. It seems that Mme. Thenardier is less aware of the specifics of her daughter's personal life now, something that makes sense for her character.

After Mme. Thenardier's "You'll be in the clear", there was originally just eighteen seconds of a musical motif (the same one which opens "At the End of the Day" and "One Day More") followed by Thenardier's speech. Since Broadway, it's instead been followed by a few more lines of dialogue:

(MARIUS)

Who is that man

(EPONINE)

Leave me alone!

(MARIUS)

Why is here?

Hey Eponine!

Only now does the musical motif play. But instead of staying silent upon seeing Cosette, Marius now sings "I didn't see you there, forgive me..." Interestingly, in this video of a 1987 performance of the original West End production, Marius just stops without bumping into Cosette as he usually does. This makes me wonder whether or not the bumping was added into the Broadway version, and the lyric was added to accomodate for the blocking change. Of course, this is all speculation; I have no way to know for sure.

Thenardier's con job is also quite a bit different post-Broadway. Originally it used the following lyrics:

How you do? Spare a sou

God will see all the good that you do

Look monsieur, lost a leg

Hero of Waterloo now has to beg

Wait a bit, know that face...

The Broadway libretto edited it into its current form:

Please monsieur, come this way

Here's a child that ain't eaten today

Save a life, spare a sou

God rewards all the good that you do

Wait a bit, know that face...

It's interesting how Thenardier's facade shifts in focus from his own supposed hardship to that of an alleged child. I suppose the latter would be a good bit more effective in convincing passersby to donate!

During "Javert's Intervention", Thenardier now says "It was me that told you so, as opposed to the original "Wot told you so"; however, this seems to be a regional choice to account for a lack of Cockney accent, not an official libretto change. British productions retain the original "Wot".

“The Robbery” ends quite differently. Its pre-Broadway form had Gavroche’s remarks directly follow Javert’s “Clear this garbage off the street!” However, now Javert’s line is instead followed by some instrumentals to a slower version of the same tune as, for instance, “Honest work/Just reward/That’s the way to please the lord” and “He will bend/He will break/This time there is no mistake”.

After these instrumentals come the “Stars” number, now in a much more natural location given that Javert now has a logical reason to be thinking about Valjean!

The number itself is mostly the same, up until the final segment. After Javert’s “Those who falter and those who fall must pay the price”, he originally had the following lyrics:

Scarce to be counted

Changing the chaos

To order and light

You are the sentinels

Silent and sure

Keeping watch in the night

The post-Broadway show replaced this with a much more climactic remark:

Lord let me find him

That I may see him

Safe behind bars

I will never rest ‘til then

This I swear

This is swear by the stars

WOW, what an improvement! Now the stars are tied much better to Valjean himself, and Javert’s motivation is much clearer!

Now that “Stars” is over, we finally get Gavroche's remarks. The lyrics are the same; however, instead of the tempo progressively getting faster as it goes along, it now gets progressively slower. Interestingly the audio of the first preview has Gavroche saying "mother dear" instead of "auntie dear", but it's back to the original line by the second known original Broadway cast audio. Both audio feature Braden Danner; whether the "mother dear" was a choice on his part or a director's, a flub, or a libretto change that was later reverted is unknown.

"Eponine's Errand" has some significant changes. First off, the original libretto gave Marius and Eponine this exchange:

(MARIUS)

Did you see that lovely girl

(EPONINE)

A lovely two-a-penny thing

The Broadway libretto edited it a little:

(MARIUS)

Eponine, who was that girl?

(EPONINE)

Some bourgeois two-a-penny thing

Marius' request has also been changed from its original lyrics:

Eponine, do this for me

But careful how you go

Your father mustn't know

He'll strike another blow

'Ponine, I'm lost until she's found

Into some far clearer and more direct instructions:

Eponine, do this for me

Discover where she lives

But careful how you go

Don't let your father know

'Ponine, I'm lost until she's found

And yes, the line was "your father" right from day one. Michael Ball flubs it as "her father" on the complete symphonic recording, leading many to assume that was the original lyric which was changed later. But I'm not aware of a single live performance to use that lyric (which doesn't make a lot of sense anyway).

Another side note: Some Marius actors have very slightly changed the third line to "Be careful how you go" or "But careful as you go", though neither lyric is the standard.

Post-Broadway, as the instrumentals to "Red and Black" play, a student (I'm not sure which one) now shouts Enjolras' name before the singing begins.

During "Red and Black", Michael Maguire changes the original "It is easy to sit here and swat 'em like flies" to "Oh, it's easy to sit here and swat 'em like flies". However, this is an individual choice of the actor, not an official libretto change. Every future Enjolras I'm aware of (except Ramin Karimloo for some reason) uses the original line.

An actual libretto change occurs soon afterwards. After Marius' entrance, Grantaire originally asks, "Marius, what's wrong with you today?" The post-Broadway show changes this to "Marius, you're late. What's wrong today?" This makes it much clearer why Grantaire might suspect something is wrong.

Soon afterwards, Grantaire's original line "We talk of battles to be won, and here he comes like Don Juan" is slightly tweaked to "You talk of battles to be won". This is a little more appropriate, since Grantaire isn't actually doing a lot of talking!

After "Red and Black", Gavroche's part is very slightly changed. First off, American performances for a few years would have Gavroche whistle right before everyone quiets down, though I have no idea if this was in the libretto or not.

Secondly, Gavroche's original remark, "It's General Lamarque! He's dead!" is shortened to just "General Lamarque is dead!"

In another contender for the biggest change in the entire edit, the entire "I Saw Him Once" number is totally removed. I have mixed feelings about this. It does give Cosette, a frustratingly underwritten character, some additional content. However, stylistically it's not all that much like any other number in the musical, and it doesn't really add enough information to the show to warrant a whole song. So I say with regret that it was probably for the best to delete the number.

To compensate for the lost number, "In My Life" is lengthened to include the establishing character moments that "I Saw Him Once" originally did. Originally it opened as follows:

(COSETTE)

Dearest papa, can I tell him of this?

How can I tell him the things that I feel?

How could he understand?

(VALJEAN)

Dear Cosette, you're such a lonely child...

The post-Broadway opener is instead as follows:

(COSETTE)

How strange, this feeling that my life's begun at last

This change, can people really fall in love so fast?

What's the matter with you Cosette?

Have you been to much on your own?

So many things unclear

So many things unknown

In my life

There are so many questions and answers

That somehow seem wrong

In my life

There are times when I catch in the silence

The sigh of a faraway song

And it sings of a world that I long to see

Out of reach, just a whisper away, waiting for me

Does he know I'm alive? Do I know if he's real?

Does he see what I see? Does he feel what I feel?

In my life

I'm no longer alone

Now the love in my life is so near

Find me now, find me here

(VALJEAN)

Dear Cosette, you're such a lonely child...

After Valjean gives Cosette his cryptic defense of his secrecy, Cosette had a remark that is sadly incredibly hard to understand in the quality of the recordings we have. It apparently went something like this:

There are voices I hear

That come into my mind

Full of noise, full of fear

When the noise was unkind

In my life

I'm no longer afraid

And I yearn for the truth that you know

Of the years, years ago

Her post-Broadway response is much shorter:

In my life

I'm no longer a child

And I yearn for the truth that you know

Of the years, years ago

Shorter, but just as effective in my book. Plus, the use of the word "child" nicely ties into Valjean's initial remark that Cosette is "such a lonely child", as well as Cosette's frustration that he still sees her as "a child who is lost in the woods".

The next number, "A Heart Full of Love", also has a LOT of rewritten lyrics. First of all, after Marius' "I do not even know your name", these are his original lyrics:

Dear mademoiselle

I am lost in your spell

The Broadway production changed the lyrics into:

Dear mademoiselle

Won't you say? Will you tell?

I suppose this fits a little better with his remark about not knowing Cosette's name.

After Marius and Cosette finally learn each other's names (an important step in a relationship if you ask me!) this was their original way of showing their affection:

(MARIUS)

Cosette, your name is like a song

(COSETTE)

My song is you

(MARIUS)

Is it true?

(COSETTE)

Yes, it's true

The Broadway production rewrote it into the following:

(MARIUS)

Cosette, I don't know what to say

(COSETTE)

Then make no sound

(MARIUS)

I am lost

(COSETTE)

I am found

In my opinion, the rewrite captures the slight awkwardness of young love much better, as well as making a lot more sense!

Immediately afterwards, this is the original exchange:

(MARIUS and COSETTE)

A heart full of love

A heart full of you

(MARIUS)

The words are foolish but they're true

Cosette, Cosette

What were we dreaming when we met?

(COSETTE)

I can sing

(MARIUS)

Dear Cosette

(COSETTE)

A heart full of love...

The Broadway libretto redoes the scene as the following:

(MARIUS)

A heart full of love

(COSETTE)

A night bright as day

(MARIUS)

And you must never go away

Cosette, Cosette

(COSETTE)

This is a chain we'll never break

(MARIUS)

Do I dream?

(COSETTE)

I'm awake

(MARIUS)

A heart full of love...

Almost a totally different scene! The post-Broadway variant is better structured, but I do like the original too.

As the trio of Marius, Cosette, and Eponine exchanges inner monologues, Marius originally has the line "I saw her waiting and I knew". The Broadway libretto changed this to "A single look and then I knew". I kind of prefer the original, as it implies a little more than something as trivial as a cursory glance.

In the closing lyrical overlap of the song, Cosette originally sings "Waiting for you", but post-Broadway she sings "I knew it too". Then, she originally sings "At your call" but post-Broadway she sings "Every day".

During the opening to "The Attack on Rue Plumet", Montparnasse refers to Valjean as "the one that got away the other day" as opposed to his original "the bloke wot got away the other day". However, this is another regional change made for the sake of making sense outside of a cockney accent. The official libretto still had the original lyrics.

A tiny change occurs during Thenardier and Eponine's fight. Claquesous originally thinks it's a palaver and an absolute treat "to watch a cat and its father" picking a bone in the street. The Broadway libretto changed this to "see a cat and a father". Why exactly the writers felt the need to make such a miniscule edit is mystifying to me, but it certainly doesn't hurt anything.

Another change occurs later in the number, after Eponine's scream. Originally this was Thenardier's reaction:

Make for the sewers, don't wait around

Leave her to me, go underground

You wait my girl, you'll rue this night

I'll make you scream, you'll scream alright!

These lines were mixed up a bit for the Broadway libretto:

You wait my girl, you'll rue this night

I'll make you scream, you'll scream alright!

Leave her to me, don't wait around

Make for the sewers, go underground

The post-Broadway variation arguably is a bit less climactic due to it not ending on a threat. However, the original climax isn't all that appropriate since Eponine and Thenardier never actually interact at any later point in the musical. I like that the post-Broadway version ends on something that's actually relevant to the remainder of the show (namely, that Thenardier will be in the sewers). Evidently the West End producers didn't agree with me; this is another line in which the original was kept there for more than a decade (at which point a rewrite closer to the original was already being used worldwide)!

In "One Day More", Javert's "One day more to revolution" is slightly changed to "One more day to revolution". However, the number is otherwise unchanged.

And that's it for Act One! The opening barricade scene to act two has a small change. Grantaire's pre-Broadway "Some will bark, some will bite" was changed to "Dogs will bark, fleas will bite". Makes a lot more sense in my opinion!

The opening to "On My Own" is changed as well. Originally it was performed as follows:

And now I'm all alone again

Nowhere to go, no one to turn to

I did not want your money sir

I came out here 'cause I was told to

The Broadway version rewrote it into the following:

And now I'm alone again

Nowhere to turn, no one to go to

Without a home, without a friend

Without a face to say hello to

A huge improvement in my book. It actually rhymes now, and is far less likely to be misconstrued as ungrateful.

After receiving a massive overhaul not that long before, "Little People" was slightly tweaked for the Broadway show. The pre-Broadway version had this ending:

So never kick a dog

Because he’s just a pup

You’d better run for cover when the pup grows up!

Another line (taken from the original longer version of "Little People" as well as all versions of its reprise) was added for the post-Broadway show:

So never kick a dog

Because he’s just a pup

We'll fight like twenty armies and we won't give up

So you’d better run for cover when the pup grows up!

Grantaire's line afterwards is literally reversed in meaning from the original "Better far to die a schoolboy than a policeman and a spy!" into "What's the difference? Die a schoolboy, die a policeman, die a spy!" This post-Broadway lyric fits better into Grantaire's cynical personality.

A very subtle edit is made in "Little Fall of Rain" (to the point that I only just realized its existence by reading an old internet forum!) Pre-Broadway, Marius asks Eponine "Did you see my beloved?" The tense is changed from past to present perfect for the Broadway libretto, so that he now sings "Have you seen my beloved?"

"Drink with Me" receives quite a bit of editing. The opening few lines are originally all sung by Grantaire:

Drink with me to days gone by

Sing with me the songs we knew

Here's to pretty girls who went to our heads

Here's to witty girls who went to our beds

Here's to them and here's to you

Now, those lyrics are split between various students:

(FEUILLY)

Drink with me to days gone by

Sing with me the songs we knew

(PROUVAIRE)

Here's to pretty girls who went to our heads

(JOLY)

Here's to witty girls who went to our beds

(ALL STUDENTS)

Here's to them and here's to you

A far more touching scene now that it entails an entire group of friends reminiscing about their lives, as opposed to the thoughts of one heavily drunk individual.

Originally this was followed by a segment by the male ensemble:

Drink with me to days gone by

To the life that used to be

At the shrine of friendship never say die

Let the wine of friendship never run dry

Then, this was followed by the same lyrics, but sung by the male and female ensembles overlapping. The Broadway libretto removes that and replaces it with an all-new segment with Grantaire. It's much more cynical and philosophical than his original lines:

Drink with me to days gone by

Can it be you fear to die?

Will the world remember you when you fall?

Could it be your death means nothing at all?

Is you life just one more lie?

The lyrics from the pre-Broadway show, in their male-and-female overlapping form, are played afterwards.

The next change occurs during the Second Attack. Pre-Broadway, this was how the opening lyrics went:

(ENJOLRAS)

How do we stand, Feuilly make your report

(FEUILLY)

We've guns enough but bullets running short

(MARIUS)

Let me go into the street

There are bodies all around

Ammunition to be had

Lots of bullets to be found

Some very small edits were made for Broadway:

(ENJOLRAS)

How do we stand, Feuilly make your report

(FEUILLY)

We've guns enough but ammunition short

(MARIUS)

I will go into the street

There are bodies all around

Ammunition to be had

Lots of bullets to be found

The following exchange also is a bit edited. Here's how it went pre-Broadway:

(ENJOLRAS)

I can't let you go, it's too much of a chance

(MARIUS)

And the same can be said for any man here

(VALJEAN)

Let me go in his place, he's no more than a boy

I am old and alone and have nothing to fear

Post-Broadway, it instead goes as follows:

(ENJOLRAS)

I can't let you go, it's too much of a chance

(MARIUS)

And the same is true for any man here

(VALJEAN)

Let me go, he's no more than a boy

I am old, I have nothing to fear

Finally, Gavroche's final lines are as follows pre-Broadway:

So never kick a dog

Because he’s just a pup

You’d better run for cover when the pup grows up

And we’ll fight like twenty armies and we won’t give…

A small edit is made for the Broadway production, so that the latter two lines are reversed:

So never kick a dog

Because he’s just a pup

We’ll fight like twenty armies and we won’t give up

So you’d better run for cover when the pup grows...

I'd say this is an improvement, since Gavroche's death is all the more impactful when his literal last unfinished words are about growing up.

Not long afterwards comes the Final Battle. Leading up to Enjolras' climactic moment, the original lines went as follows:

(ENJOLRAS)

Come on my friends, though we stand here alone

Let us go to our deaths with our face to our foes

(COMBEFERRE)

Let 'em pay for each death with a death of their own

(COURFEYRAC)

If they get me, by God, they will pay through the nose

(ENJOLRAS)

Let others rise to take our place

Until the earth is free

The sequence was edited for Broadway, giving a bit more breathing space:

(ENJOLRAS)

Let us die facing our foes

Make them bleed while they can

(COMBEFERRE)

Make them pay through the nose

(COURFEYRAC)

Make them pay for every man

(ENJOLRAS)

Let others rise to take our place

Until the earth is free

"Dog Eats Dog" is a very heavily-edited number. First off, the vamping at the beginning originally lasts about 30 seconds. By Broadway, it has been reduced to about nineteen seconds.

After Thenardier's "As a service to the town" line, he originally sung the following lines:

It's a world where the dogs eat the dogs

And the worst is as good as the best

It's a stinking great sewer that's crawling with rats

And one rat is as good as the rest

I raise my eyes to see the heavens

And only the moon looks down

That entire sequence was cut for Broadway.

Soon afterwards, Thenardier originally proclaims "Here's a little toy". The Broadway edit changes it to "Here's another toy", perhaps to make it seem less repetitive after his "pretty little thing" line.

The exact same lines from after "As a service to the town" are repeated in the pre-Broadway number after Thenardier's "When the gutters run with blood" line, with one more line added afterwards:

It's a world where the dogs eat the dogs

And the worst is as good as the best

It's a stinking great sewer that's crawling with rats

And one rat is as good as the rest

I raise my eyes to see the heavens

And only the moon looks down

The harvest moon shines down

Unlike the first instance of those lines, they aren't completely excised for Broadway. They are, however, significantly rewritten:

It's a world where the dogs eat the dogs

And they kill for the bones in the street

And God in His heavens, He don't interfere

'Cause He's dead as the stiffs at my feet

I raise my eyes to see the heavens

And only the moon looks down

The harvest moon shines down

I really like how the edited version focuses more on godlessness than on how gross the sewer is. Not that a lack of a god is inherently sinister; I am quite agnostic myself and I think the unbreakable connection between religion and morality alleged by some is ridiculous. But it is blatantly obvious that Thenardier sees no reason to be moral provided no one will punish him.

As a side note, the 1985 London official soundtrack oddly uses this variant, yet the 1986 bootleg audio I have uses the original. Perhaps the original was experimented with, reverted, and later put in again? Who knows...

After the number, Thenardier now shouts Valjean's name.

The encounter in the sewers between Valjean and Javert originally ended as follows, with Javert's first two lines here in a tune not heard anywhere else in the musical to my recollection:

(VALJEAN)

Come, time is running short

(JAVERT)

Go take him, I'll be waiting at the door

I've never met a man like you before

A man such as you

The sequence was extended for the Broadway libretto, to the tune of "Look Down" and the "Work Song":

(VALJEAN)

Come, time is running short

Look down, Javert

He's standing in his grave

(VALJEAN - simultaneously with the next two lines)

Give way, Javert

There is a life to save

(JAVERT - simultaneously with the previous two lines)

Take him, Valjean

Before I change my mind

(JAVERT)

I will be waiting, 24601

A slight change can be heard in "Every Day". Originally Marius sings that he and Cosette will "remember that night and the song that we sang". The Broadway libretto edited this into the decidedly less medium-aware "remember that night and the vow that we made".

"Valjean's Confession" has been reworked to the point that it can scarcely even be considered the same song. After Valjean's "There's something now that must be done", this was how the song went:

(VALJEAN)

Monsieur, I cannot stay a night beneath your roof

I am a convict, sir, my body bears the proof

My name is Jean Valjean

I never told Cosette, I bear this guilt alone

And this I swear to you, her innocence is real

Her love is true

Our love, our life, are now her own

And I must face the years alone

(MARIUS)

I do not understand what's the sense of it all?

Is the world upside down?

Will the universe fall?

If it's true what you say, and Cosette doesn't know

Why confess it to me?

Why confess it at all?

What forces you to speak after all?

(VALJEAN)

You and Cosette must be free of reproach

It is not your affair

There is a darkness that's over my life

It's the cross I must bear

It's for Cosette this must be faced

If I am found, she is disgraced

(MARIUS)

What can I do that would turn you from this...

After the Broadway rewrite, Valjean's "There's something now that must be done" is followed by this:

(VALJEAN)

You've spoken from the heart, and I must do the same

There is a story, sir, of slavery and shame

That you alone must know

I never told Cosette, she had enough of tears

She's never known the truth, the story you must hear

Of years ago

There lived a man whose name was Jean Valjean

He stole some bread to save his sister's son

For nineteen winters served his time

In sweat he washed away his crime

Years ago

He broke parole and lived a life apart

How could he tell Cosette and break her heart?

It's for Cosette this must be faced

If he is caught she is disgraced

The time is come to journey on

And from this day he must be gone

Who am I?

(MARIUS)

You're Jean Valjean

What can I do that will turn you from this...

The few lines afterwards are the same, but as you can see not much else in the song is! Even the tune diverges a lot between the two variants. I'm very conflicted about which one I prefer. I gravitate towards the final one, though it's nice that the original actually tried to address to confusing notion that Valjean wants to tell his son-in-law of his past yet not his own daughter.

"Beggars at the Feast" originally ended with a solo for Thenardier:

(THENARDIER and MME. THENARDIER)

We know where the wind is blowing

Money is the stuff we smell

(THENARDIER)

And when I'm rich as Croesus

Jesus, won't I see you all in Hell!

The Broadway libretto switched this to a group line:

(THENARDIER and MME. THENARDIER)

We know where the wind is blowing

Money is the stuff we smell

And when we're rich as Croesus

Jesus, won't we see you all in Hell!

I much prefer the revised version, as the two Thenardiers clearly are in this act together. It seems more appropriate to let them both have the last laugh.

A small change occurs in the Epilogue. Pre-Broadway, Fantine sings "You raised my child with love". However, post-Broadway, she instead sings "You raised my child in love".

Another change occurs later in the epilogue. In the pre-Broadway show, Cosette tells Valjean that "It's too soon to ever say goodbye". The post-Broadway libretto instead has her sing "It's too soon, too soon to say goodbye". Repetitive as it may be, I prefer it over the original because the original awkwardly combines language clearly denoting the moment with language implying eternality.

Phew, we're finally at the end! Rest assured this is almost certainly the longest changelog you'll ever be forced to endure. I'm fairly sure it's complete, but this particular rewrite was so extensive it's not impossible that I missed something. Please feel free to let me know if that is the case.

As a side note, both for this project and my own enjoyment, I want as complete a collection of Les Miserables audios as possible. I already have most of what’s commonly circulated, but if you have any audios or videos you know are rare, or some audios that you haven't traded in a few years, I’d love it if you DMed me!

Until the turntable puts me at the forefront again, good-bye…

#les miserables #les mis #changelog #les mis changelog #marius #valjean #cosette #javert #eponine #enjolras #thenardier #1985 #1987 #broadway #part 3 #long post #the les miserables changelog

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mithrilwren · 3 years

Text

I really, really wanted to contribute something to Essek Week, but unfortunately with two essays and a novel chapter due by Monday, I didn’t have the time or mental energy to write anything new. Cue me remembering that I’d actually started working on an Essek-centric shadowgast Pirate!AU last summer, that never saw the light of day! Though I did a whole bunch of research for it, summer ended before I could get farther than the first couple chapters. Still, I’m very fond of the premise, and I’d like to finish it one day. I can’t guarantee I will (life’s too busy to commit myself to another Big Fic Project atm) but in the meantime, here’s a little taste in the form of the first chapter.

-------------------

For @essek-week Day 7: AU

Courts of Silk (Chapter 1)

Essek startled from his trance to the crackle of blistering thunder overhead.

Mind bled of all drowsiness in an instant, he unfolded his legs and slid off the berth, drifting to the center of the room and tilting his ear towards the boards above.

A storm… but the skies were meant to be clear for days, and he trusted Avus to know it. Could the weather have turned so–

Boom.

Essek’s eyebrows flew up as the deck visibly lurched below his feet.

Not thunder.

Cannon fire.

More sounds now, hurried ones – an erratic tempo of feet pounding through the corridor outside his little room, the floorboards creaking dully under the weight of the crew scrambling over the deck above. He flinched as a louder noise pierced through the commotion: the rattling of a heavy fist falling against the door of his cabin, hard enough to shake the wooden frame.

“We’ve been boarded!” Zel’ra’s guttural shout startled him out of his confused stupor, and he flew to the door and flung it open. The quartermaster stood outside, her snarling jaw dripping with whitish battle foam, the kind that bugbears of Rosohna so seldom have occasion to sport within city walls. “Come on, magic boy, time for you to earn your– Shit!”

Then she was gone, and Essek was left staring dumbly at the empty corridor, as Zel’ra raced back the way she came. A moment later, there was a yelp, and the grisly crack of metal hitting bone. Then there was no sound at all, save the rocking of the ocean’s pulse against the hull, and the thump of confident, unfamiliar footsteps, coming closer and closer to his open door.

He had only a few moments to make his decision. The fight might still be going on above deck, but if intruders had already made it below, there was little hope of a favorable outcome for the crew of the Barren Bow. He hadn’t thought the Empire would be brazen enough to attack a diplomatic ship in open waters, but there were soldiers of all ilks on the open sea, and no government to hold them to account so far from land. He would not put it past a Dwendalian crew to sight a Dynasty flag on the horizon and decide to take the matter of revenge in their own hands. If so, there was no telling what treatment they might expect at the hands of their attackers. Rage was rarely tamed by abstract rules of engagement, and he doubted anyone would care to ask what the nature of their mission was, once the killing began.

But perhaps…

Quickly, Essek drew aside his sleeve and materialized the leather–bound contents of his wristpocket into his hands. His spellbook lay beside precious components in their embroidered fold, and there, at the bottom of the pile: the folio. He whispered a quiet word and the paper folded apart, revealing its damning – and perhaps, in the right hands, lifesaving – contents.

The letters.

If the tides were so unfavorable that he could not fight, perhaps that might be enough to–

He vanished the whole affair back into the ether as two shadows fell across the door.

From the darkness of the hallway, two figures stepped over the threshold. In front was a young woman: human, with swarthy skin made darker still by the weathering burn of long days at sea. Her hands were tucked beneath bare arms and her hip turned out to an unconcerned jaunt, adorned by a sash of deep blue. Behind her, and looming so tall that she had to hunch to fit through the frame of the door, was a giant of a woman. Taller even than Zel’ra, her bare shoulders glistening with rippling muscles and sweat, pale as moonlight – or as the steely glint of the broadsword at her back. The younger woman swept him over with piercing eyes, her confident grin not quite masking the focused gaze beneath. Though she bore no weapons, Essek could feel the stain of threat in every taut sinew of her body. He held still, waiting to see who would make the first move.

Her eyes finally paused, centered on the floor beneath his feet, and her grin dropped into something more like a startled ‘oh’. Too late, he realized his mistake – that his levitation, as natural and instinctive as standing on his own two feet, had just given him away.

“Mage!” she sputtered, and her hand was gripping his arm and twisting it behind his back before he even realized she’d moved. Essek dropped the levitation spell, hoping to get enough leverage from the sudden height difference to slip out of her grasp, but before he could so much as shuffle to the left, the taller woman was at his right, clutching his other arm with a grip strong enough to break bone.

“Shit,” the first woman spat as she stepped back, allowing the second to take both of his arms into custody. “Who the fuck did we just board?”

Essek kept silent, staring at her, searching for any sign of weakness and finding less than nothing. If he had just had his hands free for a moment longer… but that didn’t matter now. There weren’t many spells without a somatic component at his disposal, and cantrips wouldn’t save his neck, should the giantess move quicker to snap it than he could speak.

Without a means of immediate escape, he looked next for any way to identify his captors. They were human, but their loose, subdued dress – for the younger woman, a vest of blue cotton, the other, a braided grey tunic, and frayed ribbons in both their hair – was nothing like the silver and crimson finery of the Righteous Brand.

If not from the Empire, who were these people? Hired thugs? Mercenaries?

“Are there more of you skulking down here?”

He didn’t ask the woman to clarify, though he wasn’t sure exactly what she was asking. More drow? Yes, but he was not about to reveal the nature of the delegation travelling under his protection to her. More mages? No. As always, he had convinced the Bright Queen that his effort alone would be sufficient. For the first time in a very long time, he wished he’d been a little more conservative in estimating his own skills. Given the current situation, someone else’s power at his back might actually be welcome, rather than distracting.

Her burning gaze made it clear that he had to say something, and soon, but for once, the right words did not come. The truth did not matter: he knew that any unfavorable answer would be taken as a lie.

Still, Essek would not panic. The only way to regain control of the situation was by carefully gathering information, finding something that he could use to shift the balance of power at a more advantageous moment. That was his particular specialty.

“I do not know,” he answered coolly. “For I do not know who is above and below deck at all hours of the day. I can only speak for myself.”

“Beau! Fjor– fuck– Captain Tusktooth wants you on deck!” A new voice, its timbre high and grating, like glass against cold iron, echoed from around the corner. The woman – Beau, he filed away – turned her head and shouted back out the door.

“Just a second, we’ve got one more!” Then, “Tell him to get Caleb over here, we’ve got a goddamn mage to deal with!”

The giantess at his back leaned down, so close that her dreaded locks nestled amidst the silver chains that hung from tip to base of his pointed ear. “You aren’t going to give us any trouble, are you?” she murmured, and despite every ounce of training he’d undergone for exactly this sort of intimidation, he still couldn’t help the way he shivered at her dark tone. There was a deep quality to her voice that sung of violence, for violence’s sake, and though he wasn’t yet truly afraid, he had no wish to provoke her.

“How could I?” Essek gently flexed his arms in her grasp: not enough to challenge, but enough to reassure her of his helplessness.

Her lips curled back, and… yes. There was a little fear gathering there, in the back of his throat. A good kind of fear – the prudent kind. It would keep him alert, and focused, and ready to strike back when the moment was right.

When she started pushing him forward, he followed her lead willingly, and the two of them shadowed Beau into the corridor and up the steps that led back above deck. Essek winced as the bright noonday sun slipped into view, already anticipating the stinging burn that was sure to follow. He’d managed to avoid the deck for most of the voyage, much to the chagrin of the Assarian crew. He was not born into a body made for manning rigging, and certainly not under an unrepentant sky determined to scorch his face and hands and neck and leave him itching and miserable for days without relief. His better use was below deck, planning for the engagement ahead, and his hours of fresh air better taken in the evening, when the gentler light of the moons was merely a prickle beneath his skin, rather than a flame.

Everywhere he looked, he saw mismatched bodies. Though Essek hadn’t met the entire complement of the Barren Bow’s crew, he had to assume most of the scattered orcs, goblins, and bugbears belonged to their side. Most of the ones on their feet were being held in the shallow recess at the centre of the deck, where great cannons might have been lodged on a more modern ship. A handful of unremarkable humans, each equipped with a rapier – or, in one man’s case, a salt-encrusted retort – stood above them, keeping watch. Amidst all that humanity stood a wild–eyed goblin in a blaring yellow dress, hefting a crossbow composed of whirring gears and levers of an intricate make that rivaled Waccoh’s own craftsmanship. She was currently in the process of shouting threats down across the heads of his cowed compatriots. Some were clutching broken arms or wiping blood from contusions and burnt welts. Lying at the center of the group was an unconscious Zel’ra, the goose egg at the back of her skull already angry and red.

Finally, he spied the remainder of the drow contingent clustered by the ship’s rail. Diplomats, all of them, bound for a parley at sea and not trained for conflict beyond what it took to hold a dagger right-way up. He was the only one among them battle-tested, and even then, his means leaned more towards subterfuge than outright combat. Theoretically, the Assarian crew was meant to be their main line of defence in case of attack. Clearly they had not proven up to the task.

Essek would be filing a very unfavorable report with their commanders upon his return, if any of them survived the day.

“Captain!” Beau shouted, and a tall half-orc stepped away from the railing, his wide-brimmed hat only partially disguising the many scars that littered his face.

“Weather’s turning,” he said, casting his eyes towards the – as far as Essek could tell – clear horizon. Those same yellow eyes flickered up, above Essek’s head, and for a moment seemed to narrow before turning back to Beau. “You finished clearing the hold yet?”

“Didn’t make it that far.” Beau jerked her head, and Essek was thrust into the sunlight all at once. The glare was blinding, and apparently not just to him. The giantess’s hands jerked around his arms, like they wanted to fly up and shield her eyes as well. That was all the opportunity he needed.

With one quick motion, he jerked his arms from her grasp and drew his hands together, tracing familiar glyphs out of nothing but muscle memory as his mouth uttered an incantation, and the world exploded around him. The giantess was flung back against the doorframe, wood splintering beneath her weight, and both Beau and the half-orc slammed into the deck and began to hurtle towards the side of the boat. Forcing his eyes to stay focused amidst the chaos and the harsh light, Essek caught the glitter of a cutlass skittering along the boards as he took stock of his position on the newly reborn battlefield.

Nearly all of the boarders were in a concentrated area in front of him, and the rest of the Assarian crew were protected by the lip of the recess in the deck. The terrain could not be more advantageous. Essek allowed himself a small smirk as he raised his hand and prepared a vacuum blast that would level the whole of the upper deck, and deliver them all to safety in one swift stroke.

How arrogant, that this petty group of mercenaries thought they could capture–

“Counterspell.”

The magic sizzled and died in his hand, and Essek whirled, searching for whoever had spoken behind him. Thugs he could handle, but it was always best to deal with a mage first, when they could do such infuriating things as what had just occurred. But once he turned, he found himself facing an empty doorway, and an empty deck above that. No trace of whoever had cast the counterspell.

The giantess was gone as well.

He heard the click before he could parse what cold and heavy thing was tugging on his wrist, but he was horribly aware of what was happening by the time his other wrist was wrenched behind his back and small hands clasped the second iron band shut. A stomach-churning wave of exhaustion passed through him from scalp to toe, and he staggered, only barely holding on to consciousness. Head lolling towards the floor, he saw two soft-soled boots landing lightly on the deck in front of him.

With great effort, he managed to drag his head up from his chest, and found himself staring into blue eyes and dusty freckles, lips pressed into a thin line, all framed by tangles of copper-red hair.

“Good work, Nott,” the man said. His accent was one Essek had only heard once before, though through the mire of exhaustion he could not remember where.

Behind Essek, the half-orc groaned and pushed himself up off the deck. “Next time you have a brilliant plan for subduing the prisoner, maybe let’s try not putting us all in the line of fire, hm?”

The man ignored the sarcasm, still looking all too carefully at Essek.

“Are you finished?” he murmured, and though his body was lithe, his soft voice sung of as much violence as the giantess’s darker growl.

With a sigh, Essek let his shoulders drop. He could still feel the pulses of magic coursing through the iron bands around his wrists. Even if he got his arms free again, the cuffs would not be easily slipped, or broken. These people, whoever they were, came equipped to handle wizards like himself. Was that what they were, then? Assassins in disguise? Privateers? The blunt instrument of some government or another?

Not that it made much difference now. Whoever they were, he was at their mercy.

“Spin him around.”

Essek felt himself being maneuvered away from the man’s incisive gaze. Through bleary eyes he caught the looks of frustrated disbelief from the four drow delegates, lamenting their crushed hope in silent, huddled unity. He was meant to be their protection. Now that Essek was taken, what else could save them? Not one of them was brave enough to attempt it themselves. A shiver of disgust ran through Essek, as heady as the self-recrimination it concealed at having allowed himself to be captured so easily.

The half-orc strode up to Essek, the sword in his hand now replaced, though Essek hadn’t seen the man move to retrieve it. It was a silver cutlass, fine enough to cleave a person clean through and leave one half still propped up on the other. Too rich a prize by far for a simple mercenary – he must have come by it dishonestly, or been given it as boon or bribe. Neither prospect boded well.

The hand that gripped the sword told an equally foreboding story, for only the thumb was composed of green flesh. The rest of the fingers were severed at the third knuckle, and replaced by metal imitations fixed to the wrist by a harness of leather cords. Still, he held the hilt with all the confidence of a trained fighter, and the surety of his grasp left Essek little doubt as to its effectiveness, mechanical augmentation or no.

“My name,” said the half-orc, “is Captain Tusktooth.” A hint of bright teeth flashed from below the wide brim of the hat. “And this ship is mine now. Its cargo, mine too.”

The answer about the identity of his captors, at last, became clear, for what little good it did him.

Pirates.

“By whose authority?” Essek shot a harsh look at the foolish dignitary who had chosen this moment to find their courage, but Tusktooth only grinned harder.

“By my own.” Behind Essek’s back, Nott and Beau slipped back through the splintered doorframe and down into the depths of the ship once more. “Now, my crew is going to finish taking a look through your cargo. I trust that your captain has been honest about the contents of your hold. Are there any other surprises I should be warning my people of? Anybody else looking to make trouble?”

Would that there were. “You will find little of value to take. We travelled light.” He spoke the truth, having no more useful lie at his disposal. His tongue felt heavy in his mouth, and another wave of exhaustion teased at the edges of his mind. He fought it with all the strength he had – which was growing less and less by the minute.

“So your captain told me. But that wasn’t my question.” Tusktooth’s voice grew as keen as the blade in his hand as he lifted it and placed the edge to the shallow of Essek’s throat. “Are there others like you aboard?”

He did not flinch. Torment and torture were old friends: his own cherished instruments. He did not fear what this man would do to him, any more than he feared death itself. At least, that is what he told his errant heart, as sweat began to bead at the nape of his neck.

“No.”

Tusktooth stared him down for a minute longer, and Essek held his gaze as best he could with the sun still searing his eyes. But at last, the sword withdrew, and Essek’s breath came a little easier. “Then let’s call this an exercise in… mutual trust.” He smiled once more, and Essek returned the expression with a vague twitch of lips.

The tense exchange was followed by ten excruciating minutes of silence, during which Essek did his best not to fidget in his heavy robes, even when his exposed skin grew so heated he felt liable to burst into flames. As they waited, the redheaded man pulled Tusktooth aside for a private conversation, and Essek sweated, and watched, and tried to formulate a plan.

The pirates would find nothing of value to steal. The Barren Bow had provisions for the voyage, but anything else aboard was the purview of the Assarian crew, who had planned to head back towards the shores of Igrathad as soon as the parley concluded. There were no scheduled stops for trade, and thus, no trade goods in their hold. There weren’t even guns to offer. Essek would never dare to admit it aloud, but the Dynasty lagged sorely behind the rest of Wildemount in outfitting its fleet with the relatively new technology of cannonry, at least of the type that lacked a magical component. Firearms had only entered the sphere of weaponmaking some thirty years prior, and with Xhorhas primarily landlocked, the navy hadn’t been high on the priority list for refurbishment.

His best hope was that some of the crew had hidden stashes of coin in their quarters. Otherwise, there would be nothing for the pirates to take, and without anything to satisfy them, well… he did not want to be in manacles when that news was delivered to a man who’d already put a sword to his throat.

If only to convince himself he was not totally beaten yet, Essek watched Tusktooth and the redhead carefully, seeing what he could glean from body language alone. Their conversation was hushed but tense, and every few moments the redhead would turn his eyes towards the drow delegation, and then to Essek himself. He made sure to drop his own eyes before they could meet again, not wanting to spark another confrontation by appearing insolent. As for the pirate captain… there was confidence, yes, but the unwavering edge of confidence seemed to drop away from his shoulders as he spoke to the other man. His arms moved more wildly; his words were more rapid, and at a higher pitch. Perhaps his earlier confidence was not so unshakeable as it at first appeared.

At last, Beau and the goblin re-emerged from the staircase. “We got shit all,” Beau said, tossing down a half-empty sack by Essek’s feet. He winced as a few bruised tubers rolled out across the warped deck.

“...Shit.” Tusktooth ran a hand over his mouth. “Shit. Nothing?”

“Nott and I checked every inch of that hold, the crew quarters, everything. No money, no timber, no – fuck, I don’t know – fine silks or–”

“No cannons,” Nott added mournfully. “No black powder.”

“We went through all this for nothing?”

“Maybe someone’s holding out on us,” Nott said, brandishing her crossbow. “I could make ‘em talk for you, Captain. Make them squeal–”

“Oh–kay, Nott,” Tusktooth said, “let’s take it down a notch.” But despite his placating tone, his look was thoughtful. Again, he turned to Essek. “You never never did say what you all were doing out here, so far from home. You don’t look like a sailor to me.”

“Yes, friend,” said the redhead, stepping up to Essek from Tusktooth’s other side, alarmingly calm, and placing altogether too much emphasis on the second word to be trusted, “what is it you do here?” Essek took a half-step back, not liking the feeling of being pressed in from all angles, and walked himself straight into the chest of the giantess.

Nowhere to hide. And with his hands bound behind his back, no way to levitate up to a level where he didn’t feel every inch of height his captors had over him. Which, at his firmly average height for a drow, was many.

Focus, Thelyss. Focus.

“Why should I answer your questions,” he sneered, “when you have not done me the same courtesy? Who are you, to board a vessel commissioned lawfully by the Bright Queen herself?” It was a dangerous ploy, but a considered one – a hastily calculated risk. If the pirates could not be convinced there was nothing of value to be found, they might decide to punish the crew for concealing their rightful prize, and when even a beating couldn’t drive his compatriots to forfeit non-existent gold, the pirates might well scuttle the ship and leave them all to drown at sea. He doubted simple brigands would care much for the particulars of a diplomatic mission if there was no treasure involved, so there was little harm in broaching a subject that might be far more dangerous to discuss with more educated captors.

But apparently, some aspect of Essek’s logic had failed him again, because the redhead immediately shot a wide-eyed look at Tusktooth, before looking back to Essek. “The Bright Queen?”

Essek gave a little bow. His head swam as he dipped back up – the handcuffs, no doubt, though it could just as easily be the beginnings of heatstroke – and he had to swallow twice to find the fortitude to speak without slurring. “Essek Thelyss, Shadowhand of the Kryn Dynasty and ambassador of the realm.” The last part was an… embellishment, and if he chanced a glance over at the true ambassadors, he imagined there would be many offended looks. But thankfully, all attention was solely focused on him. “I assure you, you won’t find the prize you’re looking for on a diplomatic vessel, gentleman. Your friends have already given you proof – we carry nothing beyond our own provision. Unless you have a particular taste for the delicacies of Xhorhasian fashion, I’m afraid we have little to offer you.”

Nott snarled, but the redhead put up a hand. “Captain,” he said slowly, looking at Tusktooth. “Might I… make a suggestion?”

“You may.”

“It’s not something I’d usually propose, but times being what they are…” Tusktooth nodded grimly.

“We haven’t got many options left.”

“Precisely. I believe that our friend Mr. Thelyss here has lied to us.” He could laugh for the irony of it all; this was the most truthful Essek had been in years. “There is indeed something very valuable aboard this ship.” His blue eyes pierced through Essek, and it was only his determination to keep the – now violently pitching – contents of his stomach where they belonged, that stopped him from speaking up in his own defense.

“And that is...?”

“Himself.”

#critical role #essek thelyss #shadowgast #essek week #my writing #also since plank king essek is a... thing??? now #the timing seems appropriate lol #this fic is not that but it is still (eventual) pirate!Essek #and who doesn't love that

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emilia3546 · 3 years

Text

Shadowsinger - Gwynriel

Spoilers for ACOSF, do not read this unless you have finished ACOSF AND the Azriel pov chapter * * * * * Training without Nesta and Cassian should have been fine, if it weren't for Gwyn, if it weren't for how he could never approach her. Some nights he needs an escape, but never expected her to hear his song in the shadows, for her to sing to the shadows herself.

*****

Nesta and Cassian were still off cauldron-knows where, doing cauldron-knows what, the scent of their fresh mating bond still lingering in the House, so Azriel was left to train the priestesses alone. Not that training them was bad, he was thrilled that they were learning to fight, but at least when Nesta and Cassian were there, he could focus on teasing them, rather than his own growing desire. He stiffened at the sound of Gwyn's voice behind him,

"Azriel?" And spun quickly to face her, "Sorry, I didn't mean to startle you,"

"You didn't, I was just thinking,"

"About?"

"Nothing, don't worry about it. Did you need my help?" He hated the slight dismissiveness of his tone, but he couldn't actually tell her what he had been thinking of, could he? No, he couldn't. She might never want a male like that ever, he couldn't make her think she had to. He wouldn't, she would have to come to him, or he would be grateful for her friendship.

"Yeah, you said we could move on to archery today after warm ups, Cassian hasn't actually started on that at all, we need you to go over everything."

"Oh. Okay, I assumed you'd already been over the basics." She shook her head, and he sighed, gesturing for her to follow, "Is it just you, or are there others?"

"Emerie as well, she's coming." The few moments it took for Emerie to cross the training ring almost left Azriel shuffling on his feet, but when she arrived he was finally able to start the lesson.

Stop being so tense, she thinks something's wrong with you. A shadow whispered in his ear, he wasn't being too tense, was he? Perhaps he was. Cauldron, did she think he didn't like her? Now you're overthinking it. Be normal. He almost snorted, that was easier said than done, but he forced his thoughts away from Gwyn, and towards the bows in front of him.

"The first thing we have to do is to string them, you can't do anything with an unstrung bow, except perhaps hit someone over the head with it, but that's not very effective." Gwyn snickered, and Emerie bit her lip to keep from laughing, "Grab a bow each, not that one, you'll never be able to draw it." He handed Gwyn a smaller bow, the limbs recurved to allow a lighter draw weight, and Emerie grabbed its twin from the rack. "Those have a draw weight of about thirty pounds, but we'll build that up, until you can draw Illyrian war bows."

"What's the draw weight of those?" Gwyn asked, her voice soothing the worry he was still feeling,

"Anything from eighty to one hundred and twenty pounds. Mine is a hundred." Her jaw dropped open,

"You mean, they can be four times as strong as these? These look pretty heavy as they are."

"They will be to start off with, you'll be using a different set of muscles than you're used to, so we'll be able to build it up." He drew their attention to the notches at the ends of the bows' limbs, when the string could sit. "Get one end of the string on the limbs, and set that limb against your ankle, and step through with the other foot." He adjusted their position, grateful that Emerie had figured it out, so that he didn't have to get too close to Gwyn as she corrected herself. "Now, use your foot as leverage to pull the string up to set it in place." He demonstrated with a third bow, smoothly setting the string in place, and both females managed to copy him, grinning when they were each successful.

"I win." Gwyn chuckled, and Emerie narrowed her eyes, managing to string her own bow moments after Gwyn,

"We'll see about that." She retorted, and Azriel smiled, and as they turned back to face him the sun burst into the ring, setting Gwyn's hair burning bright in the morning glow. She was so breathtakingly beautiful that he forgot he was supposed to be teaching. He slowly walked them through each step of shooting, from their stance to the arm guards that they needed to wear to avoid the string slapping against their forearms. Once they had gotten the hang of it, Azriel set them off to practice, keeping an eye on them as he made the rounds to check on the other priestesses.

Once he got back round to them, both females were starting to make progress, although neither had actually hit the target yet. Gwyn barely turned her head, but he knew that she'd noticed him, and took another shot,

"What am I doing wrong?" She asked, still gazing at the arrow embedded in the wall a good three feet from the target.

"You need to use your whole back to draw, not just your arm. Imagine squeezing your shoulderblades together when you draw." She nodded, trying again, and the draw was much smoother, but still the arrow thudded into the wall behind the target, and she turned to him, disappointment shining in her eyes, "Try it again. Make sure you don't release full draw the moment before you let go of the string. Draw, sight and loose all in one movement." She nocked another arrow, taking a deep breath, and he came next to her, "Here," he lifted her elbow slightly, "Now release," she did, and the arrow flew straight and true, just hitting the edge of the target. She turned and grinned at him,

"Show me that again." So he did, no matter how much his blood roared at touching her, he helped her adjust her aim, until the arrow thudded straight into the center of the target. "I did it! Did you see?"

"I saw," he grinned, "Well done, now prove it wasn't a fluke," she flipped him off but returned to the range, and while he was helping Emerie achieve the same result his shadows, his very blood sang at every shout of delight when she hit the target. Emerie was having difficulty adjusting her wings to allow her to reach full draw at all, and he had to ask her to show him exactly how much movement she had.

He frowned as Emerie moved her wings, there was no way she'd be able to get to full draw with her right wing unable to move properly.

"Perhaps we can get a brace made, or if you're comfortable to let Thesan see if he can at least recover a greater range of movement?"

"I don't know, will it hurt?"

"Certainly not initially, but perhaps later on, if you wanted to regain flight, maybe, but regaining a bit more movement should be painless." She hummed,

"I'll think about it,"

"Let one of us know if you want to try, we can always ask Madja to try first, but for now, perhaps we can get a brace made to hold your wings up so that you can shoot properly." Emerie nodded, "And I'll work out some exercises for you to perhaps be able to build up the muscles there to do it yourself, do you mind if I check to see exactly what's damaged?"

"Yeah, that's okay." She still shuddered when he touched the muscles at the base of her wings, finding few of them intact, fewer that were still capable of bearing any sort of load.

"Okay, I can try to work something out for you," Gwyn had managed to unstring her bow by herself, and wrapped an arm around Emerie's waist,

"We'll figure it out," she muttered, "In the meantime you can just kick everybody's ass at close combat." Azriel smiled as the females walked away, laughing softly,

"Make sure you cool down properly," he reminded them softly as he started to tidy up the equipment that they had all used, and his gaze fell on Gwyn, talking softly to Emerie and another female, sweaty and exhausted, but still she practically shined in the early sunlight. When she tipped back her head and laughed, his shadows skittered around him, dancing with that sound as it flowed through the air. They loved her, as they told him repeatedly, annoyingly often, and demanded that he make sure to see her again that day. He told them to mind their own business, but still couldn't tear his eyes away as she waved and headed back to the library,

"See you tomorrow, Az!"

"See you later!" He waved back at her, grinning broadly until wingbeats alerted him to Rhys' arrival to take Emerie home. He quickly shook himself off, and finished tidying up, waving goodbye to the other priestesses as they left.

*****

No one heard as Azriel slipped out of his bedroom window that evening, the cool wind nipping at his skin as he caught an updraft and spiraled up to the roof. He lay back on the roof, watching the stars twinkling above his head, letting the wind ruffle through his hair, and closed his eyes. On nights like this, he sometimes couldn't face being inside, he needed to feel the wind on his face, his wings. He opened his eyes again, his gaze falling on a familiar star, his mother's voice sounding in his ears, almost as if she was there,

Always remember that star, Azriel. Every time you look up at it, so am I, that's our star, forever.

He didn't know what compelled him to do it, but a familiar song burst from him, his mother's song, the only lullaby he had ever been sung, the words falling effortlessly from his lips as he gazed at their star. He hadn't seen her in so long, he hadn't been able to, but he would find time, he would get away from his work soon. He could practically see her sitting beside him, hear her voice in place of his. The wind became her fingers tidying his hair, became her voice singing through the darkness, his shadows on his shoulders became her hands, holding him close, just being there.

*****

Gwyn didn't know what had driven her from her bed, but the moment she stepped outside, the song hit her. She didn't recognize the words, they were in a language she didn't know, but she knew the hurt, the longing in them, in that lullaby. That voice, she could have sworn that she'd heard it before, but she couldn't have, she didn't recognize it, still, the huskiness seemed familiar, the deep tones flowing over and through one another effortlessly. Whoever he was, he had a beautiful voice, and she found herself drawn towards it, her blood singing with him.

Arrorró mi niño

Arrorró mi sol

Duérmase pedazo

De mi corazón

Cierre los ojitos

Ya se va a dormir

Que el pícaro sueño

No quiere venir.

She followed the song all the way to the House of Wind, freezing when she saw the shadowed figure on the roof, head raised to the sky, great, dark wings spread behind him, voice raised in song. He did sing, she was frozen in awe at his voice, at the way it sang to her, but she still felt like she was intruding. Gwyn dared to snatch one final glance at Azriel before she turned to leave, and his head turned, surely he couldn't see her from all the way up there? But something made her stay, made her sit on a nearby bench and listen as he repeated the song again and again, until she knew the lyrics herself. The raw emotion in his voice almost brought her to tears, and she almost turned to leave again, but something made her stop, and sing with him.

*****

His shadows leapt and danced as a second voice sounded through the air, light and feminine, brighter and happier than his, a comfort to the pain of his own song. As Gwyn's voice continued to rise, his shadows left his shoulders to dance around him, she sang to them, for them,

It's her.

She's here.

Go to her.

We love her.

He almost chuckled at the overload of demands, but he sang with her, their voices twining together through the cold night air, the familiar melody giving him the courage to speak to her, to go down there. He practically threw himself off the roof, free-falling before opening his wings and gliding to the ground. When he landed, the street was empty. She hadn't wanted to disturb him. Gwyn wasn't there. Only her lingering scent proved that she had been there at all.

Part 2

#gwynriel #azriel x gwyn #azriel #gwyn #gwyn acosf #gwyneth berdara #angst #fanfic #fanfiction #acosf #acosf spoilers #a court of silver flames #acotar #a court of thorns and roses

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sofiaaaaaaaa03 · 3 years

Text

Lively

Summary: Reader enjoys singing to themselves while Din is gone for bounty hunting and one day gets caught.

(I’m new to the app so I lost the message the person sent to me, but here’s the first request I managed to copy before I lost it. I really hope the person enjoys it. I had a lot of fun!)

Request: My prayers have been answered! Thank you so much for doing this, the lack of Dad!Din Djarin with young adult reader is killing me. Ok, so could you do a one shot the where reader (who is around 17) really enjoys listening to music and singing, but is afraid that it’ll annoy Din since he’s usually so quiet. So when Din is looking for bounty’s, the reader listens to music through her speaker rather than her iPod (or whatever is the space equivalent of an iPod) and just sings her heart out. But Din comes back early to find the reader singing to herself along with the lyrics, and surprises her. I’ve got some song suggestions, you can choose which one can fit the mood of the one shot. I tried to give you a wide range of genres, but not too many songs. Let me know if you need anything.

Pairs: Dad!Din Djarin x Young Adult Reader

Words: 1,520

A/N : So I got a little carried away and ended up writing a little backstory for the reader because I imagine that they’d be from Earth and still LOVE listening to earth tunes. Like, can you imagine Din’s confusion to most human songs’ lyrics? Anyways, I really hope you guys like it and please request more things for me to write or tell me your thoughts on the story. I’d really appreciate your feedback!!

Ending up in outer space was the last thing you’d expect to happen when you turned seventeen. You thought you would be dealing with high school drama and figuring out where you’d be attending university. Not getting picked up by an alien spacecraft during a camping trip and taken lightyears away from Earth. It was too much for you to handle as you had no clue what was going to happen to you, so you quietly hummed your favorite song to help calm your nerves of whatever impending doom you would face. Though it seemed that you were not meant to face such a fate, when blasting came from the corridor of the ship and what seemed to be an armored knight entered the room, finding you huddled in the corner wearing nothing but your pjs.

You later found out that the knight was known as a Mandalorian while conversing with him under the star lit cockpit of his ship.

“Never heard of it.”

“You’ve never heard of Earth?” You looked at him incredulously, shocked at his indifferent tone.

His helmet humbly shone as he shook his head. “Wherever you’re from, kid, it must be far. Is there anyone you know around the system that can look after you?”

You shook your head. If he didn’t know about Earth then you must be really far from home. This could be why people back home haven’t been able to find any alien life forms. They were so far out of reach that they didn’t know about humans back home. Did that mean you couldn’t go back home? What would you do now that you were stranded?

The Mandalorian looked at you for a moment before sighing. He confessed that he lived with a son who needed to be watched over while he was out pursuing bounties and offered you to stay with him for the time being so long as you watch the child while he was gone. He would also do his best to find any information about this Earth you spoke about and try to return you to your home. By Creed, he’d said. Which confused you at the time though you didn’t try to argue, not wanting to get marooned your first day in space. From that day forward, you began your life with the Mandalorian and his child.

--------

“When are you coming back?” You followed Din as he activated the boarding ramp to lower to the ground. He was off to retrieve another bounty. You could tell by the puck he carried with him. Whoever’s information was in it was not going to have a good day, you were sure of it.

“End of the day, if things go well.” Din began to make his descent down the ramp, not bothering to turn around and face you. “Close the ramp. You have your coms in case anything happens while I’m gone.”

You watched as the Mandalorian set off for the nearest town, waiting for him to distance himself from the ship before pushing the button that’d close the ramp and heading back inside to get Grogu. You stopped in the middle of the main corridor, looking inside Din’s bunk. Grogu cooed inside the makeshift hammock, sleepy eyed and yawning.

“Din’s gone. You know what that means?” You picked up Grogu and made your way to the cockpit. A small squeal erupted from the small green thing in your arms, causing you to chuckle as the doors to the cockpit opened dramatically. For a baby he sure was able to understand so much. Plopping onto Din’s seat (something you only had the courage to do when he was gone) you pulled out your phone and began connecting it onto the main board.

Back on Earth, it was no secret about your love of music. You used to spend hours in your room completely losing touch with reality while you sang your heart out. It was different in space. Though the music to you was foreign and full of languages that were not of your native tongue, you enjoyed them nonetheless and even listened to them using an old datapad you found in the ship. Never aloud though. You were afraid of overstepping your boundaries with the Mandalorian you’d lived with. The fact that he never said much intimidated you enough. You didn’t want to annoy him. Besides, after a long day he deserves to come back home to peace and quiet.

That didn’t mean that you couldn’t enjoy yourself while he was gone. Oh, on the contrary it became tradition for you and Grogu to turn the Razor Crest into one big speaker while the two of you jammed out to music. As it turned out, Grogu really enjoys the 70s.

The two of you pranced around the ship for what only felt like an hour, when in reality the suns of the planet had gone down a long time since. Grogu had tired himself out and fell asleep the moment he returned to his little hammock. You, on the other hand, sat in the cockpit where the music was currently playing in. The wires had to be redirected and closed so that the only area the speakers played music in was where you were. Even though Grogu was sleeping, you were far from done listening to music. At the moment, you were singing your heart out to Killer Queen. You had been silently listening to the music before. But with a classic like this it deserved to be sung with. Or at least, that’s how you felt.

Unbeknownst to you, Din was making his way to the ship when he heard sounds coming from within. This worried him for a moment. His instincts told him that someone else was inside and with the kids. Quickly making his way up the ramp, Din upholstered his rifle and scanned the main hull of the ship. A moment passed. The hull showed no signs of struggle. Taking several steps forward Din picked up on the light snoring coming from his son’s hammock. He checked Grogu quietly, careful as to not wake him but still wanting to make sure that he was alright. Comforted to know that his son was safe, Din admitted to himself that he was being too rash with an intruder inside of the ship and took a moment to glance around the vicinity in search of his other ward. Where were you? He checked your empty cot before making his way into the cockpit.

“Didn’t know there were concerts on this ship.”

“Dank Farrik-” You jumped out of your seat, startled by Din’s clapping that had interrupted your vibes. You were too busy singing to hear the Mandalorian’s steps as he entered the hull. “I didn’t hear- how long were you watching?”

Din made his way beside the main chair, placing a hand on the headrest. “Long enough to know you messed with my cables. How’d you learn to do that?”

“Peli taught me some things last time we were with her.” Your ears burned hot. “She thought it’d be useful to learn in case you needed an extra set of hands.”

You stared at anything but Din, still embarrassed from the startle he gave you. With his helmet on it was virtually impossible to look at him and tell what he was thinking. To know if he was annoyed. If he was upset at you for messing with his ship, he certainly didn’t show it. Was he going to kick you out? Leave you stranded? You sighed, closing your eyes and waited for him to say something.

A chuckle emitted from Din’s helmet. “Y’know, I was wondering where that song was from.”

You opened your eyes, tilting your head at him questionably. “What do you mean?”

“I mean,” He sat on the co-pilot’s seat, leaning forward and resting his elbows on his knees, “Grogu has been mumbling some sort of uh… song whenever he doesn’t see you around. I always assumed that it was his way of calling for you. Didn’t really know where he’d gotten it from, until now.”

A large smile found itself on your face.

“Really?” Din nodded. “He really loves Earth music, yknow.”

“He doesn’t do a bad job mimicking it either.” A pause. “You two should play it more often when we’re travelling. It’d certainly make the place more…”

“Lively?” You added with a smirk.

Din hummed, nodding at your words. “Yeah, kid. Lively. Alright, out of the chair. We gotta hit hyperspace for our next commute.” He ruffled your hair and chuckled at you swiping at his hands. You settled in the co-pilot’s chair while he positioned himself on the pilot’s chair, grabbing your phone and staring at it for a moment. Its wires remained connected to the ship’s board.

“Here.” He handed the phone to you. “I’d like to learn more about your music...if that’s alright with you.”

You smiled, hitting shuffle on the playlist and listened to the music flood into the cockpit. You didn’t fail to notice Din’s foot tapping to the beat of the song.

#din djarin #din #the mandalorian fanfiction #the mandalorian #star wars x reader #star wars #din djarin x reader #dad!din #grogu #the mandalorian x reader #y/n #din djarin x y/n

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hockeyboysiguess · 4 years

Text

impatient | m. tkachuk

a/n: a little bit of pining, a lot a bit of other things. this was super fun to write even if it killed me a little to do.

warnings: smut, swearing, alcohol, and more smut

(this is a new and optional (no pressure but I think it will add to your experience reading my fics) thing I’m starting where all of my fics now come with a recommended wine pairing to drink while you read. full disclosure, I know absolutely nothing about wine and don’t intend to learn a damn thing about it while doing this. i order by the color and price per glass. these recommendations are based off how I feel and nothing else)

wine pairing recommendation: pink moscato, because we’re all basic bitches for matty tkachuk and pink moscato is the basic bitch wine. you know you like it. don’t lie.

word count: 5.3K

“Fuck, Matty,” you breathed out between moans as your fingers threaded deeper into the mess of curls between your thighs.

“Oh, like that?”

His hot breath fanned out across your hot, sensitive core and you groaned at the sensation. Matthew leaned in closer to you, his broad shoulders pushing your legs further apart. He still stopped short of putting his mouth on you.

“Matthew, please,” you whined, your body stiffening as you tried to grind your hips down to get more contact.

“Patience,” he kissed the inside of your thigh, a few inches from exactly where you wanted his mouth, “is a virtue, honey.”

“I fucking hate you,” you complained, but it came out empty.

“Mm, that’s hot,” was all he said before his tongue finally touched your clit and you couldn’t help but let out an embarrassingly loud moan.

Your body decided that moment you finally felt the tension start to unfold was the perfect moment to wake you up from a dream you haven’t asked for, but decided to enjoy anyway.

“Oh, fuck me,” you groaned as you pulled the covers up over your face. “He’s everywhere.”

You stumbled slowly out of bed to the bathroom. Your inability to be patient meant you washed your face with water that was verging on ice cold, which luckily today came in handy and helped you cool you off from your dream. Matthew had found his way into a lot of your thoughts when you were by yourself. He was becoming absolutely unavoidable.

“Good morning!” your long-time roommate and self-identified best friend Kayla sang as you entered the kitchen.

You have her your customary grunt in reply. One of the biggest issues in your friendship with Kayla was that she was a literal ray of sunshine presenting as a human being. She was a blindingly bright, cheery, peppy morning person who wore her heart on her sleeve and believed that everything would be better with a sprinkle of sugar and a little more love. You couldn’t understand how a person older than eight could possibly have the personality Kayla did, but she’d made it this far into life like this, so this was how she was.

“I made you a smoothie bowl. It’s in the fridge next to your coffee that’s chilling so it can be iced coffee,” Kayla informed you, sounding more like she was meant to sing to birds so they would assist her in baking a cake than that she made you, a woman arguably resembling a river troll right now more than a person, a smoothie bowl and coffee.

You grabbed the bowl eagerly, needed something to try to get your mind from replying the self-created imagine of Matty’s shoulders and curly head between your thighs. You sighed as you took your seat at the breakfast bar next to Kayla. You dug in instantly. It was one of Kayla’s better ones.

“Is good, K,” you mumbled around the berries in your mouth.

“Thank ya,” she replied with a bright smile.

“K,” you wiped the corners of your mouth before you turned to her, “can I tell you something if you promise not to tell anyone else?”

“Of course!”

Kayla was lying and you knew it. Loose lips might sink ships, but your friendship was too strong to sink despite Kayla’s knack for spilling all the beans she knew as soon as she was pushed in the slightest of ways. But, you needed to get this off your chest.

“I had a sex dream about Matthew Tkachuk,” you said bluntly.

Kayla’s spoon paused on its journey to her mouth before it dropped back into the bowl aggressively. Little purple droplets of smoothie sprayed across counter due to her sudden movement. Her mouth dropped open as she processed what you said.

“It was like, almost a sex dream, I guess,” you sighed. “He was about to eat me out and his shoulders, god the shoulders and the curls, and it was just, it was so hot and I have no idea what this means.”

“If I start singing that nursery rhyme about you two sitting in a tree kissing are you going to throw your coffee at me?” Kayla was already wincing back in her seat with her hands protectively in front of her face before she finished her sentence. “This cream sweatshirt doesn’t deserve it even if I do for saying that.”

You rolled your eyes at her and turned your attention back to your quickly thinning breakfast.

“Do you maybe like him, like him?” she asked hesitantly.

“He’s super annoying, Kayla,” you reminded her, “and I doubt he’s even into me in the slightly.”

“He’s totally into you and I know you’re into him. Annoying and a big ego is your type. He’s annoying to you because he’s constantly pulling your metaphorical pig tails.”

You rolled your eyes again, wondering if maybe they were going to get stuck up there that your mom had always threatened when you were little, before replying with, “This isn’t elementary school, K. Even if I did have a little crush, he’s not that type of guy and I’m not his type. ”

She shrugged and put her hands up, telling you that her opinion was her opinion and you could like take it or leave it.

“I just told you what I think, that’s all,” she said. “I also think we need to dress you up extra hot for the bar tonight and you better shave, just in case, you know.”

-------

As the first shot of tequila burned down your throat later that night, you were starting to regret telling Kayla. She’d already had three drinks and around four was when the secrets started spilling out and Matthew was bound to show up any minute. The team had lost tonight, but they were still coming out to celebrate someone’s birthday.

“That shirt makes your boobs look amazing!” The last word was sung, entirely unsurprising with your best friend. “Thank god you let me do your makeup tonight too. He’s not going to be able to take his eyes off you.”

“K,” you sighed as you sat the empty shot glass down on the bar, “he’s not exactly a buy-you-roses, take-you-home-to-his-momma, remember-your-anniversary, kind of guy. Pretty sure, if I wanted to, this would be a one and done sort of thing.”

Kayla shook her head after taking another shot that you couldn’t identify the origin of since you didn’t have another. Oh great, four deep.

“I’m telling you, babe. He’s into you. Like, he’s actually into you,” Kayla told you.

“Who’s into you?”

As if on cue, with an actual tug of your ponytail, Matthew was by your side with his classic, every present cocky smile and mop of curly hair, grabbing your attention even though you didn’t want to give it to him.

“No one,” you told him. “You’re just in time to pay for my next drink though.”

“You’re the worst person I know,” Matthew told you with a sigh. “You just talk to me for my money, don’t you?”

“Well, it certainly couldn’t be because of your personality,” you chirped back.

His credit card still hit the bar a few seconds later though, a wide smile on his face. He slid tight up next you, one of his hands gently resting on your back as he threw some cash on the bar along with his card to catch a bartender’s attention. His hand pressed against your back was warm and strong and you wanted to lean into it, into him. You resisted, your body stiffening as you resisted the urge to collapse into him.

“Oh, sorry,” Matthew mumbled as he took his hand away.

“Oh, you’re good! You can keep it there if you want.”

You’d said it a little too quickly and with a little too much pep for you, but luckily the volume of the bar covered it. Matthew just nodded and let his hand gently rest on your back again, his fingers drumming against you, as he ordered his and apparently your next drink.

“Don’t I get to order myself?” you asked him as you tilted your head back to allow for eye contact.

“When you’re paying,” Matthew chuckled before giving your ponytail another quick tug. “So, how’s work? Pretty sure you know how mine went today, so distract me with yours, please.”

You just started to make small talk about your work and his when your drinks arrived. Matthew was already being pulled away from you the second his beer touched his hand.

“Find me in a few!” he shouted over the noise as he was led off to the dance floor.

You definitely didn’t like you if he left that quickly, but you tried to focus on your drink instead of him. You couldn’t figure out what he’d ordered you by the taste. It was strong, but still tasted good, which was about all that actually mattered. You shrugged it off and headed over to mingle among the team and your other friends, mystery drink in hand and thoughts of Matthew in your head.

By the time your ass was back on your barstool, you weren’t sure how much time had passed, but you’d had three of Matthew’s mystery drinks and you were feeling them. Still, even at your worst, you weren’t Kayla who had already been yelled three separate times by security for climbing on a chair, a table, and the bar. She could not hold her alcohol even if you paid her a million dollars to do it.

“Jesus, I’m amazed they haven’t kicked her out yet. I see we’re being boring over here though instead of fun like Kayla.”

Matthew. Of course he’d find you the second you decided to take a little breather. You rolled your eyes at him and he laughed lightly. You knew he was teasing. He was always teasing you, always chirping you. You took the last sip of your drink and began the internal debate on if you could handle one more or not.

“Look, Chucky Cheese, not all girl are table dancing types,” you sighed, settling on the idea that one more would probably more likely than not be one too many.

Matthew slid his stool closer to you as he waved the nearest bartender down to close out his tab, apparently deciding he was also done for the night along with you. The scent of his cologne was engulfing you in a way that made the rest of the world around you slowly start to disappear.

“I’m not into table dancing types,” he informed you as he intercepted your tab before you could glance at how much he was shelling out for you tonight. “More into the roommates of the table dancing types. Especially,” he slid the clipboard with the bill to the opposite edge of the bar as his eyes turned back to lock with yours, “when I have it on good authority that table dancing girl’s roommate is into me.”

If you’d still been drinking, you would’ve choked on it with that statement.

“What?” was all you managed to get out in response.

Matthew chuckled a little and nodded softly, as if he’d been expecting that very response. He pivoted on his stool to face you. Slowly and steadily, Matthew leaned in closer to you. Even sitting, he towered over you and it made your breath hitch in your throat. Him leaning into you like this enveloped you in the feeling of him and the smell of his cologne. His lips came to rest just next to the shell of your ear, accidentally grazing it for a moment. If you weren’t already sitting, your knees would’ve buckled.

“Kayla is a little too drunk to keep your dreams a secret. She said something about how my shoulders would look between your thighs? Could’ve heard that wrong though.” Matthew said softly to you. “It’s okay. I’m happy to make your dreams come true tonight.”

He paused for a second and you weren’t sure if you had breathed the entire time he’d spoke. He took a deep breath before continuing.

“That is, if you’re interested.”

Loose lips sink ships, but maybe, just maybe, Kayla’s loose lips were about to make something float for the first time in her life.

“Don’t worry so much,” he whispered against your ear as he sensed your nerves, his lips ghosting across your sensitive skin as he spoke, “I want you so fucking bad right now.”

He pulled back, settling onto his stool again with practiced ease, and your heart started racing in your chest. You could barely hear the crowd over your heart beating in your ears. You had to think of something to say and you didn’t have a lot of time to do. Your brain was racing, not landing on any thought in particular long enough for it to take hold. Matthew knew he had you exactly where he wanted and his confidence was turning you on in a way that you hated that you loved. He leaned in closer to you, his smirk still strong as he came closer to you, his mouth inches from yours. You wanted to throw him off guard, wipe that cocky smirk right off his face, so you said the first thing that came to mind.

“You’ve got to buy me dinner first, Tkachuk.”

You didn’t know what part of your brain found those words. You didn’t know why they’d come out of your mouth. You didn’t even know how truly interested you were. The last one was a lie to yourself, but those words were a 50/50 gamble. Maybe he wanted to fuck you and take you to dinner. Maybe he just wanted one night to get over a tough division loss tonight. You had no evidence other than Kayla’s pigtail pulling theory to support the idea that maybe he might not just be looking for a one night stand and Kayla was so often wrong.

“Hmm, any chance I can cash in on dessert tonight and take you to dinner tomorrow?” The smirk was replaced with a soft smile, a smile that made you want to fall right into his broad chest and never leave. “Because I’m not exactly super patient here and I know you’re going to look absolutely killer in a tight dress at the stupidly expensive restaurant I’m going to take you to tomorrow night, but you’d also look so fucking good in my bed right now.”

"Is that so?” you asked him, stealing his smirk from earlier. “How nice is this restaurant?”

“Not as nice as I’m going to make you feel in a few minutes if you let me.”

You pressed your mouth against his as your way of answering. Matthew’s hands were on your waist, pulling you off your stool and into him as he took over, his mouth working aggressively against yours. Your hands clasped together behind his neck, securing you against him. Matthew was the one to pull back, surprising you. He released one hand from your waist to pull his phone out of his pocket and open up Uber on his phone.

“Unless that didn’t mean what I think it meant, I’m taking you home, woman,” Matthew said as he ordered the car.

“What ever do you think it could mean?” you countered in the lightest, brightest sarcastic voice you could find.

“Don’t tease me like that,” Matthew smirked, his face inches from yours now that his phone was secured in his pocket again. His forehead dipped down to press against yours. “You want this, right?”

“I’m just in this for the idea that the stupidly expensive restaurant has lobster,” you teased him again.

He shook his head softly and let out a soft breath before kissing you again in a way that told you that you were about to be in for a hell of a night. The Uber to his place was a blur for you due to alcohol and anxiety. You wanted Matthew. You knew for certain he wanted you too. That didn’t mean doubt and insecurities weren’t trying to worm your way in and ruin this for you. Matthew’s arm around your shoulders pulled you back to the present. He was pressing you tight against him in the elevator ride up to his apartment.

“Stop with the mind racing thing you do. I can see the hamsters running up there,” Matthew laughed, his head falling back against the elevator to rest as he looked at you. “You’re not going to have to dream about this anymore. You get the real thing and I’m buying you dinner. You’ve come out on top here, even though you’re not actually going to be on top tonight.”

“Keep chirping me and see if I won’t turn around right now,” you replied as the elevator doors opened.

“Your prerogative,” Matthew shrugged and he pulled his keys out with his free hand, “but I think taking your right hand over me is a poor choice for you.”

“Aw, you think I don’t own a vibrator.” Matthew’s hand stumbled as he tried to put the key into the lock, probably something to do with what you’d just said. “Cute of you.”

“Own anything else I might want to know about?” he asked you curiously as he pushed open his door after successfully wrangling his key.

“All in due time, Tkachuk,” you said with a pat of his broad chest as you breezed past him into his apartment.

Matthew breathed out a long sigh. It turned slowly into a chuckle towards the end as he shut the door, his mind jumping forward to when you’d hopefully let him see whatever you were alluding to that was in the back of your top drawer. You didn’t make it far into Matthew’s apartment before his large hands grabbed your hips and spun you to face him, his mouth crushing against yours moments later. Your hands grabbed the bottom of his t-shirt and started to pull it up.

“Whoa, whoa, easy there, tiger,” Matthew laughed against your mouth while letting his hands take over and pull his shirt up. “We just got here.”

“If you’re in a slow and steady mood, I’d rather go home to my vibrator.”

Matthew pulled back from your mouth, still laughing as he tossed his shirt to the floor. He didn’t answer you, instead choosing to attach his mouth to your neck, nipping at the thin skin there as your hands found purchase on his bare chest. His teeth grazed across the skin over your collarbone as he worked his way down and your nails slid down his chest, leaving red lines down his pale skin.

“Jesus, fuck,” Matthew groaned out as your actions, his voice only deepening due to the sensation.

His hands on your hips gripped hard, the tips of his fingers pressing into the exposed skin where your shirt had rode up. Matthew slowly guided you backwards until you felt the back of your knees hit the edge of a couch cushion. Matthew left a searing kiss on your lips before he gave you a shove so you fell back on the couch.

“Clothes, off,” Matthew told you as he unbuckled his belt.

“You think-”

“I am in charge. Don’t even,” he laughed softly as he yanked his belt from the belt loops in his jeans and dropped it to the floor. “You’re still very dressed by the way.”

You huffed and stuck your tongue out at him, only making him laugh harder, but you listened to him nonetheless, tossing your clothes to the floor along with his. Matthew stopped with just his boxers left, and you followed his lead. His light eyes were darker as he took in the sight of you in just your bra and panties. Kayla had insisted you wear the one matching set you owned tonight and you made a mental note to thank her tomorrow. Matthew’s tongue darted out to lick across his bottom lip.

“Man, that’s a good look for you.” Matthew paused as he climbed over you, holding up his large frame over yours on the couch on his hands pressed into the cushions next to your head. He lowered his mouth to the swell of your breast, biting gently into the soft skin there. He mumbled against your skin, “Don’t wear clothes anymore.”

“I think I need to, to go to work,” you muttered, your mind far more occupied with what Matthew’s mouth was doing at the moment than speaking.

His hands were coasting up and down your skin, over your thighs, across your stomach. He was touching every part of you and your body was coming alive under his touch. You opened your mouth to add something, but Matthew had used that same moment as his opportunity to pull one of the lace cups of your bra aside and quickly take your now exposed nipple into his mouth. Your open mouth turned into a loud moan as his tongue rolled across the sensitive nub smoothly. You were already almost seeing stars when he gingerly took it between his teeth for a moment.

The bra which had previously been something he appreciated, was now in his way, so it ended up on the floor with the rest of your clothes. Matthew groaned at the site of you without it. He’d decided that naked was your best look, before he’d even gotten you completely naked. You could feel his eyes drinking you in and you would have felt self conscious if not for the fact that Matthew shifted over you, pressing his hardness against your thigh in a desperate attempt for friction.

“Why didn’t we,” Matthew took your other nipple into his mouth mid sentence, letting one of his hands finally stop moving across your skin, to pinch your other nipple between his fingers. He repeated his actions from the other side, tongue rolling your nipple softly before taking it between his teeth. His fingers pinched the other roughly as he did this, making your whine underneath him. He finally finished after releasing your nipple with a soft pop, “do this sooner?”

“I don’t know, but I really need you to touch me,” you whined, your hands flying to his shoulders to push him down.

He didn’t budge. After all, he was a professional athlete with the strength and weight to match the job title. He relented though without much effort on your part, after throwing you a teasing grin, and pulled your panties down your legs with two fingers hooked into each side. He sank onto the couch between your thighs. You gasped as you could feel his hot breath on your wet slit. Matthew looked at you, taking in everything that was in front of him.

“You,” he pressed a kiss to the left side of your inner thigh, “are,” he kissed the opposite side, “so,” he kissed higher up on the left side, closer to where you wanted him, “fucking,” he kissed the opposite side at the same distance from your slit. His mouth moved closer, hovering an inch above your core and he added, “Sexy,” before pressing his tongue between your folds and licking in one firm line up to your clit.

Your eyes rolled back in your head at the contact and your hips bucked up toward his mouth to try and get more contact. One of Matthew’s hands came down low on your stomach and pushed you flat back onto the couch.

“Easy, easy,” he soft softly, giving your clit a gentle, chaste kiss. “I’ve got you.”

You let out a deep breath as you tried to get your body back under your control. Your control held until Matthew’s tongue started to circle your clit for the first time. He was pulling moans from your throat that you didn’t know you made as he worked your clit slowly and steadily. Matthew was brash and bold and fast on the ice, but he was steady here, taking his time. You were his guide as he let the noises he was causing you to make guide him.

You took notice when he flatted his tongue against your clit and looked up at you, his blue eyes locking with yours for a moment. He slowly and purposefully applied more pressure on your clit before shaking his head back and forth, dragging his tongue across your clit firmly. Your eyes slammed shut and your hands flexed into his curls at the sensation.

“Matthew, fuck,” you managed to break out, your voice cracking between the words. “Holy fuck.”

“Easy, baby. Easy,” Matthew reminded you softly before returning to you.

He ran his tongue down your slit again, dipping it ever so slightly into you, making you squirm and whine, before returning his attention to your clit. He started moving his tongue faster, sliding left to right against the sensitive bundle of nerves as he could hear the noises you were matching shift and build. You were becoming more restless under him as your orgasm starting building, desperate to feel that release. Matthew was impatient to get you into his bed, or onto his couch, earlier but he was so very patient now, milking you slowly and gently, making sure to savor every taste of you he was getting, making sure you were enjoying yourself.

“Matthew, more, please,” you begging softly, tugged his curls to try to push him more into your core.

He listened, suddenly taking his clit into your mouth and sucking softly on it. You were seeing stars by the time he released it, his tongue moving in quick circles over it. You were so distracted that you didn’t noticed his hand move from your stomach until you felt two of his fingers slide into you. The new feeling pulled you over the edge almost instantly. Matthew’s fingers pumped in and out of you as his tongue continued his movement on your clit to bring you through your orgasm.

“Oh, my, god,” you breathed out, your chest heaving, as Matthew slowly pulled back from you.

“I don’t think god had anything to do with that actually,” he joked in reply, throwing you a wink that made you remember exactly the kind of guy he really was.

You were about to throw that back in his face, until he slid the two fingers that had been in you into his mouth, sucking them clean in front of you. Your mouth was slack as you watched him, drinking in the sight in front of you.

“Dessert was fucking delicious by the way,” he told you after releasing his now clean fingers.

He pushed up off the couch and disappeared down the hallway. You heard a drawer open in what you assumed was his bedroom and shut quickly after. You were still catching your breath by the time he was back, foil packet in hand.

“Yes?” he asked, lifting the condom up slightly to you as his way of checking with you.

“Please,” you simply replied.

Your dream hadn’t even gone as what he’d just finished, but you can’t say you hadn’t imagined this before. You desperately wanted to know what it felt like to have him inside you. Matthew nodded in response before dropping his boxers to the floor, quickly ripping open the foil packet and rolling the condom down his hard shaft. He sighed happily as he looked you over, stroking himself a few times.

“Hands and knees,” he told you as he crossed the room to you.

You obliged, flipping over onto your knees, bracing your arms on the back of the couch for more leverage. You felt Matthew sink onto the couch behind you before one of his large hands gripped your ass roughly, squeezing it. He gave the now reddened skin a soft tap before his hand slid to your hip to steady himself as he lined up with you. You both moaned as he slowly slid into it, your wetness allowing for him to enter you in one smooth motion until his hips were pressed against your ass.

“Jesus, shit,” Matthew mumbled before taking a deep breath. “You feel so fucking good. Christ, woman.”

“You going to lose it or are you actually going to be able to-”

You didn’t get to finish that sentence as Matthew pulled almost all of the way out before roughly slamming his hips forward until they met your ass again. You gasped at the sudden and now unrelenting movement as Matthew moved at a rough, fast pace, thrusting in and out of you quickly. You gripped the back of the couch and began to push off from the couch slightly, meeting his thrusts with small movements of your own, making him curse between his teeth at how deep he was inside of you each time.

One of Matthew’s hands was digging into the skin of your hip, steadying him to you and his other was on your shoulder, fingers slowly sliding over from the back of your shoulder to the front, inching ever so slightly toward your neck. You knew what he wanted, but wouldn’t ask for this time around, but you could offer it. You steadied yourself with one forearm on the back of the couch before sliding your free hand up to grab his. His rhythm flattered a little until he realized what you were doing, and then he almost fell apart far too early. You gently guided his fingers until they were wrapped around your throat.

“Tell me if it’s too much,” he spat out between thrusts.

You nodded and he slowly and steadily applied pressure to your throat, the side of his hand from his index finger to his thumb pressing in just the right spot to restrict your breathing, but not cut it off dangerously. You started moaning louder with the added sensation and Matthew’s thrusts were becoming sloppy. You knew he wanted to last longer, but he got caught off guard by your assertiveness in the best way possible and wasn’t going to be able to hold out much longer.

“Fuck, fuck,” Matthew mumbled before his breathing hitched in his throat.

He groaned, his hand squeezing down hard on your throat, as his thrusts started to slow as he came down from his high. He collapsed down onto your back when he was finished, releasing your throat so he could wrap his arms around your stomach and give you a quick squeeze. Matthew pressed a soft kiss to your shoulder before slowly pulling out of you. You sighed as you flipped over so you were sitting up on the couch, giving your knees a break.

Matthew climbed off the couch and headed back down the hallway, returning a few moments later with a damp washcloth for you. You were surprised by the gestured, but grateful for it nonetheless.

“I meant it,” Matthew told you as he dropped down on the couch next to you, a water bottle in hand.

You gave him a curious look, trying to figure out what he was referring to in that moment. He took a swig from the bottle before answering.

“Taking you out tomorrow,” he continued when he saw your confusion. He passed you the bottle, before continuing, “I meant it.”

"I didn’t think you weren’t,” you replied with a shrug before popping open the bottle to take a few swigs, grateful for the cool water since you’d both managed to work up a sweat during that.

“Good,” he nodded, curls bouncing with his movement.

The moment was sweet, too sweet for how the rest of the evening had gone. The teasing tone that covered not only the evening, but your friendship with Matthew needed to return. Matthew was also too sure of himself to miss the opportunity at his feet.

“So, did I live up the dream?” he asked you, a cocky grin on his face that matched his tone. “Actually, I know I was better. But how much better was I?”

#Matthew Tkachuk #matthew tkachuk imagine #matthew tkachuk fanfic #nhl fanfic #nhl fanfiction #nhl fic #nhl blurbs #nhl imagine #Hockey Fanfiction #hockey writing #hockey imagine

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fantasticallyfoolishidea · 4 years

Text

So, what’s “Her Sweet Kiss” actually about?

There are a lot of posts about “Her Sweet Kiss” going around already. I might be kinda late to the party but hear me out. By now, plenty of people have started interpreting it as Jaskier’s song about his heartbreak over Geralt sending him and you know what? That’s great. Love it. Amazing. Superb.

But you know what’s also hella damn sexy?

Cold, hard, textual evidence. And damn, does the text deliver.

(Actual analysis starts underneath the line break bc this got longer than anticipated.)

edit 12/01/20: The whole thing’s now available in Brazilian Portuguese, courtesy of the extremely kind @sunshine-any.

So, just or a minute, I want you to forget all about Jaskier, and Geralt, and Yennefer, the events of “Rare Species”… Actually, I’d like you to just forget about the entirety of The Witcher until I get to the point. We’ll get back to them later. For now, let’s just pretend that “Her Sweet Kiss” is like any other song you might hear on the radio by an artist you’ve never heard of before.

And now, only now, without any of the show’s baggage, let’s have a look at what’s going on in this son(g) of a bitch, starting out with the first couple of lines:

The fairer sex, they often call it But her love’s as unfair as a crook It steals all my reason Commits every treason Of logic, with naught but a look A storm breaking on the horizon Of longing and heartache and lust

Okay so, you’ve got a narrator figure (whom, for simplicity’s sake, I’ll be using he/him pronouns for) and you’ve got a nameless woman he’s singing about. The song’s about love, but not the happy kind. Love robbing someone of all logic and reason is a staple of love poetry, but in this case the narrator frames it as a betrayal. The woman’s love feels “unfair” to the narrator, and he blames her for his loss of logic and reason. A single glance of hers and the narrator is overcome with a whirlwind of emotions – longing, heartache and lust. However, “a storm breaking on the horizon” suggests a sense of distance coupled with these emotions rather than a sense of immediacy.

She’s always bad news It’s always lose, lose So tell me love, tell me love How is that just?

These lines expand on the idea of unfairness. Her mere presence pains the narrator and “it’s always lose, lose”. In other words, there’s nothing he can do that will lead to a favourable outcome for him. A third party which the narrator addresses as “love” is introduced and he asks them “How is that just?”. It’s quite apparent that he feels wronged. At this point, the “love” he’s addressing could refer to a number of things. For example, he could be addressing the woman (think, “Why do you do this to me, my love?”); he could be addressing the concept of love, yet another staple of love poetry, (think, “Love, why do torment us humans like this?”). I don’t think it’s either of them, for reasons I’ll be getting to in a minute.

But the story is this She’ll destroy with her sweet kiss

The refrain is rather straight-forward, so I’ll spare you the repetition. By going out of his way to state “But the story is this” the narrator solidifies his position as a narrator figure, telling a story. You could take this as a suggestion that he’s not quite in the midst of things. He sings about how “She’ll destroy with her sweet kiss” but he’s vague about it. There’s no concrete mention of what she’s destroying. It could be their relationship, the narrator could be the narrator’s heart, let your imagination run wild, for now, because the second stanza clears all of that right up. Kind of.

Her current is pulling you closer And charging the hot humid night The red sky at dawn is giving a warning, you fool Better stay out of sight

Now would you look at that. Our narrator isn’t singing to himself, nor is he simply singing to a nondescript audience. There’s a third party (whom i’ll be using they/them pronouns for. Remember you don’t know anything outside of what’s written in the lyrics) he is addressing, who is captivated by the woman, and the narrator claims they are missing distinct warning signs. The narrator’d rather they stayed away from the woman.

I’m weak my love, and I am wanting

And this is where we start to get the whole picture. The narrator addresses the third person as “my love”. Which bears a lot of significant because it turns everything we’ve established so far on its head. (For one, it implies that when he asks “tell me love / how is that just?” it’s this “love” he’s talking to, not the concept of love, and certainly not the woman). He’s realised that “his love” is falling for the woman. The reason he feels the woman’s love is “unfair as a crook” and why it’s causing him so much pain isn’t because they’re involved in some ill-fated romance; it’s because the one he calls “his love” is the object of the woman’s love and he feels like no matter what he does, he’s bound to lose them one way or another. He’s pushed into the role of an observer while the woman and “his love” were getting entangled, hence his assumption of the role of a narrating figure rather than a figure with agency. Looking at “I’m weak my love, and I am wanting” and the following lines as a whole is kinda tricky because there’s a number of ways you could read that. It could be that the narrator is admitting that he’s tired of fighting the inevitable, hence feeling weak and wanting. However, the narrator could also be admitting to his shortcomings – as in “I know I’m weak and that I’m lacking [as a companion, perhaps? just one example]”.

If this is the path I must trudge I welcome my sentence Give to you my penance Garroter, jury and judge

Essentially, what’s happening is that the narrator is giving up. He’s accepted the way things are (or the way “his love” thinks things should be, as “sentence” suggests that some sort of judgement has been passed or a decision been made) and assumes responsibility for what wrongs he might have done his lover. By uniting the roles of “garroter, jury and judge” in “his love” he’s basically giving them (and them only) free reign over his fate. Cue the refrain.

But the story is this She’ll destroy with her sweet kiss

Now for the fun part. Because this isn’t just some random song created in a vacuum. Remember how it is a song sung and composed by Jaskier? And remember the episode it appeared in? There are some minor differences, of course. I won’t start guessing about how this might relate to Jaskier, Geralt and Yennefer’s relationship because then we’d be bridging over into speculative territory and I only wanted to try and figure out what’s going on with the lyrics. Some have pointed out that, in the episode, Jaskier originally debated making the line either “gorgeous” or “lovely garroter, jury and judge” before eventually using neither. Others have pointed out that, in-universe, Marilka also acknowledged that “Geralt” and “Garroter” sound somewhat similar, which could be interpreted as an intentional parallel from the actual writers’ side.

In conclusion, I’m shamelessly stealing someone else’s observation that “Her Sweet Kiss” totally is the “Jolene” of the Witcher-Verse.

Make of that what you will.

edit 06/01/20: Tiny caveat. I was too lazy to get into the whole thing about "real author” vs. “implied author” vs. “narrator” vs. “characters who just so happen to be writers”. Just, keep in mind, Jaskier is a bard who makes a living off his art. Writing songs is his job, and oftentimes a good song is one that makes people emotional. A lot of stuff in ep. 6 can be used to support the interpretation that HSK’s about Jaskier’s actual heartbreak over Geralt and Yennerfer’s relationship. But, I also cited “cold, hard, textual evidence” which, at the end of the day, boils down to “HSK is about a love triangle” and “Jaskier was working on Her Sweet Kiss around the time he and Geralt parted ways”. It’s a conspicuous parallel that may yet affect future episodes but, please, don’t misunderstand me as treating it as a foregone conclusion. What I was trying to say is, “here’s what we can gather from the lyrics themselves” and it can mean as little or as much as you want it to mean for Geralt and Jaskier’s relationship.

#the witcher #her sweet kiss #geraskier #gerlion #geralt x jaskier #fantastically foolish literary analysis

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georgesbestieboo · 3 years

Text

Confessions Pt 1.

Hello my loves! few things before we get started!

The pairing you will read here is an original character of mine with Bucky. She is the biological sister of our beloved Natasha Romanoff, was also put in the red room but later than Nat since she is a couple years younger. Also, the timeline is the comic timeline just to make it a bit more interesting, meaning, Natasha was born in 1928 and Calina, (My OC) was born in 1934 but since the Widows carry their age VERY well Nat will remain the age she appears in the movies and Calina will appear to be 26.

Summary- Bucky and Calina have reunited years after they were the red room lovers, can they become lovers once more or will fear get in the way?

Warnings- A bit about self doubt/disliking body, mentions of torture nothing explicit though, slight swearing, possible spelling and grammar errors (I did check but there are always those things that slip past you)

Calina was not one to party, she would rather spend her Friday nights curled up in her bay window, a fuzzy blanket draped across her lap, a good book clutched tightly in her hands and a warm cup of chamomile tea steaming on her night table. But no. Being an Avenger meant getting dragged to all the famed, insane, and overwhelming parties of Tony Stark and to be honest she hated them. The earsplitting music, the drunk, sweaty bodies pressed together, the...the people, it scared her shitless. Alas, here she was getting dragged to the mall with her best friend and sister Natasha Romanoff in search of a party dress.

“Come on! It’ll be fun!” The redhead promised, pouting her lip as she held open the department store door.

“I don’t know Nat…” Calina trailed off eyeing the endless racks of sparkly dresses that certainly were not her. “You know this isn’t, me” The assassin’s eyes just about bugged out her head as she pulled a dress with such a plunged neck seeming like it was barely attached. Natasha instantly swatted the thin material away, taking her hand as she led her towards the back.

“It used to be though,” She winked “Remember those days, Lina? Partying till dawn, drinking so much we’d see the stars, and-oh!” A short but joyous laugh escaped both lips as they thought about the nights they had spent after they had eventually both escaped the Red Room.

Calina’s laughter soon died out and her face became serious, “Yes, but, that was then. This, this is now”

“Oh don’t be such a sourpuss”

“I am not a sourpuss, ew you sound like Alexi”

Natasha shuddered.

***

“Absolutely not” Calina declared the second she slipped the dress over her body.

“Oh come on!” Nat sighed from the corner of the fitting room. They had been at this for almost 2 hours, every dress tried on ending up on the same, ever-growing pile of fabric on the floor. “This one looks good!”

Calina shook her head hearing none of it. “Nope, nope, nope. It’s too…” Her fingers slid across the scratch rime stones. “Glittery”

“Glitter is nice though!”

“And it’s so…” Her eyes trailed over her exposed figure in the mirror, her hands coming up to cover the neckline dip that reached her stomach. “Low”

“And that’s hot, so I don’t see the problem”

Turning to face her sister Calina crossed her arms, “Why can’t I just wear one of your dresses?” She whined “You have like, a million”

Natasha stood, scoffing. “One, you never wear a dress twice, and two, we need a dress that hugs your beautiful curves perfectly,” She pretended to make an hourglass outline of Calina’s body with her hands, the spy rolled her eyes. “I wanna make Barnes drool when he sees you”

Ah, the truth comes out.

“I knew that’s what you were trying to do!” Calina yelled, pumping her fist back. “I knew there was an ulterior motive!” The older woman smiled shyly,

“You got me, but hey! In my defense you and Barnes flirting with each other all the time and neither of you doing anything is annoying, I just wanna give you two a small push”

“We do not flirt all the time”

“Yeah, yeah you do”

“Молчи” Slipping out of the uncomfortable dress and breathing a sigh of relief she couldn’t help but groan, her eyes taking in all of the discarded clothes. “This isn’t going to work, Natalia, I look horrid in all of these” She squeezed her stomach as she stood before the mirror in her bra and underwear, her fingers pinching away at her skin, wishing it hugged her body tighter. Natasha’s heart clenched as she watched her sister doubt herself, something she had hated The Red Room for taking the idea of beauty from her mind. They had taught her that she would never be pretty, that she would never be enough, that she could never be loved. What hurt, even more, was knowing that her beloved sister still was haunted by those teachings. Those words constantly hiding in the shadows, waiting for a crack in her walls just to seep in and poison her mind. She slowly approached her sister, carefully pulling her hands away from her stomach and holding them tight.

“You are beautiful,” She whispered “Inside and out. Don’t let them control your head” Handing her the last dress they had left to try on she gave a small smile “Just try this last one on and if it doesn’t work, then I won’t make you go”

“Fine” Slowly taking the dress from her sister’s hands she began to step into it, the silky material sliding snuggly up her body as she wriggled her hands through the thin straps. She heard Natasha gasp but she couldn’t bring herself to look in the mirror.

“Look up младшая сестра, you look beautiful. This is the one”

“Are you sure?”

The woman chuckled, “Yes now hurry up and look”

So she did.

And my god did her heart flutter.

She actually looked pretty.

The dress was a deep sapphire blue, with cross material over her chest showing a bit of her stomach. The neckline dipped just enough to show the curve of her breasts but not too much as to make her uncomfortable. The dress was satin and tight, the shiny material clinging to each and every curve making her actually like her body for the time being. It stopped about mid-thigh a bit shorter than she preferred but everything else was perfect so she could let it slide for one night.

“I like it” Her eyes were bright with excitement, something her sister had not seen in her the other in a while. “I think James will like it too” She added sheepishly attempting to hide the heat that went to her cheeks.

“Ha! I knew it! You still like him!” Nat danced around the small dressing room triumphantly.

“Okay, okay, don’t make such a big deal about it” Calina huffed. “Of course I still like him” Her mind wandered to the first time she had met Bucky, long ago in the Red Room, the soldier teaching her many ways to kill. Romantic, I know. But it was more than that, at the time he was The Winter Soldier, yes but he had a soft spot for the ballerina. Disobeying his strict orders to sneak in and see her during the night, spending it under the moon talking about everything and anything, sharing light kisses. It didn’t last long though, soon the authorities found out, ripping her soldier from her grasp. As the years went on she never forgot about the handsome, yet the broken man she met once upon a time. They didn’t meet again until the day on the bridge where he attacked everyone but her to find out later that he had recognized her instantly giving Hydra a run for its money as he tried to get back to her.

Once they were reunited she knew she had her James back. While the road to trust and recovery was rough, she was by his side the entire time, holding his hand as they walked back from hell, getting through their ongoing trauma together. Calina’s feeling resurfaced, and the team knew his did too, but for two of the world, greatest trained assassins they were completely oblivious.

“No shit” Natasha smirked, pulling Calina from her thoughts. “Now, let’s go max Tony’s credit card with this dress and then get finish getting ready at the tower. Sound good?”

Finishing getting back into her street clothes that consisted of her over-sized jeans a sweatshirt of Bucky’s she had stolen months ago. Taking her sister’s outstretched hand a smile tugged at her lips. “Sounds good”

***

Bucky groaned as a knock echoed throughout this floor. Shuffling to open it he was met by Sam who had a shit-eating grin plastered across his face. “I know something you don’t” He sung, pushing past the super soldier and plopping himself down in his living room.

“I don’t remember inviting you in” Bucky deadpanned, holding his face in his hands.

“-I just ran into Nat and Calina downstairs”

“Cool do you want a metal?” “Will you let me finish?! Goddamn” Sam snapped “Anyways, they’re getting ready for the party tonight. Keyword their, more than one, meaning Calina is actually attending tonight”

Okay, that caught Buckys attention. “Lina’s coming? She never comes to the party’s?” He would know. Every time Tony threw a party, Bucky would always bring her up a plate of food, staying with her for dinner but eventually getting dragged back down to mingle by Steve even though he wanted nothing more than to stay with the girl.

“I know, crazy right? You should totally make your move tonight, man!” The Sergeant glared at Sam.

“Why would I do that?”

“You flirt with her all the time. You’re always touching her. You follow the woman around like a lost puppy-”

“Do not”

“-You guys have such strong chemistry anyone in the world could see it and-and! Not to mention, you guys dated before, right, in the Red Room?”

He grit his teeth at the mention of that cruel place, thinking back to the torture they had to endure. “I’m not sure if you could call it dating, we didn’t do dating in the Red Room.”

“But you loved her then?”

“Of course I did” He sighed, running a tired hand through his unruly hair. Calina Romanova was his light, his steady, constant shining star. The person he fought for, the reason he even lasted as long as he did, the reason he never gave up because after all the memory wiping sessions, her smile was always in the back of his mind.

While he had forgotten everything, even himself, he never forgot the time they spent together, hoping, praying, he could hear her laugh one more time. And after 36 years, he finally could.The weight of all he had done lessened as she ran to him just before Steve had reached his apartment, he remembered it like it was yesterday.

**Flashback**

She stood in his kitchen, the Widow suit he knew oh so well clinging to her skin as her fingers skimmed over his dusty table. “Hello James” She had whispered, her familiar accented voice standing up the hairs on his back. She stood to face him, her bright blue eyes boring into his as she smiled softly. “I’m not here to hurt you. You and I were...friends long ago I-I’m not sure if you remember me but-”

He couldn’t believe it

“Солнышко” The nickname he had not used in so long rolled off his tongue like he used it every day since they last parted. He couldn’t help but grin as the girl who danced around his dreams stood before him. Slowly, he approached her, his right arm reaching out to cup her face as if to check if she really was here and not just one of Hydra’s evil tricks. “Is it really you?” A tear slipped down her cheeks as a laugh bubbled throughout her chest. “You remember me” Bucky pulled her to his chest, the woman instantly responding by wrapping her arms around his torso tightly, afraid to ever let go. They held onto each other as if the world around them was crumbling down, after all these years they were finally able to hold one another again, tears stung in both of their eyes as they crushed each other into the embrace. “Of course I remember you, Calina” He murmured into her hair, breathing in the scent of Cherry Blossoms and crisp fall nights he had oh longed for. “I’ve missed you” He admitted.

“And I, you”

Then of course Steve Rogers had to burst in with the whole German Special Services on his ass, but ever since then, she hasn’t left his side. His soulmate was placed back into his life.

**Flashback ended**

“Yo, Buck, you still with me” The man shook his head, attempting to shake away the memory seeping to the front of his mind.

“Yeah, sorry”

“It’s good, but you really should talk to Cal, its getting annoying watching you two make goo-goo eyes at each other and not do anything about it. So either you say something or I will” He warned, waving a finger as he dramatically excited the floor. “Oh, and you might wanna start getting ready!” He called from outside the door. Bucky rolled him but made his way to the dark blue suit he had laid out days before.

“Here goes nothing”

~~Translations~~

Молчи- Shut up

младшая сестра- Younger sister

Солнышко- My sun

A/N Okay! I think that went well, let me know what you think and leave a heart if you enjoyed it! Thank you so much for reading, part two should be up soon but I’m on Vacation, although I will try my best to update quickly. feel free to leave recomondations! Lots of love and know I’m so proud of you!

~Celeste

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crystalirises · 3 years

Text

A Liar and A Son

Note: This was a prompt given to me on ao3 by Project and I have their permission to post it on Tumblr :)

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Fundy curled closer into himself, pulling his knees closer to his chest as a bout of nausea tore through his senses. His throat ached with each small sound he made in an effort to alert anyone of his debilitated state. The air felt hot around him, nearly suffocating as he clawed at his shirt collar, begging for fresh air to fill his lungs. The window had been closed for the night, trapping him in his own bedroom to choke and die. Well, he wasn't really dying, but it sure felt like he was. His vision was blurry, spots of black weaving in and out of existence as he tried to focus on the lamp desk in front of him. He was in his room, but he couldn't say for sure. Fundy let out a whimper, shivering despite the heat that ravaged his body. He must've caught something yesterday, or maybe a while ago when he had so carelessly jumped into the river after a long hot day of training. Fundy buried his head into the rough pillow, begging the abyss of sleep to take him into its kind embrace. He wasn't sure how long he could keep his eyes open, if he'd even wake once he does fall into slumber.

The day had started quite terribly, with his father practically yanking him out of bed in the godforsaken hours of dawn where even the sun still refused to rise in the east. There had been a chill and harsh wind outside, one that left Fundy shivering in his poorly-made crayon suit as they all began their daily training. Fundy could barely breathe by the time they finished, the sun high in the sky that it's warmth was more a curse than a blessing.

With their training done, Fundy got the "bright" idea to sneak out and jump into the river nearby. The water was cold against his skin, dripping down his hair as he made his way home, hoping that he wouldn't run into Wilbur.

Jumping into the river was a mistake… gods…

He heard the faint creak of wood stuttering open, a muted gasp as hurried footsteps echoed throughout the small room. Fundy groaned, closing his eyes as the sudden loud noise began to make his head ache anew. A warm hand was rubbing gentle circles on his back, another petting his hair before lowering to rest at his forehead. He heard a small tsk from above, hushed whispers asking indecipherable words into his ear as a face came into view. Fundy blinked, his vision a mess of color. He didn't know who was in the room with him, couldn't possibly distinguish the face that peered down at him. He edged a bit closer to the stranger, wishing to feel some semblance of comfort in the haze that enveloped his mind. The stranger moved closer, the mattress dipping as they sat a bit closer to him. Fundy reached out a hand, clutching at what felt like the end of a coat. A blue coat as far as he could tell. That meant one thing… "D-dad?"

"Y-yeah, kiddo… Are you alright, Fundy?"

He felt arms wrap around his form, pulling him closer until his head was resting on his dad's lap. He felt his dad fuss over him, poking his cheek every now and then as if to see if he was still conscious.

"Jumped into the river… sorry…" Fundy sniffed, eyes nearly fluttering shut as he hugged his knees closer to his chest. He expected a lecture, a tangent of words he'd probably wouldn't be able to understand as his dad went on a tirade of how foolish he had been and how dangerous it would've been if anyone had caught him outside L'Manburg. Wilbur had built the walls for him, so Fundy would never have to leave. Fundy hated them.

"It's alright, buddy. I know training was brutal today. It's not your fault." Fingers grazed his cheek. Fundy leaned into the touch, his tail wagging weakly against the bed. "You poor thing… you'll be alright, Fundy. I promise."

The arms around him slowly disentangled.

"You have a fever… Hold on a second, Fundy. I'll be right back, alright?" Fundy whined as his dad moved away, feeling the loneliness of his situation even as he heard the scuff of boots against the wooden floor of his bedroom. A cool breeze fluttered into the room, as pale moonlight graced the room with its ethereal glow. Fundy blinked, turning on his side to avoid the light. "I'll be right back, Fundy. Just try and close your eyes for now."

"B-but…" His dad's footsteps turned muffled, his door creaking as his dad disappeared into the hall. Fundy whimpered, shutting his eyes tight as he could, worried that his dad wouldn't come back. "Dad…"

Silence greeted him. He wanted to cry.

It wouldn't be the first time Wilbur had promised him something and didn't truly mean it. Fundy missed when Wilbur acted like his dad instead of his general. L'Manburg had been nothing but a cabin, the home of a hermit and his small fox hybrid son. There was no war, no drugs, no Tommy nor Tubbo, but them. Perhaps it was selfish to long for the past, but Fundy would have given everything to have his dad back. He hated the general, but missed the musician.

General Wilbur Soot was a cold man, a soldier who loved his country more than he could ever love his own family. Wilbur Soot the Travelling Musician was a loving and doting father, a man who simply wanted to give his son the world.

He's still so young… yet he's lost himself and his father to war. War has no mercy to spare, not to a father and certainly not to a child.

"Dad… please don't leave me here… Dad..."

He felt hot tears sting the corner of his eyes, wet trails slowly cascading down his cheeks as he let out a mournful sob. His dad had left him again. His hands reached out towards his hair, pulling at the tips as he tried to console himself to sleep. He was alone. His dad didn't care. His head began to pound, an ache settling over his entire body as sorrow wracked through his form. The house was eerily silent, as if his dad had truly left him alone to fend for himself against a fever. Still, Fundy held on to the small hope that his dad would come back, that he couldn't hear movement due to the ringing in his ears. He wished his dad wasn't so busy… too busy to even stay— His ears twitched, the slight groan of wood breaking through the silence as someone rushed back into the room. He let out a small noise of joy, sounding more like he was choking as a hand tried to soothe him into comfort. He felt something cold and wet pressed against his forehead.

"We need to go on a supply run soon." Fundy heard his dad mutter under his breath, the drenched piece of cloth left against his forehead as a pair of arms moved him to the center of the bed. Fundy let out a pained gasp, his vision blurring as he was slightly jostled. "Sorry, Fundy. I know it hurts, buddy."

Fundy heard the rustle of bedsheets, the sudden shift on the mattress as his dad turned to leave again. With his remaining strength, Fundy reached out, grasping his dad's wrist though knowing his dad could easily break out of his weak hold. He felt his dad's pulse quicken, the figure shifting until he was gazing into his dad's blurry face. Fundy couldn't really see his eyes, a dark shadow covering the top of his dad's face.

"Stay." His voice was hoarse, a low whisper that Fundy feared wouldn't reach his dad's ears. His dad moved closer, lying down beside him as he placed a hand on the back of Fundy's head. Fundy pressed closer, nuzzling his head against his dad's neck as a small tune tried to pull him to sleep. He'd never heard his dad sing this particular song, it reminded Fundy of the time he and Eret had started to sing while they placed down the foundations of what was to be L'Manburg. Fundy sniffled, remembering the days where his dad trusted him enough to be in charge of the houses… yet that responsibility fell upon Tubbo as his dad was too worried about Fundy leaving the walls to gather the materials they needed for construction. Eret had casted him a look, a worried glance before humming underneath his breath. It had devolved into a round of singing which lasted the entire night. He felt a chin press against the top of his head, and for a moment, Fundy remembered how good of a dad Wilbur was when he wasn't riddled with paranoia and stress. "Mmm… love you…"

His dad froze up and Fundy worried that he had said the wrong thing. He couldn't exactly remember the last time he'd told his dad that… couldn't remember the last time his dad said those words to him either. Fundy tried to pull away but an arm wrapped around his shoulder, shushing him as his dad held him closer. Fundy let out a small yip, too delirious to even be embarrassed about how childish it sounded. "I-I love you too, bud. I love you too."

His eyes fluttered close, exhaustion seeping into his veins as the fever began to pull him into sleep. Fundy clung to his dad's soft singing, wondering why his dad sounded a bit different than he usually did. Wilbur didn't sing as much, preferring to hum a low whisper that Fundy could barely hear at times. He couldn't remember the last time his father had sung him to sleep. The last his dad had been there for him when sickness placed a mist over his mind that Fundy could barely distinguish friend from foe. Still… he knew he was safe in his dad's arms right then and there. No one else in L'Manburg cared for him, it couldn't be anyone else. A smile found its way to his lips. He wished his dad hugged him more often. "Will… you be here in the morning…?"

"I will, Fundy. I'll stay with you for the night if you want me too. You don't have to worry about early morning training, at this rate you might have to stay in bed for a week… god…" A loud hiss followed soon after, his dad's hand trembling against the back of his head as a drop of water landed on his cheek. He heard a sniffle, the hand disappearing for a moment before settling on his cheek. A thumb wiped away the bead of water, "I'm sorry, Fundy. Don't worry about your old man, alright?"

"... Goodnight, Dad… promise you'll be here tomorrow? Please..."

"... Sleep well, Fundy, and yes I'll be here. I promise. I promise."

"...love you…"

"Hm… I know, son. I know."

~~~

Eret waited until Fundy's breath slowly stuttered to a peaceful lull, his forehead still creased as though even sleep there was no reprieve from the stress the poor fox hybrid suffered in his waking life. Eret rubbed soothing circles on his back, guilt gnawing and clawing at their chest as their tongue tasted the sickly sweet lie that they had told the poor child. They knew they should have corrected Fundy, should've told him that they weren't Wilbur.

But how could they tell the truth? Fundy looked utterly miserable and Eret's heart couldn't bear the devastated disappointment that would cross Fundy's face, quickly disappearing into indifference as if to show he didn't really care.

Fundy wasn't that good at hiding his emotions.

They pressed a soft pat against the fox hybrid's head before slowly moving away. Fundy stirred in his sleep but didn't try to reach out for them. Eret made their way towards the hall, leaving the door open for when Wilbur came into the house. They paused, leaning against the wall as a sharp pain of despair gripped their chest.

Dream's proposal hung over their head.

L'Manburg's army consisted of children, Eret didn't know what to do. It was a good offer, one not many could refuse… but to take a child's life much less three for the sake of a crown is nothing short but evil. Eret placed ran a hand through their face, the choice weighing heavily in his soul. They'd said yes, like the coward they were. With one simple word, Eret condemned them all to death. Fundy, Tubbo, and Tommy shouldn't have to go through such a betrayal, but there's nothing Eret could do. The deal was signed, and only the gods knew who cruel Dream could be if crossed. They had to go through with it… even if it meant seeing hate in Fundy's eyes. L'Manburg would be a nation built upon the blood and tears of children lost to war. In the end, it was never meant to be.

They heard the crinkle of bedsheets. They looked over, relieved to find that Fundy had simply turned in his sleep. Eret sighed before walking down the stairs, careful not to step on a creaky floorboard. Eret couldn't stay, it wasn't their place and Fundy didn't need them. Fundy needed his dad, and Eret would drag Wilbur home by the neck if it meant Fundy could have one moment of happiness. Wilbur needed to be there for his son. For once, damn it.

Eret breathed in the night air, the wind whipping against the end of their coat as they gazed up into the starless sky. They took a final look behind their shoulder, praying to any god that Fundy wouldn't wake to an empty room.

Eret left. They needed to find Wilbur.

----------------------------------------------------------

Hm... Yep :/

pls don't kill me ;-;

#fundy #eret #mcyt #here comes the angst again #and my timing is so horrible ;-;

43 notes · View notes

nvvermore · 3 years

Text

Angel of Music

Beatrice’s vocal lessons with Amaryllis begin, and the both of them learn much more during these lessons than they’d ever expected to

words: 9k~

Amaryllis’s POV by me/Beatrice’s POV by @juliandev0rak

—

Unfortunately for Amaryllis, Beatrice was a good student.

It sounded like a silly thing to lament over, but it was easy for a good student to sniff out a bad teacher. So, Amaryllis needed to work extra hard to appear as natural as possible in such a position. It didn’t help that yesterday Nadia had also informed them that Beatrice happened to be a teacher herself. Not versed in music, but there had to be a method to these things that it was clear they would be missing.

She’d come prepared, with a journal for notes, water, and even mentioned she took time to practice last night. Despite her outward anxiety, it was clear Beatrice felt excited. But, her attitude didn’t change Amaryllis’s unpreparedness. So far, they had been improvising, banking on her lack of experience and their charisma to fill in the blanks. They were nothing if not an actor.

Now, the two had finished discussing Beatrice’s experience level, as never having had an instructor meant very little. Amaryllis never had one either and they were doing fine. That detail they left out though. But she was proficient on the piano and had a secure grasp on reading music, and had sung for fun her entire life.

Amaryllis stood from the chaise where the two had been sitting side by side. They held out a hand to Beatrice, whose eyes flashed from their face to the offered hand before taking it. Without thought, their thumb brushed over the back of her hand, her skin soft to the touch. As soon as she was on her feet she pulled away, and Amaryllis mourned the loss.

“An important part of singing is remembering your whole body is the instrument. You need to be mindful of your entire being. It may sound difficult, but with practice it will become second nature.” Amaryllis explains as they watch Beatrice watch them. Her hazel eyes dart away when the two make eye contact.

“First step to a session is to stretch. You want your body to be loose, especially your torso. Follow after me.” Amaryllis raises their arms above their head, stretching their shoulders. “Hold for thirty,” They instruct, looking to Beatrice for understanding. Though instead of stretching, she’s starting again. This time, her gaze is on the hem of their dress, where it’s ridden up due to the stretching. The already risqué length had become even more revealing, pale skin a striking contrast to their dark outfit.

“See something you like?” The taunt snaps Beatrice out of it, and her hands nervously dart to the clasp of her cloak. “That seems a little heavy, perhaps you'd like to take it off?”

“Ah, um, yes! Of course.” her fingers stop their fiddling to undo the clasp, and she slips off the garment and hangs it on the back of a chair. Now, it’s Amaryllis’s turn to stare. Sans-cloak, Beatrice is in a light-colored lace gown. It was modest— especially compared to Amaryllis— but not any less mesmerizing. Beatrice catches them staring and they do nothing to hide that they were, lips quirked into a sly grin. She clears her throat, eager to continue.

“So what exactly is the reasoning for loosening up?”

“Tension in your body puts strain on your muscles, including the ones used in signing. When that happens, your ability and range gets cut a significant amount. Proper posture goes hand in hand with relaxation. One can have the most beautiful voice, but it all falls apart if they’re holding themself wrong.”

Together, they finish up the basic stretches, and Amaryllis retreats to the piano. They finger out a simple scale a few times over, ruby eyes never leaving Beatrice.

“Sing for me.“

An inhale, a shaky exhale, and then she begins to vocalize. She’s very quiet, Amaryllis can hardly hear her over the sound of the piano. But they smile at her and nod, a small push of encouragement. Little by little, she loosens up, growing louder as they go through the scales. Moving up and down in octaves until they pass Beatrice’s range. Her voice is light and airy, ethereal despite the hesitation behind it. An impressive high range, and that was with no breath control practice. When they told her yesterday they'd make her into a prima donna, it had been to tease. But now they’ve heard her, Amaryllis thought it might not be an impossible feat.

Amaryllis ceases their playing. Still watching Beatrice, they could pick up on the subtle tremors that ran through her. She was doing her very best to be discreet in regards to her nerves. They stood from the bench to direct her to sit back down on the chaise, fetching water for her in the process. As she drank it down, Amaryllis fought the impulse to brush her hair back out of her face. The urge to comfort her with any touch. But they didn't know how such a gesture would be received, and the unusual desire to do so brought them discomfort.

“You have a beautiful voice,” their soft complement breaks through the silence. Beatrice looked at them with wide eyes, expression flattered and confused all at once. “It’s true. Right now, your biggest setback is your nerves, and that will fade in time. But the tension you carry because of it can create pitch issues.”

“Oh,” Beatrice whispers, voice trailing off as she takes in the information. Her mouth opens to finish her thought, but loses her words when Amaryllis’s hand is on her chin. They tilt her head up to look at them, the same way they'd done so yesterday.

“You should always accept a compliment as if you truly believe it. That way, one day, you will.”

“I-”

“Your voice is beautiful.” Beatrice looks torn, face flushed and Amaryllis can tell she wants to glance away from them so badly. But she doesn't, and they stand over her patiently while she finds the resolve they know she has.

“Thank you.” Her voice is steady, and while Amaryllis knows it's not likely she believes it yet, it's certainly a good start. Satisfied, their thumb brushes across Beatrice’s jaw before pulling away. They don't watch for any reaction, deciding they've maybe pushed her a bit too much already. Standing across the room now, they decide to get back to the actual vocal lesson.

“Now that I've heard you sing without any corrections, let's go over what exactly we'll work on together.”

The rest of the lesson passes faster than Amaryllis wanted it to. They go over breath control and pitch issues, how to practice and how to work the areas she needed to in particular. Beatrice was attentive, asked careful questions and took detailed notes. The next time Amaryllis had her sing she did so with a little less hesitance. Their own hesitance surrounding teaching faded too. It felt less like they were teacher and student, and more like they were having a conversation. Before they knew it, two hours had passed, and didn’t want to keep Beatrice any longer. Even if a persistent part of their mind said they did.

“Well, It's about time you gave your voice a rest. I‘d consider this first session a great success.” Beatrice stood a few feet away from where Amaryllis sat on the bench. She looked almost disappointed at the concept of the lesson’s conclusion. Glancing around the room, her eyes landed on the grandfather clock in the corner.

“Ah, I suppose you are correct,” her hands darted to where her cloak normally sat. When she found it missing, her fingers faltered. “So how often do you think I should have lessons?”

“Weekly will be best. Much of the progress you're going to make will happen during practice. And as long as you take time to do so each day, you'll see it in little time. But if you have questions or need assistance outside of lessons, you know where to find me.” Amaryllis retrieved their grimoire from the piano lid as Beatrice gathered her things. The green cloak resumed its place on her shoulders, and Amaryllis felt endeared by the quirk. Together, they made for the doors.

“Amaryllis, I,” Beatrice began once they exited the room, “I’d like to thank you. I never thought I'd ever take lessons, let alone ones from you.” The admiration of others rarely phased them, it was another aspect of their everyday. But Beatrice’s gratitude made them feel something unlike any kind they’d received before.

“The pleasure is all mine. You're a very promising student after all.”

“Thank you,” she said with the same conviction as she did after Amaryllis’s complement earlier. Feeling a sense of pride, they smiled at her, genuine.

“Have a good evening, Beatrice.”

⎯ ⎯ ⎯ ⎯

Beatrice shows up to the next lesson early, notebook and water in hand. She tries the door to the practice room and finds it locked, so she sinks down onto the floor to sit and wait. She’s just pulled her notebook out of her bag and is reviewing her notes from last week when she hears the now familiar sound of Amaryllis’ heels approaching down the hallway. She hurriedly stuffs the notebook back into her bag just as Amaryllis turns the corner. “Well hello,” Amaryllis smiles, offering their hand to help Beatrice up, “Need a hand?”

“Oh, yes thank you,” Beatrice takes their hand, trying not to seem too eager as she reaches for them. She lets go of their hand as soon as she’s up, not wanting to make things awkward by lingering.

“Shall we begin?” Amaryllis says, holding the door open for her. She sets her bag down on the chaise and takes her cloak off, not noticing the way Amaryllis watches her from across the room. Her hands go to her clothes, making sure her blouse is tucked in properly and fluffing the fabric of her skirt to make sure it lays flat. She takes a sip of water, a deep breath, and turns to face Amaryllis.

This lesson starts better than the last. Beatrice is less nervous now that she knows what to expect, now that she knows that Amaryllis is both a good teacher and a kind person. She hadn’t expected ridicule by any means, but hearing genuine compliments from them had made her both slightly giddy and a lot more confident. Beatrice loves to learn and if she simply treats these lessons as just that, a lesson, a chance to learn something, she’ll be fine.

As she sings through a few warm up exercises her eyes follow Amaryllis as they play the piano. They seem to notice her staring at them and look up to meet her eyes, causing Beatrice to falter on the note. She tries to recover from the mistake quickly but Amaryllis stops playing and stands up from the piano bench, taking a step towards her.

“You’re too tense again,” Amaryllis explains, their hands going to her shoulders to gently push them down from where she’d lifted them as she'd sung, “Relax your shoulders, remember what I said about tension and stress?”

“Yes, I remember,” Beatrice smiles, willing her voice to stay steady and her shoulders not to shake under their touch. Amaryllis returns the smile as their left hand gently moves further down her shoulder. They fiddle with the ruffle on her sleeve briefly before removing both of their hands and taking a step away from her. Beatrice breathes in sharply in response and tries to ignore the feeling of her sleeves pressing against her arms just as Amaryllis’ fingers had been

“You’re doing very well, Beatrice. Just relax,” Amaryllis says as they return to their place at the piano bench. She’s grateful that they’re busy shuffling through sheet music and can’t see the way her cheeks color at the praise. They start to play one of the songs she’d sung last week and nod at her to begin.

Beatrice makes it through with only minor mistakes but she still can’t seem to focus when Amaryllis looks up from the piano to watch her. She messes up words, sings off key, and even sometimes grows so quiet she can’t be heard until Amaryllis looks away. She struggles to fight against these reactions, deciding to stare at a spot on the wall behind them so that she won’t notice Amaryllis looking at her. It seems to work and the next run through of the song goes more smoothly.

During a water break Beatrice gives herself a pep talk, reminding herself that this is simply a lesson, something she can learn to excel at if she follows the rules. The reminder gives her some resolve and she’s able to focus her attention on singing rather than her (very distracting) teacher. As she sings she remembers to breathe and relax her shoulders, she tries to tune out everything but the notes from the piano. She hits a note she’d struggled to hit the week before and smiles in surprise. Her eyes float down from their safe spot on the wall to look at Amaryllis, who watches them with an unreadable expression on their face before it fades into something more neutral.

“That was great!” Amaryllis says, “Let’s do that part again to see if you can hit the note twice in a row.”

The lesson moves quickly once she’s able to focus, and before she knows it Beatrice is pulling her cloak back on and preparing to leave. She stands by the door for a moment, watching as Amaryllis gathers their sheet music. Though the sight of them still makes her a bit nervous, the feeling has faded from self consciousness to something else, something she doesn’t quite want to think about yet.

“You’ve improved since last week,” Amaryllis says, turning around to face her. They give her an encouraging smile and Beatrice meets their eyes, for once managing not to blush as they gaze at her.

“You think so?” Beatrice asks, returning the smile.

“You’re a very quick learner when you’re using that brain of yours to focus instead of overthinking,” Amaryllis replies, their smile turning into more of a smirk. Beatrice does blush then, laughing under her breath as she stares down at her boots.

“Yes, well, I’m working on it,” She says, fiddling with the closure on her overstuffed bag, “I’m glad to hear I’m improving.”

“You really are, just make sure to practice so you can remember everything you’ve learned this week.” Amaryllis holds the door open for her, gesturing for her to walk out before them. She suddenly feels like she should say something else, the lesson had come to a close too quickly.

“Amaryllis,” Beatrice starts, wondering what she should even say. Should she ask them if they’re going to dinner at the palace? Should she suggest going somewhere else together? No. Surely Amaryllis sees her as nothing more than a student, or maybe a friend if she’s lucky. There’s no guarantee Amaryllis would want to spend more time with her than is necessary, so she changes course, “Thanks again.”

“You’re very welcome. I’ll see you next week, Beatrice,” Amaryllis replies, turning to walk down the hall.

Beatrice watches them go, trying not to let her eyes linger in places they shouldn’t. Amaryllis’ tight dress leaves nothing to the imagination, and if Beatrice is being honest she has been imagining. She clears her throat and turns the other direction, headed back to the safety of the palace proper. It’ll be a long week waiting to see them again.

⎯ ⎯ ⎯ ⎯

“It’s impressive,” Beatrice comments one day, in the middle of a lesson.

“What’s impressive?” They hadn’t been discussing anything in particular, so it seemed out of place.

“The dedication you have for your craft, all the effort you put into it. And I'm sure I don't even know the half of it.” As she explained, Beatrice sounded composed, but her rosy cheeks gave her away.

Amaryllis blinked, somewhat stunned, though they gave no outward indication of it. They had already recognized that hearing praise from Beatrice felt different somehow. But since their lessons had begun, the flutter they felt when she did so had only grown.

“Please,” Amaryllis waved a dismissive hand, “when you've been at it for as long as I have, it’s hardly any effort at all.”

“You know, I recall you telling me a few weeks ago to, ‘always accept a compliment as if you truly believe it’.”

Beatrice’s words paired with the smug air she said them with caught Amaryllis by surprise. For a split-second, all they could do was stare at her. Being called out for deflection, with their own words, was unexpected from her. As they'd known Beatrice thus far, it was uncharacteristic. And so was their own delight at the notion Beatrice was becoming more comfortable with them. Recovered, they propped their elbows back on the piano, leaning back against it.

All Amaryllis could think of was different ways they'd like to wipe the smirk off her rose-tinted lips. They favored the concept of doing so with their own mouth.

“Do you now?” they mimicked her attitude, cocky expression falling into place as easy as breathing. Easier, even. “I hope you’ve been practicing that part of my lessons too. I’m sure you get enough compliments to do so.” At least, Amaryllis hoped she did, that at least someone was out there taking the time to cherish her. Instead of the bashful reaction they had been hoping for, Beatrice frowned.

“Ah, not usually, no-“

“That’s a shame,” they cut her off, stepping away from the piano to stand before her. Being this close made that flutter Amaryllis was feeling speed up. The last thing they wanted was for Beatrice to frown. And if no one else was taking the time to tell her all the sweet things she should hear, they were more than happy to step up. Accepting compliments built confidence, and confidence was vital to singing. It was simply another part of the lesson, that was all. With a gentle hand, Amaryllis brushed tawny waves out of her face, keeping her from hiding behind them now. “With how lovely you are, I had expected there'd be someone to shower you with sweet words."

Voice low and velvety, they ran their fingers down her cheek. Nails just barely grazing her neck before their hand pulled away. Beatrice wasn't frowning anymore, but was watching them with wide-eyed astonishment. For a moment, Amaryllis's resolve faltered.

They thought about kissing her, it would only take another step, a tilt of her head. But, what actually shocked Amaryllis is that they did not. Instead, as swift as they had approached, they were back against the piano.

Beatrice was their student, and so it would be improper to persue her...

…Which didn’t hold up in the slightest, because never in their life had they cared about what was proper or not. Student or not, under typical circumstances, Amaryllis would have had her in their bed by now. But that was it, wasn’t it? That nothing concerning Beatrice was at all typical. From their opposition to simply seducing her to their reactions to the things that she did. Amaryllis couldn’t recall a time when they’d felt this way before.

They had decided to entertain their intrigue when they offered her lessons. But Amaryllis hadn’t imagined that it would shift in the direction they were afraid it was heading.

“Thank you,” her breathy voice pulled them back into the room. It took them a second to realize she was thanking them for the compliment. Beatrice was biting her lip, watching them with those hazel eyes they couldn’t quite get a read on.

All they could do was turn away from her, but not before they could hide away their smile. Amaryllis tried to stay focused on the lesson, and not on the dangerous territory they were heading into.

⎯ ⎯ ⎯ ⎯

They’ve done more talking than singing, Beatrice realizes as she looks at the clock. It’s been an hour since the lesson started and they’ve been sitting on the couch talking the entire time, neither realizing how much time has passed. The topics of conversation have ranged, what began as small talk about the rainy weather had evolved into how they’d each come to be employed at the palace. Amaryllis doesn’t give many details, but Beatrice drinks in every piece of their story she can get and tries to ignore the urge to pry.

Over the course of the hour Beatrice has loosened up considerably, her posture is slouched and her legs are tucked under her as she sits criss cross on the couch rather than her usual polite ankle cross. She’s surprised to find how easy it is to talk to Amaryllis, how easily she can let her guard down to talk about herself more than she usually would. When Amaryllis asks a question she finds herself answering without thinking. They seem genuinely interested in her answers, leaning towards her as she speaks and asking follow up questions.

“What made you want to teach?” Amaryllis asks, their voice pulling her gaze back from the clock on the wall.

“Well, I never had a real education as a child, I learned manners and needlepoint and all sorts of useless things like that, but science, literature, history- everything I know I’ve learned on my own,” Beatrice explains, her voice rising in volume as it often does when she’s excited, “Vesuvia doesn’t offer an education for those who can’t afford to pay tutors, and I think that should change.”

“So you just marched up to the Countess and suggested opening a school?” Amaryllis grins, their eyes trained to Beatrice’s face which is for once free of any hint of anxiety as she smiles proudly at them. The image of Beatrice stomping up the palace steps in her green cloak with a look of determination on her face makes Amaryllis suppress a laugh.

“Believe it or not, I did! I requested a meeting and left less than an hour later to pick a spot to build the school,” Beatrice laughs, “Nadia wasn’t difficult to convince.”

“I’m sure you can be very convincing when you want to be,” Amaryllis says, reaching to play with the lace trim at the bottom of her dress. Beatrice watches the action closely, not pulling away when their hand briefly brushes against her leg. “Well, I suppose we should get started on the singing lesson, we’ve delayed quite a bit.”

“Oh, I’m sorry,” Beatrice nearly trips over her dress as she gets up from the chaise.

“You have nothing to apologize for, I very much enjoyed getting to know you better,” Amaryllis replies, smoothing their clothing down as they walk across the room to the piano.

“I enjoyed it too,” Beatrice smiles, “getting to know you.”

“I should have you play sometime, I remember you being quite proficient during our first lesson,” Amaryllis says as they take their seat at the instrument.

“Well, I’m afraid I’m not very accomplished anymore. I wish I had more time to practice the piano, but there are only so many hours in a day,” Beatrice replies, taking her usual spot standing next to them.

“Would you like to play something now?” Amaryllis suggests, patting the spot next to them on the piano bench, “I’m sure you’re great.”

“Oh, well, sure if you’d like to hear me play,” Beatrice hesitates for a moment before she takes a seat next to them, trying to smooth her dress down a bit so she doesn’t take up too much room on the bench. Amaryllis smiles and moves a bit closer so that their leg is pressed to hers, she can feel the warmth of their skin through the fabric of her dress and works hard to regain her composure.

“I would love to hear you play,” Amaryllis says directly into her ear, their mouth barely brushing against her skin. She manages to only shiver the tiniest bit as Amaryllis leans away from her again, turning their attention back to the piano. Beatrice takes an only slightly shaky breath and reaches for the keys. Her fingers pluck a familiar tune, one she’d learned when she was younger and forced to sit through hours of lessons every day. She shuts her eyes as she plays it by memory, tuning out Amaryllis next to her and the distracting ticking of the clock on the wall behind her.

When she finishes the song, a short piece designed more for practice than performance, she pulls her hands back into her lap and looks up at Amaryllis to gauge their reaction. The smile on their face is different than any Beatrice has seen before. It has more emotion behind it, admiration perhaps, and she feels a flutter in her stomach at the thought.

“That was lovely, Beatrice. I thought you said you were out of practice? That sounded well practiced to me,” Amaryllis laughs, the smile replaced by their usual expression.

“Thank you. I used to hate that song so much, it would get stuck in my head for hours and I’d find myself playing the notes in the air all the time like some sort of compulsion,” Beatrice sighs, her fingers flexing in her lap at the memory, “But I’m glad the torment payed off.”

“Well I’ll stop torturing you then,” Amaryllis jokes, bumping Beatrice slightly off the piano bench with their hip, “I think we’ll leave the piano to me for now, let’s begin the lesson.”

⎯ ⎯ ⎯ ⎯

Amaryllis’s fingers still on the keys of the piano as the song comes to an end. Beatrice’s singing was lovely— as always— but something was off. What, they weren’t exactly sure. The warm up went fine, she didn’t seem stiff or nervous in the slightest, and minimal issues with her pitch. She’d taken a breath or two at a bad moment, and at one point a whole note became a half, but neither of those were serious.

They realize that they may just be projecting their feelings onto her. A comment of hers from before had been bothering Amaryllis, much more than it should have. Beatrice’s anecdote about having no say in performing a song that she hated had struck close to home. Literally.

Beatrice had never given any indication that she was unhappy with the music they chose for her. But Amaryllis had never directly asked her what she wanted to sing either.

“Amaryllis, is everything alright?” Beatrice spoke up. Suddenly they realized they hadn’t said a word in the time since the song had concluded. There was a nervous edge to her voice, the tone making an unwelcome appearance for the first time in weeks.

“Yes, I apologize,” they stood from the bench, feeling the sudden urge to move.

“Is there, um, a problem?” Her words were hesitant, uneasy. When Amaryllis turned to her, Beatrice's eyes were downcast, focused on the carpet.

“Oh, ma chérie, no. You were wonderful, don’t worry.” The endearment had slipped out without thought. Bringing a hand to her back, Amaryllis ushered her over to sit with them. They felt uneasy, but maintained their composure, focused on how soft the satin of her dress felt.

“Sorry, I-” Amaryllis faltered. Their hand was still at her back, lower now, and as much as they longed to leave it there they knew they shouldn't. Not only was the gesture a little too friendly, but feeling how thin her dress seemed to be was distracting. “I’d like to ask, what kind of music do you want to sing?”

Once Beatrice had taken in their question, she relaxed, taking a moment to consider her answer.

“I suppose whatever kind suits my voice best?” She sounded uncertain, and her hazel eyes flitting back to the ground was a confirmation. Amaryllis was having none of that.

“Ah,” their hand came up to her chin, tilting her gaze back to them, “that’s not how this works.” The two were close, but not quite as close as they had been at the piano bench last week. As Amaryllis looked down at her, the rose-colored lipstick she wore caught their eye. They gave into the temptation to stare, for a little too long.

Amaryllis is back to the same dilemma as they had been weeks ago. They wanted to kiss her, wanted to see the color on her lips smeared and mixed with their own. It was the same conundrum, but it had grown far more complicated than it had been weeks ago.

They dreaded the conclusion of their lessons, and counted the days until the next one. And between lessons they’d started seeing each other much more often during the rest of the week. During court functions and other meetings, Amaryllis had found themself in Beatrice's company. They ran into each other in the halls of the palace— literally, one time— and when on stage they looked for her in the crowd. She was never difficult to spot.

As of late, their compositions reflected their feelings. Even inspiration for the masquerade came easy, knowing she'd be in that crowd too.

Amaryllis wanted her. But now, they wanted far more than a kiss or a single night, and not in the way they were familiar with wanting someone. Wanted to hold her hand, wanted to listen to her ramble, wanted to sing with her. Wanted to know her, and had even contemplated letting her know them in return.

But they couldn’t let themself. It was foolish— to be afraid of the feelings and to have them at all in the first place. In some ways, it felt like something of a betrayal. Beatrice had trusted Amaryllis to instruct her, not to fall for her.

Finally, they avert their gaze, torn to see Beatrice watching them with a similar longing. It would have been far easier to lean into her instead of pulling themself away completely. Even if Amaryllis knew she'd be receptive, they had to have some self-preservation. They knew it wouldn’t be enough to just take what they could get from her. It would be better to let the infatuation fade than feed the fire; it would hurt far less.

“Passion is far more important.” Amaryllis leans back against the chaise. “Doing what’s ‘technically’ correct means nothing if it's not what makes you happy. Singing for the sake of arbitrary rules will only bring you dread.” They're familiar with the way it feels to lose your passion, and the trauma of it was a deep-seated pain. Beatrice’s brow creases as they speak, picking up on what their insistence indicates. “So when I ask you what you’d like to sing, I need you to answer with how you feel.”

“I’d like to sing things that I can find meaning in. The song we’ve been working on, it’s beautiful, but I can’t relate to it no matter how I attempt to interpret it. Coming from me it feels insincere.”

“I may have something in particular you'd like.” The words are out before Amaryllis can even grasp what exactly they were deciding to offer. But they couldn't take it back now, not with the delighted way Beatrice was looking at them.

Without standing, they motion in the air, and their grimoire soars over from where it had placed on the piano. Amaryllis sets the book of music before them. With their hands on the cover, they whisper the incantation that unlocks it.

Beatrice had scooted forward, leaning in, but still far enough for her to pretend she wasn't being nosy. Amaryllis knew she must have a billion questions, and they would happily listen to her voice each one. But, she only asked one.

“What is it about?”

It was a simple question, but not one with a simple answer. That was why Amaryllis had written it into a song after all. Emotions and experiences were too difficult for them to express in a usual manner. If their feelings were to be expressed at all, they had to do so in a different way.

“You’ll see,” they left it at that, casting the projection spell for the piano. Sitting up straight, Amaryllis rolled their shoulders back, and began to sing.

The lyrics they sang painted the picture of a neglected child. The intense sorrow they felt. What they dreamed of to help them through each day. The helplessness that came when they realized the dreams were only that. Dreams, and nothing more.

With a final, shaky note, they looked to Beatrice. She was silent, lips parted and eyes glassy. For a moment, Amaryllis worries they'd upset her, but then she reaches out to rest her hand on their knee.

“Amaryllis, that was beautiful,” she blinks away the tears that had threatened to fall. “You’d trust me to sing that?”

“Of course,” they place their hand over hers.

“Then, I’d love to.”

⎯ ⎯ ⎯ ⎯

Beatrice wakes up groggily, rolling over in bed only to come face to face with a rabbit staring directly at her. “Oh, good morning, Bramble,” she says, reaching to scratch the rabbit between her ears. She winces at the sound of her voice, it sounds scratchy and her throat hurts a bit when she swallows. She decides to test her voice again, “Shall we get some breakfast?” it’s definitely still scratchy.

She worries as she goes about her morning routine, wondering if she’ll be able to sing at all later. She’s been practicing in all of her spare moments, and perhaps that’s why she has no voice left for her real practice. Still, work doesn’t stop for a lost voice and she has a meeting with Nadia in an hour so she clasps her cloak, grabs her bag, and starts the trek across town.

When she arrives in Nadia’s parlor, a prompt five minutes early, she realizes how winded she feels. The moment she opens her mouth to greet Nadia she knows she might really be in trouble.

“Good morning,” She croaks, pasting a cheerful smile on her face in the hopes of distracting the Countess.

“Oh dear, Beatrice are you feeling alright? You sound quite ill,” Nadia says, looking worried as she stands in the doorway regarding her.

“I’m fine, just a sore throat,” Beatrice replies, holding back a wince as her throat grates.

‘You don’t sound fine, I believe you should go home and rest. You’re in no position to give a presentation this morning,” Nadia’s tone of voice brooks no argument and Beatrice hangs her head a bit as she tries to think of a way to convince her. Beatrice doesn’t take days off, certainly not for a sore throat. “I shall have a servant get you a carriage.”

“I’m fine, really! Don’t go to the trouble,” She pleads, but Nadia simply shakes her head and points to the doorway.

“Go home, take some time to rest, Beatrice,” Nadia says kindly. Beatrice sighs and starts to gather her things, there’s no use, Nadia’s right. She can barely make an audible sound, there’s nothing to do but wait for her voice to come back.

As Beatrice heads to the Palace gates she’s so lost in her thoughts that she doesn’t think about her lesson with Amaryllis. She all but forgets about it until she spots a familiar maroon haired figure approaching from across the foyer.

“Beatrice, you’re here early,” Amaryllis says, looking equal parts bemused and excited to see her.

“I was just leaving,” Beatrice rasps, “ Lost my voice,”

“Yes I should say you have,” Amaryllis frowns, putting a hand on Beatrice’s forehead as if to check for a fever. She stares at them wide-eyed as they deliberate and finally pull their hand away. “Does your throat hurt as well?”

“Yes,” She says, “I’m sorry, I don’t think I can sing today.”

“No, I don’t think you can. You should go home and rest, you’ve been practicing too much,” They reply, they’re still stooped down a bit to meet her eyes and Beatrice finds it hard to focus with them this close to her.

“I’m sorry,” Beatrice manages to say, feeling terrible from the pain and because she’ll be missing out on a lesson.

Beatrice thinks back to their last lesson, the way Amaryllis had opened up to her and allowed her to listen to their music. She doesn’t want to miss another chance at that closeness, both emotional and physical. There had been times over the last few weeks where Beatrice could have sworn Amaryllis might kiss her. They’d stared directly at her lips, only a slight tilt of the head away from meeting her lips with their own. But it hadn't happened, and it never will, Beatrice reminds herself. Amaryllis is her teacher, and though they’ve begun to spend more time together outside of lessons she’s sure it’s out of friendly obligation and nothing more.

“Don’t apologize to me, apologize to your poor vocal chords.” Amaryllis straightens up to their full height and takes a step back from her. They seem to be deep in thought for a moment before almost hesitantly adding, “Go home, I’ll bring you some tea to help with your throat.”

“Oh, you really don’t have to do that,” Beatrice protests, her face already flushing at the thought of them being so concerned for her.

“Stop talking, you’ll make things worse,” Amaryllis says, “It’s the building on the corner by the hat shop, yes?” Beatrice is a little surprised that Amaryllis remembers where she lives, she’d only mentioned it once in passing a few weeks ago.

“Yes,” Beatrice starts, but at Amaryllis’ stern look she shuts her mouth and nods instead.

“Now go rest,” They say, red lips pulling into their characteristic smile, “I’ll be by later.”

When she gets home Beatrice kicks her boots off and changes into something comfortable. She chugs a glass of water but it’s too cold and burns the whole way down. It might just be her throat that hurts, but she finds herself quite tired. She’d refused the carriage ride home, deeming it unnecessary, and the walk back home had taken her longer than usual. She wants to take a nap, but if Amaryllis is coming by later she wants to make sure her house is tidy first.

After a quick speed clean, which she might’ve used some magic to do more quickly, she collapses into bed. What feels like five minutes later there's a knock on the door and she sits up with a start, hurriedly smoothing her hair down as she goes to answer the door. She holds her breath a little as she opens the door, seeing Amaryllis standing in her doorway is not a sight she’d ever expected to see.

“Hello,” Amaryllis smiles as they take in Beatrice standing before them in her socks and a simple tunic, so different from her usual fancy clothing. She fidgets uncomfortably under their gaze, “Aren’t you going to invite me in?” They raise an eyebrow, and Beatrice rushes to open the door wider for them to enter.

“You didn’t have to come all this way,” She says hoarsely, watching as Amaryllis looks around her apartment. It’s not large, just the living area and a separate bedroom and bathroom off of a hallway. She’s glad she’d tidied before Amaryllis arrived, they’re used to Palace accommodations, and her little home in Center City certainly isn’t that.

“I took a carriage, it took no time at all,” Amaryllis replies, taking a small pouch of tea leaves out of their bag. “The coachman said you decided to walk, why would you do that when you were already feeling unwell?”

The question takes Beatrice off guard and she watches as Amaryllis walks into her kitchen like they live there, filling her kettle with water and setting it to boil. “It was unnecessary,” she responds when they turn around to look at her, “I didn’t need anyone to go to the trouble on my behalf.”

“If someone offers to help you, let them help you,” Amaryllis says, their face gone serious as they work to prepare the tea. “And it’s no trouble to take care of someone who’s always taking care of others.”

They look a bit taken aback at their own words and immediately turn their back to Beatrice as they pour the tea. Though she wonders at their reaction it gives Beatrice a chance to take a deep breath and rid herself of the blush on her face. When Amaryllis turns around they’re brandishing a teacup, Beatrice’s favorite though they couldn’t have known that.

“Do you have any honey? It’ll help your throat even more,” They ask. Beatrice nods and goes to the cupboard next to them, reaching on her tiptoes to grab the jar of honey from the back. Amaryllis watches her with a smirk as she manages to reach it and hands the jar to them.

“What tea is that?” Beatrice asks, taking in the slightly familiar aroma.

“It’s ginger tea, now sit,” They point to the couch in the middle of the room, “And drink.”

Beatrice takes the cup from them, trying not to react to their fingers brushing hers, and takes a seat. The tea tastes better than she thought it would, and the honey makes it sweet enough for her to actually enjoy. Amaryllis sits on the opposite end of the couch and watches as she sips the tea. She holds back a sigh as the warm beverage soothes her throat.

“I think you need to cut down on how much you’re practicing. You also need to take more frequent vocal breaks to rest, and I’m leaving this tea with you. You should have some after you practice,” Amaryllis says. Beatrice nods and continues to drink her tea, not wanting to interrupt their instruction. Amaryllis moves a bit closer to her and Beatrice turns towards them, nearly losing her grip on the teacup when they reach out to twist their finger around one of the curls that hangs near her face. Though she’s grown more used to their casual touches over time, she still finds herself flustered by how delicately they brush the lock of hair behind her ear.

“You’re making a lot of progress, Beatrice, but you shouldn’t push yourself so hard that you get hurt,” Amaryllis explains, their eyes locked to hers, “You need to take better care of your instrument.”

“I will,” Beatrice says in assurance. Her voice already sounds a bit better, and it didn’t hurt as much to speak. She smiles at the realization that the tea really had helped, and Amaryllis watches in amusement as Beatrice downs the rest of the cup like one would take a shot of alcohol.

“I need to get back for a performance tonight, promise me you’ll stay home and rest? If I see you at the Palace next week and you’re still croaking I’ll have to come up with something stronger, and it won’t be sweetened with honey,” Amaryllis threatens, but the smile on their face takes away from the effect.

“I promise,” Beatrice replies, holding her pinky out to theirs to make a pinky promise. Amaryllis stares at her finger for a moment before laughing under their breath and linking their pinky with hers.

“Good,” They stand up to gather their belongings and head towards the door, “Thanks for letting me visit your lovely home, I do hope I can make a return visit someday.”

“I hope so too,” Beatrice says, meeting their eyes for a moment before her eyes dart away to the bookcase next to them, something safer to stare at, “Thank you for the tea.”

“My pleasure, anything to help my favorite student,” Amaryllis smiles, dipping into a dramatic bow.

“As far as I know, I’m your only student,” Beatrice laughs, glad that the action didn’t seem to hurt her throat.

“Just take the compliment, Beatrice,” They say, opening the door, “Goodbye.”

“Goodbye,” She replies, but they’ve already shut the door behind them.

Beatrice makes herself another cup of ginger tea and considers writing Amaryllis a thank you note, it’s the least she can do. She gets to work, pulling out her special personalized stationery and her favorite golden ink. It takes her nearly fifteen minutes just to write their name, she tries to get the curve of the A just right, the y looped perfectly around the other letters. The actual contents of the note is short. There are lots of things she’d like to say to Amaryllis, and maybe someday she’ll get up the courage to do so, but for today she just says “thank you”.

She’d thought that writing the note might help her clear her head a bit, but when she tries to go to sleep she can’t stop the thoughts of Amaryllis. She thinks about the way Amaryllis had called her ma chérie last week, and how much she wants them to call her that again. She wants to hear more of their words spoken and sung only for her. Before she can help herself, Beatrice thinks about their lips again, bright red and so close to her own. Would it have been a mistake for her to have leaned in? Would Amaryllis have pushed her away or kissed her back?

She really needs to get over this infatuation. Even if Amaryllis had wanted to kiss her, it doesn’t mean they would want anything more. Just when she thinks Amaryllis is interested they take a step back, or they return to their calm and collected demeanor and the moment passes. Beatrice really doesn’t know what to make of their attention, their casual touches and lingering eye contact. She’s seen them flirt with others in the same way, it seems to be a facet of their personality to be familiar with people, and if that’s the case then what makes her any different?

Beatrice isn’t used to being treated like this. She’s not used to being told that she’s talented and pretty and full of potential, and though she believes their words to be genuine, she wonders if their time spent together means as much to Amaryllis as it does to her. She hopes it does.

⎯ ⎯ ⎯ ⎯

“So, what’s going on today that has you so cheerful?” Amaryllis asks as they begin to tidy up the rehearsal room now that the lesson had concluded. They're more than content to linger, packing their bag with little haste.

“I'm usually cheerful,” Beatrice fights a grin, acting coy.

“Especially so today. It certainly reflected in your performance. Now that I think about it, the past few days you’ve seemed so excited.” Amaryllis had been thinking about it, giddy each time they’d run into her and the dazzling smile she had on display.

Beatrice avoided their gaze, eyes mischievous, and Amaryllis expected her to deflect again. “It’s my birthday today!”

“Oh! Happy birthday,” they smile, full of adoration, “are you doing anything to celebrate?”

“I’m staying here for dinner tonight. A gangly birdie let it slip that Nadia may have planned something special for me.”

“I suppose that means I’ll get to see you at dinner.” Beatrice glances up, surprised, and Amaryllis attempts to suppress a laugh. “I usually dine here, I live here after all. Though, I often take meals in my room, but it seems that tonight is a special occasion.”

“Oh, you don’t have to come to dinner just for me, I’m sure you’re busy-“

“I’d like to. That is, if you don’t mind having me there.”

“Amie, of course not!”

For a moment, all is silent, both surprised that she called Amaryllis by a nickname. Beatrice looks like she’s about to rush to apologize, but their smile beats her to it.

“Then I’ll be there." Once the nickname sunk in, their face lit up— despite their attempt to stay neutral— and told her there was no issue. Beatrice nods, her demure smile doing nothing to hide how pleased she really is.

The two say their farewells for now, leaving in different directions. Beatrice, they assume, is off to get ready for a dinner in her honor, and Amaryllis is off to find a fitting last-minute gift.

After an hour, Amaryllis was approaching the dining room. A little late, but dressed for dinner and with a carefully-crafted bouquet in hand. They might have gone overboard with their gift, but Beatrice didn’t need to know. The arrangement they'd selected looked simple, but the meanings each flower held were far from it.

First, they'd started with violets, paired with sprigs of laurel. Individually, violets represented modesty, and laurel was for success. Together, they were for expressing that you were proud of the recipient. And Amaryllis was so proud of Beatrice. Their first real meeting all those months ago she was a ball of nerves, when it came to singing and being around them. But now, she had made leaps and bounds with her singing, and felt comfortable enough to call them ‘Amie’.

Then, the cowslip caught their eye. It was for gracefulness, and they'd decided it was fitting. Beatrice was graceful, even when she tripped over herself or her words, there was a certain charm to it. Even when nervous she always made her best attempt, and the way she lit up when she was successful. To Amaryllis, she was the portrait of grace.

Of course, it spiraled into dangerous territory from there. The buttercups came next, 'you are radiant with charm', they revealed. And when paired with the cowslip, they were often given as tokens of new and blooming affection. Amaryllis couldn't say their affection was new, but it was blooming into something far past a fleeting crush.

Finally, Amaryllis added purple pansies into the mix. They told themself it was simply to balance out the two bunches of yellow flowers, but that was a lie. Pansies confessed ‘you occupy my thoughts’, and gods, did she. So often they thought of her; when composing, when performing, during the day, at night, in bed. It almost felt wrong, how often their mind strayed to her and in the ways that it did.

The blooms had been wrapped together in cream-colored paper and tied with a violet ribbon. Amaryllis hoped the delicate yellows and purples would be to her liking. They also hoped that gifting this bouquet full of secrets would be symbolic. That they'd be handing off their feelings like they were handing off the flowers.

The dining room doors opened, and their worry-free façade fell back into place.

“She’s been taking lessons from a great teacher,” catches Amaryllis’s ear as they enter. To the side is what looks to be the gift table, and they place the bouquet down. It was Portia, with all her enthusiasm that they'd heard. She was at the center of the table, alongside Nadia of course, with Beatrice seated on her other side.

“Ah, well-“

“Gossiping about me?” Amaryllis stopped behind their seats, interrupting and startling Beatrice in the process. Instinctively, they place a hand on her shoulder to steady her, surprised to feel bare skin. When Amaryllis glances down at her, they regret it immediately.

She’s dressed to the nines, cloak nowhere to be seen. All they see is cream lace and tulle that drapes off her shoulders, and the satin corset hugging her frame. They’re at a wonderful angle to witness exactly how flattering it is on her.

Before they could be considered staring, they look away. But as flushed as she is, they doubt Beatrice missed the way their eyes dragged over her body. Her smile is bright, and Amaryllis is a little dizzy at the idea that reaction was for them. They certainly could dream.

“Wait, you’ve been instructing her?” Asra questions from Beatrice’s other side.

“Why are you so surprised?” Amaryllis shrugs, nonchalant, strolling away to their seat. They were well aware this news was about to be the largest scandal in Vesuvian history. Their lessons weren’t a secret, but Amaryllis hadn’t gone out of their way to mention it, and it seemed Beatrice hadn't either.

“I recall bringing up the idea of you taking on students last year. And I recall you declining, claiming you weren’t ‘teacher material’.” Nadia comments as they pass.

Lucio can’t help but join in, complaints ready as Amaryllis takes their seat between him and Julian. “I’ve begged you for lessons, and you always told me no!”

“That’s because you’re tone deaf.”

“Wait, I’m tone deaf, but we sing together all the time?” Julian adds.

“You aren’t tone deaf, you have trouble matching pitch on your own. There’s a difference.”

They aren't close to Beatrice at all, on the complete opposite side of the table, but they can see her trying to listen in.

“So Amaryllis, what prompted your change of heart about teaching?” Nadia asks them.

“There’s been no change of heart, I’m still not interested,” Amaryllis sips their wine.

“Then why is Beatrice taking lessons from you?” Julian butts in from between them.

“She stumbled upon a rehearsal of mine weeks ago, and mentioned lessons. I thought I would offer,” another sip, “I could tell she was special.”

“Is that so?”

Amaryllis makes sure Beatrice is still eavesdropping, her eyes wide and curious. “Beatrice is a very promising student. If it were up to me, I’d have her on the stage by now.”

Nadia turns to her, and the countess begins to ask her about it. Of course, Amaryllis's ability to hear what she has to say is cut off by Lucio and Julian’s bickering.

Dinner as a whole passes with no more awe directed at them for their, admittedly, out of character actions. They were thankful to no longer be in the spotlight for the night, it wasn’t for them after all.

After dessert— Beatrice’s favorite cake, of course— Nadia suggests they all move to the veranda. Amaryllis stands, but takes their time joining everyone else, finishing off their wine. Somehow, they hadn’t noticed Beatrice still in the room until her hand is on their arm. It’s just the two of them now, and her touch is a welcome surprise. Beatrice’s smile is radiant as she looks up at them through long lashes. In her other hand is the bouquet.

“How did you know violets were my favorite?”

“I didn’t, actually,” she glances between the flowers and Amaryllis. “I’m relieved to know that I chose well.”

“You did. Thank you, Amie. They’re beautiful.”

“They pale in comparison to you,” it’s cliché, and easily passed off as Amaryllis’s typical flirting. Even if now they mean it more than anything. “You look lovely tonight.”

“Thank you,” she’s blushing, but her smile is proud.

“Did you know that violets mean ‘modesty’?”

“They do?” Her eyes light up, always eager to learn about anything. “Do the other flowers mean anything specific?”

“All of them do, and some of them mean something else when paired together. It’s why I picked them.” Beatrice’s brow raises, anticipating that Amaryllis will explain. “I think I’ll leave it for you to figure out on your own.”

“What!” Beatrice pouts, and her grip on their arm tightens. “But it’s my birthday.”

“And you love to learn, so it's the best gift of all.”

“That is a wonderful gift,” she laughs. “Then would you tell me what your favorite is?”

“I like Hemlock.”

“Isn’t that…”

“Highly poisonous? Yes, though it is safe when dried.” She stares for a moment, somewhere between confusion and amusement, then laughs again.

“How am I not surprised?”

“I also like roses. But don’t tell anyone, I wouldn’t want word to get out that I’m just a romantic, it’d ruin my reputation.”

“Your secret is safe with me,” her expression turns pensive, “are you really? A romantic, that is.”

Amaryllis shifts a little closer to Beatrice. The arm that isn’t graced by her touch reaches out, hand on her bare shoulder. They notice a heart-shaped birthmark that they hadn't had the opportunity to see until now. Fingers brush over it before ghosting down her arm, wondering what her reaction would be if it was their lips instead. As they trace her skin, Amaryllis feels her shiver, and it takes every ounce of restraint to not seek that out over and over. They take her hand then, pulling it to their lips to place a soft kiss to the back of it, leaving behind a red lip print.

“I certainly can be, when someone piques my interest enough,” their ruby gaze doesn’t leave her face. Beatrice stifles a gasp, and Amaryllis wonders what to do now, how they could just walk away from this—

And then, they’re interrupted.

“Birthday girl! You’re about to miss your own toast!” Portia leans in to shout from the doorway. “and you have to lead the song, or else Ilya’s squawking is gonna give me a headache.”

Beatrice intertwines her fingers with Amaryllis's, and then leads them outside hand-in-hand. The walk from the dining room to the veranda is far too short.

⎯ ⎯ ⎯ ⎯

#many beamie thoughts #if u read all of this... i love u #will smith poses at bea’s lovely writing #the image is concept art from the 2004 poto movie #beamie #beatrice viano #apprentice beatrice #amaryllis leroux #apprentice amaryllis #amie fic

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omegangrins · 3 years

Text

A Rant on the End of Tremors 7: Shrieker Island

As the main man said,

Throwing caution to the wind because this blew up elsewhere.

If you can do it with Justice League, fuck it, let's do it for every shitty movie we've got.

While we're at it, can we change the ending of the 7th Tremors movie so *MAJOR FUCKING SPOILERS* Burt Gummer doesn't die or at least bring Jamie Kennedy back, or Marvel style recast Jon Heder, so he dies saving his son instead of a random-ass person who could have easily saved themselves. Or cut the forced montage of Burt clips at the end so his death is at least ambiguous. Seriously beyond pissed about that one. THAT is no way for him to go.

I would also like to point out that the next Tremors *HAS* to be titled Tremors 8: Ouroboros and bring everyone back for Burt's funeral . Otherwise, what's the fucking point?

I have feelings about it, people. *FEELINGS!!!*

One of my favourite childhood memories is picking out Tremors 2 from the local gas station's movie rentals and forcing my parents to watch it. I was probably 5-6 at the time.

Let's say that it's been a lifelong love affair ever since. It took me another 10 years before I even watched the 1st. Probably why I hold good sequels in such high regard.

I didn't even know about the 1st until it played as a trailer in front of 2 and never thought to watch until years later. That's a testament to its filmmaking if I ever knew one.

So seriously, that's how they chose to kill off one of the most well known and prolific characters in a movie/TV series known around the globe? With an unnecessaryily needed death and a montage of clips from all the other movies that are obviously better than this one.

And I'm saying that as someone who defends Chibnall/13th Doctor...

...and I'm fucking fuming because THIS is how you *actually* destroy something people love and hold dear to their hearts. It's like the ending of Game of Thrones. His shitty ass death has made it a loooooot harder to rewatch. And they are one of my favourite series!!! Not flawless but fun. But I will defend every other movie and all the episodes except this. Honestly I'll still defend 7/8ths of this one as well.

Like I said, it's easily fixed too. Fucking vice versa swap out Jon Heder for Jamie Kennedy, who the movies have been building up for the last two, and have Burt save his son in front of his old flame. Boom, you won't even need the montage of clips cause you can just have Travis and his mom reminisce about Burt instead. Show not tell. I don't even care he died by Graboid (although in all honesty, I've allways wanted El Blanco to take him down or Burt kills himself from the PTSD. It would have AT LEAST MADE SENSE. Hell, the best would be a heart attack to callback Val's "Yeah, Burt, the way you worry, you're gonna have a heart attack before you get a chance to survive World War Three.". But none of us ever get the best death.). And it's not even about Burt sacrificing himself to save a nobody. Cause that could work too. BUT YOU NEED TO BUILD THAT SHIT UP. Not just fucking drop it like it's hot.

Like I said too, the first 7/8ths ain't bad but it's an entirely different story than a swansong for a hero.

It's all about some billionaire scientist/cowboy hunter dude who likes to get his jollies off hunting the biggest and the baddest who ends up inviting people to this island so they can hunt down Super-Graboids he designed for shits and giggles. But then some Shrieker-fy....

And the pretentious douches come and die one by beautiful one while Burt tries to save them anyway and it's all spectacularly dumb fun until it comes crashing down in the final 10 minutes. Fuck, they should just cut the last 10 minutes. Then it's a perfect little Tremors ditty.

#RELEASETHE7THTREMORSWITH10MINUTESFROMTHEENDCUT

This isn't even about Jon Heder either. He's just doing his job. Hell, do what /u/VoiceofRonHoward pointed out.

"It is clear that Jon's character was just pasted in over Jamie's, the artifacts of the father-son relationship are all over it. They should have gone full Marvel and just replaced Jamie with Jon and acted like nothing happened."

CAUSE FUCK YES!! The only time a story sucks is when they don't commit. Commitment makes all the difference. Now, I'm pissed double-pissed they didn't do that instead since Heder and Kennedy are similar in terms of white-boy-ness.

Even Michael Gross agrees:

"Yes, yes. Now I can't presume to speak for Jamie [Kennedy]. My understanding was they asked him and he said no. And so that's why they went with somebody else. So I had nothing to do with that decision. I just heard the stories. I missed him for that reason. You begin a relationship with the character, and you want to continue it....

...As you build a relationship with this son, we had two, it would've been nice to have three, but that was the hand I was dealt."

One of my favourite bits of Tremors lore comes from the 5th too so it's not like I hate sequel changes out of hand:

"This is a warrior dance. Our ancestors hunting the lnkanyamba and the Impundulu.

"What's that?

"Impundulu. It's what you call the Ass Blaster.

"Ass Blaster.

"Yes.

"Hey, you know, you make Ass Blaster sound good.

Primitive cultures fighting Graboids, Shriekers and Assblasters. I just love that thought.

Hilariously, my meta opening to the 8th movie would be a flashback to 10,000 years ago and a Neanderthal-like Burt Gummer teaching others how to drive Graboids off cliffs like they did with mammoths.

Thank you for giving me the space to rant. Cause fuuuuuuhhhhhhhhuuccck!!!

Here's Michael Gross' own words from his AMA that prove the people making Shrieker Island didn't know their shit.

"The Tremors series is one very close to my heart and I want you to know how appreciated your continued effort is for your core fan base.

My only question would be were there ever any studio decisions made for Burt that you refused to comply with? Or was everybody pretty much always on the same page on what to do with the character?

Thanks again for your dedication.

- Josh"

"Thanks for the kind words, Josh. As regards the first four films, with Wilson and Maddock as the writers, we were very much on the same page. 5,6, and 7 were a bit different, because there was a 13-year hiatus between 4 and 5, and we had to refresh our memories while "reinventing" the franchise for a new audience. I will give you one example: in an early draft of Shrieker Island, a new writer wrote a draft where Burt threatened to shoot one of the bad dudes, and I had to tell him—this is true—"Burt never intentionally points his gun at another human being."

And his own thoughts on Burt's "death" and how to bring it all back together again.

Universal and the director [came] to me with this idea, and they said, 'This could be emotionally very powerful, if we have to say goodbye to this man after 30 years. And I hemmed and hawed, and I thought about it a little bit. And I said, 'You're absolutely right about the emotional gut punch this can be.' And I said, 'You're going to hurt a lot of people's feelings.' And I said, 'But I thought this franchise was over after four. So I could certainly live with it being over after seven.'

"What we negotiated -- well, it wasn't really a negotiation, we all agreed on this -- is that we kind of left the door open. >!Because although Burt is gone, we never see a corpse. We never see his remains. Everybody assumes he's gone. Is he buried somewhere? Is he unconscious somewhere? We never see Burt dead. We see Burt gone. We see Burt not returning. What does that mean? Has he been knocked out? Does he have amnesia somewhere? Does he wander off? Is he in a kind of coma? So yes, the way it ends is pretty profound."

"As regards to the end of Tremors 7, let me just say that while people ASSUME Burt is gone, we never see his remains, do we? Just sayin.'

"The only reason he has become the main character is that everyone else in the original cast moved on to other things. I NEVER thought of him as the central figure, but it just worked out that Michael Gross, like Burt Gummer, was a "survivor." :0) "

"No one would like to see it more than I!!! One of my greatest regrets is that so many other cast members fell away over time. Reba was on to other things, Kevin said no to a second, Fred said no to a third. I would LOVE one last go with all of them, but it is not up to me. :0( "

"There are no guarantees, but for those who wonder aloud if this is the final film, I will say what I have said before: SALES drive sequels, Show biz is 5% show and 95% business, so if this latest addition to the Tremors franchise, sells well, [Universal] will follow the money, and Universal Pictures Home Entertainment may will be back for more."

/u/ActorMichaelGross, the bell has been rung and the song sung. Get the producers on this ASAP!!

I was also the first person to discover the symbolic foreshadowing of Stumpy's end with Earl's sleeping bag in the original movie.

Let's just say, I really *really* love these movies. So if anyone knows anyone, hook me up to the producers of this series and I'll Justin Lin in the Fast and Furious out of this shit.

Since I don't think it's good to critique without proposing either, I say we can make up for this fuck up with the next movie. We'll call it Tremors 8: Ouroboros. After the snake which eats its own tail.

We find out Burt faked his death to get the Proudfoot Corporation to let down their guard and when everyone from the previous series comes back for Burt's fake funeral they give him ever loving shit for being such a paranoid whack-job that he would fake his death to fool a government agency. Why would he do this? He found an old photo of Hiram Gummer with a Graboid warning on the back and asks himself why this valley, why these things, why allways me? And we find out, it's not Burt. It's that lifestyles of extremes will end up in places of extremes. Burt and the Graboids are survivors of different species. Sure the Proudfoot Corporation IS using Mixmaster to combine Graboids, Shriekers, and Ass-Blasters into one super creature for the military but it pales in comparison to Burt looking at his life and wondering in shame how many ancient giants like himself he has killed. And with that, he actually dies, and we keep the ball rolling with the rest of the characters trying to stop what they allways thought was just another one of Burt's crazy conspiracies.

That's why it's Ouroboros. Everything comes back around. We could end/start the movie with Grady, Earl, and Jodi opening a Monster World in Perfection Valley a la Desert Jack's Graboid Adventure. I don't know. I'm fucking trying harder than the people they paid to do this already.

It ain't perfect but I'm building on sand here so changes are gonna get made.

Like if the makers of Tremors notice this,

Then DM me because fucking A you guys need some help.

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star-killer-md · 4 years

Text

Dream a Little Dream of Me Pt. 6

Hi, so I’m just gonna leave this here and pretend it didn’t take me for fucking ever to get this done. Also like real talk, my classes are starting up soon and I’m working multiple jobs so updates from here on out might get a little sparse. I AM BY NO MEANS GOING TO STOP WRITING IT. Just like, it’s gonna take me awhile or the chapters might be shorter, who knows (not me). Anyway, I hope you enjoy this shit show and if you have any theories about where the hell this is going or critiques or just general explicit thoughts about Kylo please hit me up! I love you all, I hope you’re staying safe and healthy <3333

AO3 Mirror

Part 5

Warnings: nsfw, mirror sex, male masturbation, unconscious reader so not dub-con but just so you know, Kylo’s POV in some parts, I threw in some size kink if you squint cause he’s a big boy, possessive Kylo, slight boot kink, I think that’s it?

Ship: Kylo Ren x Negotiator!reader

Word count: 9.4k (god I’m so sorry this really got away from me)

He was looking at you.

Really looking at you.

Hadn’t until now.

But that wasn’t completely true. Of course he’d looked at you—noticed you, heard all the dagger sharp curses you threw his way like a child put in the corner impertinent and prideful and intoxicating in a way that pain often is. So, yes of course he’d looked, but you hadn’t been important.

And that was not to say that you were important now, just that—

Just that the sea was churning behind him, crashing against the shoreline and the Force was stirring. It was a wild thing, and sung like the insects hiding in the nearby treeline. He could feel the pull of it, like a chain that swung in the small space between your bodies. Connecting your throats—growing every shorter—rubbing him raw and bloody.

It was in you, whatever it was that tethered him like a boat to the harbor.

He was inside you too

“No one will ever feel like I do.”

That’s what you’d said.

You were right, as much as he was loath to admit it, no one had ever felt the way you did clenching around him.

There was something primal that made him ravenous to pour himself into you. He was always too much too full to angryangryangry every waking second. Now, finally, it all had some place to go. Some well to fill—a space for all his extra self to belong.

For once, he found there was nothing more than the sound of the sea inside his head.

He wasn’t entirely sure what to do with that revelation.

Who were you? What were you hiding and where was it buried?

Kylo needed to know and you were there, already limp and pliant with no jumbled slur of raging thoughts to cloud his path.

He found that slipping into your mind was one of the easiest things he’d ever done, like following the current of flowing water. Drifting in as if carried by the waves.

Flashes of memories rushed past him, mostly just amalgamations of indecipherable emotion—fathoms of pent up aggression Kylo was forced to wade through in order to reach the black depths of your head. At every turn he was met with his own face staring back at him.

He saw his saber, swinging in a red arch into durasteel paneling, saw himself through your eyes. Felt your awe, felt the stirring in your chest at the sight. He pushed on.

Past shots of offices he’d never seen, a barrage of falsely smiling faces, teeth gnashing, always hungry. He was walking down an endless grey hallway lined with First Order uniforms all towering over him—you—looking down, casting judgement like arrows in his back. Frustration morphed and twisted into a thick sludge of resentment that bubbled and clung to his feet.

With every pop a voice escaped, shouting “everything, everything, everything” in a sick, distorted roar.

And then he found it, the source of the muck that caked his path. A pit, deep and black as pitch that spit up it’s roiling contents and dragged him tumbling down, down, down.

He could barely make it out at first, but as he fell the dim red glow grew bright, crackling and electric and throwing sparks. At the bottom of the well the light bloomed like a pyre, some flaming effigy of pure potential. The heat of it licked at his skin, tracing the edges of every scar like it knew them.

Maybe it did.

Something like a shockwave rolled out through the Force, and he backed away from the raging flames. Back, back, back until he was kneeling again on the shoreline, your cooling body still pressed firmly to his chest.

The feeling of your weight, not cold and dead, but with life still in your limbs was alien to him. Kylo battled internally with the instinct to throw you off him to the ground. He could leave you here, go and wait or never come back at all.

It would be easy.

He could see it now:

Your face twisted, lips pulled back and teeth bared like you weren’t half his size. Like he couldn’t snap your neck with a wave of his hand. He imagined you naked, covered in dried blood and bruises bursting onto your balcony, tits on full display and your finger in his chest, vitriol spewing from your mouth.

It was comical really, how you puffed up like an animal threatened, small but vicious.

Yet even as he considered the scene, his aching knees were unlocking and shifting you, soft cock slipping out in a gush of your combined releases. Kylo swung your legs easily over one arm and climbed back up the beach towards your room.

The sun was starting to rise over the sea, casting gilded strips along its surface when he laid your limp form on the bed. Your skin was marbled with the evidence of your coupling and shone in the light.

Kylo stood silently above you, the ocean breeze occasionally ruffling his damp hair as he brought a hesitant hand to his jaw. The skin was swollen from when you’d raised your hand to him. His fingers dug into the bruise, and the stinging ache of it made his cock twitch. Your face, twisted and snarling and so defiant, so foolish, inches from his before your palm cracked across his cheek.

He dropped a hand down, stroking his half hard length and remembering how your thighs felt crushing his ribcage between them. His hips twitched up into his hand in slow, languid thrusts, precum and your residual slick easing the slide of his palm.

You weren’t afraid to fight back.

Kylo’s teeth tore at his bottom lip as he pumped his cock in earnest now.

You weren’t afraid of him , he realized. But you should be.

Especially now with how his mind was supplying all the numerous ways he could beat you into submission—fuck you into submission. God he’d love to watch you crack, it would truly be a feat worthy of celebration to break the will of a creature such as yourself.

But he couldn’t deny—certainly not while he’s jerking himself faster thinking of how delicious your wet cunt felt around him—that he liked when you bit back.

His name rolling off your tongue was ricocheting around in his brain and he was sure it was the most erotic thing he’d ever heard in his life, that he would never get enough of it. He’d known that since the very first time he heard it, when you opened yourself up to him and came in his mouth, on his fingers.

A familiar warmth was building in his stomach as he thought of all the ways he could make you say it again. Thought of dipping into your head and erasing everything else but that. So it was the only word you knew.

That sent him, made him spill over his hand, white ropes of his cum painting your breasts. You looked good like that, he thought as he worked himself through his orgasm, breath rasping in his chest.

When he was well and truly spent, he let his overstimulated cock settle back against his thigh and dropped a hand to your chest. His palm spanned nearly the entire width of you, fingers swirling in the mess of his release and rubbing it into your abused skin until you were perfectly glazed in him. The sheen of it glinted in the light, a reminder that you’d been marked and would never know how completely he coated every inch of your body.

Even as the darkness whispered into his mind that this was potential, this was uncharted, this was the dragon that hid in the corners of ancient maps filled with unknown stars, Kylo didn’t tear his eyes away. Didn’t pull his hand from your breast where his fingers dug into the flesh and made their home.

Not until the sun had fully risen and you began to stir from the Force induced sleep he’d buried you under.

Not until the very last moment.

***

You woke to the sound of rushing water. It was dim though, out of focus like an echo nearly faded away. Your eyes were lead in your skull, struggling against opening to the soft light filtering into—

Well into where you weren’t exactly sure.

Thoughts were elusive and seemed to slip from your grasp or sit constantly out of reach. Details stood blurry behind a layer of foggy confusion. It was as if your brain had been frozen and restarted like one of the old monitors on the Bridge, leaving important documents to close improperly. You pushed incessantly against the film that seemed to separate you from full awareness until, finally, it popped and the world came flooding in.

Light, bright and all encompassing was stinging your eyes through the open balcony doors. The smell of salt and sand and sweat was everywhere. You were laying on your bed, the spot next to you cold and vacant—never occupied. Your chest and bare thighs were sticky as you peeled them apart and tried to sit up, feeling the uncomfortable squelch of something leaking from you onto the sheets.

And then you ached.

The deep kind of pain that extends past your muscles and sent nerves misfiring with every movement. There was not a single inch of you free from the pulsating burn of it. You laid out flat on the mattress, moving your head as slowly as possible to take stock of the damages. Bruises littered you, mottled you in painful stripes. With every new mark catalogued another memory drifted to the surface:

Hips, his hands surrounding your waist to lift you clear off the ground, his cock slipping ever deeper inside.

Breasts, where the Force and his fingers had cupped and palmed and rolled pleasure into your flesh.

Chest, his bitten nails that scratched large welts which stung when you breathed in.

Legs, how he’d ripped you through the churning water and pressed deep into the meat of your thighs.

Neck, you could feel the dull throb of where he’d bitten into the skin, sucked hard and marked you with a small supernova of broken capillaries.

But the sting between your legs topped the rest. He truly had split you in half, his cock massive and leaving you clenching to your very core in its absence. His cum still dripped out of you in a slow stream. If this was the recompense you bore, there was no telling what he must look like.

You recalled the sole of your foot connecting with muscle and bone, the crack of your palm on his sculpted cheeks.

The way his mouth tasted, the fullness of his lips and how warm he was pressed against you with no space in between. The desperation for him, the sweet sting of him moving inside you, sinking into you, the fullness, the absolution. The presence of him not just in your body but in your mind, in your being, the relief of it—like the first breath after years of asphyxiation.

You could feel him still, you realized, a tingle at the back of your neck. A soft, comforting thump when you closed your eyes. Like a heartbeat. Kylo Ren’s heartbeat, faint but present, evidence of mortal flesh and blood. Your head on his chest, his voice a hush under the roaring sea.

“You aren’t going to die.”

It felt like a promise, and maybe it was.

But really, how long could you expect him to keep it?

And that was just the first of many questions. So many questions.

The sound of water was not the ocean, but the shower you realized and it filled the room with a hazy steam from the crack in the door. You thought about joining him for just a second, indulged in the idea of seeing him bare. Seeing the wounds he bore, the ones he let you put there.

But there was no time for that now, unfortunate though it was.

Instead, you tumbled out of bed onto shaky knees that nearly gave way as you looked around for something to cover yourself with, grabbing the first piece of clothing available. It was Kylo’s, you noticed as you tugged the massive black shirt over your head and watched it fall well past your thighs.

It smelled like him. You tried not to think about it too much.

You sifted through the mess of clothing on the floor and finally located your bag and datapad, tripping over yourself to crawl back onto the mattress. New messages flashed on the screen, although strangely none originating from the First Order. Each one another of Gahl’s staff asking you for speech revisions to be approved by the advisory committee and the last one a reminder of the day’s worth of meetings with campaign staff.

You shuddered at the thought. It wasn’t really the meetings themselves that bothered you, that was routine, muscle memory at this point. But it was harder now, harder to sit still and spit out pretty fake chuckles to every pompous politician's horrid sense of humor, harder to slip in silent ultimatums when there was a knife positioned squarely at your back. When you could never truly tell who would be the one to twist the blade or at what point you would have outlasted your usefulness.

At what point it was your turn to become the next example of what pride does to the body.

No amount of whispered half covenants would be able to stop that, regardless of which masked, saber-wielding commander they came from.

Sighing, you tried to quell the constriction in your throat and typed away quick, formulaic responses. A few minutes passed until you heard the shower putter out and the soft sounds of the Commander dressing. He didn’t look at you when he pulled the door open and stepped into the room, shirtless this time and sporting a dark purple starburst that dipped below the waistband of his pants and circled over the ‘v’ of his hips.

You tensed at the memory of your bodies twisting in the surf and glanced away as he silently dug through his discarded clothes.

“That looks like it hurts,” you said, just to break the uncomfortable quiet.

Kylo regarded you in your seat by the headboard, eyes narrowing just a bit when he straightened and crossed the room. He stood by your side, taking the hem of his shirt between his fingers for just a second.

You felt him hum in your head, not nearly as loud as it was the night before, but still there—a pleasant weight in your chest. He liked the look of you drowning in his clothes. Liked the way you disappeared into them. Liked the reminder of how you fit well in the space he left behind. Felt his hand rip away like it had been burned.

“It doesn’t,” he said and turned his back to you.

As if you could hurt him.

You felt yourself flush at his response, electing to simply watch as he plucked another top from one of the piles and tugged it over his head. You lamented silently at the loss, earning you a sharp glare from the man in question. Well, at least he was giving you some indication now that he heard you.

“Yes,” he sighed, lowering himself onto the edge of the bed. “You’re incredibly loud.”

Crossing your legs, you sat the datapad aside and leaned back against the headboard.

“Oh, well my apologies,” you rolled your eyes, “I’m not exactly familiar with how this works.”

He scoffed at your hand gesturing between the two of you, “I’m well aware.”

“Is being as aggravating as possible a personal goal of yours or something?”

Kylo’s hand shot out, grabbing your ankle and yanking you down the bed. Before you had the chance to register the stab of pain that accompanied the sudden movement, you were situated firmly on his lap, thighs spread uncomfortably on either side of his hips.

“Is being a defiant little brat one of yours?” he retorted, one hand gripping hard on your jaw.

You tensed your legs against the searing ache and dug one of your knees into the bruise on his side, “Only for you, sir.”

The hand on your jaw slipped down to wrap around your throat, clamping down on the vein there and you felt the surge of blood that rushed to his dick at the memory those words elicited. He liked them in your mouth, he couldn’t hide that anymore and it frustrated him, enraged him that you smiled at the thought. Stars, you supposed if you kept mouthing off like that Atreus would have to speed things up before Ren killed you for him.

Kylo’s fingers twitched around your neck, eyes flicking to the mark he’d left on the joining of your throat and shoulder which had slipped entirely from his shirt. He seemed to be debating with himself before dropping his head and sucking the abused skin back into his mouth.

Your fingers slipped instinctively into his hair. Whether you were trying to yank him off or push him closer, you weren’t sure but then his jagged teeth sunk into the worried flesh and you whined like something wild at the display of dominance and acknowledgment that last night had been more than just another dream.

When Kylo finished with you, he stayed soothing cool mint breaths into the sensitive skin under his lips. You wanted to ask him what it meant—the mark, the beach, the newly filled to the brim, shaking in your fingers feeling blooming into existence in the intercostal spaces of your ribs—but you knew he’d never answer that.

Luckily, the waiting game was your specialty. There was no one better than you at playing the long con. He’d crack eventually, they always did. So you hid your ace and plaid something a bit safer.

“How did I find you in the hall last night?”

The Commander huffed against you, lifting his head to nip sharply at your earlobe.

“Projecting,” he conceded.

“What does that mean?”

His hands drifted to your hips, digging in and forcing you off his lap and onto the floor. The wood dug into your knees and pressed valleys into the skin. Kylo motioned with a hand and his boots obediently floated over and settled in front of you kneeling between his legs. You frowned as he stared down at you blankly and his command dawned on you.

“Really?” you asked, unable to keep the incredulity off of your tongue.

He lifted his brows and rolled his lips together, and you found yourself understanding with terrifying clarity what that meant. If you were going to play games so would he, and Kylo’s preferred method always seemed to be humiliation in some form.

Jokes on him, you thought with a shrug. You had very little dignity left to be squashed under his boots which you ripped from the air by your head. His feet were massive, nearly the size of your thigh as you slipped one into the rough leather.

“Consciousness can be detached from the physical body,” Kylo explained.

His voice lacked any of its usual rasp or vitriol, he was simply saying the words, not forcing them out. You thought he’d make a good teacher if he wasn’t such an—

The boot in your lap ground down harshly into the especially sore spot between your thighs covered only by his thin black shirt. Your cunt ached as he pressed the toe of his boot into your clit. Gritting your teeth against the pain, you kept your mouth shut and nodded for him to continue, pulling taught all the laces from his ankle to calf. The muscles were impossibly hard under your fingers

“The Force can allow you to take advantage of that separation,” he continued, swapping feet when you’d finished the first, “so physically you remained here, and your consciousness was able to project elsewhere.”

Your hands guided his foot past the leather straps and hastened through the last few laces. When the last was tied off, you tried to knock his leg to the side, but he pressed it back between your legs, smearing you with rocky earth and grinding his heel once more on your slit.

“So everything we overheard then, that was real?” you continued, voice strained as you squirmed out of his reach. Shockingly, he let you.

Kylo shrugged examining your slick stain on the leather, “Projection involves a real place and time. Dreams are more abstract.”

You nodded, pulling the fabric tighter around your knees.

“What did he mean?” you asked quietly.

You were pushing your luck, pushing his buttons really but he should be expecting that by now. He owed you this, reparations for months of workplace abuse.

Kylo stared at you, his erection still obscenely on display from your view on the floor.

“Atreus, he said I was ‘in your head,’” you elaborated and Kylo nearly kicked your teeth in with how quickly he stood.

“That’s enough,” he grunted.

You watched on the ground as he walked out onto the balcony. The wind combed through the black waves on his head revealing whitecaps of pale, freckled profile to peek out. You decided to quit while you were ahead, letting him stew. This was the most he’d ever spoken to you in the years you’d worked as his one-woman political clean up crew. Maybe you’d celebrate when there wasn’t a hit out on you.

Stretching out, your eyes caught his mask staring at you dead and resolute from the small night stand. It was heavier than you expected, lined with deep ridges and scars just like the man who wore it.

Head wounds were almost always fatal. Just one blow to the soft flesh of the temple and that was it, end of discussion. They taught you that at the academy. Always aim for the head. You traced the cracks on its carbon black surface and tried to imagine all the people who’d aimed for the Commander’s head, aimed to land the killing blow and failed. You thought of his toothpaste sitting in the vanity in the bathroom. You thought of the bruises on his chest and the blood that had pooled under his pretty skin to cause them. You thought of Kylo Ren dying.

You put the helmet down, pulled yourself off the floor and left Ren to his thoughts.

The bathroom was still thick with steam when you started the shower running. You stripped his shirt from your back and folded it on the sink before stepping in. The hot water felt glorious as it pounded the soreness from your skin. Your fingers brushed carefully over the abstract painting of bruises, the mark on your neck particularly stark in your hazy reflection in the wall of mirrors facing the shower.

You should have expected the Commander would enjoy marking his territory.

Not that you were in any way his territory.

The idea of it certainly didn’t cause a shiver to run down your spine.

When you’d washed the silt and grime down the drain and dried yourself, you left the bathroom and dressed quietly. Your outfit was professional and understated, not drawing the eye and covering last nights events without being suspiciously modest. Kylo didn’t move or speak until you drifted out to the balcony to commune before your meetings began. You leaned against the rail next to him.

“Do you know anything about him?” you asked, gazing out at the waves as the rose and crashed and rose again.

“No,” he responded, and you were thankful you didn’t have to say the name.

It felt greasy in your mouth.

“Right,” your eyes closed against the salty wind, “well I suppose I’ll do some digging then. Know thy enemy and all that.”

He glanced at you, a full once over and nodded in dismissal. You shook your head and turned to head out, shouting back to him over your shoulder.

“Remember,” only your head remained peeking through the crack in the door, “don’t leave this room.”

The door slammed behind you with a crack. Well, he was developing a pattern to say the least, you thought as you wandered down the hall to the drawing room.

***

You did your best to conceal the limp in your step as you entered, slipping easily into the small crowd of legislative staffers and scanning the room. Gahl was nowhere to be seen and neither was his ‘advisor.’ Immediately you felt a weight lifted off your shoulders. You consistently spent among crowds of men who frequently murdered people for political gain, however, you’d miscalculated how much harder it would be to keep your cool when your life was the one on the line.

The room was bright and airy, a small table was lined with furiously dainty finger food which you perused but found no appetite for. You sighed and moved on, trying to decide which inane conversation to insert yourself into when one found you first.

“Good morning,” an increasingly familiar voice spoke from behind you.

You turned to find Lem crossing the room and leaving behind a group of idly chatting aides.

“Hello,” you plastered a smile on your face in greeting as he saddled up. “The Representative chose not to grace us with his presence I see.”

He chuckled, “You really do get right down to business don’t you?”

“That is why I’m here,” you picked a tea sandwich off the table and popped it into your mouth just for the sake of the gesture. It tasted like sand in your mouth.

“Well then, I suppose I don’t mind skipping the pleasantries if you won’t think less of me for it,” Lem conceded and turned to stand next to you, surveying the crowd.

“In fact, I might think more of you.”

You followed suit, taking in the gaggles of people as your new companion passed you a glass of something fruity and expensive.

“Well in that case,” he took a sip and tucked a piece of yellow hair behind his ear, “you’d be correct in your assumption, the old man’s been called away on important campaign related business.”

“Would I be right in assuming you know more than you’re letting on?”

Lem glanced down at you from the corner of his eye and took a sip of his drink, “I think we’re both seasoned enough players of this game to know the answer to that.”

You hummed in concession, “Can you blame me for trying?”

“No,” he admitted easily. “But considering the fact you’ve been casing me like a house for robbery I would have hoped that conclusion would have come faster.

“I don’t know what you consider ‘casing,’ but I think you might be inflating yourself a bit there Mr. Alba,” you retorted, taking a sip and jolting a bit as the sweetness hit your tongue.

“A politician's assistant with an enlarged ego? Never.”

“Aren’t you a little too self aware to be in politics?”

Beside you, Lem laughed in earnest and you frowned, looking up at him. He wasn’t nearly as large as the Commander, so your neck wasn’t forced nearly to it’s breaking point in the process.

“You’re funny,” he said by way of explanation. “I didn’t think you’d be funny.”

“I’m just as shocked as you are,” you mumbled as a group of people bypassed you out into the hall.

“Well, you’re right,” Lem shrugged his shoulders, “I didn’t initially intend on ending up in government work.”

That was interesting. You felt yourself falling back into an old rhythm. Maybe Lem was onto something—if you wanted to get to Gahl, what better place to start than with the assistant. After all, if anyone wanted to know all the dirt on Hux, you were certainly the best person to ask. Why would this be any different?

“Is that so?” you prodded, hoping he’d continue on his own.

Of course he did. These people loved to talk about themselves.

“The Representative was a family friend and I was but a directionless youth bringing shame upon our good name,” he lamented, gesturing dramatically to a false, sympathetic audience.

“Was it kindness or pity then?” you asked, smiling and nodding to one of the campaign managers when she dipped behind you for a fruit tart.

Lem huffed out a laugh again and shook his head, “Gahl wasn’t always like this, I recall him being far more benignant when I first started.”

You latched on to the remorse in his tone: a soft spot in the apple. A perfect opportunity for you to worm your way in and feast on the flesh.

“It's an occupational hazard, really,” you glanced at his profile through your lashes and caught the faintest twinkle of vulnerability in the set of his jaw, “the constant power struggle drains one dry of any remaining empathy.”

“Hm, that’s certainly part of it,” Lem continued and downed the rest of his drink. “But he hasn’t really changed all that much until this election season.”

You’d broken the skin, now it was time to dig a bit deeper.

“Gahl seems pretty cut and dry, from what I can tell,” you locked your thighs against the growing ache between them from standing too still for too long, “what would you say has changed?”

“Well in all the years I’ve spent working for him, I’ve never known the man to run a smear campaign, not like this one at least. Really you should have seen the ads we ran for him, absolutely brutal,” Lem was nearly ranting now, and it seemed you’d struck the nerve you’d been searching for. “And, I mean no offense, but he’d certainly never have interacted more with the Order than was strictly necessary, much less agree to meet with your Commander what-ever-his-name-is personally.”

God you wished Commander what-ever-his-name-is Ren was around to hear that. The look on his face alone would be better than any orgasm he could give you.

“No, no, I wouldn’t do any business with us either if I could help it,” you conceded and handed Lem a second glass.

“You’re very gracious, thank you,” he accepted the drink and sighed.

You tried your best not to sympathize, but you were weak and soft and couldn’t quite help the pang in your chest. As lukewarm as you were about Lem Alba, you could see the bags under his eyes and the sallow pallor to his skin and you knew the look he wore too well.

Damn your occasional need to not be a total piece of shit.

“Trust me, I understand your frustration,” you let out a sigh of your own.

Commanding officers were a trial.

“And not to mention, ever since he brought on that new advisor, he’s had no need for any of my input,” Lem grumbled, pinching the bridge of his round nose.

Well, never mind, maybe your horrible lack of apathy was going to come in handy.

“The slimy one?”

He turned to look down at you with an incredulous smile, “Yeah, that’s the one.”

“What does he call himself?”

“Atreus,” Lem said, rolling his eyes. “Although I’m sure that’s not his real name. He seems to get off on being dark and mysterious.”

You could think of another person who fit that description, and both of them had wanted you dead on at least one occasion you were certain.

“Hm,” you nodded in agreement, “any idea where he came from?”

“None such luck, he just came crawling out of the woodwork one day a few months ago and well, you’ve seen the result,” he shrugged and finished off his second glass, taking yours from your hand and setting them off to the side. “Now, fancy a walk on the beach? I believe it’s my turn to take a crack at hunting for information.”

For a moment, you contemplated the likelihood that you were being played, that Lem was some elaborate plant and today was the day of your demise. But holding you hostage leagues away from crowds would invariably ensure your death would be wasted. Couldn’t stick it to the Order if there was no one around to watch. And not to stroke your own dick, but you were very well versed in picking up on genuine animosity towards superiors.

“I’m not entirely sure what you could possibly want to know that I have the answers to,” you said and turned to face him, “but I would love the excuse to skip a meeting.”

The sand was warm between your toes when you stepped onto the shore. A breeze stirred and kicked up the granules which bit at your skin. Lem walked beside you in silence for a while, swinging his loafers in his hand. You looked out at the water, mind flashed with reluctant images of two bodies, bare and bruised, rolling in the surf.

“What’s it like?” your companion finally said, pulling you from your not so work appropriate thoughts.

“What’s what like?”

You turned to see Lem shaking his head and looking down at his feet.

“Working for the Order,” he clarified and you couldn’t stop the scoff before it blew past your lips.

“Do you seriously expect me to believe that’s what you really wanted to ask me?”

Lem held up a hand in surrender and swung to face you, “I promise, I’m being perfectly honest.” When you didn’t say anything, he continued, tone much softer under the crashing waves. “Are you always this mistrustful?”

You were certain that was meant to be a rhetorical question, but it triggered a bit of uncomfortable introspection. The answer was clearly yes, that was a given, a requirement. Of course you were, everyone who played the game of politics and treaties and thinly veiled threats was constantly waiting for someone to change loyalties at the flip of a switch. That was the rules, no one ever trusted anyone else father than they could shoot them. Alliances only worked when the playing parties were mutually benefitting or consistently in the other’s line of fire.

Truthfully, you hadn’t trusted a single soul since your academy days, and even that was questionable. You couldn’t trust your staff to do their jobs right, and the only conversations they ever had with you was nothing more than ass kissing lacking in both subtlety and class. The higher ups used you as a convenient garbage dump for all their internal screw ups.

Any human interaction you’d had during your time in negotiations was—stripped down to its roots—simply because someone wanted something from you.

Intentions mattered, anyone who said otherwise was only kidding themselves.

“Work is fine, pay is good,” you kept your tone short, “why do you ask?”

“Just curious, I always wondered what it would be like to work for them.”

“Well, I’d say it’s exactly what you’d expect,” you backed quickly away from the incoming tide, trying not to ruin any more clothing that you already had.

“I don’t know,” Lem shrugged and followed you farther up the beach, “I figured it would be more exciting than this.”

He gestured around vaguely at the villa and the ocean. Your balcony visible from here, you realized. Soon the two of you would walk right across the patch of sand where you and the Commander had tumbled desperately into each other. When you had—

“It isn’t,” you quickly nipped that train of thought in the bud. “Just the same sport on a bigger playing field.”

“You’re not doing a very good job of representing your product,” Lem quipped.

“Well thankfully I’m a diplomat, not a salesman.”

You were standing right by the path to your rooms now, in between the parted grass you could still see the imprints of massive feet. Kylo must have carried you back last night, cold and wet and debauched. You could almost see him, muscles in his back rippling, your weight barely registering as he walked on legs like tree trunks up the small incline. The water would be dripping off his hair, coating each pretty strand and leaching away its softness.

“Isn’t it all the same evil though,” Lem mused, pausing next to you on the beach, completely unaware of what the sand here had witnessed only a few hours ago.

“Depends on what you define as evil.”

You wondered if Kylo could see you now, if he could hear you—really hear you. Wondered if you’d ever get to know what went on inside his head. Wondered if you’d even want to. Maybe that made you evil. Or maybe you were just weak.

“I think you’d know better than me,” Lem was staring off at the water when you turned and his neat hair parted with the breeze.

“Why’s that?” you asked, facing back to stare into the window to your room, hoping to catch a glimpse of something.

Just something.

“Well homicide isn’t included in my negotiating arsenal for one thing,” he huffed, stuffing his hands into his jacket pockets.

“I’ve never killed anyone.”

You didn’t know why you whispered the words, didn’t know why you said them at all, but there they were drifting out to sea like a rudderless ship.

“Why not?”

“Never had too,” you said simply, “not directly at least.”

Lem hummed thoughtfully, “But would you?”

You were still staring up at the curtain covered window.

“Is that what you think evil is?”

“That’s what I think devotion is,” Lem replied simply. “The evil is in refusing.”

A shadow passed across the glass, tall and menacing and real.

“I don’t know,” you said finally, after a moment of silence.

“Don’t know what?”

You shook your head, “I don’t know if I would kill someone, personally I mean.”

“Fair enough,” the sound of skipping shells rang out behind you as Lem spoke, “I don’t think anyone really knows until the knife is in their hand and the throat is under it.”

You aren’t going to die.

You could hear Kylo’s voice and the crashing of the sea—or maybe it was something else, something else entirely that was churning around you. Something red and crackling.

An act of devotion.

“Yeah, I suppose you’re right.”

***

You could feel his eyes on you the second you returned. It was well into the night after a day of meetings that ran too long. But one quick scan of the room and you came up empty of brooding men in flowing black robes. Despite his lack of physical presence, you swore you could feel staring, tracking the uneven movement of your legs as you took a step further from the door.

Kylo Ren was here somewhere, you could feel the weight of him, filling up all the extra space in the air.

The sullen feeling of being watched followed you, making your skin flush with gooseflesh, while you stood in the middle of the room. Something moved in the shadows of the balcony. You caught just a twitch from the corner of your vision, the heel of boot pulled back into the dark.

So that’s where he was hiding. Or maybe lurking was a more appropriate word for it.

When your eyes had adjusted to the low light of the moon, you could just barely make him out. Kylo was nothing more than a dark silhouette against the horizon, leaning back against the rail of the balcony. You couldn’t see his face, but you could easily imagine the blank, drawn expression. The regal tilt of his jaw and the sculpted profile of his prominent nose. The slight peek of his ears between dark waves of hair.

You paused for a moment, debating whether or not you cared enough to fill him in on what you’d gathered that morning. Lem had been more forthcoming with you for the rest of the day after your heart to heart and you’d been able to create a halfway decent profile of your target by the end of your last meeting. But there was palpable tension in the room that you couldn’t quite place, and it felt like one wrong step might find you backed up against the wall, feet dangling and throat crushed in an invisible grip.

Turning, you sat yourself gingerly on the edge of the bed and pulled off your shoes. When you dropped them to the ground though, you heard the rustling of paper. Scattered on the floor was the tattered remains of a padded envelope. You frowned, picking up one of the scraps to try and make out the writing.

Your name was scrawled in messy print, torn halfway through.

It was only when you noticed the small shreds of fabric littered among the mess that you realized what you were holding.

“I’ll have one of the aides send for some seaside appropriate attire, you might find you’d like to go for a swim.”

“Let me know,” he cleared his throat, “if that’s not the right fit. I can have another sent up.”

It was the package Lem had given you days ago. You’d nearly forgotten about the awful conversation with Gahl your first night on Coruscant. Some part of you was glad you’d never have to see it in one piece, the memory of his hand on your thigh still made you gag.

You grabbed a piece of the ruined material and felt the rough outline of lace under your fingertips.

From the balcony there came the sound of shuffling boots as Ren adjusted himself and turned away from you to look out over the sea.

“You really shouldn’t open mail that isn’t addressed to you, sir,” you mumbled under your breath, but got no response.

In fact, the entire room was littered with the remnants of your gift from the representative. You wondered how long he’d been sitting there sulking over it. Something in your chest swelled at the thought of him, eye twitching just before he ripped the garment to shreds. You could hear the shout that would have torn through his throat.

Really, he fucks you once and he’s already jealous? Very unprofessional.

The thought did wonders for your ego.

And wreaked havoc on your incredibly sore pussy, that clenched involuntarily against a new rush of warmth.

But however much sick pride you took in exposing the Commander’s inability to control himself, you couldn’t shake the twinge of annoyance that bubbled constantly under the surface of your mind whenever Kylo Ren was involved.

The boots, the cryptic half answers, the unclear label for whatever the hell had happened between the two of you buried in each other on the sand— that was one thing.

But this was a slippery slope and you weren’t one for simply riding along without question.

“Tell me what you want.”

That’s what he always said, be a shame if Ren couldn’t hold himself to the same standards.

Without bothering to look back at him, you stood back up from the bed, proudly displayed at the center of the room.

Slowly you lifted your arms, pulling away your top and letting it drop with a soft thump to the floor. You didn’t see him turn at the sound, but you felt it. Could sense where his eyes alighted on your bare back. They lit fiery trails wherever he paused on the blooms of broken blood vessels under your skin. You did your best not to shudder under his stare.

You worked slowly, peeling each layer off piece by piece. Made a show of it, ran your fingers along the soft skin of your arms and gave him a lovely view of your ass when you bent down to roll off your socks. You could hear the catch in his breath so faint under the sound of the wind, and wondered if he could see the wetness glinting off your thighs in the low light.

Wondered if he could smell it on you.

Never once did you turn to face him, waiting until you were completely bare to walk ever so slowly into the bathroom, leaving the door wide open behind you. Flicking on the soft lights you started the shower with a frustratingly shaky hand. Warm water rushed through the pipes and drowned out any sound from the main room.

You stepped past the two tile walls that blocked off the shower and let the stream of water tumble over you. It poured like a waterfall, cocooning you in the stream of it. You waited patiently to see what the Commander would do, if he’d take the bait.

Of course he did.

You didn’t have to wait for very long.

He took up the entire doorway when he entered, a massive wall of muscle and sinew that towered over you in a way no one ever had before.

It was thrilling.

“What do you think you’re doing?” he asked, voice low and layered with poorly restrained need.

Kylo was still fully clothed, but the hard outline of his cock was clear against his thigh. You let the water run over your breasts, cupping them as though you were one of those ornate stone fountains.

“What does it look like?”

He rolled his lips, “All I see is a whore who has no idea what she’s getting herself into.”

He was right, you didn’t. But you wanted it anyway.

“Hmm,” you nodded. “So why don’t you show me?”

You stepped out of the water, leaving puddles behind as you crossed over to him, standing just out of arm's reach. Kylo’s fingers clenched at his sides, his neck tilted down to stare at the water running down your chest.

What happened next was not at all what you’d expected.

You’d thought he might snap the way he often did, might yell or bend you over the vanity and give you even more marks that would smart in the morning. But he did none of that.

Instead he lifted a single hand, his arm impossibly long and reaching you despite the distance. The second his fingertips landed on your skin, the world went black.

You felt like you were falling, your stomach doing flips as you tumbled through darkness. Everything was coming in flashes. Your feet—well no not yours, Kylo’s you realized—sticking in viscous black sludge that clung in sticky trails along the skin of your—his—legs.

A pit, gaping and horrible.

Something burning, something blistering and crackling and raging red. It rose above you, flowing strangely like liquid sloshing and rolling like a flash flood and you staggered back. Something was rushing by your ears, light blurring in front of your eyes like a ship just about to jump into hyperspace. All of sudden, you were hurtled back into the present gasping and pitching forward into the Commander’s solid chest.

He didn’t push you away, just stood as you breathed him in and tried to plant your feet firmly on the ground.

“What was that?”

Your voice sounded so small after the intense roaring of whatever he’d shown you. Kylo’s hand threaded into the hair at the base of your skull and yanked back until your knees buckled under the force and you hung limply from his grip.

“You would do well to listen when I say you have no idea what’s at stake here,” he hissed and you clawed at his hands.

“Maybe if you bothered to explain it to me, I’d be more inclined to agree!”

He shook you violently and you tried to kick your feet under you but the slick tiles offered no leverage. Kylo dropped a hand, fumbling with the button on his pants.

“I think you’re far too busy parading yourself around like the little slut you are.”

In one smooth motion, he freed his cock from the confines of his trousers. It was just as massive as you remember, red and leaking white beads of precum. He gave it two long strokes, holding you at eye level with his dick.

You really ought to keep your mouth shut, but despite the pain in your scalp, your cunt was clenching at the sight of rock hard and weeping for you.

“Am I a slut or are you just a possessive bastard?”

You could pinpoint the exact moment Kylo Ren snapped. The change was subtle, a short grinding of his jaw, just a flicker of his eyes before he had your head slammed down on the vanity, ass up and knees spread for him to settle between.

His hand in your hair tilted your head up so you could watch as he guided his length to your soaked lips. He coated himself in your slick, circling your entrance and nudging your stiff clit with every stroke.

“Watch and you tell me,” he grunted before ramming his cock into you.

It burned and stretched until you felt him in your throat, a choked moan rattling out of your mouth. You could do nothing but watch your reflection, tears beading at the corners of your eyes when he pulled out only to thrust back in. Kylo set a savage pace, the sound of slapping skin and his groans echoed around you.

You watched his face in the mirror, flushed bright red, one hand still on your head and the other steadying your hips as he drove into you. The drag of him was delicious, pulling pleasure out of places so deep you’d nearly forgotten they existed.

“So desperate for your Commander’s cock, aren’t you?” he growled, draping himself over your back.

His chest pinned your harder into the marble vanity, crushing your breasts against the cool surface while the hand on your hip reached around and pressed hard into your stomach just above your pussy.

“Feel that? Feel how this cunt was made for me?”

Kylo’s head dropped to your shoulder and his teeth sunk into the flesh, muffling the obscene moan that rumbled between his ribs when you tightened yourself around him. You whined, nipples straining against the cold stone and neglected clit begging for attention.

“Kylo, please,” you sobbed, forgetting the game entirely, all confidence leaking away and replaced by a hunger only he could sate.

“No,” he snarled, rearing back and yanking your head up with him. “You don’t get to beg now.”

You were absolutely ruined, skin more bruised than not and mouth hanging open in a silent cry. He met your gaze through the mirror, and you were entirely convinced it was the most beautiful thing you’d ever seen. Kylo’s lovely brown eyes were completely black with lust, his hair a crown of sweat soaked curls and a lovely blush that spread all the way to his ears. Plush lips pulled back to show his crooked teeth that splayed out like white gemstones.

He looked every bit a dark, magnificent prince. A fallen angel or a devil or any number of cruel celestial beings—in any case the man above you could not be human.

And yet, you knew he was.

You’d been gifted with the evidence of it, painted him with purple blossoms and seen him bare with scars and freckles and your favorite mole above his gorgeous full lips. The way his breath always smelled like toothpaste.

In all your life you’d never been known to take orders well from any man, but staring at Kylo Ren as he pounded his massive cock into you—meeting you head on without restraint, a comeback always at the tip of his skilled tongue—you thought you might not mind it so much if it was him.

And then his hips stilled, and he was looping your arms around his neck and pawing at your thighs before locking his arms under them and lifting you up, back against his chest.

“Fuck, Kylo—” you yelped at the change of angle and the strength of his arms to keep you aloft.

The shower sprayed down on him, soaking his clothes as he leaned back against the tile wall and fucked you on his cock. The mirror provided a full view of your bodies joining. You watched entranced as his arms flexed, biceps bulging while your pussy swallowed his length and your tits bounced with every thrust.

“That’s the only name I ever want to hear out of your mouth.”

He turned his face into your neck, lips and teeth sucking and nipping at the skin. It was too much, too much and not enough and you were overcome once again with the feeling of something filling in all your hollow spaces. And you knew in your bones straight to the marrow that the pit filled with churning, crackling magma was bubbling up again, accepting everything Kylo poured into you.

You clung on to the feeling and shouted through it.

Kylo, you called, breath coming in ragged gasps.

You were so close from just his cock in you, but it wasn’t enough.

You weren’t sure if anything ever would be.

Kylo, you repeated it like a holy word, long forgotten and imbued with the power of ancient gods.

He buried his head deeper into the column of your throat, squeezing his eye shut as if that could block out your cries.

Kylokylokylokylokylokylo, you chanted in a never ending string until the dam finally broke and you felt his thoughts slipping into you like they’d always belonged there, like there had always been space for them.

It was all too jumbled for you to parse any meaning from it. Snippets of red hot anger revealed themselves to you in a shower of manilla paper. Voices, dark and malevolent whispered of challengers and danger and design. Your body, motionless on the bed painted in ropes of his release and the comforting weight of you in his arms, real, alive, willing and wanting.

Take me, if you didn’t know better you’d think he was the one begging, take all of me .

You nodded and nudged him with your nose until his lips were crashing against yours in a flurry of hot tongue and teeth. His arms left your thighs which remained impossibly in place, held up by invisible hands as he grasped at your chest, rolling a hard nipple under his thumb while the other found your clit and finally, finally rubbed frantic circles around the neglected nerves.

Kylo’s hips never stopped their frantic pace, his cock reaching its limit inside you, and finally he was cumming, sheathed in your heat and pumping you blessedly full while he sent you tumbling over the edge with him.

And as the waves of pleasure radiated over your skin, boiled in your bloodstream—as Kylo licked the backs of your teeth and swallowed down every cry that left you—everything faded out around the edges once again, although now for much more pleasurable reasons.

***

When you opened your eyes again, you were laying in bed. The sheets were damp, but not uncomfortably so.

And this time, you were not alone. Kylo’s hands, massive and all encompassing were splayed against your stomach and chest, one cupping your left breast gently in his palm. His body engulfed you from behind, bare skin hot against yours.

So hot, you thought something inside him must be burning.

Maybe it was.

Kylo? you wondered silently, unsure he could still hear you.

I’m here.

His hand on your chest flexed as he pulled you tighter. Something told you this was not the first time he’d held you like this, there was something too practiced about the placement of his body.

What is this?

You weren’t exactly sure what you meant by that, but he seemed to understand the question.

He was silent for a moment, I don’t know.

The lie was apparent the moment the words drifted into your head. And confirmation was echoed back to you. He knew, or at least knew some of it, just wouldn’t tell you.

That was okay, you hadn’t really expected anything else.

You’re safe with me, he whispered instead.

And that was not entirely true either, in fact you would not be here if not for him. But all of this had a certain inevitability about it that you couldn’t place. A feeling that this would have happened regardless, or a version of it with the same outcome.

You closed your eyes against the thought and nodded, letting yourself be held like you had so often dreamed of on lonely nights in your small quarters

You were safe then, safe but empty.

And really, that was so much worse.

---------------------

Taglist lovelies;

@thewilddingleberries @kit-jpg @findyourdarkness @contesa-lui-alucard @isaxhorror @obsessionprofessional

#kylo ren x reader #kylo ren x female reader #kylo ren imagines #kylo ren fic #kylo ren smut #dr. b writes #daldom #reader insert #dr. b talks

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aerial-aspie · 3 years

Text

An Autistic Point of View 2

Hi there! It's Hazel and I'm first going to talk about what it's like to me to be autistic.

So for me I got diagnosed with Asperger's Syndrome at the age of 14 and it has helped me understand a lot of my traits, which now I can articulate to you.

I'm obsessive and I mean very obsessive, once I find something I really really like it's all the occupies my brain day and night, everyday and sometimes to the point where I can't focus because all I want to think about is my obsession. A few examples of this was Vocaloid, BTS/K-pop and right now Genshin Impact.

During lessons, I struggled to stay 100% focused at all times because my brain always likes to drift off into dream land and I have to make a big mental effort to reign myself back into reality. This problem affect me when I used to take Chemistry (it was far too hard for my pea brain anyway) and the moment my brain switched off, BOOM! I'd missed a ton of information, even if it was only for 10 seconds.

However, now, after changing subjects and finding the right ones for me, I'm finding it much easier to control my need to daydream and can focus much better.

Next, I am forgetful. Imagine a sieve but only the unimportant information (normally to do with what I'm obsessing over) stays and everything else falls through, no matter how important it is to me. I hurt my knuckles over lockdown learning and needed to ice them frequently and it was very important, however, 2 seconds after remembering I needed to do that, you guessed it! I forgot about it.

Forgetfulness is hard, especially when at school because I need to drill my theory into my brain so hard because I will forget so easily. As well as at school, I have my phone and Alexa full of reminders to tell me to simple tasks such as to update this blog or to practice my piano or else I'd forget.

Lets throw in a weird one now. To be honest even I have no clue if this is an autistic trait but it's certainly something that affects me. When studying or reading I can't listen to any music with English lyrics. Why? Because I focus on the lyrics and draw myself into them and then struggle to concentrate when working because I can understand what's being sung. So my playlists involve game soundtracks, a few screamo bands (you can't understand what they're saying anyways) and Asian pop.

One thing that was said through my diagnosis is that it's possible I could have anxiety for life and as of writing this I'm currently trying to get therapy or medication for it.

Anxiety is isolating, it's painful with its physical side effects (which manifest in chest pains for me), it gives unneeded stress over problems which to others seem minor, it gives me panic attacks which range in severity, it gives a fear embarrassment, of messing up, of standing out, of being DIFFERENT.

Everything about myself I scrutinise, I'm trying to give up chocolate because it gives me so much extra stress that I believe it's unhealthy for myself. I must present myself in a way where I don't seem rude or impolite as I'm scared of how everyone will react. If I get into an argument or something I believe is an argument, I beat myself up about it and I feel like I hurt everyone around me.

I believe I'm a constant annoyance, when I'm around people I'm comfortable with I'm a chatterbox and you can't shut me up. But it makes me self conscious, am I talking too much? Is everyone just being friendly out of obligation? Are they all secretly annoyed at me? Are questions I ask myself daily and blame myself at some points for not being normal.

My brain sticks to the past and words echo my mind for sometimes years giving me fears that others would even know of. Such as the lessons about heart disease in biology always play in my mind to the point I want to give up chocolate because it's giving me so much stress as my brain is like OH MY GOD YOU ATE CHOCOLATE NOW YOU'RE GONNA DIE! And then I get stressed and get chest pains which only further add to it.

Now we got the heavy topic out the way lets move on! Autism has led me to have a fine motor coordination disability which has affect me my whole life, I can't handwrite well, I struggle opening tins, peeling vegetables, unlocking the door to get in my house, using scissors, folding things and the list goes on (and let me tell you it's long).

But you get the gist, I struggle with a lot of things and it can take me a much longer amount of time to work out things than someone normal.

I'm also extremely disorganised, actually that's a lie. I'm extremely organised but it doesn't look it. My room is a mess and I know that but I could tell you where everything is in seconds because it's what I call 'an organised mess'. I organise things but it's not neat, it's just where my brain decides is a good place to put things.

My school bag is so organised to point I don't like people touch it because I know where everything is and it has to be in the same pockets or else I'll get upset because it just has to be there and that is something no one can change.

However, even though I'm on that point of organisation, I still get stressed about if I have forgotten anything even though I never have.

Part of my autism is physical traits too, I am born with weak muscles in many places, the ones I know of so far are my wrists, knees, eyes and lower back. Because of this I can't handwrite long essays and have to have computer support to help me with this problem. With other areas, it's places I know I need to be careful when training at circus because I discovered my weak back after crucifix rolls on a cloudswing went wrong (it's a type of error that will always happen when learning this move) and I locked up my spine, from then on I've never done that move ever again.

Whilst being quite extroverted (only around people I'm comfortable with, if not I'm extremely shy) I'm actually very sensitive to things. I can't be touched suddenly or at my waist or I will flinch or flail and let me tell you, as I martial artist I do hit extremely hard in reflex. I also am sensitive to loud noises when I'm not expecting it, such as seeing war horse the stage show where the sounds of gun shots and explosions were played so loud that I had a panic attack in the theatre. However, at concerts, I'm fine as I'm expecting this loud noise and I know what is coming.

A weird thing I find about myself is that I'm very contrasting, I'm highly emotional but don't understand emotion. My first emotional response to any emotion is to cry and yes it is extremely embarrassing to cry in front of others (I believe crying in public should be normalised not shamed). Yet I can't understand emotion such as when people are sad, I don't realise it and happily talk to them and then feel like they hate me because they ignore me and then beat myself up for not realising they're sad when they tell me so. But it's not just sadness, being talked to in a firm voice, to me means they're angry when they're not, criticism means everything I've done is stupid and you get the point.

However, not only do I not understand emotion normally, I actually at times can't feel it, I get excited before a concert but when it starts I feel nothing, everything I feel just disappears and my mind is blank, so I actually have to force myself to be happy and then my brain realises I'm happy and I don't have to put in effort to sustain an emotion.

Now last but not least (remember how I said I was forgetful, it's already come into play here that I can't even remember if I've covered everything about my Asperger's) I can't do instructions, if I'm given a list of items I need to take, a long list of instructions to follow with no physical copy to reference by the time the last instruction has been said, I've already forgotten the first one and this has been fatal when I've ended up with really bad sunburn because I forgot to bring sun cream because the list I was given was too long to remember.

And that's it folks, my autism is a nutshell that's probably missing some stuff but it's as much as I can tell you from the top of my head and if I remember more stuff I'll make sure to post it.

Thanks for following!

#autism #autistic experiences #being autistic #autistic culture #autistic problems #actually autistic #autistic life

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empyrealix · 4 years

Text

7.593 billion people and you | hjs

pairing: han jisung x reader

genre/warnings: soulmate au, childhood friends to lovers, angst, blood, mentions of stitches, pain, death, crying

synopsis: jisung and yn have been friends for as long as they can remember. jisung moved to seoul to pursue his dreams, and they never thought they would meet again. they certainly did not expect to be soulmates.

words: 3 729

Multiverse

The multiverse. Eternally inflating and containing an infinite number of bubbles, pocket universes. Each of these pocket universes are infinite and open. If these pocket universes have a positive cosmological constant, the energy density of space, they can harbour, contain, an infinite number of daughter universes.

Jisung sighed, closing the book. He scratched the back of his neck, gaze wandering to the many diagrams of space hung on the wall with thumbtacks. He opened the book again.

One approach to the multiverse theory is that each multiverse is governed by a set of consistent physical laws. This approach explains why our Universe works the way it does. On the other hand, this means that other universes are inaccessible for earthlings.

He closed the book as the door opened, you stepped in. Your backpack slung over your shoulder, ridding yourself of it as you walked into the room, throwing it into a corner. You smiled at Jisung, shooting him finger guns as you flung yourself down on the bed. Jisung giggled.

“Your mother let me in,” You nodded, glancing at the book in Jisung’s hands. Abruptly sitting up your eyebrows creased, pointing at the book.

“The multiverse theory?” He shrugged, chuckling, “Didn’t know you were into that,” Jisung shook his head.

“It’s interesting, but I’m not really into it,” You nodded, throwing a pillow at him. He scoffed, complaining about the pillow being thrown.

Multiverses and soulmates

Jisung sat cross-legged on your bed. The lights in the room were turned off, and the only sources of light were the glow in the dark stars you and Jisung hung up one year for your birthday and a flickering flashlight.

“Multiverses can never intersect since they’re governed by a set of consistent physical laws,” Jisung nodded, a lightbulb lighting up over his head. Your eyes shone with excitement, this excitement illuminating your face. You flipped the page, this one titled soulmates. You pursed your lips, looking at Jisung before beginning to flip the page, a finger landing on the title stopped you.

“Tell me,” You nodded, beginning to speak.

“It’s believed that soulmates originally didn’t exist in this world and that they came from another universe. The universes are governed by a set of consistent physical laws, which means that we can’t access the other universes. It’s believed that there was a mistake, a rift opened somewhere allowing people to travel between universes. Scientists believe that other universes had soulmates long before ours and that when the rift opened someone brought the soulmate gene with them when they came to this universe,” Jisung lent against the headboard of your bed, eagerly soaking up every word you said.

“And the soulmate gene is a tattoo of your soulmate’s favourite thing, and it appears on your 16th birthday,” Jisung pointed out, you nodded, smiling at him as you closed the book.

“Yeah, some scientists even believe that there exist different variations of the soulmate gene, but that’s merely speculation,” Jisung nodded, studying the cover of the book. He pointed at a set of numbers and letters squished in between two exploding planets. His eyebrows creased.

“What’s that?” You looked to where he was pointing, the combination of letters and numbers.

“It’s what the scientists call the soulmate gene,” Jisung nodded, his head dropping as he fell asleep.

The 16th birthday and two identical planets; the multiverse?

Jisung laughed from somewhere in the bushes.

“Jisung, come on, where are you?” You yelled out into the darkness. You hit the side of your flashlight as it began flickering. A branch broke in the direction of the clearing, cautiously you made your way there. Your, now dead, flashlight held out in front of you as a weapon.

“Jisung,” You trailed off as you reached the clearing. Jisung was standing in the middle of it. He had laid out a blanket, and in the right corner laid a pile of folded blankets in case you got cold. He had hung up fairy lights, strung them from one branch to another. Jisung himself stood beaming in the middle. He smiled even wider, if possible when he spotted you stepping into the clearing.

“Our soulmate tattoos appear this evening,” He gestured to the blanket, “and I thought it would be nice if we watched the stars,” He pointed towards the dark blue sky as he spoke. You smiled, walking over to him, engulfing him in a hug you nodded.

“It’s perfect, Sung,” He raised a fist towards the sky in victory, you giggled at the action.

“See Cassiopeia, I told you I could do this, I told you she’d like it,” Giggling you shook your head. Jisung's eyes widened in anticipation.

“Actually, that’s Cassiopeia,” You pointed to a cluster of brighter stars, they formed a W. “That star,” You pointed to the star in the middle of the constellation, “that’s Gamma Cassiopeiae,” You moved your finger, pointing to the star beside Gamma Cassiopeiae, “that’s Delta Cassiopeiae or Ruchbah. It’s also known as Rukbat, it means knee,” You snorted, moving your finger to the other side of Gamma Cassiopeiae, the star made up the bottom of the W, “Alpha Cassiopeiae, traditionally called Schedar. The name comes from the Arabic Al Sadr meaning the breast,” You moved your hand to the star beside Schedar, “and that’s Beta Cassiopeiae or Caph. It means hand, and it’s one of the five brightest stars that make up Cassiopeia,” You moved your hand, pointing at the last star. Jisung hung onto every word you said. “This last star is Epsilon Cassiopeiae, officially it’s called Segin,” Your eyes sparkled. Jisung smiled widely, reciting everything you’d said. You nodded encouragingly at every word he said.

Jisung tugged you down to sit on the blanket, “tell me more about Segin,”. You clapped your hands together, your eyes lighting up in excitement, and a smile curving up the corners of your lips. To Jisung it looked like all the stars in the galaxy were contained in your eyes.

“Well, the star is 4.2 times as wide as the Sun. It has a temperature of 15,174 Kelvin, that’s 14,900.85 Celcius. Segin is a main sequence star fusing hydrogen in its core. A main sequence star means that it fuses hydrogen atoms at its core to form helium. It being a main sequence star gives it the classification of B3 V,” Jisung nodded, his mouth hanging open in wonder. The giggle that left your lips was bashful, rubbing the back of your neck. A blush crept up your neck, settling in your cheeks. You turned around at the sound of an owl hooting in the distance, Jisung patted your knee.

“It’s just an owl, nothing to be scared of,” You turned back to him shivering. His eyes widened, pointing at the pile of blankets he had laid out, “I have blankets if you’re cold,”. You gratefully accepted the warmth of the blanket as Jisung wrapped it around your shoulders. He glanced at his watch, “two more minutes till midnight,”. Both of you scooted closer to each other, looking up at the stars. Sometimes you would point at a specific star and say something about it. Jisung had his eyes on you most of the time. His heart beating frantically in his chest at the close proximity. He knew he should not have fallen in love with you, there were currently 7.426 billion people on Earth, the chances of his soulmate being you were minuscule. There were stories of people who dated who they wanted, paying no mind to their soulmate, but as time passed for those people, their hearts slowly stopped.

He winced as he felt a sharp pain shoot up his left arm, he looked at you, your eyes showing the same amount of pain as he felt. He looked down at it, folding up the sleeve of his hoodie. It was almost as if his skin created a new system of veins, gold thread waved its way under the skin, sometimes breaking the surface. Stitching once or twice before making its way under his skin again. Whenever the glowing gold thread broke the skin droplets of blood oozed out from the holes the invisible needle left. After minutes of pain, a shape began to take from. He could barely make out two identical planets with a constellation over it. The constellation had the shape of a W. The tattoo filled with black ink, the gold pattern under his skin gone, but the pain still lingering. He looked over at you, the gold thread no longer visible on your skin.

“What’s yours?” He muttered, you turned to him, using the flashlight on your phone to show him.

Jisung gasped, “it’s a demisemiquaver, your soulmate must like music,” You nodded, shrugging. The aura enveloping you had turned sad. You shook off the feeling, not wanting to burden Jisung, turning the flashlight to Jisung’s tattoo.

“That’s Cassiopeia,” You paused, studying the other part of his tattoo, “is that supposed to represent the multiverse theory?” Jisung shrugged.

“Maybe,” He stared out into the distance, “I have to go back tomorrow,”. You nodded, your eyes turning sad once again. A frown forming on your lips, “I’ll call you as often as I can, we’ll still be friends after this,” He smiled brightly, saying it with so much confidence that you had no choice but to believe him. He grabbed your hand, squeezing it, “I’ll call you as often as possible, I promise,”

He never called.

Stars, coffee, a café in Seoul, old friends

It had been years since you had last seen him, since you had last heard his laugh, his voice. Years since you had seen him smile at a stupid joke. It had been four years. In those four years, you had graduated, that was last year. You live in Seoul, your first year of university. Studying astronomy.

You fumbled with your phone as you walked into the café, the lady behind the counter greeted you, smiling back at her as you went to stand in the queue. In front of you stood a man, he wore a black t-shirt over it and he had a grey hoodie. The hood was pulled up over his head. He wore light blue jeans and white sneakers. His right hand was resting in his pocket, while the other, the left hand, fiddled with the string on his hoodie. The woman behind the counter took his order, telling him to wait while they made it. She smiled at you once again as you reached the counter.

“Hi, yn,” You smiled back at her, tapping on the counter.

“Yeji, hi, it’s been so long since I’ve seen you,” Yeji nodded at that, punching something into the register.

“The usual?” You smiled, nodded and shot her finger guns. She giggled at the action, pointing over to where she had sent the man to wait.

“Wait there, we’ll call your name once it’s ready,” You had almost left before she added, “see you in physics next week,” You turned around at that, shooting her finger guns once again. Her face contorted into one of concern as you tripped and fell into the man who had stood before you in the queue. He grabbed your bare wrist to keep you from landing on the ground. You gasped as a sharp pain shot up your arm. The man hissed, taking his coffee from the counter before bolting out of the café. His name was Jisung. You never got a look at his face, he wore a mask, but you got his name. Jisung. Yeji looked at you, her eyes full of concern and worry. She whispered something to her co-worker before grabbing your shoulder and leading you into the staff room. She looked you over, making sure you had no injuries.

“Fold up your sleeve,” Her voice was authoritative, and not wanting to argue with her, did as told. Your soulmate tattoo, the demisemiquaver, was black this morning. It had now turned a deep blood red. Pain shot up from it in spikes as the colour changed and the tattoo itself moved. The red faded, the pain leaving with the red colour, it turned gold. Yeji looked up at you with wide eyes, she whispered.

“I think you met your soulmate,”

Gold thread, burns and Cassiopeia

Jisung opened the door to the dorm, stumbling over to the couch on shaky legs. His coffee had gone cold long ago, and he had thrown it away. Jisung folded up his sleeve, the once black tattoo had turned gold. He traced the outline of it as he had done many times before, only that this time he winced at the sensation. It hurt. It felt as though he had burned it on a warm pot. He stared at it, gnawing on the inside of his cheek. Almost screaming once the outline of it started moving, his skin spiked, the same gold thread he had last seen four years ago stitching new stitches. It did not make new shapes, but rather outlined the stars in Cassiopeia and the continents pictured on the planets. Jisung did not realise that he was crying until a tear hit his arm, he sniffled wiping under his nose with the sleeve of his hoodie. The thread stopped moving, disappearing almost as if it never existed. The outlines it had made an angry red before turning copper. Jisung wiped away the rest of his tears, folding down his sleeve as the door opened. Minho. The newcomer placed his bag on the ground with a thud.

“You’re home early,” He remarked, “weren’t you supposed to meet Felix?” Jisung turned to look at Minho, his eyes were red and swollen from the crying.

“I cancelled,” Minho squinted at him, jumping over the back of the couch to sit beside Jisung.

“What’s wrong? Why have you been crying?” Jisung tugged on the strings of his hoodie, avoiding Minho’s piercing eyes. He shook his head, “I know that something is wrong, what is it?” Minho narrowed his eyes. Jisung sighed, he did not say anything as he pulled up the sleeve of his hoodie, revealing the gold tattoo. The dancer smiled, patting Jisung’s knee.

“You met your soulmate,” Jisung shrugged, his shoulders sagging. He wiped away another wave of tears as the tattoo began burning.

“It hurts. Is it supposed to hurt?” Jisung grit his teeth, looking up at the older boy through a veil of tears. Minho handed him a tissue and sent him a reassuring smile.

“I think so, I don’t know,” He admitted, both boys looked towards the door again as the lock clicked. Chan stepped in, running a hand through his damp hair. His eyes fell on the two boys on the couch. His eyes flooded with worry as he saw the red swollen state of Jisung’s eyes and the tear streaks down his cheeks.

“Jisung, what happened?” Jisung did not answer, only sniffling more. Minho spoke up.

“He met his soulmate, and his tattoo hurts,” Chan nodded, his brain retrieving all the knowledge he possessed about soulmates. He forgot everything as Jisung looked at him with teary eyes.

“Is it supposed to hurt?” Jisung’s eyes watered again and he clenched his hands into fists. His nails digging into the flesh of his palm as another wave of pain hit. He squeezed his eyes shut. Peering at Chan through a half-closed lid, he asked, “Is there something wrong with me?” Both Chan’s and Minho’s heart broke. Chan stumbled over to Jisung, pulling him into a hug. A hug Minho joined.

“No Jisung, there’s nothing wrong with you,”

A universe where Han Jisung does not forget you

You laughed bitterly at the thought, swallowing the rest of your coffee before throwing the brown paper cup into the bin. The first raindrops hit the surface of the river, you kicked a rock. Shuddered as a cold breeze brushed past you. Tugging your coat tighter around your figure you walked away from the park bench. Your phone rang, Yeji. You did not answer it, instead opting to shove it back into your pocket as angry tears streamed down your cheeks. You shook your head, wiping away the tears as the thought made its way to your conscious.

Maybe there existed a universe where Jisung did not forget you, a universe where you still talked. Where he called as he promised he would. You kicked a stone, gritting your teeth. Tears made their way down your cheeks, and you angrily wiped them away. You did not notice the cargo trailer speeding down the street.

“Stop!” The voice grabbed your arm, roughly yanking you back onto the sidewalk. The cargo trailer drove past, in another universe it might have killed you. The trailer drenched the two of you in water. A glance at the boy who had saved you revealed that he wore a grey hoodie. The hood was once pulled up, but it had fallen off, revealing a head of black hair. The man let go of your arm. He rubbed the back of his neck.

“I’m sorry, but the trailer,” He trailed off, gesturing to where the trailer was.

“Thank you,” He smiled, his crooked front tooth showing. You once knew a boy with a crooked front tooth. The man laughed, helping you up. His laugh sounded like angels singing.

“I couldn’t let you die,” He shuffled his feet, tucking his right hand into his coat pocket. He winced, almost as if he was in pain.

“Are you okay?” The man waved it off, his sleeve sliding down his arm, exposing a glowing mark. You knit your brows, your mind filling with curiosity. You gasped as a wave of pain hit. The man’s, Jisung’s, eyes flooded with worry.

“Are you okay?” He gestured to your arm. You smiled stiffly, nodding. The sleeve was wet as you peeled it off your skin, the glowing soulmate mark coming to light. Jisung’s eyes widened, pointing at it.

“That’s a demisemiquaver,” He muttered, his heart tightening in his chest, “I had a friend once, a friend whose soulmate tattoo was a demisemiquaver,” He mumbled.

“What did you say?” Jisung did not reply, only folding up the sleeve of his coat. The constellation and the two identical planets glared up at you. The tattoo reminded you of that night. Of him.

“Jisung?” It was barely a whisper, almost inaudible. Jisung smiled slightly, glancing from the glowing tattoos to your face.

“I guess you’re my soulmate, yn,” You glared at him taking a step back.

“No,” You turned away from him, walking over the road. Jisung stared after your retreating figure until he yelled.

“You can’t. If you do this, we’ll both die,” His voice was drowned out by a crack of thunder and the patter of rain.

A reconciliation under the stars

Jisung shifted from one foot to the other, his hands growing clammier by the second. He looked up at the night sky. Cassiopeia, the constellation he mocked the last time he was here, now felt like it was mocking him. He dried his hands on his trousers, jumping slightly as sticks broke in the distance. You stepped out of the underbrush, your gaze settling on Jisung.

The last time you were in this clearing was when you were 16 and got your soulmate tattoos, only that time there was a picnic blanket laid out and fairy lights strung over branches on the trees. This time the clearing was filled with coldness, no picnic blanket or fairy lights. Only the cold, hard forest floor. Jisung gnawed on the inside of his cheek.

“I know you probably don’t want to see me,” Jisung held out a rose, the stem of it broken. “But we have to talk about this,” He stopped, squeezing his eyes shut to stop the tears, “I don’t want to die,” His voice cracked, his eyes watered. Overflowing with tears, some fell down his cheeks. He wiped them away. Your heart shattered at Jisung’s shaking form.

“Jisung,” You opened your arms, tears beginning to form and run down your cheeks. He gripped the back of your shirt in his hands, his tears wetting it. You pulled away, “we can, we will figure this out,” Your thumb grazed his cheek, wiping away his tears.

“I’m sorry for never calling you, I was just busy,” He stopped, “And I know that it isn’t a good excuse, I know I promised I’d call,” He sniffled.

“I was upset, yes, but I understand that you were, that you are busy, “ Jisung grabbed your hands in his, moving his thumbs in circles on your skin. Tears rolled down both of your cheeks. “We’re going to have to work on this, on us,” You squeezed his hands, attempting to give him some form of comfort through the action.

“You’re my soulmate,” Jisung said in awe, the realisation only dawning on him now. You nodded, smiling weakly at him. Your cheeks dimpling.

“I have to tell you something,” He mumbled. The sound barely audible over the rustling of the leaves overhead. You cocked an eyebrow at him, wondering what it was. Jisung shifted his weight from one foot to the other, clearly nervous. His eyes moving to stare at a fleck of dirt on his shoe. “I-” He stopped himself, shaking his head. He looked at you, his eyes wide. They were filled to the brim with nervousness. Jisung’s heart beat frantically in his chest. Blood pounded in his ears. The words rested on the tip of his tongue, but he could not seem to get them out. “I fell in love with you when we were 15, and it never faded,” He laughed weakly, bringing his palms to his eyes to press the heel of his palm into his eyes.

“I fell in love with you too,” You sighed, “And that’s partly the reason I got so upset when you didn’t call,” You confessed, Jisung removed his hands from his face. You ran a hand through your hair. Jisung’s eyes widened, getting glossier than they had been.

“I’m sorry,” Jisung choked out the sentence, sniffling. He wiped away a stray tear rolling down his cheek.

“We’ll figure this out,” You motioned to Jisung before pointing back at yourself, “this whole soulmate thing. We’ll figure it out. Together,”.

#stray kids #skz #han jisung #stray kids x reader #stray kids reactions #stray kids scenarios #stray kids imagines #skz x reader #skz reactions #skz scenarios #skz imagines #han jisung x reader #han jisung scenarios #han jisung imagines

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