All I'm saying is not every day that a blond British man gets influenced by a purple all-consuming greedy deity, but it has happened more than once.

At least, Philza is lucky he actually told someone and stopped before something worse happened, unlike Martyn because who the hell is he going to tell he can listen to the whispers of the Watchers.

I saw @notsogoodangel's Martyn in QSMP AU and immediately had to open a canvas

(I may have taken a while and it's still a lil wonky, but I'm so out of practice OTL)

Including my design notes on Magpie!Martyn and the differences between his wings and Phil's, as well as the obligatory twins swapping places stuff.

I like to think that they don't even really try to convince people that hard when they swap, but they have the feds completely fooled and those that have figured it out are immediately in on the bit and back them up where they can.

Personally I think it would be really interesting if the Federation were trying to tp Phil in to reclip his wings after they recover in purgatory, and they just get Martyn instead and he's like "???? yeah sure why not, I'm Phil" and they clip his newly created wings with no actual explaination before dumping him at spawn or on top of the wall.

hcs about Gojo Satoru in modern au

Satoru is an ambivert or extrovert who has been striving for communication since childhood, but simply could not do it, until high school. He was an aloof kids who watched the communication of other kids, and when they spoke to him, he felt a lump in his throat and could not answer simple questions, even if he really wanted to answer them

Satoru hates licorice, even if it's with strawberry jam inside or in chocolate glaze

Satoru always starts learning foreign languages with swear words

As a child, Satoru did not understand how to play all these group games that other children usually play, he just watched and left without seeing point of joining something like this. In adulthood, he wanted to figure out what he would feel, for example, when he slides down a slide on a playground, swinging on a swing or hanging upside down. His whole reaction adds up to one quiet 'Well... that was fun…'

Kid! Satoru enjoyed watching insects, and then he became interested in Digimon. He gradually built up a complete card collection, but then he didn't need them anymore

When Satoru has a bad day, he, like Mei Mei, considers it a good reason to satisfy his need for something good, more often it's a purchase made without looking at the price tag⤵️

Satoru, like a magpie, drags all sorts of junk into the house, which he successfully forgets about, and later sincerely wonders where he got it from, and then sells what he purchased over the Internet or gives it to someone

Satoru feels the need to twist/stretch/roll something in his hands, this calms his need to get up and start doing something when he's moments to allow himself to sit around

An adult Satoru has no facial hair. As a teen, he's proud to have noticed at least single hair, although this joy did not last long. Shoko deftly removed a long white hair from a beautiful swan neck with tweezers (Satoru later resented her for a long time, Suguru also fell into the radius of his indignation, although he just breathed next to them)

Satoru has a mild concussion and a slight dislocation of the nasal bone (one day he felt unwell and grabbed the door to avoid falling to the floor, but accidentally hit himself in the face)

Satoru attends a drag queen show as a spectator, where Naoya performs with his stand-up

Satoru has a stupid tattoo on his coccyx and several bad tattoos on his legs, something he did himself for fun and at least two were done to him by Yuuta when he's just starting his career as a tattoo artist

Satoru lives in a state as if he's constantly walking on a tightrope. at some moments he feels nothing, and there is almost no inner monologue in his head, and it seems so empty. and at other moments, on the contrary, he feels too much, that it makes him sick of the fact that he's no idea in what form to express it

Satoru has a birthmark that he claims looks like a cock, and it gives him pleasure to ask others: hey, what do you think it looks like?

Satoru evaluates his anxiety level on a 10-point scale in his phone notes. Also keeps a piece of paper in his wallet with the inscription breathe

Satoru doesn't like coffee and smell of cigarettes, he dramatically sulks when someone accidentally or intentionally turns up next to him at this moment, and clouds of smoke and coffee aroma next to him irritate the sense of smell

Satoru doesn't drink alcohol. But it gives him absolute pleasure to take of compromising materials on all drunk dudes in his company, where he is always sober throughout the evening

Satoru buys bouquets to improve his mood and sincerely appreciates the moments when he's given flowers

As a child, Satoru had a stick of sweet corn stuck in his throat, and he thought that his stupid sweet death had come at that moment. Even after that incident, in his adult life, he retained the habit of dipping it in tea, and then shouting to someone: "hey! bring me a spoon soon, I have a "fire" in my mug here!" and while he waits for "help", sits with mock drama and watches the unfortunate colored corn sticks swell

Satoru always has cold limbs and wet palms due to hypotension, and he likes to swear heartily at his weather sensitivity. Also weather changes cause pain in his joints

Satoru considers animals cute, but in everyday life he's indifferent to it. if his partner/friend/buddy has a pet, he'll treat it just like their roommate, take pictures from all sides and willingly play, but no more. Sometimes he donates money to animal shelter

Satoru plays out an imaginary planned move to another apartment in order to use a minimum of things, but sometimes he forgets which box he put this or that thing in and just buys it again. he's also too lazy to clean up often, but before calling the cleaning company, he usually tries to clean up a little

Satoru has straight hair, which he likes to make a little wavy when still wet after a shower, otherwise he is guaranteed the effect of dirty hair (it all started when Satoru came to Kugisaki by appointment for a haircut, and Todo, who worked with her, taught him the curly method)

Satoru likes a monotonous routine, for example, peeling nuts or seeds from the peel and only then sending the whole slide formed from them into his mouth

Satoru likes to wear cute fluffy robes after a bath

Satoru has a mild form of myopia, but he never uses glasses with diopters and focuses a little longer so that the image becomes clear

Satoru is able to determine the age of graffiti by the abrasion of paints and felt-tip pens on surfaces

Satoru doesn't sing well, but he can beatbox and rap (hc where Kokichi is his beatmaker. why not?!)

When talking to others, Satoru mirrors them to some extent, and at such moments it seems to him that he partially loses himself

Satoru remembers missing someone only the moment he meets them. Since he doesn't have time to think about it, he chaotically switches between his tasks, and sometimes does several things at the same time.

Shuichi & Tsumugi Siblings + Saiouma Avian AU

Shuichi gets lethally injured at work, just detective stuff

hmmm don't like the idea of it somehow changing his personality, but interested in seeing him adjust to having to do things differently, learning how to function again, perhaps use new abilities and that resulting in his personality changing

just, getting to see things from a new perspective and needing to readjust his world-view and values accordingly

what if he was a monster hunter prior and now has to deal with partially being one

and what if Kokichi is also one (a monster) and he's the one to show Shuichi the ropes of his new lifestyle

Shuichi gets caught up in what he can't do anymore, but Kokichi comes forward to teach him the advantages of his new form and that different doesn't mean worse

oh and they meet because Shu ran away after seeing himself & finding out he's now "a hideous monster", wanting to hide and never be seen again

so when Kokichi starts mentoring him he also takes him in and they're roommates

not in the classical sense since they're away from civilization and he has more of an "evil lair" rather than a home, but it's big enough for two

he's so insecure about it, even after getting over considering becoming a monster a death sentence he spends the longest time certain Kokichi is mocking him when he compliments him (and he does that a lot)

Shuichi had transplants from a member of the same race Kokichi was born as, it cannot be concealed and whatever he has is considered hot for their beauty standards but he doesn't know it so they have plenty of moments where he's being miserable over & complaining about some traits, how obviously non-human they make him while Kokichi is in the background fangirling over how powerful he is

There have to be claws and wings involved ...at this point I can't go back from imagining them as some sort of bird people

Kokichi is a magpie and his place can be considered an evil lair because he has some stolen goods there, he didn't have to lie about it

raven Saihara

(replying to a question in the Pit, asking for them to be harpies) don't harpies live in a matriarchal society? bc those two live alone in the woods, ig they could be, it would imply that Ouma is a runaway too, just two guys who decided to abandon living in a society, in one nest because they are gay

(another suggestion) You can alter the myth slightly methinks sjfjd or just say Kokichi was outcasted But I can just yell avians if you want to be 100% factual

or that, I was honestly going to name them were-birds and say they also transform in full birds on occasion bc why not, but anything works

once he gets to the acceptance stage he goes back to Tsumugi's lab and apologizes for running off, then he works up his courage to also reunite with his uncle and even introduce Kokichi but only after Tsumugi made sure it was safe, he didn't want to risk it otherwise

"So what do you do for a living, young man?" Ko: "Mostly theft" Shuichi's Uncle, a detective who raised him: looking at Shu, trying to communicate "what did I do wrong?" without words but he grows to like Ouma eventually, after seeing how he improved Shuichi's self-esteem

their getting together moment has got to be around the time Shu realizes Kokichi's compliments were always genuine, so I think the timeline would be first reuniting with Tsumugi,

then getting together because he needed some sort of comment from a 3rd person to realize,

then meeting with some friends he knows wouldn't freak out at Mugi's lab*, those people also becoming Tsumugi's friends so she mellows out and at the end of all that feeling up to face his uncle's reaction, having Tsu set the meeting up

*it's a safe location outside of the city, so they don't have to risk being spotted by random humans

and once his uncle surprises him by being accepting he also meets up with friends he expects to freak out at least a little bit (Momota does, in fact, freak out, but not about Saihara being a monster or disappearing for two or three months, it's about his relationship with Ouma. Shuichi has to explain Kokichi's sense of humour to him so he doesn't get a heart attack)

So I’ve got three AUs here with The Secret Generator 10 Trio, and I drew them all together because they are all connected based on the same idea. In these AUs, instead of receiving their powers from something, they are what their powers are. Basically, Zak is still Kur reborn, but was born a dragon who disguises himself as human, Rex is the Omega (His design is based off of my sentient Omega AU), and Ben is the Omnitrix who decide to become a living being, choosing a human body as his main form. I’ll go into a little more detail to explain each AU, and I hope you enjoy! If you have any questions about any of these AUs, don’t be shy to ask. 🧡 💙 💚 -Zur AU- In this world, Doc and Drew never had any biological kids, as Drew found she was unable to bare any. This did distraught the pair, as it had been one of their long life dreams, but they stayed strong and decided to focus on their work for a bit, deciding on future family stuff later.  Eventually, they came across the Kur Stone with the rest of the secret scientists, and as the story goes Argost snatched it, and the secret scientists rushed into Weird World to retrieve it, losing many of their teammates in the progress. But things take an interesting turn when taking the stone back to base. You see, as the scientists were discussing what to do, now understanding what the stone really was, they all suddenly heard a faint crack...then another, then a few more, and before anyone knew what was happening, the Kur stone slip, breaking open into four pieces as a tiny, baby, serpent-like dragon crawled out. That’s when they realized that the stone was not a stone, but rather an egg, and putting two and two together, the group assumed that this was Kur’s child. Of course, they freaked out, not wanting something tied to the being said to desire to kill all humans to be wandering around the lab, but their panic caused the little infant dragon to panic too, and a chase sparked, with the little dragon rushing around the labs to hide and keep away from these strange people. The young dragon was confused, as it didn’t understand what was wrong, why these people seemed so scared, though one of these people did catch his eye, the woman with white hair. He had seen her first when hatching, and developed this strange attachment to Drew. She ended up being the one to corner the baby, who came up with a...odd idea somehow. Reaching deep within himself, he found the ability to shapeshift into a human form (Albeit with dragon like features), basing features off of Drew and Doc. This caught the two off guard, especially when seeing bits and pieces of themselves in this child. At first they thought he was trying to trick them, but when they started clinging to Drew, something sparked in the two, this need to protect this young one, who had clearly bonded to them so fast (Drew was quick to scoop them up and be ready to tell the other scientist to a back off).  It was a longgggg discussion with the others, many having concerned and worries, but eventually it was agreed that they could not place Kur’s blame onto his offspring, as it was unfair, and since Drew and Doc handle cryptids for a living, it was best that they looked after him. So, they gave him the name Zak, and their little family began.   Now, Zak is very well aware of what he is and who he is, and is very grateful for his parents for taking him in, despite what he was. The main plot of the series would most likely be the same, with a few differences, like people like the Nagas and Argost eventually thinking that Zak is Kur’s son too. But then the twist eventually comes in that Zak isn’t Kur’s son, he is Kur himself, just reborn like a phoenix. This leads into Zak’s anxiety crises about who he really is and what he could do, just like in season 2.  Zak can also switch between his human form, and real dragon form, though he is able to summon parts of his dragon form, like wings or his tail, if that’s better to use at the moment. He’s quite the magpie too, often collecting ores, gems, jewelry and anything that catches his eye. His loves the outdoors quite a bit, and spends a lot of his time out in the woods or grass fields around his home, connecting with the local wildlife too. He’s also known to straight up hiss and growl, even in his human form.  -Omega Rex AU- After the failures of the Alpha project, the crew on the nanite project eventually moved onto the Omega project, which was being lead by not only Caesar, but his parents as well this time. Based on Alpha’s designs, tweaking them quite a bit, they eventually made Omega, a much more friendly and kinder version of Alpha. Omega started off as mostly robotic, being tested on and merely hanging around the labs until needed for something. But like all of Caesar’s project, things started to change, and Omega started to become something more. It was little things at first, Omega asking little questions, curious about the world and people in it. Then Omega started mimicking people, copying human mannerism and even style of speech. People caught on quick, and become a little nervous, given Alpha was kind of the same when he started to change and eventually go rouge. They kept an eye on Omega, making sure nothing went down hill, but instead they went an opposite direction, taking a more wonder filled out look on life, wanting to know a lot about life and what it meant to be living. There were mixed responses to this, some telling Omega that they were just a robot and nothing more, others wanting to see where this would go.   Omega seemed to follow three people the most, Caesar, Rylander and Van Kleiss, each peeking his interest in different ways, each one seeing and treating him differently. Caesar often regarded him as one of his great inventions, and was enjoying seeing where Omega was going, and how they were growing, and while there were moments that Caesar treated him a little more human they he would admit, he tried to keep it professional and just say Omega was a tool. Rylander was the kindness to Omega, and would be happy enough to answer their questions and let them understand life a little better, often thinking he saw a spark of a soul in Omega’s eyes from time to time. Van Kleiss was intrigued by Omega, especially when Omega seemed unphased by Van Kleiss’s off putting nature. Like Rylander, he was fine to answer him questions about the world and life, though his negative views on life due to past issues made things a little sad for Omega to hear, even trying to ‘comfort’ the man despite Van Kleiss telling him not too. Then, the nanite event happened. It all happened so fast, but that didn’t matter in the end as Omega awoke with no memories...not even their own name. Left wandering the world now being infested with EVOs, he eventually ran into the Hong Kong Gang one by one, where he started to developed a more teen like personality, and even got the name Rex from them. This made that desire to be something more, something alive, stronger, and that feeling stayed with them even after he left the group, lost his memories again, and got picked up by Six and Providence. At first, they had assumed he was an EVO, but once they realized he was something else, a living nanite it seems, they kept him around in hopes he could help, especially after seeing he could cure EVOs and talk to other nanites.  Rex is very curious, and still mimics quite a bit, you often seen him copying gestures from Six and Holiday. Not in a mocking way, but more so like a little kid taking after the adults around him. He’s still learning a lot about being ‘human’ so he does stumble quite a bit, doing things like saying a phrasing wrong, not understanding latest trends, and sometimes forgetting the body limits of a normal human. -Omni-Ben AU- While Azmuth was alone, isolating himself in his work for the Omnitrix, he eventually managed to complete it. However, while he was having it do some test runs and look overs to make sure it was ready, he came to find that the AI may have been a little more advance than he was expecting, for the next thing he new, the Omnitrix shapeshifted into the form of a 13 year old human male. Of course, being highly confused, Azmuth questioned his creation, and the Omnitrix explained that, after looking through the DNA is had, seeing all the different speices in the galaxy and seeing how they live, how they work, they wanted to be like that too, wanted to be alive and real. They had picked a human as their man form as they enjoyed the idea of how humans grow, how individualized they are as a species. Azmuth thought about it, but finally agreed to let the Omnitrix try this out. For the next two years, still living in isolation, Omnitrix and Azmuth started up a simple life living together, Omnitrix even calling him father, which Azmuth was fine with and grew accustomed to. However, Azmuth never let Omnitrix out of the lab/base, for he feared what was out there that could try and use his creation for awful things, and with the Omnitrix alive and sentient, it made that fear worse. But, of course, things couldn’t stay the same forever, as one day Vilgax came knocking and demanded the Omnitrix. Azmuth was quick to tell his creation to flee, despite the Omnitrix’s hesitation. But, unable to deny orders from his father, the Omnitrix fleed as Vilgax followed after, taking Azmuth as his prisoner just in case.   Needing somewhere to hide or run too, the Omnitrix thought back to some of Azmuth’s stories, recalling the tale about a human called Max Tennyson, who had once defeated Vilgax, and was well known by the Plumbers. Given the Omnitrix had a human form, and knowing Max’s history with the Plumbers and Vilgax, he decided to find him, making his way to earth and crashing there. He had been following Max’s Plumber signal (Which was in the rust bucket), and ended up being found by Gwen, who took him to Grandpa Max. After explaining his situation, Max agrees to help, and after some debate, Gwen could come too.  The three begin to travel across the USA, going to old Plumber bases to collected needed weapons as Vilgax was on their tale, and looking for help in the matter. Needing to blend in with humans, Gwen helped Ben get an outfit that could hide him (Not quite the one up above), and used some make up along with an eye contact to cover up anything he couldn’t remove from himself, and eventually gave him the name Ben. Ben is quite...alien, for lack of a better term. Given he was isolated with Azmuth his entire life, there’s a lot he needs to learn and understand. He is quite smart and quick to pick up on things, but does stumble up in the moment. He’s found that the world outside it quite big, bigger than he realized, and now he’s experience so much, even new emotions he thought he never had, but...he does wanna see more of the world and what it has to offer.

#3 What is that one scene that you’ve always wanted to write but can’t be arsed to write all of the set-up and context it would need? (consider this permission to write it and/or share it anyway)

Fun Meta Asks for Writers

Adding the link to the ask game at the start this time, 'cause this is gonna be a long one, y'all. 😂

Where do I even begin? First of all, @angie-leena​, thank you so SO much for sending me this ask! It was the kick in the ass I needed to get me to actually write this scene, and for that I’m extremely grateful. I still don’t know if I’m entirely happy with the finished product, but it exists now, and that’s something.

So some of you may remember (if anyone actually follows my ramblings, haha!) that I’ve been simultaneously complaining about and obsessing over this gigantic WIP I’ve had since fucking March 2019. Nearly two and a half years have passed since I put the first word to paper, and oh how I’ve loved to cry out in frustration about how I have about 12k written on the stupid thing and yet not a single scene finished.

AT LEAST

NOT UNTIL TODAY

YES, I’VE DONE IT. I’ve finished a scene on this amazing, wonderful, and incredibly stupid WIP, and I could just cry.

FYI for anyone who doesn’t know what the fuck I’m talking about (which I’m sure is everyone, ‘cause I don’t expect anybody to remember this insane thing I’ve been shouting about all this time, LOL): this is the Slytherin My Gryffindor WIP. Yes, that is a working title. 😅 I will find a better one.....some day.......Ron/Draco is the main pair, but there will also be plenty of others sprinkled in the background.

Anyway, about this ask and that context I haven’t been arsed to write yet...

Context required in order to understand this scene 😂:

Fred Lives AU

The Muggle world and the Wixen world has kind of mixed in recent years, and it’s very common for magical people to be using Muggle technology

The Weasley twins have opened a second shop in Diagon Alley...selling sex toys (yes, really)

Their first original product line issssssss..........dildoes shaped like the Weasley brothers’ own dicks (and a fleshlight kind of thing for Ginny)

Yes this is crack!fic (but, like, also not???)

Ron has been made general manager of the shop and is there all the time, as they’re incredibly busy

Draco wants 👏 that 👏 D 👏, but is worried about Ron finding out, so keeps coming into the shop randomly hoping he won’t be there (and of course he always is)

Eventually there’s a day where Ron’s in the backroom, Charlie’s visiting and helping out at the register, and when Ron emerges, Charlie informs him that Draco Malfoy has just run in and bought Ron’s dildo

Cue Ron being incredibly turned on by this notion

So that pretty much brings us up-to-speed for this scene - it’s been a few days now, and Ron’s been trying to figure out a way to contact Draco to talk to him about the whole thing, since they never became friends or anything after the war and don’t regularly talk unless they’re just seeing each other around

The fic is meant to touch on, like...fame in the aftermath of the war (i.e. why anyone would be interested in sex toys modelled after the Weasley siblings in the first place)

Ron has evolved from his teenage self and grown to hate the fame - it prevents him from being able to date, because the press can never let him keep anything private

After this scene, the fic will focus on Ron and Draco developing a sexual - and eventually romantic - relationship (originally under the guise of “testing out” other products from the shop together)

They will try their best to keep their relationship a secret, but, like...everyone knows 😘😘😘

Also Draco is a model in this one (not important for this scene, but just thought you might want to know 😂)

In addition, some warnings/content to make note of before reading:

NC-17 (smut incoming!)

Technology circa 2005

Phone sex

Semi-public sex

Sex toys

Both Ron and Draco are a little drunk (but very consenting!)

Crack taken way too seriously

Of course, this hasn't been betaed or Britpicked, so I apologize for how very rough it is right now, lol. It will likely be a little (or a lot!) different if I ever actually finish this whole fucking fic and post it later on. I am treating this scene like a “sneak peek” of the fic, because I definitely do still want to try to finish it someday...

HOLY SHIT, I had a LOT more to say about it than I thought. 😅 So anyway. Scene under the cut.

Friday night at the Dragon's Head was packed. It took a bit of initiative, but Ron, Seamus, and Dean finally managed to snag them all a table in the back corner, hoarding the extra seats till Harry and Neville finally arrived, trailed closely by Ginny and Parkinson ― who were curiously short one blond wizard.

Ron tried not to think about it. He bought the first round with Harry, listening to him chat about the recent Puddlemere match against the Magpies. They ordered nibbles for the table. Ron munched on chips, his heart skipping every time the door opened across the room and another few patrons trickled in.

He was on his third pint of the evening when he started getting antsy. He sipped his Simison, using the light smoke curling around the rim of the glass to discreetly glance around the pub, hoping to spot a familiar head of blond hair in the crowd. His foot tapped impatiently on the floor.

"Is he coming, then?"

Ron's head snapped to attention. Ginny checked the door as well before turning back to Parkinson.

"Who?" Neville asked, snagging a vinegar-soaked chip from the bowl in the center of the table.

"Malfoy," Ginny said, craning her neck to see her girlfriend's screen.

Parkinson tapped away on her mobile, shaking her head. "No. Says he's already curled up with a bottle of wine and a good book, and doesn't fancy getting all done up."

Fucking hell. Ron drained the dregs at the bottom of his glass. It wasn't often Malfoy joined them on a mostly-Gryffindor outing ― not unless Parkinson could convince him. Somehow, Ron felt he should've known it wouldn't be in the cards tonight. Conversation pivoted again, and Ron ran his fingers up the sides of his empty pint, thinking.

At some point, Seamus and Harry set off to get another round, and Ginny hurried away with them after a quick peck to Parkinson's cheek. Neville and Dean had gotten into a chat about proper Mimbulus mimbletonia care, and Ron saw his chance. He could feel his heart start to thud in his chest as he cleared his throat, raising his voice to catch her attention.

"Parkinson?"

She turned back from watching Ginny leave, a small smile tugging at the corners of her mouth. "Yes?"

"Think you could give me Malfoy's number?"

The smirk she gave him in response made his hands shake a little as they drummed against the tabletop.

"Whatever for?"

Ron stared her down, knowing full well any excuse he told her would never be enough. Parkinson's expression was predatory ― as if she already knew the answer anyway. He waited for her to comment, bracing himself.

To his surprise, she instead dug her mobile back out of her handbag.

She turned the screen towards him, and he typed the number directly into the dialer on his phone. He waited a few minutes until everyone ― Parkinson included ― had moved on to other things and forgotten about him, and then slipped from the table.

Ron shouldered his way through the crowd to the loo, pushing inside and locking the door behind him. It was a small room, hardly bigger than a broom closet. There was a toilet and a sink, a grimy mirror hanging above it, and a dim ceiling lamp that barely lit the space.

Ron backed up to one side of the room and slumped against the wall. He gripped the phone in clammy hands. Those pints had picked a perfect moment to hit him all at once. Ron blinked away the creeping dizziness, staring down at the numbers glowing dauntingly on the tiny screen. He'd been unable to get it out of his mind for days ― the image of Malfoy riding his dildo ― and now that he had a way to contact him, he was frozen. The leaky faucet dripped, the sound maddening as it mingled with the rush of blood in his ears. This was stupid. This was so bloody stupid.

He hit call.

Ron held his breath, cupping the phone to his ear. The line rang and rang, until he started to realize he didn't have a plan B. What if Malfoy didn't answer? What if he had to leave a voicemail? What would he even say? He should've just texted him, damn it.

Then, suddenly, the ringing stopped. There was rustling and a mumbled, "Bloody useless thing." Then, louder, "Yes?"

"Malfoy?"

"Yes, this is ― Weasley?"

Malfoy sounded surprised. Ron breathed out gradually, his heartbeat slowing with it. Malfoy's voice was clear and present on the other end. No looking back. He tried to think of something to say, and only came up with one thing.

"Haven't seen you round the shop yet this week."

"Don't tell me that's really why you called." Malfoy sighed, trying to sound put-upon, but Ron could hear the hint of nerves underneath. "If you must know, that would be because I found what I'd been looking for."

"I know."

There was a sharp intake of breath on the other end. For a moment, Ron thought Malfoy might hang up. But then he cursed quietly. "Damn that brother of yours. Incorrigible."

So it really was true. Charlie hadn't just been taking the piss. Ron felt a warmth flare up in his belly, spreading down to the tops of his thighs.

"Try growing up with him. And the twins? Now that's a real nightmare."

"I was trying for discreet, but you were always there."

Ron leaned further back against the wall, staring up at the dark ceiling above. He thought of all those times Malfoy had dropped in at the shop, only to hurry out again if Ron ever came too close. Malfoy had jumped at the chance when Ron had been called away to the back that day.

Malfoy cleared his throat. "Well. You know. So what, then? Looking to mock me for it?"

"You always assume the worst with me. Why is that?" Although Ron couldn't exactly blame him. He hadn't given Malfoy much else to go on in years past. Neither of them had. "No. No, I was calling because…" Why had he been calling? It had seemed such a natural thing when he'd asked Parkinson for Malfoy's number not five minutes ago. "I was curious. If there was, er." He waved his free hand, searching for the words. Nothing sounded right. "Any particular reason for it."

Malfoy laughed ― a short bark of a sound. "I mean, obviously yes. It's a sex toy, Weasley."

Ron snorted, taken aback. "That's not ―"

"Actually, I thought it'd make a nice statement in the middle of my dining table. It would be an excellent conversation piece for dinner parties."

"For fuck's sake, Malfoy, I didn't ―"

A chuckle rumbled through from the other end of the line. There was that snark again. Merlin, it made Ron hot, his skin blooming from his collar up to his ears. He chewed his lip, pulling back the grin that threatened to spread across his face.

"I only meant ― was there a reason? That you'd picked mine?"

The line suddenly went quiet. Ron had to check his phone just to make sure the call hadn't dropped.

When Malfoy finally replied, his voice was soft, uncertain. "What would possess you to call and ask me that?"

Ron breathed in slowly, his hand tapping an incoherent rhythm on his thigh. "Well, I'm a bit pissed, to be honest," he admitted, still feeling the slight burn the Simison had left in his throat.

Malfoy didn't say anything more at first. The lamp above buzzed as the faucet continued to drip. Ron could hear the noise from the pub pressing up against the other side of the door.

Then, Malfoy said, "Maybe there was."

Ron felt his heart jump into his throat. "Was what?"

"A reason why I bought it," Malfoy said slowly, deliberately. "Figure it out, Weasel."

Oh, bloody hell. Ron took a shaky breath. Every nerve felt like it was on fire.

"And...how was it?" Ron heard himself ask as if from very far away.

Even over the din of the music beyond the bathroom door, he could hear Malfoy swallow. "It was good."

"Oh, ta." Ron chuckled despite himself.

"No, I mean...Bugger." It was nice hearing Malfoy so flustered. A rare occurrence, and one that the little fluttering pixie in Ron's stomach very much wanted to repeat. "It was brilliant, alright? Happy?"

Brilliant. The word tingled down Ron's spine. For some reason, he couldn't wipe the smile from his face. Bloody hell, was this really happening? He thought of fleeting insults thrown in the school corridors all those years ago ― then he thought of a night just a few months ago, the look in Malfoy's eyes as Ron told him about the shop.

"You wrote a song about me once, if I remember correctly," Ron said, feeling deliriously happy.

"I suppose I did." Malfoy sighed.

Ron's eyes flicked to the door, to the noise of the crowd beyond. "Why didn't you want me to know?"

"Oh, please, Weasley," Malfoy said bitterly. "Pick a reason."

"I know, but ―" Ron tried to argue, but Malfoy cut him off.

"You don't owe me anything. It would be incredibly unfair for me to expect you to be interested in return."

Ron supposed that was fair enough. He'd had similar feelings towards Malfoy until very recently.

"I would be, though. I mean ― I am."

Saying the words out loud gave them a weight Ron hadn't felt before. He let them roll off his tongue, flattened the tip of it along his lips as he thought about flashes of icy blond hair, high cheekbones, and long fingers swirling around the rim of a glass. He thought of the moment he'd finally realized Malfoy had been looking back.

"Oh." Malfoy paused, seeming surprised by that revelation. "Good to know."

Malfoy fidgeted. Ron listened intently, hearing the breath he released and the scrape of his fingers against his mobile.

"You wouldn't ― ah." Malfoy caught himself, and Ron waited for him to continue, his ears ringing. "Would you want to…?" Malfoy trailed off, finishing his thought with a scoff.

"Would I want to what ― oh."

Oh.

Ron swallowed hard. He wanted to believe Malfoy was asking him what he thought he was asking him, but even after everything, it was almost too good to be true. The long stretch of awkward silence on the other end told him he was right, though, and that made him jittery, his hand coming up to rub at the back of his neck.

"I could be reading too much into this," Malfoy muttered.

"No, no, definitely not. I mean." Ron licked his lips, his mouth suddenly feeling far too dry. "I just don't want you to think I expect this."

Malfoy made a sound, and Ron could practically feel him rolling his eyes on the other end of the line.

"Oh, so you don't ring up every person who buys a model of your cock and ask them how they enjoyed it?"

"What? No, of course not!" Ron stopped, realizing, and laughed at himself. "You're joking. That was a joke."

"Terribly clever, this one."

A sudden jiggling of the door handle made Ron jump, almost dropping his mobile in the process.

"Occupied!"

He fumbled with the phone, his heart thudding wildly. When he put it back to his ear, Malfoy was laughing. The sound made Ron feel weak in the knees.

"Where are you?" Malfoy asked, still snickering.

"In the loo at the Dragon's Head."

"Oh, of course." Malfoy sucked his teeth contemplatively. "Hang on. Is there anyone in there with you?"

Another frustrated turn of the door handle.

"It's a single."

"Good." Malfoy lowered his voice conspiratorially. "Do you want me to use it?"

Ron pressed his hand flat against the door, waiting until he heard the bloke give a huff and storm off. "Use what?"

"Your dildo, Weasley."

The silken drawl of Malfoy's voice spread like gooseflesh across Ron's skin. "Right now?" he asked incredulously, although he was already half hard at the thought.

"I could give you an exclusive product review. Unless you don't want to."

"No, I do!" Ron replied quickly, and Malfoy laughed again, making him blush.

"Eager, are we?"

"Yes." Ron passed a hand over his face, trying to laugh as well, but it came out shaky. Merlin, it had been all he could think about for the past few days. Still, he'd never imagined Malfoy would offer it outright. "Just didn't take you for the phone sex type."

Malfoy hummed. "You caught me in a randy mood. Now how do I ― ah, right."

Ron assumed he'd been put on speakerphone, as there was now an echo. He dug out his wand for a moment and cast a quick Silencio on the bathroom. It was a wonder how he had the brain power to spare, when all the blood in his body was suddenly rushing to his cock. He could hear Malfoy fumbling for something on the other end.

"Where are you?" Ron asked in return, trying to distract himself from the heady thrum of anticipation.

"In bed. Naked," Malfoy added with a hint of a smirk in his voice. Ron groaned, shutting his eyes against the image of Malfoy stretched out on soft sheets, hard and waiting for him. Merlin, had he been naked the whole time they were talking? Ron pressed the heel of his palm to the crotch of his jeans.

Malfoy went silent for a moment, until there was a faint intake of breath. His bed creaked distantly in the background.

Ron licked his lips, cupping his hand around the solid, hot line of his cock under his trousers. "Are you prepping yourself?"

"Of course." Malfoy breathed out steadily, the bed creaking again. "You're bigger than I thought you'd be. Although I'd always wondered."

Fucking hell. Ron arched against his hand. Was he really going to get his cock out in a pub toilet? The last shred of his resolve melted away when he heard Malfoy moan, low and guttural, a sound that shot straight through Ron, all the way to his toes. He imagined Malfoy laying back, his knees bent up, and slick fingers down between his legs, pressing in and out of his puckered hole. Ron was switching the phone to his left hand before he could give it a second thought. He flicked open the button on his jeans and pushed his pants down to hook under his balls, taking himself in hand.

Ron rolled his hand down over his length. Malfoy's breath hitched, and he cursed, the bed shifting with him. Ron caught his lip between his teeth, wondering how many fingers he had in him. He imagined himself leaning over Malfoy on the bed, licking a hot stripe along his neck as his hand worked him open, his thighs falling open as he settled between them.

"Fuck, I needed this," Malfoy breathed. Ron moaned, pulling his foreskin back and rubbing over the weeping head of his cock.

Malfoy muttered a Cleansing charm, and then a drawer was pulled roughly open nearby. Ron heard Malfoy pick up the phone, moving and setting it down again as he bounced on the bed, adjusting himself.

"Are you ―?" Ron wanted to ask, but he couldn't finish the thought, left hand gripping the phone hard as he tried to steady himself.

"Yes, gods."

Ron paused, listening as Malfoy shifted and panted on the other end. He didn't have to ask when it was fully in. He knew the moment Malfoy's breath faltered, the gasp he gave sending shivers down Ron's spine.

Malfoy huffed, the sound so loud to Ron's ears as the whole world funneled down to a point, to this moment as he listened to Malfoy move the toy inside of himself. He moaned, and Ron thought he could hear the squelch of lube on the other end of the line as it entered him.

"Talk to me, Weasley."

Malfoy sounded wrecked. It was enough to make Ron's toes curl just to hear it. It was almost too much to handle ― the idea of Draco Malfoy being thoroughly fucked out by a dildo modelled after Ron's own cock. Ron's head thunked back against the wall. His hand trembled a little as he began stroking himself again.

"Get on your knees for me," he said softly.

Malfoy swore. Ron heard him flip over, his panting breaths suddenly closer to the receiver. In his mind, he could see Malfoy bent over the bed, arse in the air and cheek pressed against the mattress, lips rosy and parted. He imagined himself knelt behind Malfoy, hands gripping his slender hips.

"There's, uh." Ron swallowed. "There's a self-shagging feature. If you want. The spell's ―"

"Oh, we're well acquainted."

"Fuck," Ron moaned. No way he was going to last like this. He rocked his hips, thrusting into the tight circle of his fist. Malfoy sounded like he was trying to collect himself, even as his voice broke on the last word. Ron couldn't begin to explain why that aroused him so much, but he didn't care, already speeding up his hand as it flew over his cock.

Malfoy cast the spell, and Ron felt his cry as the toy began to move on its own. The bed gave a jolt under Malfoy's weight. He gasped again, and Ron heard his fingers scrambling across the sheets.

Ron could almost see it. He imagined Malfoy's bowed back, his knees slipping and spreading apart, his toes curling. The bed creaked with each movement. A dildo of Ron's own making, Malfoy arching back onto it as it fucked him down onto the mattress. Merlin, he should've known Malfoy would take it so well, his eyes rolling back as he listened to the sounds Malfoy made as it thrust into him.

Ron closed his eyes and felt like he was sitting in the room, watching the whole show, watching a copy of his cock pound into Malfoy again and again. The pub outside the bathroom door fell away from him, and all he could focus on was Malfoy's voice and his hand on his own cock.

"Tell me how it feels," Ron choked out, wanting to hear it, see it, touch it, to watch Malfoy unravel under Ron's hands and cock, to capture each cry with his tongue.

Malfoy groaned. "So ― good ―"

"Tell me," Ron rasped again, thrusting his hips forward into his hand. "Tell me ― ah ― how good it is."

"It's so ―" Malfoy cried out, his hands skittering over the sheets. "So good ― so big ― I ―"

"Fucking hell, Malfoy."

At that point, Ron didn't know if he wanted to be watching the toy fuck Malfoy or if he wanted to take over for it. Was he really getting jealous of a dildo? He wished he was there. He wanted to tell Malfoy as much, but he couldn't manage it, instead moaning loudly as he felt his balls begin to draw up against him.

"Fuck, Weasley, you're gonna make me come," Malfoy whined, his posh accent slipping. 

Holy shit, and that was what did it. Ron made a gut-punched sound, his wrist flicking over the head of his cock. He was coming almost before he'd even realized. He barely had the presence of mind to do anything about it before the first spurt had dribbled onto the floor. He pushed off the wall and lent forward, pumping the remainder into the sink. He heard Malfoy swear, and Ron slumped back against the wall again, listening as he came apart with a shuddering cry.

The line went quiet once more. Ron rested his head on the tiles behind him, closing his eyes, holding his softening cock. For a long time, all he could hear was Malfoy breathing on the other end, his own heartbeat equally loud in his ears.

"I liked that. A lot."

Eloquent as always. Ron half expected for Malfoy to say just that, but instead he heard a very soft chuckle ― and then, quietly, "So did I."

Now that his heart rate was gradually slowing, the noise of the club outside wormed its way back in, reminding Ron of where he was, and what he'd just done. He shuffled his feet uncomfortably, glancing at the door when he heard a chatty couple pass by. How long had he been in there? Were the others looking for him?

Another person suddenly banged on the door, and Ron started, pushing off from the wall and quickly withdrawing his wand, disabling his Silencio and spelling himself clean.

"Right." He wanted to say more. Merlin, he did. But instead all he said just then was, "Well, I should probably, er, get back to it. You know?"

"Of course." There was rustling on the line, and then Ron was off speakerphone, Malfoy's voice close and intimate again in a way that made him shiver. "Have a good night, Weasley."

"You too, Malfoy."

Ron exited the bathroom, ignoring the irritated look the other patron gave him as he slipped past.

The entire way back to their table, he felt like he was floating on a cloud. Harry gave him an odd look when he slid into his seat, pulling the fresh pint they'd bought him an indeterminable amount of time ago towards him. Ron couldn't even begin to catch up with what they were all talking about, his mind drifting to thoughts of Malfoy, his mobile a leaden weight in his pocket as the night wound on.

*tiptoes in* . . . Nox Verse, Wings AU? or a different verse, if you like, but Wings AU plz?

Ohhhhhh.

Ohhhhhhhhh okay I have.

Little to no experience with Wings AUs or what tropes people usually put in them but I do love the concept of Humans With Wings so okay-

Same rules as Nox!Taur verse, Nox came from a canon timeline where wings were not a thing, he and Ardyn got flung into an alternate timeline where wings were a Thing, proceeded to freak out over WINGS ON THEIR BACKS WHAT IN THE WORLD.

Also gonna make Ardyn a Fem!Ardyn in this AU just like Taur verse because that amuses me.

Everyone has bird-like/feathered wings of some kind and what animal they most resemble is often considered a hint to personality but that’s just- stereotyping nonsense really. Anyway, species of wing varies even in families, but tend to run along similar lines. Birds of Prey will often have Birds of Prey kids, but if the parent is an eagle, the kid can just as easily be an owl or a falcon as they might be an eagle etc etc. Wing culture is ... a Thing. Like not touching wings without permission, grooming being a Major Family or Romantic Bonding experience and flying is also totally a Thing.

Ardyn and Nox, understandably, give more than a few people heart attacks over how poorly they care for their wings and Cid takes it into his head to FIX that asap after meeting first Nox and then Ardyn. He is ... more than a little flabbergasted when both are just like “show us how it’s done” because that means- touching their wings. They trust him like that? They ... no. No they probably are idiots and don’t get the significance so he will TEACH them that but also Cid is an Emotion when they still let him touch their wings after his explanation on Wing Things.

Ardyn and Nox are just super grateful to have someone who will explain his stuff because Galahd wing culture is a little different so Axis is not much help and Dave never thought he had to say anything.

The royal line are almost exclusively birds of prey but there are some exceptions. Usually the big ones like eagles and stuff but sometimes hawks or even vultures (Mors was a vulture btw). Regis is a golden eagle. Clarus is also a golden eagle while Gladio is a bald eagle and Iris is an outlier as a red-tailed hawk. Cid is a house sparrow, Cindy is a pretty warbler of some kind. Weskham was a Canadian goose. Ignis is a chickadee because they’re pretty and Prompto is a fluffy burrowing owl.

Cor is the world’s most aggressive and Fite Me™ barn swallow.

Mock his wings and you will be Stabbed™. He is faster and more maneuverable than anyone here barring the incredibly rare hummingbird.

Then you have. Nox. And Ardyn.

Ardyn and Nox are both owls.

This is ... extremely unusual, as no Lucis Caelum in this AU has ever been an Owl. Not in recorded history at least. Eagles, Falcons, Kites, Hawks, even Vultures, but never Owls. Considering the night’s association with daemons, owls are even looked at with some suspicion in certain places, considering owls are also nocturnal creatures.

Ardyn laughs quietly as she tends her tawny, red, white, and black speckled plumage of a barn owl. She finds it funny. Nox’s wings are especially amusing to her.

Nox is a snowy owl. Silky white feathers with black specks in them, the one owl that is known to go about in the day, yet is still associated with the night because of all its night-flying kin. She suspects that their wings are a subtle message, especially after learning that young Prince Noctis of this world is not an owl, but a speedy and pretty merlin (I think they’re called pigeon hawk in North America?).

Stuff goes down ... kinda like canon Nox verse? But during the marilith raid Nox actually doesn’t warp Noctis away, instead getting there early enough to save Noctis’s wings and back and picking a fight with the Marilith, so Regis shows up, freaking out from the attack AND Cid’s phone call moments earlier to see the Marilith getting torn apart by an absolutely FURIOUS stranger. A teenager with massive, bristling wings of a snowy owl and glitter eerie white-orange colors in the firelight only to turn eerie blue-white as they reflect the light of-.

An armiger.

A powerful, complete, deadly armiger that is NOT Regis’s and cannot be Noctis’s because his son is huddled there in the arms of his wide-eyed nanny, watching the teenager stranger tear the daemon apart with magic that feels thick as a tidal wave and all but screams fury-fury-don’t-touch-MINE-DON’T-TOUCH-.

The marilith dies and teen stands there breathing hard, wings mantled and fluffed, armiger spinning around him in deadly circles.

Then Regis reaches out and touches his magic to the stranger’s in awe-shock-disbelief-hope-confusion and-

The teen looks at him with blue-blue eyes and Regis has just enough time to see his own features in a younger face, to see that face crumple with something like fear and hurt and longing denied while the heavy magic tangling with Regis’s SCREAMS a mix of love and fear and loss and hurt and longing-

The teen disappears and snap-crack of a warp.

Anyway Regis investigates because of course he does and he drops in to visit Cid without calling ahead because of Cid’s earlier phone call and finds one fluffy and worried Ardyn Izunia pacing in the kitchen of Cid’s home.

Much shouting happens.

The shouting wakes up Nox, who manages to drag himself out of bed long enough to bowl Regis and Co over with angry magic before passing out on the floor, which leads to an EVEN MORE UPSET Ardyn.

And then everything kinda goes to Nox verse canon with Nox waking up in the Citadel and Ardyn being there and Noctis being adorable as he talks them into staying.

Some other thoughts on a wing-fic AU:

Nyx is a lesser striped swallow.

Btw human wings are not nearly as confined in color/plumage as the birds they take after, with human boys and girls often getting the colorful plumage where the Actual Birds are much more rigid in who gets the pretty feathers or not. No one knows why. The only people who care are the taxonomists.

Lib is a blue heron.

Tredd is a northern cardinal (and proud of it, most Furia’s aren’t northern cardinals but rather other small birds but oh boy does Tredd love having red wings to go with his red hair. Luche is a Sigh). Luche is a woodpecker of some kind. Axis is a falconet.

Pelna is a grouse of some kind.

Titus is a harpy eagle.

Crowe is not a crow, Crowe is a magpie. Anyone who cracks a joke about that will get their nose broken.

Emperor Aldercapt is a cassowary. Because I Said So.

Oracles are like- Owls almost exclusively. No one knows why. It is thought that the first Oracle Aera was actually a swan, but 99% of Oracles are owls (am I totally making a hint that the original Ardyn of this dimension had a kid with Aera who went on to be the founder of the Oracle line after Aera was murdered and the wings were the Astrals tweaking things to be a permanent, silent reminder of Somnus’s sin in killing the first Oracle? Yes. Yes I am). Of course there are OTHER people out there with owl wings, but Oracles are the ones who just- keep having owl wings, no matter who marries into their line.

Luna is the first tawny colored Eastern Barn Owl in the line in a long time as most Oracles are True Owls (so like- Screech Owls, Great Grey Owls, Horned Owls, etc etc).

Ravus is a Great Grey Owl.

Hope that satisfies your ask anon!

Sleepwalker

Some angsty Vampire AU, lets see what Magpie gets up to at night.

Vespers was at his aunt’s bedroom door, it was like clockwork.

He’d knock politely to wish her good morning or goodnight. Tell her he saved some dinner for her in the fridge if she wanted it. He’d leave at sunset and only then would she come out. She slept most of the day anyways.

Magpie was aware this was her home but she felt a stranger in it. These were not the same photos on the walls she remembered, some of the furniture was different. She did not understand how to work the coffee pot in the kitchen, it was so much more high-tech then what she recalled. She did not understand why she had photos of a little boy she recognized as her nephew but then there were more of him older and older, and she looked older and older. She did not recognize the red headed girl that lived in the house but felt she should, though…. the redhead was almost never home now. Magpie knew what she did, she was one of them now….but instead of anger she felt… sad, like she had lost something. But another part of her… understood.

Who was she?

And she realized the grown boy who called himself her nephew was slipping in that direction too…. how should she feel? What about his oaths as a hunter? What about her own?

But then again, Magpie’s own brother had not come to see her once. Even when she begged for him over the phone. What had happened? What had she forgotten? Where did they grow so apart?

Magpie ate the dinner set aside for her cold. She didn’t trust a microwave with that many buttons and didn’t have the energy to use the stove. Her world was fragmented, confusing, and exhausting. All she wanted to do was go back to sleep.

So, she did.

Magpie’s dreams were a mess of memories trying to resurface. Sometimes they made sense- snapshots for her to admire. Sometimes a blurry mess of sound and image. For the first time in a long time, she dreamt about a song. She knew this one, a comfort from similar dreams of her childhood. But she never slept deeply with dreams like this and soon became aware her bare foot had stepped on a twig.

Magpie’s eyes flashed open.

She knew that she had done some sleepwalking lately. More than once she woke up by the back door with her feet covered in mud and too tired to care. For some reason she never cared. Tonight however was the first time she had woken up while sleepwalking. She was in the woods behind her house, a flick of something in her mind asking her to come forward.

To Magpie’s surprise, her feet obeyed.

Despite her exhaustion and confusion, old instincts kicked in. She imagined a brick wall around her head. Fighting hard against the invisible pull on her body. She fell backwards with a shout-

And looked up at Jack.

It wasn’t fully him, the wound in his head where she had shot him was still gaping wide, she could see right through it.

Jack gave a dark chuckle, “well Starshine I guess I shouldn’t be surprised you caught onto my game eventually. Even when you’re down you still won’t give up a fight”

Magpie scrambled back, eyes locked hard in the vampire while hands searched blindly for anything that could serve as a weapon.

Jack laughed again and held his hands up in a mock truce. “Come now sweetheart there isn’t any need for that. Our little midnight rendezvous have been going on for a while and you haven’t minded. Granted, I didn’t let you mind but that’s just a slight detail.”

Magpie blinked, his words clicking as she slapped a hand over her neck and felt the pinpricks of where he had bitten her. There were several actually, no wonder she had been so exhausted.

“Now darling,” Jack continued, “I want to make an offer. You’re alone and you know it. Family ditched you and all. Hell, the only two that did care about you are off canoodling with a couple bloodsuckers of their own. One even is like me now. You chose to separate yourself, I just saw an opportunity when I was in need of a little TLC if you know what I mean.”

Magpie snarled, grabbing a fallen branch and swiping at the vampire. Jack doged easily however, grabbing the branch and yanking it out of her hand.

“I just wanna talk Love. No tricks, no nothing. Come with me, I messed up your memory and I’m the only one that can fix it. All I ask is is you-“

“Off with you.” Magpie hissed.

“And what are you going to do all alone Starshine huh? You have no one and nothing. I’m the only one that can help you-“

“You did this to me to start with!”

“Well you set me on bloody fire!”

“You killed half the town of course I did!” Magpie screamed, “and I would do it again and again!”

Jack gave a twisted grin, “and what about old Red huh? She’s like me now, will you go after her? What about your nephew’s beau? Will you stake him?”

Magpie paused, a flood of emotions she couldn’t even begin to process hitting her.

Jack grinned and held out his hand, “they abandoned you anyways. Why stay?”

But every morning the boy who called himself her nephew knocked on her door to wish her good morning…..

Jack took a step closer, “you rather be in the past like me, it’s part of why you can’t regain what you lost. You’re just like me.”

But the redhead was someone she knew was important to her…

“So Starshine, do we have a-“

Magpie walked away.

He screamed her name over and over, unable to cross the boundary line on the house. The one she had originally made, the one both her nephew and the redhead had maintained when she could not.

Vespers came home at sunrise to find his aunt struggling with the Keurig.

“H-here that’s set to an individual cup, let’s make a whole pot.” He suggested.

They made coffee and sat down together, neither talking. Magpie studied his face closely, occasionally looking down at the photographs she had laid out on the table.

“Where were you in this one?” She finally asked.

Vespers’ mouth opened in surprise, for a moment he looked as if he might cry before leaning over to examine the photo.

“You took that at the movie theater, it was my birthday and we went to see a movie together.”

“What about this one?” Magpie questioned as she pointed at another photo.

They continued like this all morning, and not once was Magpie tired.

Write a meta on Loras and how much he lvoes Margaery

YOU’RE GONNA REGRET THIS, I LITERALLY HAD TO PUT IT UNDER A CUT IT GOT THAT LONG

The Tyrells - they bleed green, and Loras is no exception. His family is everything; whatever their differences, he would defend any one of them to the death. He also gets on best with them; he is amenable and amusing and rarely causes arguments - it's almost impossible to rile him to anger - and so he tends to be the keeper of everyone's secrets, and the listening ear to the ineivtable squabbles that routinely break out. He is a source of calm for his mother, a comfort to his ambitious father, and likes to sit with his legs outstretched in the window seat in Willas's room, making snide comments about the people passing in the garden below. Garlan is, in Loras's eyes, the greatest knight to ever lift a sword, and Margaery - well, Margaery may as well be his twin, with the amount that they share (only...not in a creepy Lannister way).

I always headcanoned that they’re closest in age - only a year or two between them, with Loras being the elder; Garlan had already left the nursery by the time they arrived, and besides was different to them in almost every way it was possible to be, so the two were left to their own devices. Up to the age of seven or eight they even looked similar - similar enough to confuse strangers, and sometimes even the poor maids that were set to guard them, and they had the same love for attention and sparkly things, two little magpies. Loras never took on a particularly protective role with Margaery (ha! as if she’d let him) and so there was none of that odd gendered dynamic that sometimes grows up between siblings; instead they were entirely at ease with each other, and she’s one of the only people he shows his true self to - if not the only person, because even with Renly he’s playing the lover.

With Margaery he doesn’t mind being ugly, unpleasant, selfish and self-centred. He can say anything to her; she might judge him, but she’d never actually think less of him. He is far less ambitious than her in almost every way; he doesn’t care for power and only wants to live his life how he chooses, with as little interference from everyone else, with a comfortable enough amount of money that he can buy what he pleases, with challenging people to fight and his family around him - but he’s ambitious for Margaery. He knows full well that she would only be happy by being the Queen, be that literally (in canon) or figuratively (in a modern AU) and so he’ll always work with her to get her to the top. He does so in a way that’s pretty subtle (it shocks people to learn that he can be subtle, but he’s more similar to Margaery than people think), and he has her and her interests at heart always.

Loras’s laid-back, casual, and nonchalant personality balances Margaery out - even when she’s desperate for a fight, needling him, mocking him, and trying to hurt him, he never retaliates, and always soothes her out of her rages. He has a horrible way of getting right to the heart of whatever’s bothering her, which drives her mad, but after she’s stormed out and cooled down, she tends to return, contrite, to talk things over - and he’s always right. It’s Willas who can - rarely - stir Loras to anger (the two are incredibly different) and even in his blackest moods he’s never really cruel to his family, always holding something back. He can count on one hand the number of times he’s really rowed with Margaery, rather than just let her yell herself hoarse at him, and most of those situations were heavily influenced by outside trauma (Renly’s death, for instance, rendered him almost impossible to be around for months, and even Margaery couldn’t sooth him).

I headcanon too that they are very physically affectionate; Loras is like that with all his family, but with Margaery especially. He’s most comforted when they are touching, often with a head in each other’s lap, or an arm linked through an elbow; he finds himself standing with a hand at her hip or on the small of her back in company, and it smothers her, but it’s just a habit that he can’t break. He’s braided her hair more than his own and does so subconsciously if they are close enough together, and he sleeps best with her (again, not in a Lannister way, fuck you). They have very few secrets, and tend to be very hurt by those that they do keep from one another, though it’s usually to prevent hurt or danger.

A guaranteed way to anger Loras (which is, as previously mentioned, a rare state for him to be in) is to threaten or hurt Margaery. His rages in this case tend to be black and violent. He’s too talented a swordsman to be stopped if he really sets his mind to violence - Joffrey was lucky to die at the Purple Wedding, because he would not have lived long if he’d laid a hand on Margaery. Loras would go to war with her; he’s the white knight at her shoulder and has absolutely no shame about it; if anyone accused him of being ruled by his sister, he would acknowledge the fact openly and cheerfully. Why would he not be?

Then he gets kidnapped by the Federation

Obligatory ramble about Watchers/Federation underneath.

So, in the Life Series Martyn can hear the Watchers constantly, which could be because of the Watchers' influence or maybe the Listeners (if CC Martyn has answered this, I am not aware, you are welcome to correct me). In the end, it doesn't matter because he still can listen to them and The Purgatory Watcher as well. I imagine he can listen to anything or anyone under his influence even if they are not Watchers themselves.

But that train of thought led me somewhere interesting: The Watcher is just a (theorized) corrupted overseer of Egg Island, just like Cucurucho is on Quesadilla, and the workers are the same. So that means Martyn could listen to the Federation and the workers and be a good spy.

Like, he probably already would have done that because his favorite pastime is to sneak around and listen to private conversations, but now he could do it, without even entering the Federation building, he could do it passively in a relatively safe place.

So his ass is 100% getting kidnapped because this man wasn't grown or raised in the Federation's grasp, they just took him to Quesadilla to fight the Watcher since he has experience with it BUT they don't really know what Martyn can do.

For @notsogoodangel' Mocking Magpie Au!

A comic? from me? in this day and age? it's more likely than you think! Even if I didn't get around to shading it.

Transcript under the read-more

Page 1, Panel 1:

E: "Oh! Ph1lzA! My Bro! Stick Fight?"

M: "Uh… Sure I guess…" (I don't think I can avoid this one chat)

E: "YOO! He's the GOAT! LET'S FUCKING GOOO"

Page 1, Panel 2:

E: "Good Fight not-Phil!" (Those were some sick combos Bro!)

M: "Wh-!? Is it really that Obvious?"

E: "No no no, I just know Phil's Style"

M: "Oh? How different is it?" (Ouch! You're good!)

Page 2, Panel 1:

E: "Ez! Phil hits hard + fast, like he's ready to fly away the moment he gets the chance."

Page 2, Panel 2:

M: "And me?"

E: "You?" "You fight like there are Hounds at your heels. Like the world is Watching for weakness and your only defence is to bare your TEETH and make the world Bleed until only You stand."

Page 2, Panel 3:

E: (Also you took off the Backpack.) (That was fun!)

M: "Damn you got my number, man!" (That was great) "I'm Martyn btw"

E: "Etoiles, let me know if you wanna PvP!"

The Thieving Magpie Chapter 3: Accused

Note: Y’all I am so sorry for the delay in posting Thieving Magpie as I have a long case of writers’ block due to exhaustation and all. But I am glad I got it through. So I will see if I can post up the new chapter this week as it is gonna be wild and it was super hilarious. Good news I finally caved in and made an Ao3 account so please enjoy this fic!

A few weeks later

Somehow Gascon's breath grew bated, as he looked over the cafe name. That seems strange, Gascon heaved his breath quietly as he tried to ring up that number. No answer at all. Seems that from his impressions with his mysterious client, he thought for a moment they will meet in some dingy pub outside of his apartments, and soon he will lead to some secret cult where he will be passed different passwords, maybe like an obscure reference of a French film or even worse interpretive hand gestures.

Instead, it was something similar as he entered the cafe, no one gave a copious gaze to him, let alone an air of suspicion that lingered by each person. He somehow held his breath slightly.

It should be nothing.

It could be just a regular day to get some coffee. He barely glanced at his phone, following the harrowing news on Meve and the Rivia family’s estates, absorbed by the sounds of small talk (It could be categorized something like either gossip between girlfriends or a business deal), computer keyboards racing furiously for an important deadline and the whistles of steam from the milk foamer. The cashier looked at him pensively “Hello Sir may I take your order…”

“One tall latte please …” and soon he heard a buzz from his phone which reads like “G….the cheque….” Gascon closed his phone again glanced over the pastry cabinet. “Do you want something to go with your latte….”

“Oh...One pain au chocolat” as he scanned over the crowd, there is surely be someone looking for him. He smiled at her quietly as he heard another buzz which reads something urgent “Sorry…could you hold the Pain Au Chocolat… I will take the latte a moment please….”  Somehow he felt his stomach churn slightly, as he quickly dropped the exact change to her. “Your name sir??”

“G….”

Gascon bit his tongue slightly as he scanned over the cafe crowd, where he glanced at a man in a particular suit, he seems to watch him pensively “Why did you stop halfway on your order.. you got something to hide…” Gascon noticed that he started to tap something on his iPad, but he barely turns his head to the computer. "Not much, About the cheque..."

Something is in amiss as Gascon received the buzz from his phone. "Watch..." his ears perked up to the final hiss of steam. “One tall latte for G…” even before he could reach for the collection station. He felt something protruding his neck. Gascon did not hesitate to press a button around his jacket but it came too late as he snatched it away and stomped it on the ground. “We have matters that needed your presence. Our boss needs some airtime with you…”

Gascon rolled his eyes slightly “Should he come to me in the face…” as he saw a small piece of paper “And I suppose he is afraid to give me that thing in the face..” as he slipped it quietly “Would you ever be so kind to let me get my latte…before we speak of terms….”

Slowly another man came by with a scowl in his face. “I am afraid, you do not have the time to dilly dally…”

Meve cleared her throat slightly, as she repressed the trembling fear in her fists. Reynard steadied her slightly “You are brave madam to face them...” as he heard the mummers of the press “I wish this will never happen to you…” “You wish….” somehow Meve’s words grew heavier as she could hear the servants slowly manoeuvring what is left from the auction. Meve clutched her necklace slightly in fear. Her mind swirled with the what-ifs and whys while fighting the blinding flashlights, as she walked to the empty room with faces looking at her with horror and shame. It was once a venue which she could treasure a fleeting moment. But now many who question her liability including a certain Caldwell who sneered at her surrounded her.

“Say Meve… we have been associates for years am I right…” "We did not need to escalate the situation drastically, all you simply need is to tell the press that, you, Meve will give your share as ordinates by your husband and conspired a common thief to steal the statue...You are in love with him..." Meve sucked her breath and stared at Caldwell firmly “Caldwell....what you did is….” Caldwell did not hold back his empathy, as he looked over his heavy stack of documents with glee. “Simple, I oversee your husband writing his will, poor bastard has a shock of his life, at a party not too long while you are pregnant with Anesis. It was lucky that he slipped away from being armed.” He smiled gleefully at Meve “Otherwise I will take it easier, but alas cannot count my chickens before they hatched….”

“Do not mock me…”

Caldwell grimaced quietly “I do not intend too, madam…I have documents all of the years, and you do not have the fight, even Reynard witness our conversations when your husband pen his words in the moment of sanity…"

Meve bit her lip angrily, muting out any sound of anger out of her mouth. Reynard withdraws slightly from the argument. Perhaps to some extent, he was right, however, Meve found it unlawful and thought of someone else. “I have an old friend mine, and his…” Meve muttered pensively to Caldwell “He, too helped my husband to oversee his collection and he will put a case against your head and my sons…”

Caldwell rendered himself silent. Maybe it is out of glee to see Meve holding back the tears. He took that opportunity to waltz out from the room   "I will not play my cards that high if I were you..." Meve could read his expression that he would rather saunter quickly, and Reynard came to her side rather swiftly "Come, I think they all seek you..." Her eyes glared fiercely at him, she only mutters angrily that he will deserve a harrowing end.

Now she must face the show.

Meve struggled to catch a breath, as she looked over the peering crowd who lurked at her vulnerability. They probably have many questions on that scandal. “I speak, in behalf of myself and my family- yes that issue of the missing statute looms in us. I vouch that I will have the magpie in chains, and facing every worse penalty. Yes, I may be grieving..but I beg all to never escalate the situation…"

“Apologies Meve may I interrupt this press statement for a moment…we got some breaking news…"

Soon a harrowing remark came over Caldwell and he deliciously savoured the moments of torment "We deeply regret the death of our client Reginald, yes he may have a tender heart but alas when it comes to that sculpture, which we are working with the law to recover that...." as he pressed the remote control to switch one of the slides to that face. "As of now, we managed to capture him at a designated point, apparently he has been paid highly to rob the statue..."

He glared at Meve cruelly "Initially it was planned that we will take it to court over the will However recent evidence shows that she worked with a con thief..." as he clicked one of the slides to one of the emails. Meve's eyes widened with horror on these words. "G.. attached here are the maps to my estate... you can make your way...". Meve's face grew pale with horror, beads of sweat dripped from her forehead. All lies... all lies...

"I object that..traitors! Traitors! Traitors!"

The press caved in like vultures hungering for fresh meat. Soon Caldwell's men clasped her in handcuffs "As for now…you will be escorted to somewhere to suit your needs under a small court, and your rights to vouch are absolved…” Caldwell’s eyes glanced at her gleefully “Any parting words to the press, before I made a statement that you tarnished your husband’s reputation….” Meve flared her nostrils “Nothing " She could hear a pop in her knuckles as she clenched it so tightly. "I want you to see you rotting in jail, and everyone will forget you... or better…" She tried to steady her breaths by posing herself calmly and giving him a cold shoulder.

“No matter what you said, you will twist my words into heinous lies..." "Now, now, now Meve... controversial... yes..." Caldwell interrupted slightly as he delighted himself with her stiffness "I wish that Reynard would be easily swayed…” He glanced at Reynard glaring at him defiantly, as his hands are locked in handcuffs by one of his men “We discuss a while back, should you took yourself to fight me, I offered him a good sum and lifetime insurance in exchange that he will vouch for me…”

"Sadly he would rather stay with you…”

Caldwell gave a pregnant pause as if to spite her even more. “I knew that Reginald is too soft for him. And knowing him, he rather throws the fire towards you…"

Somehow Meve held her breath, as she looked over at the window of her car- she and Reynard are rendered silent “What are you going to do now...” Reynard pondered at the corner of the window, for the swarms of crowds escort them. Chatter dulled her ears and soon she slipped herself into the black car, Meve shielded herself from the glaring flashes.

“I am taking all who accomplished Caldwell...” Meve sucked her breath. “They will be sorry if they ever crossed with me..” Meanwhile, Meve’s eyes trailed to another car, and she recognised that face. That stupid face. He seems to be in ease with his arrest, along with all of Caldwell’s men trailing the path. He entertained his many fans by blowing kisses into the air and giving a wink. Gascon gave a chuckle as he slipped himself into the police car with ease.

Meve hissed under her breath. He is indeed despicable.

Soon the flashes slowly faded away into the jailhouse. They glanced at the man walking with a swagger of a rockstar. He seems to be unfazed by that whole session. A whisper came by at the distance, as if pleased “Say Meve, Caldwell really kicks your ass…”

“DO NOT SPEAK TO HER LIKE THAT. SHE ALREADY…"

"Shut it... not talking to you..." Gascon growled angrily to Reynard, and he glanced "Meve... Personally, I think he is interested to liquidate you and the sales. My, are you that bloody hopeless. The trial is just a bloody facade. Your sons and that...in the end who will win..Caldwell will get the sales. You are just an obstacle." Reynard glared at Gascon slightly "Well, of course, you guys too...", as he flicked his phone and play some harrowing tune for shits and giggles “What still crossed with me...” He popped his tongue slightly as he focused his gaze on Meve.

“Yes to a certain extent Meve…”

Gascon lamented slightly “I think he is still pissed off over one of his stolen paintings- it is still kept in my room. I treasured it as if it was my life’s work…”

“Wait is that…”

Meve heard about the mysterious disappearance of a treasured painting by Giovanni Battista Tiepolo, depicting the muses crowing Apollo. It is usually a conversation starter in Caldwell's dinners about the mysterious theft of it. Could Gascon himself do that feat? Meve thought pensively, by his casualness "And I suppose you must take things that belong to him..." Gascon glanced at one of Caldwell’s guards staring at him pensively. “Meve... I will tell that another time... ” Reynard glared at him slightly “What are you planning to do? We have no one too...”

“Getting ourselves out of that prison...." Quickly Gascon passed them earplugs, and he too covered it, with his headphones "Just bear with it, it gets pretty loud...." Slowly the speakers started to echo with a brisk march. Reynard raised his eyebrow as he paused the music to change it to a muzak theme "It seems normal…” as he took out a small pen from his blazer "You may want to keep your earplugs on..." Gascon muttered cheekily as he clicked the top of the pen, and soon that tune emits squeaks at the distance, and soon the guards’ faces seem frazzled with that ringing. They only got up again, rubbing the temples before it flicked to another obscure piece.

He has that grin which Meve could read it as, watch and learn... Soon he clicked the pen to the top. That brisk piece boomed through the speakers and soon they went through different rooms to key in the emergency codes for lockdown.

“Now run…”

He gripped the wrists of Meve and Reynard and quickly ran as fast as they could. Soon alarms blared at every corner, and only one who has his headphones noticed the chaos. “Shot they are getting away…” He got out form his seta and chased them without any hesitation. Gascon quickly spray the passageways with gas and cut every communication line with a penknife. Reynard muttered angrily, “Is this your plan, classical music and causing an emergency lockdown how this your plan…" as he tried to push the regenerate force of the way.

“You just have to keep it up…"

Via the janitors’ room, only guided by a handphone torch as their guiding light, they went. To lift their spirits he whistled that tune which was blasted in the court. “We just took a new meaning of ear worm….” which of course Reynard groaned loudly as they made out to the obscure end. For that moment Meve took a sharp breath of air and gazed slightly. “Why did you decide to help us? I thought you…”

“To spite him…” Gascon gave a playful wink to Meve “Remember that conversation in the jailhouse about a painting I stole- ahh I was Apollo being crowned by the muses for its glories and that will be Caldwell screaming to his buffoons.” He quickly showed that post to Meve. She gasped quietly, perhaps her instincts are right. It was that painting which Caldwell lamented.

“Dear gods…” Reynard muttered, “How can you…"

“And plus I have a reputation for escaping through the worse of courts. This one is child’s play…"

Soon he looked over the main road, and quietly they descended to a bus stop “Coast is clear, we need to do is to hop that bus, I will tell you more…” For that moment Meve smiled at Gascon, she was grateful that there is hope. And surprisingly she found herself along with Reynard on the shabby estate. Meve knew that her husband used to come to those places to help the children, and she heard horror stories from people.

But this.

This.

How could it be for a master thief like Gascon?

“Since you are ex-communicated by that hack...” Gascon huffed slightly “and your house will be bombarded by his Guards...” He gave a bow to his guests, and soon men dressed in jumpers and pants came down from the stairs “You have no choice but to stay here, sure it is not a 5-star hotel but at least it is something...”

The stench of mould tingled Reynard’s nose, Gascon quickly took the air freshener and sprayed it quickly “Apologies Reynard!” He hides a burst of boyish laughter. “Seems we have to pull something quick for you guys...” He cues his boys to look over the place while Meve sat comfortably on the ratty couch. “Until we can make plans...”

“So what is your idea...”

Gascon looked over at the city lights “We all know that going out and calling in public is a no-no and given that you become involved with me on the escape...” He heaved slightly “We have to wait it out Meve... until I can think of something to prove your innocence …” Gascon took a beer bottle and drank it “In which we have none.” Meve grew silent. She refused to be called out by Caldwell. “Unless I speak with Fableston. He is an old friend of my husband. He vouches for many cases…I just pray that he does not betray us…”

“And how can you be certain…”

Reynard trembled slightly “The last time your husband and Fableston spoke, it did not end well. I fear he will not look kindly at you...'Gascon nodded slightly as he looked at the city, and Reynard looking exasperatedly on the apartment's condition “And that I agreed with that grumbly folk, who knows what Caldwell pull you in…”

“I will try to call him up, see if he could vouch for you…” Meve glared quietly “With or without your help…”Soon Meve slopped against the couch, the week’s events worn her out, but for that moment Gascon saw the fierceness in her eyes. She seems determined to clear her name no matter what.

Tag List (DM if you wanted to be tagged)

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The Shape of the Soul

Dragon Age Daemon AU, featuring the Origins and Awakening companions. Inspired by this amazing post by @piedpica (who tumblr won’t let me @ for some reason? but go check out their daemon headcanons, they’re amazing). Not included are Leliana, because I can’t top the idea from the above post, Anders, because he’ll be addressed in the DA2 instalment, and the dwarves, because I've adopted the idea from other Daemon AU makers that dwarves wouldn’t have daemons.)

~

Alistair

You wouldn’t think to look at Cara that she was the daemon of a King’s son. And that’s just how Alistair likes it.

He’s never asked anyone what Maric’s daemon was, and honestly, he doesn’t care. No doubt it was something very heroic and glorious, an eagle or a stag, fit to stand alongside his father in portraits, fit to be sung of in tales. But Alistair grew up sleeping in a kennel, and Cara was always going to settle as a dog.

She doesn’t stay as a dog all the time, of course, no child’s daemon can ever stay still. After he’s sent to the Chantry, after he hurls his mother’s amulet at the wall, they both go out of their way to cause as much trouble as possible. When the sisters gather them to pray, Cara pads in quietly as a cat or a little terrier. Then, halfway through the Canticle of Exaltations, she transforms into a great snorting druffalo or an ugly-faced wyvern or even a ridiculous nuggalope, and the drone of voices transforms into yelps of shock and shouts of anger. Alistair doubles up laughing, and keeps grinning even during the chores he’s given as punishment. ‘Worth it,’ Cara whispers, and he has to agree.

But for all the jokes she plays with her changing, she always seems to come back to dogs. Perhaps she's simply trying to be as un-King-like as is physically possible, perhaps she's just being a true Fereldan. It doesn't matter. There's a comfort in it that he finds nowhere else, in having her curled against him at night, warm fur against his skin to remind him that he is not quite alone.

He doesn’t even notice that she’s settled for days, the form she takes is so very like her. It takes him some time to realise she's stopped shifting, that she's taken on the shape of those Storm Coast retriever dogs. One of those none-too-smart looking ones, with the folded-over, floppy ears and the big brown eyes. ‘I wanted a mabari,’ he mock-moans, and Cara opens her mouth and hangs out her tongue in a dog’s way of laughing. ‘I wanted someone with brains,’ she sniggers, and Alistair pounces on her and wrestles her to the ground and they tussle like puppies, letting out breathless gasps of laughter.

It’s Cara that Alistair looks to for reassurance every time the insults fly his way, every time he hears a voice sneer idiot or sees the curl of a lip betray the thought of worthless. Cara is a creature bred on the wild seas, to drag in nets from icy waters and to retrieve hunters’ kills from tangled undergrowth. She rolls around with her eyes laughing and her legs waving in the air, a jester of a dog, but there’s a soldier underneath the creamy pelt. There's strength and endurance there, things that no one sees in him until the Templars press a sword into his hand and the weapon somehow feels like a perfect, natural extension of his arm, things that no one respects until Duncan passes him his Joining chalice. And Cara's pelt is thick, to hold out the cold of a frosted sea. Over the years, Alistair’s skin has grown just as thick against the whispers of bastard and fool.

Loghain betrays them, and Alistair feels like he’ll be snarling inside forever. Never betray a Fereldan, never betray someone with a dog-daemon, never incur the wrath of a man to whom loyalty comes before all else. The murmurs start, that the crown might fall to him, and he wants the earth to swallow him. His daemon is a dog, and dogs don't rule nations. They follow and they serve. ‘We’re not leaders,’ he whispers to Cara.

She rests her head on his knee. ‘We could be.’

And Alistair looks at her, and knows she's right. For all their games, for all their playful tail-wagging and soft fur, her breed are only jokers on the surface. At their core, they are workers, hunters - even guides to the blind. Dogs are made to serve, and surely that's what a king does, just as much as a Warden? Perhaps there’s more to him than he thinks. He already knows there’s more to him than people say. No one with a dog-daemon is a fool.

~

Morrigan

Gwydion settles as the mirror breaks.

He was always changing his shape, just as Morrigan did. She pities the children who can only watch the shifting of their daemons and envy them, the children who have never known what it is to feel flesh meld into fur, to spread wings against the sky or run on velvet paws through midnight forests. She and Gwydion have run together as wolves, flitted through the woods as bats, stalked the verges of villages on cats’ silent feet. They pride themselves on their closeness, and watch the outside world with scorn. None of these poor fools can be so close to their daemons, when they have never taken on their shapes, never seen the world through any eyes but their own.

When Flemeth’s hands cast the mirror down, everything changes. The glass shatters, and Morrigan’s world solidifies. Gwydion, cowering as a rat among the shards of the mirror, twists and flickers one last time, and then flies to her shoulder like a shadow, the dark beads of his eyes glittering at Flemeth across the fragments of her bond with her daughter. Morrigan watches her mother turn her back and leave her, then rises to her feet. She would like to cry, but she knows no one will come, and so she shifts her form into the one that her daemon has taken.

Together, the two ravens lift away into the night.

He could only ever have been a bird, for so it is with all mages. And perhaps he could only ever have been a raven, for Morrigan knows the old superstitions about them. Birds of the night, birds of magic, birds of wisdom and secrets, birds of death. They are not the brazen crows or showy magpies who strut around the cities – they are birds of wild places, birds of the untamed. And Morrigan is a child of the wilds.

Ravens have an eye, too, for precious things, things that shine.  Morrigan clasps a thread of polished stones around her neck and weaves glossy feathers into her hair, but a part of her still hungers for the golden mirror that Flemeth dashed on the ground. And another part of her yearns to go beyond the trees, to find something beyond, something more, because birds were made for freedom and because a creature like Gwydion screams power in his every breath, because no one could look at the shadow-black feathers and vast wings and dagger beak and think that this is a bird that could live in a cage.

It is only after she meets the Warden that Morrigan discovers that Gwydion is a dancer.

The campfire is lit, and the wilds lie far behind them. Morrigan has a new mirror in a corner of her tent, a gift from the Warden, this strange wandering hero who has become, impossibly, a friend. Morrigan knows what happiness is – it is touching the sky on an eagle’s wings and slipping through the night as a fox, it is a spell cast to perfection, it is watching a moon rise in silver light while Gwydion perches on her shoulder. But what she feels as she and the Warden sit fireside together is something different, a kind of contentment that fills her and warms her, until she feels frighteningly comfortable and safe, until her mission and her task seem distant, even unimportant.

And as she wonders at this strange happiness, Gwydion leaps from her shoulder, shoots upwards, and starts to twist and roll in the darkening sky. He twirls wing over wing, diving and soaring and revelling in his mastery of the air.

Her daemon is an acrobat, a creature of joy, as well as a dark omen. And maybe she is more than a witch’s daughter.

~

Sten

She has no name, of course. She is the Sten, just as he is, one part of a greater whole.

The Tamassrans judge much on what shape your asala takes. The snakes and wildcats become Ben-Hassrath, the horses and oxen are clearly born for labour. He was always going to be a soldier, so he felt no great pride that day, long before he was the Sten, when he awoke to see his asala lying beside him in her true form. The golden fur, the heavy paws, the hooked talons – none of it was a surprise. ‘As it should be,’ he said, and the lioness inclined her head.

A lion is a soldier, but a lion is no brute – it is a strategist. It knows that to walk alone is death, that the one is never as strong as the many. It knows that ignorance is a disease, that only knowledge of the bush and the plains, knowledge of how prey thinks and how a hunter should act, will keep it from starving. And Sten, too, is a hunter of knowledge, learning to speak the bas tongue and asking about their world. Someday, the Qunari will rise to bring these people to the Qun, and he will stand in the front ranks of the charge. As a lion must know its prey to hunt it, so he must know his enemy to fight them.

The Arishok asks a question, and the Sten is sent to answer it, because his asala is a hunter and who better than a hunter to go on a search for truth? But then they learn the answer in the harshest way. What is the Blight? the Arishok asks, and Sten learns the answer: the Blight is the darkspawn, and the darkspawn are hunters too.

The Karashok’s buffalo blinks into nothingness as her other half’s head is torn from his body. Ashaad slumps motionless as an axe sinks into the side of his ape. Sten’s asala crouches over him long after he falls, curls over his wounds to keep the blood in, and when she sees the humans she runs to them, straining to the very edge of her bond with Sten, until they follow her and find him. He lives, yet he awakens incomplete. There is his asala, but not Asala.

Sten is a man in three parts – in his body, in his asala, and in his sword. Your weapon is your asala made metal, their strength given shape. He has lost his sword, and with it, the right to his glorious lion-soul. He is no longer a hunter who can track down the Arishok’s answer. He is worth only to be thrown in a cage to await death, and he cannot meet his asala’s eyes as they huddle inside the bars.

But then the Warden brings him into a kith, a new pride, and he no longer walks alone. His sword is returned to him, and he is complete, he is whole. On the road to Haven, he issues his challenge, the way any lion worth its claws will challenge an unworthy leader, for no pride can survive with weakness at the head. But the Warden’s words are enough for him to know that there is no weakness in his new kadan.

He always welcomed knowledge that would make him a better hunter, but now he welcomes knowledge of the Warden’s world for different reasons, because the Warden’s world has made them strong, and he wishes to understand that strength. For long nights by the fire, he and his asala listen to the Warden’s words, and they learn.

They are strange beasts, lions. They are cats like any other – proud, strong of will, free. And yet they know loyalty, and follow a leader who proves worthy.

The Warden is worthy, and Sten and his asala have a great deal of loyalty to give.

~

Wynne

Sometimes, Wynne wonders if it’s right. Daemons settle so early in life, before anyone can truly be who they will become, before anyone can truly know who they are.

She certainly didn’t, and when she looks at her daemon now, she sees something very different to what she saw back when Solomon settled. She was young, then, full of pride in herself and in her magic, in how her daemon settled so long before her Harrowing. She was proudest of all of what he became. So many of her fellows had to wait until they were thrown to the demons before they could know the shape of their souls, and so often they came back with ragged, nervous sparrows and terrified little wrens, scarred forever by what they’d seen.

But Solomon found his shape years before she was Harrowed, and it was a good shape for a girl so full of pride. Talons, and a little hook-bill, and great piercing black eyes. Mages have birds, it’s a rule of the world, and so Solomon became the newest addition to the Circle’s aviary, a beautiful tawny owl.

Wynne is rather ashamed to remember what she thought of him, back then. She saw only power and cunning, the marks of a predator. And so she snapped at Aneirin as she pushed him harder and harder still, while Solomon added screeches to her complaints. Only after Aneirin ran, and the Templars marched after him with steel glistening in their fists, did she remember those old superstitions about the wisdom of owls. Only then did she have the courage to feel ashamed.

She was not born with wisdom. There was so little wisdom in her the day that Solomon settled. Wisdom comes only from experience, from knowing that your fierceness has driven away an apprentice into the blades of the Templars, from having a son taken from your arms and into gauntleted hands, from decades of teaching pupils and coming to understand that it is not an owl’s sharp senses and cunning that she needs, but its patience. Owls can sit and watch for hours, so silent and still that you might not see them even if you walk right past them. And Wynne has learned to do the same, to sit back and watch, to perceive, to not judge the people around her but to know them.

Solomon is gone now, of course. When that demon fell upon her back in the Circle, she saw him reach feebly for her with one wing, then flicker out of sight and into nothingness.

It was the last thing she ever saw. And then a spirit embraced her, and she woke.

‘It’s a good shape for you,’ she says to Faith, who sits beside her in Solomon’s form. The Warden and the others mill about the fire, talking and laughing, utterly unaware that one of their companions is only alive because a spirit replaced her dead daemon an instant before the Maker could claim her.

Faith turns and looks at her. The spirit rarely speaks, but Wynne knows it’s waiting for an explanation, the way she so often knows what it’s thinking. It has become her soul, after all.

‘An owl is a creature of patience,’ Wynne says softly. ‘And faith is all about patience.’

Together, they sit in silence and watch.

~

Zevran Arainai

Elves are vermin, and their daemons prove it. Zevran has seen plenty of them in his time – ragged city elves with patch-furred rats clinging to their clothes, scruff-feathered pigeons on their shoulders, mangy cats slinking at their heels. His mother, with her fallow deer, was different. That’s the way it is with the Dalish. Their souls take the shape of forest creatures, creatures that can never be tamed.

Aeno both breaks the rules and keeps them. Dalish elves are forest creatures; city elves are vermin. Zevran is a city elf with Dalish blood, and Aeno becomes both.

An assassin can’t have some lumbering beast following them. As his peers’ daemons settle, the ones whose souls become clumsy dogs and horses are the first to go. Those who remain have sharp-taloned birds, venom-fanged snakes, cats that see in the dark. And then there’s Aeno, who switches one day into a sinuous little creature, creamy-white underbelly and dark russet back, tail-tip black as coal. She winds around his neck and bares her tiny dagger-fangs, and Zevran chuckles. Stoat is not a pretty name, but she’s a pretty creature, and more importantly, she is dangerous.

Weasels are vermin, that’s true for Aeno as it is for Rinna’s silky mink. But Aeno was not made to rummage through refuse or slink through street corners. Her place is the forest and the fields, where her wild kin hide among the long grass, waiting for prey. She’s a perfect companion for an assassin – small enough to meld with darkness,  to scurry ahead through shadows to listen and watch, to carry a vial of poison in her teeth and slip the contents into a waiting cup. And those little teeth… they may not be long enough to tear open a throat, but just try fending off Zevran’s dagger when a stoat’s fangs are buried in your hand. And a stoat is really a lion, shrunk down to be pocket-size, all the ferocity and power crammed into the sleek little form. The meadows are its savanna, the fat rabbits its antelopes. But the stoat does not simply spring from cover and give chase. It bounds in twisting leaps in full view of its prey, not chasing them, but hypnotising them, entrancing them until the fangs are near enough to strike. A rabbit is twice a stoat’s size, and only wit brings them down. It’s the same with princes and noblemen, men and women who think their wealth and influence gives them armour. The stoat is a dancer, and so is Zevran. He knows that a word is as deadly as a dagger, a kiss as fatal as a knife. And so he and Aeno master all those things, he and his tiny little murderous soul forging a life for themselves in blood, until -

Until Rinna's mink twists away and drifts apart into nothingness, and even while Zevran laughs, Aeno is frozen and silent on his shoulder. And then they learn the truth. Death would be easier than life with the guilt, but Warden spares him, saves him, and makes him look at Aeno with new eyes. Without the eyes of the Crows upon him, she seems different. Less of the vermin, more of the beast of the wilds. A beast of freedom. The word is strange to him, almost foreign, something that sits uncomfortably on his tongue and yet is so very, very sweet to taste. When Taliesen falls still in the alleyway, the word becomes stronger, nearer, truer. And he and Aeno are facing new prey, very different prey to pompous nobles and former comrades.

‘Don’t you worry,’ Aeno says, and shows her teeth in a grin. ‘An archdemon will die like a prince.’

For the Warden’s sake, Zevran is willing to see if she’s right.

~

Nathaniel Howe

When a man grows up in  a cage, no one should be surprised when he grows wings. Or talons.

Diana always favoured the shapes of hunting birds. The servants whisper behind their hands and his family brazenly speak the words aloud, he may be a mage, and the thought doesn't frighten him as much as it should. What would change, if he were taken to the Circle, if he swapped one prison for another? But as he grows older he sees that they’re wrong, that it’s not the spark of magic that gives Diana her wings, but a longing for freedom. He grows up crushed by his father’s glare, trapped by the resentment that hangs in the air between his parents. He sits in the trophy room, gazing at the prizes won by his ancestors and longing to share in their glory, and Diana perches beside him as a hawk, a kite, an eagle. And he thinks, this is the glory I am capable of. Look at my soul, look at the shapes she takes. Nothing can hold me back.

As soon as he’s old enough that people no longer suspect him of magic, it gets a little easier. The killers of the sky are good daemons for nobles, souls that mirror the falconry birds they carry on their gloves. His father tells him that Diana should become a gyrfalcon, the bird of the nobility, the glorious white-and-grey hunter kept by kings, and Diana tries, she does, she takes that shape again and again as if trying to force her body to stay in it. When she settles at last, though, her back is the dark blue-grey of slate, her form small and sleek, her eyes piercing yellow. His father purses his lips and turns away, because the peregrine falcon is a commoner's bird.

Despite all his father's disapproval - or maybe because of it - when Nathaniel is sent away to the Free Marches, he doesn’t learn a nobleman’s trades, doesn’t pick up the sword, the shield, the lance. He learns how to set a snare and follow a trail and make an infusion of herbs that will spell death for whoever drinks it – and he learns to fire an arrow, to place it so precisely that he can kill a dragonfly on the wing.

Diana is the soul of a man who is both nobleman and assassin. Something in him always wells up with joy when he sees her rising in the sky, sees her fold in her wings and drop, slamming towards the earth like a thunderbolt, the deadly stooping strike of the fastest animal in Thedas. She never falters, never slows. Never misses.

And yet their wings are still clipped, their freedom kept at bay by his father’s name.

The Warden comes and, impossibly, offers him forgiveness and a future. And for the first time, Nathaniel sees his daemon as she was meant to be, hunting free against truly dangerous prey. And the name Howe is no longer a shackle, because with every darkspawn he slays, every fragment of the truth he learns, every moment he spends in the Warden’s company, he purifies the name. And so at last he is free, and he knows that he doesn’t have to cast off his name to stay free, nor to be a good man.

‘I didn’t need to be a gyrfalcon,’ Diana tells him quietly, and he nods.

‘Nobility,’ he says, ‘has another meaning.’

~

Velanna

Again and again as they grow, Velanna and Nanlen hear the words, spoken and sighed and tutted by their clansmen. You never listen.

Which is true, and they are unashamed of it. What reason do they have to listen, when no one around seems to have anything to say to them? When no one has anything worth saying? The other children shun them, turn their backs because Velanna has no idea how to take part in their purposeless games, and so they stand apart and alone. They stand in silence, where they feel most comfortable, and they study the histories, hunting down knowledge and lost lore. Their solitude is met with rolling eyes and scornful glances, and none of them seem to care enough to realise how much it hurts. Pain hurts to live with, and it's easier to turn it into anger. And so they bristle and snap and insist that they know best, and Nanlen changes to show it, so that any other Dalish who tries to quarrel with them will be met with a snarling fox or hissing wildcat or a kestrel with glaring eyes. Even his very name burns. Nanlen, child of vengeance, a name that makes the hahrens swap glances and murmur their misgivings. Only Seranni can ever soften them, persuade them to stop a moment and think. They listen to Seranni, because Seranni cares enough to listen to them.

Nanlen settles not long after Velanna comes into her magic. The Clan seems to think that Velanna doesn’t hear the things they whisper to each other. ‘Keeper Ilshae’s got a struggle on her hands,’ she overhears one of the hahrens say. ‘Even the shems barely ever train goshawks. They never listen.’

But Velanna can be nothing but proud of her magnificent daemon, his feathers the colours of stormclouds and silver and snow. The goshawk is exactly what she is: the living embodiment of the wildest and most dangerous parts of the forest. Its talons are fierce as the thorns of the sylvans, the thorns that Velanna summons to her side in battle. And how can she not be proud of having a daemon who cannot be tamed or trained? The shemlen come and burn the forest, force her clan away with smoke and flames. Velanna aches to punish them, something within her crying out to tear and rend, and when the Keeper cowers away from dealing out justice she feels her rage erupt.

‘We’re Dalish,’ she snaps at the Keeper. ‘We are the last of the Elvhenan. Never again shall we submit.’

Nanlen throws out his wings and lets out a screech, and while Ilshae sighs, Velanna smiles. She pities the fool who thinks anyone could make a goshawk submit.

But then their pride kills their brothers and sisters, and Nanlen seems to change. ‘Velanna,’ he says, ‘we led them to death because we would not listen.’ But Velanna closes her ears to him, just as she always has to everyone. She doesn’t want to hear it, and she unleashes a hawk’s rage on the shemlen who made it happen, shreds them with her thorns the way Nanlen's wild cousins rip apart their kills in their claws, until –

Until she is made to see that she was wrong.

Ilshae was right. She was not ready to be Keeper. Because a Keeper’s task isn’t about being right. It’s about listening. Listening to the lessons of their ancestors, and listening to her fellows among the clan. Listening in the way that Velanna can never do, the way that a goshawk can only do if you show them patience and a reward.

The Warden offers her both.

‘It is not submitting to admit that we were wrong,’ Nanlen murmurs to her. ‘You can follow another without submitting to them.’

And so Velanna follows the Warden, and drains her Joining chalice, and marches out with the others against the darkspawn. To find Seranni, to avenge her kinsmen. To learn, at last, how to listen.

~

Justice

He knows much of demons. But these daemons – these strange, speaking, shifting creatures that the mortals call their souls - they are far, far beyond his understanding.

At first, when the Warden tells him what they are, he almost reaches for his weapon. ‘They’re not demons, they’re our daemons,’ the Warden tries to explain, tells him that they’re not the Fade’s dark entities masquerading as animals, that the spelling’s different, as if that matters – but in the end, it’s Kristoff’s memories that make him understand.

The dead Warden’s mind is full of images of his living soul, a dark-furred Orlesian shepherd dog. Her name was Mariette, and he adored her. It’s a love of a very different kind to that he felt for his wife, somehow less complicated, but no less intense. In every memory, in every vague glimmer of Kristoff’s childhood and in every vivid recollection of a battle fought, the daemon is there. A constant. Unchanging, like a Fade spirit.

From Kristoff’s memories, and from what the Warden tells him, he learns that no is quite sure what daemons are or where they come from, only that they are bound to the Fade, which is why Sigrun and Oghren walk alone, with no companion beside them or on their shoulder. These creatures are somehow linked to the Fade, to his home - but they are not demons, he realises. They are not spirits, either. They are exactly what his newfound mortal allies claim they are: souls.

Justice watches, and so he learns to respect them. For he sees how so very often they represent the better parts of his friends’ natures. He sees, for instance, how Velanna’s silvery hawk sometimes gives her a long, patient stare when her jaw clenches with anger, as if reminding her to be calm. And he sees how, when Anders tries to cast off his responsibility for his fellow mages – people suffering under an injustice that makes fury stir in Justice’s heart – the dark-eyed magpie on his shoulder turns to him and gives him a sharp, reprimanding peck.

And one night, as they travel across Amaranthine to their newest task, he sees how his friends’ daemons curl up against them, and he feels something that terrifies him. He envies them. He envies the completeness they seem to have, the closeness. Jealousy is for demons, and he tries to banish the thought, because it makes him fear what he could become, but it stays and it stays and it stays.

None of them are sure what will become of Themis, when Anders offers himself to Justice. ‘I’m willing to take the risk,’ she says. ‘Perhaps it won’t affect me at all.’ But it does, of course it does, because Themis is a part of Anders, and Justice becomes Anders, and so he becomes Themis too, and so he sees the suffering that has been wrought upon the mages, and the Templars will pay, and the Circle will be ripped apart, and he will tear down every last enemy until the mages are free, and the magpie screams like a mad thing as veins of blue flare beneath her feathers –

As they struggle through their life in Kirkwall, Justice looks at her through Anders’s eyes, and feels a terrible wrenching guilt. ‘I’ve changed you,’ Anders says, his face tear-streaked and flushed, after the night they lose control and attack the mage girl. ‘I’m sorry, I’m so sorry.’ And Justice wishes he could reply, I have changed you too. You are not the man you were when your daemon settled. I have made a distance between you, I have brought you farther from your own soul, and for that I am sorry.

And as if she knows his thoughts, Themis raises her head and looks sharply into his eyes – and yes, they are Anders’s eyes, but the part of Anders that is Justice knows she looks at him.

‘We are all one now,’ she says.

And Justice feels, despite everything, a faint pulse of pleasure. Because he no longer needs to feel the envy that he harboured, when he thought of Kristoff’s love for his breathing soul. Because Themis is his daemon now, just as much as she is Anders’s.

Perhaps I am not only becoming more demon, he thinks. Perhaps I am becoming more mortal.

Once the thought would have frightened him. But now, when he sees Themis, it gives him comfort.

(p1) okei, what i think I can gather about you from your art/writing,(bare in mind i haven't read your long fics/most drabbles yet tho). Your 200+ OC's of different nationalities show you want to live in a thousand cultures, have a thousand lives and live in every part of history, but as you cannot, you have 200 OCs which is almost like containing 1000 souls (very relatable tho).... But 200+ OCs and your longest AU's are massive, show yeah 👀👀 And you enjoy ships that bicker... cos....

(pt2) cos the intimacy needed for that is HUGE. You love the 'i love you, i hate you, but i cannot escape from you' -> bonus points if it's history, language or culture that ties your ship together. Additionally: -completed devoted to the one they love (and would suffer for them) is a dynamic that interests you -u think the italian language is hot af -i get the feeling that michele is either how u want to be loved (idyllic love), or michele is how you love, cos that's your comfort ship (sic/ire)

1. That's pretty accurate! I have this fear that I'll never have enough time on this earth to do what I want (but I've been working on getting rid of that fear. There's enough time). I'm so fascinated by the world that we're living in, what used to be and how it relates to what is. The endless multiplicities of identity that a group can contain or even an individual.

So indeed, I make OCs based on what I learn about the world and in turn the OCs give me a good way to interact safely with the knowledge I find. It's a perpetuum mobile of creativity and knowledge.

And history is just the entirety of human experience on this planet, so trying to breathe some more life into it via Historical AUs is one of my favourite ways to engage with it. I love writing term papers as much as trying to apply the scientific findings to actual people. (I think one of my favourite things may be Sexuality in the res publica AUs, the do's & don't's that aren't the same as they are now. I freed Michele & Lovino from their catholic guilt, only to immediately constrain them with the class & gender expectations of the Roman Republic lmao).

2. I never thought about it like that, but yes! I enjoy bickering because it's an admission of closeness! You can't have friendly bickering if you're not close! (Which is why Hugo & Alois Are Like That. I enjoy them constantly mocking each other greatly, but it's never friendly and it always ends in a mess).

My family had and has its shares of problems, but I know that we love each other. Immensely. We're also that kind of family to constantly poke fun at each others, so I think that's why I instinctively resort to this kind of dynamic, with any kind of close relationships. It's not the ONLY one, because that would be boring, there are so many more ways to express love and it naturally doesn't suit every kind of character.

(I just remembered when we were at the lunch table and my dad spotted a magpie on the stable roof.

Mom: " ... why are my curtains pulled back again?"

Dad: "So that I can watch magpies.")

Here are some more non-romantic examples from my work/with my characters:

AA(The last one was a response to a tiktok that was basically "Asking your nice friends for fashion advice vs asking your mean/honest friends for advice")

3. I DO love the "i love you, i hate you, but i cannot escape from you". Maybe also for personal reasons, we're not getting that private on here. It's one of the inherent tragic aspects of Hetalia that has fascinated me for a long time: They're human and they feel like humans, but they lack part of their free will. They somehow have to survive entire lifetimes, loving and hating and remembeand worse, they have to bear decisions they themselves don't necessarily make. The relationships they form with the only other people like them, whether it'd be bonds of platonic, familiar or romantic love, the only solace and stability might have, may be snatched away from them. It can turn to hate or grow cold or another nation can disappear afterall and there is nothing they as individual people could have done about it. It's a double-edged sword - You tie yourself to someone who could be your raft as well as sink you to the bottom of the ocean.

I inevitably ended up keeping this kind of relationship in my "Like Father Like Son" Universe. Now, quick disclaimer - I am not saying they are solely the victim of their circumstances. They're all criminals in my AU and I have zero patience for making excuses for the Organized Crime. I worry greatly about the problematic aspects of my work and am well aware of them. The last thing I ever want to do is actively romanticize the Mafia. I want to add for the following part, too, that I draw as much on the real world as possible, but the structures of the organized crime in LFLS are a little more reminiscent of Monarchy or Aristocrazy.

With that out of the way however, the worldbuilding in LFLS mirrors their existence in Hetalia. Escaping their position would come with great dangers, even though their existence as is will never allow them true happiness. They're different from the people around them and there is a special connection between the Hetalia characters as bosses here - All of them inherited this position. They all basically suffer under the same yoke, they all are faced with the same difficulties. And, like in Hetalia, some of their decisions are out of their control. Business overrides their private life. They have to look out for their own people and families, for their own survival, so they may hurt the ones they love. And yet, and yet, they cling to one another. Try to make it as functional as possible. Take the pain for the relief. It's not pretty, but it's fascinating as an onlooker and fictional tragedies are also a great outlet for one's own emotions.

4. That also kind of ties in with "completed devoted to the one they love (and would suffer for them) is a dynamic that interests you". Hells yeah it does, because two people losing themselves is beautiful. Yes, it can be toxic, yes one should take care of oneself and have boundaries. But unconditional love is something I believe we all yearn for and I hope I one day get to devote myself to someone else again, as much as is healthy.

Again, it's also not just perfect for lovers, but for siblings and guardian figures. Paddy would lay his life down for Harry, Charlie & Soph. ("There's no pain that I won't go through/Even if I have to die for you" - Starset; "I love my children more than anything in this life! I will chose their happiness over mine, every time!" - Slightly changed version of Congratulations from the Hamilton Mixtape).

Gilbert who's so eager to be here for Ludwig and to protect him; to take anything off his brothers shoulder that he can.

And on the romantic side, is there anything better than two people simping head over heels for each other??? Or when a character wants to kiss/fuck another one so bad that it makes him look stupid??? I also love more quiet, more serene relationships, but to appreciate their calm, you have to make a storm to compare them to. All storm or all calm only gets you bored and exhausted.

5. Hell yeah do I think the Italian language is hot af, who'd disagree with me? It also unlocks emotions that were previously unavailable when I listen to Italian music. (German does the same. There is just something to each language that it can express certain feelings in a way like no other). YOU tell me that you listen to Shimmy Shimmy by Takagi & Ketra and aren't hypnotized by Giusy's voice. No other soundtrack for my Sicilians, Greeks and Turks fooling around on a beach and being highly erotic with each other.

6. Hm, this may be tying in with 2 again. I think I'm more of a Harry, personally, to be honest! (Nerdy, got aggression problems, cheeky, hothead, can't really cook). I think SicIre is my comfort ship because it's the type of love my parents had. It's what I am most accustomed to and there's also just a beauty in not caring what the rest of the world has to say and doing your own thing. And Harry isn't the prettiest bloke on the block and will probably never think of himself as beautiful, but that is fine because Michele looks at him like a sky full of stars. And the entire world can tell him Michele's a bastard, Harry won't listen to them. From a hetalia standpoint, these two are islands who had to suffer a lot from foreign occupation and being regarded as backwards & weird. Sicily tries to keep the autonomy it has and makes sure that others know they aren't like the mainland and Ireland fought hard for its independence from the British empire. From a LFLS standpoint, Harry embraces Michele with all of his past baggage and jagged pieces. Harry is the first person Michele never fell out of love with, the only one, and he's here to reassure Harry that he is worth caring for every step of the way.

Kowalski’s #2

A bit more of the gradence bakery/coffeeshop AU Parts 1 & 2 on AO3

original!percival graves/credence barebone teen & up fluff, awkward flirting, slow burn 

I’ve been an anxious magpie recently and this fluffy cuteness has been about all I could manage just the ticket (apologies to anyone waiting for replies, reblogs, anything at all - I will be with you as soon as I can).

More below the cut. Thanks to @pangaeastarseed for all the ideas XD

*

The man returned the next day, just as he'd said he would.

Much too late, after he'd stepped through his own front door, after he'd showered and fixed himself something to eat, Credence realised he'd never asked his name.

He knew it, of course. He’d heard the man answer his phone curtly: “Percival Graves”. But he couldn't let on that he knew until Mr Graves told him that himself.

Now he was here, sitting in his usual spot far from the window, and Credence didn’t know what to do.

He’d been joking, obviously, when he’d said he'd needed good friends. No, not joking, just… Just being nice, taking an interest in the poor shop boy with the nervous manner and badly-fitting clothes. People did this, Credence had noticed; threw him kindly and pitying smiles. And sometimes they acted like he was an idiot – they spoke too loudly, too slowly, and forced eye contact as if correcting a poorly-socialised child.

Mr Graves hadn’t done that. Not yet, anyway. He’d barely seemed to notice Credence until he’d plucked up the courage to offer him a cupcake. And after that, well… It had been something to puzzle over in quiet moments.

All of his quiet moments, if he was going to be honest about it.

Credence tugged his sleeves down into his fists, and checked his pad was still in his pocket. Mr Graves looked up as he approached.

“Morning, Credence,” he said, smiling at him over his book. “The usual please.”

Credence felt himself blush, and all because Mr Graves had remembered his name. It made him want to hang his head in shame.

“There’s-” Too quiet; he stopped and began again. “There’s some specials, if you’re interested? We’ve got some sourdough rye just baked and Mr Kowalski made rugelach fresh this morning.”

Mr Graves’s gaze grew more intent. Credence felt his blush spread further, hot across the back of his neck.

“What would you recommend?” Mr Graves replaced his bookmark, as crisp and new as the book. “Friend to friend?”

“Oh, uh…” Credence swallowed. “I don't know what kind of things you like. Apart from your usual, that is.”

Mr Graves’ eyes jumped to a spot beyond Credence's right shoulder, where the menu hung over the counter. A line appeared between his eyebrows, and he worried his bottom lip slightly. Credence realised he was staring and dragged his attention back to his order pad, clutched tight in his hands.

Mr Graves rubbed his chin. “You're right,” he said, even though Credence had not said anything which needed agreeing with. “I always have the same thing.”

He studied the menu again, and then picked up the folded one on his table and studied that too.

“What do you like, Credence?” he said, in a low smooth voice. His eyes, when he raised them, were very warm and bright and penetrating, and suddenly Credence couldn’t look anywhere else.

He almost dropped his pad. Something lurked underneath the question which he was a little afraid of, and more than just a little ashamed of being afraid of. He wound the edges of his sweater around his knuckles and forced his gaze downwards, away from Mr Graves’.

“The, er, pecan fudge pie is my favourite,” he said. “But everything is good. Really.”

There was a silence which went on so long that he risked a glance up again. Mr Graves looked quite different, much less intense, almost sheepish.

“Ah, I’m sorry,” he said. “I’ve made you uncomfortable. I didn’t mean- Well, yes, I did mean, but I’m not as good at reading signals as I used to be.”

Credence had no idea how to reply to this, but it didn’t matter as Mr Graves just went on talking. In fact, he seemed quite agitated, which made little sense to Credence as he was the one who’d fallen short of expectations; the one who didn’t know how to behave in situations such as these.

“Recently, you see, the ground under my feet turned out to be much less certain than I thought,” Mr Graves continued. “And it’s thrown everything into question. Especially myself.” He rubbed his forehead. “I’m sorry,” he said again. “It was an honest mistake, I didn’t mean to impose. You seem like a sweet kid and I’ll just leave you alone to do your job.”

“No!” Credence said, before he could think about it. “I mean…”

He trailed off, and stood there stupidly until Mr Graves pulled out a chair for him.

“Sit,” Mr Graves said. “This is a conversation which requires sitting, I think. I promise not to pounce if you do.”

Credence laughed; he couldn’t help himself. But then Mr Graves smiled and looked so handsome it made everything worse. How was he supposed to explain?

“You didn’t make a mistake,” he said. “But you might make one anyway, with me. I’m- I’ve got some problems - and I’m working through them - but I don’t think I can be what you’re looking for.”

Mr Graves fell into a thoughtful silence, and Credence couldn’t blame him.

After Mr Graves had frowned deeply at the sugar dispenser for a touch too long, he stirred and said: “Don’t you think it’s a little early in our acquaintance for the ‘it’s not you it’s me’ speech?”

Credence blinked in surprise, but Mr Graves carried on.

“I appreciate your honesty a great deal,” he said. “But, with respect, you have no idea what I’m looking for.”

Credence felt he should protest, or maybe just curl up in a corner and die, but he did neither. Mr Graves spoke with grim and weary determination, and it brought out a curiosity which overwhelmed anything else he might feel.

“To be fair, maybe neither do I,” sighed Mr Graves. “In fact, your statement could apply just as well to me. You’d probably be making a mistake with me, too - I doubt very much I’m what you’re looking for.”

Credence smiled a little. “But you don’t know what I’m looking for, either,” he hazarded.

Mr Graves gave him a long look, his expression regretful. “Someone with a lot less baggage, I imagine,” he said.

“Do you have problems, too?” asked Credence.

“Many, many problems,” said Mr Graves. “Too many.”

“Oh.” Credence couldn’t think what else to say. He wanted to ask about them; would’ve liked to have told Mr Graves that that made everything easier, because then things might be more equal between them.

“I think we’d better stick to Plan A,” Mr Graves said. “Let’s be friends, and see how that works out. I'll rein in the flirtation, and you just- You just carry on being you.”

And really, that was so much more than Credence could have hoped for, even a day ago. He smiled, widely, probably far too much - but he didn’t care.

“What’s your name?” he blurted out. It sounded a trivial question after everything else they’d said. But still he didn’t care.

Mr Graves looked abashed again. “God, I didn’t even introduce myself,” he said, and briefly put his head in his hands. “It’s Percival Graves. But my friends call me Percy.”

Credence’s smile grew a bit wider and a bit shyer. “Nice to meet you, Percy.”

Percy offered his hand to Credence and shook his mock-solemnly. “It’s very nice to meet you, too.”

Parts 1 & 2 on ao3

Daemon AU - Growing Pains

Titouen’s settled. Sally isn’t pleased. From @coloneljamesmoriarty‘s daemon ‘verse.

He wakes to see Verena curled around Sally, who is clutching something in her hands.

"T, we had a plan," she insists. "A plan. What happened?"

English, he notes. She wants this public.

"Magpie?" He calls.

"Titouen settled."

"You don't sound happy."

She raises something above her head, but he can't make it out. "Look at this!" She calls.

He pushes himself up and closes the distance between them. Titouen stares up at him, indignation shining in his eyes.

"He's cute,” Sally groans. "He's not supposed to be cute."

"Can I see?"

She deposits the daemon into his hand, and leans back, pouting. Verena nuzzles closer to her, her head resting on the girl's lap.

"Not a bad set of talons."

"Central."

Titouen ruffles his feathers. "It was the best I could do."

"Large bird of prey. How could you forget large?" Sally moans. "No one's ever going to take us seriously."

"What? I don't count," Central asks in mock offense.

She shakes her head. "You're not who I'm worried about."

It takes him a moment to realize what she means. "Oh, Magpie."

"Come on. I'm screwed the second we broach camp. We both know it. Just. Just leave me out here. It's easier."

"No," Verena says. "It's not safe."

"It'll be a more merciful end. "

Verena glowers. "Not funny."

"Please don't make me go."

"Magpie..."

"Central, they're all gonna laugh."

"'m sorry," Titouen finally manages.

Sally's shoulders droop, and she gently scoops the daemon from Central's hands. "Ah, petit oiseau." She presses a kiss to his head. “Je sais.”

--

Titouen is perched on her shoulder strap, talons sunk into the mesh pocket.

"It's just ... you've got Verena. Volk's got Nadya. Maman had Thomas. Papa had Cécile. I wanted something to compete with that."

“It’s not a competition.”

“People see Verena, and they know you mean business. They’re gonna see Titouen and think I’m a joke.”

Titouen twitters.

“Don’t think you’re helping your case, T,” Verena says.

“You sound like a squeaky toy.”

Titouen takes off, settling instead on Central’s shoulder, and glowers down at his partner.  He reaches up, offering the daemon a few gentle strokes. “Magpie, would you have really been happy with something that was a quarter of your size?”

“Yes.”

“Bullshit.”

“A peregrine falcon isn’t big. A barn owl isn’t big.”

“Magpie.”

“I just … Maman had a red tail. Papa had a wolf. I have …” She gestures at Titouen.

“A bird of prey who’s small enough not to be noticed when he’s running scouting duty.”

“Small enough to be eaten in one bite is more like it. I just want to be taken seriously.”

Verena presses up against her. “It comes with age.”

“It comes with having a daemon that’s bigger than a feathery baseball.”

“Have you ever seen a baseball?” Central asks.

“…No. Maman had, though. I’d know one if I saw one.”

“They … could pack a lot of damage. Don’t count Titouen out on size.“

A tiny feathered head nuzzles along his jawline.

“We’ll handle Volk,” Verena promises. “I’ll handle Nadya.”

Sally sighs, and clicks her tongue, summoning Titouen back. He nibbles gently at her ear, and settles back on her pack strap.

--

Verena knows, as soon as she looks at Nadya, that there will be trouble. She curls around Sally, doing her best to comfort the girl.

“What?” Volk grins. “No sweeping display? No midair acrobatics?”

“He’s settled,” Sally mumbles.

Verena presses closer, anticipating Volk’s reaction.

“It’s a tender topic,” Central says, shooting the Reaper a pointed look. “Try not to be yourself.”

“I’m wounded, John. I would never insult something so cute.”

Titouen takes off, and Nadya gives chase, the smaller bird refusing to cow. Verena lets out a low growl.

“Knock if off. I said don’t be yourself,” Central grumbles. Titouen comes to land on his shoulder and, instinctively, he reaches up a hand to shelter the tiny creature.

“Everyone learns their place in the pecking order eventually.”

Verena’s growl grows louder. “Easy, easy,” the Reaper says with a smile she has learned not to trust. “It’s all in jest.”

Sally settles a hand against Verena’s side, holding her close. “It’ll all be in jest when there’s hemlock in your tea, “ Sally spits. “Titouen, vas-y.”

Verena trots after her, Central jogging to keep up.

--

They sit at the base of a large tree, Central’s arm around her shoulders, Titouen perched on his hand, and Verena stretched over her legs. She rests her head against his chest, and tells herself she will not cry.

“I’m sorry,” she mumbles. “I know I was outta line.”

Central shakes his head. “So was he. ‘Least you had your reasons.”

“This is what I was afraid of. It’s gonna be like this the whole time we’re here.”

He sighs. “It’s too late to keep going tonight, but we can leave in the morning. Haven a few days south of here.”

She picks her head up. “Won’t it be weird?”

He shrugs. “Dealt with bigger problems. Might send a message, too.”

She reaches out a finger, offering Titouen a few affectionate scritches. “You were pretty tough today,” she says, voice catching at the back of her throat. “Didn’t even flinch.”

“Ferocious little bird,” Verena says, lifting her head.

“It’ll be fine, Magpie,” Central says, pulling her into a one-armed hug. “You’ll see.”