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flowerandblood · 6 months

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Glass Cuts Deepest (4)

[ professor! • Aemond x student! • female ]

[ warnings: description of rape, angst, trauma, mention of sexual harassment, violence, swearing, self-destructive behavior ]

[ description: A female painting student is finally able to choose the specialisation she has dreamt of - stained glass. She wants to become a student of the best specialist in this field, but he, for some reason, refuses to accept female students into his workshop. She finds out that he once slapped a female student of one of the other professors. Nevertheless, she makes an attempt to find out what happened then and to convince him to teach her. Slow burn, sexual tension, dark, agressive Aemond, great childhood traumas. ]

* English is not my first language. Please, do not repost. Enjoy! *

Previous and next chapters: Masterlist

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With difficulty, every day, he forced himself to get used to her presence, to the smell of her coconut shampoo when she walked past, to her voice when she spoke to her year mates.

He always worked with his back to her, without looking at her, and she worked, as promised, in the corner, at the last table, covered by a pillar so that he could not see her most of the time.

On the one hand he felt uncomfortable, but on the other he thought with some feeling of pride that maybe this would help him get out of his area of weakness and trauma, that maybe this important decision would make something change in him.

She only dared to approach him when she wanted to show him her project, but when she laid it down in front of him he noticed with disappointment that it was too contrived. There was too much going on, he thought, she was trying to prove to herself and him that she could create the most expressive, most complicated design possible.

"Overdone and tacky. This is not a competition for the most pompous baroque stained glass. Don't show me things like that again." He said dryly, returning to cutting glass. He heard her swallow loudly and walk away, leaving behind her scent of some new herbal shampoo.

Although he feared she would be a distraction to him and others, she behaved politely and decently, concentrating on her work, talking to her colleagues only during short breaks for tea or food.

She conformed to the rules and always cleaned her workstation thoroughly, she also dressed appropriately, usually wearing a large black t-shirt tucked into high-waisted black trousers, her hair either tied up in a braid or tied partially at the back of her head as the rest of her curls fell down her back.

As much as he didn't want it, she was the centre of his relentless attention, he waited for any stumble from her, any proof that she was faking it, that there was something different under that mask than she had shown so far.

It seemed to him, however, that the more days passed, the more relaxed and smiling she became. She worked on her new project while sitting with headphones in her ears and listening to music, bobbing her head to its rhythm, painting at her table, undeterred by his unpleasant comment.

Two days after their exchange of words, she approached him for the second time, again holding a piece of paper. He looked at her sternly, wanting to make sure she knew what she was doing.

"Are you sure you want to show me this?" He asked warningly, and she nodded quickly before placing her draft in front of him. He pressed his lips together, feeling his heart thump involuntarily in his chest.

Her design was beautiful.

Her composition, although not perfect, even in its sketchy outline with the colours she had chosen and the positioning of the figures made the whole thing look light, lifted. He noticed immediately that the figures of the Virgin and Christ were inspired by Raphael's Sistine Madonna and wanted to see if she would admit it.

"Were you inspired by someone?" He asked coolly and she nodded quickly, smiling softly.

"Yes, Raphael's Sistine Madonna."

He hummed under his breath, pleased that she'd confessed, and began to analyse what he saw before him.

"On the left and right the composition is too filled in. You need to leave those four apostles lower, give more space to the background. Let them form an arc under the figure of Our Lady, not half a circle." He spoke at once what he noticed, running his hand over her work, pointing to the parts he had in mind.

She watched his every move with rapt attention and nodded quickly, her eyes shining with delight, as if with her imagination's sight she could see that indeed his changes would make the whole thing look even better.

"Yes. You're right, Professor, I will." She said excitedly, looking at him with a sort of gratitude and joy from which he felt uncomfortable.

He felt some strange kind of warmth in his lower abdomen at the thought that this smile suited her.

That she was pretty.

She was a pretty girl.

He bit his lower lip, embarrassed and horrified at his thought, and lowered his gaze, returning to his work.

"That's all."

He was not helped in dismissing this thought by the fact that, a few hours later, he came across her in the canteen, seeing her in nothing but a floral strapless summer dress.

He was relieved to find that nothing was showing through from under it, but the very fact that he saw her, in his perspective, in such a negligee made him take a greedy sip of coffee and avoid her, trying not to think about the slight pulsing he felt in the lower part of his body.

When he had gathered all the projects he made an appointment with the bishop, who invited him to his curia. They had coffee together and then proceeded to discuss the designs he had brought him. The bishop was delighted with three of them and couldn't make up his mind.

"You are the artist, tell me what you think. Which one do you think is the best?" He asked him, glancing at him curiously, catching himself involuntarily by the large gold cross hanging from his neck.

He looked intensely at the design that Wright had done and fought with himself, at the same time wanting to admit that she had surprised him positively with such rapid progress and considered her design one of the best, on the other hand not wanting to admit it to himself or to him. He grunted out loud.

"Please choose for yourself, Father Bishop. I am not a fair judge in this matter because I am prejudiced against one of the female students." He said frankly, and the bishop looked at him curiously.

"A female student? I thought your workshop was almost a male convent." He laughed low, gripping his belly concealed beneath his purple robe, and he huffed under his breath.

"It was." He muttered, as he nodded his head in understanding and sighed heavily.

"This one." He pointed his finger at the Wright project, and he pressed his lips together with a loud, tense swallow. Bishop looked at him curiously.

"Did I just choose the project of this female student?" He asked amused, and he looked away, impatient.

"Yes." He replied dispassionately.

"If you wish, because of our long-standing collaboration, I will change my decision." He said softly, and he shook his head.

"No."

Whether he wanted it or not, he had to announce the results and how he divided the work. While it was certainly a great achievement and he thought she had done a good job himself, he knew that she wasn't ready to do such complicated things as she had designed and that she needed to practice the basics for now.

The backgrounds were the perfect opportunity to do so and he saw no reason why she should suffer or consider it a humiliation, especially as he was the one who was to take care of the faces, with a little help from Cregan with the figures of the apostles.

He was concerned, however, when he walked into their workshop one day and saw Jason Lannister standing over her. Although he was not happy that she was his student, he had decided to take her under his wing and felt responsible for her safety in every sense of the word.

Especially the kind he might have expected from Lannister.

As soon as he had left, he approached her with an unhurried step, standing on the other side of her table, asking dispassionately what he wanted, willing himself to be sure of his assumptions.

"To learn the secret of my success." She said without much emotion, concentrating on cutting out the papers. He felt a tightness in his throat at her words knowing what she was implying.

"What did you tell him?" He asked coolly, leaning over the table, wondering if she was expanding on some lie or rumour about him. She looked at him surprised and sighed quietly, numbering piece by piece.

"That he shouldn't measure everyone by his standards. His attitude towards his female students was one of the reasons I didn't want him to teach me." She said quietly, and he furrowed his brow, finding it amusing that she feared harassment from Jason Lannister, but begged a known female aggressor for a place in his workshop.

"And you came to ask for a place with a professor who hit his student?" He asked seriously, lowly, and she threw him an anxious, frightened look, he saw her clench and lick her lips, swallowing hard, cutting another piece of paper.

"And did you hit her, Professor?"

He stared at her for a long moment, wondering if he should go any deeper into the subject, if he should talk to her about it at all. He felt, however, that he wanted to know what she thought about it, how she really perceived him.

"Yes." He replied with fatigue and frustration at the same time.

She didn't answer him for a long moment, her hands shaking as she tried to cut another template with straight, sure slashes.

"Why did you do that?" She asked quietly, and he chuckled under his breath.

"Does it matter?" He asked, as if the answer was obvious.

Since when did it matter what you slapped someone for? In the eyes of the law, in the eyes of good manners, even if she acted like a monster, he had no right to touch her.

Women were untouchable.

Not like men.

After all, they were stronger.

"It matters if you did it for no reason or if you were trying to defend yourself against her, sir." She said uncertainly and he snorted at her words, amused.

"In what way could she harm me? Hit me?" He asked ironically, knowing that no one would ever recognise any of his explanations, that in many people's eyes there was no way that a woman could have harmed him, that she would have been at fault, unless she had thrown herself at him with a knife.

The woman had to commit the ultimate, sudden cruelty to be considered a real threat, when in the case of the men, verbal aggression was enough.

"Women can hurt men in all sorts of ways. It's just that they are hardly believed." She said quietly in a trembling voice and he felt his heart stop for a moment. He looked at her in disbelief, feeling a tightness in his throat, feeling sick again, as if he was about to vomit.

Women can hurt men in all sorts of ways.

It's just that they are hardly believed.

"I don't know if it's a good idea." He mumbled horrified, looking at her in shock, not understanding why she had come to his room, why she wouldn't let him alone.

She continued to nag him, encouraging him to rub oil on her back when she was sunbathing while his parents weren't looking, she untied her bikini top in front of him and let him look at her breasts.

He felt uncomfortable, excited and embarrassed at the same time, like when he watched pornographic films.

He felt that something was wrong.

"You are such a pretty boy, Aemond." She purred, trailing her slender fingers along his bare arm, he had just started going to the gym and was proud of having muscles, he wanted to look like a man already, even though he was only sixteen.

Her attention simultaneously boosted his ego but also overwhelmed him in a way that frightened him, so he involuntarily ran away from her or locked himself in his room when he heard her voice.

When she came to him that night, however, he forgot to turn the key in the lock of his door and never forgave himself for that.

The fact that if he had got up before bedtime and checked it, it would have never happened.

She came to him wearing only a strapless nightgown from under which practically everything was visible, the outline of her large breasts and her womb.

He looked at her terrified, thinking only of the fact that she could be his mother, that he felt sick, his hands trembling, his heart pounding like mad.

He didn't know what to do, what to say, he didn't want to offend her, he just wanted her to leave.

"Easy. Your eye, your scars don't bother me at all." She said softly, in a low, sensual voice, slipping the straps off her shoulders, revealing her naked body to him, at which he stared in horror, feeling his head humming, finding it difficult to catch his breath.

"Why are you so tense?" She laughed softly, quietly, as if it was funny, sitting down on top of him, sliding the duvet off him, and he shook his head when he felt her grab the material of his sweatpants.

"No. My parents will hear. Please." He mumbled, not wanting to come off as weak, as a man who couldn't satisfy a woman, but all he felt was terror, he felt like his heart was about to burst out of his chest, cold sweat running down his hot back.

"Shhh. Just stay still and let me take care of myself." She whispered, as if this was going to be their sweet secret, her hand exploring what was underneath the fabric and running her fingers over his manhood, clamping her fingers firmly onto it.

He pressed his lips together, holding back a moan of horror and discomfort as he felt himself involuntarily pulsing under her hand, betraying him and his body, responding automatically to her mechanical, determined movements.

"Look, see? You wouldn't be so hard if you didn't want it. It's okay, sweetheart." She cooed, as if speaking to a small child, and when she thought he was ready, she simply slid him inside her.

He looked away from her, pressing his lips together as he looked towards the window, thinking only of how a real man would enjoy this, that he had watched endless pornographic films depicting such a scenario and trying to focus on it, however, all he felt was a burning wetness under his eyelids and his body trembling.

She raised and lowered herself on top of him, panting loudly, whispering that she had wanted this for a very long time and that she knew he had too, but that it was okay, that she would take care of him now, that he was such a good boy.

He felt her hands on his torso, on his shoulders, on his cheek, her intense perfume that she must have lathered herself with before coming to him made him feel sick.

He threw up suddenly, and she almost screamed, getting off him, panting heavily.

"What the fuck?"

He sobbed pathetically, panting heavily, and it was only then that she realised how much she had misjudged the situation. She swallowed loudly, quickly dressing her nightgown back up.

"Relax, it's okay, nothing happened. Nothing happened." She repeated, but he didn't hear her, trembling all over, feeling that something inside him just died.

Women can hurt men in all sorts of ways.

He stared at her, feeling that his lower lip was trembling, his mouth twitched in a dangerous grin.

"You prefer to defend the abuser instead of the victim?"

She furrowed her brow at his words, clearly offended by his question.

"No. I just know her version of events. I wanted to hear yours before I decided what I thought of you, Professor. I thought it was only fair." She said with some kind of regret, and he felt his heart squeeze again, the thought that she would be sorely disappointed in him.

She would be disappointed in him just like his grandfather, his father, his mother, his siblings.

"There is no excuse for me. But I don't regret what I did. What do you think about it, Miss Wright?" He asked ironically, cocking his head, wanting to see what her answer would be, how she would try to justify him this time.

A sort of pain flashed across her face, her eyebrows arched in disapproval, her eyes expressing a pure, deep sadness from which he felt discomfort in his chest.

"That I feel sorry for you, Professor. Just like I feel sorry for that girl. I hope you find the decency to apologise to her one day. Excuse me, but I would like to focus on my work." She said calmly, lowering her gaze, going back to cutting again even though her hands were shaking.

He looked at her not believing what she said.

She dismissed him.

He pressed his lips together and walked out on his heel, grabbing his jacket on the fly.

He stepped out and lit his cigarette in a quick, aggressive movement, inhaling deeply, only now feeling how much his heart was pounding, how hard he was breathing, how his hands were trembling, droplets of sweat on his forehead.

He chuckled under his breath, rubbing the tip of his nose with the back of his hand, thinking how pathetic it was that he cared about her opinion.

She was nobody to him.

She could think whatever she wanted.

Nevertheless, he noticed that she had begun to avoid him. When he entered she would look away, pretend she didn't see him, that he didn't exist.

Even though he had only dreamed of it, her attitude now frustrated him.

She considered herself better than him, a saint, but he knew there were no perfect people.

If she wanted to despise him, so be it.

He decided to focus on his task, on making a faces for her project, which, despite his aversion towards her, he still liked. He easily found inspiration for the Twelve Apostles by sketching the figures of the older men in the town square one morning, standing by the fence.

There he had a whole plethora of interesting, expressive faces.

However, he had no idea what to do with the Mother of God.

Sometimes he would give her the face of his own mother or his sister, but he felt he had done this too many times, and he didn't want his work to look the same over and over again.

Sitting at his desk he glanced at his female student who despised him so much, watched her face in gentle concentration bent over her work, her warm gaze wrapped in a fan of long lashes directed at the glass she had just cut.

He wandered his eyes over her soft facial features, over her lips, her nose, her cheeks, her eyes, her neck, and felt like a voyeur.

He took his sketchbook in his hands and waited for the moment when she looked at him, wanting to make her face him, sketching her in the meantime in the position she was in now, just to catch the right proportions of her figure.

When she finally lifted her gaze to him he felt heat in his lower abdomen, she immediately averted her eyes, but that was enough for him, he saw what he wanted.

On the one hand he felt like a pervert, on the other he felt some kind of sick satisfaction analysing every last bit of her face, taking several of his sketches with him and creating the final one. When he had finished it and dressed it with the right robes surrounding her head he thought it looked perfect.

Her portrait was melancholic, serene, there was a kind of warmth and certainty emanating from her gaze at the same time, her lips slightly parted, as if she had just taken a breath, making her look full of life, only frozen in stillness, in the moment.

He figured that as soon as he finished painting he would throw away all his sketches of her, and if anyone asked if he had been inspired by her facial features he would deny it.

Halfway through his work he went out for a cigarette and, convinced that there was no one else in their workshop at such a late hour, left the door open.

When he returned, however, he froze, horrified, seeing her figure bent over his sketches, an expression of disbelief on her face.

Fuck.

Fuck.Fuck.Fuck.Fuck.Fuck.Fuck.Fuck.

"Get out." He growled harshly, enraged that she had seen this, that she now knew what he had done.

She wanted to say something, frightened, but he wouldn't let her finish, terrified of what she could do with her knowledge.

"Get. Out." He repeated warningly. She nodded and moved quickly towards the exit.

He didn't know what had tempted him to grab her tightly by her shoulder, he heard her draw in a quick, loud breath, terrified, he could smell her, herbal shampoo and some cheap hand cream.

"Don't ever come in here again without permission. Your painting room is next door. This is my private studio. Do you understand?" He burst out sharply and she nodded her head quickly, he could feel her whole body quivering. He let her go and she literally ran out, leaving him alone.

He walked over to the table, restraining himself with the remnants of his strength not to drop all the glasses and smash them to smithereens. He picked up the sketches with the depiction of her face and began to tear them to pieces one by one.

She meant nothing to him.

I hope you find the decency to apologise to her one day.

On his way out, heading for his car, he spotted Lyanna, the girl he had slapped then, also heading in the same direction. She was now in her final year of university and wasn't using shared workrooms, not wanting to run into him. As soon as she spotted him she furrowed her brow and turned away, tense.

"Wait." He called out after her, feeling his heart pounding, wondering what he was actually doing.

She stopped, looking at him terrified, breathing unevenly. He approached her slowly, stopped in front of her and sighed heavily, lighting a cigarette, taking a deep drag and letting the smoke out through his mouth.

"I'm sorry. For then. That I slapped you." He said, shaking the ash from his cigarette onto the ground with a flick of his finger, not looking at her but somewhere to the side, licking his lip nervously.

"The truth is, if I wasn't earning so much for the rector, I'd be out of a job straight away for it." He muttered, taking another drag and letting out a puff of smoke through his nose, unsure if he was actually apologising or explaining.

The girl looked at him in silence.

"I'm sorry too. For what I said back then. Jason brainwashed me pretty good." She muttered regretfully, not looking at him but somewhere to the side, thoughtfully.

"He was afraid of the fact that you were on his tail, that you wanted to destroy him. He made me believe that we were in love, that there was nothing wrong with that, but it wasn't until later that I noticed how he controlled me. I no longer have anything to do with him, only now do I understand how he manipulated me, and now I watch him do the same with younger girls." She said in a trembling voice, looking at her fingers, and he lowered his gaze, pressing the cigarette to his lips again, taking a deep drag.

"Have a nice day." He muttered, turning away, leaving her surprised.

She thought clearly that he felt like listening to her grief now, comforting her with a good word, that nothing had happened, that she was a victim too.

She had consented of her own free will and was suffering the consequences of her actions.

No one forced her.

She had a choice, and instead of the victims, the girls he molested when she wasn't looking, she chose herself.

He thought with amusement that he didn't feel better at all. That no one would find out about what he had done.

That she wouldn't now, after two years, have those defamatory articles retracted, wouldn't tell the other professors that they had come to an understanding, to give him a break.

Everything would be as it had been, except that all he knew now was that she was as stupid as all the other women he knew.

And then he thought of her face, that face which in his eyes already appeared as Our Lady in a golden cloud, giving the weary apostles the hope of heaven.

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Aemond Taglist:

(bold means I couldn't tag you)

@its-actually-minicika @notnormalthings-blog @nikstrange @zenka69 @bellaisasleep @k-y-r-a-1 @g-cf2020 @melsunshine @opheliaas-stuff @chainsawsangel @iiamthehybrid @tinykryptonitewerewolf @namoreno @malfoytargaryen @qyburnsghost @aemondsdelight @persephonerinyes @fan-goddess

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