#there's probably fabled story around the castle about | Explore Tumblr Posts and Blogs

engeorged · 5 months

Text

Santa’s Otto

This is a sequel to Obi's Place and a prequel to Aster's Maze.

It’s been a while since I last posted, and a fair bit has happened with me and Aster, but that’s something that’s still developing. Being in a relationship with a magical being is not something that’s been mapped, outside of Greek fables, so we are still finding our way with it. Suffice to say we are both very happy and very together. Both of us have grown quite a bit. Physically, mentally and spiritually shall we say. (And by that I mean quite a lot more physically than the other two). But I think that that's a story for another time. I want it to be mine for a little longer.

Anyway, as Christmas is coming up, I thought I would tell you about an encounter I had, just a few months before meeting Aster. As it turned out, it wasn't actually me meeting a fae, but it definitely gave me some confirmation, and I think some of you will really enjoy this story! It’s about the time I met Santa in Germany. Yes, I know how that sounds, but you’re going to have to bear with me.

I’d headed to Europe a few months earlier and was working my way through some possible sightings. I hadn’t seen or met another being like Obi yet, but I’d definitely picked up some promising clues. A few things which I thought were legit, had led me to northern Germany where I immediately hit a dead end. German Christmas’ are some of the best in the world so I decided to stay a few weeks and have a break from the search. I’d been enjoying the sights of some famous local castle, and was feeling a bit hungry so I popped into a medium sized shopping mall I’d seen earlier and headed in. It was pretty quiet, which was strange considering it was the Saturday before Christmas but as I was walking through looking for something to eat, my eye was drawn to an incredibly hot man doing some maintenance work. He was dressed in an overall but it was open all the way down to his waist, revealing an incredibly toned physique. His very worked on, defined abs were covered in a delightful amount of belly fur all the way up to his thick neck and he was very much my type. I paused for a moment to drink him in and watched as he heaved some large boxes as if they were nothing. He was maybe an inch taller than me with broad shoulders and a thick head of dark messy hair with a fade at the sides. His beautifully pale European skin along with his darker hair and smattering of freckles was very striking. His face was covered in just the right amount of stubble to make him look rugged but not scruffy. But the crowning glory was his eyes! They were a vibrant pale blue that practically shone out from his face. As he turned and bent down to pick up the next box, I was surprised that his rounded meaty ass didn’t burst out of those overalls. They were unfortunately doing a good job at holding back all that muscle. I shook off my horny reverie and made a note to come back round after lunch to see if he was still there. Following my nose, I headed in the direction of food and found a little pop-up Christmas food court. I indulged in a few thick sausages and some delightful potato and apple cakes which were not bad at all. I took another couple of sausages to go and headed back the way I’d come, hoping to catch the hot maintenance guy again.

I hung around near where I first saw him for a good twenty minutes before I heard a commotion a bit further down. I walked over to where the sound was coming from and saw the festive grotto. Santa had arrived for the Christmas display. Kids were clamouring round excitedly and as I watched I saw Santa make his way through the crowds. I was yet again surprised to see that this was not your average sad old failed actor, living out his last working years as the big red fat man for a few euros an hour. This guy was young and vibrant. His broad shoulders were straining the limits of the outfit, with the white fur trim (probably real, this is Europe after all!) curving round and showing off the enormous belly. At first I assumed it was padded but it definitely caught my eye. The guy was so clearly stacked that the belly looked almost comical. It was almost perfectly round and stuck out a good foot and a half from this guy's toned body. As I watched him moving around I started noticing that the belly wasn’t squishy like a pillow would have been. It had a certain heft to it that I was very familiar with. I moved forward to get a better look and saw a kid, who wasn’t paying attention, get under his feet, tripping him up. He fell backwards onto a small elf house and levelled it. As he fell, his red coat came undone and I got a good glimpse of the huge round furry belly that was contained underneath. It was a thing of beauty, rounded and perfectly formed. Covered in dark thick hair with a small and neat belly button. He quickly pulled himself up and closed the coat, laughing it off. As he adjusted his fake white beard I caught a glimpse of his piercing pale blue eyes. I’d seen them before. Was the maintenance guy? What the fuck? I’d seen him an hour before and he was practically an underwear model. Either he’d got a Hollywood level makeup and prosthetic artist hidden round the back or there was something fishy going on.

My mind was racing. If that belly was real, it had to have grown in less than an hour? Who was he? Was this guy somehow a Fae? A crazy thought passed through my mind, was this actually Santa? I know I’d chased round the world for less weird ideas but the idea that Santa might have been real, was still a bit out there, even for me. Also, more importantly, did I have a crush on Santa?

I waited around till his shift ended. I couldn’t keep my eyes off this guy's belly. It was incredible. There was no flab or excess blubber, it looked like a solid mass of muscle over a huge sphere of gut. Well, like I was after Obi! I couldn’t lose this guy. This was the closest I’d come to answers in months. It was fascinating to watch him in action, the kids were captivated by him, and so were the parents. I couldn’t help but notice that he paid a fair bit of attention to some of the more hot dads, often touching them on the arm as he laughed at their bad jokes.

A few hours later, I saw him waving goodbye to the children before disappearing behind the grotto. I followed him and waited till he was alone. I approached him quietly so he didn’t have time to bolt and tapped him on the shoulder. He jumped out of his skin and span round, yet again revealing his massive ball belly as his coat flapped open. I introduced myself and told him I’d enjoyed his performance. Fortunately, he spoke very good English and understood me. He cautiously introduced himself as Otto and shook my hand. He took his beard off and I saw his face up close. It was so odd to see such a handsome and chiselled face sporting such a huge gut but there they both were. I didn’t really know where to go from there so I simply came out with it. I saw him an hour earlier and he had no belly. Now here he was with a 150 lbs beer gut. What was the deal? Was magic involved?

He stared at me for a little while, clearly weighing up what to say. I wasn’t sure if he was gonna bolt so I got myself ready for a chase, but suddenly he burst out with a hearty laugh and pulled me in for a hug. His belly pressing against me hit home how real it was. Our bellies pushed against each other with a satisfying thunk. As he pulled back he put his hands on either side of my belly and gave me a squeeze. As you know I’m not skinny myself, a few months of trying to eat myself into the same state as I was when Obi finished with me had added a few pounds to my bulk. Simply by touching me, Otto knew instantly that something magical had happened to me and asked me who I’d met. I told him about my encounter in the cafe and he nodded and smiled as if he understood. When I’d finished, he told me that my story was familiar and thanked me for telling it and turned to go. I reached out and grabbed his arm and asked him to tell me his story. He smiled and told me that it wasn’t going to be that simple.

We chatted for a while and worked out the terms of our agreement. As is always the way with these magical types there was always some sort of bargain or deal to be had. He agreed to answer 5 questions but to answer the questions I would have to eat something of his choosing. Now I’m not able to eat the amount I did when Obi was around but I’m still an accomplished eater. I agreed to the terms and we headed to the Christmas food market. He found us a delightful booth made from wood, with garlands of holly and pine branches covering the roof and headed off for my first meal. He returned with three of the sausages I’d already eaten. They were so good I was happy and I set about eating them whilst he sat there with a smile on his face enjoying a large European litre of beer. I thought about my first question and went with it. ‘Are you Santa?’ He scratched at his stubble and smiled a wry grin. ‘No’ he said smugly and lumbered off to get my next meal. I was pissed that my question wasn’t quite right. I needed to ask something more open ended. I was still thinking about what to ask when he returned with a thick crepe, stuffed with cheese and bacon and covered in more cheese. I grabbed a wooden set of cutlery and started eating.

As I finished, I began feeling a little full. Seven hot dogs, a pancake and some of those amazing apple potato fritters were heavy and not insignificant. I leant back and gave my belly a rub whilst I formulated my question. I needed a question that would make him give me more information than yes or no. I needed to find out if he was human and if not what he was. It came to me. ‘When did you first find you could grow an instant belly?’ His blue eyes twinkled, clearly impressed by my question. Draining the last dregs of his beer he leant back to match my position and began.

‘I was just out of university and was back living with my parents. I’d decided by then that I wanted to do something practical and started training as an electrician. It was Christmas Eve and I’d been out with my friends and came home pretty drunk and I crashed. Now I was pretty into the gym at the time and I had a killer body. Well, I guess you'd have seen it if you caught me earlier? Anyway, I woke up Christmas morning with this thing pinning me down!’ He grabbed his belly and attempted to shake it but it didn’t really move.

‘I had no idea what had happened and if I’m honest I sort of assumed it was the beer from the previous night. I thought I’d had an allergic reaction or something. Anyway, I went to the hospital to get checked out and they were baffled. No one could explain what had happened to me. With no answers I headed back to the gym and started training. I had 160 lbs to lose and I wanted it gone quickly. I hadn’t lost my muscle mass and so training was relatively easy. It took me 10 months in total but I managed it and got back into shape. I was maybe 20 lbs more than when I got the gut but it was all muscle mass so I was very much back in shape. I thought it was all behind me and then a few months later I woke up on Christmas morning yet again looking like I was pregnant with triplets. No one could tell me what had happened and so it all started again. Five years that happened for. Five years.’

I waited for more but that was all he was giving me. I went to ask another question and he stopped me and headed off. So he wasn’t a magical being. Something had happened to him? And why did it always happen on Christmas Day? What was the link? He returned with a huge turkey sandwich, dripping with gravy and cranberry sauce, with a side of roast vegetables. Yet again I dove in, all the time formulating my next question. Something was not quite right here. How did he go from ballooning every Christmas Day to being able to do it seemingly at will, in an hour? I was missing something here? I had three questions left and I didn’t want to waste one of them. I finished the sandwich (best one I’ve ever had by the way) and posed my next question. ‘Did you find out why this happened to you?’ He smiled again and nodded. I instantly regretted my wording. I’d given him a yes or no question again. He paused and offered me a lifeline. ‘Ask me about him?’ He pointed at the mural painted on the ceiling above us of a jolly Santa riding his sleigh across the sky.

That was all he was willing to give me and he left me to work on my fourth question. I needed to ask something about Father Christmas and how he was involved. So Father Christmas was real? My mind raced as I tried to get comfier in my chair. I was feeling the bloat now. The cheese in that pancake was sitting very heavily on my stomach. Otto returned with a bowl of steaming Christmas pudding. He’d brought me a whole one covered in custard that could have fed a family of six. I settled in to eat the fragrant dessert. I was struggling a bit now. It was a heavy thing to pack on top of what I’d already had. Otto was clearly enjoying watching me eat it though. He was on his fourth beer at this point and wasn’t really showing any signs of being drunk. Apparently Germans can really handle their beer.

Finishing the pudding I dropped my spoon into the bowl. ‘Alright.’ I said, belching deeply under my breath. ‘You’ve just told me Santa is part of this. If Santa is real then he’s obviously some sort of magical being or fae. Here’s my question.’ I reached over and put my hand on the top of his massive belly shelf and patted it. ‘How does Santa give you this belly every Christmas Day?’

‘Now we’re getting somewhere!’ Otto added. He drained his beer again and I swore under my fingers I could feel his belly swelling a little bit more. ‘After year five of doctors and experts not knowing why I gained nearly 200 lbs every year, I started getting desperate. I did some research online and put some feelers out there. I wasn’t expecting to find the answers I found! Turns out there are loads of guys like me around the world and we all have several things in common. All of us are over 6 feet tall, and all of us are pretty into fitness or sports. Big solid strapping men. Not one of them knew what was happening to us. That was until I found a guy in Norway who has a theory. He told me this crazy story. He’d heard rumours of this happening for hundreds of years. There were some Norwegian folk tales of trolls who would trick mortal men into being their ‘Magebror’, literally translated as ‘belly brother’. The trolls would then go off and gorge themselves all night and the poor magebror would begin to get fatter and fatter until they would burst open. He thought that we were cursed by trolls and we should simply thank the gods we weren’t bursting open. Obviously I ignored him but the more research I did the more I found out that there were some truths in these myths. It wasn’t something he’d invented but a real fable that appeared in several different folk laws across Scandinavia. I got back in touch with him and he’d vanished, so I headed off to Norway to try and find him. It took me a while but eventually I did. And low and behold he was 6’6 and stacked but with a huge pot belly twice the size of mine. He told me he’d been investigating more and more and had uncovered the truth. It wasn’t trolls doing this to us, it was Father Christmas. I could have punched him in the face. I’d gone all this way only to find that the guy truly was mental. I didn’t even say goodbye. I headed straight back home, gave up the search and tried to lose the weight again before Christmas.’

‘Christmas Eve came and I couldn’t quite shake the idea that this guy had put in my head. I decided to sit up and see if I could stay awake to see what would happen. I nearly didn’t make it but as the clock struck midnight something changed in the house. I felt an electricity in the air and you can imagine my surprise when he landed with a thump in my fireplace. And he was not how I imagined him to look. In front of me was not a fat old man with a grey beard, but a total hunk. He was tall and muscled like I used to be. Clean shaved but with some incredible big dick energy. Like some sort of daddy stud. I don't quite remember fully but I think he did have some ram horns sprouting from his head but they might have been part of the costume? It was a lot anyway. He smiled as if he recognised me. We waited in silence for a few minutes. I was totally enthralled by how attractive he was. I almost didn’t want to ask my question. Eventually I managed to speak and asked why I was gaining weight every Christmas Day. He seemed all too pleased to tell me as he launched into the explanation. It was simple, he had a few billion homes to visit every year and in every country, there was a tradition to leave food out for him. He had to eat millions of cookies and mince pies and treats in just a few hours as he travelled. And so he used magic! He would choose a load of men, all who had the frame to handle the mass, and they would be his magebror. He’d learnt from the trolls how to do it. He would eat the food and they would get fat. I was simply one of a few hundred guys who would wake up with bellies packed full of treats every year so he could stay toned and handsome. And that's why I got fat every year!’

So it wasn’t just me that had encountered these guys. This was finally some proof that what happened to me in that diner was real! The relief for me was immense. I wasn’t going mad. My mind was pulled back to earth as Otto stood to get my final meal. I had one more question. The one thing I didn’t know was how he could do it at will. He’d obviously found a way to control how and when he bulked up. And the intimate question, could he teach me how to do it? He returned with the final meal. A huge ironic plate full of cookies. There were at least a dozen and they were big ones. He slapped them on the table next to a large jug of milk. Obediently and greedily I started eating them. Dipping them in the milk,I was determined to get through them. One by one I swallowed each one down. Adding to the knot of pressure in my already overpacked stomach. My belly was feeling every bite as it distended outwards. Finishing the cookies was tough but I still had a few litres of milk to chug. There was nothing for it but to go for it. Lifting the jug to my lips I poured the cool milk into my stuffed gut. It felt good and horrible at the same time. I could feel my belly actually swelling out and straining my taut T-shirt. As the last of the milk drained down my throat, I slammed the jug on the table. Out of breath I posed my final question. ‘How do you control it? How come you can make your belly swell out when you want it to? How can I do that?’

His eyes sparkled. ‘That was three questions!’ He laughed. He reached over and gave my belly a stroke. He was firm but it was the touch of someone who knew how to handle a distended gut. ‘You’ve done well though! I’ll answer them. When I caught Santa out that night, I was the first one. No one had tracked him down before and he was pleased with me. I don’t wanna kiss and tell but let’s just say I sat on Santa's lap and he gave me a gift! He gave me the same ability that he has. The weight of food he eats, I can manage myself. Meaning I can gain his weight at will, whenever I like. Then all I have to do to get rid of it is touch a guy like he does and he becomes my magebror! I’m not magic so it’s not quite as strong as his abilities are. My magebrors are only temporary and one offs.’

I was so stuffed I didn’t quite pick up on what he was saying but I nodded anyway. That explained why he was touching the hot dads in the queue. The idea of a load of guys walking up tomorrow morning a few pounds heavier was kinda hot. To be honest, I was just relieved that I wasn’t imagining things. He helped me up out of the booth and we walked back through the mall. We chatted a bit more about my experience and some of the leads I’d found. All the while I was painfully aware of how full I was. I couldn’t stop belching as we walked, the movement dislodging the gas. As I walked, I kept one hand on the top of my gut, rubbing my bloated belly to try and ease the pressure. I’d not felt this stuffed for a while and it felt good.

I walked him back to his truck and he jumped in. As he jumped up I realised he was back to his original toned and lean self. I pointed it out and he just smiled as he drove off. As I stood in the snow processing the information I’d just been given I was interrupted by a ping. I was confused until I realised my trousers had become loose. The ping was my top button from my jeans. I looked down to see my belly was twice the size as it was when I had finished eating. I realised that he’d touched me as he helped me out of the booth. I had become his magebror! My belly had to be close to the same size it was when Obi had his way with me. I smiled as I explored my swollen belly with my hands. Also, it wasn’t lost on me that I’d just had a conversation with someone who had fucked Santa.

#belly expansion #gainer fiction #gay gainer #stuffing #belly fiction #gainer stories #male gaining #stuffing art #gainer story #gainer artwork

152 notes · View notes

lizard-shifter-noms · 1 year

Text

Broken Bloodlines Chapter 9

——————————————————————————

Part 9!!!

we are now in the latter half of chapters!

this Story contains Vore, Dont like dont read.

CW; mentions of injuries, mentions of corpses, mentions of death.

have fun reading!

and as always reblogs are appreciated! (Also ASK’s are open so feel free to bother me!)

AO3 Link for those that prefer the layout there; https://archiveofourown.org/works/44627188

——————————————————————————

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

Why was she coming with us? Did she also reject the title?

She smiled politely.

“Hello! I'm joining you for a few days! I realized i have no idea on what to do now and Rikaad offered to show me how to manage paperwork!”

I looked over to Rikaad who didn't look very happy about that.

Well, better than having her fuck up stuff and cause accidental suffering.

The ride back was spent with Robin talking to Amicia about the cat and Arthur hanging out the window again.

His Cousin did awkwardly pat his back in encouragement though.

Aside from that neither me nor Rikaad said anything, He was just staring out the window.

I decided to keep an eye on Arthur so that I could catch him in case he fell out.

Luckily he did not.

The way back seemed to drag on and on but eventually we got to the Castle.

Getting out of the carriage Rikaad wasted no time and immediately went to show Amicia on what to do even if his own knowledge on this was limited.

Arthur of course followed them which left me and Robin standing right behind the entrance gate.

This had been such a wild day and I was tired but there was also still some adrenaline in my system.

And a lot of worry as well, Fable had gotten injured then the chaos with Maringand and then Oakleys death.

I hoped the Winged man could rest in peace.

Maybe we could ask Barsen to arrange some flowers for him?

At the broken tower Oakley had almost fully moved into before he… got hit with a burning net.

I'd tell him to avoid flame colored ones for the sake of my sanity.

I turned to Robin.

“Do you know where Barsen is? I want to ask him something”

Robin shook his head.

“He was in the kitchen for a bit but then he said he had to check up on a part of the Garden and left, he didn't come back though”

Barsen simply disappearing wasn't new, he'd be around somewhere.

“Well lets ask the kitchen staff if he came back”

It was possible he had gone back to chat a little with the Kitchen staff as he did that regularly.

The Kitchen was not too far from the entrance anyway,

just around the left corner and there it was.

To avoid spooking anyone we politely knocked on the small Door that led outside.

Myril was the one to open it and she waved us inside again.

“What are you here for this time? More snacks?”

She had a tone of amusement in her voice and on any other day she would have been right.

But after everything that happened today i just didn't feel like eating anything.

Good thing I didn't have to.

I shook my head.

“Any other day sure, but we are actually looking for Barsen, Have you seen him?”

Myril seemed to think for a second before she answered.

“Well the last time I saw him Robin was also here, He said he had to check on something in the Garden.

He didn't come back but that's nothing new, the man is elusive on good days so he's probably just somewhere amidst the greenery, I swear sometimes it seems like he's one with it!”

One with the greenery eh? Yeah that sounded accurate.

Then again he did admit to us that his great grandma was a Dryad or something so the plants might just like him.

We Thanked Myril and left to go look for the Gardener.

We tried to think of where he usually was but could only come up with either the cliffside or the areas without trees as he kept ripping the dandelions out to avoid them taking over.

We searched the left side first as that one was way smaller due to the cliff ending there before we moved on to the right side.

Surprisingly we were joined then by Myril and the older Guard that had kept an eye on Rowley who was right behind.

Speaking of the little guy was awake again but still looked exhausted.

I sent him inside the castle to go ask for Medical help, proper one this time.

The Guard went with him to avoid getting Lost while Nea limped up to us just as he passed the door to the throne room.

“What are ya Lads doin?”

She asked cheerfully while leaning on her crutch, huh, she must have gotten Winton to talk then.

“We're looking for Barsen, i wanted to ask him something about plants”

She nodded still in a good mood.

“He probably has forgotten more about plants than anyone else ever knew, so if it's a plant Question he is tha man!

Ya know what imma join ya in lookin fer him, he lost his keys near the shed yer staying at”

She fished said keys out of her pocket and jingled them.

I could make out that the keychain only had four Keys on it, and one of those was way too big to belong to any of the castle doors.

Nea stuffed the keys back in her pocket and used both of her crutches to walk this time, one did look suspiciously bent though.

It wasn't too far off to assume she hit someone with it.

With four people now looking for him, even if I didn't know while the otherwise mostly busy Myril was helping,

It should be easy to find the Gardener.

Combing through the trees I avoided Oakleys tower as best as I could, I really didn't want to see the not quite finished thing for now.

So instead I ended up going alongside the inner Wall with Nea right next to me.

We had decided to not go alone in case any soldiers did manage to sneak into here.

We were almost at the Northmost side of the wall when my shirt got tangled in a thorny bush.

While Nea laughed I cursed the thing and tried as carefully as possible to remove my shirt.

I didn't want to rip this one or else I would have managed to destroy two in a day.

While I set onto getting the hem out of the plant without Damaging either Nea just kept walking, I would be able to quickly catch up again anyway seeing as she had crutches still.

It took me a good minute or so till I got it out just in time to hear a scream.

I didn't recognize the scream at first but then realized that it had been Nea's voice.

What on earth was capable of getting her to scream like that?

I wasn't the only one that heard it and as I sprinted toward the sound I was joined by some wall Guards that had just taken up their shifts again.

I had to duck under a branch and as I stood up again I could see what had been the cause of Nea’s scream.

There were about ten soldiers lying dead on the ground and in the middle of them kneeling and only held up by a tree sapling was Barsen.

He was Dead, there was no way he was Alive, not with at least seven swords stuck in his torso and a battle ax embedded in one of his legs.

There also was a hole in the castle wall right behind all of them, no doubt where the soldiers had gotten in.

My brain felt like it had been replaced by cotton and was stuck in slow motion, The entire scene before me was surreal.

The Soldiers hadn't even been killed with actual weapons, Instead there were various gardening tools stuck in whatever unprotected spot was possible.

It took a few more seconds to register that these guys were Wintons best and most devoted Soldiers, i had seen them before back in the Tower.

How did Barsen manage to take so many out?

Then things snapped back to normal when I heard a wail and a familiar redheaded form bumped into me.

He was crying and I realized there were other people, lots of them.

How did this happen?

I pulled Robin closer to me and he sobbed into my shirt.

As much as i wanted i couldn't look away from Barsen, like he'd get up any second and then try to mend the broken branches of the sapling he had fallen on.

But he would never get up again, the blood had stopped flowing from his wounds some time ago and he was just, there.

The most astounding thing was that aside from some trampled grass none of the plants had taken any damage, aside from the sapling that held Barsen.

Nobody did anything, most were just crying or staring in disbelief.

Even some of the Guards were crying.

Barsen really had been the most liked person in the castle.

At some point even more Guards showed up, half of which also did not do anything while the other half had to drag people away from the rather gruesome sight.

I shifted my arm to block Robin's view of it even if he had already seen it.

He was still just sobbing into my side while I stood there frozen as my brain refused to cooperate with me.

I was suddenly dragged away from where I stood with Robin still clinging to me, and through the wool in my head I could make out the words ‘shock’ and ‘infirmary’.

Time seemed to warp and suddenly I found myself in the infirmary on a bed next to Robin while a Nurse gave me something to drink.

It tasted bitter and I noticed that my shoulder was bleeding again but didn't feel it at all.

I tried to get up but was pushed back down again by a nurse.

I was told to stay still and rest.

After that i did not remember anything, The entire stress of the day took me out cold.

All in all it was a wonder I hadn't crumpled earlier from all that had happened in the span of just one day.

War, then there was Another Ardua, Oakley burned to death, Fable falling in the River, visiting Maringand and freeing Amicia.

Going back home and then finding Barsen dead in the middle of the Soldiers he fought.

It really was a miracle that my brain had kept working through all of that, well most of that.

Whatever they had given me ensured I would stay asleep for some time.

……………………………………………………………………………………...........................

I only woke up the next day around midday and I felt like I was missing entire chunks of my memory.

Looking to my left I could see Robin sleeping in the bed right next to me and curled up like a little cat.

Wait, this was the infirmary, how'd he get in here?

Wait, what was I doing in the infirmary?

Then I recalled what had happened yesterday.

Two people I had considered to be good friends were Dead, both having died in rather horrible ways.

At least Barsen had a body to bury, Oakley just fell apart into a heap of ash.

Now that I was calm again and had a somewhat clear mind I did question if he really had burned as fast as I had perceived it or if I just went into shock back then as well.

Wait, Oakleys claw gauntlet thingy should still be there, it would at least be something to bury.

I really hoped nobody had taken them, though they weren't really usable for anyone else.

I stood up as quietly as I could to not Disturb anyone else and tried to sneak out.

As soon as I opened the door however I was greeted by Nea, who did wear her helmet over her eyes for once and i suspected they were red and puffy, she appeared to have been standing Guard for a while now though.

At least if the chair next to her was anything to go by.

We stared at each other for a good fifteen seconds.

“Go on, get, just be back before dawn or i'll kick yer arse”

She said grimly and unhappily.

Right, she'd been good friends with Barsen as well, known him for way longer than I did too.

He'd been the only one she ever accepted help from without any sort of fuss, which was basically a miracle.

Sneaking out was surprisingly easy, Then again it seemed that now every Guard was stationed on the wall and there were signs that the area had been searched.

The garden looked, sad, for a lack of a better word.

Despite it being light out all of the flowers were closed like it was midnight, how strange.

I debated which way to go to try and get the Gauntlets when I heard rustling in one of the bushes.

I was startled at first but then realized whatever this was was way too small to be a person.

I carefully and slowly went over to inspect only to have the Cat stumble out of the bush.

She blinked at me once and then put her head back into the bush.

What was she doing?

I went closer just as she turned around again with a familiar item in her maw.

Oakleys Gauntlet! Or at least one of them.

She dropped in front of my feet and then dragged the second one out of the bush just as I lifted the first one from the ground.

“What the fuck? You really are something else Cat, also that must have taken you all day!”

“Mrow?”

She just gently brushed against my legs and then demanded to be picked up by trying to climb my knee.

I did have to admit that this was an impressive feature of intelligence and if the Kitchen staff hadn't attested to see her being Born i'd almost say a witch forgot her pet here.

But quite frankly I was way too drained to think too much about this.

Maybe she did have some magic and that made her intelligent?

I had heard of animals gaining intelligence through magic.

Well, she still did normal cat things so I really had no idea.

I picked her up like she demanded before she clawed through the bandages on my leg and held her like a baby.

She immediately began purring and closed her eyes.

Yeah, not a chance I could set her down in the next few minutes.

At least that made me feel a little less hollowed out for now.

I had the Gauntlets, so now what?

Should I bury them next to the tower?

It was where he lived, or at least wanted to.

Then I remembered that I had left that old book there anyway and if left there for who knew how long time would just damage it.

Rain was still a thing after all and Oakley did not get the roof done as far as I knew.

So i had to go there regardless, it would be stupid to let such an old one of a kind book rot there.

I'd just put it back in the Library then, maybe someone else would find it interesting.

The walk to the broken tower was short, and i could see that really all of the plants had closed their blossoms, it almost seemed like it was fall.

Without the smell of rotten leaves though, which made it all the more weird to cross through.

“Mrrp?”

The cat softly bapped at my chin before bonking her head against me.

“Im fine, i think, i'm still alive at least and have all my limbs, which is more than some other can say”

Why was I even talking to the cat like that?

Maybe it was just nice to say things without the worry of being judged or looked at weird.

Ducking under a branch I reached the small clearing that the tower was built in, yep, still looked like everything was okay here.

That really made me want to punch something, but I couldn't, One, because I was holding the Cat and two, none of this stuff was mine and I was not going to damage it!

Instead of burying the Gauntlets I decided to just leave them on a table, like he'd come home any moment even if I knew he wouldn't.

The Cat jumped out of my arms and went to sit in one of the unfinished windows right next to the old Oak Tree.

Man that thing had to be really old.

It was wider than I was tall and managed to tilt the entire tower a little.

I exited the tower since I technically didn't have any business being here, it really only made me sad seeing it stuffed full with things that now would never get used.

As I left through the doorway that only had a makeshift door I heard an awfull cracking sound.

Like splintering wood.

I looked around before the sound came again from above me.

Was the Oak tree losing some of its branches?

I'd better not stand directly under it then.

Before I could move too far away there was another even louder cracking sound and I looked up to the groove between the branches where Oakley had put up some sort of hammock.

Weird, despite the sound none of the branches appeared to be even a little damaged.

Wait, did something up there just move?

I was not mistaken as there was indeed something up there.

It had the same color as some of the barkless spots on the tree and appeared to be covered in tree sap.

What was that?

Now I wished I had a knife.

There was another cracking sound and whatever it was unfurled, revealing what looked to be a membrane and three fingers.

Wait that looked awfully familiar, but that couldn't be, there was no way.

At another cracking sound a second limb appeared, mirroring the other and just as much covered in tree sap.

I was rooted on the spot, transfixed by what was going on.

More noises of splintering and breaking wood sounded out and a vaguely humanoid shape heaved itself out of the old tree.

It grabbed the hammock from where it was and used it as a sort of old fashioned tunica.

There was a two pronged tail sticking out of it too, a very familiar and prehensile one.

“OAKLEY?!?”

He turned around and I could see that it was indeed the winged man I had seen burn to little more than ashes only a day prior.

Technically it had been around twenty four hours even.

He stumbled out of the tree, seemingly still unsure on his legs like a baby deer.

“Ah, hello Donovan! I hope I didn't scare you!”

Didn't scare me? Well kind of, but what the hell was happening?

“Oakley? What the FUCK! Is going on?”

He shook himself a little to get rid of the tree sap and used part of his hammock-turned-tunica to wipe the residue of his wings.

“Well, as you can surely tell im not human, far from it actually as there is no human at all in my ancestry!

I'm as Bastard as Bastard can be!

Well, in short im a fucked up magical creature that can’t actually die by normal means!

I just ‘resprout’ in the next best and oldest Oaktree!

But dying still hurts so I always do my best to avoid it!”

I just stared at the man, he couldn't die by normal means?

What the hell?

Also-

“What the fuck are you then that this is possible?”

I had known that Oakley was far from a normal being but this was just Wild.

He just shrugged, seemingly completely unbothered by having died the day before.

“I'm just Oakley, always have been, at some point my ancestry became so mixed that i am partially belonging to species that are now extinct”

So, he was a lot of different things mixed together which would explain the weird featherless wings and the two pronged tail.

And he had magic on top of that.

“Im not sure if i understand that correctly but in any case what the fuck?

Also you couldn't have said that BEFORE the battle???

I thought you really died!”

I was shaking now, the stress from the past days and the Death of Barsen, and the assumed death of Oakley had just been way too much.

And now Oakley was okay somehow?

He could have told people he'd be fine before the battle!

So we would have one less thing to worry about!

“Donovan, you're hyperventilating, calm down”

Calm down? How could i?

So much had happened! People died!

Right in front of my eyes too! Barsen was dead!

I unintentionally scared Fable and he was injured!

During the battle I was a coward because I didn't dare kill anyone!

There is Another Ardua here now too!

And if i had charged him any stronger he would have cracked his skull open! I could have killed him!

So much stuff that my brain was only now catching up on, like it had blocked out anything but the basic functions.

“-van? Donovan? Can you hear me? Hey!”

I looked up from where I was kneeling on the ground, When did that happen? And why did I have my hands over my ears?

Oakley sat down in front of me while I tried not to panic again.

His ears were pointed down and he did not look happy.

Then he suddenly pulled me into a hug.

“C’mere, sometimes i forget that you are all just children, eighteen isn't some magical number where you are suddenly a fully formed adult after all”

Any other time I would have been offended at being called a child but Oakley was right, of course he was, I had no idea what I was doing, I had no idea how to be an adult.

And there never had been anyone to teach me either.

Everything that had happened in the past week had just been chaotic and stressful and now I had no idea what to do.

So I cried for the first time in years.

At that moment I didn't even care that Oakley was there, or that he was still covered in tree sap.

I was just glad not to be alone, it was still hard to get used to the fact that I could ask for help, especially in things that were emotion related.

And that would take time, years of what i mistook for solitude instead of loneliness wouldn't go away in just a few weeks.

Oakley didn't say anything, just let me get all the negative emotions out while he softly ran his fingers through my hair in an attempt to comfort me.

It worked a little.

I had no idea how long I stayed like that but eventually I calmed down enough for Oakley to let go and make tea in his tower.

He noticed that I brought the gauntlets back and thanked me for it.

Now I was just sitting here with a steaming mug of tea, feeling strangely, relieved? Albeit empty.

Maybe I really should stop bottling up all of my negative emotions.

The Cat was still here surprisingly and jumped up on the askew Table.

She draped herself over my arm and started purring.

“Don't get any hairs in his tea!”

Oakley called from where he poured his own cup.

“Its fine, she's just trapping my arm but i don't mind, she's soft”

Oakley laughed gently.

“Have you found a name for her yet?”

I shook my head.

“Nah, me and Robin tried like two hundred though and it looks like she doesn't like any of them”

He sat across from me and reached a wing over to softly bap the Cats snout.

In doing so he accidentally knocked the book I had found in the Library to the floor.

He picked it up with a confused look in his eyes.

“Well that's not one of mine”

“Oh, i brought that one, i found it in the library and thought you might like it”

He stared at me for a second with something indecipherable in his eyes.

“This thing looks older than I am!

And for that the condition isn't too bad either”

Looked older than he was? How old was he?

No i wasn't gonna ask, that would just mess with my brain even more.

He flipped the first page open.

“Have you read it? You are right that this is something i find interesting”

He flipped through the book faster than I had read it, Then again he had more practice.

“Uh yeah i have read it, and i found it confusing, with those Creatures and all, also the places look like Maringand and Kamerasca.

Do you think that really happened?”

Oakley looked up for just one second.

“Well, it is very possible, The book is very old and seems to have been made as a means to retell what happened, a shame some pages are missing.

And from what i know of the area it seems accurate enough”

So that could have really happened? How long did Maringand and Kamerasca have a stupid feud for anyway?

“So Maringand and Kamerasca have always been on bad terms until now? Just because someone a few hundred or more years in the past fucked up?”

Oakley sighted at that and held up the Book.

“Look i have been alive for quite some time, and people always find a way to fuck things up, be it intentional or not.

“Everybody makes mistakes, that's perfectly normal after all.

But sometimes there are mistakes too great to move on from.

It is not their fault, but it was once, and it will be one day.

Always different people, burdening the consequences of a single mistake.

Of a single person they now have no resemblance with.

Some would call it Karma.

Others would call it unfair.

But perhaps ‘Hubris’ would be the better description for it.

To meddle with forces beyond your control and pay the price across all existence.

How terribly human.”

So, humans were doomed to repeat their mistakes across all of history?

“So no matter what we do it will all just happen again anyway?

Why do anything at all then?”

Oakey looked at me like I had flipped the table over.

Well he couldn't expect me to be happy after he said something like that!

Really! He made it sound like whatever we did was irrelevant!

Oakley then put the Book back on the Table,

out of reach of the cups and looked me right in the eyes.

“Because every tiny bit of effort could be what breaks that horrendous cycle, the people writing the book knew that.

That's why they left the story of what happened to them behind even after they were gone, so people could learn from it!

Most of the stupid and bloody battles that happen are because people don't learn from their history, sure, some say they do but then go and make exactly those Mistakes again.

Over and over again until finally someone ACTUALLY learns and does better!

But of course if the ones after that don't learn that progress is for naught.

But with every little bit of progress, Every story written and read the world can become a better place!

But that might take a long time”

I just stared at him, so there was a chance that one day things would not repeat? That it would be better for those after us?

“So should I read more books?”

Oakley launched at that, the weird bird-like caw ever present in his voice.

“Well that's one way of course, but that doesn't guarantee that you actually learn or understand, Besides, I think you are fine the way you are!

You already fought in a war, albeit a short one, without killing anyone! Thanks to that a lot of people got to go home!

No, you are fine! As long as you stay kind.

But i will warn you there are people that will take advantage of that, besides ,nobody in the world is a hundred percent good anyway”

So he basically just called me a pretty alright guy, At least that was how I understood it.

“Nobody is a hundred percent good? Are you sure? Not even Robin?”

Oakley cackled at that.

“When I say nobody I mean nobody!

Sure the little Ginger is a ray of sunshine, but he's only sixteen!

There's a whole life ahead of him with events that will change and shape his personality!”

That was not something I had thought of before, of course nobody would stay exactly the same throughout their life.

But we would stay friends regardless, I was sure of that, Besides, being a bit more mature couldn't hurt him.

“Yeah, you are right in that, still there are a lot of nice people in the castle, i doubt they would do that”

Oakley just shook his head at that, sighing.

“one of the most important things,

perhaps the most important thing I have learned in my stupidly long life is that nice people can fuck each other up in monstrous ways.

People can be bone deep, kind and loving and self reflective and still lash out under pressure.

People can be charitable and hospitable and generous and still find themselves in situations where they become selfish.

People can be well meaning and easygoing and hold deep seated opinions that turn them into vicious little bullies under the right conditions.

Nobody is just one thing, and nobody stays one way.

every person is a kaleidoscope and they will surprise you.

you will surprise yourself.”

At my surprised face he held up a hand to signal me to stay quiet.

“It's not a warning and it's not a judgment and it's not an excuse, and it's certainly not a reason to stop trying or to stop trusting.

it is just a fact. “

I wondered how long Oakley had been alive for to get all that wisdom.

“So no matter how nice i think someone is there's always a chance they will turn mean if i do or say the wrong thing?

Man, people are complicated!”

“Now you get it! Just remember, If it sounds too good to be true then it probably is!”

Well this talk with Oakley had somehow been both depressing and optimistic.

Which probably made it realistic i guessed.

I tried to move my arm a little as I was starting to get that pins and needles sensation from the cat laying on it.

She rolled off of it with a disappointed mewl.

“Sorry kitty but my arm is falling asleep”

She jumped from the table and went out the window.

Trough that i could see that the sky had been tinted a deep orange, oh fuck.

“What time is it? I told Nea I'd be back before Dawn!

She said she'd kick my ass if didn't come back by then!”

Oakley Cackled at that.

“With only one leg? I'd love to see that!”

I rolled my eyes at that.

“She could still hit me with her crutches, so id better go now, but thank you for-”

For what exactly? The tea? I hadn't even drunk half of it,

for letting me cry without judgment?

“-thanks for everything, i'll leave the Book here for now and then go to sleep, see you tomorrow?”

He nodded.

“See you tomorrow, by that time I'll have actual pants too!”

I couldn't help but laugh at his comment before carefully closing the ruddy door behind me.

After crying for who knew how long I felt tired, I just hoped that when I next woke up all of this hadn't been a dream.

At least the infirmary had comfortable beds, they weren't as stupidly soft as the ones in the room I had shared with Fable.

Fable! God, I was such an idiot! I should go check up on him!

Since he was an Elf he was likely moved to the Castles infirmary also.

I'd just ask a Nurse where he was to as if he was alright and then tell him goodnight.

Traversing the Garden at dawn made it look kinda eerie, but that was just because everything looked weirdly darker and more Orange.

At least the castle itself was bright enough to lead the way so finding it was no problem.

Going back to the infirmary I was greeted by Nea still in front of the door.

“Welcome back! One minute later and I woulda kicked yer arse!”

She swung one of her crutches at me but missed due to me being too far away.

“Yeah, sorry, it's been a weird day and I forgot to look at the time.

Also Oakley is somehow back, don't ask me i have no idea”

I went past the now extremely confused looking Nea into the infirmary where I was immediately scolded by a nurse for leaving without saying anything.

I let her finish talking before I asked her where Fable was.

She pointed to one of the curtains and I could indeed see his Rapier laying on the table outside of it.

Since I couldn't knock on a piece of fabric I just slowly slid it to the side.

The Curtain revealed only an empty bed.

“Fable?”

Maybe he'd gone to get something to drink?

But he could have asked a nurse for that.

Just to be sure he really wasn't there I looked under the covers and even under the bed itself.

Still nothing, where was he?

This really did not help my stress level, not after yesterday.

I alerted a Nurse to his disappearance who checked the rest of the room to try and find him.

Fable was tall and pale, he couldn't just have gotten out unnoticed, right?

I tried to think through this logically, he HAD to be somewhere, So where did he go?

He also had an injured foot so he couldn't have gone that far.

If he had tried to leave the defensive walls of the Castle someone would have stopped him.

Inside the castle itself there were too many people to go around unnoticed for long.

So that only left outside, in the Garden.

I just came back!

And now it was Dark, what on earth could he want there?

Well, only one way to find out.

Completely ignoring Nea as she asked what the fuck i meant by Oakley being back and where the hell i was going i went back outside again.

It was now almost completely dark, and the air had gotten a bit colder.

For once I was thankful that Fable was so pale, he'd stand out against the dark background at least.

But after what had happened I didn't want to go through the Garden, But I did need to find Fable.

So I stepped into the darkness, trying my best to avoid branches hitting my face and set out to go look for the taller man.

I looked along the wall, purposefully avoiding where Barsen had died, and slinked quietly next to Oakley tower.

I could even hear the winged man doing something with Fabric, likely new pants as he said.

I checked up on top of the trees even but there was no sign of him.

Where did he go? He couldn't just disappear!

I had now looked almost everywhere for Fable but just couldn't find him.

Maybe if I took a break and thought about where he could be I'd find him?

Besides I was a bit out of breath after all that had happened so sitting down for a minute wouldn't hurt.

Since I was near my favorite sunspot, I decided to go and rest there to think about where my Brother had gone.

His leg was busted so he couldn't be too far, right?

Emerging from the greenery I saw that the boulder was occupied by a now familiar white haired form.

Fable.

How the fuck he managed to get there was beyond me especially since he didn't have crutches anywhere near him.

He was staring up at the night sky and seemed calm, not the weird calm he exuded before but rather a calm that radiated peace.

I silently sat next to him and looked up too.

There wasn't really anything out of the ordinary aside from that it was a cloudless night and all the stars were perfectly visible now that it had gotten dark.

They were really pretty.

Maybe I should pay them more attention, at least sometime.

“There are less stars here”

I looked at Fable, what did he mean by that?

The sky was the same everywhere wasn't it?

“What?”

He answered without looking away from the stars.

“Do you know what light pollution is?”

Light pollution? The only pollution I knew of was when water was dirty, but that surely wasn't the case here.

“No, do you?”

He nodded briefly.

“Light Pollution is excessive, misdirected, artificial light.

Too much light pollution washes out starlight in the night sky making it harder to see the actual sky”

He pointed to a star to our right somewhere.

“Do you see that one?

That is Lafayah it translates to either ‘Lonely light’ or ‘Lonely Star’.

It is named that because there are no other stars near it but it still shines as bright as every other one.

I like it, it also always points North so if the sky is clear enough you can navigate with it.

Out of all the stars it is my favorite.”

I looked in the direction Fable had pointed at, there was indeed a star hanging alone in the firmament with no other stars even near it.

But it still shone brightly, i could see why he liked it, it was as lonely as he had been.

I moved to hug him, and this time instead of being so eerily puppet like he actually hugged back.

“I'm sorry for being such an idiot to you before, i should have explained things better, and i'm so Sorry for scaring you like that, i promise i'll never do it again”

“You don't have to apologize, thinking that the entirety of that madness came from your Elven side was only logical, and, somehow, it stopped me from thinking I was absolutely worthless like our Sire always told me I was.

I think now it is finally time to go and do the things i want, even if i don't know what that is yet.

Maybe i'll just have to go out there and look, im bound to find something after all”

“What do you mean by that?”

I tilted my head at him in confusion

“That means as soon as im well enough to travel i will leave this place and go see the world and all it has to offer”

He wanted to leave? But he'd only been here for like a week!

“Do you have to? You basically just got here, you could stay! i don't think anyone would mind”

He shook his head.

"I've only read about the world in books and even though i've traveled here i've seen so little of it, i want to see all i can, and i can't do that if i stay in one place”

He was right in that, if he wanted to see the world then he had to move of course.

“Promise you'll visit? After Rikaad is done with the paper stuff I can properly show you Kamerasca!”

He looked at me and smiled, a slightly crooked but genuine smile.

It was unlike the eerie puppet like one he had before.

“I promise i'll visit, who knows maybe i'll find some interesting trinkets for you”

Stuff from all over the world, having that in my shed sounded nice.

“That would be nice of you, but don't take anything heavy!

I don't want you to break your back!”

“I won't, don't worry, but maybe I'll also find more of the Ardua, or at least the Bracelets.

How many are there anyway? Well if i see any i will send them your way”

More Ardua, right, i thought my Bracelet was the only one but that didn't exactly make sense, there were bound to be more.

“No idea, a few at least, I'm pretty sure some got lost throughout time like mine did, but be careful! I don't want you to get injured.

Again”

Fable laughed, actually laughed and the sound reminded me of clear bells.

“I'll be fine, i'm not stupid, and now i know what the Bracelets can do!”

It wasn't the Bracelets though, it was me, I was the one with the freak anatomy.

I wondered if Fable was still scared, not of me but because of what I did.

“How are you? Aside from your foot i mean”

He tilted his head slightly at me, was he imitating me?

“I'm fine, why do you ask?”

“So… you're not scared?”

He blinked, making his poppy red eyes disappear for a moment.

“Donovan, are you still hung up on what happened in the river?

I can assure you i'm fine, and i'm not scared, not anymore”

Well yeah, he was out of the scary situation, there was no reason to anymore, but still.

“I just, i don't know, so much had happened and after i found the Bracelet i've been always nervous about people being scared of me.

I can turn into a huge Beast for some reason and i guess i just fear that people will hate me again for being something else than them”

I drew my knees up to my chest and rested my head on one.

“Donovan, are you afraid that I'll hate you after what happened?”

Well that hit the nail on the head, didn't it?

I did THAT thinking he already knew and was fine, and i didn't even ask!

I just LEFT him there for who even knew how long and let him think he was gonna die.

I was a horrible Brother.

“I think some part of me will always be afraid of what people think of me, i'm neither Elven nor Human and with the Bracelet i'm also an Ardua, i won't ever truly belong anywhere i guess”

From how I positioned my head I could only see half of Fable's face, but I could hear him well enough.

“I think I get at least half of what you mean, as an Albino im alway looked at strangely.

But I can promise you that I'm not afraid of you, I'll prove it if you want?”

I lifted my head back up again, prove how?

“Prove it? What do you mean? Wait, your not suggesting-”

“What if I am? If that's what it takes to show you that you are not scary then i'll do it”

So, he really just offered to go back in THERE to actually prove he was not afraid of me?

What the hell?

But looking at his face there was not even a trace of fear or doubt,

And he didn't have that puppet-like demeanor to hide it right now.

“I- are you sure? That's a rather, unusual, idea”

“Donovan, alone the fact that you are asking I am sure proves you are a good person, I think you don't have to worry as much as you do.

And yes, i'm sure, it's getting cooler out here anyway”

I sighed, Fable was odd, well so was I but it looked like he already had his mind set on that so if he wanted to prove that he wasn't scared then so be it.

I slowly stood up, motioning for Fable to keep sitting to keep any strain off his injured limb.

I went a few paces away and kneeled on the ground.

Since I was still bandaged and they wouldn't fit me as Ardua I opted to shift into a Giant instead, after all if my clothes stayed to scale then hopefully my bandages would too.

Just as I had hoped they did stay the same proportions compared to me, and since I was sitting down I didn't reach over the treeline.

I looked down at Fable, who was now so much smaller than me, and saw he was still sitting there relaxed.

“I was not aware you could be taller than me like this, though i'm sure the Bracelet counts as cheating”

I laughed at that, right, he'd only seen the fuzzy form and not this one.

But if he was making jokes about it then he was probably still alright.

“I guess so, but with all the bandages i can't exactly change shape on top of height too, not keen on bleeding all over the ground”

Fable nodded still as relaxed as ever.

“Well, the night won't last forever, and I'd rather not have anyone walk by now, we should move this along, don't you think?”

Right, I wasn't keen on having someone see, well all of this really.

“Okay, i'm going to lift you up now, if you want to back out anytime say so and i'll stop”

I gently extended my hand to him and he heaved himself up without hesitation by grabbing my thumb and using it as a handle.

Well that worked too.

I slowly lifted him up to face level and stopped for a few seconds to give him time to back out.

It was also kinda weird having the man that normally was a good head taller than me sitting in my palm now.

His paleness really gave a weird contrast against the night sky, He almost looked like a star himself.

When I didn't move for a few seconds he stared expectantly at me and I brought him closer to my face.

Opening my mouth I did my best to hide my teeth with my lips before gently sliding the lanky Elf inside.

I kept it open for a few more seconds in case he wanted to stop.

He did not tell me to stop, instead I felt him curiously brush his fingers over my palate.

Well now that felt weird.

“You have baby fangs”

What? My fangs were the same size as his!

Comparatively at least, why would he say that?

And since my mouth was full I couldn't even respond, so instead I slowly closed it, making sure none of his limbs were anywhere near my teeth.

Fable still made no motion of trying to get out or being in the slightest bit scared, he was just laying there.

He was also still poking at my palate since he was laying with his back on my tongue.

I slowly tipped my head farther back and he slid the tiniest amount before his feet dangled over my half closed throat.

Since he was so tall he filled my mouth almost completely so swallowing would be a hurdle.

At least he was lanky instead of buff.

There was still no protest from the pale man so I tipped my head back further and let him slide into my throat where I gave a tentative swallow.

Fable didn't fight it, just continued to be floppy like a tired cat.

In many ways it would have seemed similar to when I had to eat him in the River, but also somehow not.

This time he knew, had suggested it even, and he was actually calm and not the tense calm from last time.

Swallowing again he slid further down, Now he was somewhere between my lungs.

Another, last swallow had him spill into my pouch where he slid around a little.

“Fable?”

I waited with baited breath for his response.

———————————————————————

NEXT / PREVIOUS / OVERSIGHT

#SSTC #lizards writing #vore story #soft vore #v0re #g/t story #giant/tiny #g/t vore #extreme cuddling #sstc #sfw vore #Ardua #Barmea #Kamerasca #Maringand #Elf #Magic #mentions of death #character death

23 notes · View notes

legend-collection · 2 years

Text

Reynard The Fox

Reynard the Fox, also known as Renard, Renart, Reinard, Reinecke, Reinhardus, Reynardt and by many other spelling variations, is a trickster figure whose tale is told in a number of anthropomorphic tales from medieval Europe.

Reynard The Fox 1846 by Granger

He seems to have originated in French folklore. An extensive treatment of the character is the Old French Le Roman de Renart written by Perrout de Saint Cloude around 1175, which sets the typical setting. Reynard has been summoned to the court of king Noble, or Leo, the Lion, to answer charges brought against him by Isengrim the Wolf. Other anthropomorphic animals, including Bruin the Bear, Baldwin the Ass, Tibert (Tybalt) the Cat, Chantecler the Rooster and Hirsent the She-wolf, appear to give testimony against him, which Reynard always proves false by one stratagem or another. The stories typically involve satire whose usual butts are the aristocracy and the clergy, making Reynard a peasant-hero character. Reynart's principal castle, Maleperduys, is available to him whenever he needs to hide away from his enemies. Some of the tales feature Reynard's funeral, where his enemies gather to deliver maudlin elegies full of insincere piety, and which features Reynard's posthumous revenge. Reynard's wife Hermeline appears in the stories, but plays little active role, although in some versions she remarries when Reynard is thought dead, thereby becoming one of the people he plans revenge upon.

Reynard appears first in the medieval Latin poem Ysengrimus, a long Latin mock-epic written ca. 1148-1153 by the poet Nivardus in Ghent, that collects a great store of Reynard's adventures. He also puts in an early appearance in a number of Latin sequences by the preacher Odo of Cheriton. Both of these early sources seem to draw on a pre-existing store of popular culture featuring the character.

The 13th century saw the light of a Middle Dutch version of the story (Van den vos Reynaerde, About Reynard the Fox), comprised of rhymed verses (scheme AA BB). Very little is known of the author, Willem, other than the description of himself in the first sentences: This would roughly translate as:

Willem, die Madoc maecte, Daer hi dicken omme waecte, Hem vernoyde so haerde Dat die avonture van Reynaerde In dietsche onghemaket bleven (Die Arnout niet hevet vulscreven) Dat hi die vijte van Reynaerde dede soucken Ende hise na den walschen boucken In dietsche dus hevet begonnen. Willem who has made Madoc, and suffered many a sleepless night in doing so, regretted that the adventures of Reynaert had not been translated in Dutch (because Arnout had not completed his work). So he has researched the story and in the same way as the French books has he written it in Dutch.

Who this Willem was, remains a mystery. Madoc of which he here spoke, probably another one of his works, is also still an unknown text to this day. Illustration from Ghetelen in Reinke de Vos (1498)

Geoffrey Chaucer used Reynard material in the Canterbury Tales; in the “Nonne Preestes Tale”, Reynard appears as “Rossel” and an ass as “Brunel”. In 1485 William Caxton printed The Historie of Reynart the Foxe, which was translated from a Dutch version of the fables. Hans van Ghetelen, a printer of Incunabula in Lübeck printed an early German version called Reinke de Vos in 1498. It was translated to Latin and other languages, which made the tale poplular across Europe. The character of Tybalt in Shakespeare's Romeo and Juliet is named for the character Tibert/Tybalt the “Prince of Cats” in Reynard the Fox. Goethe, also, dealt with Reynard in his fable Reinecke Fuchs. Reynard is also referenced in the Middle English poem Sir Gawain and the Green Knight during the third hunt.

#reynard the fox #france #europe

29 notes · View notes

askroahmmythril · 7 months

Text

Made-Up Gym Leaders

So I was looking through some old files of mine and stumbled across these. I forgot I'd even come up with these, but I kind of like these ideas. One of those things, if I had more time and was better at imitating the Pokemon design style, I'd want to try drawing these characters to have a visual on them. But anyway, some Gym Leader ideas I had :

Flying - Audi (name basis, Audubon Society)

An elderly lady with grey hair in a bun, a decorative feather holding it in position. Horn-rimmed glasses, a kindly but spry look to her. White blouse with peacock teal shorts and hiking boots, a pair of binoculars hanging around her neck. Essentially a birdwatcher look.

Strictly uses bird type Pokemon, like, nothing that just happens to have Flying type, they're all definitely birds of various types.

A bit flighty (ha) and can get carried away talking about all the birds she's seen in her time, but not as "spaced out" as someone like Drasna, is pretty sharp and spry.

Gym Gimmick : Her gym is actually outdoors, set up as a nature hike trail. It's also a quiz gym, asking questions about bird Pokemon such as if you can identify certain footprints or other dex details. Trainers will still be eager to show off their bird Pokemon, but if you fail the quiz, you might get a harder fight as they think "Looks like you need to study more, but I can help with that!"

Rock - Cris (name basis, crystal)

Hippie type guy, unkempt hair and goatee with stubble. Very laid back look, wears various crystal necklaces, a brown leather vest with fringe around the bottom, a tie dye shirt with earth tones, worn jeans, and sandals.

His Pokemon tend to have a crystalline aspect to them, such as the Gigalith line, Carbink, etc.

Talks about the healing power of the earth, the voices of nature, very laid back in personality. Even in defeat is likely pretty lax about it and would say something like "Far out!" in admiration of your Pokemons' power. Likely would say something that might allude to being a relative of Mina from the Alola region, like a cousin or such.

Gym Gimmick : ?

Fairy - Mabel (name basis, sounds like fable / make believe kinda)

Kids' show host, probably in her early 20s. Light pink hair in a pixie bob style, cheerful expressions. Sort of fantasy princess look to her style of clothing, but notably has a cute dragon hand puppet that she provides a voice for. Her default "pose" for battle has her kicked back in an overstuffed cozy armchair, dragon puppet up eagerly, and a storybook open in her lap.

Narrates a "hero's journey" type story about the trainer as they traverse the gym.

Gym Gimmick : Her gym is actually the studio where she does her storytime show, her subordinate trainers being actors in different fantasy themed sets, like a witch in a forest, a knight in a castle, etc. If you pay attention to the story she tells, it may hint you on what your next opponent will use against you so you can prepare accordingly.

Dragon - Dyson (name basis, dice)

D&D style Dungeon Master. Dressed in a mostly modern style outfit, open jacket and jeans, but with a few accents here and there like a helmet, necklace with a D20, etc. He has fairly sharp eyes, focused looking, cocky grin. Perhaps kind of a faux fur collar on his jacket for style.

Has a flair for the dramatic, liking to build up battles in his gym as great fantasy setting encounters.

Gym Gimmick : Gym is set up like a Fire Emblem style tactical game. Battles have special gimmick rules, such as if an area is marked as a certain "terrain" type, different effects can happen in battle like weather or one of the terrain style effects. If you approach a trainer from behind, you start the battle with a free turn for "catching them off guard," but the same can apply if a trainer catches you this way.

Psychic - Tara (name basis, tarot)

A fortune teller wearing a black hooded cloak with golden runes along the trim. Her hood keeps a bit of her face in shadow, though she has sharp lavender eyes and a long violet hair braid that spills from her hood and down her side. Has a cozy looking velvet sort of outfit under the cloak, a burgundy top with black leggings and thick tan boots.

Has an aloof way of speaking, as though fate is decided and she's just there to play her part. She is however rather philosophical about her tarot readings, introducing herself by saying "My personal reading today… it spoke well of my fate here… Let us see…" Upon losing however, she amends this with "A reading, however, is not assurance. It is merely a guide and it is ours to find the way…"

Gym Gimmick : ?

Normal - Reggie (name basis, regular)

A store clerk. Clean cut light brown hair and a friendly face. White work shirt and khakis with a blue store apron. Tends to have a friendly smile, though it does become a bit more of a strained "customer service" smile for his losing animation.

Very service oriented, upon encounter he even asks if you were able to find everything you wanted today.

Gym Gimmick : His gym is in whatever city in the region happens to have the huge size department store, his gym actually being IN the store. Your bag is sealed while in the gym, and instead you're given a shopping cart. Certain areas in the gym have "Free Sample" kiosks where you can get items for use in the gym. Defeating trainers in the gym gets you coupons you can use at kiosks to obtain extra items.

……Kinda jokingly want to have a Beauty trainer in the gym that's very rude and demanding when you talk to her, and turns out her name's Karen, haha.

Bug - Nadia (name basis, needle)

A tattoo artist with a punk aesthetic. She has a yellow and black mohawk themed on Beedrill, and a green vest worn over a black half top. Has spider web sleeve tattoos.

Rough personality, confident style. Respects you as a kindred spirit upon defeat, can respect your power.

Gym Gimmick : ?

Steel - Victoria (name basis, Victorian style)

Wears a steampunk aesthetic outfit, complete with top hat and a tailed jacket. Overall a brown with bronze trim theme, gear and cog accents here and there. She has blonde hair with a silver streak, worn in a ponytail.

A refined yet excitable personality, eager to test your abilities, delighted even in defeat as it was an impressive showing.

Gym Gimmick : The gym is a tower, each floor requiring you to reassemble pipes to carry a flow of steam to power an elevator to the next floor.

Grass - Dr. Basil (name basis, holy basil, a medicinal herb)

A medical doctor, studies the medicinal properties of herbs. A bit of a gaunt, serious face, glasses. Stubble from his hard work life, though his hair is nicely kept. Wears a doctor's coat, tends to keep his hands folded behind his back and poses slightly hunched over.

Fairly serious and methodical. His comments during battle tend to be on the analytical side. Possibly a descendant of Tao Hua from Legends Arceus, similar thus in appearance.

Gym Gimmick : ?

Water - Porter (name basis, port)

Captain of a luxury cruise liner. Wears a crisp white captain's uniform with blue trim. Smarmy sort of grin, well trimmed mustache. Possibly tends to carry a fancy glass of (ahem) vacation juice.

Fairly posh attitude, proud of his vessel and the services his cruise provides. Overall fairly jolly, sees even his battles as providing entertainment for passengers on his ship.

Might make reference to the captain of the St. Anne and his struggle with seasickness.

Gym Gimmick : The gym is on his ship and may sort of feel like a combination of the St. Anne and the abandoned ship from the Hoenn games. As you traverse the ship, dipping into the different rooms to challenge trainers, you'll find keys to other cabins and areas. Upon finding the Captain's Key, you'll be able to enter Porter's room to challenge him.

Ground - Cheval (name basis, shovel)

Super into geocaching. His outfit is perhaps similar in style to BotW Link's climbing outfit, but more decidedly modern, patterned bandana, sleeveless top, cargo shorts. Has a shovel he usually poses with held across his shoulders. Shoulder length dirty blond hair worn in braids, tanned with freckles from being out in the sun so much.

Has an encouraging personality, though can be a bit antsy, always after hunting the next cache.

Gym Gimmick : Gym has a rocky and natural look. Each room has a hidden button you need to step on to open the way forward. Defeating trainers will give you hints toward the button's location, but alternatively if you're good with it, you can use the Itemfinder to track the buttons down.

5 notes · View notes

tdcloud · 1 year

Text

How the hell do you write a book? (blog#11)

And we’ve reached November! It’s wild how fast this year has gone by, but even more than that, it’s wild that I’ve managed to keep up a monthly blog for almost an entire year. The last time I tried to do this it didn’t last longer than four months, so really, it’s an accomplishment! I hope you’ve all been enjoying it. I’ll have to plan something special for next month to ring in the occasion. But today is today, and it’s only November. That begs the question: What have I got for you guys this month?

That’s the question I stumble over sometimes, to be honest. It’s easy to talk about things I'm currently working on, but eventually, I do run out of projects to tease. Thankfully, I’ve found that Instagram has been a good source of immediate feedback on this sort of thing (you can find me on there under my general online handle of Terminallydepraved.) It’s a lot of fun to show off my daily thoughts and goings-on via the Story feature on there. Sometimes I even post sneak peeks at covers, art, or snippets of my current writing projects. It’s a fun time. Consider checking it out!

Anyway, I threw a few potential options into a poll on Instagram for this month’s blog topic, and the landslide victory came in the form of a whole blog about my writing process. I’ve definitely spoken to people before about how I write and plan stories, but I’ve never given a step-by-step look of idea creation to finishing a final draft before. I figured that's probably the most interesting way to structure this initial blog—after all, I could easily write a standalone blog post on just about any single step. I’ll be getting into the overview of things and we can save those closer, step-specific posts for the future.

So, no time like the present! Let’s get to it!

For the sake of simplicity, I’m going to treat this the way I would proceed if I were writing a multi-chaptered book and not something short like a novella, oneshot, or fanfic. While the latter three sometimes involve this level of detail and pre-planning, they most often do not and don’t receive the same level of preparation that I’d give to a 300+ page book project. If anyone is curious about how I handle those, we can talk about it in a future post or I can answer it as a Q & A next month! Just ask!

Step 1: Idea Creation

Now, I’m not going to sit here and tell you how to hunt for ideas. Inspiration comes to me or it doesn’t, and most of the time it’s incredibly hard to predict what will give me an idea and what won’t. Sometimes, just watching a movie or reading a book will spit ten new ideas into my head. Sometimes, I can go months without thinking of anything new. I’ve mentioned before that I’m currently at a place where I need to start creating new ideas for future works, and there’s a reason I’ve been asking for suggestions XD I’m not currently inspired by much, so nothing new is flowing.

I’ll give an example, though, of how Brontide came to me. I was reading a book on superstitions and folklore while working a boring desk job in college. I read about faerie knots and couldn’t stop thinking about a fae character tying knots in a human lover’s hair. That in turn kept the idea in my head, fermenting away, until I’d come up with a small plot that later became the fanfic version of Brontide.

This is typically one of the easiest and shortest steps in the process. I literally only need an idea to get going on a project. Sometimes, it’s a small character interaction like that. Other times, it’s a setting (the Drow world, a castle, a city of monsters working day jobs a la Fable). The initial concept that sets the stage for the setting, tone, and general aesthetics comes first, and then I think about the characters.

Step 2: Character Creation

This is what ends up taking up a good portion of my story-inception time. As a rule, I almost always build the story plot itself around the characters as I make them. If I think about Brontide again, I imagine the setting and general tone of the story I want to tell. Then, I think about what sort of leading characters/couple would make this the most fun. As I’ve discussed in previous teasers and character profiles, I have very set archetypes that I tend to favor. Everyone’s got them, and it’s what I default to unless the story I plan on telling is very different from one I’d typically tell. For Brontide, I wanted to tell a traditional fae love story but gay. Therefore, I needed a fae who kidnaps a human, and in stories like that, the fae is almost always royalty. That’s how Ruari came into being. As for the human, those traditional stories tend to have it be a maiden or defenseless wanderer, someone who is plucked from their daily life and thrown into a situation where they have little control. Corbet was sculpted from my desire not to fall into cliche. I wanted a thief, an outcast, someone who would stab a stranger and think about robbing them over being charmed into an obvious trap.

I try to take traditional tropes and cliches and turn them on their heads. In some stories, that’s more obvious than others, but a lot of this relies on character dynamic outright, so I try to go into every story by creating the lead pair with that in mind. I like hot/cold types, but I also need a bit of edge to both of them. It’s boring if everything goes smoothly from the start, so I might make one of them hard to please, distrusting, or conniving. Good romantic pairs should complement one another, but there should also be friction and tension that keeps things interesting. That can come internally or externally, but regardless, it needs to be there to some degree, even if the story is gentle and romantic.

I always start my character profiles by answering basic questions. Age, gender, name, appearance. After that, I think about the story I want to tell. I consider what this character wants. A good character always has a goal they’re trying to achieve. It can be big or small, abstract or tangible. In Letifer, these goals are pretty easily spotted in some characters. Gabriel wants to become a detective. For Nines, we slowly learn what he wants, what he’s lacking, but before he tells us himself, we can read that he’s unsatisfied with his lot in life from the very moment we occupy his perspective: being a vampire sucks if you’re not top of the food chain.

Next, I dig deeper to understand, for lack of better word, what’s wrong with them. Why can’t they get what they want? What’s getting in their way? That’s when you dig into the backstory. This is where deeper shades of motivation come out. Why does Gabriel want to become a detective? Why is Nines stuck at the bottom of the food chain? From there we create Gabriel’s disillusionment with the police structure at large, about how useless he feels when confronted with the horrors of the world and his inability to do anything about them. With Nines, we slowly learn about what he was supposed to be, and why he is what he currently is, and how badly that’s affected literally every single facet of his unlife.

After that, I begin considering the story itself that they’re occupying. Letifer wasn’t a story specifically about how Gabriel became a detective or how Nines became a vampire. Origin stories are great, but this wasn’t that, so the plot itself had to give us an avenue to convey both of those journeys while also being focused on the greater goal of uncovering something bigger. I knew going in that I wanted to tell a crime/mystery story involving a serial killer. I wanted it to be a sort of spoof on buddy cop dramas but between a human and a vampire. That meant I knew I was telling a murder-mystery story. I came up with the culprit, the standard array of background characters a story like that needs (chief inspector for the vamps, human equivalent for Gabriel’s side of things, coworkers for them both that better serve to create disparity between each of their own experiences, and the suspects and witnesses that will be interviewed over the course of the story), and picked the setting (Detroit, a city I visit every year and have a very fond love of, and fall blending into winter, because that remains to this day the only way I’ve ever experienced Detroit in person.)

Then, I begin the outline.

Step 3: Notes and Outlining

I don’t know how many times I’ve heard aspiring writers tell me they don’t outline. I used to be the same, but writing my first book taught me that’s a terrible idea and a bad habit to get into. I’m not here to tell you how to live your life or make your art, but seriously, a book is so long and full of twists, turns, and tiny details that even the most basic of a roadmap will do you worlds of good in actually seeing your first book turn into an actual, finished product.

The best advice I can give someone who wants to write a book is to outline. I’m not going to insist you do it the way I do it, and if you’re morally opposed to outlines for fear of it “impeding your creativity,” at least make bullet points. As I always say, give yourself a roadmap that allows for detours if you need them, but don’t drive off into the world without knowing the destination at all. You’ll never finish anything if you don’t know where you’re going, and if there are problems in your story, the outline is the first, best, and easiest way to see those issues and fix them before you reach the point of no return.

Like, seriously. I’ve had to rewrite two full books from start to finish, and every time I did, it was solely because my outline wasn’t solid enough before I began writing. It may seem intense, how I plan stories, but this is how I finish them. This is literally the reason I’m able to write one book, let alone nine.

Now, this is probably the part I’ve spoken about most when the question of my story process comes up. If asked, those who have discussed this with me before will probably lead the explanation by telling you about my thesis statement method. To this date, I’ve yet to meet anyone who has ever begun a story outline process the same way, but to me, it’s necessary when it comes to distilling my intentions towards a piece as succinctly and plainly as possible. Apotheosis, the prequel to Letifer and the current patreon serialization, is a great example of this in action.

The purpose of this work is to recount the gradual seduction of Kolton by his sire Elijah Eder, head of the Luminary bloodline amidst political machinations, vampiric subterfuge, and the disintegrating relationship between Kolton and his twin brother Nines as he slowly distances himself from his old life to embrace his new one at his sire’s side. By the end of this book we should see what led to Nines’s self-imposed exile away from Kolton, the true nature of Kolton’s relationship with Elijah, and have a general sense of what life is like as a high-blood vampire. It’s not as easy as one would think, privilege of the blood aside. Even as a human Kolton will encounter power plays he can’t combat, witness the sort of debauchery the so-called elite get up to behind closed doors, and learn the stories surrounding the Fall, a mysterious event only alluded to in whispers. Kolton must adapt if he wishes to prove himself a fitting match for Elijah— and to keep his head above water too, of course.

As you can see, it’s almost a cross between a declaration of intent as well as a mini-teaser/summary. This one was pretty well polished since I had been working on it when a lot of questions about my process came up in a few writer discords, but the gist is always the same across the board. They all begin with “The purpose of this work is…” and end with me telling myself what the end-goal takeaway of the story should be. I’ve written tons of things that start out in my head as one thing and turn into another by the time I’m finished with the story. It’s really easy to lose track of what a story is supposed to be and take it in a different direction, which is fine, but when you’re writing a series you tend to need to keep on track or else the future books you’ve planned for are diverted as well.

From this thesis statement, though, I can, at any moment, read over it while working on just about any chapter and make sure I’m aligning the events with the larger scope of the story. Apotheosis is a prequel, but it’s also the best look into the Luminary bloodline that we get in this book series. As Kolton learns and experiences the elite side of vampiric life, so do we, so am I being descriptive and giving time to the culture? Am I keeping Kolton as in control of things as he can given the circumstances? This story is a corporate, vampiric thriller. It’s rooted in mid-90s culture, business settings, and the sort of cutthroat coldness that accompanies such things. It’s honestly not much of a romance—it’s closer to an arranged political marriage, and that needs to carry through in every interaction we see. I’ve had to rewrite a couple chapters already to realign myself with these views, and it’s the thesis statement I turn to when I feel myself getting lost in the weeds.

After the thesis statement, though, comes an actual summary. And I don’t mean a sales page one. I mean a full out, what happens from the first chapter to the last, and it typically takes up about 2-3 paragraphs. I don’t get into the minutiae of every single interaction or what-have-you, but I discuss plainly who does what when, what the conflict, rising action, and climax is, and ultimately how the story ends. This gives me a basic overview of the story’s progression, and from there, I delve into the steps I have to take to bring it all to life.

People on patreon get access to my outlines once a book or novella is complete, so there are better examples of how I do chapter notes available. For this, I don’t want to potentially spoil anything for someone, so I’ll just give you the first chapter of Infaust since nothing super spoiler-y happens in that.

Chapter One: (Rehan) The story opens to Rehan climbing up a hill towards a small village. The day is bright and bleeding into evening, at odds with the nature of his visit. He sees people walking along the way and they give him a wide berth. Same old same old. He arrives in the small village and sees how frightened people are. There are tons of small effigies erected around to mourn the loss of the children. Rehan thinks about why he is in fact here and he finds the elder of the village. Sits down with her and discuss terms of the job. A few witches have tried/come to take the job but left when they heard what was the cause. Chaos God. Rehan flinches but insists. Lays down his terms. The elder brings up the fact he has no familiar. Rehan presses harder on his terms, and the woman has no other option. She is visibly uncomfortable at the terms. Rehan asks for all the info they have on the God and where he is, and he tells her he can’t do it today, but he will go tomorrow. She puts him up for the night in a small shack on the edge of the village. It’s better than Rehan usually gets. He can’t wait til he gets better once this is all over.

As you can see, if I’m writing a story that swaps POVs, I always start each chapter note by specifying what character I’ll be writing from. After that, I write step-by-step what happens over the course of the chapter. Sometimes, this is a very detailed thing, and other times—usually if I feel I’ve got a good mental visualization of how a story is going to proceed—I keep it rather vague to allow for more organic unraveling. I typically try to include what elements need to be present to progress the plot, that way I don’t leave anything out, and I try to include the character’s emotional state. If you’ve read the first chapter of Infaust, you’ll notice that I left out multiple interactions he has with townspeople before he even reaches the village elder. I don’t bother explaining how a chaos god stole the children. I don’t go into Rehan’s internal monologue about how he processes the death of his familiar every time he’s in a position like this, and I don’t include any world building details beyond basic visuals of where he’s currently at. I know all of these, or I let them happen to me as I write.

I do this throughout the whole story, sometimes being vague, sometimes giving more detail based on how much happens in the scene, how important everything is, or if it’s something that doesn’t need much elaboration (sex scenes, backstory exposition moments, fight scenes—things that generally work better with me improvising or writing in the moment without thinking too hard about specifics). If there are moments when I don’t know how something happens, I make a note of it and I don’t begin writing everything until I’ve answered that question. I then give my notes to my editor and a few trusted friends to look over. I ask them questions, and they ask me questions in turn. If I don’t have an answer (How does this ritual work? How are they going to accomplish xyz when they’ve only got abc?) I keep on the outline until I’ve figured it out.

Like I said above, the outline is where the hard work should actually happen when it comes to figuring out what your story is and how you’re going to tell it. It’s my favorite part of the whole process, and it’s also how I can predict just how long a book will be and how long it’ll take me to write. I know how long it takes me to convey xyz in a scene, and I know how many chapters I can write in a certain amount of days. This isn’t something a lot of people can do. As far as I’ve seen, I’m apparently Stephen King, not G. R. R. Martin—and if you aren’t familiar with that comparison, please, look up their interview. It’s great. But anyway, the root of all of this is that a good outline will save you worlds of hurt down the line. Never rush this step and always do your future self a favor by making it the best it can possibly be before you ever put pen to paper.

Step 4: Writing

This step is pretty self-explanatory. I begin writing the story, typically starting with the first chapter and working my way chronologically through it til I reach the end. Within a chapter, though, I’ll jump around, writing the ending first, tacking out dialogue bits I’ve already got in my head, and just working my way through things until it all connects and I can check the chapter off the list as done. If it’s a story I have pretty well visualized inside my head, I may even skip chapters entirely and work wherever I’m feeling it most, but typically, I try to avoid this on book projects. It can be hard to maintain a steady character arc personality-wise when jumping around.

Also, I write a chapter within a couple days typically if not a single day, and then I move onto the next. I don’t go back to revise it unless I’m publishing a story piecemeal to patreon. Finished is always better than perfect, and if I start revising in the middle of things I’ll never get to the end. Also, I almost always feel crippling self-doubt creep in within the first five to six chapters. That’s normal. You aren’t deep enough into a story to see things come together in the ways your brain imagined. My rule of thumb is I’m not allowed to say I hate a story until I’m 3/4s done with it. By that point, I’m almost always so far into things that the pieces are coming together, and I’m vibing with it, and if not, I’m too far in to jump ship now. I commit to finishing it and throwing it to my editor, knowing we’ll hammer it into shape together.

If you struggle with this sort of thing, seriously, stop rereading shit and just keep going. Revision is your best friend and exists for a reason.

Step 5: Editing/Revising

This is probably my second favorite part of the writing process, and one of the reasons why that is is because when I’m revising, I know the work itself is done. The hard part is over. The beast is dead, and now all that’s left is refining its body into something worth reading.

I suppose I should specify that there is a difference between editing and revising. Editing is when you make major changes, rewrite things, rework them. Revising is going over things with a fine tooth comb to find the small errors, i.e. punctuation, sentence clarity, grammar, etc. I enjoy both stages. It’s actually a lot of fun getting to go through work that’s already completed and refining it into something better, and it’s always less daunting to rewrite a few paragraphs than to write an entire chapter from scratch. Even if I do have to rewrite a full chapter, I almost always know exactly what it has to be when I’m in the editing stage. After all, I know why the old chapter failed. It’s just—easier. There’s a lot less pressure to get things right, and it tends to involve the help of an editor, which relieves the burden even more.

Now, my editor is the fucking bee’s knees. Their name is NIL and they’ve been involved in every single project I’ve put out except for Brontide and Letifer—the first because they were moving when I first wrote that book and I didn’t want to bother them to read it, and if you’ve read my Brontide deep dive, you’ll know that’s a mistake I’ve regretted to this day. The latter, though, was more personal, and they were still involved in a lot of the DVerse development outside of that book. They’re a polyglot, a writer themself, a cat-dad, and one of the best friends I’ve ever had. They love vampires and magic, explore spiritualism and the intangible in ways that will make your toes curl, and they’re never afraid to tell me that I’ve fucked shit up again.

Believe me, as an author, you need to hear that more often than you’d think. Every plot hole I’ve filled in was thanks to spitballing ideas with NIL. Every character voice I’ve refined into something unique has happened because they took me aside and told me I was being derivative. They tell me when I need to rewrite a full book. They tell me when something I’ve spent months on isn’t salvageable. They also console me through the emotional aftermath of that, and they help me do better on the next go. I’m a mess sometimes when I don’t know where to take a story. I’ve yet to have a meltdown where they failed to take me by the hand and guide me back onto the proper path.

I know a lot of young, aspiring writers struggle with their books. I wish telling them to get an editor was an easier prospect than I make it sound. You need one, though, if you want your story to be a well-told one. You need someone who will tell you where things are weak, and more than that, more than a beta reader can give, you need someone who can tell you how to fix it. That’s what an editor does. They aren’t there just to fix your commas or run-ons. They’re there to distill the essence of what the story is supposed to be and help you refine it until that’s what the reader holds in their hands.

Good editors don’t grow on trees. You’ll likely have to pay to find one, or go the mainstream publishing route to have a house assign one or two to you. I prefer to have someone I know personally, who knows me personally, but regardless, you need one. You need one bad.

My typical editing process takes months. If I can write a book in one month, it’ll take three to edit and revise it. I usually read over the story myself several times, mark up chapters where I think ideas or executions are weak, and I address them myself before I hand the document off to NIL—if I haven’t just given them access from day one to help keep me on track as I write the damn thing. If I don’t know how to fix something, I mark it. I hand it to NIL. They read it first just to read it, and then they read it again to mark it up as well. It’s normal for me to wake up with 300 suggested edits on three chapters from them. Most, unfortunately, are commas XD But some are comments about plot holes, inconsistent lore details, confusing sentences they can’t decipher, and places where things I tried simply do not work.

My favorite are the reactions, though. The emojis and links to songs certain sentences remind them of, the insults towards shithead characters, and the shock at twists, the pitying condolences at how badly I’ve treated a witch-boy this time... I find this part of the process fun for so many reasons, and even if NIL hates me by the end of a story for dragging their heart through the dirt again, I can’t stop loving it.

To be honest, I can’t imagine working with anyone else on my projects. NIL knows me and my writing style inside and out, and they never try to change my style to suit their own aesthetics the way other editors I’ve had in the past do. They care about every project I put out and will spend hours on voice calls with me hammering out the issues in my story structures until we’ve figured out how to fix them. I learned early on to involve them in every step of my writing process. It just leads to the best result, and there is a reason why I always thank them in my author’s notes. I wouldn’t have put out these books to this level of quality without their help, their insight, and their support guiding me every step of the way.

I know my blog posts are full of shameless plugs, but I truly and sincerely suggest that you check out NIL and consider them for your own projects. They are dedicated and passionate, and you could not be in better hands. You can find them on their blog at https://naughtingwell.wordpress.com/

Tell them Migi sent you—they’ll bad-mouth me to the grave, and I’m okay with that.

Step 6: Publication

This is probably my least favorite part of the entire process of writing a book, namely because I have to do so much stuff that isn’t in my wheelhouse as a self-publisher. When you go the route I go, you have to be a marketing expert, a graphic designer, a copywriter, and a publicist all at once. Sure, I always have a talented artist to handle my cover for me, but I still have to format the text and title font myself. I have to do the interior myself, format it, edit it, make sure the spacing is proper and that nothing is outside the print boundaries. Marketing is its own brand of hell, one you either have to spend a ton of money, time, or both on to get anywhere with it, and it’s probably my least successful part of this whole process. I have all my social media profiles and in-person events and what not, but it’s hard, and seriously, unless you’re able to throw a lot of money each month to get ad space on different sites, you’re probably not going to see large returns without already having an established fanbase or social network to help fill in the gaps for you. I’m always very upfront when it comes to the pros and cons of each type of publishing. We can talk more about that at a later date if there’s interest, but for now, here’s how I go through publication hell.

1. I get an ISBN on Amazon and set up my sales page.

2. I format my interior via InDesign or OpenOffice and create pdfs for the physical releases. This is usually done before I send out for the cover since I have to have a total page count to give the artist an accurate spine template to work from, but I’ll sometimes do my major edits and then send the template and take care of spot edits while they art is drawn—I just can’t lengthen or shorten the book by a single page at this point.

3. Once I’ve got the cover, I submit it and the interior to get my proof copy to see if everything’s printed properly. It usually takes 2-3 times to get everything perfect, and I have to pay for each proof copy every time, sometimes even duplicates to have one shipped to my artist because accurate colors don’t show up well via camera pics.

4. Once the physical release is squared away and submitted, I send my interior file to an ebook maker because the best minds I have access to have yet to figure out how to make one that doesn’t muck the formatting up. I’m convinced it’s impossible, and I’d rather spend money than stress myself out more than I already get with late-stage pub hell.

5. Once all of the book materials are finished and submitted, I open up my own hosted pre-orders for physical copies since Amazon is a cuck and won’t let you have that anymore. Kindle pre-orders are up from the moment you set it up (less chance for loss of return on Amazon’s side of things if it’s canceled when it’s a digital release and not a printed one).

6. Throughout this process I’ve been marketing everywhere I possibly can. I make graphics, I show off excerpts, I lean on all my popular friends to boost my posts and promote it to their own audiences. I pay for ad space and I offer pre-order deals. I invest in merch to help sweeten the deal, and if I’m at cons, I talk about the new release nonstop in hopes these people might check it out when it drops.

7. The book launches, I order my pre-order stock, and I rest in between signing/mailing those out and handling any issues that arise after the fact (these don’t tend to happen anymore, but when I first started out we had lots of issues).

That may not sound that bad given it’s a nice 7-step process when it’s laid out like this, but throughout publication hell, I’m putting in hours upon hours to get things perfect and promote things well enough to make a launch a launch and not a flop. I rely on a lot of my friends, which include graphic designers, editors, artists, typesetters, and other aesthetically inclined individuals to make sure things are as good as they can possibly be when I’m handling the bulk of things myself. I don’t sleep much, I’ve visibly lost weight on occasion during a publication (I ran into my friend’s husband in the grocery store parking lot when Redamancy dropped. He complimented me on the unexpected weight loss (he didn’t think I was much for dieting) but was concerned about how badly my under-eye bags had gotten—he thought I had broken my nose at a distance, since they looked like two black eyes), and I only seem to breathe easily once it’s over.

It’s hard, is what I’m getting at, and it’s pretty obvious, I think, why it’s my least favorite part of this whole thing.

Anyway, that’s the gist of my process. It’s taken years to refine it to these easily demarcated steps, and it’s what I’ve found works best for my workflow and allows me to put out a steady stream of works. Now, let’s swing over to some questions so I can be more specific! Questions come from Instagram this time.

Any writing pet peeves?

I really hate unnatural dialogue and triteness. There’s also this quirky, Joss Whedon-esque style some people go for and it’s… really grating to me. Not every line has to be a quip, and while you think you’re being zippy and quirky like that, you’re just being bland. We get nothing from a character who responds like that, and like, I can be guilty of it too. Sometimes my instinct is to default to the quirky, quippy rebuttal, but I almost always revise it on my second pass because we don’t learn anything about a character when they act like that. It’s not a personality trait—it’s a punchline.

How do you start writing something? Like, when you already know what but just don’t know how?

Say it with me kids: OUTLINE, OUTLINE, OUTLINE! If you have that done and still find yourself struggling to figure out where to start, pick the most interesting place and begin there. If the story is Twilight, we don’t start with Bella being born, or her in her old school. The story is about her going to Forks, Washington and meeting vampires, so we start with her on her way to Forks, Washington to meet vampires! The same goes for Dracula. Jonathan is already on the train to Transylvania when we begin the story. He’s on his way to the whole impetus of this plot.

Now, if you’re having issues literally just putting pen to paper, that’s normal. That’s something I have issues with too when I begin new projects, and all I do is give myself time. I typically schedule myself to finish chapters within a day or two, but if I’m just starting a new book, I give myself a full weekend just to write the very first paragraph. Most of the time, you just need to break ground. Once you’ve taken that first step, it gets a lot easier. And hell, I’m the king of non-linear writing. Who says you have to start with the first page? Skip to where you want to write first, be it the climax, the sex scene, or the ending. Get comfortable and then go back to the beginning, and seriously, don’t sweat things. You can rewrite a bad beginning. Write utter horseshit if you have to and edit it later. You’ll find your flow once you start and that’s always the most important thing.

How do you know where to take your story and what direction to move the plot in?

Oh, I get this a lot with my own projects. I currently have a few concepts or character dynamics I really want to play with but haven’t because I haven’t figured out how to execute it yet. I think the big thing to think about is what do you concretely have in your head for it, and are you sure you’re pursuing the proper medium for it? Sometimes it’s not a book. Sometimes it’s a movie, or a comic, or a visual novel. Some ideas are too big to be possible in the format you’re trying to fit it in, and again, outlining will give you the best understanding of what sort of story it is you’re trying to tell. Also, a lot of issues when it comes to getting over those initial roadblocks at the start of a project is making sure you know where you’re going with it. Do you know what your conflict is? Do you know where the rising action is? It may sound very high school English class, but those story structures exist for a reason. I had tons of issues writing Infaust until I went back in and properly outlined what my actual conflicts were.

If you’re going to try my method of doing chapter notes, my trick is to write up basic headers like Chapter 1, 2, 3, etc. until I hit like, I don’t know, Chapter 15. Then I fill in as much as I can where I think things should happen. So, if I know the beginning few chapters, I fill those in. Then, say I know the climax. I skip to Chapter 12 and fill that in. It’s easy with the climax in place to fill in to the ending, and then I just connect the dots, filling in where I know I want certain things to go until I have a complete outline. From there, you refine, refine, refine. If you don’t know what your basic story points are, you aren’t ready to tell this story. Concentrate on figuring out what those are and it all should fall into place.

How do you manage the whole “show, don’t tell” thing?

Lord, I could probably do another ten blog posts just on instructional writing. I mean… maybe. I don’t know if I’m the best teacher to begin with, and a lot of what I do is based on instinct and vibes. The best advice I can give you on something like this is to remove your author brain while you write from a character’s pov and try to embody them as they go through the scene. They aren’t going to simply state things. They're going to relate to the world around them based on how it makes them feel, and you’re always going to be building character moments and associations as they interact with things. Instead of saying “The war was bad and unpopular,” relate to it the way the character would. Why is it bad and unpopular? How have they been affected by it? They’re more likely to tell you via an anecdote how the war killed their brother and father and reduced their remaining family to begging to get by than to just list off the political goings-on of the day. I guess just be asking yourself why a lot as you write, and read things aloud to see if what you’re writing sounds natural.

Of course, I can’t just tell you to always be doing that. Sometimes, you really can just say something. You don’t need to show everything, and mild, well-applied exposition is necessary for any good story to work. There’s never going to be one proper rule for a lot of writing questions like this. You need to practice your craft, read a lot of other peoples’ stuff, and experiment until you get the feel for it yourself.

I actually received about three times as many questions this month as I was able to answer in this blog post. Apparently there’s quite a demand for this topic? I’ll try to do some planning to better prepare for stuff like this, and I may even ask my editor if they’re willing to answer some questions as well if you guys would be interested in something like that. We are, of course, not teachers or experts on a lot of this. We can’t run a class or seminar, but I suppose we can do our best.

But for right now, that’s it for this month! It was a long one this time, but I don’t mind much, and I hope you guys don’t either.

We’re going to be gearing up for the holiday season soon, and I hope to have some new merch to unveil right in time for all your Christmas shopping needs. Keep an eye out for that, and good luck in your writing adventures!

As always, until next time!

T.D. Cloud

#author blog #blog #writing advice

3 notes · View notes

kitashitei · 1 year

Text

Celebrating Our Meeting

raws from @/pararoidhakase on twitter!

A Small, Stray Guest

Arthur: (The meeting at the castle ran long. I’ll have to look over the documents before the day ends…)

Arthur: ….Hm?

Mitile: Where did they go…?

Arthur: Who are you looking for, Mitile?

Mitile: Ah, Prince Arthur! Welcome back.

Mitile: I saw a rabbit with a red tail around here earlier.

I thought they might be injured, so I wanted to patch them up, but I lost sight of them…

Arthur: That is troublesome… I’ll help you look.

Mitile: Y-you will?

Arthur: Of course. To be honest, I’m fairly good at chasing rabbits.

Mitile: But aren’t you tired from just getting back from the castle?

Arthur: Don’t worry. I was just looking for a change of pace.

Mitile: Prince Arthur… Thank you so much!

Arthur: It’s my pleasure.

Now, are there any particular things that stood out to you about this rabbit?

Mitile: Yes. The ears were so long they hit the ground, and they were white as snow.

Arthur: Long ears and white fur….

Mitile: Ah..!

Rabbit: (Wheek)…?

Mitile: Prince Arthur, look! It headed towards the forest…!

Arthur: Alright, let’s go!

Arthur: Here we are. Mitile, over here.

Mitile: They’re really enjoying that grass, so we could probably catch them now. If I get a little closer on my broom…

Arthur: …Wait, let me try something first.

Mitile: What do you want to try? That’s a… grass whistle?

Arthur: Yes. Then…

(Fweee)

Mitile: …Ah, the rabbit came over!

Arthur: I’ve read in a field guide that this kind of rabbit is attracted to music.

I’ll blow the whistle, so I’ll leave the rabbit to you, Mitile.

If you move slowly and make sure not to touch the injured tail, you should be able to catch them.

Mitile: A-alright!

…Yes, I caught it!

Arthur: Good job, Mitile!

Mitile: Ehehe…

There, there. There’s no need to be scared anymore. I’ll heal your injury now.

Wait, its tail… Now that I look at it, the red seems to be the color of their fur.

Arthur: I see. I thought that might be the case.

This rabbit is unique in that only its tail is red. I’m glad it wasn’t hurt.

Mitile: Yes!

Arthur: This rabbit was inside the manor, right? So someone must have brought it in.

Mitile: That’s what I thought! Let’s bring it back and ask the others about it.

Mitile: Should we sing a song as we go to calm its nerves?

Arthur: That sounds fun. How about we sing your favorite song, Mitile?

Predicting the Ending

Akira: When you were younger, you certainly played with rabbits a lot.

Rabbits such popular animals that they’ve become the symbol of a holiday called Easter in my world.

Arthur: I’ve heard about that from the previous Sage. If I were a child, I’d definitely be excited for such a day.

Akira: (Speaking of rabbits, I wonder what Arthur would think of the story “The Tortoise and the Hare”?)

This is a bit out of nowhere, but if there were a race between a turtle and a rabbit, which do you think would win?

Arthur: A race?

…Would that not depend on what kinds they are?

Akira: What kind?

Arthur: Yes. There are some rabbits that run many times faster than humans, and there are turtles that are as big as mountains. Each of their steps is the width of a river.

So I think depending on what kind of rabbit or turtle, the result would be different.

Though I’m embarrassed to say all of this is knowledge from reference books… I hope that I answered your question.

Akira: You did! I learned a lot!

Akira: To tell the truth, that question was related to a fable from my world.

It’s a story where the tortoise’s careful effort wins the race. I’d only seen slow tortoises, so it was a bit strange to me.

Arthur: I see. So the result depends not only on what type, but on one’s own effort.

Arthur: I’d like to see that together with you one day.

#mahoyaku #arthur card #card #arthur #mitile

6 notes · View notes

coreymichaelsmithson · 1 year

Text

When I Was A Princess

Ever since I was a little boy, the role of royalty in fairy tales has always confused me. My grasping young mind seized upon princesses ... their beautiful costumes, their perfect hair, how they always seemed to get the happy ending they wished for (whether or not they really deserved it). But my mental picture of life as a medieval princess had been mostly formed by Disney movies and treacly storybooks, and these cotton-candy fantasies were, of course, way out of whack with the harsh actualities of the Middle Ages: stinking gutters, festering sores, tooth decay, mass starvation. In fact, being a real princess probably sucked, day-to-day, though I'm sure it was still substantially nicer to be a princess than a peasant. I'd reckon that it still is.

I’ve come to realize that my fascination with princesses was due more to the aesthetic and romantic awakening such tales ushered into my imagination than any real admiration for wealth. Growing up as a queer kid, in every sense of the word, and trying to figure out my place on the gender spectrum, I had to admit that I often identified more with princesses than princes. Princesses had better outfits, for starters, and simpler narrative arcs; they basically had to just wait around for a handsome prince to come along, and he would whisk them away to an enchanting castle, which presumably had good ventilation and abundant fireplaces, and life would forever after be perfect.

The messages us kids got from these stories were of dubious morality. Cinderella married out of her class by virtue of her comeliness, an impractical shoe, and a little magical trickery. Sleeping Beauty was a princess disguised as a peasant, who could only be rescued from her coma by a wealthy and apparently none-too-picky heir. Snow White married a would-be necrophile. Rapunzel was a captive virgin with good shampoo.

An observant friend of mine once said about Disney movies that it was “better to not look under the hood.” These are the shitty takeaways I got from watching Disney tales: “Girlfriend Be Trippin’ If She Thinks She Can Marry Into Wealth And Escape From Her Lowly Social Strata ... But Oh Wait, Here Comes Drunk Magic Grandma, Bibbidi-Bobbidi-Boo, Have A Hoopskirt And Some Pearls, There, Problem Solved”; “Girlfriend Better Not Turn Sixteen Because She Already Pissed Off The Green Sorceress Just By Being Born An Attractive Female And Now She’s Gotta Watch Out For Dragons And Country Antiques, Oops, Well, Shit, She Pricked Her Finger And Now She's In A Coma, What A Bummer, Hope A Horny Prince Shows Up”; “Girlfriend Better Not Eat That Drugged Apple After Getting High As Balls On Mushrooms And Singing To Wildlife And Shacking Up With Seven Random Dudes She Met In The Woods Because Sleep-Rape Is Apparently An Acceptable Practice In This Moral Landscape, And By The Way, Her Stepmother Is A Murderous Witch Who Asked A Hunter To Bring Her Bloody Heart Back In A Box”; “Girlfriend Better Stop Singing About Freedom And Mobility And Start Reinforcing The Patriarchal Order Through A Sad Regime Of Self-Denial Or Else She’ll Be Cursed By The Scary Octopus Drag Queen Into Having A Body That Probably Menstruates”; “Girlfriend Better Not Try To Educate Herself Through Reading But Should Instead Cave In To Stockholm Syndrome So She Can Come To Love Her Hairy And Violent Captor Who's Really Deep Down A Sensitive Guy, Honestly, Despite His Animal Rages And Dangerous Possessive Behaviors And Obvious Psychological Instability”; “Girlfriend Better Cooperate With Racist Colonialists If She Knows What’s Good For Her”; “Girlfriend Better Dress Like A Dude And Wield A Sword To Get Anywhere In Life”; and so on.

Why did the storytellers of yore aggrandize the aristocracy? Weren't kings and princes and dukes, at least historically speaking, usually the oppressors? When many of these popular fables were being formed, the peasants were still suffering under the rule of the fortunate few. The real history of royalty is rife with incest, inbreeding, religious persecution, torture, suppression of dissent, excessive taxation. So why, then, were the rich and powerful so often made into the centers of our fairy tales? Why do we cheer for the “charming” prince, who rides into the scene and sweeps our poor lady protagonist up and away to a better life? Why do we lionize the merciful king who throws lavish balls and stays executions, or thrill to the plots of the wicked queen? Why do we confuse true love with economic agency?

We do this because power makes for a seductive escape. It's easier to imagine being rescued. The prince just showed up, with white teeth and a white carriage ... what could possibly go wrong?

But when I went to college and studied history and actually got a chance to view images of real royalty in action, I had to admit my disappointment. What I saw looked nothing like what Disney and company had prepared me for. All those tapestries and etchings revealed a much sadder, grimier life.

Poor princess. I see her in her lonely tower, wearing a dumb conical hennin and a heavy-lidded, somewhat dopey expression. She has the double chin, pouty mouth, and baggy eyes of a medieval woodcut, and she always looks like she’s suffering from a bad cold. She's attended by maids and a homely matron and maybe a unicorn, and she’s pretty much resigned to a lifetime of making bad embroidery and mooning over dreamy brigands. Her “entertainment” mostly consists of watching sad syphilitic jesters or doing that lame limpwristed dancing courtiers used to do. You know the kind I mean ... twirling about and hopping with hands upheld, bowing to one another, prancing back and forth across the flagstones, making uneventful circles, all to a namby-pamby melody of sackbuts and flutes. Blech. Given that I'm a homosexual with a crinoline in his closet, you'd probably think that I'd be gleefully clapping my hands for all this cutesy curtseying and jangling of tambourines and such ... but insipid pageantry totally turns me off.

It's really no different today. We have become so removed from the primary objectives of survival that we seek to derive meaning from media depictions, from virtual representations, rather than through our own direct experiences. We talk about movies now rather than myths, celebrities instead of heroes, plots instead of legends. We are encouraged to define ourselves by the roles we occupy within businesses, by our placements within economic taxonomies, and not by our vocations or passions. We accept the narrative that hard work and fair play will get us to a place of stability and harmony, to a land of plenty, and are disappointed when we don't get the expected results. The American Dream itself is a form of fairy tale, one in which each of us will get the castle we so richly deserve. For some, the handsome prince is a one-way ticket past the moat.

Reality television is so popular because it perfectly reflects the boredom and spiritual vacuity of our culture. We get off on rehab redemptions, ugly duckling makeovers, riches-to-rags stories. We obsess over famous trainwrecks, simultaneously envying and scolding those who are richer and more reckless than we'll ever get to be. In watching their lives unfold before us, we want to feel an attendant rush of adrenaline, while avoiding actual discomfort or injury. We ridicule celebrities for their failings, while aping their influence and purchasing the products they endorse. We gravitate towards images of the rich and powerful, yet we relish every reminder of their human frailty. Our grocery store aisles are filled with shame and schadenfreude. The next time you’re at the market, just take a look at the tabloids glaring at you. Look at all those princes and princesses, publicly flayed for real or imagined sins.

We used to slay dragons; now we covet expensive sneakers. We used to tell tall tales of royalty; now we tell tall tales of supermodels and gangsters. Not much has changed ... just the bling.

I remember learning as a kid how important brands had become. One's identity was tied to adherence to a brand strategy. Of course, being a nervous adolescent, I got just as caught up in the horseshit as everybody else. In middle school, I once threw a hissy fit because a pair of cool girls two grades above me suggested I wear a particular sweater/collared shirt combo, and my parents simply couldn’t afford it. I stamped my feet and howled and wished that I could be more like the princesses, who dressed smartly and had lots of money and who seemed to wield some kind of power that the rest of us didn’t have.

Since then, though, I've learned a thing or two about class. I discovered, with a mixture of surprise and relief, that it's been the same since the days of Versailles: your class and your economic prospects can often be determined by the costumes you wear. Sometimes a person's character is not described so much by their own interests, their strengths, their morality, but by their adherence to (or outright rejection of) a quickly changing code of fashion.

That said, people who actively transform themselves to better reflect their inner lives really move me. I am stirred by self-actualization, especially in the face of stifling conformity. One day in downtown Seattle, I saw a transwoman in what was obviously an early stage of public interfacing, walking out of a building for what may have been the very first time. And I say this without a drop of condescension or snark, but rather with the deepest admiration ... I was impressed. I could see her nervousness, the shaky breath she took before stepping out of the vestibule. I could tell that this was a giant leap of faith she was taking. It would have been wildly inappropriate for me to approach her, but I so desperately wanted to. I felt such a strong urge to cheer her on that tears came to my eyes; instead, I just gave her the biggest smile I could, which was returned with some visible relief. So I’ll say now what I wanted to say to her then.

“I see you, sister, taking your first tentative steps out in public. I see that you are making an artwork of yourself, revealing the sculpture of your femininity with a chisel. Okay, maybe at this point it's more like you’re using a jackhammer, but still … you’re working to define yourself aesthetically and conceptually. You're becoming who you were always meant to be. Maybe you’re just beginning this transformative work, armed with only with a tube of shitty dimestore lipstick, an ill-fitting dress, some awkward heels, a crooked wig … but the results, for all their sincerity and pluck, are beautiful. You are so much more a real princess in my eyes than Cinderella or Sleeping Beauty or any of those other doe-eyed confections Disney sold us on. I see your courage and your commitment. I see your grace revealing itself in stages. I see your majesty, your majesty. You don’t need a prince to rescue you. You’re rescuing yourself. You go, girl.”

When I was a kid, I wanted to be a princess, sort of … though I secretly and more fervently envied the starchy villainesses, with their high eyebrows and pointy shoulders and severe hair. They had more glamor, and power, and there was something satisfying about their unremitting bitchiness, something that spoke to my own nascent and unsatisfied cruelty. But I grew out of it. So now this is what I want to say to the younger me, the one who wanted to be a princess, or a queen: forget about the damnable royals. There's no time to waste in aping them bitches. Become yourself. Your youth is going to pass so swiftly. Focus on your family, your best friends. Ignore the cool kids, the shiny popular ones with good hair and good clothes, because they will peak early, and unremarkably. It'll be the outcasts who matter to you in the long run. Stick with the lonely ones, the nerds and the misfits and the dark mysterious ones with hooded eyes, because you will spend decades adoring them, because they'll become your most loyal friends, the ones who will see you and accept you for who you really are. Focus on your real wealth: the people you love, the people who will love you back. The fake princesses will die a thousand daily deaths, suffocated by their peroxide and pearls, humiliated by their own vanities … while you will remain surrounded by jewels, your genuine ones, your flawed and pitted and perfect treasures, your heroes, your royalty.

0 notes

sp00kworm · 3 years

Note

I would love a Bram Strokers Dracula, where the reader is 21st century going on a college trip to the castle. She gets to stay in his room and he watches her, slowly falling for her and her love of literature. Then there’s a ball? where he re-emerges and woos her.

Pairing: Dracula x Female Reader, Vampire x Female Reader

Part 2

---

Codex

---

A restoration trip to a dilapidated castle from the time of the Persian empire. Before that – your teacher had gloated in the class. You tugged your suitcase along and shouldered the weight of your backpack with a grunt before you looked up through the gate at the tall, crumbling structures.

“Part of it is in working order, with electricity and water. It gets cold but its completely safe. The other half is partly beyond saving. We want extra hands helping out with the library. There are scrolls which need a delicate touch, or they will turn to dust. That’s where you come in.” You nodded at the lead with a small smile, “Don’t look so glum!” he cheered, “Its saving history, after all.”

You tuned out his talking as your small group entered the ramparts, stepping through the iron bars and in through a heavy, new door. It smelt of freshly dried wood still. The inside was lit with new electric wall lamps, but a few candelabras were still in use, dripping wax into small holders. Everything was made of dark, grey stone, and the walkways lined with rich red fibre rugs. The portraits were restored and bright with colour. You tried not to gawk as the man lead you all to the rooms for your stay.

“Your room is the last one, but probably the grandest.” he announced as he opened another large door, revealing a grand room with a large four poster bed, covered in sheer fabric and lit with candles and electricity. The walls were covered in maps and old paintings of the surrounding countryside, but the new glass in the windows kept out the cold mountain air, “You’ll need to get the fire going but there’s kindling and wood for you. It was said that this was where Vladimir himself slept, but it seems to be just a myth from what documents were left.” The door closed behind you and you didn’t remember saying goodbye or registering the man leaving. You turned from the door and stood your suitcase up, looking around at the circular room. You were in the corner tower.

“Amazing…” You whispered as you felt the new cotton sheets and let free the silk curtains, “Its all a bit much for a stay as an overrated librarian.” You laughed as you opened your bags and headed to the wardrobe, unaware of the eyes watching you from the rafters.

The vampire watched as you left for dinner and observed as you came back to clean and go to sleep. You dragged a book with you wherever you went. The titles were unknown to him. He was tired. Dracula curled into the rafters, hiding his face behind his leathery wings as the light burned his pupils. It was too bright. He listened as you blew the candles out before turning himself out of the stone and hanging from a wooden beam. Asleep. He slipped over the silk and watched again, his eyes drooping. The door opened and he slipped back up the rock.

“Master is she not enough?”

He looked and saw his latest follower. He opened his mouth and snarled.

“She is?” The lead architect hummed before jumping back to the door as a claw slammed near his face, “Is she, not right?”

“Get out of my sight.” He hissed before he slammed the door closed and rushed back into the rafters to watch you jump and squirm with the cold.

The next day, you entered the room with an old fable scroll. A woman had written it for a child. A horse who lived in the stream wooed women before dragging them under the water and eating them. A young boy took the creature’s shined pebble necklace and had the beast for his own, until his daughter took the necklace and ended up in the creature’s grasp. She wasn’t seen again until the full moon came, and she rode the creature, bare, through the stream and into the ponds and lakes beyond. He knew it well. He remembered not understanding if the daughter was happy. It was a strange tale, but you smiled as you wrote it from the scroll and into a large book. The date and catalogue number were somewhere, but you seemed to take no notice as you started cleaning the parchment. He pulled his wing back over his face and settled in to sleep, listening to you singing softly.

Days. For days he crawled through the roofs, watching you clean, hum, read and catalogue. You had a talent he was in awe of, and he was quick to ask about you. His follower obliged. A student. He could not believe you were a student at this age. Times have changed, or so he was informed. Women were not beholden to men. He laughed, a shrill noise which echoed in the bowels of the castle, shaking spiders and rats from their hiding places.

“Women are a challenge, master. They do not fall at a man’s knee anymore.”

“Did they ever, my child?” he asked with a hiss, “Women are a treasure to be found and looked after, lest they become scorn and curse your soul.”

The vampire laughed again as his disciple rushed away to excuse the noise and to lick his wounded pride. Dracula slipped into a coffin and buried into the soil before the follower returned. He leaned over the coffin with a bag, and Dracula grinned before sinking his teeth into him.

“Ah, it appears he had family business to attend to.” Your teacher hummed at the letter, “But we can continue the work. A replacement is making their way here.”

“That’s odd.” You whispered as you returned to the library, “He seemed so keen to translate those books.” You rushed back to your workstation and looked down at the table. The ink was spilled and with a cry you grabbed for the papers, holding them up. The ink flowed off them like oil on the surface of water, and you gasped at the face that was revealed on the plain piece of parchment. It was a dragon, curled around itself. A family crest. You looked at it in wonder before laying the paper down and looking at the book it had come from. A cold hand laid on your shoulder as you turned, and you jumped as a man stood behind you.

“Dracul.” he whispered, “The dragon.” His hand laid over your eyes before you could utter a sound and blackness took over.

“My love?” A man asked as your eyes opened, “You are going to be late.” The same man uttered again.

“Late for what?” You roused slowly and looked up. A silk canopy hung above you. You were back in your room, “What happened?”

A man sat at the bedside, his face sharp, angular and pale, with eyes that shone like a cat. The dark brown eyes softened. Dark hair fell over his shoulders in waves as he sat on the bed. Sharp nails curled over your shoulder.

“I have waited a long time.” He whispered, “But now, we can dance. Like the stories.”

“What is…” He leaned over and placed a kiss on your lips. The scent of iron clung to him and you pushed at his shoulders before fangs grazed your lips.

“You were brought here for me, but I will show you wonders of which you have never seen.” he reached for the bedside and pulled out the book you had been writing fables in, “A story like no other.”

You looked at the fangs in his mouth and realised who he was, “Dracula…”

The vampire smiled and leaned over you, pressing your hands back to the cushions before his fangs punctured your skin.

#dracula x reader #vampire x reader #dracula x female reader #vampire x female reader #request #fanfic #dracula 1992 #bram stoker's dracula

412 notes · View notes

secret-engima · 3 years

Text

Snippet of Always I Dreamed verse

The ruin looked … distantly, vaguely familiar. More because she knew it had to than because she consciously remembered it. A wide clearing with a semicircle of wall still remaining. Inside the perimeter of the wall were twenty stone pedestals, and on those pedestals were small figurines made of what looked to be marble. Some of the figurines were already missing, and Raven stamped down on the jolt of fear that said it was already too late to be placed on a team with her twin. Assuming each figurine had a partner, there weren’t nearly enough figurines missing to not be able to find a matching set. Now … to figure out how the figurines paired up.

Summer sidled up to the nearest one, reaching out a hand to pick it up before Raven slapped it down with a black look. Summer glared back at her, then refocused on the figurine —but didn’t try to pick it up again—, “Animals?”

Taiyang paced along the line of pedestals, Qrow following him with an expression that said he’d follow Raven’s example and smack him if he tried to pick one up early, “Wolf, hare, lion, fox, raven, mouse, tortoise, leggy bird-.”

“Crane,” Summer corrected as she joined him in pacing, “none of the animals are the same. Maybe it’s random?”

Raven glared at the little things on their pedestals, “They have to match up somehow.”

Taiyang hummed, repeated the types of animals represented a few times before he suddenly snapped his fingers, “They’re fables! There’s the Tortoise and the Hare, the Lion and the Mouse, the Fox and the Raven-.”

“We get it.” Qrow scowled and crossed his arms, “So we just pick a fable pair.”

Summer looked doubtful, and it was almost gratifying to see her glance warily at Raven —no doubt remembering the promise to make Summer’s life miserable if she was separated from her twin—, “Are we sure that’s how they’re paired up though? That seems a little…”

Taiyang hesitated, “Okay yeah that is a bit cliche.”

Raven thought of chess pieces —“I’m queen of the castle! I’m queen of the castle!” whispered cheerfully even now in the back of her head—, and a man who loved fairy tales because he’d been around to see most of them happen and snorted, “It’s perfectly cliche and stereotypical. Which is why it’s probably true. Why bother with some unknown pairing system when you can pick something easy to remember like children’s stories and call it a day.”

Taiyang rubbed the back of his head, “So we should pick a fable then, I guess.”

Summer picked up the raven figurine and tossed it to Raven herself, “Since this is your idea, if this is wrong, that means you can’t be mad at me, right?”

Raven absently pulled some cord out of her pocket and wrapped it around the figurine to form a makeshift necklace that she then tied around her neck, “Oh no. If I wind up on a different team from Qrow, the next four years of your life are mine to ruin. But I don’t think this is wrong.”

Taiyang laughed a bit nervously as he picked up the fox figurine and offered it to Qrow, who backpedaled and shook his head —handing it to him would ensure it got lost as easily as throwing it off a cliff by hand—. Taiyang shrugged and tucked it into a pocket of his cargo pants, making sure to button the pocket flap before clapping his hands, “Alright then! Hard part’s over, now we just need to get back to the cliff!”

Qrow sighed and drew his sword preemptively as they started the walk back, “Now that you’ve said that, we’re going to be in for one heck of a ride.”

“Come on, that’s just a superstition. I thought you didn’t believe in luck.”

Raven smothered a morbid laugh despite herself as Qrow leveled a flat, unhappy stare at Taiyang, “I said ‘don’t talk to me about luck’, not that I don’t believe in it. It’s screwed me over too many times for me to not.”

Taiyang laughed like it was a joke, “Come on, man. No one’s luck is that bad. Everyone just has good days and bad days.” Raven didn’t realize she was raising a hand to hit him until Summer fearlessly reached out and pushed her wrist down. Raven glared at her instead. Summer sighed like they were all children and she was the only adult, which wasn’t fair because Raven was easily older than any of them —mentally anyway— and had been responsible for lives and the taking of them for likely longer than Summer had held a weapon in her hands.

#Secret Engima Rambles #Melodies and Manuscripts #Always I Dreamed verse #rwby #team strq #feral branwen birbs are feral

45 notes · View notes

hecohansen31 · 4 years

Text

To Kill A King

Ivar+Saxon Princess! Reader

The Scheming Genius:

“Just when I thought I was Running out of time The King stood trembling at my bedside”

“To Kill A King” by Hungry Lucy

(Masterlist) (Previous Chapter)

(A/N): Hello there, lovelies!

I know it’s been along time since I have last updated one of my series but... I have just been having a lot of problems with the newest chapters of this series, because basically... I do know the events I want to take, but not what I want to write, so I can’t help but feel like what I write is never enough.

So I just wanted to apologize if this is utter shit.

Also this is shorter than usual and I just want to say that this should have been longer but I just... I just felt like I had to post this and then add more, also because I know that all my chapters are just too long.

I do hope that even if it isn’t the best you’ll enjoy it!

As always: this series means so so much to me, so any feedback is more than welcome, everything starting from comments to reblogs, just LET ME NOW WHAT YOU THINK!

Feedback makes our fingers write faster and our heart beat faster!

Have a nice reading!

SUMMARY: The truth is out and the heart that you gave so freely is now broken and yet your strength never falters, conjuring a dangerous plan to be finally free. But is it truly what you want.

WORDS: 10, 9 K

WARNINGS: Arranged Marriage, Mention of Domestical Abuse and Rape, Violence (Strong Themes), Sexual Harassment, Slavery, Historically inaccurate, Blood and Period.

Your breath came harder and harder till it choked and you lost your rhythm.

Your legs failed under you and you were solely able to stop yourself from completely falling head first on the ground, pushing your legs towards the earth.

You did bruise them, but you didn’t care as you brought them in your unfocused stare.

They were dirtied and bloody.

Not solely because you had fallen down.

And the blood on them wasn’t solely yours.

Still you hadn’t much time to think, as you heard male-like steps, hard and heavy on the ground, breaking twigs under their boots.

And fear flooded your system as you reached out for a knife trying to search at your belt and then lower, on your thigh, where you remembered having strapped up a knife.

But now it wasn’t there.

And you realized that it was probably still in the body of the man you had stabbed.

That certainly didn’t ease any of your fear, but your body seemed to have set itself up on either a running away or fighting stance, hence the sense of guilt for having stabbed a man etched itself in the back of your mind as you tried to move away.

Your legs were still too weak and soon you were dragged against the cold soil again.

And there you stayed, your nails pushing themselves in the dirt, as you tried to push yourself flush against the ground, hoping that confusing yourself with the ground would help.

And you prayed with all your last beliefs that you would be spared.

Your lungs constricted and before you knew it you were choking on air.

‘Not again’ you prayed desperately, closing your eyes ‘… I don’t want to die’.

It was now day after the revelation of the previous night.

You had been accompanied by both Caryn and Lia back in your tent, the women trying to coo you in a comforting way, but you didn’t even notice it in your unresponsive state.

It was as if you had closed yourself completely from the world, in a way that left you only overthinking yourself constantly.

You felt stupid.

Which was an awful thing to feel for you, having always considered your intelligence your sole talent.

And to know that it had failed you this much, it only brought you to the realization that your father’s poisonous words were true.

‘You, stupid girl with no purpose’

They echoed, right as you saw the room in front of you deforming into something awful,: your room in the castle as figures appeared in front of you, Kathleen laying on the ground having been struck down, meanwhile Abigail knelt in front of her shaking her awake, as you pushed yourself in front of your father.

One last attempt to protect Kathleen.

But as his eyes met yours, they were daringly blue.

Ivar’s.

That was what brought you back from that horrid vision.

And then there was ruffling with your tent, as you turned to its door, finding thankfully that it was Caryn, her dark curls lightly exiting the tight hairstyle she had chosen for the day.

She looked so beautiful.

And it just reminded you of how truly cunning Ivar could be.

He had outsmarted you, once, and he would do it again.

“You look like you haven’t slept, my lady” commented Caryn, unsure, although her voice was so sweet that it broke you inside and before you knew it, sobbing escaped your chest.

“… I did” because a paralyzing deep slumber had taken you, but it hadn’t brought you neither relief neither comfort, and it was difficult for you to remember the sole dream of that night.

Which meant it wasn’t something that you wanted to remember

“… but my body wishes for a sweet dream, before it faces the reality of things”.

Caryn smiled halfheartedly, something nostalgic in her plump lips and her longing eyes, as if she knew and could understand what you felt deep down, something that only awakened rage in your body.

You had always been babied like you didn’t have a brain and the way she acted with you just brought that back.

You had always believed what others had told you.

What your own father fed you through fear and harsh teachings.

What your books had fed you, fantasies and love stories that had now brought you to believe that the touch of a pure maiden might tame the beast.

But the beast was already corrupted.

And it would have just eaten the maiden, had she come too close.

For a moment yesterday, at the feast, you had thought about a possible life with him.

A life in which you didn’t have to be your father’s spy and you could enjoy the tenderness of the soft feelings you were starting to develop for Ivar.

But you would never have the chance to do such a thing, now.

He had killed his own brother in cold blood.

You had read that on his face when you had asked him if it was the truth.

If Ubbe hadn’t simply said a lie to tear you apart.

And you didn’t know what his brother had done, but it never could be as much as the treason that you’d have to do to him on your father’s beliefs.

Just because he had showed you some love it didn’t mean that this would be how your life would have for ever been.

You had always lost yourself too easily in the fantasy of perfect worlds, fantastic beyond everything and where you could live happily ever after, like the few fables you enjoyed listening when you were smaller.

You had been the biggest fool, truly believing that this would be just another one of them.

You got yourself dressed mechanically, but your mind didn’t shut down in the slightest as it elaborated strategies and thoughts till it got too much and you were suddenly locked inside of your mind in a drunken stupor for everything around you.

Till Hvitserk showed up in your tent.

You didn’t want to see him, but deep down a desperate part of you ached for some kind of confront with the brothers.

To know something that could justify Ivar’s actions.

But deep down you knew it wouldn’t have eased your aching soul.

“… you looked like you haven’t…”.

Why was everyone so concerned with your sleeping?

“… I know” you shot back, with an harsh glare on your face, no need of any pretense with the man you had thought was your brother, although he had betrayed you two times.

“(Y/N)…” he rushed in immediately, probably hearing the annoyance in your tone, the tight rumble of the last word “… this isn’t something that…”.

“… that might concern me?” now your rage, which had been shot down by your tiredness and sleepless night, flared up completely “… he is my husband, Hvitserk! And Sigurd would have been my brother-in-law!”.

“You don’t know nothing about Sigurd!” the comment burned you, but your entire body felt as if it had been set on fire, and for somebody who had never been able to express her own rage, it felt damnably magnificent and tiring “… he and Ivar hated themselves and we all knew it would have come to that end, one or the other”.

“That doesn’t justify Ivar’s actions” your voice was now lowered, but it echoed deeply in the tent, suddenly feeling so closed inside of her, meanwhile Hvitserk took a step back.

Something burning on his tongue, but his brain holding it back.

“… it’s a different culture, princess (Y/N)” your full title now sounded liked disdain “… you wouldn’t understand it…”.

“No, I wouldn’t” the words were now a full offense for you, but again that quiet before the tempest filled your tone and her mouth and you spit everything out as a cascade at the end of a smooth river “… I was thrust in this reality not by my choice and I had to adapt, to learn and to survive. So, I might not understand it, but this doesn’t justify it in any way”.

And before Hvitserk could say anything you pushed out of the tent, the whole place becoming much more intolerable than before, the tightness of your chest being slightly eased out by the air outside.

The sun shone there, although it seemed just like the umpteenth attempt of the whole universe to make fun of you.

But you breathed better and deeper.

But did it soothe you, in any way? No.

You felt your name called out, but you simply kept on running.

It was the only way you could achieve some sense of freedom.

It was your last freedom.

And before you even realized it, your feet took you in front of the place you needed to go to finish all of this.

Heahmund’s tent.

The man looked surprised by your presence there, even more because she was quite aware of the fact that you looked like some kind of savage nymph with your hair unbound and your feet bare.

But he welcomed you inside.

‘… I wasn’t expecting you princess to be here’ he commented, meanwhile he gestured outside, as you entered the tent, noticing the minimal objects and furniture in it, but nonetheless it was Saxon to the core.

Unlike and like you.

‘… I heard that there has been quite the celebration yesterday’ it was obvious that to him all the rituals happening were nothing but heathen dances in the full moonlight and he frowned upon them.

And upon the Christian princess that had joined them.

And for a moment you wondered about what you were truly doing with him.

Was it be a good choice?

“I want a divorce” Heahmund definitely didn’t seem to think it was a good choice, although surprise shone brightly on his face after your affirmation “… something that’ll annul my wedding, although I already know it is illegal for Christians”.

“What?” Heahmund was definitely trying to make sense of the same princess who had told him to mind his own business the previous day, and then today appeared in his tent, just a few days later to pretend a divorce.

You were definitely full of surprises.

Exactly like Ivar.

“… did you know that my husband killed his brother?” you didn’t know why you asked that to Heahmund, but the mindless expression he gave you, confirming that he did know about it, made you feel even more betrayed “… and do you think that isn’t something that might make my husband dangerous to me?”.

“I am here to protect you, princess” it was almost an automatic response, the sole he could give with such short pretense.

“… like you protected me when I was accused of having tried poisoning Ivar?” you had definitely hit a sore spot as the bishop lowered his head and launched himself on the sole chair in the room.

You were happy of standing, able to tower over him, as if to ensure your power over him.

Your father would have been proud of you.

And disgust just flooded on your tongue, at that thought.

“… if he killed his brother, think what he’ll do to me, when he’ll discover what you and my father planned to do with our marriage. All the spying and lying” you knew you must have sounded pathetic, and it made you feel almost like you were chewing onto glass.

But you felt betrayed by everyone.

Because what made you speak and what you had just asked was the rage you had ignored for all your life, the one that had come out of being constantly belittled, scared and taunted, to the point that you felt like you couldn’t react.

You couldn’t show anything that you wanted to feel truly.

And you started being sick of this.

“You knew who he was when you married him, princess” Heahmund’s tone tasted of threat and you weren’t able to stop yourself from grimacing at that, although you gripped tighter your fists, Nanna’s teachings about how to attack definitely coming to your mind.

“… but did I have any choice other than marrying him?” the words echoed in the room in a way that hang on heavy around you, like a humid cloud involving you both and Heahmund wasn’t able to turn his head to the other side, as he had always done “… my father would have thrown me out, if I hadn’t accepted it…”.

“He won’t hurt you, my princess” and strangely you were aware of it.

But… yet… your soul was scared, left betrayed by your own thought of having believed that Ivar could be different from your father, when they were two men who wielded power through violence.

You shouldn’t have been surprised but yet scenes of ordinary sweetness between you and Ivar appeared in your mind and they kept on bothering you, because the revelation made you feel like there were two Ivars, something that you had seen before.

There was the one that would cradle you close to his chest, when you didn’t feel well enough, bringing you to his own private heaven so that you could share a moment, in something that nobody had ever bothered to do for you.

And then there was this disruptive creature, some kind of hungry wolf that trashed anything and anybody that came on his way, something that made you wary, not scared, but your self-respect wanted you to run on your own feet.

And only some basilar sense of honor held you there.

And the knowledge that running away would have solely given you more problems.

“… arrange the divorce” it was an order mixed with a threat, something that you learned from Heahmund’s tone itself, the man quirking an eyebrow at you, although his mouth kept itself in a straight line “… or I’ll handle it myself”.

And as you had come you exited the tent, noticing that life had started going on as usual again.

Everybody had somewhere to go and the sounds of an active army camp filled the air and for a moment you desperately wished to disappear in it, closing your eyes and hoping that, as an enchantment, your own will could bring you away from here.

In a place where you could be safe with your sisters.

Kathleen wouldn’t have felt this powerless, she would have fought, she would have stood her ground, meanwhile Abigail would have charmed everybody in giving her what she asked…

… and then there was you, who felt like everything was lost.

Your feet brought you to place where the boats were being repaired, the entire process having come to some kind of halt, since the workers who had been taking care of the boats to come back home, had been moved to make sure Bjorn’s would be ready for his and Halfdan’s departure.

Something bitter was in your mouth at the thought.

At Ivar’s first betrayal and lie.

You shouldn’t have been this surprised after all.

“I knew I’d found you here” the voice was slightly lighter than Ivar and spoke English graciously with no inflection in his tone and you didn’t have to turn around to know that it was Alexander.

You breathed out a breath of relief.

“… if you are here to tell me you were right, please don’t”.

You were already hard enough on yourself, on your own.

“I won’t” Alexander sat next to you, and although you felt the distance between you two, it brought you pack to a past time, when you were each other’s confessor, although there were things you hadn’t been able to tell even to him.

And now they damned your body to this kind of pain and loss.

“… good” it was so low that you were sure that it dispersed itself in the wind “… because I am already feeling like I lost everything and to know that I have lost also your friendship and respect it would… destroy me”.

What was this show of sincerity?

This sudden opening up to everybody.

It felt like weakness…

… and yet the way Alexander’s arm slung loosely over your shoulder felt heavenly and before you knew it the tears you hadn’t shed but needed to, escaped your control and soon you were crying on his chest desperately.

He simply caressed your back till sobs became sighs and eventually silence enveloped you both.

“… you’ll never lose something that is sacred to my heart” he commented once you had calmed down, gently bringing your hands in his, as you raised softly your head to meet his eyes, and he shook lightly his head “… I shouldn’t have said those things… I spoke of love, but the truth was that I had no right to it…”.

“… I am sorry my feelings can’t be…” but he shushed you softly.

“You can’t oblige your feelings to feel something that you don’t believe in” he spoke softly, measuring his words because they held an equal side of wisdom and pain “… that’s why you are feeling like everything is lost… because your head tells you to feel one thing and your heart… your heart is treacherous”.

“He is a murderer…” your voice was low and yet it could have shaken mountains.

It shook your soul to the core.

“… he… he isn’t the man that I was supposed to love” it felt like a justification.

A flimsy one.

“Love isn’t about deserving or earning” Alexander spoke slowly “… I know it on my own skin, but this doesn’t make it any less easy or more… simple”.

“… I can’t stay here” your legs lightly moved underneath you as if to reinforce the concept “… I shouldn’t have ever come, I should have done what Kathleen wanted me to do, run”.

“And when have you ever followed Kathleen’s advises?” now Alexander’s mouth was quirking up in a smile, a sarcastic one matched on your face, properly “… you are (Y/N), not Kathleen, don’t ever forget”.

“But I do wish I was her!” now your voice was loud enough to make a few of the workers turn around, but Alexander’s eyes shot to them to tell them to return to work, something they did without any questions “… I can’t do this… I can’t… anymore”.

Your hands gripped the earth beneath you, probably dirtying your nails but you needed to anchor yourself down as your lungs slowly started filling themselves slowly, meanwhile you pushed your hands underneath you, stretching your body.

“Then change” it felt natural the way he said it, like it was the only natural solution, but how could you even think about that, when you were stuck as nothing more than a glorified prisoner.

“… how?”.

“We’ll grab a few horses and we’ll make a fun for it” Alexander, always the knight in the shining armor, the one who played Arthur in your games because he was ‘the Just’, certainly wouldn’t have thought about anything more than that.

To him, it would have been a knightly ballad.

And to you a true nightmare.

That was why this would never work out between you two.

He was a dreamer and you had had too much reality in your own blood to believe in those fairytales.

As you had learned in the hard way, they always disappointed you.

“… this isn’t easy, Alexander” your tone was patient and yet tight, as if you couldn’t understand Alexander’s thoughts and point of view “… Heahmund won’t even grant me a divorce”.

“… then the only way is to run”.

This, indeed, sounded like Kathleen.

But (Y/N) was already asking herself where they’d go and hide, what they’d need for it.

And how it would influence the ones she left behind.

Ivar would have probably marched to your father to ask him to find you again to bring you back and your father would have absolutely tried his best to find you, using your sisters against you.

And yet, you couldn’t stay here.

Your hands let go of the earth as if it was poisonous.

But maybe you were what was truly poisonous.

“… I can’t”.

Because Alexander could look forward, like Kathleen.

But you couldn’t.

You hadn’t been able to, since your father had taken away the possibility of a future without him from you.

His actions had never let you think with your own head, with your wishes and your own taste and now you were broken completely.

And stuck in the middle.

Waiting for something.

“Then I’ll stay with you a bit longer…” Alexander’s voice was soothing and comforting and again you leaned your head against his shoulder “… my princess”.

---

When you arrived back in your tent, rigorously escorted by Alexander in a silence that was terrible and your sole solution, you found all your ‘handmaidens’ reunited around your bed, their hands threaded together and their lips muttering a prayer that was too silent to reach your ears.

But you knew that they were praying for your protection, because as soon as you bumped into something with your knee, making enough noise to make your presence known to each of them, their eyes almost madly raised to you.

“Princess!” called out Lia, meanwhile Angelika’s slight smirk became as cold as the rocks outside and Caryn’s sweet smile faltered lightly again seeing your tired and disappointed smile “… we were worried! You didn’t… come for us, this morning”.

You wondered whether they knew.

None of them had followed you outside after you had received the news.

They had been all too busy dancing their hearts out and you couldn’t blame them.

You had always thought and felt like they were your friends and because of that they were happy of being so far away from their home, in a place where they had no real family and friend.

You had always been too naïve.

You wondered how far the word of your fight with Ivar had spread.

Part of you worried for what this might bring onto the scheme that you and Ivar had created.

You knew that Ubbe had told you this secret, because he hoped to bring whatever deal you and Ivar had done down, and he had succeeded in this brilliantly, because had the fight become of public domain, it would have brought down whatever appearance of romance you and Ivar had set up for each other.

Alongside your image of beloved leaders.

But part of you, the one that you had denied for so long, wanted to just push everything out in the open, to be able to mourn your pain publicly and have your own revenge on Ivar’s omitted pieces.

It felt so vile and yet it just felt right.

“… I just had to clear my mind” worry continued on lacing your handmaidens’ eyes, but the part of you that felt the need to doubt everything, now wasn’t able to look at them back.

You weren’t able to look at them without wondering whether it was genuine.

What was true, after all, in this settlement of liars and lies?

Your father would have called you melodramatic and even naïve, because to think that the truth was what you saw was the greatest trick that the Devil had played on humanity.

And who didn’t understand this would have been completely destroyed by others

“Is… your mind… clear, now?” it was obvious that Angelika’s words were a polished version of what she truly wanted to say.

And do, with her way her fists tightened around the pretty fabric of her lovely bluish dress.

She wouldn’t have been as naïve as you, in your place.

“… a bit” words were difficult and you excused Alexander quickly with a few more, not truly wanting him to see what you felt, unable to conceal your ache for what he had proposed, alongside the knowledge that you wouldn’t have ever been able to realize his plan “… I’d like to lay down, alone”.

It was lunch time, but you felt like you would have pushed out anything that you’d have eaten, so you thought that the only way you could tolerate the passing of the day was alone.

With your books.

“… it wouldn’t be wise to leave you…” tried to start Solveig, her voice and her Nordic accent, a small memory of your husband’s one “… we should…”.

“Leave me, alone”.

You must have sounded like a spoiled brat, but you knew that your eyes held the wound of your pride and your imagination.

And soon you heard a fluttering of feet and curt bows, meanwhile dresses grated almost noiseless against the floor, wiping it clean in some kind of ritual that left you to push yourself on the ground, on your knees.

And silently cry.

You dragged your tired body as some kind of wounded beast till the trunk with all your books and searched through it for some old books about laws, most importantly wedding laws, even getting the Bible out.

It was a small one that Father Peter had gifted you when you weren’t anything more than a small crumb, in hopes it’d guide you to sanctity.

How far were you from it…

But the truth was that you could have wielded the book with all the world’s knowledge and yet you wouldn’t have found a solution to your own dilemma, because your father wouldn’t have ever granted you a divorce or annulled the marriage.

You were his little bishop, on his own personal chessboard, willing to the ultimate sacrifice and honored for the protection of the king, something that made you unable to follow a proper trajectory on her own.

Just another piece on the board.

If you asked for a divorce your father would have immediately denied it, because you were a precious spy.

And had you tried to escape, he would have turned himself against your sisters, till he brought you right back where he had always had you.

There was no way to escape his grip.

In the end, you hadn’t had many choices when the marriage had been set up.

And now that it was celebrated and you were the wife of a monster, you had even less.

There was a third way.

That was something stories had always told you.

And as your hands were in search for many more books, almost frantic in their movements, they brushed against the leather sheath of the dagger your father had given you to achieve the most utter level of betrayal towards Ivar.

But could you kill somebody?

The dagger weighted heavily on your hands, but you knew just how to grip it to be sure to stabilize it in your grip, thank to Nanna’s lessons, since you had trained with wooden knives, in your latest lessons.

‘Held it with one hand’ and you followed the instructions in your mind, grabbing the handle with strength, as your fingers pushed up their to wrap against the metal, to grip it steadily ‘… this way you’ll have much more strength from your upper arms’.

And then you’d pierce Ivar’s skin.

And not the bottom of the trunk.

Would it have made so much difference?

Would you have found resistance?

Would you have survived the attack, had you been able to catch Ivar by surprise, finishing the fatal mission her father had given you?

But right when the dagger was through piercing itself in the trunk your hand trembled and soon the trembling pushed itself up to your whole body in a way that made goosebumps appear on your skin, a slight shade of red appearing on you cheeks.

And you felt it because they burned.

Like your arms.

As if you had received some kind of premonition, the knife slipped from your grip, as you felt somebody entering the tent.

And you had gotten yourself used to those dragged out steps.

You had cherished them just a few days ago.

And you knew that Ivar had almost caught you in a dangerous experimentation.

But nothing in you wanted to be careful.

You had been focusing all your energy on hiding the double-play you had brought in your dowry and now you were so tired of everything.

So tired of Ivar’s and your father’s games.

You should have seen how similar they were from the start.

How deceitful and monstrous they both were.

Drenched in violence and unable to love others.

And yet, as Ivar’s eyes met yours, tired and disappointed, all the flashes of your happy moments appeared in front of your eyes, again, and for a moment you felt like throwing your arms around him.

And then the image of blood, tears and smoke filled your eyes.

You had been already too foolish.

And your eyes became of ice.

“… would you like to talk?” Ivar’s voice was as dry as your mouth, but yet it felt like a dam holding back something more and you trained your eyes to the ground, to avoid seeing what he hid in his eyes.

Because they’d have made you think you were talking with a human.

“I sent away my handmaidens away for a reason” you hadn’t ever been this cold and this angry and it felt like every hit you sent his way was one to yourself and you couldn’t help but clutch your fists tight by your side, adjusting your dress just to look busy “… and Hvitserk already tried to say something”.

“He ran out of the tent with his tail between his legs” his attempt at humor was welcomed by a dry glare and this time in your eyes there wasn’t anything to be held back.

They were pure flames.

“… he told me that I don’t understand your ways” suddenly your own dam was broken and before you knew it, you were pushing out all the shit that you had swallowed all these years “… but the truth is that I was pushed in this, without anybody asking me what I wanted and what I preferred”.

“I had to learn on my own how to behave, how to act, how to fucking survive” Ivar backed off lightly, and your body raised in a swift move “… I had to learn how to fight back, how to defend myself from all the ones around me and not to trust anybody…”.

“You are a princess, you should have known these things” now Ivar’s tone was as dark as yours, and as you turned to look at him in the eyes you spotted that he hadn’t been able to conceal that you had hurt him.

And it made you feel good.

It made you take that step forward that separated you.

“… you are right” your voice was the calm before the storm, mirroring completely the static energy that followed lighting, meanwhile your voice became the booming power of a thunder “… I am a fucking believer of stories and you thought that you could control me easily because of that”.

Ivar seemed taken aback by your affirmation, and raised his arms as if to grab your attention but now you were utterly done and if he wanted to make you suffer, you’d drag him with you

“… for all my life I had somebody that controlled me, so it should have been easy for you to do the same for me, it was nice when you could make me act the role of the nice wife, the one that’d have stood by your side, no matter what…” a light of protest appeared in Ivar’s eyes and you chastised it with a look of your own “… don’t fucking deny it, my prince”.

You could have screamed and it would have done less damage than it did now, as Ivar lost suddenly his balance on his own braces and although everything in your body ached to desperately cradle him closer to you, help him up…

… your soul was frozen.

“… but I am done playing these games” and you let Ivar catch a glimpse in your tiredness “… and from now on, I wish you not to be my husband anymore in our tent, I’ll keep up the dutiful wife act outside of here, but I just can’t… I won’t be your bride in anything but my body”.

Ivar reached out for your dress, as you exited the tent, but you were faster.

Running away was your sole weapon.

And it struck deeper than a dagger.

---

Nanna noticed your uneasiness to even look towards a weapon immediately, as you came to here to train, and sent you through a run of the woods, to stretch your muscles before the real training, some kind of hand to hand combat that you had practiced till you knew the moves by heart.

For which you were grateful since your mind was completely gone.

And you couldn’t seriously do much more than crouch down and avoid hit after hit, meanwhile your attacks were lethal, enough that this time you almost hit Lia, the poor girl having to shield herself through a big push onto your chest, which sent you tumbling down.

And you welcomed the fall.

The loss of control was dizzying and maddening and for somebody who was a step close to losing it completely it was refreshing like rain on your face in a hot summer day.

And Nanna caught on all of this immediately.

She approached you as you came back to Bukefalos.

‘… whatever you have in mind, you should know that the brothers never liked each other” you rolled your eyes at her, a bold move that accompanied your own insanity since you wouldn’t have ever dared doing anything like that.

But the truth was that if you had gone through so much shit because of others, it was because you, firstly, had let yourself go through it, eventually creating a patterns of behaviors that you’d assume to avoid angering others.

You thought they’d spare you from pain.

But they had never worked truly.

And now you raged with intensity.

“… Hvitserk already tried this discourse with me” you counterattacked before Nanna could finish whatever she was saying, but unlike with Hvitserk, she held her own ground and waited for your outburst to end “… it doesn’t justify him”.

“It doesn’t, it never will” there was something deeper in Nanna’s eyes “… I am the first to say such a thing, because you see… I was Sigurd’s trainer, I taught him how to fight, although he wasn’t in the slightest talented for it, he was a great musician…”.

The confession seemed to cost Nanna years as her face became suddenly older and you couldn’t help but stop for a moment and think about what she had truly gone through.

You didn’t know Nanna, exactly as you didn’t know perfectly your handmaidens, so to be the witness of such a concealed pain it made your soul suddenly shift onto the most compassionate mood, although rage still burned and asked explanations.

“… I hate him, you know” Nanna’s voice was a soft whisper, her face holding a tight smirk, a sad one that spoke of many nights wasted to overthinking and distrusting anybody “… that’s why I wasn’t kind to you, when you first came, I thought that you were nothing but a meek little mannequin here for his schemes”.

“I am that” your voice tasted like a harsh bite, and Nanna sent you a compassionate look, but no pity in it, as if she knew deep down that that rage simply concealed much more.

“… you were” corrected her Nanna, coming closer to you, and lightly brushed away strand of hair drenched with sweat you hadn’t noticed you had shed “… but the truth is that you weren’t ever meek and stupid, someone easy to manipulate? Maybe at the start, but not anymore. That’s just a front and this strength that you are destroying through your rage… it’s the true you”.

Nobody had ever said something like that to you

You had loved Kathleen to Death and back, and yet, she had always treated her as if you were the meek little girl that your father had wanted you to be, and she couldn’t see past it, in the end becoming one of the many golden cages that wrapped you too tight.

You had always felt helpless.

Even when your strength had been reinforced.

But now somebody had finally acknowledged it…

… it felt like a freedom.

Like a beacon of hope.

That your rage shoved back inside.

“… he is a monster”.

“No” Nanna voice echoed through the empty spot of the forest she had brought you so that you could be more private “… he isn’t a monster, because those exist only in fairytales, little princess, he is a boy who has done and will for ever do monstrous things”.

“… is there any difference?”.

Your voice was slightly broken and even more importantly it seemed almost frail in the way it trembled in your own mouth, as if you wanted to eat it right back, because it was the breaking point.

Your breaking point.

Could you love somebody that would have tainted you?

Somebody who wouldn’t have hesitated to bring you down for his own plans?

No matter the fact that he had promised that he wouldn’t have ever done such a thing.

Could you turn a blind eye to all the monstrous things he did?

What would have made you?

A coward or a hypocrite?

“… there is” Nanna’s voice was instead low as if it was tasting the words, making sure they were the right ones “… being a monster isn’t a choice, doing monstrous thing is, and it only depends on us”.

“This doesn’t make everything better in any way”.

“It isn’t meant to” Nanna’s eyes settled on you unrelenting and piercing “… it is meant to bring knowledge to you. Even you would do something monstrous if you were given the proper stimulus believe me”.

The words seemed so foreign to you.

And yet hadn’t you cheated, lied and hidden?

Could you seriously blame Ivar for his lies?

Still you held your position strongly.

“… this isn’t some kind of silly courtly game, princess” Nanna’s hand shot out to your wrist and before she could grab, your reflexes acted up and you pushed it back “… and look at you, you already know the first step of it: don’t trust anybody”.

“… why don’t you cut Ivar’s throat off in his sleep?” it was treason what you had suggested, your father would have had the people saying it dead, but Nanna simply sent you a soft laugh.

“Because then I wouldn’t be different from him” it felt such an obvious choice and yet it clashed so deeply with the warrior image she had of Nanna “… the difference between me and Ivar it is that I can become a monster to defend what I believe in and he becomes a monster because he has been taught to hate whatever doesn’t agree with him”.

A logic came in front of your eyes.

“… he was born to be king, shaped by an overprotective mother who loved him and a father that hated what he truly was and taught him that love and happiness wouldn’t have been what was in his Destiny” the image of Ivar became much more complex at all these revelations “… this isn’t to justify him, but the first step to stop being afraid of people who do monstrous things is to understand them”.

Nanna’s hand now gently moved onto your shoulder, the grip strangely comforting, since it didn’t coddle you in any way.

But it stood with her.

“… I know you aren’t scared” she commented, as she slowly distanced herself from you “… and know that you are confused, so I hope that knowledge will help you in your choice”.

“As if I had one” you were simply able to mutter.

“… life is a path and you always come at crossroad, little princess”.

---

When you had come back to tent you had soon found out that you were alone, and you couldn’t exactly blame Ivar for not wanting to share the room with you.

But at the same time, you were almost grateful he had left your space.

Nanna’s talk had certainly cleared you a few things, if not about yourself, about Ivar.

But everything inside of you raged and ached for an answer that could calm your fear, ease your worries and finally find a solution to the enigma inside your heart: were you allowed to feel what you had started feeling for Ivar, or had it been all a mistake?

Your feelings were so confused that your feet just wanted to bring you away from there, if not for yourself, for the simple calm of mind that being far away from anybody would have given you.

You wanted just a bit freedom.

But you had taken your first steps in a priced cage.

So, how could you exit when the cage was smaller, and you knew nothing of it…

Your fist punched the light cupboard you had beside the entrance, where you knew that Ivar kept your nuptial gifts and you hit a bit too hard because the cupboard was slightly shaken and before you knew it, something fell right on the floor in front of you.

Floki’s gift, the small box with the moving sides, was now on the ground and as you rushed to grab it, already worried of having broken it, you noticed that out of pure luck you hadn’t broken it, completely.

But the box was now open lightly at the center and you moved yourself to collect it, finding much more than you had bargained for, because the broken box revealed a small piece of paper, which you grabbed, knowing quite well that you Vikings didn’t have written language, although you had received a book with a few runes and the proper pronunciation for words…

… and in fact, the paper didn’t contain any writing.

But it was a map.

A map, that contained all the villages around the settlement, signaling the ones that were already occupied by Vikings troupes and the ones that weren’t, making you discover that you had a convent nearby, a few days of travels.

But, again, you knew that escaping wouldn’t have been useful to anybody.

Unless… unless you managed to maintain the pact with Ivar.

And unless anything happened to you.

Had you died, accidentally, Ivar wouldn’t have been able to break the oath of protection to your father and your father wouldn’t have harmed your sister to try to get you back to him.

But you didn’t have any intention to cut your life so shortly, not only because you were coward and too attached to the life you had just started living, but you knew that suicide might destroy the oath, almost as much as a direct betrayal to either your father or Ivar.

But suddenly more and more ideas set up in your mind, as you remembered Nanna’s discourse.

A terrible and monstrous idea came to you, as you watched at the map, clutching it tighter in your hands till it appeared lightly crisped and marks of your nails etched in it.

You pushed it in your sleeve, and for the second time in that day you went to visit Alexander.

You noticed that a few guards followed you, although not closely and you were even more surprised to discover that Alexander and a few of his men had been asked to stay for a few days more.

‘To ease the princess’ nostalgy’ had mumbled Alexander, recalling the small meeting he had had that morning with Heahmund after you had left, the man looking as desperate as annoyed, and when your best friend discovered what you had asked of the bishop…

… he laughed loudly.

“… I don’t trust Heahmund, in the slightest” you mumbled, under your breath, but were still thankful for having Alexander with you a bit, even more with the plan your mind had conjured.

You showed Alexander the map you had found.

‘They probably wanted to use it to conquer more lands’ commented the blonde-haired knight, as he examined the countries that were left unconquered ‘… they couldn’t know that Ivar would have married an English princess, sealing peace with king Alfred and your father’.

‘… that gives me more credit than I have really’ you mumbled, but more because Ivar being brought in this conversation would have risked ruining all your coherent thoughts and confidence.

“This morning you said we should run away” your voice was low, although the guards outside hadn’t seemed to understand any English, but you tried your best to avoid being discovered “… but for me it isn’t just possible, I do know that if I just run away, my father would bring me back, using my sisters against me”.

“… so, you haven’t changed idea?” Alexander’s tone was slightly pensive and heavy, enough that you were very aware that he stood by your side no matter what.

And you needed that loyalty for your plan.

Something that still made you a bit icky to use, since you were aware that you were partly using Alexander’s fascination for you to get him to collaborate with you.

And it was horrible.

It felt awful.

And it was something that you could feel both Ivar and your father would have done.

Nanna had talked with you about creatures doing monstrous things, but not about the influence they’d have on the people around them,

“… my father wouldn’t search for me if I was dead”.

In Alexander’s eyes a flash of hurt and surprise appeared and immediately he reached out to you, trying to grab your wrist, but you snatched it quickly, as he instead went to gently caress one of your cheeks, as you kept your eyes down.

Unable to see the commotion and devotion in his eyes.

It reminded you of Ivar’s quiet misery of this morning.

Why had you this effect on men?

They were all moved by you and yet they wouldn’t listen on anything you had to say.

“… I won’t help you on your path to self-destruction, (Y/N)” Alexander told you, looking at you attentively “… I can’t… truly… I’ll swear my sword to your protection, but not to your destruction”.

“I wouldn’t need to die, to be thought dead” you added, trying to ease the worry in Alexander’s eyes “… I… if I was thought to be dead through some accident, leaving behind some of my things, I wouldn’t… I would be able to start again a new life, in a convent, where nobody has heard of me”.

The plan was crazy and Alexander did look at you as if you had definitely suggested something blasphemous, and honestly…

… had you had any other chance, you wouldn’t have suggested it.

But Heahmund or your father wouldn’t have ever granted you a chance of divorce.

And running out would have resulted in simply being brought back by force, either using it on you or your sisters.

And you couldn’t stay here.

Not when you had people pushing you through situation you didn’t belong in.

No matter how much you had thought of loving Ivar, your father expected you to do something against him and had Ivar discovered anything about what you had done and what you intended to do, he wouldn’t have hesitated to kill you.

And you had enough of being controlled and used for others’ plans.

You had now your own.

Your life at a convent wouldn’t have been perfect.

But you wouldn’t have risked your life, daily basically.

“This isn’t… this is…” Alexander’s eyes searched yours, hoping to find some gleam of sanity but you simply held yourself strong in your conviction, because had you lost also that…

… you would have completely vanished.

“… crazy”.

“That’s my only chance” you insisted loudly “… I wouldn’t ask you this if it wasn’t. I know that you want the best for me, but I can’t simply hide behind you anymore”.

Something in his eyes became sad and you had to admit what stood on your tongue, ready to be swallowed, because it was the truth.

And you knew that truth never paid off.

“… I know that you are in love with me” you admitted “… and I know that you want to protect me because of that, but I … Alexander I grew out of the fairytale, I don’t think it ever was. I don’t want you to do this because you expect something in return or because it is what virtuous knights do. I want you to do this because… you think it is the right thing”.

Alexander’s hand fell from your face and for a moment you were sure that you had done the wrong thing, you had chosen the wrong road and now you could only hope that Alexander would at least respect the secret of your words.

But for the second time in this day, you found a bit of luck, in this unlucky situation.

“I am not going to help you, as a lover” it hit you deeply, but Alexander’s eyes stared right back in yours, full of support “… I am going to help you, because I should have done all of this before”.

You looked at him curious about what he’d say next, but you couldn’t have ever foreseen what he’d say next.

“… I should have helped you and your sisters with your father”.

And for somebody who had never admitted what your father had made you go through, although solely emotionally, the knowledge that somebody had been witness to it took you like a sword straight up in your chest.

A bleak kind of pain hit you and you almost felt ashamed that he had found out about this.

“… how?” the words got all confused in your mouth “… how did you know?”.

“I didn’t… I just connected the dots” you didn’t know whether you wanted to hide all of this further in your heart, because shame just took you fully, or to finally breath out the truth.

Because finally you had received some respect, and somebody saw all of you.

“… once… when we were children… I accidentally ripped Kathleen’s gown, meanwhile we were fighting, and I found a big… big bruise on it”.

“… I didn’t realize back then that it came from your father, but I saw the way you flinched whenever he was slightly displeased with you, even more when I saw Kathleen flinching of pain if we ever fought, and seeing bruises on here that she justified as old wounds…”.

Alexander’s knowledge made you sick to your stomach.

Had others known about your father’s actions?

Had they known all this time and never done anything?

Although you were the first to admit that your father’s actions would have put the fear of God in everyone, you couldn’t believe that so many had stayed silent, at seeing the constant ruination of you and your beloved sisters.

“… and as a child I believed it, but when we started growing up we became more and more tight knit and I wasn’t able to ignore the way you’d shift away from your father, or the way Abigail would have her eyes trained down on the ground, whenever he was near… or how much Kathleen limped after she had answered her father’s provocations…”.

Painful memories overcame you as you choked on your own words.

“… that’s why I told you we should have run away, when we were still at the castle, before I got recruited in the army, I wanted to keep you safe, but…” a shade of guilt dyed his eyes “… I was just a boy and there wasn’t much I could do, I didn’t have the power and neither the money to convince your father to let you marry me”.

“And then my brother died and the only that kept me going was the fact that I could have finally been enough in your father’s eyes…” and his eyes showed the idealistic beliefs you had always loved about him “… but right when I came back, I found out that your father had sold you off to somebody’s else”.

The way he pronounced the word ‘sold you off’ made you feel so heavy and ashamed.

But it was the truth.

Your father had sold you like a priced cow.

And you wouldn’t have simply ‘mooed’ your annoyance, anymore.

You would have done something with it.

“… so, I’ll help you, my princess” Alexander sealed off his oath, as his hand reached out to you, nothing romantical in the way that he gripped your small hand in his “… for all the times that I couldn’t”.

You simply nodded, not trusting your voice, as you turned to the map

“... but we’ll need a well-thought plan”

“I have one” you commented lowly “… have you ever heard of the novella of the matron of Efeso?”.

---

You and Alexander had been talking about the plans for quite some time, estimating how much time it’d take you both to get ready.

You ran on stolen time, barely a week from when you’d be leaving for Kattegat, and Alexander’s staying had been extended for a few days, a whole week, if the heathens felt generous, something that made you both anxious.

And yet adrenaline filled your brain.

You almost hadn’t wanted to stop yourself from your plotting schemes with Alexander, but you knew that staying in his tent for more than it was proper would have costed you whispers.

Even more when the crisis between you and Ivar was evident.

So, you had tried to hide your schemes, through various visits, moving again to Heahmund, with the excuse to thank him for Alexander’s prolonged staying, appearing the image of the docile sheep, as the bishop complimented your virtues of patience and perseverance.

‘The ones of a true queen’ he had said, a strange gleam in his eyes, but you had chosen to ignore it, sick in the stomach at the sole thought that he had known about your father’s abuse against you and your sister.

And had never done anything.

Alexander’s confession of knowledge had opened your eyes and what you had thought was a closed world of violence and cunningness, had been open to the whole court to see and witness.

And nobody had done something against it.

They had all been cowards.

Like you.

And yet, a new kind of rage followed these new revelations, because you understood that many nobles completely depended upon your father, but yet, so many had even taken part in your father’s plan with no intention to even try to shed a glance your way.

You and your sisters had been left alone, to be adored and wished upon, and yet beaten down till your resistance broke.

But the truth was that it had never broken.

Kathleen was the portrait of that, and Abigail had much more cunningness than her soft preface gave the appearance of.

And as of you, the time in the Viking settlement had revealed to you, skills that you had never thought you owned.

You had always sold yourself short, and now it was time that you took the power away from all the men in your life that had taken it for you, doing not what Kathleen would have done, but what (Y/N) would have done.

Your father had thought that he had raised a stupid daughter, one that would be the perfect shy wife to a prince that wanted her simply to lay in bed, but you were far more than that.

And you wondered whether Ivar had known it from the start.

But these were questions you couldn’t allow yourself to have.

There were questions you’d leave behind as you took the vows and the veil.

‘… you’d have to change your appearance’ had mentioned Alexander meanwhile you talked about what you’d need to do to be accepted in a convent: money would have bought silence, but it wouldn’t have been enough to stop people from talking once it was finished ‘… maybe dye or cut your hair’.

And all these transformations had all seemed to you one more way to leave that life behind.

Your only regret was leaving your sisters.

The thought of never having to see them again, would have been difficult for you, to say the least, but Alexander had assured you that now that he had his brother’s inheritance he’d be able to move in court and he’d be by your sisters’ side.

He had sworn an oath to it, but you already believed him blindly.

You knew that you’d for ever regret the thought of him not being the one you had married and the one your heart loved, but there wasn’t much you could do, except be grateful for the support of such a friend.

After the visit to bishop Heahmund, you had tried your best to appear in public, wandering through the market alongside a few girls, till the night overtook the light of the day and you chose to dine alone in your room.

You hoped Ivar would ignore you like he had done for the whole afternoon (or better, as you had done with him for the whole afternoon).

But apparently, lady Luck had helped you too much this evening.

And your husband met you in your tent for a private dinner.

This was what he said to your handmaidens, as he sent them away, although Angelika had be to dragged away by a rather annoyed Solveig, the older woman, halfway through pushing her by the hair, something that brought a dry giggle to your mouth.

But as you turned to face Ivar, the giggle got stuck in your throat.

You had expected him to be angry, and although you had armed yourself with a good amount of your own anger, ready to spit back and fight…

… he just looked old.

As if tiredness had cursed his handsome image.

His eyes weighted heavily in their sockets and they hanged down, staring at his bracing, still on him and for a moment your hands shot forward almost wanting to do what you had started doing for him, your nimble fingers more able than the ones of any guard.

But you bit back your lips and pushed your hands away.

Many thought that the curse of sin could be transmitted through touch.

And yet, your whole body ached to give him some kind of comfort.

“… I’ll have dinner, in here, hope you don’t mind” your voice was slightly unsure and trembling, and you thought that it hadn’t reached Ivar truly, till he simply gave you a light shoulder nod, a moan of pain exiting his mouth as he moved his body “… are you hurt?”.

“What do you care?” that voice was so cutting that it was aimed to hurt you, without any doubts “… you aren’t my wife, anymore in this tent”.

You bit your lips, because your tantrum against him in that tent hadn’t been fair both to your strategy, but also to him, because as much as you hated the thought of what he had done, the rage you had shot him with was partly towards you.

You just changed the direction of it.

“… I might not be your wife, but…”.

He raised himself so swiftly and all the food that had been laid on the tray on the bed, fell in a cacophony of sounds that brought you to immediately cover your ears with your hands.

“What are you to me princess, truly?!” he was using the same tone you had used with him this morning, cutting and made to hurt your opponent, in a vocal sparring you had just learned.

And he was a champion in it.

“… you think that it is easy for me…” your words sounded frail to you, so it didn’t surprise you that Ivar destroyed them with a bloodied look and another shout.

This time your hands remained paralyzed to your torso.

“This isn’t about what I fucking did to Sigurd!” he shouted back to you “… this what is going to fucking happen in this tent! We had a fucking deal!”.

You were paralyzed and you felt bile coming back in your mouth, and before you knew it you pushed yourself outside of the tent, and emptied all your empty stomach on the ground, although you didn’t vomit anything much more than mead and water.

You stood with your body bent in two, your stomach aching and your mind running around, in a way that made you lightly scrunch your eyebrows in a way to calm your soul.

But nothing eased the confusion in your whole body.

The way it trembled so lowly.

And then rage filled you.

And you pushed yourself back in that tent.

“… you are right!” you didn’t even look at Ivar, as your hands hastily ripped off the slight nightgown you had been wearing, lowering it over your night garments “… we have a deal, then fucking take what I offered you, be the fucking prince you think yourself to be!”.

Your voices sounded so rough and so broken that they didn’t belong to you but to some wounded animal.

And Ivar looked at you surprised, as you made the nightgown pool at your feet, revealing your body barely covered by the rough fabric of your garments, your nipples piercing through the fabric for the coldness of the room.

A fire was blaring in the fireplace, but it wasn’t in any way of some use to you both.

You were looking at each other as two wounded lions, prideful and yet asking the other to quit this pretense and to help each other.

And you pierced your palms with your nails to make that thought vanish.

“… you seriously married me thinking that I wouldn’t someday protest against everything you have taken me away from…” your words echoed in the air and you weren’t able to stop yourself from the step forward you took.

“I always thought that you were smart” his voice was finally the truth.

But they weren’t of any consolation to you.

“You fell in love with a fantasy, Ivar” you spoke, your voice appearing in all the sadness of your condition “… I am not a fantasy, I am a person, and not a pawn, one that will simply stand by your side, without fear or…”.

“I would never hurt you”.

You refused to meet his eyes, because you knew it would have been the truth.

And it would have undone you.

“… those are words, not fact” and you smiled softy and tragically “… not facts”.

“I wouldn’t….” his voice was finally showing his age, a few years older than yours, and yet infinitely younger in a way that made you wonder whether you had been talking with a child

An unloved one.

“… what do I have to do to show you that you wouldn’t ever be hurt?”.

“… nothing, Ivar” your voice was flat, because otherwise it would have begged for more.

“… there must be something!” his voice was now the tantrum of a child, and as you finally raised your eyes again, you found them laced with a rejection he had known all too well.

When you had first met him, you had thought that the sadness you had seen in his eyes was due to the fact that you were both forgotten children, alone in their thoughts and ideas.

And yet, something in his eyes reeked of the same martyrdom you had put yourself through.

Hadn’t Nanna told you that his own father hadn’t ever had any gentle words for him?

But did this seriously make any excuse for him?

You had grown with a father that had abused you emotionally and you hadn’t ever thought about killing one of your sisters.

“Sometimes the only solution we can offer is simply to leave things as they are” your voice didn’t sound convinced, but there wasn’t much comfort you could offer to Ivar, not when you knew yourself what was going on in your head “… I’ll keep up part of my deal outside of here, but I don’t… “.

“… but you’ll never be my lover” now Ivar’s words made a defeated sound in his mouth “… I wonder why I ever thought that you could be that”.

The words hanged in the air heavily, as Ivar lightly turned on the bed away from you, facing the opposite part and although you had been prepared for worse, the way he had chosen all of this… it destroyed you.

But you couldn’t do much more than adjust yourself on the opposite side of him.

You just needed to hold on till Alexander would have the money and the things you needed and then you’d be able to leave all of this behind.

And yet, like some silly child, your hands reached out to the cold middle of your bed.

---

Liked What You Read? Want To Support me? Buy Me A Ko-FI!

—

@youbloodymadgenius @killerofthestars @barnzbucky @kideyz @walkxthexmoon @ sisionamissie @ serafina21 @ivetemptedfate @fisherbrookphotos @crispygiantsaladgarden @didiintheblog @ bagpipes606 @emilie1993 @ squids-for-knees @lauraaan182 @ietss @seirio-sa @ivyfatale @distinguishedsaladoperawinner @ fantasygirl1864 @ tayissexii-blog-blog @saldelys @heavenly1927 @daenarys-dixon @xwishax @barefoot-in-the-night @ ironwolfbailiffclam @loohsouzar @mother-of-goddesses @ crookedly-unique-student @ iammissdblog @invasion0fprivacy @cheesedjunhoe @wtfffffffffffffffffffffffffff @ where-are-you-everywhere @gracethegeek9902 @suzem89 @super-amberlynn @ohmy-sammy @thesoundofsouls @neyrriz @megzdoodle @ original-hbic @wanderingaroundwriting @lordsexmachine @rls905 @poisonous00 @ bingboopbong @warriorsonepiece @oo-michi-oo @gabby913 @crazy-fan-101 @sophiethegamer @fleursviolettes @ http-fvcksleep @lol-haha-joke @ntlmundy @notyourtypicalrose @ supernaturalvikingwhore @gold-dragon-slayer @limbo-limbo-limbo @ khalissechanel @annaoopeth @akaduds @ sunshine483aw @ardoreyes @ietss @cute-thingy @ntlmundy @megzdoodle @ youbelongeverywhere @inforapound @alexa4040 @peaceisadirtyword @didiintheblog @maggiescarborough @stillreadingfantasy @ wonderlandofsu @dudeidontcareaboutanything @alexhandersenx @tempt-ress @soleil-dor @sadbutatleastsassy @a-mess-of-fandoms @maggiescarborough @ lysdiferrentworld @guiltyfiend

#Ivar #Ivar The Boneless #Ivar Reader #Ivar x Reader #Ivar Imagine #Ivar Fic #Ivar The Boneless Fic #Ivar Angst #Angst #Ivar Lothbrock #Ivar Lothbrock Reader #Ivar Lothbrock Imagine #ivar moodboard #Ivar The Boneless Moodboard #Vikings #History Vikings #Vikings Imagine

84 notes · View notes

my-happy-little-bean · 3 years

Text

The Bookkeeper – Chapter 4

Chapter 4: The Starry Night

pairings: logicality, prinxiety words: 4387 chapter warnings: mild swearing, allusions to mental illness, mild dark humour summary: in which we read letters to the dead.

[read on ao3] [masterlist]

< previous chapter

–

What on Earth was he looking at here?

Logan stared at the display. A tiny baby figurine dangled in front of him, a long string of twine wrapped around its neck, thus hanging it from the ceiling.

His gaze hovered down to the nameplate for the piece: “ Fertility.”

“Are you kidding me…” Logan muttered under his breath, crossing his arms. He begrudgingly attempted to act intrigued while his mind ran blank.

He wasn’t sure if this display was what Patton intended for him to spend so much time at when he gave him the museum tickets, but here he was, spending precious time here : where the marble pillars stood at each corner of the room, where the air was thick with agreed-upon silence, where everything– everything– was beige, and where people in black turtlenecks lined the walls as they pinched their chins and hummed at the same time.

Logan knew Patton’s attempts of getting him out of the shop were well-intended, but he also knew this: he wasn’t supposed to be here. He was supposed to be writing, researching– anything but standing here and looking at what must have cost the artist two dollars.

Some cynical sense in him wondered if this answered his question more than he was able to on his own. Perhaps this was what giving up looked like. Perhaps, in a world with little to no meaning, art was meant to be a white flag; it was meant to mark where the earth cracked beneath your feet; it meant nothing.

“Quite the piece, hm?”

Logan spun on his heel. Facing him was a tall person, with brown eyes that basked golden in the sunlight that poured through the museum’s skylight. They wore a black vest overtop a pale, yellow button-up, sleeves rolled just before their elbow. Logan noted in particular the small enamel pin on the top right side of their vest; it was a small, twisting snake with scales of yellow, white, purple, and black. And Logan didn’t know much about people in general, but he knew that this was the sort of person you would look at twice in passing; once by accident, and once by enthrallment.

“Ferbachi’s ‘Fertility’ ,” the person hummed once more. A slight British accent tinged the end of their words. They stepped beside Logan and pointed at the twine around the hanging baby’s neck. “The twine represents fragility.”

“...It does?”

“No.” The person smiled smugly, not looking at Logan. “Not at all.”

Logan let out a small ‘ah’, awkwardly shifting back and forth.

“But I assume you were trying to find some meaning from the piece,” the person continued. “I’ve been watching you stand here, perplexed, for probably ten minutes now.”

‘It’s been ten minutes?’ Logan scrunched up his nose.

“You’ve been watching me?” he asked instead.

The person shrugged. “Only a little. Reminiscent of someone hiding a toy from a dog, and the dog trying to figure out where his toy went.”

A pause. The person then added, “That is to say, incredibly amusing.”

Logan narrowed his eyes on the individual. “Are all museum-goers this annoying?”

“No no.” A wide, Cheshire cat grin. “Just nosy.”

Logan huffed, muttering under his breath a string of curses. The person turned to face Logan and outstretched their hand.

“My name is Dr. Janus Carson,” they said. Each word sounded rich with caramel. “And I am not a museum-goer, I am one of the art curators here.”

Logan scoffed. “So you were the one who thought this was a worthwhile display?”

“Well one, not necessarily how curating works. And two...you can blame my colleague, Dr. Remus Harden. Most of the things he curates are more contemporary and...well, strange.”

“ This is contemporary art?”

“I would invite you not to act so surprised,” Janus replied pointedly. “Everything is made by someone...”

“Logan,” Logan supplied. “Logan Fray. He/him”

Janus nodded. “Everything is made by someone, Mr. Fray. Which means everything is enriched in some sort of purpose. Even if the purpose is meaningless.”

Logan blinked. Janus’ words felt like sound that was lost in a cave, helplessly bouncing against the walls, looking for somewhere to go.

“So why do you think someone made this?”

“I don’t know, Mr. Fray. Why does anyone make anything at all?”

A beat of silence.

“Precisely,” Logan murmured.

“Pardon?”

“I– um, is there somewhere I can get coffee here?” Logan blurted out. “I...I think I need a break from all–” He motioned at the hanging baby– “this.”

“Me as well,” Janus hummed, already walking away. They motioned for Logan to follow them without turning around. “And afterwards, I can give you a tour of something that perhaps can give you some answers.”

Logan felt his heart race. “How did you know I’m–”

“You are not the first pretentious existentialist to walk into a museum,” Janus drawled, still walking. Logan quickened his pace, frantically trying to stay beside them.

“How–”

“It’s Tuesday, Mr. Fray, and you’re in a museum alone.” Janus stopped and looked him up and down. “And honestly, the shoes give it away.”

Logan, bewildered and with child-like embarrassment, looked down at his shoes. He thought the shoes looked rather nice.

“Hurry along, Mr. Fray.” Janus’ accented voice rang in his ears like an alarm. “We don’t have all day.”

—

Patton paced back and forth along the shelves of Fray and Far Fables, Roman floating right behind him.

“How about The Hazel Wood by Melissa Albert!” Roman magically lifted the book off the shelves and flew it over Patton’s head so it could stop Patton in his tracks. “I read it the other night and found it to be fascinating! There’s this grandma who writes real grim-dark fairy tales and dies and this girl– Alice– her mother gets stolen by someone in her grandma’s stories–”

“That sounds too spooky!” Patton waved his hand in front of the book and pushed through it, Roman lifting the book back up before Patton could barrel head-first into its hardcover.

“Gah– how about The Signature of All Things! You read that one recently! Wouldn’t you want to visit the Whittaker estate: the flowers, the plants–”

“I– I don’t know, I feel like I have already been there, ya know?”

“Great Odin’s eyepatch– Patton!” Roman flew over Patton’s head and hovered in front of his nose, arms crossed. “We’ve been walking circles around the store and you have yet to give me one book! When you said you wanted to go in a book nook, I didn’t expect to be bored!”

“I know, I know!” Patton buried his face in his hands. “There’s just so many choices! I don’t want to make a wrong choice!”

Roman sighed. “You can’t pick a wrong choice, Patton. And even if you do, we can always just leave and go to another one!”

Patton let out a muffled groan beneath his palms. Maybe he should’ve done a bit more research before coming in today.

He closed his eyes. A million stories appeared in the blots of the darkness; there were visions of the cotton-candy worlds in his bedtime stories, tall mountains and deep seas. Heck, if he really wanted to, he could just pick up Around the World in Eighty Days and he could go anywhere he wanted! (Probably!) So why was this so hard?

Patton opened his eyes and looked at Roman.

“What’s your favourite story?”

Roman’s frown sent a flurry of regret in Patton’s chest. But the feeling eased a bit when Roman scrunched up his face and whizzed right past him to one of the shelves behind the front counter.

“I have a favourite,” Roman finally said, “but you’re going to have to keep a secret. Is that okay?”

“Yeah! Yes, of course,” Patton stammered. He grabbed his sketchbook and watercolour set, tucking a brush behind his ear as he watched Roman disappear behind some of the books on the shelf.

The books Roman moved behind began to slowly lift themselves off the shelves. Patton watched with wonder as they parted in the air, like double doors to a castle, revealing Roman standing beside a thin book that was pressed flat against the back of the shelves, only showing its brown, leather cover. It seemingly blended into the colour of the wood.

“Oh!” Patton tucked his sketchbook and watercolour set underneath his arm. He then held out his hands as Roman levitated the book towards him. Patton let the book sit softly in his palms. “I don’t think I’ve ever seen this one before.”

He opened the first page. It seemed like a notebook, pages yellowed with time. Patton squinted at the faded cursive scrawled on the lines: The Midnight Forest by…

“V...Aries,” Patton read aloud. Roman nodded, flying over to sit on Patton’s shoulder. Patton looked at him with a frown. “Isn’t this the philosopher Logan likes?”

“Mhm. Logan doesn’t know this ‘cause not many people do, but Virgil Aries used to write poetry books.” His smile faltered. “Well, a poetry boo k; it’s the one you’re holding right now . He only ever wrote one, and he didn’t even publish it.”

Patton smiled, flipping through some of the pages.

“Why haven’t you ever told Logan about it?”

A beat of silence.

“I don’t think I could. You’re sorta the only person who’s ever asked.” Roman shrugged. “Besides, it’s not like many people knew Virgil Aries by his poetry– they only ever knew him by his theories of philosophy.” A pause. Roman added, “It’s...it’s nice to keep some unknown parts of him away from all that.” He laughed quietly. “Dude was really sad.”

Patton nodded wordlessly, half-listening as he ran his fingers across the bumps of the pen marks on each thin page. It reminded him of the subtle glances he would sneak at Logan whenever he stopped by the shop, catching him writing or deep in thought as he browsed the books. He imagined if Virgil Aries might have let his pen dance across the paper, similar to the way he knew Logan did, ink gliding across paper floors almost seamlessly.

He took one more look at Roman, who was also reading over his shoulder. His eyebrow was furrowed and his demeanour seemed to dampen. Patton wondered then if Roman was thinking the same thing too.

“Alright! Well, I don’t know if you can make a book nook out of a poetry book, but I wouldn’t mind trying!” Patton finally said. Roman’s smile lifted ever so slightly. He floated off of Patton’s shoulder.

“I most definitely can!” Roman slowly descended onto the pages, going on one knee and pressing his palms flat against them. Circles of red magic appeared faintly beneath his hands.

“Lemme show you how book nooks are actually made! Hold on tight!”

“Hold on tight to wha–”

And before Patton could finish, he felt the book tremble in his hands. Strings of red magic suddenly sprouted from the open pages. Startled, Patton let go of the book. His eyes widened in fear before realizing that the book was staying in place in the air where he was holding it, Roman still kneeling on the pages.

Patton watched Roman’s right arm shoot up into the sky, vibrant red magic following its path. A flurry of cursive handwriting followed his palm, creating a double helix of words and magic.

Patton covered his face as a stream of it shot right past his ear. Warm air wrapped around him like he was in the eye of a hurricane. He clutched onto his sketchbook and his watercolours, grabbing the paintbrush behind his ear. He wielded the paintbrush as if it were some sort of sword, but somehow knew that he didn’t need to worry about protecting himself.

And then, Patton opened his eyes.

The first thing Patton noticed was the sky above them. Peeking beneath the shadowed branches of the tall trees was a painted sky of all shades of blue. Flurries of yellow were layered on top of the sky as floating lanterns, moving slowly like clouds in the wind.

Back on earth, small freckles of light spun around him and the forest clearing he stood in, as if the breeze was braiding golden thread in the air. It smelled like petrichor and freshly cut grass, and there was barely any noise; all Patton could hear was his own breathing, and his own heart.

“Holy...shit,” Patton whispered, lowering the paintbrush to his side.

“Why thank you!” Roman used the book as a makeshift magic carpet and guided it to rest on a log. The book easily gave into the shape of the surface it laid on like a blanket. Roman looked around the forest clearing, his smile falling. “Goodness, I haven’t done that in a long time.”

“It was amazing .” Patton grinned at Roman, though it was tinged with a bit of fear– no, not fear, curiosity. How could Roman have done all this? Who was he?

Patton held Roman’s gaze for a moment too long. Roman’s eyes glimmered with a dull sort of excitement and pride that felt as though it was meant for someone else. The air between them thickened with unexpected tension.

“Well, I can’t keep this open forever,” Roman said, clearing his throat. He motioned to the book. Patton caught sprinkles of pulsing red magic lining the book’s edges. “So if you’re going to get started on painting…”

“Yes! Yes, of course.” Patton decided to sit next to Roman on the log, setting his watercolour palette between the two of them. Then, he laid his sketchbook on his lap and got to work.

Patton wasn’t sure if time passed in the same way as it did on Earth (there was no way he was still on Earth) but he knew enough had passed for him to zone out in his painting, so wrapped up in his surroundings.

In the background, he could hear Roman reading out loud from the book.

“And if swirls of blue and yellow are not enough, and if the cities beneath are not enough

And if all these answers are not enough, love, may I give you this:

A forest made of spiral-words, and a sky made of whimsy mist.

Notice how I kiss you here, an angel lifted, then earthy heels in dirt adrift.

So now, when you return here, my love, I will never be missed.”

—

“I don’t love my job very much,” Janus hummed as they took a sip from their cup of coffee. They guided Logan through the halls of the museum. “All museums are a little problematic anyway. Most exhibits I see are just prizes for colonialism – bleh. ”

“Wonderful,” Logan deadpanned. “Life is just wonderful.”

“Isn’t it?” Janus gave Logan a smile that was cheeky enough to be Roman’s, but more serious.

Eventually, they arrived at more modern displays of art. Logan snuck a glance of the exhibit name as they passed by its sign: “ Ever Yours, Vincent : Exploring the Inner Workings of Vincent Van Gogh”.

“This is a recent exhibit I worked on. It isn’t quite ready for the public, but it is down to its final stages of revision. While I was interested in Van Gogh’s works, I was more so interested in what occurred beyond his canvas; in particular, his many letters to his brother, Theo.”

They both weaved through tall, staggered pillars of towering LED screens, which illuminated the dark room. The screens panned over rows of cursive handwriting, as if scanning through a list of ancient relics.

The hall of pillars eventually led to an open layout of interactable displays, glass casings filled with notebooks and paintbrushes and photos. The walls had ceiling-to-floor digital screens that moved through various scenes of Van Gogh’s artwork. Logan recognized a few: Irises, Café Terrace at Night, The Red Vineyard and, of course, The Starry Night.

“Such a bothered man created images that people see and feel enlightened by . I have never met a person who hasn’t felt hope looking at his starry night.”

Logan frowned, noting the swirls of blue and yellow that surrounded him. He didn’t know why, but he longed to touch the walls and feel each individual stroke of paint. He had looked at art before, but was never truly immersed in it.

“Some historians say he was depicting the view outside his asylum window,” Janus continued. “One of my favourite quotes from Van Gogh’s various letters to Theo touched upon this idea.”

Then, as if pulling the threads of their own memory, Janus closed their eyes and recited: “ ‘But what a beautiful land and what a beautiful blue and what a sun’. ”

They then opened their eyes and looked over at Logan with a small smile. “ ‘And yet I’ve only seen the garden and what I can make out through the window’.”

Logan found himself stunted by the quotation.

“He had depression, yes?”

“The diagnosis varies, but yes.” Janus’ lips twisted ever so slightly, staring at the walls surrounding them. “As I said, he was quite the bothered man.”

Logan nodded. On the tip of his tongue were questions about whether or not this proves his point; that even art cannot truly help someone escape the vast nothingness of life.

“You know, Van Gogh wasn’t really famous until after his death,” Janus said after a moment of silence. “Johanna van Gogh-Bonger, his brother’s wife, was the one who told his stories. She pushed for his art to find an audience, and she translated the letters between Van Gogh and his brother.”

As if on cue, translucent cursive slowly sprawled across the screened image of The Starry Night. The script ran alongside the slow-moving swirls of light over the silhouetted town depicted in the painting.

“I told you that I do not love my job, but in reality, I need to do this job more than anything else I need to do. And it’s because of Johanna’s work. It proves that there are stories everywhere, hidden under layers and layers of paint. Beneath every painting is a canvas, beneath the words of a letter is the paper on which they are written.”

Janus’ words were exhaled slowly, their surrounding air rich with a lifelong commitment Logan couldn’t begin to understand. They motioned at the walls, and Logan followed their hand. Logan’s irises were filled with pulsing light.

“Without a canvas, The Starry Night would just be paint, still sitting in the cans. Without the paper, Vincent and Theo would never have talked. Without Johanna, none of that would have mattered. There can be no audience for a story without someone presenting it somehow. Someone needs to be the canvas, and someone needs to be the paper.”

Janus’ words washed over Logan like gentle, moonlit tides. The scene around them slowly dissipated into another painting. The same show of art danced around him like a bewitched merry-go-round.

Logan then looked at Janus, whose eyes were filled with a sense of unshaken fulfillment. Their smile walked a fine line between the walls of definite and whatever laid beyond it.

“So why, then, does anyone make anything at all, Mr. Fray? Well, I am not sure. But I do know this: I preserve art and stories, which is to say, I preserve purpose . And I preserve all of this because they are important. In a life with very little meaning, art worms its way into the spaces that it can fit. And with the help of others, art– and everything it represents– is made bigger than the spaces of life they initially occupy.”

Janus’ eyes twinkled. “All this being said, Mr. Fray, you can imagine what this means for all the stories that follow.”

Janus’ break eventually ended a few minutes later, and as the two parted ways, Logan felt unable to leave the exhibit. A whirlwind of oil paint and words filled his vision as he let Janus’ words settle in his chest. Then, similar to all things in life, the spectacle faded; and in the moment between the next digital display of painted scenery, Logan was left alone in the vast space of emptiness.

—

Logan entered Fray and Far Fables much later than he had anticipated. He was unsure of whether or not he would catch Patton before he left, but said uncertainty was resolved as soon as he walked through the door.

Patton was sitting on an armchair, in hysterics as Roman—to Logan’s horror—magically flipped through a photo album that floated in the air. Roman puppeteered the album like it was a pop-up book, blurry and holographic film footage folding up into view and then back down into the page. The footage showed a young Logan bounding through a backyard, and then an even younger Logan having a tea party with all his stuffed animals.

“What are you– Roman!” Logan bolted towards the photo album and swiped it out of the air, closing it with a swift slam!

“Aw, come on, Lo!” Patton pouted.

“Yeah, rude interference, Moby Dick ,” Roman quipped, but with a smug smile all the same. “I was going to show Patton the pictures of you in your school’s play of The Sound of Music. ”

Patton went starry-eyed. “You were in The Sound of Music?”

Logan rolled his eyes, ignoring both of them as he sat on the chair opposite of Patton.

“Is this really how you spent your first day of book nook adventuring?” He narrowed his eyes at Roman. “I am praying that the answer is no.”

“No, of course not! I just had some energy left to re-animate some precious memories.”

Logan sighed, rubbing the bridge of his nose. A part of him burned wondering if Patton was somehow embarrassed by it all.

“And precious they were!” Patton piped in, diffusing the flame immediately. “Little Logan running around– ah, I was ready to cry!”

“Thank you, I suppose.” Logan relaxed himself into a smile. “Well then, where did you both go?”

Patton and Roman exchanged looks that, quite frankly, concerned Logan all over again. He had a feeling that mixing the two of them together spelled chaos.

“Some old poetry book!” Patton finally said. “I don’t quite remember the name, do you?”

“Nope!” Roman barked out a laugh. “You know me! Ever the scatter-brain!”

“...Right. ” Logan pursed his lips, not believing either of them for a second, but feeling too tired to press on.

“I did, however, make you something!” Patton grabbed his sketchbook off the coffee table and carefully tore out one page. Logan felt himself grow warm once more.

“Patton, you do not have to give me all your paintings…”

“Nonsense! It’s the least I can do.” Patton passed over the paper. Logan carefully took it in his hands.

In a stroke of odd coincidence, the palette that Patton had chosen was uncannily similar to The Starry Night. It was also less abstract than Patton’s usual style. Patches of navy blue and golden yellow flooded the sky above what seemed to be the silhouette of a forest clearing, which bordered the sides of the painting with dark greens and various shades of black. In the middle of the clearing were a circle of leaves, an open book laying in its centre. And hovering above the book was a small figure, leaving a trail of cursive handwriting and dark red dust, which glimmered ever so slightly in the moonlight that Patton had let fall upon the painted scenery.

“My goodness, Patton...” He looked up at him, not exactly knowing what to say.

“Pretty good, right?” Patton smiled with an uncharacteristic amount of confidence. “I don’t think I’ve ever been so immersed in anything in...well, my whole life!”

“Art can do that to you, I suppose,” Logan let slip. In the corner of his eye, Roman did a double take.

“I suppose so!” Patton stood up, scooping up his notebook and his various art supplies.

“Well, anyway, I hope I didn’t overstay my welcome! I was just waiting for you to come back from the museum– oh! How was that by the way?”

Logan found himself without words once more. Eventually, he just ended up saying, “It was good, Patton. Very...good.”

“Well, good!” Patton giggled. Logan could almost hear the twinkling of painted stars in his laugh. “I think I have an idea of where I want you to go next, but I might wait ‘till my next visit. I need to let everything just settle, heh.”

“You’re valid,” Logan hummed. He held Patton’s stare for a moment too long before clearing his throat. “I...I look forward to seeing what you have next in store for me, Patton.”

Patton broke into a wide, shining smile as he gave Logan a hug. Chills ran down Logan’s spine and jumped between the distance made when Patton pulled away.

When Patton left the shop, Logan took a deep breath and began his routine of closing up. Roman trailed behind him.

“So! What are you going to write about tonight?”

Logan could practically feel Roman’s smug smile behind his back.

“I’m going to write about nothing,” he murmured decidedly. Roman raised an eyebrow at him. Logan shrugged wordlessly. Janus’ words filled his mind once more, as if beckoning him to write everything down in a maddening fury. But even if the exact phrasing faded, the feelings elicited remained the same. And if he was going to understand those feelings…

“I need to lie down,” Logan finally said, going over to flip the door sign to ‘closed’ before heading upstairs. “I just...I need some time to be quiet.”

But despite this attempt, Logan was everything but quiet. For the remainder of the night, he bounced his new ideas and revelations off of Roman, who comically flew above his bed, grabbing each word out of the air in a flurry of ‘told you so!’s.

Logan, however, simply let it happen. He realized that for the first time in a very long time, the pressure of telling others things was slowly being lifted by the experience of being told something; of knowledge being given to him rather than taught.

And somewhere underneath the sandy shores of his chest, a new tide of magic rippled through Logan’s entire core.

The next day, Logan glowed just a bit brighter.

—

next chapter >

#TS Storytime 2021 #gabbie writes things #sanders sides #sanders sides fanfic #logicality #prinxiety #logan sanders #patton sanders #roman sanders #virgil sanders #logan/patton #roman/virgil #logic/morality #creativity/anxiety

5 notes · View notes

the-hilda-librarians-wife · 3 years

Text

Beauty and the Witch - Chapter Five

x x x x

Summary: Deep in the dark forest, there’s a castle filled with magic and mystery, where no one would ever go if they could help it. But an adventurer runs from nothing, and she might come to regret it.

Sketchbook BatB AU for reasons

Notes: I had been hoping that when season 2 came around, I would have been at the end of this fic. But then I got the idea for Love and Honour and had to write it immediately, and then I had the idea for that Halloween countdown and had to write all those fics AND THEN November came and I had to focus on my finals... so I guess I’ll take a halfway mark *throws confetti because somehow we’re already in the middle of this fic*

Read it on ao3: (chpt1) (chpt2) (chpt3) (chpt4) (chpt5)

Johanna stood at the top of the staircase to the forbidden wing, thinking she surely must have lost her mind. After the events of the night before, she’d been left with no hopes for an escape from her captivity, and when she’d gone to bed her heart had been aching with longing for her daughter even if she’d just come out of a frantic series of happenings. And yet, though her heart squeezed because of the distance between her and all that she loved, her mind seemed much closer.

All through the night and into the next morning, she couldn’t stop thinking about what Victoria had told her. There was a woman behind the monster, after all, even if it was a coarse, sarcastic one, and no person should be forced to live in the state of solitude that seemed to be hers. She had her servants, but Johanna had yet to see any of them show signs of a deeper bond with her.

Granted, the witch had been ready to doom her, and worse, her daughter, to such a life, but keeping her lowest points in the forefront of her mind would do Johanna no good if she wished to change the direction of her relationship with her captor. And surely she must be out of her senses, for she really was hoping to attempt to get to know her better. She couldn’t really tell why, but it felt wrong to let her be lonely, not because she’d saved her or because Johanna thought about befriending her in order to escape, but only because something in her wanted to get to know the beast.

No, not the beast, she told herself. Maven.

Victoria wheeled past her, lifting one eyebrow at seeing the woman there. They’d already seen each other that morning, when Johanna had gone down to the kitchens to eat breakfast, and now she assumed the servant had been with Maven to deliver her her meal.

“I’m here to check on her burns.” Johanna explained as she saw Victoria’s confusion. “See if they’re healing well and all.”

The teapot hummed in acknowledgment and continued her path back down to the kitchens, and Johanna still heard the cluttering sound of ceramic against wood as Victoria’s cart climbed down the stairs behind her when she walked through the corridor leading to the witch’s room. No natural sunlight streamed into that part of the castle, but it was still brighter than it had been at night. Once again, her eyes couldn’t help but be caught by the paintings on the wall, disheartened by the dreadful state they were in. She was sure she’d be able to restore at least some of their original glory if she could get her hands on them. Well, she thought, she might as well do so. It was not like she was going anywhere in a hurry.

Behind the red curtain, she found Maven sitting on her bed, her back propped up on pillows and her food tray to the side as she read a book. Johanna startled when she realized what the witch was doing, and ran forward to try and grab it before she got hurt. The witch was quicker, though, and noticed Johanna’s presence just in time to hold the book out of her reach.

“Good morning to you as well.”

“What are you doing?” Johanna gasped, one knee on the edge on the bed and her body leaning forward across Maven’s lap as she tried to take the object. “You’ll burn yourself even more.”

Though the woman couldn’t see it, Maven rolled her eyes. “Ah, because I’m so eager to harm myself, aren’t I?”

Finally giving up, Johanna went back to standing by the side of the bed and crossed her arms with her eyes staring daggers at the witch.

“That’s what it seems like! Why are you holding that? And why isn’t it…” Johanna inhaled, looking between Maven’s hand and her lifted eyebrows. “Why isn’t it burning you?”

The witch sat back once more when she realized Johanna had come to terms with the fact that it wasn’t burning her, figuring that the woman’s worry was due to not wanting to have to tend to her wounds once more, and closed the book on her belly. She’d read it so many times she would be able to find the spot she’d been at easily.

“There are some books that don’t burn me. They are very few, but they exist.”

Maven pointed to the shelf on the wall in front of the bed, the one with the perfectly organized books that had called her attention when she saw the room for the first time. They really were very few, Johanna thought she couldn’t even count ten.

“I think it was another trick of the Enchantress's. They were all in this room, probably to give me some sort of hope. They’re not exactly the sort of thing I want to read though. They’re all fables about selflessness and compassion. The old hag sure does have some humor.”

Johanna tilted her head at the witch when she laughed mirthlessly upon finishing speaking. There had to be more to this story than she knew, but Johanna didn’t think that was the time to ask for an explanation.

“I see.” She said. “Well, how are you feeling? I came here to take a look at your burns. Did you begin feeling any worse pains or just an itch?”

Taken aback, Maven blinked. “Did Victoria ask you to come here?”

“No, she didn’t.” Taking out the objects she’d brought on her pocket and putting them on the bed, Johanna answered. “Thought we might need to call for her. I wanted to clean your wounds again, is she the easiest way to get water?”

The witch shook her head negatively and pointed to the washing chamber. “There’s a bucket of water there. Even when you take some water out, it fills itself again.”

“Oh!” Taking the rags she’d found in the kitchen and brought with her to the chamber, Johanna hummed in delight when she saw that indeed even the small amount of water she’d taken out to wet the cloths came back instantly. “I suppose living in an enchanted castle has its perks.”

Not understanding why she’d there of her own volition, Maven watched Johanna with curiosity as she came closer again.

“Alright, now turn to your belly. The burns in your back are worse, so I need to see them first.”

Figuring she’d lose nothing by doing what she was told, Maven adjusted her pillows so that she could lie with her back and winds facing up, and Johanna sat down on the edge of the bed by her side. When the woman undid the bandages, she felt her skin uncomfortably sensitive, both because of the burn and because of her being unused to physical contact of any kind, but she did her best to stay put. Better not to show weakness in front of the prisoner.

“I won’t lie to you, these aren’t looking too good.” Johanna cooed in a soft tone to try and make the witch remain calm. “But it’s only been a couple of hours. I’ve never taken care of magical wounds before, but if they are anything like natural ones they should begin healing soon. Alright, I’m going to start cleaning them now.”

That warning was all the preparation she had before the cold, wet cloth touched her tender skin, and she twitched at the first contact. Johanna pretended not to notice.

“If we take good care of them they won’t be a bother for much longer.” She said as she pressed the rags gently to the burns, hoping her voice and reassurances would stop the witch from becoming too stressed with the situation. “My Hilda had some very similar ones a while ago. Tried to jump over the Beltane bonfire because some kids had dared her to, you see. But she got fine and so will you.”

Though she had barely been paying attention to what Johanna was saying, because after all these years she was quite sure there were few things that could significantly harm this beast form of her curse, her attention was caught when the child was mentioned. It felt odd to hear her being talked about so casually, as if Johanna had just walked in to see to her wounds and for a cup of tea before returning to her daughter, and both of them could tell the atmosphere of the room had become awkward with the comment.

“Speaking of your family.” Maven began, even knowing she was being insensitive. “Should I expect any daring attempts at rescue from your husband?”

Rather than huffing or slapping her for reminding her of the beloved she’d had to leave behind like Maven had expected, Johanna exhaled sharply, almost a chuckle.

“Oh, I don’t have a husband, so it won’t be a problem.”

“You think the father will be fine with this situation, then?” The beast asked after considering if the question was or not too rude, and deciding it didn’t matter. It happened often enough that women would have children without being married, Johanna didn’t need to suffer any prejudice at the castle on top of what she certainly must have gone through in her village.

“I don’t think you understood this.” This time, there was more open humor in her voice. “There is no father, or any man with a similar function. Hilda was adopted. I found her when she was a little baby.”

It was good that the position in which Maven needed to stay for Johanna to look at her wounds hid her face in the pillows, because she was certain she was blushing with embarrassment at that moment. Last thing she needed was to look like a fool in front of the woman.

“It was wrong of me to assume. I had just figured she was… well, truly yours because of how fiercely you are willing to protect her.”

“Hey, she is truly mine!”Johanna stopped cleaning the wounds to put her hands on her waist. “I raised her, took care of her and loved her. That’s what a mother does.”

“Of course, but not everyone is willing to do so much for people who don’t share their blood. I hadn’t meant to offend.”

Maven was not one to apologize with frequency, but she could see she’d touched a subject she shouldn’t have. If there was anything she knew about the newest member of her castle, it was how much her daughter meant to her. If she didn’t, Johanna wouldn’t be there at all.

“Well, they should.” Johanna huffed as she resumed her previous task. “Family is family, and if anything the fact that you found it just makes it more special. I don’t know who taught you otherwise, but they were wrong.”

Johanna might not know, but Maven did, and she was reasonably sure she had not been family to the woman who had taken her in, and the sting she felt when Johanna cleaned a particularly nasty burn seemed to prove her point. But then again, the woman who had abandoned her for fear of having a witch in her house, even if that witch was her daughter, hadn’t been her family either.

Running a hand through the wild combination of plumes and hair strands on her temple, the witch tried to brush those thoughts away.

“What do you do for a living? Raising a daughter by yourself is no easy task, I imagine.”

“I am an artist.” Johanna smiled. “Most of my money I’d get from doing coal drawings of things people asked me to. But what I really love is painting. Unfortunately, paint and canvases can get pretty expensive, and it’s not like I’d get many buyers in my town, at least. I only manage to do a few each year, and I sell them at the annual spring fair in Paris. Hilda loves visiting the city. The money I get is just enough to pay for the trip and for more supplies, but it’s worth it. She needs to see the world beyond that miniscule village.”

“That’s a very honourable job.” Maven said, ignoring the parts about her daughter lest she add insult to the injury. “You must be very good to be able to make a living out of it.”

Johanna’s hair covered her face as she set aside the cloth to reach for the salve. Maven could only see a small smile on her face. “Thank you. Most people think it’s a useless job, but it really is what I love doing.”

“How can it be useless when it adds beauty to the world?”

Right before applying the salve to the burns, the woman smiled more directly at her. “I think so too.”

They didn’t talk further as Johanna finished tending to the wounds and wrapping them up again. Maven politely thanked her when she was done, but when she had turned away to head back to her own room, she noticed the witch had picked up the book she’d been reading before again, continuing to ignore her food.

“You said you don’t really like them.” Johanna said from the doorway. “Why do you keep reading?”

Maven looked surprised when she looked up from her book to the woman again, having expected her to already be gone.

“I have nothing else to read.” She answered slowly, afraid the first explanation hadn’t been clear since Johanna was asking her again.

“Well, yes, but can’t you do other things?”

Though Johanna hadn’t meant it to be a calling out of any sort, the beast looked away from her and down to the book again.

“I really like reading.” With her voice small and way more vulnerable than she would have liked it to be, Maven was aware she must have sounded like a child, but Johanna didn’t laugh at her at all.

“Makes sense.” Johanna nodded, carefully considering her next words before they came out of her mouth. The Maven she knew was a grumpy and rude woman, but something told her she was beginning to peel away at her layers, and it could be her natural optimism tricking her, but she thought she was catching a glimpse of the dear and unsure soul that lied beneath.

“In that case, would it help if I read to you?” She said at last, making the beast return her gaze to her, now clearly startled.

“What?”

“Well, the books only burn you, right? This means I can still touch them, so I could read them outloud for you. I know it’s not the same as reading something yourself, but still.”

Maven blinked up at Johanna, feeling in her heart both amazement and confusion. Not even her servants, the people who knew how much this meant for her, had ever made her the offer. Why her prisoner would was beyond her understanding. Of course, this could be an attempt at being let go, but Maven had never promised freedom in exchange for good graces.

“Sorry, it was just an idea.” Johanna mumbled embarrassedly when the witch didn’t answer for a long beat. “I didn’t mean to disturb you.”

“No, it’s a great idea!” Maven said quickly, louder than she’d meant. “You… would you do that?”

Happy to see Maven didn’t think her to be some sort of naive, ridiculous girl, Johanna smiled. There was a glimmer of hope in her purple eyes that Johanna had never seen before, and it seemed to light up Maven’s entire face. She looked a lot more human in that moment.

“Of course! Why don’t you eat your food and then I’ll pick something from one of the piles to read you?’

Despite herself, Maven smiled. “I’d love that.”

_#_#_#_

“Should we bring your tea to the gardens, mistress?”

Corbeau’s voice by her side startled her, and she turned to find him on the cabinet beside her. Furtively, she stole a glance at Johanna, who was picking them a book for the evening from the multiple choices in her bedrrom’s corridor. When Maven noticed with relief that Johanna hadn’t heard or spotted her, she turned back to the servant.

“No, today is much too cold, she’ll freeze outside. Light up the fire in the hall and serve us tea there. Please.”

After this, she returned to watch Johanna choose between what seemed to be an adventure novel and a botany book. She’d never read anything about magic, never touched the ancient knowledge that Maven dreamed of, but it didn’t make their reading sessions feel like they were worth any less. Magic or not, Johanna managed to take her to other worlds and introduce her to new people, things she thought she’d been doomed to spend the rest of her life without. Besides, between the reading and the conversations that usually followed, Johanna was in her company more often than anyone had ever been, even before the curse. She thought that that was what friendship must feel like, and it was growing on her.

“Can I do anything else for you?” Maven asked impatiently when Corbeau still did not leave. She felt uneasy with him by her side when she was, by all means, hiding. Every day, her curiosity made her watch Johanna as she picked a book, and everyday she went back to her room before Johanna could catch her to pretend she had been disinterestedly waiting for her instead.

“Oh, sorry!” He whispered, looking amused. “It’s just you looked so lost in thought, I was wondering if maybe there was something you wanted to share.”

Maven bit down on her lower lip. She didn’t have fangs, exactly, but the curse did give her sharper teeth and so she had to take care not to cut herself.

“She’s been reacting extremely well to her… situation.” Maven said, her voice still low for fear of being heard. There was no problem in sharing this dilemma with Corbeau, she thought. He was her oldest servant, had been with her ever since she was a small child, he’d try to help her. “I wonder if there’s anything I can do to make her feel better here.”

“Well, there’s the usual, of course. Chocolate, roses, promises you don’t intend to keep-“

He stopped his listing when the witch glared at him, clearly not happy with or interested in his suggestions. Even though she knew he was kidding, the implication of Maven doing a romantic advance on the woman she had locked up to begin with didn’t sit well with her, and she didn’t want her servants to feel like they could begin any funny attempts either.

“I’m joking, of course!” He said when he read the expression on Maven’s face. “You’re clearly the best person to answer that question, in all honesty. You’re the one who spends the most time with her. Surely, you must know what she likes at this point. Anything you do to show that you were listening when she talked to you, I’m sure she’d appreciate.”

“Yes, I think you’re right. I’ll think on that… thank you.”

The clock smiled before walking away. It was peculiar to see it, and perhaps a little too optimistic on his part to think so, but it seemed like the two of them were coming together on their own. Who would have known? Maybe other pleasant surprises awaited for them in the future.

_#_#_#_

When Maven announced they wouldn’t be doing their typical reading time that morning, Johanna was confused to find herself disappointed. That activity had begun as an act of goodwill of sorts, an attempt to get the witch to feel less miserable. As the weeks had passed, however, the two of them had fallen into a pleasant routine of reading and spending time with each other, to the point where Johanna looked forward to their mornings and tea times together. She thought it must be because the loneliness of the castle was starting to affect her, even though she did spend some time talking to the trio of objects that still were able to keep most of their human functions. Still, it saddened her when the witch canceled their plans.

“There’s something I want to show you instead.” Maven continued, brushing off imaginary specks of dust from the skirt of her dress. She’d spent most of her imprisonment wearing clothes so simple they would only be fit for sleeping for someone who didn’t have their body covered by feathers, but since her burns began to finally heal properly she’d been putting more effort into dressing nicely. Well, maybe not exactly nicely, but better than she had been, anyway. It wasn’t as if much could be expected from someone who had to deal with wings and claws.

“Oh?” Johanna perked up, her curiosity spiked. In the time she’d been there, she’d already explored most of the castle during the hours when she wasn’t with the witch, and the prospect that there were even more things to discover excited her.

“Yes. Follow me, please.”

Maven had walked past her and into the corridor outside of her bedroom, and Johanna fell into step beside her.

“Can you wait here?” Johanna asked. “I just need to put this book back in the pile I picked it from.”

She’d chosen the book just before heading to Maven’s room, and since she didn’t know if there was any order in the way the tomes were organized, she’d figured it might be better to return it before she forgot its place.

“There’s no need.” The beast answered, and either Johanna was imagining things or she actually sounded somewhat nervous. “You can bring it to where we’re headed.”

Johanna didn’t ask any more questions as Maven guided her. They climbed down flights of stairs until they were in the ground floor, and passed through many small tea rooms and living areas, until they arrived at a dead end. Johanna knew it was a dead end, because she’d been there before and the double doors at the end of the corridor wouldn’t open no matter what she did. However, to her surprise, the beast took a small bronze key from her pocket and stuck it in the keyhole. She then looked again at Johanna, looking uncertain.

“Would you like me to close my eyes?” She asked with playfulness, doing exactly that as the witch nodded shily.

“It might be better. I’ll… I’ll help you get inside.”

She heard the doors getting open, straining her ears to try and get a clue. Soon, Maven had placed herself behind Johanna and her hands on her upper arms, carefully pushing her forward until she was inside the room.

“You may open them now.”

At the first glimpse of her surprise, Johanna gasped. It was much brighter than the rest of the castle, as the ceiling high windows had their curtains open, and her eyes took a moment to adjust. The walls were a soft shade of white that intercalated with blue parts where birds had been painted, and the pattern made it seem like the birds were flying up to the ceiling, where there were even more of them as well as a chandelier. Near the fireplace, there were couches and armchairs and high bookcases. The window directly in front of her had a windowsill seat, and to its left lay an array of art supplies worthy of the greatest masters of France. A table with all different sorts of brushes and sketching material, and cabinet with paints of all the shades of the rainbow on its shelves, and stacks of blank canvases inside it, judging by the open door on its bottom part. Considering that there were other chests in the room which were closed but probably also filled, there was more material in the room than Johanna could spend in a lifetime.

“This is the drawing room.” Maven said while Johanna was still too stunned for words. “I don’t know who was the owner of this castle before the Enchantress, but they clearly had some interest in art. Do… do you like it?”

“Like it?” Johanna breathed, unbelieving. “I feel like I’m dreaming.”

A corner of Maven’s lips lifted up only slightly, and she watched Johanna’s reaction closely, pleased with herself for having made a good choice. She’d asked the servants to clean up the room while Johanna had been sleeping, and she herself helped in the parts that didn’t have any books, and it had been worth it.

“If you like it so much, it’s yours.”

The woman gasped and turned to her abruptly. “Really?”

“Yes, it’s yours to do as you please.” Maven took a step back as she said that, ready to leave the human free to enjoy her gift. She was stopped, however, when Johanna surprised her by leaping forward and closing her arms around her neck.

“Thank you so much!” Johanna said, seemingly unaware that she’d thrown the beast in a state of complete shock. Her hands were lifted, because she had no idea of where she should put them, and as she breathed in all she could feel was the scent of Johanna’s hair. She could feel apple and peach, and something that was entirely too bright to be in that castle. Though she hadn’t seen it in years, she thought that that was exactly what summer smelt like. How did someone manage to bloom like that when she was trapped in eternal winter?

When Johanna retreated, she was smiling up at her. There was something in the way she was looking at her that Maven couldn’t decipher, and chose to ignore instead.

“Not…” Still trying to gather her thoughts, Maven had some trouble remembering what it was that she should say. “Not for that. I’ll leave you to enjoy it.”

“Wait, where are you going?” It was only when the witch tried to take another step back that she realized that Joahanna had taken her unnatural clawed hands on her own. Didn’t she worry she was going to cut herself? Since the night they met the witch had known she was brave, but it was one thing to tie yourself to a beast to save someone you love and entirely another to get comfortable enough to touch her without even shuddering. Maven didn’t know how to feel about that.

She tilted her head. “I don’t know?”

Though she cringed when she realized how much like a lost child that had sounded, Johanna only smiled wider.

“Stay with me, then! I brought the book like you said, and there are many here. Why don't you help me take a better look at this place, and then we can still read a little.”

Maven shifted her weight between her feet as Johanna walked to the bookshelf. She couldn’t fathom why Johanna would want her captor in the only room besides her bedroom where she had control over who could and couldn’t come in, and just thinking about it was a bit alarming. The woman picked up a book and Maven watched as a blush tinted her cheeks. Given that her servants had previously informed her that those books were all romances, Maven could imagine the reason for that.

“If that is of your liking.... sounds good.”

Johanna smiled to herself. She’d been right to try and get closer to the beast. If she’d simply stayed away, she would have never even dreamed of meeting the person she was talking to at the moment. There was something about her now that hadn’t been there before, and she found herself growing quite fond of this new Maven. Time would tell if she was right to give her that chance or not.

#gosh the summary is so awful and i need to change it immediately #it was made when i thought i would only write one chapter #if anyone has ideas plz tell me i hate writing summaries #fic: BatW #my fic #sketchbook ship #sketchbook ship hilda #hilda librarian fanfic #johanna hilda fanfic

13 notes · View notes

sheps-shepherd · 4 years

Text

Title: Dizzying Dynamics

Pairing: Mikleo/Sorey; Mikleo & Sorey

Rating: T (for non-graphic mentions of death/dying)

Written for SorMik Week 2020 Day 1: Waxing Crescent - Declaration; Commitment / Rigel - Benevolence; Happiness

*Reposted because Tumblr messed up my formatting so badly I just decided to redo it all.

A/N: This is my first time doing any kind of fandom week in three years so of course all the plans I had for it fell through, hence why this is being posted at the very last minute of the first day. I'm not the happiest with how this came out but it's fluffy and what more can any of us ask for.

All of my works for SorMik Week 2020 will take place in this same AU, which has its own story that I wanted to post before these and still haven't finished. It's a BBC Merlin AU, and all you really need to know is this: magic is banned in this world, Mikleo was born with magic, and Sorey is the sunshine prince we all love and deserve. Other necessary world-building happens within each work itself.

Enjoy!

Read on AO3

---

Mikleo was getting used to life in Camlann. Slowly but surely.

When his mother had first told him about the arrangements she’d made for him to come live in the capitol, he’d expected to spend a majority of his time with the grandfather he barely remembered in the medical wing of the castle, studying the basics of being a physician by day and honing his magic under the cover of night. He’d expected to spend his days reading, picking herbs, and learning how to properly make various medicines and remedies. Which was okay with him; Mikleo liked to learn, and these types of things were good to learn, and when he went home to Elysia maybe he could put it to use and be more than just the quiet village boy with the magical secret he couldn’t tell anybody.

As it turned out, living in Camlann was nothing like that. Mikleo honestly should have known better, especially when he ended his first week by saving the crown prince’s life and agreeing to take up the mantle as his manservant.

“Which is a completely glorified title, by the way,” Sorey had told him, on his first official day with his new title, when Sorey had come to get him before he could start worrying about what he was meant to do. “All the things you’re technically supposed to be doing, I’m capable of doing myself. And I don’t mind doing them either. That’s why I always told Arthur I never needed one.”

“What am I supposed to be doing then?” Mikleo had asked, and Sorey had smiled at him like that was the funniest question he’d ever been asked.

“Stopping wannabe assassins from killing me, apparently,” he’d responded, in a tone that was definitely way too bright and cheerful for the words they’d been paired with. Mikleo had found out right then and there - Sorey Collbrande-Crowe was fearlessly and unapologetically optimistic.

If Mikleo was being honest, it was rather refreshing to be around someone like that.

He spent most of his time with Sorey after that first week. When Sorey was in meetings or off wherever his princely duties took him, Mikleo was out doing all the things he originally expected to be doing. The times in between were spent wandering the castle and getting into absolutely everything they could find.

They spread out maps across the large table in the drawing room. They snuck cooling pies off the windowsills in the kitchens. They read all kinds of things in the library: history books to fables and fairytales to preserved journals. But Mikleo’s favorite times were the nights they holed up in Sorey’s room, with books or treats or stories to share.

Despite the odd circumstances that got them to this point, they became friends. Genuine friends. The prince-and-technically-servant dynamic didn’t exist.

But the prince-and-secret-sorcerer one certainly did. To Mikleo, at least. The magic in his blood always seemed harder to ignore whenever he was in Sorey’s presence, a glaring reminder of the impassable space that stretched between them.

He was lying next to Sorey in the prince’s bed, propped up on pillows with one of the larger history books opened between them, his arm pressed warmly against Sorey’s when the thought hit him - that maybe he was in way too deep, and it had only been a few months.

Sorey was still the crown prince. Artorius was still his father who hated all things magic. Mikleo had long since given up his avoid the royal family at all costs plan, but falling asleep in the prince’s bed was definitely too far. Risky things like that would put him on the king’s radar, and if Artorius found out- If Sorey found out-

But we’re already here, Mikleo considered, one afternoon spent watching Sorey scribble away, annotating tomes in the library. This will just be where we stop. No farther. No problems. There was no reason he and Sorey couldn’t be friends; Mikleo just had to tread a little more carefully moving forward. Simple. Even his magic seemed satisfied with that plan, glowing in his chest when Sorey peeked up from his work and smiled at him, and Mikleo smiled back.

And then the second assassination attempt had happened. And Mikleo had saved Sorey again. And then Sorey had saved Mikleo. And Mikleo spent the days recovering from being poisoned by staring up at his bedroom ceiling and wondering how the hell he ended up here.

Some destiny this turned out to be.

“Hello? Anybody home in there?”

Mikleo blinked his reverie away, turning his head to see Sorey standing there, dressed to the nines in his street clothes, head cocked with a curious look on his face. He beamed when Mikleo focused in on him.

“There you are! You spaced out on me.”

“Oh.” Mikleo gave his head a shake, as if clearing the last of the thoughts away. “Sorry about that.”

“Go somewhere good?” Sorey asked, nudging Mikleo over a step so they were back on the cobblestone road. Mikleo hadn’t even noticed he’d pulled them off. “Or is this a side effect of poison recovery that you didn’t tell me about?”

“Sorey, I’m fine. Just a little tired. Stop blaming everything on my recovery.”

“Just checking,” Sorey sang before taking a bite out of his apple - which him grabbing from the kitchen as they left had sparked their usual argument of: “That’s not breakfast.” “It totally counts as breakfast.”

Sorey was impossible, in the most endearing way.

“But,” the prince continued after swallowing his bite, “if you are fine, that means you shouldn’t have any problem making good on our deal today. Sure you don’t want to change your answer?”

Mikleo rolled his eyes. “Are you sure you don’t have anything better to do with your day then talk about poison?”

“Nope!” Sorey grinned around another crunch of his apple. “Already checked with Arthur. He actually thinks it’s a great idea that I do some research about this kind of stuff.”

“It is a good idea,” Mikleo agreed. “You were bound to have one sooner or later.”

“You wound me, Mikleo.” Sorey clutched at his shirt, and Mikleo rolled his eyes again at his dramatics.

Impossibly endearing. And maybe the slightest bit mortifying, too.

“I’d guess most people wouldn’t be so excited to research different kinds of poisons,” Mikleo mused as they stepped off the castle road and headed into the Lower Town. They fell in step beside each other, their arms brushing as they walked, assuring they didn’t lose each other in the morning rush of townspeople. “A bit morbid, don’t you think?”

Sorey shrugged. “Maybe. But I’m not like most people.” He gave Mikleo a cheeky grin. “What’s your excuse, huh?”

I’m not like most people, either.

“Gramps doesn’t like to leave things half-done,” Mikleo said aloud. “It’s something I need to know as a physician.”

“But shouldn’t it be something I need to know as the you-know-what? Why isn’t that something Arthur had me studying already?”

“That’s what physicians are for.” Mikleo was quiet for a moment, then carefully bumped his shoulder against the other’s. “That’s what I’m for. I have to be doing something as your manservant.”

Sorey chuckled, but the light in his eyes was dimmed as he looked over. “I know,” he said softly, and Mikleo could just barely hear him over the dull roar of people. “But you got hurt because I didn’t know better, and I’m not okay with that.”

“Sorey, you saved me-“

“You wouldn’t have needed saving if I had known in the first place.”

“You are not the reason I was poisoned,” Mikleo insisted. “The maid who put the poison in your drink is the reason.” He crossed his arms. “And again, you saved me by going out and getting what Gramps needed to make the antidote. So we’re both still here and we’re both fine. We’re even.”

“Are not.” Sorey chewed another bite of apple. “We’re two-to-one. Or have you forgotten about saving my life when we first met?”

Mikleo rolled his eyes again, but couldn’t stop the smile that tugged at the corner of his mouth. “Of course not.” But as far as Mikleo was concerned, that was a debt Sorey had already paid back in full.

He didn’t admit it out loud, but Sorey must have read something in his expression, because he smiled and gave Mikleo a nudge of his own.

“Guess we’re just gonna have to keep saving each other and see where we end up, huh?”

“Yeah,” Mikleo murmured. “I guess so.”

Sorey suddenly wrapped his arm around Mikleo’s shoulders and tugged him into his side. He blinked as he found himself pressed against the prince’s chest, his hand coming up to steady himself so he wouldn’t completely crash into the other. His hand landed at the center of Sorey’s chest, right where he had grasped it a moment ago.

He tipped his head back, knowing his face was probably bright red but also ready to demand just what Sorey thought he was doing. Then the group of children came hurtling by, practically trampling over one another as they raced down the cobble, calling out hello’s to Sorey as they ran along.

“Be careful, guys!” Sorey called back. “Watch where you’re going! Don’t run anybody over, I can’t save ‘em all!”

The children laughed but didn’t show any signs of slowing down. The little boy bringing up the rear of the group bounded past them.

“I got them, Sorey!” he exclaimed. “Don’t worry!”

“Thanks, Videl. I’m counting on you.” Sorey tossed his half-eaten apple at the boy, who caught it gleefully. “Say hi to your mom for me, yeah?”

“Okay! Bye, Sorey!” Videl took a large bite of the apple and turned around to chase after his friends.

It wasn’t until Sorey was pulling away that Mikleo realized he hadn’t even thought about trying to pull away himself, which he certainly could have done once the crowd of children had passed. The realization made his face grow even warmer. Sorey’s hand staying between his shoulder blades definitely didn’t help.

“You good?” Sorey asked, taking a half-step forward to see Mikleo’s face. “Still have all your toes?”

“Ah.” Mikleo cleared his throat. “Yes. I’m fine. Thank you.”

Sorey studied him thoughtfully. The sun was behind him in the sky, silhouetting his messy hair and casting odd shadows across his face, but Mikleo could make out smears of pink across the apples of his cheeks from the heat. He hoped Sorey chalked the redness on his own face up to that, and not to poison recovery or other things.

The beaming grin that broke out across Sorey’s face surprised him. But really, he shouldn’t have expected otherwise.

“I believe that evens our score then,” the prince chirped. “Two for you and two for me.”

“Evens our-?” Mikleo sputtered petulantly. “You did not save my life from a group of children.”

“And have you ever been bowled over by a bunch of kids on the run before? Because trust me, Mikleo, it is not fun.”

“Why am I not surprised you got yourself into something like that?”

“Hey, be nice about it! I had bruises for weeks!”

They bickered back and forth as they headed down the road again, continuing their walk through the town. There were no more clusters of rambunctious children trying to barrel through them, but Sorey still kept his hand on Mikleo’s upper back, fingers hooked comfortably around his shoulder. And Mikleo let him, telling himself it was because their playful banter was distracting him and nothing more. The magic fizzling beneath his skin made sure to let him know he wasn’t fooling anyone.

Living in Camlann was absolutely nothing like Mikleo had expected it to be.

But he was in way too deep to do anything about it now, so he might as well enjoy it.

#talesoffanfic #sormikweek2020 #sormik #sorey #mikleo #merlin au

15 notes · View notes