#last month i couldn’t even finish reading howl’s moving castle even though i liked it and wanted to. and i want to go to grad school so | Explore Tumblr Posts and Blogs

p-antomime · 2 years

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Shooting St☆r.

𖦹 minors don’t interact. ┊ wc: 3,3K.

𖦹 content: service dom!satoru, unprotected sex, creampie, nicknames, implied praise kink, scratching, oral sex (f! receiving), hair pulling, implied edging.

𖦹 pairings: howl pendragon!satoru gojō x princess!fem!reader.

✦. this is for Studio Ghibli Collab, collab by the prettiest @httptamaki! and thank you so much for letting me be part of this wonderful collab <3

"He's in town! With his castle!", was what reached your ears almost the first moment you woke up on a day that should have been ordinary. It should be because the news itself was already contrary to the simplistic, ordinary nature of your long week.

Why was he in town? And after all this time?

You couldn't even remember when was the last time you got to see even the waist of his silhouette or the emerald green pendant earrings he always use or even the jacket that looked more like a pink and blue diamond cape he always wore wherever he went.

As one of Madame Suliman's employees finished washing your hair and you remained sitting in the middle of that tub of warm water, your thoughts continued to run as freely as Satoru's hair was messed up by the light breeze that surrounded the two of you the last time you came into contact with him.

The only thing he left behind were: memories in the form of promises and a ring adorned with two central ruby stones that still remained on your index finger.

Why did he come back? To see you?

— Pff, definitely not. — You thought out loud and Sulliman's employee looked at you, thinking that you had spoken to her.

— Pardon?

— Oh, no, sorry, I just... thought too loud. — You justified yourself by shrugging shoulders and flashing an embarrassed smile before you felt her hands finish wiping the soap that was still on your shoulders and arms.

— Have you heard the news, Your Majesty?

— You may call me by my name, we're not in front of Suliman or my father. — You answered, even though you knew that she wouldn't take her princess' words into consideration because your father had trained each official to address you as if you were the highest authority, although he was. — But what news?

— Howl Pendragon is back in Ingary. — You bit your lower lip in an action that was read by her as apprehension, but you knew it was either anticipation or excitement.

"Howl". His name that wasn't actually his.

You knew this because the last time you and he had met, at his Moving Castle, when you were in Porthaven on one of several outings touring different cities in the kingdom and the two of you for the first time bumped into each other, he had told you that he "has as many names as it takes" as soon as you heard a child call him Howl and, soon after, an older lady call him Satoru.

At that moment you felt almost hypnotized to the point of memorizing the sound his green dangling earring made when he moved. Satoru Gojo was so handsome that it looked like a gift from a shooting star that it clouded your ethical sense when he raised his hand toward you daring you to take it and said that "you looked like someone who needed a little fun".

And it was fun. It was fun to go into his Moving Castle and meet what he called Calcifer – which you later learned was something like a strangely friendly fire demon, it was fun to sleep in his soft bed while he was busy rummaging through some things you didn't know about, but knew were magical artifacts and it was even more fun watching him scream from the bathroom almost three days after you climbed aboard in the Castle and ran out with a towel around his waist and getting pissed off because the shower water had somehow changed the platinum color of his hair to a coppery red – it was fun because he made a huge drama show of saying that he didn’t see a point in living if he couldn’t be beautiful with that shitty hair.

But, it wasn't fun knowing that the princess of Ingary was missing.

How long had it been since you had left the palace? Satoru made you think that almost two months equaled only two hours. And the last time you two had seen each other, he was trying to pull you by the wrist to stay in the castle and you were telling him a hundred times that you had to go back, that if you were caught living illegally, especially with a wizard not licensed by the king, he was going to be executed and you, perhaps exiled.

That day, before you ran out the door and bumped into one of the royal guards surprised to find you wearing such simple clothes for such an important person, Howl took your face in his hands and pulled you in for a kiss that was marked in your memory forever, maybe it was his spell to make you never forget him.

And, in fact, you couldn't forget him, proof of which was that while the castle staff finished fixing your hair and looking for the best outfit for you to wear during that afternoon until nightfall, your mind couldn't help but picture you back in his arms with his diamond cape covering you in the same way it did during the several nights you sat at one of his castle windows and watched the stars.

— Finished? — You asked, looking in the mirror and down at the ring decorating your index finger.

— D’you need anything else, Miss? — You nodded and gestured with the same finger that they could go, could leave you alone with a quiet room and a noisy mind.

If Howl was in town, he had probably been summoned by your father.

Or maybe he actually just wanted to see you.

— Impossible. — You whispered to yourself, sighing and stroking the blue dress around your body.

The blue of it sort of reminded you of Satoru's eyes, and you rolled yours as you realized that absolutely everything that day was forcing you to remember him. Even after months, he still wouldn't leave you alone.

As you continued to stare thoughtfully at the ring, almost half an hour had passed and you thought it strange that your father hadn't come looking for you to see if you were all right, since today his daughter had barely appeared in the corridors of the royal palace.

Almost at the same time that you got up from the dressing table stool with the dress around your body twirling elegantly, two knocks on the door were heard, and before you could say that the person could come in, it was already opened and you saw the typical hat of the palace guards appear, but the brim seemed bigger and wider, since you couldn't see who was that guard forgetting his manners.

— Excuse me? — The voice was soft, almost gentle, and you frowned, crossing your arms over breasts. — Are you busy, miss?

— My father wants to see me? — You saw the guard finish entering your room and took two steps back, who did he think he was? You didn't ask to be pampered, but a little respect sometimes is nice.

— I don't think so, miss. — His head moved to the side and the hat rose a little, that tinkling sound you memorized so well reaching your ears, the green pendant coming into view and the door being closed by his gloved hands. — But, I really wanted to, can I–

— S-Satoru? — You barely let him finish speaking before and seconds later the hat was being removed and disappearing from his hands like magic.

Obviously it was him, only he would be insane enough to go after you in the royal palace disguised as a guard.

— Oh, you haven't forgotten my names? What an honor! — A playful smile appeared on his lips and you felt your legs weaken.

All the emotions from months ago washed over you like a lucid dream. Deep inside, Gojo Satoru was in fact a cozy lucid dream that didn't take more than ten seconds to walk towards you quickly and open his arms to wrap around you.

And you took a few steps back with one hand raised, keeping him at a distance by placing palm and fingers resting on the middle of his chest.

— You think you can just barge into my house and come hugging me just like that, Satoru? You've been gone for months! I didn't even know if–

— Gone? — He raised an eyebrow. — You knew exactly where I was, I never left Porthaven, I was always wherever you could find me. — His eyes slid down your body to your ring finger. — It was you who ran away that night.

— Not everyone can live freely like you, Satoru. — Gojo licked his lips before he let out a chuckle and wrapped one hand around your wrist and pulled you against his body.

— I think you look like someone in need of a little fun and a little freedom. — You leaned over so that you could face him with a skeptical and annoyed expression that broke up as soon as you saw his eyes shining as brightly as ever, with that deep warmth and affection that only existed when he was looking at you.

You couldn't help but giggle embarrassed.

— Idiot, you haven't changed after these months, have you?

— Not for you. — Satoru answered with hands slowly moving up your back, as if he wanted to caress his most precious possession, and placing them on your face, one of his thumbs brushing against your newly made-up lips. — Is it okay if I ruin your makeup today? — His face leaned toward yours, his breath hitching against your cheeks and your heart beating so fast that you had the feeling you were about to faint.

— Better my makeup than the order of my life. — A chuckle escaped his lips and you felt them leave only a small kiss on yours.

— But I'm even better at that than I am at magic, my disorder brings your freedom, it's a fair trade, isn't it? — His feet started to move forward, consequently guiding your body backwards, and a few seconds later you were falling down sitting on the bed. — You busy today, sweetheart?

A shiver ran down your back, it had been so long since you had heard his voice in the form of that simplistic nickname and another one went the same way as soon as Gojo had pushed your body back to lay you down and taken his place over you on the bed.

— No, but you should be, shouldn't you? — You gasped, letting his hands slide down your dress and squeeze your thighs while he let kisses run down your neck without actually kissing the one place you wanted the most.

— Hm? Oh, wait, did you think I was being summoned here by your father? — Satoru raised an eyebrow before denying with the head. — I came here ‘cause I wanted to try to convince you to stay with me again. — You swallowed hard, putting hands through his hair and pulling his flushed face against yours, his hands going a little further and reaching for your panties to discard them. — I bet you missed me as much as I missed you, didn't you?

— Today... — You began to speak as you watched him loosen the grip of your hands in his hair and slide his body down to stand between your legs to slowly spreading them apart. — I couldn't think of anything but you and, frankly, I felt like an idiot for it.

When you confessed it, Satoru couldn't help but get red cheeks as his greenish earrings sparkled around his face. He looked like a Renaissance painting.

— You did? — He leaned down to kiss the top of your pussy after pulling the dress up to your crotch. — So, I guess I should give you more memories to think about while I'm gone, huh?

His tone was playful, but you knew that deep down he was serious. And you would have responded immediately, if Gojo hadn't wrapped his lips around your clit and sucked on it without much pressure.

This was not the first time that you had lain together, but it was the first moment that he seemed so sure of what he was doing to you. At first, there was no concise feeling, just the two of you trying to convince each other that it was no big deal and that it would be the last time.

But being the last time was the last thing present in both your mind and his as Satoru began to roll the tongue between your folds and suck you with the same eagerness as the first time. He liked to leave you dripping and pull you almost to the limit until your liquids were licking all over his chin and leaving his lips glossy only to then pull away and blow some cold wind against your puffy clit.

Your hands tangled fingers in his hair again and soon after Gojo whispered how much he loved your pussy, you whimpered and pushed his face against it so that you could dictate the rhythm with hips almost smothering him – and he loved this feeling too. His fingers bunched around your waist to help you keep using his mouth to take away and his eyes stayed fixed on your face contorting in bliss; he missed being able to see that kind of expression from you too.

When your legs started to get too wobbly and your up and down movements against his beautiful face became more erratic, he knew you were about to cum and started to focus a little more on your clit to give you exactly what you wanted most.

And your orgasm came hard enough to cloud your vision, make you bite your lip hard almost to the point of bleeding to keep from moaning too loudly and have your whole body squirming as Satoru licked your whole pussy like a starved man. It seemed that your bottled up feelings ended up making that climax longer and more intense than expected and as he felt your trembling fingers releasing his hair gently, Gojo stood up with a small, sideways smile on his smooth lips.

— Was waiting for me for these months worth it?

You tried to control the breathing before answering, although your head still remained dizzy in the minutes it took Gojo to strip off his own clothes and finish pulling up your dress.

— For you? Always worth waiting, I guess. — You whispered, propping yourself up on elbows and watching him sit down on the bed before pulling you onto his lap.

— You "guess"? — He stared at you with pupils dilating and hands kneading and stroking your ass as his long dick slid between your folds. — Are you asking me to fuck a certainty into you?

— I'm asking you to keep your promise not to lemme go again, Howl.

— If you... — His tip inserted itself inside you and you arched the back, his arms wrapping around your hips to hold you still as he invaded your little pussy that always tried to push him out the first few times he tried. — Come with me this time, I'll never let you go again. — His cock invaded you completely as soon as he finished speaking, and your head fell back in bliss.

It was so good to feel it again filling you completely and stretching your walls, and more than that: to feel his hands possessively gripping your waist and his lips gluing themselves to your neck to leave wet kisses and to hear the tinkling of the green pendant of his earrings.

For the first few thrusts, Satoru kept you still so that he could feel himself going deeper and deeper until you put hands on his chest, pushed him back until he was completely laying down and began to ride him as if you had done this countless times before.

The wet sound coming from between your legs getting louder and louder and Satoru's eyes fixed on the way your tits moved up and down with your movements

You were able to enjoy a few minutes of dominance over him before his hands returned to your waist and held you still as his hips slammed against yours harder than before, you could feel his veins pulsing against your tight walls, he was so close; it was obvious by the uncontrolled nature of his movements and the louder and louder gasping moans escaping from between his lips.

The moment you leaned in to kiss him was the same moment he buried himself deep inside your pussy and let all his cum drain out to the last drop, your nails clawing at his back and your head falling back as Gojo pushed his hips against yours just to make sure he had thrown his cream as far as possible.

Just then, as his dick left you empty, your body slumped against his and you were soon propped up on your bed by Satoru’s nimble hands, he didn't waste his time to hug you sideways as he normalized his own breathing.

— You... — Your voice came out as a whisper, your head resting against his chest and you could hear some of his heartbeat. — Are you going back to Porthaven later today?

— Maybe, but I hope I won't come back alone. — You bit the lower lip nervously, but didn't have much strength to answer, the fatigue from the previous physical exertion started to make you yawn and feel like sleeping.

— Can you stay a little longer with me here?

— I can stay as long as you want, sweetheart. — He left a tender kiss on the top of your head and you snuggled a little better into his arms.

Soon you drifted off to sleep as you listened to his heartbeat and felt his hands gently caress your back. Your sleep was so deep that you didn't even feel or hear it when Howl slowly got up, put on his own clothes magically changed to look like the guards' and opened a portal in the floor that swallowed both you and him.

When your eyes opened again, it took you long minutes to be able to discern what was around you. It was his Moving Castle, the same way it had been months ago, but a little more messy since its owner didn't care much for keeping things organized. And Gojo had even cleaned you up thoroughly and dressed you in more comfortable clothes that he had probably bought for you days ago.

— Satoru? — You called out to him before you rubbed your eyes and saw, with the low light of the candles illuminating the room, that the door was open, just as the front one of the castle, which was actually in the back, was also open; you saw this as you passed through the main hallway.

Walking outside Howl's castle, your eyes caught a glimpse of perhaps the most beautiful landscape of your entire life. They didn't look like gardens with patches of grass and flowers surrounded by calm water humanly possible to make, had he made them using magic?

Almost in the center of the garden was the only magician who could create it with his bare hands looking up at the star-sprinkled sky and as soon as you put one foot out the door to step onto the grass, Satoru turned toward you and smiled brightly; he was wearing the same pink and blue diamond cape of always and the white shirt underneath that you knew was soft.

— Hi, love! You're looking all pretty with this clothes I brought for you! Did you like ‘em? — You walked towards him calmly, your eyes busy admiring the garden around you. — Wow, Y/N! Your hair looks like starlight now, it's beautiful! — He said this even though your locks were a bit messy, you barely managed to wake up properly.

But in that moment, with him taking one of your hands and the two of you watching the stars above his garden, you knew once and for all that this time you would not run away from him again, after all, a fickle heart is the only constant in the world.

ㅤ🏷 tagging: @wakasa-wifey @hirwishin @inu1gf @dukina @ravenina14 @qudvxnkanx @slut4manjiro @kuroaka @sleepy3 @mizurimirai @semisgroupie @goldenmnr @mrsvaleska @k-ryuuguji @no-name-jack @binglebonglerightonthemoney @vlyntage @novaresque @fuyuus @amaejiki @bontens-cum-slut @rxcked .

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hops-hunny · 3 years

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Just a Flight Away

Pairing: Neville Longbottom x Ilvermony!Reader

Word Count: 2.8k

Request N/A

Summary: Neville has a cutie who lives in America but no one seems to believe him.

Warnings: None!

A/N: This isn’t a request but it’s based off of me rambling here and slightly off of the vibe telepatia by Kali Uchis gives off.

If there was one thing Neville was thankful was it was the absolute goddess he got to call his girlfriend. It was funny the way they first began talking to one another. (Y/n) had been trying to contact a friend at Hogwarts but after the long trip from Ilvermony to Hogwarts, her owl was quite exhausted and ended up bringing the letter to Neville instead. Neville saw the poor bird, giving it a bit of bird seed and water that he kept in the green house before he set off to find the rightful owner of the letter. Luckily he had 3rd period with the girl who thanked him before excitedly yanking the letter from his hands. When Neville went to go check on the owl, he saw that it had already left, leaving a heart shape in the bird seed.

After that day, Neville hadn’t really thought about the incident that much. Well, that was until he saw the same owl fly towards him with a letter in its mouth. He smiled fondly at it rubbing under its chin with his finger before going to give the letter back to the owl until he noticed it had his name on it. He ripped it open, careful to not damage the envelope before reading the letter.

Dear Neviile,

Thank you so so so much for getting the letter to Gwen! Gwen is a good friend of mine who I had been missing dearly and if not for your kindness she would have never received my letter.

As you may be able to tell from the seal on the letter, I attend Ilvermorny school of witchcraft and wizardry. I've heard of how grand and great the infamous Hogwarts is, is it true? How is England in general? I've never had the pleasure of traveling out of America.

Oh yes! The main point of this is as a thank you, I've attached a package of my favorite American sweets as a token of my gratitude. The package is enchanted which is why it's so small. To restore it to its original state, place it on a flat surface before tapping it with the tip of your wand.

Sincerely,

(Y/n) (L/n)

Neville felt his face grow warm at the girl's kindness. (Y/n). 'What a beautiful name..' he thought to himself before pulling out the galleon sized package from the envelope. He pushed aside a few plants on the table in front of it before placing the package down, tapping the top with his wand. He gasped, watching in amazement as he saw the package expand. Neville wasn't quite familiar with this enchantment, perhaps he'd ask her about it in his response. His cheeks turned a brighter red. Response?

Did she want to speak to him more? He didn't want to assume but by her letter and her asking questions, it made it clear that this wasn't the last exchange she wanted to have. Was this a prank? Were the Weasley twins up to this? There was only one way to tell. Neville reached a shaky hand forward, opening the package as he closed his eyes expecting something to pop out at him but when he opened his eyes there was nothing but a box of snacks he had never seen before. He let out a sigh of relief, ignoring the racing in his heart.

After that, Neville and the girl started to talk quite a bit. Months had turned into years and he couldn't have been happier. It felt nice to have someone he could talk to, someone far away from all the hustle and bustle of the castle. To her he wasn't the kid with unfortunate luck or the "cowardly" boy in Gryffindor. He was just Neville, her boyfriend. Neville, her kind boyfriend in another continent, far away.

(Y/n) loved Neville just as much. It wasn't that she never had suitors approach her. In fact, she had quite a few. (Y/n) was what you could consider popular, not that she cared. She was kind, smart, and beautiful. Who wouldn't want that? However, she always felt like none of the men who'd approach her got her. They all just saw her as a beautiful woman instead of what she was, a normal girl deserving of love. That's why she liked Neville so much. No matter what he always treated her with the utmost respect and that hadn't stopped when they started to date either.

When the two had first exchanged photos, Neville was stunned. He had been talking to that beautiful of a girl? He couldn’t believe it. It was as if Olivander himself had sculpted and carved her out of the best of wood. She had glowing (s/c) skin, soft healthy looking (h/c) (h/c) hair, and a smile that could compete with the sun on its brightest of days and win. And when he found out she was single? He would’ve been a fool not to make a move. Angels as sweet as (Y/n) didn’t come around that often.

And although their relationship was as great as can be there was the underlying sadness: they lived across the world from one another. Every time either of them would see a couple hug or kiss in school, they’d feel a twinge of jealousy pierce their hearts. It wasn’t fair that the most perfect person in the world was off enjoying themselves in their respective countries. Although (Y/n) tried to ignore it, Neville was the type to bring it up. He’d describe in the most beautiful of words what he’d do if they were together. How he’d hold her in his arms and show her off to all of his friends. Where he’d take her on a date, the plants he wanted to show her as they were both herbology geeks. Meanwhile she’d end each of the letters discussing this topic with the same phrase as usual. ‘You know I’m just a flight away. If you wanna I could take a private plane.’ He could never ask that of her though. As much as he’d love everyday to be filled with his flower, he wouldn’t wanna rip her away from the things she had going on in her own life.

It wasn’t all bad though! After the girl had taught him the charm she used when she first sent him something, they both would send each other gifts back and forth as much as possible. Neville sent her sweaters with his scent embedded, charmed flowers, chocolate frogs, anything she wanted was hers. She’d send her own things to remind him of her as well. Her favorite stuffed animal, loads of photographs, little crochet hats she made for Trevor, more...unsavory things as well definitely not her underwear. Despite the increase in objects Neville owned, none of his friends had questioned it until he started to wear a necklace with a heart shaped piece of onyx on it with the letter (Y/f/i) carved into it.

“Oi! Neville. Where’d you get that necklace from?” Ron questioned his friend who sat across from him in the Gryffindor common room. The boys had all decided to study together which of course turned into Neville studying as they goofed off. Neville tensed as his cheeks heated up turning a pink color.

“O-oh um..it’s from my girlfriend.” He said, saying the last word as soft as possible. He prayed to Merlin that his friends hadn’t heard him but unfortunately for him they had. It wasn’t that he didn’t want anyone to know about her. It was far from that. He was just a bit protective, he didn’t want anyone to try and steal her from him. Even though it was impossible since they had no contact with her, he never knew when it came to his friends. They always found a way to make the impossible possible.

“What year is she in?!”

“Who is it?!”

“No way, is she fit?!”

He finished at the chorus of voices, trying to calm them down so he could speak. They all scooted closer to him, looking up at him expectantly. “Well you see..” he trailed off, looking away as he played with the pendant around his neck. “She doesn’t go here. She attends school in Ilvermorny. But to answer your question, yeah she is bloody fit.” he responded, turning his attention back to the scroll of paper in front of him. Dean, Ron, and Seamus exchanged a look with each other trying to suppress their laughs.

“Yeah I’m sure she does Nev.” Dean said sarcastically as he joined the other two in laughter. Neville looked up at his friends confused at their behavior.

“Yeah Nev, if your nan sent it you could’ve just told us! Better than saying you’ve got a girl halfway across the world.” Ron said, pushing the boy slightly as he continued to laugh at him. Seamus was doubled over, snorting with laughter as fire whiskey shot from his nose causing the other two to howl with laughter.

“It’s not from my nan! My girlfriend really did send it to me.” he exclaimed, smacking Ron on the back of the head, before doing the same to the other two men. “Besides, you have some fucking nerve accusing me of lying when none of you have birds yourself.” he sneered, causing the boys to quiet down some.

“So harsh Neville, you didn’t have to go there mate! Well what’s this ‘girlfriend’ of yours called.” Seamus asked, doing air quotes as he mentioned the topic at hand. “You’d think it was a bit strange too if your friend suddenly mentioned a girlfriend who lived all the way in the states too wouldn’t you.”

“(Y/n). And I’ll have you know this isn’t a new thing. We’ve been dating since around 2nd year. Sure, I’d find it a bit strange if you mentioned a girlfriend in America that you had never brought up prior, but I wouldn’t find it impossible! Now if you excuse me, I have to go.” he quickly stood up, packing up his materials as he stormed off to the direction of his dorm. He sped up, ignoring the protest and begging of his friends to come back and continue to hang out with them. He had enough of them and he wasn’t gonna sit there and let himself be called a fucking liar by Hogwart’s biggest ones.

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

“Did you guys hear? Students from Ilvermony are supposed to be coming to visit!” Ron said, running up to the other four boys. “I’m just picturing how hot all the girls from the states are gonna be. All hot and leggy with those bloody accents. I could combust just thinking of it!” he exclaimed, flopping down on the couch. Neville gasped softly, looking up. Did he hear him correctly?

“Where’d you hear that from? I didn’t hear anything of the sorts.” Hermione questioned, looking up from her book at the interesting news she had just heard. However, Neville was still frozen. Was this true? And if so, why hadn’t (Y/n) mentioned it. No, no it couldn’t be. She surely would have told him.

“I just overheard it from Dumbledore himself. They should be arriving in a few minutes! They’re staying here for a few months. It’s a part of this new thing that they’ve set up. Something about wanting the students to learn different methods and what not. They decided it’d be a good idea since summer is coming soon.” he said nonchalantly, looking over at Neville who hadn’t moved since the news left his mouth. He went to question what was up with him before his eyes lit up, recalling the conversation they had a few months ago. “Hey Neville? Didn’t your supposed ‘girlfriend’ go to Ilvermony.” the boys all suddenly interested began to ‘ooo’ exchanging looks with each other.

“See Neville, this is why you don’t lie. Lies will always come back to bite you in the rear. Perhaps Ronald i-”

“I wasn’t lying, Hermione! She really does go to Ilvermony.” he exclaimed, standing up as he wiped his hands on his pants. All of a sudden, there were the sounds of a bunch of American accents speaking which caught all of their attention. Many different students in Ilvermorny uniforms (some without them) roamed freely to explore the large and intense castle.

“God you weren’t kidding Ron, the girls are bloody fit.” Dean muttered, eyeing some girl who gave him a wink before giggling and running off with her friends. “Woah look at that one, are you kidding me? She’s a fucking goddess!” Neville’s curious hazel eyes followed his friend's words as he saw a familiar shade of (h/c) hair styled in the way his girlfriend wore it. Wait, was that his sweater?

“That’s not just some fucking girl, that’s my girlfriend!” Neville exclaimed, standing up from his seat.

“No chance.”

“You couldn’t pick a more believable one?”

“Prove it then.”

Neville went to say something before the girl turned around, locking eyes with him. She gasped, tearing up some as she pushed through the crowd of people running to him as quickly as possible. “Nev! Neville babe, is that you?” she exclaimed. Neville’s face flushed brightly taking in the girl’s appearance. She had worn the first sweater he had given her, a mossy green sweater with an obscure pattern, with a pleated skirt pairing it with a pair of boots. Neville nodded his head quickly, holding his arms out as the girl ran into him almost knocking him over. He picked her up, spinning her around quickly before setting her down, holding her soft face between his hands.

“W-what are you doing here?! You never told me you were coming to visit!” he exclaimed, wiping at the stray tears that had left her eyes. He moved his hands from her face securing them around her waist as he stared down at her. God she was even more beautiful in person.

“I wanted to surprise you! I actually found out a few weeks ago and let me tell ya, it was SO hard not to tell you!” She giggled, reaching up to stroke his cheek. He leaned into her touch, smiling at her. “I didn’t think it was possible for you to get even more handsome but bloody hell. You’re so fucking hot, Nev.” she said, feeling her face heat up. Neville flushed a bright red before leaning down, kissing the girl on the lips. She pulled him down more, wrapping her arms around his neck as she kissed back. The kiss was full of the love and affection they had both been craving from one another. (Y/n) tangled her hands in the back of his hair as he deepened the kiss, moaning softly. They both jumped away from one another at the sound of someone clearing their throat. “Ah sorry! Nev, are you going to introduce me to your friends?” she asked looking up at him as she intertwined his large hand with her smaller one.

“I suppose I will, even though for some reason they thought you weren’t real.” he quipped, glaring at the four boys who looked away ashamed. “From left to right there is Harry, Ron, Dean, and Seamus. And over there,” he said pointing to the big arm chair in the corner. “That is Hermione.” he said as they all muttered ‘hi’ and ‘sorry’ from some of them. (Y/n) giggled some, waving at them all.

“It’s very nice to meet you all! Nev talks about you guys all the time in his letters. Oh!” She said, eyes looking at his chest. She reached a hand forward, grabbing the engraved onyx in her hands. “The necklace I gave you!! You like it? I think it looks really good on you.” she exclaimed with a smile, happy her boyfriend enjoyed the gift she gave him. Neville once again looked at his friends chuckling some at their wide eyes.

“Of course I do, petal. I wear it everyday, everywhere I go. Right guys.” he teased, watching as they all stuttered out ‘yes ‘yep’ ‘sure does. “Come on flower, I’ll show you around the castle. I know you’ve been looking forward to that for a while. Also, you look quite cute in my sweater.”

“Thank you. I wear it quite often, even though the smell of you has worn off it still brings me good memories.” she said, playing with the slightly worn out sleeves of the sweater. “I’d love to!! Can we check out the greenhouse first? I wanna see that plant you were talking about. Maybe we can work on identifying what species it is!” he nodded in response, taking her hand once again as they began to walk off. Before they turned the corner, he quickly turned his head around using his unoccupied hand to flip off his friends before turning his attention back to his lover.

“Who would’ve thought? Longbottom with an absolute fox.” Ron said, slumping back down as he frowned. Hermione took the book she was reading smacking him upside the head.

“Maybe if you knew how to treat women you’d be with one too.”

#Neville Longbottom #neville longbottom x reader #neville x you #neville longbottom x you #neville x reader #harry potter imagines #Harry Potter #harry potter imagine

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script-nef · 3 years

Text

So why won’t you realise it '^' | Gojou Satoru

Category: fluff

1.9k words; Movie date [2/6]

Spoilers of Howl’s Moving Castle!! Beware!!

← Previous chapter | Masterlist

“Eh, Shouko! What do you mean you can’t make it?”

“I mean, another person is about to come in and they need me to heal them. By the time I’m done the movie will be finished.” Shouko’s voice over the phone is laced with annoyance and sadness coupled with lethargy. You don’t know how she pulls off such a unique combination of emotions but she somehow accomplishes it every time. “And I was looking forward to it…”

This would have been the first time you had a break with her since the trip to France. And while she enjoyed it a lot, the same couldn’t be said for the two males. Which was weird since Gojou is infatuated with sweets and Ken-chan agreed to come. So it was kind of weird when there was a tense atmosphere between them. You know your brother and Gojou are nearly polar opposites, but their animosity wasn’t usually that strong.

They brushed it off as nothing when you asked if something was wrong, which was sort of dubious since you could kind of see the black cloud looming over the both of them, but you let it go. If it was something important, they would be able to handle it themselves or report it to you. You couldn’t sense any cursed spirits nearby so you guessed that they were just in a bad mood for some reason.

Still, you had a wonderful time and found some new snacks that everyone enjoyed. So a day well spent, all in all.

And Ken-chan told you to tell him if Gojou ever offers overseas trips or anything similar, so he must have enjoyed it. Maybe you can ask Gojou to take all of you to Denmark one day.

“Ah… my dear Howl. Life and curses separate us again.” Her voice is full of sadness now, no doubt mourning over her chance of watching her favourite character on a huge screen with surround sound disappearing.

“It’s okay! I’ll bring you the figurine and we can watch it again here in about… uh…”

“Ten years?” She sounds like she’s about to drop dead.

“Uh… yes… But maybe five years? Hopefully? You know, I shouldn’t watch it without you. I’ll come back to school.”

“No, no. Watch the movie. At least you’ll get to see it. Ah, they’re coming now so I have to go.”

“Ah, okay. Bye, Shouko! Stay positive!”

A non-committal sigh accompanies a small “Bye” before the call clicks off. A frown takes over your face at the lost opportunity for her. She was looking forward to this for a long time and you leapt at the chance for another girls’ day out. Being able to watch a childhood favourite is an added bonus. But now you’re standing in the movie theatre, the ticket desk just across the room and an extra on your hand.

It’s a shame because it cost quite a lot. Shouko is definitely going to mope about this when you get back and maybe start smoking again. She always has a pack on her even if she said she quit, and smokes one if she’s stressed or angry. You should call someone and make sure somebody takes it away from her.

You should probably hold onto the ticket and give it back. Or maybe that would make it worse for her, serving as a reminder of this day. Conflict rages inside your head. There’s a high possibility of either decision breaking her heart. Again. A buzz from your phone saves you the trouble of deciding.

Shouko: I sent someone as my replacement.

A tap on the shoulder makes you turn as you type in a reply and you come face to face with a black jacket. Gojou’s head pops down.

“Hey there. I think you called for a replacement!” He seems to be in a ridiculously good mood, even more so than usual. Maybe his students successfully finished another mission. Which is great. It also means more paperwork for you. Which is not so great.

“How did you com—ah. Teleportation.”

“Ding ding ding! Correct!” He's been using the skill more frequently lately, popping in and out of places like one of those Whac-A-Mole games. . It gives you heart attacks all the time and you’re sure he gets a kick out of it. You saw how his smiles widen when you flinch or react. Thankfully it’s when you’re alone so other people never see you jump what feels like a metre into the air.

“Do you want popcorn?” He breaks you out of your thoughts. “I think they have the new caramel flavour. Apparently it’s way too sweet.” So perfect for Gojou. Even though he’s asking if you want it, there’s a spring in his step which definitely means he’s getting some. Probably the biggest option they have.

And you’re proven right because he comes back with two huge buckets which look impossible to finish. When you try to object, he cuts off with “I’ve eaten three buckets before. Alone.” With the smile he’s giving you, it really doesn’t sound like he’s joking. You try to take one to lighten the load but he says it’s alright.

He signals the way to the theatre rooms with his head, walking beside you as you find your way.

“So what’s the movie?” Your head snaps to him in confusion.

“You don’t know?” A shake and a shrug. “It’s Howl’s Moving Castle. This was Shouko’s idea since she loves it and this year is Studio Ghibli’s 40 year anniversary. The cinema is having an exclusive showing of their movies this month. Only one session per movie, for some reason. Surely they would make more money if they played it over multiple days, but. I dunno. Executives make weird decisions.” A light scoff from him to tell he knows exactly what that’s like. His hatred for the higher-ups runs deep. You don’t push it.

“So she wanted to come but got held back at the last minute?”

“Yeah. Ah, here are our seats.”

You’re placed in the very middle of the room and you both make yourselves comfortable. Shouko went all out for this movie, upgrading the seats and making it a recliner. Your poor back, abused after sitting in chairs and hunched over computers for so long, practically melts into the plush cushion. It’s so comfortable that you might fall asleep in it if it isn’t Howl that’s about to start.

Feet dangling in the air, you look over to Gojou to see him on his phone. It looks like he’s in a chatroom and you catch the words ‘Shouko’ and ‘favour’ before looking away. You didn’t mean to peek, but it’s not like you can consciously not read something. It was in your line of sight and you averted your eyes as soon as you realised what you were reading. Your brother brought you up better than to pry into other people’s businesses, even if it’s really, really tempting.

“Phones need to be placed on silent, you know.” The ads are coming on the screen. He smiles at you, slipping it into his pocket.

“Just talking to Shouko. She says she hasn’t even started properly.”

Disappointment fills you. Gojou is a good friend to watch this with but you hoped Shouko would somehow miraculously finish in time. She would be devastated.

“I’ll have to make this up to her when we get back. Give her the figurine and keep her hap—ah! I forgot! Gojou, I was supposed to ask someone to take her ciga—” He cuts you off with a light pat on your hand.

“Don’t worry, I did it already. All of them are safe out of her reach and I gave her packets of hot chocolate instead. When we get back, she’ll have drunk at least half of them and be in a good mood.” What a Gojou-like replacement. He smiles like a child wanting pats on the head for a job well done. You just barely catch yourself from moving.

Gojou gets a rep for being aloof and neglectful, but he does take care of the people he holds dear to him. His friends, members of the school, his students. You hope you’re included in the list.

Actually, the more you think about it, the more you realise he’s different from initial perceptions. You learn more and more about him as time goes on, in the most delightful sense. He’s somewhat like an onion, new characteristics being revealed every time a layer is peeled. A snicker escapes at the thought of Gojou dressed up like an onion, just waddling around. He shoots you a questioning head tilt which you wave off.

In the years that you’ve known him, he made himself into a trustworthy friend. One full of laughs and ridiculousness. Maybe it’s his childishness that puts you at ease, but he’s incredibly comfortable and easy to relax around. Thoughts trail and the words fly out of your mouth before you even think.

“You know, I think you would make a wonderful boyfriend.”

He freezes completely, like somebody’s zapped him in place. You stare at him, wondering what’s wrong, but the lights dim and by the time he gathers coherence, your concentration is on the opening sequence.

“Ah, that was so good! Ugh, I love Howl. Isn’t he so cool?” You skip out of the room, remembering to take the figurines provided at the exit, with Gojou trailing behind you. “You know how she asks him to wait for her in the past? The first thing he says to her in the movie is ‘I’ve been looking everywhere for you.’ He searched for her the entire time! This is modern poetry. This.”

“Do you think Howl would be a good boyfriend?” The question stops you. It’s different than usual for some reason, the voice asking the question and the intensity of it. He’s still his aloof self, all smiles and grins, but there’s something you can’t quite place that’s wrong. It’s unnerving, but you diligently answer his question.

“Um, I mean, yeah? Look at how cute he is with Sophie. See?” The figurine is a frozen shot of Howl and Sophie dancing in the rain with an umbrella that’s not being useful at all. They’re both incredibly detailed, so much so that you can see their clothes and skin drenching wet. Wow, this is actually a phenomenal job. Shouko will be so happy. It makes your heart lighter knowing that at least something might light up her day.

“Why is he cool?” Gojou seems to be invested in Howl. It confuses you since he just watched the movie with you and he saw how awesome Howl is.

“Hm, well for one he can do magic.” He opens his mouth but you shush him with a finger to his lips. “Yeah, I know, what we have is kind of like magic too. But theirs is just… different. He just makes it seem kind of elegant. And he overcame his fear just for Sophie. Remember the scene with Sulliman and in the cluttered bedroom? He still found the strength to protect her even though he was so scared before. It’s admirable. I guess I like strong guys.”

“Hmm~” His tone is contemplative. “You know I’m stronger than him, right?”

A question mark forms over your head. He’s being really weird today. “Yeah? You’re the strongest in the universe, silly. What’s up with you?” Gojou just chuckles and ruffles your head.

“Nothing, nothing. Just making sure you know.” He slings his arm around your shoulder, the intensity gone and the light spring in his step back. “Who else do you think is strong?”

Next chapter →

#gojou x reader #gojou imagine #gojou satoru x reader #gojou satoru imagine #gojo x reader #gojo imagine #gojo satoru x reader #gojo satoru imagine #jjk x reader #jujutsu kaisen x reader #jjk imagine #jujutsu kaisen imagine #jjk #jujutsu kaisen #gojou #gojou satoru #fluff #series #female reader

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kalimagik · 4 years

Text

Red with Rage

George Weasley x Reader

Word Count: ~1.5k

A/N: This was a request by @siriusly-addicted-to-writing - I’m sorry it took awhile to write, but when I started, I just couldn’t stop! But I hope that you like it! My requests are open to anyone who would like to request something! I have a few others that I will be working on, but I promise that I’ll get to them at some point! If you like, give it a like, reblog, comment, or send me a message! Enjoy and happy reading! <3<3

*Not my GIF - credits to owner

“No, no. That’s too obvious,” Fred grumbled as he kept his head close to George’s, whispering.

“That’s the beauty of it Freddie! She won’t even see it coming!” George argued in return.

The twins were doing their best to keep their voices down. Umbridge was either slinking around, eavesdropping or had Filch doing it for her. He’d already ruined plenty of their plans to cause chaos around Hogwarts. Everyone had just returned from the Christmas Holiday and the semester already seemed to be going in the toilet. Umbridge brought everyone’s moods down the moment they stepped foot in the castle. So, naturally, Fred and George had to fix that.

“Fred, I’m telling you. Doing something to her tea would be a masterpiece. We could easily make her breath smell like dragon testicles, no problem!” George whisper yelled at his brother.

“That would be a punishment for anyone who has to stand near her during detention, it isn’t worth it!” Fred tried to explain again.

“Well then I don’t know what we’re going to do!” George threw up his hands, leaning back in frustration.

“Hello, boys!” Y/N grinned as she sat on the bench across from the twins.

“Y/N,” Fred nodded before returning his attention to the paper in front of him.

“Hello there, love,” George smiled as he leaned over the small table to peck his girlfriend’s lips. “Give her a bit more of a welcome, Freddie.” George joked.

“My apologies, Y/N, but I can’t focus on much until we come up with a way to get at that TOAD,” Fred emphasized, scratching his head again.

“OOOO, are we planning pranks? Count me in!” Y/N pulled away from George and tried to glance at the paper in front of Fred.

“No, not happening, love!” George pulled the paper from Fred’s fingers and stuffed it into his pocket.

“WHAT?! Why not! Common!” Y/N’s mouth hung open as she pleaded with her boyfriend.

“Yeah, why not?” Fred asked. “We could really use a fresh set of eyes. PLUS, she’s a pro!”

“What he said!” Y/N agreed, trying to give George her biggest pouty eyes.

“No, I’m not risking it. I don’t want her to get in trouble if we mess something up or get caught.” George looked right at Fred as if Y/N wasn’t sitting right across from her.

That’s when the twins’ back and forth became them conversing in their own little world. It always amused Y/N when this happened.

“George, before you two started dating, she was the mastermind behind half our pranks! I don’t think she ever got caught once!”

“But I wouldn’t be able to forgive myself if she had to endure detention with the toad.”

“She’s never had detention before! What makes you think it’ll happen this time.”

“This woman is unpredictable. She is probably listening to us right now. We know that she has targets on our backs.”

“We would totally take the blame if we are caught though. There is no way Y/N will get in trouble.”

“As cute as this is, guys, I can make my own decisions.” Y/N waved her hands in between the twins.

“Sorry, love. Didn’t mean to leave you out there.”

“It’s okay, I’m used to you two having your own little code.” She replied as she rolled her eyes.

“I really don’t know if it’s a good idea.” George shook his head. Y/N knew he was just being protective over her, but she could take care of herself and that was supposedly one of the things George loved about her.

“Georgie, we need her. You have to admit it. She will bring this planning to a whole new level. We need some fresh ideas.”

“Fine,” George sighed as he watched his brother and girlfriend high-five in victory. His heart was in the right place, but he knew deep down that he was never going to convince these two that Y/N joining in wasn’t a good idea.

“Now that that’s settled, let me hit you with my ideas. I have been kept on the outside for these last few months, but that doesn’t mean I haven’t been conspiring on my own.”

Y/N laid her plan out for the twins. She had escape routes planned out, look-out positions, distractions involving Peeves and unsuspecting students. The boys watched in awe as she told them every last detail. When she finished, Fred turned to George, wearing a shit-eating grin. “Tell me why we’ve been leaving her out of our pranks again?”

In all honesty, George wasn’t sure. She was an evil genius. The prank would be set in motion the next day. Y/N had already tracked Dolores Umbridge’s schedule, so that recon was already taken care of. George was amazed but also slightly terrified of his girlfriend. As long as she never turned her talents on him…actually, he would be honored for her to pull a prank on him. Pranks this detailed were a work of art in the eyes of the Weasley Twins.

George walked down the hallway with his brother, carrying loads of books in their arms. As they passed Umbridge’s chambers, Fred tripped over air, causing both him and George to drop all of their books. Y/N had Peeves causing a ruckus in the Astronomy Tower, so the twins dropping their books was just a back-up. In the commotion, Y/N slipped into Umbridge’s rooms under the invisibility cloak she had borrowed from Harry. How Y/N found Umbridge’s chambers and learned to get inside, George did not want to know, but their plan was going perfectly.

By the time the boys picked up the hordes of books they didn’t need, Y/N had slipped back out of the door. She was careful to stay behind the boys as they cleared the way in the hallways all the way back to the Gryffindor Common Room.

“Everything go well?” George asked once they were safely tucked inside.

“No problems at all. Now, we just wait until the feast later. We’ll see if my concoction worked there. I bet Umbridge will be red with rage,” Y/N chuckled as she thought about what she had just done.

Y/N and the twins laid low for the rest of the evening, keeping their ears open. As 6 o’clock approached and students made their way down to the Great Hall, Y/N told the twins to keep their heads down. They would move with the crowds to keep from being suspected. Y/N had the timing perfectly. Umbridge always liked to make an entrance to feasts, so she always showered right before to be prim and proper.

Settling in between the twins, Y/N pretended to go about her business. The twins knew the full plan, but they truly didn’t know what to expect from this prank.

Y/N covered her mouth, pretending to rub her nose as she whispered, “5…4…” Y/N began counting as she watched the doors. “3…2…1”

As if on cue, Dolores Umbridge let out a wail that rang throughout Hogwarts. Her quick, small footsteps could be heard echoing off the stone as, Y/N assumed, Umbridge ran towards the Great Hall.

The doors flew open as the short “headmistress” stood in the opening. She had on a pink, ruffle bathrobe, hair still wet, but her skin and her hair were not their usual shades. They were maroon. Her skin and her hair were maroon. It was obvious that Umbridge had tried to run it off and tried to magic it off, but it was no use. The dye wouldn’t budge.

“Who- did this?” Umbridge’s sour, high-pitched voice gritted through her teeth. The laughter started off as chuckles that grew as more people became braver. Soon, the entire Great Hall was howling with laughter.

No one but Y/N and the twins knew anything about the prank, they were all stunned, but pleased. Seeing Umbridge outraged was always a good way to lift everyone’s spirits, especially when she would never catch the culprits.

Umbridge huffed in frustration as she stormed out of the Great Hall. Filch followed. Looking up at the staff table, Y/N could see wide smiles etched on the professor’s faces, despite them trying to hide it. Even McGonagall hid her smile behind her goblet.

“Well done, Y/N/N.” Fred whispered under his breath, low enough that the commotion drowned him out. “Remind me to never get on your bad side.”

“Love, that was brilliant. Maybe we should have brought you in earlier,” George praised, wrapping an arm around Y/N’s shoulders and pulling her into him so that he could press a kiss against her temple.

Picking up her cup, Y/N felt her smile grow because of her victory. Before taking a sip, she laughed, “I told you she would be red with rage.”

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dreamescapeswriting · 4 years

Text

Crush Culture ~ PJM [Request]

➳➳➳Word count: 1.7k

➳➳➳Genre: Fluffy

➳➳➳Pairing: Jimin x reader

➳➳➳a/n: I know this is on the shorter side but i really wanted to try and write this in a happier context rather than all my others which involve liking someone else. I also didn't want to make it like 'as cold as ice' but i hope this turned out okay for you sweetie,

Yoong could tell by the way you lit up whenever Jimin came into the room and he wasn't mad about it, he wasn't even upset which is how he knew that you weren't meant for one another. He was a little upset at first that you had gotten closer to his friend rather than him but he still didn't mind it. You and Yoongi had been dating for a month and in all honestly, it felt nice to be around him and he was a great guy, you got along well but you found yourself getting closer to his friend Jimin than you did Yoongi and Yoongi felt the same way. You didn't have the heart to tell Yoongi about how you felt, learning from past experiences that not all guys liked being turned down by girls and that it was best to keep trying in the relationship but Yoongi had other plans for you.

"Hi Jimin, how was your date last night?" Yoongi asked trying to get a response from you but you were either really good at hiding the fact that you were jealous or you had no idea you had a crush on Jimin and your anger was stored somewhere deep down inside of you that it couldn't be reached.

"Awful, she stood me up." Jimin pouted throwing himself down onto the dorm sofa between you and Yoongi, looking at Yoongi while he rest his head on your shoulder. You comfortingly patted his arm trying to make him feel better,

"Her loss, you're amazing JimJam." You whispered in his ear poking his cheek to try and make him smile but it wasn't working he was upset that he was being stood up not once but twice that week already and then touched by someone who he had a major crush on but couldn't do anything about because she was dating one of his best friends. Yoongi watched you both as you searched through Netflix together to find a movie debating on if the plan would work on not. He knew you weren't the type to cheat and he knew that Jimin wasn't the type to go behind his back but if the connection was as real as he thought then maybe it was possible.

"I left my laptop at the studio, Jimin do you mind keeping Y/n company for a little while?" You looked up at Yoongi to see him moving over to the front door of the dorms and he smiled at you leaving the dorms without giving you a kiss on the forehead something he'd grown accustomed to over the course of the last month of being with you but he wanted to get you two alone. He wanted you to see that there were feelings for one another and he needed to get out of the apartment for a bit.

"Do you want to watch Howl's moving castle?" You nodded at Jimin's question,

"I'll get snacks and some blankets."

Then that was how it started. That whole week after the first night you stayed with Jimin at the dorms the rest of the boys were all out while you and Jimin were getting closer, Yoongi seemed to be pulling away from you though which was starting to worry you. He would invite you over to the dorms only to leave you alone with Jimin with some silly excuse for the night and not come back until the early hours of the mornings,

"I think he's going to break up with me." You said to Jimin that night as he searched for a movie for you both, you were sitting in one of Yoongi's hoodies eating from the bowl of popcorn that Jimin had made you both.

"What makes you say that?" You groaned not wanting to confide in his best friend but also the need to let the feelings out was getting too much for you to handle and the weight of carrying something like it was hurtful,

"I don't seem him as a boyfriend anymore...It sounds awful because we've been together for a month but I don't feel-"

"A connection?" Jimin finished for you sitting down beside you and abandoning his quest to find a movie. He was more intrigued by the fact that you didn't see Yoongi as someone you could date anymore or at all,

"Yeah." You whispered looking up to see Jimin staring back into your eyes, he knew what he was thinking was wrong but it didn't stop the thoughts from running through his head. Thoughts about kissing you and not stopping until you told him to, or just holding you in his arms all night.

"Is there someone else?" He whispered not wanting to act on his thoughts right now but feeling the urge to he wanted to make sure he was reading the room right, your hands were hovering over his as you thought about telling him that it was him making you second guess everything around Yoongi.

"There might be." You both whispering despite being the only ones in the dorm, Jimin looked at you and then down at your hands which were inches away from his yet again.

"I think you should talk to Yoongi about it then, it sounds like it's something a couple should talk about." As if by magic the door to the dorms opened and Yoongi walked through, you moved away from Jimin and stared up at Yoongi who was in all honestly a little sad that you were still apart from one another.

"Can I talk to you?"

Yoongi had taken you into his room after you asked to speak in private with him and now you were standing in front of him while he sat on the bed watching you pace back and forth in a ramble,

"I know that we've been together for around a month but do you honestly feel some kind of connection for me? Because I thought I did but I'm starting to think I like you as more of a friend than anything Yoongi and I know it's probably awful to say and that you're going to hate-" Yoongi was staring at you with a small smile across his face which made you stop talking, you'd never had someone smile at you during a breakup before and it felt unnerving.

"You like someone else I know and no, I thought I felt something with us too but now it's like-"

"I see you as more of a friend or a brother..." He nodded in agreement with you and you felt the weight lift from your shoulders, your body physically lifted up as you felt yourself feel free from the weight you were carrying.

"Why didn't you say something before?" You questioned sitting next to him on the bed, he shook his head.

"I'd never been in relationships before, I thought if I kept trying it would feel better but I guess not...Then I saw the way you looked at Jimin and I knew there was something real there." You felt guilty once again, so he knew about Jimin?

"You knew I liked him?" He nodded looking over at his bedroom door and starting to chuckle,

"I actually kept leaving all week in hopes you would both confess for one another, he's had a crush on you too it's so obvious." You stared over at the door and then back to Yoongi as if he was a crazy person he was taking this really well and you liked that he wasn't being judgemental about it,

"You're not mad?" He shook his head and took your hands in his sitting them on his knee.

"I would have been madder if it had gotten into later in the relationship and it happened but as you said...we both see each other as nothing more than friends so we should stay that way." You smiled at him and he pulled you into a comforting hug letting you know it was all okay.

"I'll just get changed and head home." With that, he left the room and you got changed back into some jeans and the original shirt you'd come over to the dorms in.

"Jimin is going to drive you home," Jimin was shoved forward by Yoongi and you smiled nervously at him looking up at Jimin with another smile as you walked out of the dorms together and down to the cars.

"Did you tell him you liked someone else?" He questioned as he drove you home, the journey had been silent until that point.

"Yeah, and he said he felt the same, that it was better to be friends for us than anything else." You told him, Jimin felt a twinge of hope as he heard the words leave you mouth, he pulled up outside your apartment and began walking you up towards the door.

"Jimin-" You were cut off by him kissing you roughly, your back being pressed against your apartment door as he held you in place, one hand on your waist while the other cupped your face. One of your hands found their way into his hair and the other fumbled with the door handle getting it open and making your way inside the apartment together, your lips never leaving for a second as you made your way up to the bedroom together.

After that night it was pretty weird to be around Yoongi for a while, you and Jimin started hanging out in your apartment instead of at the dorms until things cooled down. You didn't want to be the reason any fights started happening even though Yoongi told you it was okay you wanted to be sure it felt right with Jimin first and it did. You ended up dating for a while and now, three years later, you were sitting at a wedding together, Yoongi's wedding to be exact. Watching him marry someone he found after you and Jimin set him up with one of your friends and they seemed happy together a lot happier than you and Yoongi were. You smiled over at Yoongi as he stared at you and Jimin on the front row, sending you a small thumbs-up as he began repeating his vows back to his soon-to-be wife.

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heyyyharry · 4 years

Text

Chapter 1: The Princess

(from the ‘The Conman and the Maid’ series)

…in which a trip to the South changes a princess’s life forever.

Word count: 5.4k

AU: princess!y/n, prisoner!harry, conartist!harry.

Series description: Y/N is a princess and Harry is a prisoner in her castle. With his help, she escapes from her arranged marriage and her father’s rotten kingdom in search of a happy ending, if there is one.

PROLOGUE

Once upon a time, in a faraway land, a beautiful princess fell in love with a charming prince. It was love at first sight, and the prince risked everything and fought the evil to rescue the damsel in distress. After the victory, they ruled the kingdom in harmony and lived happily ever after...

But that was not the story you're about to read.

In this faraway land, the bad guys didn't always cloak themselves in black nor were they easy to spot. They lived among the good ones. Princes weren't always charming. But the princess didn't need a prince.

She needed a sword.

~~~

The snow fell weightlessly downward from the pure white sky, like colourless confetti in a wintry ballroom. It alighted on Y/N's face as softly as her mother's kisses, but it was cold, very cold. Her tiny gloveless hands were numb as she tightened her fingers around the grip of the wooden sword, trying to keep balance on her two awkward legs. Her mother had told her time and time again never to go outside without her gloves. But the little princess would rather lose her fingers than lose her weapon during a fight.

Her brother Egon stood a few feet away with his sword in his hand, mirroring her fighting stance, ready to attack. Egon was ten and she was eight. He was strong and fast, and their father — the King, was very proud of Egon's sword skills. Y/N knew there was no way she could beat him. She couldn't do that indoors let alone outside while she was freezing like this. Still, she didn't want to give up, so she hoped she would last longer this time.

"On guard!" Egon shouted and charged straight at her like a swift arrow. She managed to swing her sword and shielded her head from his wooden blade, but he continued hitting and she could only defend herself while stumbling backwards. One hit in the stomach and she was sent to the snow-covered ground.

"This is why a girl should not hold a weapon," Egon said with a smirk as the tip of his sword was just an inch away from the tip of her nose. "You can't fight, little sister. You only get yourself hurt."

Y/N propped herself up on her elbows and watched her brother lower his weapon and turn away, content with his victory.

"Can I try again when we get back?" she asked.

Egon looked over his shoulder, a corner of his mouth quirked up when he saw Y/N struggling to get up as her feet were sinking into the snow.

"Sure, dear sister," he said. "Then I can beat you up again and mother can't say anything about it."

Watching Egon race back to the castle, Y/N heaved a sigh and came to pick up her sword. The cold that had seemed mild at first was now almost unbearable so she must return home before she began to freeze, or worse, her father realized she had left her chamber.

"Y/N! You are late!"

"I'm so sorry, mother. I was—"

"Fighting again?" King Willem raised his voice and the distinct chattering of his men faded to silence. All they could hear now was the desperate howling of the wind through the portcullis. Everyone was looking at the little princess, for whom they had been waiting in the awful cold.

Y/N fidgeted with the fur on her white coat, her eyes were glued to her feet. She was too afraid to look up into her father's eyes.

"Please forgive me. It won't happen again," she pleaded, despite believing she'd done nothing wrong.

If she hadn't had to take a bath, change into a dress and wait until the maids finished braiding her hair, she wouldn't have shown up late. But she knew every word she said now would only get her into more trouble. It was better if she stayed quiet, like a lady should.

Meanwhile, Egon was sitting in his carriage with a mischievous smirk on his face. She knew it was him who had told their father where she'd been. Of course, he must have purposely forgotten to mention that he'd been with her the whole time. But even if she'd told the truth, her father would rather believe she was lying than punish his perfect son.

"Get the horses ready."

Willem turned away and the crowd of guards and servants scattered at his command.

The cold that was spreading across Y/N's skin was nothing compared to the look her father had given her as he headed to his carriage. If it hadn't been for her mother's sympathetic smile, she would probably have burst into tears.

Queen Meira kneeled down in front of Y/N and held her tiny face between her palms. The gloves felt so warm against the princess' cold flushed cheeks, which put a smile back on her face.

"Remember what I said, darling?"

"A princess should always be punctual." Y/N sighed, nodding her head. "I know, mother. It won't happen again."

Despite knowing she would break that promise one way or another, Meira still let Y/N get away with it and stood up, squeezing her daughter's gloveless hand.

"Come, my dear. Let's not give your father more reasons to be angry."

Every year, King Willem and his court would travel to the kingdom of Theros in the South to attend the annual summer festival. Edgar Connell was Queen Meira's younger brother and also the king of Theros. It was he who had taught Y/N how to fight with a sword and he was probably the only one who loved her more than Egon. In fact, her uncle Edgar didn't even like Egon, and that was another reason for Y/N to love visiting him. Egon couldn't lay a finger on her during their stay in their uncle's castle. Besides, the South was so much better than the North.

In the South, Y/N could stand under the sun and feel the warmth of those brilliant rays of light. She could also dance on a cushion of green while watching the strands of grass move in the breeze as easily as her hair.

Here in Isolde, it snowed all year round. Winter, spring, summer, fall, no matter what season it was, it was always snowing. Y/N guessed as you lived too long in the cold, your hearts would begin to freeze until it reached a point where you could feel nothing at all. That was why most of the people in this kingdom were so dull and sad.

Thanks to the Gods, she was blessed with a warm heart like her mother, a true Southerner.

Queen Meira had grown up in Theros, and it was only until she was married to Willem that she moved to Isolde. She had always said Y/N was more like her, while Egon was a Northern man like their father. That, and being a boy, had made life so much easier for Egon. He could go anywhere with his sword and fight anyone he wanted. But of course, Y/N didn't want to be like him and hurt innocent people for no reason. She just thought it was unfair that he was praised for violence while she couldn't even be seen anywhere near a toy weapon.

There was this one time her father caught her fighting imaginary enemies with a stick, so he broke the stick and locked her up in her chamber for two days. If her mother hadn't convinced him to change his mind, who knew how much longer she would've been punished? Nevertheless, Y/N didn't think she was wrong. It wasn't her fault that her father had never shown affection for her. He probably wouldn't have treated Egon the same way if Egon hadn't been a boy.

Y/N had overheard some servants in the castle call him a heartless monster who only loved the crown on his head and himself. And even though she understood why they had said something so cruel about her father, she knew for a fact that it wasn't true.

The one thing King Willem loved the most wasn't the crown or even himself. It was the woman who had been by his side ever since they were children.

"It was love at first sight," the queen had told Y/N. "He was everything I'd ever wanted. He was kind and patient and prudent. But to put on that crown, he had to leave so many things behind, one of which was that young boy I fell in love with. I love him very much, and yet, sometimes, I still miss the person he used to be. That's the price one has to pay to wear the crown, Y/N."

It was a lot for an eight-year-old to take in and Y/N supposed she would get it when she was older. Even if she didn't, it wouldn't matter. It was Egon who would be on the throne one day, not her.

It took about a month to travel from Isolde to Theros because the king and his court had made a few stops here and there before arriving in the South. Willem hated delays. But for every annual trip to Theros, he allowed one more stop by the Vidarr river right outside the castle. That was where he had met Meira for the first time.

It had been fate. They were supposed to meet in the castle, but Prince Willem had decided to explore the foreign land alone on that beautiful summer afternoon, and Princess Meira had decided to go to the river and pick some flowers for her mother's birthday. Their love story was almost perfect.

Y/N knew one day she would marry a prince as well, so hopefully, it would be someone who was just as madly in love with her as her father was with her mother. And of course, she would make sure that her husband stayed kind even after becoming king, the one thing her mother had failed to do.

Hopping off the carriage, Y/N turned a blind eye to the judging look her lady-in-waiting was giving her, and stretched her limbs like she'd normally do before a fight. Then, she closed her eyes and took a deep breath. This was the smell they didn't have back home. The smell of flowers, of fresh dewy grass, of mud, of freedom, of summer. Real summer. So while her parents were lost in their own romantic world and reliving the good old days, Y/N snuck away from her lady-in-waiting and followed Egon into the forest. The children raced along the riverbank until they found a large tree and were far enough to be the only two there.

The water was green this season, darker in the shadows and more pale in the light, but still green. Y/N got down on her knees and flicked it with her hand to watch droplets scattering over the surface like rain, another thing that didn't exist in the North, just like snow in the South.

Just like her mother, Y/N loved the rain. It rained a lot in the summer in Theros so she got to see it every year. Meanwhile, many people in her father's kingdom had lived their entire life not knowing what rain was. And Y/N felt very lucky to be born with such a great privilege, which she always had to remind herself every time her brother made her feel miserable.

"What are you doing?" Y/N asked when she saw Egon stripping off his shoes and stepping into the river. "You cannot swim, brother. Neither can I. I won't be able to save you if you fall into the deep end."

"Does this look deep to you?" asked the young prince as he spread his arms, his knees hadn't even gone beneath the surface. "Join me, little sister."

Y/N shook her head without a second thought. "We should probably get back."

"Get back?" Egon snorted. "Go ahead. You're such a girl."

Those four words were all it took for Y/N to kick off her shoes and stand barefoot on the sun-warmed grass like a "girl" she should be. Maybe this wasn't a bad idea after all, she thought before holding up her dress and taking careful steps into the river. Once the water was flowing around her limbs and drinking away her body heat, she thought she could just stand there all day long.

But then, the princess felt something soft and mushy around her ankle. She tried to brush it off with her other foot but—Was it...moving?!

A loud scream tore through her tiny body as it collided with the surface and sank deep into the dark green water. Her arms and legs kicked out desperately as she tried to swim up but she couldn't. The water swirled around her, trapping her. Her head was throbbing and her lungs felt like they'd been set on fire. Where was Egon? Why hadn't he pulled her up? Those were the only questions she could ask herself before she felt a hand clasped around her wrist, dragging her upward to the daylight above.

It took a moment for her vision to clear, and a shadow towered over her, blocking the blinding southern sun.

"Can you hear me?" the stranger asked, his voice echoing in her head. And when she felt the warmth and softness of the grass beneath her body, she realized she was still alive and jolted right up, her forehead bumped into the other person's, both gasped in pain.

It was a boy. A kid, just like her.

"There, there," he said while rubbing her back as she coughed uncontrollably and spat out the water she'd involuntarily drunk. "Why did you go swimming when you couldn't swim?"

The little princess wiped her mouth and shot the boy a spiteful glare. "I didn't. I fell into the water. There was a snake!"

She expected him to be scared or at least shocked, but he only laughed and said, "there's no snake in this river. Maybe it was a fish."

Embarrassed, Y/N decided to ignore him as she pushed herself up and looked around, trying to recall which path would take her back to her family.

"Well, a 'thank you' would be nice?" said the boy as he jumped to his feet and wrung excess water out of the dirty old shirt he was wearing.

Y/N almost told him to get lost and stop wasting her time, but after taking a whole second to eye him up, she mumbled, "thank you."

She wasn't a monster. She felt very bad for how miserable he looked because of her, but she supposed she didn't look any better. She was drenched, her dress was stained, and her hair was once again an unruly mess. She didn't look like a princess anymore. She looked like...him.

With a smile, the green-eyed boy brushed his wet brown curls out of his face and extended a hand for her to shake. She only stared at it, and then at his face.

"Not a handshake person then?" he joked, yet she only responded with a shrug.

Normally people would bow when they met her or at least kiss her hand. This boy didn't know she was the princess so she couldn't blame him, but it didn't mean she wasn't slightly offended.

"What's your name, peasant boy?"

"Peasant boy? I just saved your life!" The boy chuckled, shaking his head. "I'm not telling you my name. You sound like that crazy lady in my village."

His comment made her roll her eyes. "How old are you then?"

"Ten. I don't know what you could do with that information but—"

"So you're the same age as my brother Egon," she said, giving him a once-over.

This boy was taller than her so she had expected him to be older. What surprised her was how he was nothing like her brother at all. He talked differently and behaved differently, and he had just saved her life when her brother had left her to drown. So it was true then. Not every boy was the same.

"I'm eight," she finally told him. "And you are very strange."

"Me? Strange?" He pointed a finger to himself, looking quite amused and surprised. "Have you heard everything that came out of your mouth?"

The princess gave a slight shrug and ducked past him to follow the path she had recognized.

"Leave me alone. My family won't be so happy to see you."

"Why? I saved you, didn't I?"

"Yes, now it'd be nice if you saved my time by leaving me alone."

"That was uncalled for," said the boy, but he kept on walking with her anyway. "And I'm not following you. I'm playing hide and seek with my best friend."

"Hide and seek?" Y/N stopped immediately. The look on her face as she turned around made the boy cackle.

"What? You've never played hide and seek before?"

She had, with the maids, who were all older than her and always let her win. Egon had never played and would never play this game with her, for he believed it was made for the girls. So, no. The princess had never played hide and seek, not properly at least.

"Of course I have! All the time!" she lied and waved him off. "Now leave me alone and get back to your friend. He must be worried."

"She. Her name is Kenny. She's pretty like you, but much nicer."

"Your friend is a girl?"

"Well, she looks like one," he said, trying not to laugh, but his snarky remark went right over her head.

"Is she your betrothed?"

"What is a betrothed?"

"Someone you'll marry when you're older."

"I don't know." The boy shrugged, pursing his lips. "Maybe. If we both want to."

"If you want to?"

"Why should you marry someone you don't want to marry? It doesn't make sense."

Y/N didn't know that. She had always thought everyone was betrothed to someone when they were small and eventually fell in love with this person their parents had picked out for them. So it didn't work this way then. Interesting...

"Crow! Where are you?!"

The voice from the distance made both kids turn their heads.

"Oh, that's Kenny! I have to go!"

"Crow?" Y/N smirked. "Your name is Crow?"

"No."

With that one-word answer, the boy ran away without a goodbye, shouting, "I'm coming, Kenny!" and then, he was gone.

Y/N thought she was insane for even considering asking to come along. He might have been slightly annoying, but she really wanted to play hide and seek like a normal child for once. But then the thought of her angry father reminded her that she must get back immediately; otherwise, there would be severe consequences.

"Oh, hello there."

Y/N gasped, completely blanched at the stranger she'd bumped into. It was a woman, young and beautiful like her mother, with piercing grey eyes and icy silver hair. Her face was white, corpse-like white, and her lips were as dark as the color of her cloak. As she flashed a smile, her gold front tooth turned Y/N to stone. The princess took a step back when the smile on the woman's face slowly disappeared.

"Are you lost, Your Majesty?"

"Wait, how do you—"

Y/N didn't get to finish her question when a loud piercing scream tore through the serenity of the forest. The strange lady now stepped aside to make way for her.

"You should get back before it's too late," she said, smiling again.

Frightened and confused, Y/N started running. She sprinted as fast as she could, following the scream which she had recognised. It only got louder as she got closer, and by the time she'd made it back to her family, it was already too late.

She knew there would be consequences, but this was even worse than she'd imagined. Her legs gave in as she watched the whip crack down on the maiden's back. The princess' lady-in-waiting was screaming and begging the king to spare her life, but King Willem just kept on whipping until her light blue dress was stained with fresh blood.

"Y/N!"

The whipping stopped.

The whole scene sank into silence as Meira dropped down to her knees and pulled her daughter close. Willem finally dropped the leather whip in his hand, catching his breath and told the guards to take the maid out of his sight. She was unresponsive when two men dragged her away.

"Is she...is she dead, mother?" Y/N asked, tears were streaming down her face and she was shaking in her mother's arms.

"No, she just...she just fainted..." said the queen, yet she sounded just as afraid.

"Where have you been?"

"Willem—"

"WHERE HAVE YOU BEEN?!"

"I-I fell into the river, father!" Y/N cried out while clinging onto her mother in fear of being dragged away just like the maid. "Egon was there! He left me there to drown!"

"She's lying!" Egon pushed past the guards and rushed to the front. "I was looking for her but I couldn't find her so I came back to tell you, father!"

Willem put a hand up to silence the boy and glowered at Y/N, who was sobbing into her mother's chest.

"The princess will stay in her chamber for the rest of our stay. No one is allowed to speak to her except for the maid who brings her food."

"Father, no!"

"Willem, please..."

"And you." He turned to the queen and his voice started to break. "If you say one more word to defend her, you'll be locked up as well."

When he stormed off, Y/N looked up at the queen. That was the first time she'd seen her mother cry.

"Crow! Why are you wet?!"

Now, where could Harry begin?

He could tell his friend that he'd just saved a girl from drowning in the river, or he could make something up and save himself from hearing Kenny's same old lesson. But when the little girl gave him that worrying look with her big shiny eyes, he couldn't help it. He panicked. And whenever he panicked, he tend to mess up what he actually wanted to say.

"I met a girl."

"A girl?" Kenny arched both eyebrows in shock. "In the forest?"

"Yes. She was lost. I helped her get back to her family."

"That doesn't explain why you're wet though."

"Right..." The boy chuckled as he combed his fingers through his hair which had dried from staying out too long in the sun. "She...she splashed water on me."

"She splashed water on you?" Kenny gasped, her eyes only grew bigger. Harry knew he was going nowhere with this lie and he should back out while he still could.

"Just forget about her. She's gone now." He gave his hand a wave before reaching for hers to pull her along, but she didn't move. She shot him an angry look instead.

"Promise me you won't scare me like that again," she said, frowning.

Harry was left with no choice but to give her a nod and pull her into a tight hug. "Never again, I swear."

Everyone in their village knew about what had happened to Kenny's father last year. One day he was wandering to that same river and he never made it back. They found his body washed up on the bank a few days later. There had been many different rumours about how he'd died, but nobody actually knew what had happened. And since that day, Kenny had never come near a river or a lake again.

"Come on, let's get back to help your mum!" Harry said cheerfully with an arm around her shoulder. He felt like a weight was lifted from his chest when she plastered a smile on her face.

"You're only eager to help so you can attend the king's festival dinner tomorrow night!"

"Well, that's not...wrong," he said and they both laughed. "One day, Kenny, I'll become a lord, and the king will invite me to his festival dinner every year. I won't have to help in his kitchen to be able to attend."

"Will you take me with you?"

"To the king's dinner?"

"Yes!"

"Anything for you, my lady." With a smile, he took her hand and gave it a kiss.

He knew if he'd told anyone else about his dream, they would've laughed and made fun of him. But Kenny was different. She believed in him, and she always made his unrealistic dreams feel a little more achievable.

Ever since Harry could remember, he had fantasised about living the life of a prince even though he'd never even set foot near the portcullis before. That forest was the closest he'd ever been to the castle. As he climbed to the top of the tallest tree, he could see almost everything on the outside.

The walls stood mute as grey stones rose from the ground, defying entrance and protecting what had been entrusted to their care. Someday, he swore he would stand where knights stood and see what kings and dukes saw. Someday he would look through the window on one of those highest towers and the rest of the world — this forest, this river, would be so tiny.

But today, his place was in the kitchen.

His family was poor but Kenny's was not, relatively. Her mother worked in a kitchen of the castle which was quite a big deal for someone from their village. The Rowleys didn't like him very much. In fact, Patricia Rowley had bigger plans for her youngest daughter than being friends with a poor boy like him. Harry's father was a blacksmith, his mother was always ill, so his sister had to take care of most of the housework. He had no future at all. The Rowleys would never want him to be Kenny's—

What was that word the crazy girl had told him again?

Right, betrothed.

They would never want him to be her betrothed. But did he want that? What about her? Did she want that?

A smack on the head made Harry jump out of his daydream. He looked up and saw Patricia frowning at him. "You are here to work! Go out there and help Kennedy!"

Frightened, the boy hurriedly picked up the tray and carried the food out of the kitchen, to the tables at the back of the dining hall. They didn't let servants go anywhere near the royal family or their royal guests, but to see them from a distance was also a dream come true for him.

"That's the king of Isolde," Kenny told him as they hid behind the curtain at the very back to enjoy some fruits they had stolen from a drunk gentleman.

"Why is that seat empty?" Harry asked, pointing to the chair next to the Northern king.

"The princess couldn't make it. I heard that she was sick."

"Maybe it's too hot for her here," Harry joked, making Kenny laugh. He loved it when he made her laugh, even if it was unintentional.

"Maybe," she said with a nod. "The queen is very beautiful."

"Indeed. Do you think she's beautiful as well?"

"The princess?"

"Yes. I've never seen a princess before. I think she should be the most beautiful girl in her kingdom."

"What would you do if you could talk to her?"

"Oh, I would ask her to dance!"

Kenny didn't comment on Harry's answer, but as she stormed out, he realised it wasn't what she wanted to hear.

"Kenny, wait—"

Chasing after the girl, Harry accidentally bumped into a stranger at the entrance. His heart almost flew out of his chest when the beautiful woman flashed him a shiny smile and headed straight toward the king's table. Just like everyone else in the room, he couldn't take his eyes off her.

While all the guests were wearing the most colourful clothes, she was dressed all in black. Her skin was so pale it didn't look any warmer in the candlelight and her footsteps were so light it seemed as if she was floating. She looked like a ghost. A beautiful one.

Then, something else caught Harry's attention. He spotted a gold hairpin under the royal guests' table which he supposed someone had dropped, and nobody else had seen it because he was the shortest person in the room. The first thing that came to his mind was how pretty it would look on Kenny's hair. He had to get it for her, no matter the cost.

As King Edgar rose from his chair to welcome the mysterious lady to his castle, everyone was too busy paying attention to her to notice the little servant crawling under the tables.

"This is Madam Maggie," Edgar said. "She's a prophet, the most powerful one in the land."

"So she's a witch?"

"You can say that," Maggie smiled, unbothered by Willem's cynical remark.

"She communicates with the gods, and she can foresee the future," Edgar said, turning to the king from the North. "Willem, my brother. Would you like to see?"

"How?"

"I can read your palm and tell you about the future of your kingdom, my lord," Maggie said and there was already chattering in the background.

Willem was probably the least superstitious man in the room, so he just laughed it off and told her, "how about you read my son's palm to see what a great king he will be?"

Excited, the prince gave Maggie his left hand.

"The left hand represents your inborn fate while the right hand represents your destiny affected by different decisions and outcomes," said the prophet. "People's fates are governed by God while fortune is created by themselves. So which would you prefer, my lord?"

"Tell me about his destiny," Willem said after a moment of thinking.

"All right, my lord." Maggie gave a nod and stepped closer to take the prince's hand. The whole table fell to silence as she observed the palm closely and ran her fingertips across its lines. "You have two beautiful children. May I ask where the princess is?"

Edgar cracked a smile when he saw the looks of shock on his sister's and Willem's face and others'.

"The princess doesn't feel well so she cannot join us tonight," the queen said. And look on Maggie's face made her tremble.

"Is that so?" said the prophet as she turned to Egon. "If this boy becomes king, and he will—"

Egon sat up straight and fixed the crowd on his head as his father and mother smiled proudly at him.

"—your entire dynasty will go down in flames."

"Nonsense!" Willem roared as Egon withdrew his hand immediately. The whisperings of the other guests got louder as fear was etched on Willem's face, but Maggie still looked as serene as when she first arrived.

"This woman is mad! Guards!"

"Willem!" the queen cried out, but Edgar had already put up his hand to stop the guards before they could get to Maggie.

He turned to Willem with a stern look on his face. "Remember that Madam Maggie is my guest and so are you. A guest cannot request another guest to leave."

Willem was just about to reply when Maggie suddenly spoke, "the little princess, however."

"What about her?" asked Queen Meira.

"Princess Y/N is your only hope."

Maggie's short answer sent the whole table into chaos. While the other guests were discussing what the answer meant, the Northern family was frozen in their seats.

"Have a lovely evening, my lords and lady."

Bobbing a curtsy, Maggie turned away, and suddenly a tiny human jumped out of nowhere and dashed out of the nearest exit before anyone could figure out who it was. When they turned back, baffled and fearful, the lady in black had disappeared without a trace.

"Kenny! Guess what just happened in there!" Harry called out as he ran across the courtyard to where his best friend was sitting on the doorsteps.

She didn't look so thrilled when she asked, "is it about the princess?"

"Yes, it's—"

"Do you like her?"

Surprised by the question, Harry took a step back when Kenny got up and closed the distance between them.

"I haven't even seen her face!" he said, making her frown.

"You don't have to see her face to like her. Everyone knows she's beautiful!"

"She's a girl I don't know, Kenny."

"What about the girl in the forest? The one you do know." Kenny crossed her arms, her nose stuck up.

"She probably returned to her family already, and I won't ever see her again," Harry said and blew out his cheeks. "What is this all about, Kenny?"

The girl fidgeted with the hem of her dress for a moment before she could finally close her eyes and blurt out, "I like you."

"I like you, too," he said innocently.

She stared at him with wide eyes and mouth agape for a moment, but then realised he didn't get it so she waved him off and turned away. "You know what? Forget it."

"Wait, I got you something!" Quickly, he grabbed her by the arm and put the golden hairpin into her hand.

Kenny's eyes popped out when she realised she was holding actual gold.

"Did you steal it?!" she exclaimed, making him laugh.

"No, someone dropped it. Do you like it?"

"We must give it back, Crow!"

"We don't know who it belongs to," he reasons, giving a half-shrug. "Even if we did and returned it, they would probably think we stole it. I mean, look at us! Look at me!"

The way he humorously overreacted put a smile on the girl's face.

"Right," she agreed and pinned the hairpin on her hair. "Thank you."

"You're welcome," Harry mumbled as his dimples popped up.

The children stared at each other for a long moment, and Harry believed his heart had never beaten so hard and fast. Before he could stop himself, the question just slipped right out, "do you want to be my betrothed?"

"What is a betrothed?" Kenny squinted her eyes and gave him the same look he'd given the crazy girl at the river.

"Someone...someone you'll marry when you're older."

"Oh...okay, then..." Kenny sucked in a breath, trying not to smile so wide. "Of course, Crow. I'll be your betrothed."

#tctm series #princess!y/n #conartist!harry #prisoner!harry #harry styles fanfic #harry styles fanfics #harry styles fanfiction #harry styles fanfictions #harry styles imagine #harry styles imagines #harry styles writing #harry styles series #harry styles angst #harry styles fluff #harry styles smut #harry styles

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lightwormlol · 3 years

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ACOFAS REVIEW -INC SPOILERS

4.5 stars.

Okay, so! This was the first book I was able to finish in 2021. I've kinda been in a reading slump, and struggling to get past the 30-50% of books. I think its because I took essentially 3 months off my normal (daily) reading schedule and have been prioritising other things (health, fitness, job applications etc) - I think it's a testament to how addicted I was to this that I finished and consumed this at the rate I did! I recently went back and added some things to my ACOWAR review. To briefly summarise, I feel that, at the time I read it, it kind of gave me what I needed, but it definitely isn't getting a re read - my love for feysand has definitely lessened over time, but honestly i'm not that mad at sarah for this, as I find that whenever I've passed the sexual tension part of relationships in books, I tend to get bored of the domestic bliss. Like, leave that shit for an epilogue and keep it at that? As someone generally averse to relationships, but there is definitely a grace period for how long I can actively be smitten with a couple... before it becomes sickly. Taking all this into account, I honestly was nervous for this book, its release date totally took me by surprise, and I read it on a whim. As a Nessian shipper (I mean we didn't really have a choice after acomaf but to delve into the world of fanfic to keep us going) - this book gave me most of what I wanted and needed from them! I think,(some) kudos to SJM, for not disappointing in their relationship. This was definitely a character > plot driven story. In terms of the plot, I wasn't really invested until around the 38% mark? I'm not sure if I was adjusting to the writing style (lots of dramatic. sentences. that. are. so. abrupt. Nesta Archeron. Death etc) - or if it was bc I hadn't read an SJM book since the novella, which I basically skimmed. I was obviously reading for Nessian, but I didn't really feel intrigued by the wider plot (death gods, the human queens? Given I had lost my previous obsession with the world/ have outgrown 'fandom' culture, that made me actively update my knowledge, I couldn't remember a lot!) I think its clear that SJM excels character driven stories, but I think her worldbuilding and execution is significantly better in the throne of glass franchise. Now, I did say this was a character driven story. This is mostly regarding Nesta, Cassian and Azriel. I loved pretty much any interaction they had! I love a good training montage. Ngl though, I think, unless you possess an ardent love for Nessian, you're not going to be particularly wowed by this, if you've read heir of fire, or even acomaf. I obviously am never going to be able to be objective, because I've loved nessian so much from 2017-now, but I loved the dynamic those two (and three - friendship wise between nes/cass/az). One of the highlights of ACOWAR for me was the snippets of Az, showing tenderness, and opening up to the newer members of the inner circle (and i'm excluding any hint of an Elriel ship because FUCK THAT LOL) For me, the tip with SJM books is: once you outgrow them/the particular mode of narrative style, is to not anticipate anything other than a character driven story, albeit one riddled with smut. I personally am a romance heavy reader, so I'm honestly deconditioned to it at this point, (like, when I see reviewers scandalised I'm like... wow, the amount of trash I have consumed in the last five years loool.) While I disagree with the fact SJM marketed this series as y/a (or maybe it wasn't her per se, but the key booksellers definitely did this for her) - I think its clear enough now she's descended into the adult/borderline erotica genre.(very mild imo). I personally like to adopt a policy of skimming sex scenes when I find the dialogue cringy (most the time it is lets be honest any talking is v second hand embarrassment). Cassian and Nesta were definitely better than Rhys and Feyre post chapter 55 though! I was so glad there weren't a million moments of Cass/Nesta betraying their arousal with their scents, in front of everyone (like feysand, the voyeuristic pda pricks they are). I found the slowburn ish nature of their relationship great, and I actually think if you're a virgo/emotionally stunted reader, you will be happy with their relationship dynamic. It contrasts with the daemati sexual snark of acomaf, but it felt right, and authentic. This book was a journey of personal growth, for Nesta. It is clear SJM loves books about strong women, and maybe thats what makes me love this book so much. I think, out of all the archeron sisters, I love Nesta the most. This is for my Rose Calloway fans, my misunderstood, somewhat cold/left out girls, who are less receptive to being vulnerable. If you're a slowburn fan, it's not Mariana Zapata levels of slowburn, imo it's the perfect combo. Addictive enough that I don't want to put it down, but not so fast moving that I couldn't believe it. I loved the sex without emotion relationship they had!! This is honestly never done in mainstream n/a fantasy, unless its a caricature of a 'slut' that normally rivals the main character, lmao. Even if their inner conflict was p transparent, this gave me everything I needed! I know this is vapid lol but I also love the physical dynamic between the two, they just look so good together, the amount of fanart I'm going to reacquaint myself with after this review!! I adored seeing Nesta grow, (even if towards the end I kind of resented her sudden acceptance into the inner circle, i get SJM loves her and just wanted a fluffy ending, but, as a Nesta like character, it's awkward and stilted on her end to adjust to the inner circle like this - i mean, hugging rhys, really??)

I think, if I had to compare this to any other SJM book, I would say Chaols book (though I obviously preferred this). That being said, I felt less attached to new characters in this book than I was in even Chaols book (and even then ngl I remember nothing?) Obviously I loved what it represented, as a trio of traumatised women. I just, didn't love this the way I loved other inner circle members! I get that they gave Nesta exactly what they needed, a family that doesn't hold the history of her sisters, who she doesn't have to worry about holding preconceived notions of disappointment. I loved this for her! Even then.. I just wasn't attached to either of them. I found their interactions cute - but boring. Towards the end, when their stories/pasts are revealed, I couldn't help but cringe slightly, I can't put my finger on why, but I just didn't buy it. Maybe it's the brit in me but I couldn't be moved by this slightly forced bonding moment.. which was so anticlimactic. My 'aww how cute' tolerance is defo deserved for characters whose tropes I love. Maybe they just didn't fit into this list. Maybe I'm just being a cow here?

Now, let's speak about the real star of the show.... A FUCKING MAGICAL HOUSE FRIEND??? YESSSSSSS. IF YOU ARE AN ILONA ANDREWS INNKEEPERS CHRONICLES FAN, U WILL LOVE! How was the animation of this somehow more touching than all of nesta's other friendships combined? Exactly what I ordered, thank you. This trope somehow touches more than any material bonding!! The cute witch x house dynamic (also maybe howls moving castle vibes?) I loved the trying to reach the target of 10,000 steps (a little Celaena HOF). I think this, heir of fire and acomaf are my favourite SJM books for this reason. Gripes: I definitely had some personal gripes with how other members of the inner circle treated Nesta (rhys i'm looking at you. Disappointed doesn't even cover it.) I inherently take offence to any elain scene, as i'm so over bland characters whose existence is reduced to wanting to fucking plant flowers?? like?? really? To go from moriel to that is such a downgrade, even if I fell out of love with Mor due to the way she snubbed Nesta (you're a 500 year old being and you can't see someone is clearly traumatised?). I adore Az so much, but if it aint polyamorous, I cannot see any pairing with Elain making me happy. (wouldn’t mind gwyn though) I think the whole mating bond that I do not want is a good dynamic, but I really hate that everyone has to be mates in this world. I don't think we were that surprised, but it would've been nice if the somehow, idk, developed a strong bond over time, without it being preordained? Like, even if they do not all actively stay with their mate, given how disproportionate mates are among the general population, what's the likelihood 6 members of the inner circle (including lucien) have mates?

My advice? Read this book if you love nessian and the acotar world in general, but don't expect the world building to be consistent with greater fantasy series'. This style of story is obviously what to expect. She writes what she likes, and if her fantasy is this - then who are we, as readers, to expect otherwise?

Final rating: 4.5 (no, i'm not objective, but objectivity does not exist if you are a real, human being, lol)

Original Characters: 5/5 (nessian/az/house wise) 1/5 (feysand - really over how they essentially take over the very end of the book - ugh, I wanted nesta's arc to be wholly separate from them) Writing style: 3.5 Cringe Scale: Low, with the exception of some dialogue. New Characters: 2 Plot: I went into it with a 2 and came out with a 4. Not in terms of complexity, but in terms of how addictive and enjoyable this reading experience was! (less)

#acofas #sjm #sarah j maas #acotar #nesta #nesta archeron #nessian

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gifted-burnout-archive · 4 years

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The Morana-Andstone Letters

Prologue: What We Choose To Forget

Word Count: 1.6K+

Author’s Note: Oopsies, I dropped some Harry Potter fanfiction onto my blog... Guess it’s staying here. Yeah, I decided to branch out a little, and as a proud Gryffindor and after seeing a photo of Tom Holland looking handsome I just had to write this. It’s an old idea I had back in the day but never wrote, so here you go!

Warning: none.

In war, only the victorious come back as heroes, and the only ones remembered are the heroes and the villain who headed the war against goodness, against just practice and peace. Everything and everyone else sort of fades away into the grey, lost to the story they contributed to. You don’t find them in paintings on the walls, in memorials for the dead, they aren’t a part of the history students learn.

They become nothing, but in some cases, maybe that’s for the best.

For you see, there’s a fine line between good and evil, and in times of war that line becomes so blurred that sometimes people do bad things, horrible things, for good reason. Heinous acts, in the midst of war, become survival: betrayal, deceit, murder. It’s no longer about moral codes or what’s right and wrong: in war one decides whether to be a martyr or selfish.

You choose whether to live with regret or die without, and everyone from the Battle of Hogwarts who survived is weighed down by some level of guilt, of self-hatred. Because good people died in their stead, because they chose to be selfish.

Traces of the criminals who tried to destroy the peace of the wizarding world were wiped from the mainstream consumption, leaving only what authors offered in course textbooks and the heroes recounted in their memoirs. The act was put in place by Minister Granger-Weasley, the first muggle-born to hold the position, in hopes it would allow the public to heal, to move forward. Portraits of the Fallen Fifty were hung in Hogwarts, the souls of those lost captured in paintings for the students to remember who had died for their right to be in those hallowed halls, and for families to visit: it was nice to be reminded of a loved one’s smile, their laugh, even if they were no longer around. Every May 2nd, a national holiday came into effect, a memorial service took place in the Hogwarts courtyard, and Professor Potter disappeared into the hallways of the castle, to walk through the battle he unwillingly started and finished too late to save so many of his friends, his family.

The first and second Wizarding Wars were covered in the History of Magic classes during every student’s third and fourth year, and the young teens were encouraged to write parents, aunts and uncles, grandparents, about the events that transpired, their take on turbulent time in the world’s history.

It was after one of these letters was sent home by a student that a flame of curiosity was sparked, a question posed by a distant relative who had long since left the country had enticed them to take their two closest friends on a quest through the castle one Autumn evening, as winds howled outside and the rain thundered down.

They were swift, quiet, and stealthy on their mission from their common room to the library, most particularly the Restricted Section of the school’s most active study space: it had been one of the few places that was salvageable after the war, and had amassed a great number of books in the years since. They dodged the Prefects and Teachers on patrol, one of them making the comment that the three were just like Professor Potter and his friends back in the day.

The restricted section of the library was still heavily guarded, containing works only seventh year students and teachers were allowed to peruse, but the three fourth years were fuelled by intrigue, and with their smartest learning a few special spells from a very funny red-haired portrait by the Gryffindor staircase, they had all the tools required to pick the lock without triggering alarms, and slip themselves amongst the bookshelves before the next Prefect patrol came round the corner.

“I still think this is a bad idea.” The first said, ironically the one who broke them into the forbidden area of the library. They were met with a chuckle from their companion.

“You read the letter the same as us, don’t you want to know more about the Death Eaters?” the second asked, only to be shushed by the third and final student. He was more jittery than the other two, albeit curious.

“Don’t say it out loud!” He hissed, looking around like one might appear out of nowhere and scoop them up. The organisation had been disbanded after the war, the majority of them thrown in prison to pay for their crimes.

“Oh, come on, stop your worrying. Now, what exactly do we do?” the second asked the first of the three, who pulled a notebook from their back pocket.

“Well, it looks like we just have to find the right book code for Death Eaters… Let’s each take a bookshelf. It’ll be faster, and hopefully we’ll get further than we did last year.” They muttered, the trio avoiding eye contact for a moment before splitting up. It wasn’t the first time they had attempted entry into the library Restricted Section, though it was the first time that had reason to.

The third student had received the letter that sparked the whole plan a month ago, the trio taking turns to monitor patrol schedules and hone their talents for that evening’s activity. He didn’t like knowing that some great uncle or something had fought with the bad guys, he felt it made him a worse person, though his companions had been quick to assure him otherwise. He couldn’t change the actions of some bigoted ancestor, he just needed to be a better person than they were.

As his eyes scanned the shelves on the section’s east side, his wand lighting up the titles on the leather bound book backs, his friends did the same in the west and south sections. They moved as fast as they could, reading titles as they hurried around looking for something, anything about the Death Eaters.

When they met back at the bookcase they had started at, all came back with the same report: there was no title under that name, no work in the library retaining to the information of the Death Eaters.

“It must be sorted by individual… Files on each of them?” The first suggested, the second muttered a soft cuss under her breath in response. They all looked rather defeated by the revelation, but their lock pick didn’t risk detention for nothing, and punched the third student on the arm. “Come on, we made it this far…”

“You’re acting like we just have to think of a terrible person and the book will pop out!” He hissed, the three glancing up as a light appeared at the library’s entrance. They were quick to rush round a corner, the three finding themselves sat side by side with their backs pressed to old wood and locked cupboard doors. Only once the light had disappeared, and the library plunged back to near darkness, with only the moonlight lighting up the room in a weary blue glow, did any of them let go of the breaths they held.

“This was a waste of time guys. We had fun, we got here, now let’s head back to our rooms before we get caught and miss out on Hogsmeade next week.” The third student proposed, clearly the most frightened of the three. He should have never shown his friends the letter, they were far too head strong to not act on information like that.

“Your…” The second paused for a moment, forgetting who on earth it had been that responded to third’s letter for class. “Look, some dying relative of yours said that there is always more to a story than meets the eye, right? Why don’t we find that out?!” She was more enthusiastic after her other companion’s vote of confidence in her idea, though it was rather short lived.

“You got further than last year, kids. I’m impressed.” A male voice spoke up from close by, the three letting out a combined sigh. The turning of a key and the swinging of the gate echoed in the large space, sure footsteps quickly headed their way. The three scrambled to their feet as the glow of their wands welcomed the kind face of their Defence Against the Dark Arts teacher, Professor Potter. He had a tired smile across his features, and gestured for the three to follow him from the Restricted Section. “I’m so impressed that I won’t punish you… This time. If I see any of you trying this again, no more trips to Hogsmeade for the rest of the year.” He warned, and a nod was shared amongst the three students.

“Yes sir…” The all muttered in unison, starting a defeated shuffle back to their rooms. Potter stayed behind a moment to lock the gate properly, his eyes unwavering from a book on the top row of a nearby bookcase, sliding back into its place amongst the stacks.

The contents of it were too vivid and complicated for such young minds to understand, and Harry left the library that night knowing he had done a good thing.

Documents of the war were all kept, an archive for the few cleared individuals to view, Potter was lucky enough to be one of them. He had read all the books in that Restricted Section at least twice, the particular book he had read many more. There were parts of the war people didn’t know happened, that people had no reason to know occurred. And it was better that way.

As far as the wizarding world was concerned, the people behind the Morana-Andstone letters stored in that book never existed, and it was better that way.

Some people deserve to be forgotten.

Tags: @im-a-writer-right

#harry potter #harry potter fanfiction #slytherin x hufflepuff #hufflepuff x slytherin #draco malfoy #hufflepuff #slytherin #hogwarts #oc fic #oc x oc #hp fic #the morana-andstone letters #hp au

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everythingunderthesky · 4 years

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The Racing To Read Tag

Thanks @librarian-unlocked for tagging me!! (This is Pinkninjas, hello!) This tag seems to have been created due to this video!

1. Warm Up: A book that stretches your mind

I’m going to say Bio Rescue by S. L. Viehl. This book really made me question the ethics of certain things (as good sci-fi is wont to do) and it left a pretty big impact on me the first time I read it! I’m not sure if my understanding will have changed since then, but it’s definitely a fond memory. It follows Zair, an aquatic-based life form from another planet on her journeys through the military, and through the even more dangerous waters of her personal life.

2. Start Line: What’s a book that you started but never finished?

I’ll go with The Hidden Life of Trees by Peter Wohlleben! The first time I checked out this book, I didn’t even manage to open it! Just finished my second attempt, managed to read about halfway through. It’s a super informative and interesting book, and it’s definitely set up in manageable chapters. Unfortunately, nonfiction books tend to be an issue for me—But I’m reading it for research purposes, so I’ll be trying to knock out the last half in a few months! I have so many sources from this book saved, it’s really incredible how trees can communicate—And what they can!

3. Sprint: A book you read really quickly Gideon The Ninth by Tamsyn Muir was an incredible read—There was so much wit and humor, I almost couldn’t put it down! (I did eventually, as my body unfortunately requires some modicum of sleep.) If you haven’t heard of this book, it’s essentially Lesbian Necromancers In Space—There’s a rich history, subversive humor, and a “house” system that dictates your speciality in society—And of course, a lot of swords and my favorite thing, puns.

4. Marathon: What’s your favorite long book? I’m going to go with Myth Adventures by Robert Lynn Asprin! I love the pun, and the characters are so much fun—Dragons and demons and all sorts of hijinks! Magic and mystery and tiny me took SO MUCH inspiration from the ending, I feel like I learned a lot as a writer.

5. Hurdles: What’s a book that had ups and downs? The Sleeper and the Spindle by Neil Gaiman. There was some content in there that I found unexpectedly—And thought it was super fun, but the story turned away from the plotline I’d hoped for. All in all though, I really did love the book, and was happy where they left the ending! Chris Riddell’s illustrations are SO gorgeous too. Fairytale retelling! Pretty illustrations! It’s lovely!!!

6. Finish Line: A book you were proud to finish I had a difficult time with Castle In The Air by Diana Wynne Jones, as I couldn’t get invested in the new characters the story was following—It’s the second in a series, and I was disappointed that the characters I knew and loved were only mentioned in passing. The book picked up in the latter half, and I ended up really loving where they went with it!

7. Gold Medal: Best book you’ve read during a readathon I don’t think I’ve done a readathon!

8. Participation Ribbon: An underrated book you wish got more attention

The Dark Lord of Derkholm by Diana Wynne Jones. Like Castle In The Air, this is the same author who wrote the original Howl’s Moving Castle, and this book is JUST as incredible. The concept is essentially that a planet is being paid to put on a yearly “LARP” by another dimension, but the time differences between dimensions mean that those who originally signed the contract have died—And their descendants want out of the deal. Fantasy world, focuses on a particular family, and I 100% fell in love with the characters!

Tagging: Anybody who wants to do it! @ Me when you’re done, I’d love more fun books to read!

#tumblr tag game #racing to read #books #book recommendations #fantasy books #sci-fi #my bookshelf #this was a lot of fun!#I may go and read some of my old favorites now ;)#long post

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littlewritingrabbit · 6 years

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lams, 8/9

8. Things you said when you were crying.9. Things you said when I was crying.

There’s just… generally a lot of crying.

Holy mackerel Anon, I overthought this to the extent that I may or may not have created an au, congratulations…

Also I hope you’ve heard the story of Orpheus and Eurydice….

The Quest - Part 1

Up ahead, Azor was barking. Alexander Hamilton dashed through the woods after him, jumping over logs and feeling his heels sink into the soft carpeting of needles. Eliza Hamilton followed just behind, her skirts bundled up in one hand and baby Philip in the other. Bringing up the rear was Pierre du Ponceau, who was attempting to read as he ran, his nose so close to the words it was a miracle he managed to avoid the trees.

“We’re losing him!” Alexander gasped, his face almost drained of colour except for its customary freckles and a mad flush across his cheeks. He vaulted another log and followed the sound of the barking as if it were a lifeline.

“You follow him and we’ll catch up,” Eliza called after him. She swung her legs over the log and hitched Philip a little higher in her arms.

“It should be right up ahead,” Pierre yelled, “Like a rock, or… or a cliff?” Both his shins collided with the log, but he made it over in one piece.

Alexander burst out of the trees, gasping raggedly, and paused to run a hand through his hair and take in his surroundings. There was indeed a cliff, rising up before him like a jagged castle wall. The early-morning mist blew across its surface, obscuring its height so that he might have been standing at the bottom of a very deep pit, or even on the ocean floor.

Plant life didn’t touch the dark stone of this cliff, as if it knew better. Even Azor seemed afraid of it, whining and pawing at the ground in an unsettled sort of way. Alexander felt a chill deep in his bones, a warning as old as there had been Heroes to challenge the natural order of the world.

Eliza and Pierre crashed out of the woods behind him, and then stood in stunned silence beside Alexander. Eliza laid a hand on his shoulder.

Dear, dear Eliza. She had been so kind these last few months. After the war had finished, there had been days when Alexander had simply felt too terrible to do more than sit in the shade under the trees in the backyard, or by the fire, and attempt to make it through a letter or two to whoever needed him. There had been nights when he’d awoken in terror, wrapped up in the blankets and his nightshirt like they were funeral shrouds, reliving yet another nightmare of what he had done and seen.

Most days however, he couldn’t seem to slow down. There were essays to be written, bills to be drafted, an entire government to re-invent. And when he wasn’t occupied with this, Alexander was dashing all over the countryside with Pierre on his newest quest.

The quest had started the previous year, when the letter had arrived. It hardly needed a description, one could simply say ‘the letter’ and it would be obvious that it was the particular letter from Henry Laurens on the subject of his son’s death in the service of his country. The letter had quite possibly broken Alexander, or at least wounded him so deeply that he might never recover, as from that night onwards, he had been dedicated to discovering a way to save the friend he loved.

At first no one had known – it was a quest for scribbled maps in the dead of night and staying out crashing through various forests every spare moment of the weekends until Eliza finally confronted him about what on God’s green Earth he was up to.

He had broken into an exhausted fit of sobs upon telling her. His eyes had burned with a broken desperation, “I don’t know how to describe it my dear,” he had whispered, “But he was a part of my heart, and I cannot rest until I see him once more.”

At this point, there had been many things Eliza could have said. These included but weren’t limited to the usual inability of man to bring back his dead friends, how Alexander’s energies might be better spent proceeding with his own life rather than chasing after one that was already gone, and the fact that he might very well be going mad, but he had been so tearful. So instead she had asked him one question. “Would it make you happy?”

“Yes, a hundred times yes.” Thus Eliza joined Pierre as a member of the quest.

It had been relatively easy to convince Pierre in the first place. Simply a chance to have an adventure that went against the fabric of reality and translate some old legends would have been enough to convince him to sign away almost anything. He also sympathized with Alexander, knowing from their time in the war (and possibly from experience) the extent to which he cared about Laurens.

Several legends, translations thereof, and one singing lesson later, there they stood, facing the cliff in the hour before dawn one cold spring morning. “Is this the place?” asked Eliza quietly.

Pierre turned a few pages and pressed his face into the book again in his peculiar way of reading. “It certainly fits all the descriptions,” he said.

“This is it,” said Alexander.

A gust of wind made the mist swirl around the cliff and the pages flutter. Eliza pulled Philip’s blankets closer around him. She slipped her hand into Alexander’s. “Are you sure about this? We can always go home if you want to.”

“I know,” he replied, “But I have to at least try.”

“You know, I suppose, that you may never return?” Pierre added helpfully.

Alexander squeezed Eliza’s hand gently, “And you know that I would never let a little thing like death stop me.” They stood, shoulder to shoulder, in the shadow of the cliff, and began to sing.

“Oh why soldiers why? Should we be melancholy, boys, Oh why soldiers why? Whose business ‘tis to die. What, sighing, fie! The colours they are flying, boys, ‘Tis he, you, or I, We’re always bound to follow, boys, And scorned to fly.”

In three part harmony, their voices echoed off the cliff face, disturbing the mist and echoing off into the forest as if there were many people singing all together. Then suddenly, a crack like a gunshot sounded, and a split appeared in the cliff face. As they sang, it grew larger and larger, until it was large enough to climb through, and Azor was howling at the top of his lungs.

They stopped after the second chorus, though the echoes of their voices carried on for several moments afterwards, like the forest and the cliff were singing in reply. “I’ll be back as soon as I can,” said Alexander. He turned to Eliza and kissed her gently, “I love you,” he said.

“I love you too,” she replied with a sad smile.

“Aahh goooo,” said Philip, reaching a pudgy hand out to grab onto Alexander’s nose.

“Bonne chance, Alexander,” Pierre shook his hand, “Or should I say, Orpheus,” he smiled. Philip started to cry as Alexander adjusted his sword, picked up his lantern and rope, and slipped into the crack in the cliff, leaving the mortal world behind him.

It was so dark he could hardly see his hand in front of his face, so he pulled the cover from the lantern and lit the candle inside. All around him there were black rocks, almost like obsidian, rising up in jagged points of stalactites and stalagmites, and the same mist as outside seemed to linger over everything, whispering away into far shadowy corners.

Alexander chose the nearest stalactite as his landmark, looping the rope around it once, twice, three times, until it felt secure enough to never come undone. Then he set off into the dark, weaving between the rocks on a downward slope, his rope snaking behind him. One step at a time, his footprints marched their way down where the living were never meant to go, his heart thumping away in his chest in a reminder of how much he should not be here.

But when it concerned John Laurens, Alexander would brave Hell, Tartarus, or any other grim fate.

The ground sloped steeper and steeper as he marched on, first like a staircase, then like the sides of a mountain, until he was climbing more than walking, relying more and more on the rope. All at once, the path seemed to stop, pitching off into a dark abyss. One wrong step now, and he would plunge down and be dashed against the bottom of that great darkness.

Alexander tentatively approached the edge of the path. He tied the remaining end of his rope around the lantern, and slowly lowered it into the abyss. The lantern’s glow shrunk away from him until it was a little point like the flame of a candle amid the dark, and the rope fully unravelled, but he still couldn’t see an end to the fall.

Forward or back? There were only two ways he could go, and back would mean admitting defeat, so Alexander wrapped his leg around the rope, pinned his other leg against it, and lowered himself into the pit.

It was pitch dark except for the lantern’s faint glow some few storeys beneath him. His arms shook with the effort of holding his weight up, and his breath came out short and sharp in the echoing silence. This rope wasn’t just tethering him to the world of the living, it was holding him fast to life itself, because if he fell now, who knew how far he would fall?

John is down there. The thought kept him moving stubbornly downwards. His dear boy was somewhere in the dark below, and no matter how the rope burned his hands and the muscles in his legs trembled with the force of holding him up, he had to keep going. His Laurens, he thought, his love and his best friend and his brother-at-arms. He had warned him against the dagger, the rope, and the poisoned bowl, but how was he to know that one premature charge would have the same effect?

Alexander neared the end of the rope, until the lantern was only three, two, one feet below him. There still appeared to be no floor in sight, but his arms were burning and his hands were rubbed raw, and he wasn’t sure he would be able to hold on any longer. Alexander clung to the rope, swaying a little in the subterranean wind, and utterly devoid of options. Then his arms and legs gave out, and he slipped with a scream into the land of the dead.

As it turned out, the fall wasn’t very far, it was just so dark that he hadn’t been able to see where the ground was. He found it promptly, by hitting it, and surmised that he had broken nothing, but probably bruised his legs.

He stood on the shore of a river. Alexander could only tell there was a river at all by the sloshing noise it was making, as there was so much mist everywhere, but there was what looked like a small raft on its shore, so he stepped onboard and forded the river. It was when he reached the other shore that everything around him changed.

Suddenly his senses felt dull, his ears ringing and his eyes unfocussed. The mist around him seemed to be whispering, but in whose voice he could not be sure. “I pray you bear me witness…” “Alexander!”“No…” “I meet my fate like a brave man…”“HELP!”

He stumbled forwards, shaking his head. Figures moved through the mist, but Alexander could pay them no attention. He needed to find his friend. He yelled John’s name at the top of his lungs, but it seemed swallowed by the cavern air around him.

It might have been a minute, or an hour, or some measure of time in between, before he found himself in a ring of stalagmites, or perhaps they were columns.

“Now this is something I haven’t seen in an Age,” said a voice. Alexander whipped around, but found nothing. When he turned back, the mist had solidified itself into a figure. Facing away from him, the figure had thin shoulders, unpowdered hair, and a coat as red as blood.

“Who are you?” Alexander asked.

“I am Death,” said the figure simply. Alexander took a step back in surprise, unsure as to why Death was a redcoat.

“Where is John Laurens?!” his voice icy, Alexander glared at the redcoat who would not show his face. “Tell me you coward!”

“Coward?” asked the redcoat, slightly offended.

“Yes,” Alexander yelled, furious that Death could be so unmoved, “You’re a bloody coward! You stole the life of my mother! You stole the lives of my fellow soldiers! You stole the life of the man I loved, and yet you sit here, cowering in your darkness, and you won’t even show me your bloody face!!”

“You would not like my face if you saw it,” said Death, “Faces are a human invention after all. I have a fair few.”

“Turn and fight me, Death,” said Alexander, drawing his sword. He was no longer afraid. Anger had made him rash. It was the sort of anger that boils up from your heart and constricts your throat and makes your eyes fill with tears, the sort of anger that is so hot it hurts deep in your core.

“I do not think you would like that either,” said Death, turning.

Alexander stifled a gasp. Death looked surprisingly familiar. His face was almost fair, or would have been, had it not been tinged blue and his eyes a hollow sort of dark. Just above his cravat an ugly bruise ringed his neck, and he carried his head at an odd angle. All in all, Death looked suspiciously like John Andre.

“It’s not me you want to fight, Alexander Hamilton,” he said. “I simply take those whose time has come. It’s not anything personal. It’s just that every man has his day, and their days were over.” He appeared so unconcerned that it was frightening. Death doesn’t discriminate, he simply takes regardless of who and where and when. He doesn’t care who is left behind.

“John Laurens’s life was not over,” Hamilton shot back, “He had so much left to do! He was going to speak out against slavery, he had a wife, and a daughter, and… he had me! He had a chance to be happy after the war was over. I don’t know if you know much about life, Death, but John Laurens’s life was not a particularly happy one, and it could have been so if you hadn’t bloody taken him away!”

Death didn’t have an answer, he simply stepped back. Now he appeared less like John Andre, and more like a little girl Alexander had known back in St Croix. She had died of a fever. Her cheeks were still flaming red, as if in proof. Her wide eyes stared at Alexander from her thin face, and she simply waved a small hand.

Out of the shadows behind a stalactite stepped John Laurens.

All the tears that had been boiling within Alexander all those nights filled with nightmares and all those long, unseeing days came streaming down his cheeks. His shoulders shook with sobs and he couldn’t help but dash over and throw his arms around his Laurens. It had been so long.

John was paler than Alexander had ever seen him, wearing a blouse that was stained crimson with blood. Someone had evidently taken his coat, boots, sword and waistcoat. Tears silently ran down his cheeks, but he said not a word as Alexander threw his arms around him and held him as if just by virtue of their embrace they might never be parted.

“John, John, I’m so sorry, I love you, and… and I miss you, I-” John leaned down and quieted him with a kiss. His mouth tasted metallic.

Alexander pulled back and placed a hand over John’s blood-soaked chest. “Are you hurting? Is there anything I can do? Is… why…” he rounded on Death, “Why can’t he speak?”

“He’s dead,” said Death, as if it should be obvious. She wrapped a little finger around one of her curls and gave it a thoughtful tug. “The dead cannot speak to the living… but no, he’s not hurting. He just looks like that.”

John ran his fingers all over Alexander’s face, as if mapping him out. He brushed the tears from his cheeks with a sad smile.

“You give him BACK!” Alexander screamed, “You let him GO! You have no right, no right at all to keep him here!”

“I’m the only one with that right,” Death was back to his red-coated self now. Alexander made a small noise like his heart was breaking. He had come down here for nothing. “But I can make you a deal.”

“A deal?” Alexander could not recall a deal with Death which had ever gone well, but he was determined to be the first example of such.

“Precisely. You may have heard of such a deal,” said Death, “I will give you leave to go, and if John Laurens wishes to follow you, he may. But you must never look back at him until you have reached the world of the living, or else he will be lost to you forever.”

“I accept your deal,” said Alexander, looking not at Death, but at John, with determination blazing in his eyes. “Will you follow me?”

John formed the words with his mouth, but he could make no sound, so it took a few trials for Alexander to be able to read his lips. He said: as well as I am able.

“Then fare you well, Death,” said Alexander, a roguish smile on his face.

“Oh Alexander Hamilton,” said Death, his appearance changing once more to that of a middle-aged woman with freckles, thin and pale as if on her deathbed. He shuddered at the familiarity. It was his mother. “I’m certain I shall see you again soon.”

Alexander turned on his heel and marched away from Death.

He soon found it was a lot harder not to look back than he thought. When he reached the river, he couldn’t be certain John was on the raft behind him. He called out for him, but, of course, received no reply. So he sailed across the river in the desperate hope that John was still with him.

When he reached the place where the lantern swayed above the ground, he found he couldn’t jump to reach the bottom of the rope, so he had to climb several feet up the sheer cliff-face to be level with it. Don’t look down, he thought, not necessarily because it was steep, but because if he looked down now, he might see John, and then the quest would be all for naught. So he climbed with his head bent upwards until he was parallel to the bottom of the rope, took a deep breath, and leapt for it.

If Alexander had thought that climbing down the rope was difficult, he had not considered how it would be to climb up it. All his muscles trembled and complained that gravity was not helping them, and a few times he scrambled down a few feet by accident before resuming his climb. Don’t look down. Don’t you dare look down. The rope swung back and forth behind him, but whether this was because John was scaling it, or simply because the lantern was swinging back and forth at the bottom, it was impossible to tell.

When he finally reached the top, he realized that there was no way to pull up the lantern without discovering whether or not John was behind him, so he placed his hand on the rope and followed it blindly, stumbling over and around rocks until the cavern echoed with his footsteps and he could not tell if there was anyone behind him at all.

And oh, how badly he wanted to look. What if John was not there? What if he had gotten stuck on the rope, or fallen to his death, again? What if he had simply not come in the first place? The world had not been particularly kind to John Laurens in life, so what if he was unwilling to risk it a second time?

Or what if something else had followed Alexander in his stead? What if there was some pale creature bristling with teeth, or a small clawed thing, or any other number of monsters that one’s mind concocts when it is dark? What if something impersonated his friend, only to be set loose in the outside world?

Alexander shivered, and told himself that he was frightening himself over nothing. John was behind him. He had to be. But shouldn’t he just take a quick look, just to be sure? He called once more, and no one responded. Just one look, he thought. Surely Death wouldn’t be able to know from all the way down there?

The dark crowded close around him, but he clutched the rope like a lifeline, his heart hammering somewhere near his esophagus.

Ahead of him, a light opened in the darkness, and he could hear a dog’s barking.

To Be Continued…

#History AND Writing #Time for a ficlet!#The Quest #Alexander Hamilton #Eliza Hamilton #Pierre du Ponceau #John Laurens #Looks like all my otherworldly entities are redcoats what's up with that...?

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sunflowerheartwriting · 6 years

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Dragonic 9

Welp, It is about time I am back with an update, right?! Sorry for the wait my friends! Work has gotten crazy since the last update but i finally got a day off after working for a month or so, to finally give you this! Please expect another update in the coming days as well to make up for the wait! :D As always thanks for reading my dudes! FF.net and AO3

Gajeel and Levy finished off the food Sue brought, as Gajeel explained what his advisors told him through mouthfuls.

"As you know Lullaby, is a terrible sickness that can spread like wildfire if we're not careful. It can knock even the biggest person off their feet, keeping them in bed for days. Weeks if it's not caught in time." Gajeel spoke finishing off the last piece of meat. "What makes it so bad is the symptoms are the same as a common cold, so it's hard to know if you have it or not."

Levy sat in a chair that usually sat in front of his desk, but she brought around to sit beside him to look over her notes with him. "How many people are infected?" Levy asked, turning to look up at the man.

Running his hand through his hair, he shook his head, "Almost an entire hospital. One of the older doctors recognized what was going on and quarantined the building. She sent a message to us before she shut it down."

"But, Lullaby hasn't been seen since, The Mad King era. It doesn't make sense that it's back now." She frowned.

"I know, that's why I have one of the best coming tomorrow to help us get this under control." He smiled to himself a memory sparking his mind.

Levy watched him smile sweetly at whatever he was replaying in his mind before it fell back into a frown. She wondered what he could be thinking about that made his mood change so drastically.

Collecting his thoughts to the main objective, he continued to speak. "We will get this under control, I'm just worried about it spreading to the castle." He huffed, rubbing his palm against his cheek as his face twisted in worry.

Nodding her head, Levy understood that if the King goes down then the kingdom will eventually follow. "We have to make sure your health stays in tip top shape."

"My health?" He asked in astonishment, as if he was insulted by her comment. "My health will be fine, it's my staff and yours I'm worried about."

Creasing her eyebrows in confusion, she stated, "But you're the King and if you go down, we go down too. So, yes. Your health is just as important."

He quirked an eyebrow in amusement, her frustration rising at the smug smirk curling his lips. "What's so funny?" She asked.

"You figured out that my family has different senses than you but you somehow overlooked that our immune system may be part of it too."

Her eyes went wide in realization, mouth snapping open at his statement. She did think about it but she didn't have enough information to come up with a good hypothesis. Plus there's very few books on the dragon slayers so assuming what they have and don't, without something to back her up didn't feel right to her. The only reason she guessed they had different senses was the proof she had.

"Gihee, no need to look so surprised." He chuckled. "Do you want know what else is different?" He asked leaning in close with a toothy grin.

Levy face flushed a deep red by his question and how close he was. The smell of the woods still clung to him and a scent that she couldn't place that was naturally him caused her insides to flop. "I-uh-I'm not sure about that." She stuttered out.

"My, My Miss Levy are you thinking dirty thoughts?" He grinned wider causing Levy to sputter in embarrassment.

Covering her flaming face, she shook her head trying to get her emotions under control. There was no way she was going to admit to what she was thinking and in all honesty it wasn't the cleanest. She felt a firm hand on her head and heard the King's signature laugh.

"I'm just teasing shorty, but if you still want to know-"

"I'm ok!" She interrupted, speaking louder than she wanted too. "Let's just get back to work."

She desperately needed to focus and to think about something else other than how red her face was and the erratic beating of her heart. Taking a much needed deep breath, she cleared her mind ignoring the butterflies in her stomach that continued to move erratically as they got back to work.

Gajeel's grin was replaced with his previous grave expression as he talked. The sound of rain hitting the window seemed to fit the gloomy mood of the kingdom, a heavy tension hanging over the pair as they tried to come up with a solution to the sudden epidemic. More food was brought by Sue as the two skipped dinner, too engrossed in their discussion to leave the office. Levy ate a few pieces, occasionally throwing pieces of meat to Lily who moved from the couch to her side. The big cat seemed anxious of the rain, as he balled up tightly by her feet, ears flat down occasionally whining when a big gust of wind rattled the windows.

Rubbing his head, Levy voiced her concern. "Is Lily ok? He seems really anxious."

"You noticed that, huh?" Gajeel said with a sad smile. "He's terrified of thunderstorms. Even though I don't think the weather is going to get worse than this, the wind has picked up quite a bit."

Levy didn't know what she expected but thunderstorms definitely wasn't it. Lily let out a whimper at the mention of his fear, putting his paws over his ears as if he could hear the storm raging outside. Smoothing the raised fur, Levy tried her best to calm the nervous panther.

"It's ok, Lily. It's only going to rain tonight. No thunderstorms." She promised scratching behind his ear, earning a low purr. She smoothed some more fur down, waiting for him to calm down a little more before turning to look at Gajeel. He shot her smile of approval, before stifling a yawn.

"It's late and we have a pretty decent strategy on how to help until reinforcement arrives tomorrow, so I suggest we go to bed." Levy declared standing up, collecting the empty plates and placing them back on the platter.

Gajeel stood up with a stretch and a loud yawn, agreeing as he twisted his torso left and right to crack the stiffness out of his back from sitting so long. Levy straighten the items on his desk the best she could, as the wind and rain outside picked up, the rattling of the window and howling of wind sounding ominous. Lily's body vibrated with fear, his fur sticking up immediately as he scurried from his spot on the floor towards Gajeel. The big cat lept onto the unsuspecting Gajeel causing him to stumble back a few steps as he held onto the shaking feline.

"You're getting heavier, buddy." Gajeel grunted out as he adjusted Lily's weight in his arms, holding him as if he was a small kitten. Lily's butt and back was supported by Gajeel's arms as the cat's head and paws tried their best to hide in the crook of Gajeel's neck with no avail. The sight tugged at Levy's heart strings, her wanting to hug the two but also not wanting to interrupt their moment. She wondered how many times Gajeel had to hold Lily in order to ease his anxiety of the storms.

"I guess Lily won't be walking you back tonight without my help." Gajeel said petting the cats back softly.

Collecting the platter, she shook her head at his statement. "No, it's ok. I can make it back on my own. Lily is great company but he's too shaken up right now and we're all tired."

"Oh, so I'm not good company?" Gajeel teased, chuckling at the small woman's face as she quickly tried to correct her previous statement. "I'm just teasing shorty. You're way too easy to rile up."

Puffing her cheeks in frustration, she pouted at the realization that he got her again. "Goodnight, Gajeel." She said with a roll of her eyes, leaving the office platter in hand.

Leaving the platter in the kitchen, Levy quickly made it to her room so she could take a shower to wash off the day's stress and get into bed. The sound of the rain lulled her to sleep, as she prayed it wouldn't thunderstorm for the sake of Lily.

The next morning Levy was surprised again to see Gajeel and Lily awake and dressed. Levy wheeled in their breakfast, immediately handing Gajeel his plate as she greeted him.

"Good morning, nice to see you're both awake." She said, before walking over to Lily who was stretched out on Gajeel's bed. "Are you feeling better this morning?" she asked the feline as she gave his head a generous pat, placing a bowl of kiwis in front of him.

His ears perked up sitting up with a smile, a low purr vibrating from his chest in appreciation. "I'll take that as a yes."

"You spoil him too much," Gajeel said before stuffing a piece of pancake in his mouth. Lily let out a slight growl, causing the man to stop eating, his eyes squinting at the cat.

Giggling lightly, Levy leaned down, whispering loud enough for both of them to hear. "Yea, I think he's just jealous too."

"Oi! I am not!" He defended, as the two laughed. Grumbling to himself he stuffed more food in his mouth occasionally shooting daggers to his cat, who smiled happily as Levy showered him with attention.

Levy waited for them to finish their breakfast before she sent the dishes back to the kitchen and returned to Gajeel's side. She met him in the hallway as he walked briskly to his awaiting advisors.

"What's on the agenda for today, your Majesty?" She asked trying her best to keep up with his long stride.

"I have to talk with the old men about our plan before company arrives."

Nodding her head in agreement, she asked, "Are there any orders you have for me while you talk with them?"

Slowing his pace, he smiled to himself, "Yes. I want you to sit in with me." Levy stumbled at his statement, Gajeel quickly grabbed her arm just in case she fell. Heat raced up her arm at his touch as he helped her stand correctly. Shaking off the feeling she turned him, his words ringing in her ears.

"What? I can't sit in with you." She announced with wide eyes, "It's not allowed. Officials only."

He shrugged his shoulders nonchalantly, "Who cares, you're the one that helped me, so you're as official as it's gonna get."

How could he say something like that? And say it as if it wasn't a big deal? These were people who have mentored and aided royalty for generations. They've been trained and taught how to help their people, whereas Levy wouldn't know how to act around them. Is there a certain etiquette to the conversation? Where does she sit? Would it be weird if she sat close to Gajeel? Could she speak or would she just have to sit and listen to the conversation? All these questions and more swirled in Levy's brain as she thought about his request. It would be an immense honor to sit in with him, but…her past is tainted now. She's no longer a scholar's daughter, she's now a bought item.

"I still can't go in. What would your advisors think?" She faltered, her eyes going downcast, staring at her feet. Fiddling with her fingers, her voice sounded as small as she felt. "I'm sure they know…about me."

She couldn't see his face but he was frowning as he looked down at her. She was wringing her hands as her thoughts got the best of her, spiraling into self-doubt. She didn't belong there, next to him; whatever gave her the notion that she did? A gentle grip on her hands pulled her out of her disassociation.

"Levy, look at me," he spoke softly as if not to scare her as he wrapped his other hand around her wrist pulling her closer to him. They were standing toe-to-toe, her head bowed, nearly touching his chest. "Please, look at me." She shook her head no.

She couldn't look at him, not now. Her emotions were displayed clearly on her face and she wasn't ready for him to see them. Not when she was so unsure herself. But his hands wrapped around her own seemed to anchor her to the real world as she heard him clear his throat.

"I-I'm no good with the words. But, past is the past and it no matters now. You here now, help me with the kingdom and you are person of good." His broken words of encouragement, as he tried his best to use what she taught him caused her to smile. He was getting better and his hesitation to speak between words was improving. She guessed that this was his own way of trying to cheer her up and it worked.

A small giggle came from her lips as she looked up to her King. "You're getting better, I'm proud of you."

"Thank you, I have a wonderful teacher."

They both smiled like idiots as they stared into each other eyes, when the sound of someone clearing their throat made them jump apart. A guard approached them bowing at the waist as he spoke.

"I'm sorry to interrupt, your Majesty, but the advisors are requesting your presence."

Gajeel understood the general notion of the guards visit and turned his attention back to Levy. "I can handle the old farts by myself, how about you and Lily pick some of the plants we talked about. That'll be one thing off our list."

Picking up her skirts she curtsied, "Yes, your Majesty." He shot her a wink as he turned to leave with the guard, ignoring the weird look the guard gave her. Levy watched as they walked down the hall before she turned to head back to the kings quarters.

#gajevy #Gajeel X Levy #gajevy fanfic #multigajevy #gajevy multific #fairy tail #ftfanfic #ftfanfics #fairy tail fanfic #Dragonic

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riley1cannon · 3 years

Note

For the year-end book asks, 1, 2, 12, 24, 25 and a number of your choice 💗💖

Whee!

1. How many books did you read this year?

Way too many. Finished #99 last night, and am currently embarked on #s100 & 101. That’s only a few more than I’ve been avergaing lately, so it wasn’t entirely due to COVID. I’m regretting it now as there isn’t a lot left in my TBR pile, and it’s going to be awhile before that can be replenished. Which actually leads to--

2. Did you reread anything? What?

Yes, more than I have in a long time. A trend likely to continue well into 2021. It’s not a bad thing, though. It’s fun to go back and see how old favorites hold up. There haven’t been too many disappointments. I reread several Archie Goodwin-Nero Wolfe mysteries (hey, Archie does 99% of the work, so I figure he should have top billing 😉), and those have held up nicely. Only a few eye-rolling, time period accurate sexist moments. And it’s been long enough since my last time through that I don’t figure out whodunnit right off the bat. I revisted Stephanie Plum as well, just One For the Money & Two For the Dough, and enjoyed them enough to want to continue with the reread for awhile. Just ploughed through the first five Richard Jury myteries, and will likely carry on with that reread as well and try and catch up with the series. Star Struck Dead by Sheila York was just as much fun the...third, fourth?...time around, and went nicely with two Philip Marlowe’s--The Big Sleep & Farewell, My Lovely. They Came to Baghdad was the only Agatha Christie this year. And I started to reread the Amelia Peabody series, but only made it through Crocodile on the Sandbank. Something to pursue in the new year.

12. Any books that disappointed you?

Oh yes. The Witch of Willow Hall was a huge letdown. It had so much potential, all the trappings of a Gothic novel, but for me at least it failed to deliver. It just played like every other YA novel about a girl who’s not like other girls. The only character I liked was the ghost of the great-grandmother who was hanged for witchcraft. Would have loved to read a book about her.

Sometimes it’s not the book that is at fault, but the reader’s expectation, and that’s why I have to put Howl’s Moving Castle here. I went in expecting it to be like the movie, and could never get past that. Knowing that, I may try it again some day, to see if that helps. (I had the same problem with Neil Gaiman’s Stardust.)

The only one that hurt, though, was Airs Above Ground by Mary Stewart. Now, there have been a couple of her romantic suspense novels that haven’t quite worked for me, but this is this the first that I actively disliked. The usual formula is there but it just doesn’t work this time. I expected better of you, Mary Stewart.

24. Did you DNF anything? Why?

A few times. More often it was a matter of reading something, not clicking with it, and putting it aside for another time. One I couldn’t stand to read one more page of was Nora Robert’s Jewels of the Sun. The male lead was just too obnoxious to endure another moment.

25. What reading goals do you have for next year?

I’d like to slow down and read a little less, for one thing. I’ve always been annoyed with those people who post about how they read fifty books in one month, and have never wanted to turn into one of them.

Otherwise...? I’ve been trying to revive my love of science fiction, so far with little success, so that’s something to work on. I need to get back to reading some non-fiction too. It’s been too long since I’ve done anything that way beyond dipping into something for some research. Nothing too grand, no particular agenda.

Number of my choice: 17. Did any books surprise you with how good they were?

Yes! And I love when that happens. An historical mystery called The Vanished Bride by Bella Ellis, with the Bronte sisters as amateur sleuths, took me by surprise. I was so sure it would be awful, too far-fetched or too dry and careful, to be interesting. It is an homage to the sisters, but not so respectful that it feels you’re on a museum tour. The mystery was a really good one, too, with a most satisfying finish.

Burn for Me by Illona Andrews was another surprise. Paranormal romance and I have not often mixed well, so my expectations were low. Especially when the romantic lead is named “Mad” Rogan, and given a backstory that is beyond problematic. So what do I do but fall hard for Rogan and Nevada, and actively root for them to find a happy ending! Knock wood, I have the second book, so that will be on my reading agenda next year.

Heiress for Hire by Madeline Hunter sounded tempting--romance and mystery, post-Regency (but not quite Victorian). I had my doubts, but darned if it didn’t win me over right off the bat, with Minerva whomping Chase over the head and restraining him when he breaks into her home. One of the things I especially loved was that they communicated. If one heard something shady about the other, for instance, they brought it up and discussed it. And the sexy stuff was...yeah, it was good. Best I’ve read since last year’s The Widow of Rose House by Diane Biller. In both those books, consent is a huge deal, and never ever ruined the mood. I didn’t even mind that the actual mystery wasn’t solved by the end, but was to be carried over to the other books in the series.

After the disaster that was The Duke & I, I was leery of ever trying Julia Quinn again. I decided to take a chance on What Happens in London, however, and was thoroughly delighted by the result. So much that I may even venture back to the Bridgerton’s one of these days.

And Red, White & Royal Blue was, on the face of it, exactly the kind of book I’d give a wide berth. A book about a romance between the son of the U.S. president and the heir to the British throne? Politics and royalty, two things I can’t stand, and that are not remotely sexy? Boy was I taken by surprise with this one! Mind, I wouldn’t have objected to the occasional break from Alex to get Henry’s POV on things, but other than that it was just about perfect.

Thanks for the asks!

#books #books read in 2020 #cramzydays

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httplovecraft1890 · 6 years

Text

Friends Like These

A rather aimless drabble done in preparation for a crossover fan fic I’ll be writing in the future for Junji Ito’s Souichi and Tomie series, this is a writing exercise to get a feel for Tomie’s character. She’s such a great villain, isn’t she? I feel she’s probably Ito’s most terrifying creation because she’s ultimately so fundamentally human in how rotten she is.

Without further ado…

"Sorrow found me when I was young. Sorrow waited, sorrow won.” - The National, “Sorrow” (2010)

Tomie hates the In Between Place.

It’s what she’s come to call the plane of existence after whatever idiot she’s decided to ensnare inevitably does her in – a long list that includes stabbing, choking, dismembering, beating with various objects, electrocution, hanging, to name a few things – before she is reborn. The In Between Place is nothing more than an inconvenience but one that Tomie isn’t sure how long will last. Sometimes her regeneration takes hours; other times days, even weeks. There are no gods to judge her misdeeds. There’s just the void, an endless gray mist that stretches out before her as far as she can see.

At one time Tomie had been afraid of the In Between Place. The brief respite she had been given due to her miraculous recovery from being pushed over the cliff deep in the forest had only made things worse when every eye that had leered down at her had been as cold and distant as those she fixes others with now. When she had been murdered by Takagi, Yamamoto, and every other boy in class 1-B she had awoken scared and lost in the now familiar purgatory. She had cried herself hoarse unable to understand or comprehend her fate. Her mind had felt as if it were swirling endlessly, a shaken snow globe that had been unable to stop, as she had gone through varying states of consciousness before she understood that each piece of her was growing anew. Eventually, though, she had been drawn back through the membrane between the In Between Place and the world of the living. She doesn’t even understand after all this time what she is exactly. A demon? A witch? A ghost? There’s no one around to ask and Tomie isn’t sure she cares enough to know even if there were.

What matters is that she’s mastered death, conquered it in a way that no one else has. Tomie is special, just as her father had promised her from multiple lifetimes ago now, when she had been small enough to sit on his lap, the smell of sake on his breath as he read her a bedtime story, even if sometimes he never managed to finish them before passing out. The Western ones had been her favorite with their princesses waiting to be rescued by brave knights in castles. She had been ignorant then as to how boys truly were but she can’t completely scrub her father’s soft voice or his gentle kisses goodnight to her forehead from her mind.

“You can have anything you want if you try hard enough, my lily.”

That had been one of the first lies ever told to her by a man.

If that had been the case, she would not have found him on the floor having drowned ingloriously in his own vomit one morning at the age of five. Nor would she have been left at the mercy of her mother, a shrill harpy of a woman, jealous of Tomie’s beauty (just as all the others are, of course), who always had her brought back by the police when she tried to run away from home. Mother is another reason she can’t stand the In Between Place. It leaves her alone with her memories of people and places that no longer matter, of bruises that she had to hide underneath school uniforms or black eyes that were explained away from falling down the stairs.

Yet to say she is alone isn’t accurate. There are shapes within the ‘fog,’ twisting and turning about, faces that are so stretched in agony they barely resemble the human beings they once were. All the girls she has ever absorbed, everyone who Tomie has devoured to help regain her strength, anyone unfortunate enough to come into contact with her are all here like an enormous extended family. At a time when Tomie couldn’t control them they terrorized her. They had swarmed as if they were an angry nest of hornets buzzing about and howling into the nothingness that she had no right to keep them against their will. But the more souls she accumulated the softer their voices had become until at last the hellish choir had died just as so many of them had.

All but one.

Time is frozen in the In Between Place; she can’t feel its passage and there would be no way to tell even if the laws of the outside world applied here. At the very least it keeps her stroll through her personal fiefdom a leisurely one. The spirits flee from her in fear as she walks by them, dancing away from the expensive pair of couture heels her lover had bought her days before he’d run her over with his sports car in a fit of rage. It had to have been a record, Tomie is sure. They had lasted an entire six months together though she is sure his love of verbal abuse had something to do with it. They’d connected via a dating app after all. He hadn’t even minded that she’d been unable to keep up appearances in her profile’s photo. He’d told her that he’d been into special effects when he was younger and that it was “wicked cool” she could do makeup like that.

Gag.

When at last she comes upon the being she’s sought, sitting in a ‘clearing’ hundreds of steps away from where Tomie arrived, it takes everything within her not to let her normally barbed tongue slip. Somewhere in the corners of Tomie’s mind, or in her shriveled, blackened heart, there is an ounce of compassion that still exists for the poor figure in front of her. Stuck with the ugly bob cut (a poor decision she’d warned her against even at the time), clad in clothes that are over a quarter of a century out of date, sits her only friend. Tomie lowers herself down next to her, subconsciously being careful not to crease her long and expensive blue dress her idiot had bought for her a week ago.

“Do you try to make it difficult for me to find you on purpose or…?”

Silence.

That’s normally how their one-sided conversations go. Reiko Mizutani has long since given up speaking. She had always been a girl without much of a backbone and her time in the In Between Place had ground her into less than nothing. Sometimes she even sits so still that her ghastly companions all about them act more lively than she does.

“Always the same with you, Reiko. Why the cold shoulder? I’m doing you a favor, you know.”

She had never intended it to be this way.

It hadn’t been Tomie’s fault that the one piece of her that had not reconfigured itself as fast as it should’ve, the heart that Reiko had dropped tearfully off of the bridge on the way home from school they’d once taken every afternoon, and had found its way out to sea and then to the town where Reiko had moved. Tomie hadn’t had much control of her powers then. The hunger that had gnawed at her had been so all-consuming she had barely registered she had pounced on Reiko until she was halfway through sucking the marrow out of one of her femurs just who her victim had been.

Tomie knew she was not a good person, even before her transformation. She hadn’t cared what others thought of her and saw no reason not to play with her vapid peers’ thoughts and feelings. Yamamoto was nothing more than a passing curiosity as interchangeable as anyone else in their year was. Takagi had been a fling just to see if she could destroy a marriage, though admittedly the decision not to use a condom had been his idea, not hers. Her fellow students had called her so many different names behind her back that they had drowned together in a sea of white noise. Whether Tomie was called a whore at home or at school didn’t matter.

“This one wasn’t so bad looking this time, was he? Foreigners do tend to have bigger bank accounts…”

Foreign. That’d have been the way to describe what she had felt as she had looked away from Reiko’s unseeing eyes by the tide that day. Reiko may have had awful fashion sense, a childish view of romance, and an assortment of other personality flaws that had seemed grating when they’d been in class together but it hadn’t mattered in that moment. When the deed had been finished the sensation of truly having severed the last connection to her old life had hit Tomie. There would never again be phone conversations late into the night to complain about the latest test, what universities they were considering, or anything of the sort. In a way she’d died for the second time that balmy afternoon.

“…Bigger dicks too. I told you if you stick with me you’ll never be disappointed.”

Reiko simply stares at her feet, utterly unresponsive to her attempted camaraderie, and Tomie is more than fine with talking to the wall her companion has erected between them. It is an infinitely preferable fate than being railed against for what she has done to her. Better that than being forced on the defensive for the events of the past 30 years.

She reaches over, taking one of Reiko’s small hands in hers, giving it a squeeze so gentle she surprises herself. “What about you, though? I never can tell what you like or don’t like when we’re out fishing together. Surely you’ve got a type, Reiko.”

The other girl’s glass eyes remain unfocused, staring out into the expanse just as they always do whenever Tomie asks her questions. This is all that’s left of Reiko – a dying ember that must be tended to prevent it from being snuffed out. Tomie stretches out her legs, leaning comfortably against Reiko’s shoulder.

“I’ll get the answer out of you sooner or later. We’ve got all the time in the world here.”

She hadn’t cared at first whether or not Reiko would suffer when she first returned. She had been so consumed with hatred at the fact her so-called friend had not fought harder for her, to tell her classmates off for murder. Instead Reiko had done what she always did: clammed up at the first sign of trouble and tossed her heart away as if it were yesterday’s garbage. It was only her attempt at going to the police in the end that Tomie had decided to spare her mind from being broken at all.

“I have to admit I’m getting tired of foie gras and caviar… it might be easier just to find a chef. It is fun watching some of them when the check comes, though.”

Reiko stiffens at the contact between them, her back ramrod straight, and while she has no need to breathe Tomie can feel her diaphragm shuddering against her. She never fights or crawls away; Reiko is nothing but a broken-in horse at the stable now. It doesn’t offend Tomie either. She’s used to those around her recoiling in horror when they get a glimpse underneath her carefully maintained façade.

“Something wrong, Reiko? You know I don’t bite much.”

Tomie can’t help herself. The joke tumbles from her mouth before she can stop them and Reiko takes the opportunity to press her forehead against her knees. Despite not talking Tomie is sure that prayers are being mentally sent to anyone that will listen to free her. A curious mixture of contempt and regret settles in her. She doesn’t need to allow the link between them, their souls becoming one when she chooses, to let her breathe fresh air with her lungs, to taste the foods and drink that she consumes, or allow her to experience whatever lay she has found. Then again perhaps expecting gratitude from finding a man desperate or pathetic enough to withstand her and then allowing him to have his way every so often to keep him strung along might not be something in her favor. She usually finds a knife entering her gut a more satisfying experience than being under a sweating pig whose idea of ‘passion’ is generally limited to a few minutes of grunting before emptying his seed inside her without even the minor courtesy of pulling out.

But Reiko does not experience the trauma of dying again and again. If Tomie wanted she could let the girl’s mind embrace the cool nothingness of the In Between Place every time the inevitable occurs. It is the quirk to her dark magic – to have her fate be replayed ad nauseam by those around her – that she protects her friend from. Once was enough for Reiko.

“I shouldn’t have said that.”

Tomie finds she means it too.

“I’m just an awful tease. That’s what you told me when we were younger. Guess I never did grow out of that, did I?”

It’s not quite an apology but Tomie knows that this minor peace offering will suffice. There’s nothing she could say or do to make the situation worse than it already is. She pulls away from Reiko’s side, hands on her knees as she stares out into the In Between Place, watching her slaves drift in their eternal torment. She wishes she knew why she’s gone to such lengths for Reiko, why it matters so much that she keeps a token reminder of the girl she’d once been around. Even back then Reiko was someone who only made her look more beautiful by comparison – the girl next door versus a woman. There is no need of that now. All she has to do is so much as look at a man and he will follow her to the ends of the earth.

“We’re all rotten deep down. I’m…”

She’s what exactly?

“…Glad you’re not like that.”

Her eyes roam over Reiko. The schoolgirl’s features have frozen in time just as much as hers have, whether crystallized by Tomie’s own willpower in the In Between Place or if this is a side effect of dying itself she doesn’t know. That damned jumble of emotions washes over her again as they both sit now in the uneasy quiet that fills the air between them.

“Tomie…”

There are very few things that can surprise Tomie. Any eventuality is one that she has either experienced or tried to prepare for. But in all the years that have passed since that day on the mountain there has never been a word between them; all she has gotten in return for her efforts at keeping Reiko ‘alive’ has been her refusal to flee from her presence, probably more out of terror than loyalty. But this is fresh, almost exciting in how unexpected it is. Reiko’s head lifts itself up and the gaze she is fixed with is hard enough to cut through a diamond.

“Yes?”

“…You’re wrong. You’re not a tease at all.”

Tomie can feel her one of her perfectly manicured eyebrows raise ever so slightly at that remark. She is never wrong; her ability to read others and stomp their dreams into the dirt is what she prides herself on the most. There is no good in her, if there ever was any to begin with, and even assuming there had been at all is self-pitying charity. Surely there is no way that Reiko after all this time forgives her for what she’s done.

“What makes you say that?”

“You’re a monster.”

Oh.

This will not stand.

Memories of her mother threaten to wash over, an angry, spiteful hag who couldn’t stand the thought of her own daughter not being as miserable as she is, punching and kicking whatever part of Tomie is not tucked into her fetal position in whatever room she has found her in. Nor does she care to remember the growing pain of finding out that she will never be able to have a picture taken for fear of revealing what she’s become. Almost involuntarily, she reaches over and grips a handful of Reiko’s hair, forcing her friend face to face with her.

“Reiko, I think you and I both know that you’re better than that. Words hurt – especially when friends turn against on one another. All those special memories together can become the nastiest kind of rumors imaginable.”

Reiko’s bravado seems to fizzle out in just as much time as it emerged. She barely struggles against Tomie’s grip on her pixie cut. Why did Reiko find it necessary to make things so ugly? After all that Tomie has done for her, her nerve astounds her.

“I think that you owe me an apology.”

The spark of rebellion isn’t quite put out as Tomie’s little flame looks at her again as a small smile graces her face. Her eyes leave her shoes and glance out towards the purgatory that surrounds them before she shrugs.

“You owe everyone here an apology first.”

If there is one thing that Tomie hates it’s rebellion. Every man who has ever been able to resist her charms, every girl who couldn’t put two and two together to get out of her way, they’re all as tedious as the last. She offers them nothing but her presence, something alone that should suffice, but this is a slap in the face on an entirely different level than what she’s used to dealing with.

No matter.

If mother taught her anything it’s that if a message is drilled home enough it’ll stick.

“Apologize?” Tomie tilts her head in amusement. “I don’t really think I’d have to. After all they made their own beds to lie in and they understand their mistakes. They’ve atoned for what they’ve done.”

Releasing a hand from the side of Reiko’s face Tomie snaps her free hand’s fingers. All at once the world around them changes. Dozens of the phantasms that haunt this realm begin to swirl about them, faster and faster, as they shriek and moan in despair. They’ve long ago lost their individuality; the only way she could identify them now would be to focus on their tormented faces (not that she cares to). Gripping the side of Reiko’s face once more Tomie watches as Reiko’s eyes dart wildly about them, unable to press her hands against her ears to make the voices stop, unable to prevent the dizzying whirlwind of her fellow prisoners from giving her vertigo.

“I sacrifice so much for you, Reiko. All those dates with men, every weak compliment, every kiss with awful breath, every passionless evening… I’ve tried so hard to find someone you’ll enjoy. Yet you’re still ungrateful.”

Reiko only whimpers in response and Tomie is sure she is regretting ever standing up for herself now more than ever.

“What more is there I can do? We’re friends ‘till the end, aren’t we? I remember you telling me that when we were younger.”

Reiko’s jaw is working back and forth, almost as if she is about to cry, but Tomie knows just how little tears mean. She’s done it on more than one occasion herself to get out of a situation that looks bad enough. Tomie is sure that Reiko hasn’t forgiven her yet, isn’t truly sorry. It’s just another trick to get her to stop her assault.

“Even when we were in school I’d try to find someone who could stand you like I could. You rebuffed them all. ‘I’m waiting for university to get serious,’ wasn’t it? I believed you then; you didn’t have many social skills. The more I think about it, however, the more it sounds like… an excuse.”

Tomie truly is the worst. She can’t help herself. Her mind now runs with every possible thing she can do to make the situation as cruel as possible for her friend. She’ll pay for finally speaking up with nothing but a slap in Tomie’s own gorgeous, perfect face.

“Was it because you didn’t think you could keep them around for long? Scared that you’d look like a complete amateur next to me? Or maybe something else…?”

Releasing Reiko’s head at last, Tomie plants a finger on her chin, rhythmically tapping it as she ‘ponders’ in thought. She’s decided already how this will end between them. Tomie loves nothing more than to push boundaries after all.

“Perhaps you actually weren’t interested in all those boys I tried to bring around. That would’ve been embarrassing, after all, to admit that they just didn’t cut it for you. Really, I think that maybe it was me who you had a crush on.”

It is in that moment that Tomie can begin to feel some part of herself beginning to drift away, as if her mind is beginning to shatter into a dozen different pieces. She will be leaving the In Between Place soon; she’ll have to keep this little charade shorter than she’d like.

“I wouldn’t blame you, of course. Being around me for so long, it’d only be natural that envy turned into something else, especially if you thought you could use your friendship to leverage it.”

Reiko’s eyes are confused, scared, and Tomie takes a moment to revel in the liveliness she sees in them. This is what she’s been missing all this time – a companion that she can call on in her thrall who will never hurt her.

“N-no, that’s not– I never–!”

She has practically forgotten about the countless spirits spiraling about them. Her attention is on nothing now but Tomie herself.

As it should be.

“Shh…” Tomie whispers gently, bringing a finger to Reiko’s lips. “It’s okay. You don’t have to hide it, Reiko.”

The pull towards the world of the living is stronger now, insistent even. With her free hand Tomie snaps her fingers once more and all at once the souls she’s collected scatter to the non-existent wind. It is just her now and Reiko, sitting across from one another, in the gloom.

“You don’t have to forgive me. I forgive you.”

She leans forward, inching slowly toward her target, as she places a chaste kiss to the other girl. She can feel Reiko sputter, choking and spitting as the other girl violently pulls herself away from her, spastically scrambling backwards.

“W-what the hell was that?!”

Tomie rolls her eyes, barely even containing the urge to break out laughing at the overreaction. Perhaps she will do this more often, both with Reiko and without. Men are awful but women are a riot to watch squirm.

“A kiss.”

“Why would you ever think–”

“You’re a bad liar, Reiko. You always have been.”

She doesn’t particularly care if her poking is anywhere near the mark. But Tomie has found something at last that gives Reiko life, animation, and if it means she has to do it again…there are worse fates Tomie can think of that she’s sure Reiko would beg her not to unleash.

Reiko says nothing, her eyes flashing and angry, as she hunkers down once more into her resting position. With this Tomie knows she has won for now. She has tended to her little spark for so long that she’s managed at last to make it into a small fire. The only thing left to do now is to keep adding more kindling to its blaze.

As she leaves the In Between Place behind, her mind drifting back across the void she gives one last glance to the small, shaking girl near her. For a moment the anger she felt earlier dissipates and in its place is something Tomie can’t identify. It is a strange, murky thing that she’s never experienced, as confusing as what she’d felt on her initial search for Reiko. Tomie doesn’t dwell on it – self introspection is not something that matters – but at last she settles on ‘longing’ to describe it. Perhaps Reiko will forgive her someday.

Perhaps Tomie will learn to not be selfish.

#tomie #junji ito #drabble #junji ito collection #fan fic #unintentionally femslash if you squint #tomie kawakami #horror #manga

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chroniclackofselfpreservation · 3 years

Text

And The Dragon Will Come When He Hears The Drum

Chapter 3 - rage alone isn't fuel enough to enable me to fly

Back to the Beginning <Previous Chapter / Next Chapter > AO3

(TW: headaches, extreme cold, numbness, toxic family relationships, flashbacks, mention of a corpse)

(The title of this chapter comes from "Double Helix Kyrie" by Raymond Luczak)

Janus flew through the night without stopping. It had started snowing in earnest after the first hour or so, making his muscles stiff and decreasing visibility. He’d almost run into a snow-capped peak at one point, but the higher he flew, the more volatile the winds became. It was exhausting. Janus had to beat his wings twice as hard to go half as far as he normally would amidst the growing storm. He smelled the air often, on the lookout for any sort of static build up in the clouds. Dragons were notorious for attracting lightning while in the air.

When he at last arrived at the distant village, he couldn't feel his wings at all. Approaching the ground for a landing in the snow-covered meadow behind the healer’s modest cottage, Janus’s legs buckled beneath him and he hit the snow with a thunderous thud. He tried to fold his wings against his back, but the muscles wouldn’t respond, instead content to tremble and be useless. The icy wind slipped beneath his wings and, despite his best efforts, filled them like parachutes, sending him skidding snout-over-tail into the trees at the edge of the clearing.

“Janus?!” a voice shouted over the howling wind. Through the snow, he saw the disheveled healer holding a flickering lantern, shirt half-tucked and feet shoved shoddily into untied boots. Janus needed to shift, but he couldn’t focus long enough with the wind threatening to pluck him off the ground, and his mind threatening unconsciousness. If he passed out, he’d be stuck as a dragon until he came to.

Emile tromped through the knee-deep snow, one hand raised against the blizzard. “Did you fly in this? Janus, you could have been hurt!”

I’m not the one you should be worried about, he spoke to the healer’s mind. At last getting one of his wings under control by shoving up against a tree and crumpling it into place. The other caught another gust of wind and wrenched back, the muscles in his back and shoulders tweaking painfully.

Setting the lantern down, Emile scrambled up Janus’s shoulder—a foolhardy attempt that, with one fatal slip, could have ended with them both stranded out in the snow—reaching precariously far and secured his hands around the first major joint in his wings, dragging them down toward his body. With a lull in the howling winds, Janus at last closed his trembling wings.

Before he could succumb to unconsciousness, Janus made one last-ditch effort to shift. His form shrank instantly, and Emile let out a surprised cry. The healer landed on top of Janus, knocking all the wind out him.

“Oh no! Janus, why did you wait for me to—oh jeez, are you okay?” he fretted, scrambling off of Janus and brushing the snow off him.

“Inside,” he croaked, trying to roll over, to crawl, something. His arms wouldn’t listen to him. They just hung there uselessly, throbbing in the snow. The middle of a blizzard was no place to explain what had happened. Besides, Emile was starting to shake. He wasn’t even wearing a coat. Janus would be fine, the fire inside him more than enough to keep him warm all night if he had to, but the foolishly kind mortal had come out here in nothing more than day clothes.

“Right. Of course,” he said, hooking his hands beneath Janus’s arms and dragging him through the snow toward the cottage. Emile fell several times, slipping in the slush, but didn’t give up.

Janus passed out before they reached the house.

* * * * * * * * * *

Roman was an obstinate prince, and he knew it well. Enough, in fact, that it didn’t surprise him that his sister took advantage of him being sedated to pack up camp and start the brigade’s course back toward the castle. They’d traveled through the night—they must have, given the plush bed Roman was laying in and the faint rays of morning light streaming through gossamer curtains to his left. His head pounded worse than any hangover he’d suffered before, as if someone were driving a metal spike through his eye socket with every beat of his heart.

Squinting through the pain, Roman found himself alone in his quarters, dressed in clean, satin sleep clothes. The fireplace on the opposite wall was empty and cold. The pale stone walls loomed over him, coming together in ribbed vaults at their apex. On the left wall hung various swords and daggers for him to practice with whenever he pleased—and he often did.

His eyes finished their wander around the room at the grand bookshelf near the curtained window. Logan’s books. Roman tried to swallow, but couldn’t get past the lump in his throat. The warlock had been content reading in the palace library, but Roman had used any excuse to be around Logan.

You stole all the books on sorcery?

I didn’t steal them. Just relocated them.

Into your room?

Is that a problem?

Roman remembered Logan’s smile then. He so rarely smiled. It had become a sort of mission for the prince to bring a smile, however faint, to that studious face.

Roman heaved a shuddering breath, biting back the urge to dissolve into hysterics again. Why was no one around? Surely Patton, or even an attendant would be tasked with watching him. He was injured after all.

Who am I kidding? he thought, resigned. My parents would throw a ball if I dropped dead. One less thing for them to worry about.

As if on cue, the door to his chambers opened and a herald stepped through. Roman groaned and pulled one of his many pillows over his face in preparation.

“The Queen is here for an audience with Prince Roman,” the stuffy man announced. Roman flipped him off from beneath the pillow. The herald scoffed and left, the soft click of the queen’s shoes replacing him.

“That isn’t very princely of you, Roman,” she tutted before he could lower his hand.

“Apologies,” he muttered, feigning nonchalance. In truth, being around his mother in such a vulnerable state sent cold fear dripping down his spine. He had nothing to threaten her with.

“Oh, really,” she huffed, plucking the pillow away from his face and tossing it to the floor. “Don’t be so dramatic. Raila told me what happened. Warlocks die all the time. The fools are always overtaxing themselves in battle, leaving themselves vulnerable. It’s too bad, though. Yours lasted far longer than any of mine have,” the queen said, inspecting her nails.

Roman knew she was trying to get a rise out of him, but knowing her agenda didn’t make her words any less infuriating.

“What can I do for you, mother?” he asked, murderously pleasant.

She stroked his cheek with a sharp-nailed hand. “Is it so unbelievable that I wanted to check up on you, dear?”

Roman suppressed a shiver, meeting her gaze defiantly. She pursed her lips, hand pausing on his jaw, unimpressed by his silence.

“Right,” she said, giving his cheek a rough pat that Roman flinched against, despite his best efforts. “Don’t lounge around all day. I’ll expect you at dinner.”

With that said, the queen left.

Roman let out an explosive sigh, running his hands down his face. He swung his legs out from under his blankets and over the side of the bed, forcing himself up into a seat. The room lurched, his head pounding anew. It took several minutes before Roman figured he could stand without immediately collapsing.

There was a knock at the door. “Your Highness?” Patton called through the door.

“What do you want?” he snapped, leaning against his bedpost.

The healer opened the door and stepped inside. “I came to remove the healing sigil, Your Highness,” he explained, holding up his bag. “It should have done its job by now.”

“Healing sigil…?” Roman said.

“I inscribed one on the journey last night,” Patton said with an amused smile. “If you would remove your shirt, Your Highness.”

Roman unbuttoned his top and found an inky black symbol in the middle of his chest. “I’ve never seen you use one of these before,” he said curiously.

“You’d broken three ribs,” Patton explained, motioning for Roman to sit on his bed. He unclasped his medical bag and rifled through it. “I simply figured you wouldn’t want to be stuck in the castle for six weeks while they healed.”

Roman shuddered at the thought. Unable to escape his parents or siblings for a month and a half? He’d rather fight a hundred dragons. Patton took out a bottle of clear liquid and a small metal device that looked like a safety pin with a thimble attached to the end.

He paused, looking up. “How’s your head?”

“Terrible.”

Patton plucked a tiny vial from his bag and motioned for Roman to hold out his hand. He tapped out about a teaspoon’s worth of cobalt blue powder. “Let this dissolve on your tongue. It should help.”

Roman sniffed it quizzically. “What is it?”

“If I wanted to kill you, Your Highness, I would have done it out by the stream,” Patton sighed.

He has a point, Roman figured and downed the powder. Blueberry flavor exploded across his tongue and he almost coughed.

“I’m going to take your pulse,” Patton said, setting an open notebook on the side table. “I can take it on your wrist or neck. Which would you prefer?”

Roman held out his arm, not keen on the idea of letting someone’s hand that close to his throat. Patton took his hand and pressed two fingers into his wrist, just below his thumb, lips moving soundlessly as he counted to himself. Speaking of throats, the prince noticed Patton’s own was free of any sort of bruising or redness.

“How’s your neck?” Roman asked as casually as he could manage, as if he hadn’t literally strangled the man less than twenty-four hours ago.

Patton stiffened, ignoring him for a moment as he finished his count. “Well,” he said, dropping Roman’s hand and scribbling something down in his notebook without looking up at him, “I am a healer, so it’s doing better than it would have ordinarily.”

Roman squirmed a bit. “Right. Well, um, that’s good.”

“I need to listen to your breathing to ensure the ribs have healed properly,” Patton continued clinically. “May I place my ear on your chest?”

“Why do you keep asking me if you can do things?” Roman chuckled.

Patton still didn’t meet his eye. “Because you and your siblings have a propensity for attacking those who touch you without warning. May I?”

“Knock yourself out.”

The healer bent down and pressed his ear to one side of Roman’s chest, the skin-to-skin contact making the hair on the back of his neck rise.

“Deep breath,” the healer muttered. Roman obeyed, biting his cheek against the memories threatening to flood his mind. Logan and him laying in bed together, the warlock’s head resting against his chest, just as Patton’s was now.

“And another,” the healer said, shifting to the other side of his chest, right over his no doubt frantic heart. Roman gripped the blankets until his knuckles were white, forcing himself to take a deep breath.

Patton pulled away, glancing down at Roman’s fists. “Was there any pain while you were breathing?”

“No.”

“Good. I’ll remove the sigil, then.” He uncorked the bottle and poured some into his palm. It came out slowly, a syrup of some kind. Patton spread the strange liquid onto Roman’s chest, careful not to smudge the sigil. He flinched, surprised by how cold it was.

“May I ask you something, Your Highness?” the healer asked softly, almost unsure.

“What is it?”

Patton paused, his fingertips hovering just over the prince’s collar bone. “Have you ever apologized for something?”

Roman snorted. “Of course I have. I apologize to my parents all the time.”

“Other than the king and queen.”

Roman thought back. “I think I apologized to Reid once,” he said. His older brother had had to break one of his fingers to force it out of him, but it was an apology nonetheless. “Why?”

Patton pressed his lips into a hard line. “Nevermind,” he muttered, holding the small metal device just above his chest. “Prepare yourself.”

Before Roman could even open his mouth, Patton squeezed both sides of the pin. Sparks flew from within the thimble-like bowl, and the syrup ignited with a sharp hiss and a flash of green flame. In an instant, it was gone, leaving his chest dry and bare of any markings.

Roman yelped, scrambling back over the mattress. Patton fought a smile.

“You didn’t warn me on purpose,” he accused, heart racing.

Patton blinked at him innocently. “Would you like an apology, Your Highness?”

“Get out.”

“Certainly.” The healer grabbed his things and went to leave, giving a stiff bow.

“Wait!”

Patton hesitated. “Yes, Your Highness?”

Roman swallowed, trying not to sound too desperate. “Logan. Where is he?”

Patton’s expression softened somewhat, his shoulder’s relaxing. “He’s safe and cleaned up in my office. I even put a preservation spell on him.”

“Move him to the dungeons,” Roman said, lowering his voice. “As discretely as you can. Don’t let anyone see.”

Patton’s brow furrowed. “The… dungeons, my prince?”

Roman tore his signet ring from his finger and shoved it into Patton’s hands. “Show this to the dungeon guard and they’ll let you pass. Please,” he begged—perhaps for the first time to someone of a lower social standing than him.

Patton nodded, taking and ring and exiting the room. Roman’s headache was almost completely gone, thanks to that mysterious powder.

It was time to visit his baby brother.

* * * * * * * * * *

Remus paced the cave for what must have been the thousandth time. Virgil lay in his dragon form, eyes half-lidded, panting slightly. The sword hilt still stuck out from between his ribs tauntingly. He’d figured pretty quickly that the blade hadn’t pierced Virgil’s heart. He wouldn’t be alive right now if it had. What was more likely, he’d simply been insanely lucky and only punctured one lung.

Morning light peeked over the mountain peaks, the sky empty. No sign of Janus. The snow had cleared up, at least.

It made Remus twitchy with rage at the thought of that snot-nosed prince injuring, and possibly eventually killing, his best friend’s partner. Janus would probably die of grief. And then Remus would be alone. Again.

Giving in, Remus started toward the cave entrance. “Don’t die while I’m out, Virgil.”

Where are you going? he asked weakly, his tail twitching. There was human blood still smearing its spikes.

“To capture a prince.” He didn’t want to leave Virgil alone, but it wasn’t going to change anything if he did end up dying before Janus got back. Remus would just have to sit and watch.

Instead of arguing, Virgil quipped, Capture? I thought you wanted to rip his head off.

Remus reached the edge of the cliff then turned back, shrugging. “I like to play with my food.” And with that, he tipped backwards into the air with a salute.

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mega-otakumadness · 4 years

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This post is a part of the Year of Asian Stories reading challenge; for more information, please visit this post! (opens in a new tab)

Now that we’ve hit April, my Year of Asian Stories reading challenge is 75% done. Nine months in, three months to go, and… I am failing miserably. Also I’m very behind on posting reviews, too. So I was hoping this could be an assortment of mini-reviews that I have yet to post, especially for ones that I didn’t enjoy or ended up DNFing.

I’ve read a fair amount of books from this challenge so far, and I wanted to let you guys know how I’m doing so far and set some goals for the last three months of this challenge.

Books I’ve Read: Fantasy

Of the original thirteen books on my YoAS reading list, I’ve so far read six of them. One got a four-star rating from me: Red Winter by Annette Marie.

For my full thoughts on this book: Year of Asian Stories: Red Winter by Annette Marie

(No five star ratings in the fantasy section yet, but the ones I have left I have very high expectations for!)

The Twelve Kingdoms managed a solid 3.5 star rating.

Here is my review for this one: Year of Asian Stories: The Twelve Kingdoms

Unfortunately, both Descendant of the Crane and We Hunt the Flame, which I had extremely high hopes for, ended up at a mere two stars each.

In summary, Hesina (our protagonist, who is the princess of the kingdom and is investigating the death of her father), was incredibly stupid, made poor decisions, and despite her coronation being interrupted by a blood-soaked soldier bearing news that the rest of his battalion has been captured by the enemy, did nothing as queen to appease the public or protect her country. My notes from when I was reading this book say, in all caps because I was that angry at this book, “HESINA IS A STUPID SELFISH GIRL AND A TERRIBLE QUEEN.” And then the “twist” at the end was stupid and pointless and Hesina’s anger at her father was also stupid and pointless. You know whose anger wasn’t stupid and pointless? Mine when I read this book.

It seems as if Faizal just took a bunch of concepts from other popular medias (eg. the Wastes from Howl’s Moving Castle, the “forest that is about to swallow us up” from Nausicaa of the Valley of the Wind, the mysterious lady dressed in all silvery-white who is called the White Silver Witch from Chronicles of Narnia, and the entire premise of the “girl who hunts in the forbidden part of the land to feed her family and has a brother-like friend who can’t tell her he loves her, a mother who has given up on life after the death of her father, and a little sister who needs to be protected and loved” from Hunger Games) coddled it together with some average writing (umber eyes, anyone?) and forgot to add in a plot that would entertain the reader (the entire purpose of a book) until the last page.

For my full thoughts on this book: Year of Asian Stories: We Hunt the Flame

Two books in this section were DNFs. Tsumiko and the Enslaved Fox and Blood Ninja.

Tsumiko and the Enslaved Fox just failed to capture my interest or attention. I barely managed to make it to the 25% mark and then gave up on it in favor of Christmas (according to my Goodreads, I read it on Christmas Eve) and in favor of my very much anticipated reread of Harry Potter and the Half Blood Prince. I feel like, with a bit more editing and another revision, this could have been a great book, but so many things kept throwing me off as I read that I just didn’t want to spend any more time on it.

It was pretty much the same with Blood Ninja: I kept finding so many “off” things during the first few chapters that I just couldn’t get into it, and so when I finally hit the 25% mark, I gave myself permission to stop reading it for a few days and see if it called me back. It never did, and I ended up giving my copy away to a friend who is a middle school teacher whose kids probably enjoy it now a lot more than I did when I read it.

Contemporary/Non-Fantasy

Of the books in the contemporary section of my original post, I’ve read only four of them: A Tale for the Time Being, I Love You So Mochi, Fukushima Dreams, and Norwegian Wood.

A Tale for the Time Being and Norwegian Wood both got two stars, while I Love You So Mochi got four. Fukushima Dreams, unfortunately, was a DNF. You can expect a review for I Love You So Mochi to come in the following months. I’ve already posted my review of A Tale for the Time Being, and I may or may not post a full review of Norwegian Wood.

A cute contemporary with an interesting FMC that, unfortunately, had a few mini-WTF moments and some stuff that I wish had been expanded upon further.

400 pages of absolute nonsense–a dual POV story that didn’t even need Ruth’s POV. This could have been a single-POV story with just Nao’s story and I would have enjoyed it a whole lot more, if not for the blatant disability slur this book tossed out like it was no big deal.

For my full thoughts: Year of Asian Stories: A Tale for the Time Being

Nothing about this book was fun. Murakami got us to ship the main character with one of the girls, then all of a sudden took that girl out of the picture and got the main character to have instalove with the girl’s roommate, instead. There were a bunch of things wrong with this book, so if you’d like me to post a full, unabridged review of it, I will.

I just couldn’t get into this one. I DNFed it at about chapter four. I feel like this could have used another editing pass to make the prose stronger. And I couldn’t connect to Sachiko, our main protagonist, either. By the time I got to the point where I ultimately stopped, I was just bored reading this and wanted to move on to something else.

Nonfiction

I have actually managed to read two of the four nonfiction books I set for myself: My Awesome Japan Adventure and Japanamerica.

Japanamerica got a 3-star rating from me, on account of it being quite outdated, boring to get through, and less of an examination of the history of anime that I thought it would be and more of a statement about ANIME WAS CAUSED BY THE BOMBING OF HIROSHIMA, which kind of got shoved down the reader’s throat every other sentence. My Awesome Japan Adventure was just a really adorable read that I loved to bits and gave five stars. As it’s a picture book, however, I don’t feel like there’s enough content there to discuss, so I don’t foresee this getting a full review. It is a really great book for an upper elementary kid to learn about Japanese culture, though, if you’re looking for something like that. Though if you would like a review of My Awesome Japan Adventure, please let me know and I will share my full thoughts on it. 🙂

Anime/Video Games/etc.

I have finished none of the anime or video games for this challenge, as of yet. I am slowly working my way through Assassination Classroom, with Yona of the Dawn being on my radar, but the only video game I’ve picked up in the past five or so months was to play Super Paper Mario (and not even to finish the story, which I should mention that I’m on the final chapter and about to face the ultimate boss guy, but to instead start a whole new game and play through the first seven levels once more until I got to where I left it off, but then not continue it anymore past that).

So I have some work cut out for me in the next few months. I still have fifteen books left to read (and two of them are in Japanese, so that’ll take me longer to get through!), three anime to watch, and two video games to play, all before July. Guess I should get started then, eh? xD

Thank you very much for tuning in, everyone. If you’d like to support my content, make sure to follow The Discerning Reader blog to get my newest posts direct to your inbox.

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Happy reading everyone, and I’ll see you next time!

Corinne 乙女

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You might also enjoy these other posts from me:

Year of Asian Stories Announcement

2019 Bookish Survey

Year of Asian Stories: Red Winter by Annette Marie

Year of Asian Stories This post is a part of the Year of Asian Stories reading challenge; for more information, please visit this post!

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