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magalidragon · 3 years

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paris is always a good idea | a Jonerys Drabble

Thank you @youwerenevermine for my wonderful birthday gift, I love it so much and I love Paris so much and Jonerys and you for making this for me so I felt inspired and wrote a quick little drabble thing, lol. It’s only the fourth time I’ve written Jonerys in a modern, non-Westeros world, but it was fun! And I wanna’ go back so much! Paris, je t’aime!

They met while in university, oddly enough, as fate would have it, on her birthday.

She had been there to study art, for a year abroad, savoring every last second wandering the wide, arched hallways of the Louvre, staring at grand masters for hours on end, burning the vibrant colors and mesmerizing brushstrokes into her memory, wishing she could be as good as them one day. One day, someone would have her art in their house, and proudly boast they'd gotten it back when she was but a nobody, painting on the streets or in the grassy parks.

Since it was her birthday, she decided to treat herself, and instead of heading straight to the university to get some time in the studio, she decided to get an ice cream at Berthillon, heading to the Ile-St-Louis instead of to the metro, taking her time to admire, as she often did, the glory of Notre Dame, it’s gargoyles and buttresses.

At the glacier she took her time selecting a flavor, did not even mind paying the exorbitant price and shouldered through tourists taking refuge from a cold rain that had begun to fall. She savored it, the clean water bouncing off her peat coat and the beanie she’d tugged over her silver hair.

She was about to set off, to eat her ice cream and wander into the Marais, perhaps drop down into the Latin Quarter— maybe take a trip to Chanel or Dior or Celine to admire the creations she couldn’t afford— when her ice cream went flying, straight onto the wet sidewalk. Where a mass of pidgins attacked it with gusto.

“Merde! Faites attention!” she shouted, stomping her Doc Marten on the ground in petulant annoyance.

The man who had bumped her because he’d been roughhousing with another friend had been apologetic. He bought her another and said his name was Robb Stark. He was from Scotland, was on spring break with his buddies, which she didn’t care about. To apologize he invited her for a drink, especially when the worker who she’d told it was her birthday had commented on it again when she got another ice cream.

She figured why not? He was attractive, sorry, and nice enough so she agreed, although she had commented his French was terrible best to speak English. “You’re English?” he had teased.

“Half and half,” she answered. English father, French mother.

At the comptoir where she suggested they meet, in Montmartre, she brought her roommate Missandei and Missandei’s boyfriend Grey. It was just a drink and they’d leave and go to the dinner Missandei planned to take her to anyway.

Except that’s where she met him.

The dark, brooding figure at the tiny table in the corner, ignoring Robb and Robb’s friend Theon, and a couple others, favoring silence and his drink. He was in all black, barely acknowledging her and slipped out for a smoke when Robb began to shamelessly flirt. She didn’t care about Robb, she cared about him.

Jon.

She exited, saw him lighting a cigarette against a lap post. She flicked her coat collar up and sidled towards him. “Puis-j’en avoir un?”

“Sorry I don’t speak,” he began, and his eyes— black in the orange lamplight glow— flicking to her. He smiled gently “French.”

She smiled and repeated her question in English. “Can I have one? A smoke that is?”

He stuck the cigarette between his pouty, sinful lips, framed with a cropped dark beard, and reached into his coat pocket, removing a pack. She took one delicately and he lit it, cupping his hands around the tip so the wind didn’t blow it out.

A stream of smoke escaped her nostrils when she puffed and she smiled up at him, hoping he got the hint. “Do you like Paris?”

“Not especially.”

“Aw come on,” she teased. She hummed, closing her eyes and taking in the cold night. The electric buzz is people on the street and at the cafes and bars around them. “Paris is always a good idea.”

“Someone famous said that.”

“Audrey Hepburn.”

He sucked on the cigarette and smiled, a tiny one, the curve of his lip sly rather than shy. “You aren’t in there with the rest of them.”

“Because it’s my birthday and I want to do what I want to do.” She stubbed the cigarette out on the post and turned, disposing it in the bin by the door. A quick text to Missandei: I’m going to skip dinner, I think I have a date, she turned and studied him. “I’m…”

“Dany,” he said. He shrugged, finishing his smoke. “I remember.”

Her eyes narrowed. “I didn’t think you were listening when Robb introduced me.”

“I was.” He pulled the tartan scarf around his neck tighter. He glanced towards Sacré-Cœur, illuminated white in the lights around its base. He smirked at her. “You going back in?”

She shook her head. “No,” she drawled. She followed his gaze to Sacré-Cœur. “Have you been up there?”

“No.”

“You should. Some of the best views of Paris.”

He chuckled, voice tight. “You should invite Robb.”

“I think he might be a third wheel.”

It took him a second, the gears in his mind turning, understanding what she was saying. He cocked his head. His black curls were in a mess around his face. A few scattered rain drops landed on them, and he shook it free like a dog. Or a wolf, she thought, noting the animal embroidered on the edge of his scarf.

He narrowed his eyes again. “I told you I don’t really like Paris.”

“Why?”

“It’s loud. Busy. Dirty.”

She laughed. “Every city is like that but in Paris it’s different.”

“Why?”

Her bravado got the better of her and she stepped towards him, linking her arm through his. If he didn’t get it now, he was a stupid fool who deserved it when she kicked him into the gutter. “Because,” she murmured, rising to her toes, trying to gaze as directly as she could into his eyes, which she now saw were actually gray. His breathing quickened. “You’re with me.”

The wolf got the point with that comment. He allowed her to keep her arm around his and lead him towards the cathedral. They spoke of nothing and anything on the long walk through Montmartre to the highest point in the city.

He was in Paris for a research trip. He was studying medieval weapons and was going out to Bayeux to study some relics. His cousin Robb and friends came along for the free trip. They spoke about being starving artists in their field-- her literally an artist as it were. They talked about Paris-- how much he disliked it, how much she adored it. The top of Sacre-Coeur might have changed his mind, but he pretended he still didn’t get the appeal, so she dragged him back down to the streets, to her favorite all-night boulangerie, into the metro and across town to the Eiffel Tower, spinning in circles on the Champs du Mars. They ran across the Pont-de-la-Concorde and across the Tullieries. They wandered down the Seine, smoked cigarettes in the doorsteps of old buildings in the Latin Quarter, and drank cheap wine in one of the tourist-cafes near the Jardin du Luxembourg.

They meandered back through the streets, the city oddly quiet, the rain stopping, and she brought him to her garret studio in the Bastille, up the six flights of stairs to the top of the building, where she shed her coat and boots adn scratched her fat cat Drogon’s ears, leading him to the wrought-iron bars in one of the four windows she had, pushing the window open and crawling out, up onto the roof where she wanted to show him something.

“Look,” she directed, when he climbed up next to her-- less gracefully-- pointing to the lit-up Eiffel Tower.

He cursed under his breath. “It’s gorgeous.”

“It’s my favorite place in Paris. The rent is steep, but it’s worth it for this.” She chuckled. “And it has the best view.”

He whispered. “Yes, it does.”

And to her surprise, since she didn’t realize the time, the tower began to twinkle, the 20,000 lights across its metal beams flickering and she glanced sideways; he wasn’t watching the tower, but her face. She arched her brows. “You know, the lights twinkle for five minutes every hour, on the hour.” She smiled and shrugged, whispering. “It’s a sign that you’re supposed to return to Paris.”

Instead of saying anything, like how silly that was, he leaned in and cupped her face in his wide palm, callused and warm, bringing her face to meet his, kissing gently, in the twinkly glow of the lights. He pulled back a moment later, breathing, “I think I like Paris. And you’er right...this place has the best view.” His eyes were wide on hers, focused. She chuckled, nodding in agreement, and pulled him back to her for another kiss.

That night she savored every moment with him, as they pulled each other’s clothes off slowly, kissing and touching, every smooth curve and muscle of each other, each hard ridge and plane of his strong, muscular body or her soft, lean one. He touched her and kissed her and stroked her in ways she’d never experienced, bringing her to heights she’d only dreamed about. It was intense, the lights behind her closed eyelids when she came, over and over, gripping his shoulders, hair, the bedframe behind her. He rose up and over her, in and out, their bodies moving as one, thrusting and arching.

She didn’t know if she’d see him again; if this was a one-time, romantic Parisian adventure, but in the morning when she woke, she found him coming back inside from getting pastries and coffees, the faintest scent of cigarettes and her toothpaste on his lips when he kissed her good morning.

They exchanged their information, vowing to speak daily, and he would see her when he got back from Bayeux. She couldn’t believe when he did call and he kept his word. “When you lie, words lose their meaning,” he’d explained, obviously reading her surprise.

And when her year ended in Paris, she found herself in London, back at university, dreaming of their magical time there, even when they made time for each other, going back and forth from London to Edinburgh; and he from Edinburgh to Paris during the last couple of months of her year there.

They made it a priority; every single year they spent time in Paris, like they were students again, on that magical night.

They grew older, no longer needing to find the cheapest drinks and cigarettes, or staying in studio garrets, eventually able to experience some of the best hotels and restaurants the city had to offer, as he sold books and became a well-known author and professor, and her dream of becoming a famous artist came true, when sure enough, someone bought one of her paintings on the side of the Seine, someone who happened to be an art dealer in New York.

It was their city, where they met, and where they could remember.

After they married, about fifteen years after that fateful birthday, they visited again, and spun together on the Pont-Neuf, kissing and murmuring how they loved each other and always would, and he took her back to the tiny studio garret, which was now theirs, and sat on the rooftop and watched the Eiffel Tower sparkle.

“Paris is always a good idea,” she murmured, head in the crook of his neck, her back to his front, wrapped in a warm blanket, and his arms tight around her middle. She tilted her face up to his, sated, and still hopelessly in love with him. “Take me to Paris, Jon.”

He nuzzled his nose into her cheek, whispering. “You are Paris, Dany.”

As it was the city where they’d met, fallen in love, and found true happiness, she grinned, because that was his way of saying how much he loved her. She brushed her lips over his, sighing, “I love you.”

“I love you too.”

And they kissed, as the Eiffel Tower lit up, and she curled up into him, falling asleep in the city of love and lights.

#jonerys #jonerys au #jonerys drabble #Erika's gorgeous moodboards!#my random drabbles #Paris is always a good idea #Paris and jonerys is a better idea #happy birthday to me lol

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hauntedelation · 3 years

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Seize The Throne

(Picture found on Google, I don’t own.)

Description: He was always so reckless, drawn and following the darkest paths in life. You can’t help but chase after him with stars in your eyes and a bizarre thrill churning your gut. Maybe this time things were too heavy for you.

Pairing: Black Female Reader x Will Shaw

A/N: I recently watched one of my favorite mob movies, Goodfellas, and fell back in love with that gritty image. A good friend of mine, @hope-to-hell, had already created her world of Mob!Will and has several parts out featuring him and his chaotic ways. Part one, part two, and part three explore so many depths to him and that heart-pounding life. I strongly suggest reading!

Her writing of this version of Will was my most favorite and I really wanted to try to pay homage to that. I hope I did good love, 🥺💗

Word Count: 5.7k

Warnings: Graphic depictions of violence, gore and blood play, minor character death, reader sustains injuries, some fluff if you squint. I do not recommend if you happen to be sensitive to these topics. Please heed the warnings.

Proofread as much as I could, Please enjoy guys!

➽─────────────❥

The bottle is sat down next to your leg with a soft clink. Sand and sporadic rocks mold around the glass, holding the claret drink inside upright.

You feel your body hum pleasantly. The vibrations stem from the top of your head, down through your thighs, and settle in your toes, which are currently sunken into the warm clasp of the shore.

Salt and a hint of cinder brush your face and press through your hair, tousling the tight ringlets out of your eyes and behind your ear. You take in a breath while the wind dies down. To the very depth of your lungs, you allow the night to enter you.

The water is cool; blue as can be. It just about matched the sky earlier that morning, save for the bunching of storm clouds trailing toward the horizon.

It’s a wonderful feeling against your feverish skin, but it doesn’t fail to sting the cuts on your feet. You don’t move a muscle, not any closer to the swirling foam, but you ponder, maybe it will help.

You're unwound and you had been ever since you came closer to the sand. Head dancing blissfully and filling with each drop of the piquant wine, your visions were growing far more spirited than they had been for the last several hours.

The deal with Holford went to shit.

➽─────────────❥

You weren't sure why you were strung along with this one. Will had been disrupted, true, but he was always that way whenever a deal this significant came along. The other guys were unknown, fresh in the game but garnered enough reputation to be talked to. He insisted that you were to not be left at the house, too much risk, he couldn’t see you.

Much of the originally agreed amount was lost, the usual inquiry and loaded threats were slung from either side. Forty thousand was at stake, and the bastards dared to show up with only a quarter of that.

You were there resting two rooms down in a decaying office, listening to those voices, Will’s, Syverson, and maybe another. There was a restive silence, before a guttural shout and a bang was sent out, followed by an explosion of more. You felt your heart throb clear in your throat.

It was difficult to keep track, and the walls of that building were already so abysmally thin. There was a good possibility that if a punch was thrown, it would put a hole right in the plaster.

Bullets went through the drywall and sprinkled chalky dust into your hair. You had the right mind to jerk away and hit the floor. The concrete was chilly and layered with the filth that reminded you of a public subway. Upon impact, you were no doubt painted with inky marks on your knees and elbows.

You didn't cry out, none of it could be heard anyway. Yet, you did a fine job keeping whatever you wanted to scream out on the inside. You held your breath and ducked your head to the lowest point of the room.

It all tumbled over, that composure, soon after witnessing the man protecting you get his insides blown out.

From under the table, those projectiles continued to whizz in and out of the walls. Daniel, you think the kid’s name was, though he was only four years younger than you he had the face of a youth. He was always polite, getting you whatever it was that you wanted, afraid of disappointing.

They should have known he wasn't ready, wasn't skilled enough for any of this.

The door was kicked at, the brass lock weakening and soon falling away. Daniel whipped around, his machine gun tucked against his armpit and trembling finger on the trigger. He let out a few shots at a sharp speed, laying more holes in the door before dashing to the side.

He was panting, his big brown eyes glancing to you before pulling out another magazine from his pocket.

A deafening boom went through the wood, and the door flew open revealing colossal-sized boots stomping in. You don’t recall a second shot. Everything had been stunned, from your ability to move to any volume in your ears. All that was, had been ringing.

That gunshot indeed came, because you saw the kid fall back.

Crimson rained down over you and you felt the warmth dot your skin, covering the shade of your nail polish. Your eyes reopened and picked up far more carnage—tiny pieces of him all over the vicinity. Bone and flesh, some landing near your hands on the floor.

His body toppled to the ground. You remember how he landed, head smacking against the solid concrete and his eyes opened wider than saucers.

He was in shock, gurgling and spitting up blood down his chin. His fingers desperately scrambled for the handle of his machine gun, but it was kicked far out of his reach.

The faceless gunman placed Daniel’s chest under his boot, crushing the torn hole in his middle and forcing more distressed wails from the young man. Before the kid was able to cry any longer, he was cut off by another boom.

There wasn't much time to respond then. Your longtime guard was desecrated, all the life drained from him the instant the third shot was sent from the twelve gauge.

And all that you continued to hear, was ringing.

As that cliché says: time slowed to a standstill. Bullets pelted the surfaces, nonstop and in every direction. Devastation surged, wood chips and old papers swept up, and heavy footsteps trudged all throughout the concrete floors. You spent your lifetime under that table, cowering away from the turmoil.

Along your cheeks, and falling to your hands you saw the clear, salty liquid bend and mix with that young man’s blood

The make-shift shelter lasted a mere five minutes, then it was flipped over. Glasses and other items shattered onto the ground and spread to every corner of the room.

Directly after, your wrist was snatched in a viselike grip.

He had nails, this beast holding on to you. They were long, jagged, and digging far into your flesh. You sucked in the mucid air, holding back everything in your throat: bile, sobs, whatever it was. The man dictated something in your ear, along the lines of,

‘Keep that pretty fucking mouth shut before I pack it full with lead.’

It was more than a motivator. He adjusted his hold and dragged you toward the entryway of the room, pushing aside Daniel's lifeless body. Your free hand braced against the ground, but your legs were left dragging. It was grueling, finding leverage to move with the man.

With each manipulation the brute had on your body, each step of his feet and yank to your wrist, your legs caught shards of the glass and were sliced open. Amid this, the lacerations on your wrist gradually formed under his nails and began to drip hot down your arm. He was moving with purpose until he stalled right near the doorframe.

More bellows and pops of machine guns echoed against the stone.

The man was waiting, probably for the next cue. Or, maybe he was considering that last threat to you, should he go through with it?

How could you know?

After a while, you couldn’t feel anything at all. You couldn't feel the barrel of the gun pressed against your temple, your vein pumping against the hot surface, and the circulation around your wrist anymore. Your skin grew cold, vision drawing away. The lights in the room dimmed and you finally lept in a dark tunnel.

The weight between your shoulders slumped toward the ground.

It was shortly thereafter, seconds later, that those same voices came much closer than before. Your wrist ached but no longer were you under that crushing grip. The steaming metal of the shotgun was absent from your skin, though the pressure would forever be burned against your skull.

The only sensation that remained were calluses grazing against your skin.

There were no longer any gunshots, no more footsteps, or even glass shattering. The masculine tones in your ears surfaced and started to be particularly familiar. Those hands on your body, the clammy palms securing your jaw, it was real.

You felt how damp the thumb pads were and the sticky residue that was left behind along the line of your cheek.

Opening your lids was taxing, but you saw dark curls stuck to a creased forehead. A fresh gash was drawn on an eyebrow and dozens of bruises on that handsome face. A pink lip painfully split nearly in two.

The light was beaming around his head and the source was different than the one in that previous room. There were more windows. Natural light revealed one side of his form, highlighting his dewy skin and the dampness of his shirt.

The deep red splotches covering his body.

Your pupils dilated and centered on his face. He was panting, tongue swiping at that cut on his bottom lip. His voice read a steadied, but fraught question.

‘Hey—hey, Doll. You’re here with me, yeah?’

Will’s focus was dashing across your face and the rest of your body. His breathing jolted when he caught your pupils, but never did he lose grip of that solid poise. He reached up and his fingers smeared more pungent liquid on your face, forcing the iron-laced odor into your nostrils.

You coughed, grunting at the rough scratch along your throat. Your lips pressed together before you forced your head to nod weakly. You were sore, and you didn't really wish to move your legs at the moment. The hairs of his arm grazed against your fingertips. With a flex to your good wrist, you took hold of him.

You were breathing. You could see, you could hear, and while every bit of your nerves flared and pinched—you...were alive.

Will released a sigh low within his chest and out of his nose. The strain in his shoulders released a fraction, yet the muscles in his back maintained the stiff shape. His eyes were cognitive and lingered keenly on yours. He didn't choose to say anything else, and neither did you.

Your throat and your lungs felt as if they were packed with dust. And, what was there to say?

He dismissed a question that was brought up by a ragged-looking Sy. The veteran stopped his pacing by a blown-out window and shook his head. In a blur behind Will, you saw him remove his cap and use his stained shirt to wipe at the sweat on his buzzed head.

The air around Will's head was spiraling, the remnants of the firefight clinging to the air around you. You squinted and looked past the fog to see mutilated bodies, with thousands of bullet casings littering the floor.

Limbs twisted around, mangled, with pools of blood swallowing up each of the remains.

Every member of the Holford group was dressed in matching tan-colored suits, the corpses' jackets now drawn with scarlet. You weren't sure if you could answer the question, which man had been the one who grabbed you? Who killed Daniel?

Maybe he was one that slipped away.

Your braids moved from your face, the soft hairs by your forehead pushed back and smoothed away. Will's fingers, thoroughly slick with blood, left behind glistening streaks in their wake.

Following a short phone call made by Syverson, you three and the remaining number of Will’s men vacated the building. Duffle bags of cash and anything else that was of importance was secured.

While you made your way out of the structure, you caught the sight of armed workers, nudging the bodies of Holford’s group and aiming the end of their guns down at their heads.

The pops that rang out were sent past your mind. The air outside washed over you, fresh almost jarring. Under the occasional shots fired in the building, you could pick up the hum of insects and birds.

Your eyes fluttered under the tepid sunlight, and instead, you occupied yourself with the feeling of that. Just for those short seconds, you were under those rays.

Will was hot on your heels with a vigilant hand on your lower back, his other arm providing support for your shaky footfall. He was still running on hot, that look in his eye reflecting off far away from here.

He directed you toward a black truck and carefully helped you slip into the back passenger seat. After clicking the seatbelt over your lap, he dragged his eyes over you one last time, persisting on your wounds. He drummed his fingers on the palm of your hand and parted from you a promise,

‘It will be a little while, but I will be back. Sy will be taking us back to the house...we're gonna get you cleaned up.’

Through your lids and out the window of the vehicle, you observed the men’s work. Their actions were swift and it was clear to see that disposal of certain events was in their expertise.

A few of the guards were gathering red gallons of gasoline, entering the building, and dousing every surface on the interior. Others were negotiating with Syverson and Will, the latter man speaking with venom falling from his mouth. The last worker exited the archway and tossed the red bin in behind him.

Your legs ached. Minutes trickled by, and at first, you withheld moving. But it was as if each laceration was prying open. You took your eyes from the scene outside the truck and grit your teeth to readjust your body.

The window bore the weight of your head.

Will took a prolonged look at the decrepit building, his arms crossed and locked over his chest. The tendons in his jaw were spasming like a coiled knot and his mouth set at a firm line.

Whatever thoughts broke down in his mind, they were intensively racing and reflecting the failure of today. He sent a final nod to Sy before turning and making his way to the vehicle you were residing in.

Another man fished a lighter and cigarette out of his pocket, adjusting the strap of the rifle on his shoulder. He then flicked open the metal casting, lighting the end of the stick. Without closing the lid, he threw the lighter into the broken window of the building.

That drive was long. Despite the many twisting roads and turns, you noticed the flames shredding their way through the sky several miles away.

There behind you, Will's lips pressed to the crown of your head, with your body tucked into his chest. In your lap, you watched his torn knuckles flex. He formed a fist and would do so every couple of seconds, tremoring and taut. Eventually, he would ease up and relax those fingers, still shaking, but it would return.

Repeatedly, open and close...

open and close,

open and close.

➽─────────────❥

You flinched as Syverson carefully picked the glass out of your legs. You were sat on the granite countertop, bruised knees hooking over the edge and your foot resting in his camo-clad lap.

He was in a chair located directly in front of you, with his cap sitting on the counter and an assortment of tools surrounding it

Your wrist was the first that was looked at. It was throbbing, hardly able to be moved but the bleeding clogged. He cleaned it as much as he could and set it into a makeshift splint. Syverson then notified you that you most likely suffered fractures.

He would have a friend come tomorrow to properly take care of it.

The tweezers were skinny and almost disappeared under his thick fingers. He had his palm wrapped around your calf, and with an attentive eye, he leaned closer to dislodge more shards from your skin.

You wince as a jagged edge is plucked from your calf.

"Stop squirmin' little lady."

You tilt your head to the side and cradle your injured wrist in your lap. Your braids tangled and fell just over your shoulder. In a corner of your mind, you thought about a hot shower, scrubbing your skin, and taking the damn things down. To wash everything away.

It was absolutely anticipated.

Sy resumed his work, wetting his lips and holding back that vexatious grin.

The only sound resonating throughout the kitchen was the clink of the splinters hitting the plastic bowl, and the music of a film playing on T.V. Here and there you could make out Will's voice in the other room, his timbre suppressing an unhinged man.

How could he not? You knew how much today went south, it wasn't expected, but you didn't make an attempt to eavesdrop anymore.

Really, you didn't venture to do anything but sit and wait until the soldier at your feet was finished.

Will had entered the house before you and with not another step further, he conveyed to his partner that same pithy look. The point of your shoulder was gently tapped and under his bushy beard, the southern man offered you an apologetic look.

Sy was nothing but meticulous. He had a way about his movements that indicated his substantial experience. While he was working, your eyes glanced over that brawny man, taking in the thick slabs of muscle on his shoulders. You had to figure he possessed more scars than five men combined.

He had the look of a man who had seen a lot in his life and could destroy everything in his path, but to you, he was the sweetest he can be.

You withheld a moment longer, additional pieces of shrapnel were dug and removed from your limbs. He pulled back and sat down those tweezers, promptly moving his fingers to wrap around a cheap bottle of alcohol.

He doused a fresh white cloth with the clear drink and patted each of your opened wounds.

"Mwell...You're lucky you don't need any stitches, sweetheart," he husked.

Your lip quirked at his tone. He peered up at you with a ghost of a sanguine reflection in his eye. Remarkably, he was always the one to find a smile out of you, always after those wearisome days. You decided to indulge the man, forcing a curl to your lips. You then turned away and watched the images flash over the television screen.

His fingers lingered on a bigger cut on the top of your knee, clearing his throat. The muscles of your thigh tensed, like acid on flesh. Your nails clutched the surface of the granite and scratched shallowly.

Sy's thumb rubbed at the outside of your leg in return, applying a little more pressure to the wound before ultimately removing his fingers.

Your attention drifted away from the screen, you knit your brows down at your legs. You were sure that you would adorn some scars from today, the unfortunate memory coming in at each glance to your body.

The bottle of alcohol was placed between Syverson's legs, tucked close to his groin. You clocked your eye from his face back to the container. He was occupied wrapping bandages over your wounds, soon finishing off the last one before catching your look.

He took his hands from your legs, and palmed the neck of the bottle, unscrewing the cap. He tipped his bushy jaw back and poured the biting liquid down. Sy offered the drink to you with a crinkle of his nose. It was unspoken, but you chewed on your lip.

"Do we have anything else?"

➽─────────────❥

The bubbling of the ocean, that sparkling shore, and the break in the clouds, all of it was transfixing. You wanted to see the moonlight, to breathe the fresh air, and genuinely feel that you were alive.

So you slipped into something willowy. You couldn't pinpoint where it came from exactly. The tag was black and stitched gold in a foreign language, far too small to discern without a magnifier. From a closer look at the skew of the words, you could guess it came from somewhere in southern Europe.

The fabric was silk, completely pearly white with a sheer design layering over your chest. It was revealing, rightfully so though it was currently the dead of summer.

Moreover, it worked well to not agitate your wounds.

You passed by the living room where Sy had his feet kicked up on the coffee table, fingers rubbing at the bridge of his nose. The man was slumped as far as he could on that couch, all grime, perspiration, and fatigue.

You made sure to not close the glass-sliding door all the way.

Behind the sepia-colored bottle, you scanned about your surroundings. The palm trees strewn about the property swayed lazily in the wind, welcoming, disclosing to you: It's alright, you can relax now.

There was a blur of grey standing against the greenery, men in slacks with glimmering metal-encased by their arms. Those silent watchdogs weren't new to you, their presence would vanish from your mind from time to time. And even more so, the image of them called: It's alright, everything is okay now.

Except it wasn't, it wouldn't be for as long as you would remember today, but ever since arriving at this location you had been trying to convince yourself otherwise. Best practice was to acknowledge, right? You wouldn't pretend that today never happened, that you didn't come a hair's breadth away from perishing.

Being wasted away far before you should.

It's not hard to think about. This lifestyle, the outlook, and the expiration date of it all. You've known about it ever since you were a teenage girl.

The missing people that would show up in undisclosed locations, how strict your mother was with making friends, the luxury items in your home, and all of the days your father would be away, it didn't make sense until much later.

Securing all of your family's secrets followed quickly with your adulthood.

You think back to before everything split apart before you broke away. And now you stand outside of a clandestine house in God-knows-what country, you reflect.

It was never meant to last forever.

These nights you thought about many faces, strangers to the person you are now but people that blotched their fingerprints in your brain. Your mother comes around, stops during those times when you grow the most imaginative.

She would adorn a knowing look on her face but waited until you asked her for advice.

If you could just talk to her now. She'd probably kiss her teeth, cross her arms, and her heart breaking the longer she watched you. The dismay gone—no, she'd never forget what you did to the family, how you could give away your father like that with no further thought.

You hope that she would find it in her to understand, that she would look into you and see why you did everything.

If you opened your eyes and saw her standing before you in the sand, you'd take her hands in yours and ask her—just how to navigate. How do you go day by day and still feel alive?

For the first time in your life, you had no clue what she would reply with.

You were close to lifting your foot off the stone porch and making your way through the sand until the slide of the patio door reached your ears.

He sauntered out wielding a cup of amber, hair damp and pushed back from his forehead, his clothes changed to something fresh, new. He had just as much gauze wound around his body as you did, but he walked as comfortably as any man.

Will was born for this life.

He sat down by the outdoor dining table, placing his glass down and stretching his legs wide and relaxed in the chair. His fingers slid down the length of his shorts, stopping at his knees and staying there.

You wrapped the gown around your body and brushed away the bumps rising on your skin.

There was a gale that blew through whenever he was near, more submerging than the humid air around you. Something close to those storms that frightened you as a child, the imminence and the pause between claps of thunder.

Yet, every time that they came, you ever ran away to hide.

Will's brows creased, and he removed his attention from the undisturbed tide straight to you. His right hand moved back on his leg and pat the top of his thigh,

"Come here."

You were slow with approaching him. The bottle in your hands was replaced with his shoulders, the container clinking dismissively close by his drink. Will's arms opened up the moment you stepped between his thighs. His head tilted back, peering up at you. He wound his fingers behind your thighs and settled you astride his lap.

The way that you drew into him, there wasn't much helping it.

You could feel him on your neck, your cheeks and your lashes, Will's breaths, and his utmost tutelage. Maybe this was your favorite. From your position, you could look down at him just right, draw the light in his covert eyes.

You were able to capture all of the lines on his face, the shade of his skin, and those dots that appeared after being out in the sun. You could study this man, searching for whatever you wanted. Each and every time you tried discovering something new.

With all of the secrets he locked away from you, there were about a dozen escaping every other day. Tales whispered amongst the other members and strangers, lingering eyes on Will's back whenever he walked by. He carried himself as if he was grasping at direction, but it was well known how untamed he used to be.

No, he was still a wild animal in his soul, you knew that part about him wouldn't ever change. You bet if you took his hand in yours there would still be dried-up blood stuck under his nails. You knew this but here you are, towering over him and you still can't quite read the shadows in his eyes.

These times? Unfortunately, they were few and far between.

Right now, he held onto you like you wouldn’t be slipping away anytime soon.

“Y/n.”

Will was mindful of your wounds, fingertips gliding over the sides of your legs and taking a cautious hold of your bound wrist. The bruising feeling shot through the crushed bones. Will gingerly placed his lips along the top of your thumb and followed the bandage wraps down your wrist.

"How're you feeling?"

He didn't blink, and for an important reason, you wouldn't look away from him. He wanted from you, your reply, whether or not it was one-hundred percent.

"I'm okay."

Your coils moved with your head, a chary nod. You knew that you shouldn't think too deeply about that question. You were patched up, scrubbed clean from all of the stains today, his skin was there and warm under your hand.

So you scooted closer to Will, brushing your chest against his, and laced your fingers around the back of his neck.

He focused on your natural hair, how the tresses flowed down your back and framed your face. You made good on your promise to yourself on cutting the old-style away. There wasn't anything quite like that feeling, that weight falling away and nothing but an utterly new look.

You turned your eyes toward the horizon, catching the distant twinkling of fishing ships and airplanes. The red and white were faint, and sometimes those lights blended in with the stars. But never had they been any closer than several dozen miles.

On the shell of your ear and down your jaw, Will's facial hair started stroking and prodding.

"Doll…"

Your lips pulled tight. You carded your nails through his damp ringlets and twirled a few strands around, fidgeting.

"Don't you go soft on me."

His fingertips sunk lightly into the flesh of your lower back and bottom. You heard him sniff quietly. For a second there, you thought he was going to apologize to you. Though, Will's thumb hooked under your jaw, caressing with a tender stroke before leading you to him.

And he kissed you, real slow.

More than he ever had with you. Will was always messy—greedy, a palm on the nape of your neck and draining the oxygen from your lungs.

He kissed you as if you were about to fall into pieces. You pulled away from him after a long while, still dazed. It was before you could slide off that white gown and unlace the waistband of his shorts. All in front of those men in the shade. It wouldn't be the first time, nor the last.

He was reluctant, his palms residual on your body, but you slotted your fingers through his and detached them from your hips.

Will carried somewhat of a smile slanting his face. In the low light, you can catch a glimpse of it, how his cut lip stretched. You braced your hand midway on his chest and lifted yourself up from him. You then palmed the wine in one hand, tossing a look from over your shoulder before setting on your way.

He didn't get up or try to chase after you, but the movement behind his eyes did.

You went on to do what you originally wished to, feeling the salt and the sand. You had been neglected of this for forever it seemed, months, years maybe. Just like through the window of the bedroom there was still a spell of sorts being cast on the beach, you weren't going to fight it.

All the way to the mouth of the shore you went, taking in sips of wine and filling your vision with the stars.

Never did he take his eyes from you.

"How's she holding up?"

Sy stood about two feet away with a towel draped around his shoulders and his back leaning against the patio door. Will turned his head to glance at the soldier, before returning to you.

"She's... she'll be alright."

Will sat up in his chair, sweeping his eyes through the backyard once again.

"We lost five guys today, three including the guys from the inner circle, two others were regulars...Still have over 27K to retrieve," Sy reflected.

He set his elbow on the armrest, rubbing his fingers over the stubble on his face and surrounding his lips.

"It's a shame what happened to that kid. I'll take care of his grandparents...send them a severance."

Christ, he was actually feeling a bit of guilt, more so with how the kid went out. But, he knew what this job was. He was told about the repressions and what was expected.

Daniel was a few months shy of his next birthday if Will had that right. And, now he wouldn't even be able to have an opened casket for his funeral. Not that this mattered in the end, though.

He wouldn’t have a casket at all.

"...They've fucking lost it if they think this is all forgotten."

Syverson nodded his head, already preparing his mind for any possible retaliation. No doubt much of the next few days will be filled with planning, making calls, and ordering more supplies. Maybe a few all-nighters just to get the deal straight, spending money just to make triple the return. He thinks that he might phone up Walker, the caliber of this situation had blown up in that man's range anyway.

"You have guys surrounding the perimeter?"

"Don't you go sweet on me, Will," Sy laughed. Of course, there were men around the perimeter. Not one spot was left open.

Will wrapped his fingers around the glass and took a small sip of the drink. His jaw twitched once again at that phrase, it just about mirrored yours, "I'm not."

There was a brief silence between the men, Will wasn't looking at Sy but both of them had somewhat of the same thought winding through their worn-out minds. The soldier followed his partner's eyes, down the shore and to where those tan grains disappeared in the water.

"Then why are you sitting outside, watching her like a hawk?"

Will did not say anything in return. His tongue prodded again at the cut on his lower lip. He slowly lifted his glass and knocked back the rest of the liquor in his cup. The water and the trees moved in the wind and the sound filled their ears. Those low clouds were picked up by the gust and eventually revealed the moon.

That cool blue light spilled down and radiated off your bronze skin. It was like you glowed, drawing Will's unreadable gaze.

You were pushing your feet toward the ocean, just barely letting the water touch. Your fingers wrapped around the neck of the bottle, not moving the container but, letting your nails pick at the ridges in the glass. Will stared at how your head tilted to the side, and your lashes closing, taking in the breeze blowing through you.

There he was dwelling, fingertips tapping on his knee and another bracing on his face, ruminating through those long corridors in his mind. As he watched you he couldn't help but think in the past, back when he first laid eyes on you and took in that fear entangled in your soul.

He thinks back to your inconceivable proposition, you were on your knees for him, begging for a chance to show him what you got. You were dead serious in the end and you slid to him that folded up paper with the keys to the universe.

He shook his head and scratched at his hair, Will's brain repeated those words that your father said to him. Through grit teeth, spitting, and bloodshot orbs, his voice echoed that foreboding line up to Will.

‘Listen, son, you fall asleep at night with the visions of the world twirling in your palms. You are hungry for it and you run rampant with the darkness that resides in every man. You don’t lock yourself back and you will stumble. The time will come where your dominion crumbles and knocks the crown off of your head. And when you wake, a phantom won’t take you, but you will be rasping for it when you watch everything you breathe for get torn to shreds.’

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Taglist: @feralrunaway @inlovewithhisblueeyes @emyearns @mansaaay @cavillryarchive @thetaoofzoe

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#henry cavill x reader #henry cavill imagine #henry cavill fanfic #Will Shaw #henry cavill x black!reader #black reader #woc reader #will shaw x reader #will shaw imagine #henry cavill x you #will shaw x you #henry cavill x black reader #the cold light of day

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writing-the-end · 3 years

Text

LoL Chapter 51- Fallen Angel

(Sorry this is late! i got my vaccine and it mcfucking knocked me out lol)

Masterpost

A Wizard Hermits tale (AU, designs, ideas belongs to @theguardiansofredland)

The hermits return to Eremita from a restocking trip, to discover they have been raided. And one hermit has been taken.

Warning: Capture, slight torture scene

_________________________________

Eremita has become their safe haven, the last bastion for the guild. Even when the arcane guard chased them all the way to the water’s edge, no sane person would dare follow the hermits into the Ashioll sea. Which is exactly why they lived in its mysterious, misty embrace.

They could no longer simply fly off upon the backs of sky turtles, or even teleport into the towns they frequented. Now, when the hermits absolutely had to go into public for supplies they couldn’t make or grow themselves, they sailed in on Cleo’s pirate ship. And when they had to leave, they made sure that if anyone was following them, they took a roundabout direction back to their home. It adds time, weaving between the islands and through the mists, but ensures no one can guess where they live.

Cleo’s pirate ship beaches up onto the sand, nestling back into place as a wrecked vessel once more. The dream magic fades, revealing broken oak boards, seagrass growing through seams, and splintered masts of the ghost ship Cleo commands. Hypno blinks free from his sleep, rubbing his eyes and yawning. “Already? Man, my dream was just starting to get interesting.”

With the help of rattling skeletons, their bones held together by magical muscle and sinew, the hermits unload food, meats, fabrics, and more. Enough for months, as if they were preparing to be snowed in after a massive blizzard. Almost all the hermits were a part of the flow of supplies.

Almost. Only three hermits stayed behind. Zedaph had an accident with his two explosive friends, and while it wasn’t the first time, Grian wanted to keep an eye on the burns in case the magic lingered. Mumbo stayed behind as well, but for very different reasons. One, he was easily recognizable. Everyone knows the multimage that Dolios wants captured alive. Him and Grian are the only two who Dolios demands be captured alive. He also was in the middle of inventing some new contraption, and was not about to leave it behind and lose all his progress. Last Cleo saw of him, he was extinguishing burning locks of hair. She wonders if he’s made any progress, or if he’s burned all his hair away at this point.

Once Impulse and Tango have unloaded their share of the shipment, they go in search of their friend. Both still feel bad for burning Zed, even if it was by accident. And they’ve all been burned at this point in all their years together. But it doesn’t mean they don’t feel bad, especially leaving Zed behind. At least they brought back a caramel apple from his favorite stall in the market, as well as fresh hay for his barn and animal friends.

“Zed? We have a surprise for you!” Tango calls, his voice twinged with mischief, as if they plan to prank their friend rather than give him a gift. No response comes from the flat roofed barn, except the distant bleat of a sheep. Tango looks at Impulse, fiery hair remaining vertical even as his head tips to the side. “Could he be taking a nap?”

“You know Zed and his sleep schedule, he wouldn’t interrupt it, even when he wakes up on the wrong side of the bed.” Impulse waves it off. “He probably just isn’t listening, or maybe pulling a prank of his own. Let’s go in.”

Impulse waves Tango through the gate, careful to keep the sheep, goats, and other farm animals from getting between Tango’s feet and causing his hair to ignite the dry hay in his arms. A horse nips at the bale, but Tango keeps it well away from catching fire. He’s relieved to lighten the load he’s carrying as soon as they're inside the barn. Both mages look to the bed tucked in the corner, but no Zedaph. Tango tosses the haybale aside. “He should be resting.”

They clamber over the piles of hay, searching every nook and cranny for Zedaph. Even his cookie stash, which they let him believe is still a secret. But Zed is nowhere within the barn he chooses to live in.

Concern pales both Impulse and Tango’s face, and Tango’s hair reacts in kind to the revelation. “Perhaps he’s being treated by Grian?”

Tango doesn’t answer, already following the path across the width of the island, from one shore to another. Grian’s floating cloud, the quartz tower with large archways and a glass domed roof. Perfectly built for a sky angel, his wings and speed. Not so perfect for his roommate, and all of Mumbo’s redstone machinery, his own lanky body climbing up onto the solid cloud and stairs to sleeping quarters.

The redstone workshop at the base of the building has been cleaned up, though a few vials seem to have rolled away, as if they were grabbed then subsequently dropped. But, just like the barn, no sign of Mumbo.

But there is a sound. Echoing from the glass dome, a sniffling, stifling cry escapes from above, followed by a gasping, shuddering breath. Impulse runs up the steps as fast as possible, each bounce from stair to stair accentuated with a tiny explosion to give him more speed. Tango blazes behind, fire burning bright as the sun as energy courses through him. He notices on the way up grey streaks against the pure white quartz.

“Zedaph?” Impulse breathes, screeching to a full stop. In the center of the room, Mumbo and Zed are huddled close, holding on tight. Their eyes wild with fear, and in Zed’s eyes he can see a shared memory. A shared trauma him, Impulse, and Tango all share. Two hermits, holding onto each other like its their last hope.

Only two. “Where’s Grian?”

Mumbo opens his mouth, but a strangled cry only escapes. Tears fall from both their faces, shaking like leaves. Something bad has happened to their friend. Tango slides across the floor, grabbing Zedaph and Mumbo. “What happened? Where’s Grian? Are you hurt?”

They both shake their heads, but finally Mumbo gathers enough of his voice to speak. It’s weak, broken apart like glass shattering. “He took him.”

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A cold, wet air fills Grian’s lungs, biting into his skin like ice on a cold morning. When he tries to open his eyes, the dull ache of his skull becomes sharp, forcing the angel to screw them closed again. Grian grimaces, trying to figure out why he has such a terrible headache. Did he hit his head in training? No, he wouldn’t have been allowed to sleep with the hermits hovering over him. Perhaps he drank too much. Once again, impossible. Grian knows what his hangover is like, and it’s not this.

He realizes he’s definitely hanging, but not from drinking. Cold, hard metal presses flat against his wrists, suspended over his head. The iron bites into his skin, all his weight rubbing his wrists raw.

“Good, you’re awake. I was starting to get bored waiting, though I do quite enjoy relishing in finally having my prize thirty years in the making.” The snide, even tempo of Magistrate Dolios’s voice hurts worse than any headache or wrist, and Grian finally manages to open his eyes. The cavern he finds himself in is foreign, not even remotely similar to the brick and iron dungeons where he last woke up in Dolios’s clutches. So long ago, it feels like. The Championship. At the time, he felt like he was at the top of the world. Now? Now he feels like the world was crushing him.

Grian resists his bindings, but even when he kicks outward, his feet don’t even scrape the dank floor. He tips his head back, until the crown of his head collides with a smooth, hard material. Just at the touch, he can feel the oppressive energy of the crystal. In his vision, he sees the sharp tip of the massive gem. Each wrist is locked tight against the crystal, the nails buried deep in the crystal lattice.

He looks around, searching for other hermits. For Mumbo, the last face he remembers before…

The memories flood in, cascading alongside the fear and panic. He remembers everything, every terrifying second. Leaving Zedaph to meet with Mumbo, he remembers the scent of marigolds on his hands, just after crushing the petals to make a paste for Zedaph’s burns. The quiet island, most of the other hermits gone. He remembers patting his pocket, the note from his best friend telling him to meet at Iskall’s place.

But when he arrived, Mumbo was nowhere to be seen. It wasn’t unusual, Mumbo tended to get distracted and be late. So he waited, plucking orange petals from his clothes, hair, and hands. He should’ve noticed the way the wind shifted, becoming cold and stale, before disappearing completely.

He should’ve realized something was very wrong when the grey stormcloud appeared. But he didn’t. He was so focused on waiting for Mumbo, then on getting rid of the flowers in his feathers, that he didn’t see the husks crawl their way free of the ocean. At least, not until the husk of a soldier came barreling for him, empty glowing white eyes and ashen, flaky form charging with halberd drawn.

Grian squeaked, dodging the attack. Stumbled over the writhing form of a cactus cat, the fading spines still quite sharp, he was saved by a pair of not-grey arms.

Not grey arms draped in wine red fabric, the hems decorated in gold thread. He realized who it was immediately, and scrambled to try and get away. But Dolios’s magic kept a strong grip, vines of black twisting and tying Grian’s wings to his back, while a hazy fog had grown around them.

He remembers the feeling of Dolios’s hands in his hair, pulling him to his feet as he struggled and fought against the vines and the fog that filled his mind. Hands clawing at his binds, even biting the magistrate at one point. He remembers the taste of blood, iron on his tongue and Dolios swearing, blasting Grian with magic.

And the last thing he remembers, before being knocked out and torn away from his home, was Mumbo’s face. Rounding the corner, completely oblivious to the fight occurring. It was at that moment that Grian realized, when his eyes locked with Mumbo’s that it wasn’t him that sent the letter. The confusion, of seeing Grian, the surprise on his face. He was walking towards the infirmary, dropping the box in his hand upon seeing the sight before him.

The fear on Mumbo’s face matched Grian’s own, as he was dragged into the sea. A second later, a swift burst of sonic energy knocked him out.

And now he’s here. Dolios saunters across the room, gathering ingredients and writing down notes. Grian swings his legs, and summons his wings to try and be free. But as soon as the blue and white feathers appear, they crumble into ash. Crushing weight sets in on his head, his shoulders, his lungs, and his magic, and the crystal he’s trapped against hums with power. “You’re quite different from the last angel I hunted. At least you fought back, but in the end they left me without the gift of their magic. This time, I’m not letting anything go to chance.”

The magistrate sets his bowl of guts aside, approaching the crystal and Grian. His hands are clasped behind his back, shoulders straight and head held high. The weight of the oppressive dark magic doesn’t bother him. Grian’s not ready to give up just yet. He attempts to kick Dolios, but the dark mage stands mere centimeters out of reach. So Grian decides to use his words. “You’re kind of an asshole, you know that?”

“I’ve been told that once or twice before, yes. But the rest of Lairyon loves me. And why wouldn’t they? I’ve brought prosperity to this kingdom, done more than that stupid rainbow king could ever do, and all of this because of my power.” Dolios sweeps his hands, vapors of dark magic swirling from his fingers as his fingers clench to fists

“Stolen magic. If the citizens knew, they’d hate you just as much as I do.” Grian reels back his head, and does the best he can to annoy Dolios. He spits on him. The glob of spit lands on Dolios’s cheek, the magistrate flinching, then reaching up and wiping it away. A fresh anger in his eyes.

“And who would believe you? An outcast mercenary orphan? The last of your kind?” Dolios stoops low, plucking a husked feather from the floor. He walks back to the table, mixing the components and ingredients from his jars of death with Grian’s feather. “Your power is rare. Angelic mages are always powerful, a power I crave. You will be a wonderful addition to my collection of magic. The last of the angels to complete my set!”

A fearful shiver ricochets down Grian’s spine. “You’re going to turn me into a husk?”

“Oh, gods no!” Dolios laughs, so loud that it echoes off the cavern walls as he throws his head back, brown curls dancing across rich fabric. “I wouldn’t dare waste such magic to become simple energy for me and my beast. No, no. Do not fret, little bird, you will become so much more. I don’t plan to drain your energy. I plan to steal it.”

The hunger in Dolios’s eyes as he turns, the concoction in his hand, Grian realizes what he's seen all this time in Dolios’s eyes. Hunger. A madman hellbent on taking what he sees as rightfully his.. A predator stalking his prey. And Grian was cornered, pinned. Unable to fight back, unable to fly away. Fear is replaced by terror, a sensation Grian struggles to fight back. He needs to think clearly if he hopes to survive.

“The last angel died before my powers were…” Grian pauses, seeing the coy smile on Dolios’s face.

“I always had a-” Dolios pauses, waving his hand nonchalantly before marking the ground around the crystal spires with dark seal. “-fascination with angelic wizards. A dear friend of mine in my youth was one. Ever since then, I knew I had to have that kind of magic in my collection. So strong, each and every one of you. With magic even the ancient ones revered. And now?”

Dolios steps back, casting his magic circle. Rather than emitting color and light, it absorbs all color to make the pattern of his magic. He raises his hands, and two satellite crystals awaken. Darkness swirls in the lattice of the gems, mist eeking out through pores and filling the cavern with darkness. When the mist reaches the seal surrounding the crystal Grian’s chained to, the spire behind him, pressed against his back, activates. The pressure on his body, his magic becomes unbearable, breaking into pain. Like a harpoon through his chest, the dark magic takes hold. Biting down, biting in.

And slowly, agonizingly stealing his magic. So intrinsically tied to his soul, hsi lifeforce, it feels as if his very being is being dragged from every inch of his body in contact with the crystal. He writhes to escape the painful magic, but the bonds hold firm and he struggles to catch his breath. Dolios steps back, basking with ravished delight at the scene before him. Enjoying the pain that tears at Grian’s skin, soul, and spell. “Now the magic will soon be mine.”

#hermitcraft #hermitcraft au #hermitcraft fanfic #light of lairyon #wizard au #wizard hermits #lol #wizard grian #wizard cleo #wizard zedaph #wizard mumbo #grianmc #grian #zombiecleo #zedaph #mumbo jumbo

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secretbondsandloveconfessions · 3 years

Text

All Bastards Are Brothers

Just a series of kinda fluffy, kinda angsty one-shots about the brotherly bond between Rhys, Cassian, and Azriel. Stories are not connected.

Ao3 Part One

Part Two: A Shoulder to Cry On

“"Cass," he said again. This time Cassian didn't respond, choosing to wipe furiously at his eyes, so Azriel said his name one more time. This one commanding him to look at him. "Cassian."

"What?" Cassian turned around, his siphon flashing. Anybody else would have recoiled, choosing most likely to leave the commander alone rather than facing the wrath of his killing power, but Azriel wouldn't. Instead, he stared straight into his best friend's now-red eyes, and as he had done countless times in their younger years, he opened his arms out wide.”

Or: Upset over the state of his and Nesta's relationship, Cassian relies on Azriel to help him out. Luckily, the shadowsinger is content to lend a listening ear.

It had been the third time in one week that Rhys had called a family meeting.

Recently, with the Illyrian rebellions finally squashed and the turbulent relationships between the Courts still yielding trouble, as well as the ever-constant rebuilding from Hybern, it was becoming hard to get everyone in the same place at the same time. It seemed to Azriel that someone was always away on business. However, by some miracle in the past week, they had all managed to be present at not only one family dinner, but three.

The first had been, in all accounts, a failure. Rhys and Feyre had learned that she was carrying a daughter, not a son, and they had called a meeting to celebrate the future High Lady of the Night Court. The wine and the appetizers had been fun while they lasted, but before they had even filled up their plates with dinner, Feyre had made a comment about becoming fat, so Rhys kicked everyone out of the house in order to show his mate how much he still cherished her body. A sweet sentiment, but even if Rhys had allowed them to stay, no one would have wanted to be around for that, least of all Azriel.

The second, at least, had been a full dinner, and a delicious one at that, but it had ended up as more of a meeting than anything else. Each member of the Inner Circle briefed the group on their tasks and their tasks alone, so instead of their family, it was their Court. He wasn't Azriel for that dinner, but shadowsinger and spymaster, and Rhys wasn't his brother, but his deadly High Lord. They all hated these dinners. No one liked to be an advisor when they could be a friend.

To make up for it, tonight, as he had heard Rhys tell Elain earlier, was meant purely for their family: A break in the chaos of their lives when they would leave all of their worries and responsibilities behind and laugh and drink until the stars rose high in the sky.

And that was what it had been.

The eight of them, counting his High Lady’s sisters, sat around a new, slightly larger table, and simply talked. Rhys told stories of their youthful adventures, Cassian and Amren bickered about nothing, Mor drank and laughed loudly in his face, and Azriel, as per usual, joined Nesta in a quiet aloofness and watched everything go down.

Feyre had hardly eaten at dinner, pretending to enjoy herself, but she wasn't fooling him. Her pale face and subtle disgust as certain foods passed were incriminating, and the glances she shared back and forth with Rhys solidified it enough so that he didn't need his shadows to tell him anything. Nonetheless, it wasn’t at all surprising to him that when Rhys invited them all to stay for drinks, Feyre declined, and instead resigned herself to the bedrooms upstairs.

"I think that I will leave as well," Nesta announced to the room, sending a small smile to the remaining Archeron sister. She waited for the chorus of goodbyes and a kiss on the cheek from Elain before closing the door behind her.

“Rita’s or drinks tonight?” Mor asked the remaining.

Rhys groaned loudly. “Just drinks, please. I’m too tired to deal with dancing.”

Mor cocked an eyebrow, “Feyre keeping you up at night?”

“My daughter is,” he said. “Or rather she keeps my mate up.”

“Take it from someone who’s millennia older than you,” Amren warned. “You won’t get a good sleep ever again.”

Rhys winced as Mor patted him on the back. “Can’t wait.”

Azriel smirked and turned to his other brother who was intensely staring at the wood floor, eyebrows furrowing. Azriel was about to address him when he suddenly chugged the rest of his wine and muttered something about walking the girl home, pulling the door closed behind him too hard for the others not to notice. And sure enough, as he turned back around, all four of them were looking.

Azriel noted how their expressions changed one by one. Rhys frowned at the open door, where Cassian had stood just moments before, Mor did the same, Amren looked bored, though her eyes betrayed a hint of annoyance, and Elain cringed, violently. Azriel couldn't blame her for that. If he hadn't spent centuries perfecting his own poker face, he supposed that his expression would look very similar to hers.

Nobody dared to say anything. There was an unspoken rule of their family not to mention the bond between Cassian and the fiercest Archeron sister, no matter how painfully evident it was. It wasn’t until Rhys cleared his throat to thank Nuala and Cerridwen that the easy conversation started up again, though Azriel wouldn’t join. Instead, he slowly drifted out of the dining room and peered out the window. Both Cassian and Nesta were long gone, and Azriel got a bad feeling in his stomach.

He sent a look back into the room. Rhys was chatting with Amren as Elain cleared off the table. Part of him ached to stay and assist the latter, but Cassian needed him more. Without another glance from the others, Azriel silently wrapped himself in his shadows and disappeared.

The night had been a pleasant temperature, but the air was now thick and moist, threatening the city with stormy weather, and he loathed the way it stuck to his skin like sweat after a long day of training.

By the time he was right outside the house’s cast iron fence, he could see all the way down the street, he watched as his brother caught up to Nesta and grabbed her elbow. For a few moments they walked together, but then she turned to face him. He couldn't hear her words, nor would he use his shadows to spy on them, but her body was rigid in a way that was sharp and commanding. Maybe not in a mean or prickly way, not as she used to be, but in a way that left no room for Cassian to rebound. With that, she continued her path home and left Cassian stranded on the footbridge.

Cassian watched her presumably until she rounded the corner before turning to face the water. Azriel waited a few minutes to see if he would return to the house, but he stayed glued to the spot, wings dropping.

Azriel frowned lightly and flew down to the bridge, landing just on the edge so he could walk up. Cassian didn't lift his head from the wall when he spoke to him.

"Go away, Az."

"Not unless you come with me," he said back coolly, sticking his hands into his pockets.

"Yeah," the general sniffed. "Well, then I guess we're both in for disappointment this evening."

"She'll come around, Cass."

"I wish I could agree with you."

Cassian had told Azriel about the bond when he and Elain visited the camps a few years earlier. Elain had stayed with Nesta while Azriel had taken Cassian away and gotten him drunk.

He didn't regret it. Cassian had needed a night to let go, to not care for Nesta or any kind of rebellion. It had taken that night of freedom and three quarters of a bottle of brandy for Cassian to confess to Azriel what they all had suspected for months: he and Nesta were mates.

He remembered blocking the air around them with his shadows, preventing unwanted ears from listening in, and keeping his face neutral and non-judgmental. He remembered not wanting to risk setting Cassian off on him. Tonight would most likely end the same way. Though, the chances of waking up the next morning to a regretful, hungover, and angry Cassian were much slimmer.

Still, Azriel had kept his promise that he wouldn’t tell anyone, and if that meant that he’d have to be a shoulder to lean on tonight, then he was happy to do it. After all, he would do a lot of things to get Cassian to smile again. He hated the heartbroken look on his face. It made him want to march up to Nesta's apartment and yell until she apologized. But, he wouldn't.

He knew what it was like to be ripped from the only world he knew. He knew what it was like to be forced into a strange place with strange people and with powers nobody understood. To hear, see, and feel things that nobody else could--no, he too knew what it was like to have powers he also didn't understand. Little did she know, Azriel was her once. And if he hadn't had the shadows, or Rhys and Cassian to keep him company those first years of his life, he wouldn't know what would have happened.

If Nesta needed the space and the time away from everything, it would be granted to her, and if that meant that he had to support his brother more in the process, that was something Azriel needed to do.

Cassian sniffed again, bringing Azriel out of his own introspection, and he glanced down, frowning, to see that his brother was gripping the railing so hard that his knuckles were white.

"Cassian," Azriel said gently.

"I'm fine, Az."

"We've already established that that isn't true."

"I'll be fine, then."

"Cass," he said again. This time Cassian didn't respond, choosing to wipe furiously at his eyes, so Azriel said his name one more time. This one commanded him to look at him. "Cassian."

"What?" Cassian turned around, his siphon flashing. Anybody else would have recoiled, choosing most likely to leave the commander alone rather than facing the wrath of his killing power, but Azriel wouldn't. Instead, he stared straight into his friend's now-red eyes, and as he had done countless times in their younger years, he opened his arms out wide.

Cassian looked unsure for a second, glancing around at the deserted streets, but he eventually gave in and wrapped himself around his brother, burying his wet face in his neck. Azriel only rubbed a soothing hand on Cassian's back.

"Gods, Az. I don't know how Rhys did it," he said. "Every time she's near me...I can’t think of anything else. Everything is just Nesta, Nesta, Nesta. I can’t breathe, I can’t think, it’s only her. I swear she sets my soul on fire, and she doesn't even fucking know it.” Azriel remained silent, egging Cassian to keep talking. “Why can’t she just see me? Does she think about me at all?”

“She does, brother, I swear to you,” Azriel murmured back.

“How do you know that?”

Azriel thought back to all the longing stares she gave him when she thought no one was looking, and all of the times the shadows gossiped into his ear. “I just do.”

Cassian broke away from Azriel's embrace and began to pace the short width of the footbridge.

"I thought that when I found my mate, it would plainly be the best fuck I ever had. All I'd really known about mates was Rhys' parents, and they hated each other, so romance never clicked into it. But Nesta," Cassian faltered as he said her name. "She's way more than a good fuck. Mother's tits, she's way more than a romance. I know I sound like one of her slutty novels, but I swear, she's the other half of me. The half I hadn't known I was missing."

Azriel knew the feeling well. He had replayed that moment when Mor first walked into the Illyrian camp all of those years ago in his mind too many times not too. He had believed her to be his other half, to be the light to his void darkness, and though now his love for Mor was beginning to fade, he still understood the pain of not sharing his life with her, and he would be damned to let Cassian suffer from the same fate.

“What do you want her to be, Cass?”

At that moment, a thin drizzle started to fall from the sky. Cassian looked up at it before speaking.

“I want her to be the person that I spend the rest of my life loving,” Cassian looked back to his brother. “Who I can fight for and come home to at the end of the day, who I can raise a family with...that is if she wants one.”

“That’s remarkably soft for you, brother.”

"I love her, Az,” he said, his voice low and defeated. “And it's driving me crazy."

Cassian collapsed onto the bench and put his head into his hands while Azriel continued to lean against the railing. They fell into companionable silence after that, the only noise becoming the soft thunder and Cassian’s occasional sniff.

"Cass," Azriel started a while later, as the rain started to get heavier. "We should probably go back inside."

"Okay. It made Azriel's heart hurt to see Cassian so downtrodden and dejected. He stood up and reached a hand down to his brother, who wiped the long hair from his eyes and grabbed it. "Thanks."

Their walk kept the silence for the most part, Cassian lost in his thoughts, but before they turned the corner into the driveway of the townhouse, Azriel chirped quietly, "At least now they won't be able to tell that you've been crying."

Cassian let out a laugh. It was dry and emotionless, sure, but it was a start, Azriel hoped. "I suppose you're right, Az.”

As they walked in through the door, the remaining three sets of eyes stared at them, the room quiet as they waited for an explanation. Any other dinner, he'd let Cassian speak for the both of them, letting him take the brunt of whatever misadventure that they had gotten themselves into at that time. It was one thing he always deeply appreciated about his brother. Azriel hated being the center of attention, hated all the eyes staring at him, hated how it made him feel small, even if it was just their family, and for Cassian to see that and absorb what excess attention he could, Azriel was eternally grateful. However, now was not the time for him to shrink back in the shadows and watch his brother take the reins. It was time for Azriel to return the favor.

"It was stuffy in here," Azriel supplied, knowing that Cassian couldn't. "We stepped out for fresh air."

"In the rain?" Rhys asked softly. Cassian stilled beside him as if his brother had just revealed a deep secret of his. Azriel tore his gaze away from his brothers in favor of Elain and silently pleaded with her to say something. Weak. His shadows chided him.

"Well," Elain huffed. "The rain has only just started, and they probably weren't exactly keen on flying in bad weather."

"I'd rather not be struck by the wrath of the mother," Azriel replied smoothly. "What's the big deal, Rhysie? Scared of little rain?"

Amren snorted, and Azriel felt a renewed sense of control, even if it only slightly reassured him.

Rhysand rolled his eyes at his brother and held his hands up in fake surrender. "I was just asking."

"What are we drinking?" Azriel said, walking into the living area. Rhysand began to speak about a case of wine that Lucien had sent over from the Day Court, but Azriel wasn't listening. His focus was put entirely on Cassian, who remained close to the door as if he was planning to leave again. Wordlessly, he instructed his shadows to push Cassian over, though he seemed to wake up from his trance and walk the remaining way himself. Rhys and Elain didn't seem to notice his little trick, but Amren caught his eye with a smirk. Azriel glared back, daring her to say something.

Amren wrinkled her nose across the table. “Rhys, dry your dogs off before they start to smell.”

#bat bros #illyrian babies #azriel #cassian #inner circle #acotar #acowar #acofas #acosf #pre-nessian #nessian #elain archeron #nesta archeron #rhysand #slice of life #angst #fanfiction #acotar fic #acotar fanfiction

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felicia-parker · 4 years

Text

Prompt: 01 - “No, come back!” Fandom: dcau/dc comics (the huntress/the question) Rating: T TW: none.

He often forgets how Gotham really smells when he returns. It smells like a mix of industrial pollution, brackish water from the harbors, and nothing at all like Hub City. He leaves the train with his head ducked down, hat on his head, no one notices him anyways in the flurry of snow falling in the city for the first time all year. People are already complaining of scraping driveways come morning, but he ignores them all as he passes. His mask is balled up in his pocket, bare face being kissed by flurries. It makes his cheeks match his hair. Vic shoves his hands in his pockets, feeling for his gloves and hastily shoving them on his quickly numbing fingers.

“I should call…” He mutters to himself, “that’s what you do.”

He tries to pull up the social cues she has so painstakingly drilled into him on the last six months, twenty-one days, fourteen hours, and thirty-five minutes. She reminds him to call since he refuses to text, there’s too many hands those messages could fall into, cell phones aren’t safe but the Government is slowly killing the payphones making his anonymity harder and harder. Helena gave him a phone, sleek and black, the screen already has a chip from him dropping it after a night of scrolling internet sleuthing led to him falling asleep in his favorite chair, the phone becoming victim to the floor. He only has one contact in it, one photo, no messages, one voice mail saved-- she had pocket dialed him, her useless mutterings forever recorded on his digital answering machine.

He listens to it when the nights get a little too long and the trains stop running.

Vic pulls out the phone and double taps the little screen. It illuminates amongst the darkness of the city and he stops on the sidewalk to quickly type in a code too long for anyone to memorize, before turning it back off and stuffing it down in his pocket. He decides he doesn’t need to call. If he has anyone tailing him, they can’t know where he’s going. Vic glances over his shoulder.

The paranoia is getting a little worse, but Helena doesn’t seem to mention it anymore. She just sighs and reminds him of how many ‘bad guys’ she’s tossed into gutters. It doesn’t soothe him like she thinks it does, but he lets her brag until she’s content. He crosses the street right over the crosswalk which leads him into a burrow of the city. Tall buildings are illuminated with door lights and street lights that seem to stretch on for an eternity. All of the buildings look the same, except every other one has another color slapped onto the brick. They are all cookie-cutter, cheap apartments, ones that the working class usually fill.

He walks until his feet start to ache, the old dress shoes he’s wearing are worn down, dried blood is caked on the underside of the heels, excellent for remaining invisible, poor for snowy nights in a city that didn’t particularly belong to him. Vic stops outside of a light gray building on the corner and begins to count the windows. On the sixth floor he sees the light on, the fire escape is decorated with a dying plant and nothing else, window closed and curtains open. When a shadow passes by the glass, his heart skips a beat and he glances up to the sky overhead. The clouds are thick and dark, no moon, no infamous signal in the sky.

He breathes a sigh of relief and begins to climb. The old iron squeaks every few steps, he notes the rust on the third floor and makes a mental note to not put too much weight there on his way back down and climbs until his breath clouds the window of the sixth floor, corner apartment. The edges of her window are slick with moisture, she must have cooked tonight, filled her apartment with the heat of the kitchen as she worked. His gloved fingers trace over the sill and he moved to lift the glass. It didn’t budge. She had locked it for once.

The sound of the television vibrates against the window and he peers in with hands cupped around his face to see her stretched out on the couch, papers everywhere, red pen between her lips as she holds a paper above her head. Her hair is spilling over the couch in wave of dark curls and he marvels in the simplicity of it all. She looks absolutely normal.

Helena is anything but normal. He knows this. He dares to even love such an idea, of this woman who is an unstoppable force with no concept of white and black, her world is shades of gray and personal vendettas. Helena stretches once more on the couch, taking the red pen from her mouth to mark something on the paper with ease.

He knocks, the pen goes wild over the page as she all but throws herself off of the couch and onto the floor. A momentary flash of fear crosses her face, followed by anger as she pulls her pen up like mini dagger, set to throw it with deadly precision at the window when she recognizes the outline of him. Her shoulders sag and she stomps over to the window. In one quick yank the glass comes up and he’s met with the lingering smell of homemade food, warm and tinged with garlic, but all of it is forgotten as she shouts at him with her voice sharper than any knife.

“You’re supposed to call! I gave you a phone Q!” Helena’s cheeks are flushed red, her teeth are clenched tightly together and he can see the muscle in her jaw is strained. Anger radiates from her form.

“I wanted to…”

“No!” She shouts the word and slams the window back down in his face. It’s a miracle the glass stays in place. She keeps her hand on the window, glaring at him when he takes the step back to leave. A minute ticks by and then a second, a third, and finally he backs up to go back down the escape, shoulders slumping. He should have called, he should have warned her, should have asked if she even wanted to see him after being apart for so long.

His foot touches down on the ladder when he hears the window open back up, “No, come back!”

Her voice isn’t as angry and this time her hand reaches into the cold for his. She manages to grab hold of his coat sleeve, pulling him impatiently over the threshold. Vic stumbles a bit, but once he’s inside she closes the window behind him, putting the lock in place before grabbing at his coat again. Helena is far from gentle. She pulls at his coat until he’s leaning over, close enough for her mouth to find his. She kisses him until he’s gasping for air, until he has to pull back to recover his bearings.

His eyes glance over her living quarters, there’s a half-decorated tree in the corner where her desk usually sits, the desk now stowed away for the holidays no doubt, leading to all the school papers being strewn across her coffee table and couch, markers and highlighters all around. The television drones on and on with the nightly news bleeding into a late night talk-show.

“Am I…” He clears his throat, “Not welcome?”

“Don’t be an idiot.” She waves a hand at him, reaching behind him to pull the blinds down, drawing the curtains for privacy. “I just wish you would use that phone.”

“Trackable.”

“Yeah, that’s why I got it for you. I’d like to know when you’re coming here. It’s not like we have…” It’s her turn to trail off and she walks to the kitchen as she does so, opening the fridge and pulling out the leftovers of her dinner to warm up for him. He doesn’t tell her no. Vic learned a long time ago to never reject food from her. Helena mutters something else and slides the homemade plate of lasagna into the microwave.

“Are you listening?” She asks him.

“Yes. No set schedule.” He nods to her and stands still for a minute too long, feeling like an obscure piece of furniture in her little home. His own home is empty, soulless, untraceable. Hers is full of art, plates, second-hand furniture, and little things here and there that just fit the woman in the kitchen.

The microwave dings as she’s pulling a glass out of the cabinet and setting him a place at her kitchen bar, “Come, eat.”

He eats like a starving man. A home cooked meal is such a rarity in his life, something he only gets when Helena is around. She refuses to eat an abundance of ready-to-eat frozen meals, instead spending hours in the grocery store to find fresh ingredients, an unnecessary thing in his world. Helena pours herself another glass of wine, gives him one too but he only sips that, going back to scraping the fork over the plate until it’s all gone.

“Thank you,” He murmurs the soft appreciation, he no longer feels cold, but warmed from the inside out. She crosses behind him and pulls at his coat. Vic lets his arms go limp, lets her pull his coat away. She takes his hat too and hangs both by the door, coming back to pull him free from the bar stool, drawing him towards her couch for more comfort. He lets her lead him around. He can’t seem to stop his feet from following her. He would follow her to the edges of space, hell, and everything in between, but can’t seem to say the words to her. Instead he settles for the silence between them. She sets him on the couch, pulls the blanket from the back of it and tucks it over his shoulders, kisses the top of his hair before making it messy with a ruffle of her fingers.

“I always forget how bright red…” She snickers softly, teasing him for not wearing the mask, for giving himself over to her with no second skin to block the way.

Vic tilts his head up to her own, frowning slightly, “Would you prefer the mask?”

“Don’t be an idiot.” She repeats the words from earlier. Her brows knitting together in concern before she crosses in front of him and takes the place next to him on the couch, gathering up more papers to grade, “Don’t ask that question again.”

“Can I ask another?” He turns his head over, watching her pull her legs up, tucking them under her, pen cap already in her mouth as she begins going down the line of questions, looking for the incorrect answers.

“Mhm,” She hums softly, not glancing up at him. Instead she runs the pen over the top, making a perfect one-hundred in a little loop, following with a little star at the corner of the page. He watches her work with ease, moving onto the next page with her little red pen on the hunt of mistakes.

His mouth forms the words, “Can I stay?”

Her pen scratches an ‘x’ over an answer. He waits for her to put an ‘x’ on him as well, but she does no such thing.

“I was expecting you to,” she doesn’t look up from the papers still, “I hope you’ll stay for a while.”

Helena shifts now, moving to lay her back against his side, “You hope or want?”

“Does it make a difference to you?”

“Yes.” He answers her matter-of-factly. He wants to hear her say the words. Vic wants her to say she wants him to stay, wants him to be with her even if it’s for such a short time. Christmas is four days away, three nights, he can make the train on the fourth, be back in Hub before she grows too used to his body in her bed.

“Then,” Helena shifts again, this time picking his arm up and sliding under it, she lays now half against him on the couch with her legs stretched to the other end, she smells of floral shampoo and ink, “I want you to stay, but you have to actually stay. You can’t skip breakfast.”

Vic takes a moment as she makes herself comfortable against him before he fully relaxes. He lets his arm slide over her stomach and pulls her into him until there’s no space left, she’s draped comfortably into the curve of him, papers to grade in her hand. His hand twitches for the remote, to turn away from the channel of mind-numbing late-night television, enjoying the warmth of her finally returning to him after months of being away.

“I think I want to stay.”

She marks another one-hundred across the top of the page, adds a little star to the corner before tilting her head back against his chest, the word leaves her with a soft sigh and a curve of her lips, “Stay.”

#fictober20 #vic x helena #the question x the huntress #my writing

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areusittingcomfortably · 4 years

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When wind and weather's fair

@cristobalrios asked for:

Holo prompt: Ian or Enoch or both singing celtic folk songs or Enoch singing sea shanties while piloting the ship? Any or all characters you want can get involved.

After an exhausting few days, La Sirena’s Captain and passengers have retired to bed, leaving the emergency holograms in charge of the ship. Rios has locked in a course for Earth, and the ship is on autopilot, so there is little for the holos to do but keep an eye on things.

For Emmet this means lounging in the seat most recently occupied by Annika, with his feet up and his eyes half-closed, while Enoch sits upright and alert where Raffi usually sits. There is nothing for Emil and Mr Hospitality to do so they haven’t been activated, but Ian is methodically working his way around the ship repairing the smaller issues that the field replicator device hasn’t been deployed to fix, and decides to keep Enoch company by doing some routine checks on the bridge.

With the Captain safely tucked up in bed (with the little doctor, no doubt, he smiles to himself. Emil would have a few things to say about that, he’s sure! He and Emmet are very protective of Rios, and they have not yet forgiven her for killing Maddox, but he and Enoch are quietly pleased) Ian is feeling decidedly jolly and starts to sing quietly as he works.

Well there came a letter yesterday, our ship it will sail at morn ‘Alas! cried my bonny lass, that ever I were born.