#where is he going? probably his dad's rather than nikolai's i think

[parameddic]

@hvndredstories from here but it's not really a 'reply' just a. here's TK finding the note and Immediately Leaving kdjfldsjj

He stood in the middle of his weirdly-clean, bleach-smelly apartment, stickynote in hand. Heart'd jumped into his throat when he'd come home and found the door open after he'd just got an emergency locksmith out last night. This was, uh. Sort of really bad. Um.

Sort of weirdly. Friendly? In the note. But really bad.

... "Okay," a breath, to himself. He nodded a little, eyes roaming the apartment. Empty, and if it wasn't then he was not going to be finding out: he collected his keys from the coffee-table he'd put them down on two seconds ago and stuck the stickynote right back where he'd found it. "Time to move house." Didn't even stop for clothes or toothpaste. No thanks, he just left.

#ic #hvndredstories #skdjflsdkjgskdjglk the spoken exposition and everything #tk vc: ok that's enough i'm moving #where is he going? probably his dad's rather than nikolai's i think #unless his dad kicks him out for whatever reason it is now #''well - i've got Company'' and it's just his latest murder-girlfriend but he doesn't want tk coming in and interrupting. #''can't you go see nikolai?'' #like he hasn't been intermittently complaining about nisha for months at this point

[luverofralts]

Arkhelios University

“What are you thinking, you metal plated piece of -”

“Elaine! Screaming isn’t going to solve this. Maybe, if we all sit down and talk about this, we can still have a wedding. Lots of people get cold feet before a wedding.”

Roman tried to hold back his future mother in law, but she was surprisingly strong for an older woman. It was taking all of his strength just to keep her from launching herself at the former servo.

“You had better not do this to me when you get married,” Elaine hissed, briefly taking her focus off of Ironman to give Roman a look that sent chills down his spine. “You or Abe. I will end either one of you if you make a spectacle like this one in front of the world. I will end you both and raise Theo myself to teach him some respect.”

“That won’t happen,” Roman replied nervously, shooting a desperate glance at Ironman. “Abe and I won’t get cold feet., Trust me, we are highly motivated to get married.”

Surprisingly, you’re not the scariest person demanding a wedding from us. Somehow I don’t think the demon sovereign would be understanding if we suddenly decided to not get married.

“I told you that I didn’t want to make this a big deal, you promised me,“ Elaine continued, once again focusing her anger on Ironman. “You promised me that I wouldn’t be embarrassed! Now I have a stupid wedding arch on my front yard and no wedding. People are going to talk!”

“Elaine, are you honestly more upset about throwing a doomed party than the feelings of a paternal figure who has been in your life since you were born?” Roman asked, only to get a dismissive noise in response. “Maybe we can talk this out.”

“I can’t go through with this, it’s too much,” Ironman protested. “I thought it would be romantic to become human and then join myself to Nikolai, but it’s too much. How do I know that I even want to be with him? What if I should have fought for Oriana instead? It’s probably too late to ask her out again, right?’

“Oh for god’s sake!”

Elaine threw her hands in the air and stormed off, but not before shooting Roman another chilling glare.

Maybe I would rather take my chances with the demon sovereign after all. I might have a better chance at survival with her instead of Elaine.

“Roman, I can’t do this. Tell me what to do, I don’t know what to do.”

Roman sighed, and rubbed his aching temple.

“Look, no one has to get married today. Why don’t we all just sit down and- Theo get away from that cake or you can spend the rest of the month without your tv time!”

Roman turned around just in time to see his son trail a finger in the elegant yellow icing he’d spent all morning finishing.

“Where is your father? Why isn’t he watching you?” Roman demanded, pushing his son away from the cake and trying to smooth over the new gap in the icing with a knife.

“He’s busy,” Theo answered glumly. “Luci flushed one of Grandma’s rings down the toilet and he’s calling a plumber. Can I have cake now? Grandma said everything was ruined anyway, so we don’t need a cake anymore. That’s what she said!”

“How did Luciana get a ring? And no, you can’t have the cake!”

While Roman lectured his son, Ironman heard the doorbell ring. He was no longer programmed to answer the door when a guest arrived, but he still felt compelled to answer it all the same.

“Dad! I brought someone to meet you!”

Nickolas burst through the door with a smiling young woman at his side.

“Dad, this is Tiana, she’s my girlfriend. I met her at school. Tiana, this is my dad.”

Ironman blinked with confusion. Nickolas had never referred to him as his father, aside from the brief time Oriana had let him as a toddler who was learning to speak. He had spent more time with the boy than Abraham had spent with any of his children, but it still felt odd to usurp Abraham’s title. He felt a fatherly affection for all of Abraham’s children and grandchildren, but no one had ever made it official by addressing him as such. He had to assume that Nickolas was using the term for the benefit of the young lady beside him.

“She’s gorgeous,” Ironman finally managed to choke out, baffled by his body’s reaction to the young woman. He smiled lecherously at Tiana, making a gesture he’d seen teenagers make towards their crushes. It didn’t seem to impress her and Ironman again felt anxiety overwhelm his senses. He had only been a human for mere hours, and already he had ruined everything.

“Um, yeah, my Dad’s a little off today,” Nickolas stammered, looking around for a friendly face. “Oh, my mom is over there, she’ll want to say hello for sure.”

Nickolas waved at his mother, who declined to wave back. Her naive husband did however, so Nickolas felt safe to approach them.

“Mom, Benvolio, this is Tiana,” Nickolas said, gesturing to his date. “Tiana, this is my mother and my step father.”

Oriana looked confused to see the young man and was lost as to why he was calling her mom. Her young daughter barely did, and she saw Juliet every day. Oriana was certain that Abraham’s son was too old to address her as mom, though she had lost count of the years since he’d been taken from them. She’d never had a mother of her own, so the term felt alien to her.

“Hi Nikolai,” she quickly said, missing the disappointment in her son’s eyes as he tried to laugh off her comment.

“It’s Nickolas,” he replied, trying to hide his embarrassment from his date. “Remember Nikolai is the groom today, and I’m Nickolas, your son.”

“Oh there isn’t a groom today after all,” Oriana said pleasantly, as if they were discussing the weather and not the possible end of a relationship. “Ironman called it off. You know those Helios men and commitment. I have money on Abe running away down the aisle whenever those two decide to try a ceremony.”

“Benvolio is betting against her,” Benvolio declared with a cheerful smile. “Benvolio believes in the power of love overcoming adversity.”

“Mom, I’m a Helios, remember? Not all of us are like Dad,” Nickolas stressed, looking over his shoulder at the confused woman beside him. “Some of us love commitment.”

“Theodosius, I swear to god, if you don’t get away from that cake-”

“You can’t call me that, the demon queen said you can’t! I’m going to tell on you unless I get to lick the frosting!”

“No, I’ve been on hold for twenty minutes now, I need a plumber, and I need one before my mother does an inventory of her jewelry box. You don’t understand what she’ll do to me if she-”

“Do you know how hard it is to lead this family? Of all the pain and embarrassment that I endure daily because of my children, and the choices they make? My father would die a second time seeing how you’ve disgraced us here today. What am I going to tell people when they ask how the wedding was? What am I supposed to say?”

In all the commotion, Nickolas sank down to one knee and presented Tiana with a small box.

“Tiana, I would be the happiest guy on campus if you said that you wanted to spend the rest of your life with me,” he began, trying to talk over the shouting around him. “I love you and I want to spend the rest of my life with you. Now that you’ve met my mom and dad, and you already know Nathan and Lucy and Abe, do you want to marry me and join the Helios family?”

Even against the noise of the Helios household, Nickolas heard her answer loud and clear.

“Yes.”

#sims 2 #arkhelios #arkhelios university #nickolas fontana #ironman helios #elaine helios #Roman Bellamy #Abe chun #sim: theo bellamy #oriana fontana #Benvolio Durant #sim: Tiana Poe

[hollywoodcannon]

Anonymous asked: How did you and Nikolai handle the Twins becoming little ladies? That change in hormones must have been a little rough on you both though I would bet high dollar on both of you making damn sure the girls knew what was going to happen them (no sudden shocks or thinking they hurt themselves) and that there was nothing shameful in it.

It was challenging for Brian to accept the changes that were slowly happening to his beloved daughters. Little girls no more, where conversations used to be dedicated to plotting devilish schemes, side hustles that would bring them easy cash on the schoolyard, they were then filled with gossip and makeup and boys. Sometimes girls - Eva and Ena were still just babies in his eyes - the Loose Cannon nearly sent into shock, close enough to descend into a true fit. It didn’t seem possible that such a thing could’ve occurred within his own family. Certainly to others but not his own, every day that they grew older, came more and more time that he and Nikolai spent teaching their children about such bodily, emotional, transformations. What they knew from experience in the matter, their close friends and family, what could be gathered from books, internet article pages. It was difficult, and yet, they all were prepared. And Brian found himself biting his tongue more often than ever before. Sparing Eva’s feelings on whatever it was that made her become so upset and wounded, withholding from Ena an opinion that, otherwise, would’ve seemed a touch too harsh, Daddy’s mouth an honest, if not also, foul one. 

Such changes had taken a toll on the girls, too. Bodies always becoming something far better than it was before, older and wiser and cuter still, prone to do what it was meant to, even if it made Eva and Ena uncomfortable. Aches and pains the worst of it all - their discomfort a knife straight to Brian’s heart - cramps unable to be soothed so quickly from many heating pads, warm cups of hot chocolate and fuzzy blankets wrapped around tight. Even their papa couldn’t relieve the hurt, no matter how much he tried, his smarts working overtime to figure out a cure, Nikolai looking just as tired as his daughters. But it was out of reach for both fathers alike. Only able to do so much, for what they couldn’t, they made up for in constant affection, gentle embraces, kisses to the heated skin of their Eva and Ena. Still, it was the most awful form of torture that Brian had ever come to know. Worse than having his ankle shattered by a psycho Texan, worse than almost having his very life taken several times over. An agony unlike the rest. 

“We handled it as best as we could.” Brian replied. “But it wasn’t easy. I don’t care what anybody says, because, truthfully, it’s hard to go through as a dad when your kids are girls. Guys and chicks, we’re built different. There’s things that my daughters were going through that I had no damn clue about. Sure, I’ve been around women, dated them, was raised by one, but I’ve never actually seen the changes up close before, not on such a personal level. I didn’t know what to do or how to even start talking about that stuff with them. Nikolai and me, we read probably over 20 books about the topic. It felt like I was back in fucking sex ed, but this time around, I was trying to make sure that I really understood enough about puberty and adolescent hormones for the sake of my Ena and Eva, rather than trying to shove my tongue down Macy Duncan’s throat. Maybe if I spent more time paying attention to what my teacher said back then, less time goo-goo eyeing my classmate, I might’ve been able to help my girls out sooner now. But thanks to my hero of a husband, I wasn’t too lost on the required reading. It was actually pretty interesting. I’d like to think it helped out the girls, least in some way, a little, too.”

“I had a harder time than either Ena or Eva did, though. Seeing my baby girls turn into women, it was a lot. It was damn weird. One minute, I was playing dolls with Eva, and within a blink of an eye, I’m acting like Archie Bunker to her, telling her to get changed because her skirt was a touch too short, that she couldn’t go to a friend’s birthday party in it. That’s Nik’s job to be the hard-ass parent, not mine! And do you know what she did? My 14-year-old daughter pulled the ‘daddy, please’ trick on me. She pouted, fluttered her lashes at me, and said, ‘but, Daddy, all my friends are wearing it. Please, Daddy.’ I couldn’t believe it! My little princess, who never, ever pulled a stunt like that before, just whipped that one right out of her back pocket. She tried to play me like putty. I almost did, too. I almost caved. But damn it, I couldn’t. She can be cutesy around me with certain things, but miniskirts at 14, hell no. I could only imagine what kind of mutts were going to be at this party. Just trying to sniff up my baby like she was a piece of prime beef. I was one of those dirty bastards when I was her age! And with her being as pretty as her papa - she looks just like him - anybody with brains would’ve tried to paw at her. I wasn’t going to entertain such a thought. Fuck, no.”

Brian smiled, laughing a bit as he continued sharing his story. “Eva liked to try and win me over most of the time, but it was always Ena who went after Nik. They have a special bond. Whereas her sister holds more similarities facially, Ena acts just like my husband, her father. They’re both science geeks. So, when the girls both hit that age of no return, Eva targeted me with her boo-boo lips, and Ena went to win her dad over with some chemistry, physics stuff. Whatever they were discussing in recent. Just like Nikolai, too, our daughter’s damn smart. She could outmatch me in anything academic. Admittedly, I was never a good student. I played sports. I read books. Did I ever study, really give it my all? Eh, that’s up for debate. But, anyway, that was Ena’s gameplan. She’d nearly get my husband, too. She’d have him get so lost in their conversation, that he’d almost forget about whatever request she was asking for. My favorite was when she tried to get out of the house past curfew in order to see her best friend. A best friend who lived 15 minutes away. See, I know that trick. I tried to play it on my own mom once. 15 minutes turns into 2 hours, and I don’t know how the hell it got so late.”

“Nikolai saw right through her. Told her no, flat out, she had to obey her fathers’ rules and curfew hours, but he still answered her research question. You could understand now why my mother likes him so much. I think she likes him over me. Look, I do too. But it was then that our daughter discovered as much for herself. Nobody can beat Papa. He’s too intelligent for that. He loves Ena too much to risk her safety. Just as I love her and her sister. Sure, seeing them grow has been a pain-in-the-backside at times. Sometimes, I just wanna lock them in their rooms forever and never let them go. But it hasn’t all been terrible and getting to know them for who they are is pretty great. Seeing their personalities shine through - I can actually talk to our daughters and they can talk to me. They’re their own people now. It’s strange, makes me want to curl up into a ball and pretend that they’re still small and needy for me, that I’m not an old man, but I do like it. Ena and Eva, they’re not just my kids, but they’re also my best pals. I love seeing them grow more and more each day.”

___

#( Anonymous ) #Pipe Bombs Flyin' // Answered #Legacy Continued // Present / Current ERA #Crazy Little Thing Called Love // Brian x Nikolai

[angst-fairygodmother]

37 and 66 from I love you things with Ollie and Jess?

A/N: Hi Nonny! Thank you so much for this prompt. I’m so sorry it took me a while to write, but I hope it was worth the wait. I went back and forth while writing this between making it a reader-insert and using Jess as an actual OC and finally settled on the latter, because it just felt right. (Which is probably how I will continue to write this pair going forward also.) Word Count: 3493 Rating: G - mostly fluff - heights (and fear of influencing how it’s written), a little swearing, referenced/implied panic attack

Jess closed the shop at 6pm on the dot, giving herself an hour to get ready for...whatever Ollie had planned. There weren’t a lot of places to go out to dinner in the area, and she desperately hoped he wouldn’t start out by inviting her home to meet the infamous Charlie Sway. She chewed nervously on her nail, staring at her closet. She knew she needed something that would work for anything, but her mind continued to run in circles trying to decide exactly what that meant. 

She couldn’t remember the last time she’d given this much thought to what she looked like on someone else’s account. It felt strange to say the least. But, she mused, not a bad kind of strange. Eventually, she settled on a cute cream-colored sweater and jeans, hoping that the evening temperature dropped enough to make them reasonable.

There was a soft knock on the door and she frantically cast one last look over herself in the mirror, smoothing down her shirt and hair, stomach twisting nervously. 

She threw open the door perhaps a bit overenthusiastically, a warm expression on her face. 

“Hi,” she greeted him, the single syllable all she could get out as she met those soft blue eyes. 

Ollie grinned when he saw her, the excited, adoring expression making her heart flutter. It was hard for Jess not to scoff at the cliché, when she was behaving like the protagonists of the romances she sold by the dozen. But at least he was looking at her the same way, and seemed at least momentarily speechless. 

“Uh, do you want to come in?” she offered meekly after a moment, gesturing over her shoulder. “Or I can come out, and we can...I mean...um...”

The two of them stood there, staring at each other dumbly for a moment, on either side of the doorway. 

“So...where are we going?” she asked after a long pause ripe with awkward tension. She wanted to kick herself. Ollie had been so easy to talk to from the moment he walked into her store, but now, suddenly they were going on a proper date and everything felt different?

“I have a picnic bag in the back of my car, and I thought we could drive somewhere, and then maybe hike a bit?”

“A hike?” she asked nervously. “Like, up into the mountains?”

“Yeah. There’s a point up there that has great views of the entire town and the lake. Nik heard about it from one of the girls at the bar we were flirting with…I mean he was flirting with mostly. It wasn’t...I mean I didn’t...and this was before I met you…”

“Ollie,” she laughed lightly, tilting her head to one side to look at him. “I’m not the blushing, swooning virginal maiden, and I don’t expect you to be either.” 

He coughed, face turning crimson and she couldn’t help smiling fondly. Finally, things were feeling a little more normal, this was still the same Ollie she had come to adore. 

“You’re also only here for the summer, or however long it takes you to find your Dad’s record. So I hadn’t set my hopes on serious, or exclusive. I just think you’re cute, and fun to be around, so why not enjoy something and see what happens with it?”

“Oh.” His face twisted as he considered her words.

“However, I don’t think a hike is a good idea. It’s going to be dark soon.”

“There’s still almost two hours before sunset, and I brought flashlights so we can get back down the mountain.”

Of course, he had planned ahead. It would be stupid to plan a hiking date and not account for that, and he was far from stupid. And they were both dressed fine for the occasion. Her mind quested desperately for some other reason that they shouldn’t go and came up blank. So instead she held up a finger for him to wait, and went back to collect her camera. If she were going to do this, she might as well get some good photographs out of it, she rationed. Maybe even one she could sell prints of, if she was incredibly lucky. (She already felt insanely so, when such a wonderful boy wanted to go out with her, so why not see how far that streak ran?)

~

The first part of the hike went surprisingly smoothly, and it didn’t take long before Jess and Ollie were joking and laughing, scrabbling over rocks like young goats, playing eye-spy with the woods, any weirdness melting away in the evening sun. She barely noticed the way their path climbed, and felt completely relaxed.

Gradually, without her noticing, the trail narrowed and became steeper, until it rounded a tight bend up ahead, nothing but air off to her left and solid rock to the right. She swallowed nervously, trying to keep her eyes from the empty space. All of her joviality dropped away like the ground. 

“Jess?” Ollie asked, noticing her discomfort as she edged very slowly along. “Are you alright?”

“Yes. Yeah. Fine. I just...don’t like heights.” She answered, breath and words coming in short bursts. 

“Oh. Shit. Um, we can turn back if you want? I didn't realize you--”

“No. No, it's fine. We're here now. I'll make it through. You just might have to hold my hand for the way back down.”

She’d meant it as a joke, a light flirtation to distract her from the many, many feet she could fall with one misstep. Unfortunately, it didn’t seem to be doing any good, as her mind found a way to focus on both the space and how cheesy the sentence was.

“Do...you want me to now?” he countered, holding one slim hand out. 

She flashed him a small smile, taking it with her own and trying not to think too much about how nice, how right it felt. “You’ve been taking lessons with Nikolai haven’t you?”

“What?”

“That was smooth, Oliver,” she teased, enjoying the way he turned red all the way to the tips of his ears. 

~

Eventually, the young couple made it to the overlook, with much gentle guidance from Ollie to keep Jess’s nerves from overwhelming her, and she gasped. The lake stretched out below them, still and silver in the evening light, shining like a mirror. Tiny specks of color, moving too fast or too far for the eye to really track marked the boaters and jetskis, and kites flown from the small public beach. Most of the buildings disappeared into the verdant green surroundings, and the ones she could still spot looked like houses and shops and mansions for Polly Pockets, not people. The sun was just starting to dip behind the mountains on the far side of the lake, hazy outlines of shadow against the sherbert sky. 

“Oh, Ollie,” she breathed, stunned. “It’s beautiful.”

He mumbled something she didn’t catch and started unpacking the picnic he’d brought in his backpack. Not wanting to disturb him, and clearly left to her own devices for the moment, she took out her camera, adjusting the lens carefully, capturing as much of the view as she could. Then, on an impulse she turned around and snapped one of Ollie, silhouetted against the forest and the peeks of sunset between the trees, before he could notice. The sound of the shutter, or the finishing touches being put on dinner, made him look up.

“What are you doing, Jess?” he asked, confusion written across his features. 

“Taking pictures of beautiful things,” she answered with a shrug, bringing the camera to her eye again.

“No,” he held up his hand to block it, laughing. 

“I’m serious. This place, up here away from it all, suits you.”

“You’re full of shit, Jess.” He shook his head, his hair falling across his face.

She took another photo while his guard was down. 

“Come sit down. Marlena put together a good meal.” 

Relenting after another photo out into the distance, almost wishing she dared to get closer to the edge of the overlook, she carefully disassembled her camera, storing each piece with reverence back in its bag, before sitting across from him. He had set up quite the array on the blanket: simple but delicious looking toasted sandwiches, glasses and lemonade, berries and chunks of watermelon, and what looked like very freshly baked chocolate-chip cookies.

“Ollie, it looks amazing,” she said with a smile, popping a sweet, juicy blackberry into her mouth with a small, exaggerated moan. “And tastes even better.”

He blushed, shrugging and laughing sheepishly. “All I did was carry it up here.”

She rolled her eyes as he deflected yet another compliment. He seemed to always be doing that, much to her frustration, and she made a mental note to find a way to make him see how much she meant them, how true each one was. 

Silence fell over the two of them as they started picking at the buffet between them, but it was an easy one, a pause rather than an interruption, and eventually conversation resumed. She asked him about his search for his father’s record and listened as he spoke of the things he had found, which weren’t what he was looking for but seemed to bring (mostly) happy memories of his childhood. He asked for stories of her family, and of what the town was like when summer-people left. 

“Sway Lake is a different place,” she concluded eventually, casting her eyes about her on the clifftop, “just like it is from up here. Or frozen in a moment in your record.” 

By now the remains of the food had been set aside, and the pair had scooted closer on the picnic blanket, sitting side by side and facing out, instead of across from one another. Hesitantly, Jess shifted her hand closer so that their pinkies brushed, daring him to take action and hold her hand again. He didn’t seem to notice as he turned to face her, eyebrows knitted in confusion. 

“I…” he cleared his throat and started over. “You have a really unique view of the world.” 

Something in the way he said it made it feel like the kindest compliment someone could give, and it was finally her turn to blush, ducking her head to hide as her cheeks heated furiously. 

“I mean I guess,” she fiddled with the edge of the picnic blanket beside her, plucking at a loose thread so she didn’t have to meet his eyes just yet. “I’ve never really thought about it like that...”

“The view up here must be great for photos,” he said, making her laugh at his abrupt change of subject, obviously picking up on her embarrassment and knowing it well. 

“Yeah, it is. I’m hoping they come out well. Thank you for showing it to me.”

“The way people were talking, it’s pretty well known...how come you haven’t been up here before?”

“Heights, remember?” she flashed him a half-smile as she tilted her head to one side. “I’ve never had someone invite me before who seemed worth the risk.”

“How do you know if something’s worth it without ever seeing it?”

“You know your record is without hearing it don’t you? Besides, I said someone, not something.”

He froze, blinking owlishly at her. 

“Ollie?” she asked after a long pause, wondering what was going on with him suddenly.

“Can I kiss you?” he blurted, and now it was her turn to freeze, the question momentarily incomprehensible. 

“Yes,” she breathed, barely getting the word out before his lips were pressed against hers. 

The contact was abrupt, almost a headbutt but more romantic. There was a moment of awkward fumbling, of bumping noses and clashing teeth, until their mouths finally slotted together properly. Even after finding the right way to connect, there was a split second of hesitation, and then his hands came up to frame her jaw, pulling her closer, the tips of his fingers teasing at her hairline and the small hairs that had escaped the scrunchie holding most of it back. Keeping one of her own hands on the blanket to hold herself steady, Jess wrapped the other around the back of his neck like an anchor and leaned into the pressure of his soft lips on hers. 

All too soon he pulled away, panting breathlessly, and staring at her with an awe that made her own breath catch in her throat. She was half tempted to pull him back into another kiss, if only to make him stop looking at her like that. 

A distant roll of thunder shattered the moment, and her eyes flickered toward the clouds gathering on the blue-purple horizon. 

“We should probably head back, before that gets here,” she said reluctantly, wishing she had more time.

Ollie nodded in agreement, and the two of them made quick work of packing back up the remains of the picnic. He handed her a heavy black flashlight (that, she noted gratefully, and then laughed internally at her own thought, would double as a decent weapon against a rogue mountain lion at least long enough to run) and set off down the mountain. She tried to follow him without looking down, but the uneven terrain in the growing darkness made that too difficult to maintain. Soon the very idea filled her with just as much fear as looking. The edge of the path seemed to drop sharply, drawing ever closer to her feet in the narrow beam of yellow light, until it felt like she was walking along the very line of the drop. 

She stopped short with a yelp, head spinning from the sensation and whole body trembling. The sound made Ollie turn around sharply, placing himself as a barrier between her and the fall as she pressed her back firmly against the rock. 

He took her by the shoulders, trying to get her to make eye contact instead of staring blankly at the sight, or lack of sight beyond him. 

“Jess? Can you hear me?” he asked. “It’s alright, Jess. I’m right here, I won’t let you fall.”

Her blood roared in her ears and she saw his lips move but it was too loud for her to hear him.

When talking didn’t seem to work, he wrapped his arms around her, drawing her into a tight hug. Her fingers curled into his sweatshirt, clinging to him like a lifeline. Face pressed into the side of his neck she let out a sob, as the world spun around her much too fast.

~

The rest of the journey down to Ollie’s station wagon and much of the drive were a blur. Jess wasn’t completely unconvinced that he had somehow found a way to carry her down, although that was giving his physical strength more credit than he looked like it deserved. The storm picked up as they drove, clouds turning the sky to black, lit only by the occasional crash of lightning, and rain slamming against the roof and windows.

All too soon, the car stopped, parking in the narrow street in front of her building. They exited the car and promptly Ollie took her by the hand, lacing their fingers together. Not wanting to stand in the rain, she used the point of contact to drag him along, running as if she could dodge the water falling from the sky until they made it to her door. They stood there under the eaves, hair and clothing dripping, facing each other reluctantly, not wanting to say goodnight just yet.

“Tonight was…” he said, pausing. 

“Amazing?” she finished, smiling and feeling the light heat of a blush on her cheeks.

“Yeah. That.” He smiled back, and looked for a moment (during which her heart beat like a bird trying to escape her chest) like he was going to kiss her again. “I should let you go inside…”

“Stay over,” she blurted out before she could consider the words. 

“W-what?” he stared at her like she’d just grown an extra head or twelve. “Jess I can’t do that…”

“It’s late. And the weather’s bad. And I saw you yawning while we were driving back. I’d worry about you if you tried to go home now.”

“It’s just around the other side of the lake…”

“Yeah, but that’s like half an hour unless you drive recklessly. All it takes is drifting off for a second...please stay?”

“But...what will people think?”

“People,” she raised an eyebrow, “or your grandmother?”

“I don’t just mean her. I don’t want you to be treated like--”

“A slut?” 

He shuffled and looked away. 

“People aren’t that bad, you know. There are a handful of dicks, but most of town doesn’t give a shit.” 

“I didn’t mean…” he frowned. “I’m a Sway. I know people don’t like my family. If you’re seen with me like that...I know what being an outcast feels like, and I don’t want you to have to feel that way.”

“Well I guess you'll just have to make sure no one sees, then.” She smirked, before she sighed. “Look, Ollie. We're grown adults. What we do at night, or any other time, or with whom is no one's business but our own.”

“I know but--”

“No. No buts. I wouldn't have invited you to sleep over if I didn't mean it, or I wasn't prepared for gossip and fallout. It’s up to you. I just would feel a lot better if you did.”

“You really want me to stay?”

She rolled her eyes and fixed him with a look rather than actually answering. The wet breeze sent a shiver over her as she turned to unlock the door, not waiting anymore for him to make a decision. 

“And it’s not...too fast?”

She shrugged, taking him by the arm to pull him into the house and into a kiss. Her other hand threaded into his hair and his hovered over her hips as if he wasn’t quite sure he was allowed to touch her .

“Too fast is a myth,” she murmured, breath ghosting across his face. “Besides, I was inviting you into my house, not my bed.” 

She’d lost count by now of the number of times she’d managed to make Ollie blush tonight, but each time you did was just as adorable as the first. 

“Although, I was going to offer to take the couch,” she said over your shoulder as she led the way toward the furniture in question, “so I guess it was...also...into my bed…this is...I’m making it weird.”

“What? No!” he fumbled to reassure her. “I mean, no. You’re not, not no I won’t sleep in...I don’t want to, without you. Not that we have to sleep together. It’s just. It’s your bed.”

“God we’re a pair,” she said, laughing now as she dropped down and motioned for him to sit beside her. “Tripping over ourselves like romantic baby deer.”

“I just don’t want to mess this up,” he admitted sheepishly, sitting awkwardly perched on the edge of the cushion as if he was going to run at any moment. 

“Is there...something to mess up?” she asked, reaching over to take his hand and lacing her fingers through his. 

“I think so,” the words may have been a statement but his face was a question as he turned toward her a little more. “I don't want this to be some summer fling, Jess. I want it to be real.”

“Hey, summer flings can also be real. There was this one guy who…” she paused at Ollie's expression and shook her head, “never mind. The point is they're not mutually exclusive. But I appreciate the sentiment. And I’d really like that too.”

“What does that mean though?” he asked. 

She paused. “That’s what we have to decide. But...not tonight. It’s late. We should go to bed and talk about it when we’re rested.” She fought back a yawn that emphasized her point as she stood. 

He nodded, watching her turn and cross the room, eyes lingering low. It took him a moment to realize when she had stopped moving again. 

“Well aren't you coming?” 

“What?” he squeaked out. 

“It occurs to me, the bed is big enough for two and way more comfortable than the couch.”

“I…”

“I just mean to sleep, for real. And, I guess, maybe cuddling?” She bit her lip nervously. “Unless you're not good with that…”

He stared for another long, awkward moment. “Even with my nightmares?”

She shrugged. “Yeah. I’ll deal. Or maybe having someone else beside you will help.” 

Ollie scrambled to his feet, nearly tripping over himself in his rush to join her by the doorway. She laughed, lacing her fingers with his and leading him further through the apartment, silently marveling at how well things had gone, for a first date.

#it only took...almost 2 months to get to this. that's totally fine... #I had to do a lot of tweaking and pronoun conversion #so please (politely) hit me up if I missed anything #Oliver Sway x Jess O'Neill #Oliver Sway x OC #Song of Sway Lake fic #The Song of Sway Lake

[nightwingshero]

Rosemary, abatina, dill, hollyhock, and sweet pear for whoever you feel like talking about! 💜

Thank you, hun!!! I did a mixture, because I’m missing some old OCs of mine, and some need serious development. Yeah, so it got really long, I am so sorry!

Rosemary: What's their fondest memory?

Blair: It would probably be laying out in the backyard with her dad while they watched the stars, or her dad buying her that nice telescope that he’d use with her. It meant a lot to her that her parents indulged when it came to her interests, they were always supportive. Most of her time was spent at aquariums, the observatory, zoos, and just doing a lot of stuff with her parents. Science fairs were always a blast, because her parents would help. 

Emma: This would be either her and her brother Mark playing in the pond they had or playing football on the beach in the summer. Em would also work on an old Mustang, one she’s still helping him build, and Ash would come over most days and they would all just have a huge dinner in the backyard. Georgia gave decent weather for it. Most of her fondest memories are with her family or Ashton, because they grew up together and did a lot together when Emma’s family moved there. A beautiful, sunny day in Summer always takes her back. 

Quinn: There were times where they would travel back to Russia to visit the remaining members of his mother’s family, and he would love it. Quinn absolutely adored his babushka, and the stories she would tell. His mother would tell the same tales, but it wasn’t the same as how his babushka would tell it. There was also sailing with his father. That was something Quinn thoroughly enjoyed, and it was something they continued on doing until his father died. 

Wren: Definitely playing piano with her mother! That is probably the most precious moment for her. When she plays it now, she still feels as if her mother is there with her. Not only that, but her music teacher was her one good thing growing up. Mrs. Hall taught Wren how to actually play, and when Wren would sneak to lessons (under the guise of studying or going to the library), Mrs. Hall would often bake cookies and brownies for Wren, as if she were her own grandmother. Wren attended her funeral when she passed, and it actually felt like she had lost her grandmother when she heard. But those are memories she holds dear. 

Abatina: Are they very picky or particular about anything?

Blair: Not really, no. Blair is rather easy going and goes with the flow. I think the one thing would be don’t touch her work station. It’s organized chaos with an actual system that only she knows, and she will absolutely lose it if you mess with anything because that’s her life’s work you’re messing with. I think that could be said for any scientist though, and she is very verbal about it. It’s a light reminder, or a happy request until you get too close and she becomes slightly frazzled and makes you keep your distance. 

Emma: She can be an absolute control freak and has to have things a certain way (whether that’s because she was in the Marines or if she inherited it from her mother, who’s to say?) No eating in her cars, don’t touch her guns, and if you’re going along with her on something, you’re following her lead. Ashton, Nora, and even Roach give her hell for it, but honestly? Sometimes she can’t help it. Emma has a habit of taking control of a situation when it calls for it and she’s a super organized and neat person. Everything has it’s place, things are cleaned or done a certain way, and she would rather just do it herself. 

Quinn: His hair and shoes. Listen, Quinn is very boyish in looks (there’s a reason Ryan Gosling is his faceclaim) and his hair is usually neat or done how he wants it. He’s not overbearing about it, he just takes his time with it because he does put care into his appearance. His shoes are shined, his clothes match and his outfit is sharp, he doesn’t go more than a few days without shaving. Once the Collapse happens, it’s one of the things he can control, so he does. Grayson often jokes he’s the prettiest guy of Armageddon, but Quinn laughs with him. 

Wren: She doesn’t like it when other people drive. Having been in a traumatizing car accident, she prefers to be at the wheel for that sense of control. It’s honestly makes her so damn anxious when that’s not the case, and Quinn drives like a damn maniac from time to time in New Dawn. She will cling to something for dear life, and absolutely will backseat drive. It leads to a lot of spats between her and Jane, Quinn, and Ivy. 

Dill: Do they have any rivals?

Blair: I would say that one of the biggest would be John Constantine. Blair is skeptical when it comes to the mystical and supernatural, needless to say, she absolutely does not believe in magic. However, when the Particle Accelerator went off, someone close to her was wearing a totem or a spiritual pendent that got mixed into her meta powers (it’s how she can cosmic project and do some of the things she can with energy manipulation...it also helps balance out her going supernova and such), so...some of her powers are part of the arcane. Johnny knew that the second he met her, so when she gave him grief and became skeptical when he was helping Ollie bring Sara’s soul back, he just smirked at her and went “hate to burst your little bubble, love--” and honestly, they’ve been at it from there.  

Emma: Ha! Emma is competitive and very proud, so yeah, she has rivals, some more fun than others though. For example, her rivalry with Nikolai (and sometimes Price) is who can drink the other under the table. Yuri...well, they ended up in a fist fight on a misunderstanding when they first met, so while he’s working with her and the 141, there’s definitely some rivalry there with them trying to one up the other. She’ll spar with Ghost to see who is better too. Honestly, she’s always up for a challenge, and its something she shares with a lot of her fellow Marines back home--including her cousin and her teammates. 

Quinn: John fucking Seed. Listen, they hate each other, full on loathing, because Quinn isn’t afraid to point out that he’s in a cult and we all know how John is when someone makes him feel insecure and inadequate...with Quinn he very much does, even if that isn’t his intention.  It also doesn’t help that John notices how Quinn looks at his wife from time to time, and he doesn’t appreciate it, but the biggest thing is that Quinn openly challenges him on everything. To Quinn, he wants to poke holes in his logic and show that John isn’t at all what he thinks he is. Quinn is a natural leader, he had been in the Navy, he knows what that looks like and he’s quick to call John out on shit. Wren gives him a bit of a run, too, their rivalry just happens to uh...turn into something else. 

Wren: Holly Pepper and Mary May Fairgrave. Those are the two that gives her the most trouble. In any other scenario (and in most AUs), Wren and Mary May get along just fine, but in canon? Wren straight up punches her in the face. There’s more to it, of course. Wren is being worn down by people wanting her to do this and that for the Resistance, her constantly being pulled in every direction and being forced to give to people without them giving in return. And Mary May wouldn’t shut up about the truck, while saying Wren was dragging her feet on what the Resistance needed done (mostly because Wren was sleeping around with John, but they didn’t know that yet), and Wren just gets overwhelmed with frustration and anger, and straight up punches her in the face and tells her “if you want the truck so damn bad, go get it yourself”, and storms out. Holly Pepper later becomes an issue because she knows John slept around with her, and Holly loves shoving it in Wren’s face. So...Holly ends up dying because she straight up attacks Wren, and Jane helps her with it because she knows that John has a soft spot for Wren. Plus there’s that little shit Quinn in New Dawn...they’re a lot of fun. 

Hollyhock: What's their biggest goal right now?

Blair: Currently, it’s to find her place and stride with the team and her powers. She just wants to not have to lay awake at night and worry she’ll lose control again and hurt her friends and loved ones. Her whole life has changed, and there are still things that are throwing her off. She needs to find her footing again and feel more confident in what she’s become. Helping people, including herself and teammates/friends, is what’s most important to her. 

Emma: As of right now, it’s to regroup and hunt down Makarov. She’s still healing from when Shepherd took out the 141 base and tried to kill her, Ashton, and Nora. The stitches are still healing a bit, but she’s pumped up and ready to take him down. Her goal, and focus, is doing whatever Price and Soap need her to do. It’s almost tunnel vision at this point. 

Quinn: Take down the Highwaymen and fix whatever bullshit Whitney and Wren have going on. He won’t at all pretend he knows what fucking type of politics they have in New Eden, or what rules they’re going by, but it’s very damn clear that Ethan is no good and needs taken down. Him and Grayson came because Carmina asked Rush, and they were never ones to back down from a challenge, not when it comes to helping those in need. So, he’s gonna take down Mickey and Lou, allow Grayson to avenge Rush while protecting Prosperity, and then stand with Wren and Whitney as they take over New Eden.

Wren: That depends on if we’re talking Far Cry 5 or New Dawn, but she’s mostly taking out the head Seed and establishing peace. She’s trying to do what’s right, and whether that’s for herself (which is the eventuality of her changing sides) in Far Cry 5, or for their people and her family in New Dawn (overthrowing Ethan and opening New Eden to more freedoms.) It’s all revolved around Eden’s Gate though, and she agrees to help Quinn and Grayson because she still cares about Kim and Nick, and much of the others, so it’s just a pitstop on her plan. 

Sweet pea: If you had to choose a favorite dessert for them, what would it be?

Blair: Crème Brule, strawberry shortcake, or chocolate lava cake. You could say all of the above, to be honest, she loves sweets. Blair is always snacking, and they’re usually little cakes, fruits, or something sweet. There’s a reason crepes are her favorite breakfast foods, fruit and sweet? Yes. Which I guess you could  add porfait on the breakfast menu too, in that case...anyway, snacking is usually something her and Mick has in common, though she’s not constantly looking for it the way he is. Mick finds food in missions and randomly...Blair is more disciplined than that. She will grab stuff for him a lot of the times if they’re in the same room or if she’s working near him. Leonard just stares between them, he’s not sure what he thinks of their comrade (he also lost his more recent memories, so he can shut it.)

Emma: Dark chocolate cake or tarts. Anything that has a bitter or sour tinge to it, because she’s not really a sweets person. Not when it comes to that, at least. She loves her mom’s sweet tea (and homemade lemonade). But she just would have something like raspberry butter cookies, cherry pie, or even an old fashioned ice cream (yes, with bourbon). She loves dark chocolate though. And tiramisu. 

Quinn: Oh, he loves the Russian desserts his mom would make, and honestly, Quinn has such a sweet tooth. Bird’s milk cake, Russian rugelach, waffle cakes, and especially kartoshka. He would help his mom (or babushka when they would visit Russia), and would eat them with Russian tea they would make. He also enjoys many flavors of gelato. 

Wren: Cheesecake. Without a doubt. She has always been, and will forever be, in love with cheesecake. And all kinds, if we’re being totally honest. She will eat any flavor, she feels strongly about it. You wanna piss her off easily? Eat her cheesecake. Wanna get on her good side again? Bring her cheesecake. John does. Whenever he’s in trouble, he throws a cheesecake on it. She’s constantly eating it to the point Whitney and Rowan have both reminded her that it’s not a meal. Does she listen? No. 

#oc: blair chambers #oc: emma miller #oc: quinn langdon #oc: wren blake #my ocs #asks #arrowverse #call of duty #far cry new dawn #far cry 5

[welcometophu]

Into the Split: Reinforcements 5

Twinned Book 3: Into the Split

Reinforcements 5

[ Previous | First | Next ]

More people drift in throughout Saturday. Alaric is kept busy greeting newcomers and making introductions, while Pawel, Alia, and a small group of Mages from New Hampshire and Burlington stay in a side room to explain and re-explain the situation to the new arrivals. After a time, Mac joins them, popping in and out to get refreshments and make sure Pawel stays steady.

Chris sticks close by Alaric’s side, one hand always on Alaric’s back or arm, low and steady. When Alaric grumbles too loudly, Corbin swoops in to take over, Drea joining him as Alaric and Chris disappear.

Disappearing sounds like a great idea. Nikolai and Seth head up the stairs as well, turning the opposite direction to head into the guest wing while Alaric drags Chris into the family wing. From the sound in the hall, they don’t make it to Alaric’s room before there’s a low growl and someone thumps back against a wall.

That also sounds like a great idea, although Nikolai wouldn’t mind a little less violence involved.

As soon as he and Seth are in their room, Nikolai’s already stripping and Seth grins as he climbs into the bed. It’s a nice way to spend some time and recover from the crowds. Seth grounds him, and Nikolai hopes he does the same for Seth.

Hours pass, and darkness starts to creep into the room as Nikolai’s stomach growls. Finding food would mean leaving this space and braving the crowds again. He burrows closer to Seth and tugs the blanket up over them both, cocooning in the warmth and darkness.

A sharp rap on the door, and it’s opened immediately after. Corbin pokes his head in. “Thorne’s going to light things on fire. We have beer.”

“I locked that,” Nikolai says, emerging from the blankets to glare at him.

Corbin twists the knob and it turns easily. “Guess not,” he replies. “My point is, we’re having a bonfire and if you don’t want to be left behind when we head to the place, get your asses outside. It’s a great view, maybe a mile walk or so.” He starts to close the door, then pushes it back open again. “The other point is, nobody’s going to just stumble on us once we get there. Which means yes, it’s a chance to get away from the crowds and hang out with a smaller group of people.”

He closes the door with a thunk, but his footsteps don’t go far. A moment later, there’s another rap further down the hall, and Corbin starts talking again.

“I can be ready to rejoin the world.” Seth pushes the blankets down, untangling them from his feet. He rolls over and plucks his shirt from the floor, dragging it over his head. His hair is a mess, sticking out in every direction; Nikolai’s not sure it can be tamed. It’s not the only part of them that’s a mess, either.

“We probably need a shower,” he says, grabbing for the hem of Seth’s shirt.

Another rap against the door, but it stays closed this time. “If you’re planning on showering, make it quick,” Drea calls out. “If I see you heading to the showers, we’ll wait, otherwise we’re leaving.”

Seth rolls out of bed, grabbing their towels from the back of a chair. He tosses one to Nikolai before wrapping one around his own waist. “Give us five minutes,” he calls back as he opens the door.

Drea wrinkles her nose, huffing an almost silent laugh. “We’ll give you fifteen,” she says. “Go get cleaned up.”

When they finally make it downstairs, it’s a smaller group that Nikolai expects. Dax and Nate are back from wherever they went. Their hair is wet as if they’ve freshly showered, but Nikolai didn’t seem them in the baths upstairs. Alaric seems more relaxed than he did earlier, glancing up from his conversation with Corbin when they emerge, then going back to it just as earnestly. Chris chats with Dax and Nate, while Cass watches nearby. Trish, Sera, Rory and Kit, Stormy, and Dayton all round out the group. It’s still larger than makes Nikolai happy, but it’s more reasonable, as long he doesn’t have to deal with Dayton’s constant quiet stare.

There’s no rush to get to the location, and they meander down a pathway behind the house that Nikolai thinks might lead to somewhere near the river. They’ve already been walking a while when Nikolai realizes someone’s missing. “Where’s Thorne? You said he was going to light a fire.”

Rory makes a noise. “Doing something.”

“Or someone,” Stormy says cheerfully. “Probably someone. I have a lighter, so we don’t need his Talent for making flames. We’ll handle it old school, and if anything gets out of hand, I’ll just rain on it to put it out.”

“We will still have a bonfire, never fear,” Corbin assures them, ducking between Nikolai and Seth, sliding his arms through theirs. “I promised a quiet night and relaxation, and I will deliver.”

“How’s it going to be quiet with you there?” Alaric rumbles.

Corbin squawks and lets go, disappearing in a flurry of feathers as he flies up and lands on Alaric’s head in raven form. He pecks lightly at Alaric’s head, while Drea laughs.

The mood is far lighter than it was earlier.

The walk takes longer than Corbin implied, but when they arrive, it’s worth it. They’ve gone past the swimming hole, Nikolai thinks, circling back somewhat as the path went uphill, and they’ve emerged at the top of a small cliff and waterfall. Water cascades beneath them down into the small river, flowing back towards the house. It creates a natural background noise, and it sets Nikolai at ease.

True to her word, Stormy quickly sets up the fire and gets it roaring. Bags are unpacked, bringing out chairs, blankets, pillows, and small tables with food. Seth claims one of the oversized chairs, pulling Nikolai down to sit with him in it. They’re squeezed in, but it’s not uncomfortable.

When someone presses a red cup into his hand, filled with liquid that smells yeasty and bitter, Nikolai accepts it and takes a cautious sip. He wrinkles his nose; it’s… darker… than he expects. He can’t really think of a word for it, but the second sip isn’t as bad as the first. Bitter, definitely. Maybe a little fruity, too, he isn’t exactly sure. He passes it to Seth, who takes a long gulp, obviously liking it better than Nikolai did.

“We have beer, hotdogs, and s’mores for later,” Drea calls out. “Tonight it’s cook your own food over the fire, grab yourself a bun, and feel free to drink and eat as much as you want.”

Nikolai remembers s’mores from his childhood, and he’d rather have those than beer. But the hotdogs are out first, and he joins the people crouching around the edge of the fire to toast two of them over the flames—one for him and one for Seth, at least to start.

Stormy sits cross-legged on the ground, drumsticks in her hand as she taps a rhythm against a flat rock. Dayton sits behind her, leaning back to back with Stormy, her head tipped back and eyes closed. There’s a low rumble as if she’s purring to the rhythm of Stormy’s improvised beat.

Drea sits with Corbin’s head in her lap as she combs through his hair with her fingers. Sera has a skateboard that she balances on, shifting back and forth easily as she talks, hands moving. Her gaze seems fixed somewhere else, as if she reads something Nikolai can’t see at the same time as she speaks.

“Should’ve brought my guitar,” Trish comments idly from where she sits on the ground, leaning back on her hands. She glances to where Rory curls in a double chair with Kit, and he huffs a low laugh.

“Feels good to relax tonight,” Rory admits. “Trying to learn how to be social without a guitar in my hands.”

Nikolai remembers the way Rory seemed to keep it as a shield when they were in his room. His statement makes a lot of sense.

Kit pats Rory’s chest. “We can leave any time you want,” he assures him. “I’m just avoiding Carolyn for a little bit. She’s… somehow involved in the inner echelon of whatever planning is going on and I don’t want to be that involved. People seem to think twins are a package deal.”

Rory covers Kit’s hand with his own, fingers curling as he holds him still. “I’m fine here. And I’m glad you’re not getting involved at that level. I really hope Thorne isn’t, and I really hope that Dad keeps Mom and Dad from jumping in the deep end. Which might be difficult. Mom tends to jump first and think later, and Dad’s usually following her to keep her out of trouble.”

“They must’ve been fun when they were our age,” Trish observes.

“Actually, Dad started the band then, and I think that gave Mom and Dad plenty to focus on which kept them out of trouble.” Rory slumps a little further in his chair, curling closer to Kit. “Someone in there has to be the voice of reason, or else they’re going to end up world jumping or something again.”

“Not without us,” Seth says.

“‘M’fine if I don’t have to go back,” Alaric rumbles, and Chris makes a sound of agreement.

“They’re doing what you wanted, though, right?” Cass asks. She’s claimed a spot on the ground, across Dax’s lap but her feet are over Nate’s legs as she tilts her head against Dax’s shoulder. “All these people getting along and talking about things instead of trying to fight with each other. This is the kind of thing you wanted to happen.”

“It’s what needs to happen for our future,” Dayton replies before Alaric can. “Particularly if we want to fight against your child armies.”

“Our what?” Cass sits upright, Dax grunting as she elbows him in the chest. “My what?”

Dayton levels a look at her, unblinking.

Cass pushes to her feet, hands in fists as she looks down at Dayton. Dax rubs his chest, but it’s Nate who stands and touches Cass’s hand silently.

“What?” she snaps, glaring at him. A moment of silence and she spots Dax. “Shit. I’m sorry. I just—”

“Overreacted, I know.” Dax pushes to his feet, offers a hand. “C’mon, let’s take a walk.”

“Which is code for don’t anyone else take a walk,” Chris murmurs.

“Or pick a different direction,” Cass retorts. “Honestly, there is a lot of forest out here. I’m sure you can find your own little hookup corner if you need and leave us to ourselves.”

Alaric tilts his head back. “They always stink,” he mumbles. “Always.”

Seth passes the cup back to Nikolai, and this next sip isn’t as bad. He has food in his stomach, and he feels a little warm, and kind of relaxed. He takes a longer gulp before handing the cup back to Seth so he can finish it.

Someone refills it after that, and it’s warm and comfortable enough that Nikolai loses track of how many times it empties out and seems to magically be refilled. It seems to go quickly, with both him and Seth sharing the same cup, but at the same time, the night stretches out, time elongating in the flicker of the firelight, and the ease of slow conversation spilling around them.

He doesn’t understand a lot of what they talk about. The conversation has left the current problems of the world behind and moved on to movies and television and books and sports. Cass comes back and talks about clothes with Trish, while Alaric and Chris disappear. At some point Drea and Corbin drift away for a while. Nikolai thinks Dayton is gone, but he spots her again by the food, talking to Stormy as they pile chocolate on peanut butter cookies and leave out the marshmallow.

Peanut butter s’mores are new to him, and they are delicious. He has to stop drinking the beer in order to enjoy the marshmallows. The first taste of sweet after bitter makes his nose wrinkle and he can’t help the full body shudder. Someone hands him a bottle of water and he drinks it down, cleansing his palette for the sweet dessert.

They have four bags of marshmallows when the night begins. Nikolai thinks that it is entirely possible that he and Seth eat half a bag of crisp, warm, slightly burnt sweetness on their own.

Mac appears by the food and pours herself a beer before she joins the group. She steps over Trish and lowers herself to sit next to Cass, her feet drawn in and knees bent. “So, they’ve gone past getting to know each other and a bunch of them have moved off to another room and are seriously discussing how they can either replicate the ritual or undo it, or failing that, find a way to heal the Shadows so they stop threatening our worlds.”

“Knowing what happened to them at least gives them somewhere to start,” Sera volunteers.

Mac raises her beer in acknowledgement. “True. But. I’m not sure this is something reversible. And if they do reverse it, how far does that go? Does that fundamentally change the world and lower the number of Emergences again? Does it force them out of Nikolai’s world or does it somehow lock them in there? Does it heal them, or just make it so more of them can’t suddenly Emerge and start eating everyone in sight?”

“When you think about it, it sounds a little like a bad zombie movie,” Nate muses. “If the Shadows are eating people.”

“More like vampires,” Dax says.

“The point is—” Mac raises her beer, stops abruptly. “Hell if I know what the point is at this point. I’m not sure they do, either.”

“Shadows are supposed to be able to travel.” Nikolai remembers that much. “Chelsea can move between the worlds through the Split. What happens if they heal them? How are we going to get home?”

“Actually.” Sera’s gaze drifts off after speaking the one word. Trish elbows her, and Sera refocuses, one hand in the air. “Hang on, let me just get—okay, here it is. From what I found in those files we shouldn’t have access to, Shadows used to be able to move freely outside of this realm. Sigma Delta didn’t know where they went, and apparently Shadowwalkers didn’t like to talk about it. But those were normal Shadowwalkers. Whatever happened, it’s been perverted, so maybe after everything’s better, normal Shadowwalkers—like Mattie—will be able to still move between the worlds.”

“But we won’t know until it happens,” Nikolai says. He can see his chances of getting home slipping through his fingers. They might save the world, but at the same time, they might lose their ability to live there.

Seth’s hand finds his, and Nikolai holds on tightly.

“We definitely won’t know until it happens.” Mac glances at the trees just as Corbin and Drea walk back into the circle around the fire, hand in hand. “It’s all terrifying right now. The kinds of things they’re talking about involve levels of power that I’ve never seen used. I don’t know how they’ll do it. I don’t know how the government did it originally.”

“But you were involved with the project.”

Mac cranes her head to look back at Trish. “I was involved in the part where they started training me to join the military before I even knew that’s what I was going to be doing,” she says quietly. “I was involved as a soldier. A teleporting soldier whose partner was an assassin. So. No. I don’t know anything about what happened before I Emerged. And I really don’t think my dad’s going to answer questions if I go ask. I really don’t want to tell him I know more than I did. We need to keep some kind of surprise on our side.”

Cass exhales roughly. “Mine already knows I’m upset about something. He’ll think it’s all about Minnie, so that’s fine. He won’t be suspicious.”

“Why don’t we want them to know we’re coming for them?” Corbin asks. “Don’t we want to unravel this mess from the inside out?”

Mac shakes her head. “This is bigger than we can deal with right now. We need to fix the problem of the Shadowwalkers. The government’s going to be harder. But we can stop helping them and that’ll at least make a start.”

“What if something happened in my world,” Nikolai says slowly. They aren’t the same place; they’re analogs, and they’ve proven that over and over. But they are similar. “What if they can’t replicate, or unravel, this ritual because it didn’t just happen here. It happened in my world. And in the one that’s already gone. It happened across the twinned worlds and that means it has to happen across them again.”

Seth knocks into him. “Well, that’s what we’re trying to do with the Dreamscape, right?”

“Right.” That makes Nikolai more certain that the involvement of the Dreamscape is critical to whatever they’re doing. Which only makes the execution harder, trying to coordinate Dreamwalkers from both worlds—one where they are spread out and terrified, and another where they are too afraid to use their abilities to work together. It isn’t going to be simple.

“I have an idea.” Trish reaches into her pocket and drags out a piece of paper. She reads it, makes a face, and folds it back up to put away again. “Not that piece of paper. We need some blank paper, and something to write with.”

“For what?” Sera’s gaze shifts from unfocused to curious, watching Trish.

“Everyone write a wish down, toss it in the fire. Whatever you believe, just think of it being sent there when it burns,” Trish says. “Momma’s a Baptist through and through, but we used to do this even though it wasn’t exactly a Christian rite. Sometimes she’d say it smacked of Witchcraft, but right now, I think we could all do with a little magic.”

“Ten minutes,” Corbin says, before flying upwards in a flurry of black feathers. Alaric’s eagle follows him, racing through the sky.

More marshmallows disappear in the time while they’re gone, the group silent in the wake of serious discussions. Corbin drops out of the sky with Alaric, forming back into humanity with bags clutched in their hands. Alaric distributes the paper, while Corbin hands out pens.

Nikolai stares at the blank sheet, uncertain what to write. Seth slips from the chair and leans against a rock, writing something that looks more like a long letter than a simple wish.

Kit writes with his paper against Rory’s back, while Stormy kneels across the way, her paper pressed against the hard ground. Dayton walks away, tapping the pen against her thigh. Trish scribbles quickly, crumpling her paper when she’s done.

She’s the first to throw one in the fire, and she crouches close by as it burns up, ashes drifting into the sky. She rolls back on her heels when it’s gone, offering a hand for Sera to come forward.

They go one by one. Sera, then Kit and Rory, then Cass, and Dax. Nate is still writing as Alaric and Chris put their papers in. As soon as Nate’s done, he crumples his sheet of paper and throws it from a distance, flinching when it lands in the flames. Mac pops in next to the fire to set hers carefully among the flames. When they flare up, she teleports back to a safe distance to watch it burn.

Seth stands up and turns away from Nikolai, the paper hidden as he folds it neatly before dropping it into the fire.

Nikolai hasn’t even set a single word on paper yet.

He writes while Dayton returns and crouches next to Stormy, whispering before they both go to throw their papers in together.

I want to be able to go home and live with my family and grow old with Seth.

I want this world to be safe from Shadows.

I want my own world to be safe from Shadows.

I want my friends and family and myself and Seth to be happy.

I want to have a world where we don’t just survive, we can thrive.

Nikolai sets the pen aside and crumples the page roughly. He walks up slowly and grabs one of the sticky, abandoned marshmallow sticks and uses it to stab the paper. He holds it in the fire, keeping it in view while it crumbles to ash and flame.

He doesn’t know if the words go anywhere, if this does anything good. But it lightens the mood and maybe that’s what they need in that moment. Things are going to get harder again soon enough.

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#welcome to phu #welcometophu #into the split #phu twinned #twinned #its reinforcements

[lifeawoke]

ramble on about our fave's kid(s) please

if they had a kid ask meme    -    open    ! 

i WILL and i will do it for all of them because i love the bezukhovs very much.

name: marya “masha” pyotrovna bezukhova (honestly should just be bezohova in my opinion but whatever)

gender: female

general appearance: dark hair, dark eyes, tanned skin. not particularly special looking, like both her parents honestly. nose that goes right down and ends with a curve rather than a point. 3a hair, never a hair out of place (thanks aunt marya). a little tall for a girl, average weight for her height. 

personality: marya had a lot more say in masha’s raising so she takes after her a little bit. also, she’s the eldest of the bezukhovs, so she’s more strict and responsible than her siblings. she’s religious, not to the same point as marya, but where her dad’s a spiritual religious person & her mom’s a church-going, pray when something bad happens/you want something religious person, she’s more of both. not very artistic but smart and practical. knows a lot about politics from her dad. caring & protective, especially of her younger siblings. not soft spoken but not loud like her parents might be. will stand her ground though. more of an ambivert than anything, appreciates silence though. i love her

special talents: is the only one of the rostov-bezukhov kids to remember any english & often translates things, mostly political articles, for her parents/family.

who they like better: pierre, he’s a little more serious than natasha. but if she had to choose anyone ever it would be aunt marya or grandma natalya even.

who they take after more: pierre. facts. i kinda explained it earlier. 

personal head canon: marya, like her aunt, is a lot like sonya. she has the most potential/reason to marry up or rich and leave the family, maybe even travel, but is far too dedicated to her family to leave before the youngest are grown up.

face claim: i hate this no

next kid !

name: elizaveta “lisa” pyotrovna bezukhova 

gender: female

general appearance: a bit of an oddball, light brown hair, hazel, eyes, tanned skin. looks a lot like pierre, despite being a short little thing like natasha. has long arms though, something you wouldn’t really notice unless she points it out (and she will point it out to complain about them). a big mouth like natasha and more brown-ish lips, which she also hates. lisa also has “curly” hair, although its more of a wave so maybe 2b-2c. it suits her well enough, considering hair is mostly pulled back in her generation/time. a lil thicca than the rest of the litter. chubby cheeks that suit her round face. i’m kinda thinking a half-guatamalen e.liza s.canlen.

personality: was raised with a lot more freedom than masha, so a little less prim and proper. this was kinda the point where nat & pierre already knew they were gonna end up popping out kids the way disney pops out remakes so they kind of just went with the flow and got a lot more.. parenty with lisa. this didn’t mean much. she’s affectionate like natasha and passionate like pierre. doesn’t share his interests, though; lisa’s more of an athletic type. is a big complainer, which is sometimes endearing but less so the older she gets. fairly feminine but doesn’t have this obsession with boys and marriage the way her mother did and the way that girls were expected to. gets along well with her sister. more of an extrovert. 

special talents: she’s an excellent horse rider, also says fuck side saddles because she heard a queen in denmark did it once and she’s only gotten better since. 

who they like better: she’s freest around pierre & she loves that but she relates most to natasha, so it’s 45/55 tie honestly.

who they take after more: natasha; they both like riding (lisa more than nat) and both have personalities that demand to be seen in a mostly endearing way. 

personal head canon: growing up lisa was probably closest to nikolai andreyevich, and you can see even as they grow up how close they are. there are even moments when lisa goes to coco before she goes to her own sister about something. it scares some guys off as lisa gets older but she doesn’t really mind.

face claim: if e.liza s.canlen was half gutamalen, i’d say her

the boy !!

name: pyotr “petya” pyotrovich bezukhov

gender: male

general appearance: okay you know o.scar i.saac? imagine him young, tall, and SKINNY. except not when he’s young, he’s a chubby kid and it’s the cutest thing. some pictures for reference. he also is p confident looking, if that makes sense. maybe not the long hair but maybe when he’s younger? 

personality: mirrors his namesake a lot. young kid that’s just so weirdly mature it’s like... who are your parents bc it’s definitely not nat & pierre. except it is. he gets a lot of extra love from natasha who has been wanting a boy for so long so she could name him after petya. he’s a mama’s boy, #respectwomen, an intellectual like his dad. has a lot of the same problems as his dad in his youth– indecisive & sometimes hedonistic. i mean he grew up rich it does things to you. but i love him dearly. and he does find his purpose earlier than pierre did, finds love in government stuff, which he half gets from his dad and half from his older sister, who cared a  l o t for him. is super close with marya, gets along well with lisa. he isn’t very sentimental though, although he has a soft side for his mom and eldest sister, he can be too objective for some people. an introvert but not shy.

special talents: he can knock out a novel a day if he wants to; his attention span is a mile long

who they like better: oh natasha. she loves that kid & he loves her

who they take after more: pierre ! petya admires pierre for sure and i can imagine pierre feels a lil more comfortable teaching his son about puberty nd sex and stuff than he does his daughter so i imagine they speak freely to each other

personal head canon: petya was even going to run off into the army like petya ilyich without knowing that his uncle did the same thing, but natasha caught him and explained to him what happened to her brother & he’s been jaded by the idea of fighting in a war ever since.

face claim: o.scar i.saac but half russian bhsbdj

the last one! in my head they have a lot more but we shall discuss them at a different time. 

name: yeva “yevochka” pyotrovna bezukhova

gender: female

general appearance: an oddball again, but less so. dark brown eyes and straight blonde hair. a skinny, long face and a very unique nose, one you don’t ever see– i’m thinking like a.licia v.ikander’s nose. it adds character to her already freckled face. her skin is many shades lighter than her father’s but she tans well and often.  very feminine in appearance and dress but looks shy. very skinny, almost sickly skinny like her mom is. average height. 

personality: more of the observing type. spoiled but not necessarily bratty (at least not compared to most rostovs growing up). enjoys the arts, especially performance ones, but doesn’t really enjoy being a part of them. she’s insecure like lisa is but isn’t as vocal about it, which gives this sad kind of air to her. she’s more religious like marya, almost soley because she spends the most time with marya. lives life slowly. very chill but clearly lacks purpose. not very comfortable with who she is as a person. ends up being very close to her parents because she would rather spend time with them than other kids. 

special talents: she’s an excellent chef because she spends a lot of time in the kitchen (usually with grandma natalya until she died, then just on her own going through old recipes) 

who they like better: probably natasha because she admires her outgoingness. 

who they take after more: pierre ! doesn’t have his passion but has his slight awkwardness.

personal head canon: yeva grew up watching her father a lot, but felt the most embarrassed when he’d say something that wasn’t well-received. this proclivity towards second-hand embarrassment stops her form doing a lot & putting herself out there. 

face claim: a.licia v.ikander’s nose on a much paler, freckled, and blonde a.dria a.rjona. it sounds weird but i think it?? kinda works for what i’m trying to get across

#soughtlove #♥ – » pyotr kirillovich bezukhov. trsl. петр кириллович безухов. » soughtlove. #their BABIES #save #i love them and their childrens

[prkrc]

hey there demons! it me, sam! this is just parker’s same old intro edited with some updates and wanted / taken connections, so feel free to take a look if you’re interested! messaging me @ellvie is probably easiest!

DISCLAIMER: this is a sideblog so i might post stuff to the wrong acc sometimes js

so, this guy right here…riley ignatius parker-warrington…will throw hands if you call him anything other than parker. it’s what everyone calls him. you gotta be really special to call him riley and not immediately get decked for it. tbh most people probably think parker is his first name anyway so! moving on

parker was born to a wealthy family in a small but affluent village called alderley edge in cheshire, england. he’s the youngest of four sons so he has three older brothers.

his family, the parker-warringtons ( known more commonly as the warringtons ) are stupid rich. it hurts me to think about it askdh. they’re basically the british rockefellers. parker’s great x6 granddad started the family business back a couple centuries ago and nowadays they’ve got their hands in everything from business to architecture to real estate to education to oil…they own a lot of stuff. the warrington building in downtown london was completely made up just now is basically the rockefeller center of the uk. 

the family drama has been highly publicized in the uk & europe for longer than anyone can remember at this point, but not as much in america. 

anyway, parker spent his early years sheltered and pampered and homeschooled by tutors and nannies bc his parents never had time for him but it’s whatever he got over it really early on in life.

parker’s always been a huge troublemaker with a restless nature so his wealthy, uptight, lowkey shady af parents who are obsessed with the family’s image could never really deal with him and eventually decided to just ship him off to boarding schools all over europe, just one after the other after the other bc he kept getting kicked out lmao.

about the only thing he enjoyed about his childhood and schooling were his music lessons. he was taught to play piano, violin, and even the harp. other things like math and history and science didn’t come easily to him at all, but music? he was great at it and he’s always loved it. during his teen years while away at boarding school was when he first procured an electric guitar and learned to play. along with that, he also discovered punk music, aka the greatest thing in the entire fucking universe if you ask him. far as music goes, he’d found his calling in his early teenage years.

at school he was basically that rebellious kid in all the movies who wore doc martens with his prim & proper school uniform and carried around a pocket knife and cut class to go smoke while vandalizing school property and would absolutely fuck up some prissy pretty boy’s face just for looking at him the wrong way.

literally the only reason he actually graduated rather than flunking out was because his father was able to pull some strings aka bought his very last boarding school a whole new library wing. parker did actually consider running away a few times, but there was a part of him really reaaaaally deep down that actually enjoyed some aspects of school ( though he very strongly believes many education systems across the world need a serious overhaul and blahblahblah don’t ask him unless you want a lecture ). anyway, the moment he was done with school, he did finally skip out on…well, everything and everyone and ditched the country altogether, heading out first to seattle washington, then to los angeles, california, and then he finally settled in new york city when he was twenty years old, meaning that he’s lived in nyc for the last three years!

started his band, rabid porcupine, right after moving to the city. they’re a punk band, popular among the subculture and virtually unknown to everyone else. parker is the lead vocalist, guitarist, songwriter, overall face of the band but don’t get it twisted he could never go solo his whole band is important to him.

his parents have threatened to cut him off & disinherit him about a billion times but will probably never actually do it even though they see him as a huge disgrace to the family name. they call sometimes but he never picks up. if anybody asks he’d probably say that he hates his family but he honestly doesn’t. i don’t think he’s capable of hate lmao. he doesn’t like them and he’d rather stay away from them bc he and his family just do not get along, but at the end of the end of the day, v deep down he has like….a teeny tiny molecule of affection for them even though his family is 100% genuinely awful people

so, parker left nyc for a bit! even though it was only like a week ago in real time i wanna say he’s actually been gone for about two to three months maybe? idk but he went back to england in a rush, just kinda vanishing overnight as he tends to do.

he told no one where he was going or that he was even leaving at all. not even his roommate or…the person he’s very attached to, stas. he didn’t wanna tell anyone why he had to leave.

BUT WE’RE ALL GONNA FIND OUT RIGHT HERE AND NOW SURPRISE! his dad died. yikes. now they had a very…complicated relationship. parker hated his father and his father hated him. tbh his death wouldn’t have been enough for parker to go all the way back to england bc he fucking hates it there if it weren’t for the fact that his dad was pulling some fuck shit from the grave.

long story short, he left the family company to parker in his will. not the family, not his wife, not any of his other three sons. nope. the whole ass billion dollar company, every single subset, everything…was left to one riley ignatius parker-warrington.

naturally he was fucking furious. he hates the family business, he hates their company, he hates office work, and he hates knowing that his father only did it to spite him. he immediately attempted to get rid of the company. tried selling it, just straight up giving it away, even driving it into the ground lmao. just, anything to get it off of his hands and out of his responsibility but nothing has worked so far.

and that’s why he’s back in nyc! he wants a lawyer’s opinion so what i think parker is gonna do here? lowkey try to sneak into town, get some help from a lawyer he trusts and then leave without anyone else noticing or knowing that he was in town at all because he absolutely does not want to be here and he especially doesn’t wanna show his face. too bad for him!

lemme…stop? and just give you a few quick facts bc this is getting super long who’s even still reading this?

looks like he could kill you and could actually kill you

he hasn’t been home in like five years but he still has the heaviest most posh british accent you will ever hear in your life + he knows he’s fulfilling a stereotype here but he doesn’t care he fuckin loves tea

his three older brothers are named sebastian, nikolai, & rian. he doesn’t get along with any of them but he and rian he by far has the worst relationship with rian, his identical twin who’s a few minutes older. unlike most stereotypical twins they’ve literally never been in sync, have never gotten along and have probably beaten each other up before.

his family is big on modern day arranged marriages but you can miss parker with that bullshit he will date whoever he wants

that being said i think he’s probably…straight? idk tho & like who’s really straight anymore honestly

most people think that he’s a jerk bc he’s incredibly standoffish and temperamental but he’s actually…not that bad? like he’s sure he’s permanently grumpy but he also holds the door open for people and says thank you to janitors and probably helps old ladies across the street and would literally rather die than be rude to wait staff in a restaurant

seemingly very passionate about everything always openly expresses his emotions. he doesn’t…know how to hide them? he doesn’t know how to pretend like he doesn’t care?

adrenaline junkie, reckless af & likes to party but isn’t into hard drugs. he’s tried once or twice but just really isn’t a fan. he smokes & drinks & smokes weed sometimes but that’s it

very observant and good at reading people

basically the walking talking rl embodiment of the jerk with a heart of gold trope.

knows he’s not the easiest person to befriend but if you are his friend, then he’s gonna be loyal af, the realest ride or die of all time

however, he tends to take the tough love route when he’s trying to help someone out. like just bc you’re his friend he’s not gonna coddle you bc you’re upset he’s gonna tell you how to how to deal with your problems & emotions

which is funny bc lmao he’s angry af 1000% of the time. will throw hands anytime anywhere

so to the surprise as nobody he took up boxing as a kid and to this day it’s the only sport he cares about at all. he still boxes once or twice a week as a hobby & it’s probs pretty good for him tbh

also took a lot of music lessons back in the day. he’s actually a very talented pianist who probably could’ve gone on to play professionally if he stuck with it but nah. he likes the guitar. you’ll probs never catch him playing the piano which is a shame bc he honestly is a beautiful pianist :/

worked as an auto mechanic before he committed to his band full time but highkey misses it sometimes. he still likes cars & absolutely loves motorcycles, will talk about them all day with you if you want.

he has a motorcycle which pretty much built it himself from scratch and it’s just…it’s literally his child ok he will freak if you so much as lay a hand on his motorcycle ok /f r e a k/ like don’t even look at it the wrong way

feminist af

parker is grumpy and angry and standoffish but look he really is and really tries to be a decent guy. anyone who knows him well would see that very clearly and honestly, that’s probably why they stick around even though he can be difficult.

CONNECTIONS

family

future step sibling - genesis iver

maternal cousin, don’t get along - open.

paternal cousin, basically the only family member he likes - ingrid larson

romantic

ex girlfriend / highkey in love - anastasia sangster

ex on good terms - open.

ex on bad terms - open.

former toxic on / off relationship - open.

fwb - maia kauri.

former fwb - open.

platonic

best friend / ride or die - mason grey

roommate - open. please check the main for info on this wc!

close friends - reese monroe, kennedy drakos, isla thompson, open to more.

friends -  warren daily, marnie almeida, sullivan ramsey, alexandra blakely, cameron jones, open to more.

unlikely friends - wren daily, open to more.

frenemies - rosalind cox, jake carver, open to more.

attempted good influence - logan van kamp

workout buddy - willow sparks

negative

enemies - lukas donovan, open to several. parker is a goblin so he could’ve pissed someone off for many reasons

ex friends - jay weston, open to more.

doesn’t like / trust - lex sinclair

since this is officially a novel i think it’s time for me to sTOP LMAO. i have no specific wc in mind but i’d love to plot so please feel free to message me if you’re interested! as always i’m super excited to plot and write with everyone!

#excessintro #death tw #mostly just for my personal reference but he could use some connections so pls feel free to take a look!

[ana-annotated]

128 THINGS I LOVED ABOUT CROOKED KINGDOM (WARNING! SPOILERS AHEAD!!!!!!!) Part 1

1. It has WYLAN’S POV

2. Jesper is one of his biggest reasons for committing to being a member of the Dregs and he knows it

3. Kaz breaks into the house of a wealthy and probably dangerous lawyer in the middle of the night but first things first, he’s gotta give the guard dogs belly rubs before robbing their owner.

4. Nina is still facing the consequences of ingesting parem and yet here she is undercover, charming this lawyer out of his whistle.

5. Wylan’s dark side just gets darker

6. Kaz having a rare soft moment and telling Wylan where his mother is buried cause he knows what it’s like to lose someone suddenly and not get to say goodbye

7. Matthias trying to understand Kaz’s sleight of hand and still failing to see how he does it

8. Matthias wishing Wylan or Kuwei would wear a hat so he could tell them apart

9. Wylan blushing at Jesper’s touch

10. Wylan Van Sunshine

11. Leave my grandmother out of this

12. Jesper’s dad is so innocent and precious and must be protected at all costs

13. Are you all students? Of a sort

14. Matthias has a little sister

15. Matthias comforting Alys cause she reminds him of his mother when she was pregnant

16. Nina whining over Matthias sacrificing her biscuits to keep Alys quiet

17. Matthias jealous of Jesper making Nina smile

18. Inej laughing in Van Eck’s face for thinking he outwitted Kaz

19. Nina expecting Matthias to rub her feet from now on whenever she wants him to

20. Matthias longing for a domestic life with Nina

21. Nina longing for the comfort of family relationships like the one Jesper has with his father

22. Jesper as a kid

23. Jesper’s mom was the sweetest most badass person ever and taught him everything he knows at such a young age

24. The WYLAN’S MOM CURVEBALL WHO THE HECK DOES THAT TO A PERSON MY POOR BABY HOW DARE JAN DO THAT TO HIM AND HER?!

25. Wylan’s motivation to get revenge

26. Kaz giving Wylan a pep talk about strength when facing a weakness

27. Matthias’s relationship with his wolf

28. Matthias pretending to be a happy go lucky Fjerdan

29. Nina having to explain every single dirty joke to him and convince him they’re not insults

30. Nina and Matthias’s first kiss being straight out of a Disney movie 😍😍😍😍😍😍😍😍😍😍😍😍😍😍

31. Everyone points guns at each other in Ketterdam it’s basically a handshake

32. Matthias going into full military general mode and leads a two-man Grisha army in a victorious mini war against the Dime Lions

33. Kaz literally CRASHING Van Eck’s dinner party

34. Dunyasha: “I am Dunyasha, a white human blade, a ruthless assassin princess, and my sole purpose is destroying you. Prepare to feel my ninja stars.”

Inej: “New phone who dis?”

35. Colm Fahey adopting his teen gang member son’s five gang member friends

36. Nina finally getting her waffles

37. Only to realize Matthias Helvar is possible better than waffles (just barely, but still)

38. Matthias believing waffles is Nina’s one true love instead of him

39. What’s new? Nm, Nina can raise the dead to do her bidding, Inej plummeted 20 stories and nearly died at the ninja stars of some assassin chick with a huge ego, and there’s a huge gaping hole in Jan Van Eck’s dining room ceiling. Hbu? Who wants waffles?

40. They’re all crazy but Wylan realizes there’s nobody he’d rather have by his side cause the Dregs are HIS CREW

41. Kaz Ankle Breaker Brekker sliding past a pair of Van Eck’s guards and knocking them off their feet at once with his cane

42. The Crows trying to outdo each other with the highest rewards offered for their execution or capture.

43. Kaz winning that contest in a landslide

44. Nina flipping off their Wanted posters

45. Nina changing out of her Fjerdan costume with Matthias’s “help.”

46. Jesper and Kuwei’s haunting the Dime Lions

47. Little Inej stopping hearts and scaring her family to death on the high wire but wanting to keep going back on no matter what

48. Inej only falling when a net is underneath her

49. Wylan’s first impression of Jesper

50. Jesper’s flair for neon fashion

51. “Mother, father pay the rent! I can’t my dear the money’s spent!”

52. “On a dare I ate a literal trough full of waffles doused in apple syrup and almost went back for seconds.”

53. Kaz treating Jesper like a brother, even yelling at him and calling him Jordie because he’s so protective of Jesper and wants to keep him from making a mistake too big because of his gambling addiction. Seeing Jesper get carried away with his best worries him and he just wants him to be smart and not make the same costly mistakes Jordie did.

54. Kaz and Jesper arguing like brothers and then proceeding to fight like brothers while Inej, Nina, and Matthias sit around bored, waiting for them to snap out of it cause they’re definitely not going to kill each other with their bare hands, and there are bigger things to worry about.

55. Jesper’s dad breaking up the fight with a single threat

56. Jesper Llewelyn Fahey

57. I KISSED THE WRONG BOY

58. Inej and Jesper’s friendship

59. Matthias being very okay with PDA with Nina

60. Colm’s presence making the Dregs feel like kids worn out from a rowdy birthday party

61. Kuwei being a straight up savage and lying about his language barrier

62. KANEJ WOUND BANDAGING SCENE DESTROYED ME EVERYTHING ABOUT IT I HAVE NO COMPLAINTS NOR DID I EXPECT HIM TO EVEN GET HALF AS CLOSE TO HER AS HE DID

63. Kaz trying so so hard to push away all memories of his trauma to be in the moment and touch Inej and just show her how much she means to him

64. She followed him anyway

65. Kaz reclaiming his rightfully EARNED Dregs throne

66. Inej watching him kick out Haskell and kick traitor Dregs ass with pride

67. “I suggest a cane”

68. “What’s wrong with him?”

“Same thing that’s always wrong with him, he’s Kaz Brekker.”

66. Nina constantly trying to get Kaz to warm up a little, whether by joining a group hug or letting someone help bandage him up post-fight for his life

67. Colm willing to do anything to help the gang without question

68. Wylan’s cute anger at Jesper for mistaking Kuwei for him (let’s be real tho he was pretty mad at himself too for not being more upfront with his feelings since he had no Tailor to fix him)

69. Wylan getting mad at Nina for failing to mention she found a refugee Tailor that could change him back

70. Colm feeding into Nina’s waffle/food in general addiction

71. The politics in the story are so intricate and it just continues to be built upon in Crooked Kingdom. It’s detailed enough that honestly, Leigh could probably write a whole Grishaverse history textbook. It’s pretty interesting to read from everything we get from the Dregs discussing their home nations, their histories, traditions, and relations with other countries. Leigh put in so much effort to build not just an authentic country in Kerch, but an entire alternate world. Really fun to read about.

72. Wylan’s offense for Jesper not being able to tell him and Kuwei apart in that moment

73. Jesper stealing a portrait Wylan’s mother painted of him to help them reconnect once Wylan’s features are returned

74. “I told you, I like your stupid face.”

75. Jesper helping Genya tailor Wylan’s “stupid” face because he remembers it quite well

76. Jesper nearly losing it when he returns to find the boy he had fallen for at first sight has returned to his original appearance

77. JESPER KISSING THE RIGHT BOY

78. “I really hope we don’t die”

79. Colm giving an award worthy performance in front of Van Eck to rope him and the Council into falling for Kuwei’s fake indenture auction

80. Nina’s underlining threat to Van Eck for messing with Kaz, only a fool would try to scheme against Brekker

81. Colm telling Wylan that he’d be good for Jesper ☺️

82. Wylan taking an actual beating from other Dregs to make Jan Van Eck believe the Dime Lions were going to kill his son for him

83. Wylan’s on point acting making everybody in the chapel believe his father was a conniving scumbag all along

84. THE FACT THAT JESPER CAN ACTUALLY USE HIS POWERS TO AIM HIS BULLETS

85. Kaz lying like nobody’s business to the Merchant Council and everyone bidding on Kuwei to throw Van Eck under the bus

86. Kaz freaking BLOWING UP THE MENAGERIE IF THAT’S NOT A DECLARATION OF HIS LOVE TO INEJ IDK WHAT IS

87. Kaz and Inej hand holding

88. Nina pretending to be pregnant

89. Matthias believing Kaz could fake a birth

90. Genya teaming up with Kaz and Nina to fake Kuwei’s death

91. I haven’t even read the Shadow and Bone trilogy yet but I love King Nikolai and his alter ego and I can’t wait to read more of him in the series and in King of Scars!!!!!

#kaz brekker #six of crows #crooked kingdom #inej ghafa #kaz x inej #nina x inej #grishaverse #ketterdam #leigh bardugo #dregs #also matthias is still alive and no one can convince me otherwise #matthias helvar #nina zenik #jesper fahey #wylan van eck #jesper and wylan #wylan van sunshine #kuwei yul bo #kuwei

[nutwit]

5, 14, and 32 for the dnd ask meme, please!

o shit another one ok!

in the words of the good red man, here a we go i think i said that last time actually oh well

5. Favorite NPC

Oh that’s a tough one.  I think it’s tied between Bernard Tripsocket, gnome conspiracy theorist, Julian Montressor, the dapper physicist pirate captain of the Stern played by Christopher Jackson, and Mzumiel (Zoomy), a three-city-block-long beta fish eel monster, demon lord of the fourth column, master of the ethereal and lover of model trains, the billion-eyed and long-mouthed, and owner of the most soothing telepathic southern accent this side of the underdark.

this next one’s a doozy so its under the cut

14.  Introduce the other parties you’ve played in / DMed

I’ve DMed for just one other party, and played in just one other party too.  And technically speaking, the party i DMed for was part of the same story as all the characters in the last answer?  Here let me explain.

There are three parties:  the CFRP, the Freelancers, and the Librarians.  The CFRP stands for Center for Firmament Research and Protection, and they’re the party I outlined last #asked and answered.

The Freelancers are a team of legendary heroes *snrk* who do adventures for hire.  They’re honestly a more traditional dnd party, but we play the freelancer campaign in dungeon world, so fuck you.

Helios Amastacia, high elf paladin.

Remember Venus Amastiacia from the last post?  Her older sibling has been out looking for their wayward sister for years.  Helios is built like a brick shit house and bares the power of Tyr, the one-armed god of tactics and war.  They’re by far the most level-headed of the bunch.  Strong parent vibes but also strong sibling vibes, and also just generally very strong.

Tex McCree, human fighter.

Jesus Fucking Christ this man.  He’s fucked his way across half the continent, at some point toppled some kind of feudal lineage, accidentally got a lordship, peaced out of that and found A Shotgun, somehow, sweet-talked his way into bed with the chairwoman of the Shatterpeak Council (Keegan’s mom), he’s a mess!  He’s a mess!  He got grossed out by touching a dead body like a week ago!

Mira the Blade, human thief.

She’s the best thief in the world.  No, really.  I’m not just saying that, it’s important for her character arc.  She’s even stolen from the Amastacia vaults, which she and Helios have laughs about sometimes.  She likes to push the limits of her abilities and wouldn’t be caught dead in a bathing suit for a number of unspecified reasons.  Very gay, extremely gay.  Has an as-of-yet unidentified link with Nikolai Hoobluff from the CFRP campaign.  :3c

Hollik Bannagammer Merrilin, gnome bard/barbarian.

Baby boy.  He just wants to write good songs about his heroes, Mira and Helios.  Him and Tex are very good chaotic friends who have never caused problems ever for the party in any circumstances.  One time he bought approximately 2000 dollars worth of fish from a butcher at 4 in the morning.  His catchphrase is, “Hello, new friends!”  Also if you hurt his friends he will kill you.

Sunbeam Talbot, halfling ranger.

So this one’s fun.  In the second arc of the Freelancer campaign, before Talbot joins up, they get hired by Hollik’s brother Bernard to steal his notes back from the museum he recently got fired from because his notes prove some big conspiracy or whatever.  Talbot happened to work at that museum, and Mira tried to steal his ID to get in, but Talbot clocked her before she got away.  So now that the museum’s been destroyed by ancient death roots from beyond time (don’t ask), he’s hunting her down to figure out what the fuck is going on.  Also, in the CFRP campaign, he’s the head of the CFRP. 

So, for those of you keeping track, the timeline is super convoluted and intriguing.  I have a lot of reveals I really really want to get to, so hopefully we’ll be able to start playing again once school lets out after next week.

So that’s the Freelancers.

The Librarians are a group of relic hunters brought together by a mysterious pair of brothers to recover a mirror from an ancient ruin that totally isn’t made of rebar and concrete for undisclosed reasons.  We haven’t played much with them because Katie’s been busy but I’m totally in love with her world.

Alys al’Damo, half-elf wizard.

Alys is off looking for the chosen one to guide them on their quest for something something.  She doesn’t really know who or what she’s looking for.  All she has to go on is vague prophecy and tarot-like character descriptions that she adheres to vehemently.  She also has a very good hawk familiar and specializes in fire magic.

Vix Sen, half-orc bard.

Vix is a very strong very sexy fashion designer.  She’s the Edna Mode of dungeoneering.  She’s designed turtlenecks for the king of all turtles probably.  Mostly she spends her time nowadays casting three thunderwaves in a minute jesus fuck Vix please I like having EARS.

Jedediah Brookes, human warlock.

Doctor Brookes is very dirty and greasy and very nice.  He has a secret doctor’s office in the seedy part of town where he stitches people up for free if they’re down on their luck, but in secret, like batman.  But surgery doesn’t explain his witch bolts.  Turns out his dad is a god of healing or something?  And Jed, being great, begrudgingly made a pact with him to be his emissary on earth.

Cederus Dur-Barundeaunt, dwarf cleric.

This boy is mine!  Cederus is a very old, very wise dwarf who’s spent most of his life in the clergy.  He’s that sort of old man style rascal where your pop pop would smuggle you a sweet when your mom said no sweets.  The most important part of his characterization though, and the reason I love playing him so much, is because of a bit of worldbuilding I did with Katie.  Dwarves in this world calcify as they get old.  Cederus is getting on in years, and two parts have already started to turn to limestone:  his upper leg, and his eyes.  He is totally blind and relies on his familiar to see.

I had to do some homebrewing with Katie to make Cederus work right because clerics aren’t supposed to have familiars and I had to start at level 2 for this campaign.  He’s got an extremely thick french accent.  I love him.

AND FINALLY

32.  Your favorite role to play (tank, healer, etc)

I haven’t played many roles actually (I’m the DM it’s my curse), but honestly, I don’t even think of characters like that at this point.  I’m not really very interested in playing any particular “role“ over the others, because I’m not really into that kind of play?  The numbers and the mechanics are a lot of fun, sure, but the reason I play DnD is to write a good story with my friends!  I’d much rather play a character with a motivation or theme that I’m really into than fill a party role, although roles can be useful in coming up with motivations!

THIS WAS SO BIG IM SO SORRY and also very late!  but if anyone is interested in more of this, let me know!

#my post #asked and answered #call-me-nemo-cae

[pennywaltzy]

The Cacophony Of Life (1/6)

So I am bound and determined to do this fic as at least the last fic I finish this round of WIP Big Bang, if not the second to last (provided I can figure our where I want the fic to go). This fic was originally asked for by @elliedilly and this first part has been up for ages. Hopefully I can find where I have all the info for this fic on my laptop and get to writing part 2 tonight. Enjoy!

The Cacophony Of Life - From birth, every person can hear the music that their soul mate hears, whether it’s music that they’re playing, listening to or singing along to, in their mind. Measures can be taken to lessen the sound, but there are times when the sound is too much, too overwhelming. For years, Sherlock Holmes and Molly Hooper use their connection to each other through the music they both hear to communicate: first to annoy each other as children, then to care for each other as teenagers and young adults, and finally to express the longing that hopefully one day, and one day soon, they’ll meet each other face to face and express the love that’s grown between them throughout the years.

Read Part 1 | Help Me Survive? | Commission Me?

January 1985 Sherlock Felix Mendelssohn-Bartholdy, “Symphony No. 4 in A major, Op. 90 "Italian" - I. Allegro vivace” Molly The Chipmunks, “My Sharona”

Sleep. He was sleepy. His tummy was full and he wanted to curl up with Redbeard and go to sleep. Sleep would be so nice. Quite lovely.

His thoughts were kind of squished together, all muddled and everything as he yawned and padded his feet towards his room. His mummy had gotten him the bee pyjamas with the footies, his favorite. And his favorite bear was on the bed, Mr. Snugglesworth. He gave his mummy a grin as she tucked him into bed. Normally Father did it but it was quiz night, and he was smart and that was how he showed it. He wanted to be smart too, like Daddy and Mummy and Mikey and Sherrinford. He wanted to learn everything.

He waited for his mummy to turn on the music. He knew his Mummy thought he’d like soft, soothing music to go to sleep to but he liked this song the best. This song gave him the best pirate dreams, where he was sailing the high seas with Blackbeard and they were looting all the ships and burying all the treasure.

Once the song started he settled in, waiting for his mum to turn off the bedroom light and then shut his eyes. He was almost asleep when he suddenly heard the most grating sound. His eyes flew open. No, no, no. He wanted to sleep. Why couldn’t they let him sleep?

Ooh, my little pretty one, my pretty one When you gonna give me some time, Sharona Ooh, you make my motor run, my motor run Got it coming off o' the line, Sharona

The voices singing the song were high pitched, giving him a headache. They didn’t even sound flas…fals…real. He just wanted it to stop, wanted to drown it out. He threw his covers off, padded to the record player, and then turned the volume knob all the way up until Mendelssohn-Bartholdy’s symphony drowned out the noise in his head.

He hated the person he was attached to, the person who could hear the music he listened to, the person who played music to annoy him. Hatedthem. And when they increased the volume of their music, out of meanness, he sank to the floor and sobbed. He hated them. Hated them so much.

Soul mates were stupid.

He didn’t want one. Not ever.

March 1986 Molly Falco, “Rock Me Amadeus” Sherlock Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart, “O zittre nicht” (as performed by Lucia Popp in 1969)

She was bored. All the stations played all the same music. It was…boring. Boring boring

boring

. She’d rather hoped if she managed to wrest away control from her sister Emily and her brother Colby that there’d magically be something worth listening to.

But at least the stuff on the radio was better than the stuff in her head. Her mum and dad had explained that every person is born with a soul mate, someone destined to be the person they fall madly in love with, and when their soul mate is born they hear all the music they hear. They can hear anything they listen to on the radio, or any music they’re singing, or music they’re playing themselves.

And she had a boring soul mate who listened to nothing but the dreary classical music that Mrs. Eshaghicn made her listen to when she’d go over while her mum took her dad to the doctor. She didn’t like that music. She liked fun stuff. Stuff she could dance too. Everyone in her house was sad all the time. Mummy tried to make things less sad, and Daddy did too, but they were sad a lot. And she could tell, just like Emily and Colby could. They could see it.

She was four, but she knew some stuff. After all, people said she was a bright young thing.

Finally she found a song she liked. It wasn’t really a bounce around to song. It was an okay song, she guessed. Her brother said it was one of those songs you could learn something about. Some composer of the classical stuff her soul mate liked so much. She rolled over onto her back on the floor and tapped her foot in time with the beat, listening to the man speak the educational stuff in the song.

1756, Salzburg, January 27, Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart is born 1761, at the age of five Amadeus begins composing 1773, he writes his first piano concerto 1782, Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart marries Constance Weber 1784, Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart becomes a free mason 1791, Mozart composes "The Magic Flute" On December 5th of that same year, Mozart dies 1985, Austrian rock singer Falco records Rock Me Amadeus!

The song was just about to go back to the more rock part when her soul mate butted in. She reached over for the volume dial, ready to drown him out, when she paused. This song…it wasn’t so bad, she supposed. It was almost pretty. The woman singing had a nice voice.

And then she realized she’d heard it before. Her daddy had it. Well, maybe not this exact version, but he had this song. She got up off the floor and went to his records. He liked music. Had a huge collection of vinyls from years and years and years. When he felt good, he’d let her sit on his lap and they’d go through and listen to things. Or she’d try with her stupid soul mate trying to blast it out of her head.

Finally she saw the record. She looked at who composed the song the woman was singing. Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart, it read, and she smiled a little. Maybe there was something to the classical music after all.

Not that she’d admit it to her stupid head soul mate.

May 1987 Sherlock Antonín Dvořák, “Humoresque No. 7 Opus 101” Molly Whitney Houston, “I Wanna Dance with Somebody Who Loves Me”

His soul mate had abominable taste in music.

He was trying to get through his lessons, the soothing sounds of “Humoresque No. 7 Opus 101” playing in the background of the kitchen as he worked. Not his actual school lessons, but the private tutor lessons in chemistry that Mummy and Dad had gotten him because it fascinated him. His actual school lessons bored him to tears, to be quite honest. It was all baby stuff. He’d learned that ages ago, it seemed. He wanted to learn the things Mikey was learning but Mummy said he couldn’t just skip grades. Wasn’t right. Wasn’t proper.

But tutors they could do.

Whoever his soul mate was had been listening to the most wretched music for the last two hours and he’d done every exercise he’d learned since the music had played in his head when he was three years old. His mum and dad had done a good job teaching him about it, getting him to understand when he was old enough, and he was thankful he’d had a few years peace as whoever it was who had parented his soul mate had tried to expose them to soothing music the first few years of their life, because listening to what he or she played had been torture ever since he was six. He craved the classical music that was soothing to all his senses. And whoever his soul mate was just wouldn’t oblige.

He hated them. He hoped he never met them. He hoped something grisly happened to them and they just…went away and he’d get blissful silence in his head. It wasn’t a nice thought but then he wasn’t a nice child sometimes. He tried to be, but it didn’t always work.

He was just about to add the last bit to the chemical solution under his tutor’s watchful eye when he heard a sudden clap and it startled him. He spilled the powder mostly on the desk, earning him a shake of the head and a slight clucking sound from his tutor. His jaw set at that. Damn them,he thought to himself as spoken part of the song ended and the sung lyrics to this wretched song started. He’d heard it before, multiple times in the last few days, and yet it still gave him a start.

Clock strikes upon the hour And the sun begins to fade Still enough time to figure out How to chase my blues away I've done alright up 'til now It's the light of day that shows me how And when the night falls Loneliness calls

Oh, what he wouldn’t give to be able to chase his soul mate away, he thought to himself as he went to get more of the powder, feeling the tips of his ears redden under his tutor’s disapproving gaze. Far far away, to somewhere where they never had access to music again.

Then life would be much more pleasant.

November 1988 Molly Taco, “Puttin’ On The Ritz” Sherlock Nikolai Rimsky-Korsakov, “Hymn to the Sun”

She scanned the audience to see if they were there. Her dad hadn’t been feeling well. Mum had said they’d try to make it, try to see her performance, but…well, she knew she shouldn’t count on them being there. Dad was having less good days these days and more bad ones. Mum didn’t talk about it, but she knew. Whatever was wrong wasn’t getting any better. It was probably never going to get any better.

But she couldn’t think about that. Tonight was the charity event, the talent show that St. Margaret’s was putting on, and she had to do her bit whether her Mum and Dad were in the audience or not. She’d been working on the routine for weeks now. She knew it had been hard for her parents to afford the dance lessons along with the tuition for her and her brother and sister’s schooling, but she’d been grateful. She loved dancing, especially tap dancing. She was actually quite good at it, and tonight was her night to shine. She had on a special leotard her teacher had loaned her that looked like a tuxedo, complete with bow tie and tails, and she had a top hat and even a cane. She looked just like she could have come off a Broadway show.

“You’re next, Molly,” her teacher said. Molly nodded and then waited in the wings, giving another glance out at the audience. She still couldn’t see her family, but then she couldn’t see all the audience, and the lights were in her eyes. Maybe they were there after all. She’d do them proud. She’d show them the lessons were worth it, show them just how good she was.

Finally it was her turn. She made her way to the center of the stage, her heels clacking on the hard surface. She got in her position and then the music started. She’d picked the long version of the song for her routine, knowing full well she could pull off a nearly five minute long performance. She started to do her routine and it kicked into high gear when the lyrics started.

If you're blue and you don't know Where to go to, why don't you go Where fashion sits Puttin' on the Ritz Different types who wear a day coat Pants with stripes and cutaway coat Perfect fits Puttin' on the Ritz

And then it happened, the moment she’d been dreading. She heard something in her head. Oh no, she thought. Not now. Her soul mate had taken to trying to throw her attention by playing very loud music while she was going through her routine. And sometimes it worked. She tried every trick her parents had taught her to block the music in her head, but something was different. Her soul mate wasn’t listening to it on a record player or a radio. It sounded amplified, as if they were in an auditorium, but also quite close. And then it hit her.

They were actually playing it themselves.

She stood still for a moment in disbelief, forgetting she was in the middle of performing her routine. Thankfully she snapped out of it quickly and she felt she hadn’t made too much of a noticeable mistake. But…this was strange. She hadn’t realized her soul mate could actually play an instrument. How many times had she heard him before without realizing he was playing the song himself? How had she not noticed before?

She finished up her routine and then scurried backstage. Here she was, all proud of her dancing ability, and her soul mate was a bloody violin prodigy. Wonderful. She sat on a box backstage and caved in on herself. Maybe she just wasn’t talented enough after all.

December 1989 Sherlock Pyotr Ilyich Tchaikovsky, “Dance of the Sugar Plum Fairy” Molly New Kids On The Block, “Hangin’ Tough”

One of the few things all five members of his family could agree on was the family tradition of watching a ballet performance of The Nutcracker around the holidays. It seemed there was so much more bickering these days, between Mycroft and Sherrinford, between Sherrinford and his parents…he tended to stay out of the family drama but he had the feeling that eventually it would all either explode and be a gigantic mess or implode and leave a hole in the family.

Either way, he wasn’t looking forward to the situation.

He was on the floor with Redbeard waiting for them to leave while his brothers occupied the chairs and sofa around the telly. His soul mate had been surprisingly quiet as he had listened to the music on his battered cassette player, headphones clamped firmly on his ears, so he didn’t have to listen to everyone’s snarling at each other. While this event only happened once a year he listened to the music from it as often as he could. He supposed he’d have to stop soon; he was ten now, and it was time to give up childish pursuits such as a love of ballet. He’d had to start to develop a tough exterior, a thick hide to keep the bullies at school at bay. A “stiff upper lip,” as Mikey called it. And there was the fact he had developed an interest in things of a criminal nature. Not causing crimes, but solving them. There was a suspicious death at a pool in London that intrigued him greatly but he’d be damned if he could get the authorities to pay attention to him and his theories.

But at least for right now, he wanted to concentrate on the music. For one more year he had the excuse of family tradition to enjoy the ballet and the music. Next year…who knew what the next year would bring? For all he knew, his family structure would no longer be the same.

The bit he enjoyed the most, “Dance of the Sugar Plum Fairy,” started, and he relaxed into Redbeard, resting his head on the dog’s soft fur. He was getting old, he knew that. He hadn’t been a young pup when his parents had gotten him, and he moved more slowly now. Still, they had time together. That was what mattered.

Suddenly there was a jarring sound in his head and he shut his eyes. Of course she would have to start listening to some incessant pop dribble now, he thought, clenching his teeth. He’d surmised his soul mate was a female nearly a year ago, when the music she tended to listen to skewed towards male groups with supposedly handsome male singers. He began to use the techniques to temper down the music in his head to duller levels, not wanting to listen to this particularly odious song again. She’d listened to it nineteen times so far this week and it was only Monday evening.

Oh, oh, oh, oh, oh Oh, oh, oh, oh, oh

Listen up everybody if you wanna take a chance Just get on the floor and do the New Kids' dance Don't worry 'bout nothing 'cause it won't take long We're gonna put you in a trance with a funky song, 'cause you gotta be

Hangin' tough Hangin' tough Hangin' tough We're rough

He resisted the urge to roll his eyes. If the members of this…this…boy band were what she fantasized about than he had no idea why they were soul mates. He’d never be caught dead being like any of them. Never in a million years. And if she liked inelegant fops like that?

Then he didn’t ever want to meet her.

Once he got it down to a manageable level, a dull murmur in his head, he turned back to his tape player and turned up the volume for good measure. It would be best to ignore her, he supposed. They weren’t right for each other, not matter what their stupid biology had predetermined. Simply not right for each other. One day they’d both realize that.

Mark his words.

#sherlock #sherlolly #sherlock holmes #molly hooper #fanfic #fanfiction #mollock #multipart: the cacophony of life #elliedilly

[markstrom]

The Canucks are Attractive 101

by @markstrom, @feistyteee, @tomiath, @nhlmarkstrom, @huttsybobuttsy, @pyatts, @baercheese

This is the ultimate guide for anyone who ever said the Canucks are not attractive. Say goodbye to the world as you know it. 

First of all: Swedes. We all know it, Sweden somehow produces the best looking people on this planet and the Canucks have some of them. 

1. Jacob Markstrom 

Our starting goalie is 6′6 and no one can look at him without melting away. His voice and his sweet Swedish accent is the cutest thing you’ll ever hear. Also: eyebrows. Also: eyes. The curved nose needs a shoutout cause it’s adorable. His face is just a masterpiece of art and anyone who doubts this has, well, no idea of art. We also love to mention his tattoos because damn. 

2. Anders Nilsson

Only a fool might think one Swedish goalie is enough. Meet Anders Nilsson, another 6′6 goalie from Sweden. He’s the absolute purest sweetheart, as you can spot a pride flag on both his masks. To represent his gay friends, he says. His hair/beard color combo is different but it works. So. Damn. Well. Plus: the freckles, we love them dearly. Our Swedish goalies support each other at all times, goalie controversy? We don’t know her.

3. Alexander Edler 

He looks like Alexander Skarsgård but on skates. Another sweet Swedish blondie who is also the sweetest dad. His hair always looks on point and he does indeed have a nice tan in his pic. Probably best dressed Canuck, his fashion is on fire. What a man. 

4. Loui Eriksson

A man also known as The Poodle. His fluffy and curly hair make you want to touch it. His look is sometimes very weird and intimidating and some people might think of Louis Vuitton when hearing his name but remember, this kind of fur is completely Canucks branded. 

5-6. Henrik and Daniel Sedin

These are our leading Swedish fish and they do look the same. Some people might say they aren’t really pretty, but hey if you’re into gingers, we got two identical ones for you. We aim to please. 

Next: the team dads (Disclaimer: this does not mean they actually have kids). We got plenty of them and they’re mostly cute and obviously good with kids – or still single.

7. Sam Gagner

Sam Gagner aka Gags is a really smiley. GAGNER WITH SCRUFF IS ICONIC. Also smirk smirk smirk. He likes to wear an all white mouthguard that makes his teeth look weird during the game but that’s okay because he needs to protect his perfect smile at all costs! Bonus: He looks so comforting like you can trust him with your life.

8. Brandon Sutter

His sarcasm is A+ comedy. He also looks like he could play the role of a guy everyone falls in love with on The Young and the Restless. He’s just very pretty, hair is soft, light scrub and eyebrows are 👏🏼. His eyes are pretty and they are very kind. Also that little smile/smirk is giving me all kinds of feelings ngl.

9. Christopher Tanev

He most definitely looks better with teeth than without. Tanev is the protective type of guy, he takes pucks to the face for you but mostly for Marky, literally. Long hair don’t care. The soft, dark brown of his eyes can tell that he couldn’t hurt a fly. Bet he takes the ladies out on good dates too.

10. Michael del Zotto

“Michael Del Zotto does wedding photoshoot, does not actually get married”

“New Vancouver Canucks defenceman Michael Del Zotto was named one of our nation's 25 Most Eligible Bachelors”

“Just showed up, plugged in his iPod without anybody asking, just plugged it in”

Michael del Zotto, more commonly known as DJ MDZ has Italian heritage as you might realize in his name. He’s got curls curls curls. Simple, overall goof who often thinks too highly of himself. Further he’s the absolute kind and friendly standard Canadian. 

11. Erik Gudbranson

YOU CANT TELL ME HE DOES NOT LOOK LIKE HE IS SUPPOSED TO BE ON THE GQ COVER!!! Certified male model Erik Gudbranson. God definitely was in a very good mood when he gave him his face. His nose is straight and thin, it just makes you want to tap on it. His smile is very comforting and so is his look. His eyebrows are a statement. This guy knows for sure what a hairstyle is. His sense of fashion is straight out of a fashion magazine. The scrub is just the whipped cream on top, his face is artwork. 

12. Markus Granlund

Looks quiet and serious but has a great sense of humor and arguably some of the best Instagram posts. He’s from Finland so if you want a Finnish player we have all ages. He’s got pretty green eyes.

13. Alex Biega

Alex Biega is a cute family man. Great with kids, nice, cute smile, rosy cheeks, nice nose. Con: he has no hair, but you don’t see that when he’s wearing a helmet.

Next up: our young guns! They are all handsome af and just overall lovable. They’re fast and speedy and some of them are thicc af. Save the best for last, our personal favorites.

14. Ben Hutton

1. If you’re ever feeling down, watch a hutton video, he’s happy 24/7 and knows how to have fun. 2. He’s always smiling and his smile can brighten a room. 3. Those dance moves tho. Who knew a “Barbie girl” lip sync could be so hot. 

15. Darren Archibald

He is a wall, he is badass and that makes him so ass. His skin looks very soft and his beard does actually look good, not like Guddys. HIS BEARD IS PERFECT. His eyebrows are straight up goals and look at the dark, kind brown of his eyes. Beautiful.

16. Bo Horvat

Bo’s face is chiseled like a god. He carries his dog because he doesn’t want to make him walk. He love to go to the beach with his dog but he doesn’t let him swim because he’s “more of a sinker”. His nose is very cute and his body is damn well trained you can just look at him forever. Bo has very soft short hair and he is often amused by Brock’s non-existant smile. 

17. Brendan Gaunce

Baby face Brendan Gaunce has the hairstyle of a guy from elementary school. His lips are so red at all times it’s inhuman. He looks very innocent but it feels like he’s not. He’s just kind of there, no one really knows how or why. Kind of looks like a little baby deer. 

18. Tyler Motte

Fact: There are no good pics of him in the inter webs. Tyler “Applesauce” Motte kinda looks like a college kid from a frat. He’s a very fast skater and his penalty killing is absolutely sexie. 

19. Nic Dowd

Dowdy is just overall an incredibly handsome guy. That hair line and the wavy fluff, can you see it? Beautiful. The cheek bones? Beautiful. He could work as a male model if he wanted but fortunately he plays hockey to bless us with his beautiful face. 

20. Troy Stecher

Stechy has straight up the most adorable dog on this planet. Let’s be real if anyone says Phoebe isn’t their favorite Canuck they’re lying. Kind of an underrated defence man so not a lot of people fully appreciate him. He’s like that rough and tough hockey player that’s also very adorable. His voice is simply great. 

21. Brendan Leipsic

Where do we start here? First of all he calls his dog his son and it’s very adorable. Also his curls. CURLS. They match his face so well and they are absolutely adorable. His lips have a perfect shape and look so soft. Generally his face looks just super soft and kind. Also, have you ever noticed his fashion sense? Definitely one of the best dressed guys on the team. He’s also very aggressive on the ice and he hustles and works very well with our favorite d-man Derrick Pouliot. His nickname is delicious country gravy because he works so well with the chicken strip.

22. Brock Boeser

Here we go, it’s time for Prince Charming! The hockey community on here already knows how great he is and look I even found a rare footage of his shiny smile. Whenever he smiles he helps the global warming because his smile melts icebergs. Awesome. He always chews on his mouthguard rather than use it and his mom doesn’t like that. Oh, he also went to prom with a girl who has down syndrome and that’s really the type of guy he is. His flow is legendary and often his hair look like actual gold. He leaked his hair routine and apparently he just uses Head and Shoulders shampoo. 

23. Nikolay Goldobin

Goldy is the most adorable Russian puppy you can find anywhere in the NHL. His hair are super fluffy and he doesn’t know how to wear a hat but that only makes him look even more adorable. His nose is so small and round it’s absolute gold! Don’t even get me started on his eyebrows because they are flawless! He got the most innocent and sweet smile out there, he always seems happy. You want to squeeze his cheeks and generally just hug him. It seems like he gives nice hugs. 

24. Sven Bärtschi

@baercheese is here to confess her love: “My cute little Swiss boy ♥ my forever favourite & definitely underrated in the looks department & as a hockey player. His nose might not be straight but it’s still cute (I will fight you if you disagree) and his hair is always slicked back to perfection👌🏻 If you haven’t heard him talk you need to because he has a sight accent and it’s my favourite thing in the entire world 😍 He’s also a known dog lover & has a dog named Bear (named after himself basically), what’s not to love?”

25. Derrick Pouliot

Derrick Pouliot, also commonly known as Poulet, chicken strip and super strip is our cutest chubby teddy defenseman and we all know it. He grew up in the middle of nowhere in Saskatchewan and not a lot of people got to appreciate his beauty so far. His hair are the pure fluff and make you just want to run your hands through it. His face looks so soft, his eyes are warm and you just want to squeeze his cheeks ngl. Listen to his voice once and you never want to listen to something else ever again. He is not really tall and his hockey gear looks kind of too big for him, the others love to pat his head. Sometimes his hair get a little curly and it’s just the cutest thing ever. Just by looking at him you can tell that he gives the best and softest hugs ever and he makes you feel comfortable at all times. He is really silent and not outgoing, he needs a lot of time to feel comfortable with new people but that’s totally okay. He’s super cute with kids and just overall totally lovely and kind. A real Canadian.

26. Jake Virtanen

Jake Virtanen is the ultimate snack. He’s half Canadian, half Finnish and 100% babe. The man can skate. Fast. Right into my heart. To quote the great philosopher of our time, Taylor Swift, he’s so gorgeous, it actually hurts. He has the cutest dance moves and the most precious smile. When he does that little slanted smile, I swoon, you swoon, we swoon. Bonus: When he works hard his face turns red and it’s adorable lmao.

#vancouver canucks #darren archibald #sven baertschi #brock boeser #nic dowd #loui eriksson #sam gagner #brendan gaunce #nikolay goldobin #markus granlund #bo horvat #brendan leipsic #tyler motte #daniel sedin #henrik sedin #brandon sutter #jake virtanen #alex biega #michael del zotto #alex edler #erik gudbranson #ben hutton #derrick pouliot #troy stecher #chris tanev #jacob markstrom #anders nilsson #nhl #hockey #compilation

[drudragonrose]

A Wolfe Dinner

Forks and knives scrapped the fine china plates in total silence. The silence was deafening. Adira wanted to scream for several reasons. Why the hell did her father want her boyfriend here? Why did her grandmother insist on being here? And far be it for Fabiola to miss a train wreck in the making, especially when she could help. The only thing that could make it worse would be in her aunt Elizabeth would be her with her now seventeen-year-old daughter Lexi. There was a knock on the door and Adira wanted to sink into the floor and take Colton with her. Kayja answered the door then walked into the dining room followed by her sour-faced aunt and her equally disdainful daughter.

“Mrs. and Ms. Crumplebottom.” Kayja said with a bow then made her way back to the kitchen.

“Lexi!” Fabiola cried while getting up to greet her cousin.

“So this is him. Addy darling I didn’t think you were the type to get taken in by looks.” Elizabeth said taking her seat at the table. “Sorry, we’re late. The husband wanted to know exactly where I was going and at what time I’d be back.” She added now addressing her brother and mother who were both wearing a scandalized look.

Luna sighed “At least you both made it in time for dessert and tea.” She said with her famous gracious smile. Elizabeth was nearing forty years old but that smile still made her scared for her life like it did when she was little. Adira for her part was staring at what was left of her meal thinking you’re one to talk auntie. Everyone knew that she only agreed to marry Talon because he was at least handsome. A decision that Elizabeth was regretting more and more each day as she had no qualms about expressing on more than one occasion. Colton placed his hand on her thigh under the table and Adira turned to smile at him something that Fabiola was quick to notice.

“Gross, at least pretend to be a decent pureblood.” She said sneering while getting back in her seat. Fabiola waived her hand to pull out a chair for Lexi who took it gratefully.

“Yeah like, way to keep your good girl image girl. Broadcast to everyone you’re a muggle loving slut.” Lexi added matching Fabiola’s smirk.

“Alexandra Marie Crumplebottom, I thought we taught you more creative language than that,” Elizabeth said looking at her daughter with a mix of disappointment and exasperation on her face. Lexi just rolled her eyes.

Luna laughed into her hand. “Forgive her sweetheart it’s not like you didn’t utter your share of expletives when you were her age,” Luna said smiling at Lexi fondly. Adira had her hand over Colton’s who by that time had turned a shade of red. Please keep the focus on your favorite granddaughter. She preyed squeezing her boyfriend’s hand

“Though you’d never hear such language from Adira here. I do wish she would be as creative with language as she is with her music and her choices in a partner.” Luna said. Her eyes surveyed Colton for probably the millionth time that evening. As if looking for something that she had yet to find about him.

“You will forgive me but I don’t believe in making my point with excessive language,” Adira said, sounding meeker than had in her head. She cursed herself for speaking at all.

Elizabeth snorted. “Spoken like a true spineless twat. Probably why you chose mussels here. Dumb but able to protect you if you get into a tight spot, is that the idea? I mean, as far as I heard you’re in rudimentary Charms. So having physical strength by your side might be a help.” She giggled as if the very thought were ridiculous.

“I’m in supplementary lessons because of the advanced nature of the magic I’ve taken on. It’s different.” Adira corrected then winced. She shouldn’t have said anything. Normally she would have just let her family take their shots at her, using their biting words to fuel her all night writing benders but Elizabeth had taken a shot at two things that hit a nerve, her music, and Colton.

Colton felt her shaking and threaded his fingers through her’s. “While we’re at it. I’m in several of Adira’s advanced classes and even if I wasn’t Adira is free to choose whoever she wants to date.” He said staring daggers at the four women.

”Ew, it speaks,” Fabiola said pushing her plate of food forward. “And suddenly I’ve lost my appetite. APRICOT” She screeched making Lexi cover her ears. The plate of food vanished instantly, it’s place taken by a rather large sunday.

“Weren’t you on a diet?” Lexi asked looking at the thing.

“Does it look like I need to be on one?” Fabiola asked glaring at Lexi as if daring to keep her train of thought going. Lexi took the hint and looked down. I thought you had more fight in you than that Adira thought but then no one stood against Fabiola for long.

“Fabby darling, you’re beautiful as you are but it would do you well to slow down on the sugar. It will catch up to you.” Luna said kindly. Caught in between two of your prized grandchildren grandmama? Adira turned her head away so they wouldn’t see her smirk. “Addy, what is this I hear about you taking on one more day of ballet?” She asked turning the conversation back to Adira. Fuck

“Well a competition is coming up and Colton and I want to make sure that we’re in the best shape we can be in.” She said doing her best to smile.

Luna’s eyes went back to Colton. “Isn’t he too wide to be a dancer?” She said very bluntly for it being Grandma Luna. Lexi and Fabiola burst out laughing.

Why couldn’t they be twins and I be born to another family? “Colton is part of the orchestra and he will be playing the piece that I’m going to be dancing to,” Adira said simply.

“Oh, and what is that you play young man?” Luna asked. Fabiola and Lexi had been distracted with extra sweets that had been summoned to the table.

“Piano is my main instrument though I am a fair flute player,” Colton said modestly. Adira smiled then. Fair was putting it lightly. He was as brilliant at the flute as he was at the piano though she could never get him to admit it.

“Fair. And you’re happy with fair?” Luna asked. Grandma please no. Adira begged in her mind. She had been weighed by this kind of questioning before and didn’t want Colton to be subjected to it too. Luna was crushing when she hit her stride.

“Of course he’s happy with fair. He is a muggle after all and all his kind can ever be is fair.” Elizabeth said smiling at the both of them.

“You were always hard to please Lizzy.” Nikolai said airily. He was looking over messages on his phone.

“And you are as distracted as ever dear little brother.” Elizabeth shot back. Nikolai put his phone down and coughed embarrassedly. You’d think you’d pay more attention after killing mom that way. Adira thought.

“He’s not a muggle!” Adira finally snapped. “One of his fathers is a vampire!” She added hoping to get them to lay off him a bit. She could take their scrutiny but Colton had done nothing to deserve it.

Fabiola made a show of choking on her spoon. “So you’re saying that your boyfriend is not only the son of two worthless males but he’s also a powerless Dampher? My gods dad just disown her already.” She hissed. Fabiola for her part didn’t give a damn what he was he was still a male and by their very nature were worthless to her.

“Says the one who’s trying to get in the skirt of a berry with no magical heritage at all.” Adira countered. Fabiola gasped and all eyes turned on her now. “Run.” She whispered to Colton.

“I’m not leaving you here alone.” He whispered back but then his text alert noise sounded. His fathers were calling all the brothers home and he had to go too. “Sorry.” He said taking his leave of the table.

“You leave Amanda out of this muggle lover.” Fabiola hissed when Colton had left.

“Then you leave Colton out of your insults,” Adira said. Reckless, she was being reckless. She would have to be very careful of where she went over the next following days but it felt good to speak up for once.

“Now Addy if Fabiola has a crush on this young woman then there has to be something special about her,” Luna said calmly.

“Well yes. She has naturally turquoise hair.” Adira said crossing her arms.

“There is more to her than that!” Fabiola said slamming her hands down on the table.

“Yeah then name it!” Adira yelled back.

“Addy darling calm down,” Elizabeth said reaching for her angry niece.

”Don’t touch me!” Adira said backing away from her. “You were helping try and get rid of Colton. Don’t any of you try and deny that’s what this dinner was about.” Adira said now in tears.

“We are just trying to protect you, darling. Things rarely go well with those not of our own kind.” Luna said.

“Why don’t you let me be the judge of that. Or don’t you think that you’ve taught me how to judge character?” She asked looking at her grandmother now. Luna sputtered. “And you, so much of a coward to confront Colton yourself so you have your sister and mine dig into him!” She shouted at her father.

Nikolai held his hands up. “I honestly was just trying to meet the boy-”

“Don’t you dare lie to me dad. I hate you all!” Adira yelled and stormed off to her room. Luna looked at Nikolai who just shrugged. Luna walked off to the living room for her evening tea muttering about the weakness of parents nowadays.

Adira stopped crying eventually but she knew that Colton would never talk to her again after this. Just then she heard a tapping at the window. She thanked Tamarind for installing the flower vines next to her window when she saw who was there. “I thought you’d never want to see me again.”

“Why on earth would I do that?” He asked taking her into his arms for a hug.

“Everyone was horrible to you and they’re my family so…” Adira trailed off thinking about the people she was forced to call her blood.

“Hey, hey I fell in love with you, not them. We’ll go so far away you won’t have to talk to them again.” He said running his fingers through her hair as she buried her face in her chest.

“What about your family?” She asked. She loved the Shmitts and it would break her heart if Colton had to lose communication with them because of her.

“They’ll know where we are and can visit anytime. I’ll make it make things better for you I promise.” Colton said holding on to her. They had talked about life together before though Adira had never taken it as seriously as she did now.

“Everyone’s gone home and dad’s got called into the office to deal with a “crisis”,” Adira said smiling up at him mischievously. Colton leaned down and kiss her a little more roughly than he’d meant to but Adira didn’t mind at all.

(Present for @cawthorntales)

#Random Writings #Adria Wolfe #Colton Shmitt #gift writing

[tommy-shepherd]

Kith and Kin

Read on ao3

Swan/Skov

Chap. 1/?

Skov doesn't have a good relationship with his family, so Swan invites him over to meet his instead.

“Fucking cold in here. Piece of shit weather.” Skov mumbles, haphazardly pulling his favorite purple hoodie over his head from where he had retrieved it from its spot on the floor. There’s a draft coming in through the cracked window in the bedroom, but his stupid boyfriend runs hot and he knows better than to close it fully or he’ll have to hear Swan complain about it literally forever. Tugging the sweatshirt down over his hips with a final shake of his head, Skov stomps out of the bedroom and throws himself onto the couch. When he does, Swan looks over with a knowing grin. Skov flips him off.

“Fuck you.”

“I didn’t say anything.” And the asshole has the gall to laugh, Skov kicks him in the thigh, but regrettably it’s not hard enough to bruise.

“You didn’t have to. I know what you’re thinking.” Swan laughs again.

“We’ve been together too long.” He pauses, running a hand back through his hair before he motions for Skov to move closer to him and then pats his lap. “C’mere.” The smaller boy quirks a questioning brow but he shifts, lifting himself off the couch and rotating until he’s seated on his boyfriend’s lap, straddling his thighs. There’s a long moment of silence where neither boy says anything, Swan just staring at the smaller with a dopey smile on his face. Skov scowls.

“Yes?” Another beat of silence. Swan shakes his head fractionally.

“I love you.” And when he speaks, Swan’s voice is calm and steady and sure. His fingers tangle in the soft curls of white hair that tickle the nape of Skov’s neck and he tilts the boy’s face up gently to meet his gaze. Skov wonders how such large, strong hands can be so very capable of such tenderness.

Still, with furrowed brows, Skov smiles in return, soft and certain though he resists the urge to roll his eyes and break the moment of vulnerability between them. They deserve the tranquil bliss of here and now, sitting together in near silence with nothing but their adoration for each other.

“I love you, too,” His voice is nearly a whisper, but Skov is proud of himself for leaving off his usual bite. He grins, holding back the laughter that threatens to bubble out of him at any moment with the confession. There’s no joke here, but he doesn’t remember the last time he’s felt so completely good and it’s overwhelming. Swan grins back at him, thumb brushing across the small star tattooed on his boyfriend’s cheek, pressing against it like it was his own personal brand on the boy.

After that, they both lean in, unconsciously, naturally, whatever it may be, it’s a chemistry they’re used to, one that comes without thought or effort. Their kiss is unusually sweet, simple, chaste, as far as they’re concerned. It’s also short lived. The next time their lips meet it’s with renewed fire, a bruising force, a bite. Skov’s arms wrap around his boyfriend’s broad back and in return he’s tugged closer by the hands now cupping his face. He lets out a pleased hum in reward. They press themselves as close together as possible, lips, chests, hips, trying to become one shared existence. Swan never gets bored of the feeling, he shifts, one arm around his small boyfriend's waist as he flips them, leans over, caging his boyfriend in and pressing him into the plush cushions. Skov rolls his hips and moans. Swan deepens the kiss as the other boy parts his lips with the sound. It's perfect. It’s the feeling of running his tongue along the cool metal balls of Skov’s tongue piercings, of feeling them clack against the back of his teeth, and the feeling that action sends through his entire body. Both boys pull away to breathe.

"Fuck," Skov laughs. "Love makes you so horny." It's a tease, but as usual, Swan only smiles, his thumbs going back to stroking Skov's cheeks and the look in his eyes is soft enough to make the smaller boy squirm underneath him.

"You make me horny," Swan counters without heat. "I just happen to love you so fucking much." Skov bites his lip, watching his boyfriend watch him.

"You wanna make love to me, Alex?" The question is accompanied by a shit eating grin. Make love, a cheesy phrase neither boy employs when describing sex, even when it’s with each other. A beat. Then both boys burst out laughing.

When they have control of their senses again, Swan leans down, another soft kiss and he mumbles yet another confession against Skov's lips.

"Yeah. I really do."

The next morning, Swan wakes up in bed alone. When he first opens his eyes, stretching his long limbs out, his hand lands on empty mattress rather than the warm body of his boyfriend. His brows pull together and he closes his eyes again, yawning as he scratches the bare skin of his belly, fingers brushing the coarse hair trailing under the waistband of his pajama bottoms. He can hear the muffled sound of his boyfriend’s voice from the other side of their bedroom door and he listens to the sharp cadence of it for a few more minutes as he toes the line between wake and sleep. When he opens his eyes again, the LCD display of his clock reads 8:37 AM in bright green. Just the fact that the other is awake is a warning sign itself, but Skov is loud in the other room again, tone strained though Swan isn’t able to decipher his words. With a sigh, Swan hauls himself out of bed, eyelids still heavy and feet dragging on the carpet.

Making his way out of the room and past the kitchen, Swan finds Skov curled up on the couch. He’s wearing sweat shorts and one of Swan’s old camp t shirts and a scowl that could probably scare off Medusa herself. He’s on the phone though, so Swan stays silent, sitting on the couch beside his boyfriend as he tries to rub the remnants of sleep from his eyes. Skov is quiet again, back to listening to the voice on the other end of the line but he’s clearly itching to say something, sharp words always ready on his tongue. Swan reaches out and takes one of his boyfriend’s hands, thumb brushing over scarred knuckles in slow circles. Skov doesn’t resist, but he doesn’t return the affection either.

“Mom,” He says instead, voice tight, though it’s clear, to Swan at least, that he’s trying to hide how irritated he is. His voice has taken on a tone of placid obedience reserved only for speaking to his parents but even that can’t completely dull the rebellious edge of the boy. ‘They don’t deserve him.’ Swan thinks, closing his eyes to rest his head back against the couch, but he knows that’s not his place to say. “I’m sorry. I did send flowers… Well, I thought you’d be at the resort in Kuala Lampur. …No, I didn’t ask. I’m sorry.”

There’s another pause and Skov squeezes his boyfriend’s hand hard enough that Swan can feel his own knuckles scrape together under his skin. The larger boy looks up and brings his boyfriend’s hand to his mouth, delivering open mouthed kisses to the swell of his knuckles instead. Skov gives him a withering look.

“I know. I know. Mom.” And his attention is back on the call in an instant. She must be reprimanding him now, because that tone of his slipped out and Mrs. Skov won’t tolerate that kind of disrespect from her son. Swan has seen that lecture in person, and it’s not a pretty one.

Skov’s brows furrow, creasing his smooth, tan skin. Swan thinks he hears a biting tone say Nikolai from the other end of the line, and the next time Skov speaks, his voice is a soft, almost whisper.

“I’m sorry. I’ll call more often. Yes. Okay. I will. Happy Mother’s Day. …Paalam.” He hangs up, hand falling to his side, but Swan stays silent, waiting to see where Skov stands emotionally. He waits for an explosion that doesn’t come. Skov just sits there, phone clenched tightly in his hand and Swan grows more concerned. His boyfriend is not quiet by nature, and while he doesn’t think always being angry is healthy, in this instance, he would have both expected, and welcomed it. The Skovs were some of the most frustrating parents Swan had ever encountered. And he went to a private boarding school full of rich boys with mommy and daddy issues.

“Elliot?” He tries after a few prolonged moments of silence. “You good?” It’s not the right thing to ask, he knows, and it’s not what he wanted to ask, but it comes out anyway.

Skov doesn't answer, though Swan watches the muscles in his neck twitch, his jaw clenches and he grinds his teeth angrily. It would be easier, Swan thinks, if Skov hated his parents. But for reasons many of them can’t understand, a parent’s lack of love does not equal the same in the child. Skov wants his parents’ affection, hell, he just wants their attention and even if maybe, they'll never really love him, never really care about him, Skov will struggle through his interactions with them and hurt himself over and over. Swan doesn’t get it.

His dad is absent at best and he doesn’t really lose much sleep over it. His mom is enough for him. Then again, he thinks, at least he has his mom. Neither of his boyfriend's parents make an effort to pretend to care, and when they do, it’s always for selfish occasions. Fundraisers, press dates, mother's day. If Nikolai Elliot Skov can't contribute to the family, then it's easier for them to ignore his existence until an occasion he’s needed arises again. He’s never really needed though, he just helps make a better impression, when they pretend to be a happy family. Swan hates Skov's parents with every fiber of his being.

"Elliot. Talk to me, babe." Skov throws his phone against the far wall in lieu of a reply. The case stops it from breaking (they’ve learned this is a must with all their phones) but it leaves a nasty mark on the plaster. Swan knows his boyfriend. The explosion was delayed, but there it was nonetheless.

"I'm fine," Is what the smaller boy manages to grind out after the momentary outburst. "It's just the same shit." That obedient tone is gone, but there is less anger than expected, as if he’s reigned himself in. Maybe that’s what the prolonged silence was; Skov slipping from one persona to the next. Obedient to rebellious to himself. Swan never takes Skov’s attitude seriously though, or at least, he never takes it to heart.

"Okay. …Okay. So you don’t wanna talk about it."

"No. I don’t." Swan sighs.

"Alright well. You're still coming with me to mom's right? The whole family is gonna be there, you know. Kinda a big deal…." He tries for a grin, it's half-hearted, but Skov barely glances at him to notice.

"I don’t really want-"

"Please, babe? Mom was really looking forward to seeing you. It would make her day." It’s an unfair card to play. None of them can say no to Ms. Swan— Jenni as she insisted they call her— and Skov is no exception. He loves Swan's mom. The smaller boy scowls.

"Fine. But I'm not doing it for you. I'm doing it for Jenni. Because it’s Mother's Day." This time when Swan grins, it's sincere.

"Of course.  And she'll thank you on both our behalves." Skov snorts at that and Swan is just glad to get some sort of positive reaction out of him. The smaller boy peals himself off the couch in a fluid motion but when he stands, it’s not to go retrieve his phone. Swan figures it'll stay where it is for the rest of the day, or at least until they leave.

"I need to shower. Is this a formal thing?" The way he says formal is almost a sneer and Swan smiles, standing as well. His boyfriend is so cute.

"Nah. Semi-formal maybe? I dunno. No running pants. But jeans are fine."

“My whole wardrobe is running pants.” He starts as he walks to the bathroom. “Jenni won’t mind.” Swan can’t help but roll his eyes, but the affection in his smile gives him away.

“Elliot. Real pants. For once.” Feigning a put upon sigh, Skov walks into the bathroom and begins to strip off his pajamas.

“Alex. Fuck off.” He turns on the shower, but even with his face mostly turned away from his boyfriend, Swan can see the smile tugging at his lips. “If you wanted a boyfriend who wore real pants, you should have dated someone else.”

Swan laughs from his spot in the open door way, watching the muscles of the smaller boy’s back flex and shift under tan skin. Skov is beautiful and Swan’s laugh is a bright, open sound. It’s a sound that Skov always finds comfort in even at his worst moments, something that shatters the walls he’s built and pulses in his veins in a way that even the music he creates can’t compare to. Swan is a grounding force, with the patience for Skov’s loud heart and his tenacity. Not many people can say that, and both are impressive skills to have. Skov thinks Swan might be too good for him sometimes, but he will take advantage of his boyfriend’s ignorance for as long as he can. In the meantime, he gets in the shower, hoping the hot water will melt away the excess of emotions he’s had to put up with today.

Its 9:13 AM when Skov finishes washing away his heart and begins to raid his own dressers for something appropriate to wear to the Swan family gathering. Alex, the Swan taking him to the gathering, is taking his own turn in the shower and is missing the moment’s dilemma, something the shorter boy is immensely grateful for at the moment. When he had said that all he owned was jogging pants, it hadn’t necessarily been a lie. Though he does own other types of clothes, none of them are exactly what he would consider a ‘nice family’ to find presentable for an event like this. He has his formal clothes of course, but Skov only wears button ups for his parents, whether to see them, or as a duty to them, and not even his desire to impress the women that make up the Swan family will change that.

With a grumble, Skov tosses another pair of track pants over his shoulder. He debates the merits of drop crotch joggers for a conflicted moment before tossing those aside too. Swan had said jeans. Skov has a few pairs, but they’ve all got rips and tears and holes, most of them intentional.

“Uggghhhhhh.” Letting out a loud groan, Skov tugs at his own hair, shoves everything back in the drawer and tugs at the next one over. He pulls out a pair of washed out, blue jeans, skinny legged and soft. The only tears are at the knees with a third across his right thigh and the boy figures that’s probably going to be as good as it gets. After that, it’s not too hard. He pulls on a large white tee, one of Swan’s, a marbled gray sweatshirt and his army print jean jacket. He feels comfortably like himself, but he also feels like he might present as a reasonably decent human being. With a self-approving nod, Skov steps into his gray high top Adidas and waits for Swan to finish in the shower.

#the raven cycle #the dream pack #skov #swan #joseph kavinsky #dream pack #trc #wow two fics in one day #my fic #swanskov #skovswan #idk #lol

[welcometophu]

Into the Split: Reinforcements 4

Twinned Book 3: Into the Split

Reinforcements 4

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By the time breakfast is over, the room is more than full. Cats, dogs, mice, birds, lizards, and any number of other animal life line the room. Dayton has been replaced by a tawny lion, curled on the floor at the foot of the chair of one of Rory’s bandmates. Clan taking their animal forms has helped squeeze more people in, but it’s still crowded and standing room only around the edges. Nikolai and Seth give up their seats and take up space by the wall, Nikolai standing with his arms wrapped around Seth from behind, anchored in his stability and warmth.

Nikolai only recognizes some of the people in the room, although he suspect he was introduced to others along the way. He hopes it doesn’t matter that he can’t put names to most of these faces. At least he knows that someone thinks they’re important to what they’re trying to achieve.

Alia sits with Pawel, Alaric, Sera, Del, and others that Nikolai isn’t sure he recognizes. When Alia stands, much of the room falls silent, the rest following in the wake. She smiles tightly. “We shall begin. I do not expect that we will meet like this often, but I thank all of you for taking the time to travel here to Haverhill, to come together in a meeting of Talent. I hope that in the future we will be able to continue to work together to achieve a peace our world has not yet seen.” She glances at Pawel.

He rises quickly enough to knock his own chair over. While Alaric reaches to right it, Pawel moves out from behind the table. “I’ve knocked my computer off the podium while teaching. Probably better for me to get somewhere a little more clear,” he says, his voice raised and clear, easy to hear throughout the room. His hands move as he speaks, although Nikolai isn’t sure the gestures exactly match the words. “I know that everyone here has heard some version of this story, that everyone has some pieces of information, but I want to make sure that we begin from a clear starting line today, and that we can easily map out where we are going. I don’t want to bury us in detail, but rather, I want to give an overview of the important facts. We are working together—Clan and Mage, Lineage and Emergent—to try to eliminate a threat against all Talented people from the Shadows.”

On one side of the room, Mattie coughs loudly.

Pawel ignores her. “We have determined that our world is not the only one, and that there is one other world which is tightly connected to our own, and that may share a fate with ours. That world has already been overrun by Shadows, threatening Talented and non-Talented people alike.”

“There was a third one,” Del interjects, leaning forward on the table where she still sits. “It collapsed.”

Pawel’s attention shifts abruptly as he gives her a sharp look. “What?”

She gestures at the rest of the room. “Do you want me to talk about the Dreamscape, or do you want to keep explaining?” she asks. “Because it sounds like you’re enjoying the explaining. You like teaching.”

Del flinches, and Nikolai gets the feeling that someone kicked her out of sight, but her gaze at Pawel doesn’t waver.

Pawel turns his back on Del. “We have determined that the Talents of Traveling and Dreamwalking have something in common, as well as having aspects in common with Shadowwalkers. The Dreamscape lies between all of the worlds, and Dreamwalkers are able to all reach the same Dreamscape. But they are not able to exit it into other worlds, except in unique situations. Within the Dreamscape, we were able to identify our correlation to another world.”

“Two worlds,” Del says, her voice low, but carrying.

Pawel gestures at her, and she smiles slightly, sitting back in her chair.

“There are three paths,” Del says. “There’s a point where they diverge, and I remember that when we first saw them, Carolyn and Kit said that one was right, one was almost right, and one was very, very wrong. It’s turned out that the one that was almost right is a world parallel to ours, but they have Shadowwalkers actively trying to hunt them. The third one was already overrun, and badly. The path’s gone now. It was there, just a few days ago, and now it’s just not there at all. And the Shadows continue to encroach along the edges of the paths, and it’s getting harder and harder to get to the other world.”

The way home is growing blocked. Nikolai’s fingers curl against Seth’s stomach, and Seth covers his hand, squeezing lightly. Nikolai exhales, tries to center himself.

“We’ve been working on creating a network,” Del explains. “We went from a dozen Dreamwalkers to well over a hundred. My meadow’s been invaded and isn’t peaceful any more.” She sighs heavily. “It’s a price to pay. There are more coming in, and we have Dreamwalkers all over our world and the other one. We can work together to create a Ritual in the Dreamscape that would affect both worlds.” She glances at Pawel. “Once we have an idea what that Ritual is.”

“Dreamwalkers can’t work together,” someone says from the far side of the room.

“There are three in this room,” Nikolai replies. He feels the weight of the attention levied on him for that statement, and he’d take it back if he could. “Dreamwalking requires education. Training. I’ve had Seth with me since we were kids, and he’s my anchor. But we aren’t interacting, so you know it’s possible. Del’s right there, and Nikita, and me. Dreamwalkers can work together. Just because they haven’t in your world doesn’t mean they can’t.”

He takes an involuntary step back at the sudden buzz of sound and lets Pawel and Del handle the explanations of exactly who he and Seth are. There’s a weight in the room when they’re done, as if the people he doesn’t know are staring at them.

It’s not comfortable.

Seth’s calm washes over him, envelopes them both in warmth, and Nikolai focuses on that rather than the regard of too many strangers.

“Yeah, sure.” Sera pats Pawel on the shoulder, then climbs onto the table to stand on it. The ink on her hands is crawling up her arms, creating new designs as they watch. “I’m Sera, and I’m a Technopath, which is a really fancy name for an Emergent Talent that has something to do with technology. Some of us interface with technology natively, some of us have it inside of us. Me, I absorb it, and thanks to that I’m kind of always online, like a human interface to the internet at large. Anyway. Pawel put me in charge of creating chat rooms and a space to gather online and bring together information in secure databases.”

She makes a face, nose wrinkling. “And in some cases to get into some other secure databases that do not belong to us. Technopaths are sometimes born hackers, too. Which is a legal grey area that we are going to ignore because we managed to get some information that you guys are going to really be interested in.”

She hops forward, ending up sitting on the edge of the table, her feet kicking. “So, we’ve established our own network. We’re encrypted and secure, and we’re currently hosting the Dreamwalker spaces online. Carolyn and Pawel have also started to curate a ton of information about Talents, which is great, since it lets us get a better look at data. But security is a huge thing, because what we also found is that we aren’t the only secure repository of data about Talents out there. And the other one is owned by the government.”

Silence.

Sera raises her hands. “So. If you’ve ever thought hey there’s a government conspiracy about us, you were right! There is an organization within the government named Sigma Delta—yes, the sum of change. They’ve been gathering information on us for decades. Lineage information. The percentage of normal people who Emerged in an average year prior to the Emergence, and the same information for the years since. And Rituals. They have databanks of information about Rituals, but not information on casting them. Information on what happens when they’re cast. We haven’t managed to crack all the files we’ve found, and to be honest, we’re trying not to let them know that we’re rooting around in their data.”

“They know.” Mac blinks into existence as she speaks, reaching out to touch Pawel’s shoulder, grabbing him to yank him close enough to whisper in his ear. Pawel holds up a finger and Sera stays silent while Pawel and Mac confer quietly. When they separate, Mac takes a step closer to Sera and stands, legs slightly spread, and hands clasped behind herself.

“Sigma Delta is a special program for Talents being trained for the military,” Mac says. “I began training with them as a teen, just after the Emergence. After all, they knew I’d be exactly what they wanted, and it wasn’t a secret that I’d Emerged. From what I know, they already had a lot of people in the program prior to the Emergence. I heard a bit about it before I was formally involved, back when my dad was just starting to date my mom.” She hesitates, adds, “My stepfather. Senator Delwin Palmer. He’s highly involved in the project. It’s a top security, eyes-only kind of thing, and I’m breaking a lot of oaths by talking about it here.” Her gaze shifts, finding someone on the other side of the room. “But given what I’ve managed to put together, and what Sera’s said, I think we need to talk about it.”

Cass stands up, a chair falling down behind her, and pushes through the crowd, heading for the door.

“The government’s been involved in our lives since before the Emergence,” Mac calls out. “And it’s still trying to find more of us. Trying to make us do their—” She cuts off, disappearing from view.

She doesn’t reappear anywhere inside the room, and Cass is already gone.

“Well then,” Sera says. “That wasn’t part of my speech, but… I’ve actually got more for you, and what I have is even worse. From what we found, we think they may have caused the Emergence. Probably accidentally, but what they were trying to do wasn’t any better.”

Her feet kick slowly as she holds one hand out, three fingers up. “Once upon a time there were three separate Lineages: Soulstealers, Deathstalkers, and Shadowwalkers. Sigma Delta decided they wanted to create a controlled heavy duty government weapon. They collected a group of latent Deathstalkers—people who were of the Lineage but had never manifested the Talent. These particular Deathstalkers also happened to have Shadowwalkers in their Lineage. Then they unleashed the few Soulstealers they had managed to find, allowing them to feed on these Latent Talents while they set a Ritual in place. The Ritual was meant to make anyone who had a shred of a forgotten Lineage to Emerge. I don’t think they expected it to go global the way it did.

“So it had two effects. The Emergence started, and it hasn’t stopped. There’s something different about our world now, and people are more likely to Emerge. And it created the kind of Shadowwalkers we know now out of those people who were part of the Ritual. Starving. Soulless. Split between the Dreaming and the darkness.” She glances at Mattie. “Able to be healed and become Shadowwalkers of the traditional, legendary variety. If you can find their soul.”

Conversation erupts throughout there room and Nikolai can’t piece it together. Too many threads, too many voices saying too many different things.

“So,” Seth murmurs to him, turning so that they face each other, forehead to forehead, cocooned in their own quieter space. “When they did the Ritual here, it somehow affected us as well.”

“Maybe because our worlds were so close,” Nikolai muses. “Maybe because of people like Alia and Valentine, or even like Nikita and me, or you and Heather.”

He wonders what happened in that third world. He wonders why they died so quickly, and where the Shadows from that world are going now.

It’s not a good thought.

“Can we reverse this Ritual?” Someone who was an eagle only moments ago asks. “Can we undo what the Mages did to us?”

“It is the Mages fault,” someone else says.

Alia slips into the form of a lion and roars, the sound echoing off the walls before she returns to human. “This is not about Clan versus Mage,” she says sharply.

“Clan were there, too,” Sera says, feet still kicking where she sits. “There are Clan in the government organization, and there are Mages, and there are a whole host of other kinds of specialized Talents. This isn’t about what kind of Talent anyone has. This is about some people,” she emphasizes the words, hard and sharp, “deciding to try to gain power through any means possible. And what they did opened us up to the potential for being destroyed.”

“In our world, that’s exactly what’s happening,” Seth says, his voice cutting through the commotion around them. “In the third world that Del talked about, that’s probably already happened. Just because it’s not that bad here yet doesn’t mean it won’t get that way. It wasn’t bad in our world, at first. We were able to hide. Then more and more people started dying, and fear is an amazing thing: it changes the world overnight.”

Alaric stands abruptly, shoulder to shoulder with Alia, looming despite not being the bear. “This is not about Clan versus Mage,” he growls, the words resonating throughout the room. “This is not about Talent or non-Talented people. This is about making sure that the Shadows cannot have our world. This is about undoing the damage that has been done, here and elsewhere.”

The woman who was an eagle takes another step forward, hands on her hips. “Can we reverse the ritual?” she asks again. “Can we undo it? Make the Shadows go back to being whatever they were before, and keep them from hunting us?”

“We don’t know,” Pawel admits. “I’ve been talking to the folks who’ve come down from Burlington, and we’ll be spending more time in discussion once we can include all available Mages.”

“We have a blended community. Our Mages would be happy to work with you,” a pregnant Clan woman calls out, and Pawel nods to acknowledge her, motioning as if to have someone from their table join him as well.

“The problem is, we don’t know how they did the ritual, just that it happened,” Pawel says. “And one concern is the amount of energy that was involved. Did they leverage using the Soulstealers to take the energy from willing donors? Did they use unusual Talents as a battery source, or possibly the energy from the mass Emergence that began around the world? Did they somehow use something from the Dreamscape, and that’s why it became so intrinsically tied to this situation?” He spreads his hands. “We know a lot more than we used to, but what we don’t know is still an abyss, open and yawning in front of us. And worse yet, the things we don’t know could kill us if we make an attempt to do something without more information. Magic will make do. If a ritual is cast, the energy has to come from somewhere, and I suspect that when the original ritual was created, that wasn’t accounted for.”

“And that’s why it went horrifyingly wrong,” Sera says, her heels thunking back on every word. She hops down from the table. “That’s all I’ve got for you right now. We’re working on identifying the cabal  behind that original ritual, and seeing if we can use that to get more information. The Technopaths are kind of having a blast right now trying to see how deep they can get before they’re discovered.” She holds up her hands. “Not me, of course. I’m making sure that I keep my Talents in totally legal places.”

That’s the signal for everyone to move, apparently. The group breaks up, people moving between tables, some leaving. Nikolai stays where he is, with Seth close by. He’s not sure what happens next, or how he’s going to be involved in it, but for the first time, it seems like they have a direction. He’s just not certain it’s a good one.

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#welcome to phu #welcometophu #into the split #phu twinned #twinned #its reinforcements

[ruleandruinrpg]

CONGRATULATIONS, KAITLIN!

You have been accepted for the role of ANTON LANTSOV with a faceclaim change to Reece King. Admin Bree: Choosing Anton’s player was probably one of the hardest decisions I’ve had to make as an admin, and for that reason alone, I’d like to congratulate the three of you for writing such brilliant applications. Each of you captured him in your own unique way, and it took me hours to decide which I liked best, because each of your portrayals brought something wonderful to the table. But I’m incredibly confident in my decision to offer him to you, Kaitlin, because your application was stunning in more ways than one. His dialogue in your samples, your headcanons—all of it was so incredibly him, so much that I don’t doubt for a second your ability to portray our beloved Crown Prince. Beautiful work! You have 24 HOURS to send in your account. Also, remember to look at the CHECKLIST. Welcome to Ravka!

OUT OF CHARACTER

ALIAS:  Kaitlin.

PREFERRED PRONOUNS:  She / her.

AGE:  20.

TIMEZONE & ACTIVITY LEVEL:  I am more or less available all of the time. I’m currently in the middle of hunting for a new job, but it will be part time so I’ll still be around all the time. Obviously muse wavers and fluctuates and such, but I’d say around a 7 out of 10.  As a quick sidenote: I do have to say that the first two weeks of the group I’m probably going to be a bit busy. Opening weekend we are celebrating my mom’s 50th birthday by going into the city for a night so I may or may not be on at all during that time. It depends on how busy we are that night. Then a week after opening I’m going to Italy on a family vacation with my Dad and Stepmom and siblings etc. During that time  I’ll be around at night for sure, but not likely at all during the day! 

CURRENT/PAST ACCOUNTS:  My only current active muse is Adeline Calore.

Also… please don’t hate me for how long this is.. I got really carried away… Love way too strong. Yikes. 

IN CHARACTER

DESIRED CHARACTER:  Crown Prince of Ravka, Anton Matvei Lantsov.

WHAT DREW YOU TO THIS CHARACTER?  By Saints I wish I could make this short and sweet, but it feels like there’s just about a million things about Anton that are screaming my name. 

I really really really wish that I could say something like “his was the first teaser that I read and I’ve been hooked on him ever since,” but in truth it took much longer for the Fox Prince to sink his canines in and really hook me. When the group was first coming out and posting things to the teaser blog and such, I knew I would be crazy chaotic busy pretty much from the time of your guys opening (As in like, when you started posting teasers. I’ve been busy so long I’m about ready to start crying, but this app has been surprisingly stress-relieving.) until about two weeks after your first acceptances: I’d resolved myself against applying for that reason. 

But like all deliciously attractive roleplays, I couldn’t help but keep my eye on the group, take a peek at the main every so often to see how things were going. I wasn’t paying close attention, and originally my gaze fell to Anastasia (partially because Ashley Moore is the love of my life, as she should be everyones, and partially because I am quite partial to princesses). I had no real plan to apply… and then I read Anton’s bio, in an attempt to learn everything I could about Ana, and fuck was I done for. 

Just like that, he had wormed his way into my heart. All I wanted to do was spread my volcra wings and start screeching because holy shit was I in love. I had 12 million other things to be doing every single day and yet, I’d be driving in my car to pick my sister up from a friend’s house and Anton fucking Lantsov would start running through my mind. (Coincidentally, I have a feeling he has this affect on a lot of people, not just me.) I’m thinking about things that he might say, how he might react if someone slighted him – is he the sort who would cut off a man’s hand because he questioned his authority as a war general (answer: maybe, possibly probably) or would he tear him down using a combination of carefully chosen words (answer: maybe, probably, he’d do both)? For a while, to be perfectly honest, I struggled a lot with finding his voice. It’s not that I couldn’t figure out why he says the things that he does, or even why he acts the way that he does because I think that I figured that out pretty early on. (At least, in my opinion. I hate when people make declarations about characters as though they know them better than the admins and so if I sound like that…. just, kick me. Seriously.) I legitimately mean, his voice – the things that he says, the words that are so carefully crafted on his lips. A big part of this is likely the fact that I am not particularly charming, and that’s legitimately the core of Anton’s persona; he is a charmer through and through, able to mold himself into any situation to make people like him. I, on the other hand, am a potato who doesn’t even like talking on the phone because it relies so much on words and that is a lot of pressure on a very small thing. But honestly I was obsessed and couldn’t stop thinking about him. Little devil snaked his way into my heart, the same way he snakes his way into everyone else’s.

What first drew me to Anton was, honestly, just the first line of his biography. I am a genuine sucker for royalty, especially the glorious and the tragic – of which Anton is both. He is legitimately everything that the crown could ever want from a prince, which makes it all the more confusing as to how exactly he got to where he is. It’s not exactly that he’s ambiguous, because his goals and motivations come to me with crystal-clear clarity: he wants better for Ravka, and that’s the be-all, end-all of it. It’s a lot like the quote by Nikolai in S&S: “I’m a prince, Alina. I can’t afford to be myself.” This is what I’m trying to get at, in essence, but it goes even further beyond this in Anton’s case. It’s not so much that he can’t afford to be himself, but rather that who is he is defined by his nation, what his people need from him. Who he is, therefore, is whoever his people need him to be. Ravka is everything to Anton, and he would never compromise his nation or his people for the sake of a single person, including himself. 

Anton may not have been born for the throne, but he is absolutely made for it. Anton, for all intents and purposes and for the sake of understanding him, strikes me as a sort of conglomeration of many of the male Greek deities. He has the wit of Ares and he has the savvy of Apollo, a boy as equally loved by the son as he is scorched by it – he has simultaneously gained everything and lost everything with his ascension to crown prince, his love his family his friends, it’s all been pulled away from him for the sake of the crown. He doesn’t complain, but he’s still been put on a pedestal he never expected to be put on. He’d grown accustomed to the battleground, allowed the gaze of war to settle into his skin alongside muted war-crys. He was a soldier though and through, racing towards victories on the horizon, a blade in his elder brother’s palm used to cut down Ravka’s enemies. 

But then Zeus crept in, making way for the true king Anton could become. Suddenly war and ruin were not all that he need know; he could know what it felt to hold a crown atop his head, to hold lightning in his hands and command where it might strike instead of being the strike. He was right to get involved with the war effort, was right to believe that war was entwined with his fate, but he had it wrong. He’s not the boy born for bloodshed, not the boy born to carry out the wars, but the one born to stop them, the boy born to bring peace to a nation that has too long been under siege by a darkness none of them knew how to fight. Or maybe the wars will kill him. Who knows. 

Honestly? I’d be crazy to not want to explore a character with that kind of weight on their shoulders, wouldn’t I? 

WHAT FUTURE PLOT IDEAS DID YOU HAVE IN MIND? 

LANTSOV MEN DIDN’T DIE: Anton, the word-lover, Anton, the wordsmith. I would love for Anton – who always had a quick remark to make before words could even enter his opponents thoughts – to be at a loss for words, for ideas. Perhaps it comes because he finds himself suddenly on not only uncharted, but also uneven ground, a place where not even his wide comfort zone can reach. Anton is brilliant, but there’s always someone out there smarter, someone just that touch more clever, and maybe they’ll put him into a position where he is in over his head. I think this is the kind of situation that would be really great for his character development; he is a selfless prince, to be sure, but he is also a vain prince, and to see him knocked off the pedestal he’s been put on, or even just knocked a rung or two down the ladder would be really fascinating. After all, the world around him is fast changing and he’s just have to learn how to run faster, talk quicker, be that much smarter. It’d be interesting to see someone pull ahead, even if only for a moment. Lantsov men, after all, are gods walking – but even gods can be killed, can be outsmarted. Just ask Ivan. 

E’YA STA REZKU: I am become a blade. In this case not in the hand’s of the Sun Summoner, but in the hands of Ravka, of his home, of his nation, of his people.  Da Vinci (my light, my life, my idol) wrote this thing: “every whole is greater than the part.” As much as I hate to so obviously take inspiration from Nikolai, I can’t help it in this case. Ravka is Anton’s first love. Therefore, to be perfectly honest, all I want is to see Anton come to grips with the fact that he will legitimately, finally, one day be at the helm of this nation. Anton, sun-haloed, war-torn, hungry Anton Lantsov is to find himself wholly consumed by his nation, and I’m wondering if he’s truly as cut out for it as he believes himself to be. He does, after all, have his weaknesses – his pride, his preference for alliances rather than relationships; when everything is skin deep it’s easy for him to betray, but just as easy for him to be betrayed. Anyways, this is kind of already in the midst of happening, but I’m really excited for Anton to morph from General into Crown Prince.

BLOOD IS THICKER: I don’t actually know if I really want this to happen or not because Anton will be in for a world of pain if it does, but I would love for it to be revealed that he is in fact a bastard. I’ve been talking about it a lot recently in various Skype chats, and I have a feeling it’s because I’m a sucker for angst, but can you imagine the pain that fact would put Anton in? He’s lived his entire life under the burden of whispers and doubts, but those he could handle; he could do it because Anton is a Great Man™ in the traditional sense of the word great in that he is pretty much designed to bring about revolution, to bring about an end to the nation’s suffering. He is a god through and through, with equal parts capability for mercy and ruthlessness when it comes to the good of his nation, and he knows it. He didn’t always, but as the people allowed him to be more volk than sobachka, he began to see himself for what he was. To have it revealed that he is in fact a bastard, that he cannot and will never again wear the crown, would be to rip the very fabric of Anton’s soul from his chest. I don’t think he would know who he is if the crown was ripped from his head, it’s too big a part of the destiny he sees for himself now. It would be a fascinating thing to have happen, and a fascinating thing for me to get to explore, but honestly I’d be very worried about his mental state if this came to fruition. 

THE SPARE SEEKS AN HEIR: The most obvious and most discussed thus far would have to be Anton finding himself a wife, considering it’s an act as future king of Ravka that will help to define his reign over the people. Who he chooses to have by his side while he rules will reflect back on him a great deal, and I would really like for it to be someone that he doesn’t necessarily expect to fall in love with. I feel like a lot of people at court tip-toe around him, or at least they should because he’s going to be the king for Saint’s sake. He is a king of the people as much as a king can be, but he is still going to be a king, is still a god walking among mere men. Probably because of that fact, there’s a kind of attitude that I want to see from Anton’s future wife, someone that isn’t afraid to call him out for being a douche – charming as that douchery may be. I also think that a kind of defiance would be something that Anton would greatly appreciate. After all, he spent his life as the spare, the prince that no one needed but they got anyways. He was someone that people needed to respect, and he commanded that from them, but he was never going to be king and he got used to that part of his life – that possibility of comfort, of familiarity, of casualness. As future king, he probably lost a lot of those casual relationship that brought easy smiles to his cheeks and was left with so much distance. I want Anton to find someone not only unafraid of that distance, but who crosses it with confidence and ease. 

GOT YOUR SIX: I would really like to see Anton training a second, and farther beyond this, Anton involved in the war efforts in general. This might be something that develops in Anton’s past, in the sense that it’s a position / relationship that already exists that just isn’t written in his bio is this makes sense. Anton with his soldier friends, joking around as they all lose themselves to the drink around him, tossing back glass after glass of kvas, their lives pressed into the dirt and destruction all around them. I feel like there’s no really an established relationship for Anton that involves the war brigade, and given that’s such an integral part of the man he became, I’d love to get to explore it more. 

WOULD YOU BE WILLING TO HAVE YOUR CHARACTER DIE?  I want to be really cool and say yes, no problem, but I have a feeling if I was accepted I would cry and be really protective over my little bastard king and cry even more if you killed him. I’d probably let it happen anyways though, you know, for the Angst™ 

IN DEPTH

IN CHARACTER PARA SAMPLE(S): The sample(s) may be as long or as short as you see fit. It must be in third person and in-character.

REASON IS NOT AUTOMATIC. – I really just wanted a glimpse into how Anton handles the men in his army. I had intended originally to write about the kindness he shows them, but since I wrote a headcanon about how he treats the good men (remembers their names, their lives, remembers they are people and not just blades in his collection), I thought it might be interesting to see how he handles the ones who are in the war for the blood, not the loyalty.  

 “We’ll probably be able to catch a few more of them lurking around in the woods, then we can have some more fun with them. Damn Fjerdans, always thinking they can take what’s not theirs, what’s ours.” There’s a pause, a silence a bit too harsh to be stagnant, as though the speaker was looking forward to the other man’s answer to his next question. “You take any alive?”

“Yeah,“ the other man says, and the tone of disappointment caught in his throat makes Anton sick to his stomach. These were his men, not the Fjerdans who ridiculously thought Grisha to be witches, or men from Ketterdam entwined with the drug industry; his men, and he thought they would be better than this. It’s a bitter reality for him to swallow. “One of them actually surrendered,” the man says, his words crisp on the cold night’s air. Anton cannot see the voice that it belongs to, but somehow he knows they are not someone to make a friend out of. “Rest of the company was around though, so I had to turn him over.”

“We aren’t taking the live ones to prison are we? We don’t need any more damn mouths to feed. I’m hungry enough most night as is.”

“Nah, just the ones who seem like they might know what their men were doing crossing into Ravkan territory. Think Popov, that new interrogator, is in with one of ‘em now. I know the live one I caught is going to be executed once the interrogator is done with him, but what I wouldn’t give to kill the Fjerdan myself.”

“Well, at least Popov gets to have some fun tonight.”

His voice is distinct when he begins – slow, deliberate, regal, in the most patronizing of ways. Men like this must be kept in line. “Now, boys,” the Prince begins, removing himself from the shadows of the tent to expose himself to these bloodthirsty wolves, calling them boys so as to make them remember that as much as he build himself into friendship with his merry men, they will forever and always be below him. And in this moment, disappointed in the cruelty of man, he needs all the status he can get. “I would say have you been paying attention, but it’s clear you haven’t. I sent out stealth parties into the trees not half an hour ago so that they might ambush the remaining Fjerdan invaders as the moon rises. Worry not; we will take and protect that which is ours and march home with any spoils. Or did you doubt your leaders?”

It’s casual, the insinuation of treason, of insubordination, of treachery. It’s the most powerful weapon against men who dare to let thoughts of such nature to take hold in their minds – the notion that it makes them weak, that it makes them lesser. (Wonderful, how the pride of men can be used so easily against them.) It often pulls men like this back, dragging them from the edge of the dark abyss and into his own arms -- where he may use them as he pleases.

Anton is never certain how he should feel about such men, the wolves of Ravka made into human flesh, but he doesn’t dwell on the thought, instead choosing to turn away from these devils in tattered clothing. It’s been almost a year to the day since Anton has stepped his foot in the Grand Palace, in his home. Tomorrow will be the year mark, and he finds more and more often that he itches for the palace, for the ability to stride through the halls, no longer sobachka but volk, no longer a weak-hearted little boy but a man as sharp as volcra talons.

Becoming a god had come at a lofty price.

( What he doesn’t say, cannot admit, is not so much that he fears he is beginning to forget; beginning to forget the sound of Anastasia laughing, the way his father’s voice curls around consonants – sharply, as though every word must be a knife to cut down his enemies – or the way Darya tended to favor certain words over others.

This? This separation? He is afraid to admit that he does not mind.

Foolish for him to have thought it would ruin him. )

Anton sits at his desk, scrawling word after word, letter after letter, pouring his mind into the pieces of parchment bound in leather.

I told Ivan this morning of the terrors, the absolute horrors, that the Shu invaders used against me and my men. There have been rumors for years about the technology they have been developing, and I fear I’ve witnessed those beginning to come to fruition.

Yet still, he doesn’t listen to me when I try and tell him my designs. I don’t understand how a mind so built for war, for weaponry could be so opposed to hearing about the developments that another thinks they could make. Dawn begins to breaks along the snow-covered horizon and he is off, walking away from me in the middle of my words, his mind too distracted by the battle his is about to wage to see the bigger picture: Ravka is going to fail .

I fear what he is going to do to our nation by keeping it as he has always known it. Ivan is no fool, but is he a king either? We need him to be. Ravka needs him to be, more so now than ever.

Every morning he wakes to desire of the most unholy sort: treason. The second son, greater than none. Funny, truly, how desperation can drive one to greatness. Nothing, however, could be done about fate, about birth order. He way be a god, but the second tier was the only level he’d be able to call home.

Anton doesn’t hear when his brother enters the room, barely notices that Ivan has entered unannounced and unwanted to come and stand at Anton’s shoulder as he hunches over the desk before him. But then his elder brother is leaning over and he can feel the breath – warm and hot, unwelcome – touching the bare space between his hairline and the top of his shirt and suddenly the journal is being slammed closed as he shoves away from his chair.

He recognized it as Ivan before he even saw him with his own eyes, even before his brother began to speak. He would know Ivan anywhere, though he may pretend not to. All he can hope is that he hadn’t read any of what has been put to paper.

“Saints, boy. You’d think I’d just held a knife to your throat the way you jump.”

Boy – the slight cuts Anton more than he’d care to admit. (Instead he’d just blather on about it in his diary later.) At first he shrinks away from the casual reprimand, knowing with sharp clarity what the small word insinuates -- he’d used the same method only minutes before. Anton, of course, had learned his tactics from the best.

“Don’t you think I know my nation well enough to know best how to handle it?” Ah -- so he had read it.

“Brother, of course I know you’re worried about what lies beyond our borders; we all are. But don’t you see? The Shu to the South and Fjerdans to the North? And right between lies our nation – while great, vulnerable; we sit cut off from our trade routes along the Western borders. All it will take to overcome us is an army strong enough, technology that we in our wildest dreams have not been able to craft. I will not allow them to take what is ours and call it their own.” Anton is alive now, caught up in the feeling of greatness, of the divinity that Ivan himself had shown him existed in Lantsov blood.

“Ivan, If the Shu decide to attack us, and I mean really attack us, we will lose. The Shu are expanding their army and I’ve seen their weaponry; if they decided to come together with Kerch to attack us by land and sea, well, even the Grisha won’t be able to protect us from that kind of machinery. Our neighbors want to expand their borders and swallow Ravka whole. We cannot continue to be a nation divided. If you would just allow -- ”

“It’s very romantic and all how you wish to save the world, but I think we both know it takes a man like me to actually do it. People respond to strength and strength alone, young brother, not reason; and while I must credit your mind with the cleverness it is due, it has nothing on the Ravkan army’s brute force.”

Sometimes he wonders about his brother; Ivan the great, Ivan the Terrible. Is he unable or perhaps just unwilling to understand that fear is a temporary solution? After all, is it more difficult to learn how to be cruel, or to learn how to be soft? Anton was beginning to think the gods knew not of humanity, knew not the workings of a human’s mind. He was beginning to think that it was a good thing he’d been forced to remain half-boy for so long, that being a god meant he would forget how to bleed.

And so long as he remembers what it is to bleed, he will remember to protect that humanity his brother had seemingly lost.

OTHER GIRLS WERE FAINT STARS. – A bit of a timeline, this sample more or less shows the rise and fall of Darya and Anton’s relationship, at least the ways in which I imagine it.

 The truth of the matter is this: Anton Lantsov would do anything for that which he loved. He’d written it once in his journal before:

Love for me is different, I think. People say that love feels like home, but it’s not. It’s like a religion. It’s so much bigger than a building where I can be myself – It’s terrifying. It’s a black night and a single burning star. It’s building them a city and calling it Church. It’s taking all of human history and bending it to their will. Forget the ending, I will build them a story anew.

He finds her in the gardens, and in spite of himself, he grins from ear-to-ear at the sight of her. He thinks it’s her back (It’s always the back with him – the way a person’s spine curves and the ridges where their shoulder blades end, the little dip between the two. He quite enjoys mapping out those places, and he does so with as much vigor as he puts into his campaigns.) that truly gives her away, the dark cascade of hair that falls over her shoulders and grazes the spot where fabric covers spine. The set of those shoulders really should have acted as a warning sign, but even if it did he chose to ignore it. (Anton, of course, does nothing without choosing to do so.)

“Miss Voronov, are you enjoying the evening?”

He almost laughs when she whips around, her face a delicious shade of red. He’d always loved the sight of a flush in a person’s cheeks – spoke to wonderful things happening below the surface, inside of a person’s mind. Perhaps she, too, was thinking of their midnight rendezvous under the influence of a tad too much champagne. He knew she was a dangerous game to play; he’d go back to war soon (too soon, really) and to dance with his emotions now would be to play with fire -- but, then, when had love or war ever been fair?

“We should probably pretend it didn’t happen,” she begins, moving quickly beyond pleasantries to address (or rather – not address, seeing as she seemed to want to forget) the kiss he’d shared with her the night before. His lips stayed in place, a smile commanding its hold as a hearty laugh rolled its way through his chest.

“Pretend what didn’t happen, you taking advantage of me or kicking me out after you did it?”

“I did not take advantage!” She sounds taken aback, and it’s all Anton can do to hear the gasp of air in her throat and not press his mouth to hers again. Instead he clicks his tongue in disapproval, his head shaking in mock innocence, though the warmth in his eyes is a dead give away for the fondness that’s settled across his skin. And he knows she can see it for she’s clearly holding back laughter, small chuckles escaping her with each word. Each sound tastes like cherry wine. It’s sweet in a quiet sort of manner, gentle but assured – as though she laughs like that every day, as though he makes her laugh like that every day, as though she may just allow him to stay by her side from now until eternity just to keep her laughing like that. He makes it his gospel.

“Oh, I was drunk and extremely handsome.” His head tilts to the side as he pauses, looking at her with obvious endearment. “You took advantage.” (What better way to show affection than with humor, no? His brothers always told him otherwise, but he finds this woman’s laugh intoxicating – he’d worship at the altar of that sound if only she’d let him.)

“I think extremely handsome is being overly generous.” The corners of his mouth tilt down in mock distress. He knows that she will come around, that she is pretending for the sake of honor, or perhaps self-protection; he can see it in the tilt of her mouth, the repressed grin.

“Oh no, last night I was wearing my good shirt, the deep blue colored one. Compliments my complexion quite nicely. Last night I was extremely handsome. You took advantage.”

“I did no -- ”

“Would you care to take advantage again, say tomorrow evening?” he says, interrupting her. He’d probably pay for that later.

“Your Highness – ”

“Please Darya, call me Anton.” He uses her given name, and he can feel the weight of it on his tongue like Atlas bearing the world, can feel it on his tongue like intimacy made concrete. The set of her mouth is what makes him smile again, the determined way in which she forces it into a straight line.

“Your Highness,” she says again. Determined little star; he could already feel his gravity shifting, anchoring him to her instead of the grass beneath their feet. “-- don’t you take anything seriously?” She knows the answer to this is yes, that he takes everything seriously, devotes himself completely to everything his nation needs, but it’s not what he says.

“I find life tends to get rather dull that way.” Sailors always tell tall tales of mermaids luring men to their deaths beneath the waves, dragged down to the shadowy depths; he thinks he’s found his siren call.

She pauses, shaking her head, but the smile he’s been trying to coax out of her is finally beginning to show, the walls beginning to crumble as he so desperately wished they would. “You really ought to stop looking at me like that,” she says.

“Like what?”

“Oh, I think that you know what.”

And he does know what, because he looks at her like he finally understands the Apparat’s preaching, like she is the moon and he a lone wolf desperate for a response. He looks at her like she’s the sun, and he’d gladly raze his wings to ash if she’d only asked him to come near.

It could be daunting, he supposes, but Anton had never walked away from a challenge before. He wasn’t about to start now.

He had been right: love and war were certainly not fair. They were vicious opponents, each as demanding as the other, both entwined together like the strings of fate. He tells himself that he is not at all bitter, that the war is where he belongs; it’s easier when she isn’t so near.

He is throwing rocks at her window and to be fair, he knows it’s all entirely absurd, but he can’t help the smile that colors his cheeks rose. Too long had he been ruled by sulfur and gunfire, by glory and victory. Too long had he been away from peace, and Darya was nothing if not solace against broken bones and battlegrounds.

He told himself that he wouldn’t do this, that the first stop he made when he returned from war wouldn’t be her, but the moment he was alone his body had taken over his mind and carried him here, for he’d missed her more than he could ever put into words. It was unbearable, really, to even think her name –  Darya Voronov, Darya Voronov, Darya Voronov, Darya Voronov, it took over everything if he let it seep in – when she wasn’t near. Thoughts of her made him tremble with it: humanity.

It terrified him.

(Perhaps it’s why he needs the jurda: to tame his heart, to strengthen his hands.)

There’s a certain euphoria he feels whenever she is near, and even the simple sight of her leaned over that balcony edge is enough to make his heart ache in ways he never imagined that it could, in ways he hopes will never fade. Her gaze meets his (truly, it hasn’t been that long but it’s been far, far too long) and suddenly everything else pales in comparison to her eyes, all the other beauty in the world pale stars in comparison to her full moon. For a moment his breath hitches in his chest and he counts one --  two -- three -- before he can breathe again.

“Anton, what are you doing out there! Someone may hear you!”  She half-whispers her words, chiding, but the smile that winds its way onto her cheeks is a dead give away, her tell. He knows she is as happy to have him home as he is to see her once again. Seeing her standing there, the delicate weight of her lifted onto toes so that she might lean over the railing, makes him smile crookedly. (Really, what other sort of smile can a boy with fifty faces have?) He’s unsurprised at her delight, remembering that with every letter he sent her, she sent one back with equal fervor: come home, she would write. I miss you, too, he would send back.

“Well, you know how I feel about taking risks,” he replies with a smile to match her own blossoming one. Like calls to like, he would suppose.

“Don’t you know what my father would do to you if he caught you out there? What your father would do?”

It doesn’t matter to him what her father would do, what anyone would do. The only reason he hides her is for her benefit, for her own safety. She deserved so much better than to be put under scrutiny, under the watchful eye of every other woman at court who may have thought to seek out the hand of a prince; Darya was already an outsider at court, despite the efforts of Ana to make people see otherwise. She was not from a high house, did not come from money, no, far from it. He loved her, and as he does all the things he loves, he protects her whatever the cost, even if that means he needs to hide her from the rest of the world.  

Hearing her speak he realizes that it’s true what they say about distance, about separation. The first thing to go from your memory is the voice, and hearing Darya’s now, fluttering along the gentle breeze, it sounds something like church bells, the notes of a choir’s hymn at sunset.

He feels grounded, anchored to her. A disciple at his knees before the saints.  

His eyes are alight with mischief when he finally replies. “Make me marry you, perhaps?”

A dangerous game to play, indeed.

Anton barely thinks twice about being called to his father’s study. He’s almost grown accustomed to the man now, barely registers anymore that the man standing before him is twice the god that Anton will ever be, that his father is the titan who taught him how to shed the sobachka pelt Ravka had put on his shoulders. He knocks -- a succinct rap rap on the mahogany door frame -- before entering, passing through the entryway to Olympus only when his father’s voice calls out come in.

“Darya Voronov?” Ivan had never been one for playing games, and tonight was no different. If Darya was Anton’s own personalized version of an addiction, then his father was buzzkill incarnate. He crosses his arms over his broad chest, and Anton immediately feels smaller; he almost crumples in on himself with the weight of his father’s gaze. Please, father, he wants to beg. Let’s not do this.

He keeps his gaze apathetic, the guarded prince guarding his heart; he cannot afford to give too much away. The king stands (Do kings ever truly sit, even when they are planted on their thrones? When they are always so high above all others?) and waits for an answer from the spare, but for a moment Anton finds himself absent a quip to allay the situation, absent a tongue. The bonds between father and son, no matter the complexity, no matter the darkness, no matter the questions (Are you proud of me? Do you love me? Do you love my mother? Am I hers?) are unshakeable though, and as cleverly as Anton my try to shed the weight of his father’s gaze, may try to escape the imploring eyes, gods do not know the meaning of the word no.

Anton should have known better than to think he could hide her from a man who saw the bigger picture like it was marked out for him on the floor in dotted lines. “I know all, my boy.”

Anton wants to laugh it off, to pretend like his father is being absurd. He knows his words are thin, that his father has eyes even in the statues that decorate the Grand Palace, that nowhere is safe, but he lies anyways.

“Father, I never pegged you as the type to listen to petty gossip.” He pretends not to feel the way his heart has begun to beat more quickly between his ribcages, growing so large with every pump of blood that it surely is on the verge of explosion. The young prince should really know better by now than to try and lie to a man who could lie for a living. (Old habits die hard, I suppose.) “Do you pay all such rumors credence, or do you consider me a special case?”

His father is shaking his head then and he is looking straight through Anton as though there is a shining star buried in his chest setting his every secret aflame, bright and burning for all the world to see. And maybe there is something buried there, a piece of Darya stuck like a burr on his heart, his body drowning with the gravity of it. He wouldn’t be surprised.

“You’re a skilled liar, Anton, but not skilled enough.”

Gods don’t care for weakness, and love is surely one.

She hates it when he smokes, but to be fair, he only does it when he’s away from her, like when she is around his need for vice is sated. Without her Anton is a burning pyre, and when there’s smoke the pipe is too tempting not to give into. Coming back to the palace he finds it difficult to quit, and standing beside the lake makes him nostalgic for the ocean -- his hands needs a distraction or they may just begin that insufferable flexing that happens whenever he wants something he cannot have.

“You know, once of these days they’re going to tell you jurda can kill you,” she says, her voice suddenly breaking through the night, just as flame is approaching pipe. How quickly he smiles; he needed a distraction, and Darya was be a much more appealing addiction to indulge himself in. Dangerous, the intellectual part of his brain days, for they are in public and much to his own chagrin, Darya is a well-kept secret.

Delicious, the wolf says.  

“You think you know what it’s going to feel like, but this” he says, a general of war suddenly gentle in the hands of his flower, gesturing clumsily at the empty space between their two bodies. “This is nothing l could have predicted. I don’t know why anybody bothers with drugs when they could just fall in love.”

There are a million words on the tip of his liquor-lacquered tongue. My throat, mine. You left stars in my heart and now I claim this space between your ribs as mine, mine, mine. I am in your heart and it is paradise; I am in your light and it keeps streaming into me. “Never leave me,” he says instead. His head is shaking, a mind caught in incredulity. How had she claimed him so? A man who was everything, reduced to a man in love, a man at his knees?

“Is that what you’re afraid of?” She says it like a joke, like it’s nothing, but Anton knows better.

His lips brush hers and it tastes suspiciously of wildflowers.

“Who says I’m afraid of anything?”

You get to be the King. This isn’t the way he thought it would feel. For a momen\ it felt like magic, but now it feels like getting stabbed to death. You get magic gloves! You’re all cotton candy pink and glowing! He feels strangely trapped, like a princess in her tower or the dragon stuck in the dungeons.

She finds him in the gardens. and while there is no longer a tear in his eye, salt has clung onto the peach fuzz that covers his cheeks. The faded tears tighten his skin, just as the noose he’d placed around his own neck so many years ago had finally grown taut; just as he’d always wanted. The gravity lines that had once held him spinning in her orbit had been severed, and he hung precariously from the hands of the Ravkan people. His fate belong to them now, not her.

If he was going to put the noose around his own neck, he supposes he should at least do it right.

“Anton,” she calls when she is only a few feet away. Here he’d been thinking they wouldn’t even say goodbye, wouldn’t submit themselves to the pain of such an endeavor. But then again, he’d always been the dramatic sort, and much as he wanted to save himself from the war of love, he knows that a wound left to fester would surely kill, that neither one will be able to move on without the safety of a clean cut.

He didn’t do it on purpose (or maybe he did, he can’t be sure), but everything about him is stark sobering; his clothes are crisp and free of blemish the same way his face remains smooth, unburdened. He had to make it look easy, had to make it as pure and unblemished by the loss of his brother as possible. It will be easier this way, he thinks, and maybe he’s right. (He usually is.)

“My dear Darya – ” he begins without thinking, something he thinks he’s never done.

“Please don’t call me that – yours, as though I ever will be.”

His eyes cast themselves towards hers and it’s not exactly painful; perhaps nostalgic would be a better word. She looks like a morning glories unfurling at down, she looks like home. It’s instinctual, the way his hand nearly floats away from his side to stroke her cheek; he’d just washed them recently, and he knew she’d be able to smell the lemon on them. It’s all he can do to not surge forward, to wrap her in his arms to keep her safe and tucked away from the pain and darkness now threatening to take over.

Instead he breathes, and flexes his hand once, twice, three times over. He knows she deserves something better than this, better than the role of dirty secret. Doesn’t change the turning in his abdomen at the thought of her lips on his.

He wants to apologize for all of the things that he ever said to her, wants to take it all back. What good is it doing either of them now? When they’ve known happiness, pure and unbridled love, only to have it ripped away by something as heavy as blood? Sorry about taking your heart and making myself a home there, sorry about walking with you through the gardens under a black sky alight with bright stars. I’m sorry that I built a cathedral at your feet, and I’m sorry for the sacrilege I’m about to commit. Sorry about the casket I’ve already buried our love in.

Sorry about ruining everything before even saying it aloud.

Is this what destruction looks like? Or maybe it’s something else, something like construction. Maybe it takes clumsy hearts at twilight to realize that what was underneath the floorboard was what he was destined for, that the perfunctory kiss goodbye he plants on her rosebud mouth was something he should have been prepared for all along.

It’s love or it isn’t; does it matter anymore? It does. Of course it does.

“Our nation needs strength, Darya. No matter the cost.” He doesn’t say it aloud, not exactly, but he knows her to be clever enough to hear the words he cannot say: the cost is you, the cost is you, the cost is you.  

He would pay it time and time again, and he wouldn’t think twice.

“I know, my love. I know.”

He turns away from her then and there’s the same unmistakable set of his shoulders, the one he learned from his brother, from his father. It’s the stance of a Lantsov. It’s the stance not of a boy turned men, but of a man turned god.

The truth of the matter is this: Anton Lantsov loves Ravka, and he’d do anything to protect it.

CHARACTER HEADCANONS: 

MY HEART ON YOUR SLEEVE: Anton is always giving away his heart in the form of material objects. With his men, the ones who did right by him, by a man not just their general but their friend, he would give them little trinkets that he had invented that would make their lives easier – an especially powerful telescope that would allow men to see an enemy approaching from further distances, a jacket made from the same material as his own kefta, a seemingly simple pair of gloves that have metal in the knuckles so any hand to hand combat would be just that much more dangerous, and so on and so forth. It’s not necessary by any means, but it adds to his charms, makes him more friend than other, makes him more human if people are able to carry little pieces of his mind around in their pockets. Similarly, he lavishes his lovers with gifts. There haven’t been too many, and besides Darya they were all frivolous teenage trysts, but each and every single one of them found themselves adorned with jewels. Darya, of course, was always telling him that she didn’t need it, but that never stopped him. He can’t seem to help it, the ways in which he loves to inject himself into other people, to don his peers with little bits of himself – perhaps it’s a way of claiming ownership, of claiming power, but it’s also something that gives him pride; to see people wear and use the things he has given them, it lets him know that they appreciate what he does for them, and he loves to be appreciated. 

HEAD ON, HEART OFF: For the greater good, he tells himself. I think it probably scares him a little bit, how easily he was able to walk away from Darya. There’s a great many nuances to this situation, but at the end of the day I don’t think that, once he knew of his brothers death and what that entailed for his own future, he ever thought twice about keeping Darya in his life. He’s far too smart to ever truly believe that Darya could be his queen, and so he let her go without a second thought. Part of it was for her own sake; if he held onto her until he found himself a wife, then he would be doing her not only a great dishonesty, but also a great disservice. He knows that she deserves far better than to be the king’s mistress. And he thinks about her, often – sometimes it’s late at night, when there’s no one there to distract his thoughts from the image of her sprawled across his silk bed sheets, and sometimes it’s when he hears something funny or something beautiful; she is who he wants to share those moments with. But still, he left her like it was nothing, like it was easy, because that’s what his kingdom needed, what the crown demanded. It scares him how quickly the man he wanted to become has vanished, a crown prince left to fill his shining shoes. 

BATHE IN STARLIGHT: I am dead convinced that Anton has an unshakeable love for all things that live above his head: the birds that live in the trees, the trees themselves that grow so big and tall and will outlive him by millennia, but most important the sky, and what is beyond that. The galaxies and the cosmos fascinate him, and he is constantly staring up at them, clambering his way onto the roofs of buildings in an attempt to get closer to them. What secrets do they hold, those floating little balls of light? He can see them there, flickering in the sky above – they’re the only absolute constant in his life. Out on the Vy, or making camp near one of the Tula Valley’s many abandoned farms, even lost in the vast otherness of Tsibeya, the stars remained the same, guiding him through the darkness and to safety. 

EXTRAS: 

I do have a mockblog, which I’ve linked in this whole sentence! As per usual, I think it’s probably more helpful for me than it will be for you, but it’s there. :) I’ve also made Anton a pinterest board! 

Some extra things, a number of which are just more headcanons:

a playlist that i made for anton… here’s hoping you have spotify. it’s more or less instrumental songs that made me think of him, but there’s a couple of lyric songs in there as well. 

i forced myself not to make a darya & anton playlist, but listen to moondust by jaymes young and try to tell me it doesn’t make you cry. i’ll wait. 

birthdate: december 31st: capricorn. This sign is, above all else, ambitious. And while I don’t think that Anton necessarily lusted after the crown when he was the second son, he absolutely fought tooth and nail to make sure he was not only well-liked, but well respected. He rose through use of his own merit and skill to the title of General, and he did it because he’s patient. He’s resourceful. He gets what he wants. Capricorn’s other common traits tend to serve their ambition in that they are usually quite disciplined and quite intuitive; I think this lend nicely to the notion that Anton is very good at reading people – their wishes, their desires, they all come easily and quickly to him, allowing him to be whoever the person needs him to be. Capricorns often are very good with their words, which fits with his ability to but charm people and put them in their place, with his ability to bring nations to their knees with a twist of his tongue rather than his wrist. 

gender identity: cisgender; he/him. Anton’s entire life he was bred for war, for the life of a general. He was taught to keep his hair cropped short, his posture straight, and his muscles coiled tightly. He was taught walk like a man. This is why I’d suspect he’s never considered what life would be like if he were able to separate himself from his gender, from the constriction of the pronouns he’d been given at birth. The phrase be a man was so wound in with his identity that I doubt he could have ever given much thought to abandoning that which he was born into. 

sexuality: heteroperformative, but likely unopposed to the idea of sex with any and all genders, and more than likely has tumbled with his fair share of people of varying genders. To be perfectly honest, I don’t think he’s given a terrible amount of thought to his sexuality, always just assuming that he would have to marry some noble girl regardless of his own choices. The fact that he found and loved Darya wasn’t something that happened every day in Ravkan court, and I don’t think he was expecting it at all. Sure he’s the second born son and so his marriage wouldn’t have been nearly as important as any one made by Ivan, but Saints forbid Anton end up marrying anyone other than a well-mannered lady capable of matching his own level of wit and sophistication. No, Anton’s own personal willingness to cross all of those boundaries never mattered because he knew that in the long run he likely wouldn’t be marrying for love. 

hogwarts house: In my heart of hearts I love Gryffindor so much and was honestly trying to figure out a way to justify putting Anton in Gryffindor, but I just couldn’t manage it. I think he’s very probably in Slytherin given his pension for ambition and bringing armies to heel, but I think the sorting hat may think twice about not putting him in Ravenclaw. 

books: It’s not surprising that someone with an ability to connect to a vast array of people is then able to connect across a different field: the page. For as long as Anton can remember he’s always loved books, and the worlds that different stories can create. Before the spare was the heir, he was generally free to spend his days as he pleased. Prior to his introduction to the battalions, Anton could pretty much always be found in the library and anyone who walks into Anton’s personal quarters int he palace likely could have mistaken the room for a second one. His room is practically littered with stacks of different books, some of them historical and some simply novels to be read for pleasure. They cover every surface – piles on the floor beneath his desk and on the chair in the corner of his room. Books on his nightstand and at the foot of his bed. All of varying lengths and topics and age. His favorites always turn out to be about historical leaders, sometimes monarchs sometimes dictators sometimes usurpers. Men and women of great power and prestige who did great or ( sometimes and ) terrible things for their nations. Sometimes he pretends he’s not, but he’s always taking mental notes of what those Greats did that made them the ruler that they were. Even before he had the crown Anton was ready for it. 

languages: As the great wordsmith that Anton is, it makes sense that he would make sure he could be as such in as many languages as he could get his hands on. While out at sea, there is little else to do on passages than read a book, or perhaps practice a bit of swordplay (not that he really needs much help in that department). So read he would, plowing through books on Kerch and Shu Han, devouring the language and attempting to form the sounds on his tongue even without the aid of a native speaker. But eventually a vague understanding wasn’t enough, and he pestered each speaker of foreign languages that he could find into showing him to to move his mouth, where to put his tongue exactly behind his teeth. He loves words, and the more the merrier.

mars: For the longest time he couldn’t justify with himself getting a dog, unable to reconcile his want with the amount of time he would spend away from the creature. When his brother died, when he was made Crown Prince, he found himself spending more time at the palace than he had since he was a teenager, and he found a true friend in the small Golden Retriever puppy that he acquired. His father had said Get a Great Dane if you really must have a pet, but Anton loved the unbridled loyalty that came with his Golden, and he wouldn’t trade Mars for anything. The puppy now follows him everywhere, and he grows bigger and bigger every day. Mars, he finds, is very good at listening to his secrets. 

sailing: Anton, beyond a shadow of a doubt, loves the sea. There were a great many things that kept him from it while he was growing up ( namely The Unsea ) but even the darkness couldn’t hold Anton back from the place he was meant to be. Being out on the water was as close a thing to religion as Anton has ever felt, despite the preachings of the Apparat that he alway had to sit through while growing up. The language of the Saints had never resonated in his mind until he witnessed what it was to feel the wind kissing his skin, salt getting caught up in his too-long eyelashes. There’s something so liberating about being out on the water, an emotion that comes only when the land begins to fade from vision. In my head it was the first thing that was truly, incandescently Anton’s. He was the Second Born battle-savvy son, but Ivan was ruthless in battle in a way that made Anton’s pension for clever tricks instead of brute force not only less popular with his father, but it made the battlefield less his. Maybe that’s a selfish thought, but being at sea was the first thing that he was really, really good at that his elder brother hadn’t already claimed – the almost rhythmic slapping of the hull and the crooning of seagulls, the rigging creaking as it tightens around the pins.  **As a sidenote, I did come up with this headcanon prior to reading the Grisha trilogy – it is entirely possible that I was projecting my own love for the sea onto Anton, but I think it fits beautifully with his instiably curious, restless mind – but I am really really pleased that it aligned with Nikolai’s character because I love him and I just think that King of the Sea Anton is a beautiful Anton. 

good men: This one ties in kind of closely with my “HEART ON YOUR SLEEVE” headcanon, but I wanted to expand on that one just a little bit more down here. I think that Anton is the kind of General that remembers every single soldier that he served with, and even many of the ones that he was only commander to. He is just that kind of man, the one who cares about people far more than they very well may care about him. He asks men he hasn’t seen in three years how their lives have changed, remembering that one man’s wife was pregnant when they first met and so will ask if he ended up with a spitfire who can’t sleep through the night or not, will ask about anything he can remember from his past with them and the people love it, and it’s why not a single person out there questions the fact the the prince is the general – they know he wasn’t just given the title for the sake of the title. Anton damn well earned it. 

drinking: As a dastardly teenager with a face far too beautiful for it to be any good for Ravka’s women, kvas was more than likely one of Anton’s very best friends, as it would have been for any other young teenage boy. But I don’t think Anton drinks anymore, at least not really, and I think this is probably a fairly recent development. Obviously champagne and the occasional glass of kvas is necessary in the life a royal – for entertaining guests who prefer brandy to warm the hearts rather than the talk of alliances, or for wooing a woman into bed with the sultry glance above the rim of his glass – but I don’t think that he really drinks to excess. He’s too focused on Ravka and making it the kingdom he believes it can be: grand and powerful. He wouldn’t risk any modicum of control for the sake of waking up nauseous and bleary-eyed – no matter how attractive the prospect of liquor may seem in the moment. WIP.

grisha: Anton acts all holier than thou sometimes (read: all the time) but it’s more or less a facade to entertain while still commanding respect, and his emotions about the Grisha are not any different to how he feels about other citizens of Ravka: they deserve protection. As a child, his vision was tainted by the glasses of prejudice, but as soon as he began coming into his own, as soon as he began traveling through Ravka, he stopped seeing abomination and began to see allies, to see the human beneath the Small Science. It mattered not to Anton the fact that Stasya Belov could command air particles; he wanted to go for a tumble with her in shadowy corners just the same way Darya Voronov made his abdomen tighten. He saw beyond the prejudices he had been taught, and that newfound vision has stuck with him – and he’s determined to carry it not only through Ravka, but into Kerch and Shu Han and past the Fjerdan borders. He has a vision for the world, and it’s colored in acceptance. 

charms: I find the fact that Anton is extraordinarily charming quite fascinating if I’m being perfectly honest, because every persona that he dons is as genuine as the last – a feat not easily accomplished. The Grisha have odinakovost and etovost, that strange ability of theirs to call to the small sciences, but Anton has something equally as powerful: that ability to see into a person’s soul and know exactly what they need from him, who he must be to gain their trust. He’s a golden kind of charming, the kind of boy who lights up a person’s world, the kind of boy who creates warmth wherever he goes. Sometimes it makes a hearth, sometimes it burns men to the ground – it depends on what will serve him best. 

knives: Anton has always been skilled with knives. Anton, to be fair, tends to be good at everything that he puts his mind to. 

letters: Every single time he was away from the palace (and, to be sure, it was a great many times, for many months at a time) he sent letters back to his two favorite ladies: Anastasia and Darya. When he first began going to war, it was only to his sweet Ana that he would send mail to regularly, but as soon as Darya came into his life he was hooked on her, drowning in an all-encompassing love, and he’d pour and pour and pour himself into the pages he sent to her until there was nothing left to pour. More often than not he would press a flower he found near camp and include it in the letters he sent; even when he was away he wanted to give people a tiny little piece of himself, even if that piece was only a bit of where he was in the world at the time of mailing.

jurda: He smokes the root from a pipe, but only when he’s away from the palace (read: only when he’s away from Darya.) He tried chewing it, like all soldiers do, but he found the feeling it left in his mouth uncomfortable, and quickly moved onto using the pipe instead. It’s not quite that he needs a vice, but more so that it’s the only thing he’s found that can sate his appetite, that can calm the wolf every time he gets agitated. It’s strange, perhaps, but Anton needs no aid in finding energy as many who chew jurda do, but rather that thoughts of Darya often used to distract his energy from where it needed to be. The smoke focused him, smothered the want to make way for the war. 

prayer: Good sailors. Good soldiers. Let the sea carry them to safe harbor, and may the Saints receive them on a brighter shore. Anton repeats the Sailor’s Prayer to himself after every single battle, whether the men he’s lost have been sea-lovers or not. Sailing is as close a thing to religion as he has ever truly believed in and he can’t quite shake himself of the habit. Sometimes it’s a simple Saints receive them and sometimes it’s the entire prayer, but either way the sea is always with him. 

CONNECTIONS – These are, of course, player approval contingent, but I tried to keep them mostly Anton-sided to avoid potential variations in interpretation! I know that there’s a lot of these, and so that some of them may need tweaking, but given Anton’s status, he knows a great many people and I wanted to really explore his thoughts about Ravkan court given it runs his life. 

ivan – Fascinating, isn’t it, the bonds between brothers? If manipulation were a two-sided coin, then Anton and Ivan would be on opposing sides: Ivan, the physical, Anton, the mental. Where one was all fists, the other relied on wits. Where neither was overly tender or merciful, one knew what the words meant where the other pretended the words didn’t exist. How do you live with yourself? Anton occasionally thought to ask, though he knew what his elder brother would respond with: a haughty laugh, an innately valorous twist of his mouth (everything Ivan did was fraught with grandeur, with glory, with darkness). By always being the last man standing. Little did he know.  

viktor – He is Viktor fucking Lantsov, a harbinger of the kind of darkness that he saw in his elder brother’s soul as well. The two, it would seem, are cut from the same cloth, and for that reason there’s a terror that fills Anton’s mind every time he thinks about the youngest brother – the same terror he once felt when he stood in Ivan’s presence. If Anton’s destiny was always to be the crown, then Viktor’s was always to be the spare; for that reason he is filled with wounds and they are leaking gasoline, leaving Anton to navigate the precipice between comrade and competition, weapon and wary. It has never been easy, loving his brother, especially when he knows that Viktor’s fury knows no bounds, his anger raging with a kind of frenzy even the strongest hurricane couldn’t stomp out. He has already incurred his brother’s wrath, and he has no desire to incur his fury. Only the tides will tell him what he will do next, and even those he’s not sure he can rely on.

anastasia – His printsessa. God he loves Ana; he loves Ana so much that sometimes it hurts, so much that he makes her think of bringing knife to rope so that he might cut himself from the Lantsov noose around his neck, away from the kingdom. But that’s all he does: think. He will never take action to mend the fragile broken thing that now rests between them, will never put blood above country. Like all half-gods, Anton had come to accept this tragedy – it shocks him every single day how easily this acceptance came to him. There was no blackhole of sleepless night where he mourned the loss of sister and brother, of lover or friend. There are few people that Anton will openly admit to having loved in his life, who have seen him in the most vulnerable of places, and while Ana is one of those special few, he is no longer the sweet little sobachka he once was. With crown came kingdom, and that needs to be more important than any love, even family.

tatiana – Fuck if he doesn’t absolutely loathe the time he must spend at his cousins side, though he would never admit to his dislike aloud. As close to the edge as she pushes him (and, to be sure, Cronos’s cool embrace often sounds more appealing than listening to Tati screech on about this or that – but, hey, we don’t choose our family) he would extinguish any star that dared to threaten her, the same as he would for Ana or Viktor, despite the distance and coldness between all of them.

darya – He would give anything is this world to make Darya happy, anything but himself. There is no easy way from Earth to the stars, and if Anton’s blood calls to the sea beneath the hull of his ship, then the fabric of Darya’s soul is made of stardust. He once thought that this would never be the way of it, with his heart abandoned on her sleeve, his ability to love suddenly gone, but now he sees the truth for what it is: this is his destiny, no matter the steps it took for him to get here. He loves (he would desperately like to believe it to be loved, but he isn’t in the habit of lying to himself) Darya, and he knows that he always will. The fox that he once was will love her until the sun rises in the west and the sea turns to sand beneath his feet, but the volk that he has become, the volk that was always lying in wait beneath his skin, will never allow himself to feel for her what he once did. To do so would be to put himself above his country, and Ravka deserves better than a king who cannot abandon the boy he once was for the GOD they need. 

the darkling – Anton sees him for exactly what he is: a plague made flesh. It’s not a warm thought, neither is Anton filled with the kind of warmth others at court are when the Darkling enters a room. Pain makes noise, and despite all the pain he causes, the Darkling is silent as the moon. Anton can’t very well trust a man who feels nothing can he?

gemma – He thinks about marrying her more and more often, and not for any frivolous reason such as love. He sees her not for her beauty and not even for her brains, but for what the people see in her: hope. If Iskra is his hope for a better future for himself, then Gemma is his hope for his nation. He sees in her illuminated cities, at the very center of her is a well to satiate the thirst his people have been suffering under for centuries. It’s not fair, but what is fairness anymore? When the fate of a nation is not just in your hands, but in your blood, in your bones, you cannot turn away: Anton will ask everything from her, and he will do it without a second thought. Here is my hand. Here is my throat. Here is anything you want, even the marrow from my bones if you ask it. He doesn’t believe in religion, but he would build one to her if that’s what she needs. The nation needs her and just as he would give himself to his people, he will do anything she asks if she’ll just be his ally, his hallelujah.

iskra – She flinches, and he would be disappointed. He thinks her beyond something as trivial as fear. Perhaps it’s strange, or perhaps unfair, the way he holds her up, places her so high above all of the others. He mounts her on a pedestal as though she is one of Donatello’s masterpieces and Saints help the soul who dares to call her anything but a marvel. He plucked her from the masses, just another bastard in a crowd, an Etherealki whose fate he could see from the moment his night-darkened eyes fell upon her face, and he helped to turn her into something glorious. When he found her, she was already a sight to behold: a dragon to set fire to each of his enemies, a warrior in soft skin. She was a bastard who had left everything she had ever known to start a new life someplace foreign. Even then he knew that she was something meant to be spoken of in legends, a girl turned woman, turned blade. Ashes to ashes, dust to dust. And like a phoenix, she rose from the ashes of her former life, and Anton made for himself a home at the hearth of her. Like calls to like. He sees in her both what he fears and what he dreams of – a bastard who has created a life still worth something, a bastard who rises above what others seek to drag them down for. I rise. I rise. I rise. “Nadeyus moya,” he calls her when no one can hear. My hope.

inessa & feliks – He compares them both is Iskra, and time and time again he is disappointed in them. It’s not fair, not in the slightest; it’s like comparing kings to gods, of which Iskra is certainly one. Inessa is remarkable, to be sure, but she is a snake in snakes’ skin, a girl whose veins seem forged from gasoline not unlike his brothers – just waiting to be set aflame. Feliks comes from an equally, though differently, violent background, and it’s not that he doesn’t trust the guards with his siblings lives (he does, cautiously, as he does all other things), but he worries about the darkness that seems to color their lives, worries that it will follow them from past and into the present. Too many have wound up dead in both of their pasts for Anton to truly trust them, no matter how often and thoroughly they prove themselves capable. 

arisha – Arisha is… a force to be reckoned with, to be sure. She’s a clever sort, the kind of wolf that would dare to challenge his status as alpha is he left her with an opening to do so. He thinks she would have done well with his brother, both creatures of equal part gods and terror. She’s a good actress, with the kind of poker face that most men would sacrifice entire nations just to crack, but Anton holds a stack of cards that she can’t even begin too imagine, with plays that she’s never seen before. (Or so he thinks; tragic, Anton is, remember?) And while the minx makes him uncomfortable, while he makes sure to never turn his back in her direction for fear she may slip a knife between his ribs – to be fair, he makes every effort to never turn his back on anyone – he listens to what she has to say about the kingdom as intently as his mother does, as his father does. Until she proves herself an enemy he will continue to treat her as ally, but he waits with bated breath for the moment she will show her true colors. 

oyun – There are so many vipers in Ravkan court; Oyun Kir-naran is one of those many, and she makes no apologies for it. Anton finds he can respect that, despite the soft-edges she paints herself with. She speaks with a tongue like velvet, like the sun’s rays filtering in with dawn, and it sounds like lust, tastes like intimacy, and it’s all on purpose. Saints know Anton sees through it because he does the same thing: play on people, use their tells to be the kind of person they spill their secrets to. Oyun is exactly the kind of person he needs to be wary of, just as he is who she needs to worry about – each wants to bring the other’s nation to it’s knees, and if he could he’d say Scurry back to Shu Han, Oyun, his voice collected and his face unreadable. You can’t win here. As it is he bows his head respectfully and smiles. Let the games play on. Gods do not bend their knees to wolves in sheepskin.

ANYTHING ELSE?

And FINALLY I have approximately 12 million favorites, but the book I’ve probably read the most times is Inkheart by Cornelia Funke, just because it’s filled with book-lovers and I am nothing if not one of those! Thank you for reading my app & can’t wait to keep a weathered eye on this group even if I’m not accepted. ♡

#accepted: anton #raraccepted