If so, hiii! Could I please request a Viktor x wealthy nobleman reader angst set in s1 and during the timeskip? Maybe to do with reader’s parents are forcing him into an arranged marriage so he can’t be with Viktor but they’re still trying to make it work??? Don’t feel obligated to write this it’s up to you n e wayz have a good day thankss ♪(๑ᴖ◡ᴖ๑)♪
viktor x male! wealthy nobleman! reader
angst, (implied) smut, some dialogue. an experimental little thing, really.
word count: 1,7k
author’s note: this request. it’s so scrumptious. so beautiful. so delightful. thank you for asking me to write this, i don’t think i’ve met your expectation but i certainty tried to throw in some extra angst. enjoy, my darling anon!
—
He wakes up in a sweat-slick frenzy and there’s salt dribbling down his neck when he reaches to feel it, scraping matted hair off his pale skin.
The sheets beneath him are crumpled into intractable waves. The detritus of his restless sleep and whatever erotic mess he’d made out of you a few hours ago. But when his arm crawls to your side of the bed, smoothing over the rippled splendour, his fist clenches around nothing.
Heavy lids flutter with effort when his ochre eyes roll beneath the chestnut strands, fruitlessly roaming around the pompous room. All claret patches of luxurious furniture curdling into countless voids in the dim light. There’s something so inherently you and not-you-in-the-slightest all the same clashing inside this chamber. Gaudy, and tasteless, and redundantly sandalwood. Duck-feather pillows and thick mattresses. Exuberant safety.
Viktor rests his eyes, propping his head up on a trembling hand. He could never get used to this. He could never get used to you. Your reputee. Your respectable decorum. The things he’s supposed to enjoy—or, rather, try to make amends with.
And yet, they’re still so foreign and confusing. He swears there’s a myriad snarky insults written all over this gigantic house—on every ridiculous vintage lamp and on the mortifying softness of your carpets—hell, even the curtains sway at him sibilantly, somehow.
He especially loathes the mirrors—those eerie, gilded culprits. It’s not that he despises the reflection. Anything but that. It’s mostly the way he clashes with the grandeur that makes him avert his eyes. Away from the jaunty reminder that he doesn’t belong here.
Hw slips one leg off the bed, gaining precarious hold of his cane through drowsy confusion. Hides the slopes of pointy shoulders beneath his flimsy shirt, but leaves it unbuttoned. Counts puce hickeys strewn across his chest and cockily runs his heavy tongue over each molar when the number exceeds ten.
He doesn’t bother with the belt, either. Simply trudges out of the room with pants hanging low on hips and lets his walk become gallus when he passes Agnes. The maid throws him a judging glance. She knows. And he knows she knows. You’re not exactly secretive about the blissed debaucheries happening in that spacious bedroom every time your venerable parents leave the City of Progress.
Too bad he doesn’t care enough to keep you out of trouble. It’s more of an eye-for-an-eye dilemma. You’re still so skittish to address him as your partner during those numerous fancy galas. Janna, he can’t even make it to the guest list. It’s like you completely lack the balls (and the appendage is definitely there—Viktor did check, after all). But it’s okay. Viktor can be the ballsy one. He can rub it in their faces on your behalf. And tonight the maid’s face falls victim to his stunt.
He asks if she’d seen you, sickeningly glibly. Finds the audacity to address you by your first name, with his head tilted cheekily to the side.
“He’s in the drawing room,” Agnes mumbles, looking away. “Playing the piano.”
Viktor hums. Of course. He should’ve guessed. He thanks her with a snide nod and takes his leave. Thinks of just how oblivious rich people are to their antics: it’s ridiculous that the sounds of a literal keyboard instrument fail to reach every room in this enormous mansion. It makes him really ponder the size. So much space for privilege, yet not an inch for love. Boastful quarters built on ingenuity.
The door makes a heavy screech when he comes in, panting hard. He finds you at the edge of your padded seat, all tense shoulders and rigid breaths, cheeks blooming a frustrated, sweaty pink. Your fingers are torturing the keyboard, tapping out a bluesy, messy tune. He leans on the doorframe, forehead landing against mahogany with a light thump. And when he notices the expensive ruffled shirt he’d torn at earlier, he can’t help but linger on the patch of skin bearing evidence of his kiss.
Your melody gains a sharper edge, all whiny chords clashing in a dismissed plea—either to gods or your conniving ancestry, but that’s open to interpretation. Could be both, really.
It’s not often that he gets to admire his boy like this—tumultuous and rigid, sweaty forehead contorted with veins in your angry awe. And Viktor doesn’t want to startle you. He sneaks behind your back and hovers above your shoulders, his breath a sly tickle against your fevered temple. But his presence grounds you. Your limbs tumble, going limp as they slide off the trembling keyboard. The piano strings are still vibrating when you turn to kiss him, wet lips meeting chapped.
He glides under your tongue and hums something indistinct, but his words get swallowed before you can make them out. Franticly, you cling to him, desperate fingers clasping around bony thighs, and down he goes, pulled into your lap—a bubbly giggle rasping against your mouth when he straddles you. He tastes of boldness, sweat and something delirious. Runs his hands up and down your back while his own arches into the keyboard and hits one cacophonic chord. It has you leaping out of your seat, hairs on ends like a skittish cat. Viktor looks at you, and his mouth unravels into a boyish smile.
“Am I interrupting?” He finds his voice, still groggy from the aftermath of his slumber.
You offer him an apologetic wink of both tired eyes. “You startled me.”
“Ah, I see. I’m sorry. You should have kept going. I quite liked that improvisation.”
You both laugh.
He rakes his hand up your neck, bony fingers circling the bulge of your voice. They draw a gulp. But your face looks strained, brows knitted together in something bizarrely tic-like—and it doesn’t go away even when his lips line up with that sensitive slope, licking, kissing, biting their way down to clavicles.
“What’s troubling you?” He whispers, leaning back. Stares at the glistening stripe of his saliva and swallows hard, matching your flush when you turn away to gnaw at your bottom lip. Now both mouths can chew the tension and taste its iron.
“Nothing?” You try to lie, but your delivery is just a tad too quizzical. Like you’re asking him to narrow it down for you, to find the answer on your behalf. Too bad he would never do you such favors.
He fists his hand into your hair, tugging hard. It forces you to look back into his mighty eyes—oh that lovely, oxidised copper—and orders you to speak from the altitude of his posture. You shudder, seeking mercy. He doesn’t have any to give. Not tonight.
“There’s clearly something,” Viktor insists, letting go of your hair. Your scalp tingles with a delicious scorch. “I don’t appreciate the covertness. Especially when you’re hardly able to keep it up. You never play quite as… vehemently unless you’re upset.”
“It’s Agnes,” you crack, looking at the doorway. The maid is not there, but the weight of her gaze haunts you everytime you sneak Viktor inside, even when she’s not there to witness you cling to him. “She, er— My parents are threatening to fire her. She told me she can no longer keep concealing our… secret. ”
“So be it.” Viktor shrugs. “Let her talk. She needs her income. It’s not like they’re not aware of my existence anyway.”
You scoff. “Yes, but it’s not like they’re particularly fond of you, either.”
“Since when does that distress you?” He snaps right back at you, and his loving hands instantly withdraw from their hold of you, clenching into fists instead. “You can’t possibly be taking their input into consideration, can you?”
For a moment, you simply stare at each other, eyes shooting angry stardust. You can feel a dry, nervous cough tickle at your throat, and the blood buzzing in your temples and pressing hard. You have to tell him. Preferably, now.
Because Viktor is oblivious to the ultimatum you were given all those months ago. Here he is, looking down at you full of puzzled devotion, smug, and sweet, and so utterly soft. And he doesn’t know that you are to be married to another man. To one meticulously picked out by your parents through tedious meetings. Oh just how many times have your ears bled during their insipid speeches about how you should stick to someone of your own kind. And just how you despised their demeaning crap about witnessing their noble boy’s downfall.
And the punchline? Well, it is nonexistent. You still haven’t grown a fraction of a backbone. You bend to their will and adhere to self-pity, painfully wary of how to break this circle. It’s just that you let your fear prevail.
And it’s a thing to be ashamed of. Because how dare you hold him close, all intertwined limbs and glassy eyes locking with such yearning—all the while you fail to muster the courage to offer him elopement. Hell, to even tell him the truth. You don’t deserve him—not now, not ever. Cowards are not to form bonds with those who never ask for permission.
So you wet your lips, anxiously staring up. Your hands bonelessly dangle at your sides, as if terrified of reaching for him again. You’re going to tell him. It’s right there, at the tip of your tongue, threatening to leap out your mouth like an insult one doesn’t mean. You just have to do it like he does: be bold, be brave, start talking—
“Of course, Viktor,” you mumble instead, feeling the shame creep down your throat. “I don’t care what they think. I’m sorry.”
His eyes flicker with that familiar, joyful spark of his. Fawning at you so gently that your heart almost bleeds through the fancy shirt, almost crumbling right then and there when he scoots closer again. You simply close your eyes, smiling when his hot breath fondles your face. You’re never going to tell him, are you?
Something inside you dies when he kisses your cheek, lean body tensing atop yours as he commences an embrace that you return with guilty reluctance, hiding your ugly tears against the mess of his hair.
“Good,” Viktor whispers, holding you through your shudder. “Now, could you play me that nocturne I like, please?”
You grip the piano hard enough to leave nail marks on the gorgeous instrument.
armand, his eyes enormous: you MOCK armand? you make fun of his traumas on the stage? oh! oh! suicide for the band! suicide for the band for One Thousand Years!!!!
I have decided to finally grow some balls and start posting short stories about my oc's.
I mainly started doing this to help characterize them consistently as well as practice writing which I need to do if I want to become fantasy kafka.
I also know that this is cringe and badly written.
Enjoy(￣∇￣)
🀦🀤The lords concubine🀢🀣
Sometimes I supined in the dark, my hair tickling my nape while I imagined a thousand versions of the stars raining down. I spent a lot of time just doing that. Waiting for god to return. She's always been busy, being here and there, doing that and what else. I turned in bed. To my side, now laying on my rather bony arm. I flexed my other hand then, seeing the tattoos stretch out over my knuckles in front of me and moving my fingers around, bending them over each other in different angles before letting my pallid hand fall onto her pillow.
Sometimes I disliked not having anything to do, other times I relished it. Tonight I decided, I simply despised it. I was a useless parasite with nothing to do. Waiting for the busy god I call my wife. I turned again. I wanted her here in bed with me, telling me what to do, how to be.
Yet it remained utterly silent. It could take hours, maybe she would not come to bed at all. That rarely happened these days but it happened nonetheless and the possibility of it frightened me deeply night after night.
I fell back into thought to back when the war was still going on. I would lay in bed, in the darkness just as I did now, listening to her and the others discussing things I didn't- don't understand in the next room. She would more often than not, not come to bed at all and if she did her breath would reek of alcohol and smoke.
It was somewhat easier back then. Only because I was able to make them out through the wall. I would concentrate and try to make out her voice among the others. Now I was resting in a grand estate with dozens of ornamented walls that were so very unlike most of the places we had occupied for so long. She always had been deeply troubled by noise. Though the alcohol helped with that back then. Of course I wasn't complaining, I should be glad to live by her side in the first place.
Most of the noble families had gone down in the war, hadn't I striken her fancy by pure luck I would've gone down with them. Nothing more than a fourth child from a minor noble house. It was a fate I often pondered on nights like these where I had nothing better to do. Earlier I was convinced that I'd have ended up dead, my frail body not suitable for any hard labour. Over the long years my outlook changed. I had looked at slavery very naively back in my youth, thinking that only strength or beauty were worth being kept alive for.
One of my rare conversations with him changed that then.
I'm now of the opinion that I would've probably been kept alive for a while simply because I was educated and young. Maybe a house servant, kept away from the hard fieldwork and dressed finely for dinner parties of some other country I would've been sold to for my exoticism.
I wouldn't have lasted long probably, they soon would've realized how incapable I was and the brothels wouldn't have wanted me either due to my unfortunate face, but at least not immediately killed.
I was ripped out of my thoughts of slave politics as I heard the floor boards creak. I felt excitement run through me sharply. i stared at the door and when it finally opened I was nearly shaking from the anticipation of it.
She did not spare me a glance as she strode through the room, taking off her outer coat and waist-belt. Throwing both on the floor for a servant to pick up later. Her casual clothing always had a simple elegance to it. A princes attire changes after he becomes a king, a god can wear what he wants.
Currently she was wearing nothing but her undershirt as she finally graced me with her eyes. Her beautiful, beautiful dark eyes which look almost black in the low light even though they appear so light in the sun and-
She didn't speak as she got into bed with me and I didn't either. She appreciated my quietness im these moments and I would never go against her comfort. Her hand snuck under my nightdress and I felt her long nails across my back, first soft, then harder, harder, harder then drawing blood, then again. Scratching open my scabs from previous nights. I leaned into the crook of her neck as she finally pulled back. My blood seeping through the nightdress into the bedding, certainly not enough for blood loss yet I was feeling dizzy nontheless.
I wasn't able to ponder it much longer as her voice cut through the silence. The first vocal sound in hours-yes it must only have been merely 9 hours yet it felt longer than that, years? decades? No merely 9 hours without her voice. Merely 9 hours without my own. That felt longer as well, but differently, biologically.My throat ached and the sound that answered god was so very quiet and pitiful then as it always was when answering her.
The first shots of Beldaruit in the anime finally gave me the push I needed to write this post about his condition. It's something I'd been putting off for a long time.
(TW: This post contains medical illustrations and X-ray images showing examples of the condition. Nothing too graphic, but anyway.)
Officially, in the manga it hasn't been stated that Beldaruit has a medical condition, or that he was ever paralyzed. But then Chapter 81 gave us this page...
...and everything fell into place!
«My bones have been brittle from the day I was born»
Yes, this is a real medical condition.
Osteogenesis imperfecta (OI), also known as Brittle bone disease, Lobstein syndrome, fragilitas ossium or Vrolik disease.
● ICD-11: LD24.K0 ICD-10: Q78.0
«Osteogenesis imperfecta (OI) literally means “imperfectly formed bones”, and is a rare and complex genetic disorder that is often characterized by bones that break easily. The vast majority of OI is caused by variations (mutations) in genes that affect the structure of type I collagen or genes whose proteins interact directly with type I collagen.»
In other words, a person with this condition is born with bones so fragile that their legs can break under their own body weight, and even lifting an object can result in a broken arm.
This would explain why Beldaruit is confined to the chair and prefers to travel around the Great Hall through smoke illusions. If he tried to stand on his own feet, his legs would most likely break under his own weight.
We only see Beldaruit lying in bed, where he has already developed pressure sores and ulcers. (I absolutely love the level of details in this manga and how seriously Kamome Shirahama approaches depicting different medical conditions.)
Also, notice how gentle all of his movements are. He doesn't even fully close his fingers around the rope, and the way he holds his pen is so delicate:
Symptoms found in various types of OI include:
whites of the eye (sclerae) that are blue instead
short stature
loose joints
hearing loss
breathing problems
problems with the teeth (dentinogenesis imperfecta)
Potentially life-threatening complications, all of which become more common in more severe OI, include: tearing (dissection) of the major arteries, such as the aorta; pulmonary valve insufficiency secondary to distortion of the ribcage;and basilar invagination.
More information
There are several types of osteogenesis imperfecta, ranging from mild to severe. I'll only talk about Type I, because I believe that's the one Beldaruit has. His body shows no obvious skeletal deformities, and he's quite tall, both of which are consistent with the mildest form of the condition.
You can read about the other types here
"Type I OI: people with Type I OI, the mildest and most common form, may have only a handful of fractures or as many as several dozen fractures in a lifetime. They may have few obvious signs of the disorder. In Type I, there usually is little to no bone deformity. Height is less affected than in other types of OI, and many people with Type I are often similar in height to other family members. Muscle weakness, joint laxity, and flat feet are common. Dislocations and sprains may occur, as well as fractures. Life expectancy appears to be average."
Works featuring characters with the same condition:
I do think it's maybe the sweetest thing I've ever seen that Pantalone lets Dottore love him exactly how he naturally loves people. He lets him experiment on him, vivisect him, treat him more like a multi-faceted object than a person at times, but he doesn't let Dottore control him, and Dottore doesn't push to. Want me to stop smoking? Fuck you I paid for these lungs. Wanna use my soul to make your next homunculus? Do you actually think that would feasibly work in practice, dipshit. This is a man who has spent centuries being codependant on Teyvat's worst guy and is completely numb to his shenanigans. And somehow... their dynamic works?
"What's a little discomfort between family" is exactly how he treats Pantalone, just like Columbina said. But unlike Columbina, or literally anyone else on the planet, Pantalone doesn't fear him. He fully accepts that that's just Dottore, and flaw or not he doesn't care to try and change it. And he knows when and where to draw the line between "Dottore being dottore" and "Dottore being a freak", and Dottore respects that, and respects him for doing that.
It's a strangely realistic depiction of love, actually. Love like that isn't all bliss, it's a lot of discomfort, a lot of labor and indulgence of the other person. In some ways, it's like a transaction. Maybe that's how Pantalone thinks of it. Because no matter how much he gives Dottore, he does get it back. He gets back the investments he makes into his research, the experimentation on his own body in the form of bleeding-edge healthcare only he is privy to, the company of a partner who truly and fully understands him. This isn't a kind of love you dream about, but it's a kind of love you very well could have and hold.
To put it simply in the words of Whizzer and Marvin from Falsettos;
1. G-g-guys! I-im not like the other fans I swear 🥺🥺🥺I hate mona and bill so much 🥺🥺🥺🥺🥺🥺🥺the Cory painting is disgusting 🥺🥺🥺i-i only like it because it's a cool concept!!
Oh Mona my beloved skrungly brungly kabungy, please make my crippling depression and stomach cramps go away by raping me, decapitating me and devouring my flesh, possibly not even in that order 🥺
Got reminded again of my old coworker who was a massive misogynist but also trans inclusive. Told me he believed trans women are indeed women because "only women would be stupid enough to want to be women"
He also aggressively corrected himself whenever he accidentally misgendered a trans guy we knew because "there's already more women than men in the world, the more numbers we steal from them, the better." Did that even when the trans guy wasn't around.
I need to point out that he was completely serious btw. This man had no sense of humor if he tried.
He was a cook at the restaurant/bar I was a bartender at, and almost punched a costumer once because he overheard him talking about how women belong in the kitchen. Told me he thought women should stay out of kitchens, that cooking is a man's job and when I asked him what he thinks women should be doing, he went quiet for a moment, then proceeded to explain to me the following
"I trust a bitch to run a kitchen as much as she can run a country, they should do shit like plumbing. Or electricity. Something you can just learn to do and don't need to lead, you know?"
Apparently women are good at "fixing shit". He claimed that he doesn't trust male plumbers or electricians except if they're gay because "something most be wrong with you if you want to go fix other people's houses, that's that maternal instinct"
Love that you guys seem to like the stories about my Guy, here's another. (also for context i need to say that english is not the language he spoke, and when i say 'fag', i'm using it for our version of the slur. Our Guy insisted that that's just how you call gay people in our language (it isn't))
We had an openly gay coworker who looked like it (crop tops, dyed hair, make-up) and he was often harassed by the waiters from the football bar next door. The gay dude had the same name as the Guy, who insisted that we would specify the he isn't gay, so they just became "Name" and "Not Gay Name". He was fine with that.
Oh he also once went on a rant about how he respects our gay coworker more than "those other fags" because "at least he has the balls to look like a fag, yknow? None of that sneaky shit where you can't tell if they're trying to fuck you or your girlfriend." When I then told him I was bi, he looked me over and called me some slurs before telling me that I don't need to rub it in that I can get both. Then he asked me if I think he's hot and when I told him no, he informed me I should stick with women because I clearly have shit taste.
He once accidentally bullied one of our younger waitresses out of an early eating disorder she was developing before working there (she told me about it after)
Boss gave us one meal from the menu a day as a job bonus, and we had this very shy seventeen year old working with us who was already nervous around men, but Our Guy was a 6'3 dude who only stopped yelling and cursing when he was not speaking at all. If he was the one cooking that day, he'd peek out of the kitchen an hour before he'd start closing it up, and would shout at you if you haven't ordered your meal yet because he hated cooking once he already cleaned. The waitress was scared shitless of him, and so whenever he would yell at her to "fucking order already", she'd panic and just pick something.
She didn't eat much but the first time she tried to throw out almost the whole plate, he got so personally insulted that he berated her for not picking something she'd like, and demanded to know what he did wrong. He got really upset about apparently not being able to cook something that this kid would like and I'm pretty sure he started putting in extra effort to make sure she would eat it this time? It lead to him quite literally standing over her like a hawk when she ate to "see her reaction" and demand an immediate review to see what he can improve.
She later told me that it she was so scared and awkward around him back then that it kind of overrode her fear of food, and that she still sometimes pretends she's back there, when she feels a bad episode coming on, so. He did do something good for the world i guess
Our Guy met a nonbinary person once when my friend came to visit me at work. He was just on a smoke break so I had to introduce them and when I said "They're visiting" he got confused and asked us how many people are there (and then threatened murder if they dare order something while he's on a break). I had to explain this man what a nonbinary person is, he thought about it for a second, called the whole thing "fucking stupid, there ain't that shit in nature" and then proceeded to very mockingly refer to them as (our language equivalent of) "your majesty" and use the pronouns you use for people you're supposed to respect (which is genderless and very formal)
My friend thought he was really funny before I explained to them that I'm pretty sure he thought he was being mean (but hey he it wasn't misgendering so yay)
Then (after his break) they ordered a vegan sandwich and we heard him cussing them out about how "they should pick a fucking struggle". Later I asked him about it and got told that "how much shit can you deny yourself? Cheese, gender, the fuck's next?"
I like how his issue isn't with the "that shit ain't in nature" thing he mentioned, but the idea that being nonbinary is some form of self-deprivation and that they deserve a gender like everyone else.
