dear jason

𝗂'𝗆 𝗍𝗈𝗈 𝗒𝗈𝗎𝗇𝗀 𝗍𝗈 𝖻𝖾 𝗍𝗁𝗂𝗌 𝗇𝗈𝗌𝗍𝖺𝗅𝗀𝗂𝖼 | I don't usually update very often |

[mydearjason]

▏　RED HOOD’S ROBIN　𓂋　 ꒰͡ ͜ Ï ͜ ͡꒱͏

00. PROLONGUE next: (PART 1 in progress)

One could expect anything from Jason—anything but the fact that he’d end up with a ‘Robin’ of his own.

The Scarecrow was one of the people you feared the most ever since your mother decided to move to Gotham City—a bad idea, clearly, and one she never explained to you, why she chose such a dangerous place. Every time the news showed what became of his victims, thanks to his fear gas, your fragile body would tremble against your mother’s worried embrace.

A current of panic flooded through you every time she left the house for work, especially after you saw the last incident on the news—the one that claimed several lives in the streets of the Upper East Side, where you lived with her in a cheap apartment in the red zone.

Maybe that’s why you were so sensitive to every detail in your surroundings: the creak of the floorboards, the whispers of the wind slipping through the window, the distant wail of sirens.

And then came that night, when everything changed: the cold became unbearable, and your bones seemed to crack under a shiver that not even the heater could drive away.

You opened your eyes slowly, trying to adjust to the glow of the television in front of you.

The voices coming from the news channel reached your ears as muffled echoes, sounds you didn’t really pay attention to. You had fallen asleep on the uncomfortable couch in the living room after your mother left for work when the clock struck 7 p.m.

You still felt drowsy, your body numb, your thoughts foggy and unclear. After a deep yawn and a stretch that only made the ache of sleeping in a bad position worse, your body froze.

Your stomach tickled—not like the swing-set tickle in your belly, but that unsettling sensation that spread more and more through your body.

You were so cold, and you couldn’t move, couldn’t react; slouched on the couch, your fingers turning white from clutching the frayed edges of the old fabric.

You knew that feeling well. Your mother had called it intuition—that uneasiness blooming out of nowhere in your chest, convincing you something was about to happen.

And you desperately hoped it wasn’t something bad.

But the only thought crashing through your mind was your mother’s face—the fresh memory of her earlier, grabbing her bag, turning back to smile softly at you as her lips murmured warm words of goodbye. Words you never imagined would be the last.

“I want my mom… where is she?” you thought in alarm. You stood up quickly, glancing around the living room until your eyes landed on the window. Gotham’s starless sky was lit up by a symbol—the Bat-Signal.

But that was normal, wasn’t it? Batman was out almost every night, punishing bad men. You couldn’t think of a reason why they would have to light that signal.

You prayed it wasn’t for something bad.

But everything would be fine. Because Batman and Robin were out there. Maybe.

The door rattled under insistent knocks.

You opened it with cold hands, barely reaching the doorknob. Two police officers stood there, and behind them, Commissioner Gordon lowered his gaze to meet your height. They asked for an adult, another presence in your home—one that was never there.

Sometimes you still remember that night, embodying the pain as if it were the first time. As if your emotions had memories that echoed through your body, wounding you as if you were reliving it all over again, dragging you into that dark, depressive pit that changed your world forever, that snuffed out the innocence in your eyes and made you see the world differently.

The pounding of the officers’ fists still echoed in your chest, and when they asked for an adult, all you could do was stammer your mother’s name. Gordon looked at you, and in his eyes you discovered what you never wanted to see: pity.

From then on, you lived surrounded by invisible whispers. Your mother, once your shelter, became a prisoner of her own mind. Panic attacks, screams in the middle of the night, terrors you couldn’t see but could feel every time she squeezed your hand until your fingers went numb.

Your fear was never your own. She passed it on to you, with every story she told about that man, about the monster in the burlap sack who seemed to be everywhere. You grew up convinced Jonathan Crane didn’t need to touch you to destroy you—he only needed to break the person you loved most.

And that was enough to ruin your life.

To shatter your illusion. Because Batman, nor Robin, not even Nightwing, were there to save your mother.

And that bitter resentment only grew stronger as your thoughts hardened, shaped by the forced maturity you had to carry—at only eleven years old. Because there were no sane adults left in that house, and the cracks in the walls and spreading stains of mold were the clearest sign: as the mildew grew, your mother’s mind decayed alongside it.

And though your body still trembles when you think of him, you know this: you survived.

Your mother survived, though broken. And you survived, though scarred. And that scar became a silent promise: someday you will stop being afraid. Someday you won’t be the frightened child—you’ll be the voice that stands up for those still trembling.

Because survivors don’t forget. And you are one of them.

Though no matter how strong you try to appear, you were weak, fragile, sensitive—and could probably collapse under something as simple as a strong wind.

Jason Todd knew what it felt like to be unprotected, even when there was supposed to be someone there to shield you from danger, to wrap you in their arms against all harm.

And you were just a stray dog like him, searching for the warmth you had lost at home—throwing punches with bloody, scraped knuckles as you tried to find it again.

A stray dog who found warmth in the first person who offered even the smallest piece of trust.

Him.

Jason felt his chest tighten, silent vines growing inside him until his breath grew short. It was that feeling of pain again, the echo of the past crashing into him without warning.

It was your face.

Your bruised cheeks, dust smeared as if you’d been dragged across the ground while fists rained down on you.

Maybe that was the clearest sign—your nose dripping crimson, sticky against your skin, staining your lips.

It was your eyes that haunted him the most. They didn’t shine, they were empty, hollow wells that even the lights of Gotham’s docks couldn’t bring back to life.

But there was something else there too. Rage. Something dark that made them burn. The same look he’d carried in his own eyes after crawling out of that green pit, staring at his reflection and realizing he was no longer the same.

There were a hundred different ways he could have crossed paths with you. But this one? It was cruelly ironic. Like karma clawing its way back to him, forcing him to face the echoes of his past. Both of you stood frozen, the sound of waves crashing somewhere behind, when he caught you in the act—halfway through removing the wheel from his motorcycle.

A thick metal bar dangled from your hand, gripped so tightly it looked ready to strike at the smallest twitch from him. And those eyes—those owl-like, chilling eyes—never left his, staring straight through him without a hint of fear.

It was like you weren’t even breathing. Your body rigid, fists clenched tighter and tighter until your knuckles cracked. The way you stared him down was unnerving, your pupils blown wide, your gaze sharpening.

Jason knew, deep down, that if Damian or Tim ever found out he’d been frozen in place—paralyzed—by some random girl, they’d laugh until their ribs hurt.

And in his mind’s eye, he could already see Bruce’s look—the one that told him they both knew exactly what this reminded him of.

He could almost hear Dick’s laugh too, amused that even a kid could stare down the Red Hood without flinching. But then, inevitably, that laugh would fade. His features would soften, and the weight of it would sink in—the ache of realizing just how lost a child had to be to end up stealing like this.

You didn’t just see his face when he pulled off the metal mask with an irritated sigh—you stole the damn wheels off his motorcycle too.

He hated how hard it was to swallow the truth staring back at him. His reflection. Another kid broken by Gotham’s streets.

“I’m not… I’m not gonna hurt you,” he muttered, careful not to startle you further. “I promise.”

Your eyes narrowed, flickering with confusion, maybe even fear, but it was gone in an instant. They only hardened. You said nothing. You couldn’t.

Because you knew your voice would betray you. That high, childish pitch would shatter the fragile armor you’d built.

You flinched back when he took a step forward, like a startled deer, glass bottles and pipes clattering behind you as you scrambled away too quickly.

And something inside Jason cracked.

Instead of chasing that feeling, instead of holding your gaze so you could see the concern he was trying to bury, he simply fixed the wheel back onto his bike.

He revved the engine, ready to ride away and leave the chill of old wounds behind. He wanted to say something, anything—

But before the words could form, you bolted. Gone in the blink of an eye, running despite the scrapes on your legs, vanishing into the maze of shipping containers.

Leaving behind the metal bar.

Leaving behind Red Hood himself.

You knew it was his bike—his logo was painted on it clear as day. But your impulses always won. The gnawing ache in your stomach always won. Hunger always won.

[mariposium]

➶ : THE LOST PRINCE — jacaerys velaryon

summary — while combing the beach for treasures, you stumble upon the unconscious, grievously injured body of a soldier. you decide to help him, but in doing so find love in a man that may never be able to return it. (11.4k)

featured — jacaerys velaryon / fem!reader

content — spoilers! tread carefully, fluff and ANGST, angst w/ a happy ending, hurt/comfort, canon divergent, jace lives, light medical descriptions, reader cares a lot for jace, dual pov!!!, inexplicit mental health struggles (reader’s deceased father), dead vermax ☹, 18+ MDNI implied sexual content/fade-to-black, tw there is a baby

a/n — am i anywhere near caught up with hotd? no. did i write this in spite of that? yes. i'm sorry if things don't make sense or are not in line with canon. the wiki and i did our best!

(cross-posted on ao3)

The cerulean waves lap at the silver beach, ebbing and flowing with the morrow’s breeze. Quiet has finally settled on the shores after a night of war and destruction. A battle beyond these argent sands occurred out in the gullet. All night, the savagery had kept you awake. This morrow, you collect treasures from your fish nets.

You step carefully across the sands, adjusting your silk scarf tighter around your mouth and nose. You bend the knee at the first net.

You heave it onto the shore. Nothing except too-small pieces of fabric and inedible shelled fish are in this one. You empty it and release the fish back to the embrace of the sea.

You stand again, taking a few more steps down. Your mind drifts as you fall into a rhythm of checking these nets, pocketing pretty shells and scraps of metal. Wonder pricks at the back of your neck as you imagine the war. As the lone tenant of this pier, you had never had to consider the rites of the Targaryen rulers. Most of your neighbors had already chosen their sides, even if it did not really matter in the scheme of things—neither of those fighting for the throne cared for their subjects, especially not those at the bottom, like you.

Rulers like these bled the common man dry while claiming it to be an act of love.

You move a little rougher with the next net. Nothing but rocks and debris in this one. You imagine it will be a while until you find a worthy treat. The Gods are usually not as generous on solemn days like these. War makes monsters out of men, and the Gods scorn those who partake.

When you stand again, your eyes drift a little further down the bank. At the edge of the shore, a clump of trees catch your gaze. The water is darker there, cloaked in shadow. The shrubbery bends so far, it almost touches the water. You draw closer, eyebrows furrowed.

A dark lump sits entangled by brush, barely concealed by the cluster of foliage. You draw closer, hesitantly. As your eyes adjust, you realize it is not a lump of debris, but a body. Your breaths quicken.

If the person is alive, would it hurt you? Never trust a soldier, your father had once told you.

You bend your knee just as if you are checking a fish net. Your hands unfurl from your sides, reaching out hesitantly. You can only see his body. It is clothed in thick leather, a quality of which you’ve never seen before. Several arrows stick out of his torso. A pool of blood stains the sand maroon beneath him.

You pull back the shrubbery to see his face. You startle at the sight, falling back onto your bum.

His eyes—they were open—albeit, he did not seem to see much of anything. His skin was not grey and placid like the bodies that you had seen before. Worse, you’d heard something when you held yourself over him. A breath, shuddering through his parted lips.

“Alive,” you whisper in awe. To survive so many arrows, then the tumultuous sea… it would take more than just courage. It would take something otherworldly. You know then that your decision has been made.

A huge piece of driftwood sits beneath him in the sand. You push it aside to straddle him. Gently, you grab his arm and sling it around your neck.

The rest of your journey back to the cabin passes in a frenzied blur. You move quickly, trying to spend as little time as possible forcing the grievously hurt man onto his feet. He lets out little grumbles as you move, head lolling this way and that like a puppet cut from its strings. You make it inside and push open the door that your father used to live, laying him onto his back on the bed.

Blood immediately infiltrates the off-white of the duvet, crimson floating before your vision. He groans continuously as you break the ends off of the arrows—serving as a reminder to the heart that still valiantly pumped beneath his ribs. Once they are off, you are able to slide the armor off. 

The tunic comes easily. It seems to be made of a material that deflects water, so when you drop it onto the floor, a puddle of liquid forms in its spot. You struggle a little with his breeches—though, those too come easily with a little pull.

After he is naked, you stare at his body in silence for a moment. You have helped men with injuries before. Arrow injuries just like these, even. But you’d never helped a man with this many. 

You reach out to touch his cold cheek. He is so young—had to be your own age. Too young for the cruel, unflinching hold of war. Gently, you close his eyelids, shutting away the dark brown of his unseeing gaze. He did not need to be witness to this.

You steel your nerves and clench your fists a few times to breathe life back into your numb fingers. Reaching into the bedside table, you grab your supplies—bandages, a bottle of rum, a couple cloths, and several blunt blades.

“I’m sorry, if you are awake,” you tell him, poising the knife along the edge of one of the arrow heads. “This will hurt a lot.”

Hours pass quickly under your blade. Each of the five arrows is cut away, sewn with fishing line, disinfected with rum, and bandaged tightly. Sweat falls into your eyes as you step away triumphantly, and you lift a hand to brush it off. As they are levelled with your eyes, you realize your hands are a bloody mess. Your stomach churns and you force the appendages away.

You hover over him a moment longer. You study the shallow rise and fall of his chest, the fluttering of his eyelids. He had a strong nose and jaw, thick dark eyelashes and a head of water-matted brunet hair. By all appearances, he was quite common-looking. He had the complexion and hair of any man you’d pass on the way to town. But something about him—the quality of his armor, the blemishlessness of his skin, it screamed something ethereal.

But even Gods can be killed. 

Your mystery man is not out of the woods yet. The chances of any of those arrows not nicking anything inside him is next to none. He’s also lost a lot of blood. The sheets are covered in it, not to mention the amount he was sure to have lost at sea.

You draw the hair sea-slicked to his head away from his forehead. Your hand slides to cup his cheek. He might never wake again. Your kind hand may be the last he knows. You wonder how many people missed him—if they were sitting with baited breaths, waiting for him to write. If only you could ease their worries.

You pull away and leave the room before your eyes can fill with traitorous saltwater tears.

There are few certainties in life. Ever since you were but a child, you had recognized this. Life is tumultuous and unfair. It takes and it takes, until you can give no longer. 

The sea is a comfort. She does not take, she gives. Usually, she gives you more valuable things than a body, but you try not to question her motives.

It’s been a day since you patched him and he still has not woken. His chest continues to move despite this disconcerting sign, and that remains your only comfort. You stood near-vigil at his beside for most of the hours following. Anticipatory nerves fill your every waking second, even at night when you lay awake trying to sleep.

You recognize that the danger has not fully passed for him. He had not had water in who knows how long. Eventually, his organs would fail due to dehydration and blood loss. That is, if the internal bleeding didn’t kill him first.

You also cannot help the hope that blooms in your chest as you gaze upon his face. Perhaps it is the fact that his skin seems more alive as of late. The fact that you have seen his eyes move behind his eyelids more and more often. The fact that you were quite insufferably lonely, and therefore latched onto any individual who came your way—alive or barely, as in the case of this man in your cabin.

You want him to survive because you want to know him. It is a thought that scares you as much as it invigorates you.

By his bedside, after a long morrow of scavenging by the tide, you dump your satchel of goodies on the now-clean duvet. (Now that had been annoying to do—having to move his admittedly quite heavy body over to remove the sheets). You begin to sort through them, cataloging them.

The silence is unsettling, so you begin to speak.

“The sea has been kind this morrow,” you say softly. You pick up a smooth rainbow shell, twisting it this way and that in the light. “These will sell for a couple of silvers.”

You put the shell down and then grab your cloth, gently stroking away sand and debris.

“My father taught me to do this,” you tell the man, “he taught me everything I know.”

Satisfied with its shimmer, you trade the shell for a clam. You pop it open forcefully—apologizing profusely to the creature as you did—and stick your fingers into the dark crevice you created.

“No pearl,” you report when your fingers come up empty. You bring the clam up to your eyes, stroking its now-broken shell. “I’m sorry, friend.”

The last piece had been one you were excited for. You grab the shrapnel of metal gently in your palms, categorizing the weight and feel of it with your hands. 

“Probably off a shield,” you decide. “I’m sure a blacksmith would like this.”

You put the metal down and let out a heavy sigh. You stare at the man, worrying your lip between your teeth. Perhaps some foolish part of you had hoped he would wake up to the sound of your voice, like the stories you had read as a girl.

But life is no story, as you had to continually remind yourself. Things like that just didn’t happen.

You go through a few other bits and bobs in silence, mood dampened by reality. A couple of small shells, a nail, and a scrap of maroon fabric. You aren’t sure why you grabbed the fabric—perhaps you’d wanted to try and sew something. It is quite pretty, you decide. It had belonged to someone once.

Once you finish polishing the items, you lift your head up to look at the man. Thoughts and images flash through your mind. What was he like? You wonder. He seems strong, based on his broad shoulders and defined stomach. But he also didn’t have the worn skin of a common man. He didn’t have callouses on his hands or fading scars upon his torso. He had to be a prince, you decide. A prince of a faraway land, hoping to bargain peace between the two feuding Targaryen houses.

You nod, satisfied with that recreation of events. Yes, a prince. A just, altruistic one. Perhaps he knew of the war and wished to come and save the small-folk.

You look down at his pale hand resting lifelessly upon the duvet. You swallow thickly. 

“You must wake soon,” you whisper, “the kingdom needs you.”

He does not stir. You sigh and gather your things into your satchel. If he is still not awake by the morrow, you decide, you will return his body to the sea.

That evening, you sit at the table with a plate of roasted fish and a glass of water. The fish is one of two meals you eat regularly. The other was for special occasions, depending on if you were able to procure bread and potatoes at the markets. 

You always eat the eye of the fish first. You do not like it looking at you as you eat its flesh. It feels wrong. The eye is not very tasty, though. The odd texture always makes you vaguely nauseous–the gooey, chewy ball. Your father had always laughed at you when you ate fish. He was not of an imaginative mind. He did not see the fish as being once alive, like you did. He did not imagine it swimming beneath the tide, with all its other fishy friends–before it was snared by ruthless hands and suffocated by the open air.

You stare at the vacant chair across from you with an empty feeling in your chest. It had been so long since you had a companion at supper time. Your father had not spoken much, but his presence alone was always enough to keep you happy. He is gone now, like with the ebbing of the tide, and all that is left is the shadow of the person he used to be.

His fishing pole, next to the door. His journal, where he kept extensive notes about what he found out on the sea during the day. His bed that now had a new, warm body sleeping in it.

You wonder what your father would have done, had he found the man. You take another bite of the fish, forcing it down with a thick swallow. Would he have left him? You had never thought of him as being cruel, but you also know he loathed unwelcome responsibility. He had enough of an imagination to conjure horrible images of betrayal and hurt, and so you decide he probably wouldn’t have brought him home to you. He had too much to lose to do so. Everyone did.

And so why did you? Perhaps, you think, you have lost everything that matters most to you already.

You stare down at the limp skeleton of the fish on your plate. You had never seen a person die of dehydration. Your father had once told you a story about a man he knew that had, and it sounded awful. 

You pick up your dinner knife, a sharp, clean-edged blade, and hold it in the candlelight. The silver edge catches the light, highlighting the sharp point. Your hand trembles as you study it.

Would it be quick, painless—slitting the sleeping prince’s throat? Or would it be messy and painful? Would it draw him out of sleep and would he gaze upon you with hurting eyes as he clutched the gaping hole in his neck?

Regret gnaws at you. As time draws on, you begin to think that the mercy you had granted your prince had been nothing but a farce. That by saving him for one moment had only just prolonged his suffering.

You put the knife in your satchel and stand. It is cruel, keeping a person alive only to die in a violent manner like this–it is inhumane. 

You take quick steps to the bedroom. 

You have never killed a person before. Your father had plenty. He always said the eyes, you can hear his voice in your mind now, the eyes are always the worst part. 

You can’t eat the prince’s eyes like you can the fish’s. No matter what you did, you would have to see those eyes. And with it, the betrayal. You stand over his prone body now. 

A sliver of moonlight streams in from the open window behind you, casting cool light across the heaving chest. He remains impassive, completely unaware of what you were about to do. You do not realize you are crying until you bring the knife up to your eyes and catch a glimpse of your face in the silver.

“I…I am sorry, friend,” you repeat the same mantra you had told so many clams before as you pried your fingers in their mouths, looking for a pearl. “But this is a mercy.”

Your hands tremble like windblown seagrass as you lift the knife against his skin. A moment of hesitation prevents you from acting. And it is just enough for a pale hand to wrap around your own and for dark eyes to snap open.

“Waaa-ter.”

You let out a sharp gasp and yank your hand away. The man watches you, his visage crumpled with pain.

He repeats himself, voice quieter than the first time. “Water, please…”

You move into action. You dart out of the room, hands fumbling with the metal bucket by your door. You run across the moonlit shore to the well that sits on the edge of the woods. Quickly, you fill the bucket. You curse yourself all the while–mind racing in what-ifs and guilt-ridden condemnations. 

You heave the bucket back into the house and grab the same goblet you had used with your own water. You take a huge scoop and shuffle back into the bedroom like a child caught with their hand on the sweets plate.

The man is still awake when you re-enter, his eyes wide and eyebrows furrowed. You drop next to him on the bed and angle his head and neck up onto the pillows behind him. Finally, you fulfill his request. He drinks like a man in Essos who has wandered the Red Waste for weeks; heavy, desperate gulps of the liquid. Some fall and drip down his side, which you dab away with a nearby cloth.

When he finally drinks it all, he pulls back, his breaths labored and eyes half-lidded.

“W…Where am I?” he finally says once he has caught his breath. You notice him scanning the room as if trying to find the answer written in the stone.

You decide not to answer honestly. You fear what his reaction will be if he forces himself to recall the battle. Instead you say, “you are safe.”

He stares at you as if only just noticing you. His dark eyes are swallowed almost completely by night, exhausted and ridden with heavy bags. He lifts a hand, as if to touch you, but it falls short. His eyes flutter, and then shut.

He falls unconscious. You touch two hands to his chest to confirm his heart still beats steadily. You let out a breath you had not realized you captured when you find his pulse.

Shame hits you like a tidal wave. You were going to… you were going to kill him. You are shocked at the tears that swim in your eyes. You stand in a hurry–not without remembering to pull the duvet back up to his chest–and stumble out of the room. 

The adrenaline has all but worn away now. Tears clog your eyes, slipping down your cheeks. You allow yourself to feel the emotions–all of them. Relief, shame, exhaustion, and fear overwhelm you completely and you can do nothing but sob. On the table in front of you, the skeleton of the fish and the silver knife mock you without having to say a word.

Waking feels like drowning. Fighting against the wave ahead of you, trying to get your head above water. Then when you finally surface, you fall behind the waves again.

Jacaerys wakes to the sun in his eyes and a warmth around his waist. He thinks for a moment, perhaps, he is in a dream. Another barrier between him and wakefulness. Then, the pain hits him. No, dreams don’t feel like this.

The groan stumbles past his lips before he can stop it and his eyes shoot open. Everything is pain. It surrounds him like dragonfire and steals his breath. He trembles as he uses all his strength to cradle his side.

“Gods,” he murmurs. He feels beneath his fingers the familiar texture of a bandage. Someone helped him.

Helped him. Helped him from what? He gasps as memory rolls over him. Drowning. Arrows piercing through skin and muscle. A dragon’s roar of pain. No, not just any dragon—

“Vermax,” he cries out, tears springing to his eyes. No, no, no…

But it was true. His mind had never failed him before. His dragon. His beautiful dragon. Falling to the bottom of the ocean like a ship’s anchor. He tries to move, to jump to his feet, but he can’t. Pain ricochets up his side, and he can literally feel the side of his chest pulling taut. 

He stares at the ceiling above him with tears fogging his eyes and coating his tongue in salt. For one long moment, he despairs. Why? Why would he be punished this way? Forced to live without Vermax? The bond between rider and dragon could not—should not be severed. Not by something as futile as war. He can’t breathe, can’t think. Everything is despair.

He should have died. Living is not a gift in this condition. His knuckles go white against the duvet. Anger sweeps over him—hot, potent fury.

He curses everyone who caused this. Aemond, Alicent, Aegon, even fucking Helaena. He doesn’t care. They’ll all pay.

But not like this. He finally shuffles himself into a seated position, cringing at the pain that shoots from every direction. Every small movement feels like another arrow tearing his skin. 

His feet are unsteady as he finds his footing. For a second, he fears he might not be able to even walk. Then, he finds himself. He grabs his breeches off the table and slowly, painfully, shrugs them on. He leaves his chest bare—unable to even think about having to lift his arms over his head. He keeps one hand on the wall and the other around his waist as he stumbles across the room. 

The place he is in is frighteningly humble. There’s nothing unnecessary here. Everything has a purpose, a function. No gilded armoires, tall candlesticks, or commissioned portraits. Bare, cobblestone walls, sparse furniture (all glaringly handmade and rustic), and cobwebs hanging in every corner. 

Jacaerys moves slowly from the room he started in to the short hallway that opens into a tiny living area. A large fireplace is the only comfort to him. A pot of a molten, unappetizing glob bubbles above the waning fire. 

There are very few personal effects here. Nothing to propose any kind of hint or insight. Out the window of the front of the ramshackle building, he sees amber light flickering across a wide sea.

His breath shudders out of his lips. He doesn't recognize this place at all. He’s hurt. He has no dragon. He’s never felt worse in his entire life.

All of what energy he summoned flees him in that moment. He practically collapses into a nearby chair and it creaks pathetically under his weight. He hangs his head and a soft sob escapes his lips. 

Tears tremble down his cheeks and onto the wood table beneath his hand. His mind races, memory and pain and fury collide in a war of its very own. Vermax, his mind strays. The perfect dragon. Gone. He digs his nails into the grain of the table beneath his hands, trying to recapture something to ground him. Short, hyperventilating breaths escape his lips—his vision fogs.

Then, everything clears. His hands unclench and he leans back in the chair. He stares at the ceiling, measuring his breaths. You are still alive, he tells himself. Therefore you are still useful.

Because perhaps that was his real fear. That he would no longer be of use—that he would no longer be worth fighting for. He’d always measured his worth in terms of what he could provide to his mother. Perhaps the truth is that his worth stretches beyond that.

He hears the sound of crunching footsteps outside. He sits up in the chair, eyes flickering toward the door. Ahead of him, he notices with a jolt, a knife lay discarded on the table. He grabs it before he can think the better of it, brandishing it like he actually could fight his way out of this mess.

He ignores the pain throbbing in his side and pushes himself to stand again. He won’t die now. He can’t.

The door creaks open slowly, and he angles the knife in front of himself protectively. 

But the figure that crosses the threshold isn’t what he’d been expecting. Wide eyes and a mouth fallen open into an oval. Hands clutching a satchel of… is that a seashell? 

She drops the satchel with immediacy, hands flying into the air. Jacaerys thinks he hears something break inside.

He keeps the arm holding the knife up despite the involuntary tremble that has begun in his arm. A cool sweat travels down his temple. His vision wanes. Despite her… figure (she hadn’t brandished a weapon a day in her life, he thinks), he knows looks can be deceiving. 

“You’re up.” She does not immediately acknowledge the weapon in his hand. She’s either brave or simply ignorant. Jace is not sure what he’s more afraid of.

“Who—“ he starts to speak, but he breaks into a coughing fit. His throat feels like it is on fire. She takes a step forward, as if to help or harm him, but he freezes her in place when he turns his gaze back onto her warningly. “Who are you?”

She tells him her name. Then she quickly adds, “you washed up on the beach in front of my cabin. I found you.”

He bends over to clutch his side. He notices her eyes widen.

“Please, I’m not sure you should be up. You sustained massive injuries,” she tells him. “Your body needs rest.”

“I cannot—“ he scoffs, then coughs again. “I cannot simply rest. I must leave. I must…” 

A pang in his side makes him gasp and hunch over. The knife falls with a clatter against the floor but he can’t seem to bring himself to retrieve it. Everything feels like it is in slow motion, out of his reach and control.

She grabs him around the waist before he tips over. He stays conscious long enough for her to lead him back to bed, but he falls within the waves again the second his head hits the pillow.

Consciousness returns to him in fragments. The sound of footsteps by his head. A burning pain spreading up his chest, to which he thinks he shouts, but cannot prevent. The feeling of a wet cloth soaking his tears and sweat. 

When his eyes finally flutter open, it is dark in the room. A candle burns to a nub on the nightstand next to him, wax coating the wood. Sorrow fills his chest again so quickly it nearly steals his breath.

He sees her slip into the room like a wraith come to haunt him. It is ridiculous, he thinks, that she should be the one to stand over him. On any other day, in any other circumstance, she would not put up much of a fight. Now, he is at her mercy.

“You tore one of your stitches.” Her voice is soft, but it reverberates in his ear drums and skull like a dragon’s final roar. He clenches his jaw and turns his head toward the moon that hangs like a silver noose in the sky. “I had to sew it back while you were resting.”

Jace doesn’t reply. He isn’t sure he would know what to say. How does he encompass all his feelings—or even one of them, into a coherent thought? It isn’t possible.

She draws closer and he tenses. She notices. “Are you going to try and hurt me again?” 

He considers her for a moment, then shakes his head.

She pauses, thinking about something, then she settles upon his side of the bed. Jace notices for the first time since she’s entered the room, that she has a bowl of that wretched-looking soup in her hands.

“Here,” she says, outstretching the bowl. He leans back. She pulls away slightly. “Sorry.” She cringes like even she realizes that the soup is nothing to write home about. “It is all I have.”

Jace swallows thickly. He reaches a trembling hand out. She smiles, relieved.

He goes to take the bowl, but his arm feels weak. He pulls back. “Perhaps…” he pauses, clears his throat. “Perhaps you could…”

Asking for help has never come easy to him. Being weak is not something he is accustomed to. His other hand clenches the sheet in his fist.

She nods. He does not have to be explicit. He untenses his hand as she leans forward, a small bit of soup in the wood spoon.

The first bite makes his face twist. She laughs.

“I truly am sorry,” she says. “I know it is probably not what you are used to.”

It takes every bit of his strength to swallow the offending liquid. It is strangely salty. It tastes like the brine that filled his mouth when he— 

He cuts the thought short. No need to ruin his own mood again.

“Something happened to you out there,” she says as if she’d read his mind, and although it should be a question, it is not, “something bad.”

He swallows another gulp of the soup. He does not reply. 

She must realize he does not want to speak on that, for she does not press the matter. She lifts the spoon again and he forces down another sip.

“The soup has fish and some potatoes—oh, and they had carrots at the market today, so I put those in too. Perhaps those are the disgusting parts. I won’t purchase them again.”

Jace does not have the energy, or perhaps the heart, to tell her it is certainly not the vegetables that have made the soup taste like what sea captains scrape off the bottom of their ships.

She scoops another bit of soup and he forces it down. His mouth had begun to retain that saltiness even when he no longer had the soup in his mouth, like a stain one can’t wash away with soap and water.

She does not speak for a long pause, but Jace suddenly feels a bit antsy. It feels too intimate an act to not be speaking.

He swallows another mouthful, then clears his throat to speak. “Did you catch the fish?” he asks, his voice hoarse.

“Oh, no, no,” she replies to him like it is a preposterous suggestion. Like killing fish is below her standards. “I just buy them.”

He frowns around the spoon in his mouth and hurriedly swallows the liquid. “Then why were you on the shore when you found me?”

She stirs the foul soup around for a moment, thinking hard about something, then she looks up at him. “I collect things. Shells, scrap metal, and fabrics. You would be surprised what comes with the morning tide, and even more what people would pay for them.”

An odd business, Jace can’t help but think. It seems like a hard thing to have to rely solely on the Narrow Sea for food and shelter. The Narrow Sea, he remembers with a sudden clarity. That is near where they fought.

“Are you going to tell your name?” Her head is tilted as she asks this, the soup bowl now empty and forgotten upon her folded legs.

He ponders the question for a moment. He could tell her his full name, but it might backfire, especially if she harbors a grudge against his family. He doesn’t think she has it in her to cause him harm, but he knows that many do not until they are cornered.

“Jace,” he finally tells her. “Just Jace.”

She smiles and her entire face lights up like nothing he’s ever seen before. Something twists in his stomach. “Nice to meet you, Jace.”

One, two, three, four. You count the shells noiselessly as you thread them onto the fishing line. They clink together softly as you pull the line taut around your wrist, measuring the width mentally. You remove the bracelet and add a few more of your little shells.

A few days had passed without much event. Jace drifted in and out of consciousness throughout the day and slept soundlessly through the night. He did not complain, but you had seen his thinly-veiled winces and his shuddering breaths. You know that he is suffering more than he lets on. 

It is an odd thing, you think, to be harboring a man in your home that you know next to nothing about, but had inexplicably formed an attachment to. You still know nothing more about Jace than his name and even that had not been an answer easily wrought.

You slide the shells all to one side and swiftly tie a knot at the end of the line, forming a perfect circular bracelet. Putting it to the side, you cut a new piece of fishing line and begin sorting through your shells again.

Just as you go to slide the first shell on, you hear something behind you. The creaking of wood as light footfalls go across.

You turn your head, body tense.

“Jace,” you say, surprised by his appearance. You stand.

He had not been up since he’d ripped that stitch a few days ago, actually heeding your pleas to rest. But a part of you knew even then that the peace would not last long. He is a restless creature, like a bird stuck behind the bars of a cage.

“Do you need something?” You clutch your fingers together across your front, as if doing so could somehow steel your nerves.

He takes a step into the room. You notice his gait seems more steady today. He looks around every bit of the room, his eyes taking in all the pieces that make up your home. You gnaw your lip between your teeth. Did he approve of what he saw?

His voice comes suddenly, a blade cutting through the silence. “What are you doing?” 

It is not accusatory nor standoffish, instead it seems almost curious. You grab the bracelet you just finished and hold it out to him.

“A bracelet.”

Jace steps closer, tilting his head. “For what purpose?”

You let out a short laugh. “It has no purpose. It is just pretty.”

“Hm.” He stares at the offending object like he’s never thought about making something just for the sake of making something before. You smile. He averts his eyes to the other side of the room.

“You said you do not fish,” he says, “and yet you have a fishing rod.”

You follow his eyes to where the thing sits near the door. It sits, forgotten, in the corner of the room—there to haunt you and the person you’d never become, you’re sure.

“My father…” you start to say, but something gets caught in your throat. You forcefully swallow past the blockage. “My father used to fish.”

Jace’s accusatory eyes soften around the edges. He hobbles closer and takes the seat across from you at the table. Your father’s seat.

“And your father—“

“He is dead,” you answer curtly, “he has been for two summers now.”

You pick up the bracelet you had only just starteda nd slide a seashell onto the line. Hurt does not fill your chest like a cavity anymore—now all you feel is numbness as it spreads from your lungs to your heart. 

Jace turns his head to look out the window at the night sky. “My father is gone too.”

Your eyes leap toward his in a flash. He does not look at you, his hand tracing repetitive shapes on the table. The deep circles beneath his eyes have all but faded now, but the weariness to his expression remains. He possesses the gaze of someone who holds more than they can carry–a gaze your father shared.

Your throat bobs as you force yourself to swallow. You feel hollow, but a bit of warmth has reentered your chest. Two children, you think, without a parent—an awful thing, certainly, but not especially rare in Westeros.

You slide another shell onto the bracelet, fingers trembling. “He went mad.” Telling the truth, those three words, stings like betrayal. “He was a knight before I was born. He never… he never forgot what he had to do. The faces of the men he killed… they haunted him.”

Jace goes pale. His dark eyebrows furrow, the line of his mouth pulling down. “I-I’m sorry. That must have been difficult.”

You nod. Put another two shells on the line. Desperately, you search for a way to change the subject. “He always wanted to teach me,” you say, gesturing to the rod, “but he never did.”

He drags a quick hand through his curly brown hair, then pauses as he gets caught in a tangle. He huffs irritably.

“Perhaps,” he says, onyx eyes catching the amber light of the candle flickering on the table, “if I could summon the strength to get dressed and brush my hair, then I could show you how.”

You swallow thickly. “You do not have to—“

“It is the least I can do,” he murmurs. “You saved my life.”

To smile feels inappropriate, so you avert your eyes and begin to tie a knot in another bracelet.

Jace stares at himself in the mirror that stands in the corner of the bedroom with solemn eyes. His eyes glaze over the bandages that wrap around his chest and lower torso, then the unfamiliar slightness to his shoulders and waist. He feels as though he looks at a person he no longer recognizes, like his mind has been transported into the body of someone much weaker than he used to be.

The old house is quiet in the morrow. Every once in a while, a soft breeze will make the house creak. One may occasionally hear a sea bird calling in the distance. Other than that, everything exists as if completely removed from reality; untouched by the war that rages just beyond the sea’s reaches.

His eyes flick back to the mirror and he sees her standing behind him with a deep green doublet wrapped in her arms. 

“It was my father’s,” she says, drawing closer. “It might be a little large on you.”

Jace nods. She hands him the doublet. The material feels like cheap linen, nothing to the quality he had worn before. He does not mind. It would be odd, he thinks, for him to expect anything better.

He lifts the top over his head and she helps guide it over. She seems to be trying not to touch his skin, like she thought he might be made of glass. He clenches his jaw when he feels the familiar tightness in one of his wounds as his arms stretch over his head.

The doublet falls over his body easily, but it does hang on him a bit like the robes a septa might wear.

He hears the sound of muffled laughter from behind him and he turns his head.

“My apologies.” She can barely get it out through her thinly-suppressed amusement. “You do look a bit funny, though.”

Jace feels his lips tug upwards in the first semblance of happiness he’d felt in days. It feels odd and out of place, and so it disappears with his next blink.

“Shall we go?” 

Jace nods. He follows her out of the bedroom and into the living area, watching as she bends to grab the fishing pole. He walks behind her as she leads the way outside, too slow to match her pace.

The brush of a briney mist against his skin feels like flying across the humid air on top of Vermax. His chest pangs and he forces the thought away. His eyes brush the swaying grasses that stand cloistered around the sea’s edge, each one caught up in a current of air drifting by. He watches the woman as she strides ahead of him.

She is quite plain. She does not have the dresses of the courts he is used to, nor the manners of a highborn lady. She moves unhindered by corsets and the plumes of expensive dresses. Her soft legs pump quickly across the sands, barefoot, like she has mapped every inch of the shore to near-perfection and knows without looking where she must go.

Seeing her slip ahead, her hair tangled in the sea’s mist, then as she turns over her shoulder with a jovial grin, it feels so different than anything he’s ever known before.

Baela is beautiful. She is poised, and gentle, but with a rough edge that assures him she could—and would—easily hurt him if pushed to it. But his stomach never flipped when she spoke. He never searched for her eyes from across the room. He never grasped her hand and wished he never had to let it go. He had known her for so long, he assumed she was all he’d ever need, that the feeling of content he felt in her presence was love. Now he isn’t so sure. 

She reaches the shore and stops when her feet hit the tide.

He meets her gaze as she turns to him. His heart pounds in his ears.

“Is it not wonderful?” She sweeps her arm in a half-arc as she speaks, eyes glimmering beneath the high morrow’s sun.

Jace draws his eyes away from her figure to the open waters. It is wonderful, he thinks. If not wrought with pain and regret.

He forces his gaze away. “Yes.”

“So,” she says, shifting on her heels, “how do we begin?”

Jace steps forward and picks up the rod. He retrieves the little scrap of maroon fabric that she had found a few days back and attaches it to the end of the hook. 

“It is always a good idea to have some kind of bait,” he explains, “fish are attracted to movement. If you can find insects or worms, those work even better. But this fabric may do. We will have to see.”

He moves close to the edge of the water and lets the rod scrape the top of the ocean. “Most fish do not swim right by the shore, so you will need to throw the line out a little ways. Make sure that you do not catch your skin with the hook.”

She nods, eyebrows drawn together in deep contemplation. Jace nearly smiles at the way she’s taking this all so seriously, before he catches himself and schools his expression.

Jace steadies his hand and propels the line out into the ocean. One of the wounds on his side complains at the movement, but he ignores it. He watches the line bob in the water with a softened expression. His memory flits between days spent under the sun at Driftmark and Dragonstone, laughing while he chases Lucerys with a wood sword; Laenor showing him how to fish among the tidepools; a fierce burn from the sun that is soothed by his mother’s affectionate hand.

“Who taught you this?” Her voice breaks through the silence that had settled between them. Her eyes keep steady on the line, lashes squinting against the harsh light.

“My father,” he replies after a moment’s hesitation. 

Another pause. 

He feels her shift to look over at the side of his face. “I’m sure he would be quite proud of the man you have become.”

Jace’s breath halts in his throat. Hands suddenly feel clammy. His heart hiccups and thuds against his skin. He had not thought of Laenor in a long time, Harwin even longer. It feels like decades had passed since he had seen either of them, a forgotten moment in his life overshadowed by tragedy after tragedy.

“Oh, look,” she says suddenly from beside him. “A conch shell.” 

She wields the massive thing toward him. Her entire face is bright with delight as she shows him the object that any normal person would completely disregard. She is anything but normal, though.

“These always sell for a few silvers at the markets,” she informs him, “the rich folk think they are good luck.”

He is not able to reply before his arm suddenly jolts and he is pulled a few inches forward. On the end of the line, something stirs in the water. 

“Come,” he orders her urgently. “Something is biting.”

She draws close, her eyes wide. The conch shell drops to the sand. “What is it?”

“I don’t know,” he says, “here, you hold the rod.”

“What? I don’t know how to catch a fish!”

He thrusts the rod into her hands. “I am too weak to reel it in. You have to.” It is a lie, but she does not seem to recognize it.

Her hands slip all over the rod as she tries to fight the beast at the end of the line. Jace, pitying her struggle, slides behind her and steadies her hands by placing his on top of hers. She freezes for a moment, then begins to pull. Jace clutches her hands gently within his own and he notices that they tremble like seagrass beneath his own. 

“Hold it steady,” he says against the shell of her ear, “pull only when you feel it stop fighting. You do not want–”

Suddenly, the pressure is removed from the end of the line and they are both sent stumbling backwards onto the sand. Jace lands on his bum, but she is able to catch herself as she tumbles beside him. The line must have broken. The fish is long gone now.

“Oh Jace, are you okay?” He looks over at her as she crouches beside him. “You did not reopen your wounds, did you?”

The laugh that tumbles out of his lips makes her jolt back. Distantly, he is not sure why he is laughing. The fish got away, he landed on back on the sand, and now one of his cuts hurts. But he had just felt so alive. So unburdened by responsibility, like any man of ten and eight without the entirety of their mother’s empire resting upon their shoulders ought to feel. 

The laughter eventually abates, and all that is left is the open sky atop him and the sun beating down on his skin.

“Do you think that the fish I cooked last night was spoiled?” she asks in response to his exuberant mood. “Once, my father caught ill from bad potatoes…”

Jace feels another chuckle escape his lips. “Sorry,” he tells her. “I have… not felt that free in a long time.”

She lets out a soft ‘oh’ and moves to lay next to him in the sand. Far enough away that there is no chance that they will touch, but close enough that Jace can smell the lavender on her skin.

Jace stares at the clear sky ahead of him until he begins to feel his body ache with exhaustion. He pulls himself into a seated position, but she does not move immediately. She looks at him with soft eyes from where she lays against the sand, a small, affectionate smile upon her lips. Her chest rises and falls slowly, hand absentmindedly drawing pictures in the sand.

His stomach churns as he turns away. He stares out at the rippling current with half-lidded eyes. 

“How far is the nearest town?” His words are nearly carried away with the next tide that pulls up the shore. She hears him all the same, sliding to sit up next to him.

“Not far,” she replies, a toothy grin on her breath, “would you like to come and help me pick out a fish for dinner tomorrow?”

Jace does not reply. The hope tinged in her words makes something inside him feel rotten. Like he is corrupting the world wherein she lives. As he takes longer and longer to reply, he notices something settle upon her face. A realization that fades into melancholy.

“Oh.” She looks to the sea in an attempt to hide the dewiness in her eyes, but Jace notices all the same. “You wish to leave.”

“My mother,” he says, “she will be looking for me. She will not stop until she finds me.”

She nods.

Something compels him to continue. “I would stay. I would, truly,” he says, “but this is bigger than me. Bigger than this–”

“I understand, Jace.” But Jace is not sure she does. Her lips purse, her eyebrows drawn to form a small wrinkle between them. 

“I would at least stay a couple more days,” he tells her, “I need to make sure I do not simply hurt myself again by leaving too soon.”

She pulls her knees to her chest and rests her head upon them. “It sounds like a good plan,” she agrees quietly. “Perhaps… Perhaps I could pack you some food as well.”

“Yes,” he says this far too enthusiastically, but he notices her brighten at the joy in his voice and so he continues to smile. “That would be wonderful.”

She nods, pulling at a frayed edge of her dress. “Then it will be done.”

The two of them watch for a few more moments as the red sun burns a hole against the sky and as the water ripples with wrath.

“I will leave on the morrow”--That is what he had told you over dinner the previous evening. 

In the morrow, the sky opens and floods them with her tears. 

You stand by the window of the cabin looking out at the frightful weather. Rain falls like daggers against the darkened, tumultuous sea. Waves crash against the shore. A crack of lightning makes you flinch.

“The Gods are angry,” you say to the still air of the cabin. 

Jace sits halfway over his plate of roasted fish as you say this. Then he straightens, his eyes flickering briefly outside. The dark brown of his irises reflect the grey of the clouds swirling above. “Or they do not grant me leave.”

You force yourself to pull away from the window. Turning your head, another flash of brilliant light comes across the floor, painting everything white. You fall into a silence as you step carefully across the cabin.

You knew that from the moment you found him, that it would not be permanent. Just like the rains that fall from above now, this momentary storm in your life will too pass. You had not even wished for him to stay, initially. You recall that first night, sewing his wounds with fishing line, as your eyes stretched across his alien visage. You had told yourself that his presence would be temporary as a comfort then, now you tell it to ground yourself in reality.

Jace had become more friendly in the past few days. Conversation came easily to him and made the thought of him leaving that much harder. Now you were the one that deflated at the sound of his voice across the hall, the one that shrunk from revealing the parts of yourself that had not seen the light in years.

You are selfish. It is a quality that had always lurked behind your eyes, but had sharpened since your father’s death. It is a survival tactic. Every animal, even humans, wish to hold onto the things they hold dear. It does not matter if it is not much. Everything you have is in some way worth keeping–including Jace.

But you could not fight logic. His mother, his family–they had a higher claim to him than you did. You could not keep him like a bird with clipped wings. It is cruel to even think it. 

You scrub the dish in your hands until your hands feel raw and achy. The only light comes from behind you in the smoldering fireplace and the flash of light that illuminates the sky. You hear the clatter of the bowl from behind you as Jace finds his footing–the screech of the chair as it rubs harshly against the floor.

You feel his warmth as he comes to stand beside you. He reaches a hand into the soapy mess over the wood bucket and fetches your hand from the fray. 

“You have made yourself bleed,” he observes quietly, a finger stroking over the cuts. 

You feel your throat bob under the weight of his probing stare. You slip your hand away from his and turn your back to dip the bowl in the bucket of soapless water.

“Have I done something to upset you?” he murmurs. His words are echoed by a rumble of thunder in the distance.

You still your movements for just a second before continuing. Your cuts throb at the feeling of the cool water cleansing the blood from your hands. “No,” you reply simply.

“Then why have you been so quiet as of late?”

You drop the bowl onto the wood surface in front of you and turn, drying your hands with a near cloth. “I just haven’t had much to say, I suppose.”

Another flash of light. Rain as it beats ceaselessly against the metal roof. You face him, clenching the towel in your fist.

“Shall we remove your stitches?” It had been suggested a few days ago as the first thing he would do before departing, so he would not have to bother with finding someone to do it for him on the road. 

Jace looks like he might say something. Then he shakes his head. “On the bed?”

You nod. “That would be easiest.” 

You slip behind him as he moves toward the bedroom. On your way, you light the spill near the fireplace and bring it with you. Your eyes find his figure as it slinks through the darkness. He’s healed so much better than you had ever expected he might. He should not have survived his injuries—should not have been able to heal so quickly. You think the Gods must favor his survival much more than they favored the own laws they stipulated.

He slides off his doublet and lounges back into the bed. You let the flame on the end of the spill touch the end of the wick of the candlestick and the room is bathed in a soft glow. You suffocate the flame and put the spill onto the table next to the bed.

Jace watches you as you do this quietly. When your eyes move up to his face, you notice his eyes are lidded, the tips of his ears red. You feel a warmth catch hold of your skin at his gaze and you avert your eyes to his chest.

You begin your work in silence. You lift the knot of each stitch and easily slice through it with the sharp edge of your knife. At the end of your first removal, you are happy to see that the wound has faded to a pinkish stripe.

“Who taught you this?” 

You startle at the sound of his voice after several long minutes of silence. It is a deep baritone, rough around the edges. Its unexpected richness has you shifting in your place on the edge of the bed. A flash of white light from out the window bathes his face in color. 

“My father.” You do not elaborate further. You think it self explanatory. Your father taught you everything.

“Was he hurt often?” 

You cut another knot. “There are no maesters in the far reaches,” you tell him. A hint of bitter frustration lines your words. “I have assisted several people who have needed help in the village.”

“I did not know,” he replies softly, “that is quite kind of you.”

“We all share responsibility here, no one is without duty.” You put another piece of the fishing line to the side. “It is how things function when you do not have the entire Seven Kingdoms at your disposal.”

You notice Jace’s eyebrows furrow. His stomach tenses beneath your hand. “How did you…”

“It is obvious,” you say, “your voice, your cadence, the way you were dressed when I found you… you have no scars, no callouses. You did not offer your house’s name, so I can only assume—“

“Jacaerys Velaryon,” he says, “that is my name.”

You still. Your eyes dart to his, alarm filling your chest and stealing your breath. “Velaryon,” you echo, heart racing. “That is the name of…”

“Perhaps you know of Corlys Velaryon,” he offers, “the Sea Snake. He is my grandfather. Or Rhaenyra Targaryen, my mother—“

You stand, breathing panicked. “You must leave,” you say, “why did you stay so long? The realm… your mother… the Seven Kingdoms need you.”

Jace leans forward to grasp your arm. You allow him only because you fear you may topple over without the stability.

“I am of no use to them in this condition,” he scoffs. You notice a faraway look in his eyes. The same look he sometimes got when he stared upon the ocean or recalled stories of his father to you. “My dragon is dead, my body a wreck. There is nothing left of me for them to scavenge.”

“T-That is not true,” you stutter. “You must at least find out if they are safe. You have been healed for days… you could have left—“

“I stayed for you.” You fall silent at the sincerity in his voice. His hand drifts down the bare skin of your wrist to thread between your fingers. He cups your hand between his own.

“You cannot stay,” you tell him.

“It does not matter if I stay one more day. The realm will not fall today,” he replies, “we cannot travel in this ruinous weather, anyway.”

Your eyes drift to the window, where the wind throws its tears against the pane. You nod slowly and find your seat again.

You grasp the knife from where you sat it on the duvet. You slide the other to rest upon his warm stomach. His breaths quicken beneath your hand as you drag it up to the next wound.

“I almost killed you the day after I found you,” you whisper, “I thought it would be a mercy. The fact that you are here at all… alive, breathing. It is a gift from the Gods.”

He leans forward. “What stopped you?”

Your movements pause from where you had started to cut away another knot. “You did.”

His throat bobs. His hand moves from where it clutches the sheets to where your hand rests upon his sternum. He strokes the skin of your hand gently.

You lean forward without realizing what you are doing. He does not allow you to back away. He brings his other hand to the nape of your neck and leans forward to seal your lips with his.

The kiss is languid. His tongue probes the seal of your lips and you allow it to slip inside. You bring your hand up to cup his jaw and he drags the hand cupping your neck to your hair. You let out a soft moan against his lips and he responds to the noise by pulling you forward onto his chest.

You do not lean your weight onto him in fear of hurting him, but you feel his hands crawl to settle upon your heaving ribs. You gently settle your lower half onto his hips, settling your hand down on a part of his chest that had no injuries.

You and Jace continue to kiss for what feels like hours. It is exhilarating. It feels like flying. Your stomach feels warm and fluttery, and your lips are throbbing.

You shift your hips and Jace lets out a groan. You pull away from the kiss, concerned. His hand moves to grab the flesh of your hip, sliding you back some. There is a hardness beneath you that makes a pleasant chill slide down your spine.

“Are you alright, Jace?” 

“Unless you wish for us to have sex,” he grumbles, “you should move off my hips.”

You swallow thickly at the insinuation. Sex. A novel thing. A thing that should be saved for marriage. But marriage seems so far from your mind now, drifting away like a current.

“And what do you wish for us to do?” you murmur. You slide forward an inch and he throws his head back onto the pillows. His chest heaves.

“You know what I wish,” he groans. “Is it not obvious?”

You lean forward so that your lips barely brush his own. “Then take it.”

Sunlight streams through the window ahead of you, branding the side of your face with heat, and your eyelids flutter against the intrusion. You fist your fingers in the sheets and twist your legs close to your body. As you shift, you feel an arm pulling you backwards.

You grasp the hand splayed across your stomach between your trembling fingers.

“Stay,” he murmurs against the shell of your ear. Tears bead in your eyes, but you keep them at bay.

Your thumb finds the pulse that thrums beneath his skin and you count his heart beats. The Gods are cruel, you think. They had kept Jace here long enough for you to miss him when he leaves.

You turn your body over to face him. You are not surprised to see him already staring back at you. His dark curls are a mess on the pillow beneath him. His lips pull upwards at the corners, but do not reach his eyes. He brings his hand up to stroke your cheek.

Your chin wobbles and he blinks away a frown.

“It will not be forever,” he tells you softly, reverently,

“I will return to you one day.”

You bring a hand up to wipe away the stubborn tears. “I suppose you do not know when that will be.”

He leans forward to give you a kiss and you know that is the only way he can possibly tell you no. 

Pulling away from the kiss feels like saying good-bye.

You stay in bed as he stands, sluggishly dressing himself as if he was still looking for reasons not to leave. You do not think he finds one. He turns his head to look back at you and his expression falters. 

A small smile curls at your lips as you mouth the word—go.

He heeds your instruction and leaves your cabin with a satchel of roasted fish, a map to the nearest town, and a bracelet strung with seashells.

ONE YEAR LATER…

The nets are full this morrow. The tide ebbs and flows, slinking across the silver sands. Birds let out cries of rejoice overhead for the plentiful bounty gifted by the sea. 

You bend the knee to heave the first net out of the water. You clutch your chest protectively as you search through the things with the other hand. 

“Hm,” you murmur, “a rainbow shell.” 

You bring the shell up to the light and small reflections bounce across your vision. Tucking it into your satchel, you search some more. A piece of metal, two scraps of fabric, and a clam.

You pocket the metal and one of the ratty pieces of fabric, but allow the clam to slide back under the tide. You bring your dry hand to rest upon the head of the babe swaddled against your breast.

“Shh,” you whisper to him as he begins to stir. “It is alright, my prince.”

He brings his head up slowly to peer at you. A splatter of sea foam settles on the side of his face, but he does not seem to mind. He gives you a gummy smile and you return it lovingly.

He watches with bleary eyes as you sort through the next net of things. You show him each individual item as you retrieve it. Your heart skips when you feel a familiar shape and weight in the palm of your hand.

“A conch shell,” you inform him with a giddy grin, “these sell for several silvers at the market.”

He stares at the shell with wide eyes. The pattern, a dark brown and white mottling, you think, must confuse or enrapture him by the way he looks at it.

The small of your back has begun to hurt. You straighten up and lift a supportive hand to rest underneath the baby’s bum.

“This will be enough for today,” you decide. “The sea has gifted us more than we need.”

The little boy smacks his lips as if agreeing with the statement. You nod and carry your satchel and the boy up the familiar path to the cabin.

However, your footsteps slow as you grow closer until you stop right before the door. Something is not right. You protectively cradle the back of your son’s head as you touch a hand to the door.

It pushes open with little resistance. You slide the knife you kept on you at all times to your hand in one swift movement as you step inside.

You take not but two steps beyond the threshold before you freeze. The knife clatters to the ground and a gasp shudders from your lips at the sight in front of you.

He stands across from you like he never left. He’s dressed in black gilded leathers, his body a tad leaner and steadier. His face looks older, more mature and shaped by circumstance, just as you imagine yours must too. His mop of dark hair curls around his ears, longer than when you saw him last.

His lips with awe. He stares at you and your face as if trying to map something with his mind. 

“Jace,” you say breathlessly. “How…”

“I saw you by the shore as I rode in from town,” he murmurs, taking a hesitant step forward. He lets out a soft laugh that sends your stomach aflutter. “I thought I might surprise you. I guess I am lucky to not have received a knife in my throat.”

Your throat bobs. Mistiness clouds your vision. “You came back for us.”

“For us?” Jace echoes, eyebrows furrowed. He comes so close he can reach out to you with his arm and you know that he has seen him then, by the shock that melts his features.

The boy turns his head to the best of his ability in your swaddle, his eyes searching for the unfamiliar voice. Jace’s mouth comes nearly unhinged, a trembling hand lifting as if to stroke his head, but it falls short.

He forces his eyes to look at you. “He… he’s mine?”

You bite your lip to suppress your smile as you nod. You reach around your neck with one arm while the other supports the baby’s bum. You unravel the swaddle easily, and the chubby baby flails his arms with relief. Never one to like a cage.

You outstretch him toward Jace and he takes him eagerly. He holds him with practiced ease. He supports the baby’s head and bum as he gazes down at him, tracing his forehead to the slope of his nose to the flutter of his lashes with only his eyes.

Jace finally breaks away from the baby long enough to look up at you. “And I just… I just left you. You and my son.”

Your heart skips a beat at the name. Son. You bite the inside of your cheek to keep from grinning like a fool.

“You had to,” you say, stepping forward to lay a gentle hand upon his upper arm. “Your family needed you.”

He clenches his jaw. “Nothing we did… nothing we accomplished… equals this.”

He strokes a featherlight touch against the boy’s cheek and he wrinkles his nose.

“Will you…” you pause. You try to steel yourself for the rejection that may very well follow, hands clammy by your sides. “Will you be staying long?”

Jace’s eyes rush to meet yours. He steps forward. The baby whimpers in his arms at the movement. 

“I would stay forever if you would have me.”

You feel your heart skip a beat. “What? What of the throne? Of your family?”

He shakes his head. Your stomach drops.

“My brother Aegon will be the next ruler. Wed to his cousin.”

“And you?”

His dark eyes soften as they consider this question carefully. He clutches the lost prince to his chest protectively.

“I am right where I want to be.”

© mariposium ; do not copy, feed into ai, redistribute, reupload, edit, translate, or otherwise steal my works, thanks!

[stephanisoejono]

happy new year -------------_--------------------

[calamity-aims]

[soulinthewasteland]

HAPPILY EVER AFTER

Dark Valarr x reader

Summary: You remain at Valarr's side exactly as he always wanted. But every passing day steals another piece of the woman he loved, until all that's left is a beautiful ghost wearing your face.

CW: RAPE/NON-CON, coercion, implications of infidelity and child abandonment (false; Valarr's machinations), depersonalization as a response to trauma, apathy, poor professional ethics, obsession, denial, family problems, mommy issues, masochism?, unilateral joy.

WC: 10.1 K

AN: This one's dedicated to @rakiroad, thanks for the idea. @mei-vis wanted to be included here.

Part 1 | Part 2

Dinner had been arranged with more care than usual, although no one had said aloud that there was any particular reason for it.

No anniversary was being celebrated, no birthday, nor any date marked in bright red on the family calendar. Nevertheless, for several weeks your eldest son had spoken of that April evening with a mixture of excitement and nervousness that was impossible not to notice. He had insisted on repeated occasions that there was no need for a grand display, that "I only want to introduce you to someone important to me," words that failed to convince anyone.

The house had understood, even before any of you had, that something was changing.

When the young woman arrived, she was welcomed with the impeccable courtesy that characterized the Targaryen family. She greeted Valarr first, shaking his hand with a politeness that seemed almost rehearsed, before turning to you with a smile that was slightly more timid. She could not have been more than eighteen. It was evident that an electoral war lasting at least two hours had taken place to choose the dress she was wearing and that, despite her efforts to project confidence, her nerves still revealed themselves through small, involuntary gestures.

The way she intertwined her fingers in front of her body, how she absentmindedly smoothed the fabric of her skirt every few minutes, or the quick glances she cast toward your son in search of reassurance that she only seemed to find whenever he smiled at her encouragingly.

"Breathe," he whispered as he guided her toward the dining room, leaning down just enough for her to hear. "I promise everything is going to be alright."

She let out a small laugh, born more from nervousness than from the mask of confidence she was wearing.

"That's easy for you to say. They're your parents."

"Precisely because they are." That answer managed to calm her nerves a little.

The table had already been prepared by the time everyone took their seats. The enormous windows overlooked gardens wrapped in the golden light of dusk, while the warm glow of the chandeliers spilled over the porcelain, crystal, and silver, creating an almost unreal setting. Everything had been arranged with the silent perfection that had always defined that house. Not a single piece of cutlery out of place. Not a single napkin folded incorrectly. Not a single detail neglected.

It was, in every definition of the word, a perfect setting.

The conversation began cautiously. Valarr asked his questions with the calm confidence he had always known how to use to put those around him at ease. He asked about her studies (Economics), about the university she hoped to attend the following year (King's Landing University. A good choice.), about her parents (a surname noble enough), and about the books she enjoyed (a bit of mystery. Arthur Conan Doyle and Agatha Christie).

There was no harshness in his voice, nor any intention of intimidating her. Quite the opposite. He listened to every answer with genuine attention, only intervening to ask another question or offer another observation that gradually eased the young woman's visible tension.

Barely twenty minutes had passed before she already seemed to be breathing much more naturally, encouraged by the occasional kiss her boyfriend would press against her cheek.

At one side of the table, your daughter watched the scene with an outrageously amused expression. "This is unbearable."

Her brother raised an eyebrow without looking up from his plate, the white streak he had inherited from his father standing out more than ever. "Who?"

"You," she insisted, pointing at him with her fork.

"What did I do now?"

She made an exaggerated gesture with the utensil toward the young woman sitting beside him. "You keep looking at her as if you're starring in The Notebook."

"Because I'm in love." The answer came so immediately that it provoked a wave of laughter around the table.

"Gross," she muttered, hiding her face behind her hands.

"You're just jealous."

"I'm traumatized."

The other brother joined in almost instantly.

"Give it a few months. Then they'll start arguing about where to have dinner, and she won't think he's so perfect anymore."

His brother turned toward him. "Don't project your failed love attempts onto me."

"I wouldn't call them 'failed love attempts.'"

"They were."

"Once."

"Three times."

"Twice."

The argument continued with exactly the same rhythm it had carried throughout their entire childhood. They interrupted one another constantly, exaggerated every detail, corrected things that were completely irrelevant, and eventually forgot what the conversation had been about in the first place. Even now, standing on the threshold of university, they still behaved exactly as they had when they were ten years old.

Val slowly shook his head as he lifted his cup to his lips. "I actually believed age would make you all a little wiser."

"They'll never change," your daughter declared before taking another bite.

"Thank you for the optimism, sweetie."

"Anytime"

Laughter filled the dining room once again.

The young woman relaxed completely. She was now participating in the conversation, asking questions of her own and even daring to joke with the boys. Little by little, she stopped feeling like a guest and began, if only for a few hours, to feel like part of that table.

Only then did she begin to notice you.

Not immediately. As dinner went on, she started picking up on small details, almost insignificant and difficult to explain. It made no sense.

You remained seated where you always sat beside your husband, your back perfectly straight and your movements so measured they seemed rehearsed. You ate slowly. You smiled whenever someone addressed you. You always answered politely. You never interrupted anyone. You never raised your voice. You did not seem uncomfortable.

And yet, something felt out of place.

There was something strange, something that escaped any logical explanation.

It was as though your reactions arrived a fraction of a second too late. The others would laugh for what felt like the hundredth time; first you would watch everyone else enjoying themselves, and only then would you smile. Whenever someone asked you a question, there was a noticeable pause before you answered, as though you needed to search for the appropriate reaction before offering it.

It did not seem like shyness. Nor sadness, something nameless.

Perhaps you simply had not liked her?

The young woman tried to ignore the feeling. She couldn't.

It happened during a brief lull in the conversation, while your children were animatedly discussing the universities they hoped to attend the following year, that she finally turned toward you.

"Your son talks about you all the time."

The conversation quieted for a moment.

You looked up at her and smiled. That curve of your lips was beautiful, serene, your teeth perfectly white, and still an ominous absence lived within it.

"Oh, does he?"

The young woman nodded enthusiastically. "He says you always find a way to help everyone. That when he was little, you were the one who explained history to him because you somehow managed to turn even the most ordinary dates into unforgettable stories."

Your son smiled with an almost childlike blush spreading across his face. He waited. They all did.

Three pairs of mismatched masculine eyes, all fixed upon you—those darkened shades of brown watching expectantly, those dark stones submerged beneath an indigo sea stretching endlessly before you. All three of them—your sons and your husband alike—were like identical drops of water that had once stirred violent waves inside you.

Now, they barely managed to provoke a reaction.

The appropriate response to what she had just said would have been some silly anecdote, a joke about those years, some story that only a mother could tell.

You remained silent for a few seconds. Then you slowly nodded, accepting the information.

"That's very kind of you to say." Nothing more.

The conversation quickly moved on. One of the boys changed the subject. Your middle son immediately started another ridiculous argument with his brother. The young woman laughed again.

Valarr never took his eyes off you. He noticed the pause.

He remembered that years ago, you would have seized that question as an excuse to tell three different stories, leave the entire table in stitches, and lovingly embarrass your son in front of his girlfriend before the evening was over.

Now... You had only smiled.

While the family continued eating between bursts of laughter, he felt with disturbing clarity that the silence that had been growing inside you for years had finally become visible to someone else.

Valarr had also noticed the change in the young woman's expression. A blink that lasted just a little too long. A slight tilt of her head. That almost imperceptible hesitation that appears when someone realizes something does not fit, even though they still cannot put a name to it.

He recognized it.

He had spent years seeing it reflected on other people's faces.

In psychologists who, during your sessions, would ask you a personal question and then furrow their brows when you answered with a polite smile that said absolutely nothing.

In old acquaintances who happened to meet you at some event and, after speaking with you for a few minutes, walked away carrying a strange sense of unease they could never quite explain.

In members of the household staff who had been there since the children were small and who, every now and then, found themselves watching you from afar with a quiet, unspoken nostalgia.

Everyone noticed that something was wrong, no one understood what it was, and no one ever dared to ask.

Your eldest son chattered excitedly about the university they would both be attending the following year, describing the grandeur of King's Landing thanks to the countless visits he had made to the campus during its summer programs. His brother was quick to interrupt him, listing the innumerable reasons why that choice was terrible, sparking yet another argument that drew exaggerated protests from your daughter and inevitable laughter from the young woman.

You remained there, listening, joining in every now and then, like a presence around whom everything else continued to revolve.

She tried again.

"And what about you?" The question came so naturally that, at first, no one paid it much attention.

"Me?"

"Yes," she smiled shyly. "Your son told me you studied at the same university as Mr. Targaryen."

You nodded slowly. "I did."

"What did you study?" she pressed gently, hoping to earn an answer longer than two words.

"International Business."

The young woman's eyes lit up immediately.

"Really?" She leaned forward slightly, completely forgetting the carefully rehearsed manners she had arrived with that evening. "I want to study Economics too."

Since dinner had begun, something resembling a genuine, youthful emotion briefly crossed your face so briefly it almost went unnoticed. Almost.

"It's a beautiful field," you said.

She smiled eagerly. "Did you ever work in it?" she asked innocently.

The young woman continued smiling as she waited for your answer, completely unaware that she had just pushed open a dusty door that had remained closed for far too many years.

Your husband reacted first.

It was not obvious. Anyone who did not know him well would never have noticed the change. He simply stopped moving his cutlery. His hands remained still beside his plate, his wedding band catching the light from the chandelier, while his attention abandoned the boys' argument entirely and settled on you.

He never looked away. He couldn't. He already knew the answer before you uttered a single word.

Your daughter absentmindedly held her glass of water while your son's girlfriend waited for a response, convinced she had shot at the perfect target to win your sympathy.

Only Valarr understood that she hadn't.

He watched your fingers slowly wrap themselves around the base of your glass. He saw the brief moment your eyes dropped to the table, the tiny silence you needed before answering, and felt something tighten painfully beneath his ribs, stealing the air from his lungs.

"No."

A single word, gentle. Without bitterness. Without resentment, the tone you would use while merely commenting on the weather.

She blinked. "Never?"

You offered the serene smile you had learned to wear for everything, the same smile that left even experts of the psyche unable to find the truth hidden beneath your emotional disguise.

"No," you repeated. "Life simply took another path."

She wasn't satisfied with the answer, but she accepted it without questioning you further, unconvinced that this could possibly be the whole story.

Valarr remained perfectly still, his gaze never leaving you.

He remembered.

He remembered the young woman who devoted her mornings to studying theory only to spend her nights putting it into practice. He remembered the lover of ancient civilizations. He remembered the beautiful girl hopelessly addicted to coffee with almond milk, a pinch of cinnamon, and two cubes of sugar.

Where is she?

Beside him remained the skin of the woman who had once dominated the entire campus, the female phenomenon who had captivated professors and students alike through the brilliance of her work, the girl who cried after midnight because a 99% on an exam convinced her she simply wasn't good enough, the one who mocked his pretentious attempts to sound sophisticated, the one who laughed at him, the one who argued.

Now, instead, beside him was the other one.

The one who no longer teased his disastrous attempts at cooking, nor corrected his historical quotations out of sheer pride, nor disappeared for hours beneath mountains of books only to return carrying a new theory she could hardly wait to share. The one who smiled exactly the same way every time, nodded with the same quiet composure, and accepted every decision with a compliance that years ago would have seemed inconceivable. The one who no longer cried. The one who no longer laughed until she couldn't breathe. The one who seemed to have surrendered even the right to be angry.

A woman who still breathed, still walked, still occupied the same place beside him in bed every night, yet whose soul appeared to have quietly withdrawn from her own body long ago, leaving behind only a kind, silent, extraordinarily easy woman to love precisely because she no longer demanded anything at all.

'Life simply took another path.'

He was the other path, he had built this other path.

Valarr picked up his knife, cut a piece of meat, brought it to his mouth, chewed, and swallowed. No one could hear the noise echoing inside his mind.

Where was that Y/N?

Where had the student gone who could never sleep the night before an exam because even an outstanding grade didn't seem good enough? Where was the woman who could turn any conversation into an endless debate simply because she enjoyed defending her ideas? The one who filled the margins of her books with tiny handwritten notes? The one who argued with him for hours for the sheer pleasure of proving she was right? The one who was incapable of remaining silent whenever something struck her as unfair?

Where was the woman who had made falling in love with her feel as inevitable as breathing?

He lifted his gaze once more.

There you are, sitting exactly where you had always been, everything he had wanted you to become, and, at the very same time, everything he had come to hate most.

—

Night had fully settled by the time they left the estate.

The garden lights faded behind them, spilling over the stone pathways as the chauffeur slowly guided the car away from the front entrance. For the first several minutes, neither of them spoke. She sat staring out the window, her hands folded neatly in her lap, mentally replaying every moment of dinner as though trying to determine exactly when she had made a mistake.

Eventually, she broke the silence.

“Your mother...”

He turned his head slightly. “What about her?”

She hesitated. “I think she didn't like me.”

His response came so quickly it almost sounded startled. “What are you talking about?”

“I don't know.” She lowered her gaze to her hands. “It's just a feeling. She was very kind, but—I don't know how to explain it. It felt like... like she wanted to be anywhere else except there with me.”

He remained quiet for a few seconds before letting out a slow, almost weary breath. “It wasn't you.”

She looked up. “No?”

He slowly shook his head. “My mother has been... like that since I was twelve.”

The words lingered between them like a bad omen. She frowned slightly. “Like that? What do you mean, ‘like that’?”

He rested his head against the seat, seeming to wrestle with himself for a few moments, as though deciding how much he was willing to tell her.

“She used to be different.” A faint smile crossed his face. It was an odd smile. Nostalgic.

“Everyone says she was brilliant.” He fell silent for a moment before continuing. “My father always says that back in university there wasn't a single professor who could keep up with her once she started arguing. She was one of those people who could spend hours talking about history without ever becoming boring, who filled the house with books and somehow convinced everyone around her to become fascinated by subjects they never even knew existed.”

His voice gradually faded as he spoke, like the flame of a candle slowly deprived of oxygen. “I barely remember her that way.”

She listened without interrupting, until he stopped. “What happened?”

A short laugh escaped him. There wasn't a trace of humor in it. “If you asked my father, he'd tell you nothing.” His eyes drifted toward the city lights sliding past the window.

“But I remember the exact moment she stopped being herself.” The car continued through the night in silence. “She disappeared for four months.”

She blinked. “Disappeared?”

“She left.” He said it with a coldness that seemed completely at odds with the weight of those words. “With another man.”

Silence settled over the car once more. “An... affair?”

He nodded slowly. “His name was Robert.” Even saying the name still tasted bitter. “I remember the day she walked out of the house perfectly. They had a huge argument after she asked my father for a divorce and he refused to give it to her. My little sister cried for weeks. My brothers and I barely understood what was happening. My father...” He paused. “My father looked like a ghost.”

She said nothing. Neither did he.

He still wasn't looking at her. “In the end, she came back.” The words sounded dry. “She crawled back to my father like a pathetic damsel in distress” There was no compassion in his voice. Only an old resentment. A deep one.

“He was kind enough to let her come home—we all pretended nothing had happened. Every single one of us. As though Mom hadn't spent almost half a year sleeping with another man while we, her children, cried ourselves to sleep because of what she'd done.” He slowly shook his head. “Ever since then...” His voice grew quieter. “It's like she never really came back.”

She remembered the smile from dinner. Perfect. Polite. Empty. Suddenly, she understood why it had unsettled her so deeply.

It wasn't a fake smile. It was a smile with no one left behind it.

“I'm sorry...”

He took several seconds before answering. “So am I.”

The car slowed as it approached her home. Finally, he turned to look at her.

All that bitterness vanished almost immediately, replaced by the same gentle eyes she had fallen for. He took one of her hands in both of his, his thumb slowly brushing across her skin with a tenderness completely unlike the anger he had shown only moments before.

“You won't become like that.” She held his gaze as he smiled with quiet warmth. “I know.” He lifted her hand and pressed a soft kiss against her knuckles. “I know I'll never wake up one morning and find that the woman I love has run away with someone else.”

He paused briefly, looking at his beloved's face, trying to erase his mother's from it.

“I know you won't be like her.”

—

The morning unfolded with the same carefully orchestrated quiet that had come to define every day of your life for years. Outside, a sky veiled in gray clouds filtered the light into a dull glow, turning the city into a procession of faded buildings and streets still slick from the rain that had fallen before dawn. Inside the residence, the household staff moved with their customary discretion, preparing breakfast, answering calls, and organizing a schedule that rarely suffered the slightest alteration. To any outsider, the house continued to function with the flawless precision of a perfectly maintained machine.

You descended the staircase a few minutes before the appointed time wearing a simple dress in soft, pale tones, your hair carefully pinned back, and an expression so serene that no one would have imagined this was anything other than an ordinary outing. You greeted the staff with your usual kindness, asked whether the children—though they had long since ceased to be children—had already left for university, if your daughter had already gone to school, and thanked one of the housekeepers for the black coffee she placed before you, taking only a couple of quiet sips.

Valarr was already waiting beside the front door.

He wore one of his customary dark suits, the car keys resting loosely between his fingers as he gazed absentmindedly toward the gardens. At the sound of your footsteps, he lifted his head and smiled with the effortless warmth that still came so naturally whenever his eyes found yours.

“Ready?”

You returned the exact same smile. “Yes.”

He stepped closer, tucking a loose strand of hair behind your ear before leaning down to press a loving kiss against your forehead. “We'll only be gone for a little while.”

You nodded. “I know.”

You never asked where you were going anymore. There was no need. It was always the same place.

The drive passed with very little conversation. There was tension between you, nor because either of you was angry. It was a different kind of silence, one far older, one that had sat so naturally between you that it had become part of the way you communicated.

Valarr drove slowly, one hand resting on the steering wheel while the other occasionally lingered near the gearshift. Every so often, he glanced toward you for only a second, and each time he found exactly the same image: you gazing out the window at the passing city. You did not appear sad, nor happy. You simply watched, as though the pedestrians on the sidewalks, the buses idling at traffic lights, and the crowded cafés all belonged to a life that had never truly been yours.

“The boys called a few hours ago.”

You didn't look away from the glass. “Did they?”

“Our eldest asked if we're still having Friday dinner tonight.”

You nodded slowly. “That sounds wonderful.”

He waited for another response. A question, perhaps. A comment about how university was treating them, some curiosity about the exams they were preparing for that week.

None came.

“He also said his girlfriend will be joining us.”

You nodded once more. “It'll be delightful to see her.”

Everything and nothing at the same time again. The conversation died exactly where it had begun.

Valarr's jaw tightened ever so slightly before he returned his attention to the road. Years ago, that simple remark would have become a conversation lasting half an hour. You would have wanted to know which classes they were taking that semester, whether they were still planning the international exchange program, if she was still interested in economics, or whether they needed help with a project.

Now, you accepted every piece of information with the same quiet composure with which you accepted the weather forecast.

The office occupied the top floor of an unassuming building on a quiet street, far removed from the constant noise of the financial district. From the outside, it was impossible to distinguish it from any other professional practice. There were no large signs, no crowded waiting rooms—only a silent lobby, warm-colored walls, bookshelves overflowing with volumes, and the faint scent of freshly brewed coffee mingling with lavender.

She was the twenty-third psychologist.

Valarr knew the exact number.

He had personally interviewed every previous specialist before allowing them to meet you. He had requested international references, reviewed academic publications, and studied research on complex trauma, dissociative disorders, persistent depression, emotional apathy, and prolonged psychological grief.

The session began exactly like all the others. Simple questions. Conversations that seemed almost trivial.

The psychologist did not appear to be in any hurry. She took very few notes, never interrupted, and simply allowed the silences to breathe between one question and the next.

“How are you feeling today?”

“Fine.”

“Have you been sleeping well?”

“Yes.”

“How has your week been?”

“Quiet.”

“Have you done anything you've particularly enjoyed?”

You thought for a few moments. “I accompanied Valarr to two charity events.”

“Did you enjoy them?”

You smiled. “They were very well organized.”

The psychologist remained silent. You hadn't actually answered the question. She didn't press the matter.

“Your husband told me you were an exceptional student in university.”

Your fingers remained folded neatly in your lap. “That's what he says.”

“And what do you say?”

Another pause. “I don't remember it very well.”

“Do you still keep in touch with any friends from that time?”

“No.”

“Do you miss them?”

“I don't know.”

The woman tilted her head slightly. She wasn't writing. She was watching, waiting for something to emerge naturally from the silence.

“Tell me about a happy memory.”

You spent much longer thinking this time. Finally, you answered.

“The birth of my children.”

“What did you feel?”

Your lips remained perfectly still. “Happiness.”

“Describe it.”

The silence stretched on for many long seconds.

Your eyes remained fixed on some indistinct point in the carpet. “It was... important.”

Nothing more.

The psychologist understood immediately what had just happened. You weren't incapable of remembering the events themselves.

You were incapable of reaching the emotions attached to them, as though someone had carefully archived your entire life, separating every memory from the feelings that had once accompanied it.

The session ended an hour later.

When you stepped out of the office, Valarr immediately rose from the sofa where he had been waiting the entire time. He didn't ask any questions in front of you. He simply kissed your forehead with the same familiar tenderness as always.

“Would you mind waiting for me for a moment?”

You obeyed. “Of course.”

You walked toward the small terrace overlooking the street while he remained behind with the psychologist.

Neither of them spoke for several seconds. Valarr was the first to speak.

“Has there been any progress?”

The woman didn't answer immediately, she looked through the window.

You were sitting beside one of the planters, absentmindedly watching the leaves sway in the breeze. You looked completely at peace—that same permanent, tranquil stillness.

“Yes.”

That single word made Valarr's heart race.

“Yes?”

She slowly shook her head. “Not the kind you were hoping for.”

He felt hope disappear almost as quickly as it had arrived. The psychologist rested both hands atop the folder she was holding. “I've spent more than twenty years working with people who have endured extraordinarily complex trauma. I've treated patients who couldn't speak for months, people who lost entire years of their memories, and survivors forced to relive the very experiences they were trying to escape.”

Her voice softened.

“Your wife's case is different. She isn't avoiding her memories. She isn't repressing emotions. And she certainly isn't pretending.”

She drew a slow breath before continuing. “I believe that, at some point, she learned that feeling had become unbearably expensive, so she gradually built a version of herself capable of living... without doing so.”

“Can she come back?” The question was barely more than a whisper. Pure desperation.

The psychologist remained silent for several long seconds. “I can't promise you that. Nor can I tell you it's impossible. Today, when I mentioned university, something happened for less than a second. Her pupils changed. It wasn't conscious. It wasn't a smile. It was recognition.”

She offered him a careful, almost scientific smile. “There's still someone in there.”

She looked back toward the terrace. “The problem is that she's been hiding for so many years... she may no longer remember the way back.”

Valarr watched your figure for a long time.

You remained seated, quietly watching the plants bend beneath the wind with that same familiar serenity. So beautiful. So peaceful. So impossibly close. So unbearably far away.

—

The bedroom lay wrapped in a quiet half-light.

Only a single lamp beside the bed cast a warm glow across the furniture, stretching long shadows over the walls. Outside, the rain had begun again, tapping softly against the tall windows with an almost hypnotic steadiness. Everything was silent. Too silent.

You sat on the edge of the bed, your hands resting neatly in your lap, your gaze fixed on some indistinct corner of the room. Had just finished brushing your hair, and wore the pale nightgown you slipped into almost every evening. You looked peaceful.

As always.

Valarr stood beside the window.

He had remained there for several minutes without moving, one hand resting against the cold glass while the other slowly curled into a fist.

He had tried to convince himself to wait. To let time continue doing its work. To give time more time.

He had spent years doing exactly that, years taking you to specialists, years reading books he had never imagined he would one day need, years searching for an explanation capable of telling him how to bring back the woman he had lost without her ever truly leaving the house.

That night... He simply couldn't bear it anymore. He couldn't sleep beside the shell.

He turned toward you. "Do you know what I miss?"

You didn't answer. Your eyes met his with that same quiet serenity they always carried.

He took a step toward you. "I miss you arguing with me." Silence. "I miss you telling me I'm wrong." Another step. "I miss us fighting over the most ridiculous things."

Nothing.

His breathing became uneven.

"Do you remember when we'd spend an entire hour arguing because you insisted Napoleon Bonaparte made that decision for political reasons, and I kept saying it was driven by pride?"

He waited. He waited for anything: a smile, a flicker of recognition, an automatic correction.

Nothing.

Only that calm, empty gaze, like the surface of a windless lake.

Valarr swallowed hard. "I hated it whenever you won." A quiet laugh escaped him. It broke apart before it had fully left his lips. "And you always won." He kept walking until he stood directly in front of you. "Do you remember how you used to make fun of my French?"

Silence.

"You said it was a crime against humanity." He waited again. Nothing. "Never missed an opportunity to tell me my pronunciation was awful."

Nothing.

"You laughed at my speeches."

Nothing.

"You called me pretentious."

Nothing.

His voice began to crack. "Get angry!" The words echoed through the bedroom, louder than he intended.

For a moment, even the rain seemed to stop.

"Call me an idiot!" His chest rose and fell violently. "Tell me I ruined your life!" Another step. "Hit me if you have to!" His voice shattered completely. "But do something!"

You continued looking at him. There was no fear. No anger. No sadness. Only that peaceful expression that seemed capable of surviving any storm.

He slowly shook his head. "No..." His voice dropped to a whisper. "Don't look at me like that."

That calm felt infinitely worse than any scream. He could have endured hatred. Accusations. Contempt. Even silence laced with fury.

But not this.

Not this peace that belonged to someone who had stopped expecting anything from the world.

"Where are you?" The question barely escaped his lips. "Where did you hide yourself?" His eyes filled with tears. "Please..."

He was no longer speaking to the woman sitting before him, he was speaking to a memory.

"Just come back once." His breathing broke. "Insult me." Another tear slipped down his cheek. "Correct me." Another. "Laugh at me."

His voice dissolved completely. "Just... come back to me."

His legs finally gave out beneath him. He collapsed to his knees before you as though every ounce of strength that had sustained him through those years had abandoned him all at once.

He buried his face against your lap.

And he cried.

He made no attempt to suppress the sobs. He made no effort to preserve his dignity. He wept with the exhaustion of a man who had spent far too many years carrying a hope that grew heavier with every passing one.

His shoulders trembled beneath your hands. His breathing was ragged. Painful. Desperate. You remained still for several seconds.

Then, with the same calm you might have used to tuck a blanket around a sick child, you slowly lifted one hand. Your fingers slipped gently into his hair. You stroked it slowly. Carefully with infinite tenderness.

Once, then again, and again without saying a single word. Only that quiet, almost mechanical gesture, seeking to soothe a pain you no longer fully understood.

Valarr felt the caress. That was what finally broke him.

The movement was exactly the same one you had made hundreds of times throughout your marriage. But it no longer came from the woman he had loved. It was only a learned gesture. A kind response. The echo of an affection whose origin seemed to have been lost long ago.

Even so, he did not pull away.

He remained there, his forehead resting against your lap while your fingers continued gliding slowly through his hair, clinging to that tiny fragment of tenderness like a shipwrecked man who, even knowing the rescue ship will never come, cannot bring himself to let go of the last piece of driftwood still keeping him afloat.

—

Over the following months, the routine settled over your lives with such unwavering consistency that it eventually ceased to feel like an attempt at recovery and became something far closer to ritual. Every Tuesday morning, at precisely ten o'clock, Valarr drove you across King's Landing following the exact same route, as though repetition itself possessed the power to repair what neither time nor love had managed to restore. Outside, the seasons continued changing with quiet indifference: trees shed their leaves before blooming once more, storefronts replaced their displays, construction projects rose where abandoned lots had once stood, and strangers hurried through streets that no longer felt connected to your own life. Inside the car, however, nothing ever truly changed. You always occupied the passenger seat with your hands folded neatly over your lap, your gaze resting beyond the window without truly seeing the city drifting past.

At first, Valarr always tried to speak because silence frightened him now.

"The twins passed another round of interviews this morning."

You turned your head just enough to acknowledge him, offering the same gentle smile that had become your answer to almost everything.

"I'm happy for them."

A few minutes later he tried again.

"Our daughter is thinking about changing school."

You nodded thoughtfully, as though carefully considering the information.

"I hope she chooses whatever makes her happiest."

The conversation dissolved once more, yet he refused to surrender.

"The roses finally bloomed in the east garden. You should see them."

"I'm glad."

Nothing else followed.

Years earlier, those same remarks would have carried the two of you through half the journey. You would have asked which companies had interviewed the twins, whether they were nervous, whether your daughter still intended to study abroad, or whether the roses had survived the late frost after all. Every ordinary detail had once become an excuse to spend hours talking together.

Each exchange arrived complete, polite, perfectly formed, somehow incapable of giving birth to another sentence. It was like throwing pebbles into an ocean so impossibly calm that not even the smallest ripple ever returned to shore.

The appointments themselves soon adopted that same quiet predictability. The psychologist experimented tirelessly with different therapeutic approaches, refusing to let routine become surrender. Some mornings she guided the conversation toward childhood memories, inviting you to speak about your parents, your school years, or the ambitions you had once nurtured. Other sessions revolved around identity, grief, purpose, emotional attachment, or the quiet rhythms of everyday life. Occasionally she abandoned every structured technique altogether, brewed tea for the two of you, and simply allowed the hour to unfold naturally while discussing novels, newspaper articles, or whatever happened to occupy the world beyond the office walls.

She never interrupted you, never hurried your thoughts, and never filled the silences merely because they became uncomfortable. Instead, she allowed each pause to breathe, believing that some words required space rather than pressure before they could emerge.

"How have you been sleeping lately?"

"Quite well."

"Have you been reading anything?"

"Not recently."

"You used to enjoy reading."

"So I've been told."

"Do you miss it?"

A long pause followed before you answered.

"I couldn't tell you."

"What do you enjoy doing now?"

Another silence.

"I don't know."

"What makes you feel most like yourself?"

You lowered your eyes toward your folded hands.

"I'm not certain."

Every answer was delivered calmly, sincerely, and without hesitation. That, more than anything else, unsettled her. You were not resisting therapy, attempting to deceive her, or protecting yourself behind carefully constructed defenses. There was no hostility, no resentment, no visible effort to conceal your emotions. You simply answered every question as truthfully as you could.

The terrifying part was that the truth itself had become almost completely empty.

Nearly two months after your first appointment, the psychologist found herself crossing a boundary she ordinarily would never have considered. It was neither desperation nor curiosity born of academic ambition. She simply wanted to know who you had once been.

Because everyone who spoke about you described two entirely different women.

There was the woman who sat across from her every Tuesday morning, unfailingly courteous, endlessly composed, and so emotionally quiet that even sadness seemed unable to disturb the stillness surrounding her.

Then there was the woman everyone remembered.

Valarr remembered her.

Your children remembered fragments of her.

Former professors, old classmates, previous colleagues—even members of the household staff who had watched your family grow over the years occasionally spoke about you with unmistakable nostalgia, as though mourning someone whose funeral had taken place long ago despite the fact that she still walked through the same halls every day.

It was impossible not to wonder how one person could become so completely different while remaining physically unchanged.

One evening, after her final patient had left and darkness had already settled over the city, she remained alone inside her office surrounded by scattered case notes, psychology journals, and cups of coffee that had long since gone cold. She opened her laptop intending only to verify a few dates, yet one search became another until, almost without realizing it, she found herself reconstructing the outline of an entire life.

King's Landing University preserved remarkably thorough digital archives of its graduates. Academic distinctions, published research, scholarship recipients, debate champions, conference participants, graduation ceremonies.

Your name appeared almost immediately, on repeated occasions.

Outstanding Academic Achievement. Faculty Excellence Award. International Research Fellowship. Departmental Honors. Published Undergraduate Thesis. National Debate Champion.

She continued scrolling as each page revealed another distinction, another article, another photograph, another professor describing your extraordinary potential, until a single title caused her hand to stop moving entirely.

King's Scholar.

She stared at the screen for several long seconds before opening the article.

There you were.

Years younger, standing proudly beneath the banners of King's Landing University with your graduation robes draped across your shoulders and your diploma tucked carelessly beneath one arm because the other was already gesturing animatedly toward someone outside the frame. You were laughing—not smiling politely for the camera, but laughing with your entire body. Your eyes sparkled with unmistakable life, your posture radiated confidence, and there was an excitement about you that almost seemed capable of escaping the photograph itself.

The accompanying article described you as one of the brightest graduates the university had produced in decades, praising your research, your leadership, your relentless curiosity, and your unusual ability to inspire intellectual discussion among both classmates and faculty alike.

One sentence from your supervising professor refused to leave her mind.

"She possesses the rare ability to make everyone around her think more deeply than they believed themselves capable of thinking."

The psychologist read that line three separate times before looking back at your photograph, unable to reconcile that brilliant young woman with the patient who quietly answered every question by admitting she no longer knew how she felt.

—

The psychologist did not wait until the following week.

That very evening she remained alone in her office long after the building had emptied, unable to pull her gaze away from the glow of her computer screen. Around her, newspaper clippings, academic journals, university records, faded photographs, and handwritten notes lay scattered across the desk, each new document painting a portrait that seemed to belong to an entirely different woman. The more she read, the more impossible it became to reconcile the brilliant, fiercely curious young student described in every article with the woman who sat quietly across from her every Tuesday morning, answering every question with the same calm, almost supernatural composure.

She was no longer searching for a diagnosis.

She was searching for you.

For the woman who had existed before whatever had happened erased her without taking her body with it.

The following session began differently.

There were no questionnaires waiting on the table, no discussions about your sleeping habits, no careful inquiries regarding your mood or the events of the previous week. When you entered the office, you found only a thick folder resting neatly between the two chairs.

The psychologist waited until you had taken your seat before opening it.

"Today," she said quietly, "I don't want to talk about how you're feeling." You lifted your eyes toward her. "I want to talk about who you were."

Without another word, she reached inside the folder and slowly slid a photograph across the table until it came to rest in front of you.

It was your graduation photograph.

You lowered your gaze toward it and remained perfectly still for several long seconds, studying the young woman smiling back at you without saying a single word.

"Do you remember it?"

A long silence followed before you answered. "Not very well."

The psychologist nodded gently, as though she had expected exactly that response. "I'm not surprised."

She opened the folder again and began placing document after document beside the photograph.

Certificates. Newspaper articles. Academic awards. Conference programs. Published research.

One after another they formed the outline of a life that seemed increasingly impossible to associate with the woman sitting before her.

"I didn't know a university could be this proud of a single student." Your eyes moved slowly from one page to the next. "King's Scholar." Another document. "Faculty Award for Academic Excellence." Another. "National Debate Champion." Another. "Published undergraduate researcher."

The room remained silent as she continued reconstructing your past piece by piece, not with the intention of overwhelming you but of placing before your eyes the life everyone else still remembered.

"You know what surprised me the most?" She waited before continuing. "Not a single person I spoke to mentioned your grades first." Your attention lingered on an old photograph. "They all spoke about your mind."

She picked up one of the interviews.

"One professor told me he'd never met anyone so incapable of remaining quiet whenever she believed an argument lacked substance." She reached for another.

"Another said you were unbearable because you always stayed after class to ask one more question after everyone else had already left." A faint smile crossed her lips. "And Professor Harrow..." She lowered her eyes toward the paper. "He said arguing with you was exhausting. Even when you lost, you somehow managed to make everyone else question whether they had actually won."

Your fingers moved. Barely. The smallest movement imaginable.

She noticed. She deliberately chose not to acknowledge it.

"I spoke with Professor Harrow."

Your breathing faltered for the briefest instant. "He is eighty-three years old now," she continued softly, "and he still remembers your graduation."

For the first time since entering the room, you raised your head completely. Suffocated.

"He told me that while everyone else celebrated outside the auditorium, you walked back inside alone because you wanted to hear the lecture hall one last time before leaving it forever."

The room seemed to grow impossibly still. "He followed you." Your eyes never left hers. "He asked what you were doing." She opened another page. "You looked around the empty room and said..." Her voice softened even further. "'I think this place made me brave.'"

Something changed.It was so subtle that, had she blinked, she might have missed it.

Your brow tightened ever so slightly. Your lips parted. The expression that crossed your face was neither pain nor confusion. Recognition struggling against years of silence.

The psychologist remained perfectly still, terrified that the slightest interruption might cause the moment to disappear.

"You weren't a quiet woman." Another pause. "You were relentlessly curious. You argued simply because you loved thinking." Your fingers slowly curled into your palms. "You refused to accept shallow answers."

Your breathing was no longer perfectly even. "You loved history." Your eyes drifted back toward the photograph. "You loved international business." A muscle trembled faintly in your jaw."You wanted to lead a company."

Your lips opened again. "...No."

The word barely escaped your throat. The psychologist felt her heartbeat quicken.

"No..." You repeated, but this time it no longer sounded like an answer. It sounded like resistance. Like something buried beneath years of quiet obedience pushing desperately against the surface. Your eyes remained fixed on the photograph. "No..." Your voice trembled. "I—" The next word took several long seconds to emerge. "wanted—" Tears slowly gathered in your eyes, though you seemed completely unaware of them.

You continued staring at the young woman in the photograph as though meeting someone you had spent years believing was gone forever.

"I wanted—" Your voice finally broke. "more. He—hetook it from me."

Silence filled the office once again. You said nothing else. You didn't need to.

For the first time since your treatment had begun, the silence no longer belonged to emptiness. It belonged to grief. To memory.

To someone who had finally managed, however briefly, to feel something again.

The psychologist drew a slow breath to steady herself before quietly closing the folder. She did not ask another question, did not risk turning that fragile moment into another clinical exercise, and simply allowed you to remain there, staring at the photograph while silent tears traced their way down your cheeks.

When the session finally ended, you stepped into the hallway with slow, measured movements.

Valarr rose from the waiting room immediately, exactly as he always did after every appointment, having spent the last hour seated in the same chair with a book he had never truly managed to read.

He looked at you once, and something inside him stopped, he couldn't have explained what was different. You weren't crying. You weren't smiling.

You looked exactly as you always had. And god, your eyes.

There was something inside them that hadn't been there when you walked into the office.

A flicker.

A faint, almost imperceptible uncertainty that fractured the flawless serenity you had worn for years so small that anyone else would have dismissed it entirely.

Valarr couldn't.

He had spent too many years memorizing every expression your face had ever made. He crossed the room slowly.

"Love?" You lifted your head. Your eyes met his. For a single, fleeting heartbeat, he did not see the quiet woman he had learned to live beside. He saw someone thinking. Someone questioning. Someone standing on the edge of remembering.

The expression vanished almost as quickly as it had appeared, dissolving once more into that familiar calm. He had seen it. He knew he had. For the first time in years... he had not felt as though an empty shell were looking back at him.

For one impossibly brief moment you had been there. This, he thought, is the other one.

—

The journey home barely existed for you.

Beyond the car window, the city slipped past in a blurred procession of buildings, traffic lights, and people carrying on with their ordinary lives, completely unaware that, inside that vehicle, someone had just remembered the unbearable weight of her own existence. For years you had inhabited a silence so profound that even your memories had lost their edges; now they returned all at once, without order or mercy, crashing into you with the violence of a dam finally giving way after holding back its waters for far too long.

You weren't crying. Not yet. It was worse than that.

You sat perfectly still, your hands resting in your lap, breathing slowly as though the slightest movement might be enough to shatter you completely, while Valarr barely took his eyes off the road long enough to make sure you were still there. Every time he looked at you, he discovered something new.

Your eyes were no longer empty. There was fear. There was confusion. There was pain. Terrible, real emotions he would have given anything to see them again.

The residence welcomed you both with the same elegant silence it always had.

The staff greeted you politely before disappearing into the corridors, understanding, without the need for explanations, that the house was meant to remain quiet that afternoon.

You walked slowly through the entrance hall. It did not seem as though you were heading anywhere in particular; instead, you looked like someone wandering through a museum dedicated to a woman you could no longer remember being.

The staircase. The piano. The family portraits. Every object awakened an image. A feeling. A different version of yourself.

You stepped into the sitting room without saying a word. The gray afternoon light streamed through the tall windows, settling over the furniture with an almost painful stillness as you stopped in front of the fireplace, where the family photographs still stood: holidays, birthdays, Christmas mornings, and pictures of your children covered in paint back when they could barely hold a brush.

In every single one, you were smiling. A wide smile. Alive.

You couldn't remember ever smiling like that.

Slowly, you lifted a hand, your fingertips brushing the frame of one photograph. In it, you were holding your newborn son while Valarr embraced you from behind. The image had preserved a perfect moment forever and, yet, you did not remember the photograph.

You remembered the hospital room. The scent of disinfectant. The burning ache of your cesarean incision every time you tried to breathe. The exhaustion, the fear, the guilt, the despair, and the almost superhuman effort it had taken to force yourself to love a child whose very existence reminded you of the way he had been conceived.

Then another memory surfaced.

University.

The packed auditorium. Your name being called at graduation. The applause. The scholarship. Your professors. Your ambitions. The absolute certainty that your life was only just beginning with a trip to London.

Emma. Robert. Divorce attempt. The argument. Shouting. Those four months. Coming back. The years. Everything, everything came flooding back at once.

The air vanished from your lungs as you pressed a trembling hand against your chest, each breath suddenly becoming painful. "No..."

The word barely escaped your lips as you slowly shook your head, as though repeating it might somehow stop the avalanche crashing through your mind.

"No..." The tears came without restraint. They were not quiet, not graceful. They were the desperate sobs of someone who had awakened inside a life she no longer recognized as her own.

You took one step backward, then another.

Your legs began to give way, you felt that you were about to faint. Your legs, they could no longer bear the crushing weight of everything you had just remembered.

Valarr had remained motionless the entire time, watching you without moving closer. He knew this pain was necessary, but the instant he saw your knees buckle, he stopped thinking altogether, crossing the room in two hurried strides and catching you before you could hit the floor.

His arms wrapped around you with desperate firmness as your body collapsed against his without the slightest resistance.

That was when you finally were reborn.

You buried your face against his chest and began to cry with an intensity that seemed impossible to contain, clutching the fabric of his shirt as though you needed something—anything—to keep yourself from falling apart completely.

"Valarr..." His name came out shattered, so shattered it scarcely sounded like a word.

He closed his eyes as he felt your full weight settle against him. After so many years of you being composed, untouchable, and impossibly serene, for the first time you allowed yourself to fall.

And you fell into him.

"I don't know who I was—" Your breathing fractured between sobs. "I don't know—when I—, when I disappeared." Every sentence seemed to tear another piece from your chest. "I forgot so many things..." You slowly shook your head, unable to stop crying. You didn't know where you started or finished, there was no physical limit, only total pain. "I forgot the girl who wanted to conquer the world—and I never even realized when she stopped existing..."

For years he had wanted nothing more than to bring you back, imagining this moment hundreds of times without ever believing it would hurt this much.

He held you even tighter, not to stop your tears but simply to keep you standing while you fell apart. One hand stroked your back in slow, soothing circles while the other rested protectively behind your head with almost reverent tenderness.

"You didn't disappear." His own voice trembled. "Not completely." He pressed a gentle kiss to your hair.

You continued sobbing against him, no longer capable of standing on your own, your entire body trembling as though years of silence had finally abandoned you all at once, leaving behind nothing but the unbearable exhaustion of carrying a life that had long since stopped feeling like your own.

"No—" you sobbed . As soon as the truth had struck you, it returned with the force of a hurricane. He. He took it from you.

You moved away from him, creating distance with a push.

Graduation. Your graduation dress. The nonexistent wallet. The tear in the fabric. His disgusting touch. All these images hit you in the way that only reason can over time, revealing the most atrocious of truths. The man in front of you, who had held you with the care necessary for a precious possession, who showered you with silk and jewels and whispered sweet nothings in your ear, took your life away. The culprit was right in front of you, looking at you with a mixture of fascination and concern.

Ire took the place of sadness.

"You—fucking son of a bitch," you spat venomously, angry tears sliding down your cheeks. "I remember—I remember it so well, you lying, cheating bastard." Word by word came out of your mouth, and he could only be satisfied.

He couldn't be happier.

"You raped me. You took my life, you stole what I desired most. You—" He pressed his lips against yours. His lips tasted of almond milk and satisfaction. His hand moved behind your head where it had previously been caressing you, forcing you to stay still. A sound of relief arose from deep within his chest.

"My love..." he whispered against your lips before attacking them again, his expression that of a child in a toy store. "God—it really is you. You're here." You bit his lip when he leaned over, he just moaned. "Again—fight, claw, scream. Do it. Do it, and that way I'll know you're alive."

You glared at him, kicking his leg. He slammed you against the wall. A groan escaped you, only to be silenced with another kiss. He didn't seem to need air, and even if he did, he wouldn't stop. This was what he wanted. You had given it to him after years of thirst, and today he would devour it.

Panic gripped your body again. It was too much, so much at once. The memories, his touch, his force pressing you against the wall as you tried to escape. Barriers that would keep you here at his mercy. Tears—this time of humiliation—flowed. You clawed at his arms, and he pressed his erection against your thigh like an animal in heat.

Just like on graduation night, you'd have to let him take.

He continued rubbing against you, his breathing ragged like the wet, disgusting kisses he left on your neck. When you tried to push him away for the umpteenth time, he grabbed both of your wrists in one hand, placing them above your head.

His other hand was greedy, moving from your collarbones to grasping your breast, then patting your sex from above. Even when the wall wouldn't allow it, you moved, and that only motivated him more. "Valarr— stop! Valarr—" he kissed you silence.

You despised how your body—the shell—moved your hips toward the touch of his hand, the way your cries let out some sound of primal pleasure.

"You like it as much as I do," he said, pulling down his pants hurriedly and cursing under his breath for taking so long. "Look at you—just a moment ago you were rubbing against my hand like a bitch in heat. You love it." The clinking of its strap as it fell gave you enough of a clue to know what was coming. It didn't prepare you. It entered you cruelly. You weren't wet, and it hurt and burned like hell.

You weren't a virgin, but you felt a tearing in your rubbery walls as that parasite—his member—thrust against you in a steady rhythm. You cried loudly, and he didn't stop you. Every time an insult escaped your lips, he kissed you; every time a moan escaped, he soothed it by caressing your clit.

"You feel sublime," he gasped against your ear. "So tight— so perfect"

He didn't care about the employees' eyes—they wouldn't be bothered. They'd seen this for years.

Just their boss taking his wife.

—

Conversation flowed through laughter, interruptions, and exaggerated protests, just as it had on countless other nights. Your son's girlfriend had just finished telling a story about university when you added one of your own, correcting one of the details your eldest son had deliberately embellished with a smile. He protested immediately, his joined the argument, and for a few seconds everyone at the table was talking over one another.

It was your daughter who, in the middle of all that familiar chaos, slowly set her cutlery down on her plate, frowned ever so slightly as she looked at you.

"Mom..."

You lifted your gaze to hers. "Yes?"

She remained silent for a few moments before smiling with a mixture of surprise and relief. "You're different."

The table gradually fell quiet.

You tilted your head slightly. "Different?"

"Yeah." Her smile widened just a little. "I don't know... you're arguing again. You're telling stories again. You've already corrected my brother three times since dinner started."

"I... I hadn't even noticed."

"Don't stop."

Her words lingered in the air.

Valarr never took his eyes off you.

A slow, deeply contented smile spread across his face before he leaned toward you and pressed a gentle kiss to your cheek. "You have no idea how long I've been waiting to hear that."

His lips lingered against your skin for one heartbeat longer before he pulled away, and when he looked at you again, there was a happiness in his eyes so serene it was almost devastating.

He had finally gotten back the woman he had always loved.

Without realizing that, now that you had awakened, you had also recovered every memory of everything you had lost in order to remain by his side. And, at the same time, your downfall had given rise to another genesis.

'Don't stop,' your daughter had said.

Don't stop, because your downfall with Valarr was just beginning to resurface. With your rebirth came the plagues again, and this time you would experience them skin deep.

Yourself. Not the other one.

[soulinthewasteland]

LABOUR

Dark Valarr x reader

SUMMARY: A devoted wife. A loving mother. A life that looks perfect from the outside. You have everything he promised would make you happy. So why, after all this time, do you still feel haunted by the woman you could have been?

CW: RAPE/NON-CON, marital rape, misogyny, power imbalance, coercion, golden cage, verbal threats, infidelity/emotional cheating, emotional sabotage, manipulation, gaslighting, implicit stockholm syndrome, jealousy, déjà vu, economic and emotional dependence.

WC: 10. 9 K

Part one

You woke wrapped in warmth.

Not merely the warmth of morning light filtering through the tall windows, nor the lingering comfort of blankets tangled around your legs. It was a different kind of warmth. Familiar. Constant. Woven so deeply into the fabric of your life that it had become impossible to separate from it. Valarr’s arm rested securely around your waist, keeping you close even in sleep, as though years of marriage had trained his body to seek yours without conscious thought. For a few moments, you remained completely still, listening to the steady rhythm of his breathing behind you and the distant murmur of a house that, for once, had yet to awaken. No children racing through the halls. No hurried footsteps. No voices demanding breakfast. Only silence and the rare luxury of existing within it. A silence that felt almost sacred after so many years of family routines, hectic mornings, and small responsibilities that began long before sunrise. For a handful of minutes, the world seemed to have paused solely for the two of you.

Slowly, you opened your eyes and allowed yourself to enjoy the moment. The room was bathed in a soft golden glow; the first rays of dawn stretched lazily across the polished floorboards and rumpled sheets. Beside you—or rather, behind you—rested the man who had occupied nearly every chapter of your adult life. Husband. Father of your children. The person whose presence had become so familiar that sometimes it surprised you to remember there had once been a version of yourself who had never known him. A version who had slept alone, dreamed alone, and planned a future without ever imagining Valarr Targaryen at the center of it. It felt strange to think about now. Strange to remember the young woman you had been before he became such an absolute constant. Because after so many years, after so many shared memories, after so much time spent building a life together, it was difficult to tell where your story ended and his began.

A small smile touched your lips.

Even now, after all these years, he still slept exactly the same way.

Possessively.

Not cruelly. Never that. Rather with the unconscious certainty of someone who had spent years loving the same person and saw no reason to stop. One arm around your waist. One hand resting lightly against your stomach. As though, somewhere deep within sleep itself, he still refused to allow too much distance between you. As though even in dreams there remained a part of him that needed to feel you nearby in order to be completely at ease. It was an old habit. One of many he had developed during the early years of your marriage and never abandoned. Some people stopped reaching for each other after enough time had passed. Valarr had never been one of them.

Carefully, trying not to wake him, you turned your head slightly to look at him over your shoulder.

The effort was pointless.

Valarr had always been absurdly aware of your presence.

Almost immediately, his brow furrowed faintly. Then he opened his eyes. For a second he seemed disoriented, caught somewhere between sleep and reality, suspended in that hazy space where thoughts were slow to form. Then he saw you.

And smiled.

The transformation was immediate.

It was not the smile the public knew. Not the polished expression that appeared in photographs, meetings, interviews, and charity galas. This one was softer. Warmer. Younger, somehow. A private smile reserved for very few people in the world.

Entirely yours.

“Good morning,” he murmured, his voice rough with sleep.

“Good morning.”

His gaze lingered on yours for another moment before he leaned forward and pressed a lazy kiss against your shoulder. The gesture was so automatic, so natural, it nearly made you laugh. As though his first instinct upon waking was still to seek you out. As though the years had not diminished in the slightest that quiet need to show affection even in the simplest moments.

“You’re awake.”

“So are you.”

“Unfortunately.”

That earned exactly the reaction he wanted.

Your laughter broke the silence of the room, soft but genuine, and the satisfaction that appeared on Valarr’s face was immediate. As though making you laugh remained one of his favorite accomplishments. Perhaps it always would. There was something almost boyish in the way he seemed to treasure every one of your smiles, something that had never entirely disappeared no matter how many years passed or how many responsibilities settled onto his shoulders.

Without warning, he pulled you closer.

You protested weakly when your back collided once more with his chest.

“Valarr.”

“No.” He protested.

“You don’t even know what I was going to say.”

“I know exactly what you were going to say.”

“Oh, do you?”

“You were going to suggest that we get up.”

You paused. “Maybe.”

“Terrible idea." His arms tightened slightly around you.

“You’re a grown man.”

“I am.”

“You have responsibilities.”

“I do.”

“You have meetings.”

“I know.”

“And three children.”

Valarr buried his face in your hair. “I’ve decided to ignore all of those facts.”

Another laugh escaped your lips.

The house would awaken soon. One of the boys would inevitably start an argument before breakfast. Your daughter would probably demand everyone's attention at once. There would be schedules to follow, obligations to attend to, and people waiting for both of you. The world would begin moving again, and you would each return to the roles you had been playing for years. Parents. Spouses. Responsible adults. But not yet. There were still a few stolen minutes left before the day truly began. A brief space where no responsibility could reach either of you.

For now, only this existed.

The warmth of the morning. The quiet comfort of familiar arms wrapped around you. And the simple, suffocating certainty that, after all these years, Valarr still held you as though he could not quite believe you were real.

Morning arrived slowly, pouring golden light across the tangled sheets and the comfortable silence of the bedroom. Neither of you seemed particularly eager to leave the bed. After so many years of marriage, there existed between you a familiarity so deep that it no longer required words to sustain itself. Valarr remained stretched out beside you, watching you with the same quiet attentiveness he had always reserved for you. One hand rested on your waist while the other absently traced the smooth fabric of the silk nightgown he himself had bought for you months earlier. The material slipped beneath his fingers like water.

For several minutes, nothing else happened.

And yet, it was enough.

Valarr tilted his head and pressed a gentle kiss to your cheek. Then another near your jaw. Another beside your neck. Slow, absent-minded kisses, born more from affection than desire. As though he simply enjoyed your existence. As though he still found it impossible to fully comprehend that after all these years you remained there, sharing his bed, his surname, and his life. His lips barely brushed your skin as the morning unfolded around you. Every gesture seemed as natural as breathing.

“Good morning,” he murmured against your neck.

“Mmm.”

“Fascinating response.”

“You already wished me good morning.”

That earned another smile from him.

For a while, you remained exactly like that, barely moving, enjoying the rare tranquility offered by a house that had not yet fully awakened. The children were still asleep. The staff had not yet begun filling the hallways with activity. For a few minutes more, the world seemed to belong solely to the two of you.

Eventually, you opened your eyes completely and turned your head slightly to look at him.

“You should get up.”

Valarr immediately frowned. “No.”

“You have a meeting.”

“Later.”

“Valarr.”

“Not yet.”

“Valarr.” You insisted.

“You’re a tyrant.”

That drew a small laugh from you. “You have an investors’ meeting in two hours.”

“Two hours is plenty of time.”

“Not for someone who takes forty minutes deciding which tie to wear.”

His offended expression appeared instantly.

“That happened once.”

“Three times.”

“Twice.”

“Four.”

Valarr sighed dramatically before leaning forward to place another kiss beside your jaw. “I was trying to be romantic.”

“And I’m trying to stop you from being late.”

“Your priorities are questionable.”

Even so, he eventually surrendered. He almost always did when it came to you. With obvious reluctance, he finally abandoned the comfort of the blankets and allowed you to drag him toward the breakfast waiting downstairs.

And breakfast, like everything else in that house, was already prepared. The dining table had been arranged long before either of you descended the staircase. Fresh fruit. Warmly baked bread. Coffee. Tea. Fresh juices. Everything positioned with impeccable precision by people whose entire existence seemed devoted to anticipating needs before they were even voiced.

The mansion operated like a perfectly calibrated clock. There was cleaning staff who kept every room immaculate. Personal chefs responsible for every meal. Gardeners. Drivers. Tutors. Nannies when necessary. Nothing was ever lacking.

And nothing was lacking for your children, either.

All three were growing up surrounded by extraordinary privilege. They received the finest education available. They studied languages, music, literature, history, and art from an early age. Their personal libraries contained more books than many schools could afford. They had never known financial insecurity. Never gone hungry. Never wondered whether there would be enough money for something essential. Everything they needed appeared before they even had to ask for it.

From the outside, your life appeared perfect. Perhaps that was why nobody saw the cage. Because the most effective cages rarely look like prisons.

You did not work. Nothing was ever denied to you, so no one questioned why. The professional opportunities you had once pursued with such determination had slowly disappeared behind years of marriage, motherhood, and comfort. The need for a career of your own had gradually dissolved beneath reasonable arguments, practical decisions, and promises that there would always be time later.

Later.

Always later.

Meanwhile, the days continued to pass.

You could not leave the property without informing someone first. You did not have a mobile phone of your own beyond the house line. The television channels available were limited. Access to the internet depended almost entirely on Valarr’s computer, when he allowed it or when he happened to be present.

There was always a logical explanation for every restriction. Security. Privacy. Protection. Convenience.

It never looked like control. It never looked like a prohibition. It never looked like an order. And that was precisely what made it so difficult to identify.

Valarr loved you.

That much was undeniable.

He adored you with an intensity that remained obvious even after all these years. He showered you with affection. Surrounded you with comfort. Listened to your preferences. Remembered your likes and dislikes. He still bought you books, dresses, flowers, and small gifts inspired by conversations you yourself had forgotten.

And perhaps that was the cruelest part of all. A prison built by someone who loved you was still a prison, even when its walls were lined with silk.

And some nights, when the house finally fell silent and the rest of the family was asleep, you would find yourself staring into the darkness beyond the windows, wondering what your life might have looked like if you had boarded that plane all those years ago.

The question never lingered for very long.

Because by morning, Valarr would be kissing your cheek again, the children would be racing through the hallways, and the house would awake, and the cage would begin to feel like a home again.

The feeling vanished almost as quickly as it had arrived.

The distant sound of a door opening somewhere in the house, the muffled voices of the staff beginning their morning routines, and the faint rustle of Valarr’s footsteps disappearing briefly toward the dressing room eventually pulled you back into the present. As happened almost every time, the uncomfortable thoughts were pushed into a quiet corner of your mind, buried beneath the familiarity of routine. There was breakfast to share. Children to wake. An entire day waiting beyond the walls of the estate.

By the time you finally descended the stairs a few minutes later, the dining room was already flooded with morning light. Vast windows allowed golden rays to spill across the long polished table, illuminating the flawless tableware, the freshly arranged flowers, and the abundance of food that had been prepared long before any of you appeared. Fresh fruit. Warm bread. Homemade preserves. Eggs. Coffee. Tea. Fresh juices. Everything arranged with the impeccable precision that characterized a household where needs were met before they were even expressed. The scent of freshly brewed coffee drifted through the air, mingling with the aroma of warm bread and melted butter. Everything looked perfect.

Too perfect.

You took your seat as a maid discreetly filled your coffee cup, and for a few brief seconds, you enjoyed the rare silence that preceded chaos.

It lasted exactly that long. Seconds.

“Mom!” The voice echoed through the house before you even saw its owner.

Your daughter came racing down the hallway at full speed, her hair still slightly tousled from sleep and carrying an amount of energy that seemed physically impossible for someone who had only just woken up. She launched herself directly at you without the slightest intention of slowing down, forcing you to open your arms just in time to catch her before she collided with the table. The little girl immediately settled against your side, wrapping her arms around you.

“Good morning, sweetheart.”

“Good morning.” The response was immediate. “Dad wouldn’t let me stay up late!”

At the opposite end of the table, Valarr did not even look up from his coffee. “Because it was eleven at night.”

“I wasn’t tired.”

“You fell asleep on top of a book.”

“That doesn’t count.”

“It counts exactly the same.”

The outrage that appeared on your daughter’s face was so genuine that you struggled to suppress a smile.

A moment later, the boys arrived. With them disappeared any remaining possibility of peace. The two of them crossed the dining room arguing at full volume about something that had clearly begun long before they entered the room.

“I’m telling you, you can’t win a war using only cavalry.”

“Yes, I can.”

“No.”

“Yes.”

“No.”

“Yes.”

“No.”

“Yes.”

Valarr closed his eyes. “Good morning to you two as well.”

Neither responded, far too occupied with proving the other wrong. That earned a small laugh from you. Some things never changed, and the stubbornness of those two boys was one of them.

Little by little, breakfast unfolded amid overlapping conversations, endless questions, and constant interruptions. Your daughter insisted on telling you about an extraordinarily complicated dream involving a dragon, a gigantic library, and a pink horse that, for some reason, could speak several languages. One of the boys was trying to convince Valarr to let him participate in an academic competition the following month. The other argued with both of them simultaneously while attempting to prove he was right about a historical event he had read about the night before. Voices blended together. There was laughter. Complaints. Dramatic protests. Resigned glances.

Chaos. Beautiful chaos.

For a while, it became easy to forget everything else because this, too, was real. The children’s laughter. Small hands reaching for yours across the table. The way your daughter unconsciously leaned toward you while she spoke. The way the boys sought their father’s attention even while pretending to argue with him.

And Valarr. Always Valarr.

Seated at the far end of the table with a cup of coffee in his hands, watching the children whenever he thought no one was looking. There was something almost endearing in those fleeting expressions. Pride. Affection. Satisfaction. A quiet happiness he rarely showed the rest of the world.

This was real. More real than any dream. More real than any lost opportunity. More real than any career.

“Mom?” Your youngest son’s voice pulled you from your thoughts.

You blinked. “Yes?”

“What did you want to be when you were little?”

The question arrived with such complete innocence that, for a moment, time itself seemed to stop. The knife you had been using to cut fruit remained suspended above your plate.

Across from you, Valarr seemed to go still as well. Only for a second. Long enough.

“Why do you ask?” his voice carried from behind the rim of his coffee cup.

“Our teacher asked us to write an essay.” He shrugged. “I want to be a historian.”

“No, you don’t.”

“Yes, I do.”

“Last week you wanted to be an astronaut,” you added.

“I can be both.”

“No, you can’t.”

“Yes, I can.”

The argument immediately resumed, but you barely heard any of it because you were still trapped inside the question.

What did you want to be when you were little?

The answer came at once. You remembered perfectly.

That girl who studied until dawn. The brilliant student who had arrived at university determined to conquer the world. The young woman who dreamed of international offices, constant travel, ambitious projects, and a career built entirely through her own merit.

You remembered her. You still did.

Even though she seemed to grow more distant with every passing year.

“Mom.”

You blinked again. “Yes?”

“You didn’t answer.”

You smiled. A small smile. Polite. Practiced. “I wanted to work very hard.”

“That’s not a profession.”

The laughter was immediate.

“I know.”

The conversation carried on as though nothing had happened. The boys returned to their debate. Breakfast continued. The moment seemed to dissolve into the familiar noise of the morning.

And yet, when you lifted your gaze, you found Valarr watching you from the opposite end of the table.

He wasn’t smiling, wasn’t speaking. He was simply looking at you.

As though he had heard the answer you never actually gave. As though both of you knew exactly what that answer had been. And for one brief moment, far too brief for the children to notice, something heavy passed between you.

Then your daughter asked for more jam. One of the boys launched into yet another absurd argument. The room filled with voices once more.

And the morning moved forward as it always did.

—

The following morning, Valarr left the house with an unusual sense of urgency.

It was not something obvious. In fact, to anyone who did not know him as well as you did, it would have seemed like an entirely ordinary morning. He woke early, kissed the children on the forehead before they came downstairs for breakfast, reviewed several documents while eating, and answered a few brief phone calls regarding an important meeting scheduled for that afternoon. Everything appeared routine, predictable, perfectly integrated into the orderly machinery that constituted his life.

And yet, when he finally rose to leave, he left the plate in front of him untouched. Not the coffee—the coffee he finished down to the very last drop. But the eggs, fruit, and toast remained practically untouched.

“Aren’t you going to eat?”

Valarr barely looked up from the papers in his hands. “I don’t have much time.”

“Val." An uncomfortable pang of worry settled in your chest.

“I’ll eat something at the office.”

He said it with the same casualness someone might use to comment on the weather before leaning over your chair, pressing a distracted kiss into your hair, and walking out of the dining room without a backward glance.

The conversation should have ended there. And yet, as you stared at the abandoned plate, a small feeling began to take root inside your chest. It was ridiculous, absolutely ridiculous, but over the years you had grown accustomed to taking care of him in ways so small that sometimes you barely noticed them yourself: reminding him to rest, forcing him away from work when he had been awake for too many hours, making sure he ate during particularly demanding periods. Valarr was brilliant—extraordinarily brilliant—but he was also perfectly capable of forgetting basic human needs whenever something captured the full extent of his attention.

So, sometime around midday, you made a decision.

You would bring him lunch.

You spent far longer getting ready than was strictly necessary. Much longer. Perhaps because you had not truly left the house in weeks. Perhaps because the idea of stepping outside your daily routine felt pleasant. Or perhaps because some part of you still enjoyed the expression that appeared on Valarr’s face whenever you made a particular effort with your appearance.

The dress you chose was elegant without being extravagant, crafted from a light fabric that moved softly around your legs whenever you walked. Your hair was arranged with care, and your makeup was subtle and refined. Natural enough to appear effortless, deliberate enough to highlight exactly what you wanted highlighted.

When you finished studying your reflection, you felt something close to satisfaction. It had been a long time since you had dressed up simply because you wanted to. A long time since you had looked at yourself as a woman and not exclusively as a mother.

Afterward, you collected the lunch the chefs had prepared for Valarr and left the estate.

The corporate headquarters dominated several entire blocks of the financial district. Glass. Steel. Money. Power.

Even after all these years, it remained impressive. The building seemed to rise above everything around it, reflecting the sky across its gleaming façade and projecting a presence so imposing it was impossible to ignore. The car had barely come to a stop before you stepped onto the sidewalk, surrounded by executives, assistants, and employees moving in and out of the main entrance with the accelerated efficiency characteristic of large corporations.

And that was when you heard your name.

“Y/N?”

You turned. Recognition came immediately.

It was the student from the Aegon Foundation Ball. Or, more accurately, the former student.

Years had passed. The university boy was gone, replaced by a man in an immaculate dark suit, a corporate identification badge hanging around his neck, and a confidence far more settled in the way he occupied space.

For a moment, both of you seemed equally surprised. Then he smiled. A genuine smile.

“Well.” Amusement lingered across his features as he looked at you. “I wasn’t expecting to run into you here.”

“Neither was I.” The gears in your mind scrambled to remember his name. “I don’t mean to be rude, but your name was...?”

“Robert,” he finished for you. “It’s been years.”

“Yes.”

“A lot of years.” His gaze dropped briefly before returning to your eyes, and when he spoke again, his voice carried an unexpected warmth. “You look— incredible.”

The sincerity of the compliment drew a small smile from you.

“Thank you.”

“I mean it.” His eyes studied your face as though trying to reconcile the woman standing before him with the memory he carried of the university student you had once been. “I don’t think you’ve changed at all.”

“That is objectively false,” you protested.

“No, seriously.” He shook his head. “You’re magnificent.”

A faint warmth rose to your cheeks. Not necessarily because he was flirting, but because it had been a very long time since someone outside your immediate circle had looked at you that way. As an individual. As a woman. Not simply as Valarr Targaryen’s wife.

“Do you work here?” The question came casually, almost innocently, and yet it caught you off guard.

“I…”

The answer died before it could fully form. Because no. You did not work there. You did not work anywhere. You had no office. No position. No access badge. No name engraved on a glass door. Nothing besides your husband's last name as access to this life.

The uncomfortable feeling appeared for only a moment before you managed to conceal it.

“I’m here to see my husband.”

The smile returned immediately. “Your husband works here?”

You nodded. “He is the owner. Valarr Targaryen.”

Recognition was immediate. “Oh.” For a second, he looked surprised. Then not so surprised. As though, after considering it for a moment, it made perfect sense. “I don’t know why I feel like I should have guessed.”

That made you laugh. “Is it that obvious?”

“A little.” His smile widened. “Definitely a little.”

The conversation continued for several more minutes. You talked about the weather, former classmates, professors you both remembered, and the years that had passed since graduation. It was an easy, pleasant conversation. The kind you rarely had with anyone outside your immediate family.

And before leaving, he pulled a card from the inside pocket of his jacket.

“By the way.” He offered it to you. “I doubt you want to spend hours talking about corporate economics, but if you ever want to grab a coffee, catch up, or just get out of the house—” The pause was brief. Deliberate. "Call me.”

You looked at the card. Then at him. Finally, you smiled and accepted it.

“Thank you.”

By the time you reached Valarr’s office, he was already working.

The transformation that crossed his face the moment he saw you was immediate. A smile appeared before you had even reached his desk, warm and sincere in a way very few people were ever allowed to witness.

“There you are.” He sounded pleased. As though he had been waiting for you.

He abandoned the documents he had been reviewing and rose to his feet while his gaze traveled slowly over your figure, lingering on the dress, your hair, and every small detail you had taken care with that morning. The satisfaction in his eyes was so obvious it was almost ridiculous. “You look beautiful.”

That earned a half smile from you. Not magnificent, as Robert had said. Beautiful.

“Good morning to you too.”

Valarr rounded the desk and approached, taking your face gently between his hands before kissing you slowly, with the easy familiarity of someone who still found pleasure in doing so after all these years.

“You brought me food.”

“Someone had to.” You murmured, "Don't want you to starve to death in the middle of a meeting."

“How lucky I am.”

“Very.”

“I know.”

The afternoon unfolded in an absurdly familiar way.

First, Valarr insisted that you stay.

Then he insisted that you sit with him.

And eventually, he decided that sitting with him meant sitting directly in his lap, as though it were the most natural thing in the world. Perhaps for the two of you, it was.

For hours, you remained comfortably settled between his arms while he reviewed reports, signed contracts, participated in virtual meetings, and answered phone calls. One of his hands almost always rested somewhere against you, at your waist, on your arm, or laced through your fingers, as though he needed constant reassurance that you were still there. Every now and then, he would lower his head to press a kiss against your shoulder, your cheek, or your hair, small displays of affection scattered throughout the afternoon with such complete naturalness that they no longer seemed like conscious gestures at all.

It was near the end of the workday when you finally spoke.

“Val.” Your voice was soft.

“Hm?”

“I don’t like depending on the house phone.”

The hand resting at your waist stilled for the briefest moment, just enough for you to notice.

“I want a phone. My own phone”

The silence that followed was not uncomfortable. It was thoughtful. Valarr studied the documents in front of him for several seconds before lowering his gaze to yours.

“A phone?”

“Amazingly enough, yes.”

The corner of his mouth curved upward. “What a revolutionary concept.”

"I know"

“The world isn’t ready.”

You rolled your eyes. And, to your surprise, he simply nodded. “All right.”

You blinked. “All right?”

"Yes.”

“Just like that?”

Valarr smiled. A quiet smile. An unusually gentle one. “If you want a phone, you’ll have a phone.” His thumb brushed lightly across your side. “My wife will have everything her heart desires.” He leaned down and kissed your forehead. “I’ll take care of it this week.”

For a moment, nestled against his chest while the city began to illuminate beyond the towering windows and the final rays of sunlight disappeared between the buildings, you felt something close to relief.

Small. Insignificant. Real.

Without realizing that, inside your handbag, the business card that man had given you was still there.

Waiting.

—

During the first few weeks, it did not even feel like a conscious decision. It simply happened.

You had only received the phone a few days earlier, and although Valarr had agreed to give it to you without argument, without imposing any visible conditions and without even asking exactly what you wanted it for, something inside you still reacted to the small device with a caution that was difficult to explain. Perhaps because you had not owned one in years. Perhaps because, after so long living within other people's schedules, implicit permissions and carefully defined routines, even the simple possibility of holding a private conversation still felt strangely forbidden. That was why you never texted when Valarr was home. Not because he had ordered you not to. Not because he constantly monitored you. Not even because there was any concrete threat. It was something much subtler. Much older. A habit built over years. A learned reflex that made you slip the phone away the moment you heard the familiar sound of his car passing through the front gates or the staff announcing his arrival.

Never when he was there, so your conversations with Robert always happened during the day. While the children attended lessons. While Valarr worked. While the enormous house remained submerged in that elegant silence that sometimes felt comforting and other times unbearably empty.

At first, the messages were sporadic. Small. Harmless. A conversation about the Aegon Foundation. A casual question. A comment about an economic article. Then other things began to appear.

Memes. Far too many memes.

And you quickly discovered that the internet had evolved considerably during the years you had spent enclosed within that mansion.

Robert

I need to know something.

You

What?

Robert

Do you understand this meme?

[image]

He attached a picture of a terrified-looking cat sitting in front of a computer while a loading bar remained frozen at 99%.

You

Is it worried because the download isn't finished?

Robert

...

Oh my God

You're adorable.

You

Why?

Robert

That wasn't the answer.

You

Then I don't understand it.

Robert

I know.

That's what makes it better

That type of conversation began repeating itself with alarming frequency. Robert seemed to find endless amusement in your complete inability to understand modern references. Every meme became an improvised lesson. Every absurd video somehow led to an even more absurd explanation.

Robert

Look at this.

He attached a video.

A man dressed as a shark was dancing in the middle of an office while electronic music blasted in the background.

You

Why are you sending me this?

Robert

Because it's art

You

No.

Robert

Yes

You

No.

Robert

Your inability to appreciate contemporary culture concerns me.

You

I think you're the one who should be concerned.

Robert

Impossible

I'm too busy being iconic.

You

What does that even mean?

Robert

Exactly my point.

Little by little, you began looking forward to those messages. Not because you were in love. Not because you were seeking anything specific. Simply because they were light.Because nobody expected anything from you. Because Robert spoke to you as though you were merely a person and not a wife, a mother or an extension of someone else's life. Not reduce the wife of Valarr. Sometimes the conversations stretched on for hours. Other times they consisted of nothing more than ridiculous exchanges.

Robert

Have you seen Shrek?

You:

Yeah

Robert

Good

Then we have a solid foundation for this friendship.

You

Is that how you determine your friendships?

Robert

Absolutely.

Some people have standards. I have Shrek.

You

How reassuring

Robert

Thank you.

And for the first time in years, you found yourself laughing alone at a screen. Without realizing it. Without overthinking it. That small window into the outside world was slowly reminding you of a version of yourself you had forgotten.

At first, Robert never asked why you disappeared every evening. Eventually, he noticed. Because it happened at exactly the same time without exception.

Robert

I have a theory

You

That's concerning

Robert

You disappear exactly when the workday ends

You:

That's not true

Robert

It's 5:46.

I'll bet twenty dollars you disappear within an hour.

You

I won't

Robert

We'll see 👀

At 6:52, you stopped replying.

At 8:15, another message arrived.

Robert

HAHAHAHAHA.

I knew it.

Over time, it became a private joke. Robert began referring to your disappearances as the blackout. He sent memes of employees clocking out. Soldiers leaving battlefields. Astronauts losing communication with Earth.

Robert

Signal lost. The captain has abandoned the mission.

F.

You

What does F mean?

Robert

I can't keep doing this

You

Robert.

Robert

It's a reference

You

To what?

Robert

One day I'll give you an intensive internet course.

You

I'd rather learn quantum economics.

Robert

That's exactly why you need the course.

And yet, beneath all those jokes, the same silent rule remained. You never texted when Valarr was home.

Never.

The phone disappeared the moment you heard his car entering the driveway. Conversations ended immediately. Notifications were silenced. As though some part of you still believed it needed to remain hidden. Perhaps because you knew it did. Perhaps because you did not want to ask yourself why. And that was precisely why the mistake caught you completely off guard.

That afternoon had been unusually quiet. The children were occupied with their tutors. Valarr was attending a meeting that, according to his schedule, would last well into the evening. You were seated beside one of the library windows while Robert sent an endless stream of ridiculous videos that you barely understood.

Robert

Look at this

THIS IS IMPORTANT.

The video showed a man falling off a treadmill while dramatic music played in the background.

You

Why is this funny?

Robert

Because he fell. Are you blind?

You

That looks painful.

Robert

Oh my God

You're impossible

You

I don't understand the internet

Robert

It shows.

It's fascinating to observe you.

You smiled despite yourself. And kept texting. What you did not notice was the notification that appeared several minutes later.

Val ❤️

How is your afternoon?

The message disappeared beneath the others. Not because you intended to ignore it. You simply did not see it.

The conversation with Robert continued. One meme led to another. One question led to a story. Then came absurd photographs from a conference he was attending and sarcastic commentary about one of the speakers. Time slipped away unnoticed until, eventually, you heard the distant sound of a car entering through the front gates.

Your heart gave a small jump.

Instinctively, you locked the phone. Habit. Always habit.

Valarr arrived home approximately twenty minutes later. You found him at dinner. Impeccably dressed as always. Tired, though attempting to conceal it. Handsome in a way that was almost irritating. The children monopolized much of the conversation, recounting world-changing developments involving lessons, books and sibling disputes.

For a while, everything seemed perfectly normal.

Until dinner ended. That was when he spoke. Not immediately, he punished you with the wait. Not accusingly. Simply when the two of you were finally alone.

“Everything alright this afternoon?”

You looked up. “Of course.”

“Really?” Something in his tone sharpened your attention immediately.

Valarr remained leaning against the back of his chair, watching you with that calm expression that had always been far more difficult to interpret than any open display of anger.

“Why wouldn’t it be?”

“I don’t know.” His voice remained soft.Too soft. “I texted you.”

Understanding hit instantly. The phone. The message.

“I’m sorry.” The apology came quickly. Honestly. “I must have— I must not have seen it.”

Valarr held your gaze for several seconds. “You didn’t see it.”

“No.”

“You were online.” That made you blink. It did not sound like a question. It sounded like a fact.

“I saw that you were online.” The silence that followed was small. Brief. Enough.

For the first time since you had begun talking to Robert, you felt an uncomfortable sting move through your chest. Valarr smiled. He did not look angry. That was precisely what made it unsettling.

“It just seemed strange.”

“I have the right not to answer immediately.” The words left your mouth before you could stop them, and the moment they settled between you, you knew it had been a mistake.

Not because it was untrue. Because it was true. A simple truth. A normal truth. A reasonable truth.

Something shifted in Valarr’s eyes only for an instant. Only a shadow. So brief you could almost have convinced yourself it had never been there. Then it vanished.

“Of course you do.” His smile returned immediately. Perfect. Impeccable. Familiar. “I was only... asking.”

Yet, as the conversation continued and the evening moved forward with apparent normality, an uneasy feeling remained lodged somewhere in the back of your mind. For the first time since you had received that phone, you had the strange impression that Valarr had not merely noticed that you failed to answer.

He had noticed exactly when you didn’t.

—

The gala unfolded with the carefully constructed perfection of events that seemed to exist solely to demonstrate how much money could be spent in a single evening without anyone feeling guilty about it. The main ballroom shimmered beneath a cascade of crystal chandeliers whose reflections multiplied across polished marble floors and champagne glasses held by impeccably manicured hands. An orchestra played soft music from an elevated platform at the far end of the room, subtle enough not to interrupt conversations, elegant enough to constantly remind everyone that this was no ordinary gathering. Business executives, politicians, philanthropists, investors, and heirs drifted between carefully curated groups, exchanging greetings, business cards, and promises with the same ease that other people discussed the weather. Everything smelled of exclusive perfumes, fresh flowers, and old money. Everything was refined. Everything was immaculate. Everything was exactly the sort of environment in which Valarr seemed to breathe with insulting ease.

You, of course, looked exactly as you were supposed to look. The gown had been chosen weeks earlier by a designer whose fees likely equaled the annual salary of many families. The jewelry was understated yet impossibly expensive. Your makeup was flawless. Your hairstyle remained untouched despite the passing hours. The image was irreproachable. The perfect wife. The mother of his children. The elegant figure standing beside him in photographs, magazine covers, and charity events. You had learned to play that role so effortlessly that most people would never suspect the effort it required. You smiled when you were supposed to smile. You listened when you were supposed to listen. You contributed to conversations with precisely the right amount of intelligence and charm. No one saw the cracks. No one saw the exhaustion. No one saw the questions that still lingered in the quietest corners of your mind.

Meanwhile, Valarr moved through the crowd as though he had been born specifically for evenings like this. He greeted people whose names you barely remembered. He carried on simultaneous conversations with executives, investors, and political representatives without ever losing the thread of a single one. He smiled. Charmed. Persuaded. Shined. And yet, even in the middle of all of it, he still found ways to make sure you remained close. A hand briefly settling against the small of your back as you crossed the room. A fleeting brush of his fingers against yours. A quick glance from the opposite side of the ballroom to locate you among the crowd. Small gestures. Familiar gestures. So constant that they had become part of the landscape of your life. Most women would have considered them romantic. You no longer knew what to think of them.

It was during one of those conversations that you met Emma, the woman from the news.

At first, she seemed like just another guest among the dozens of people you were introduced to at events like these. Elegant. Self-assured. Intelligent. The kind of woman who naturally belonged in environments where important decisions were made over exclusive dinners and private meetings. Yet as the conversation progressed and you began listening to her speak about her work, something uncomfortable started stirring inside you.

Emma managed international projects. She traveled constantly. She supervised teams spread across different countries. She spoke casually about negotiations in London, meetings in Singapore, conferences in Berlin, and opportunities in places you had once dreamed of visiting when you were still a student. She did so with the effortless confidence of someone who had built that life herself and was barely aware of how extraordinary it actually was. As you listened to her describe multimillion-dollar contracts, strategic decisions, and flights booked with only a few hours' notice, you began to feel something you could not immediately identify.

Because Emma resembled someone.

Not physically.

Not in the way she dressed.

Not even in the way she spoke.

Emma resembled the person you had once imagined becoming.

The student who stayed awake until three in the morning because she was convinced that one day she would lead important projects. The young woman who had received an impossible international job offer. The girl who had believed the entire world was waiting for her.

Every word that left Emma's lips seemed to open a small window into a life that had ceased to exist before it ever truly began. And the longer you listened, the harder it became to ignore the uncomfortable feeling growing slowly beneath your ribs.

Then Emma smiled. A kind smile. A sincere smile.

And she said something that shattered whatever emotional stability you still had left.

“I’ve always wanted to meet you.”

You blinked lightly. “Me?”

What was so special about you that this woman, so successful, so prosperous, wanted to meet you in person?

“Of course.” Her laugh was soft. “You two are practically a legend.”

The comment drew an automatic smile from you. The polite one. The social smile. The smile you offered when you did not know what else to do.

Emma shook her head gently. “No, I’m serious.” She picked up a champagne glass from a passing tray. “You’re so lucky.”

The statement was so casual that it took you a moment to process it.

“Lucky?”

“Of course.” Emma shrugged. “If a rich, attractive man who was completely in love with me asked me to give up everything to be with him...” She smiled. “I’d do it happily.”

The feeling was immediate.

Like a stone sinking to the bottom of a lake. Heavy. Cold. Inevitable. Emma continued speaking without noticing a thing. To her, it was a compliment. An expression of admiration. A romantic fantasy.

“I mean, look at him.” She discreetly gestured toward the other side of the ballroom. Valarr was surrounded by people. Smiling. Listening. Shining beneath the lights, as always. “There are women who would kill to have a life like that.”

And perhaps that was the worst part. Emma was not being cruel. She was not trying to diminish you. She was not trying to hurt you.

She was just looking at your life from the outside and seeing exactly what everyone else saw. A perfect marriage. A perfect house. A perfect husband. A perfect family. A happy ending.

And suddenly you discovered that the image exhausted you.

For one brief second, you wanted to ask her whether she would still admire that life if she knew what it had cost. Whether she would still call it luck if she understood what it meant to abandon a part of yourself so important that, even years later, it still surfaced in your thoughts when you least expected it. Whether she would still envy you after hearing about the dreams you had buried in order to build that happiness.

But you said nothing. You simply smiled. The same perfect smile. The same smile that had spent years replacing more honest answers. And not long afterward, you found an excuse to leave.

You wandered through the ballroom without any real destination, weaving through clusters of guests you barely registered. The music continued to play. Conversations continued to unfold. Laughter continued to fill the room. Everything remained exactly the same, and yet you felt as though something inside you had shifted slightly out of place. Eventually, you found a nearly empty side terrace, sheltered from the main crowd by enormous glass doors. The night air brushed against your face the moment you stepped outside, and for several seconds you stood perfectly still, trying to recover a composure you did not even understand why you had lost.

Then it happened. Not dramatically. Not spectacularly. You simply realized that you were crying.

Tears slipped silently down your cheeks as you stared at the city lights stretching across the distance. No sobbing. No noise. No visible collapse.

Exactly like university. Exactly like exam season. Those nights when you locked yourself inside a library because the pressure felt unbearable and you could not afford to fall apart in front of anyone.

Those tears. The same ones. And perhaps that was what hurt the most. Because they reminded you of who you had once been. How desperately you had wanted certain things. How fiercely you had fought for them. And how much they still mattered.

You remained there for several minutes. Then you breathed. You wiped your face. You breathed again, and you pulled yourself back together. As you always did. As you always had.

When you finally found Valarr again, he smiled the moment he saw you approaching. That smile disappeared almost immediately.

He knew you far too well, had learned to read even the smallest changes in your expression years ago.

“What is it?” His voice was soft. Concerned. Genuine.

“I don’t want to stay any longer.” The words came out quietly. Controlled. They were enough.

Valarr studied you for only a moment before nodding. He didn’t argue. He didn’t ask questions. He didn’t try to persuade you to remain. He simply extended his hand toward you. “Let’s go.”

And so you did.

The limousine glided through the illuminated avenues while the city drifted past the darkened windows in an endless procession of lights and shadows. For several minutes neither of you spoke. Valarr sat beside you, watching you from the corner of his eye, clearly trying to decide how much he should push. Eventually, he was the one who broke the silence.

“It didn’t seem like a bad evening.”

You didn’t answer.

“Did someone say something?”

Silence.

“Are you alright?”

You kept your gaze fixed on the window. Then he began talking about other things. The children. A meeting scheduled for the following week. A new project. Anything that might fill the silence without forcing you to respond.

And you simply listened.

If you spoke, you risked saying something irreversible. Something you had spent years avoiding. Something that sounded far too much like the truth. Eventually, Valarr fell silent as well. His hand found yours on the seat between you. He held it. Gently. Tenderly. Lovingly.

And as the limousine continued its journey through the darkness, you realized something infinitely more painful than any argument.

Valarr still loved you, more than ever.

And that was precisely why you could not stop wondering whether it was possible to love someone deeply and still miss the person you might have become without them.

—

That night, after the gala, Valarr did not press.

He did not try to pull explanations out of you, nor did he demand that you put into words something you were clearly not ready to name. During the drive home, as the limousine moved through the city's illuminated avenues and golden reflections from the skyscrapers drifted across the darkened windows, he remained beside you in silence. At first, he spoke a few times, asking gentle, cautious questions with that carefully measured patience he tended to adopt whenever he sensed something was hurting you, but every attempt was met with brief, distracted answers—or silence altogether. Eventually, he stopped trying. He understood that you did not want to talk. He understood that any additional words risked pushing you even farther away. So he simply stayed there, occupying the seat beside you, watching you discreetly when he thought you weren't paying attention, while you kept your eyes fixed on the city lights and pretended that the tears shed in that secluded corner of the ballroom no longer existed.

When you arrived home, he didn't ask, either. hat was precisely what made it so difficult to stay angry with him.

Valarr could be controlling. He could be confident. He could be unbearably certain of himself. But he was also capable of recognizing when a wound needed silence more than solutions. Over the years, he had learned to read you with unsettling accuracy. He knew when to argue with you, when to challenge you, and when to simply sit beside you and wait.

That night, he chose to wait.

Later, while the two of you were getting ready for bed, he found you standing in front of the master bathroom mirror, motionless, staring at your reflection without truly seeing it. Your makeup was gone. Your gala dress lay abandoned over a chair. All that remained was the emotional exhaustion left behind by a conversation that should not have meant anything and yet had somehow managed to pry open a crack you had spent years trying to ignore.

You didn't hear him enter.

You only noticed his presence when he appeared behind you and his hands found your waist with the familiarity of someone who had spent more than a decade loving you.

For several seconds, neither of you spoke. He simply stood there, holding you. The weight of his body against your back felt warm. Safe. Familiar.

Home.

Slowly, Valarr rested his chin on your shoulder as he looked at your reflection beside his in the mirror.

"You're thinking too much."

A small, humorless laugh escaped your lips.

"How observant."

His fingers intertwined over your stomach. "I don't want you to be sad."

It should have been a simple sentence. An innocent one. And yet something about it caused the knot you had been carrying in your chest for hours to tighten even further. Because you believed him.

Valarr could make monumental mistakes. He could hurt you. He could suffocate you without realizing it.But you had never doubted that. You had never doubted that he loved you.

His lips brushed your temple. Then your hair. Then your cheek. Small, absent minded kisses. Affectionate. As though he were trying to piece you back together little by little.

"Come to bed."

And you did.

That night, he held you while you slept, one arm wrapped around your waist and the steady rhythm of his breathing warm against the back of your neck, as though he wanted to protect you even from the things he could not understand. For a few hours, it worked. For a few hours, Emma disappeared. The woman you might have become disappeared.

The cage felt like a home again.

Until the phone vibrated at two seventeen in the morning.

The sound was insignificant. Almost imperceptible within the absolute silence of the room. Enough.

Valarr's eyes opened almost immediately. Years of responsibility had trained him to react to any interruption in the night, and for several seconds he remained still in the darkness, trying to identify the source of the noise while the glow of a screen faintly illuminated the bedside table.

Beside him, you remained deeply asleep, your head buried in the pillow, your breathing slow and even, completely unaware.

The phone vibrated again. Valarr frowned slightly. It wasn't normal. Most people who needed to contact you used the house line. Almost nobody texted you at that hour.

Without thinking much about it, he picked up the device. The screen lit up. And the name that appeared was enough to erase every trace of sleep.

Robert.

A new message.

For several seconds, he simply stared at the name. He opened the conversation.

At first, he read calmly.

Then he kept scrolling. And scrolling. And scrolling. The memes. The private jokes. The absurd conversations. The messages exchanged over entire weeks. The little details. The photographs of books. The references that only the two of you understood. The conversations about history. About films. About abandoned dreams. About things you had never mentioned in front of him.

Nothing was explicitly romantic. Nothing constituted an affair. That was precisely why it began to infuriate him. Because this was not desire. It was intimacy. It was trust. It was time. It was a part of you that existed completely outside of him, and Valarr was not accustomed to that.

By the time he finished reading, the expression on his face had become impossible to decipher. Then the phone vibrated again. Another message.

Robert

I'm starting to think your husband has you locked up 😂

Something dark crossed Valarr's face, he slowly turned his head toward you, and woke you up.

"Wake up." You didn't react. "Y/N."

Your brow furrowed slightly. "What...?"you murmured sleepily.

"Wake up."

The restrained hardness in his voice finally pulled you completely out of sleep. You blinked several times. Confused. Disoriented.

And then you saw the illuminated screen held in front of your face. You recognized the chat. Every trace of sleep vanished instantly.

Valarr held your gaze. "Explain it to me."

You slowly sat up. "What are you doing going through my phone?"

"Explain it." He repeated it.

"H-he's my friend."

A short laugh escaped him. There was no humor in it. "Your friend?"

"Yes." The words were spat out awkwardly, unnaturally.

"Interesting. You've never mentioned him."

"Because I knew exactly how you'd react."

Something hardened in his expression. "Like what?"

"Like this." You pointed at the phone. "As if I've done something terrible."

"And what exactly am I supposed to think?"

"Think that I have a friend."

"One you text every day?"

"Yes."

"One you keep hidden?"

"I didn't hide him!" Your voice rose a fraction.

"I had to find out at two in the morning, my love. If that isn't a secret, I don't know what it is."

The silence that followed was heavy. Uncomfortable. Valarr stood and began pacing across the room, he needed to vent this anger. He would vent it or it would explode on you like the tide against the sand.

"What does he have that I don't?" The question sounded sincere. Too sincere.

"This isn't a competition—"

"Then explain what it is." You stared at him for several seconds. Then you answered.

"He listens to me."

Valarr went rigid. "I listen to you."

"Do you? Really?" Your voice began to harden. "Then tell me when the last time was that you asked me what I wanted to do with my life."

That silenced him.

"Y/N..."

"No. Answer me." He opened his mouth, then closed it again. He had no answer.

"I don't work."

"Because you don't need to."

"I have no independence."

"You have everything."

"That's not the same thing."

"You have this house."

"It isn't mine."

"You have security."

"It isn't freedom—"

"You have a family."

"And I love them." Your voice trembled. "I love them more than anything, I love our children, I love their chaotic laughter and the boys' debates." Silence settled between you. "... But I lost myself too."

Those words seemed to strike him physically, they were the only words he had never wanted to hear.

"Is that really what you think?"

"I think I've spent years trying not to." For the first time since the argument began, Valarr looked away.

"Everything I've done has been for you." He revealed the truth so that you would come closer to scrutinize it. So that you would approach it with a magnifying glass and, with the utmost care, discover the truth.

"I know."

"Everything."

"I know."

"Then why does it sound as if I'm the villain in your story?" The question hung between you, heavy and suffocating. "Do you know what bothers me the most?" he continued. "The way you talk as if I'm the one who took something from you. As if I'm responsible for everything you regret. You accepted the ring. You chose the wedding date. You—"

"Valarr..."

"No. You listen to me for once." He pointed the phone at you.

"I gave you everything. The house. The children. Security. Opportunities. A life most people will never have." He moved closer to the bed, his anger carefully restrained.

"I never said you didn't."

"You act like none of it matters." His eyes dropped to the screen. Then he read aloud. "'Sometimes I think you would've been incredible running a company. You have that kind of mind.'"

Your stomach dropped.

"'You have that kind of mind,'" he repeated slowly. "Is that what you want to hear? That you could've conquered the world?"

"Stop doing this."

"Doing what?"

"Turning it into something it isn't."

"What I see is a man telling my wife exactly what she wants to hear. Looking for approval."

"He's my friend—"

"He's a man."

"That doesn't mean anything."

"Of course it means something." The response came immediately. "Men don't spend weeks listening to a married woman's problems for no reason."

Your eyes locked onto his. "Do you hear yourself?"

"I'm being realistic."

"No. You're being insulting."

"I'm telling the truth."

"What truth, Valarr?" you demanded, meeting his gaze. "That women can't have friends?"

"I didn't say that."

"You implied it."

"I'm saying you're naïve."

Naïve.

The word landed between you. Again. The same word from the Aegon Foundation ball. The same superiority. The same constant need to correct you.

"Do you know what the real problem is?" you asked at last. "Every time I try to talk about something that hurts me, you end up reminding me of everything you've given me. Not because you want to understand me. Because you want me to feel guilty."

For the first time, something faltered in his expression. Only for a moment. Then he answered.

"Because you should be grateful."

The silence that followed was absolute. He seemed to realize what he had just said a second later. Too late. You were still staring at him as though you were looking at a stranger.

"You owe all of this to me," he continued. "This entire life. The house. The name. The opportunities. The stability. The security."

Each word sounded worse than the last. Crueler. More honest. Closer to something that had been buried for far too long.

"Without me, Y/N, you wouldn't have any of this."

Your breathing became uneven. He kept talking.

"Without me, you wouldn't have this house. You wouldn't have this position. You wouldn't have this life." Then came the final blow. "Without me..." His voice dropped into something cold and terrible. "You wouldn't be who you are, I built you" Something inside you broke. "You chose to be with me, Y/N," he said. "You let me put a ring on your finger. You accepted my name. You said yes when the priest asked whether you would take me as your husband."

The tears continued to slide down your cheeks as you tried uselessly to wipe them away. Every time you brushed one aside, another seemed to take its place immediately. The exhaustion of entire years felt lodged inside your chest, crushing everything beneath its unbearable weight.

It wasn't just Robert anymore. Or Emma. Or even the argument you had just had. It was something larger. Something older. Something that had been growing in silence for far too long. Valarr watched you for several seconds from the other side of the room. He was still angry.

You could see it in the way he refused to look away from you, as though doing so might mean losing control of something. You could see it in the tension of his jaw, in the stiffness of his shoulders, in the measured rhythm of his breathing as he forced himself to remain calm when he clearly wasn't.

Finally, he crossed the distance between you. He did it suddenly, as though remaining still for one more second had become impossible. You instinctively stepped backward until the edge of the mattress struck the backs of your legs. Valarr stopped in front of you.

Too close, invading a space he normally respected when he was angry. The argument still burned between you. You could see it in the tension of his shoulders, in the way his jaw tightened, and in the fixed stare that never left your face.

When you tried to move around him, he stepped in the same direction.

He didn't touch you, but he didn't let you escape the conversation either.

"Valarr." His name came out exhausted.

That was when his hands found your arms and he pulled you into a sudden embrace. Not careful. An embrace that was too tight, too desperate, as though he were trying to convince himself that you were still there.

You immediately tensed.

Valarr felt it. Of course he did. And yet he didn't let go. Not when you pushed against him. He rested his forehead against your hair and closed his eyes "What am I supposed to do?" he murmured, his voice rough with exhaustion. "Because I don't know what else to give you anymore." His arms remained around you as he continued speaking, each word more vulnerable than the last. "I've tried to give you everything. Everything I thought would make you happy." He whispered against your hair. "But there's still hope. "You've always been stubborn. You were in college," he inhaled from your hair, drawing in your scent. "That's why I fell in love with you, because of your stubbornness. Your inexhaustible denial of scarcity, your hunger for more, your... Your sharp rejection."

Suddenly, almost at the same level as that unexpected embrace, he placed his palm on your neck, and with a movement as deliberate as it was abrupt, he turned your face toward the large mirror beside the bed. You saw everything. How the anger still inhabited his body, the weight he imposed on yours, the fear that accompanied your features. "No please, no, no Valarr—" The hand on your neck moved over your mouth with a thrust. A plaintive whimper tried to escape your lips. It couldn't.

"Keep it to yourself. I've heard enough from you and your bitchy behavior." His other hand lifted your nightgown. You didn't make the mistake of resisting; you learned long ago that it wasn't worth it. You cried as you always did since that time in his car on graduation day: silently. His digits pressed against your clothed intimacy, awakening worldly sensations in your core. You could see it.

He didn't bother to remove the fabric. Just folded it to one side, a finger abruptly entering your sex, thrusting against your rubbery walls. Tears streamed from your cheeks into the palm of his hand. Again and again and again you felt his fingers slide in and out of you. You couldn't complain. You weren't going to complain. You just needed to take it, that's what you'd done from the beginning. "Look at yourself," he said, pressing your face against the mirror. Strong. Needy. "Robert will never have this. He doesn't love you. He loves what he thinks you represent, "The successful girl from college, The brightest mind on campus. The promise" grazed your clitoris with his thumb, your pussy squeezed his finger. "You're not that girl anymore. You're my wife."

He withdrew his finger from your hole, now wet with sexual instinct, not desire or arousal. He lowered his pants and boxers to his thighs, just enough to free his erect cock. He brought his hips closer, and the rubbing against your sex served as medicine for his desire. Those eyes, so different and kind, were pools of primal desire. "I love you... God, how I love you" He confessed against your lips. "Don't make this any harder for both of us."

He entered. His cock fitting inside you. It felt just like he always wanted it to, wet, tight, and undeniably his. While he was thrusting into your very being, your eyes were fixed on the reflection in the mirror. Life was an eternal paradox, you thought.

A few years ago, you sensed it in his lingering glances as he walked through the university hallways. In how he condemned you after the student council president election. It was there when you rejected him under the moonlight. It spoke after your conversation with Robert at the Aegon Foundation ball. Reflections don't lie, and now, with the indelible image in front of you as his hips slammed against you, you saw it.

You could see the monster you had for a husband. Tangible.

As tangible as the life he took from you.

[annaevermore]

Lady Knight — Prologue

Pairing: Aerion Targaryen x betrothed!fem!reader

Summary: After Aerion's betrothed disappears just a few weeks before their arranged wedding, conveniently enough, a mysterious knight appears at the tournament in Ashford.

Tags/warnings: arranged wedding, mentions of misogyny

A/N: First time writing for Aerion (and for akotsk in general) so I'm kinda nervous. For the sake of the story, I made up a whole new House and island because I can! It is inspired by Renaissance Florence, Babylon and Ancient Rome. English is not my first language. Enjoy!

series masterlist | masterlist

"I shall not marry him."

Your voice reverberated through the walls of the grand palace of House Aurelium, making a few servants stop in their tracks and share some preoccupied looks among themselves, before deciding that the wisest thing to do was to ignore the raised voices altogether.

Behind the heavy wooden doors, you were engaged in a rather heated argument with your father. It wasn't an uncommon occurrence — both of you being known all across Aurelia Isle for your fiery tempers — only this time the pair of you seemed more determined than ever.

"The matter is not up to discussion. An agreement has already been reached with Prince Maekar, and it would not be sage to scorn a Targaryen."

"You cannot do this to me, father. He's mad. Everyone knows it, even across two seas."

Warm tears were gathering in your eyes, and when they finally spilled, it wasn't dainty. The salty drops looked more like a stormy sea, and you hoped that the pathetic scene unfolding right under his watchful gaze would make your father sympathize with you. Maybe the Gods, too.

Aerion Targaryen — or Brightflame, as he refers to himself — had quite the reputation, even in Aurelia Isle, an island in the Jade Sea, three moons of travel away from the Seven Kingdoms.

From the tales you've heard from merchants and diplomats, he believes himself to be a dragon in human form, which had always amused you — like every man-made foolery. But being betrothed to him made it less of a jape to you, and more of a reason to be concerned about your future.

The fire that was burning behind your father's eyes — so similar to your own — seemed to weaken, and for barely a moment, you allowed yourself to believe you had convinced him to break off the wedding.

But like all dreams, it eventually came to an end.

"I will not change my mind, but don't believe, not even for a second, that I'm doing this out of hatred, my sweet child."

He took a step closer to you, and gently lulled you into his arms, just like he used to do when you would scrape your knees as a babe.

You didn't let his behavior fool you, because you knew exactly why he was so compliant when he accepted the marriage proposal without even consulting you.

All he ever wanted was prestige. That's what every great lord of House Aurelium always wanted. Your ancestors spent many ages being patrons of the Arts and the Sciences, trying to elevate themselves intellectually and spirituality. It came to no surprise to you that your father gleamed at the prospect of one of his daughters marrying a man that has dragon blood running through his veins.

There was also another reason both of you couldn't ignore.

In the past, you've made it particularly hard for your father to find you a respectable husband. It is not like you were against marriage altogether, but you wanted it to blossom out of mutual respect and sincere love.

Your father had to think about the future of the House, though, and so he did, trying to get you to marry a lord of a nearby island, completely ignoring your protests when you found out how old the man was.

So, when he wouldn't listen to you, you took matters into your own hands, behaving like an savage during your first official visit, and resembling a smug minx when your father announced that the betrothal had been ended, respecting the other lord's wishes.

Your father tried again, and again, but each time you would find an increasingly creative method to drive away each man he found for you.

Not long after, you didn't have to lift a finger: your reputation preceded you.

So, it would not be absurd to think that this betrothal was, in a sick and twisted way, his punishment for all of the hardships you had put him through.

"You are most certainly not doing this out of love," you spat, freeing yourself from his arms and storming out of the room, becoming deaf to his deep voice calling after you.

You had no destination in mind when you exited the council room, but your body seemed to know exactly what would sooth your nerves.

The gardens of the palace are believed to be the most magnificent of the island, and you had to agree.

They were so vast, it was hard to see where they ended. A multitude of exotic flowers could be found within its perimeter, thanks to all of the foreign merchants that dock in the island's bay. But, most importantly, the garden is also the place where all of the members of the House have been trained to swordfight.

Once your feet had brought you near the stables, you stopped, looking as determined as ever.

"Squire," you called out, firm but not unkind, "fetch me my sword and a worthy opponent."

The young boy looked petrified as he looked around, even more so when he realized he was the only one there.

"M-M'lady, all of the other squires are not here..." he mumbled, avoiding looking at you in the eyes.

"You shall be my opponent, then," you simply stated.

He looked at your attire — a pretty silk dress in your favorite color — and you could tell what he was thinking, your face breaking into the first smile since the meeting with your father took place.

"Are you afraid to lose against a lady in a pretty gown, boy?"

The squire seemed at loss of words, unsure whether or not you were jesting. After you raised one of you eyebrows, expectant, he seemed to exit the trance he was in, and shook his head, before running to fetch both of your swords.

The difference between the two is stark: his is simple, probably his first one, while yours has been crafted by the best blacksmith of the island, and was polished regularly, reflecting the early morning sun.

You took your places, standing at a careful distance, and you could already feel your muscles release the tension they had been holding ever since you heard the news of your betrothal.

"May the most courageous fighter win," you said, and before the young squire could even think of uttering a reply, you struck first.

He managed to move out of the way just in time — not that you would have actually hurt him on purpose — and lunged forward as well, but there was no real heat behind his movements.

He was clearly holding back.

You were able do fend off all of his strikes, but he was struggling to do the same with yours. Although your muscles began to ache, in the best way possible, your movements remained fluid, as if the steal were just an extension of your body.

Deciding to take the young boy out of his misery, as he was clearly finding it increasingly difficult to keep up with your pace, you flicked your hand with a quick movement, and when he lost hold of his sword, you gracefully placed the tip of yours against his jugular.

"You'll make a fine knight one day," you said with a warm smile, which crashed harshly with the coolness of the blade against his skin.

He thanked you, with trembling lips, before retrieving his sword and walking away in a hurry, disappearing inside the stables.

You looked down at the blade in your hand and saw your reflection. Behind your eyes laid a fire, and you won't let your father, or worse, Aerion Targaryen, quench it.

In that moment, you knew what you had to do. Your reflection shifted, a smirk adorning your face, as your mind raced, planning your next move.

Three moons passed before the day of your arrival at Summerhall finally came.

The servants had been running around for many days now, working in order to make the castle look the best it ever has.

House Aurelium had quiet the reputation. It is whispered that they posses an amount of wealth that would make even the greatest Houses of Westeros pale in comparison. Not only that, but some scholars believe them to be the possessors the most extensive knowledge in all of humankind.

Their homeland — Aurelia Isle — is described as grand and magnificent, with breathtaking architectures and sublime landscapes.

All of this information, though, is surrounded by a thick cloud of mystery, some even believing that the island is just the product of tales and myths.

The distance and the difficulty to make information travel to and from Aurelia Isle made it the perfect place for Prince Maekar to look for a wife for his son, Aerion.

No Lord in the Seven Kingdoms would consciously give his daughter away to a man such as the Bright Prince — tales of his cruelness traveling fast enough to make finding a suitable woman a difficult mission.

But then, during a council meeting, one of the diplomats of King's Landing mentioned Aurelia Isle and the Lord currently governing it. He talked about House Aurelium and their oddities, such as the fact that they let peasants study and women fight.

Maekar scoffed. A Lord only gives this much freedom to his subject if he's not strong enough to subdue them.

But then, the diplomat mentioned the difficulties Lord Aurelium was facing while trying to find a suitor for his daughter. Immediately, the prince's attention was captured, and that very same day, he wrote a letter to your father, proposing an alliance between the blood of the dragon and the rulers of the Jade Sea.

Aerion, predictably, was unhappy with the decision, offended not only by the fact the woman his father had chosen for him was not of Valyrian descent, but also because you were the daughter of a mere lord, no matter how grand the realm.

The portrait of you he had been shown depicted a bland woman, the only detail worthy of notice was the sward dangling by your side, resting on the soft material of the gown you were wearing.

You would arrive with your head full of wicked ideas, he was sure. He would have to remind you that from the moment you will be married to him, you will become a Targaryen princess, and shall behave like such.

Now he is standing outside of the grand entrance doors, alongside his family. Maekar in particular is looking particularly pleased — a rare look for him — at the prospect of finally tying down his arrogant son, and possibly making him less cruel and reckless.

All of them are wearing their best clothes, the Targaryen colors standing out against the white-clad forms of the king's guards standing strong behind them.

In the distance, the sound of horses and carriages approaching can be heard, and unconsciously, Aerion stands a little taller and moves his head a little higher. His intent is to show you how powerful he is — a real dragon — and certainly not to impress you, the lady he couldn't help but be intrigued by, despite still believing wholly that you could not be a good enough wife for him.

The horses approaching are mighty creatures, with shiny coats and braided manes. The carriages are no less beautiful, made of the best materials and hand painted with intricate decors, making them look like painting.

Slowly, they come to a stop. 

First, the guards exit, positioning themselves as to form two parallel lines, one at each side of the door of what must be your carriage. Then, some ladies in waiting follow, standing at the side and subtlety eyeing the Targaryens, trying to get a good look at King Baelor, Prince Maekar, and, obviously, your betrothed.

Finally, a trumpet fanfare rings out loud, and a booming voice declares:

"Hear ye, hear ye! Y/n of House Aurelium!" 

It seems like time halts for a moment as a guard reaches for the door and opens the carriage. Everyone is waiting for you to come out, the man's hand remaining stretched to help you descent out of the carriage.

Another moment passes, and you have yet to make your appearance. The ladies begin to murmur among themselves, and the guards share a quick concerned look. 

Aerion begins to grow impatient, and Maekar has a terrible, terrible feeling.

One of the guards finally gathers the courage to sneak a glance inside the carriage, but when he turns back, he looks as if he had seen an horrifying creature. 

Another man does the same, and like a wildfire, panic reached each member of your court.

"What is the matter?" Maekar asks, already bracing for the worst.

The guards share a look, unsure on how to proceed.

"Tell us!" Aerion orders, ready to go and take a look himself, but halting at the feeling of his father's hand on his shoulder.

"Lady Aurelium, she..." 

"She what?" 

A gulp.

"She disappeared!" 

A/N: This was the fic! Reblogs and comments are always appreciated, even if it's criticism (as long as it's constructive). I love talking with you angels, so my dms and inbox are always open!

All the love, Anna ♡

[louloucake]

things you do for love ⌖⁺‧ ₊ pt. 2

stalker!ex-boyfriend!aerion x reader pt. 1

-18+, slight CNC, p in v, unprotected sex, non consensual sex, mentions of m!maserbation, graphic depictions of violence murder, references to domestic abuse, toxic relationship, obsessive behavior from aerion ofc, kidnapping, possessive behavior!! soryyy ab any spelling mistakes ᥫ᭡

he had you pinned in the mud, your breath hitching in your throat as he loomed over you. you kicked at his shin, screaming for him to let you go, but he just gripped your arm and hauled you up. you stumbled on the wet grass as he dragged you toward the truck parked by the driveway.

"n- no please, let me go, please, please aerion!" you shrieked, thrashing against his grip. "i-i just want to go home!"

he didn't care that your nails were digging into his forearm or that you were sobbing. he opened the passenger door and shoved you inside, his hand rough on your shoulder to keep you from getting out.

you scrambled backward, pressing yourself into the seat. he slammed the door, and then, before you could do anything about it, he reached over and engaged the deadbolt with a heavy click.

you stared at the lock, your chest heaving. "w-what are you doing? unlock it!"

he didn't answer. instead, he walked around to the driver's side, his footsteps heavy and unbothered by the puddles soaking his boots. he opened the driver door momentarily to speak face to face with you calmly.

"listen to me," he said, his voice low and dangerous. "i'm going inside. i'm going to grab your stuff. then we're leaving."

he didn't wait for an answer.

he slammed the door and turned on his heel and walked around the hood of the truck. the rain soaked his hair instantly, plastering the dark strands to his forehead. you watched him go, your breath hitching in your throat, your hands gripping the leather of the door handle so hard your knuckles turned white.

your fingers scrambling to work the lock. you jiggled the handle, pulled it, pushed it- nothing. the mechanism was solid, deadlocked from the outside. you were sealed in. you were trapped.

you pressed your palms against your eyes, trying to force yourself to wake up from whatever nightmare had folded itself around you, but the pressure only made the heat behind your lids worse. blood. mud. the smell of wet earth and metal and him. it clung to you in layers you could not peel away.

when the passenger door opened again, you jolted so hard your shoulder knocked against the seat.

aerion climbed back in with your bag slung over one shoulder and a bundled armful of your things held carefully against his chest as if they were breakable. his hair was dripping. water ran from the hem of his shirt in little dark streams, pattering onto the seat. he shut the door behind him with that same maddening control and set everything down between you and the dashboard without a word.

he reached for the ignition. the engine caught low and rough, a growl rolling through the truck. the windshield wipers started their slow sweep, cutting the rain into pieces.

the drive was a blur of dark roads and wet headlights and the unbearable knowledge that he had made this decision for both of you and had not once considered turning back. the city passed in smeared lights. the houses became fewer, farther apart, and then the roads narrowed into the part of town where the trees leaned close over the pavement and the pavement glistened black under the rain.

you stayed rigid the whole way, arms locked around yourself, staring ahead as if you could force your mind elsewhere by sheer refusal. but every so often, when the truck slowed for a turn or rolled over a dip in the road, you felt his hand near yours, not touching, only hovering for a second before withdrawing again as though he were reminding himself not to grip too hard.

that unsettled you more than if he had.

when he finally pulled into his driveway, the apartment rose out of the dark with its porch light burning over the steps. he cut the engine, and the sudden silence rang in your ears.

“stay here,” he said.

his jaw tightened, though the expression vanished almost at once. he opened his door, rain flooding in, and disappeared into the night. this time, he did not lock you in. the knowledge should have comforted you. instead it only made the trap feel larger, because now the choice was yours and you still had nowhere to go.

you sat there with your hand on the door handle, heart pounding so violently it made you nauseous. through the windshield, you could see him moving up the porch steps, carrying your things inside with the same careful precision he might have used with an offering. there was something almost unbearable in the gentleness of it.

then he came back for you.

he opened the passenger door and held out his hand.

you did not take it.

aerion looked at you for a long moment, rain mixed with dried blood sliding down his cheekbones, the porch light cutting gold across the sharp line of his mouth. then, instead of forcing the issue, he simply said, “come inside before you freeze.”

“i’d rather freeze.”

something flickered in his eyes at that, a brief, darkened spark, “i’ll drag you in if i have to.”

your hands were numb. your clothes clung to you in cold, miserable weight. every breath you took felt wet and shallow. but pride kept you rooted to the seat, stubborn and shaking.

aerion bent slightly, close enough that you could smell rain and iron and the faint clean bite of soap from earlier that day. “i’m not asking you to trust me right away,” he said quietly. “i’m asking you not to make this harder than it already is.”

you wanted to spit at him. wanted to scream. wanted to claw at the calm in his voice until it split open. instead you only stared, breath hitching.

he waited.

when you did not move, he leaned in, slipped one arm behind your knees and the other under your back, and lifted you out of the truck as if you weighed nothing at all.

you gasped at the shock of it, your hands flying to his shoulders on instinct, outrage and helplessness colliding so hard it left you breathless. but he did not give you time to fight him. he carried you up the steps, through the doorway, and into the warm dim of the apartment while rainwater dripped from both of you and tracked a wet trail over the polished floor.

he shut the door with his foot and kept going, not toward a bedroom, not toward anything you could have predicted, but toward the kitchen, where the overhead light glowed softly over the counters and the sink.

you stiffened as he set you down on the edge of the counter. the granite was cold beneath you. your legs swung uselessly, still not quite steady enough to support you.

aerion stepped back just enough to look at you.

for the first time since he had hauled you out of the mud, his expression shifted into something almost careful. he reached up and brushed a damp strand of hair off your face, his fingers stopping at your temple for a single, brief second. then he turned away before you could flinch.

“i’m getting a towel,” he said.

you watched him cross to the hall closet and return with one thrown over his shoulder, along with a clean shirt of his and a small first-aid kit from one of the drawers by the sink. the sight of it made your stomach twist. he noticed the movement in your face and did not comment on it.

instead, he set the kit down, folded the towel in his hands, and stepped between your knees.

the first touch of the towel against your cheek made you jerk. he paused at once, eyes lifting to yours, waiting. when you did not pull away, he resumed with agonizing patience, blotting the blood and rain from your skin, your jaw, your neck. his hands were steady. so steady. he wiped away the streaks of mud near your ear, the rain from your lashes…

you stayed silent in shock, because there was nothing in you that knew how to name what was happening.

his thumb brushed the underside of your chin, tilting your face up so he could dry the blood at your lip. you tasted copper still. he saw it too, and something unreadable tightened in his eyes.

“are you hurt?” he asked.

you swallowed hard. “don’t.”

his hand stilled. “don’t what?”

“don’t talk to me like that.” your voice broke on the last word, anger and fear made it tremble.

for a moment he said nothing. rain tapped softly at the kitchen windows. somewhere in the apartment, a floorboard creaked under the settling weight of the night.

then aerion reached for the towel again, as though he had heard you and chosen not to answer the part of it that mattered. “take this off,” he said, nodding at your wet tank top. “it’s soaked through.”

you recoiled. “no.”

his gaze moved over you, “then you’ll sit in it until it dries cold against your skin. your choice.”

he stood there unflinching, one hand resting on the counter beside your thigh, the other holding the folded shirt. not touching. not forcing. just waiting in a way that felt somehow worse than being shoved.

your fingers moved stiffly at the hem of your top. humiliation burned through you as you peeled the wet fabric from your skin, one slow, miserable motion at a time. aerion looked away immediately, sweet enough still to give you some privacy, and handed you the clean shirt without comment. it smelled just like him, it was too large, too warm, but you pulled it on with shaking hands.

“done.” you whispered when you looked up again, then he lifted the towel and began drying your hair best he could.

you had expected force. expected impatience. expected him to pin your wrists or bark at you to hold still. instead he worked slowly, section by section, which made your stomach ache with confusion.

it was too much. it unsettled the angry, defensive coil in your gut, confusing you so thoroughly that you forgot where you were for a split second. why was he being like this?

jumped off the counter before you could overthink it, your feet slipping on the linoleum, and well- you didn't go far- just three stumbling steps toward the hallway.

panic was a visceral thing, a cold spike in your veins, and you needed distance.

before you could take another breath, a strong hands closed around your waist.

his grip was iron, hot and unrelenting. you twisted, trying to pull free, but he was already hauling you back, his momentum carrying you off your feet. you let out a sharp, startled yelp as he spun you around, his arm banding across your waist to lift you effortlessly.

"no! let go!" you thrashed, kicking your legs. he was too strong.

with a grunt that sounded more like effort than exertion, he hauled you up and tossed you over his shoulder. the world tilted violently. you hung there like a sack, your stomach lurching as he turned and strode toward the bedroom.

the hallway spun by in a blur of motion. you tried to claw at his back, tried to lever yourself up, but he shifted his stance slightly, holding you firm, and the world spun again.

the door slammed against the wall with a heavy thud that vibrated through the floorboards, echoing in the small room. you were tossed onto the mattress, the springs groaning under your weight as you bounced once. the linens were cool against your skin, a stark contrast to the feverish heat of his body hovering over you.

he didn't step back. he stepped between your knees, looming large, blocking out the moonlight from the window. his shadow fell over you completely, a dark, suffocating blanket that made your breath hitch. he looked down at you, his jaw tight, his eyes dark and unreadable.

"we don’t have time to play around." he said, his voice low and rough, like gravel grinding together. he reached out, but instead of touching you gently, his hand settled heavily on your shoulder, pinning you to the mattress. “listen to me, i’m trying to protect you.”

you tried to squirm, trying to create space, but his grip was iron. "let me go," you breathed, your heart hammering against your ribs like a trapped bird.

"if you keep behaving like this," he said, his voice dropping an octave, dangerous and sweet all at once, "if you keep running from me- giving me fucking attitude when all i've been is patient, then i’ll have no choice but to correct your behavior. do you understand me?"

the threat hung in the air, thick and heavy. it was a promise of dominance, of being pinned until you submitted. and it terrified you, but there was a strange, traitorous part of you that wanted him to do it. wanted him to take control so you didn't have to think anymore.

it hurt him to see you so terrified of him. it killed him to see you flinch. but he knew he couldn't coddle you. he couldn't be sweet and soft right now, because that was what you expected, and that was what you ran from.

"i don't want to scare you," he whispered, his thumb tracing the line of your cheekbone, the touch agonizingly gentle. "but i can't have you running away, baby."

he moved then, settling his weight between your legs, his hips pressing against yours. he felt huge, overwhelming. he looked down at you with a mixture of desperation and calculation in his eyes.

he knew he was being unfair.

but he also knew that he needed to tie you down, literally and figuratively, before you could drive yourself crazy.

“let me take care of you."

he didn't wait for a verbal confirmation, his hands already moving with that familiar, frustrating expertise to the waistband of your shorts. he pulled them down slowly, the denim rough against your skin, but his touch was reverent, almost gentle, as he stripped the wet fabric away and tossed it aside.

"let me take care of you, baby" he said again, his voice a low rumble that vibrated through the mattress.

he settled lower, his chest pressing against your thighs, and you felt the heat radiating from him. he traced the line of your hip bone with his thumb, his eyes dark and focused. then he leaned in.

the first kiss landed on the sensitive skin of your inner thigh, just above the knee. it was so soft, tentative. but as he moved upward, he didn't miss the smear of dried blood on your skin from where you’d probably been cut earlier. his lips brushed over it, lingering.

it was disgusting. it was intimate. it was a mess.

your hands gripping the sheets so hard your knuckles turned white.

he moved further up, his lips trailing a path of fire along your trembling thigh. when he reached the apex of your legs, he looked up at you from beneath his lashes. his eyes were dark, dilated, and filled with a hunger that terrified you as much as it excited you.

his hands slid to the elastic of your panties. he didn't pull them down all the way immediately; instead, he hooked his fingers inside them, pulling the fabric down just enough to expose you to the cool air. then, he pressed a kiss to your soft pussy lips.

your brain was fried, completely overloaded. you couldn't think, couldn't parse the situation. you were laying there with your boyfriend…ex-boyfriend's…cal’s blood drying on your skin. it was gross. it was wrong…..

he unzipped his pants, the sound loud and sharp in the quiet room, and palmed his aching hard cock through his boxers. the sight of it made your breath hitch, the sheer size of him promising a stretch that you weren't sure you could accommodate.

panic flared hot in your chest, a sharp counterpoint to the arousal thundering in your veins.

you scrambled back on the bed on pure instinct, using the last of your strength to put distance between you. but he was faster. his hand shot out, fingers hooking around your heel with a bruising grip, and he didn't hesitate—he hauled you back toward him with a rough, impatient jerk of his arm.

his dark eyes tracked you, hungry and possessive.

"some girls just need to be fucked out to relax," he murmured, his voice rough with need as he kicked his pants and boxers down, his cock springing free, heavy and thick.

you opened your mouth to protest, to say that you were tired, that you were broken, that cal's blood was still clinging to you like a reminder of what you lost, but he cut you off with a kiss pressed against your cheek, soft and apologetic.

"and i'm sorry," he whispered against your skin, his hand tightening in your hair to hold your head still. "i'm so so sorry. it hurts me more than it hurts you…."

he lined himself up, the pinkish red head of his cock nudging against your slick folds. there was no preamble, no patience left in him.

“aerion- w-wait no no-”

he pressed forward, sheathing himself inch by agonizing inch until he was buried deep inside you, stretching you wide and filling you completely. the intrusion was sharp, a burn that made you arch your back, you tried to squirm away, to escape the overwhelming sensation, but he was already there, holding you down with the weight of his body, pinning you to the mattress as he began to move.

the rhythm was fast and brutal, a desperate attempt to drive the confusion and pain right out of your system. burying himself to the hilt with a groan that sounded almost pained. the dry blood from her earlier injury was being ground into the sheets, sticky and uncomfortable, smeared across your skin and likely onto his as well.

as he moved he leaned down to kiss your cheek.

“sh sh sh,” he murmured against your skin, the sound vibrating through you as he thrust harder. “it’s okay. just breathe. i’ve got you-”

you couldn't breathe. you couldn't process the sensation of him filling you so completely while the ghost of the boy who died was still drying on your skin. it was too much. the tears finally spilled over, hot and stinging, and you tried to scramble away, to put distance between your bodies, but he anchored you down with a hand on your hip, holding you firm.

“y-you're scaring me-” you gasped out between sobs, your fingernails digging into his shoulders. “i don't want it like this-”

he didn't stop. he didn't even slow down. he leaned down and pressed a kiss to your forehead, his face softening just a fraction.

“yes you do,” he growled low in his throat, his voice rough and husky, claiming the space he occupied. “i know you do. i can feel it. you still love me…always be my girl.”

he pressed a kiss to the corner of your mouth, tasting the salt of your tears and the copper tang of his own sweat. "d-don't you feel how much i need you?" he rolled his hips again, harder this time, driving the point home with a groan that was half-pain, half-pleasure. "i know it hurts baby- but i'm here- m’right here. just relax baby…”

he laced your fingers together, forcing your hand down between your legs, guiding your fingers to the swollen bundle of nerves. "show me. make it feel good. just how you like it."

you couldn't help the small, broken sob that escaped your lips as your fingers found the slick heat between your thighs. "a-aerion, i... i can't..." you stammered.

he leaned in, his lips brushing against your ear, "you can," he whispered, his voice rough and commanding. "you will. you're going to feel good, and you're going to cum, and you're going to let me take care of you. you're going to let me make it all better."

you felt your fingers move on their own, following the rhythm he knew so well, the friction building up, a coil tightening in your belly that had nothing to do with fear and everything to do with the way he was looking at you, the way he was touching you, the way he was filling you up.

"god, i remember," he groaned, his hips stuttering slightly, the sensation of your tight walls milking him making his eyes roll back. "i used to watch you touch yourself through your little panties when you didn't think i was looking...watching you rub your little clit, moaning my name... i would get so hard i'd have to jack off in the car after dropping you home."

you felt a flush spread across your cheeks, a mix of embarrassment and arousal. "you... you watched me?" you whispered, your voice barely audible.

he nodded, his eyes dark and hungry. "fuck- i couldn't help it. i wanted you so bad. i still do." he pressed a kiss to the corner of your mouth, his lips lingering. "i still want you, baby. i still need you. i still love you."

you felt a tear slip down your cheek, a mix of happiness and sadness and something else, something that felt a lot like hope. "i- love you too," you whispered, your voice breaking.

"shhh... i know baby" he soothed, kissing your tears away, his own breath coming in short, sharp gasps. "that's it. gooood girl."

and then it happened. a sob broke free, but it morphed into a loud, wanton moan as you rubbed yourself frantically against your little pearl. the pleasure spiked, sharper than the pain, and your fingernails dug into his biceps, leaving red crescents as you held on for dear life.

the white-hot wave of your orgasm crashed through you, shattering the last of your defenses. your body went rigid for a heartbeat before going boneless, a ragdoll finally untethered from the fight.

you cried out his name, a broken sob swallowed by his mouth as he didn't stop, didn't miss a beat. he used your release to drive himself harder, faster, chasing his own climax with a frenzied rhythm that seemed determined to erase every thought, every fear, and every memory of the boy who wasn't there.

but as the intensity peaked and began to fade, aerion slowed. his movements became slower, deeper, more deliberate. he watched you, his dark eyes softening as he noticed the tension leaving your shoulders, the way your breathing evened out. you were pliant now, sleepy and loose beneath him, and he seemed to savor the change.

“there we go,” he whispered against your skin, his voice a gentle hum now, completely at odds with the roughness of moments ago. “let go, baby. just let go and fall asleep. i’ve got you. you’re safe here.”

“you’re not going to be scared and alone anymore. i’m not going anywhere….”

the steady beat of his heart against your chest, the warmth of his body surrounding you, the feeling of being completely full of him- it was a drug, a sedative that overrode the panic. the darkness in your mind crept in, gentle and tired.

“just sleep,” he murmured, his voice fading into the background as the exhaustion finally won. “i’m here.”

the last thing you felt was the weight of him, anchoring you to the earth, and then, finally, nothing but the sweet, heavy silence of sleep.

you woke slowly, surfacing through layers of heavy sleep that clung to your body like wet cloth. for a few moments, nothing made sense. the steady vibration beneath you. the low hum of an engine. the strange warmth wrapped around your shoulders.

then your eyes opened, darkness stretched beyond the windows, headlights swept across the road ahead.

you sat upright so fast the movement caught his attention immediately. he glanced over from the driver's seat before returning his eyes to the road. "easy."

you looked down at yourself. an oversized t-shirt hung off one shoulder. the sweatpants pooled around your ankles.

for a second, you simply stared then you looked back at him.

"aerion."

he already knew what you were asking. "your clothes were soaked."

you kept staring at him. "you changed them?"

his jaw tightened slightly. "i wasn't leaving you in wet clothes."

you looked away first, outside, the highway stretched endlessly through the darkness. no houses. no gas stations. no signs of life.

just road.

the realization settled over you slowly.

you had no idea where you were. "aerion..." this time your voice came out softer. "where are we going?"

one hand rested loosely on the steering wheel while the other tapped once against his thigh. thinking. "we're heading west."

you stared at him. "are you tired?"

"no, but we are heading to a place to stop soon."

"where?"

he sighed quietly. "motel."

you stared at him for a moment. a motel.

"how long have we been driving?"

"a few hours."

"a few hours?" you looked at him again. "and i slept through all of that?"

"you were exhausted." the ache in your body was proof enough. your throat felt raw from crying. your eyes burned every time you blinked. every muscle seemed heavy.

the adrenaline had finally left.

the truck rolled through another stretch of darkness, you watched telephone poles flash by.

one after another.

one after another.

one after another.

"aerion."

he glanced over briefly. "what, baby?"

you swallowed. now looking at him further you can see he also managed to clean himself up, the blood no longer really visible on his skin. the question had been sitting in your chest since you woke up and you weren't sure you wanted the answer.

"what happened after..." your voice trailed off, you couldn't bring yourself to finish it.

his eyes returned to the road and for a while he didn't say anything. the silence stretched long enough that you thought he wasn't going to answer. then he spoke.

"i cleaned you up and i got you into the truck." his gaze stayed fixed on the road then his jaw shifted.

the truck fell silent again. you looked down at your hands, they were clean and for some reason that nearly made you cry again.

the highway curved ahead, a green road sign appeared in the distance and aerion straightened a little. "we're close."

you looked out the window and sure enough, distant lights were beginning to appear.

a small town.

nothing more than a handful of businesses clustered around an exit. a gas station. fast food place. a convenience store. a faded motel sign glowing red against the darkness, then the motel sign passed overhead. aerion flicked on the turn signal and the truck turned into the parking lot and suddenly the road that had felt endless was over.

aerion shut off the truck and neither of you moved.

outside, the motel looked almost deserted. a few cars sat scattered around the lot. you stared through the windshield, you didn't want to get out but you didn't want to stay in here either.

everything smelled like him. the truck. the clothes. the blanket.

aerion scrubbed a hand over his face.

"what happens now?" the question came out quieter than you intended.

he looked down at his hands. "i honestly don't know. i had a plan right up until everything went wrong."

everything went wrong. that was one way of describing it. "you mean when you killed cal?"

the words hung heavily inside the truck. aerion went still. "yeah." his voice sounded rough.

eventually aerion leaned back against the seat and looked out at the motel. "when they find him, things are going to get complicated."

you swallowed hard. "when?"

"i don't know." he rubbed at his jaw. "tomorrow maybe. maybe the day after." his gaze drifted toward the office. "the point is they're going to start asking questions."

the knot in your stomach tightened. "i didn't do anything."

"i know, baby." his answer came immediately. "i know you didn't."

you looked down at your lap. "what if i just go home?"

the words slipped out before you could stop them. aerion was quiet for a long time, long enough that you almost regretted asking. when he finally spoke, his voice was careful.

"do you actually want to?"

you opened your mouth, then closed it again because the truth was complicated, home wasn't really home.

the truck fell silent again, then he sighed. "i just need you to stay with me for tonight." you looked over and his eyes met yours. "i'm serious."

for the first time all evening there was genuine tension in his voice. "if you panic and run off right now, neither of us is thinking clearly enough to fix it. i know you don't trust me."

his gaze dropped briefly. "i'm just asking for tonight." his eyes returned to yours.

then he reached for the door handle. for a second you hesitated, then, before you could think too hard about what you were doing, you followed him out of the truck.

the night air hit you the second you stepped out of the truck. the motel looked even smaller up close. the paint was peeling in places. half the curtains were drawn shut. a few yellow lights glowed behind windows on the second floor.

aerion grabbed the duffel bag from the backseat and slung it over one shoulder. you noticed the way he scanned the parking lot automatically like he couldn't stop himself.

the office door chimed softly when aerion pushed it open, warm air washed over you immediately. the woman behind the desk looked like she'd been working for twelve straight hours, she glanced up from a magazine, then her eyes moved between the two of you.

aerion was standing close enough that your shoulders nearly brushed, one of his hands resting on your lower back. she leaned back in her chair. you stared. aerion stared. the woman stared right back.

"you kids look exhausted."

just two tired young people stopping for the night. aerion handed over some cash then the woman typed something into the computer, then she glanced between you again.

"one bed?"

your face immediately grew hot. aerion looked down at the counter. "yeah." the answer came naturally, without hesitation, like he hadn't even considered another option.

the woman nodded. "got it."

a few more clicks, a printer whirred, "you two married?"

aerion looked startled for half a second before recovering. "uh…"

for the first time since you'd walked into the office, aerion actually seemed caught off guard. his eyes flicked toward you, then back to the woman.

aerion cleared his throat. "recently." your head snapped toward him so fast your neck hurt.

she leaned back in her chair. you wanted the floor to open and swallow you whole. aerion somehow managed to keep a straight face, then the woman glanced at you.

"honeymoon?"

before you could answer, aerion said, "something like that." you looked at him in disbelief,

something like that?

something like what?

you were wearing your ex boyfriends clothes because he'd changed you while you were unconscious. your boyfriend was dead. you were halfway to another state.

the woman seemed somewhat delighted. "that's sweet." the printer spat out the receipt, the woman tore it free and slid it across the counter. "you know, my husband and i did the exact same thing."

aerion blinked. "what?"

"road trip." she pointed vaguely toward the parking lot. "right after we got married. no plans. no reservations. just got in the car and drove."

you physically felt aerion freeze beside you, just enough that you knew exactly what he was thinking. the story sounded like the fantasy version of what he wanted this to be. the version where none of this had happened. where cal wasn't dead. where you hadn't cried yourself sick. where the two of you had simply decided to leave together. to elope and honeymoon at any place your heart desired.

the realization made your chest tighten, the woman was still talking. "best decision we ever made."

aerion looked down at the counter then the woman handed him the room key. "second floor. room 214."

aerion accepted it. "thanks."

then she smiled at both of you tiredly, "congratulations."

aerion thanked her again, quietly this time, and stepped back from the counter. the bell above the door jingled as you pushed outside, cool air hit your face immediately. the parking lot stretched out around you.

aerion shoved the room key into his pocket. you looked at him. "recently?"

there was the faintest hint of amusement in his eyes now, "i panicked."

"you panicked?"

"she caught me off guard..."

aerion opened the door with the room key already between his fingers and stepped inside first, one hand still braced against the knob as if he expected something to be waiting on the other side.

the room was small. but still bigger than you expected.

a bed against the far wall, a cracked dresser, a tv bolted onto the wall above the dresser, and a bathroom door standing half open beneath the harsh yellow light of the ceiling fixture. the air smelled faintly of old fabric softener.

you lingered in the doorway while he moved farther in, setting the duffel bag down by the foot of the bed. he glanced toward the bathroom, the window, the closet, and the door again in a careful sweep.

you stayed where you were, hugging your arms to yourself while he went back to the door and turned the deadbolt with a sharp little click.

aerion finally turned around and saw you still standing there. “bathroom’s there,” he said, nodding once toward the open door. “you can shower first.”

you shook your head, though you weren’t even sure what you were refusing. the shower. the room. the silence that would come with being alone behind a closed bathroom door.

he studied you for a second, his face unreadable, then seemed to understand enough to let the rest of it go unsaid. you could tell he did because his voice changed when he spoke again. it got lower, less direct.

“you don’t have to if you don’t want to.” he said.

the motel room hummed softly around you. you suddenly did not want to be by yourself. not even for a few minutes. not even with the bathroom door between you, because if you were alone, even for long enough to strip off the clothes he gave you and stand under running water, your mind would catch up to you.

aerion seemed to understand before you said anything, his shoulders shifted subtly. then, after a pause, he asked, almost carefully, “want me to go with you?”

he rubbed at the back of his neck, looking toward the window for a second as if he needed the movement to think, then cleared his throat. “sorry. i meant, like, i can sit outside the door. just keep you company. if you don’t want to be alone.”

“i don’t need you sitting outside the door,” you said, though the words came out softer than you meant them to.

aerion nodded once, accepting that too quickly. “okay.”

you shifted your weight from one foot to the other, staring at the bathroom door, then at the bed, then back at him. the room suddenly felt too quiet again, and the thought of standing under hot water with no sound but your own breathing made your skin crawl.

aerion watched you for a second longer and then spoke before you could overthink it. “i’m not going anywhere,” he said.

“okay…” you muttered, though it sounded more like surrender than agreement.

a corner of his mouth twitched, though he seemed to catch himself before it could become a real smile. “i’ll be right here,” he said.

you hesitated another second, then reached for the bathroom door. the light above the sink buzzed faintly. you stopped in the doorway and turned back. aerion was still by the dresser, watching you like he had no intention of letting his attention drift even for a second.

“don’t leave,” you said before you could stop yourself. the words came out raw, almost embarrassed.

he nodded once, slow and certain. “i won’t.”

you finally turn away and step into the bathroom, the door shut behind you with a soft click. you stood there for a second, one hand still on the knob, listening to the muffled quiet of the room beyond it. you could hear him moving once, the faint scrape of a chair being pulled closer to the door. he really did stay nearby.

the shower took longer than it should have, eventually the hot water began to cool and you forced yourself to shut it off. for a second you just stood there wrapped in a towel, staring at nothing. then you heard aerion's voice through the door.

"there's clothes in there for you. they're clean." a pause. "i left them by the sink."

you looked down. sure enough, folded clothes sat on the counter where they definitely hadn't been before. you weren't even sure when he'd put them there.

you got dressed slowly, the sweatpants were too big again. the sweatshirt was too big. everything smelled like detergent and aerion.

when you finally opened the bathroom door, steam followed you into the room. aerion was sitting in the chair by the window. true to his word. still there.

he looked up immediately, your hair was still damp, the sweatshirt sleeves covered half your hands.

the pant legs dragged behind you until you sat on the edge of the bed and started rolling them up. you pulled one pant leg up and stuffed it into your sock. then the other. by the time you finished, the sweatpants were gathered awkwardly around your ankles, but at least they weren't dragging on the floor anymore.

aerion looked down at them. then at you. then back at the sweatpants, the corner of his mouth twitched.

you looked toward the bathroom. "do you want to shower?"

he shook his head. "nah." his gaze drifted toward the floor. "i already did."

"when?"

"back at the apartment." aerion leaned back in the chair and stretched his neck slightly. he looked exhausted. now that the adrenaline had worn off, it was impossible not to notice.

you tucked your feet underneath you on the bed, the mattress dipped slightly. "you should sleep."

he looked over. "so should you."

"yeah." you stared very hard at the television bolted to the wall, the television suddenly became fascinating. a few seconds passed, then aerion rubbed a hand across the back of his neck.

"i can sleep on the floor."

you looked over immediately. "the floor?"

"it's fine."

the motel carpet looked like it had witnessed crimes. you stared at it. then back at him. then at the carpet again. aerion followed your gaze.

"okay, yeah. maybe not the floor."

despite yourself, you laughed. a short tired sound and aerion looked relieved to hear it.

after somewhat drying your hair and getting ready for bed, you sat over on your side of the bed, wrapped in a blanket that smelled faintly like motel detergent, staring at the dark television screen across the room. and aerion was beside you.

then, before you could stop yourself, you shifted closer. your eyes burned, you were so tired, tired enough that everything hurt, tired enough that being angry felt impossible for a few minutes.

"aerion."

his voice was quiet in the darkness. "yeah?"

you swallowed, the question had been sitting inside you for months long before tonight, long before cal.

"why did you leave?"

eventually aerion rolled onto his back and stared at the ceiling too, for a while he said nothing. when he finally spoke, his voice sounded somehow older…deeper. "i thought i was doing the right thing."

another long pause.

"i just didn't think you deserved to get dragged into my life."

you turned your head. "what does that even mean?"

his jaw tightened, you could see it even in the darkness. "my family life was fucked, i was angry all the time. i was getting into fights every other week..."

he rubbed a hand over his face. "and you...you were the one good thing in my life. i thought letting you breaking up with me, was me being selfless."

you felt a lump form in your throat, the tears threatening to spill over again. "you thought leaving me was being selfless?" you whispered, your voice breaking. "how is that selfless? how is that...how is that loving me?"

aerion turned his head, his eyes meeting yours, and for a moment, you were both suspended in the silence, the moonlight casting a soft glow on his face, highlighting the pain and regret etched into his features.

“i didn't want to hurt you. i didn't want to ruin the one good thing i had." he said, his voice barely above a whisper. “i wanted you to always look at me like i was the person you ran to, not the person you needed saving from.”

the lump in your throat grew, and you felt a tear slip down your cheek.

"you didn't want to hurt me, but you did," you whispered, your voice trembling. "i thought i was going crazy. i couldn't eat, i couldn't sleep. i just...i just wanted you…”

aerion reached up, his thumb brushing away the tear from your cheek. "i'm sorry," he said, his voice filled with a raw, aching sincerity. "i'm so sorry. i was a fucking idiot. i thought i was protecting you, i wanted to be better for you. i wanted to deserve you."

"i love you," he whispered, the words a promise, a plea, a confession. "i've always loved you. i never stopped. i'm going to make it up to you, baby, i promise.”

you felt your resolve crumbling, the anger and the hurt and the fear all melting away under the weight of his words, under the warmth of his touch, under the intensity of his gaze. you wanted to believe him. you wanted to trust him. you wanted to give in and let him love you.

and so, you did. you leaned in, and you kissed him. you felt his arms wrap around you, pulling you close, holding you tight, as if he was afraid you might slip away. and in that moment, you didn't want to be anywhere else. you didn't want to be with anyone else. you just wanted to be with him, to be loved by him, to be whole again.

you felt a sudden surge of boldness, a need to bridge the distance between you, to feel his skin against yours, to remind him that you were here, that you were real, that you were his. you pushed against his chest, rolling him onto his back, and then you were straddling him, your knees on either side of his hips, your hands on his chest.

you leaned down, your lips brushing against his, a soft, tender promise. "m’sorry- m’sorry i fought you so hard…i'm not going anywhere," you whispered back, your voice barely audible.

his eyes softened, and he reached up, his hand cupping your cheek, "it's okay, baby," he whispered, his voice gentle, soothing. "it's okay. i'm sorry i was so rough with you. i'm sorry i scared you. i'm sorry i hurt you. i just...i just needed you to listen. i needed you to stay. you just wouldn't listen, and i needed you to. i needed you to understand that i was trying to protect you…"

you nodded, a small, shy smile tugging at your lips. "i understand," you whispered. "i understand…"

for a moment neither of you spoke and the room had gone quiet again. aerion's hand remained against your cheek for another second before falling away. you could still feel the weight of everything sitting between you.

cal.

the future of everything.

"aerion..." something in your voice made his expression change immediately.

the softness faded and reality came back. you saw it happen, the reminder that this wasn't over. you shifted beside him, pulling the blanket tighter around your shoulders.

"what are we going to do?"

aerion looked away toward the dark motel window. you could practically see him thinking. when he finally spoke, his voice was quieter than before.

"they're going to find him."

you looked down at the blanket in your lap. "what happens when they do find him?"

"they start asking questions." you hated how calmly he said it, he'd clearly been thinking about it for hours. "they'll talk to people, they'll try to figure out who saw him last. who he was with."

"we can't just stay in motels forever."

"i know. but we need to keep moving for a little while."

your stomach dropped at that, "a little while?"

"just until things settle." his eyes stayed on yours, "right now everybody's emotional. everybody's panicking. that's when people make mistakes. so we give it time."

“what if they come looking for me?” you asked,

“if they do,” he said, “we’ll deal with it.”

“i’m still angry with you,”

aerion gave a short nod, his mouth barely moving. “i figured.”

there was no argument in his voice. no defense. no attempt to pull you into forgiving him before you were ready. he shifted lower against the pillows, one hand moving up to tug the blanket higher over both of you. the movement was careful, almost absentminded, like his body already knew what to do before his mind could catch up. then he looked at you for a long second and said, quieter now, “come here.”

you moved closer, and the springs made a soft groan beneath you. aerion’s arm settled around you almost automatically, like it had done it before, like his body remembered the shape of you even when everything else had gone wrong. there was no hesitation in the way he held you. no awkwardness.

you tucked your face against his shoulder and closed your eyes.

aerion let out a slow breath, and you could feel some of the tension leaving him little by little, the hard edge in his shoulders easing just slightly beneath your cheek. his hand rested against your back, warm through the fabric of his shirt, and his heartbeat was steady in a way that should not have comforted you as much as it did.

you listened to it for a while, letting the sound fill the empty spaces in your head.

aerion’s fingers moved once against your back, slow and absent, just to make sure you were really still beside him.

tomorrow could wait.

for a few hours, at least.

[maekarart]

By PTonteria on X

[ak319]

Dark A.M x fem!reader

-- ★ The Word of Claim ┃ ─𝐏𝐚𝐫𝐭 𝟏𝟏 ─

Warnings/MDNI: none. ✰ 2.4K +++ Arthur pic by bambs, scenery by watanabe, and dutch by 𝗅𝗅𝖾𝗇𝖺𝗋𝗍𝗎𝗆𝖻𝖺𝗌

★ Prev I concept m.list

It was 9 in the evening, and Molly , well, she needed a smoke. Dutch had barely strung together more than three words today. Why? Why would he ignore a perfect, loving, loyal woman? Because of a boy. A "self-proclaimed son" he'd plucked off the streets , and now that boy was gone, taking Dutch's smile right along with him.

"Bollocks…" She exhaled a slow ring of smoke, staring up into the starry night.

Then she heard it , a small noise. Small enough to be missed.

Suki.

Curled up beside your and Arthur's tent. Shit. They'd forgotten her in all the drama and hurry.

"Hey… there, girl." Molly crouched, scooping the cat into her arms with a gentle smile. For a moment, she forgot all her worries in the quiet warmth of soft fur , well, except for Bill and Pearson's thunderous snoring rattling across the camp.

"Let's see if there are any leftovers for you…" Her feet turned toward the wagon, but something made her stop.

The tent flap, slightly open.

At first, it was only curiosity , a passing wonder at how seamlessly you had settled in beside Arthur. She told herself it was nothing more than that. Her gaze swept over the dim space, lit only by the lantern hanging outside on Dutch's tent, its amber glow bleeding faintly through the canvas.

What an analogy. Dutch, a shining light in that orphan boy's eyes, and now that boy had gone and left this whole gang for his woman.

Ah, Dutch. When will you ever realize…

There was a quiet sting of envy as her eyes drifted over the space. The way your hairbrush lay beside Arthur's comb. Homely. Domestic. All the small, tender things missing from her own life. How was that even possible , more warmth tucked into what began as a hollow, vengeful arrangement than in a relationship built on something real? Something like love?

Her gaze wandered to a chest near the far side of the tent. A beautiful one. Nearly as fine as her own. Yours.

"Maybe your snack is in there, hm?" she murmured to Suki, knowing full well it was wrong. But one glance outside confirmed the camp was still and silent, and , well. Recent events had given her reason enough. She just needed to be sure. To know that you were someone worth trusting. A woman who was a victim, not a…

"Mhm. Doesn't seem like it."

Her hand glided over folded garments until her fingers met something solid beneath a satin dress. A perfume bottle? Her brows knitted as she lifted it , small, dark, filled with what looked like dried leaves and herbs.

But Molly O'Shea was no fool. She was not one of the naive girls giggling around the campfire. She had knowledge, and she had sense , enough of both to recognize exactly what she was holding.

These herbs.

Something clicked in her mind. Several things, in fact. And several others… didn't.

She stood there a breath too long. Should she take it with her , no. No.

She placed it back carefully, tucking it beneath the satin just as she'd found it, closed the chest, and made certain everything was exactly as it had been. Then she slipped out of the tent with Suki still warm against her chest, her breathing heavier than she'd like to admit, and made her way to the wagon without looking back.

❀˖°

"Hosea… got a minute?"

"Yes, what is it, Miss O'Shea?"

"It's , I wanted to ask about Abigail's condition. Is she doing any better?"

Hosea skimmed the camp for the girl's presence, but it seemed she was still sleeping in. Good. She needed it.

"Doing better, yes. Though she gets cramps often now." He exhaled quietly. "It worries me."

"I know. But do you know why? It wasn't happening before…"

"Well, when I took her to the clinic, the doctor said she may have eaten something that didn't agree with her." He glanced away, rubbing the back of his neck. "I didn't mention the rising tensions here, of course , the shootout with the law, all of that. And John… that stupid boy, keeping his distance. He's been gone for days now. I just hope he went after Arthur and nothing else."

"Hm." Molly nodded slowly. "Well. I'll be sure to look after Abigail more."

And that was how she found out , mid-conversation, almost in passing.

"Oh, it could be a reaction to those chocolates I had…"

Molly's fingers stilled around her cup. "Which ones?"

"(Y/N) gave some of them to me." Abigail shifted, pressing a hand absently to her middle. "Everything's been unsettled since, if I'm honest. Suppose they didn't suit me. They were so delicious, though."

…Chocolates.

The box in the chest. The bottle. You taking Abigail to the clinic in those early days , and then the law arriving not long after. Was any of it a coincidence?

Molly held her expression carefully, even as her mind turned it over and over, fitting the pieces together like a puzzle she wasn't sure she wanted to finish.

"Mhm. Could be," she said at last, her voice smooth and unhurried. "Next time, don't eat anything like that , nothing artificial from the market. All you need are fruits. Pure, simple things."

Abigail's expression softened, a warmth blooming in her tired eyes at the steadiness of Molly's voice . something almost motherly in it. It nearly brought tears to her eyes. With everything so tense, and John gone…

He never cared anyway.

"Thank you so much, Miss Molly," she said quietly. "Your words mean a lot. They really do." The thudding of hooves stole their attention. After two weeks , guess who was back? Arthur and you.

You were wearing different clothes than the night you'd left, and Arthur had a bag slung over his shoulder. A long silence swept the camp as everyone registered the sight of the two of you riding in together, unhurried, like it was the most natural thing in the world.

"Seems like someone had a good holiday." Molly smirked, arms folded. "At least some people around here are enjoying themselves."

Abigail was already on her feet, crossing the camp toward you both.

"Arthur, son ... you're back." Dutch stepped forward, pulling him into an embrace that Arthur returned stiffly. Then Dutch held him by the shoulders, studying his face for a long moment, something unspoken passing between them. "Knew you would be," he said gruffly, with the quiet certainty of a man who had never truly doubted it.

His contemplative gaze swept briefly to you , acknowledging, nothing more. Certainly not with the same warmth he reserved for Arthur.

"Well. There's something I'd like to speak to you about, son." Dutch gestured toward his tent. "Would you mind?"

He was surprised when Arthur's hand found yours.

"Yeah, we do." Arthur's voice was even, unhurried , and all the more final for it. "Whatever you've got to say on behalf of that bastard, she hears it too."

The camp went quiet. Arthur Morgan...saying no to...Dutch? Unheard of. Dutch held his gaze for a beat, then two. Something shifted behind his eyes , not quite surprise, but close to it. He exhaled slowly through his nose.

"I understand." He turned his head. "Pearson... fetch us some (coffee/tea), would you?"

❀˖°

Pearson set the cups down without a word and made himself scarce. Smart man.

Dutch settled into his chair with the ease of someone who had never once lost an argument he cared about winning. He let the silence sit for a moment , comfortable in it, the way only men who controlled rooms ever were. His eyes moved between the two of you, unhurried, taking inventory. Then he smiled. not unkindly.

"First things first." He looked at you directly, inclining his head with something that almost resembled grace. "I am glad you are safe, my dear. Truly. Whatever… friction may have occurred, that much was never in question."

Then his gaze shifted to Arthur, and the smile warmed further , genuinely, or so it seemed.

"And you." He exhaled, leaning forward, elbows to knees. "You had me worried, son. I won't pretend otherwise. But you're here. That's what matters."

He reached for his cup. Took his time with it.

"Now." His tone didn't harden so much as settle , like a man easing into the real conversation after the pleasantries had served their purpose. "I imagine you've got a good deal to say to me. And I'll hear every word of it, I promise you that. But I'd ask , I'd ask, Arthur, not demand , that you hear me out first. As you always have. Can you do that?"

He didn't wait long for an answer.

"Micah is…" He paused, as if carefully selecting the word, as if he hadn't already chosen it long before he sat down. "…Micah is what he is. I won't insult your intelligence by telling you he's a gentle soul. We both know better." A quiet, almost conspiratorial chuckle , just the two of us, Arthur, we understand things the others don't. "But what I will tell you is that he is useful. And right now, in the position this gang finds itself in, useful is not something we can afford to throw away lightly."

His eyes drifted to you then...briefly. "I understand he caused… upset. And I am sorry for that." The apology landed smooth as river stone, worn of all rough edges. "That was not my intention. None of this was my intention. You have to believe that."

He set his cup down.

"But Arthur." His voice dropped, just slightly , intimate now, drawing a circle around the two of them that quietly excluded you without ever acknowledging it. "This life we lead, it asks things of us. Hard things. Things that don't always sit right. You know this. Better than anyone here, you know this. And what I need , what this family needs , is for you to be present. To be here. With us. The way you've always been."

"She's important to you." He didn't look at you when he said it. "I can see that plainly. And I would never ask you to give up something that matters to you." He spread his hands open, the portrait of reason. "All I'm asking is that you don't let one bad moment drive a wedge between you and the people who have been with you since the beginning. That's all, son. That is all I'm asking."

He leaned back, calm, unhurried , a man who had just laid out something perfectly fair and was now simply waiting for the other person to agree.

His eyes finally settled on you, steady and warm and utterly unreadable beneath it.

"And you, my dear , I hope you know there is place is yours too and you have value here. We take care of our own."

"Course you do." You retorted. "Arthur, that disgusting man is not coming back here , whatever the case. Over my dead body!."

And with that you were gone, leaving Dutch to stare at the space where you'd been sitting.

"Arthur-"

"She's right." Arthur's voice was flat. Unmovable. "He doesn't come within an inch of this camp. We go to him if we need his help so badly. That's the end of it."

Dutch held his gaze for a moment, then exhaled through his nose. "Fine." He reached for his cup again. "Fine."

For now.

"There is… one more thing." His tone shifted , lighter now, almost careful, the way a man handles something fragile he doesn't want to drop. "Consider it good news. Lord knows we could use some."

Arthur didn't move, just watched him.

"This is something I kept between myself and Hosea for a time. I won't go into every detail, but , when we left Blackwater, the two of us became involved in a business arrangement with some gentlemen. And as a reward for our part in it…" Dutch set his cup down with quiet precision. "We were given a plot of land. In Cinderpoint. An acre and a half. Good location. Good soil."

The tent was very still.

"I had construction started , quietly .. with some of the money we earned helping out your girl's father. I'm telling you now because I want you involved, Arthur. I want you to take responsibility for it. Go out there, look after the building, oversee the boys. It's time we…" He paused, and for just a moment something almost genuine crossed his face , tired, and old, and wanting. "It's time we put down something solid. A farm. A proper business. A foundation." Arthur stared at him.

The word foundation sat in the air between them like smoke.

He'd heard Dutch talk about plans before. I have a plan, Arthur. Trust me, son. He'd heard it in the cold, heard it hungry, heard it with blood still drying on his hands and Dutch's voice steady as a river current, always pulling him forward, always just over the next hill, the next job, the next horizon. One last time had been said so many times it had stopped meaning anything.

And yet.

Land. Legal. Documented. Theirs. Arthur picked up his cup. Turned it slowly in his hands without drinking from it.

"You're tellin' me," he said at last, his voice low and measured, "that we've got land. Sitting there. Right now. With papers."

"Every document in order. Hosea saw to it himself." Dutch leaned forward slightly. "This is real, son. This is not a dream I'm selling you. This is something you could stand on."

Arthur was quiet for a long moment. Long enough that the sounds of the camp outside filtered back in , someone's boots on gravel, the distant whinny of a horse, the ordinary noise of people just living.

He thought about you. The two weeks spent outside...under a proper roof for once. About what it had felt like to wake up somewhere quiet, with you beside him, and nothing pressing in from every direction for once.

He thought about how that had felt like something worth keeping.

"Cinderpoint," he repeated slowly, like he was testing the weight of the word.

"Good land," Dutch said again, quieter now. Arthur set the cup down and rubbed a hand across his jaw, eyes distant. "I'll go look at it." His voice gave nothing away. "Can't promise a damn thing til I see it with my own eyes."

"That's all I ask, son." He reached over and gripped Arthur's shoulder, firm and brief. "That's all I ever ask." Arthur nodded once. Then stood, setting his hat back on his head, and stepped out of the tent without another word.

Outside, the camp carried on around him. But his mind was already somewhere else, flat land, open sky, and the quiet, dangerous shape of something that almost looked like a future. You , him and perhaps more...all now very near..

He couldn't believe it. His dream of having a normal life was finally coming true...

AN: It was hard to come back to writing after being so busy, which ultimately made me suffer from writer's block too, but y'all guys' love for this story made me vomit all the words out. Kinda short than rest of parts but...yep. To be added or removed from the tag list, u can always lemme know!

★ tag list: @m1stea @warmsideofthepillow03 @thatoneraeder @marzintears @nxttaru @cazzacarm @she-is-my-unrequited-love34 @nulixity @poll-u @bajabish @cheesycheddarr @luzzbuzz @dilfsarelife @ninastyless @claire-is-here @replaythatrayrae @hopingtoclearmedschool @lain3iwakura @bashfulcowgirl87 @catjsashrine @littlebirdgot @heloixe @summerdazed @meheheasasa @sensitivegamergirl @jbrownta @mandalover2023 @ceza-141 @httpskuri @abigatorchomp @nalitali @hopingtocleaemedschool @misoxramen @kiwifishy @immasimp4oldman @strawluvr @dutchiepoo2 @ikonic141

[sykovblood]

Ticci Toby ٩(๑❛ᴗ❛๑)۶

[brainlice]

[ponosolegafan]

Toby x "No, I'm not a human"

[rubyys-domain]

[CHAPTER FIVE]

when FIRELORD ZUKO takes a liking to AVATAR AANG'S mysterious new BRIDE.

TORN BETWEEN TWO ROADS ! — aang x reader x zuko

PLOT. republic city is finally at peace, and for once, katara allows herself to hope—maybe now, after everything, she and aang can finally become something real. but when aang returns after eight months, he isn’t alone. he comes back with you at his side, introducing you as his wife. suspicious yet helpless, his friends do their best to welcome you, even as nothing about this sudden marriage makes sense. but while everyone else keeps their distance, one person doesn’t. and perhaps Zuko gets a little too comfortable with the avatar’s new wife.

CHARACTERS. AANG and ZUKO.

CHAPTER WARNINGS. 18+, mdni, angst, implied sexual assault, fight with zuko, zuko is kind of a prick ngl, protective aang, takes place 10 years after atla, age gaps, reader is 21, established relationship, fem reader, atla spoilers, no spoilers for legend of aang, not proofread.

(please check the story masterlist for the story warnings.)

WC. 5.3k

masterlist : story masterlist

chapter four

a/n: why do i feel like i am rushing the story?

p.s. since this was originally part of the previous chapter and i ended up having to split it, i completely forgot to mention in the chapter before that it has been two days since the reader arrived in the fire nation. this is a direct continuation.

You barely remembered Aang leaving that morning.

The memory lingered in pieces, the warmth of his lips against your forehead before dawn, before he inevitably left.

By the time you had properly risen from bed, the palace was already devoid of his presence, leaving behind only the faint scent of incense that always seemed to cling to him.

So, by afternoon, you found yourself wandering.

The Fire Nation Palace had begun to feel less overwhelming over the past three days, though you still occasionally lost your way amongst its endless corridors and towering halls.

Servants moved carefully around you, trying not to subject themselves to possibly offending the Avatar.

Soldiers stood guard beneath banners adorned with crimson and gold, and the heat of the nation bled through the open architecture of the palace itself, keeping true to the Nation's title.

Your steps eventually carried you toward one of the larger balconies overlooking the capital.

And there he stood.

After your arrival, you had to come clean to Aang about your interaction with Zuko. You hadn't seen the Firelord since, and you had been hesitant to question Aang about it.

Zuko remained near the railing with his hands folded behind his back, his gaze fixed upon the nation stretched before him.

The afternoon light cast itself across the sharp lines of his face, catching against the scar along his left eye while the wind stirred the ends of his robes faintly behind him.

For a brief moment, you considered turning around.

But he had already noticed you.

"Good afternoon," he greeted, his voice surprisingly loud for how calmly he said it.

You bit your tongue, knowing you had no way around it anymore.

"Good afternoon, Fire Lord Zuko," you returned eventually, approaching with measured steps.

His attention shifted fully toward you, though his posture remained unchanged, carrying the authority he so obviously had.

There was still undeniable tension lingering between you both after your argument aboard the ship, hiding beneath the polite exchange.

Zuko broke the silence first.

"I trust your stay within the palace has been pleasant thus far?" he asked. "It has been three days already."

You moved to stand beside him, leaving enough distance between you to remain proper as your looked upon the view below.

"It has been well," you answered politely. "Thank you for your hospitality."

Zuko hummed quietly at that.

"It seems," he began after a pause, "you informed Aang about our...interaction."

Your expression nearly faltered.

So Aang had spoken to him after all.

You had not known whether he would, nor had Aang shared anything regarding whatever conversation followed afterward.

The realization unsettled, and you resisted the instinctive tension threatening to surface across your face, drawing yourself subtly straighter beside him instead while your hands folded neatly before you.

"My intention was never to offend you," he said at last, his tone stripped of it's usual sharp edge.

"I am aware my words overstepped, and I am very sorry they caused you hurt."

The apology settled awkwardly between you, leaving you unsure on how to respond.

You felt embarrassingly childish, standing there knowing you had confessed the entirety of your disagreement to Aang the moment you arrived at the palace.

It reminded you far too much of a child tattling on their bullies' parents, having to face a confrontation later.

You composed yourself quickly, each movement measured carefully to preserve what remained of your dignity despite the embarrassment steadily tightening within your chest.

"Thank you," you replied softly. "I appreciate the apology."

Your fingers folded neatly over the railings before you as your head lowered briefly.

"And I must apologize as well," you admitted after a moment. "It appears I have become the reason behind your difficulty in trusting your own friend."

Zuko's brows furrowed faintly.

"There is no need for you to apologize," he answered immediately.

"The fault lies with me. It is I who failed to trust Aang's decisions."

You nodded quietly at his words. 

Another silence followed afterward, though this one felt less suffocating than before, neither of you quite willing to speak further yet you no longer carried the same urge to leave his presence.

Then Zuko broke it once more.

"There is something else I would like to apologize for."

Your brows furrowed faintly.

"What for?"

For the first time since you had arrived, hesitation crossed his face properly, as his jaw tightened briefly before he answered.

"That night," he began carefully, "at Katara's home...I overheard part of your conversation with Aang."

Your eyes snapped toward him instantly and he did little avoid your gaze.

"I had gone to return his emblem," he continued evenly.

"I did not intend to intrude, but by the time I realized what I had walked into..." His expression hardened slightly at himself.

"I remained long enough to hear more than I should have."

You stared at him for a moment, very stunned by the confession itself but also by the fact that he had admitted it to you.

If it had been you, you would taken it to the grave.

"How much did you hear?" you asked quietly.

Zuko exhaled through his nose, leaning slightly against the railing beside him.

"I could not tell you how much was spoken," he admitted. "Only that I heard enough to understand very little."

He turned, facing away from you as he spoke.

"In truth, the more I seem to learn about you, the less I understand."

There was no mockery in his statement, only honesty as you lowered your eyes briefly, fingers folding together.

"I understand your concern for Aang," you said after a moment.

"I appeared rather suddenly in all of your lives, and in doing so, I seem to have complicated matters that existed long before me." Your voice softened slightly at the next words.

"Especially between Aang and Katara."

Zuko remained silent, allowing you to continue.

"But Aang loves me," you finished quietly, not leaving any room to object your statement.

At that, Zuko nodded once.

"Yes," he said simply. "He does."

The answer is earnest.

"And if it offers you any reassurance," he continued, "from what I have observed, Aang and Katara do share a long history together, but it remains precisely that. History."

His gaze held yours steadily. "And if you still seek an answer to the fears you carried that night, then no, I do not believe Aang would ever betray you."

"I know he will not," you confirmed, and the firmness in your voice surprised even yourself.

"But...that is not my greatest concern."

Zuko studied you carefully then.

"Then what is?"

The question settled heavier, realizing you had opened another gate for a topic you shouldn't be discussing with him.

Your eyes drifted from him once more, deciding to speak on it anyway.

"I have always feared," you admitted slowly, "that one day he may regret it."

Your throat tightened slightly around the next words.

"Regret me."

Zuko's brows pulled together, recalling Aang's words from that fated night.

"Was he not the one who asked you to marry him?"

"Yes," you replied softly. "But the circumstances of our marriage were...unorthodox."

You chose the word carefully, careful enough not to reveal too much.

Zuko noticed regardless.

"How so?" he asked quietly.

You paused for a long moment after his question, your fingers curling slightly against the railing beneath your hands.

Then, quietly, you confessed.

"I was meant to marry the crown prince of my nation."

Zuko, despite the barrel of questions pouring in his mind, does not interrupt you.

For once, he remained entirely silent, understanding instinctively that this was the first genuine glimpse into your past you had willingly offered him.

"It had always been decided," you continued.

"My father served as the king's advisor for most of his life. And when the crown prince and I were born on the very same day, my father believed it to be fate." A faint smile touched your lips, but it carried little to no amusement.

"Eventually, he convinced the king of the same."

The wind swept past the balcony again, carrying the warmth of the afternoon.

"The prince and I..." You hesitated briefly, choosing your phrasing carefully. "We were acquaintances, nothing more. I could never truly call him my friend."

You let out a sigh, coming to terms with the fact you were actively sharing your history with Aang's friend.

"In truth, I do not believe he considered me one either."

Zuko watched you quietly.

"We rarely saw one another despite growing up together," you admitted.

"But it did not matter. From the moment we were born, everyone around us already knew that our futures will be united," Your fingers tightened even further against the railing.

"So we simply accepted it."

Then you fell silent entirely.

Zuko's gaze lingered on you, before he finally asked the question he had been waiting to speak.

"What changed?"

You remained still, your attention drifting upward toward the open sky stretching endlessly beyond the palace walls.

"Then," you said softly, turning your head just enough to glance at him, "Aang arrived."

Something in Zuko's expression shifted faintly, only growing more curious by the second.

"And you fell in love?" He asked carefully,

The laugh that escaped you caught him entirely off guard.

"Spirits, no!" you replied immediately, amusement finally alive in your voice.

"What exactly do you take me for, Fire Lord Zuko?"

One of his brows lifted slightly.

You shook your head softly, the remnants of your laughter fading.

"Perhaps had I not already been betrothed, I might have understood what people describe as love at first sight." You admitted after a moment.

Zuko's attention sharpened immediately.

"Then why?" he pressed again, the careful mask of indifference beginning to fracture at last beneath his growing curiosity.

You looked back toward him then, a small smile lingering upon your lips.

"Tell me something, Fire Lord," you began softly.

"Between a king and the Avatar, who do you believe commands greater authority over the world?"

The question seemed to catch him off guard entirely.

Zuko's brows furrowed faintly, as though he were attempting to understand where exactly you intended to lead him.

Still, after a brief pause, he answered honestly.

"A king."

"I believed so as well," you admitted.

"After all, the Avatar possesses no royal standing. The Avatar exists to preserve balance, to remain impartial above all else."

Your fingers traced absent patterns against the railing, running your nails across the carvings.

"A king commands nations. The Avatar merely guides them."

You paused for a clock's tick before continuing.

"But answer one more question for me." Your eyes gaining yet another glint of interest.

"If the Avatar stood to your right, and The King of..." You trailed off, looking away in thought before you continue.

"...The King of the entire world, supposedly, stood to your left..." Your smile deepened slightly.

"Which direction would your eyes turn to?"

The question lingered between you both.

Zuko inhaled slowly through his nose, and despite already knowing the answer, he still found himself considering it properly, turning the thought over in his mind before responding.

"...Right." he admitted at last.

Your smile widened in approval.

Zuko exhaled quietly, realization settling over him piece by piece as he turned his face away.

"So," he said slowly, "your father convinced Aang to marry you."

"You catch on rather quickly," you mused, confirming his statement.

A faint huff escaped him, not entirely convinced.

"But Aang is not someone who would agree to it." Zuko replied, looking back toward you now.

"Especially not regarding something of this matter." His eyes narrowed. "How exactly did your father convince him?"

"He did not," you answered softly, shutting down Zuko's trail of thoughts.

"I did."

The confession struck him immediately, his head turning toward you fully now, disbelief flashing openly across his face for the first time since this conversation began.

"How?" he asked at once.

You did not answer him.

Instead, you tilted your head slightly, your gaze settling on him.

"Do you have a sister, Zuko?"

The question caught him entirely off guard.

His face morphed and something solemn crossed his features, his posture stiffening despite the obvious effort to conceal whatever memory your question had stirred.

You noticed it instantly.

"Oh," you murmured. "My apologies. Have I touched upon a sensitive matter?"

Zuko exhaled quietly through his nose before answering.

"No," he replied after a moment. "It is alright. I...do have a sister."

You nodded, choosing not to prod it the matter just yet.

"Then surely, as royalty, you already know the answer to what I am about to ask."

Zuko's attention narrowed down to your next words.

"If a woman of noble or royal standing were to become intimate before marriage," you said carefully—

"would a future king still choose to marry her?"

Maybe it took him a second, perhaps two, but the understanding struck him soon enough.

Zuko's eyes widened faintly as he turned completely toward you now, his body shifting as disbelief settled into his expression.

"Aang would never..." he whispered, the words leaving him almost involuntarily.

You smiled at that, and it was not bitter. If anything, it seemed strangely fond.

"You are correct," you replied quietly.

"Aang would never." Your gaze held his steadily.

"He had Katara, after all."

The statement, though quietly said, rang loud between them, filling the gaps of what Zuko could not.

You were waiting for some semblance of a comment, but none came, so you looked away first.

"My feet have begun to ache," you said, smoothing your hands along the fabric at your sides.

"I shall go rest now." You inclined your head politely.

"Good day, Lord Zuko—"

You had barely turned before his hand closed around your wrist, the force of it startling you entirely.

Pain shot sharply through your arm as your breath caught, instinctively trying to pull yourself free from his grip, but his hold remained firm.

"Did you..." His voice faltered once, entirely unsure how he could even go about asking his question.

He formed the words slowly in his mind, but when they left him, they were laced with his disbelief.

"Did you force yourself upon him?"

You froze.

The accusation struck harder than his grip ever could, halting your faint struggle against him.

The shock on your face was immediate, your expression falling apart so suddenly it seemed you could not even comprehend the words that had just been spoken to you.

You lifted your eyes toward him.

"Unhand me," you whispered plainly.

After a moment, he did. The second his fingers released your wrist, you stepped back from him, staring in utter shock before something entirely unexpected escaped you.

A laugh.

It was faint at first, as if you were trying to suppress it beneath your lungs.

But then another followed, your hand rising quickly to cover your mouth while your shoulders trembled beneath the sound.

Zuko stood frozen before you, caught between confusion and rage.

"What is so amusing?" He asked slowly, observing how you pressed the bridge of your nose, much like Aang had done.

"You!" you answered through the remnants of your laughter, lowering your hand slightly as tears gathered painfully in your eyes.

"It's amusing how easily you throw around such statements." You shook your head faintly.

"At least Sokka merely believed me status-hungry. Even that is kinder than the vile accusation you just made."

"I was not accusing you—"

"You were," you cut him off immediately. "And you did so without hesitation."

The humor vanished from your face entirely then.

"You are pathetic, Lord Zuko," you whispered, the hurt in your voice far louder than your anger could have ever been.

"You spoke those words so easily without once considering how heavily they might weigh upon me."

Only then did he properly notice the tears, realizing he completely misjudged the situation.

Regret struck his face instantly.

"I am sorry—"

"Forget it," you interrupted sharply, already turning away from him.

"I cannot even disguise this as your concern for Aang anymore." You stated as you walked away from him.

Your pace quickened across the corridor, hurt and humiliation burning through you.

"For you to stoop so low..." Your throat tightened around the next words. "It was...unexpected."

Zuko followed after you immediately.

"Please!" he called after you, urgency finally breaking through his facade, "Allow me to apologize."

"No!"

You turned around so abruptly that he stopped mere inches away from you, the closeness sudden enough to steal the breath from him entirely.

Your eyes glistened as you looked up at him, wounded frustration pulling harshly at the muscles of your face.

"Why must every conversation of ours begin with an apology and end in an argument?" You asked quietly.

For once, Zuko had no answer.

But his hands lifted instinctively, settling carefully on your shoulders in an attempt to steady both you and the conversation unraveling between you.

"I am sorry," he said again, the words stripped entirely of pride.

"I swear to you, I never intended to hurt you." He inclined his head, not trying to avoid your gaze but doing so anyway.

"I was worried for my friend, and I allowed that concern to cloud my judgment."

You said nothing.

You only stared at him with that same wounded frown, your silence far harsher than anger.

Then, after a long moment, your voice finally returned you.

"Please let me go," you murmured tiredly. "I wish to rest."

And this time, Zuko listened.

His hands fell away from your shoulders immediately, giving you space to turn around and disappear down the corridor alone.

The meeting had dragged on far longer than Aang had anticipated.

By the time he entered the throne room later that afternoon, you had already been settled into your temporary room within the palace.

He had stayed with you longer than he should have, making certain you had bathed after spending some time beneath the sheets together.

He made sure you had eaten properly, and that you were comfortable as the afternoon sleep finally took you, visibly tired from your journey.

Only then had he forced himself away.

And now, seated within the throne room amongst ministers, generals, and advisors of the Fire Nation court, Aang found his thoughts nowhere near the matters being discussed before him.

Usually, his presence within political meetings carried a certain lightness to it, an ease that often softened the stiffness of royal proceedings.

Even during disagreements, there remained something breezy about him, an openness that made people forget, if only briefly, that they sat in the presence of the Avatar.

Today, that ease was absent.

His posture remained straight throughout the entirety of the meeting, his expression unreadable, responses short and precise whenever his input was requested.

The shift in demeanor had not gone unnoticed either, several members of the court exchanging uncertain glances whenever any matter settled too long on him.

Even Zuko had noticed.

From atop the elevated throne platform, the Fire Lord's eyes drifted toward Aang more than once during the meeting, sensing something unsettled beneath the stillness he wore.

So when the final matter concluded and Aang spoke before anyone else could rise—

"Leave us."

—the entire room had fallen silent.

No one moved at first.

The command had not come from the Fire Lord.

A few uncertain gazes shifted toward Zuko instead, waiting for correction or dismissal, because at the end of the day, regardless of the Avatar's status, this remained the throne room of the Fire Nation.

Zuko studied Aang, watchful of the serious glint that showed beneath his friend's face.

Without question, Zuko inclined his head slightly toward the Grand Chamberlain.

The older man understood immediately.

"The meeting is adjourned," he announced loudly.

One by one, the members of the court began filing out of the throne room, robes sweeping across the floor while quick footsteps echoed beneath the towering ceilings.

The massive doors eventually closed behind the last remaining council member, the sound reverberating through the now empty hall.

Zuko finally rose from his place.

The elevated dais placed him high above everyone who entered the room, an intentional symbol of authority inherited through generations of Fire Lords.

From below, he appeared untouchable seated there, distant in both power and stature.

Yet now he descended the side steps without ceremony, his robes shifting behind him as he approached Aang directly, concern settled into his features almost immediately.

"What is it you wish to discuss?" he asked, voice loud and clear now within the emptiness of the throne room.

He doesn't receive an answer from the Avatar.

His brows furrowed faintly.

"You seem distressed. Is your wife dissatisfied with her chambers?"

Aang said nothing once more as he remained standing in the very center of the room, unmoving beneath Zuko's gaze.

Zuko slowed slightly near the final step.

"You had the court dismissed. What is this about, Aang?" he asked again, confusion beginning to edge into his voice.

Aang finally looked at him properly then.

"What was your real reason for bringing my wife here?"

Zuko stopped mid-step, his expression tightening faintly as he stood directly before Aang. He searched his face briefly, trying to determine how much exactly had been said.

"What do you mean?" he asked carefully.

Aang did not waver.

"Were you genuinely trying to help me," he asked bluntly, "or did you bring her here to investigate her?"

The Fire Lord was speechless; the frightening part was how accurate the accusation truly was.

Zuko felt the realization strike immediately, though years of royal composure kept it from reaching his face fully. But, beneath the surface, something unpleasant twisted sharply in his chest.

Not fear of confrontation.

Not fear of punishment.

Fear of disappointing.

It was an old feeling, one Zuko despised for how easily it returned whenever Aang looked at him like this.

Once, years ago, he had chased the twelve-year-old boy across the world in desperate pursuit of stolen honor, reducing the Avatar to nothing more than a target he believed might fix his broken life.

And even after all these years, even after friendship and forgiveness and peace, part of him still feared becoming that person again in Aang's eyes.

So he lied.

"Aang," he began steadily, "what would make you think such a thing? That was never my intention."

Aang's expression hardened faintly.

"It felt intentional when you questioned my wife about our marriage." Aang was agitated now, visibly trying to slow he thoughts down before saying the next words.

"Even more so when you lied and misled her after she answered you honestly."

Zuko folded his arms loosely across his chest.

"We were having a conversation," he replied. "One your wife initiated after entering my study."

"From what I heard," Aang countered immediately, "she was ready to leave. You were the one who stopped her."

"She appeared restless," Zuko answered. "I merely offered her tea."

"And with the tea," Aang countered coldly, "you offered to discuss Katara."

Zuko stared at Aang.

You truly had hidden nothing from your husband.

For some reason, Zuko had assumed you would omit certain details, particularly the conversation surrounding the Water Tribe girl.

Yet instead, you had recounted the interaction in full, trusting Aang enough to leave nothing concealed between you.

The realization settled, understanding that he underestimated your bond with Aang.

"Your wife was the one who asked about it," Zuko replied at last. "And out of respect for both you and Katara, I chose not to speak on it."

"That only made things worse!"

Aang's voice rose slightly then, frustration finally slipping through the restraint he had maintained since entering the throne room.

The sound echoed sharply through the empty hall before he abruptly stepped back, shutting his eyes as his fingers came up to pinch the bridge of his nose, likely stopping himself from openly speaking of the insecurities you try to hide from him.

The gesture was familiar to Zuko. Aang would often do so whenever he was forcing himself not to say something harsher.

Zuko liked to think it was something the Avatar had picked up from him.

Aang exhaled as he lowered his hand.

"Zuko," he began, "I don't want to drag this out. I'm not here to fight with you."

Despite trying to remain calm with his words, Aang looked at Zuko dead in the eyes, telling a different story altogether.

"Just...don't meddle in my marriage."

"I never intended to—"

"You keep saying that," Aang interrupted, seemingly fed up with everything, "but right now I'm having a hard time believing you."

The words struck Zuko hard.

"Please," Aang continued, "don't turn against my wife just because you don't know her."

Zuko said nothing.

There was very little he could say.

"I'm the one who brought her here," Aang went on.

"If you have questions, ask me."

Perhaps the statement was genuine permission. Perhaps Aang truly would have answered whatever Zuko wished to know in this moment.

But something told him pressing further would only worsen matters.

So Zuko straightened himself instead and answered with the composure expected of a Fire Lord.

"I have no questions, Aang. It is an honor to extend my hospitality to both you and your wife."

Some of the tension in Aang's shoulders eased at that.

"Thank you."

And with that, he turned away.

His footsteps echoed through the empty throne room as he headed toward the doors, the guards outside already shifting in preparation to open them for the Avatar's departure.

Yet just before the doors parted, Aang stopped.

Without fully turning back, he tilted his head slightly for his voice to carry clearly across the room.

"If I hear you've spoken to her again," he said quietly, "it better be to apologize."

Then, before Zuko could answer, the doors opened, and Aang walked out.

Zuko could not sleep.

The palace had grow quiet, the halls outside his chambers empty save for the occasional shift of guards changing posts, yet sleep refused to claim him no matter how still he remained beneath the covers.

He had continued through the rest of the day despite the fight he had with you, burying himself beneath reports, meetings, and discussions in hopes that duty might silence the thoughts plaguing him.

It had not worked.

Now, with darkness stretched across room, he found himself replaying every word spoken between you both on the balcony earlier that afternoon.

And every time he reached the end of the memory, it only worsened.

Not only had he failed to offer the proper apology Aang had all but demanded of him days prior, he had managed to turn the conversation into something far uglier.

The worst part was that he had not even realized the severity of his words until he saw your face fall apart before him.

Zuko shut his eyes, exhaling through his nose before opening them again to stare upward.

The darkness above him became a canvas for recollection, his mind returning once again to the fragments of your conversation.

"If a woman of noble or royal standing were to become intimate before marriage, would a future king still choose to marry her?"

He understood more now.

Your previous engagement had ended because of intimacy before marriage. That part had become painfully obvious the moment you revealed the existence of the crown prince.

"Aang would never..." "You are correct. Aang would never. He had Katara, after all."

Zuko pressed back against the pillow beneath his head.

He had misunderstood you entirely.

At first, he had believed your words implied Aang's refusal came solely from loyalty to Katara, yet the more he replayed the conversation now, the more flawed that assumption became.

Because Zuko knew Aang.

He knew his values, the vows Air Nomads upheld, and that his discipline had been rooted into him since childhood.

Aang would never dishonor a woman in such a manner, regardless of Katara's existence.

You no longer sounded accusatory.

You were bitter. Hurt even

Then came the memory he regretted most.

"Did you force yourself upon him?"

Zuko shut his eyes again immediately, shame twisting sharply through his chest.

Spirits.

The answer had been right in front of him the entire time.

Whatever happened between you and your former betrothed had not been your choice.

That was why your engagement collapsed.

That was why honor weighed so heavily upon you.

That was why the accusation had shattered you so completely.

And instead of understanding, he had cornered you with the cruelest conclusion possible simply because he could not make sense of where Aang fit within the story.

So he had grasped onto the first explanation that seemed logical and hurled it toward you without thought.

The memory of your breakdown made his stomach twinge with guilt.

He should have known better.

While Zuko spent the night trapped within the unrest of his own thoughts, you had finally managed to find sleep.

The night was still early, but the hurt left behind by your argument had exhausted you more than you realized.

And after hours spent curled beneath the blankets, wishing for Aang's return, your mind had eventually surrendered to slumber. 

The palace had remained quiet then, the distant crackle of torches outside your chambers blending into the stillness of the night until everything faded into unconsciousness.

You did not remember what you had been dreaming about when you woke.

Only noise.

It reached you faintly at first, enough for your dreams to blur into confusion while sleep still clung heavily to your senses. 

Somewhere beyond the walls of your chambers, voices rang through the halls accompanied by hurried footsteps and the metallic clash of armor.

Your brows furrowed as your eyes slowly opened.

Another shout echoed through the distance.

Then another.

You pushed yourself upright immediately, the blankets slipping from your body while your heart began beating faster without fully understanding why. 

The room remained dark save for the pale wash of moonlight slipping through the heavy curtains, and in your disorientation, you could only sit there listening as the commotion outside grew louder by the second.

You still could not make out the words.

Your fingers fumbled for the robe resting near the edge of the mattress, quickly pulling the thin fabric around yourself before tying it shut with clumsy hands. 

The chill in the room suddenly felt unbearable, as you slowly got off the mattress and made your way towards the door.

Then came the scream that shattered through the corridor clearly enough for you to finally understand.

"Attack! Attack on the palace!"

You hadn't misheard. The statement was undeniable.

Every thought in your mind vanished.

You stepped back so abruptly, you almost lost your balance, panic flooding through your chest while your eyes darted around your chambers.

What were you meant to do?

Leave the room?

Remain hidden?

Find guards?

Your pulse hammered painfully while another wave of shouting erupted somewhere beyond in the palace, followed by the unmistakable sound of guards running.

You could not bring yourself to open the doors blindly.

Not without knowing what waited beyond them.

So instead, you hurried toward the windows at the far side of the room, your bare feet slipping slightly against polished floors as you reached for the thick cord holding the curtains shut.

Your hands trembled while pulling it.

The curtains slowly lifted upward with each tug, moonlight spilling wider into the chambers inch by inch.

At first, you saw as smoke curled upward from somewhere within the palace grounds.

Then, the fire caught your eye, orange light flickering violently against the night sky.

And then you saw it.

Something enormous burned through the darkness toward the palace itself.

Your breath caught instantly.

It resembled the sun more than fire, a massive sphere of blazing orange and gold tearing across the sky with terrifying speed, growing larger with every passing second until you realized—

It was coming directly toward you.

The cord slipped from your fingers as your body froze.

The curtains collapsed shut immediately, swallowing the room back into darkness while panic seized your entire body.

You turned and ran.

But before you could barely reach past the bed, the world behind you erupted.

The impact crashed through the chambers with catastrophic force, glass exploding outward while heat and destruction tore through the room in an instant.

chapter six coming soon...

a/n: I will just straight up say that i have projected myself onto zuko's character in my fic (NOT IN THIS CHAPTER), it will make sense in the future chapters and i may even explain it when the time comes. whatever happens with zuko going forward...everyone will not understand it, but i will explain my perspective on it, rest assured.

[taglist open] (please mention under the latest chapter or the story masterlist)

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[sushizushi6]

Bro got budget cuts

[ponosolegafan]

Toby x "No, I'm not a human"

[brainlice]

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wait...we're not dating? - j. todd

dcu masterlist | main masterlist

gn!reader x jason todd

summary: for the entire year you and jason have known each other, he assumed you two were dating and had no idea that you weren't.

warnings: none but lmk if i missed something, just jason being oblivious, might be a little ooc

UNEDITED!!!

jason isn't stupid—he knows there's rules that define whether or not two people are dating. but he is just a bit dense.

you'd met on a rooftop about a year ago, a classic vigilante encounter. instant tension, instant bickering between you and jason. he hadn't been entirely smitten. he simply thought you were beautiful, but that didn't mean anything.

not until you two start working together. bruce sends the two of you out on a mission, and you say something along the lines of, "let's make it a date, then." you said it with such an arrogant, cheeky grin.

and because that mission had gone so well, you and jason are consistently sent out together. alone.

because you'd said "let's make it a date!" he began to say it back. just a little joke. he'd say something like, "save the date..." quite bashfully. and you'd snicker and agree.

and that consistency is what makes jason think the two of you have started dating.

every single time the two of you are dispatched on a mission, it's always "save the date" or "let's make it a date" with you.

it happened so effortlessly, in his mind. so seamlessly. he doesn't feel like he needs to perform around you. he's not a blushing mess, he doesn't stutter or even treat you very differently, hence why you don't notice that he thinks the two of you are together.

except for when he stops by and gets little trinkets. maybe a stick of chocolate for valentines day. not flowers, because he wasn't able to gauge whether or not you'd want some.

for your birthday, he got you a small gift. something that reminded him of a childhood story you'd once babbled on about.

he's just a little bit sweeter and a little bit softer around you, compared to when he's conversing with other teammates.

this you notice, and you begin to consider that maybe he has feelings for you. a little crush. but you'd never in a million years consider that he thought you guys were fully dating.

his strange acts of kindness spark a tiny crush inside of you. you're spending more time with him. enjoying your missions with him just a bit more. laughing, smiling. and he begins to feel like home.

you wonder—should you ask him out? he doesn't seem like he's going to make a move any time soon. and, after all, he's been picking up so many small gifts for you here and there. maybe he's waiting for you to do something.

so, one night, you consult his brothers.

"jason likes you. i can tell," dick reassures. "he likes being around you, whether that's as friends or because he likes likes you, i dunno."

"definitely," tim had said. "jason with chocolates in his hand? never seen before. until you."

damian rolled his eyes when you asked. he scoffed and said, "i've been waiting for you to catch on. why don't you just ask each other out already?"

they act like jason is acting so differently. perhaps you just don't know him as well as they do.

one night, on a mission, you gather enough courage to turn to him and ask. "hey..."

"yeah?" he says, tipping his head towards the starless sky.

"i...um...i know we do a lot together. and i don't want to ruin our friendship."

"friendship?"

you nod. did jason even consider you a friend? why did he seem so confused? "yeah. i just...i really like having you around. so don't make it weird, okay?"

he dips his head. "okay...?"

"do you...want to go on a date with me?"

he blinks. once, twice. "are we not on one right now?"

you shrug. "i mean, i would hardly consider this a date." you gesture to the honking cars below, to your feet swinging off the edge of the roof.

"why are you asking me out?" he says, leaning forward.

you're a little stunned. a bit hurt. "because...i like you? because we spend a lot of time together and i think you're fun to be around? i don't know."

jason waves his hands in the air. "yeah, i know. but...why? i mean, we're already dating. if you wanted to go for a date and not have to go on a mission at the same time, you could've just said—"

"i'm sorry, what?"

"you...could've just said you wanted to do something different for our dates?"

you shake your head frantically. "no, no, no. you said that...you just said that we're dating?"

he stares at you like you're the one not making sense. "yeah...?"

"we're not dating, jason."

his mask hisses as he pries it off his face. his brows furrow and his cheeks redden with embarrassment. "we're...not?" he says it so softly, so painfully that you almost want to convince him that you are dating him.

"jason...oh, jason. did you think that all our talk about dates made this a date?" you can barely stifle your laughter. "jason, oh jason...you're so sweet. darling, it's an expression."

"so we're...not dating?"

"how long have you thought that?"

"about a year now." bashfully, jason's shoulders sink. "i thought we were, since you never turned down any of my gifts."

"i just thought that was you being nice. i'm sorry, i never thought to give you anything back. i just...thought you were being nice."

"of course i was just being nice. i...liked having you around."

it sounds silly saying it all aloud, but now that you think of it, jason's loyalty to you was plain as day. he was a reserved person, so it was easy to think he was just being a loner, like usual.

there was time the two of you went undercover. two girls had been ruthlessly vying for his attention. both infinitely attractive. some men, too. and he hadn't even blinked. you assumed he was just playing his part when he scooped you into his arms and wouldn't let go of you the entire night.

the way he listened to you—that gift he'd bought you for your birthday. reminiscent of some stupid childhood story you'd told him on some meaningless, random night. yet he'd remembered.

because that night hadn't been meaningless to him. no night with you had been meaningless.

perhaps he wasn't dense or stupid for thinking the two of you were already dating. perhaps you were in fact the dense one, for not seeing the signs. for not seeing how sweet he was sooner, for how silently loyal he was.

"jason." you loop his hand in yours. his pulse beats steadily. he's not nervous around you. neither are you anymore. "how long did you say we were dating?"

"we're not—"

"how long did you say we were dating for?"

he bites his lip. "tomorrow would've been...uh, our one year anniversary. i didn't know if you wanted me to plan something. you didn't seem to care very much, like the people do in the movies." because you hadn't even known. "i did want to plan something, though. you just never seemed like an 'event' sorta person." he chuckles. "i guess...i guess i know why, now."

"i love surprises," you mutter. "you can still plan something. there's still time."

"but we're not...you said we're not dating." he just seems so damn sad about it.

you shake your head. "what're you talking about?" you grin and rest your head on his shoulder. you can't believe he thought you just didn't like events, you didn't want to cuddle. you just hadn't known.

so you smile, allowing the stench of gotham celebrate the countdown to your first anniversary. the moon hangs high in the sky, and you check your watch. midnight strikes, and you snuggle into jason.

"happy one year anniversary, jay."