"But you are still you." Malleus Draconia x GN!Reader
The Ramshackle Dorm wasn’t much to look at. The wallpaper peeled like old bark, and the floorboards creaked under the slightest step. But to you, it was home — chaotic, drafty, ghost-ridden home.
And somehow, it had become something special to him, too.
You sat on the front steps, the air still warm from the summer sun. The sky was turning soft shades of coral and honey, fireflies beginning to flicker like stars on earth. In your hands was a small paper lantern — a silly idea Grim had after seeing it in a book.
You were just tying the string when a familiar spark of magic filled the air.
A heartbeat later, he appeared.
“Tsunotarou,” you greeted with a smile, not even startled anymore by his sudden arrivals.
Malleus Draconia, crowned in the glow of twilight, offered you a small smile. “Child of man… or should I say, Prefect. Am I interrupting something sacred?”
“Hardly,” you chuckled. “Unless you count arts and crafts as sacred.”
He stepped closer, hands tucked behind his back. “In your presence, even the mundane seems… enchanting.”
Your heart stuttered — it always did when he spoke like that. Not that he noticed; or maybe he did, and chose to act oblivious.
“I was going to hang these around the dorm,” you said quickly, gesturing to the small pile of lanterns. “The place could use a little light.”
“Then allow me to help,” he said, and with a flick of his fingers, the lanterns floated into the air, dancing as if alive.
You watched in quiet awe. “Show-off.”
He tilted his head. “I simply wish to impress you.”
Your cheeks flushed. “You already have.”
The silence that followed was soft and full — the kind where no words are needed, because everything was understood. He stood beside you as the lanterns glowed faintly in the air, their warm light brushing against the cracked walls of the dorm.
“Tell me, Prefect,” he murmured after a while. “Why do you always smile when I come here?”
You blinked, surprised. “Because I’m happy when you visit.”
He looked at you with such intensity that you had to glance away, suddenly shy.
“And I,” he said, voice gentle, “am happy to be the cause.”
You smiled down at your feet, warmth blooming in your chest like the lanterns above. “You’re being extra charming today.”
“I only speak truth,” he replied, his tone so earnest it made you laugh softly.
He offered his hand, and you took it — surprised by how warm his fingers were despite the night setting in. Slowly, carefully, he pulled you up from the steps and led you under the arch of floating lanterns.
“Dance with me,” he said simply.
You blinked. “There’s no music.”
“I hear enough,” he whispered. “The way your heart skips when I’m near... it’s music enough.”
You stared at him, half-scandalized, half-swooning. But you couldn’t help the laugh that escaped your lips as you stepped into his arms.
And so, beneath paper lanterns and firefly light, you danced — no fancy ballroom, no grand orchestra, just the cracked stones of Ramshackle and the beating of your hearts.
And for Malleus, this — your smile, your warmth, your hand in his — was the most magical thing of all.
The soft glow of the lanterns began to fade into something more fragile, like a dream slipping from your fingers. The air around you grew colder, though Malleus’s hand remained steady against your back.
You tilted your head up to look at him —
—and found him staring down at you with a sadness so deep, it stole the breath from your lungs.
"...Malleus?" you asked, your voice almost a whisper.
He didn't answer at first. Only tightened his hold, as if to anchor you closer, as if you might disappear with the mist.
"Child of man," he finally said, his voice heavy, trembling beneath its usual strength, "I wonder sometimes... if I am doomed to lose everything I hold dear."
Your heart thudded. "Why would you think that?"
He laughed softly, but there was no joy in it. "Because it has always been so. For beings like me — blessed with long life, cursed with endless solitude — time does not gift. It only takes."
The lanterns overhead flickered, the wind stirring uneasily. The shadows cast across his face made him look almost otherworldly — beautiful, powerful, but achingly lonely.
You reached for his hand, but he caught your wrist midair, cradling it in both of his hands, almost reverently.
"I fear," he said, lowering his forehead to press against your knuckles, "that no matter how tightly I cling to you... one day, you will leave me. By fate, by time, by death."
His voice cracked like thin ice. "And I... I will remain."
You felt the truth of his words seep into your bones — the ancient, sorrowful truth of beings who live longer than the stars remember.
He was not afraid of monsters.
He was not afraid of war.
He was afraid — terribly, deeply afraid — of loving you only to lose you.
A cold ache spread through your chest.
"Malleus," you whispered, your free hand brushing against his face, coaxing him to look at you.
He obeyed, reluctantly, eyes burning with a desperate, hopeless love.
"If that's a curse," you said softly, "then let it curse me too."
"I don't care how short my life may seem compared to yours. I don't care what fate has written. Right now... here, with you... that's enough."
You smiled, tears blurring your vision. "You're enough."
For a moment, the fear in his eyes wavered — replaced by something tender and agonizingly grateful.
He pulled you into his arms, holding you as if the world might tear you from him at any moment.
Above you, the last lanterns flickered — struggling against the night.
And in the hollowed remains of Ramshackle, under the watchful stars, a dragon fae clung to his beloved, desperately, fiercely — as if by doing so, he could defy the cruel ticking of time itself.
As if loving you was both his greatest blessing — and his inevitable doom.
Ramshackle was lively tonight — perhaps livelier than it had ever been.
The broken windows were strung with makeshift garlands. Lanterns — the same ones you once hung years ago — floated lazily in the air, their soft golden light brushing across the faces of the people you loved.
Grim was stuffing his face with cake, shouting at Ace and Deuce, who were both laughing so hard they could barely stand. Epel and Sebek were arguing passionately over something ridiculous — as always. Even Jack, usually so composed, cracked a rare, toothy grin.
You stood at the edge of it all, a small smile playing on your lips.
Today, you had graduated from Night Raven College.
Somehow. And yet, among all the noise, your eyes sought him — instinctively. And there he was.
Malleus Draconia stood a little apart from the others, near the crumbling wall, the faintest smile on his lips as he watched the scene unfold.
He was taller now, if that were even possible, and his presence was even more commanding — the aura of someone who had truly come into his power. A prince. A king-to-be.
Yet when he looked at you, his eyes softened, and he was once again just your Tsunotarou.
You made your way over to him through the chaos.
"I was afraid you wouldn't come," you said lightly, leaning against the wall beside him.
He looked down at you, amusement flickering in his emerald eyes. "You invited me. How could I refuse?"
"You graduated two years ago," you teased. "You're a full-grown adult now. Thought you might be too busy to hang out with a bunch of fresh grads."
He chuckled, low and rich. "I have countless duties waiting for me in Briar Valley. Yet none are more important than being here, with you."
Your heart squeezed painfully in your chest.
You looked away, blinking up at the sky where the stars were just starting to pierce the twilight. "Time flies, huh?"
"It does," he agreed, his gaze never leaving your face. "And yet, some things... remain eternal."
You turned back to him — and found yourself caught in that look again, that look that made the world quiet down, made you forget everything except him.
"You haven't changed," you said, smiling. "Still saying things that make my heart race."
"And you," he said, reaching out — hesitating for only a fraction of a second before gently brushing your hair back behind your ear, "are still the one I wish to protect, above all."
The old fear, the old sadness, flickered briefly in his eyes — that fear of losing you, of the inevitable tide of time.
But when you leaned into his touch, when you smiled at him with every ounce of feeling you had, that fear seemed to break like a wave against the shore.
"I'm not going anywhere," you whispered.
He leaned closer — close enough that you could feel his breath against your skin.
Close enough that you knew — if you wanted — you could close the distance.
You could finally break the years of aching tension.
"OI, PREFECT! TSUNOTAROU! Get over here!" Grim's voice cut through the moment like a knife.
You laughed, stepping back reluctantly. Malleus exhaled a soft breath — part frustration, part amusement.
"Another time, perhaps," he murmured.
You grinned at him. "Definitely another time."
He offered his arm like the old-fashioned gentleman he was. You slipped yours through his without hesitation, and together, you walked back toward your friends — toward laughter, toward the fleeting, precious night.
Later — when the party had died down, when the others had fallen asleep around the dorm like scattered stars — Malleus stayed behind with you, sitting under the lanterns you had once made together.
The crown weighed heavily on Malleus’s brow.
He had become King of Briar Valley after his grandmother’s passing, as destiny had long foretold. The court sang his praises, the citizens revered him, the ancient forest itself seemed to bow to his rule.
But none of it filled the hollow space inside him.
He still wrote to you — every week without fail.
Each letter was carefully sealed, each word woven with spells of protection and longing.
He sent them across the sea to the Island of Sage, where you had chosen a quieter life in a small, forgotten village.
At first, your replies came steadily — soft words in your familiar handwriting, sometimes messy, sometimes neat, sometimes full of silly sketches or pressed flowers.
He treasured them more than any jewel in his treasury.
But then, the letters stopped.
At first, Malleus waited patiently.
Perhaps you were simply busy.
Perhaps you had fallen ill and would soon recover.
Days became weeks.
Weeks bled into months.
A gnawing fear — ancient and familiar — began to claw at his chest.
He sent Sebek and Silver to try to contact you through modern means — social media, phone calls, any way they could.
But there was only silence.
A void where your voice once lived.
Until at last, Malleus could wait no longer.
He cloaked himself in magic and crossed the sea under a violet sky, the cold winds howling like mourning spirits.
He traveled to the small village where you had made your home.
And there, he found the truth he had feared above all things.
A small, simple grave stood among the whispering trees, worn smooth by the rain.
There was no grand memorial, no monuments of gold.
Just a quiet marker, lovingly tended by the villagers — those few who had known you, who spoke softly of the kind soul who had once lived among them.
Malleus stood before the grave for a long, long time.
Long enough that the sun began to set behind the hills, staining the sky a mournful crimson.
His heart shattered quietly inside his chest.
He knelt before your grave, his clawed hand trembling as it brushed the worn stone.
No tears fell — dragons did not cry easily — but a deep, keening sorrow echoed from his very soul, too ancient, too vast for mere tears.
"I see," he whispered, voice breaking.
"You kept your promise... You stayed until the end."
He bowed his head, long horns casting twisted shadows across the ground.
"Forgive me," he said, "for not being there to hold your hand... at the last."
The lanterns of Ramshackle, the dance under the stars, the letters — all of it flickered through his mind like a dream he could no longer touch. And yet, even in this unbearable grief, Malleus smiled softly — a fragile, broken thing.
Because you had loved him.
And he had loved you.
Nothing could take that away.
"I will find you again," he said, the vow cutting through the dusk like a blade. "In this life. Or the next."
He pressed a single black rose onto your grave — enchanted, so it would never wither, never die.
A symbol of the love that time, distance, and even death could not erase.
Then he rose, the cold wind tangling through his cloak, through his hair, whispering like your voice in his ears.
Malleus Draconia, King of Briar Valley, walked away from your grave beneath a sky thick with stars — a dragon cursed to live on, but forever carrying your memory in the hollowed place where his heart had once beat.
Malleus is now 185.
The spring wind was gentle, carrying with it the scent of blooming sakura. Ramshackle Dorm stood, quiet and crumbling, tucked away from the world’s bustling pace.
Time had gnawed at the edges of the dormitory — the stones were cracked, the wood faded and bowed with age — yet somehow, the old magic still clung to it, stubborn and proud.
And every spring, the sakura trees you once planted with trembling hands — trees that should have withered and died — bloomed with furious, breathtaking life.
Blossoms like clouds of pink flame filled the sky, petals raining down like tears of joy and sorrow.
He returned every year.
Without fail. Malleus Draconia — King of Briar Valley, ageless, powerful, a figure of myth to those who spoke his name — knelt beneath the ancient cherry trees, watching the petals fall around him like snow.
He held an old, worn bundle of letters against his chest.
Your letters.
The ones you sent him all those lifetimes ago.
Their ink had faded, the paper grown thin and delicate as moth wings, but he kept them close, bound with a black ribbon, enchanted so that no time nor element could destroy them.
Sometimes he read them aloud, his voice quiet, trembling with something far too vast to name.
"How are you today, Tsunotarou?"
"I hope you're eating well!"
"I saw a flower today and thought of you."
He smiled, and the smile was full of endless grief and endless love.
He had searched for you for so long.
He had wandered through countless villages, crossed continents, peered into the weavings of fate and time itself — looking for even a fragment of your soul reborn into the world.
But still, even after 100 years, he had not found you.
And yet he believed. Because love like this did not end. Because somewhere, out there, your soul — fragile, warm, stubborn — was waiting for him, reaching for him through the endless spin of life and death.
Above him, a petal landed on his shoulder. He looked up, emerald eyes reflecting the soft pink world around him.
He imagined you there — sitting beside him on the worn steps of Ramshackle, laughing as the blossoms tangled in your hair, your hands brushing against his without fear.
"You should have been here," he whispered, voice breaking against the wind.
"You should have seen how beautiful the world still is."
The silence answered him — not empty, but full.
Full of memories, full of dreams, full of the aching promise he had made long ago:
Even if it took a thousand years.
Even if the stars themselves burned out.
He would find you.
Until then, he would return here, every spring.
He would sit among the flowers.
He would wait.
Because love like his was stronger than sorrow, stronger than death. And because he could still hear your voice in the wind, laughing, calling him home.
The sakura still over Ramshackle Dorm, blanketing the world in endless pink. Malleus stood under them again, like he always did, the worn bundle of letters pressed to his chest.
The same ritual. The same prayer.
But this year, the wind was different.
This year, fate stirred.
He felt it first as a whisper in his ancient blood — a thrum beneath his skin, a pull he had long given up believing he would feel again.
Someone who looked like you.
Someone who carried your same soft, fragile features — the same tilt of the head, the same curve of the smile you once gave him under these very trees.
But there were differences too.
This you was not fully human.
Two small, delicate horns peeked through your hair — unfamiliar, yet so heartbreakingly right.
Dragon blood, like his, now sang in your veins.
And your eyes — once bright and warm — were distant now, like a mirror reflecting a sky he could no longer touch.
You stood at the edge of the courtyard, gazing up at the sakura without a word.
The breeze teased the hem of your cloak, and a few blossoms caught in your silver hair.
Malleus couldn't breathe.
He crossed the distance slowly, afraid that if he moved too quickly, you would vanish like a dream.
When he was close enough, he called out your name — the name he had spoken into the wind a thousand times.
You turned, cool and composed, regarding him with unreadable dragon-green eyes.
He fell to one knee before you, head bowed low.
"...You’ve returned to me," he whispered, voice cracking under the weight of centuries.
You tilted your head, a faint frown marring your brow.
"I don't know you," you said, voice soft, melodic — and yet distant, unfamiliar.
The words cut deeper than any blade.
But Malleus smiled through the pain — a fragile, trembling smile — because even if you did not remember, even if your soul had changed, you were here.
He rose to his feet slowly, careful not to frighten you.
"My name is Malleus Draconia," he said.
"I have waited for you... longer than the stars have shone overhead."
You looked at him, studying him with a guarded, wary gaze.
"Because you are precious to me," he said simply.
"In every life. In every form. No matter how much you change."
The spring wind tugged at your cloak again, and for a moment, the faintest flicker of emotion passed across your face — confusion, sadness, something deeper.
"You must be mistaken," you said at last. "I'm not the person you remember."
"Perhaps not," Malleus said, voice low and reverent.
"Even if time takes you from me... even if the world ends... I will find you again. In this life. Or the next."
Because love — real love — was something even fate couldn't destroy.
Tumblr really thought they could just make my computer crash but i have the whole draft in my notes anyways, u aint slick ho.. last xx
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