You're obsessed with your magic teacher, Master Qifrey, but he always treats you with the utmost respect, when you'd really love to get railed by him </3 Enter - Master Gojo. He's brought in to assist, and he has no issue giving you all sorts of lessons that Qifrey won't - like making you squirt. Qifrey is not very happy catching Satoru fingering you on the dining room table of all places though, so decides to make it both your problems!
٠ ࣪⭑ pairings - yandere! Gojo x witch! reader x Sorcerer! Qifrey
٠ ࣪⭑ warnings - Gojo being a little shit, kinda a crack fic lol, Qifrey losing it, horny reader, Qifrey and Gojo kiss on... accident!? twice! (Sure) fingering, oral (m and f receiving) p in v sex, spitting, cum swapping, Eifel tower, tummy bulges, creampies wc- 3.2k
part of my crossover event!!! I will have two more (Sugu / Sebby and Choso / Valko!) ty to everyone for two years on Tumblr - despite a couple loud haters, the majority of you all have made me very happy to write here!
qifrey art here!! Gojo art here!!
Satoru hates watching you like this, the apprentice of his damn dreams just over there drawing pretty patterns – with Master Qifrey of all people.
Oh, you'd think they got along because they're both white haired sorcerers?
Well you'd be dead ass wrong.
Satoru can't stand how much you have swooned at Qifrey since he's arrived to help with training the future witches here, don't you realize Satoru has six fucking eyes!? Qifrey has only one, how the fuck could he ever even dream to keep up with Satoru Gojo of all people?
It was amusing, him thinking he could – but was not amusing was seeing his crush with Qifrey, following him all around and giggling as if you were one of the other girls he kept. But no, you were a whole ass woman, and Satoru thinks Qifrey should keep to being a step dad, and leave you all to Gojo himself.
You were supposed to be training with him too, but half the time Qifrey was on some bullshit and just disappeared, leaving Gojo to deal with all the damn kids always getting into trouble. He was fine when he left though, when it meant moments with you all to himself.
His fists clench now, pretty blue eyes narrowing as he watches you and that white haired copycat through an arched window, you peek then, turning your head to the side as if you could feel his eyes – and catch him, making him flap his arms around and fall back on the soft grass.
Shit.
He doesn't need you to know how often he watches you, especially since he's come here - he should be focusing on the apprentices he is here to train, not dying over you, jerking his cock in the room next to yours. But you just smell so good, and you look up at him so damn pretty.
You're always simping for Qifrey though.
Satoru is right here!?
He is always trying to show you things, yet - like a brat, really - you're all doe eyed for the other white haired sorcerer. But this weekend, it’s gonna be his chance – for you to see how strong he is. Surely when Satoru shows you his own powers, you’ll get soaking wet.
Well…
You do get soaking wet, when Satoru accidentally transports you into a goddamn ocean.
“Shit!” He must have been distracted!? “I’m sorry, sweetheart… this never happens and…”
“It’s f-fine,” you’re coughing and shivering, your thin white gown clinging to your body in a way that further ruins Satoru altogether, his cock throbbing at the sight of you like this. “I think your transportation magic is… ahem… really…”
“You’re shivering,” he pouts now, tugging you to him, ignoring how good your tits feel against his chest, all lush and pretty. “I am sorry, lemme get you back home. I wanted to show you the beach, not…”
“It’s all right, Master Gojo,” you smile all tremulously, clinging to his neck as he picks you up. “I’m a little dizzy.”
“I’ve got you…”
Satoru gets you back, and after you’ve gotten into dry clothes, he realizes that the two of you are alone.
No kids up.
No one eyed Qifrey and his lover (that’s who Satoru thinks that man is, well… Satoru sure hopes!)
It’s his chance to show you a different magic.
He gathers himself that night at dinner, you're sitting next to him tonight, his hand resting on your thigh as he smiles at you, watching you bite down on your lip, a pretty flush to your skin.
"I am sorry again for today,” he murmurs, brushing a lock of your drying hair back gently. “I really thought I had that one down.”
“It was kind of fun,” you giggle now, sipping your wine, a drop of it on your lips. “Master Qifrey always keeps me away from any danger, locked up almost. So it was a little… exhilarating.”
“Yeah?” You nod and he exhales.
Thank God.
“I actually have a different method than Qifrey does for magic," he murmurs softly, as you nibble on your dinner. "I should show you some time."
"Oh, different from the ocean trip?"
"Mhm," you lean forward just a bit, pretty tits leaned out of your neckline for his hungry blue eyes to hit. You sip your wine carefully once more, feeling the intensity of his gaze taking your breath.
You may or may not have a crush on Qifrey - but you also may or may not have a crush on Satoru.
Scandalous, you can't do such things!
They're both your teachers, and you're a grown woman, much unlike the young girls that joined you as apprentices, aren't you supposed to set an example? But your thoughts are utterly wicked - imagining just how much of their cocks you can fit in your throat.
Scandalous thoughts that must end!
"I could show you, it's a little different," Satoru says, chuckling and slipping up that blindfold he wears constantly, letting pretty blue eyes drift across your collarbones. "More based on touch than drawings."
You feel your cunt clench around nothing. "Oh, touch, you say?"
"Mhm."
"Well,” you set down your glass, heart racing as the fire crackles, illuminating his tall shadow taking over yours on one of the stone walls of the Atelier. “I'm most eager to learn."
It's moments before Satoru has you spread right on that table, shoving your skirts up, his fingers pumping in and out of your needy cunt, the squelching so damn loud. He's leaning over you, as his fingers move in and out faster, a hand clutching yours as it rests on the table, your ass arched all pretty against him as you cry out.
"S-Satoru!"
Your voice is all hoarse as your head falls back, as much as you adored Qifrey - well, he'd kept it all professional. He'd never done more than brush your cheek with his fingers once, a lean close – so close you thought he’d kiss you – just to pull back and walk right out.
Not Satoru.
He had no problem kissing you messy, his eyes were insane as he hit your sweet spot over and over, laughing against your ear, lips brushing against it.
"How are my lessons, pretty little witch?"
"Wh-what... are you teaching, ngh," his teeth nip your ear, eliciting a filthy little cry. “They’re v-very – ah! Gojo…”
“Satoru,” he whispers, pumping faster with his thick fingers in your plump, messy cunt. “Say it, sweetheart.”
“Satoru!”
That's what Qifrey hears when he walks in.
"Well, here's that sweet spot, the one that makes you gush," he's honing in on it, smirking when Qifrey walks in, but your face is pressed against the table cloth, drooling on it, Satoru’s hand entangled in your hair.
Qifey is torn - between wanting to fuck Satoru up and wanting to drag you right over to himself, hearing your pathetic, mewling little cries, your squelching cunt as the dumb fucking sorcerer he brought in to help is touching you. Qifrey’s hands are damn near shaking, clenching into fists as he walks in, slamming his gear down on the ground loud enough for you both to pause.
Satoru just smirks, this little shit.
Your face is all fucked out, drool down your lips, eyes glazed over in a way Qifrey had only ever dreamed of.
Oh yes, filthy dreams of his apprentice, the one he’d tried so fucking hard to make sure not to touch, to be professional. Yet here Satoru Gojo is, with his dumb blindfold shoved up his face, grinning right at him and apparently fingering your cunt again, judging by the messy, wet sounds echoing and your little moan.
“What is the meaning of this!?” He demands, you bite your lower lip, but Satoru simply hums a bit, reaching around to grip one of your tits, squishing it in his hand.
“I was showing her my own magic, one eye.”
Qifrey snorts, shaking his head and pulling out his little notebook. “Time for you to get locked the fuck away, six eye freak.”
“Aww, can’t make her cum without your doodles?” He’s got you arching, and Qifrey’s cock is throbbing underneath his robes, his eye damn near twitching behind that spectacle, as your nails scramble for purchase on the table.
Qifrey walks over and Satoru is furious at how you grip his fingers when he’s that close, how thick your coating of slick gets, he gets so mad he slips a third finger inside, making you cry out.
“Eyes on me,” he murmurs in your ear, but the other sorcerer is gripping your chin, forcing you to meet his gaze, that eye glinting dark.
“No, eyes on me,” he says softly in that tone of his, absolutely fucking you up, his free hand trailing down the side of your pretty tit, tracing the gentle curve as you’re trying to hold it together. “You needed your cunt played with and never told me?”
“She didn’t need to tell me,” Satoru’s lips pressed against your neck, his teeth nipping your skin.
“I tried but y-you… seemed very – ngh, reserved,” he sighs, shaking his head once more.
“Here in the dining room? Really, Gojo?”
“Want dinner though,” he pulls out his fingers, dripping with you, smirking as he sees the sorcerer fucking salivate, sucking your juices right off them, moaning, his cheeks hollowed. “She’s so tasty.”
“My room. Now.”
You both pause, Satoru raising a brow, but Qifrey just walks off, looking at you both behind his shoulder.
“I said now.”
You’re sure you’re in for the worst tongue lashing of your life, even as Satoru has this big, shit eating grin on his face, walking up the winding stairs to his room, when the door shuts behind you, and suddenly it’s Qifrey, his fingers on the buttons of your gown, making quick work of them. He sighs when he sees you naked, groaning at the sight of your pretty body as Gojo’s own eyes dart across.
“Seems our first time will have to be sharing you,” he murmurs, clicking his tongue and brushing your hair back. “Shame, I wanted you all to myself.”
“Who says I’ll share her?” Satoru tugs you to him, lifting you like it’s nothing with his hands on your thighs, carrying you right over to Qifrey’s bed and laying you down, just for the other sorcerer to come right over, shoving Satoru right over.
“You already started having fun,” he presses you down against those silk sheets, cool against your heated skin, making you tremble just a bit. “Look at you…”
“Master Qifrey…” You’re all flustered, and he raises a brow, as Satoru’s slipping off his top, revealing the muscles of his hard body, while Qifrey’s fingertips trail your thighs, sliding up and making you tremble.
“You were aching all this time, hmm?” His voice rushes over you, and Satoru’s sigh is loud.
“Will you move so I can show you how to eat pussy?”
“Tch, think I don’t know how to pleasure a woman?” Satoru is snickering as Qifrey kneels at the foot of the bed.
“Do you just draw on her thigh?” Qifrey doesn't answer, he simply slips his long fingers up your skin. Watching those juices pour right out.
"I've wanted to do this since I first saw you," Qifrey murmurs, as if it’s just for you – spreading your thighs with his hands carefully. "Taste this sweet, pretty little pussy."
“You have? I–ah!” He leans in, his breath hot against your sensitive folds, before his tongue makes contact with your dripping slit.
You cry out, arching against the bed, hips pressed up as he licks a slow stripe up your slit a few times, coating his tongue in it before he parts your puffy folds, circling your clit with deliberate precision. The very tip of his tongue swirling intricate patterns like drawings, all in front of Satoru Gojo.
“Fuck…” that's all he can manage, as one of your hands grip the sheets, and the other entangles in Qifreys pretty white locks.
“There it is,” he mumbles, pussy drunk as he smirks over at Satoru. “She quite likes her clit being covered in my ‘drawings’ hmm?”
Satoru watches with hungry blue eyes before kneeling down right next to him, his mouth capturing your other thigh in a little kiss, grasping dribbles that are glistening right down.
“Move over,” he bites your skin. nudging Qifrey aside. "Let me taste her too."
Instead of arguing, Qifrey simply shifts a bit, leaning over you to capture your chin, allowing Satoru to eye your dripping folds, parting your pussy wide and watching it clench around nothing.
Qifrey spits your own cum in your mouth.
“Swallow, pretty Apprentice.”
You eagerly obey, earning a pleased smirk as Satoru buries his face against you with just a bit of clumsiness, his tongue exploring every inch of your folds before pulling back with a groan.
"Fuck, you're tight," he mumbles, sliding a finger inside as Qifrey licks your clit again, the squelches obscene. "Can you even take us?"
“Mhm – ah!” Your thoughts are cut off when both men begin to eat your cunt – desperately, your hands in each of their silky white locks, one of your thighs in each hand as they spread you wide.
Qifrey leans in and captures Satoru's lips in a messy kiss as if to make sure to capture all your juices, his tongue slipping over Satoru's mouth to taste you on him. The sight makes your cunt clench around Satoru's fingers, the way they're moaning. The way the saliva drips between them – your two teachers sharing your taste between them right over your twitchy clit.
“Oh…” they both blush a bit and pull back as if it were some mistake, before diving back in, tongues circling your clit in tandem, both men's fingers working your needy cunt. “Did you two… ah. Kiss?”
“No!?”
“Indeed no!?”
You go to giggle.
Big mistake.
The two white haired sorcerers immediately position you, so you're laying on your back sideways on the bed, Qifrey settling between your thighs with his fat cock tugged out of his robes, as Satoru positions himself by your head, his pink tip dripping white little drops on your lips.
“You want me to take care of you, hmm? Pretty girl,” Qifrey’s words are fucking you up – blood rushing through your ears as you nod, feeling his cock slide between your puffy folds, while Satoru’s darts on the seem of your lips, running across it achingly slow.
"I want to watch that pretty throat bulge when I fuck it," he murmurs, moaning when you lap at his tip, your mouth opening wide. “Watch you swallow every inch."
"And I want to see myself…” He pushes right into your slick heat, you’re so damn wet your cunt takes him easy despite how fucking long he is, he lets out a little moan, eyeing that stomach bulging. “Right here.”
tBoth men eye your body, Qifrey painting pretty patterns with his fingers on your tummy, while his cock is gliding in, Satoru pressing so that you choke on him, shushing you carefully.
“That’s it, you can take us, sweetheart,” he cooes those words, watching his shape in your throat while he sees Qifrey’s cockprint moving in and out of your stomach. “Look at you. Made for it.”
“You're taking us so well,” Qifrey whispers, picking up your thighs now and spreading them wide, watching how she so greedily grabs onto his cock, every thrust making slick just pour. “I was neglecting my apprentice, I see.”
“You were,” Satoru whines out – Qifrey would make fun of that sound, but he’s doing the same goddamn thing when you grip him, swallowing around the other sorcerer’s cock. “Fuck…”
They begin to move their cocks in perfect sync, tears slip from the corners of your eyes as Satoru sinks deeper, and Qifrey’s tip is just kissing your cute lil cervix. You’re so full of both of them you can hardly see, vision fuzzy as your eyelashes flutter closed, seeing stars behind your eyes.
It’s not long before he has you on your hands and knees, sucking Satoru like that while his hand entangles in your hair, his heavy balls slapping your clit, the loud slick sounds of the men fucking you echoing in the bedchamber. Satoru’s gasping out as he shoves his cock fully inside your mouth, that tip gliding on your throat until your nose is flush with the little smattering of white hair, and Qifrey is leaned back, watching your cunt taking him.
“Look at that, so eager,” he clicks his tongue, smirking just a bit, that little eye glass fogging up with his own breaths as he pulls out fully, slapping his fat cock right on your needy cunt, chuckling. “Beggin’ for all that cum inside, isn’t she?”
Satoru pulls out so you can speak, throat sore with how he’s stretched it out, saliva just dripping from your lips. Satoru tilts your chin up, smiling down at you, thumb brushing over your lower lip now, swiping some of his pre.
“Answer him, sweetheart.”
“Want it,” you manage, peeking back to see your teacher gripping your hips, nudging his tip teasingly against your clit, coating it in sticky pre. “I do…”
“How do we ask, love?” Qifrey nudges your clit again. “Have I not taught you any manners during our lessons?”
“Please,” you whisper, gasping out as Qifrey shoves his length back inside your snug lil cunt, she’s quivering all round him as he leans close, and Satoru is tugging your mouth back open.
“Want to swallow all this cum while he fills you?” He asks, making your cheeks heat up. “Looking all innocent when you just want all this cum.”
“Mhm,” is all you can manage, tongue out, letting them both fuck their loads inside – so full you’re swallowing Gojo down, as Qifrey pumps you so full it won’t even stay in.
Don’t worry – the sorcerers make sure to clean your pussy right up, and if their tongues catch each other, well they’re just sharing your taste – and Qifrey’s cum is quite sweet, even if Satoru won’t admit it. They’re certainly not kissing, and they absolutely can’t stand each other – they’re just getting along for you!
synopsis . Trying to coax your usually gentle partner into fucking your throat whilst giving him head. content . afab!reader, somewhat established relationship, oral sex (m!receiving), dirty talk, face fucking, pet names, brat taming, praise, sadism, etc.
author's note: i need him so bad like pls. anywho, answering this request (kinda lol). banner from: “Kubitsuri Danshi to Nikushoku Joshi”
“Y-Yes, down your throat now. Oh my-, just like that. Perrrfect.” Qifrey couldn’t help the words that floated out of his mouth, a hand grasping at the top of your head tightly enough to reveal veins against his skin.
He tried not to buck his hips too much almost every time you sucked him off but it was difficult not to when your head was bobbing so vigorously, letting his twitchy tip kiss ‘n cling to the very back of your throat. He told you he had a stressful day, so all you wanted to do was relieve some of that stress for him—even though he typically advises against doing so adamantly.
You’ve no idea why he’s so keen on remaining stressed and pent up. Nor do you understand how the man goes on and on about how much he hates water and all things wet, yet he’s throbbing against your flattened tongue the moment you stick it out for him.
His wishes aside, all you longed for was to see that other side of him he tried so hard to keep hidden from those most dear. Though, Qifrey had a way of hiding all intimate parts of his personality from those he treasured most.
With the sole exception of sex, of course. While it did relieve some amounts of stress, it most certainly was too satisfactory of an act for him to indulge in with just anyone.
Which is where you come in—his pretty lil’ partner.
“Can you-, hahhh… p-possibly—fuck—slow down, my love?” Qifrey tried to warn you, his fingers taut atop your head as his the muscles in his thighs tensed and his desire to buck his hips upward increased. And yet, you merely lifted your gaze up to meet with his and then began to bob your head up ‘n down even quicker. “N-No, not faster. I-, hnngh.”
The hold he has on you suddenly steels and your eyes widen as you realize you’re hardly able to move. Qifrey’s mentally apologizing for the way he begins to thrust up into your mouth and push your head down to meet with each one.
“I cannot maintain my composure when you suck on me like that,” He huffs, lashes fluttering whilst his pretty face twists up in pleasure. Then he’s tilting his head to the side and casting a half grin down at you, “Fuuuck, you made me do this, y’know. S-Staring at me like that… god, you look so gorgeous with my cock in your mouth.”
You felt your thighs clamp together tightly in an attempt at soothing the sudden ache his words spurred from your body. You weren’t sure if he realized it or not, but this was all you really wanted from him.
“Yeah? You like that, do you?” Sweat begins to build up against the smooth planes of his skin and he’s nearly irritated by it. So much so that he finally slips up and drops that gentle, kindhearted act of his, “Oh, I bet you do.” Your lips smooch down against his swollen base as he holds you in place—the faint tuffs of a white happy trail tickling your skin. “Tell me then, tell me how much you like having your mouth properly fucked. Come now, let me hear it.”
“Mmmph!” You mumble around him, batting your eyes up rapidly at him.
Qifrey chuckles. He did quite enjoy it when you tested him, and that feeling only doubled down when he saw you like this, “Still putting forth your best efforts even when—nngh… y-your mouth is all full of me. How cute.”
Your partner—never boyfriend, for reasons you’re entirely unsure of—gains that different shaded glimmer in his eyes all of a sudden. You relish in the feel of his dick drooling something pleasantly nasty down your throat and he seems to be delighted by the sight of it. That, and the sexy way in which you squirm in between his legs like you wanted him to be meaner to you or something.
“Slow, my love.” He tried to warn you, tried to apply pressure to your head and steady how quickly you sucked at his cock. “S-Slow down, I’m close.”
His voice was so delicate even as his orgasm approached and you found yourself moaning around his shaft as his tone wavered and pitched in reaction.
Then your hands met his legs and you gripped at him, lifting your gaze back up and swirling your tongue across every reachable vein he had to offer you. He wanted you to slow down again, but just like the last time, you refused to do so and proceeded to suck faster ‘n harder.
Things click for him right then.
“Ah? You want me to… oh.” His cock was throbbing all against the constricting walls of your throat and he knew you felt it. Even so, you still swallowed him in deeper and ignored how gags threatened to interrupt your actions. Qifrey found himself grinning, “You’d like to swallow it, would you?”
Naturally, you nod.
The witch before you was many, many things—but a complete pushover for you was not one of them. If you were going to actively disobey his orders of slowing down just to get what you wanted, then he was going to only allow your desires to come forth on his own terms.
Which is exactly why he holds your head as he pushes himself up to stand. You try to pull back as if you needed to breathe but your mouth is rapidly clogged by the length of his cock pushing forward in one, mean thrust.
His balls smack against your chin and he feels you whining around him as he grunts, “Naughty girl.” Qifrey readjusts his hands to the sides of your pretty face before letting out a soft sigh. Though, his calming exhale was rather opposite to the vicious look in his eyes as he began having his way with your mouth, “I do hope this-, hah… satisfies your fantasies well. Mmgh.”
You somehow gain the bratty nerve to try and wiggle your head away from his steeling grip and he seems to find that most humorous.
Cocking his head to the side and narrowing those rude eyes at you, “Still—keep still,” He groans, rolling his hips forward more thoroughly so that you could feel each inch of his cock twitch around your mouth. To his surprise, you manage to stop your squirming, and for that he smiles and says, “Goooood. Now swallow.” before cumming directly down your tongue.
When he soon pulls out of you, he’s left to watch gallops of saliva and his cum string between his tip and your lips. The sight should’ve been seen as disgusting, given how wet and sloppy it was. And yet he was still hard, still twitching in front of your face even as he panted to catch his breath.
It really was unfair how gorgeous of a partner he’d obtained.
He couldn’t help but want to fuck every drop of his frustrations out into you—especially when you were peering up at him with those glossy eyes of yours, looking as though you wanted to go again and again until he had his fill of you.
You move to wipe at your mouth, “Qifr—“
“Actually,” He’s cutting you off rather sharply, taking his dick into one hand and shuddering from the sensitivity of it before his feet shift his body closer to you. Then his other hand finds the top of your head and he’s glaring at you like you’re nothing more than some toy for him to make use of, “I quite enjoyed that.”
You blink once.
Qifrey had a tendency to focus on your pleasure most days, claiming that doing so is most enjoyable for him too. But you knew there was another side of him he wasn’t showing you quite yet, and apparently this was it.
His fingers disappear into your hair and his palm is nearing the back of your head. You knew he was about to absolutely ravish your throat based on the way he was holding onto you.
“Let’s go again, shall we?” Serves as the only warning from his plush lips. Then you watch him move his hand from his dick and to your jaw, tipping your chin up before he swipes a thumb over your cheek in awe. He hates water but it would be quite the sight to see it falling from your face all because of him, “Preferable until you’re crying… and after that, you’ll keep quiet about this. Understood?”
Qifrey had to make sure your silence was a given these days, seeing as you’d created a small habit of hinting at the intimate nights you experienced with him. And to make those matters worse, he’d found out that you shared these vague details with Olruggio of all people.
Hence why you’re pouting, “Not even—“
The witch cuts you off by nudging the hardened edges of his cock in between your lips all unevenly, letting his shaft gloss over your wiggly tongue and deep down into the back of your trachea—easily causing you to gag.
“You will tell no one about this.” He orders, yanking your head back so that only your lips are left to quiver around his tip, “Not a soul. Now nod if I’m understood.”
Obediently, you do.
Then his cheerful grin returns, despite that darkened look remaining present in his eye. “Good girl.”
qifrey who likes to plunge his fingers in and out of you while he makes small spells for tomorrow; something to help the girls practice! but you just couldn’t wait.
“nnngh—qif….” — “good, right?” kissing your temple while you sat down on his lap, squirming for how deep his digits would reach inside you. “too— haah! fast… sl- slow down pleasef-“ your eyes rolled back again.
the arm that held you pulled you in closer. “since you didn’t have enough patience to wait, playing footsie with me at the dining table— you don’t get to decide, my love.”
with that, he suddenly stops, fully ram his lengthy fingers inside. padded fingertips massaging themselves against your g-spot made your breath hitch,
“hmm? what was that, love?” you couldn’t even give a snappy reply back. you were so close to coming again, and yet it was as if he already knew, you didn’t deserve the pleasure of release.
“this is what happens to those who can’t wait.” his right hand finally finishes with another small drawing, one that drew what it could by muscle memory. “what happened if the girls saw, mmh?”
“maybe you’re into seeing me flustered. you’ve been trying to do it all week, and yet haven’t succeeded.”
placing the pen down into the container of magical ink, pushing it to the side before firmly pinning you down now onto the table in front of the both of you.
“you’ve got my attention now, [name]. so i’ll give you a choice, do you want me to start rough or stay grinding until you learn your place?”
Qifrey admits to you that he's never had an orgasm, and you offer to help with that.
In a bit of a drunken haze, Qifrey had admitted to you he’s never had an orgasm. He never had time to think of such things, but he would admit the shock on your face had him a little embarrassed, which was how he ended up in your room, in the dead of night, twiddling with his thumbs, and trying not to run back to his room. Pleasure was not a normal occurrence in his life, and quite frankly he wasn’t sure what to even expect. Sure, he had popped a boner on occasion, but he’d never done anything about it, just dealt with the discomfort until it went away. But you assured him, there was a much better way to deal with it.
What Qifrey had not admitted to you, was his attraction to you. To him, that felt infinitely more embarrassing than never having an orgasm. Especially if you didn't feel the same, he couldn’t imagine ruining your friendship like that. However, this seemed like crossing a line as well, but you suggested it and he was never one to deny you. You were a bit tipsy, and he really did plan to say no, but when you practically crawled across the couch and got in his face, telling him about how good you could make him feel; that was the first time he’d ever felt butterflies in his stomach at someone’s words, and well he wanted to find out more.
You walked out of your bathroom, entirely naked. His eyes widened, doing everything to look at your face and not your exposed form in front of him. He had seen you naked on multiple occasions, when you were trying on outfits for a night out, or simply just changing in general, you never cared, but this felt different.
“You can look, Qi,” You sauntered over to him, placing his hands on your hips, “It’s all for you anyway.”
His heartbeat quickened, his chest rising and falling in a rapid succession. You had given him permission, so why did this feel like an invasion of privacy? His voice caught in his throat as he slowly raked his eyes down your throat, to your bare chest. His breath hitched at your perfect breasts, nipples pebbled from the cool air blowing in from the cracked window. A wave of heat flowed between his legs, a slight twitch in his cock. This was different from the times this happened before. Before was an inconvenience, but now it was something he wanted to explore.
“If I do anything that makes you uncomfortable, you tell me, okay?” You smiled up at him with your perfect teeth and your perfect lips, the ones he had thought about kissing so many times, but never in this context, certainly not, that would be indecent.
He nodded, allowing you to slide your fingers into the front of his belt and pull him towards the bed.
You sat on the edge, “Would you like me to take your clothes off?”
“I can do it myself,” He stumbled out, taking half a step back, the room suddenly much too hot.
“Okay,” You said calmly, not wanting to startle him, “Take your time.”
He swallowed, Adam's apple bobbing in his throat before removing his robe, hanging it over your desk chair. He took a deep breath, meticulously removing the rest of his clothing and folding it onto your chair. He was left in his boxers, one arm crossed over his chest and holding his bicep as if to try and hide from you.
You tilted your head slightly, “You don’t have to remove those yet, if you aren’t comfortable.” You smiled and Qifrey suddenly felt even more self conscious as your eyes raked over his exposed form, “Do you want to come sit?” You patted the bed next to you.
He carefully made his way to the bed, the mattress sinking slightly as he sat next to you.
“Can I sit on your lap?” You asked, not wanting to do anything without letting him know first.
“Um, alright,” His hands shook.
You smiled, lifting yourself before straddling his lap, wrapping your arms around his neck. “Is this okay?”
“Mhmm,” He mumbled, hands fisting the sheets.
“How about this?” You smirked, grinding onto his semi-erection.
He sucked in a breath, hands flying to your hips and holding tight. You froze, not wanting to startle him further, but the sheen of red that had taken over his face, and the ever growing bulge beneath you made you want to do it again.
“Can I?” You asked cautiously.
He nodded, arms shaking against you.
You rocked back and forth, a whine escaping Qifrey. He bit down on his bottom lip, “Uh uh,” You chastised, “I want to hear you,” Your hand snaked up his nape, curling into the back of his hair. Using your other to gain some leverage on his shoulders before grinding harder onto his bulge.
“Oh god,” Qifrey moaned, head falling forward into your collarbone. He had never felt anything like this. It was as if he wanted you to stop, but he would beg you not to if you tried. It was wrong, but fuck was it unbelievably pleasureable. Your nails raked against his scalp, almost in time with your hips grinding forward. An obscene wet noise filled the room as you sped up, your arousal coating his boxers and seeping through to his cock below, mixing with the pre dripping out of his red, mushroom tip. He had never wanted to feel something bare so badly, but that would mean removing you from his lap to peel off his boxers and he simply could not fathom that. Not when this felt so good, not when his cock was twitching, and something was building some immensely he wasn’t sure he could handle it, but he didn’t want you to stop. His hair was stuck to his forehead, glasses fogged as he breathed heavily into your shoulder, but you kept going. The prettiest noises and gasps falling from your lips. And he thought those were perfect, but what sent him over the edge was the breathiest moan of his name, your mouth mere inches from his ear.
A wave of ecstasy overtook his body, a warm liquid spilling into his underwear below. He bit down onto your shoulder, unknowing what to do with himself. You cried out, still rocking your hips, still chasing your own pleasure. But when you felt his cock stall underneath you, you stopped, not wanting to overstimulate the man, not yet at least, though you desperately wanted to finish yourself, tonight was about him.
“Are you alright?” You breathed out.
“That was,” He took in a breath, “Exquisite.”
You laughed, “Maybe next time you can put it inside.”
“Inside?” He lifted his head from your shoulder, tilting to the side when he met your gaze.
“Oh, Qifrey, I have so much to show you.”
A/N: I kind of want to make this a mini-series of first times with Qifrey
*Please do not repost, copy, or feed any of my works to your AI*
QIFREY happens upon your small village looking for spell casting materials. but when a storm hits, he stumbles across something that might be too much for him to handle…
contents: fem!milf!reader x QIFREY , smut (MDNI), fingering, teasing, nipple play, multiple orgasms, ȯverstimulation, unprotected ṣex, finishing inside, pet names (ma'am, darling, miss, beautiful, baby for reader, sir for QIFREY), breeding kink
wc: 1.7k
“Hm, no honeytrees here…”
The silver-haired man turns his gaze upwards towards the clouds, dark and rumbling in the distance. “I didn’t realize I had to go so far out into the countryside to find one.” He murmurs. “And with a storm coming. How untimely.”
Heavy droplets of rain are falling by the time your village comes into his view. Circling his pen over his palm quire, he shields himself from the rain, slowly making his way towards the nearest house.
I suppose I’ll ask a local for directions, he thinks with a sigh.
Rapping on the door, he’s expecting an average villager to open the door, but-
Oh.
You peek through the crack in the door. “Hello? Can I help you?”
Even with only half your body exposed, Qifrey is speechless. Voluptuous curves, gentle eyes, soft skin peeking through the crack—shit.
You’re exactly his type.
Regaining his composure, he manages to force out words. “Hello there! Sorry for intruding. I was wondering if you knew where to find honeytrees? I heard they were native to this region.”
You pull the door open and he sets his gaze on your eyes, trying so very, very hard not do let his eyes trail down to your swelling cleavage.
“Of course!” You smile. “But it’s raining rather hard outside right now—please do come in! I’ll give you the directions later.”
Qifrey hesitates. “I really appreciate it, ma’am, but I really must get going-”
“Please, sir, this storm is sure to continue for a while. It’s late too, look at the time! Rest here while you can, I insist,” you urge, hands on your very wide, very lovely hips. “It’ll be nice and warm in here.”
He swallows. “I- really, that’s not necessary-” But before he can get another word out, you drag him inside.
It’s warm and cozy in your home, Qifrey admits to himself.
“Please, sit down. Make yourself comfortable, sir,” you chime, hurrying to the kitchen. “I’ll make tea.”
He resigns himself to your sofa, his weary body sinking into the pillows. Glancing around, he notices a shining picture frame hung above the crackling fireplace.
“That’s my daughter,” you beam from the kitchen. “Isn’t she just the cutest?” Your smile threatens Qifrey’s heart rate as you stroll back into the living room, teapot and teacups in hand.
“You have a daughter?” He tilts his head.
“Yes, sir, I do. 5 years old this year.”
Handing him a steaming cup of tea, you return his question. “Do you have children?”
He pauses for a moment, taking the teacup from you. Images of his apprentices spring to mind. “Well,” Qifrey quirks a smile. “Yes, I suppose I do. Three- no, four now.”
“Really now? For such a young man? I suppose you must be a real heartbreaker!” You laugh, pouring yourself a cup.
Qifrey tries to ignore the way his cheeks heat up. “No no, I can assure you, it’s nothing like that,” he hurriedly reassures. “It’s- they’re- adopted.”
“Ah, I see now. Still, being a father at your age must be tiring,” you respond with a gentle smile.
“I’m really not that young, miss…” he murmurs.
You raise an eyebrow. “How old are you, then?” you muse. But your voice is suddenly sultry, flirtatious, and it sends shivers down Qifrey’s spine.
You lean forward, your full, heavy breasts showing off aaaaall your cleavage dangerously close to Qifrey’s face. And this time, he can’t pull his gaze away.
“Old enough to be a father,” he manages out. You smirk, scooting closer to him. Your arm brushing his is enough to send sparks down his nerves. He can see you, all of you, in such breathtaking detail—the swelling curves of your breasts and hips, the roll of your tummy, the softness of your graceful hands. Even your nipples are visible, perky, peeking out through your sheer white nightgown. His dick twitches in under his robe.
“Really now?” you tease. Trailing a finger up his arm, you can’t help but giggle. How cute.
Leaning over, your lips to brush the shell of his ear, and you whisper so seductively that Qifrey nearly faints: “How fortunate.”
Qifrey bolts upright, standing stiff as a board. “Ma’am, I’m- flattered, truly, but- your child, your husband…we…” his stern voice falls to a hush. “We cannot do this.”
You look up at him. “Sir…my husband left this village a long time ago. While I was still pregnant.” You cast your eyes downward. “And my daughter is fast asleep. Has been for a while now, this late into the night” you crack a smile, giggling. “That girl can sleep through anything.”
Qifrey stills. “I’m sorry, ma’am, I didn’t realize…”.
You smile softly, shushing him. “Please, it’s no problem. I don’t mind, truly.”
Pausing, you fidget with your hands. “But if you’d truly like to make up for it…” you whisper, gliding your hand up Qifrey’s leg. “Please, let us…enjoy this moment together, if you would so like?”
It takes nothing more to collapse any of Qifrey’s remaining restraint.
He’s on you in a split second, gasping into your lips, kissing you ferociously.
So, so pretty. So soft.
He’s chanting mantras in his head as his hand slips underneath your thin nightgown, circling and teasing at your nipples.
“Oh- oh, please, sir- ” you gasp out, bucking and whining, grinding your hips into his. He moans into your lips, nudging your legs open with his knee. “You temptress,” he grunts, swallowing back a moan.
Your pussy twitches as his cold hands cup your tits. His thumbs run over your hardening, perky nipples, and you bite back a whimper.
“Such pretty, sensitive little nipples,” he purrs. “C’mere, darling.”
He bends over and mouths at your tits through your sheer nightgown. “You like me sucking on your tits, don’t you?” he smirks, tongue flicking your nipple. “Say it, beautiful.”
“Y-yes, I like it so much!”
His pale, slender hands grab at your waist and ass with desperation, pulling up the hem of your skirt. “Good girl,” he breathes. “You’re so obedient for me, ma’am.”
“Mm, sir, please,” you whine, back arching.
“Not sir. Qifrey,” he whispers into your ear, nipping at your neck. Your pussy twitches as his fingers dip into your slick folds. “Ugh- ”
His fingers twist and scissor inside you, the lewd squelching of his fingers turning your brain to mush. Thumb rubbing your red and puffy clit, Qifrey pulls a whine from your lips. “Aw, poor thing,” he coos. “But it feels so good, doesn’t it?”
You squeal as Qifrey rubs your clit faster and faster, his other fingers thrusting in and out of your hole as your juices leak out.
“C’mon, cum all over my fingers, beautiful,” he rasps. And with a cry, you climax, toes curling and eyes rolling back in your head.
“Fuck,” Qifrey breathes. Your cunt was puffy, slick shinning in the warm glow of the fireplace. He can’t help but spread your pussy lips open with his fingers, admiring your pretty, swollen clit.
Round, heavy tits heaving with effort, you lay back gasping for air. “Qifrey, I- oh!” You shriek as he flips you onto your stomach, grabbing your hips and lifting them—and suddenly, his cock plunges into you.
You’re so warm and soft and tight, Qifrey thinks, gritting his teeth. “I’m- gonna start moving, okay?” he hisses, shuddering as your tight hole contracts around him.
“Yes, please, fuck me!”
With a sharp smack to your ass, he bottoms out in you, leaking tip kissing your cervix. Qifrey’s eyes bore into the spot where you two are connected, watching his cock split your pussy apart.
“Mmm, you’re doing so well,” he laughs breathlessly. “You’ve got such a- hah- such a nice, juicy ass, too.”
With a groan, slaps your ass before grabbing your titties, bouncing and jiggling from the aggression of his thrusts, and he pinches at your nipples. “O-o-ohhh, f-fu-fuck!” you cry. “Fuck me harder, please~!”
“Yes ma’am.”
And with that, Qifrey’s thrusts become harder, faster, his balls slapping against your clit as he pounds your pussy. His hips are ferocious, his cock drilling into you so violently that it leaves your ass cheeks red and stinging.
Bending over you, he moves his hand down to your throbbing, dripping clit, rubbing the sensitive bud in quick circles.
Body trembling, you’re lost for words, only babbling out nonsense as he fucks you deeper and harder.
“Such a round, juicy ass and- ” Qifrey grabs your chin and twists you around to face him. “-such a sexy set of titties, fuck.”
He kisses you harshly, tongue thrashing and tangling with yours as you mewl into his mouth. “Naaaaasty lil’ pussy- hah- you looove this dick, don’t you? Dirty thing.”
You whine, pussy squelching in response, slick leaking down Qifrey’s cock as he hammers into your wet hole. “Yeah? Want me to pump you full of cum? Give you another cute lil’ kid?”
Qifrey’s grinning ear to ear, biting his lip as he imagines you round, plump, tits filled with milk. “Let me make you a mama, yeah?”
You moan, voice cracking. “Yes, yes, please Qifrey, breed me~” you babble. “Wan-want you to fill me with your cum, p-please?”
You’re batting your pretty eyelashes up at him, and the sight makes his cock twitch.
“Breed me, please?”
Oh, god help him.
He really can’t resist you, you and your juicy tits and jiggling ass, your softness, your sweetness. All of it has his pristine mind in shambles as he loses himself in fucking your tight, wet heat.
The plap-plap-plap of his balls against your soaking pussy has him whining with need just as much as you. “Pound me harder, c’mon, please, need your dick!” you moan out. “Make me cum a-again- ah~!”
Fingers bruising your hips, he nips and sucks at your neck. “Whatever you want, sweet thing-” One of his hands find your tit, flicking your nipples, while the other delves down to your bruised pussy, a finger sinking into your pussy next to his cock.
“Ooh, cumming, I’m- cumming!~”
With a squeal, you squirt slick all over his cock and fingers. Qifrey’s jaw drops open, letting out a long, drawn out moan. His balls clench, spurting his thick, hot seed into your abused, twitching cunt.
“Fuuuuck, baby, you- ah- feel so fucking good!” he hisses, eyes rolled back, hips bucking and stuttering to a stop against your ass.
Cock still twitching and stiff inside your pussy, you and Qifrey lay there for a long moment in silence, bathing in afterglow, a mess of sweaty bodies and heaving chests.
You’re still catching your breath when he breaks the silence.
“You…are incredible,” Qifrey breathes. “I’m sorry if I…went too rough. I’ll get you the right herbs, make sure you don’t take to my seed.”
He stands up, his pale skin still glimmering with sweat. “I’ll leave now, ma’am, I’m…thank you for the- oof!”
Your arm wraps around his slender waist, pulling him down into you.
“Stay a while longer…you still need those directions, right, honey?”
a/n: i'm alive! i had such a busy year but i'll be trying to write more now! missed you lovelies ₊˚⊹ 𑣲⋆｡˚ dividers from @/cursed-carmine !!
Imagine sitting on Qifrey’s face and he moans as if he’s the one being pleasured. His angelic tone resonates throughout the entire room as he gently grasps your ass, gliding his tongue across the expanse of your folds repeatedly. There’s nothing in this world that he would rather taste than you, and so when he shoves his tongue through your fluttering hole, he bucks his hips up into nothing and whines.
“Oh, darlin’ you taste so good, mmf—” His nails dig onto your skin, forming crescents in its wake and leaving reddish marks that you know will bruise by tomorrow. As if realizing, he loosens his grip, pulling away momentarily to whisper an apology before diving back in. He plants soft kisses along your clit, moving downwards then practically makes out with your pussy.
⟢ tags: master x apprentice relationship, eventual exmaster!qifrey x brimmedhat!reader, ambiguous age gap, reader's age is undefined, mentions of self-harm (reader), allusions to vague qifrey x olruggio, lowkey codependency, reader has subtle yandere-ish tendencies if you squint, spoilers for manga (please let me know if there are any more tags i should add this is my first time writing content like *gestures*)
"The selfishness behind my reason for taking on pupils made me ill. But they'd never have to know that. So I decided that I would put every fiber of my being towards becoming a good educator. Only now do I realise just how foolish that, too, was."
Qifrey takes on an apprentice to keep the silverwood at bay. It works, until it doesn't.
⟢ chapters: one | two | three | four
I. THERE BENEATH
drag path (n.) — a visible, often continuous trail, mark or disturbance left behind on a surface by an object or person being dragged
Qifrey had told himself it was fine.
The memory-erasure spell Olruggio concocted had worked beautifully, despite the circumstances. His friend's eyes had gone blank for only a moment, and in the next, they'd been taken ahold of by a deep sleep. The sort of sleep that was gentle and kind, even as the silverwood's pale branches writhed and recoiled in remonstration. And when Olruggio awoke, the sun was setting over the lake, and there was no evidence of what had transpired; only the familiar tilt of Qifrey's hat, a dark ribbon rippling in the wind, and the frayed ends of his tassel brushing Olruggio's shoulder.
That had been three years ago.
Now, Qifrey stands at the window of an unfamiliar room in a newly built house that will one day be his atelier, somewhere out in the Naakiwan Downs, east-northeast of the Kahln. The land stretches endlessly before him—open plains rolling into each another until they dissolve into the distant horizon, vast swathes of pale grasses beneath a blue sky that seems to go on forever. It rarely rains out here, on the Zozah Peninsula. An atelier, of his own, under the open sky.
One part of his promise, kept.
But he's not foolish enough to hope that his distance from the Great Hall—from Olruggio—will not give rise to problems of their own. Traveling alone had done nothing but proven that even that minute solace was enough for the silverwood to take root once more. And Qifrey would rather die than let his dearest friend's sacrifices have been made in vain.
He needs to stay on the edge. Unsettled. Uneasy. The moment he stops feeling as though the world is pressing in on him, so will the silverwood.
Beldaruit used to hover. For some reason, Qifrey remembers that with uncomfortable clarity. The sage's pale smoke-grey eyes would track him wherever he moved through the magic workshops of the Great Hall—never overt or intrusive, yet always there. And greater than his control over conjuring magic was his talent for conjuring nonsensical excuses, ones that he would use to check on the condition of Qifrey's health and mind.
You work too hard, Beldaruit would say in that airy, almost absentminded tone—so lighthearted it could almost be mistaken as jest. And Qifrey would roll his eyes, dismiss his concerns, and Beldaruit would worry anyway.
Perhaps that's what he needs. Someone to worry about. Someone whose concerns and matters would keep him tethered to the present, too busy to fall into the quiet where the tree could spread its roots.
An apprentice, then.
He finds you one afternoon as ordinary as any other. It's raining when he reaches the port town of Havso—a steady patter that turns the cobblestones slick and darkens the wood of every dock and doorway. For all the precision Qifrey has honed over water, getting wet remains an irritation he's never quite outgrown, and the sound of rain prickles at his awareness like a thousand fine needles, impossible to ignore. He hurries through the narrow streets, searching the shops—for a new cast iron pot to replace the one that had cracked last week, some twine for binding dried herbs, other small sundries—when he sees you.
The canvas awning you're huddled beneath is doing almost nothing at all—not to protect you from the cold spring rain, or from the sharp, biting winds sweeping in from the coast. Water drips steadily from the hem of your smock, your hair plastered in wet strings to your narrow cheeks. Despite this, you don't move.
Qifrey doesn't mean to stop. But he does.
You look up when his shadow falls over you. He takes the edge of his cloak, the water dispelling spell inked discretely beneath its hem, and sweeps it in a gentle arc above your head. The rain above you curves away. Your eyes widen ever so slightly, your gaze tracing the water trickling off the air as though sliding off an invisible dome, before you look back at him again.
"I don't like getting wet," Qifrey says, in manner of explanation.
You simply stare. For a moment, Qifrey wonders if you speak the common tongue at all—it's not uncommon for sailors from foreign kingdoms to abandon unwanted children in port towns like this—or if you're simply mute.
"You're soaked," he tries again, more gently this time. "Do you have anywhere to go?"
Silence stretches in the space between each of his heartbeats. The rain patters, fingertips dancing along the boundary he's drawn. Then, you shake your head.
So you do understand him. Qifrey should have guessed—children like you are a dime a dozen here, orphans, strays, the overlooked and unclaimed. No one would notice if one or more vanished from the edges of the docks.
Convenient, a colder part of him supplies. You are old enough to comprehend, young enough to be malleable, and compared to an apprentice born into a family of witches, you won't know enough of magic—and by extension, the silverwood—to ask questions that he doesn't want or know how to explain.
He takes you in.
The first few weeks are easier than he expects. You come to him with no poor habits to unlearn—no stubborn rune-drawing tendencies, no theoretical 'shortcuts' circulated by some of the lazier professors in the Great Hall. Teaching you is like working on a blank sheet of parchment. You simply watch what he does and try to do the same. And when you fail—which is often—you do not seem to be affected or frustrated. You simply do it again.
The only real issue is that you have never learned to write. Qifrey watches your hand wobble across the parchment—leaving dark splotches in some places, lines breaking off in others. Your fingers wrap around the ink wand like a stick you've picked off the ground, all knuckles and no finesse.
Qifrey lets out a quiet sigh.
"Your grip is wrong."
You look up at him, uncomprehending. Qifrey sighs again and hesitates, just briefly, before he steps closer and leans down. His hand slides over your fingers, carefully adjusting each one until the wand rests properly between them, the tip hovering just above the parchment.
"Like that."
The moment he releases you, however, your grip tightens again reflexively. The wood of the ink wand creaks faintly in protest. He quickly takes your hand again.
"Gently," he murmurs. "Like holding a robin's egg."
Qifrey guides your hand across the parchment. A straight line. A square. A circle. Your hand relaxes under his, just a little.
"Just like that," he says, and lets go. You look at the ink wand in your hand. "Now, try again."
You practice until the sun goes down.
He teaches you the basics. The three basic components that make up every spell, the five elemental sigils for fire, wind, water, earth and light. The keystones that govern a spell's direction and strength and purpose, how the sizes of the rings can affect its range and potency. Everything he says, you memorise. And everything he teaches you, you practice until you can reproduce it by heart.
After only about a few months of training, Qifrey dares to say that you've reached the standard that most witches your age who've grown up around magic would be at. The rate at which you're learning is… unexpected, to say the least. He should be pleased. Any decent teacher would be.
Qifrey tells himself this as he watches you inscribe a heating spell along the belly of a copper kettle. It's a reasonably complex problem for a beginner—the spell must conjure heat but not fire, be stable enough to maintain an even boil, hot enough to warm but not so fierce as to warp or melt the metal. It's a careful balance of precision and power that tends to elude most newcomers to spellcasting.
You hand him the kettle when you finish. Qifrey pushes his glasses up the bridge of his nose and lifts it up to his good eye, turning it slightly in the flickering light coming from the fireplace. The dispersion keystones are neatly drawn, arranged around the central fire sigil in two concentric circles. The limiting keystones sit where they should, too—balanced on either side, ready to dampen the spell the moment the heat climbs too high.
"Good," Qifrey says at last. The word feels thinner than it should be. He lingers a moment longer than necessary, as if searching for some flaw to justify a correction, but finds none. "We'll be able to use this to brew tea in the mornings, now."
You nod once at his assessment from where you're watching him by the kitchen table, then ask, "What next?"
There is no flicker of pride. No satisfaction in your work, no pause to take in what you've done. Just a simple what next, as if each perfected spell is nothing more than a marker on a long road you don't care much to tread on.
The first thin root of worry pushes through the soil of his chest.
Qifrey tries to keep his distance at first. He really does. A master-apprentice relationship only needs to go so deep for one to learn and the other to worry, and too much closeness would be counterproductive in his attempts to keep the silverwood at bay. He buys you all sorts of magical books and supplies you with wands and ink when you need it. He cooks, too, warm and filling meals that nourish the body and are rich in nutrients, until the hollowness in your cheeks softens, replaced by a healthier, rounded plumpness. He corrects your glyphs when he spots mistakes and guides your hand when your lines falter. It barely assauges the guilt in his chest.
You don't make it easier for him. Through no fault of your own, he knows, and yet somehow, that only makes it worse. You don't seek him out for any needs outside of your magic studies, never ask for anything, and eat exactly what he puts in front of you without comment. You wake up at dawn to start the tea kettle, and from there you start practicing magic without ceasing until he has to firmly tell you to go to bed.
There are no tantrums, no complaints, no childish demands for attention or affection. Surely, even children must have their preferences. Trinkets they like, foods they refuse to eat. But you are quiet and serious and wrong in a way that he cannot name, and Qifrey finds himself watching you much the same way Beldaruit had once watched him.
"You don't have to keep doing that," he tells you one evening. You're hunched over the kitchen with a half-empty cup of water, the parchment in front of you crowded with dozens of identical glyphs. The fire sigil that you'd just traced over in water glistens for a moment, then fades as the parchment slowly dries. You must have drawn the same glyph at least a hundred times now.
You don't look up, dipping your wand in water again. "My circles aren't perfectly round yet."
"You don't have to master everything in a single day. You could take a break."
"Why?"
Qifrey doesn't have an answer for that. Or rather, it's perhaps that he has too many. Because you look tired but refuse to admit it. Because your hands will cramp if you keep going. Because watching you work yourself into the ground makes me feel something too similar to what I used to feel for Olruggio, and that scares me.
"It was only a suggestion."
You consider it for a moment, and then turn back to your parchment. Qifrey sighs, pushing aside his robes to lower himself into the chair across from you.
"Do you have any reason for learning magic?"
You rotate your wrist once in the air before setting the wand's nib to parchment. "You asked me to."
"That's my reason, not yours."
"It's the only one I have."
Qifrey watches your hand move across the paper, and something in his chest tightens. This arrangement is supposed to be simple—selfish, yes, but simple. You are supposed to ask things of him, to need him in small, manageable ways that keep him worried just enough about your progress and studies without causing him too much concern. You have done exactly just that.
And yet here he is, worrying about you constantly for a completely different reason.
He thinks of Beldaruit's gentle gaze, the soft curl of smoke illusions coaxed into being on nights when sleep proved treacherous, when the memories of darkness and rain pounding unceasingly against metal and claustrophobia set in. He remembers Olruggio's warm smile and even warmer eyes, the ribbon on his hat that Qifrey still touches sometimes in the dark, tracing the multiple preservation sigils he's inked onto the silk.
His reminder to never forget, to never grow complacent.
"Take a break," he says again, and this time, there's something in his voice that makes you stop.
You look at him for a long moment, head tilting slightly to the side. It reminds Qifrey vaguely of a sparrow. Finally, you speak.
"You're worried," you say, as though you're making an observation. Qifrey forces a smile.
"I'm your master. It's what I'm supposed to do."
You glance down at your parchment once more. For a moment he thinks you might refuse, ignore his words and go right back to practicing, but then you set your wand down next to the paper and push your chair back, legs scraping along the slate flagstones.
"I'll continue tomorrow," you announce, without looking at him.
"Good," he says in response, and the two of you sit in silence at the kitchen table, undisturbed except for the crackling of the fireplace, and Qifrey has to remember how to breathe without counting the spaces between each one.
Hearthglen Village is about a few furlongs from the atelier, more often than not in need of small, persistent fixes, and thusly, the ideal place for you to practice using magic after passing the Pentacle of Proving's second test. Qifrey walks beside you through the small handful of thatched cottages scattered through the patchwork quilt of farmfields, returning the villagers' greetings with easy familiarity. It's always good to maintain good relations with the unknowing, especially those living nearby.
Eventually, the two of you arrive in front of the client who'd requested Qifrey's services. The problem is simple: a farmer's irrigation ditch has gone haywire somehow, and now his turnips are drowning in mud. Qifrey could fix it alone in ten minutes, but that isn't the point. He nods towards the field, giving you an encouraging pat on the shoulder.
"Go on."
You hesitate only for a moment before you go, hovering tentatively over the knee deep muck with your sylph shoes as you float out to the irrigation ditch. Your expression is reminiscent of a wet cat's—vaguely displeased, faintly affronted, as though the world has committed a personal offense by being this unpleasant. Qifrey has to hold back a smile.
In the meantime, Qifrey chats with the farmer as you work—something about the summer heat this year, the stubbornness of the soil—but he makes sure to never let you slip from his sights. You're already at the ditch, hat bobbing as you hover over the mud. He can almost picture your hand beneath the shelter of your cloak: fingers wrapped around the wand, drawing those precise lines that you've practiced over and over again with unswerving confidence.
He's listening to a rundown of this year's cabbage harvest when a faint rumble echoes across the field. The earth shifts, groaning as though rousing from a long slumber, and then the water starts to move. Mud loosens and starts to drain from the fields, revealing the green leaves of the turnips peeking out through the soil once more. It's quickly replaced by a steady stream of clear water.
The farmer's face brightens with relief. He claps his hands together with a delighted laugh, already turning to call out his thanks as you drift back over to the solid ground of the path, the hem of your cloak splattered with drying mud. You don't smile back; instead you wipe the faint sheen of sweat from your brow and look to Qifrey for approval.
He pushes his glasses up and nods once. "Well done."
You accept his verdict the same way you accept everything else—quietly, without visible pride or disappointment. The farmer tries to press a basket overflowing with all variety of squash into your hands and your eyes find Qifrey's like you aren't sure what to do with gratitude. He takes it for you.
"They're a natural," the farmer nudges Qifrey as he moves to leave. "Where'd you find a talent like that?" Despite the surge of pride that races through him, he hesitates.
"They found me," Qifrey says, instead.
More villagers request your help over the course of the afternoon. A family's goat wandered into a small ravine, a child's kite got stuck in a tree. You lift the frantically bleating animal to safety with a levitating spell, and coax the wind into tugging the kite loose from an elm's tangled branches while the village children gather to watch you work with eyes full of wonder. The girl bounces on her heels as the toy finally drifts down into your waiting hand, and you hand it over without a smile.
She hugs your legs anyway. You stand there awkwardly, arms glued to your sides, and Qifrey has to look away before he laughs.
Hours later, after the last request has been fulfilled and the sun is low enough to turn the clouds a warm ombre-ochre, you and Qifrey decide to walk home, the path stretching before you like a pale ribbon through the fields. You walk next to him in silence, as you always do, fingers stained with smudges of black ink and clay soil.
"You did well today," he says.
"Thank you."
"But."
You glance at him then. Just a slight flicker of the eyes, darting sideways and upwards. You've learned, by now, that your master is far from straightforward around topics that are necessary but difficult to broach.
"But?"
"But magic doesn't seem to make you happy," he finishes.
You neither deny nor confirm it. Your steps just slow slightly against the gravel scattered on the path, stones crunching beneath the soles of your boots. For a while, there is only the sound of the wind moving through the wheat fields.
Eventually, you speak.
"Does it have to?"
Qifrey thinks about that. About the way you've perfected every spell he's taught you but never once asked to learn any out of your own desire. About how you can spend hours, days, drawing circles and lines over and over again simply because he tells you to. About how quickly you've become good at magic—and how little of it seems to belong to you.
"It doesn't have to," Qifrey says, at last. He's cast all sorts of magic in his life, spells that have burned and hollowed, ones that have scarred and pained him beyond what any physical wound can. Not all of it was joy. Not all of it was kind.
Yet.
"But you should find a reason. To desire magic, I mean."
You glance at him, eyes briefly searching, as though weighing the shape of his words, their meaning. He licks his lips, suddenly dry.
"Magic is meant to grant wishes of the people," he says, more gently now. "To bless them. That includes yourself." His lips press together, smile half-formed before faltering, and the wind moves through the fields, rustling restlessly through the long grass. "I—I hope you can learn magic not because I tell you to, but because you want to."
The last sentence escapes him in a rush, as though forced from his lungs with some sort of wind dispelling spell. The thought settles heavy in his chest again, the silverwood shuddering. For all his care—for all the effort he's poured into teaching you properly, responsibly—one truth remains unchanged: Qifrey had taken you in because he needed an apprentice. Not out of kindness. Not out of any noble intent he can comfortably name.
He doesn't know what he would say if you ever asked him why. Any lie would feel too great a disservice to the one person he'd thrust this fate upon, and the truth feels brittle, insufficient—something that would fracture the moment he speaks it aloud.
But you never have. Sometimes, he suspects that you already know.
The remainder of the walk back passes in silence. The sky fades from sienna to lavender before deepening to a dark indigo. One by one, the first stars emerge at the very top of the firmament, their light faint and trembling. You say nothing, and Qifrey tells himself to give you time—you need space to process things, and pressuring you would only make you retreat further into yourself, like a snail hiding in its own shell.
The atelier comes into view at the end of the lane, its windows dark. Qifrey steps ahead, undoing the sealing glyphs on the door. It swings open with a soft creak, and he pauses, holding it ajar for you to step through.
You don't.
He turns back to see you standing a step behind the threshold, gaze lowered to the path at your feet, as though something he cannot see there has snared your attention and taken it captive. Qifrey frowns, head tilting.
"Apprentice?"
You don't answer immediately, hands in your pockets, the tip of your boot scuffing the ground. Then, quietly—
"I want to cure Master."
For a moment, Qifrey forgets how to breathe. He can only stare at you, mouth slightly parted. The words fail to catch despite him having nothing to say. Your voice had been small, careful—like you'd been turning the words over in your mouth for miles, smoothing their edges so they wouldn't cut your tongue on the way out. Of all the things he'd imagined you might say, this had never even been within his considerations.
He grips the door handle a little more firmly for support. The brass carvings bite its patterns into his skin of his palm.
"Cure me," he repeats, dumbly.
"Yes." You nod, the movement slow, as if hesitant in your admission. "The headaches that you try to hide from me. And your right eye, too," you add, pointing at the side of his face covered by his hair, as if he might not know the one. "You touch it when you think I'm not watching, but it seems like it hurts."
Qifrey didn't realise you'd noticed. He thought he'd been careful.
"I thought I asked you," he says, more quietly, more unsteadily now, "to want something for yourself."
"I don't like seeing Master in pain."
Qifrey’s grip on the door falters. Something tightens in his chest—perhaps the silverwood, perhaps something else, so sharp it cuts him open like a blade, and yet he doesn't know whether he wants to let go. For so long, he's been waiting—for you to want something, to reach beyond instruction, to claim even the smallest piece of magic for your own.
And you have.
Qifrey exhales slowly, the sound thin against the quiet of the evening. For once, there is no ready answer waiting behind his teeth. He thinks of Olruggio's face, the path to salvation he'd offered Qifrey paved with the pieces of his own memory. He thinks of the tree growing inside of him, its roots tangled in his ribs, its branches seeking the sun through where his eye once used to be.
Healing magic is a direct alteration of the body, and every form of body alteration is forbidden—banned on the Day of the Pact, enforced by the Knights Moralis with iron and fire. And even if it wasn't, the silverwood is not merely an illness. There is no cure for what grows inside of him.
But you don't know any of that.
So Qifrey smiles softly. Releases his death grip on the door, pulling away to rest a hand on top of your head, the same way Beldaruit used to do for him.
"That's very kind of you," he says.
Your expression doesn't change, but the tautness in your shoulders loosens just a fraction, as if you'd been bracing for him to laugh at you, to dismiss your dream as a fool's flight and fancy. Instead, he pushes the door open wider and gestures you inside.
"Come on," Qifrey tells you, swallowing the sudden thickness lodged in his throat. "Wash up. I'll make squash stew for dinner."
You nod and disappear up the steps to the second floor. Your footsteps fade quickly, and soon Qifrey's ears pick up the sound of running water, of the bath being filled.
He remains in the doorway a moment longer, one hand braced against the frame, the other lifting—almost unconsciously—to brush over where his right eye used to be, featherlight. The motion is familiar, thoughtless. Almost habitual.
But he's been exposed, now. A deprecating laugh escapes him, the wisps of it slipping between his teeth. It's only now, Qifrey thinks, that he's beginning to realise just how foolish he'd been.
He's fallen into the pit that he'd dug with his own two hands.
Sleep eludes Qifrey that night.
He lies on his back, one arm thrown over his forehead, the other resting on his chest. Beneath skin and bone, the cage of his ribs, the silverwood pulses its slow, patient rhythm, waiting. The ceiling above him is indistinguishable in the dark, but he's stared at it so many sleepless nights that he can recall to memory the grain of every plank, the small water stain in the corner that faintly resembles a bird in flight.
Just above him, in the room upstairs, you are sleeping soundly—or he hopes so, at least. Belly full of squash stew, dreaming of pleasant things. That you are warm and resting, and that, for once, you are not pushing yourself past the point of sense simply because he asked it of you.
I want to cure Master.
Qifrey turns onto his side, facing the wall. His pillowcase smells faintly of lavender—scented sachets you'd made last week, making use of some aromatics a village herbalist had given you for your help. He'd accepted one when you'd offered it, almost without thinking, assuming that it was thoughtful but practical gesture.
Now, the scent lingers like smoke.
Beldaruit used to say that the best apprentices were the ones who could surprise you. Qifrey always assumed he meant talent, insight, some brilliant intuition that no one else could replicate. Someone who could make teachers lean forward in their seats and think, that's the one.
But here, lying in his bed, your words from hours ago still sitting warm in his chest, he wonders if the old man had meant something else entirely.
Qifrey pushes out a breath, the tip of his tongue pressing behind his teeth. You will learn about the forbidden magic, eventually. Every witch does—and as your master, it will be his responsibility to teach you about it. Some things are too dangerous. Some lines cannot be crossed. All magic that is drawn on the human body or affects the human body is outlawed.
And that includes healing magic.
You will learn that, and then you will not ask too many questions about why his eye cannot be fixed. Eventually, you will move on and find another, better wish.
But for now, Qifrey takes your words and folds them carefully, tucking them away into the furthest corner of his heart where the silverwood cannot reach. He closes his one good eye and waits for the sun to rise once again. And when it does, Qifrey will greet you in the kitchen downstairs with a cup of hot tea and a smile, he will teach you combination sigils and binding spells, and he will never bring it up again.
Because some wishes are too heavy to be said aloud, and some teachers are too selfish to let them go.
Summer slips unnoticed into autumn, and autumn, in turn, yields to winter. Qifrey teaches you to crochet, then to knit—awkward at first, fingers too stiff around the slumbersheep yarn until Qifrey takes your hands and guides you through the movements, much in the same way he does when teaching you spells. He shows you how to tend to the heating spells that keep the house warm without burning it down, how to summon precise gusts of wind to blow snow off the atelier's sloping roofs. And the months pass just as the weather changes—gradual, inevitable, marked only in hindsight by the shift in the air, the thinning of light.
And as you grow older, Qifrey finds the distance he once tried so carefully to maintain eroded by the same unrelenting tide. Bit by bit, day by day—until one morning he wakes up and realises he cannot quite remember what it feels like to not have you there.
It's not something that changes overnight. Instead, it is a thousand small, mundane things—the way his hand moves without thinking to drop two cubes of sugar into your teacup, the copper kettle with your heating spell whistling behind him on the stove. You're at the basin with your sleeves rolled up to your elbows, washing a skillet faintly smelling of bacon while a brushbuddy dozes on your shoulder. Everything is good, and everything is warm.
This is dangerous, Qifrey thinks. And then he thinks it again, because the first time hadn't been enough to make him stop.
The morning he's forced to confront it comes without warning. Quietly, unassumingly, a thief in the night.
Qifrey notices that something is different the moment he steps into the quiet of the kitchen. The kettle is cold, and the matching cups that a travelling potter had made for you sit upturned on the counter, untouched from where you'd set them aside to dry last night. He stands in the doorway for a moment, listening. The atelier breathes around him like an extension of his own body—the soft creak of timber settling, the low whisper of wind along the eaves—but beneath it, nothing. No quiet patter of footsteps in the floor upstairs. No water running in the washroom.
Perhaps you're sleeping in, he tells himself. The idea is almost pleasant. You never do; you're always awake before him, tea already steeped, moving around the kitchen to prepare breakfast—presence slipped so easily into his morning routine that he'd stopped noticing it altogether.
Qifrey sets the kettle to heat, before rummaging for the battered tin of tea leaves in the overhead shelf. He prepares a cup for you, placing it at the chair that has become yours in all but name, and sits across it with his own. The brew's a little more astringent than he's used to—steeped a touch too long, perhaps—but he drinks it anyway, idly sorting through the neglected stack of mail from the council.
The sun climbs higher in the sky. Light spills through the kitchen window, between the gap in the curtains, inching slowly across the table to catch on the rim of your untouched cup. Qifrey looks through the latest spell you've been working on: an attempt at replicating his Palm Dragon Teacup. He makes small suggestions in the margins, noting down more efficient arrangements and combinations of keystones, ideas for refining its precision. Still, it's good work. Your work is always good.
More time passes. He finally completes drafting a letter to the Great Hall—something about independent ateliers and watchful eyes—and sends it off before picking up a book about complex fire spells. Qifrey thumbs through the pages slowly, more out of idleness than focus, pausing every now and then when something catches his eye. A variation making use of the stabilising keystone. A more efficient heat-dispersal glyph. He dog-ears about six different pages with the intention of showing them to you later, when he looks up and realises that your tea has long gone cold.
Qifrey closes his book, sets it aside, and heads for the stairs.
Your bedroom door is closed.
That isn't surprising to Qifrey. You've always been a private person by nature, and you're even moreso protective of your few possessions, your personal space. Qifrey learned early on not to intrude without invitation or cause.
But your diversion from routine is… odd. Surely you will forgive his worry.
Qifrey hesitates, knuckles hovering over the wood of your door, before he knocks. "Apprentice?"
No answer.
He knocks again, a little sharper this time. "It's past noon. If you want to sleep in, just let me know, alright? You deserve the rest."
Still no answer.
The thin thread of unease tightens around his chest.
"I'm coming in."
The door swings open easily beneath his hand. The room that he steps into is familiar and empty. Your blankets are carefully folded at the foot of the bed, your traveling cloak absent from its hook by the window. And your sylph shoes, the ones that he'd helped you mend just last week, are missing from their place next to the dresser.
Qifrey stands in the center of the room, the air suddenly going very, very still. The silverwood in his chest trembles.
Calm down, he tells himself firmly. Your bed is made—your absence must be deliberate. There must be some sort of explanation. Perhaps you wanted a taste of mischief, to act your age for once. Perhaps you snuck out to one of the nearby villagers, Hearthglen or Azmar, to meet people, make friends. Be normal. You mentioned the daughter of Azmar's baker last week. He recalls a girl your age with flour on her apron who'd been fascinated with your magic. Perhaps you've gone to pay her a visit.
He turns slowly, forcing his gaze to move along with him. Your ink wands are in a little cup on your table, textbooks sitting in rows on the shelf where they belong. Encyclopedias, histories, grimoires he'd deemed safe for your learning. Nothing out of place. He's about to leave the room, fetch a guidance orb just to make sure that you're alright, when—
Something small and furtive shifts between a gap in the books. The brushbuddy's tail twitches into view before it darts back into the narrow space behind, as though caught somewhere it shouldn't be.
Qifrey frowns.
He reaches up and pulls the entire front row of volumes aside, setting them down on the table with a heavy thump. Dust stirs in the air. Behind them sits another, shorter stack of books, tucked neatly out of sight. Aside from him, there isn't another occupant in this atelier for you to hide things from. Which means you meant to conceal this deliberately. From him.
Why?
Qifrey ignores the cold uncertainty in his chest, picking up the first book. Medical journal. Second. Herbal remedies of the Southern Continent. Third, an encyclopedia on human anatomy, although only the section on ophthalmology is bookmarked, annotated so densely that barely any margin is left untouched. The rest of the books are of a similar vein.
Only the last one is different—a notebook, worn pages filled with a cramped but script that he would recognise anywhere. The rest are filled with sketches—plants that even he doesn't recognise at first glance, roots and leaves and bulbs rendered with careful attention to detail. Analgesic properties. Toxic in high doses. Antispasmodic. Causes hallucinations.
He flips through more rapidly, pulse quickening, but the later pages only get worse.
Burn, left forearm. Applied tincture from ground monoceros horn and milkwort. Moderate pain reduction, mild nausea. Bruise, right knee. Poultice from steeped elderwood and nightpoppy. Significant pain relief, but results in complete loss of sensation and movement in area. Lasts three hours. Burn—
Qifrey's vision blurs. His other hand grips the edge of your chair, knuckles white, breath coming out sharp and shallow as he forces himself to breathe. You've been hurting yourself. On purpose. Testing remedies for… for—
He doesn't dare to let that thought complete itself. He turns the pages quickly, skimming past entries until he reaches the last one. The ink is smudged where the parchment presses together, as if you'd jotted it down and closed it in a hurry. It's still faintly wet.
There is a rough sketch of silvery stems and thin, needle-like leaves. Spineneedles, you've labelled them. Your notes crowd the margins: potent pain-relieving properties. Possible long-term restorative effects. Grows only in steep valleys inhabited by winged serpentines, venom necessary for germination. And below it—
Kestrel's Maw, eight furlongs north of atelier. Serpentines least active at dusk and dawn.
Qifrey feels his blood turn to ice in his veins. Outside the window, the sun hangs high in the cold winter sky, almost at its zenith—long past dawn, past any reasonable margin of safety. It's far too late. You should have been back hours ago. No, worse—you should have never gone at all, risking your life for such foolish, pointless endeavours. You should have been in this very room, sleeping soundly beneath the blankets, unharmed and safe and under Qifrey's protective eye. Instead—
He'd flown over Kestrel's Maw once, years ago. He still remembers the way the cliffs drop away into nothing, wind screaming through the narrow ravines, strong enough to throw even an experienced witch off balance. And the serpentines there are especially aggressive—great, winged creatures with beaks like drawn swords—nesting in the crevices where the spineneedles grow.
And that's where you've gone.
I'm responsible for this, Qifrey thinks numbly, and the words are a realisation as much as an accusation aimed at himself. I did this. I made you this way. I wanted someone to worry about, and now—
The image comes to him, unbidden: your body, broken at the base of the ravine. Impaled by sharp spikes at the bottom, limbs twisted at unnatural angles. Cloak ripped and dark with blood, flesh torn from your bones by monstrous beaks. And your face—that quiet, serious, earnest face—pale, chest still, eyes open yet blank and vacant and unseeing and—
No.
No.
Qifrey runs. He doesn't think. He doesn't allow himself to. The door is too far—he shoves your shutters open and throws himself out of the second floor window, into the harsh midday sunlight. For a second, wind rushes up to meet him, flailing, falling—before the sylph seal beneath his feet flares. And then he's airborne, rising too fast but not fast enough, the wind tearing at his hair, the fragile control he's forcing himself to hold together.
Please, not them, is all he can think as he hurtles through the sky. Not my apprentice. Not them. I'll do anything. Please, please, please—
He doesn't know who he's begging, only that he'll beg anything, bargain everything—if it means that you're still alive when he arrives.
Even from a distance, the ravine makes for an unnerving sight. The karst pinnacles spear upwards as though they seek to pierce the sky, like the vicious teeth of some enormous, long-dead beast. Qifrey had forgotten how sharp they were, every edge honed to a hostile point. Even the light falls strangely, splintered by stone so that shadows fall where they shouldn't, fractured into shifting planes that make depth and distance difficult to judge.
He clears the plains beneath him with unmatched speed, wind tearing past him—
—and then, he sees you.
You're clinging to a narrow outcropping perhaps fifty feet below the cliff's edge, body pressed close to the rock wall as though trying to become one with it yourself. Your sylph shoes are missing from one foot, and there's a long rend in your cloak. You aren't moving—only holding on, just barely—feet perilously close to the edge of a fatal, yawning drop below.
Above you, three winged serpentines circle patiently in the air. Their beaks hang slightly open, tongues flickering you as if tasting the air—your blood, your fear, the inevitability of what's next. The only mercy here is that they're not attacking. They are waiting, drawing it out. The same way a cat toys with a mouse it already knows cannot escape.
Qifrey doesn't stop or slow. He dives.
The wind screams past his ears, rising to a fever pitch as he plummets. His palm quire slips into his hand by instinct alone, wand flying over the paper in sharp, practiced strokes before he can even spare a thought as to who might be watching.
The spell takes shape in a single breath. Water wrenches itself from the air, the thin moisture caught in wind and stone, surging upwards into a coiling mass until it takes shape—a great, fluid dragon, its body twisting through the open air with a roar that echoes throughout the entire length of the gorge.
Two serpentines are caught in its jaws almost immediately, their cries cut short amidst the sound of snapping wing and bone. The third shrieks, veering sharply away before wheeling back, beak gaping in fury—but Qifrey is already moving, one arm wrapping around your waist and tearing you off the cliff face, hauling you bodily into the open air. You make a quiet sound in the back of your throat—the closest to afraid he's ever heard you—fingers gripping at the front of his shirt.
"Master—"
"Don't call me that right now."
The serpentines shriek behind him, rallying. Qifrey presses the sylph seal on his boots together, the weight of you unwieldy and palpable in his arms, and flies home.
You don't speak on the way back. Neither does he.
The atelier rises into view at the edge of the fields, its familiar shape cutting through the blur of wind and motion. He lands harder than he intends, knees buckling for a second before he forces himself forward—half-carrying, half-dragging you through the front door. Your cup remains where he left it, untouched on the kitchen table, and he sets you down onto the chair—the same one he'd been sitting in just an hour prior, drinking tea and so, so oblivious—more roughly than he intends.
You don't complain. You never do. The same way you never protest, never ask, never tell him anything—
Qifrey turns away. His hands are shaking. He wrenches open the drawers, rifling through them with none of his usual care, yanking out bandages, salves, clean gauzes. Something clenches in his chest like a fist, squeezing, tight, so tight.
"What were you thinking?" he snaps. He almost doesn't recognise his own voice—low and taut and cutting. "Going to such a dangerous place—alone—without telling anyone—without asking—"
He finds the antiseptic, shoved into the back of a drawer. His fingers slip on the stopper, trembling faintly.
"You could have died. Do you understand that? You could have died. Those creatures—they could have—" Sent you plummeting down the cliff. Eaten you. Torn you to pieces. He can't bring himself to finish the sentence. The images they conjure are too much to bear.
He whirls around again, still not quite looking at your face, and takes your left arm. The cuts are worse up close—long, ragged scratches that split skin, dried blood flaking at the edges. Your palms and fingers are raw and abraded from where you must have clung to the sharp rock.
Qifrey dabs at them with more force than necessary. You flinch just once, before going still again.
"Rash. Reckless. Stupid." The words spill out of him like water from a broken dam. They're sharp enough to wound, meant to hurt, and he knows this even as he says them but cannot bring himself to stop. "I didn't teach you that. I taught you to think, to assess, not throw yourself off cliffs for—for worthless plants—"
"Master—"
"I said don't." Hearing that title alone makes him want to scream. "Don't call me that now. You don't have any right to when you—"
"It's Master's fault."
The words land like a slap. Qifrey turns to look at you—one hand frozen over a roll of bandages, the echo of them stinging—only to find your mouth drawn taut in a stubborn line. And your eyes, those quiet, watchful eyes that have always followed him so carefully, are hard with something he's never seen in them before. Not guilt. Not shame. Something closer to accusation.
As though he is the one who has wronged you.
"Oh, it's my fault," he repeats, his voice rising sharply on its own, an unpleasant mixture of anger and incredulity. "I didn't tell you to sneak out without telling me. I didn't tell you to seek out winged beasts you have no experience fighting. I didn't tell you to—"
"Yes, because Master never tells me anything—"
"For good reason!" He throws his hands up, the dishcloth—stained with your blood—twisting taut between his white knuckled fingers. Qifrey wants to shake you. Maybe tear his hair out. Another part of him—a smaller, quieter part—wants to lock you in this atelier and throw away the key forever, just to make sure that you are safe. "There are things I don't tell you because they are dangerous, things that I am trying—I have been trying—to protect you from—"
"I don't need to be protected like a child—"
"Then stop acting like one!" Qifrey is shouting now. He knows that he's shouting. He can't stop. "Sneaking around behind my back, hiding books in your room, burning and cutting yourself, putting yourself in mortal danger for a cure that doesn't exist!"
Your obstinate expression only darkens further. "Master can't know for certain—"
"I do!" His hands come down hard on the tabletop, and you flinch. Your teacup jumps, porcelain clattering as it tips. Cold tea spills across the gingham patterns. "I know because—" Because he's already been to the Tower of Memories, and he knows that what ails him is no illness or curse. "—because I've already read every book, tried every remedy—I know that there is no cure! There is no cure, and there will never be, so stop trying to throw your life away for something so—"
"I won't!"
Something in Qifrey snaps.
"If you're so unwilling to listen to me," he says, his voice suddenly cold and flat in a way that doesn't belong to him, "then maybe you should no longer be my apprentice."
The moment those words leave his mouth, Qifrey knows at once that he would do anything to take them back—tear them out of the air, swallow them whole even if they cut his throat to ribbons—but the damage is already done.
You go very still. The anger doesn't leave you, not entirely, but something beneath it fractures—hairline cracks spiderwebbing across thin river ice. Your mouth works soundlessly, shaping around words that don't make it out, before pressing into a thin, bloodless line.
When he dares a glance up again, your lashes are wet. You're not crying—you never have, not in front of him, at least—but your eyes are bright, too bright now, in a way that feels dangerously close. Your lower lip wobbles only once before you sink your teeth into it and force it still.
Qifrey hates water. The sound of rain makes his chest tight, and the feeling of being wet makes his skin crawl. He hates the way it blurs the fading remnants of his vision, the way it soaks through his clothes and leeches the heat from his bones, the way it reminds him of things he's forgotten and things he wishes he could forget.
But this—this—is worse.
Qifrey's hands falter, then drop back to his sides. Why had they even been raised in the first place? The kitchen is too quiet now, empty except for the phantom ghosts of your anger and his, the steady drip of tea from the table's edge, forming a puddle on the flagstones beneath. He feels exhausted all of a sudden—wrung dry and scraped hollow.
It's only then that he notices the bag. Your hand—the other one, still dirty and bleeding—is curled around a small pouch of cloth, pressed so tightly against your chest that your knuckles have gone white. Even after everything, you are still clinging to it. Still trying, desperately, to keep it safe.
"Give me the bag," he says.
Your eyes jump to Qifrey's face. You glance down at the bag, as though just only remembering thtat it's there, before your fingers tighten around it again, spine curving over it protectively. Hesitation flickers across your expression for a brief second, before you give a small, stubborn shake of the head.
No.
Qifrey sucks in a sharp breath through his teeth, patience fraying, before he reins himself in forcefully. He's done more than enough damage, today. "I won't—I'm not going to do anything to it," he says, trying to sound reassuring, more gentle. He doesn't know if he succeeds. "Just—please. Give me the bag."
You stare at him for a moment longer, as though wordlessly weighing whether you can trust his words. Then, slowly, reluctantly—you loosen your death grip on the pouch and hold it out.
It's surprisingly light in his hand, once he takes it. Almost as though it holds nothing inside at all. His fingers, still faintly numb and tacky with your blood, fumble with the drawstrings as he pulls them loose. He looks inside.
A handful of silver leaves lie scattered across the bottom of the pouch. Thin and gleaming, each one shaped like a sewing needle. Spineneedles. Carefully gathered, but so few of them—barely enough to brew a single thumb-sized vial of tincture.
Yet the mere sight of them is enough to strip all the anger from him in an instant. Qifrey stares down into the pouch, the thin scatter of silver leaves there glinting faintly like stars in the night sky, and feels something inside him give way.
He isn't angry with you. He's never been angry with you. The one whom Qifrey is so unbearably angry with, so deeply ashamed of—is himself. Because the only reason you did any of this—pushed yourself to such lengths, put yourself in harm's way—is because he let you believe he could be cured. He'd smiled and selfishly kept the words you'd uttered that day close to his heart, like a precious treasure, and in doing so, he'd unwittingly sent you hurtling straight into danger's embrace.
A slow, quiet breath escapes him. Qifrey slowly lets himself sink to his knees in front of your chair, suddenly weary in a way that he cannot quite name. You shift at the movement, glancing down at him with something uncertain in your expression, unsure of his moods.
"…Master?"
He sets the pouch on the table and carefully takes your hands in his. You try to tug them back to your chest on instinct but he holds on to your wrists, gentle but insistent. Qifrey turns them over, palms out, your fingers curling slightly, and looks at the small, round marks he's never looked close enough to notice before. Burn scars. Old and new, layered together, a wordless record of every time you had pressed pain into your own body in search of something that might help him.
His throat closes around the words he doesn't have.
"Thank you," is all he can say, in the end. Even then, it feels inadequate. "For trying to cure me. For going to such lengths to ease my pain." Qifrey pauses, his thumb brushing over a half-healed scab on your knuckle. "But it… it won't work."
You look at him, then. The defiance has receded from your eyes, leaving behind a thin, wavering uncertainty in its place. "How can Master be so sure it will not work?"
Because I've already tried everything. Because I read about it in the Tower, and I know the truth. Because the problem isn't my eye or the headaches—it is the tree growing inside of me, the parasite that will kill me if I stop worrying, if I stop hurting, if I let myself be happy for even a moment.
But Qifrey cannot say that. Not yet. Perhaps not ever. His fingers drift down unconsciously to brush the ribbon trailing from the top of his hat.
"Because, like I said, I've tried every remedy in existence." He shakes his head with a defeated smile, squeezing your hands. "Nothing works. And it only hurts me more—more than my eye or any headache—to see my beloved apprentice put themself in danger for my sake."
You go still, fingers curling loosely under his own.
"I should be the one protecting you," he continues. "Not the other way around. That—that's the whole point of having an apprentice." Qifrey almost laughs at that, the line of his mouth twisting into the shape of a half-formed, self-deprecating smile. Oh, he was so, so foolish. "I'm supposed to keep you safe. And yet, here you are, throwing yourself into danger for me."
His gaze drops back to your hands, the small scars scattered across your skin.
"I'm content," Qifrey says quietly. "With what I have now. The atelier. You." And as the words leave him, he realises that they are not merely for your sake—they are true, plain and simple. "The pain is small in comparison."
You don't speak for a moment. The afternoon light has shifted, turning golden and syrupy, pooling on the floor between you like liquid honey. Qifrey can hear the sound of his own heartbeat in the silence, a slow, steady march in his ears.
"But I don't like to see Master in pain."
Your voice is small, but matter-of-fact. You say it in the same way you might state an obvious truth, such as fire is hot and water is clear and the sun rises in the east. As if it's simply a fact of the universe that you dislike seeing him in pain—and therefore, you must do something about it.
Qifrey's heart clenches, a sharp and sudden thing. Before he can think better of it he's already leaning forward to gather you into his arms. It's the first time he's ever hugged you, he realises distantly. He's held you when you were learning to use sylph shoes for the first time, guided your hand and wand through careful strokes, rested a light hand on your head once or twice—but never anything like this. Never returned even a fraction of the quiet comfort you've given him simply by being there. Some master he's been.
You go stiff for a moment against his chest, caught off guard by the suddenness of the gesture. A few breaths pass before your shoulders loosen, ever so slightly, and then your forehead dips, coming to rest slowly against the line of his collarbone. And your hands, one half-bandaged and the other still dirty with smeared blood and dirt, come up to grip tentatively at the back of his shirt.
When had you become so precious to him?
He closes his one good eye and presses his face into the top of your head, ignoring the way his glasses push up on the bridge of his nose. Your hair smells faintly of lemon verbena and soap. "Don't do something so dangerous again, alright?" His voice comes out muffled, even to his own ears. "Promise me."
There's a long pause. Then: "I don't want to give up, Master."
Qifrey sighs, something between an amused sigh and weary acceptance. Clearly, it'd been wishful thinking at best to hope otherwise, and the fault for it lies squarely with him. He draws back just enough to look at you. Your fingers tighten in his shirt.
"If you have any ideas," he says at last, the words coming together with reluctant resignation, "tell me first. Before you do anything. We'll experiment together—here, in the atelier, where it's safe." His eye narrows slightly, a faint edge of sternness threading through the softness. "I won't stop you from trying. But I'm not going to lose you to a cliff face or anything else, and there will be no forbidden magic. Do you understand?"
You hold his gaze. For a moment your expression is unreadable—eyes too much like mirrors, reflecting too much of him back at himself, too clearly, too honestly. Then, slowly, you nod.
"Okay."
"Good." The word leaves him more easily than expected, as though some heavy weight has finally been lifted from his shoulders. Qifrey pulls you in again, a brief but quieter second embrace, before he lets you go and leans back. Even with the space between you now, the residual warmth of you lingers, settling into the hollow places between his ribs like sunlight.
"I'll make dinner tonight," he announces, getting to his feet. "You should get some rest. But first—let me finish treating your arms."
"Okay."
You hold your arms out obediently. He takes them, careful as though he's handling some priceless, irreplaceable magical artifact, tutting softly under his breath at the state of you. The cuts, the burns, the bruising—he tends to each with attentive hands, and insists on drawing you a bath of milk and herbs as he works, all while you squirm and offer half-hearted rejections in protest.
Somewhere in his chest, the silverwood stirs.
a/n: i cannot believe that some of my best writing this year might have been for yet another white haired man voiced by joshua waters in en who is also competing in the depression olympics. the only difference is that qifrey is a twink and i only found out about him three days ago before proceeding to bash out ten thousand words for him despite not really blorbo-ing him. am i denial or do i need the asylum 😔 n e ways i hope you enjoy! please don't crucify me for the age gap or the eventual problematic student teacher relationship </3
