femme-écrivain

(thank you, anon ❤️❤️. This is a big prompt which could easily be a long MC but I've condensed it as best I can to suit my short fic agenda. I hope that's okay.)

(also this may have deviated a leetle tiny bit from your prompt. I hope you like it anyway. It certainly lit a fire under my muse and I thank you immensely for that)

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Read it on AO3

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It wasn't the Slap, in and of itself, that brought about his change of heart. Quite the opposite, really. Of course Muggles would resort to such crude acts of violence, his father would say, they have no other recourse since they don't have magic. Granger was simply demonstrating her inferiority. It should have reinforced everything he'd ever been told about her kind.

So it wasn't the Slap as such, no. It was more the look on her face as she'd delivered it. The glee and the disdain. Disdain for him, when it was supposed to be the other way around. He was the one who hated her. She should be grovelling at his feet, he was the Pureblood, magic was his birthright. Not hers. Never hers.

That summer Draco found himself restless, plagued by thoughts so foreign he had no idea what to make of them. Granger, that swotty annoyance he rarely thought of except as Potter's shadow or whenever he had to explain to his father why he had, yet again, failed to achieve top marks for his year—suddenly she was at the forefront of his mind. Why had he never noticed before how dark her eyes were or the way her curls caught the sunlight? She had freckles on her nose and her lips were pink—the colour of his mother's favourite roses. Horrible things happened to Draco when he thought about Granger's lips. Uncomfortable, squirmy things, like snakes slithering inside him. He began to dream about her.

The night of the Quidditch World Cup, those Muggles suspended in midair... all Draco could see was her up there, helpless in that terror and confusion, the object of ridicule from those like him. The horror of it spurred him to act, to warn her—carefully, subtly, couched in language the most dedicated Death Eater could not reproach. He knew she was clever enough to hear what he was really saying and the look in her eyes as they met his—just briefly—reassured him that she would not be foolish. It did little, though, to quell his newfound fear. 

—

“Granger.” 

The Tri-Wizard Tournament had ended. Cedric Diggory was dead. Potter was near to madness, screaming to anyone who would listen—and quite a few who wouldn’t—that Vol-that the Dark Lord had returned. Draco believed him. He knew, better than anyone else he knew what was coming. This past year he’d spent in varying states of anger and apprehension, furious with Granger for taking up so much space in his head and terrified that someday soon she might not be around to take up space anywhere. If his father had his way she wouldn’t be, and Draco—caught in a fascination that since the Yule Ball bordered on obsession—knew that he did not wish to live in a world where Granger was not.  

She turned to look at him, surprise and wariness in her eyes. “What do you want, Malfoy?” she demanded. 

Merlin, what a question. Draco knew what he wanted, deep down, though he could neither admit nor articulate it. “From you?” he sneered. “Nothing.” 

Granger rolled her eyes and turned away and desperate fear surged up in him. “Wait!” he cried, and grabbed her arm. “Wait, I—I’m sorry.” 

“You’re what?” 

“Listen, Granger.” He held on tight to her arm. “Don’t do anything stupid.” 

Her eyes narrowed in suspicion. “What are you on about?” 

“Potter, he’s—he’s right, okay? The Dark Lord is back.” Granger gasped and Draco’s hand tightened on her arm. “I know you’re going to want to fight him,” he pressed on, seizing the advantage of her shock. “I know that I can’t stop you. But just—don’t be stupid about it. Don’t let Potter drag you into anything rash. You have to have a plan, Granger. The Dark Lord can’t be defeated by Gryffindor bravado or the power of hope or whatever the fuck you lot believe. You have to have a strategy. You have to be prepared.” 

“Why are you telling me this?” she whispered. “Why do you care what happens to me?” 

“I shouldn’t.” He looked at her, at the curls frizzing around her face, at her deep brown eyes, at the freckles that haunted him on the bridge of her nose. She licked her lips and his gut clenched. “I should let Potter get you killed and I shouldn’t care a thing about it,” he hissed. “I should want you to die. But I don’t. Believe that, Granger.” His voice cracked. “Please. Listen to me and stay alive. Promise me.” 

She hesitated for a single, terrible moment and then she nodded. 

“I promise.” 

—

Umbridge was a cow, thought Draco, stupid and sycophantic, but people like that made such perfect patsies that he should have been in his element, basking in the glow of her favour and delighting in her blatant vendetta against Potter. There were times when he did just that, when he couldn’t help gloating at Potter’s frustration, but in the back of his mind and the corner of his eye there was always her, always there at Potter’s side, helping him and having his back and hating him. 

Though sometimes Draco caught her watching him, in class or from across the library. A speculative, probing look, like she was trying to work out what made him tick. Like she might not believe the image he presented on his surface. 

She should believe it, he thought viciously, it was mostly true. And for the bits of it that weren’t he couldn’t let her see them, however much he wished he could. The Dark Lord was on the rise and nothing could stop his ascent. Draco’s image, his reputation, his family, were all the leverage he would ever have to keep her safe. And so he sneered and mocked and called her Mudblood, joined the Inquisitorial Squad and did his very best to keep Potter down. By the end of the year there was no more speculation in Granger’s eyes, no check at all upon her hatred of him. Draco took the pain of that and buried it deep, along with every other feeling that he held for her, behind Occlumency walls more tall and strong than even the Dark Lord himself could begin to fathom. 

—

He wrote to her, that summer. Letters he would never send, not even if he could. Not even if the Dark Lord weren’t there, in his home. Not even if he didn’t now bear the mark on his arm that would forever hold them separate, on opposite sides of an impossible divide.

On parchment he could be honest. For the first time in his life he could express the things he truly felt and thought and wanted. He kept the letters with him at all times, spelled to look like schoolwork. The Dark Lord had little interest in his studies and Draco’s Occlumency by then was more than strong enough to safeguard his secrets. 

Hogwarts that year was torture. The spectre of the Dark Lord’s expectations always on his heels, Potter dogging his every move with suspicious eyes. Granger, grown curvier over the summer, filled out in places he only dared to think about alone in his bed, protected by a fortress of Silencios. He continued to write her letters, every day, half-mad confessions and lustful fantasies, pleas and promises and bursts of vicious anger. Hidden in plain sight, they were both his guilty pleasure and his deepest shame. 

“Watch where you’re going, Mudblood,” he spat one afternoon in November, when Granger came charging out of a classroom door at full speed, barrelling straight into him and sending his schoolbooks flying. 

“Sorry!” she cried, as she scrambled to gather up the dropped books and scattered parchments. “I’m so sor-oh. It’s you.” 

Ridiculous to feel hurt by the way her eyes shuttered when she spotted him, thought Draco. Stupid. He slammed his walls into place and let a sneer curl his lip as he snatched his things away from her. 

“So clumsy,” he snarled. “Graceless. Typical Mudblood, I suppose. You’ll fall right into the Dark Lord’s lap at this rate.” 

She rounded on him, but rather than snap out a retort as he expected she shoved him back against the wall. “Don’t use that term,” she hissed. “Say ‘You-Know-Who’ like everyone else. Harry’s already suspicious of you, if he hears you say that—”

She was so close, too close. She smelled like ink and parchment and something delicately floral he couldn’t put a name to. He wanted to lean in closer, identify its source. Drown in it, until everything else in his life faded away and there was nothing left but her. 

Instead he shoved her away. “Potter should be suspicious,” he snapped. “Sounds like he’s finally showing some sense. You should do the same.” With one final, scorching look he turned and stalked away, before she could reply or return the several of his parchments still clutched in her hands. 

The next day Granger found him in the library. She sat across from him at his lonely table and slapped some parchments down between them. 

“Is this true?” she demanded. 

Draco felt his heart stop. “Is what true?” 

“This.” She tapped her finger on a parchment. One of his letters to her, all concealment spells removed. “Does You-Know-Who really expect you to kill Dumbledore?” 

“Yes.” He clenched his jaw tightly, wishing he could lie, but the truth came out as though wrenched from the depths of him, drawn inexorably by the look in Granger’s eyes. That speculation, now back again and more certain than before. “By the end of the year or else he kills my mother.” 

“Oh Malfoy,” she breathed, and he squeezed his eyes shut so he couldn’t see the pity in hers. He did not want her pity. “You have to tell him.” 

“Who?” 

“Dumbledore.” 

He scoffed. “Confess to attempted murder, to the intended victim? I thought you were supposed to be clever, Granger.” 

“This is an impossible task,” she retorted crisply. “You’re being set up to fail. And you have access to information. Valuable information, Malfoy.” 

He opened his eyes to find her watching him shrewdly. “Strategy, remember. Your advice. Dumbledore can offer you protection, and he will. For a price, but one which you can easily pay. What have you got to lose?” 

She stood as if to go but left his parchments where they lay, strewn before him on the table. “Granger,” he rasped, and she paused. “How—how much of this did you read?” 

“All of it.” 

Christmas Eve, 1998. Hermione Granger appears unexpectedly at the entrance to the Slytherin Common Room, and offers Draco Malfoy a gift.

This small act of goodwill sparks a friendship between them that stretches across three more Christmas Eves and one Christmas Day, as Draco learns to forgive himself and become a man who is, at last, able to accept her love.

Draco stared at her. He blinked, slowly and deliberately, but she did not disappear. “Are you… lost?” he asked when the silence between them began to grow uncomfortable, whilst hurriedly compiling a mental list of potions someone might have slipped him that would result in auditory and visual hallucinations of this nature.

To his astonishment, her eyes crinkled and her nose wrinkled and her lips curled up and she snickered. Hermione Granger, pursed-lipped, haughty-voiced swot extraordinaire, snickered a laugh.

“I’m almost sorry you’ll never know how funny that is, Malfoy.”

Before he could respond to that baffling statement—really, she was doing very little to dispel his suspicion that she was a figment conjured by his overwrought mind, he reflected crossly—she held out a parcel wrapped in silver paper and tied with a dark green bow. “Here,” she said, in a voice that suggested she was getting something over with. “This is for you.”

Draco took the parcel from her as a sort of reflex action. When someone offers you a gift the natural response is to take it, even if you then stare at it with utter bewilderment and a touch of fear, like you’re wondering if it might detonate.

Not that he truly thought it would, but… it wasn’t exactly outside the realm of possibility. He’d seen Granger in battle, he knew what she was capable of.

“Don’t worry, it’s not explosive,” she said, reading his mind in a deeply disconcerting way. “It’s a Christmas present. For you.”

“Why?” was all Draco could think to say.

She flushed, a soft rose-pink that tinted her lips and the tops of her cheeks and brightened the rich honey shade of her eyes. Draco felt his own eyes widen as he watched the colour rise, his mouth slightly open, staring as though he’d never seen her before.

Perhaps, in truth, he hadn’t.

I have a lot of reasons for leaving HP, but the tl;dr is that I have trans loved ones who feel existential distress around HP content, and their distress is distressing to me. I may elaborate on that in the future, but the discourse is rancid, so I won't if I don't have to beyond: my time in fandom was queer-led, queer-inclusive, queer-supportive, transformative and transgressive, and I have no regrets about my participation. It's also time for me to move on. I have other, much pettier reasons, too. I was tired of entitlement and direct insults in my inbox. My friends all moved on to other fandoms and/or original work, and they were the engine of my fandom joy. I found the rate-and-rank culture of DHr dehumanizing. I wasn't interested in my work being openly compared to others. I've had Booktok influencers with massive platforms despise my work and write angry GR reviews about it. The love in my inbox FAR outweighed all that, but the pressure to do DHr "right" was (and I assume still is) enormous. I don't feel like I ever got DHr right. But I'm so deeply grateful LAOHA and my short DHr works found their people. I'm glad they're on AO3 and in people's bookmarks and downloads. I have no intention of removing anything. I hope everyone keeps taking creative properties that have Problems™ and doing new, interesting and horrible things with them forever. XO

i learnt about @ecclesiasticallatinfest um, yesterday, but i thought it was a great idea and wanted to participate so i knocked up a quick translation of my shortest fic. i'm an experienced translator but i always do french to english so going the other way was a challenge. Fortunately i knew exactly what the author meant by everything though she is a bitch for the flowery prose. i may have taken a few liberties with the french language, including disposing entirely with the passé simple because i cannot be arsed, so i hope gentle readers you will be kind.

original fic is here

translation is here

Stede Bonnet ressemble parfaitement à un des hommes dans son tableau préféré. Un jour, il rencontre l'homme qui ressemble à l'autre. Ça donne l'impression d'être destiné.

(Il l'est.)

savez-vous pourquoi on a les tournesols

Stede Bonnet adore les musées. 

C’était toujours comme ça, depuis sa première visite, lors d’un voyage scolaire. Un voyage qui était, à tous les autres égards, bien peu mémorable. Les tourments habituels des jumeaux Badminton et de leur cohorte, la solitude habituelle de Stede, lui seul avec ses livres et ses pensées. 

Mais il se souvient du tableau. 

Il se souvient de ces deux hommes sur le pont de leur navire, si vivement rendus par touches d’huile qu’il avait l’impression de sentir lui-même le vent qui fouettait dans leurs cheveux et gonflait les voiles de leur vaisseau. Il se souvient de la fierté de leur posture, l’absence total de peur. Il se souvient de leur unité, le fil de leur lien impossible de nier, palpable même depuis une peinture et à travers trois cents années. Il se souvient du désir ardent qui animait sa jeune poitrine. C’était ça ce qu’il voulait. Cette unité. Ce lien. Ce quelqu’un qui le regarderait du manière dont les pirates du tableau se regardaient. 

Personne n’avait jamais regardé Stede Bonnet comme ça. 

Même aujourd'hui personne ne le regarde comme ça. Ni ses parents, ni son ex-femme. Même pas ses enfants. Il traverse la vie comme il traverse les rues de Londres, seul parmi les foules bouillonnâtes des gens—familles, amis, amants. Mais pas pour lui. Jamais pour lui. 

Mais il adore toujours les musées. 

Il est aujourd’hui le conservateur de l’aile du XVIII siècle de la National Gallery de Londres, un boulot de rêves pour lequel il a travaillé toute sa vie. Il devrait se sentir triomphant, et il l’est, vraiment. Mais… doucement triomphant, et pour la plupart à soi-même. Le fait qu’il n’ait personne avec qui le partager ne fait rien, pas vraiment. Aller chaque jour au musée, savoir que c’est sa place, une place qu’il a méritée, c’est ça qui lui rend heureux. Plus heureux qu’il n’a jamais été. Ça suffit. 

Lorsqu’il acquiert le tableau, le tableau, celui qu’il a vu pour la première fois à Auckland il y a tant d’années, son bonheur est complet. Chaque jour il va dans sa gallérie et se tient debout en face de ce tableau et le regarde. Il se tient debout et il regarde et il ressent à nouveau ce désir presque douloureux dans sa poitrine. 

Peu à peu il se rend compte de quelque chose, une quelque chose très particulière dont il ne sait pas trop quoi faire. Un des hommes du tableau, celui du droit, l’homme blond à la barbe courte et pointue et à l’allure fringante, sa chemise blanche flottante et sa ceinture en soie turquoise autour de la taille, cet homme… il ressemble à Stede. 

Exactement comme Stede. À tel point que c’en est bizarre. Il ne l’a jamais remarqué autrefois, évidemment, comment aurait-il pu? Mais maintenant qu’il est plus âgé—du même âge, semble-t-il, que l’homme du tableau—le ressemblance est indéniable.

Il se laisse pousser la barbe, par curiosité académique, il se dit. Juste pour voir si la ressemblance est renforcée ou entravée. Il se laisse pousser également ses très courts cheveux, afin de mieux ressembler les boucles du tableau. Il introduit de la couleur dans sa garde-robe, les bleus vifs et les verts joyeux, même un petit jaune impertinent, de temps en temps. Il découvre qu’il adore la couleur, et la mode, et qu’elles l’adorent en revanche. S’habiller le matin devient un plaisir et non plus un corvée. 

Ne plus il se heurte les gens dans la rue parce qu’ils ne le remarquent pas. Plutôt, les inconnus hochent la tête à son passage et lui rendent ses sourires amicales. Ils arrivent même de faire la bavardage dans les queues. Ils gloussent s’il tente une petite blague. Il commence à faire des blagues exprès. Les gens rient. Ils rient d’amusement et pas de moquerie. Pour Stede, ça change tout. 

Ce Stede avec plus de confiance, plus de couleur, débordant d’une exubérance naturelle enfin libérée et tellement ravi de se ressembler si parfaitement à l’homme du tableau, commence à tourner plus fréquemment envers l’autre. Cet homme que, même enfant, il a trouvé presque trop magnifique pour apercevoir. Cet homme grand, beau, tout vêtu en cuir, sa barbe et ses cheveux longs fouettés par le vent et glorieux, qui contemple le doppelgänger peint de Stede avec le regard le plus doux qu’il n’ait jamais vu. 

Ce regard. La douleur dans sa poitrine devient insupportable lorsqu’il y pense, mais il y pense tout de même, et fréquemment. 

Malgré sa confiance en lui récemment trouvé, il n’existe toujours personne qui a jamais regardé Stede Bonnet comme ça. 

--

“Sacré tableau, n’est-ce pas, mon pote?” 

Stede se détourne de sa contemplation matinale du pirate vêtu en cuir, surpris et ravi d’entendre la cadence d’un accent familier. C’est rare qu’il rencontre un autre Kiwi à Londres, même si la ville accueille des gens venus des quatre coins du monde.

“Vous savez, c’est drôle,” reprend la voix. Elle est profonde et résonnante et elle caresse la peau de Stede comme du cachemire. “Je me souviens une fois, lorsque mon enfance en Nouvelle-Zélande, j’ai vu ce tableau. J’y suis resté en regardant pendant une bonne vingtaine de minutes. Les autres gamins se sont partis sans moi et le prof a dû revenir m’emmener pratiquement à l’écart. Je me rappelle plus le nom du prof mais je n’ai jamais oublié ce tableau.” Il se tourne vers Stede qui peut maintenant voir tout son visage. “Peut-être que ça vous paraisse fou, mais diriez-vous—pensez-vous que cet homme, celui de la gauche… vous pensez qu’il me ressemble?” 

Stede rest sans voix, bouche bée. Parce que oui, il dirait, oui. L’homme du tableau te ressemble vachement et s’il existe personne qui peut le déclarer avec autorité c’est Stede. C’est lui, après tout, qui avait regardé ce tableau chaque jour et tous les jours pendant tout de l’an dernier. L’homme à son côté a la même taille, les mêmes cheveux longs et barbe magnifique. Et lorsqu’il se retourne et leurs yeux croisent, Stede a le souffle coupé. Les yeux aussi se ressemblent, ce marron doux et chaleureux. Ils traversent le visage de Stede et ils s’écarquillent, signe de reconnaissance d’abord, puis d’émerveillement. 

“C’est toi,” il chuchote. “Cet homme, l’autre. C’est—c’est toi.”

Stede sait qu’il doit dire quelque chose, n’importe quoi, et donc il lance les premiers mots qui lui viennent de l’esprit. 

“Es-tu réel?” 

C’est une question de merde et il se sent ridicule pour la poser, mais les beaux yeux de l’homme se plissent sur les bords et il rit. Il rit d’amusement et non de moquerie. Le Stede d’aujourd’hui connait la différence. 

“Aussi réel que toi, mon pote. Je m’appelle Ed.” Il lui tend la main. 

“Stede,” répond Stede, en la prenant. Un frisson électrique parcourt sa peau, du point de contact jusqu’à l’extrémité de toute terminaison nerveuse qu’il possède. Il retient à peine son souffle. “Je suis le, um, conservateur. Du musée. Fin, pas du musée entier, seulement l’aile du dix-huitième siècle, mais c’est pas important en fait, ce que c’est important c’est que moi aussi.” 

“Toi aussi?” répète Ed. 

Stede hoche la tête avec enthousiasme. “Moi aussi, j’ai vu ce tableau lorsque mon enfance en Nouvelle-Zélande. J’arrivais pas à me détourner, moi non plus. Et je—” 

“Ne l’a jamais oublié?” 

“Ne l’ai jamais oublié! Je l’ai acquis à la première occasion. Ce n’était qu’après que je me suis rendu compte que, er—que l’homme dedans avait—” 

“Ton visage?” 

“Ouais.” Stede hausse légèrement les épaules. “Mon visage.” 

“C’est un bon visage,” dit Ed. La frisson électrique s’intensifie. Il découvre qu’il tient toujours la main d’Ed. 

“Sais-tu ce que j’aime le plus?” il demande. 

“À propos de ton visage?” 

“Non!” Stede proteste, avant de se rendre compte qu’Ed le taquine. Il sent ses joues rosir mais il continue. “Non, pas à propos de mon visage. Dans le tableau.” 

“Qu’est-ce que tu aimes le plus dans le tableau?” 

“C’est la manière dont ils se regardent,” dit Stede. “Ils sont si connectés et les expressions sur leurs visages, c’est—” 

“L’amour,” finit Ed. Sa voix est bourrue. “Ils se sont amoureux.” 

“C’est ça.” Les mots se coincent dans sa gorge. “En tant que garçon je ne pouvais pas le voir. C’est à dire, je l’ai vu mais je ne savais pas ce que c’était. Tout ce que je savais c’était que je voulais quelqu’un à me regarder comme ça. Mais personne ne l’a jamais fait.” 

“Jamais?” 

“Non. Pas—” Stede s’arrête, happé par les yeux d’Ed. Ce regard lui coupe le souffle. 

Ed maintient son regard tout en relâchant la main de Stede, tout en entourant la mâchoire de Stede de sa main, ses doigts s'enfonçant dans ses cheveux, s'enroulant autour de l'arrière de sa tête et l'attirant plus près de lui. 

"Pas jusqu'à ce moment,” murmure-t-il, puis ses lèvres se posent sur celles de Stede. 

Le baiser est d'abord doux, hésitant. Stede n'a jamais vraiment aimé embrasser ; il est peu expérimenté dans ce domaine et même moins enthousiaste, malgré ses dix ans de mariage. Mais ce baiser, ce baiser, l'illumine de l'intérieur ; ce picotement électrique travers sa peau et s’infiltre dans ses os. Il se retrouve penché sur le corps d'Ed, agrippant sa taille, poussant un petit gémissement impuissant qui attire un gémissement plus profond de la part d'Ed. Le baiser devient chaud, humide, tout à fait inapproprié pour un mardi matin pluvieux sur son lieu de travail, mais Stede s’en fout pas la gueule.

Après, ils restent en se regardant, yeux écarquillés et haletants, et puis en unisson parfait ils se tournent comme tirés par un fil, vers le tableau. 

Les deux hommes leur sourient, leur sourient, il n’existe pas la moindre doute. Le sosie d’Ed leur fait un clin d’oeil, tandis que celui de Stede hoche sa tête avec un sourire fier et content. “J’étais sûr que tu l’aurais trouver,” Stede entend dire sa propre voix, dans sa tête évidemment mais les mots sont aussi clairs que comme s’il les avait dit lui-même. 

Il se retourne vers Ed. “T’as entendu—” 

“Ouais,” réplique Ed. “J’ai entendu.” 

Ils regardent à nouveau le tableau, qui est précisément comme il a toujours été. 

“Viens déjeuner avec moi,” dit Ed, abruptement. 

“Il est dix heures et demie du matin!” 

“Un brunch, alors. Je sais un bon lieu, pas loin d’ici.” 

“Ah, oui?” Stede est tellement heureux qu’il a l’impression que son sang a été remplacé par du champagne. “C’est où ça?” 

“Mon restaurant.” Ed lui sourit. “Je viens de l’ouvrir. Blackbeard’s Bar and Grill, il s’appelle.” 

“Ooh, nom fabuleux. Et donc tu… vises rester à Londres?” 

“Aussi longtemps que Londres veut bien de moi,” dit Ed, et Stede sait qu’il ne parle pas seulement de Londres. “Et bien. Brunch? J’ai de la marmelade.” 

Stede reste bouche bée. “Comment—comment sais-tu que j’aime la marmelade?” 

“J’ai eu de la chance,” dit Ed. Ses yeux pétillent, de chaleur et affection et interêt et reconnaissance, et oui c’est enfin réel, ça se passe vraiment. Quelqu’un regarde Stede Bonnet Comme Ça. 

Ici au milieu de son musée bien-aimé, devant son tableau le plus précieux, le plus bel homme qu’il ait jamais vu, soit peint ou en personne, lui regarde de la manière dont il a si longtemps rêvé mais n’aurait jamais pensé savoir. 

Et dans sa poitrine il se sent à nouveau cette douleur mais ce n’est plus la douleur exquise. C’est la douleur d’une joie trop forte d’être exprimée. C’est le bonheur complet. 

C’est l’amour. 

“Le brunch serait super,” dit Stede. “C’est parfait.” Ça donne l’impression du début de quelque chose de spectaculaire. 

heyy ofmd tumblr i have written a thing. Inspired by this post.

starting with "take it slow" in ep 5 through the "missing" time between 5 and 6, then post ep 6 sex and into the innkeeper era. Sweet and sexy and funny (i hope). Have a read.

Can we take it slow? Ed had asked, and he’d meant it. I think last night was a mistake, he'd said, and at the time he meant that too. But he didn't mean let's take it slow forever and he didn't mean all sex is a mistake and he definitely didn't mean to find himself alone with Stede in their rickety soon-to-be-inn, sleeping in his arms every night and not getting laid. It's driving him out of his mind. And he intends to make that very much Stede's problem.

an excerpt:

Maybe he just doesn’t want me. 

It’s an absolutely ridiculous notion given Stede’s very obvious suffering but Ed’s sexually frustrated too and it’s seriously messing with his capacity for rational thought. He’s been throwing himself at Stede for days now and Stede’s done absolutely fuck all about it and the only explanation Ed can come up with anymore is that Stede just doesn’t want to. 

So much for I didn’t know it could be like that, he fumes, as he hammers nails into the roof with more force than is advisable, given the rickety state of said roof. So much for Oh, Ed you feel perfect. So much for the greatest sexual experience of Ed’s life, apparently it meant nothing at all to Stede. Apparently fucking Ed was so awful that Stede will go to just about any lengths to avoid doing it again. 

He works himself up into such a lather with these thoughts that when he’s done on the roof and goes back inside, the sight of Stede’s welcoming smile tips him right over the edge. 

“Oh there you are, Ed,” he says, “good. I wanted to ask you—” 

“Mate, what the fuck?” Ed yells. 

Stede’s brow knits in confusion. “What?” he says.

“You know what,” Ed snaps back. Stede’s wearing a well-worn white shirt today, so thin and open at the collar he may as well be wearing nothing. Ed wants to lick him. Just lick up that little pool of sweat that gathers at the base of his throat. Lick his pecs, bite his nipples, suck his dick—fuck. 

“I can’t do this anymore,” he growls. “I fucking won’t.” 

“Do what?” Stede looks truly baffled. “Ed, what’s wrong?” 

“What’s wrong?” Ed throws his hands in the air. “You’re asking me what’s wrong?” 

“Yes, I am.” Stede stands and cautiously approaches. “Is there anything I can do?” 

“Anything you can do?” Ed starts to laugh. “Is there anything you can do? Yes, Stede, there fucking is something you can do. You can fucking mean it when you say you love me.” 

“I—” 

“You can be honest,” Ed barrels on, ignoring his attempts to speak, “and tell me that I’m not enough for you and you hated having sex with me and you never want to fucking touch me again.” 

“Ed—” 

“And you can stop,” Ed continues, voice rising, “wearing those fucking shirts that leave your chest bare and smelling like clean sweat and the sea and hibiscus, some-fuckin’-how, and you can stop looking at me like you think I’m the greatest thing ever when you won’t fuckin’ just fuck m—” 

They are terrible at running an inn. 

In the beginning. 

They don’t know the first goddamn thing about the hospitality industry. Or carpentry, plumbing, invoicing, logistics. Anything, really. They know nothing. 

They learn. 

There’s a lot of trial, even more error. But by the first time the Revenge returns for a visit they have something. A roof that doesn’t leak. Un-rotted floorboards. Nooks and crannies free from feral beasts of any kind. Zero spiders. Twin armchairs in front of the fire and a bed just big enough for the two of them. It’s a start. 

The Revenge comes bearing gifts. Wee John has knitted them some afghans and Frenchie sewed an enormous quilt, which takes pride of place on the bed. They’ve towed in another ship as well, a wreck whose timber they all pitch in to rebuild into an extension and some outbuildings. Roach helps them plant a kitchen garden and a medicinal one. 

Jackie gives them business advice and contacts for her old suppliers. Lucius has a guestbook for them, with marginalia he drew himself. Some of it at least is appropriate for guests to see. The rest…

“Are you planning to have guests who’ll faint at the sight of a cock?” Lucius inquires innocently. “Because I’ll be honest with you, that seems unlikely.” 

The idea of guests of any kind is still a long way off, but they’re getting there. They can envision it now, and not just as a wild fantasy they spin each other at night as they lie entwined with sweat cooling on their skin. They have actual plans, concrete ones, and a decent understanding of how to realise them. 

They get to work. 

Jackie’s contacts prove invaluable. Soon they have a liquor supplier, deals with local butchers, bakers, candlestick-makers, and even a reliable fisherman to give them first dibs on his haul. 

(It’s not Pop-Pop.) 

A few survivors of Zheng’s old crew hire on as housekeeping and kitchen staff. The soup is phenomenal. Ed learns how to make it and how to cook a fish without burning it. They have fresh-smelling towels, expertly folded. They have guest rooms, and soon they have guests. 

It’s an adjustment, having new people in their space. Some of the guests are gawkers, eager for a piece of Blackbeard and the Gentleman Pirate. They reserve the right to refuse service to anyone, namely those particular assholes. But other guests are much more pleasant. Locals looking for a bit of a mini-break, people from nearby islands wanting a getaway, even the occasional European who doesn’t know who they are. 

The guests are mostly happy with their stay. There’s excellent soup and decent fish, fresh linens and great views. The walls could be a bit thicker, perhaps, for everyone’s comfort, but the hosts are always most apologetic in the morning and offer copious marmalade in exchange for good reviews. 

The Revenge returns frequently, each time with some new trinkets and finery for their former co-captains. In exchange, they host bonfires on the beach with music and dancing and wine, until they all fall asleep together in a pile, so like the old days on the ship that Stede watches them in the soft light of the embers with tears in his eyes. 

“All right, love?” Ed asks him. He slips an arm around Stede’s waist. Stede tugs him in until Ed’s head is nestled against his shoulder. He strokes Ed’s hair. Ed sighs and snuggles closer. 

“I’m all right,” Stede says. “A bit nostalgic is all.” 

“You miss it.” 

“I miss the crew. I wish they could visit more often. I suppose I miss the sea, though of course it’s right there in front of us. But I’m happy, Ed. I have no regrets.” 

“Really?” The whisper of doubt in Ed’s voice has Stede pulling back to look down at his dear face. 

“Yes really! Do you doubt it?” 

“Kind of.” Ed shrugs. “It’s easier for me, I think. I was ready to be done with it, Stede. Desperate to do anything else but be Blackbeard. But you—you had just got started. You could be out there now with the crew, pirating away. You could be famous. You could—” 

“Ed Teach, you listen to me.” Stede’s got his Captain Voice on now and the sound of it has Ed’s stomach turning cartwheels, his dick leaping to attention. “I don’t care about any of that. I only wanted to be a pirate for the freedom. To escape my old life. But I have a life now that I would never want to escape. Do you know why?” 

Ed shakes his head. 

“Because I chose it. I chose you. I love you and I would be happy anywhere you were.” He cups Ed’s cheek in his palm and kisses his forehead, his nose, his lips. Ed moans and presses closer but Stede pulls back, just far enough to whisper, “You make Stede happy.” 

They spend that night alone in the inn, no guests, far enough from the beach that when they serve breakfast to the crew the next morning not a single smirk or smart remark is sent their way. 

They wave goodbye to their friends that evening and stand together on their porch to watch the ship sail off into the sunset. Stede turns to Ed with a smile. “New guests checking in tomorrow,” he says. “We should probably fix the creak in the door hinge of Room 1.” 

“I’ll do it,” says Ed, “if you polish the candlesticks. Fuckin’ polish makes my nose itch.” 

“Deal,” says Stede. He turns to head inside. “What’ll we have for dinner?” 

“Got a nice turbot we could roast.” 

“Ooh, fab.” 

The inn’s front door closes behind them. 

It’s still a bit rickety, their inn. It’s old, it creaks, it springs leaks from time to time. It’s hard work, keeping it going. But they are devoted to the task. Whatever it takes, they will see their inn thrive. 

Please join me in reporting this theft to AO3 and in leaving comments on the fic demanding the “author” take it down. Apparently everything they post is stolen. Help me stop them!

PART ONE: 

It wasn’t as though Crowley had never known bad times before. He’d been around more than six thousand years, obviously there had been low points. The fourteenth century, for a start. If ever there had been a bloody waste of a hundred perfectly good years, it was the fourteenth century. Crowley wouldn’t go back to the fourteenth century for anything. He’d drive through a dozen rings of hellfire around London, walk barefoot over miles of consecrated ground, he’d navigate a rainstorm where every tenth drop was holy water before he ever returned to the fourteenth century. 

And yet, on this particular Tuesday as he sat hunched over in a booth in the corner of the grottiest pub he could find, leaning heavily on the bottle of Talisker clutched in his hand and pretending—poorly—to read the newspaper, Crowley found himself recalling those damp and endless years of the fourteenth century with a sort of gentle nostalgia. 

Ah, the fourteenth century, he thought to himself. Those were the days. 

He’d barely even known Aziraphale then. 

A bell over the doorway sounded a cheery little tinkle as the door opened to admit a new patron. Or rather, nothing even remotely of the sort happened because there was no bell over the door. This was very much not the kind of establishment to have a bell over its door, much less one that sounded a cheery tinkle. That was one of its principal attractions, in Crowley’s opinion, the lack of a tinkly bell. Tinkly bells meant something terrible was coming and so when the patron whose arrival it heralded sat down in the seat across from him he did his best to ignore them. 

He failed.

“Good morning to you, Mr Crowley, sir,” chirped the voice of Muriel, former 37th Order Scrivener and current proprietor of the A.Z. Fell and Co. bookshop. “Wot’s all this then?” 

“You know you don’t have to keep saying that,” Crowley said. “You’re not actually a police officer and even if you were, they don’t really say that. Well, not most of them at least.” 

“I know, sir, but I like to,” Muriel replied. “And I am still wearing the helmet.” 

“Yesss, the helmet.” Crowley forbore to mention that Muriel was hardly fooling anyone in a pure white version of a police constable’s helmet. That would require far too many complicated explanations with which he was in no fit state to grapple and most of which would sail right over the daft angel’s head in any event. Instead he said, “What news?” 

“News?” echoed Muriel.  

Crowley ignored the throb in his temples. “Yes, news,” he snapped. “The news that you have for me. The reason you are here, invading my space and imposing upon my privacy.” Muriel’s expression remained uncomprehending. Crowley abandoned his quixotic attempt at subtlety. “What’s going on in Heaven?” he hissed. 

“Oh, right that news!” Muriel laughed. “I’m so glad you reminded me. It’s big!” 

“Yes, and what is it?” enunciated Crowley, with particular emphasis on the t’s. 

“The Archangel Aziraphale”—Crowley barely suppressed a flinch—“is returning to Earth! And he’s bringing with him… a friend.” 

“Friend?” Crowley snarled. “He doesn’t have friends. I’m his only—” He clamped his jaw shut before the humiliating words could escape. 

I’m his only friend.

Except he wasn’t, though. Aziraphale had made that very plain. Crowley’s devotion, his loyalty, his—he couldn’t even think the word—none of it was reciprocated. One tiny crumb of approbation from the Metatron and Aziraphale had turned his back on a partnership six hundred centuries in the making. That was all it took. 

So no, he wasn’t Aziraphale’s only friend or indeed his friend at all. But apparently someone else was. 

“What friend,” he demanded, so harshly that even Muriel looked taken aback.

“I don’t know,” they said, “but whoever he is, he’s important. Heaven is very keen that he should get a nice welcome when he arrives.”

“Oh I’ll ‘nice welcome’ him, all right,” Crowley muttered. 

“What was that, sir?” 

“I said—oh never mind.” It didn’t make sense even in his whisky-addled mind. “What has any of this got to do with me?” 

“Oh! Well it doesn’t? I suppose? But you did ask me to tell you if I heard anything about Aziraphale. And I heard this! About Aziraphale! So I came to tell you.” Muriel’s brow wrinkled. “Was that wrong?” 

“I did tell you to do that, didn’t I.” Crowley sighed. He really ought to mind what he said whilst deep in his cups, and not to take laudanum in mixed company. Never mind that any company these days was preferable to his own.

He looked over at the kind, sweet, vacant face of the angel sat across from him and said, “Well, thank you, Inspector Constable, you have discharged your duties admirably.” Muriel beamed. Crowley scowled and looked away. Some company was preferable to his own. “Now piss off.” 

“Yes, sir! Pissing off right away, sir!” chirped Muriel, and when Crowley looked up again they were gone. 

-

The “friend” in question was soon revealed to be none other than the Second Coming. Or so he claimed, and claimed it far and wide. Aziraphale claimed it too, and lent all the considerable weight of his new celestial authority to the support of this man and his rapidly increasing ministry, the crowd of half-witted sycophants who began to follow him wherever he went. Crowley lurked at the back of it one afternoon in Trafalgar Square, as inconspicuous as he was capable of being, listening as the man preached a message of hope and peace and tolerance and love. It was inspiring, or it should have been. 

But Crowley was a demon though and through, despite what Aziraphale had once claimed to believe. Human rhetoric didn’t land on him. He was a demon and what was more he knew Aziraphale—friends or not he knew his angel. Knew him well enough to clock the tension in Aziraphale’s jaw and his shoulders, the lines of strain around his mouth and the carefully neutral expression in his eyes. 

When Aziraphale was happy his face was soft, his eyes eager, his smile bright as the sun. Though his posture remained perfectly correct, the movement of his hands always betrayed his feelings. They would flex and wave and flutter and Crowley would watch them, half-listening to Aziraphale’s chatter, just enough to give appropriate response, while the rest of his mind imagined those hands doing things to him that would shock the angel to his very core. 

But now, as Heaven’s anointed prophet preached his message of global harmony, Aziraphale’s hands were still. They hung at his sides, limp and unmoving. Not so much as a tug at the waistcoat or smoothing of lapels. It was downright unnatural. It was wrong. 

Crowley’s angel was so miserable he all but radiated it and though Crowley hated him now—yes, hated, he did—one couldn’t simply spend six thousand years having someone’s back then not care at all when they landed themselves in the soup. 

Or at least, he couldn’t, damn it all. 

It should have been far more difficult to get close to Aziraphale. He was the Supreme bloody Archangel now, thought Crowley crossly, he should have better security. You wouldn’t have caught Gabriel keeping such lax standards. No one would have been able to just walk in on him. 

Yet the bookshop had barely any protections at all and Aziraphale was staying there again, although his prophet, so Crowley’s informants informed him, had a suite at the Ritz. Crowley strode right in through the bookshop door, past Muriel where she sat at attention at the desk and up the winding staircase, down the hall and up to the door of the small sitting room that was Aziraphale’s most private space. 

He draped himself against the doorframe, casually, the very picture of nonchalance, and watched as Aziraphale scribbled away in a leather journal whilst pretending not to notice him. Crowley permitted this indignity for forty-three point seven seconds precisely then he drawled, “Angel.” 

“Crowley,” Aziraphale replied in his primmest tone. He held out for another twelve point nine eight seconds before turning his head. When he did their eyes met, just for the space of time that exists between heartbeats, but Crowley felt the impact of it like an elephant gun to the chest. 

There was a space in his chest, he’d discovered, a hollow little nook just below the ribcage, where he ached whenever particular things happened. When he’d thought Aziraphale was dead, for one. Or when Aziraphale had chosen Heaven over them. Or, more recently, while reading the novels of Jane Austen, purely for curiosity’s sake of course. To really get into the mind of the genius behind the Clerkenwell jewel heist. Who, as it turned out, was rather a dab hand at the old novel writing as well. A woman of surprising talents, that Jane. She got him in the nook every time.  

What an asinine thing it was to fall in love. Crowley pressed the heel of his hand against the ache, as Aziraphale returned his attention to his journal. Obscene, wretched business. He should never have done it. Though to be fair, the thing had been set in motion some millennia before he’d even clocked what it was, and yeah it had taken Maggie and Nina’s blunt advice to get him actually to put a name to the thing and yes, that clever bit of Jane’s about fixing the hour, the spot, the look, the words… in the middle before I knew I had begun…  had made him feel rather better about being so stupidly slow on the uptake, but still.

Asinine. 

PART ONE: 

It wasn’t as though Crowley had never known bad times before. He’d been around more than six thousand years, obviously there had been low points. The fourteenth century, for a start. If ever there had been a bloody waste of a hundred perfectly good years, it was the fourteenth century. Crowley wouldn’t go back to the fourteenth century for anything. He’d drive through a dozen rings of hellfire around London, walk barefoot over miles of consecrated ground, he’d navigate a rainstorm where every tenth drop was holy water before he ever returned to the fourteenth century. 

And yet, on this particular Tuesday as he sat hunched over in a booth in the corner of the grottiest pub he could find, leaning heavily on the bottle of Talisker clutched in his hand and pretending—poorly—to read the newspaper, Crowley found himself recalling those damp and endless years of the fourteenth century with a sort of gentle nostalgia. 

Ah, the fourteenth century, he thought to himself. Those were the days. 

He’d barely even known Aziraphale then. 

A bell over the doorway sounded a cheery little tinkle as the door opened to admit a new patron. Or rather, nothing even remotely of the sort happened because there was no bell over the door. This was very much not the kind of establishment to have a bell over its door, much less one that sounded a cheery tinkle. That was one of its principal attractions, in Crowley’s opinion, the lack of a tinkly bell. Tinkly bells meant something terrible was coming and so when the patron whose arrival it heralded sat down in the seat across from him he did his best to ignore them. 

He failed.

“Good morning to you, Mr Crowley, sir,” chirped the voice of Muriel, former 37th Order Scrivener and current proprietor of the A.Z. Fell and Co. bookshop. “Wot’s all this then?” 

“You know you don’t have to keep saying that,” Crowley said. “You’re not actually a police officer and even if you were, they don’t really say that. Well, not most of them at least.” 

“I know, sir, but I like to,” Muriel replied. “And I am still wearing the helmet.” 

“Yesss, the helmet.” Crowley forbore to mention that Muriel was hardly fooling anyone in a pure white version of a police constable’s helmet. That would require far too many complicated explanations with which he was in no fit state to grapple and most of which would sail right over the daft angel’s head in any event. Instead he said, “What news?” 

“News?” echoed Muriel.  

Crowley ignored the throb in his temples. “Yes, news,” he snapped. “The news that you have for me. The reason you are here, invading my space and imposing upon my privacy.” Muriel’s expression remained uncomprehending. Crowley abandoned his quixotic attempt at subtlety. “What’s going on in Heaven?” he hissed. 

“Oh, right that news!” Muriel laughed. “I’m so glad you reminded me. It’s big!” 

“Yes, and what is it?” enunciated Crowley, with particular emphasis on the t’s. 

“The Archangel Aziraphale”—Crowley barely suppressed a flinch—“is returning to Earth! And he’s bringing with him… a friend.” 

“Friend?” Crowley snarled. “He doesn’t have friends. I’m his only—” He clamped his jaw shut before the humiliating words could escape. 

I’m his only friend.

Except he wasn’t, though. Aziraphale had made that very plain. Crowley’s devotion, his loyalty, his—he couldn’t even think the word—none of it was reciprocated. One tiny crumb of approbation from the Metatron and Aziraphale had turned his back on a partnership six hundred centuries in the making. That was all it took. 

So no, he wasn’t Aziraphale’s only friend or indeed his friend at all. But apparently someone else was. 

“What friend,” he demanded, so harshly that even Muriel looked taken aback.

“I don’t know,” they said, “but whoever he is, he’s important. Heaven is very keen that he should get a nice welcome when he arrives.”

“Oh I’ll ‘nice welcome’ him, all right,” Crowley muttered. 

“What was that, sir?” 

“I said—oh never mind.” It didn’t make sense even in his whisky-addled mind. “What has any of this got to do with me?” 

“Oh! Well it doesn’t? I suppose? But you did ask me to tell you if I heard anything about Aziraphale. And I heard this! About Aziraphale! So I came to tell you.” Muriel’s brow wrinkled. “Was that wrong?” 

“I did tell you to do that, didn’t I.” Crowley sighed. He really ought to mind what he said whilst deep in his cups, and not to take laudanum in mixed company. Never mind that any company these days was preferable to his own.

He looked over at the kind, sweet, vacant face of the angel sat across from him and said, “Well, thank you, Inspector Constable, you have discharged your duties admirably.” Muriel beamed. Crowley scowled and looked away. Some company was preferable to his own. “Now piss off.” 

“Yes, sir! Pissing off right away, sir!” chirped Muriel, and when Crowley looked up again they were gone. 

-

The “friend” in question was soon revealed to be none other than the Second Coming. Or so he claimed, and claimed it far and wide. Aziraphale claimed it too, and lent all the considerable weight of his new celestial authority to the support of this man and his rapidly increasing ministry, the crowd of half-witted sycophants who began to follow him wherever he went. Crowley lurked at the back of it one afternoon in Trafalgar Square, as inconspicuous as he was capable of being, listening as the man preached a message of hope and peace and tolerance and love. It was inspiring, or it should have been. 

But Crowley was a demon though and through, despite what Aziraphale had once claimed to believe. Human rhetoric didn’t land on him. He was a demon and what was more he knew Aziraphale—friends or not he knew his angel. Knew him well enough to clock the tension in Aziraphale’s jaw and his shoulders, the lines of strain around his mouth and the carefully neutral expression in his eyes. 

When Aziraphale was happy his face was soft, his eyes eager, his smile bright as the sun. Though his posture remained perfectly correct, the movement of his hands always betrayed his feelings. They would flex and wave and flutter and Crowley would watch them, half-listening to Aziraphale’s chatter, just enough to give appropriate response, while the rest of his mind imagined those hands doing things to him that would shock the angel to his very core. 

But now, as Heaven’s anointed prophet preached his message of global harmony, Aziraphale’s hands were still. They hung at his sides, limp and unmoving. Not so much as a tug at the waistcoat or smoothing of lapels. It was downright unnatural. It was wrong. 

Crowley’s angel was so miserable he all but radiated it and though Crowley hated him now—yes, hated, he did—one couldn’t simply spend six thousand years having someone’s back then not care at all when they landed themselves in the soup. 

Or at least, he couldn’t, damn it all. 

ANTONY: fear it not, Caesar, it is not dangerous it is poorly managed social media and most of them think you are a salad 

CAESAR: would it were better regulated and could be monetised. but i fear it not

Basically, it’s a fanfic asks with a twist - because now it’s the askers who answer the questions and send them to YOU! Mostly to give you some love about your writing! Giving you some well deserved ego boost! <3

So, askers - pick a number, or several numbers, to answer in ask boxes that you send to your fic author!

My favorite fic of yours

My favorite chapter in my favorite fic of yours

The best character you’ve written for

The best ship you’ve written for

A fic I haven’t read yet from you, but I want to

Something I remember vividly from reading one of your fics

What made me the most emotional after reading

What I like the most about your writing

A fic i’m excited for you updating/posting

A character/ship I didn’t enjoy/think about as much before you wrote about them

Something I wish/hope you write

A fic of yours that i’ve re-read

If i’ve ever shared/talked about your fic to someone else

A fic I didn’t expect to like so much

These are your bedtime stories, your palate cleansers, your individual serving sizes of serotonin. It’s okay to enjoy these even if you only read slow burn 100k+ fics, I promise. Live a little! 

This is a sampling of some amazing favorites, but I’m always reading new things and will add to it regularly. If you find something you love, I know the author would love to hear it, and so would I! Take a deep dive into their catalog to find other gems. 

Here's Part One, if you missed it. Part Two below: