i swear im built for this

est. nov '25

18+, semi-selective, low activity, as shaken like a ragdoll by leith ━ follows from @beetilbub ; blog still a wip but open for interactions.

━ sketch wip.

my half of a valentine's lingerie swap w/ @darkcacaocookieandfriends, with some flower symbology bc i can never be normal, it is my curse.

Licorice's breath caught in his throat. Maybe it was for the best that he couldn't speak; instinctive reactions were piling up against each other so rapidly that any response would've ended up a flustered clusterfuck.

He stared into bold red eyecings, unable to imagine what the cake monster could possibly be seeing. Did he look shocked? Indignant? Confused? Brute could probably parse out the emotional cocktail that had dumped down his spine better than the necromancer could, reeling as he was, and for not at all the first time, that fact made him feel terrifyingly vulnerable.

There had been no mistake of what was said. Not when they were standing so close he could smell the berry juice on Brute's breath. The low growl in the otherwise loud statement made his immediate thought - that the man was testing him, joking, just trying to press him for a rise - fall flat. There was a tension in the weight of the air between them that felt far too intimate for him to believe it.

But could he believe the alternative?

Licorice's eyes flicked through every detail in Brute's face as though it could give him any way to deny what this was. What this absolutely was. What he'd found himself, after the probably-not-a-date and the maybe-just-talking and the late-nights-just-happen-with-you uncertainties, so very sure of, and woefully unprepared for.

He wasn't sure how long the silence had stretched between them, but he felt the growing weight against his chest to do something, say something, even as his mind raced through a million fears and reasons he shouldn't do the only thing that felt right.

When he finally opened his mouth, leaning closer to the cake monster without meaning to, words still battled back and forth with no clear victor in what was going to come out. Something snarky, something to push him away, something to put him in his place - Licorice was his master after all! - anything to hide the way his heart was beating out of his dough and wanting, craving so desperately to pretend this could be real. What won, in whispered tones because he couldn't dare say it as loud as Brute had, a statement as much as a question,

Licorice peeled his head off the ground, the effort making his brain spin. He wasn't sure if the ringing in his ears was from impact or leftover roaring laughter from Brute, but as he fumbled his way to his feet in panic, the voice that cut through was definitely his minion's.

'Get your dough out there and fight.'

Licorice spun so fast to face Brute and confirm that he was obviously joking wasn't he?! that the necromancer almost fell back over. Pain spiked from the sudden motion and he stumbled to keep his balance, struggling even further to decide which of the three Brutes he was seeing was real enough to earn his squinted glare.

Motion caught his attention, and he turned his gaze to meet the legs of some kind of creature. It took a long, agonizing drag upward for him to finally meet some kind of strange eyes that he couldn't make sense of. Whatever this thing was, it was no cookie, and it was big. If the throbbing side of his head was any testimony, it was strong too.

"Y-You can't be serious!"

Licorice could barely get the plea out before his instincts lit up, throwing himself to the side as the creature's strange twizzly arm came down with a force that dented the ground.

The landing was more graceful than his first, but far from glamorous. With a fist cradling the growing knot on his forehead, his other hand instinctively went to raise his scythe, before being hit with the stomach-dropping realization that he didn't have it. Terror shot through him as his eyes dashed to where he'd first been hit, but, thank the Witches, the weapon was lying safely next to the rubble pit, not too far from the cupcake man who... still didn't seem to be participating in this.

Dark magic welled up inside him, twisting and then bursting to raise a small group of Licorice Servants from the ground. It wasn't much, he needed his scythe for more hard-hitting spells, but it was a good enough distraction to let his cake minion jump in. Which the man would, of course.

'Take the loss'?!

More so than the sarcasm his minion had used in his agreed-upon title, and, if he'd have heard it, even more so than the threat, that little phrase sent his jam boiling. Anger shot through him in an instant; it was visible in every inch of his tensed demeanor. His previous fear vanished against the crippling, all-too-recent memory of Dark Enchantress glaring him down, annoyance dripping from every insult as she walked him through exactly how useless he was, how useless he had been, how useless he always would be if he couldn't do something as simple as controlling his cake monster, in their own stronghold no less.

"You can handle this much. Can't you?"

Her order for this mission had been punctuated with so, so much disdain in that final question. It did its job without needing an answer; that gut punch had landed hard enough to let her walk away without waiting for a placating ramble of 'yes, of course, I'll do anything'. It played out perfectly fine in the silence that followed.

And Brute, after causing this whole debacle in the first place, wanted him to take another hit. Another failure. To face her again with nothing but empty-handed apologies.

His face darkened to a scowl, and the grip on his scythe tightened.

"What's beneath me is your insolence. If you don't care to get this job done right, then so be it. I don't need you bringing me down and making this harder."

Licorice stomped past the man, continuing back toward the crossroads to try the other direction.

"I'll find those cookies with or without you!"

He didn't spare his companion a second look, frustration and dread mixing an explosive cocktail in his chest, so much so that his focus on their surroundings was buried far in second place. His attention narrowed to the path ahead, and he was much too occupied to notice the sudden shift of a shadow in the treeline.

"Decoration?!"

Licorice scoffed. Each quickened step was punctuated with indignation as he closed the (very short, might he add!) distance between himself and the cake monster. Rounding the front of the their two-man parade and not breaking stride, he aimed his scythe out in front of him like a pointing stick at the man who'd so rudely insulted it.

"Like you would know a true artifact of power if it nipped you on the frosting! Hmph."

"Fine, since you so desperately need my guidance, I suppose I will lead."

He turned to the road ahead, swooshing his cloak a bit more than needed to punctuate the statement, as he took his pace in front of the other.

The trail through the rather dense woods was suddenly the only thing in his view. His moment of bravado had hinged just a bit on their band of targets being nowhere to be found, the danger of traps or a sudden ambush having declined steadily as the hours wore on. But without Brute's large frame, the once narrow path seemed... so out in the open. Vulnerable. Was he so sure that there was no one lurking behind that odd tree? Or that one? ...Was it just him, or did the sky get a little darker?

He placed a step firmly on the ground, and swung his foot around on a perfect 180 degree pivot.

Licorice took a long, dragging inhale, before releasing the most exaggerated sigh he could muster.

"I told you we were going the wrong way."

It was one of countless complaints he could've made. They'd been walking for hours; there hadn't been any sign of the cookies they were meant to find; he still felt the sting of Dark Enchantress's rant about his inability to control his minions; Brute was breathing too loud; all problems of equal validity and deserving of gripe. He, of course, had chosen the one option most likely to start a fight, given that he had been the one who'd argued for this direction back at the crossroads.