#fantasy!ls

The whole world feels brighter when Carlos comes home from work. He rides his horse into the stables, the sun catching on his bright iridescent wings and gleaming on his golden skin. He looks a vision of heaven to TK, who wishes he wasn’t caked in dirt from cleaning the stables. If he could, TK would run up to meet him, but his one attempt to do so led to being choked out and waking up in bed, exhausted. 

“Carlos!” he calls instead. 

Carlos’ face breaks out in a wide smile as he dismounts, leading his horse the rest of the way. When TK stands to meet him, he pauses- he doesn’t want to get all the sweat and muck on Carlos’ beautiful clothes- but Carlos has no such qualms. He wraps his arms around TK and holds him tight. 

“I missed you,” Carlos murmurs against his temple. “I missed you so much.”

“Sap.”

They both laugh a little, still clinging to one another. TK presses his face against Carlos’ shoulder. He smells worldly. Like earth and sun and rain, like far away perfumes and spices, like all the things that TK will never see. 

“Oh,” Carlos says when they finally part.

“Oh?”

“I brought you something. One second.”

He returns to his horse’s side and digs through the pouch on the side of the saddle, producing a small velvet box. The container alone looks so nice that it makes TK’s heart pound, but the interior is what makes it leap into his throat. 

It’s a bracelet, with bright blue gemstones the likes of which TK has never seen. He doesn’t even think The Princess has something made from these, so to think that Carlos brought him this... he doesn’t know how to respond. In his silence, Carlos takes his wrist and gently fastens it for him. 

“It’ll get dirty,” TK manages. “Or taken from me.”

“Then I’ll bring you another.”

Michelle always has this meeting with Carlos before he leaves. They go over his objectives, his cover story, his time frame. It’s a job for someone else in Marjan’s cabinet, but they’ve been doing this since before Michelle was Marjan’s personal guard, and it would be strange for Carlos to do it with anyone else. 

“You’re posing as a servant,” she says. “It’s the best choice. They don’t pay attention to their servants here. But we’re at odds, so you should be really careful, okay?”

“Always am, Chica.” 

He throws in a wink for good measure to make her laugh, but it doesn’t work. They both know this is the kind of mission that people don’t always come back from. 

“Be safe, Carlos,” Michelle pleads.

“I will.”

- Like the moodboards state, Marjan is a princess, Michelle is an angel and a knight, TK is an indentured servant, and Carlos is a fae and a spy. 

- Marjan is the sole ruler of her kingdom, but her title is princess because technically her mother is still the queen, though she left a while ago and hasn’t returned. She’s extremely well loved by the people of her kingdom- they adore her 

- Michelle is her knight, her protector, and sometimes, her lover. Michelle joined the royal guard because it’s what was expected of her as an angel, but she’s come to love her job and the closeness she gets to Marjan because of it.

- TK is an indentured servant to the palace because of his father. Owen indebted himself to the royal family, promised them his son, and then died for the cause, leaving TK to work off the debt. He’s magically bound to the castle and unable to leave the bounds of the property.

- Carlos is a spy for Marjan. He keeps an eye on the kingdom to make sure there’s no rebellion. He also looks around at nearby kingdoms when tensions rise to ensure they’re not planning anything dangerous.

- Marjan and Michelle spend a lot of time together even when Michelle is off duty. Marjan loves to help groom Michelle’s wings, and Michelle is always helping Marjan in- and out- of her gowns. 

- Carlos brings TK things from his travels, because TK has always wanted to see the world. And of course, whenever Carlos is back in the palace, they spend time cuddled up in Carlos’ quarters.

The curse brings nightmares. Or at least, TK thinks it’s the curse, because the memories are not things he should rightfully have swimming about in the darker corners of his mind. The curse was there. The curse remembers. It brings to mind a memory of being a babe in his father’s arms, his mother gone longer than she stuck around. 

He dreams fitfully of his father’s youthful face, up above him and pleading with the king to take this child in lieu of himself for his debt overwhelms him. 

“A gift for the baby princess,” he says, and the curse begins to writhe through TK’s small body. “She will need a stable hand for her horses, a servant to polish her crown, a friend to read her stories. Take him. My honored gift to make up for my debts.”

TK cried. It hurt, especially when he was so young, to be overtaken by the dark magic. He wakes up every time around this part, sweating and gasping and crying, but luckily tonight he has Carlos’ warm embrace to turn his face into and beg for comfort. 

His struggles wake Carlos, who no longer asks what’s wrong. He simply pulls TK into him and makes him feel held, feel swaddled, as the pain and sadness and abandonment washes over him. 

“It’s okay,” Carlos murmurs. “It’s over.”

Carlos realizes too late. He’s dizzy and aching, and he can’t seem to draw enough breath into his lungs. He can’t tell if he’s hyperventilating as an effect of the poison or because of anxiety, but regardless, he’s losing the uphill battle to get oxygen into his body. His feet give out under him. 

“Sir Reyes, are you feeling alright?” A smug advisor asks him, grabbing onto one of his arms. No, that’s wrong. He’s posing as a servant here, and not under his real name. They know who he is. Oh God, he has to get out of here. “Don’t worry, we’ll take care of you.”

“Unhand me,” he drawls, his mouth quickly going numb. “Stop...”

A second guard takes his other arm and they lead him away from the party. He can’t feel his legs. His head lolls back uselessly, though he keeps gasping for breath, as they drag him deeper and deeper into the palace, further than he’s been before. The cold air and dim lighting makes him think they must have gone underground. 

They’re going to kill him. 

He didn’t get to say goodbye to his princess, whom he would and will give his life for. He didn’t get to say goodbye to Michelle, his best friend and confidante. And worst of all, he didn’t get to say goodbye to TK, who will tend the stables every afternoon waiting for Carlos to come home. 

“Should take his wings,” one guard says, brushing the sensitive tissue with a gloved hand. “They’d look pretty on a wall.”

“That’s for the king to decide,” the other says. 

“Just in case, I won’t hurt them. It’d be a shame to damage the trophy.”

What are they going to do to him? Carlos’ very soul screams at the idea of being mutilated in such a way, but he’s in no state to so much as cry out. All he can do is let them shove him face first into a stone-walled cell without so much as a bed. Unable to catch himself, his face slams into the floor. 

《TARLOS: FANTASY!LONE STAR AU》

Some women are dripping with diamonds

Some women are dripping with pearls

Lucky me,

Lucky Me

@carlosreyesweek

Carlos stretches out on the bed, relieved to be home again for the first time in months. He’s been undercover for ages in Primalia, and to be back home, back with TK, makes his whole body feel much lighter. 

TK kisses his bare chest and hums, smiling up at him. His green eyes are brighter than the plains, and softer than the finest feathery down, as he grins. Besides their reuniting, he’s sure TK is happy to have an excuse to be out of servant’s quarters when off duty. When Carlos isn’t here, he isn’t even allowed in this wing of the palace.

“I was thinking about the curse,” TK whispers. “There’s an herb in Raleigh that’s supposed to be able to break it. I could be free, Carlos.”

“TK...”

That’s when TK sits up and cups Carlos’ face. “We could run away together.”

“I love you, but stop talking.” Carlos takes his wrists in hand and leans into his touch even as he says, “I can’t do that. I’m sworn to the crown, and you know I love our princess with my entire soul. I can’t run away with you, and I can’t search for something that may not exist.”