@inkwingsinc <3

"Sweet, warlike Laera; she never considered their fights actual fights, because when her blood was hot and temper stoked, she behaved like a woman possessed. Walden loved her for it. His sister was heavy and soft and incapable of physically protecting herself, but her temperament, a quirky aposematism, would hopefully signal to potential predators that Laera herself could be a threat. A lie, but a useful one."

"Her brother was brilliant—uncomfortably, undeniably brilliant—and Walden always had trouble because of it. He was often taken by bouts of unexplained melancholy that would develop slowly into fits of violent rage; the very act of being alive was a toil for him, and with his Mentat training opening his mind to greater horizons, he found himself crushed under the weight of his own mind. The spice calmed him, though. The spice made her brother return to himself by inches."

Find the story here: https://archiveofourown.org/works/54217396/chapters/137290048