#panic cw

tw panic attack mentions under the cut <3

Some context-- this occurs while Ell'iandyr and Heron are in Zadith (Heron for a buying trip, Ell to find their familiar, Amira.)

~760 words

Content Warnings: panic/anxiety attack

It’s been a little over a week since we first arrived in Zadith, and it has been quite the learning experience for me. My pronunciation of Zadithi has improved (marginally) and watching Heron as he barters is an education unto itself. But as to the reason I asked to be brought along-- to find my familiar-- I’ve made no progress at all.

kiss   prompt      —      selective   !

@iorast​ asked: a kiss after being pulled into an alley to have a moment to themselves

PANIC   ENCASED   HIM   in   a   show   of   unexpected   loss   of   control,      the   sorcerer's   breath   a   staccato   of   what   should   be   a   steady   rhythm.      one   moment   he   was   fine   and   the   next   his   mind   was   clouded      —      high   pitched   ringing   in   his   ears   drowning   any   concerned   questioning   thrown   his   way.      something      ——      someone   guided   him   to   rest   upon   a   cold   ground,      broken   hands   shaking   moreso      until   they   were   encased   in   another's   grip.

going   out   tonight   wasn't   a   good   idea      ——      a   NEARBY   CAR   WRECK   taking   him   from   his   surroundings   so   thoroughly   that   he   wondered   if   he   should   just   ——

a   pair   of   soft   lips   ghosted   over   his   own,      his   own   mismatched   eyes   open   and   yet   unseeing   —   slide   closed,      his   breathing   evening   out   after   a   long   while   of   silence.      black   hair   cascaded   around   his   vision,      blocking   his   gaze   from   anything   other   than..      loki   ?   

Nate woke up to the most excruciating headache of his entire life. Well—he supposed it wasn’t technically called “waking up,” considering how drunk he’d been last night—it was more like just being unconscious and then, abruptly, painfully conscious. 

But Nate didn’t have time to dwell on semantics—not when it felt like a herd of Erumpent had stampeded on his head. He groaned, and shifted his arm out from underneath Xi, who was still asleep in bed. Her face crinkled with a frown at being subconsciously disturbed, and Nate pulled the duvet up over her shoulders when she rolled over, as he got out of bed and stumbled toward the bedroom door. Fuck, he needed a pot of coffee as strong as rocket fuel and a hangover potion, in that order, immediately.

But when he turned the doorknob and pulled, the door wouldn’t budge. “What the…” Nate muttered under his breath, jiggling the door on the frame unsuccessfully. The thing was, their door didn’t lock. None of the doors in the house locked, besides the front and back doors; it was a constant point of frustration for Xi when there were hedges in the house, and one Nate heard about often. Hastily, Nate backtracked, rubbing at his eyes (which did little to alleviate the pressure that throbbed just behind them) before grabbing glasses and his phone from the nightstand. There was an unread text, from Seth:

{FROM: SETH} heads up: some cooperative magic backfired. attempted camouflaging spells on the safehouse for protection as discussed and someone miscalculated the illusions bit. all doors are unfunctional until further notice. working to fix asap.

Immediately, Nate’s claustrophobic panic instincts kicked in at the thought of being trapped in a room until further notice, and he thought he might be sick. The door to the bathroom had mercifully been left cracked, and Nate barreled in there and retrieved an anti-nausea potion from beneath the sink, and tossed back the whole thing. He splashed some water on his face, willing himself to stop shaking. He was just a bit hungover. The hedges would get them out soon. Nate could handle this.

It was then he noticed that the other door in the bathroom, which connected Harriet’s room to this one, was also slightly ajar. That seemed like a bit of luck—if Harriet was up here, surely she could figure out how to break them out faster without blowing the doors off their hinges, right? Without any hesitation whatsoever, Nate pushed open the door and walked into Harriet’s room. “Thank fucking god, Harriet—the hedges fucked up the cloaking spells and now the doors are all fucked up…do you think you can circumvent whatever they did and get us out of—?”

It was then that Nate noticed that Harriet was not in her room. Loxley Blair and his sleeping dog, however, were. 

“Loxley?” Nate said with alarm, even as the events of the previous night started crashing back through his mind. Loxley had come into the bar, and stayed well after the official “closing time,” drinking shots and watching everyone play Push. Him and his roommates had shown up at the flat several weeks ago, having found out about the FTB hedges without knowing about Nate or Xi’s involvement; Nate had been otherwise occupied at the time, but he’d heard plenty about it from Xiomara: how protocol had dictated she allow them entry, despite her clear disapproval. How they’d successfully performed the magic required to let them stay. How Piper Oliver had cornered Xi in the kitchen and explained their predicament. 

They’d all shown up a few times since then, and it had been awkward. Which Nate had expounded on at length last night, after he’d suffered a brutal Push defeat and subsequently gotten absolutely smashed. Harriet was out getting laid and Nate had insisted that Loxley come back to the flat for the night, and they could get very very high before passing out. And that’s about where Nate’s memories ceased. 

“Fuck. Fuckfuckfuckfuck…” he said, lowering his voice and glancing back through the bathroom in the direction of his bedroom, where Xi was (hopefully) still asleep. “Okay, I know this is inconvenient, but we’re kind of stuck in here while everyone else sorts out a spell mishap. Do you think you can just, like—chill in here, and be quiet, until we can—?”

And that’s when Xiomara came in.