#raev writes

Since tumblr can be a little allergic to links, I thought I'd take a second to ramble about all the various little (and not so little) fics I have up on Ao3

Den of Shadows

Jaguar's Midnight: Currently a single chapter of me exploring ideas of a Midnight that is more blatantly BDSM and less human trafficking. Maybe more to come? Who knows

Unpublished Turquoise thing about her time with Daryl (pester me about if it you're interested)

Hawksong/Kiesha'ra

Ties that Bind (haitus, 30 chps) A queer, polyamorous, Romeo and Juliet with shapeshifters set on a backdrop of the first tentative peace in a thousand year war. Canon's hotter cousin. Not currently explicit but plans to potentially get there

Frayed Knots (ongoing, 20 chps) The place where all the scenes I thought would go in TTB but didn't wind up. Some one offs, some deleted scenes. A mixed bag of spicy adult stuff and just fun character exploration. Iirc spicy chapters are marked as such

Dasi High (abandoned, 4 chps) Highschool AU of Maeve and Kiesha and Co, if their story was on the CW

Forbidden Skies (ongoing, 4 chps) Crossover with Forbidden Game. Julian is a falcon and Jenny and co are avians and serpiente. Basically FB's chars and plot cosplaying as K'r

Forbidden Game

Forbidden Skies, see above

Holy Fire (one off) A sort of song fic where Zach thinks way too hard about Jenny and tries to become a magician

Hearts Desires (complete, 4 chps) Still playing with Zach the magician, this one is meant to be a fairly short exploration of magic/runes, Zach's obsession with Jenny, his inability to readjust after the game, and coming out to himself. And tree sex. It's a weird one.

Summer Therapy character study (one off) exploring her massively underdeveloped character a bit

Unpublished pre-canon Jenny thing where she's kind of aware of something (Julian) watching her at night (spicy, pester me about it if you're interested)

Longer descriptions under the cut

Aiden gestured to the blade protruding from his chest. “As you can see,” he said with a sort of “viola” motion, “I seem to be bad at dying. Hence…” He gestured to the pile of bodies around him.

Shadriel was unimpressed.

“I still fail to see your point,” the demon said flatly.

Aiden pulled the blade out and offered it back to the demon’s guard. The griffin took it with an unhappy sound and began dutifully cleaning it. Aiden sat down and waited for his wound to heal.

“You’re a demon,” he said bluntly. Shadriel made an equally blunt noise back, unimpressed. Aiden took of his shirt before the wound could close around the fabric. “Physicality is your specialty. I want you to fix whatever’s broken in me.”

“Whatever is broken in you,” Shad said, “is a myriad and many, and probably better suited to an Anima or Mente. You’re a serial killer.”

Aiden shrugged. “I’m seeking Death. One particular death. He keep eluding me.”

Shadriel gave an arch look that said “so I see” and “that’s fairly obvious” and “I still think you’re nucking futs.” Shadriel could say a lot with just looks.

Aiden returned a look that said nothing but held ages, too many lifetimes spent wandering, searching. Alone. Shad sighed.

It had been a long time since Shadriel had communed with the anima collective. He couldn’t do it directly – his demon essence kept the plane from him as surely as the anima collective’s combined energies kept their plane closed unto itself-- but through the spirits of intellect he’d managed to lure and collect to his cause, information could flow. And anima always followed thought wherever there was an opening, as surely as water flowed downhill through any cracks.

So Shadriel sat, tucked safely behind several circles of warding, a bevy of guards at the doors, and simply thought, letting the pieces of his conundrum flow out into the web of intellect spirits he’d cast into the wide world.

I have a seer, but no path to the Oracles. She has a guardian, strong and dedicated, but no real power to Defend her. I have a man who seeks Death, but leaves only dead bodies in his wake. He had a body that cannot die, at least not by any weakness he’s been able to discover.

Bit by bit, he began to feel eyes upon him. They weren’t proper eyes, of course; one would have to have to have a physical form to have eyes. But the anima collective was all made up of being who had once had eyes, and they remembered their former forms, though they disdained the limitations of flesh. As a being of pure flesh and physicality, Shadriel was surprised he’d been able to get their attention at all. Anima and Demons were diametrically opposed, just as Benevolents and Destinies were. It was only the planar paring of Oracles and Enforcers that worked in tandem rather than at odds. But the two sects of Destinies argued enough amongst themselves to make up for the harmony between the Oracles and Enforcers.

The eyes began to drift, annoyed that Shadriel’s thoughts were full of things well and commonly known. He shifted his focus back to the problem at hand.

The man who seeks Death but cannot die was made that way by the Shining ones. A shiver of outrage went through the collective at the thought of the kin that had cast them out, had bound them to a world of sticks and mud and so changed them. Or rather, inspired them to change themselves to escape it. There was a glimmer of possibility there, in the anima’s attempt to escape the binding curse by escaping physicality all together. It hadn’t worked, but the idea was worth turning over, even though it wasn’t quite fully formed.

Several anima scurried away with it, pleased with this offering and eager to ponder the burgeoning idea from every angle. Shad let it go, attaching an intellect spirit to each one, to be sure the information flowed back to him as they made their discoveries. He pressed on.

A body is an easy thing to change. Agreement, an echo of the opinion that bodies should be cast off all together, but consensus that their nature was highly malleable. Gods, it was dizzying thinking like this. Smugness that his singular mind could not keep up. Shad dismissed it. He liked being his own individual. He continued in his own singular train of thought.

Fate is not an easy thing to change. Annoyance at the interference of the other planars; Destinies and Oracles and Enforcers alike both worked to shape the world to suit their purposes, though with very different methods. Destinies read the threads of Fate woven by Ksm, a cosmic force personified as a weaving woman. One sect worked to support individuals with notable threads, the other worked to ensure the threads of the overall patterns stayed strong and true. They often butted heads with one another, as no one Destiny had all the pieces. Oracles had all the pieces, and set in stone certain immutable facts about the universe. Enforcers went out and made sure those facts remained so. Again, bored anima drifted away from the demon’s stating of the obvious.

But it can be shifted.

All in all, fate magic was a wretched stalemate. The best one could hope for was to hand a fate off to a different individual, dodging the worst for yourself by passing the buck. Such was the nature of luck magic. But if such workings were not done carefully, if balance was not maintained--

Threads snapped, balances shifted, accounts settled, Shining Ones come and must be answered to.

The collective was impatient enough with him to shout in a nearly unified voice. The last time the Shining Ones had had to intervene, the chimera and faeries had been born. Of those faeries, the Mente Court was starting to encroach on Anima territory. They could weave and bend the mind, manipulating thoughts and experiences like light through a prism, paint on a canvas, waves on the shore. The anima did not like these new faeries. They wished them gone.

What has been set by the Shining Ones must be, Shad thought carefully. But what they cannot see they cannot demand an accounting of. With an Oracle of our own, we could learn to work in the dark places of their sight.

A resounding cry of agreement and exultation went up, and several anima flooded along his intellect spirits to ride with them out into the world. He had found a seer with only those weak spirits. With anima bent to the cause, they would find an Oracle. One who wished to see what was not meant to be seen. One who could be tempted by their offer.

Shadriel opened his eyes and took a moment to ground himself in the physical world. He dropped his circles, opened the door to his chambers, and pulled one of the guards off the door and into his bed, where he put every inch of his wonderful body to use, and gloried in the pleasure of having it.

Aiden was restless. It was kind of the demon to put him up – or maybe the basic duties of a host, considering it was one of his men who wounded him – but Aiden couldn’t sit still any longer. The pain of his wound was just another drop in the pulse ache of wrongness that had come from causing so much death.

And all for nothing.

So Aiden wandered the manor, not really surprised that the demon had left no guard on him. If Aiden just wandered out, that would be the end of his involvement. He thought about doing just that, but decided to poke around a bit instead. Shadriel was supposed to be one of the first; sure he had some interesting secrets tucked away around here somewhere.

-

The first place he came to was a library. It had taken some doing to get there. At first, every door Aiden opened had simply led back to his own guest room. He’d quickly figured out the house ran on intent, and Aiden hadn’t really fixed anywhere in particular in his mind when he’d set out exploring. He’d mostly wanted to move, and make some kind of progress. All too vague and nebulous set the house’s pathways.

So he thought about information, about knowledge, about uncovering some secret, some perfect answer just waiting to be discovered. When the hallway offered him a set of double doors instead of the endless row of singles, he took it.

The library was as vast and plush as the rest of the manor. Here, the lights were fully electric, another anachronism to add to the pile. He appreciated the clarity and abundance of light, as so he assumed did the demon.

He hadn’t expected to find much, but he certainly hadn’t expected to find any people.

The guard was much like the one who had wounded him, but this one was somehow softer. This was not to say he was soft, simply softer. Like bone was softer than diamond. He seemed equally startled to see Aiden, but he stood and offered a completely unnecessary bow.

“Lord Shadriel--”

“Is not who I’m looking for,” Aiden said swiftly. “Please, don’t let me disturb you.”

The guard subtly moved back his book, a colorful paperback of the sort that most definitely would not be invented for almost a millennia and who’s subject matter was probably considered unmaly to be interested in. Aiden didn’t care if he read romance novels in his spare time; all Aiden wanted was to make even a modicum of progress.

The guard didn’t retreat.

“If there’s any way I could be of assistance--”

“If there was I wouldn’t hesitate to ask.”

Aiden tried to swallow down his nastiness. It wasn’t like him, to be sharp and cutting. Well, it was, but not in his bitter way. His wit was meant to be turned to jokes, clever turns of phrase. Meant to make his lover laugh, to draw out that smile that was equal parts fondness and indulgence.

A smile they’d tried to take from him.

Aiden sighed and offered the guard an olive branch.

“I just want to feel like I’m getting somewhere. Laying around with nothing to do was making me crazy with restlessness. Is there some section of this massive place on finding spells, or death lore, or…”

He trailed off, not even knowing what he was looking for. Hadn’t he already tried everything? But the guard stepped forward and gestured for Aiden to follow.

“There are no sections,” he explained as he walked, “Or any order to it that I’ve been able to discover. But there is The Catalog.”

In the center of the room was a table, supporting a single, massive book. It’s spine should have cracked long before, but as the tom practically hummed with magic, Aiden wasn’t surprised it remained intact.

“You found your way here,” the guard said, almost completely hiding his tone of reproach. “So I assume you can work a book that runs on intent.”

“Yes, thank you.”

Aiden went to the book hungrily, laying his hands directly on the pages. They were blank, until suddenly they weren’t. He began to gently leaf through them, letting his attention go soft as his thoughts went sharp. Books on Death. Books on Finding. Books on the Shining Ones. Books to take me home.

Without fully reading any of the words, Aiden nevertheless comprehended the information, knowledge of the location of several offerings, and which seemed most likely to satisfy his need. He let his feet carry him to the shelves, let his hands make selections, and carried his pile off to a nook to devour.

Day 1

“So you’re tearing yourself apart,” he said at last. “To what end? Are you trying to corrupt your uncorruptable nature, or…?” He trailed off, giving the other man room to speak.

The eyes he met Shadriel’s with were the clear blue of frozen winter skies, and just as cold.

“I am trying to bring back what is mine. Death was my lover, before the Lady War bound us both. I want him back. I deserve that much after what I’ve been through.”

-

The Benevolent had collapsed not long after that, his wound greater than he’d anticipated. Shadriel’s guard were skilled, thorough, and armed with planar steel – stuff not wholly of the middle plane. The world was still new, still changing, at least from perspectives as long as their own. Shad could remember a time when they’d all been dumped here, banished to a mire of sticks and mud. He could remember the shape of his own first body, pure and untainted by the essences that now bound them all to this place. First had been the planars—direct exiles from the valley and their direct children – and more recently, the faeries and chimera. Doubly bound with holy elements and mundane, the chimera were something new, something more mortal. Of the sticks and mud themselves.

But Shadriel and his kin – this case, Earthen Demons – were still more of magic than of mud, and their presence changed the world around them. Where many demons collected, the demonic plane arose. Where many of Aiden’s kind, the Benevolents, gathered, the benevolent plane, and so on. Shadriel had no idea what went on on any of the other planes; by his very nature he could never go there; he just kept pushing the plane farther and farther away like water disrupted by soap. But he also had little idea of what went on in the demonic plane anymore nowadays either; as Aiden had noted, Shadriel preferred his little asynchronous bubble.

Being a planar had its perks.

So Shad tucked Aiden in in one of the guest beds, and retired to his study to think. He knew the story of the Pale Horse and Lady War and the one now called Death, split from his power into the hands of many, his mantle torn and scattered to keep it from falling into the wrong hands again. A tribe of people had risen up from its seeds, and now moved among the chimera to help release their souls from the tethers. Bit by bit, they would become one with the mud, settling into the clay with every cycle of death and rebirth. As their shining kin intended it.

But not Shadriel. And not Aiden.

The demon already knew he would help the benevolent. He was just too soft hearted. But he would wait, and learn more about his particular situation, and make certain he wasn’t unleashing some accidental hell, like the Lady War. No, the Pale Horse had been leashed for a reason, and his lover’s mantle rent and scattered for a reason. Shad would help them however he could, but he would not risk his own people just to mend one broken heart.

No matter how very broken it was.

So he decided it was time to gather information. He sent some of his people out to gather up seers, others to speak with deaths. More still he sent to commune with spirits, mote of magic that were almost sentient, almost beings, but not quite. Those could move across all the planes, and carry his messages to planars who might know more than he. He was discreet, trimming as much of his own energies from the spirits as possible, splitting up information between them so no one spirit had the whole picture, and sending them out slowly, one by one in a steady stream. He’d lived for centuries already; he’d live for centuries more. He could afford to be a slow fisherman.

In the meantime, he could be a good host to his guest, as he waited for a nibble.

Coming Home is an Asylumverse take on Hades and Persephone. It started with me getting a wrong number call at 5 in the morning, and I sort of fell in love with the idea of a middle manager Perse accidentally calling big boss Hades to cover a shift :P

It was five in the mother blessed morning, and his phone was ringing.

Iades groaned and groped for it on the bedside table, knocking it to the floor in the process. He snarled at Sir as the dog groused about being moved, muttering as the beast snuggled into his brother pup, Baron. Spot helpfully batted at the vibrating phone from his favorite pouncing spot under the bed, so Iades was well and truly annoyed when he delivered a gruff, “ ‘lo?” into the phone.

“Um, hi. This is Peo- Penny, from the Heathery? The schedule says you’re supposed to be in this morning.”

“What?”

He struggled to remember which of his locations had a Penny working at it.

“The schedule? This is Jaden, right?”

“Which Heathery,” he growled. “I work at several.” He was too sleep-fogged to clock that no, in fact, he was not Jaden.

“Uh, Helmsdale? Oh!” Her abrupt tone shift made him sit up so fast he hit his head on the headboard, biting back a swear. “I am so sorry, Jaden just walked in. Have a good morning, erm, night, uh, sleep. Good bye.”