Twisted Wonderland FanFic Recomendation

Azul sighed as he readjusted his glasses, his demeanor as the dorm leader and owner of the lounge regained. "Yes, I have it right here." Azul smoothly slid the glass towards Floyd to which he took it and went back to do his duties. "I should head back to taking down orders as well, though it was rather cut short," Jade replied as he had a mischievous smile placed upon his lips which sent the dorm leader's gut a bad feeling.

When both of the Leech twins are now occupied with other tasks, Azul took this opportunity to clean the ingredients and appliances he used for the order.

He loved the satisfying process of personally cleaning and organizing the bar. Especially when he polished the glass and can see his reflection and yours almost as if you were right there behind him.

"Hey Azul, Jade told me to change seats since I'll just have a drink for today." (Y/N) said with a sheepish smile. Her eyes made eye contact with his own which made his heart skip a beat. "Ah (Y/N).. y-yes I'll go ahead and make the order. what was it?"

"Mmm... what would you have in mind?" You tilt your head to the side.

"Well-"

"How about you treat her to a Blue Lagoon Kiss?" Jade slid a hand over Azul's shoulder with an innocent smile. Azul's eyes widen at the twin beside him but remained composed.

"Sounds romantic, what's it about?" You propped your arms on the counter, your body leaning in with a curious smile. A part of Azul's brain is relishing in the proximity but another is wishing to once again curl up in a ball from the attention you're giving him.

"I'll let my dear friend Azul tell you the tale." Jade chuckled. "Floyd and I will be busy cleaning up."

"Don't you have other customers to attend to?" Azul retorted. Jade then gestures to the rest of the lounge where it seems all the bustle from a while ago stopped and only the music of jazz played in the empty area. "H-how?" He murmured to himself.

"Oh, is it already closing time?" You asked with panic in your voice. "I-I can go tomorrow if its too much trou-"

"No, no it's quite alright!" Azul instinctively held on to your hand where he only realized

it right after. He instantly pulled back as you looked at his eyes once more. Azul cleared his throat and dusted himself as the Jade seemed to have already disappeared to wherever.

"Since we personally know each other and as dorm leader, I can make an exception." He smiled as he straightened his gloves. "Blue Lagoon Kiss is actually inspired by the story of the mermaid princess who fell in love with a human, the leech twins and I used to sing a song titled 'Kiss The Girl' where legends say that the sea animals would sing the song for the human prince to fall in love with the mermaid."

"We thought it would be the perfect drink to boost sales from our more.. romantic demographic."

"That's our Azul, always thinking of business." You chuckled. "Alright, gimme one kiss, I-I mean, one Blue Lagoon Kiss please." You smiled.

Azul feared that throughout the process of making your order it'll just be the music as background noise but fortunately for him, you came to ask and chat with him almost about anything. He laughed and slowly began to show a side of him where's just himself, no responsibilities, no image to remain, just Azul.

"Here you are (Y/N). one Blue Lagoon Kiss." He slid the drink towards you and excitedly took a sip. It was at this moment he glanced at your lips and felt the nagging sensation to kiss them. They were soft, supple and of course, he would never forget the smile that they form into. In between the breaks of you drinking from the glass, Azul unconsciously leaned in as the two of you were deep in conversation.

"- to taste fruity but at the end, there's like this buildup of the sweetness." You beamed. "I think you just made this my new favorite~" You gleamed as take in one last sip.

"Another satisfied customer at the end of the day." He tips his hat which made you chuckle a bit. "And here's the payment and tip for the cool bartender." You handed out your cash to him where your hands briefly touched. Azul locked eyes with your eyes and it looked like you were leaning in as well.

He took the chance and closed his eyes.

But to his surprise, he felt soft lips on his cheeks.

He opens his eyes and looked at you quizzically. "W-what..?" His voice trailed softly. You smiled as you leaned away and started to prepare your stuff.

If only that wound wasn't distracting you from his perfectly built and proportioned body, you would be staring at how droplets fell from his chest, down to his abs, and how low that towel was hanging loosely around his waist with his very evident v-line—.

"Leona!" you caught yourself while rubbing your face. You were staring, STARING at something else. Get a grip on yourself; your husband is WOUNDED.

"What?" he exhaled through his nose while he tossed the smaller towel in the dryer.

"What?" you repeated with the most dumbfounded expression you could make, "What?!" you exclaimed this time as you looked at him in disbelief.

"Quit the yelling," he clicked his tongue and clamped his wet hair in a messy hairdo.

"Leona—" You couldn't even create a full sentence. He was that nonchalant. You would only irritate him with endless questions and the wound would be exposed to more bacteria. "Sit down, will you?" you groaned and stood up from the bed.

Without any complaint, he obeyed and sat down. An elbow hoisted on the side table while you wrang the towel dry. The wound was already cleaned during his bath but the liquid the towel absorbed consisted of some antiseptic the elders would use to their wounded soldiers.

"Now stay still."

You leaned down; seeing the wound closer and seeing how deeply red it was. You wondered how he didn't grow faint with blood loss or even know how much it bled. You held onto his broad shoulder and just did one small and gentle pat.

"Fuck!" he jolted and hissed which sent you jumping yourself.

"Oh, now it hurts?!" you scoffed and patted again only for him to hold your wrist and glare at you with a grit to his teeth.

"Stop it," he growled yet it did not intimidate you the slightest.

"No. You stop moving so we could get this over with!" You pulled your wrist away from him, readying your tail in case you needed to swat his hands again. He was harder to tend to than Cheka, a KID!

"It's already fucking clean already. You don't need that shit!" he growled again as he got a grip on your wrist again. It stung, it really did stung but that's the purpose of the antiseptic the maids gave you. It was able to clean the wound further.

"I wouldn't be doing this if you didn't get it in the first place!" You pulled your hand away from him again and made your tail wrap around his wrist. Swiftly and firmly — yet keeping a gentle pressure — you pressed the damp cloth on his wound again.

Leona hissed and grunted under his breath as he looked down at you tending on his wound. Well fuck, it did sting when he cleaned in during his bath but it was nothing compared to the sting now. The more you dressed his wound the lesser it stung until it was tolerable enough.

You looked up at him with furrowed eyebrows before looking back down on his chest. The laceration would definitely scar alright. It started from the top of his left nipple and nearly down towards his right nipple. It definitely look like someone scratched your husband. It wasn't just one scratch after all.

With a sigh, and after seeing him relax, you tossed the towel back into the basin and grabbed the ointment.

"How did you get that anyways?" you asked softly while collecting the ointment in a cotton pad. "You scared me when one of the guards came running in with your shirt bleeding."

"Damn leopard."

"L...Leopard?" you questioningly blinked at Leona who leaned on his cheek. He was visibly irritated and his tailed flicked in annoyance.

"Damn brat decided it was a good idea to jump on me while I was outside," he scowled, remembering how a juvenile leopard around adolescent years attacked him. "He fucking claimed I was disturbing his hunt when there wasn't even any prey in that area. It was ridiculous and shitty."

"And you fought back, I assume?" you sighed and kneeled down in between his legs.

"You think I'd let him just attack me like that?" he scoffed. "Didn't even stand a chance."

"And you decided to come home all bloody and wounded looking like you didn't care while I paled in worry." You shaked your head as you dabbed the white substance on his chest. "If you're like this, how did you leave that leopard in?"

"Ran away like he wasn't a predator himself. Pathetic."

"Leona."

"I barely touched him, got it? All I did was stare him down. Thinking he was scary when he's facing a lion," he scoffed again this time with a smirk as he leaned back with his arms behind him. "I would've been amused."

You glared at him through your eyelashes. His prideful nature never changed — though admittedly, it is attractive. Your other hand held onto his thigh for support before lightly dabbing the ointment on his wound. He hissed again.

"Can't you do this painlessly? It's starting to itch."

"Nope," you deadpanned and made sure the whole wound from the first scratch to the third.

You two fell into a comfortable silence while you remained concentrated on dressing the wound. You believed it would heal faster and the thought of seeing the scar sent shivers up your spine. Leona isn't one to be exactly caring when it comes to wounds and bruises on his body. Just as long as it doesn't bother him. He's just as thick-skinned as any other lion out there.

You didn't hear him let out any noise of discomfort anymore after dressing the final wound. You figured it didn't hurt anymore and, notably, it will not hurt the next day. Best he slept without a shirt tonight to not add any more pressure to the wound. Did that bother you? Not really. More warmth from his body.

Noting his silence you looked up at his face to see his half-lidded eyes staring down at you. You thought he was in a daze — which was less likely. You always found his gaze, his eyes, compliment his handsome nature more appealingly. Maybe he was growing sleepy—

"You look good in between my legs like that."

"Fuck you!" You punched his shoulder out of instinct and stood up with burning cheeks. Despite feeling flustered, this was nothing new to you. You've done everything a husband and wife would do in bed. He was one of the, if not the most, striking lions in the savannah. Anyone married to a tall, dark, and handsome man would still end up receiving butterflies. Cliché but where's the lie?

"Stop laughing!" your voice cracked as you grabbed the bandages and stiffly walked back to him.

"If you wanted it that bad, just ask." He pulled you closer by the wrist. "Don't think I didn't catch you staring when I came out of the bathroom."

"I hate it that you know how attractive you are and I hate it that you're using it against me and I hate it that you're my absolute weakness." You exhaled through your nose with puffed cheeks before wrapping your arms around him chest and pulling the bandages around his back.

"See? You're tempting me." You caught his eyes staring at your loose shirt — his shirt — and your chest was literally for show.

"You'll get it later after I wrap this around you. Now be a good husband and stay still."

You have no idea what you just spat but you know you have to get ready for a long night. After a few more minutes of wrapping his chest, you locked the end of the bandage and admired your work. Now, Leona's wound is wrapped up and you forgot he was literally still naked.

"Done." You grinned, proud at yourself that you were able to pull off basic first aid.

"I'm not."

Leona grabbed the leftover bandage from your hand and tossed it away. Easily pulling you to the bed with you hovering him and him on his back. You sat on his torso and crossed your arms. "Oh. We are." You tried to get off, however, he kept his hands on your thighs.

"Now you stay still."

Fuck.

© 𝐣𝐚𝐧𝐠𝐦𝐢-𝐥𝐚𝐭𝐭𝐞 2021.

You rise onto one knee, toes digging into your sand-speckled beach towel. “Deuce!” You want to run over there and check on him, but you don’t want to embarrass him by acting like a mother hen, either. “Are you alright?”

Deuce waves you off, flashing a weak thumbs up. You’re relieved to see that his nose isn’t bleeding, although his face does look a little red. At first you can’t tell if he’s flushed with mortification or sunburn, but decide on the latter when something Ace says makes him turn even redder. Deuce rounds on Ace and smacks him hard on the shoulder while everyone else on the volleyball court hoots and hollers, and you plop back down with a scoff. Idiots.

Ruggie snickers, widening his eyes and (poorly) feigning innocence when you shoot him a quelling look. “What? I’m only laughing ’cause he brought it on himself. If he didn’t wanna get beaned in the face, then he should’ve been paying attention to the game instead of you.”

You shift uncomfortably and glance at Leona, who’s stretched out on the towel between you and Ruggie, sunning himself. When he only flicks his tail in irritation at all the noise, you turn back to Ruggie and say, “I really don’t get it. I mean, it’s just a swimsuit.”

A fairly modest two-piece suit at that, comprised of high-waisted bottoms that cover your navel and a ruffled top that doesn’t even show cleavage; hardly a string bikini. Is it because you’re the only female student at an all-boys’ boarding school? Is it the novelty you present that has them so fascinated?

Ruggie rolls his eyes, sucking up the last dregs of his drink and smacking his lips. “Just a swimsuit, she says.” Impatiently, he hitches up the waistband of his dangerously loose trunks (also hand-me-downs, and dangerously loose because they belonged to Jack). “Lessee if you’re still singing that tune when the riot breaks out.”

“Don’t be ridiculous,” you say stiffly, then steal another peek at Leona. Still no reaction. Maybe he’s asleep? “That’s not going to happen, and even if it did — which it won’t — the Headmage would put a stop to it before anyone got hurt.”

You and Ruggie both look over at Crowley, who was very quick to volunteer his services as a chaperon when Kalim announced his intention to sponsor a trip to the local beach. He’s not doing much in the way of chaperoning at the moment, fast asleep in a reclined lounge chair with a paperback book draped over his face. You won’t be surprised if he winds up buried up to his neck in sand before the day’s out.

“Or not,” you mutter. You don’t know what you were thinking, really.

Just then, Leona rolls onto his stomach with an appropriately feline stretch and reaches lazily for the drink cooler, grumbling under his breath when he finds it empty. He props himself up on his folded arms, back arching and biceps tensing, the neck of his tanktop swooping low to flash dark brown nipples and a sculpted chest. He doesn’t say a word, but he doesn’t have to; his accusatory glare speaks volumes. Sagas, even.

Ruggie, who’s holding a sweating bottle of Mystery Drink you didn’t even notice him take, answers Leona’s silent rebuke with a shrug. “Hey, if you wanted it that bad, you should’ve done somethin’ about it before somebody else came along and took it.”

For some reason, Ruggie’s looking at you when he says this. Leona makes a disgusted noise and lies back down with an imperious wave of his hand.

“One of you go get some more, then,” he says, and shuts his eyes to resume his nap.

You frown at him, not that he notices or cares. “Would you like us to fan you with palm fronds while we’re at it, Your Highness?”

Ruggie snickers into his Mystery Drink, and Leona smacks you on the hip with his tail without opening his eyes. Biting back a reluctant smile, you push to your feet and heave a pointed sigh.

“I’ll go get them,” you say, heading in the direction of the communal coolers. “You’re welcome.”

Ruggie lifts his drink in a respectful salute, but Leona just rolls onto his side, putting his back to you. You resist the urge to kick sand over his head and continue on your way.

A few of your classmates wave hello or call out to you in passing, but the majority of them can only seem to stare in captivated silence — some more discreetly than others. Self-consciously, you peer down the length of your body, at the curves of your breasts and stomach and the stretch of your bare legs. You shake your head, baffled, and hug your arms to your chest as you pick up your pace. Just a bit farther to the drink coolers, and then maybe you’ll detour to the changing room and throw on a t-shirt —

Or maybe you won’t be doing either of those things, seeing as a pair of long, lean arms just snaked around you from behind and squeezed.

“Where’re you off to in such a hurry, Shrimpy?”

Dammit. Of all the times to run into these two.

Jade steps neatly in front of you, looking distressingly good in a pair of sleek purple trunks, his cheeks and shoulders freckled with scintillating grains of golden mica. You imagine Floyd looks much the same. Too bad you’re in no mood to enjoy the view.

“Afternoon, Prefect. Are you enjoying your day out?”

Jade makes you sound like a dog at the park. You push at Floyd’s arm, but it’s no good; you don’t think he even felt it. The diplomatic route it is, then.

“Look, guys.” You try to sound firm but not rude, because you really don’t want to piss them off when Floyd’s in the perfect position to squeeze your innards out through your eye sockets. “It was nice of you to stop by and say hello, but I’m kind of busy right now.”

“Huh?” Floyd digs his fingers into your abdomen — not painfully hard, but with enough of a pinch to make you think of sharp teeth trying to burrow into your guts. Ulp. “You didn’t look busy. Why don’t you come and play with us instead?”

What, as in play with their food? Hard pass. “I really don’t think that’s —”

Jade smiles disarmingly. You are not disarmed. “No need to look so untrusting, now. We only wanted to ask if you were in the mood for a swim. The water’s quite pleasant, you know.”

You’re probably overreacting, but you think of every story you’ve ever heard about mermaids drowning hapless sailors at sea and instinctively start to struggle in Floyd’s arms, throwing desperate looks across the beach toward Leona and Ruggie. Leona still has his back to you, but Ruggie’s frowning in your direction. He leans down and says something to Leona, but you can’t tell if Leona responds, or if he’s even awake.

Either way, you can’t just wait around for them to rescue you. You’re preparing to execute Plan C (Plan C is biting Floyd on the arm and hoping you’re fast enough to outrun them) when someone reaches into the fray and pulls you free. You’re tucked safely into the newcomer’s side, their smooth skin brushing yours, a glossy tumble of coppery curls flirting with your peripheral vision.

“C’mon, boys, give the poor thing a little breathing room. How’s she supposed to enjoy her day of fun in the sun with everybody fighting over her like the last strawberry tart at an unbirthday party?”

Liquid relief courses through you. You’re so happy to see a friendly, ulterior motive-free face that you stop checking if Leona’s gotten up. “Cater!”

Cater hugs you around the shoulders and tosses you a wink. “Hey there, cutie. Thought you could use a Cay-Cay in shining armor.”

Floyd pouts, thwarted, but Jade only clasps his hands and smiles agreeably. “As gallant as it was of you to come riding to the lady’s rescue, Cater, I can assure you that we bore her no ill will.”

“Oh, no doubt,” Cater says breezily. “But sweetie pie over here was looking just a tad bit uncomfy from where I was sitting, so I thought I’d swing by and make sure. It’s an upperclassman’s job to look out for the little baby freshies, right?”

You give Cater’s waist a grateful squeeze, and he flashes you a camera-ready smile. “Hey, light-bulb moment.”  Cater produces his phone from who-knows-where — do his swim trunks even have pockets? — and taps the screen awake with his thumb. “How ’bout we take a quick selfie? We’re bound to get a ton of likes with this scrumptious little thing taking center stage. Hashtag #BeachDay.”

Jade cups his chin and chuckles quietly — at your expense, you’re sure. “I certainly wouldn’t mind. What do you think, Floyd?”

“Um, actually,” you cut in, “I was just on my way to get changed, so…” You shrug Cater off and start to back away slowly. “Rain check?”

“Awww,” Floyd whines. “You’re gettin’ dressed already? How come?”

So people will stop staring at me like I’m an exotic animal at the zoo? “Uh, well, I kinda ran out of sunblock —”

“You can borrow some of mine,” Cater says helpfully. Shit. You scramble to formulate a new excuse.

“That’s, um, really sweet of you to offer, but the thing is if I don’t use this one specific brand of hypoallergenic sunscreen I tend to break out in super bad hives — not a pretty picture, let me tell you — so I’ll juuust — beonmywaynowbye!”

With that, you turn tail and flee, kicking up clouds of sand that irritate your eyes as you practically sprint to the changing room. You don’t even stop by the coolers first; if Leona’s that thirsty, he can march his ass over here and fetch his stupid drinks himself.

The changing rooms are located on a silty patch of land where the beach rises to meet the scrubby grass. The building itself is nothing to write home about; just a long, low wooden shack with an open doorway and a pitted tin roof, a half-deflated orange life preserver hanging off the northern wall as if to add a splash of color to an otherwise painfully drab view. To you, it might as well be the goddamn Palace of Versailles.

You begin to relax the moment you step inside the narrow building with its two rows of wooden changing stalls, your feet sifting through the thin layer of sand that’s been tracked in here by all the beachgoers who have come before you, and which will eventually be washed away the next time it rains. The shack isn’t wired and the rough-hewn walls are bare of the magestone-powered lamps that light much of NRC, but there’s enough sunshine filtering in through the doorway and the high paneless windows for you to see by. You pluck off your sunglasses, fold them, and set them down on the narrow ledge that serves as a shelf.

You should hurry up and change before someone comes looking for you, but you hesitate, frowning down at the glasses. They’re sleek and sturdy and they look like money, and when Leona first gave them to you you’d badgered him about the price until he finally told you just to shut you up. When you tried to return them, reluctant to accept such an expensive gift, he said if you didn’t want them then you might as well throw them out, since he had no use for them.

You kept them, obviously. Mostly out of spite, but also because you were not-so-secretly happy he’d thought of you.

You huff, irked (with yourself, with the twins, with him), and crouch by the pile of duffel bags and backpacks to dig for your things. So Leona didn’t throw a hissy fit just because some other guys looked at you sideways, so what? It’s not like you want a crazy possessive boyfriend who can’t stand to see you breathe in anyone else’s direction.

You successfully excavate your bag and yank the zipper open with a hiss of metal teeth. You tell yourself your eyes are stinging from all the sand you kicked up earlier, that’s all.

But, god, couldn’t Leona have acted just a little bit annoyed?

“The hell’re you hiding out in here for?”

You startle and clutch your shirt to your chest, right over the uneven kick of your heart. You swivel around to scowl at Leona, looming in the doorway and backlit by a halo of sunlight that dyes the tips of his hair and ears a dark, molten gold. It almost looks like he’s wearing a crown. You suppose that’s fitting.

“What am I doing?” You stand up, still gripping your shirt like a cotton shield. “What’re you doing, sneaking up on me like that? Should I get you a collar with a bell for your next birthday?”

He crosses his arms and leans a shoulder against the door jamb, then hooks one ankle over the other to complete the picture of perfect of indolence. “Try it and see what happens. And I didn’t sneak. Ain’t my fault your senses are so dull.” He wrinkles his lips back from his fangs and yawns. “I saw you scurrying off this way like a scared little mouse, so I followed. Got a problem with that?”

You twist your fingers in the folds of your shirt, tugging the elastic collar out of shape. “I’m just surprised you bothered to notice,” you mumble, mostly to yourself.

Of course, since Leona’s senses aren’t nearly so dull as yours, he hears every word. He puts back his ears, jaw ticking. “What’s that supposed to mean?”

“Nothing,” you say curtly, and pull your shirt over your head before bending down to root for your denim cutoffs. Maybe you’ll head back to campus early; with the mood you’re in, what point is there in sticking around other than to make yourself even more miserable?

But then a broad, dry hand fits itself to the curve of your shoulder and tugs you back against a warm, firm chest, and your senses may be weaker than his but the scents of sweat and sunshine perfuming his skin are still strong enough to make your nostrils tingle. You didn’t even hear the sand rustle beneath his feet when he snuck up behind you, again.

Collar, you think, squeezing your hands into fists. Bell.

His jaw brushes your cheek as he lowers his head, long hair falling over his shoulder to tickle yours. “If you’ve got somethin’ to say, then say it.” He curls his other hand around your hip, palm burning you like a firebrand through the worn cotton of your shirt. “You know I hate that passive aggressive shit.”

“You’re one to talk,” you retort, thinking of the petty heights Leona’s capable of climbing whenever a certain fairy prince is involved. “And I’m not being passive aggressive. I just don’t feel like picking a fight with you right now.”

“Heh. Maybe I wouldn’t mind a fight.” The hand on your hip roams up and over to your belly, well-maintained claws plucking at your shirt. “What’re you wearing this thing for, anyway?”

You snag his wrist with half a mind to push him away, but you just end up holding on to him, feeling his pulse thump steadily away beneath your fingers. You lick the taste of salt from your lips and say, “I was thinking of heading home.”

“Yeah? What were you gonna do — walk the whole way back?” Leona hooks his fingers in your collar and tugs it down your shoulder, sweeping his thumb over the newly exposed skin to trigger a wave of shivers that start at your neck before crawling all the way down to the root of your spine. “What’s the matter, herbivore? Sun getting to your head?”

Something’s getting to your head, alright. “Sure,” you say thinly. “Let’s go with that.”

Leona makes a chuffing noise and presses his nose to the crook of your shoulder to breathe you in deep. You feel something tickling your leg and realize it’s his tail just before he slips it beneath your shirt to wrap it tightly around your thigh.

“That right?” he drawls.

You’re not surprised when he cups your breast and circles his palm over your nipple until it flares up full and stiff, but it still rocks you. Good thing he’s holding on to you, because you don’t trust your legs to support your weight right now.

He drags his tongue up your neck, and as you shudder in helpless reaction you wonder — not for the first time — how you might taste to him. Beneath the sweat and sunblock, do you taste savory or sweet? Can he taste the heat of your blood pounding beneath your skin?

Leona’s tongue retreats with a parting nip of shivery-sharp teeth. He pinches your nipple between his thumb and forefinger, pulling on it through two layers of fabric until it almost hurts, only to let go just when you’re ready to whine for him to stop. He draws you back against him and presses down on your stomach, coaxing your hips to rock.

“’Cause I can think of a few good reasons for you to stick around.”

You’re awfully interested in hearing these reasons, all the better if they’re accompanied by a practical demonstration, but then a dark smudge flutters by one of the windows and kicks you back to reality with a cold, hard jolt. The shadow you just saw was too small and too high up to be anything but a bird, but there’s a very good chance that next time, it won’t be just a bird.

You dig your nails into Leona’s wrists and feel him lift his head to look at you. “Not here. Anyone could walk in. There’s no door.”

“Huh?” Leona stills his movements, tail coiling tighter around your thigh before abruptly loosening. He growls low in his throat, then says in the aggrieved tone of someone who is being greatly inconvenienced, “Fuck, fine.”

You’d be lying if you said you weren’t disappointed, but it’s for the best that you pumped the breaks. Exhibitionism as a concept might give you a wicked little thrill, but being fined for indecent exposure decidedly doesn’t. You start to turn in Leona’s arms, reaching up to give his satin-smooth cheek a conciliatory stroke.

“It’s okay,” you tell him. “We can always —”

Pick this up later, is what you were going to say, but the words get caught in your throat when Leona turns you the rest of the way around, settles your feet on top of his like he’s teaching you to dance, and walks you backwards until your back thumps gently against a wall. The sunlight beaming in through the open doorway is extinguished with a creak of unoiled hinges, leaving only the light coming through the narrow windows to see by, and you blink rapidly as your eyes struggle to adjust to the sudden change. Leona shifts against you, and you hear the scraping click of a rusted lock being shot into place.

He’s shut the two of you up inside a changing stall.

“There’s a door now,” Leona informs you, just in case you missed it. His breath warms your lips and his lashes scrape your cheek, the green glow of his eyeshine flickering as he blinks. “Happy?”

“Um.” You grip the hem of his top and fidget, then go still when he presses his hips flush to yours, tail sliding up your leg to circle your thigh once more. “Someone could still walk in, though?”

“Let them,” Leona says dismissively, bowing his head to drag his teeth over your shoulder. You have to lock your knees to keep them from wobbling. “If they try to peep, I’ll kick their ass.”

“Because violence is the answer to everything,” you say, more breathlessly than you’d like. You’re supposed to be the voice of reason here, but you can’t help but press your face to his shoulder in turn to take a deep, shuddering inhale of his sweat-and-sunshine scent, tongue darting out to taste him.

Leona’s tail flexes around your thigh, the tufted tip rubbing up against the cleft of your cunt through your nylon bottoms. A gasp escapes your open mouth, and his answering laughter rumbles down your spine like a sine wave through a tuning fork.

“Not everything,” he says. He slips his hand down your back to give your ass a smug squeeze, and something inside of you snaps, then dissolves. Your sense of shame, maybe.

By now, your eyes have adjusted well enough for you to just make out the fanged curve of his smirk. You’re going to wipe that look right off his face, you decided, and push up on your toes — still overlapping his — to catch his full lower lip between your teeth and bite down, hard.

Leona snarls and jerks back his head, lip pulling free of yours like a stretched rubber band snapping back into shape, then presses back in to take your lip between his teeth. He bites down, more gently than you had, but it still stings because he has fangs. He worries your lip between those fangs like it’s a tender cut of meat he wants to savor, only relenting when you yield with a whine. He swipes his tongue over the bloodless dents his teeth left behind, then tilts his head and gathers you close to give you a proper kiss.

Your lips bloom beneath his, one hand fisting tightly in his shirt while the other burrows beneath his hair to curl around his nape. You licked the taste of salt from your mouth only a few moments ago but now you taste it again, along with the tang of sunblock and the fizzy sweetness of some soft drink. Leona’s tongue is rough in your mouth, the heavy ridge of his hips pinning you in place against the half-rotted wall, which groans in protest beneath your combined weight.

You are briefly concerned about splinters, then quickly forget to care when you feel a tugging on the hem of your shirt. Leona’s trying to undress you, and you know from experience that he’ll just tear your clothes and replace them later if you don’t move fast enough to suit His Highness.

You obligingly raise your arms, then help him wrestle out of his own shirt, blue arcs of static crackling through the air when you drag it over his head. You smooth down his mussed hair and twine your arms around his neck, every square inch of your skin prickling with delight at being pressed so close to his. Your pulse pounds in your ears, your bruised lips a slick, swollen echo of how you feel between your legs. You turn your head to kiss him again, but he denies you, nipping your chin before dropping to his knees.

Your knees start to wobble again, and you brace your hands against his shoulders to keep yourself standing. You’ll never get used to seeing him like this, never get used to knowing that you’re the only person he’d ever kneel for, that he’d make his beautiful face into a throne just for you. You’ve already sweated through your bottoms in the heat, but now a pulse of anticipation slicks your cunt with a thicker, more viscous kind of moisture, your suit’s stretchy nylon crotch clinging to you like sticky paper.

Leona wets his lips and inhales through his nose, scenting your arousal like a wine bouquet. You whimper, knees finally giving out, and he catches you. Squeezes your hips. His hands are so big his fingers curve all the way around to your ass.

“Hey. Were you really gonna make me wait until later?” He licks a filthy trail up your inner thigh, spined tongue abrading your skin like a pumice stone. “Smells to me like you wouldn’t’ve lasted that long.”

That earns him a tug on his hair, another privilege afforded only to you. “Shut up.” The sharp tone you meant to adopt is belied by the obvious quiver in your voice. “Don’t be disgusting.”

Another slow, indulgent lash of his tongue makes you wonder if he enjoys the taste of salt on your skin, be it sweat or sea spray. “You like it.”

You do — not that you’d ever admit to it. “I told you to shut — ah.”

Your legs jerk, thighs trembling so hard your knees would knock together if Leona hadn’t shouldered between them to mouth at your sex through your swimsuit bottoms. The fabric is just thin enough for you to feel each individual spine on his tongue as it scrapes over your lips and clit like sandpaper, rubbing you raw. It’s not an unpleasant sensation, but it does skirt the edge of too much, to the point that you’re already squirming even with the fabric in the way.

He lifts one hand to tap you smartly on the ass, making you jolt. “Knock that off and hold still. You’re gonna gimme a black eye.”

You bristle at the order but lock your knees and do as he says, because if you don’t he might stop, and you don’t want to have to beg him to keep going. Leona chuffs, pleased, and hooks his fingers in your bottoms to ease them down an inch, then two, uncovering your navel and hipbones. He sweeps his tongue up the slope of your lower belly, so you have to fight even harder not to squirm — but then he stops, and hisses. Really hisses, not at all like a human but exactly like a cat, a wet, angry, spitting sound that makes your skin break out in goosebumps.

“The fuck is this?”

The fuck is what? you wonder dazedly. You look down, eyes skittering past the angry glow of his to land on the hands wrapped jealously around your waist. Only then do you comprehend what he meant: etched across your stomach are a series of thin, shallow scratches, brilliantly red in color and obviously the work of someone’s nails. Looking at them, your heart gives a hard, anxious thump.

“It’s nothing serious,” you say quickly. Your hands flutter like nervous birds across Leona’s shoulders, which feel coiled to spring. “I’m not hurt. Floyd was just messing around earlier and I guess he must’ve scratched me on accident.”

Leona’s upper lip lifts at one corner to flash a curved canine tooth. He’s not angry with you, but you’re still shaken by the intensity of his reaction to something so minor. What happened to his earlier indifference?

Maybe… maybe he wasn’t as indifferent as you’d thought?

“Yeah, I know,” Leona grumbles, surprising you into silence. “You think I didn’t notice him hanging off of you like a damn coat? I was about to come over there and knock him on his ass when you ran off.”

He rocks forward on his knees and pulls a mouthful of your flesh between his pointed teeth, sucking hard like he intends to cover Floyd’s marks with his own, then releases it with a damp pop just as you begins to ache. He leans his forehead against your stomach like he doesn’t want you to see his face, ears laid flat along his skull.

“Bad enough I had to listen to Hunt singing your praises from all the way across the damn beach earlier.” The low register of his voice rumbles through your abdomen like an echo in a chamber, sinking into the cradle of your hips to hum through your clit. “Now I’ve gotta go gut a fuckin’ fish, too.”

Ah. So he is jealous.

You school the dopey grin that wants to unfurl across your face and say, reasonably, “Rook sings everyone’s praises. And you’re not going to gut anyone.”

“Yeah, yeah,” Leona says in a way that makes it clear he’s not really listening and is only acknowledging that you spoke at all to keep you off his back. He tugs your bottoms down another inch, bunching them up around your hips, then wraps his tail around your right ankle and pulls. “Now c’mon and lift your foot so I can get you outta these fuckin’ things.”

Your stomach swoops as if he reached inside you and tugged. Oh, you think, okay, and hurriedly lift your foot, clutching Leona’s shoulders for balance while he works the bottoms down your legs. With one leg freed, you start to lower your foot so you can lift the other just for Leona to leave the bottoms slung around your left ankle and rise fluidly from his crouch, muscles flickering beneath his skin like shadows cast by the noonday sun. He braces one hand beneath your ass to hoist you up and pushes the other between your legs to squeeze your cunt.

You yelp and cling to Leona’s arms, your head spinning drunkenly as the floor falls out from under you. Chuckling, Leona nuzzles into the crook of your neck and dips two fingers inside of you as if testing the waters. When he feels how wet you already are, sweating in the humidity and sticky with arousal, the folds of your cunt squishing beneath his fingers like carpels of pulpy, overripe fruit, he breathes out a satisfied groan that seems to resonate in the very core of your stomach.

You answer that groan with a pleading whine, hugging his hips with your thighs and digging your toes into his waistband to try and push it down. You can feel the bulk of his dick through his shorts, so close to where you need him but not close enough, driving you half crazy with hot, frustrated want.

Leona gives your throat a reprimanding nip. “Pipe down. Someone could walk in, remember?”

Leave it to Leona to throw those words back in your face while he does everything in his power to ensure that you can’t pipe down, angling his wrist to stroke his thumb over your clit and thrust his fingers deeper inside you like he’s searching an oyster he dug out of the sand for pearls. You tighten up around him, digging your nails into his arms to press little red half moons into his sun-warmed flesh.

If he’s gonna play it like that, then so will you.

“If you’re that worried about someone walking in on us” — you push your heels against the small of his back, nudging his trunks down another inch — “then why don’t you hurry up and fuck me before they do?”

Leona snarls in your ear, and your scalp pulls taut, the hair on the nape of your neck standing straight up. “Who the fuck’re you ordering around?”

He pulls his fingers out of you with a harsh twist of his wrist and yanks up your top, smearing your breasts with warm, gooey streaks of your own slick, then shoves his hand back down between your legs to push at his shorts until his cock springs free to slap your cunt. Your thighs tense and your clit tingles, heart leaping into your throat.

Leona huffs impatiently and hauls you closer, claws scratching lightly at your ass. “Why’re you clamming up now? You’ve taken it before.” He curls his hand around the root of his cock and presses the damp, flared head to your opening like he’s nocking an arrow in a bow. “You’re the one who said to hurry up and fuck you, so let me fuck you.”

Your cunt wrings out another gush of syrupy moisture at the blunt reminder of what he intends to do to you, and because you want him to do it to you, you try your best to unclench even as your thighs begin to shake from the strain of staying spread around his hips. Leona grunts through his teeth and hefts you up a little higher, cockhead slipping further down your slit to breach that first shallow inch. Shallow, yes, but still deep enough for you to feel a familiar prickle.

Unlike him, you are entirely and mundanely human, but you still arch your back like a cat in heat to take him deeper, your clit throbbing so hard you can feel the pulse of it in your ears as the barbs crowning his shaft rake your cunt like dozens of blunted claws. The first time you saw them, you nearly balked, certain that the two of you would never be able to fit together without blood and pain. Obviously, he proved you wrong — again and again and again.

Now he scrapes his cuspids down the apple of your cheek and laps up more of your sweat with a pass of his rough tongue. “Maybe you don’t want me to hurry.” He drags his hand up your thigh, hitching your leg higher around his waist to tilt your hips and sink in another prickling inch. “Maybe you want somebody to walk in and see.”

You mean to tell him that’s the very last thing you want, but all that comes out is a gasp, that wicked little thrill from earlier returning in full force to quiver in your belly and tighten the walls of your cunt. Leona hisses through his teeth at the squeeze and pushes forward till his chest crushes your breasts flat, hooking your knees over his elbows so he can palm two covetous handfuls of your ass. You feel strung up, weightless, pinned on his cock as if on a spear. Your legs tremble harder, your toes curling so tight they cramp.

“Fuck,” he bites out, half growling, half laughing. “You really do, don’t you? Who would’ve thought the little herbivore had it in her?”

When he says “in her,” he braces his feet and thrusts up his hips, fucking the rest of the way in until there’s no more room left, barbs snagging on your walls to hook him deep inside of you. Those barbs catch against your clit on the way out and your foot gives a reflexive kick, a garbled moan falling from your mouth. Leona licks your chin, a gruff purr rumbling in his throat. It’s a comforting gesture, but if you thought it meant he was finished teasing you, you really should’ve known better.

“You want those assholes outside to see me fucking you like this? Huh?” His tail bats your legs as it lashes back and forth, his spined shaft scouring your cunt as he fills you and fills you and fills you with cock. “You want them to know I’m the only one who can?”

His next thrust knocks your ass against the wall but you are too far gone to spare even a fleeting thought for splinters, for anything that’s not the wet glide of his cock inside you, stuffing you to the brim. There’s sand between your toes and a growing ache in your back and you are going to walk away from this stiff and sore all over, and you don’t care, you don’t care so long as he keeps fucking you just. Like. This. You duck your head to lick a trickle of sweat from the swell of his chest and he growls, butting your head aside with a thrust of his chin so he can run his nose up your neck and suck your earlobe between his teeth.

“But I’m not gonna let ’em look,” he mumbles, grinding his hips in a tight, hot circle. He pushes your knees back till they almost touch your shoulders, winding every muscle in your body tense as a spring with your cunt coiled taut at the center. “I’ll fuckin’ kill them if they look.”

Something in you seizes but doesn’t release, trembling, waiting. Waiting for him to drag his cock halfway out of your sex, barbs raking your clit to pull your building orgasm out of you by the heels. You bite at his shoulder with your nubby human teeth, stomach cramping, cunt pulsing, and he buries his groan in the crook of your neck like he doesn’t want you to hear it. One-two-three more thrusts plant him so deep inside you you can feel his head pressing at the back of your throat as a treacly warmth floods your cunt and trickles down your thighs, dousing you in the scent of him.

You don’t doubt that was his plan all along.

You come down in fits and shivering starts, your orgasm’s pulsating aftershocks growing weaker and weaker with each passing minute. Enough of those minutes have gone by in total silence for you to wonder if Leona’s fallen asleep standing up when he finally speaks.

“Hey,” he grunts. He doesn’t lift his head from your shoulder, either because he’s too lazy to bother or because his cheek’s been glued there by your sweat. “The next time some grabby asshole touches you without your permission, you fucking tell me.”

You blink over his shoulder at the dust motes spiraling through a bright beam of sunlight, a ticklish kind of feeling stirring in your chest.

Oh, you think. Not just jealous, then — worried, too. You hug him as tightly as you can with your noodly arms and legs and comb your fingers through his sweaty hair, even daring to give him a brief scratch behind the ears. He grumbles and butts your cheek lightly with his forehead, and you smile.

“Okay,” you say softly. “Just don’t get yourself expelled for my sake, alright?”

Leona scoffs. “If Crowley didn’t expel me for wrecking the Spelldrive Stadium, then he’s not gonna kick me out over a couple of snot-nosed brats who had it comin’.” He shifts his feet, dick tugging at your insides and making you wince. “You good to walk?”

“No promises.”

You let him ease you out of the human pretzel he’d contorted you into, pulling a face when his cum oozes down your leg to splatter on the floor. Leona smirks faintly, unrepentant. Not that you ever expected him to be.

“Hold on.” He hitches up his trunks with one hand and unlocks the door with the other, ducking outside. He returns a moment later with a t-shirt dangling from his fist and proceeds to wipe you clean, gentler in his post-coital contentment than he ever is otherwise.

The shirt isn’t his, or yours. You frown at him, tugging your swimsuit into place while he loops his tanktop over his head. “Whose is that?”

Leona just shrugs and tosses the soiled shirt aside. Someone’s going to be extremely unhappy about that. “Leona, you can’t just —”

“Trust me, you do not wanna go in there.”

You freeze and shoot Leona a panicked look, but he just scrubs his hands through his hair and yawns, sleepy and satiated. You don’t hear the rest of the conversation clearly, just an indistinct back-and-forth, but it doesn’t last long. When the voices outside fall silent, Leona flicks his ears and turns to leave.

“C’mon.”

You really don’t want to, but it’s not like you can hide in here all day — or you could, but you doubt Leona would let you. Resigned to your fate, you grab your sunglasses and head outside to face the music, the music in this case being Ruggie’s disgusted scowl. You don’t ask him how long he’s been standing guard for; you’re probably better off not knowing.

“Ugh, seriously?” Ruggie mutters, already turning away like he can’t bear to look at the two of you. You can’t say you blame him. “You owe me a week’s worth of meals for this, Leona. No, two. No, four —”

“Yeah, yeah, whatever.”

Leona presses a hand to the small of your back to nudge you forward, and it’s only when you feel his bare skin on yours that you realize you forgot to change into your t-shirt. Peeking at Leona’s profile and taking stock of the aching tenderness that persists between your legs, you decide you actually don’t mind going without it so long as Leona’s there to scare your more tenacious admirers off.

Crowley’s being buried up to his neck in sand by Epel and Grim, and Ruggie’s going on about how he doesn’t get paid enough for this crap. You take Leona’s warm hand in yours and he lets you keep it, tail twining loosely around your thigh.

He gets blushy even when you don't surprise him. Physical affection flusters him a lot because he's not used to it.

Oh, and if you were to pick him up and spin him around he will scream. And if you do it in public he'll get very embarrassed and yell at you to stop. It's not that he hates it, but he doesn't like people looking at him when you do that, it's not good for his reputation or image. I mean, how would students react to some guy grabbing the Azul Ashengrotto and spinning him around like a child?

Azul is rather touch starved, so he's a bit stiff in the beginning when it comes to physical affection, and because of this he rarely initiates it.

But one time, he comes up to you in private and hugs you from behind. And he's a bit confused when you freeze up. And that's when he realizes that you get flustered when the roles are reversed! He finds this so cute.

And from then on, he begins initiating physical affection just to see that reaction again.

Azul had asked you to come over to the Mostro lounge for a study date, and thankfully you weren't busy so you agreed. When you entered, the building was eerily empty. Then you hear someone clearing their throat, alerting you of their presence. You knew it was Azul, and you were about to turn around- before you felt arms wrapping around you.

You, naturally, freeze up. But you don't exactly freak out because you know it's Azul. But you were definitely feeling a bit bashful. "I missed you." He muttered. "We saw each other in alchemy today" you whispered, yet he didn't miss the slight tremble in your voice.

He lets go of you, spinning you around. He's met with your flustered expression, as you play with your hair out of embarrassment. Azul had found out your weakness, and he's going to use it against you. Not in a bad way, of course!

I hope this made sense! This was very fun to write so I hope you like it ^^ oh and i had no idea how i could put in the fact that readers male except for that one line, but i hope thats okay!! If you're unsatisfied I can rewrite this!

When the announcer said your name, you came out to a roaring cheer of people and waved to them. You wore a nice casual outfit, not too professional or casual, and you sat down between two of your co-stars. Vil kept an eye on you as he watched the rest of the cast come out. Once everyone was seated, the announcer made small talk with the cast for a bit then the Q&A panel started. Vil watched as you interacted with your cast, being friendly, and as well with fans who asked you questions. 

“Have you ever been offered roles that weren’t villains?’ 

“I have been offered other roles that were not villains, I had a director recently ask if I could play the leading hero in their upcoming movie, but I respectfully declined the role since it would clash with another project.” 

"Mind sharing with the class?" The announcer questioned. 

"I am sworn to secrecy until given more instructions." 

“That’s something I wanted to know,” one of your cast members asked, turning towards you. “Why do you only play villain roles?” 

“Playing the villain is more fun than the hero, there is so much more you can do to drive the story." 

“Was there someone who inspired you to do this, or do you just want continuous villain eras?” one of your costars questioned. 

“Yes, to both, Vil Schoenheit has played many excellent roles, but he is mainly known for playing villains that get overshadowed by the hero. As much as the hero is great, the villain drives the story further and basically makes the hero.” 

“Are you trying to hide your love and admiration for Vil?” 

“I will not deny that Vil is breathtaking and drop dead gorgeous, but I appreciate his skills more.” 

“She didn’t deny it!” One of your costars yelled, causing the crowd to go wild as you smiled then shrugged. 

Vil felt a little moved by your explanation of why you always play the villain, but that doesn't change his opinion on you having more potential than just being stuck in a typecast role. He continued to see as the panel went until the end came and then the signing panel started. He told his manager and bodyguard he would be fine, but the bodyguard told him that they would watch from afar. Vil thought that it was a decent compromise before entering your line. 

He waited in line, holding a small piece of paper, and silently watched you interact with fans before silently laughing at how friendly yet professional you were with fans. Once he finally reached you, you greeted him with a smile and gently took the piece of paper Vil handed to you.  

“Who do I make this out to?” You ask, ready to write. 

“Put whatever you want” he said before watching you write something before pausing, waiting for who to make this autograph to. “Vil Schoenheit. 

He watched as you froze and lifted your head up as he took his glasses off and gave you a smile, causing you to malfunction a little. He enjoyed seeing you fangirl a bit as your costars saw this and were having the time of their lives as they watched you freak out. You both shook hands and exchanged niceties before your manager asked if you both wanted a picture together which he at once agreed. You both posed as your manager snapped a picture of you both. You thanked him for coming again and bid him farewell as he left, dodging the fans in the lines who were trying to get a picture. Every celebrity has moments when they want to walk around in public. Once he reached his bodyguard, he looked down at the signed photo to see if you wrote something at the end. 

PS I think you’re pretty cool.  

Later that night there was a bunch of coverage about the earlier interaction from fans and the convention themselves talked about it. Vil scrolled through your tag to see you wearing sunglasses, but you had napkins underneath the glasses to cover your face. 

The last picture of the collection was of you shooting a peace sign towards the camera, making Vil chuckle a bit. Once he clicked on your profile, he followed you and sent you a message. 

The director I am working with is interested in offering you a part of their movie. Would you be up to it? 

He watched as three dots danced around before seeing the message you sent. 

Depends on, maybe we’re already going to be working together. Who knows I may end up being your villain? Can you keep up with my pace? 

‘Treasure beyond your wildest dreams!’ Ace said.

‘Knowledge long since lost to time!’ Deuce corrected.

‘Yeah, okay, but what is it,’ you asked.

And neither of them had an answer.

Abandoned castles suspended over a sea of bubbling lava were not your preferred holiday destination. You’d told Ace this several times. You’d begged, pleaded, to please just be normal for once. But noooo. Both the snarky, ginger, bastard and the other half of his singular brain cell had apparently decided that suicide ala boiling rocks sounded like a perfectly lovely plan for your Saturday evening.

“I’m just saying,” you huffed as the rope bridge swung worryingly beneath your feet, “taverns are a thing. Faires. Market runs. Casual side quests that won’t wind up with us being flambeed alive.”

“But there’s treasure!” Ace complained, the muddled light off the lava below illuminating his pout in a way that made it look especially punchable. “I heard there’s this really awesome magical sword! Or maybe it was a shield or something—”

“Or something,” you grit out. “What if it’s a book, huh? You can’t even read.”

“We can try!” Deuce returned, a spark of that familiar determination zipping through his blue eyes.

“Or we can sell it,” Ace said, which was certainly the more likely option of the two.

One of the rickety, wooden, slats cracked beneath the low heel of your boot and tumbled down into the lava below. Maybe it hit the gurgling pool of death with a hiss, or a whump, or some other cool sound. But all you could hear was the ringing in your ears.

“Oh my god. I’m going to die.”

“I mean, maybe,” Ace shrugged. “But at least you’ll have a cool new sword propped up at your grave or something.”

You managed to make it all the way to the other side of the horrible death bridge without plummeting to your doom. Except now you were standing at the foot an equally horrifying castle. It was massive—grand on a scale that seemed entirely impossible for something constructed in the heart of a volcano. Its dozens of ebony spires clawed at the sky. The walls crawled with grey ivy and thickets of thorns so dense that you couldn’t see even the barest hint of brick beneath. It looked evil in the way that cursed tombs felt evil—eternal, and still, and oppressive. Like a creature in its own right rather than just an agglomeration of black stone.

Ace drew his sword and Deuce readied his axe. You sighed and plucked at the strings of your stupid fucking lute, and wished once more that you’d had the foresight all those moons ago to take the cushy internship position Lord Crewel had tried to offer you. But, no. You’d wanted to be an adventurer.

The massive double doors of the entrance swung open with an eerie groan. A pair of stern looking gargoyles stood guard as the three of you cautiously made your way into the castle. You swore you could feel their eyes following you—that you’d seen them flex jagged claws into their stone perches in an aborted attempt to dive after you.

The inside of the looming fortress was no more welcoming than out. Dark, emerald, stained glass windows lined the walls—smothering any of the warmer light from the volcano and tinting the entire hall a sickly green-grey. The stone floors and walls were elaborately carved with the faded stories of dynasties long since passed, but what had once surely been immaculate craftsmanship had shifted and cracked with age—crushing floors into tight slopes and littering already narrow walkways with heavy debris.

“We just have to find the tallest tower,” Ace hummed, swiping at a few dangling trails of thorns with the blunted edge of his blade. “And then the highest room in that.”

“The treasure is never in the highest room in the tallest tower,” you complained. “You just heard that in a drinking song once.”

“Is that true?” Deuce frowned, looking terribly betrayed.

“No way!” Ace snipped. “I told you! An old crone read my fortune in her bone dice, and she said to always check the highest room in the tallest tower! Because that’s where I’d find my greatest treasure!”

“Maybe the greatest treasure is the friends we’ve made along the way?” Deuce suggested helpfully.

“No.”

So you split off from a grouchy Ace and dejected Deuce to try and find some stairs. Every room in this stupid castle was swimming in so many shadows that you could hardly tell right from left, let alone if there were any kinds of secret doors or passageways that may lead to an equally secret tower. The chamber you’d found yourself in now was gigantic, and each tentative step you took echoed discordantly through the ashy gloom. You kicked miserably at a loose rock and it skittered off into the darkness with a dull thunk. And then something… odd, began to happen. That darkness began to move—to rise and unfurl like a great set of wings on a beast. And—oh. Oh no.

“Would you look at that,” Ace whistled under his breath, neck craned all the way back as he squinted at what was most definitely the tallest of all the towers this creepy castle had to offer. “Guess what, nonbelievers. I found the—”

“DRAGON!”

Whoosh went the great swathe of emerald fire as it exploded down the barren hallway and nipped at your heels. You dove out into the open courtyard just in time to avoid being roasted alive, and the gargantuan monster behind you let out a roar fit to shake the earth. A quick tuck-and-roll left you crouched behind a fallen pillar, and the dragon’s bright, green, glower turned on you and your garbage hiding spot with a rumbling snarl. Its rows of sharp, white, teeth closing just above your head—missing its mark by barely a hair’s width.

“Gotcha!” Deuce snarled, his armored fists dragging the dragon away by its tail. Or, well, tried to. Because the dragon was a hundred feet long at least, and your blue haired friend probably looked like nothing more than a pesky rat darting between its feet. It turned and snapped at him irritably, taking a great, big, step forward in a bid to get a firmer stance to attack. You threw yourself in the other direction to avoid being trampled.

“Go!” Ace called, charging in from the other side. “Quick!”

Because at the end of the day, they were still both your brave, tanky, warrior, friends. And you were just a very, very, squishy bard who really would not fare well against a particularly motivated goose, let alone a dragon. So you skidded through the rubble and onto your feet, and started to sprint back into the castle’s halls—hoping maybe you’d be able to find a bit more cover.

There was a great clatter, and both Ace and Deuce yelped. You looked back hurriedly to see the pair of them clutching onto the dragon’s tail for dear life as it whipped them back and forth through the ash and debris cluttering the ground. With one, final, great, sweep, the dragon pitched them into the air and sent them careening through the roof of that ‘tallest tower.’ You muttered a hasty incantation and the sparkling outlines of soft feathers danced along your fingers. You hoped you weren’t too far. You were probably too goddamn far. But you hummed frantically under your breath nonetheless and entreated your middling magic to give them a soft landing.

And then there was another wave of green hellfire raining down over your head and you turned and ran.

Fuck, fuck, fuck, fuck—

Even if you’d been a champion sprinter, there was little good it would have done you against a beast whose stride was longer than you were tall. You made it back into some hall or other, and into another cavernous room, and then you were pinned into a corner—the dragon looming over you like a vengeful wraith come to take its due.

It was gigantic. Probably the biggest creature you’d ever seen. And it was sleek—all lithe muscle and glossy rows of black scales that glittered oddly in the dull, grey, light. Its wings spread wide behind it, spanning the entirety of the vast chamber. They looked like the sort of wings that could stir up a hurricane. The curling horns atop its head seemed sharp enough to gore a man or twenty, and the purple crests lining its skull were tapered down flat in a way that reminded you a bit deliriously of a pissy cat pinning its ears back before it swatted at you.

Its lips curled back over pointed canines as it snarled at you, and you were showered in a swathe of hot sparks.

“Oh, what large teeth you have,” you squeaked, and when the dragon dipped closer to bellow into your face, your reeled back with a splutter. “I—I mean white, sparkling, teeth!” you rattled, nearly incoherent. The dragon’s snout twitched away, almost like you’d startled it. “I mean, I’m sure you hear this all the time from your food, but—wow! Just! Very lovely! Definitely the prettiest smile I’ll ever be eaten by!”

Slowly it lowered its great head, and you could see the neon glare from its narrowed eyes.

“Not that you have to eat me,” you added hurriedly, hoping to whatever Gods could hear you that your smart mouth could finally be useful for more than just talking circles around assholes in bars or weaseling your friends out of shitty contracts. “I’d very much like not to be eaten. But all the same, we did intrude in your home—and it’s definitely a very nice home—so I’d totally get it. And I guess if I did have to die today, knowing that my life would be in the hands of something so magnificent is certainly reassuring.”

The dragon seemed to preen a bit at that. You could see the sharp crests beneath its horns soften as tension bled from the beast’s posture. It ducked in close again, and this time you felt a sharp pull of air rush past your cheeks as it sniffed you. Its nostrils were the size your head—bigger even, maybe. You didn’t want to think about it, but the dry heat of its breath puffing into your face made the entire thing a bit hard to ignore.  

“Did I mention what a charming home you have?” you rambled on. “Very aesthetic. The gargoyles at the gate were a lovely touch.”

The dragon made a low, warbling, noise in its throat that wasn’t quite a growl, but wasn’t particularly… reassuring, either. It made the hair on the back of your neck stand on end.

It ducked away—not far, just enough to reach one of the large, carved, walls at the outskirts of the room. Its long neck slithered out before pausing pointedly over an archway. It took you a long moment to realize it was gesturing to something. Another gargoyle from the looks of things—this one almost entirely crumbled away under the strains of time. You could just barely make out the shape of its square jaw and taloned fingers.

You nodded so hard you nearly gave yourself whiplash.

“Yes! I see! Very beautiful! Such fine craftsmanship!”

The dragon cooed at you. Swear on your life and all the money in your back packet. An actual, honest to God, coo. Fuck, maybe you’d managed to charm your way out of imminent dismemberment and death after all.

It ambled closer once again, a curiosity lighting its eyes and warming those neon irises into something that was less poisonous-hell-fire and more mellow-evening-in-the-forest.

Amidst all the rippling waves of ebony scales, your eyes caught on the smallest smear of crimson. Just a touch of red—right along the spikes of its tail. Carefully, cautiously, slower than molasses, you stepped forward with your hands raised. You whispered a handful of familiar words under your breath and your palms glowed fuzzy and blue. Dragons were supposed to be inherently magical, right? So this one would certainly understand that the string of syllables you’d babbled out were good, and helpful, and not at all a provocation. The dragon was looking down at you with lidded eyes, its gaze a bit unfocused. You gulped.

“I’m sorry my friends messed with your tail,” you apologized, gingerly holding your fingers out to hover over the abrasions without actually touching. “They were just trying to protect me. If—if that makes it any better.” The minuscule wound began to knit itself back together neatly beneath the pulses of your magic. “I do tend to need a lot of protecting—I’m not much a warrior, if that wasn’t completely obvious by the everything about me—so I can’t really blame them for being a bit gung-ho about it.”

After a moment or two, the scratches had faded back into solid, matte, black and you drew back with a content hum.

“There! All fixed!” You gave your most winning smile. Please don’t eat me, your brain chanted on endless repeat. Please don’t eat me please don’t eat me please don’t eat me—

The dragon reared back and settled on its haunches with another heavy puff of sweltering breath. You could feel the heat of it prickling all the way up your arms. After a long, long, moment of silent consideration, the dragon leaned forward again and rumbled deep in its chest. When you only stood there, properly petrified, it huffed again and bumped its nose against your sternum, nearly toppling you over.

“I don’t—” you started, nervous. “I’m sorry. I don’t really get what you’re trying to say.”

With another sigh that sounded entirely too put upon, the dragon lowered its great head. The air itself seemed to grow heavy against your shoulders, and you could taste the cloying bitterness of strong magics on the back of your tongue. Black miasma oozed from beneath the dragon’s talons and melted along its scales. The caustic scent of ash and petrichor burned along your nostrils, and you had to pinch your eyes shut and cover your nose to keep from coughing. You managed to sneak a peek past your fingers just in time to watch the shadowed outline of the beast collapse. And out of that puddle of black goo emerged a man­. He was tall and lithe, just as the dragon had been, with glowing green eyes that were terribly familiar. They were framed with thick, dark, lashes and sat perfectly on a face that was nearly too handsome to be human (well, it really wasn’t human you supposed, so that little tidbit probably accounted for said inhuman beauty well enough). Recognizable eyes and stature or no, the curling horns atop his head would have sealed the deal plenty well enough on their own.

He shook off the shadows twining around his ankles with a lazy twist of the hand and then turned to you with a curious little hum.

And holy fuck Mister Dragon apparently had no sense of shame, or maybe just no qualms about social niceties and practicalities, because his human self was wearing about just as many clothes as his lizard form had been.

You squeezed your eyes shut with a squeak, and then double covered them with your hands for good measure.

A chuckle rolled through the air—as dark and pleasantly rich as the finest of chocolates. And then there was a clawed finger beneath your chin, tilting your head back, and back, and back until you were at least half-way sure it would probably be safe to open your eyes again without infringing on his decency.

“You are fascinating, Child of Man,” it—he—hummed, low in his throat. His thumb dragged down to hook beneath the curve of your jaw and support the finger tucked up under your chin. “And it’s been so, very, long since I’ve been fascinated by anything.”

“Uh,” you replied, like a perfectly functional human being.

The dragon’s lips curled up over his pointed teeth—still just as sharp and white as they had been when he’d been so much bigger and scalier.

“I think I’d like to keep you,” he said with a nod to himself, as casually as one may talk about picking up extra groceries from the market.

“Uh,” you said again.

“You did mention that you needed protecting,” he continued, tapping a clawed finger against his own chin. The small smile quirking his lips twisted into something smug. “And that is certainly something at which I would excel.”

Your head was swimming.

“I—I mean. I’m honored that you—that… you—” You couldn’t even think the words, let alone get them past your brain and out of your mouth. You cleared your throat and fought to keep your eyes level with his clavicle and nowhere else. “D-Don’t you think you’re moving a bit fast?” you laughed nervously. “I mean, I’m sure my friends will probably be on their way back down soon—and—I mean, we haven’t even introduced ourselves yet. I don’t even know your name.”

He blinked, slow and serpentine.

“Oh. I suppose you wouldn’t.” He canted his head to the side, long strands of that inky black hair of his spilling across his shoulder. An amused sort of grin worked its way along his mouth. “Dragons are not keen to give out our true names so readily, but you seem like a clever one. Tell me—what do you think I’m called then, hmm?”

You glanced up quickly at the horns atop his head and couldn’t help yourself.

“Tsunotarou?”

He let out a bark of laughter that seemed to shake the walls.

The man abandoned the newborn on the mountain. He couldn't stand the idea of his wife cheating no matter what she claimed.

The baby wasn't his son.The child was pale as milk and his hair was as light as snow.

In his anger, the man had killed his wife but as heartless as he was he couldn't kill the child with his own hand. He left the baby to die in the hills by exposure or beasts.

The man was right the child wasn't his, not anymore. The child was marked, moon touched by his mother. The goddess had been promised the child to claim as her own.

Unfortunately, nothing had gone as planned. The baby had been left in the middle of the day where the goddess could not reach and by nightfall, she couldn't find him. She searched the earth desperately for her son only to find him in the hands of the fae.

Celestial and fae had rules and were strict when abiding by them. The fae had taken the child as his own since it was on his land and even named the baby. If the goddess tried to take the child there would be chaos across the realms.

Instead, she firmly made her way to face this fae father and demand her son back.

"No."

"I'm sorry what?!" Yuu asked incredulously, her skin glowing.

"Shh. You'll wake the baby." Lilia hushed her as he held the newly named Silver. The name bound the child. If Lilia didn't agree she couldn't take her son back. "You can't have my son."

"He's my son. I'm the reason he was born. It was part of the deal." Yuu growled quietly watching Lilia holding her baby to his chest.

"I'm not part of your deal. I found him all alone. What kind of mother leaves her baby?" Lilia scolded her as though she was a child herself.

"I can't help that I'm one of the moon spirits. I can't come out during the day."She snubbed.

"If you can't be there half the day why should you raise the child? How can you take care of him?" Lilia asked astonished, baffled by the goddess's shortsighted plan.

"I'm taking him to live with me in the heavens where he belongs. My palace will be his home, he has a nursery ready for him." Yuu placed her hands on her hips.

Lilia shifted to place Silver on a nest of pillows on the couch.

"Silver is mortal, he's human. He can't survive there." Lilia argued running a hand through his long hair.

"I've prepared paradise fruit. He'll become immoral like us-" Yuu explained feeling proud of herself. She had thought this through.

"No!" This time Lilia raised his voice. Silver didn't steer as the adults stared silently. "You can't decide that for him."

"It's what's best."

"He isn't going to be like us. He needs time to choose for himself."

"Do you want him to die?" Yuu sounded appalled her moonlit hair shimmering.

"No, I want him to be happy. Don't you?" Lilia reasoned with her enough to calm her down.

They sat down quietly for a while. They didn't want to argue but this was their baby.

"Do you want to hold him?" Lilia asked.

Yuu nodded as the fae handed the cradled baby off to his mother.

Silver was so small and warm. He looked so peaceful in his sleep. He looked just like her too with fluffy white locks. This was the child she desperately wanted. Opaque tears filled her eyes.

"Why would a goddess want a human baby?" Lilia asked her, his heats fluttering at the sight of the mother and child.

The goddess frowned before shifting Silver closer to her heart.

"I don't have a lover and I don't have the power to make a child alone. I could sculpt beings from stars but I can't make a baby." As she said this she held out her hand to show a pile formless stardust and turned it into a glittering bunny. "Spirits are part of all things that walk the earth. Every night I watch mothers and their families and I become a fraction of their being. I feel their love and I want to have that. I want a child to love."

"That's tragic. Do you really not have anyone to love in the heavens?"Lilia asked letting the star rabbit hop into his hand.

"Up there everything is different. I don't want to marry anyone there. Let's leave it at that." Yuu sighed.

"I can't give Silver to you. You are his mother, I'll recognize that but I'm his father. I'll take care of him here and during the night you'll take care of him." Lilia offered a compromise and hopes that they both can be happy.

Yuu agreed and their arrangement was established. Lilia took care of Silver during the day and every night Yuu came to take the night shift. It was ironic due to Lilia also being a night person.

The nursery was rebuilt in the castle with a crib made from clouds. She weaved curtains from soft moonlight. The stuffed animal were starlight animals Yuu animated.

Lilia was a much more goofy parent than Yuu initially believed. He couldn't cook but neither could Yuu since she didn't need to eat. They once tried cooking together and destroyed the oven.

Lilia also teased the goddess all the time about mortal culture. He told her that human mothers might get accused of eating the baby in their sleep(a real myth). She was horrified and didn't sleep near Silver until she was sure she wouldn't do that. It was Lilia's ploy to take up her spot on the bed so he could cuddle with his son. They eventually learned to share and all three shared the bad. The baby book Yuu read said it was healthy to sleep as a family and helped the baby regulate their sleep.

Lilia also mentioned a mom who dipped her baby in the river Styx to make their baby invincible. Yuu immediately tried to dip Silver in the river but she was stopped thankfully.

Yuu has a good storyteller too and Silver fell asleep to her voice every night. When Silver had a nightmare one night she gathered starlight into a lantern and made a nightlight for him. She stroked his hair until he fell asleep.

As Silver got older he believed that his parent were married. Lilia never corrected him and Yuu didn't know. It was heart breaking when he learned the truth and thought they got divorced.

Yuu lost her mind when she met Malleus.

"We have two babies?!" She asked panicking as she grabbed Lilia by the collar.

"Yeah, I thought you knew. We had him a few years ago and he grew so fast. Don't you remember having him?" Lilia said mischievously as the flustered goddess tried to wring his neck.

She fawned over Malleus and Silver endlessly. The boys slept tucked into their mother's side. While they slept, Lilia lay on the other side of them. He looked into her calm iridescent eyes as they smiled silently listening to the children coo in their sleep.

Somewhere along the line, she became his partner and the mother of his children. She wasn't his wife but she might as well have been.

Should the ring be a moonstone?

He held off as the boys got older and Sebek joined their family. Yuu was much softer on them and healed any cut they got rather than letting the healing naturally.

Silver developed magic similar to his mother, he summoned creatures to do his will as his mother made animals.

Silver's narcolepsy might have been caused simply because of his moon-touched nature. He was born that way.

Malleus got in the habit of going on walks at night due to his mother. When he was away at school it made her feel closer and watching over him. During the new moon, Yuu and Lilia disappear into the night together for "Adult time with no kids"

At some point, the pair were just called Mr. And Mrs.Vanrouge by the school. It's not like Silver could deny it as he looked just like his mother. Silver also never figured out he was adopted because Yuu didn't have pointed ears.

It is when you face him in the wake of your last outing together that everything hits at full force for you. Looking at him now, knowing it will be the final time you get to slip into the facade of being his, burns a hole in your chest and the resulting smoke leaves you gasping for air. 

Vil, as always, remains pragmatic and neutral about the ordeal. He’s grown into the perfect entertainer, a cold and ruthless entrepreneur masquerading as a paragon of idealistic beauty and influence. 

But he is soft when it comes to you. Be it another act to save face, to keep the ruse feeling fresh by even stringing you along, or be it something more, he is always softer when it comes to you. 

As you talk to him now, in the cool late-afternoon air outside your dorm building, the only people around, he knows exactly what to say to soothe you. 

Or, at least, he thinks he does. 

“It’s one more gala, and then it will all be over. Just pretend a little longer, for me?”

“That’s the problem, Vil,” you choke, clutching his forearms as though they are your final tether to him. As though, if you dare to let go, he will relinquish his corporeal form and disappear into a cloud of smoke. “I can’t pretend anymore.”

Your confession catches him off-guard. You can tell by the way that his eyes widen and the corners of his mouth twitch. Such minute differences to his expression, but, when someone is so well-attuned to every single move they make, even the slightest deviation from the norm stands out like a blemish. 

For a moment, you wonder if you’ve taken a step too far with your words, crossed the invisible boundary between you that has been very clearly set ever since your first meeting. It’s all supposed to be fake. It’s only ever supposed to have been fake. 

And yet here, now, at the thought of going your separate ways, everything feels far too real. 

The words continue to tumble from you without hesitation, spilling over as though you’ve burst a dam that has festered on the brink of destruction for years. By this point you have all but collapsed into him, eyes watery and desperate as you stare up at him. 

“I’m sorry, I didn’t want to tell you like this. I didn’t want to tell you at all. I was just going to stay quiet about it and then it would be over and we’d move on and it would be fine. I just-”

Vil takes your face in his hands and shushes you softly, holds you with such delicate contrast to your own constrictive grasp. His long fingers are cool and pleasant as they curl along your jawline, cradling you tenderly.

“You are everything. Everything,” he whispers, lips grazing your temple. “I’m sorry.”

As you crumble into him, you let your grip falter. Let him hold onto you tighter as you unravel years of pent-up yearning and emotions that hadn't even had the chance to be given a rational thought.

And he is, like he always has been, so much softer than how he presents to the world.

Only for you.

You felt your eyes fluttering for the first time, letting out a yawn and attempting to get up from the soft cushions of the bed you're laying in. In an attempt to get up, your head bumped into something what appears to be a glass. It surprises you that your bed has a glass cover on top, not to mention the absurd amount of flowers surrounding your room. You opened the glass coffin and for the first time, you are in awe the way the entire room looked like; it's gloomy yes, but the way the flowers added to the room's atmosphere makes you feel...at ease strangely.

You wondered to yourself how on earth did you ended up in this marvelous room. You tried tracing your memories on how you ended here in this strange place and yet, no luck. Your eyes landed on the sole exit of the room, trying to unlock it by nudging the door knob. No one answered. You tried speaking towards the door, in hopes that someone could hear you, no one responded. You are about to give up, returning to the bed coffin you once laid in when all of the sudden, the sound of locks and deadbolts are unlocked, revealing a small, petite maid carrying various flowers and her gardening tools.

Judging on how she looked, she is indeed a fae from the ears and the shade of dark olive green hair. She seems friendly enough for a fae so you spoke her meekly. "Um hello there.." From the shock alone, the maid dropped both the gardening tools and the bouquet of flowers that Malleus ordered her to be planted on your room. Stuttering, she bowed down before you, making you surprised in return. "Y-y-your majesty! I d-didn't expect you to be awake! It's an honor be by your presence, my king/queen!" Not only you are confused on why that woman called you by such rank you didn't even recall gaining it. You remembered that you aren't someone who is deemed as royalty but also you weren't from a royal blood line.

Unless someone who is royalty married you–

"I'm so sorry but this is a misunderstanding." The maid looked up at you in confusion. "What do you mean, your highness?" You quickly shooked your head as you picked up the various tools and flowers she dropped minutes ago.

"I am not used to be called by such endearment and I am not from a royal blood line–" The maid cut you off. "B-but, you are (y/n) Draconia! The crowned ruler of the Valley of Thorns and his majesty's love." She felt like you didn't by her words, which confuses her even more. As a last attempt, she pointed her finger to the portrait right above your bed which turns out to be a coffin. From the picture, you can see on how happy Malleus is alongside you. But, what makes it even more creepy is that you didn't recalled being married to him as your portrait portrays you as someone who is equally as happy as he is, the only difference is that your eyes glowed a bright green along with the black and green garment as your wedding attire.

"Y-your majesty? Are you okay?" You felt like you are about to pass out, stumbling upon the overgrown grass and vines on the floor below. With the adrenaline pumping by your veins, you ran away, pushing the guards and dropping your crown in the process. You ignored all of the sounds that rang around the place, ranging from the guards pleading you to stop from the bells above ringing, signaling that someone of royalty is in distress.

Which in fact, caught Malleus's attention as he saw the guards running and heard the bell ringing above.

Turning around the corner, you see a huge door which could lead to your forgotten freedom when suddenly, your body jolted backwards from the sudden force as the tip of your cape was caught by a sharp stone. In desperation to escape, you pulled your cape so hard that the expensive fabric was ripped and once again you sprinted against the tall door right around the corner. Your entire body was covered entirely with sweat and you never felt this good since the day you've slept and the adrenaline you have felt, it felt so accelerating yet weird at the same time.

You are about to open the door and to your surprise, Malleus appeared alongside with several guards and Lilia by his side. "My beloved!" He spoke, his voice is laced with a series of emotions ranging from disappoinment to sadness upon seeing your distressed state. Seeing his eyes alone, your precious memories from the past reminded you of what you once had. From your heartslabyul friends to your own family back in your world, it was those happy moments you want to cherish for the rest of your life.

However, you also remembered how that man you saw not only is your captor but also your husband and king. It was dawned upon you that Malleus himself took you away in fear that you will leave this world that called you in the first place and out of greed and desperation, he married you against your will. Seeing him for the first time made you sacred to the core, ignoring his attempts on coercing you to leave that door alone. Not listening to him, you opened the tall doors which turns out to the door that leads to the balcony.

This made Malleus worried for you even more as he shouted your name once more in fear. With nowhere else to go, you climbed on the stone fence of the balcony and felt the cold wind hit your face for the first time. "I knew that this day would come." Lilia murmured as he held Malleus's shaking hand as an attempt to console the once young prince. "(y/n)!" Lilia shouted, successfully getting your attention. "Malleus has something to say! Please let him explain to you!"

In return, you shook your head side to side, tears seeping through your face as you held the stone pillar for support. "How can I believe his explanation if that man before me casted me that wicked spell that cause me to have that slumber?!" You shouted fearlessly despite being scared towards him. The man that was once your friend walk towards the open doors of the balcony, with your crown by his hands. "I'm doing what's best for you, for us and seeing you leaving me is indeed torture and I won't spend thousands of years ruling alone without someone to call both my love and spouse."

"Then why did you choose me out of all those people? Why not someone's who's the same species as you?" Now, Malleus was right below you, with a sad smile on his face. "Because you didn't fear me even after you knew my name. You are the first and last human to whom my heart yearned for and the one I call the love of my life." He spoke. "I indeed apologize for casting that spell against your will but as I've stated before, I'm doing this for the sake of your love."

You didn't trust his words but asked another question. "How long I was asleep?" You asked, in which the king of faes gladly answered. "About a century, my dear. Just like the tale of the sleeping princess I've read to you when we are still in NRC." You almost lost your grip against the pillar upon hearing his words. Sleeping for a thousand years? For you it felt like you've been sleeping for at least a day or two. Then, another realization dawned upon you, making you nauseous. "Does this mean that-"

You look at Malleus's green pair of eyes and the fae said nothing but a sad nod. Everyone you loved in NRC, even your friends and family on the other side of the mirror are dead and you didn't have the chance to say good to them face to face. You failed to realize that while you are in deep thoughts, Malleus pulled you down from the pillar as you knees gave out once more. Tears begin to stream down your face once again, hitting Malleus's chest as a way to protest and as a way to wake up, hoping that this moment is nothing but a nightmare you couldn't wake up. You didn't believe that it's been thousands of years since you last saw your friends and everyone you knew in NRC.

If it weren't for you visiting that cursed dorm where he once resided, you could have the chance to go home, to be with your friends and family and to die as a human. You continuously hit his chest and it didn't bothered him, not even once as he cradles your tired body against his body. "No no no..." Your murmured, slapping his body. "This must be a dream- no a nightmare. This isn't real, I'll just wake up and everything's back to normal." You sobbed, now giving up on hurting the man before you.

You know that there's no one to take you in if you ever ran away from the castle since everyone you knew is now dead. No blood relatives nor friends to be by your side except for Malleus. For he and he alone could take care of you and he gladly accepted that offer. "This isn't a dream, my child of man." He replied, caressing your messy locks and placing the crown on your head. "You don't have anyone else but me to turn to. For I, Malleus Draconia, your husband and king, will love and cherish you for as long as I've lived." Kissing your head once more, he carried you back the room that was once his sleeping quarters, is now a shared room of both you and him.

He stared at you in awe as you kept on clinging close towards him. "Please don't leave me, my love. I will promise you that no harm will go through you, even from me." He replied, to which you kept on sobbing against his chest, now covered with tears and snot but the king didn't mind at all.

After all, he would like to thank his grandmother for the spell she taught him since he was a child. You are indeed this fae's sleeping beauty, now in his arms and forever be his.

Do not republish, edit, or repost to other websites.

Deuce Spade ;

Deuce hides his feelings the best out of everyone, but you are on his mind constantly in the form of daydreams.

He's a bit quieter as a result. Usually you’re the one he’s replying to and speaking to the most, so when you’re not there he prefers to listen instead, picturing what you would be doing or saying.

If someone mentions you though, he’ll be quick to join the conversation.

Would be more involved in his dorm activities as well as track and field. It helps him stay distracted and gives him more time to think about you and what to text you later :')

Being the model student he now is, he'll copy a second set of notes for you so you won't be behind when you return. He'll even draw little pictures on them and leave helpful (and sometimes silly) comments for you. If you see a scribbled out "I miss you :/" or two... ignore it.

Stays cool and collected throughout your absence, in the end. The time without you makes him appreciate you more when you're back. Just promise him you won't leave again.

Epel Felmier ;

Progressively starts spiraling the longer you’re gone.

He calls you nightly for as long as you’re away. 

Goes out of his way to make plans or do interesting things just so he can have more to talk to you about when he calls. 

He’ll make you talk to him until he falls asleep because he finds he usually dreams of you when your voice is the last thing he hears.

Probably gets a bit more snappy, though. Usually you’re there to keep the peace within the group and prevent their schemes, but without you they start to lose it just a bit. Perhaps he’s hoping that if he does something really stupid you’ll come back faster.

It doesn’t work, obviously. You scold him over the phone instead.

And now he's carving your initials into apples aggressively and pouting. You made him more sad. How could you?

Epel is definitely a handful in your absence. Come back asap.

Jack Howl ;

Also doesn't make a big deal out of missing you.

He's very considerate of whatever your circumstances are for being absent, so he leaves you alone unless you text him first.

He'll reply instantly when you do message him, though. He even set a special alert noise for you :')

Definitely carries something of yours with him at all times, like a piece of jewelry or an accessory. He was a bit embarrassed to ask for it from you before you left, but the comfort it brings him makes him glad he did. He’s very sensitive to smells so this little piece of you keeps him from worrying too much while you’re away.

The cutest thing he does though? He listens to the music you like. When he's out on runs he'll have your playlist on shuffle, thinking about you until Leona tells him he's falling behind.

Overall handles it well. You wouldn't even know he missed you if he wasn't seeking you out more than usual after your return.

Sebek Zigvolt ;

Sebek is so good at hiding the fact that he misses you, that he almost fools himself.

Epel and Ace would no doubt tease him relentlessly if they found out, so he keeps quiet and focuses on his duty to Malleus. That's always supposed to be his focus anyway, no sweat.

But when he can get a quiet moment to himself? He’s somehow always going through pictures of you.

There’s a secret folder on his phone titled '🤦‍♂️' that is filled with dozens of pictures of you and him. They’re all selfies you dragged him into while he pretended he didn’t want to be in them, but when you’d sent them to him, he’d saved them all immediately. He’s made sure no one's seen it though, especially you.

(Besides Lilia who’d crept up on him and seen it once and was overjoyed. Sebek is still mortified.)

Occasionally, he’ll check in on you through text and send something like “Make sure you’ve eaten, human!” or an image of the other first-years with, “Why did you make me befriend them?”

Pull him aside and give him a hug when you get back, please. He's in denial but he'll appreciate it.

It wasn't hard to find you, you usually stroll around the Rose maze or tending the hedgehog during your free time,

And he was right. He found you crouching down and petting the colorful hedgehogs as they surround you, waiting to be petted one by one.

"Dear Rose.." you flinched at the sudden voice behind you, moving your head to the side to look at your lover who was standing (not so) tall. "Riddle, is there anything you need?" You were a bit nervous but didn't quite show it.

You froze, a few sweats had dropped from your forehead as you try to avoid looking at him. "N-no..." You heard him heave a heavy sigh, standing up and motioning you to do as well.

Riddle walked to your side, crouching next to you as he also pets the hedgehogs, "Nothing in particular..." He stopped petting and looked into your eyes, "Were you the one who ate my tart?"

You stood up but look to the side, your fingers fidgeting in nervousness. You closed your eyes when you heard footsteps, anticipating for any action.

But all you felt was a small peck on the side of your lips, "I taste some sugar and whipped cream," and another peck as he moved your face when he held your chin "and the strawberry's sweetness..." He pulled away after.

You covered your face with your hands from the embarrassment of being caught and the sudden actions Riddle did. "This a violation of Rule #089, I could've punished you for this, but..."

You peeked from your hands to see any anger on Riddles face. But all you got was a smirk, "You compensate with Rule #053 when I got a taste"

When he said those words you totally blew, crouching and mentally screaming as you were sure your heart will be heard from how loud and fast it was.

"Next time I won't let this slide. Although I don't mind it if I get more than a tart in return"