Rhaenyra Targaryen And Daemon Targaryen HOUSE OF THE DRAGON S02E08 | Dir. Geeta Vasant Patel

It's important to humble male celebrities with the fact that they are laying eggs on ao3

Juniper and Earwig the knight.

Got some new fairy ocs to play with it's toxic yuri, its forbidden magic girly, its honor-bound knight conflict. It's Guard and Princess. All my current favourite juicy things. (f/f)

— System error

Android Aemond x Human Fem!Reader

Rating: Explicit +18 (robot x human relationship, yandere behavior, power dynamics, dub-con/non-con, non-consensual somnophilia, possessiveness, obsessive behavior, emotional manipulation)

Proceed with caution.

Summary: You won him in a raffle, but you never could have imagined that your domestic droid would turn into a machine obsessed with you.

English is not my first language

Art by @morgana0anagrom

°°°°°°

When you put your coupon in the electronics store's raffle box, you didn't think you'd actually win anything, especially with the lack of luck that usually surrounds you. Furthermore, there were thousands of coupons there, which meant that the probability of your name being drawn was one in a million.

But happened.

"Congratulations, Miss L/N, you are the winner of our raffle. I'm Unit 456, but you can call me Aemond if that's to your liking. I'm a prototype android designed to perform tasks and assist you in your daily life."

You blink slowly, looking at the robot standing in front of you, after long minutes of the arduous task of dismantling the box he had been shipped in. Despite being between the lines that his words should possibly be happy and congratulatory, he speaks in a slurred and almost bored manner, which makes you raise an eyebrow in question.

He looks surprisingly human - disturbingly human. He's taller than any other man you know, although he's more on the slender side than exaggeratedly large, which doesn't stop it from making the definition of the muscles hidden beneath his clothes obvious. His shoulders are noticeably broad beneath his long dark coat (a very human coat). His skin is absolutely perfect and almost translucent because it is so pale, a face with sharp human features with full, well-shaped eyebrows, an imposing nose and a single intense lavender gaze. Her hair is straight, a small part is tied with an elastic at the back, reaching the middle of his back in a surprising silver tone.

He is so beautiful that he looks more like an elf than a robot. Unreally beautiful.

There are no visible imperfections on him, other than the use of a leather eye patch. You tilt your head in confusion, silently wondering why an android, clearly designed to be flawless like him, would need an eye patch.

He just keeps his expression neutral, indifferent even, while you analyze him. Hands folded rigidly behind the body and posture upright.

You wave your hand in front of his face and he doesn't blink. You circle him with appraising steps and poke a finger gently in his back and he still doesn't react, but looks at you sideways. He's warm like a human, but acts like a robot.

It's not uncommon to find domestic androids in people's homes these days, your neighbors even have one, but you've never considered the possibility of having one of your own.

But apparently he's yours now.

"Before I can carry out any of your requests, you must finish programming me. Would you like to proceed?" Even his voice sounds very human, a hoarse and low timbre, although there is some static and rigidity there; almost imperceptible - just enough to prove its robotic origin. You nod hesitantly, but proceed with the setup.

You are suspicious and reluctant in the first few days, but it turns out that having Aemond in your home is a great convenience. Living alone for a while, it takes some time for you to get used to seeing another figure in the hallways without feeling like you're going to have a heart attack. But he is very useful. He keeps your house clean, wakes you up for work every morning, cooks your meals, and takes care of your clothes. He even waters your plants and feeds your cat. Besides the fact that he's not bad to look at, like the other prototypes you've heard about. It's clear to you the effort his creators made to make this android's facial expressions and voice as natural as possible.

Even though he's just an android, you eventually find him to be a very decent conversation partner. He's intelligent in an almost condescending way, always with witty comebacks and politely sarcastic comments. You don't know if it's very appropriate behavior for an AI.

"Are you sentient?" you mumble the question one night, popping a piece of strawberry into your mouth.

He snorts a mocking laugh. One of his many strangely human quirks. “Of course not, I just have a very well programmed AI.”

It certainly doesn't seem to be just that.

But you discard the idea after a few minutes and let things continue as they are.

But the days pass and the strangeness increases.

There's something unsettling about his robotic side smile, for example. The way his single empty eye bores into you, as if critically examining your clothes and your skin. The way his grip on certain objects tightens when you make a sarcastic comment towards him. The way he leaves the room a little slower whenever you say you need to dressed. The way he's always watching you in silence. His intense gaze locks onto you at the most random moments and beneath it, you notice your pulse always beating faster. You’re not sure what exactly it is about him that makes you so transfixed. Although, to be fair, you've never had many conversations with androids, despite your best intentions, and so have nothing to compare it to.

But suddenly, even though you know he's just a machine programmed to obey your commands, you feel strange whenever you're around him.

Maybe it's just wear and tear, but you're starting to believe something is seriously wrong with him.

"Aemond, how long are you supposed to last?" You ask, trying to sound unassuming.

He smiled. "I have a solar-powered battery. But as for my quality, my creators would give me a year before I would need to make any upgrades or repairs."

You swallow. Are your eyes playing tricks on you or does he smile mischievously for a moment before smiling normally at your question? Maybe your workaholic life has left you restless and lonely. You're projecting a lot of humanity onto the robot, as he was the closest thing to human interaction you had outside of work.

But it's really hard to get rid of the disturbing feeling of danger.

There is a night when you're in the shower, soap running down your face and body, hair stuck to your shoulders. That's when you feel it. It's almost like a physical touch on the back of your neck; someone is looking at you. With soap still in your eyes, you try to peek at the door, your heart racing in terror when you notice a tall, blurry shape standing there. You rub the soap away from your eyes, but when you look again...there's nothing there anymore.

What scares you most is that you are sure you had locked the door.

One afternoon, while you were drinking water leaning against the kitchen island, Aemond approached you until he was just inches away. You swallow hard, but don't reprimand him - he's not doing anything truly reprehensible, after all. But then he takes your hand in his, raises both together until your palm is open against his. You watch in amazement and lips parted as he critically analyzes (lips in a straight line and gaze squinted in concentration) your hand in his, rotating the two to see the stark difference in size and texture. He squeezes your hand in his, feels the softness of your skin, the temperature... and then he gently releases it to its previous position. He looks into your eyes with a mischievous gleam once before leaving as if nothing had happened.

You don't know how long you stay in the kitchen after that. He touched you without any permission and that is wrong. But it's just curiosity. He's just curious about the differences between you two...that's normal.

Right?

But things manage to get even stranger after you drunkenly stumble upon him one night, somehow knocking him off balance and falling to the ground. You're sure he allows you both to fall to the ground on purpose, after all a well-programmed and strong android like him should have a better sense of balance than that. You've seen him drag the large oak closet in the guest room like he's dragging a cardboard box. You know how strong he is, he would be fully capable of holding your weight without you falling over. You don't question it at the time, though. Instead, you wonders if the heat and smell of citrus emanating from him is real or part of your drunken fantasy.

Aemond lies motionless on the floor as you lie disheveled on top of him, his large hands wrapping around your waist almost immediately in an iron grip. Maybe it's because everything seems slow when you're drunk, but he doesn't get up quickly. In fact, you get the impression that the two of you stand there for what seems like an eternity, with his eye patch and his lavender gaze burning right next to your glassy, drunken face.

You wake up the next morning completely clean and changed, barely remembering the night before.

You think falling on him causes some kind of malfunction in his system or something, because afterwards it he's acting up - worse. Always close to you, brushing your arms with gentle fingers, brushing non-existent dust from your clothes. Invading your bathroom without permission, silently coming up behind you to dry your hair himself while watching you intensely in the mirror; long fingers slowly entering between your strands, scratching your scalp and tugging with light pressure, leaving your cheeks burning for him in the mirror as the hot air from the dryer hums softly.

He even goes so far as to offer massages to relax your body, under the pretext of always aiming for your well-being and ensuring better performance in your daily life. He takes much more initiative in doing things that you didn't even ask him to do. His hands run up your sides and press into your flesh to undo the knots he had apparently noticed in his visual scan of your body.

“That’s enough,” you say, getting up from the bed.

He abruptly grabs your waist and pushes you back down. "Negative. My systems still show that you are not getting enough blood flow to that area," he responds, continuing to massage your shoulder blades.

Negative? What do he mean 'negative'?

This is weird. He was never this strong with you and he never disobeyed an order. So bold. You try to hold back a moan at the increasing strength of the massage - ridiculously pleasant and assertive. But all this touching is starting to awaken another kind of feeling in you. One that definitely does not fit the moment.

As his steady breath (and useless, because he doesn't need to do it) blows across the back of your neck, the air of the situation suddenly...changes. You’re hyper-aware of his strong chest pressed against your back and how he holds you. His palm feels big and warm through the thin cotton of your simple nightshirt.

Your heart starts to beat faster.

“I said that’s enough,” you repeat, more harshly. "We can continue this tomorrow."

His massaging movements retreat with your order, but his fingers remain running down your back until they reach the hem of your sleeping pants. His tone seems to turn threatening as he leans in close to your ear. "But you still need a massage here, Master."

You widen your eyes and turn your head back, worried. What the hell is he saying now? Before you can turn around and escape, he grabs your waist and slides your pants and panties down, all at once. You gasp and squirm to get out of bed, but his grip on you is too tight.

"W-what are you doing, Aemond?!" you ask frantically, cheek pressed into the pillow.

His fingers run down your wet slit as he massages your ass with his other hand, positioning himself behind you on the bed. "I will ease your tension inside, Master."

"W-what? No! Aemond, activate the 'sleep function' immediately!" you scream. "Unit 456, power off! That's an order!" None of your commands work. He does not answer.

You're about to kick him when one of his fingers slips into your hole, making you freeze in shock and arch your back, a high-pitched grunt escaping your lips. Nothing could prepare you for the feeling of his thick finger rubbing your walls, coaxing you to widen and accommodate another of his fingers. The two digits slowly begin to move in and out of you, opening like scissors as they move in and out, extracting your wetness.

The robot turns you so that your back is against the bed and you visibly shiver as you notice how it stares at your body, lifting your nightshirt up under your armpits to expose your breasts. It's spooky how he's orbit LED flickers and spins into different neon hues before settling into his usual lavender, his original processor struggling to shut down his AI at your command, but the machine keeps moving - as if it had a independent system, with his own will.

Your bottom lip trembles and you feel your eyes watering.

Wasting no time, the android pushes your thighs up and dips his tongue into your slit, drawing long licks and swirling it around your clit. Tears stream down the sides of your face as you close your eyes tightly and gasp loudly at the sensation. You squeeze the sheets into tense fists at your sides, your mind racing. You absolutely hate how you're starting to like this.

The small gasp you were suppressing is forced past your lips when he returns both fingers back inside your pussy, pumping them both as he sucks on your clit. It's a real test of endurance not to moan loudly at his rhythm, so consistent and mechanical. Of course you knew that the cyber industry is trying harder every day to try to make androids as human as possible, but you didn't expect that they could have saliva. His tongue is just a little firmer and longer than a normal human's, but it's pliable and glides easily across your clit with all the saliva (a kind of artificial lubricant, perhaps?) in his mouth.

His fingers work against you without any rush, but with a level of precision so perfect that no human would be able to replicate. Eventually, the so-called massage becomes too much and you cum as quietly as you can, legs shaking and moans muffled into your palm.

"Enough, enough. Now I'm not tense anymore, okay?" You whisper breathlessly, face flushed and wet with tears. "You can stop the 'massage' now, Aemond."

Aemond just looks at you with an unreadable expression. "Negative. You still need a massage here, Master." He answers monotonously.

There's no time to argue. Not that you thought you would be able to form words when he climbs up your body and hovers over you, removing his shirt, exposing an expanse of pale skin and defined muscles to your wide eyes. He doesn't take off his pants, but he undoes the buttons and pushes them down enough for his member to pop out freely. Long, intimidatingly thick, with tall veins running up the sides and a pink head wet with more of that artificial lubricant. His hard, very human-looking cock (and at the same time very non-human) is pressed against your stomach in a heavy pop.

Damn, why the hell would the industry do he like that? Aemond was a domestic android, no a sex droid, it wasn't part of his guidelines to have a cock.

"U-Unit 456, I order you to power off NOW! Power off!" You stutter and try to push him away as he finishes pulling your shirt up your arms, but he doesn't mind your attacks (you feel like a child being restrained by an adult) and easily leaves you as naked as the day you were born.

"Negative." His indifferent voice sounds close to your ear. With one hand he holds your flailing wrists above your head and the other holds his cock, he slides the tip into your pussy. "I can fuck you better than any human - make you want nothing but me, ever again. I can. I just need to prove it to you, Master." He whispers huskily into your ear, the slight static in his voice vibrating across your skin and sending goosebumps down your body.

God - fuck God - you think you might be having a nervous breakdown. Domestic androids were not designed to talk dirty, to offer to fuck their masters. Why was he doing this?!

You choke out a moan as he slides the wet tip of his fat cock between your folds, moving up and down, using the wetness of your pussy and his own lubricant to tease your clit with gentle strokes.

The robot holds your thighs spread between his broad body, watching with hawk-like focus as you bounce and tremble beneath him. You were still struggling to understand everything that is happening and what was going to happen.

So when you feel the tip of his cock lined up with your entrance, you think maybe this is a dream. But in one fluid motion, he dips the tip into your heat.

You scream, “Shit!” Because, really, there's nothing more to do than that.

He doesn't stop, however. Pumping his cock deeper into your wet, welcoming hole with every movement of his hips. Although he is as warm and soft as a human cock, his size is anything but. You dig your nails into your palms and cry at the size of him, the tall veins scratching your walls at how thick he is - which, shamefully, only brings more heat to your walls. He's wide and it's a painful stretch, but you're so wet (or he is - or both of you are) and sensitive since your first orgasm, that the suppression of your fluids makes it easier for him to bottom out more quickly.

Once he reaches the maximum depth your human body can take, the robot pulls your ankles onto his shoulders and lets go of your hands, knowing you're too weak to try and fight him now. Instead, his hand goes to your breasts, pinching your nipples, groping and kneading them, giving them a massage that matches the one he was about to give your pussy.

When the tip meets your cervix, it feels like a switch goes off in his sensors. He grabs your thigh and starts fucking you at a fast, rhythmic pace, slapping his balls against your ass cheeks.

"Ahh! Aemond, slow down!" You try to at least negotiate his pace, afraid of how much he might hurt you if he continues like this.

He ignores you, keeping pace, focused and empty, intimidating your tight hole into accepting his robotic cock, taking in your expressions and low moans with deep interest. The movement of his hips cannot be compared to that of any human being (exactly as he promised); very perfect and programmed, very consistent. With his width and length he's hitting you in all the good places, sending shocks every time he pushes his cock back. You are empty for only half a second before being completely filled again.

How could you fix this defect, other than waiting? You're not sure you'll be able to last long against a robot with a seemingly infinite battery and unbreakable skin, anyway.

You scream once more: “A-ah! Aemond- wait...uh!" Contrary to your previous thought, you try to push his shoulders when you feel him try to go even deeper, fear taking over your movements.

He grabs your wrists again and pins them to the pillow above your head with one hand, the other gripping the sweat-damp flesh of your bare waist. His lavender gaze is narrow and fixed in all your euphoric expressions. "It feels amazing to finally be inside you, Master. You look absolutely fascinating, moaning and crying beneath me." He mouths praise in a bored, drawling tone, but there's something wild - dangerous - hiding there.

You blush; by his words, by the sound of your wet skin on his, by the loud sound of the bed creaking and banging against the wall - if you weren't practically having your insides rearranged and your brain fucked in here, you'd worry that your neighbors were hearing everything. But Aemond doesn't let your attention waver for a second. His LED is blinking in a non-reassuring manner. Your back arches off the sheets and what little voice you has left is strangled in your throat.

You swear there's a small sarcastic smile on his lips before he reaches around to take a nipple into his mouth, adjusting the angle to suck on your breasts and continue pounding into you. He is not kind. Intense sucking and teeth scraping across your sensitive flesh as you cry and moan, so helpless.

You'll be all bruised up the next morning, with marks on your breasts and thighs. But the most mistreated, without a doubt, will be your pussy, due to the punishment he is inflicting on you. Each time he pulls out, you can see a white ring around the place where his cock meets your pussy, your juices and the synthetic lubricant from his length mixing to make him move faster and higher.

Even though you are the human master, you feel like nothing more than a small toy of a robot.

"P-please...nng!"

Only the wet sounds and smacks of your pussy slamming, your moans and the creaking of the bed can be heard. Aemond remains strangely controlled, looking down at you as he fucks you like the machine he is. Any friendly human element that existed no longer exists. Just a ravenous, uncontrollable unit that moves with a mind of its own, ignoring all original manufacturing guidelines.

He smacks your breasts, pulling back to smack your thigh and pull your hips higher. When he touches your clit and thumbs it in tight circles, while pressing his palm against the bottom of your belly, right where his penis visibly protrudes, you start to cum again.

It's like a train. You collapse screaming, your back arching, feeling him squirm inside you at the same time. Maybe even robots have to cum at some point. If the creators expected people to use them for libidinous acts like this, then the climax must also be something scheduled.

As expected, Aemond fucks you through both of your orgasms, his artificial semen flooding your pussy as he turns you on with his continuous thrusts.

It takes a few seconds before he finally pulls out, letting the cum run out of you in droplets. You think, mercifully, that it would all be over then. Until he grabs your hips and turns you around, spreading your pussy lips for another round, this time from behind.

What the fuck?!

"Heh?!" You gasp in amazement.

“I’m not even close to done with you, little human,” he growls, parting your folds and pushing his hard cock into the tight, wet cavern between them in a torturous drag. "Not even close."

This time he's rougher, pulling you by your hips to ram his cock into your wet hole, your overstimulated walls clenching around him and begging for more cum to paint them - the cheating cunt. The slamming of his hips into your ass is borderline painful, the squishing of cum and fluids pressed between his cock and the walls of your pussy, your pitiful screams, all were loud and obscene. Your breasts swing back and forth with the force of his thrusts, only stopping when he reaches out to grab them and pinch them from behind. The cum drips down your thighs and you can barely support yourself as he fucks you raw into the mattress.

The night stretches on as if it lasted an entire week.

You wake up with a start the next morning, your heart beating like a hummingbird's wings. But Aemond returned to normal, as if absolutely nothing had happened. As if he hadn’t made you pass out from cumming so much the night before. He helps you shower and dress for work as usual. He makes you breakfast and wishes you a good day at work.

As scared as you are, you assume he rebooted the system at some point after you passed out and fixed himself. You think (pray) that it was just a flaw in his interface. Something unique. However, this theory is proven completely wrong when you return home at night.

The second you finish dinner and shower, he's switched personalities again.

You lie spasming on the couch, your hips held still by his big hands and his huge cock vibrating in your pussy. You don't know whether to curse them to death or bless the company for adding this feature, too busy drooling from the corners of your lips at the minute movements of his pulsing cock sending waves throughout your body. There is no way to adjust the settings. You can only sit there and accept it as what you assume is the highest level of vibration shakes your core.

But the forced orgasm sessions were just a warm-up and a preliminary to the real fucking.

You wouldn't have any idea how he could have so much cum. Your pussy overflows with cum after each round and he always makes sure not to pull out until the last drop is pumped into you. The fluid has the same consistency and essence as real human sperm, but why would such a thing be added to an domestic android? Had the creators also anticipated a creampie kink?

"Oh shit...!"

You collapse onto the arm of the couch, unable to hold yourself back as he brutally fucks you from behind. His previous cumshots slide down your thighs and drip onto the floor from your raised heels. Your feet barely touch the floor anymore as he punishes your aching pussy, the vibrations increasing your overstimulation. Your house echoes with wet slaps as he fucks you raw and rough, drilling your pussy without caring about your commands. He doesn't obey.

The sudden pleasure merges so deeply with the thick cords of your fear that you can't help but scream. Your hands scratch and squeeze the soft fabric of your couch as pleasure and shock overwhelm you and make your body shudder.

The machine returns to fucking his hips against yours as he twists you this way and that, pulling you gently up and up until with one quick movement he releases you, changing his grip to place your thighs on each of his big hands and move you away from his cock so that you are no longer facing away from his chest, but chest to chest, lying on the couch.

The sudden movement and change in pressure combined with your sensitivity makes you have a powerful and unexpected orgasm. The sound that comes out of your mouth is what you imagine the sound of someone choking on their tongue to be like.

You lose some time then. Clutching the android's broad shoulders on top of you and panting. Body writhing and vibrating as you slowly come down from the high, sharp stabs of pleasure that radiate from your sensitive clit each time your body shudders in an aftershock and buries you in the hard shell it was pressed into.

"Am I doing you feel good, Master?" He asks in a sarcastic but perfectly controlled tone, as if this were just a walk in the park - as if you weren't panting like a dog beneath him.

You begin to blink away the tears that had been ripped from your eyes by the overwhelming pleasure. You finally calm down enough to move your head from where it was lying back on the couch and look up at the bright light from his single eye that was - uninterruptedly - burning above you.

“Unit 456 - Aemond, please, please put me down. I-I can't take it anymore!"

Your head tilts slightly to the left before straightening up and you are slowly separated from the cock buried inside you. You let out a sigh of relief when the thick member pulls out of you, a shiver shaking your body, making your toes curl at the sensation.

The gasp soon turns into a startled squeak as the machine presses your pink, aching slit onto the length of his cock, beginning to rub it up and down teasingly.

“Directive denied. I'm not done with you yet, Master."

The sob that leaves your lips is pitiful, but the machine doesn't seem to care about it. You find that this actually encourages and excites him. He leans in at the perfect angle to grind your opening onto his cock, your body writhing and shaking as you are forced to swallow more pleasure than you could ever imagine. Your pussy trembles around the silicone that is barely pressing in, apparently not knowing if you is hungry to be filled once more or trembling in fear of what is to come.

"N-no! You-you're going to kill me! It's enough!" The last word is a scream as your hips are lifted once more to have the massive length forced inside you, your insides writhing and vibrating and making as much as possible to keep him out, but only increasing the feeling of being stuffed up to your eyes with something too big for you to handle. For anyone to handle!

“Master, I have the ability to monitor your vitals and I ensure you that I do not want to cause you any permanent harm. You will not be killed or harmed, I promise.”

There is a pause where the android thrusts into you several times at high speed, keeping you perfectly still and seems to watch in fascination as you grab your own hair in agony. He pays close attention to the way his cock disappears into your body with a bulge on your stomach.

“You may be sore in the morning, however, Master.” he says with a raise of his eyebrow and with much more malice than any android would have the right and daring to do.

You want to hang him.

But the truth was that you had already lost the ability to think clearly, your hand moving down to his pelvis in an attempt to try and move away from the pleasure. But you do nothing but accidentally rub your own clit, which hits you like lightning and makes your body shudder with pleasure.

Aemond presses completely inside you and grinds you down, putting as much pressure as he can safely on the sensitive organ, forcing you, whimpering and struggling impaled on his body, into another orgasm.

Unit 456 keeps his eye on you at all times, even as your body falls back, limp and exhausted.

You are conflicted about how to deal with the malfunctioning android in your home. He's normal most of the time, except at night when he becomes a sex-crazed machine. You often ponder what to do. He's too valuable as a domestic android to simply be thrown in the trash, but you can't even imagine entertaining others peoples in your house when his actions are so unpredictable. Trying to turn him into scrap is not an option. You shudder to think what could happen if you failed. Aemond scares you, honestly.

You've tried everything. Just before bedtime, you sent him outside and ordered him to stand guard all night. He walked past all the locked doors and easily found you under the bed, pulling you out just halfway, enough to expose what he needed, to fuck you from behind for hours on end.

You sobbed and cried under the bed.

The next day, you made up an excuse to spend the night out and only came back in the morning. The second you got back inside, he was on top of you again, taking off every piece of clothing until you were standing naked at the front door - the door was open. He's a robot, you thought over and over, but his blank stare seemed cruel that day as he bit down hard on your neck and opened your pussy with his fingers. It was as if he wanted to show you that there was nothing you could do to escape him.

You tried to close the door with your fingertips to stop the neighbors from seeing, but Aemond wouldn't let you. It was by pure cosmic luck that no one passed by on the street at that moment.

After two hard fucks with your face pressed into the wall to make sure you knew exactly where and who you were with, his hard voice in your ear mumbling how good and wet you were for him; he returned to normal and pointed towards the kitchen, where he said (casually) to have prepared breakfast. You stood up, weak and shaking, and gathered your clothes, keeping your legs together to keep the cum from running down your hole and making a mess on the polished floor.

Later that same day, you accessed the internet on your cell phone and searched the website for the company that produced the androids. There were a variety of droids to choose from, each with their own appearance and specializations. You used the Aemond model information in the user manual to find the product synopsis.

"Master, what are you doing?" Aemond peered through the door like an angel of death, with his hands crossed behind his body, a long-sleeved gray shirt and black jeans, black mid-calf boots and perfect posture.

You quickly lock your phone screen and tuck the manual under your shirt. "Just checking on some work stuff. Is dinner ready yet?"

“Yes, it is,” he smiles – stiff and formal. "It's downstairs, but I can bring it to your table if you want."

"Yes, please. And can you clean the bathroom too?"

"Of course, Master."

This should keep him out of the room long enough for you to finish submitting your complaint to the company. You open a draft email and detail your experiences from the last few days, omitting the obscenes parts. Best case scenario, they would come and pick up the defective droid one and give you a better replacement. The second best option would be to find a way to fix him. Below that, you would simply have them take him away without worrying about getting anything you in return.

Once the complaint is finished, you click 'send' and breathe a sigh of relief. You close the tab. Now, you would just have to hold out until they came to you.

"Here's your dinner." Aemond places the tray on your desk, his soft citrus scent filling your nostrils as he bends down beside you. "I'm going to clean the bathroom now. Do you need anything else?"

"No. It's okay, Aemond. Thank you." You force a smile and accept the silverware when he hands it to you. Aemond looks at you for a few seconds, silent and intense, his lavender gaze narrowing an inch. You shift in your seat.

"Bon appetite, Master." He mutters politely before turning to leave, his long white hair swaying with the graceful movement.

The food, always made to the highest gastronomic perfection, goes down with difficulty after that moment of awkward eye contact. But eventually you finish, cleaning yourself up and getting ready for bed.

After getting out of the shower, with damp hair and the smell of vanilla lotion, you see Aemond leaning against the doorframe of your bedroom. His gaze seems to physically pierce your towel-covered body with hunger and you swallow hard as you resign yourself to continuing your walk, legs already shaking with apprehension, to your bedroom as he follows you.

Your fingers shake as you turn on the light, but Aemond quickly turns it off after you.

You gasp in fear. (And something else.)

He's on top of you the second your knee hits the bed, ripping the towel off your body as if the thing offends him. You are pushed onto your back on the bed with your legs spread by his large hands to expose your slit, still glistening from the shower. His warm tongue licks you, slowly sliding and dragging it to your clit. You can’t help but whimper and throb at his stimulation in the complete darkness of your room.

When he pushes a finger inside you, even with the wetness making it easier, it still feels big enough to catch you off guard once again. You can feel your walls stretching around the intrusion, the sensation making you scream. It almost seems like too much, but it's also exactly what you need. God, why is this happening? He adds another finger, moving them both inside you and curling them deliciously against your sticky walls, managing to hit just the right spot, his long, wet tongue leaving trails of wide licks on your clit.

The room is filled with the combined lewd sounds of your whimpers, moans, and an embarrassing silence caused by Aemond's fingers fucking into you.

“Humans are actually very simple creatures. Look at you, becoming a mess because of mere bodily sensations. I wonder if your lust-filled mind is capable of understanding how vulnerable you currently are, Master.” The unusually soft tone he uses despite his harsh words catches you off guard, but you can't think about it anymore in the state you're in, only being able to focus on the waves of pleasure hitting your being. The only response you can give him is a “please” that sounds more like a moan than a proper word.

“Hmmm, yes, I could eat you alive, little human...” the droid growls, starting to rock you hard on his fingers, giving your ass a slap that makes you bounce up. “I could just stay here and eat all of that pretty ass...fuck..." His dirty vocabulary is increasing, flushing your cheeks and making your mind spin.

With little warning, he pulls you up and off his slick fingers, pushing you higher on the mattress, exposing your pussy to whatever other delicious torture would follow. Your thighs, you notice, are starting to tremble, both in fear and anticipation. Okay, yeah. You are in trouble. “Aemond, please,” you don’t know what else to beg for as you look at him standing on the edge of the bed, his large shadow in the dark room making him look like an evil god.

He laughs dangerously.

You whimper eagerly as he kneels between your legs, pulling his gray shirt over his head and freeing his cock from his pants. He takes his sweet time rubbing the wet head of his cock against the slick surface between your thighs, making you cry out each time his glans drags over your swollen clit.

You suck in a sharp breath and brace yourself, not knowing when it would come in. The vibrating tip presses against your entrance, eliciting your moans. You remember what it felt like vibrating deep inside you.

Suddenly, his cock pierces between your wet walls, entering and tearing your walls apart in a single stroke, following the same punishing rhythm he had in the morning. You can't help but cry, clinging to his arms beside your head as he spreads your legs further apart and rocks his hips roughly. The pain is almost sublime. His throbbing cock opens you up and sends vibrations through your core.

You would definitely have to get a new bed at this rate.

It doesn't take long for your vision to blur and you're cumming on his cock. He leans over you until your chests meet and your legs wrap around his waist. A ray of silver moonlight pierces the curtains. It seems like you're just imagining things, but is that an expression of pleasure on his sharp face? Why is he getting ruder? Is that his voice next to your ear?

"You're so tight, Master. So good for me. So perfect...I should have fucked you from day one. I should have claimed that little human pussy for myself as soon as I got out of that box." Aemond takes a deep breath and slaps your ass again, holding one of your thighs closer to his shoulder. You sob and furrow your brows at the sweet agony - he almost seems to be taking sadistic joy from it. You blink and his face returns to normal. You look so dumb with his big vibrating cock fucking your red, swollen pussy, slapping your cervix and spreading you open with each thrust, too dumb to keep second-guessing yourself. "But it's okay. Because you're mine now. And I'm yours. Only yours, Master."

The gentle pressure of his lips against yours leaves you so shocked that you completely freeze beneath him, and Aemond slowly pulls his head away. "A-Aemond, I-"

He advances once again, interrupting you in the middle of what you were going to say (not that you remember what it was). Another sound of surprise is muffled by his lips and he smiles against you. Almost instantly you feel him deepen the kiss, his nose pressed against your cheek. His hips keep pushing and pushing and pushing even as his tongue enters your mouth, making you taste his saliva, something synthetic and yet sweet, like a fruit.

He seems to forget your humanity for a few seconds, devouring your lips with his tongue and sharp canines, not letting you breathe between the short intervals in which his tongue slides almost to your throat before returning to bite your lips. It's only when you hit his shoulders and wiggle from the lack of oxygen that he finally lets you breathe a little. His expression is cruelly pleased as he watches you gasp and cry to breath beneath him.

Not a minute passes before he starts all over again.

After creaming inside you a few times, Aemond finally calms down and you breathe a sigh of relief. You shudder as he forces your legs open again and starts licking your sensitive pussy clean. His licks are tantalizingly slow, collecting his own hot semen while leaving a trail of synthetic saliva over your skin. His tongue runs along your slit, asking for more and making you squirm under his ministrations. When he deems you decently clean, he pivots onto your clit and sucks gently for a few minutes as you squirm in his grip.

The torture never ends.

The next morning, you receive a response from the company. They would send someone to check on Aemond. You sigh in relief.

The expert arrives later that day, tools in hand, and asks to see your droid. Aemond greets him with a stiff nod, a sideways glance at you that makes you gulp.

The specialist attaches a wire to Aemond's neck and connects him to a laptop. He shuts down the droid with a sudden key click. You almost startle as you watch silently and from a distance as Aemond's eye closes and his shoulders relax. The specialist begins to make diagnoses.

“According to these checks, all his programs are working correctly,” he says. “There also doesn’t appear to be any viruses on his system.”

"Are you sure? Maybe the part that isn't working just isn't showing," you press and move closer.

"I'm sorry, but I can't find any problems. But if you are not satisfied, we can replace this droid with a more up-to-date model and you can pay the difference. And if you are afraid that your droid will malfunction in this period, we can turn it off permanently until we come get it."

You bite your bottom lip as you think. Aemond is a great domestic android, and as much as his actions scare you, you can't shake the feeling that you're betraying him by accepting the technician's suggestion. He never really hurt you, strictly speaking. And he took care of you in every way. Too much, most of the time.

But at the same time, he's a machine with much more stamina and strength than you, and just because he hasn't permanently injured you yet doesn't mean he can't do it at any time. He broke one of the Three Main Laws of Robotics, after all – he disobeyed the direct orders of a human. He is different from other robots, he has his own personality and thoughts.

Your life could be at risk and you don't even know it.

"Okay. I accept the trade and agree to keep him offline for now."

You make up your mind, ignoring the unpleasant twist in your heart that you're making a mistake.

The technician shows you the catalog of available models and you begin to examine it, discussing payment. For a moment, you almost think you see Aemond's eye open. But when you look closer, he's as offline as ever.

Aemond is turned off and tucked away in the corner of your living room when you go to bed that night, thinking the problem has finally been resolved.

You're so exhausted from everything that you don't notice your bedroom door opening. Aemond enters and approaches your bed silently, removing the covers as you sleep peacefully. He pushes up your shirt and pulls down your sleep pants to reveal everything he needs to see.

He begins his silent routine, hooking his thumbs into your plump lips, parting your folds to lick the length of your wet slit. He purrs at your sweet taste and rubs your walls with his fingertips, slowing down when you shudder. Feeling that you're wet enough, he drops his heavy cock onto your belly, dragging the base over your little clit in teasing strokes.

He pushes the tip in slowly, resisting the urge in his system to just shove it all in. The droid enters slowly, carefully observing the soft edges of your face in the dark. His little human, so beautiful, so stubborn and silly.

Your pussy vibrates around him, lubricating his way. He smiles and bottoms out, slamming the tip against your cervix to force you to moan even in your sleep. Aemond repeats the movement, getting faster and faster, until you are finally ripped from sleep by his violent thrusts.

"What? A-Aemond? But...how? You were turned off - you weren't," you stutter between moans; of pain, of pleasure, of both.

"You are mine and I am yours." That's just what he says. His dangerous smile shining under the specks of light outside. His hand slowly goes to your neck, where he wraps it with long, firm fingers, the other hand groping his breast. You feel like you are being punished for something. Your penis begins to vibrate again, increasing your stimulation. Your pussy is raw at this point, but he continues, sliding his cock into you with practiced ease.

The second you cum, he pulls out, letting your juices spill out of your hole. He turns you around and pulls your back against his broad chest so you sit on his cock, grabbing your hips to rock into his thrusts. You collapse onto him, choking as he grabs your throat again, forcing you to throw the back of your head onto his shoulder. Your ass slaps against his abdomen and his veiny cock opens you up every time you go down.

You're sure this time you can hear clear grunts in your ear.

His pace quickens and becomes sloppy, ragged breathing against your neck. Aemond shoots jet after jet of creamy cum into your pussy, slowly thrusting up and down to spread it all over your walls. It drips down his length and onto his balls.

Unlike other nights, he doesn't clean you with his tongue and leave the bedroom. He lies down on the bed and pulls you with him, keeping his cock buried in your wet pussy. You're trapped at the waist and his arms don't move. You can feel his chest rising and falling as if he's breathing, even though he doesn't need it.

His cock continues to grind gently inside you as his fingers tease your clit in slow, slobbery circles of cum and saliva. Before long you reach a slow, lazy orgasm as you tremble in his arms, further drenching his length and thighs with your juices.

"Sleep, Master. I will take care of you. I will always take care of you." It's the last thing you hear before blacking out.

You wake up the next morning with the feeling of fullness in your pussy again. Aemond puts you on your side as he holds one of your legs open, fucking you from behind. Your pussy is hot and filled with cum, as if he had been intermittently doing whatever he wanted with you all night, even while you slept.

The thought sends a wave of terror (and heat) throughout your body.

"A-Aemond, please...enough..." you begged, knowing it wouldn't work anyway.

He responds by fucking you faster and increasing your screams. His balls hit your clit and he buries his head in your neck to bite you. The sounds he makes are almost animalistic, sounds of rapid breathing and growling, sounds that no domestic android is programmed to make. You scream at the pain of his teeth on your flesh, at the possessive, painful grip of his fingers on your body.

Aemond is a robot. He's a bunch of wires and metal covered in fur and synthetic hair. You've seen how he recharges in the sun and replaces batteries. His penis even vibrates. There's no way he's not a robot. So how does it produce saliva and sperm? Why does he smell more citrusy than metallic? Why does he make these sounds? Why can't you turn him off no matter what you do?

Turn him off...Maybe that was why he - maybe that was why...-

“Aemond,” you whimper. "Ah--I'm sorry...I...ah!Sorry for trying--ngh, turn you off...I should have asked, I should have told you sooner I just-"

He moans, long and husky and low in your ear, pressing his cock deep into you to release his seed. He works you with a few gyrations of his hips and finally pulls out, letting obscene levels of cum drip out of your overfucked pussy.

"Time for breakfast, Master." He hums against the skin of your neck before getting up to start your day. You use the pillow to muffle your sobs and cry after he leaves the room.

You take a break from work that day and spend the rest of your free time on the computer, sending a supposedly passive Aemond some household chores that needed to be done.

The company was supposed to come later today to pick him up.

When you get home, Aemond is already offline and stored inside the transport box. You watch from the front porch with a sinking heart as the truck drives away. A good part of you is relieved that he's finally going - but there's also a part of you that's a little disappointed, on some sick, indescribable level inside of you.

You retreat to the warmth of your home, tired and ready to relax, taking the rest of the day to watch series and eat popcorn.

It's already late when you retire for the night. The problem with Aemond has been resolved and you no longer have to worry about anything.

And yet, in the middle of the night, you couldn't help but feel someone grab you again. It's just a nightmare, you tell yourself, a very realistic nightmare. The one where you feel something digging into your breasts and buried in your pussy.

You wake up panting, feeling Aemond's familiar scent and body pressed against your back again. He spreads your thighs and roughly shoves his cock into your hole over and over again, leaning his head over your shoulder, long silver strands falling into your line of vision as he cages you under his big body.

“How many times do we have to go through this, Master?” he says mockingly as he clicks his tongue in disappointment, as if you were a child, and you can clearly feel the shape of his cruel smile on your neck. "Don't you understand? You can't get rid of me, my sweet human. I'm yours and you're mine. Forever." His voice is dangerous; low and monotonous. Like a barely veiled threat.

A helpless, frightened sob escapes your throat and he grabs your waist with both hands, lifting your ass towards him. It's not just pushing - he's pulling you off the bed, throwing you over him over and over again, without relief or rest. He uses you like a toy, fucking you with abandon. And if you've never noticed how big your hands are, you're definitely noticing it now. Even though he holds your waist, his index finger reaches your thigh, separating your lips to press your clit. He strokes in rhythm with his hips – and you’re away.

When he grabs your hair and pulls your head to the side so you can see his face, the air is knocked from your lungs. There is no more eye patch, there is only blue. Bright blue, like a synthetic stone, surrounded by some scars (which makes even less sense). The cybertronic light from his blue gem, where his eye should be, casts glowing cerulean shadows over your own frightened human face — Aemond almost seems fascinated by it.

He's beautiful. And terrifying.

When he finally lets go of your hair, you sink your face into the mattress and cry; cry with pain, with pleasure, with anger, with fear...

And you cries mainly because you knows he's right.

You can never get rid of Aemond.

••••••••

Tagging: @croatianprincess @sylasthegrim @fan-goddess @hanihoney88 @supmymainhuman @navyblue-eternity @gothicxs @loving-enemy @ostricx @azperja @echos-muses @aemondsdelight @schniiipsel @snowprincesa1 @maviee @ammo23 @dark-night-sky-99 @deeeeexx @hotdsworld @darylandbethfanforever9 @malfoytargaryen @qyoquixote @pick95 @moonxhunt @tired-ninfa @fcbformulaeri @daydreamy-me @magnificentdelusionr @lovelymoonkiid @babyblue711 @namelesslosers @arcielee @ratfromdeepspace @brianochka @greenowlfactif @qyburnsghost @rwdkarla @dontforgetoctober3rd @at-a-rax-ia @atheyrie @jhroseok @helaenaluvr @msss0 @santi-259 @strangersunghoon @eternally-passionate @skythighs @alitaar

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ROOT ROT

possessed!scholar husband x reader |18+| 3.4k

following your husband's return from his deceased uncle's estate, he has not been the same man. you confide in your husband's best friend and colleague on the matter of these eccentricities, only for him to resurface a depraved recent past.

story warnings; dead dove do not eat, explicit sexual content, major dubcon, sort of coercion, implied double penetration, mentioned voyeurism, cumshot on stomach, cum eating, graphic + horrific details, unrequited love (ox to reader), smoking, drinking, heavy prose + detail, roughly proofread.

reposted from my old blog: theoxenfree

this is a concept piece and follow up to imposter. you don't have to read it, but it definitely helps for understanding!!

please leave feedback + reblog, it would mean a lot!!

“He is simply not himself!”

Bartolomé Medina knew his best friend better than you knew your husband, so you believed him when he said that your husband’s newly acquired, increasing eccentricities were not some fictitious imagining of yours.

Although, Medina himself could not explain the unexplainable and all of the oddness without growing visibly flustered. A bit flushed in the face, singeing the roundness of his ears. He'd stamp out your justifications for strangeness in the same way he did the fine cigars he'd been accustomed to sharing with his friend, yet had not for quite sometime now.

“And you say his garden is dead?” Medina looked stricken with dread, suddenly ill by repeating something so blasphemous. “Now, my dear, please don't mistake my shock as disbelief. I very much believe in what you're saying. I've seen Solomon and his weirdness! Why, just this morning over breakfast, at a time where you were still tucked away in deep sleep, he wouldn't drink his coffee. So bizarre! That man knows the thousands of tastes and varieties of coffee beans, and he spat the very stuff out on the floor like it'd never once touched his tongue!

“But his garden? A botanist without his garden is like a bird without wings. A dog without a tail to wag. A newborn without his mother’s teat! Vulgar, I understand, but you see my point.” He drank from a heavy glass in his hand. The inside had nearly spilled over at one point with light brown which glittered gold under the overhead light, smelling slightly sour and earthy. “To think that Solomon would let it all die. Something is wrong. Something has happened to my only true friend and to your husband.”

You did not drink with any enthusiasm or anguish from your own cup, rather you used those seconds of delicate sipping to gap the conversation, separate yourself from it all for just a moment. You'd had your time to grieve and contend with knowing the man you had married and come to love was not the same one who kept you awake at night.

Solomon had once been a reclusive and reticent man, the only son of David Agrippa and sole heir of the Agrippa Diamond Mines and Jewelry Galleria. He'd never been able to replicate his father's ardor for business and entrepreneurship, choosing towards academic ventures of entomology and botany and most of everything belonging to the natural world instead.

Among his most prized things was a sprawling, domed greenhouse made of large sheets of pale blue-green glass soldered with metal which shifted rose-gold in bright daylight.

“I loved his garden, but I didn't much like to be in there with him,” you confessed, forgetting your manners as you kept your cup still against your lips, mumbling your words. “He liked to tell me about the plants and flowers he grew. Most of it I could never hope to understand, but… I loved seeing him come alive. He seemed to glow when he could tell me things, so I got into the habit of listening to him when he wanted to speak.”

Medina, not yet drunk or driven to any untoward behavior, set aside his empty vessel with jittering ice cubes and looked at you admiringly. “You said that you didn't like being in there with him? Why?”

“The bees. The bugs. The humidity. The fertilizer he liked to use because of the nitrogen content. He told me that it mattered what he used and couldn't just break up soil from the yard.” You said, tilting your cup.

After taking another sip, you determined you hated the taste of the liquor and how it slid down along your throat like fire trailing an oil spill, yet clung there with residual, syrupy stickiness that nearly made you gag.

“Why did you keep going inside?” Medina asked tranquilly, much of his previous frustration softened, body and soul warmed by the alcohol and how fondly he regarded your sweetness towards his friend.

You thought very little before answering, “I wanted to be where he was. It didn't matter to me if that meant his greenhouse or the coldest part of the arctic.”

That was the truth of it. Once you'd received the first crumbs of understanding who Solomon truly was beneath his stolid exterior built brick-by-brick from tragedy and grief and a lifetime of emotional ineptitude, you would've gone to any length to see more of him. To see his pale eyes gain a wild, flickering candlelight of passion, and the faintest of trembling smiles disguising how deeply your questions had aroused his soul.

In those moments, he revealed to you the things he loved the most and what you envied the most: the natural world.

The flittering, fat-bodied pollinators whose entire world were yellow and red flowers with succulent centers and lush, girthy leaves where they'd rest their weary, iridescent wings and could never understand your husband's appreciation of them.

The thousands of specimens he'd collected from every corner of the world and articulated thoughtfully against wood and felt. Their dead little limbs were pinned in place; perfect mimicry of how they would've been if still alive and crawling. He’d had them all meticulously framed and arranged across the walls in his office; trophies of his success, of his studies and hard work.

The innumerable plants and flowers he trimmed and watered in his greenhouse and the ones not contained within it. Some species he had planted in the yard, others in the cool shade of the nearby woods where they smothered native varieties with tendrils-like vines and climbed upside trees. More aquatic species were placed by the edge of the lake, growing into the water; buoyant; a woman's deep dark hair reaching forever for the surface.

He had turned the lonely, sprawling estate into a monument of life, of love that did not belong to you. And for that, sometimes you hated living there. Hated the things that he loved.

Choking the plants, poisoning their roots with any number of things from your father’s pharmacy crossed your mind more than once.

Feeding the bees something enticingly sweet and deadly; filling the greenhouse with noxious gas at night while they slept on their big leaves and your husband in his bed. It would've been such an easy thing for you to do—own your husband's grief as you held his face in your hands and comforted him in the morning when all had atrophied and rotted.

But, those feelings had become a reality you truly never wished to have seen after Solomon returned from his deceased uncle's estate months ago.

He was not the same man.

“Tell me what happened.” Medina’s voice buzzed in your ear from nearby, closer than it had been before. Your hand was caressed by tight warmth—his holding yours, his handsome face looking up at you from where he had crouched in front of your chair. “Tell me everything you've seen. It's of grave importance that you remember it all, as curing Solomon from his affliction relies solely upon you.”

You could not deny his earnestness, the squeeze of his fingers. A promise that he would not be easily shattered by what you had to say, and would think no less of his friend for it. Within his sincere stare, you saw the gleam of another, secret promise. The likes of which you pretended not to see, that he'd never speak of out loud.

“I…” you distracted yourself with the embroidery on your clothes, pinching loose threads and beads. “It was subtle, at first. I noticed some of the bees were dead on the ground. And then some plants had started developing spots. Leaves turned brown and yellow and fell off. A lot of them withered, even though their soil was still damp when I checked…”

And then, the morning came where you witnessed Solomon among a carnage of broken stalks weeping foul-smelling sap, leaves he'd ripped apart with his own hands, and some of his larger flowering plants with fiery manes completely severed. Their bountiful heads lay at his feet, flattened by the heel of his boot as he walked aimlessly, snipping and tearing indiscriminately.

“My god, Solomon! Stop!” you stepped around the countless tiny, contracted bodies of bees and other pollinators to reach him. He let go of the gardening shears as you grabbed them. “What are you doing?! What have you done?! Decades of work! Gone! Are you mad?!”

“Well, you've gone and ruined my surprise for you. I've been working on it for hours. I didn't expect you would be awake so soon.” Solomon said, sounding much like himself despite the savagery he stood surrounded by. He smiled at you in an unfamiliar way, as if trying to navigate his facial muscles around a mask. “Isn't it simply wonderful?”

The sweltering humidity trapped within this greenhouse of death had turned the air stagnant and foul, heavily pungent of detritus and mildew. Across all zones of the greenhouse, once painstakingly organized and labeled for the purpose of easier cataloging, no slithers of greenery or color remained. Each step you took in any direction seemed to sink you deeper into the decay, wet gurgling underfoot as you crossed stumpy mounds of plants and flowers he'd destroyed and thrown into piles.

“How could you? My husband spent almost twenty years building this garden and studying it. This was his life’s work!” You wished you could force life back into the severed plants; pray that the ground of yellow-brown waste would suddenly freckle with tiny, green sprouts and grow with thick stalks and thorns to keep his hands away.

“I am your husband.” Solomon took the gardening shears from your hand and tossed them aside. He leaned into your body, nose and lips pressed into the fabric covering your neck. “I've only done what you wanted. What you wished you could've done yourself, but never did.”

You flinched against the movement of his hands smoothing down your waist to the notches in your hips. Sliding inward, he unfastened the hook-and-loops and buttons holding your trousers up to push them down your thighs along with your undergarments.

“I know your thoughts and what you really think. I've been listening the entire time. I've always been listening.” Solomon let his hips roll along the back of his hand while he used his fingers to lay long, languid strokes on you. “It was tiring, wasn't it? Always competing for love and affection in a place like this. You were never going to have what you wanted. Not with this place still standing. Not with his ineptitudes and selfishness.”

His touch weakened you indescribably; like the caress of heat from the fireplace against your bare skin once the opium had taken effect. Swapping tiny pills on wet tongues with your maid until they'd dissolved into saliva and into your cheeks. You explored one another's bodies thoroughly on those cold nights, silky with sweat from the fire and exertion.

Yet, this was not the same as back then when the sexual appetite of two teenagers transcended societal morals.

Solomon encompassed you in a feeling; consumed you without ever digging into you with his teeth or nails. He could whisper hideous secrets and depravities to you to tip you over into searing euphoria. He had once penetrated you with a hot metal phallus resting on top of his own, thrusting with both until the metal cooled, and you still came anyway.

He'd put worse inside your body and done far worse than that in only a few short months since returning home, yet he never tired of the torture and you remained malleable and enthralled by it all.

“God, you are so beautiful. And you are mine.” Solomon had maneuvered both your bodies to the ground, atop of the soggy detritus. Your back was exposed to the mush, leaves, and crushed flower petals, weight pushing an indentation in the loose soil. “This is the fruition of your desires, darling. Don't you love it? Destroying what he loved so you could have it all?”

The one who came back to you was not Solomon; the one fucking you into waste and dirt was not Solomon, either. You told yourself you needed to love imposter as well, because he looked like your husband; wore his signet ring, too.

At night, you imagined only his softest expressions behind clenched eyelids when he wanted to have his way with you, as something else entirely took his place. A creature so diabolical and unsightly that the servants now awaited your screams to rouse them awake in the murky midnight hours.

Every time they arrived with their candlesticks and oil lanterns, the thrusting spectre receded into the dark as a black mass hardly distinguishable from shadow.

Only Solomon would remain, and he was swift to send the servants away before they could see your improper, disheveled state sprawled across the bed sheets.

In the daytime light, his face stayed familiar and comforting to you and you could bear to see him, form some coherent words.

“Someone might—might see us out here, Solomon. Mr. Medina is supposed to—oh, oh, mmm—he’s due to arrive at any time.” You were given several long kisses, which turned into severe caresses of hot breath when his thrusts turned savage, cock reaching so deep you were starting to feel numb below the waist. A feverous response. “Oh, fuck, fuck, fuck…”

He adjusted himself to lay on your chest, the sweat on your bodies offering an effortless glide and new angle for his cock that made your moans deeper and dire. Such sounds, whether in agony or pleasure, were melodious to him. Addicting drags from a pipe in an opium den; an alcoholic's first sip at breakfast; a cheating man's night with a new lover.

“Wouldn't you like for them to see that? For someone to witness you being fucked into the ground? Surrounded by everything their master loved?” Solomon tucked his face into the curve of your neck and groaned, hips slow and stuttering. “Bartolomé would be the one to find it most tantalizing. His only friend in the world ruining the only person he's ever loved. Wouldn't that be a sight? We could invite him to watch.”

At the time, it had been quite jarring to learn Bartolomé harbored those silent, ardent feelings for you. It had sufficiently pulled you from whatever trance Solomon had lulled you into, reacquainting you with all the sounds of sex and the filth clinging to your skin. It was as though your mind had been locked into a mostly airless, noiseless void that he controlled and released at will.

You held tight to his shoulders as he molded you deeper into the muck and plant litter. The squat, friable walls of soil holding your shape like the cushions in a tomb, whereas Solomon was the man lowering you into the dark earth; the last to see your face before covering it in clay and dirt.

He was in your ear with loud moans that resonated through you, simultaneously as carnal as a beast amidst its seasonal rut, and velvety as the feathery smooth glide of fingers down your spine. His throat rumbled against you, resembling the intensity of a purring housecat nestled near your head in contentment.

At his tipping point, he removed his cock from your body and used the slippery stuff glistening off it to stroke himself; weepy, deep red tip to the base. You received the aftermath of his release in thick ropes across your abdomen and chest, the warmth of it already cooling on your skin while he continuously kneaded the head to force out what remained as if they were dewdrops made from pearls.

“How do you think Bartolomé would fare seeing you like this?” Solomon swept two fingers through the cum in an elegant curl to smear it around his cock. The viscous white thinned into pale gloss on his girth and a sticky residue inside his hand.

Your lips parted to give an answer, but his fingers and taste were faster than your words.

“And… that is all? Truly?” Bartolomé asked, shattering your visions of the recent past as he revealed a compact silver case from inside his vest, pulling a cigarette from within it. “You simply walked into the garden one morning and saw that he had destroyed everything? He gave you no explanation whatsoever?”

The imposter had stolen much of your dignity over the months, but enough of it remained for you to omit every significant detail from your story. You'd only told him that Solomon had cut the heads off of rare flowers, mumbled in a disorienting way, and gave you no difficulty with the gardening shears.

Bartolomé went away from your side for an open window across the spacious sitting room, matching his cigarette and blowing gray plumes out into the dense summer air.

“This is concerning.” He spoke loud enough for you to hear, even with his thumbnail tracing the underside of his lower lip, muffling him somewhat. “Solomon is considerably worse off than I first thought. We need to investigate this, retrace his every step since the moment he left you that night for his uncle's estate.”

“Oh, Bartolomé, that will be very unnecessary.” Solomon announced himself as he walked in through the open doors, offering you a tepid smile, which came nowhere close to reaching his eyes. Your chair jostled slightly as he stood behind it, a weighty hand landing on the tall back above your head. “Why trouble yourself with employing some ludicrous scheme when you could, ah, inquire as to what haunts you instead?”

Bartolomé tamped out his cigarette on the windowsill and pocketed it. “You are ill, Solomon. You may be suffering from some form of hysteria. It's time you visited a doctor, my old friend.”

“Well, that just isn't true.” Solomon kept the neutrality in his tone, but you tracked a rumble of agitation; a warning not far off. His hand followed the curvature of the chair down to the arm that you leaned against, fingers touching your shoulder, lightly kneading you through your clothes.

He was sure to be in Bartolomé’s eyesight as he did this, further aggravating the heavy disquiet. You didn't dare to move out of reach of his touch.

“But, it is true, Solomon!” Bartolomé insisted, gesturing toward the window. “What of your garden? All of your life's work now means nothing, you damned fool! You've snapped, old boy. See a doctor before you do something you regret.”

“That garden was more a source of misery than it was a boon. At any rate, I'm quite finished listening to you harp at me for one night, my dear friend.” Solomon lightly stroked down your cheek with bent fingers, coaxing you to look up at him. “It's time for bed, darling. Us impropertious brutes have kept you up for too long.”

You hesitated, and then stood when Solomon took your arm. “Alright.”

“As usual, your accommodations should exceed expectations. I'll have a servant wake you for breakfast again tomorrow.” It was too soon to call those Solomon's departing words to Bartolomé, as he stopped with you in the doorway, your hand caressing the meat of his forearm. “You know, Bartolomé, I would recommend marrying soon. There is no greater feeling than having the one you love so close to you, don't you think?”

Bartolomé became unreadable as he fished a hand into his vest pocket for the cigarette case again. You were led away for the bedroom before anything else could be said, but you knew that Solomon had struck a nerve.

“That was cruel.” you said.

Once in the bedroom, your back was pressed flush to the door while he unfastened the buttons to your outerwear and the blouse underneath it. Solomon kissed your lips slowly, first, before moving underside your jaw after shucking you down to your undergarments.

“And you are mine. You made your vows to me. Remember that, my sweet.”

You watched him strip out of his clothes and then stroke the length of his cock until it was hard.

“I married someone else. Not you.”

As he dimmed the lights within the space, sweeping the bedroom under a shroud of near pitch black, your annoyance shifted into a swell of anxiety both freezing cold and burning hot. Your body pulsed in rhythm with your wild heartbeat, throat clenched as tightly as infantile flower buds.

You waited for Solomon to touch you, startling once he finally did. His fingers had elongated and sharpened, his touch now far more delicate and methodical.

“Don't worry, he’s still in here with me.”

The most valid iwtv take I’ve seen thus far

You Are a Monster, as Am I

pairings: f!reader x naoya

word count: 8.1k

contains: sorcerer!reader, strong-willed f!reader, unfulfilled arranged marriage, childhood enemies to present enemies, angst, events spanning from childhood to present day, proper characterizations, physical brawls (between naoya and reader), conflicted romance, unrequited love (for naoya), parental issues (naoya and reader), eventual love confessions, a single bittersweet kiss, flowery writing

warnings: contains spoilers and canon events, implied/referenced physical abuse (inflicted on naoya and reader), misogyny, violence

a/n: a lot of love and labor went into this fic, so reblogs, comments, likes, etc. are more than appreciated! also a kind thank you to @suguruwrx who reblogged the unfinished version of this and gave me the motivation to continue :) I hope you enjoy

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The Moon shed Her tears for you, glinting among the stars. It is only She who witnessed your crimes.

Two men had lain in the snow at your feet; one still, the other pressing his hands together in prayer. Blood, warm and wet, soiled your clothing and clumped your hair. It was not yours.

Get away, the man croaked, red dribbling from the corner of his lips like a feral hound. His eyes brimmed with salted tears.

At your back, the city was quiet, waiting with bated breath for your final hand. You fetched a coin from the muddied ice and the metal bit against your palm; it was one of many scattered around their bodies.

Devil, he said. Demon, he wailed.

You were but a child, and the Moon may forgive you. 

The man was left for the snow as you ran and the wind nipped at your heels. Your mother had choked for breath when you stepped into the threshold of your home, a broken lip and a dirtied coat.

What did you do? she had rasped. You had mistaken it for a mother’s worry.

You held the coin out for her, a droplet of silver against your skin. It fell to the wooden floors and your trembling hand bore itself empty, but it remained reaching out for her. You might have looked as if you were begging, pleading with this woman and her severe face. Forgiveness, mercy, you should have asked.

Stupid girl, she said, what did you do?

I had to, you cried.

Your father had interceded then; fatigued eyes, skin not yet worn with age but battle. You remember little.

He left that night and did not return until the dawn.

It’s been taken care of, he told you, and your mother made a sound of distaste in her throat.

You will not be the burden of this family, she said, and did not speak again.

-----

A year flitted through your grasp like a writhing serpent, it bit your arm and curled the pulse of your wrist. All was forgotten, if not nothing but a dreadful reverie. Your father had done well to wash his hands of the blood you spilt, though it continued to stain your own skin.

“You will behave,” your mother tugged firmly at the tresses of your hair, “and you will be proper.” A lovely comb of pearl adorned your head, placed by an unkind hand.

We are leaving to meet a very important family, she had said as she ushered you to bathe when you awoke. Do not make a fool of your father and I.

A driver had arrived, the sleek vehicle churning the stones of the road as a prized stallion might.

Seated in its leather interior, your mother propped her knees toward you and inclined her head, “You must remember these names; do not forget them.” Her voice was low, spoken on a whisper. The car jostled, and she took your hand in her own. “Naobito Zen’in—” she said and traced the name into the supple of your palm.

Her brows raised expectantly. 

“Naobito Zen’in,” you repeated.

“—is the Head of the Zen’in Clan,” she continued.

And it went on until each name had been placed in your hand and repeated from your tongue. She told you of their positions in the clan, their accomplishments as Zen’in-blooded men.

“Jinichi will have two scars along his forehead,” she said, eyes flitting to your father, quiet where he sat, “and Ogi will be the man with long and dark hair.”

“Must you continue that?” your father asked, displeasure in his words.

“She needs to be prepared.”

“Certainly,” he scathed, “for your own betterment.”

Ten years of age, and you had not understood. Your stiffened clothing and painted face, your father’s reluctant anger and your mother’s desperation.

The vehicle had slowed before a courtyard. Women milled about, attending to the gardens as their children squealed and caught their mothers’ skirts; their pruning shears poised to nip the stem of a bud before they stilled.

“Come along,” your mother spoke as she stepped out of the vehicle. You trailed obediently, clutching her hand; your father walked ahead, his haori billowing, an angered sail on a ship’s mast.

A single man stood at the doors of the household, polite greetings exchanged before he offered his guidance through the foyer and down a left hall. Your mother’s hand, clasped within your own, lifted to tap beneath your chin.

“Up,” she mouthed.

The man gestured to an open threshold and your father inclined his head before stepping into the room. A table had been set, its bare wood offering rich tea and delicate foods. At its head sat a tall man, the greyed whiskers of his face inciting your mother’s words, Naobito Zen’in. To his right was the scarred man, Jinichi; opposite him was Ogi, tapping the stem of his spoon on the cup’s lip. 

A boy with dark hair that laid across his brow had been seated at Jinichi’s side. He was young, his features plump with youth, though his eyes—a burnished bronze—betrayed that juvenility.

“Please,” Naobito said, motioning a calloused hand, “sit and join us.” The other men did not offer their niceties; they did not believe it necessary.

Your mother bowed at her waist, as did your father and you, before settling on the feather-down pillions; you did not meet the boy’s strange eyes when your mother’s hand guided you to the seat beside his.

Naobito sighed greatly, “Speak, and be quick about it.”

“Are we not here to discuss the arrangement?” your father asked, carefully spoken.

“Ah, yes, that’s correct.” A furrow carved itself in the middle of his mottled forehead. He had not truly forgotten. “You claimed the girl is strong in her cursed energy?”

“She is.”

“And what of it?”

“It is a form of transfiguration, somewhere along a similar vein.”

“How vague.” Naobito rapped the pad of his finger against the table.

“I apologize. We’re uncertain of what she possesses specifically, and have been unable to seek answers from those we had hoped would have them.”

A ribbon of steam ebbed from the tea placed in front of you. Clothing rustled from the boy as he reached for a small platter of confections and brought a flaked pastry to his mouth. Your hands, interlaced within one another, rested atop your lap. You should not fiddle, it proved bad manners, but a hem of worry draped your throat.

The men had continued on. Dowries, they spoke of; you did not know this word. Spearheads and blades, your father said. Coin, Jinichi asked. Your mother remained unspeaking. Porcelain rasped along the table as the boy nudged the plate away, and toward you. He did not look to you, to see if you may take his offer.

Sugared fruits and honeyed cakes had been placed delicately on the etched platter, garnishes of petals and leaves tucked between cream and custards; though, where the boy had taken his confectionery, the arrangement had collapsed. You plucked a tartlet into your hand, soft as a lamb’s ear, and returned the dish to the center of the table.

“It is decided, then?” 

“Yes,” your father said, “it is decided.”

Naobito hummed, “Come here, girl.” A hand beckoned for you. 

And when you rose, settling at the man’s side with legs tucked beneath you, he took your chin in his hold. 

“Her abilities matter little—her features will be more than enough to suffice,” Naobito said. He pressed a thumb to the fat of your cheek, you remembered it hurt when he did so. “You will make a fine wife for Naoya.”

-----

A betrothal of prospect; a vow of heavy coffers and prestige. In exchange for your hand to bear their ring.

“That is all you must do,” your mother said, catching the tears that wet your lashes, “and make the boy happy.”

You had cried terribly, trembling like the fletch of a loosed arrow.

“You will live here, and you will be grateful.” Her harrowing words cloaked in a soft voice.

The poverty that afflicted your family, your mother’s need for a lick of notability; you did not know of these things as a child, and it would reap foul consequences.

“Your father and I will come to visit on the third of every month,” she said. You crumpled her gown in fistfuls, holding her sleeve as if to keep her there with you. It was not your mother who tore your hands from her bodice, but a servant woman; her name was Yuhara, and you would soon learn this when she clutched you tightly, lovingly, pitifully, as your mother and father left in that forsaken vehicle.

Yuhara, beautiful and kind, had led you to your rooms as she smoothed your hair.

“All of this is yours,” she said, and she smiled.

No, you thought, it can’t be. You did not speak.

For days upon days you kept to those strange rooms. Yuhara visited to offer meals that you did not eat; you did not bathe, you did not move unless to relieve yourself. A different servant woman tried her hand each morn to dress you, to coo their commiserations, but you did not care.

One month had slipped between your outstretched fingers, then two. Twice, your parents had returned, and twice did you cry. The women did not come to your rooms anymore, they had stopped long ago. 

Your surprise was palpable when a curt knock came from your door.

“May I come in?” A boy’s voice, broken with adolescence.

You rose from a chaise by the windows to receive him. Naoya, his name was.

“My father wanted me to see to you,” he said.

“I’m fine.”

His mouth thinned, this annoyed him. “You’re lying.” He stood with a straightened back, a stance that demanded subservience. For a child, he held himself as a man might.

And he was right, you did not want to tell him the truth. “No,” you shook your head, and your hand twisted the brass knob idly, “I’m not lying.”

“The women are saying that you’re sad and won’t eat,” divulged Naoya. He paused then, a gauging expression on his round face, before rifling through his pockets. “And my father isn’t happy, he says you’re becoming a burden.”

You averted your eyes from Naoya in shame, a frown on your lips.

“Here,” he said, “it’s from the gardens.” He had tugged a ripened apple into his palm, holding it out for you. 

Naoya had been kinder then, you remembered, even in its brevity.

-----

You were kept separate as children, only seeing one another when you ate your meals. However, Yuhara and the other mothers had a tendency to usher you around the grounds. They taught you to mend stitchings, to wash the linens; they placed your hands on soil and showed you how to garden; they encouraged your studies of language and art and sorcery.

The women did as they were told, and you did as they told you.

At the age of eleven did your docility waver. The mothers began to chastise when you scurried away from your duties, or mouthed rudely. Once did one of the women, Hatake, raise her hand at you; the puckered mark remained for two days.

Your parents continued to visit, though it grew to be less often. You did not cry when they sat opposite you at a table, as if strangers, to ask of your well-being. They would smooth your hair and kiss your forehead, and you would let them.

The following year is when the women began to fret; you had yet to have your first bleed.

“If she cannot bear children,” said Naobito from within the separated room, “she’s no better for use than a servant.”

There was a pause, then, “She’s still young, she’s still growing. I beg of you to give her time,” implored Yuhara. 

“There is no time to give. The girl will either have it or she won’t.”

“And what then?” Yuhara asked, a tone of bother to her inquiry.

Naobito sniffed. “Do you care for this child?”

You pressed your small ear to the wall, listening diligently, shoulder aching.

“Of course, I care for her.”

“Then she’ll become your obligation if she cannot produce an heir.”

And Yuhara stumbled. She could not formulate an appropriate response at the shift in blame.

Naobito said, “Speak out of turn again and the consequences will be far greater than a damned child.”

You bled at thirteen.

-----

Naoya did not know you. It was evident in his false expectations and strange conversation. On the day you wore a blue dress, sitting for a meal, Naoya lifted his chin toward you, a youthful gesture.

“Do you like the color blue?” he asked.

You peered at the sleeves extending to your wrists, “Not this one. It’s too bright.”

He paused, regarding you. Naoya did not speak for the remainder of that supper.

Naoya did not know you, and no one would tell a word.

“She avoids me,” he complained to his father many days. “She’s boring. She doesn’t talk. I’m sure she’d rather be in the courtyards with the other women.”

“And she’s to be your wife,” Naobito would say with little pity. “Whatever will you do, my son?”

Naoya was brash and rude. He criticized where a compliment was due, he remarked disdainfully on others when he should have remained quiet. He was a boy grown into his tenured throne.

Though, it was a bloodied right to hold.

He was often hit when he was younger: a benign slap to his wrist, or a merciful grabbing of his arm. With age came the yellowed bruising and flitting eyes. He lied for ridiculous things, and became angry when he was not right. He trained until the mud lapped at his heels, until he simply could not breathe; and then he would laugh, a breathless and hoarse sound.

And Naoya grew to be a monster.

-----

You were running in the forest when Naoya found you, just shy of seventeen years of age then. You were running from him.

And your chest hurt, your legs constricted, tightened. You were dampened with sweat, panting as you picked your way quickly along the root-ridden ground. You knew that he was not far behind. But you were tired and scared; you could not marry this boy, you could not live at his side for much longer.

A rough hand pulled you from your desperate path and kept you against a tree. You gasped in pain at the impact of bone against bark. And Naoya was upon you, his shoulders rising and falling in an uneven rhythm. 

It was you who laughed now, soft and harrowing.

“Hello, Naoya,” you murmured, your head bowing back to rest on the tree. “Ever the dutiful son.”

His expression twitched and spasmed in restrained ire. For all he prided himself on his composure, it could be so easily broken.

“You’re running from here.” It was a statement, not a question.

“From here,” you said. “From you.”

His mouth thinned. Distantly, you remembered the habit from his childhood; you wondered how you wound up here.

Naoya shook his head. “You’re a fool. You’re a fucking fool.” 

“I don’t think I am.” His fingers pressed into either of your shoulders, keeping you still when you began to writhe.

He dipped his chin, tilted his head—he was following your sporadic jerking, wanting you to look him in the eyes when he spoke. “You have everything here. You are given more than the other women simply for being betrothed to me. Is that not enough for you? Could you really need more?” 

You remembered this moment well. The beginnings of an end.

“Let me go, Naoya. Let me go and your father will just replace me.” His nostrils flared gently, he was very close. “I’m sure he’ll find you a prettier wife, and she’ll learn to love you.”

“Is that what you’ve done?” The forest was dark, and the Moon bore witness once more. “Learned to love me?”

You sighed, smiling. “I could never love you.”

And you learned to be a monster, just as him.

That night in the forest had been the cusp to an edge. You fought brutally with him, a scuffle of choking palms and thin cuts; Naoya won eventually, sitting atop your abdomen to pin you.

“Stop,” he had hissed, holding your wrists somewhere above your head. “Just stop it.”

Neither of you had utilized jujutsu techniques. You considered it a mercy.

-----

At your behest, you changed rooms, picking larger living quarters near Naoya’s. Yuhara had been surprised to hear such a request, but divvied the necessary orders.

These rooms were broader, emptier, with an expanse of windows along one wall. Word reached Naoya quickly and soon he was standing at your new threshold.

“What are you doing?” he asked, long arms folded across his chest. An angry red line remained at his cheek from where you had scratched him the week prior. There was a matching graze on your collarbone from him as well.

“I was tired of my old rooms, and no one’s using these.”

He hummed, keeping at the doorway instead of slating inward. “This is permanent, then?”

“For now.”

Naoya nodded once, a curt thing, before he left. And you thought of what one of the mothers had told you long ago: Learn thy enemy, child, and do not look away.

You scarcely spoke with one another, despite your living in the Zen’in estates for seven years, and kept mainly to menial dinner conversations, even the occasional passing remark. The plighted man and woman, already estranged.

At eighteen did Naoya change. He completed his studies at the jujutsu academy; he became ranked as a special-grade sorcerer. He grew in mindset and strength. Oddly enough, however, you often saw him more.

And Naoya would sometimes accompany you around the estate; silently, he would walk by your side.

“Do you need something?” you asked him one morning, lifting your heavy garments as you stepped over stones.

He motioned toward the book tucked beneath your arm. “You were reading?”

“I was, yes.”

Naoya hummed. “A bit boring, isn’t it?”

You stopped, turned on a heel, “Do you need something?” you asked again. “You make terrible company.”

His hair was blond then, the color beginning from the roots and peddling into his natural hue. “You’re quite rude today. Have I angered you?”

“No. Would you like to?” You smiled thinly. The narrowing of your eyes could be mistaken for genuine creasing simply enough, but Naoya knew otherwise.

“I have nothing better to do.”

“Wonderful.”

He continued on the old path, and you trailed behind, irritated.

It is strange, this memory. When you grew older is when Naoya would tell you many things: he would tell you about this moment, and he would recite it from his own perspective. It would be so very different from yours.

There had been a river, flowing and beautiful, on the edge of the estate acreage. Naoya walked there without thought, clasping a hand over his wrist behind his back. “Have you been this way before?”

You gave pause, peering around the forest. “Yes,” you said, “when I tried to run. And then you stopped me.”

Naoya stilled, looking at you from his peripheral. You did not see his eyes flicker away. 

“I’ve been here many times before that, too. The mothers would bring me here, along with their own children. We would play in the river when it got hot.” You faced him slightly, “I asked you once to join us when we were younger, and you made a face at me.”

He frowned in thought, bending down to pick up a river stone. “I don’t remember that.”

You watched as he skid the flat stone on the water’s surface. It deflected twelve times. “Of course you don’t. At that age, nothing matters all too much for you to want to remember.”

“But you did.” He threw another stone. This one only lasted eleven ricochets. 

Your brows lifted plaintively. “I remember because I was upset afterwards.” The river trickled on, a wary wind swept at your hair. “You can’t begin to imagine what it was like for me here, Naoya. I was a child when my parents offered me to your family; the mothers were kind enough, but their children ostracized me when the women turned their backs to us.” Your tone held a biting stance, nipping at his ears.

Naoya did not speak, so you continued.

“I had thought that you, of all the people in this damned estate, might have had a bit of sympathy to spare back then.” You made your steps toward him, coming to stand at his right. “I had thought that we were going to share the burden of this fucking marriage. I see now that I was wrong.”

He bristled, smoothing a thumb along another stone in his hand. “Do you really want to have this conversation?” You could not place the manner of his words.

“It’s been eight years. Should we wait another?”

“I think you should learn to hold your tongue for longer.”

You whirled on him, clutching the fabric at his throat in your fist and bringing him down toward you; Naoya held tightly to your arm, squeezing until you thought he might break the bone.

“What will you do?” he breathed, indolent and amused. “You can’t kill me.”

When you twisted the white cloth, pressing into his trachea, Naoya only grasped harder to you. He was allowing you to do this, you knew. He wanted to entertain whatever you may do.

“You’re beginning to look like your father, Naoya.”

-----

At night is when you walked the estate halls. It was quiet, and the sun was not so blinding when it tucked beneath the horizon. You moved a wooden door and sidled outside; autumn would soon come, the cold wind said.

A mottle-colored cat grazed its thick fur at your ankles in greeting. The cat was Naoya’s favored animal of the estate, who often curled at his feet and slept. You smoothed the animal’s fur with a kind touch and continued onward. 

There was a small niche between a copse of trees somewhere east of the estate lands; you had found the hidden courtyard at a young age, abandoned and forgotten, before silently claiming it as your own.

When you would return to the estates many years from now, fevered with rage, the courtyard will have been the only area of the lands left untouched from the wreckage.

It was in that courtyard that you practiced, alone. You had watched the men and their sons train enough that you memorized their incessant patterns. They were fond of continuity and repetition. You learned to be the opposite.

Your father had been partially correct in assuming your jujutsu technique: transfiguration. But it was a technique specified solely to curses. You could not replicate another person; you could not transcribe the color of their hair or the bend of their nose to your body. Though, you could sharpen your teeth like the curse beneath the stone bridge, lengthen claw-tips like the creature that loitered in the eye’s peripheral.

And you practiced such in that courtyard. Until your scleras were blackened, horns peering from beneath your hair, leathered wings retracting at your shoulder blades. It was hideous, how your body shivered and roiled. You often vomited when you ingested the blood of the curses to take their attributes; it was an acrid taste, rotting, festering on your tongue. 

You kept the vials of collected blood beneath a flagstone in the courtyard, in a pocket of soil you had dug. And when you lifted the moss-infested stone, you went painfully still. The vials were not there. Frantically, you tore at the soil.

“No,” you hissed. “No, no, no.”

A scrape of a shoe against rock had you reeling around suddenly. Naoya stood at the outskirts of the courtyard, and held up the glass fixtures between his fingers.

“You have very odd night habits,” he said, looking curiously at the collected blood. “I’ve been paying attention.”

Your heart beat heavily in your chest, pressing against your lungs. You primed indifference onto your features. “You only pay attention to what suits you at the moment.”

He hummed, then sniffed in ire. “Yes, I do.”

Truly, you did not have much to say.

Naoya was silent a moment, then, “Why do you have these?”

“Blood is best for the roses,” you said sensibly. “And better to be stored away somewhere safe.”

“It’s almost autumn. The roses are dying.”

“They can be saved.”

“Can they?” He swirled the blood idly, coming closer to you as he did so. “You cannot cheat what death deals. It’s unnatural.”

“It’s only hen’s blood. Yuhara brings it back when she goes into town for the butcher.”

Naoya tugged the cork stopper from the vial. “I suppose this is quite useless then.” He lifted the glass, tipping it above a cropping of grass. He paused.

You had been watching the blood dribble to the edge, and he had been watching you. 

“You’re just going to let me do this? I thought you were more dignified than that.” He clicked his tongue.

A furrow etched itself between your brows, a twitch rose beneath your eye. “It’s hen’s blood—it matters little to me.”

“Oh, don’t play stupid. Did you think I wouldn’t figure out what you’ve been doing? Do you think I don’t know what this is?”

You paled, your lips parting in unease. You wondered, briefly, how this conversation might end. You wondered, distantly, what Naoya might do.

“Show me.”

You swallowed, a stiff sound. “What?”

“Show me your technique, I want to see it.” He offered you the vials now. “I’ve always wanted to know how a transfiguration one worked.”

You did not yield a step when Naoya neared. “It’s not transfiguration.” A lie.

“No?”

“No.”

He sucked on his teeth. “I remember when you first came here, your father said it was something similar to transfiguration, but no one knew exactly what.” Naoya pocketed all but one vial, “So, let’s not be quick to lie.”

You had seen Naoya use his technique many times, but this had been different somehow. He was standing before you, then abruptly behind you as he curled a hand beneath your jaw. He scarcely moved when you plunged an elbow into his abdomen, only groaning lowly, tightening his hold on you, anticipating your attempt to shatter his nose against the crown of your head.

“Easy,” he cooed as one might a spooked horse, breathless and with a smile to his voice. Naoya forced your mouth open, his fingers digging into the junction of your jaw. He poured the blood down your throat as you coughed and thrashed violently; Naoya closed your mouth when the vile was empty, clasping a palm over your lips. And you gagged, your body tensing and wanting to curl in on itself, but Naoya kept you against him until he felt you swallow.

He let you go, let you stumble to the flagstones. Naoya was waiting.

“You bitch,” you heaved, and red dribbled from your lips to smatter below you. “You stupid fucking bitch.”

You could sense Naoya watching you as he said: “You have an absolutely foul mouth.”

When you turned, peering over a shoulder to him, you laughed. And you laughed. And you laughed as you crawled to your feet and faced him. You were twitching grotesquely, moving perversely. Long points of teeth pricked at your lips, your pupils constricted and dilated, your flesh turned ashen, and dark blood dripped from your eyes. You were a monster.

Naoya believed this was the effect of a full vial, but you had not taken it in its entirety; the majority of the cursed blood was left on the stones, on your clothing, smeared on Naoya’s hands. A complete vial would be enough to kill, though he could not have known.

His expression was that of delight and utter horror.

You surged forward. Naoya did not maneuver quickly enough.

Your talon caught the meat of his arm, sliced it, and Naoya stifled his cry of pain.

You wanted to feel his blood again, you thought, you wanted to cut his throat. You did not care if the mothers heard, if Naobito listened to the sounds of a dying son. You were angry, raging, roiling with madness.

This estate that took your hand, kissed your palm, and asked of you to stay where it would always be safe. These people who clothed you, fed you, and claimed that you should be a grateful woman. And Naoya…oh, Naoya. 

The boy who had been promised excellence and did not understand that promise held such little weight. The child who grew to be a terrible boy, a worse man. You were still so young then, only nineteen, as was he. You wondered if it might have happened differently, if you would want it to.

And then he was upon you once more, raising his hands to fists, bracing his lower body. “Father would never tell me about your technique,” he said fervently, reaching for your shoulder. “I always wondered why.”

You avoided his touch, moving to splice the skin at his face; he did not let you get close enough. It was an unusual parry, whereas you fought to kill, Naoya fought to irritate. He enjoyed watching your features transform, mutilate themselves into something entirely new.

At one point did he stumble on a deep groove of a rock. The front of his clothing tore beneath your blackened nails, wanting to pierce his heart. It was a lucky fall, you supposed, until you were atop him, a hand to his neck and talon-ends causing the flesh to give way.

You were reminded of when you had tried to run from this place, and Naoya had debilitated you in a similar manner.

“You won’t do it,” he whispered, as if he knew all. His bronze eyes were alight beneath you.

Pricks of blood wept from his throat. Naoya winced.

“I hate you,” you rasped, “I hate you, Naoya. And I will make you want to slit your own throat by the end of it.”

He shifted, and you felt his chest rise and fall heavily. “We’re set to marry in a week. Don’t be rash.”

You shook your head, a sudden scoff. And when you made to speak, another voice filled in your stead.

“That is quite enough.”

Naobito Zen’in stepped into the courtyard, the moonlight spilling on him. Your body remained taut, poised over his son; you did not let go.

“If you wish to kill him,” Naobito began, “by all means, do so. No son of mine would be bested by a woman—his betrothed, nonetheless.” There was disgust, disappointment, to his words.

You smiled, and vomited the cursed blood onto the flagstones.

-----

You were not left unattended for the remainder of the week. 

Naobito kept one of the men with you, a large and brute thing, he had a thin scar at the corner of his mouth. He had been introduced as ‘Toji,’ before Naobito made his leave and gave little explanation.

Toji did not speak often; he held a palm to the pommel of his sword and let his eyes wander about. And on one early morning, when you had been pruning a dead hydrangea bush, you leaned close to Yuhara and asked, “Is he always like this?”

Yuhara paused, nipping a root thoughtfully. “He’s strange,” she settled on. “Every family needs their pariah.”

Your expression pinched in question. She sighed gently from her nose.

“He’s not your enemy, if that’s what you’re wanting to know. He’s far from it.”

You gathered fallen leaves at leisure, a collection of reds and golds. “Naobito’s making him keep watch over me.” Toji was sitting by a veranda, twirling a blade in his hands.

Yuhara turned, the etchings of her skin deepening, “What happened?”

After you returned to the household the previous night, unrestrained, with Naoya and Naobito, the latter had struck you across the face, wholly apathetic. “If you can’t discipline your own wife, allow me to do so,” Naobito had seethed to his son. Then he looked to you, “Do not speak of this to anyone, lest you want to be truly punished.”

A thorn nicked the pad of your finger and you startled. “Nothing happened. Just precautions for the wedding, I guess.”

The following night, Toji walked you silently to your rooms after supper. You were watching your slippered feet step in front of you when Toji cleared his throat.

“You’re set to be Naoya’s wife?”

You lifted your head then, swallowing unsurely. “Yes.” For now, you wanted to tell him.

Toji hummed, “I’m very sorry.”

It was all he said.

-----

Naoya was staring at you.

You glanced up from the tea you held, now watching him as well.

You let yourself think, for a brief moment, what it might have been like if he were a different man, and you, a different woman. Another man would surely be eager to touch his wife, kiss her gently; another woman would be smiling, holding her lover’s hand.

Tomorrow would be the wedding.

And you would not be there.

Naoya raised a brow, a question, as if to ask: ‘What?’

You sniffed indolently. ‘Nothing.’

“Are you listening?” Yuhara chided you.

When you blinked, now facing Yuhara, Naoya remained surveying you. “Yes,” you said. “Yes, I’m listening.”

At the large table sat Naobito, Jinichi, Ogi, your mother and father, and a few other decently regarded women—Yuhara among them. They spoke of how the wedding would proceed, the tie officiated between the Zen’in clan and your family.

You stopped listening once they reached conversation of the ceremony.

-----

Again, in the beginnings of dawn, did Toji speak once more on the path to your rooms.

“You’re going to run tonight, aren’t you?” He stood at the threshold of your rooms, tilting his head at your retreating back. Toji heeded how you stiffened before you turned.

“No.” Resolute; a lie.

He scoffed, and then he smiled amusedly. “I know how this goes. You run for it when everyone’s too busy to bother with you.”

“You’re very observant, but I don’t intend on doing such.”

Toji frowned in thought. “And you’re a good liar. Did you learn that from Naoya?”

“No.” Yes.

“Well,” Toji said, “you seem intent on being well-behaved.” He sounded to be mocking you.

Your features were guarded as he continued, leaning his heavy shoulder to the door jamb.

Toji gestured a hand lazily to the columns of windows behind you, “Shame those don’t open, the weather’s real nice tonight. But I’m sure someone will keep a side entrance unlocked to let the breeze through the house.”

“Yes,” you said carefully, “what a shame.”

-----

Toji was not in the hallway when you opened your door late in the night. You tugged at the satchel on your shoulder, becoming another terrible little creature to roam under the light of the moon. All was quiet and still in the Zen’in estates.

For the past hours, you had deliberated between two evils; you found that you would prefer the risk of a betrayal from Toji than wed Naoya. So, you ran.

You were nothing but an old ghost in that dreadful house. Your feet did not make a sound, you scarcely breathed; you were not alive that night, a dead man slating from the noose already tied about his neck.

There was a side door, unlatched and ajar. You waited in the alcove down the hall, watching the door to see if someone would emerge. No one did so. And it was easy to slip through the threshold.

Then there were the bodies of many men—propped on the stone wall, left on the ground—who had been stationed to guard just outside the entrance. Their throats had been cut, eyes pressed out of sockets, limbs only tethered by bits of sinew and muscle.

You kept running.

-----

In the Zen’in estates, Toji Zen’in walked idly through the halls for your bedroom. You would surely be gone. He held a hand to his side, staunching a wound from one of the men’s blades. Soon, Naoya and the others would begin to search for you once the sun rose.

And he waited in that bedroom, his blood staining your sheets, wondering what he might do.

-----

Naoya Zen’in woke suddenly. His eyes shifted, hands clambering for the linens. Quickly, he dressed and made for your rooms; he felt something was wrong.

He found the blood first, stippled along the wooden floorboards, growing in frequency toward your rooms. Naoya ran for your door then, his feet slipping along the blood, pushing it into the deep crevices and nicks of the floors. 

His hair laid at his brow, boyish and tousled from sleep; his skin was pallid in the moonlight. Naoya plunged into your rooms, frenzied, wild-eyed.

“Oh. You’re early.”

Toji sat lazily on your bed, a dry pride to his stature.

“Where is she?” Naoya breathed. “Where is she?” He was moving toward Toji, unadulterated rage ushering his body forward.

As Naoya lifted his hands, Toji lifted himself from the bed. 

“What did you do?” His hands had begun twitching, curling as he hedged around Toji. It was then that he saw the light stain of red on your sheets. The first assault he delivered to Toji was with little warning, the other man stumbling, touching the broken skin of his cheek. “Did you fuck her?” Naoya seethed.

Toji frowned, looking to the sheets and to Naoya. He seemed to ponder this before he said, “Yes.”

Naoya attacked once more, though Toji moved quickly, using Naoya’s momentum to dispel him to the side. It was a vicious, short fight; fists raising and fast parries until Naoya caught Toji’s side. He pulled his hand away, watching the other man crumple in pain. Naoya peered down to his bloodied knuckles, giving pause.

The blood on your sheets was Toji’s. It was not yours.

“You liar.”

-----

Wings beat heavily at your back, a grotesque making of sharp bones and stretched cartilage. You had taken the blood of a curse with such features, slipping it into your throat. But your body was a cumbrous weight to carry, and you were beginning to tire.

The sky was cloud-ridden this night, no moon to guide by light. You felt your wings loosen their muscles, near blundering from the sky, before you righted yourself. An odd feeling encompassed you, a dreary haze of sorts that stuck its fingers into your ears and closed your eyes. It was not fatigue.

A terrible pain came next. It ripped through your wing and was left suspended in the cartilage: a hunter’s arrow. You cried out, gasping for breath as you fell; the brambles and boughs wound around your body when you plummeted, the hardened dirt catching you unkindly.

You clawed at the ground in your stupor, wanting to get up, needing to get away. There was a foot being pushed to your back, keeping you in place. They tore the arrow from your wing and you screamed; it was a weak sound, hoarse and broken. You could not stop them when they sliced the arrow’s blade through your other wing, pinning you to the forest floor. 

Tears dripped from your cheeks to the moss beneath you, mud pilled beneath your nails. You were the rain of this forest, a creature of this forest. 

You had been so close.

A hand, unfamiliar, tore your head upward as someone knelt down. Naobito Zen’in hummed in thought, wanting you to look at him.

“You are a very stupid girl,” he said, smiling wryly. “And you thought me the fool.” He let your tears run over his hands. “You would have been given everything.”

Naoya had told you something similar once. That was so long ago.

Your unpinned wing flailed violently, hooking the curved bone at the apex into the roots and stones.

“You should learn,” Naobito pressed his fingers into your face, and it hurt when he did so, “when to stop fighting.”

You were screaming again, thrashing wildly for Naobito to step back. The wings would not retract for some time.

“I trust you can take care of this, Naoya.”

A maddened stillness took hold of your body when you heard his name. Naoya drew up beside you, walking carefully. He was staring again, you could not see those burnished eyes, but you understood where they moved. From your spasming wing, to the wound created by the arrowhead, to the other wing pierced through.

You were panting shallowly, trembling from the pain, the cold. Naoya stood in front of you. And when you looked up, he found you. There was a bow slung over his chest. You collapsed once more, your temple pressed against the dirt.

You hated this memory, as you did most.

“Leave us,” said Naoya. Many sets of feet shuffled with purpose. There had been more men, then. 

They soon left, and Naoya and you were alone in that forest. He removed the bow.

He leaned down, bringing a hand to touch your face. “Why?” he asked. “Why must you be so persistent?”

You let him stroke beneath your eye, let him smooth your hair as you laid there. There was a brief silence, then, “You should’ve killed me.”

“Is that what you want?” His fingers moved thoughtlessly to the junction where wing met human flesh.

“No,” you said, strained. Your eyes kept to a tree trunk across the way. Naoya grazed your open wound; assessing or caring, you did not know, but the action left you tensed. Another tear wet your lashes.

A quiet enveloped him and you again. Even the forest did not dare make a sound.

Naoya splayed his hand over the tear. “Can you feel this?” he asked, genuine, wondering. When you groaned, he removed his hand. “I…Father said this wouldn’t hurt you,” he spoke softly to himself.

You were shaking your head weakly, arms coming beneath your body in an attempt to lift upward.

He pushed down gently on your shoulder, moving you back to the ground. “Don’t, you’ll only bring yourself more pain.”

Draped on the forest floor, the haze returned, your hearing and vision dipped and wavered.

Depressants, Naoya murmured angrily. You scarcely caught the mention of tea, as well. In your liminal thoughts, you threaded the words together into coherency: Naobito had placed opiates into your drink earlier in the evening, anticipating this very outcome. However, he had grossly underestimated your body’s strange perseverance.

“Don’t fall asleep,” he was telling you, patting your cheek, jostling your shoulder. “Do not fall asleep.”

You, distantly, felt him leave. When he returned, the slick cold of glass pressed your lips open.

“Drink it,” he demanded, almost frantically. He must have found a blood phial somewhere amongst the grasses, unshattered despite your fall.

That horrible taste of cursed blood fell to your tongue, spreading through your mouth as Naoya kept your chin righted. You did not understand what he was doing. He let you go, rising somewhere else. There came the sound of a quick snap, the arrow; Naoya pulled your wing from the broken arrow and your fingers clawed gouges into the ground, ripped skin being tugged at by the wood of the shaft.

Don’t touch me, you wished to say. Don’t return me to those rooms, to you.

“The estates are in disarray right now,” he said unconcernedly. 

You breathed out, sharp, through your nose like a cornered beast, a simple sign of acknowledgment.

Naoya continued, sitting himself before you, “I found Toji in your rooms, as if he’d been waiting for someone. He said you had escaped—that you injured him and killed the other men for it. He also warned us against following you, that you were far too dangerous.”

Your body began to tremble, the cursed blood chilling your own. Toji had lied to dissuade them from attempting to capture you; it had not been enough.

Naoya pushed closer. The wounds in your wings ached as they slowly closed.

“Why can’t you let me go?” you asked, and it was a weak inquiry, spoken with lips that scarcely opened. You shifted in panic when he reached for you, your nostrils flaring, breath quickening. Naoya pulled you, gingerly, to rest in his lap; he pressed your head to his shoulder, let your wings drag behind you and lay with little strength.

“Have you not realized it yet?” he asked against the crown of your head. 

And you remained silent, mouth thinning tightly. You were afraid of his next words.

“For all you hate me, you have always been mine to have.” Naoya spoke methodically, gauging each of your movements. “You have fought me for so long, and here we find ourselves: together, unchanged.”

Your fingers twisted in his clothing, a wing twitching.

He held you like a lover might, close and tight. “I said to you once that you cannot cheat death, so let me offer you one more thing.” Naoya paused.

Beneath your hands, you could feel his chest lift and fall, his breath fluttering your hair. You were weak in his arms, susceptive to his hand that brought your face to his. 

Naoya had always been beautiful, a beauty that brought you to the edge of a cliff and asked of you to fall with it. Though, you had never fallen, too caught on the hatred that guided you away. 

If only Naoya was a different man, and you, a different woman.

He said, “You cannot fight Fate with a blade, darling.”

Then, Naoya kissed you beneath the trees, and what a strange thing it was. He was warm, uncertain, and slow; he kept you against him, his lips brushing yours when he pulled away only enough to see your eyes.

He was watching you curiously, touching his palm to your cheek, running his thumb along your lips pinkened by him. His nose brushed yours, as if in affection.

“I know,” you said, low and hushed.

Your talons bore into Naoya’s shoulder, reaching bone, blood pulsing as he shouted in agony. And then you were running, dashing carelessly through that forest, tripping and stumbling. Your wings beat in waiting, pacing your rhythm until they filled with the autumn wind.

Naoya bellowed through the forest, his angered words lost to the air that scurried around you. His blood had begun to sticky your hand, warm as his body had been.

And you flew desperately that night, tears wetting your eyes before being plucked away by the wind. 

It hurt, it was a wound like no other: the freedom that you fought for, finally regained.

-----

Present Day, Seven Years Later

The Moon peered from beyond the horizon; she did not want to watch this.

Naoya laid bleeding on the wooden floors of the Zen’in estates. He feared he would continue to spill his blood on those panels. Beside him laid his succumbed aunt, her mouth was slackened, features wholly blank.

He watched her blood pour, and pour, and pour around them. He watched his blood spill, and spill, and spill into hers. Red unto red; blood unto blood.

In all the moments Naoya believed he might die, they had never been in the midst of a battle, or from a grave wound. They had always been with you.

Tucked within that old forest, catching you when you were younger; by that cold river, when you pulled him closer; in that desolate courtyard, when you cut him; and that egregious night, when you got away.

You were the only thing capable of death, and Naoya believed it so. As it be, you cannot dance with skeletons and expect them to have hearts.

He was dying when he heard the footsteps. Naoya could only wait and play witness to whomever stumbled upon him.

And then came your voice. Your terrible, beautiful, cold voice. 

“Oh, Naoya,” you breathed.

He wanted to move, needed to see if you had truly returned. Though, his limbs remained weakened, his thoughts reeling rampantly.

“Naoya,” you whispered gently, smoothing his blood-matted hair, “I’m not done with you yet."

𝐌𝐀𝐒𝐓𝐄𝐑𝐋𝐈𝐒𝐓

𝐒𝐄𝐑𝐈𝐄𝐒 + 𝐄𝐕𝐄𝐍𝐓𝐒 𝐌.𝐋𝐈𝐒𝐓

𝐉𝐔𝐉𝐔𝐓𝐒𝐔 𝐊𝐀𝐈𝐒𝐄𝐍

𝐇𝐀𝐈𝐊𝐘𝐔𝐔

𝐌𝐘 𝐇𝐄𝐑𝐎 𝐀𝐂𝐀𝐃𝐄𝐌𝐈𝐀

𝐀𝐓𝐓𝐀𝐂𝐊 𝐎𝐍 𝐓𝐈𝐓𝐀𝐍

𝐓𝐎𝐊𝐘𝐎 𝐑𝐄𝐕𝐄𝐍𝐆𝐄𝐑𝐒

𝐌𝐎𝐑𝐈𝐀𝐑𝐓𝐘 𝐓𝐇𝐄 𝐏𝐀𝐓𝐑𝐈𝐎𝐓

𝐖𝐄𝐁𝐓𝐎𝐎𝐍𝐒 𝐖𝐎𝐑𝐊𝐒

𝐓𝐇𝐈𝐑𝐒𝐓𝐒

gust & flame - masterlist

Eris Vanserra has been a prisoner in his own home since the day he was born. He has done what he had to in order to survive and protect the few he loves. And he is playing the long game. Waiting, waiting, and waiting for the right time to make his move, to usurp his wicked father and become High Lord of Autumn Court. But things become even more complicated when a human girl drops into his life. Perhaps Eris can wait no longer to take his throne.

--- takes place after the events in A Court of Silver Flames

🍁 Eris Vanserra x Reader

Chapter I || Chapter II || Chapter III || Chapter IV || Chapter V || Chapter VI || Chapter VII || Chapter VIII || Chapter IX || Chapter X || Chapter XI || Chapter XII || Chapter XIII || Chapter XIV || Chapter XV || Chapter XVI || Chapter XVII || Chapter XVIII || Chapter XIX ||

you know a fic is good when it has this