Wadecalhoun​:

wadecalhoun​:

          “Oh you’re freakin’ me out somethin’ mighty now,” Wade turned almost gravely serious for he’d never seen Robin be so caught up within herself. The tear threatens to fall from her and it glistens atop vivid irises though Wade says nothing, he knows better than to point out a vulnerability in someone unless you’re intending to wound. He’d always fought and remained tacit through his own trembling teeth and dampened eyes and he wouldn’t undress Robin so emotionally in the midst of some cheesy Roman cafe; it’d be wrong. He’s quite animated as his head pans down to look at her hand upon his then back up to her sullen mien, her idea of a promotion causing his brows to crease in confusion. “And did’y have a choice in that? ‘Cause if I had a fuckin’ promotion I’d be doin’ a lil’ dance yet you’re over there all curled in on yourself.” They were all licking their wounds, that much was true, but it was the only way Wade figured he could pose the question all whilst supporting her facade as an immovable and unwavering figure.

...

“I was voted in after our last Chancellor confessed to working with those hunting our kind to call those who would sooner kill us than let us live in peace,” she comments softly, unable to apologize for her odd behavior when at the end of the day she couldn’t. Masks were something well-used by those on the Fall court, capable of keeping a facade for sake of survival, and yet, Robin could not afford to keep such a thing going when Fen’harel had proved to be a liar amongst liars. It was time for honesty to triumph on her court, and she would lead by example so that her loyalty would never be questioned. Even now, she is using that truth to further prove her loyalty. She had tried to ignore her suspicions, the pull from her clairvoyance telling her that Wade was walking a path that she could only condemn but —  He is a friend, a true one, and she cared for him. Cared for him enough to ignore the clues, cared for him enough not to pry. That had to end, though, for she would not allow for their friendship to threaten the people under her charge. “We are being hunted, and the leader the Fall Court chose over three millennia ago forsook us for power. Needless to say, I have been left to fill quite the big shoes while having to avoid their mistakes.”

Lamentably, mortal alcohol remained lacking in comparison to their spirits, but even she would not be cruel enough to spike the punch with some of the newly brewed fungi concoctions while some relatively decent mortals were present. Instead, she finds herself hanging from a chandelier absentmindedly as she people watches and occasionally sends flicker of magic to cause people to trip and embarrass themselves in front of those they are trying to impress, of spilling their drinks and so on as she sips from the brew. When Yavie all bust manifests next to her, she sends him an affectionate grin as she offers him the bottle as her eyes flicker up to the blinking stars abroad, eyes wide in delight at the sight before turning down to look at the star wistfully. "I think you might have elevated the entire tree with your choice. Next time, though, do invite me to the negotiation please. I would love to watch."

@thegoodfellow location: Christmas Rave, Hakan's Castle notes: treat from sailor moon to the rotted queen

Not one to come to a party empty handed, Yavie had arrived to the castle when the music was reaching its peak. It was a very festive time of year and the elf had managed to pull himself away from the stars for long enough to attend. As he entered the air about the flashing, neon lights seemed to twinkle with an infinite array of blinking stars. "What do you think?" Yavie asked as he produced a crystalline star, within the Astral creature had borrowed some of the essence of polaris to illuminate the festivities and the long nights that followed. "Stars aren't easy to negotiate with but once I explained to her that it was for Christmas she was very receptive. I'm going to put it at the top of the tree."

title: the hunt continues when: post the tinkerer where: rome, Audelë, more trigger warnings: usual stuff

Agony.

Tamlen’s death had been painful, the drainage that followed a rip on their plan. But Tamlen had come back to them against all odds, and the relief had been overwhelming.

Inan hadn’t.

His death feels like being unraveled, like losing a part of herself that she assumed would always be there. The second heartbeat behind her chest is gone, the thread of devotion and steely determination rotting away as death came to take her warder’s hand. Somewhere, a drow is being born. In Rome, Robin’s warder dies, an unfinished melody, a hunt cut short. 

She hadn’t even been able to convince him to call her by her name. 

Lain’s death had hurt, the growing care she had felt for the lycan, a sharp stab to her chest, but she had not loved the wolf. Not quite, not yet, and now never for he is gone, and she knows that even if Death was the one to collect what was due, she had played a part in that game. It is a tragedy, a story unfinished. 

It was not love. 

Inan was her warder, she had welcomed him in and invited him into her soul. Loving him was not unlike loving a part of herself. She had kept that emotion at bay, well aware that she had done nothing to earn anything from him but his loyalty, suppressing it to prevent any more awkwardness between the two. Inan’s story with Fen’harel is well known, and she would not push through his boundaries after that betrayal. 

Would not have. 

But in the end, it did not matter.

Her warder is dead, decay spreading through Rome as Thanatos collects his due, and all Robin can do within the Titan is sink her thoughts with her fellow Chancellors and fall upon the song of destruction they are weaving until they cannot do so any longer. 

The Titan falls, and with the fall, their end is marked. 

There is no opportunity to fight, no magic to summon, no song capable of stopping the Great Old Ones as they fall upon them like predators upon their prey.  

The next fifteen years are spent in the ground, all thought lost beneath the agony of the song of decay and rot, of the end and the beginning. 

The darkness is a familiar call, the pain an old comfort, akin to the ritual that had seen her confirmed into her role as Fall Chancellor. A legacy of the Dusk Elves that they once were, the ritual recalled costumes of old, and it is now the only reason Robin does not lose her mind to the slow movement of rot, slowly spreading through her body but keeping her alive to keep their nutrients. It’s a song of fungi, beautiful on its ugliness, on its destruction. She doesn’t lose herself to it, doesn’t break down and lose hope, but it comes close. Were it not for the familiarity of the torture, she might have.

She doesn’t. 

She awakens to the astral bombs falling and to freedom that tastes as sickly sweet as the rot that had settled on the back of her throat over the last decade. There is no hesitation when she joins the other Chancellors into a song and they come together to become the Titan once more. 

For one last time in this timeline. 

Robin dies in the battlefield, only to awaken in a Rome that has not yet been Forsaken. 

The battle is set aside, more pressing matters coming into the forefront as they find themselves changed. The Chancellors’ retreat, the war pushed back and with it their destruction of Rome, far more important things to do than to deal with the mortals that destroyed them and saved them alike. The world changed one more time, and Robin changed with it, working with the four other chancellors to create Audelë, a new home, alike the Courts that sheltered them for so long, but something new altogether in the same breath.  As the dust settles, she finds Inan, brings him forth into a hug despite his arguments against it and laughs before letting go, polite distance that he is so fond of falling upon the two once more. 

Peace fell upon their kind once more, a deal with the dark elves set in place. And the Courts? The Courts protected once more.

It’s not enough. 

It will never be enough, but her people deserve the rest. Dusk has fallen upon them, and with it comes a new world they need to learn for themselves. Ignoring it all in reckless rage would be foolish, and the tricksters that hide in the shade are anything but that. 

They will wait, they will watch, and they will be ready.

The hunt is eternal, and so are they.

TATI GABRIELLE Dazed Korea (October 2020)  

Tati Gabrielle for Mood Magazine

sabinabrutus​:

“I imagine they’ll suss out any lost party goers, just have to use their nose as bloodhounds for the bloodbags that are still trapped in the castle.” It’s a dark and disgusting way to refer to the party goers but Sabina has always prided herself in her general disregard for social niceties. “For tonight, we’re allowed to go wherever we want. Is there any mirrors you’d recommend stepping through?” She doesn’t know if she’d take the recommendation, she loves to take chances just to see what’ll happen but she does not trust Eladrin and doesn’t believe that they won’t send her to the otherworld as another attempt at the changeling army.

...

“And what if they don’t until it is too late? Castles are a rather dangerous thing,” she points out with a sigh, eyeing the mirrors both with interest and wariness alike. Robin would be fine no matter where the mirrors lead, but she had seen more than one mortal amongst the guests and the poor dears would likely unlucky enough to cross the mirror into a predatory vampire or something of the like. At the least, she has to make sure that the mortal which Aurora calls family does not step into the room. He seems like the sort that would be unlucky enough to accidentally become someone’s meal. “I haven’t gone through any myself, I am currently fighting my curiosity to do just so. I haven’t been in Rome in years so I don’t know whether to risk it or not. Any suggestions from your side?”

who? @chancellorxlaer​

where? summer’s sands

Robin is by far the least experienced of the Chancellors. Born to the stable reign of Fen’harel, having grown with the belief that the Dread Wolf would protect their court and never harm them, only to be proved wrong by the liar’s own lips. Only to be thrown into a position she had never wanted, her freedom restrained and the weight of responsibilities that grew heavier by the day settling on her shoulders. She had done the best she could, but her transition had not come in a time of peace. No matter what, it never seemed like she had done enough. Not for the courts, not for her court. Not while more than half her people suffered at the hands of their most ancient enemy, not while there was nothing she could do, for her expertise laid on subterfuge and not the full frontal attack the drow required. Her task had been solidified once she had become a Chancellor: to watch the Eye’s moves and undermine them as much as they could. And despite that, she had given one of them the entrance to their last refuge, given Wade permission to enter, and invitation. She had been lucky the only one to pay the iron price had been her, lucky that her mistake had not cost any fey life, but even in this luck, she had been unlucky. For she is weakened now, when they need the Chancellor’s strength to be at it’s fullest.

A sigh escapes her lips, as she approaches Laer’s presence. Robin is in dire need of advice, and although she wishes to go to Meryasek or Aurora instead, she cannot overburden her friends on such a crucial time. Laer, however? He has had millennia to learn how to hold the burden of his position, even in war time, and she faithfully believes that although he does not carry all the solutions, talking to him will at least help.

“I am in dire need of advice,” she comments quietly, as she comes to stand next to the other as they survey Laer’s work at shaping his new domain. “And I would prefer if it’s yours, but if you are too overburdened by current events, do let me know, I can find someone else.”

Robin loses control of the situation before she figures out the source of Lain's loss of sanity. Lain moves, a

nd with him come the changelings, rusted weapons reaching beyond what their body would make seem possible as the blade dug far into his skin, the sound wet and all the more revolting as she realizes that it is nothing less than a kill shot. Panic sends her heart racing as she crosses the distance and multiple quick steps, hands stretched before they retreated hesitatingly. She could heal him, she knew this, and yet. And yet she wouldn't. There is far too little magic on her, and healing him would scrap the bottom of her reserves, and she cannot do that. Not when the war is barely beginning, and there is work to be done. A pained expression crosses her face as Lain speaks, a keening hurt as she realizes this is it, she has killed her wolf.

The Fall Chancellor is about to open her mouth to reassure him that she knows, that she is ore than well aware that under normal circumstances he would never betray her as he had done.

But she is too late.

Between one breath and the next, Lain is gone, and she is left blinking out his blood from her eyes, the sticky substance smattering her face and clinging to her eyelashes.

It's not a sight that she will forget any time soon.

He wanted nothing more than to give up and run.  But he had no control over his body anymore, the Drow had warped his mind beyond reason.  The only thing that manifested in his thoughts was kill. The wolf charged at Robin once again, only to be intercepted by one of her changelings. For a split second, Lain managed to wrestle back some semblance of control over his corporeal form.  He could have easily evaded the fungal changeling’s blade, but he did not move.  The sword pierced his stomach, the tip protruding from his back.  Pain bloomed through his midsection and it was enough to snap him out of his rampage, his body shrinking back into his human shape.  The room started to spin, he was losing so much blood from a pierced artery, he collapsed against the nearest wall. 

“Robin, I’m so sorry,” He managed to gasp out, blood dripping from his mouth.  His shaking hands clutched the open wound on his abdomen, trying in vain to hold back the ichor freely cascading from the gash.  Tears welled in his eyes, he glanced down at his wound then back at the fall chancellor. He would be dead soon, but that fact had not dawned on him yet. “I-I didn’t mean to-,” He couldn’t even finish his sentence before his body exploded. Splattered red viscera was all that was left of him. His lifeblood painted Robin’s clothing, the changelings standing guard, the walls, everything. 

Maybe the world would be a better place with him gone.  This was what he always wanted, right? Death. 

zahryaofspring​:

✿*° ‘° ･

Zahrya hums, a finger on his chin as he grins in Robin’s direction. She and the others were sights to behold, as any eladrin in their status would be, but neither she nor Aurora had the years to let their beauty flourish as he had and Laer once put it best—-summer follows spring.

“Yes yes, beauty is easily obtainable but wonderment goes further. You must dazzle, stun, and amaze all at once with your very presence. Perhaps one day you’ll shine nearly as bright as me!” he giggles, clearly amused by the idea. It was his to rise and hers to fall, so he didn’t think it was possible but who knows. Maybe Robin carried within her an autumn the likes of which Zahrya has never seen. Doubtful, but possible nonetheless. 

He loses himself for a moment in the scene of small critters enjoying their blissful day. Robin is correct in that regard at least, displays like that are one of the treasures of this forest. “It’s not just for her,” he shares. “We deserve a place of our own. Here, we can make our own and raise our young ones safely. I was the only one afforded that luxury, and though this isn’t on the scale of the maze, this forest will suffice.”

...

Robin has an inkling on the direction Zahrya’s thoughts are going, an idea as to what he is alluding amidst his works. Each of court had their innate sense of superiority over the others, and Spring tended to brag about it’s ability to create life. If she isn’t wrong, she knows exactly what he was implying.

She wonders if he realizes how particularly infuriating that belief is, but Zahrya had never been particularly aware nor smart so she doubted it.

“I suppose that is possible,” she concedes, a brief nod to mimic an agreement despite none of her words were a true agreement. Zahrya could keep his misconceptions and biases, for he had so few on his life outside of that and his devotion to the Queen. She wouldn’t want to take that away with the truth. Not when she is trying to mend bonds.

“I am sure the courts appreciate it, I know I do,” she confesses, despite the tugging of guilt at the knowledge she has stolen the Tiber’s land. And yet, the courts now more than ever.