71! (and With Our Dear Lucy If You Would)

Hello! Can i please ask for #029 with a dash of soulmate au? (If you are still taking requests that is.) Thank you!

That turned out a bit longer than expected. But then you need a bit of a background and world building for soulmate AUs.

Have fun with that one.^^

029 - Curious

Despite everything Lucette had always been curious about the tattoo that had appeared on her breastbone, ending just below the neckline of her dress.

Next to the white lily blossom that had been there as long as she remembered a second plant had slowly stated to grow. First starting as a line next to it and slowly spread out next to the broad leaves and the stem of the lily, slowly gaining more and more details.

It was not normal and while she detested Delora for cursing her, she had still taken advantage of being around a witch and had managed to get her alone to ask.

And in the two weeks she hadn’t really looked at it since she got cursed, the thin black lines of the tattoo had broadened into a fully recognizabel branch adorned with white flowers, thin and straight leaves spreading out from it, accompanying smaller whiter blossoms.

And since then she had been introduced to the principle of soulmates, which were common among magic users and much more rare among normal humans.

A pair always shared the same tattoo in the same place, starting out with one flower and then a second one slowly appearing. The smell of the flower you started out with, would always be the one strongest to you, and the smell of it always with you, only noticabel for the partner.

Lucette liked lilys because of their posture, straight and tall and elegant, but she also loved their sweet smell, always so much sweeter than anything else, only matched by the scent of the second flower.

She could live with the lily describing herself. It was her favorite.

The second flower that had appeared on her was white blooming oleander. She had never seen it in the palace gardens, never smelled it before, but the books she read to research the flower, described a sweet scent. And a visit to a park only proved that one true.

And curiosity was what drove her to search the city for the person accompanied by a matching scent.

The curiosity was what drove her to follow Rod through the passage into palace, when she caught a hint of the smell on him.

The curiosity was what drove her to shout out the warning to Mythros, as Alcaster tried to kill him from behind.

Mythros smacking Alcaster’s sword asside with magic and pulling a dagger out of his sleeve and pinning the mans arm to the wall by driving it throught the attackers palm without hesitation or any kind of expression reminded her of yet the last paragraph, she had read about the plant.

No matter how pretty it was or how harmless it looked for not having thorns and sweet smelling blossoms, no horse or cattle would willingly eat it and shy away from it as it was highly poisonous.

Myth hadn’t bothered to give a closer thought about the tattoo appearing on his chest for years, had never bothered to take a closer look at it until the evening after the princess had disappeared from the palace and all the rage and worries broke out when he was finally alone in his home and found himself looking into the bathroom mirror when changing into less noticable clothing to match a coat with hood to check in with his informants in the city.

The image of a second flower having joined the blooming branch he had never bothered to identify threw him off, just as much as the kind of flower that was there.

The white lily seemed like a mockery, slapping into his face that -despite what he had told himself during the last years- there may be something for him in this world beside his servitude to the queen. Something that was his on a level no one could simply take away.

Soulmates didn’t always get along, but the reports that he had found during the years had always found the problem in how set one or both parts were about what their partner was supposed to be like.

He had never even imagined having such a partner, regarding how many had died during the Hunts, leaving many with a tattoo unmatched.

And now he found himself curious, who fate deemed fitting for him.

White Lilies stood for majesty and purity and in some interpretations even innocence.

The curiosity also gave him enough drive to identify his own plant, despite his already heavy workload of keeping Alcaster happy, hiding the Tenebrarum and his Queen, doing his work as the king’s advisor, finding and organizing witches that may be sympatetic to his cause once the Queen was free again and looking for the princess. And sometimes he strolled around the city when his head was too full, trying to pinpoint the smell of lilies in streets with way to many smells to clearly pinpoint anything.

Distilling the extract of white oleander and creating an oil was an art in itself, especially because he couldn’t risk cases of poisoning on accident.

But the smell would stick when he was gone and may lead his soulmate to him when he was unable to find that person.

And everthing came to bear when there was a shout behind him, warning him just in time to keep getting killed by Alcaster, accompanied by the sweetest smell he could imagine.

The resulting comotion had multiple causes.

Alcaster, who was the head knight, had just tried to kill someone and his small legion of knights had just tried to stage a coup.

The princess warning him, counted enough of a good deed that the count of three was full for her curse, breaking it, making everyone remember her.

Myth highly protective and dazed by the revelation of who his mate was, was not willing to put her into any kind of danger and didn’t bother hiding the exact extend of his power to deal with knights, who thought that pointing a few sharp blades at him for intimidation and ended up with shelves getting pulled down onto them outside the unlucky soul, who got thrown out of a window.

The king would hopefully forgive him the mess.

But as everything died down, Alcaster taken away into the dungeons away from the knights loyal only to him, the princess settled back into the palace and the repairs and clean up started, Myth got called to the king.

When he got asked, if there was anything else he had hidden, there was a choice.

He could lie and say no. The Tenebrarum was still savely hidden, the Queen with it. But the traitor had been living with the princess and may turn up soon, spilling everything about him and the Lucis bearer was more than powerful enough to find the Crystallum and the Queen enclosed in it. Plans destroyed, planning useless and even his mate gone from his grasp.

And while his Queen may not have bothered to get involved in soulmate business, if his mate had been anyone else, his mate was her daughter, who should be loyal to only her and not get protective of a possible mate.

He wanted to live. He wanted to keep his mate. He couldn’t have his Queen and his mate.

His words like barbed wire in his throat, he started talking.

40? hehe thanks

040 - Blackand Blue

Myth couldn’tunderstand the knights’ enthusiasm to whack things with swords. It was just aformalization of punching each other black and blue during a brawl. Not that heapproved of these tendencies either. He understood goading someone into a fightto get an advantage -had done it himself once during the hunts to lure a hunterinto a trap and securing his own survival.

But whyexactly did the average men think that getting into a brawl and punching eachother’s teeth out was something to brag about. He preferred moving in theshadows, out of harms’ way, where no brute could just barge in to throw fists aroundto make his opinion known. Or on a misguided search for glory, thinking that itwas going to impress some girl.

He reallyhadn’t the time to deal with people like that. That was Alcaster’s domain. Hewas busy enough with magical training in between his duties as advisor andhandling politics. If he added physical training on the whole pile of work, hecould just scratch sleep completely of his schedule.

And he wasbetter off not in pain from getting beaten black and blue anyway.

111!!

111 - Coward

Myth was very sure that most of the knights and other people obsessed with waving swords around would call him a coward. But there was simply no reason he could think off to knowingly put himself into harms way! And why should he enter a fight he knew wouldn't end well for him? That was simply being stupid.

Running from danger you couldn't fight was a viable strategy to prolong your own life, it had already worked during the witch hunts after all. And even kept him saver than hoping that these stupid humans would simply leave him alone, just because he really wished they would.

Running and hiding was a strategy, he could live with, as long as he came out on top in the long run. Sure, some people may call him a coward, but at least he was an alive one.  

Well, my ask box is empty. So it was the random number generator for today.

011 - Memory

Memories were a tricky thing. Myth knew that and tried -sometimes desperately- to not get lost in them, while trying to imprint even the slightest detail into his mind, to not let them fade into obscurity.

It didn’t always work.

There were things he remembered, he didn’t want to know-

-firesflaringScreamsSmokeOhGodwhycouldn’ttheystop!-

-and things he had tried to cling to, but had still faded away into nothing-

-warmth to snuggle up against, a familiar smell, buthecouldn’trememberherfaceanymore!Why?-

-and no matter what, he couldn’t reverse time to refresh memories or make others to have never happened.

He missed things. He hated thing. He treasured things lost and hated what remained. But it wasn’t as if he could change what happened to give him these memories. At least some things were better of as memories. He could only hope that they would fade enough to stop giving him nightmares at some point.

010? Honestly I can’t choose, I love them all

And here is it. ^__^

010. Breathe Again

Being ableto breath normally again… nice. Myth could still recall the feeling of wantingto breath, trying to breath, but beingunable to, restricted by ropes too tight, cutting into the skin of his throatand almost completely blocking his airpipe.

Stupid Hunters.Stupid humans! They should all justgo and die!

The boyglanced down, checking the surroundings. The forest was empty and quiet. Climbingup here had been difficult, still dizzy from the long lack of air, but it hadbeen worth it. People rarely looked up, even when looking for someone. Andthere were no fruit trees anywhere near where he was, so there wasn’t even areason why someone would be looking up in this area anyway.

Jumpingback to the ground, the boy started moving away from the settlement. Now thathe was outed as a witch in this area as well, it was better to get the hell outof the area, before they decided to pick the search up again. He would need tojump a few settlements, to make sure, no one recognized him, but that wasn’tthe first time and he had enough experience with that already.

Keeping an eyeout, he pondered why so many deaths the humans inflicted on them had to do withbreathing. Gallows, if used wrongly, choked you. The fires may choke you beforethe burns kill you. Sometimes they drowned the witches, nothing to clean upwith them being dust and no wasting of resources either.

Maybe theydid that, because there wasn’t any blood to cause a mess then. Shrugging, he madesure to keep a steady pace. No reason to let these bastards catch him again. Hehad gotten lucky this time. He couldn’t count on always being able to take abreath again in the morning air of the day after the one when he got caught.

More Myth x Lucette? "053. Keeping a Secret" Your writing and this ship is just *squee*!!!!

053 - Keeping a Secret

Keeping a secret was easy, if there was no one to share it with. Myth had always made sure that his secrets were all his own. No witnesses to his magic. No one seeing through his glamour.

But this, this was a different kind of secret. A delicate game of hide and seek, right under the nose of the Lucis bearer, the traitor, the king and Alcaster.

Not that he was much better than the traitor now. And even for the same reason.

He had never been so relieved to have been able to convince the princess to keep quiet about his magic (he had needed to show her the Crystallum for that) than when she had revealed herself to him, through the glamour the fairy bearer had cast.

The in a maid outfit was scandalous. And amusing. Not that he would ever admit that to her face. Just because she was much more stable about her favour than her mother didn't mean he needed to risk her goodwill.

And she was letting him close enough, to run his fingers through her hair, trusting him to keep Alcaster in check and Varg on a leash. She hadn't been happy about the curse, but it was better than letting the knight disappear, just because Alcaster was an idiot.

And they even had a good alibi already thought up for him as well. The king was letting of regular rants about witches after all. The late queen was visibly enclosed in the crystal and the fairy leader may not want to keep that a secret and they didn't need to lead revenge seekers straight to the Tenebrarum.

Only revealing his identity just before the birthday would be much safer than giving stupid humans a chance to damage the crystal in panic at seeing Hildyr.

A pity that most of these secrets would come out soon.

Advertising for my own work. A Cinderella Phenomenon fanfiction, with a slow build Lucette/Myth pairing.

As of October the 23rd it has 9 chapters and roughly 44k words.

Lucette is the MC and the story is mostly from her point of view. Whoever wants can go and take a look.^^ (And leave a review, if they want to. I love feedback.)

Myth x Lucette "050. Breaking the Rules" dabble?

050 - Breaking the Rules

There were many rules applying to a princess. Social ones, etiquette and sometimes simply expectations about how a princess currently had to behave. There were always witnesses for behavior. Family, servants, chaperons or maybe even guests.

Currently there was no one outside of Myth. And the level of freedom that added to their interaction was exhilerating like the first time she had channeld magic freely in an appropriate open space.

There were no roaming hands or deep kisses belonging into back alleys. Lucette was no fan of there things. But despite everything Myth was clingly and just like herself loved to be close enough to her for touch. Holding each other. Being closer than was approopriate. Kisses were a rare thing, both were not quite sure how to add to their current relationship.

But both needed the touch. The contact. No matter the rules, expectations or opinions. Touch made it real, where words were simply lacking.

And Lucette would willingly break many kinds of rules to keep that assurance that everything between them was real.

myth and alcaster drabble!!

Have a small piece.^^

Myth didn’tlike Alcaster. He was brutish, had no sense for sensible approaches and was tryingto take what belonged to his queen: The throne.

What didthe man even think was going to happen? Well, he knew what the man thought wasgoing to happen. That him taking over would instil enough fear into people tomake them ‘more productive’ again. Moron. He would be busy wasting theresources of this raised productivity to instil the fear needed to raise productivity.

Even nowthe man was strutting around in the room they were meeting in. Tense, as ifawaiting someone to just barge into the room. Not that Myth was going to remindhim of the spell keeping people away.

“That planis not going to work that way,” he finally said, “There is no way we can assurethat all of the turned knights will be in the palace at the same time and noone else. The number of the knights in question is too small.” And people notinvolved would never let his alliesin. And witches were vulnerable to steel like everyone else, if there was notime to cast a shield.

The man gavehim a cold glare Myth just answered with an unimpressed, raised brow. “Do youhave a better plan?” he snarled coolly. “More time to turn more knights to thecause,” he commented calmly. The man could do with some patience. But thenhumans had short life spans. Did Alcaster start feeling his age? Was that thereason why he started pushing everything forward faster?

“We can’twait forever! If the brat marries, there’ll only be more people to take care of!”“As long as the king pretends to let the crown go, there shouldn’t be a problemat all,” the witch replied. Not that the crown would go to anyone else than hisqueen.

He wouldtreasure the face of this human, when his queen returned and he noticed fromwhom he had tried to take.

How would myth react to being in a love and having a love rival.

Well, here is what I came up with.

Was kind of tricky to work out and hope it isn’t too far fetched.

He ran intoher by accident. Even a year after her disappearance there were stillpossessions of his queen in the palace he had hidden away and sneaked into moresecure hiding places whenever he had the chance.

Like in thisnight, when he was moving the stash of magical books to somewhere else.

The librarywas dark when he had retrieved the first books and it was still dark when hecame back for more, dawn just dusting the horizon.

But now therewas someone else in the library as well. Stepping back into the darkest shadowshe slipped to the stash, made sure it was safely hidden and then went toinvestigate.

It was ayoung woman, not older than himself, taking books from the shelves and puttingthem onto a cart. Myth didn’t know her. The rebellion of the traitor had gottensome personal replaced due to ‘questionable actions’ under the reign of thequeen.

It was thesame reason why the former advisor had been let go, allowing him to slip intothe court.

It seemedthis woman was new as well.

Auburn hairframed a light skinned face with dark eyes. From the clothes she was wearingshe was either higher middle-class or lower high-class. Well, this wasn’t hisproblem. He barely interacted with the staff at all in anyway.

Myth saw heragain, when he was forced to consult the royal library for a dictionary  to better translate a contract he was tryingto make sense off.

She waschattering with a maid, passing by the shelf he was looking over and -when helooked over to identify the noise makers- she gave him a cheerful wave. Forcinghimself to stay in character of his new personality, he nodded back and thenscratched that meeting from his mind.

Then he runinto her for real.

For somereason the king was permanently shoving more work his way. On one hand, it wasa clear sign of being trusted. On the other hand, the man was most likelysimply trying to get out of tiresome and boring paperwork, now that his queenwasn’t terrifying people into respecting contracts anymore.

Myth roundedthe corner of a hallway and smashed into someone, paperwork sent flying.

They wereboth apologetic about the meeting, she embarrassed and he just done with theday, both collecting their own work which had scattered over the hallway andgoing their way.

An hour laterhe needed to hunt her down, because he was missing some sheets.

Her name, itturned out, was Elena. She had lived outside the capital in a town not far awayuntil the Great War ended and she had come to the capital looking for work,getting hired as a library.

She wascheerful, open and always up for making new friends. And she seemed to deemevery new person she talked to a friend.

Him included.

After thepaperwork incident -and yes, she did hold onto the sheets, because she didn’tknow if she could simply hand them off to another servant, proving the abilityof thinking sensible thoughts- she seemed set greet him every time they crossedways.

In thehallways, when she passed by his office, when he was forced to look somethingup in the library, it didn’t seem to matter to her.

The onlyreason why Myth didn’t leash out on her, was her ability to see when she wasinterrupting something and letting it be, leaving him alone to work through it.It was… kind of nice.

It took a fewmonths before he got a better grip on what she was like. How she was a bit shyaround strangers with no one around she knew and always willing to approach newpeople as long as she had a friend around. She didn’t like people mistreatingbooks -even had a slight temper there- and loved reading.

Myth foundhimself even slightly enjoying her company, it was way less offending than thetraitor had ever been, if only because she could stay quiet.

It took sometime for Myth admit to himself that he enjoyed Elena’s company. She was-everything considered- way less complicated than most women he had been forcedto interact with.

He likedbeing around her. He could make comments about books she understood, even makea bit of fun about how ridiculous some of the poetry books were, with theirperception of love and how it made everything just better and how marryingsolved every problem.

Then he foundhimself looking at books he had read some time ago and wondered if she wouldlike them. Was it something she may have read already? Something she would findinteresting? Or something she would put aside as boring?

Why did heeven care? His focus should be somewhere else completely, on securing andstabilizing the kingdom, so his queen would have everything she needed upon herreturn.

Why did hecare?

He… couldn’tanswer it.

Myth foundhimself thinking more about that question while living his days in hisdisguise. And then decided to just let it go.

He was workingon keeping the kingdom secured and he needed to wait a few more years for hisqueen to be released anyway.

As it was, heentered the library and found Elena joking with a young man.

She quicklyintroduced them. He was a young noble, visiting the castle and introducedhimself as Richard, complimenting him on achieving the position he had at hisage. Myth kept the conversation light and curious about the reasons about theman’s visit.

Richard was,as it turned out, visiting on behalf of his family, and had asked and receivedthe allowance to use the royal library for it.

Myth let itgot and went his way.

For somereason it bothered him that Richard was there, spending time with Elena.

And for somereason it bothered him that she was looking at him like- …like what?

When histhoughts caught up with him, Myth stilled. Why did he care that these two werespending time together? It was, all things considered, none of his business. Hehad way to much work to do anyway to play babysitter for two adults.

So why did itkeep bothering him?

He keptpondering that thought, trying to sort out his own mind.

The firstthing he really noted was, that he felt unnaturally happy and relaxed aroundher.

The nextthing was that -for some reason- he really liked her smiling at him.

And the lastfact was that for some reason he really couldn’t stand that man.

What the hellwas wrong with his mind? He would need to ponder that more…

Days blurredinto weeks and Myth found himself… strangely stressed.

He visitedthe library on occasion, always finding them in either blissful silence (hestayed a bit if that was the case) or in animated discussion (he left).

In a way hefelt… angry. He wasn’t sure at what. Like someone had intruded on somethingthat was his. Which wasridiculous. He had no reason to claim ownership to anything of the library.

Days passed,his mood riding and falling, him grumbling under his breath and the kinghearing and commenting -sounding way too amused- if he was jealous.

The commentmade something inside him freeze.

He thoughtabout it, when he was alone.

Was hejealous? He disliked Richard, disliked how he spent his time with Elena,disliked how she looked at the man, but not him-!

…was he…attached? Did he… like her?

More timepassed and Myth pondered this new revelation, remembering how comfortable hefelt around her.

…maybe heshould… do something about it?

The smallgifts were easy enough to come by.

Nothing too expensive,no reason to get intrusive or pushy. Richard did not seem to appreciate the newattention on Elena, glaring at him when she wasn’t looking.

He justraised a brow at the man, daring him to make a scene.

It still wentdownhill in the end.

He didpretend to be someone else, after all.

It was aninnocent enough conversation up to the point where fairytales came up.

There wereinterpretations thrown around, obscure ones retold (there were no books aboutthem in the library) and at some point it went to the source of this gap.

“I heard thequeen burned the books. As if it would erase everything,” Elena sighted,putting a book away, “I mean, just burning a few books doesn’t erase thecontent. There are more copies after all.”

“What do youmean with erase everything?” Myth asked, morbidly curious.

“What witchesdid. I mean, the fairytales tell you all what happened and so many of them areso gruesome!” the young woman shuddered, “I mean, these things must have beenreally bad to get written down. I’m sure you could add a few recent ones fromthe war as well!”

“We couldcall it ‘Rise of the Fairies’!” Richard added laughing, “What do you think,Mythros?”

“I rememberthat there were a few witches as well in the uprising,” he said after a shortbout of silence, fighting down seething rage and boiling blood.

“Sure! Andthe witch queen and the fairy leader were friends once! Would give it quite thedramatic spin!” she laughed, “But then it would just be a story!”

It isn’t justa are story. The tales are just a story! There is nothing true about them-!

Myth feltsomething squirming inside him, heart hammering, he forced his body to relax.

“Have fundiscussing it,” he said, voice neutral, “I have paperwork to get through.”

Later in theday, in the privacy of his own home he raged.

It was thefollowing day that he passed the painting of his queen.

He stopped and turned to the portrait.

The queen was looking down on him, eyes cold,unyielding and judging.

What had he been thinking anyway? Itwasn’t like he had time to waste on something like that. He had way more important things to get done.

ScratchingElena from his mind, he turned away from the canvas and went his way. Shouldthe two, naive idiots have each other.

His loyalty was to the queen and no one else. No oneelse was important. No one else mattered.