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I.D., a continuation of FaeApoc/Addergoole @kissofjudas

Mar24

After Convincing, after Identity.

“Tell me who you truly are, and give us reason to believe it.”

Adder panicked.

Stuck in the man’s gaze, he had no choice but to answer. But what could he say?

“I’m Adder, sh’Hana, cy’Caitrin, called the Link. I was oro’Orlaith in my first year of school. We joked about it being oro-oro, remember, Ora? And when I Named Hunter, when I named my son,” he was freaking out and he didn’t know how to stop, damnit, the first time he met his son and he was hyperventilating. “When I named Hunter, you looked at me, and rolled your eyes, and you said, ‘why, Addy?’ and all I could say was ‘he’s going to need both halves to get through it.’ Is that enough, Ora, please?”

He dropped his Mask, holding out his hands with the tiny pointed fangs under the nails. “And you know I never show anyone these.”

“Careful with those, Adder.” Her voice was level and unimpressed. “Silas, I’m convinced. This is the boy I Kept my last year of school.”

Adder held his breath. There was no mistaking the fact that she was deferring decision to this… this man. This man who had taken his spot, his Ora, his son.

He needed them. Adder waited on judgement.

This entry was originally posted at http://aldersprig.dreamwidth.org/496808.html. You can comment here or there.

Short/Cut, a story of the Faerie Apocalypse, for the Giraffe Call

Mar23

For [personal profile] clare_dragonfly‘s prompt. Around Addergoole Year 33

“Ladies.”

Griselda and Solange shared a look. They turned, two petite women on two giant motorcycles, to look at the man standing in the road behind them.

“Zel?” Solanage muttered it out of the side of her mouth.

“Got it.” Griselda murmured under her breath while Solange dismounted and walked forward in short, measured steps. The man was taller than either of them, of course, broad in the shoulders and carrying at least five visible weapons. His skin had the sun-burnt and wrinkled look that means he was trying to ignore what the sun could do to him, and his hair was yellow-white like old paper.

By contrast, neither of the women had a weapon visible; the closest thing was the small jerry-rigged device Griselda was pretending to talk to.

“Can I help you?” Solange was the sweeter-voiced and sweeter-faced of the pair; people smiled at her while they eyed Zelda with distrust.

Like this one, who smiled yellow teeth down at her. “You’re little to be out all alone.”

“We do all right for ourselves. Don’t we, Zel?”

“We travel the world fair enough.” That was her code for fae, with a thrown-in twist for probably up to no good. Solange nodded; she understood.

“We get by.”

“Ah, but you’d get by better with me.”

“We like the team we have.” Zelda had moved up to stand near Solange. Her hands were empty; she’d put the device away. “Why did you call us?”

“It’s a lot easier to chase down prey on foot.” He looked startled, as the first of Zelda’s spells took hold, forcing honesty out of him. Then he grinned. “Done with the foreplay, I suppose.”

His glamour dropped, revealing him for the seven-foot-tall scaly-skinned creep that he really was. Zelda was already in the air, darting in and out of his reach while she threw off bolts of lightning.

That bought Solange the seven seconds she needed. She spat out an under-breath spell and two wooden long-swords leapt into her hands.

She stabbed the creature in the gut and throat while he was reaching for Zelda, giving the fluttering sorceress long enough to dart out of reach and set off another electricity-to-the-brain spell.

Three more stabs and seven more quick lightning bolts later, the creep was down, wrapped in Solange’s chains of hawthorn and rowan. “We heard you were around.” She sat on the man’s chest, wrapping further chains of wood and thorns around his throat. “Funny, people always think short…”

“…and don’t think fae.” Zelda laughed. “This is fun.”


For [personal profile] ysabetwordsmith: I am not good at working descriptions into short stories, but Griselda and Solange are both women of color, and this is the post of the apoc.

For AGRP characters: Griselda is Miryam and Aleron’s daughter.

And Solange had a mention in Calling in the Storm

This entry was originally posted at http://aldersprig.dreamwidth.org/496237.html. You can comment here or there.

That Girl Thursday: Cody

Mar21

Guest Entry by [personal profile] lilfluff
Cody sh’Leyla cy’Caitin oro’Yolanda

Cody knew exactly who she was at her old school. She was the school freak and a geek. A role she had come to accept and even take some defiant pride in. And when she was informed she would be sent to Addergoole she didn’t expect any of that to change. Then the changes started coming.

Early the first week Doctor Caitrin gave her a name for her body’s physically genderless condition, the first time any of her doctors actually spoke with her regarding it. In the second week the masks came off revealing students and staff with far more blatant differences than hers. Then Hell Night came and terrified her until her Change came upon her. Fortunately as she recovered in Doctor Caitrin’s office she found she now had a protector in the form of her keeper and a whole suite full of new friends.

Cody was only a bare fraction over five feet tall short before her Change. Her lack of height and androgynous features often meant she was mistakenly thought younger than she actually was. Which while annoying she found preferable to when people thought she was a boy. That wasn’t helped by her preference for dressing in overalls and wearing unflashy jewelry. She has tried growing her chestnut colored hair longer but has found that no matter what she does it soon looks messy and at least when it’s short it just looks tousled.

After her Change she lost two inches of height and while furless she has taken on an almost elfin-feline appearance. The pupils of her gray eyes are no longer circular, long whiskers have sprouted from her face, and her ears grew longer and mobile. The only thing missing to complete the appearance would be a tail. But given her lack of fur she soon decided that was a good thing. While her Change didn’t bring claws or other fearsome features she did find herself with better hearing and balance, puzzling new sensations from her whiskers, and a powerful leaping ability. She just needs to make sure not to jump headfirst into walls like she did when she first changed.

She has yet to identify an innate ability. She is capable of bringing extreme focus to tasks. To the point of shutting out the outside world. But, she was prone to doing this long Changing or even arriving at Addergoole. With little social life she would often turn this focus onto her studies working at times several months ahead, leading to the grades that she thought were the reason she’d been granted a full ride scholarship for Addergoole.

This entry was originally posted at http://aldersprig.dreamwidth.org/495445.html. You can comment here or there.

An Education

Mar21

For [personal profile] rix_scaedu‘s commissioned continuation of Educational.

Teach me.

It was the best way to couch it to him and, it seemed, the best way to show her, too.

Ambrus could teach. He hadn’t been given that much opportunity, before, but he knew how it worked. He had been watching people teach for years, spending his free time around teachers, reading the books in the Library on teaching. He had an idea of the concept.

And Phillipa seemed to enjoy learning. She wasn’t one of those goody-good-good students, the ones who knew everything and kissed the teacher’s ass – he couldn’t imagine her kissing anyone’s ass, or anyone’s anything, for that matter – but give her a challenge and she dove into it with a vengeance.

Learning how to be a sub was her new challenge. Teaching it was Ambrus’, and he found that, despite knowing all of it, so many of the ins and outs, teaching was turning out to be an entirely different thing.

“We’re going to the Library.” He was running out of other ideas. She kept asking why. He couldn’t remember, not clearly, the last time he’d asked why.

“Why?”

He almost laughed. Instead, he took hold of the ring in the front of her collar. The gesture forced her chin up, so that she was looking into his eyes. He smiled; she shivered. Something about his smile did that to her. He couldn’t really say he disliked it, but it was certainly novel. “We are going to the Library to research the condition of being submissive. You may come along unbound and speaking, or you may come along bound.”

Ambrus was a little surprised to see Phillipa licking her lips. “Bound sounds kind of hot.”

Damn. How was he going to get this one past Luke? He took the opportunity as a teaching moment while he worried about that.

“‘It sounds hot’ is one of the primary reasons for a great deal of d/s. After all, being Kept might be a cultural condition…”

“But being a submissive is a social kink.” Phillipa recited the response with a lip-licking smile. “Yes, sir. And I’m being a submissive today, right, sir?”

He’d found he couldn’t stand being called Master. Well, he was in charge, he could choose which title he wanted to hear.

“Today is a sub day. Good girl.” He patted her head and thought about the problem he’d created. All right. Taking her bound to the library. “Go put on that pretty little sundress. Skip the shoes and underwear. You won’t need them.”

“Yes, sir.” Her arousal was coming off her in waves. Ambrus adjusted his pants and thought about will-power, and the sacrifices of being in charge. You should Keep someone, indeed. His Mentor was a sadist.

While Phillipa dressed – such as it was – he dug through the toy box until he found the restraints and collar he wanted. His penchant for playing dress-up with her meant that his Kept had more collars than anyone but Zita. Luckily, she didn’t mind.

Today would be white leather. He took off her classroom collar and buckled the heavy collar around her throat. O-rings everywhere; this one jingled like a parade.

Then he added wrist cuffs – jangle, jangle, until he hooked them behind her back – and then the ankle cuffs. He stepped back and grinned at her.

She smiled back, testing out her range of motion. “I think I need a leash.”

“I think you need a leash, too. Conveniently, I brought one.” He hooked it to her collar. “Now. Let’s go to the Library.”

“I thought you said I was going to be silenced.”

“I like talking to you.” He kissed her, because the taste of her lips was wonderful. “Fine. Do not speak unless spoken to until we get back to the room. You are a hard woman to please.”

“I try.” She was grinning widely. Ambrus found her pleasure thrilling, a sort of thrill he didn’t remember feeling in a long time. He could make her happy, not because he had to, but just because he wanted to. That was neat.

Leading her through the hall made the hairs on the back of his neck stand up. What if they ran into a…

“Ambrose.”

“Luke.” He swallowed hard. Ever since Regine had first brought him here, the angry Mara had terrified him. Even when Luke had clearly been trying not to be scary, he had still been so angry.

“Phillipa.”

“Sir.” She was grinning, the little minx, grinning. Awesome. He’d never seen an unhappy Kept be able to pull of a real grin.

“This is an interesting arrangement for the hallway.”

Oh, he was going to do his disappointed face. Ambrus smiled back at him, hoping he could pull this off. “We’re going to the Library to research Kept-Keeper dynamics.” He threw in, for fun, a little barb. “My Mentor thought it would be good for me to learn how to Keep someone.”

“Hrmph. He would.” Ambrus thought he saw the ghost of a smile on Luke’s face. “Well, if Wysteria doesn’t complain, I won’t either. Have fun, you too. Just… not in the halls.”

“Yes, sir.” Phillipa’s grin was catching. Ambrus tugged on her leash. “Come on, Pretty Petal Pony. Let’s… study.”

This entry was originally posted at http://aldersprig.dreamwidth.org/495078.html. You can comment here or there.

Magic Mondays: frodleikr

Mar18

In the setting of Faerie Apocalypse and Addergoole, Frodleikr is a Word, one of the cornerstones of magic. It is a Domain, a category of thing-to-affect, rather than a Manifestation, which is a manner-of-affecting.

[personal profile] clare_dragonfly asks: When was frodleikr lost, and how the heck do you even lose a Word?!

Nobody knows. Nobody is talking. And who can fault them?

The legend is that the thirteen departed gods (and the one that stayed) each had their Words. Eleven were given to share among all of the fae, but three gods favored specific breeds: Frodleikr went to the Daeva, of course. The other two went to the other two breeds.

Not every Daeva had access to the Word, of course, but many of the oldest did. The theory goes that it was lodged in the strongest fae blood. And, as time went on, fewer and fewer fae, it is theorized, had access to the words and fewer and fewer could teach its use.

Nobody’s quite certain when it vanished from memory. Certainly, the Council still remembers it, and the oldest of fae still alive. But who wants to admit that they’ve misplaced a building block of the universe?

If the Grigori and Mara know what happened to their Words, by the by, they’re not talking

This entry was originally posted at http://aldersprig.dreamwidth.org/493973.html. You can comment here or there.

Fire, a drabble of Luke and Myst (@kissofjudas)

Mar17

After Strong Relationships, after Bloodless.

The …ninja… writhed in Mystral’s grip, mentally and physically. He fought her, struggling against the invasive Working with everything he had. Zen.

Zen. A place of quiet. A place of water.

The storm rushed through, ripping the water out of the pond, revealing his thoughts below. The camp. The quiet trade in those who would grow up to be such very good slaves. The wooden chains.

Calm. The ninja breathed. He could not kill himself, as he should, as he had been ordered to. But he could dream of the fire. Fire. Fire, and the way it touched the sky. The way his home had burned. The way the bridges behind him had burned.

The storm rushed in and blew out the fire, showing the camp, again, the fortress with its little cabins, so tidy, all in a row, with its silence. With the silence of death, although many people lived.

Fire.

Snow, and the way the children sometimes did die, in the winter, hauling wood, doing chores.

Fire!

The coffles being led to sale across the continent.

Fire? The ninja was running out of energy. He felt as if his mind might burn out.

And that would be okay. He would never survive the failure of this mission, anyway.

Fire. He remembered the fire.

~

Luke knew he was out of control, or, at the least, balancing on a knife-edge of control and rage.

Bring it on he’d shouted at the wind, and then, angrier, “Come to me, or, goddamnit, I will find you.”

No-one came. He couldn’t actually leave. He wouldn’t leave the children. But he needed to hurt someone. He needed to hear them break beneath his hands.

He muttered Working after Working, searching the surrounding area. There, there, there. There. The dead ones, the incapacitated ones. They were all as he had left them. There. And there, one, walking towards him, trying to sneak up on him.

“You will die,” he informed the air, intentionally mis-aiming his call. “For invading my home and attacking my family. You will die.”

“But you will die, too.” The voice was female, level, cool, and evil. Luke spun as if surprised to look the direction the voice came from – not where the woman was coming from. He readied his attack. Let her think him blustering and foolish. “And your children will go to the Unit. No matter what you do, foolish man.”

“What Unit?” He strode forward, just a step. Not far enough to leave the children un-protected, but far enough to make it look that way.

“My Unit.” She really thought he was a moron. “The Unit.” Now her voice was coming from yet another direction, and she was sneaking up on the kids. Luke did not smile, but inside, the fighting glee rose in him. “Your kids will do well. Then again, mutt children always do.”

Mutt. For a moment, he saw red. Control it, old son, control it… The voice inside his head was Mike’s. He’d worry about that another time. Right now, he had a bitch to capture.

This entry was originally posted at http://aldersprig.dreamwidth.org/492973.html. You can comment here or there.

Way Back Wednesday: Leaving Town (D.J.)

Mar13

Some decades ago.

“What the hell kind of freak are you?”

“You’re no kind of woman at all!”

“Get out of this town!”

Dane Jordan straightened its skirt, thumbed its nose at the crowd, and left in no particular hurry. As long as it was leaving, they probably wouldn’t throw things. The trick was to leave so that they all saw it leaving – and didn’t think about the fact that its house was in this direction.

Dane had left more towns than it could count anymore. This was one of the cleanest departures so far, knock on wood. Then again, Dane had a lot of practice.

There was a car waiting in the driveway. A lean woman sat on the hood of the car. “I heard the trouble.”

Dane shrugged. Play it cool. Always play it cool. “Shit happens.”

“Not around the Ellehemaei.”

Now that was a word Dane hadn’t heard in a while. “I’m listening.”

This entry was originally posted at http://aldersprig.dreamwidth.org/492394.html. You can comment here or there.

Present

Mar12

There were things Mike expected to come home to during the summer.

Students, sometimes – the trusted ones, with the invitation to his public home areas.

Desserts and other treats.

Once in a while, a co-worker, who needed stress relief or a shoulder or just wanted to hang out.

Flowers, some times, when said stress relief, etc., had been very appreciated.

What Mike did not expect to find – on the floor, just inside the doorway – was a boi. Specifically, a boy, bound in iron ankle and wrist and collared in the same. A naked boy, kneeling on the tile of the entryway. With a tag attached to the collar.

Mike knelt down on the tile. He contemplated Masking, but, though the boy looked human, he was in the middle of the Village. Humans didn’t come here.

Michelle,

The name was a cue. Before the boy lifted his head, Mike shifted into a female form, wishing – for at least the twenty thousandth time – that she was any good at all with shaping Unutu.

I found this on my rounds. I have no idea what to do about him. As soon as you sign this paper, he’s yours.

Treat him well, Michelle. And don’t Keep him for too long.

Luca

Beneath his signature was a scribbled transfer of Ownership. Attached to the note was a pen.

“Laudanum, hrrm?”

The boy did not look up. Mike ignored ethics and dipped into probably-Laudanum’s emotions. She had to have some idea what was going on before she signed this.

Worry. Worry, want, anticipation, anticipation, anticipation! Worry, concern.

No fear. And the impatient anticipation smelled to Mike like arousal. “Well, then.” She signed the paper. “Laudanum, you’re mine.”

He didn’t speak, yet. Was he mute? Had Luca ordered him into silence? “Speak.”

The boy’s voice was rough, as if unused for a long time. “I’m yours.” Only then did he look up, his astonishingly green eyes meeting Mike’s. “Mistress.”

Luca did give her the most awesome presents.

This entry was originally posted at http://aldersprig.dreamwidth.org/491930.html. You can comment here or there. comment count unavailable

Bloodless, a drabble of Luke and Myst

Mar11

After Thunder, after Bad Kids

Luke swooped down on the monster holding his children. He was silent, quick, and utterly merciless.

The man died quickly and bloodlessly – except for the blood Chavva had managed to draw. Luke didn’t want the children spattered in gore.

A second attacker almost ruined that resolution. The bastard jammed a shortsword between Luke’s ribs, aiming for his heart.

“Unh. Icarus, grab your sister. Do you have a knife?” He grabbed the blade with both hands and stepped back away from it. “Jasfe tlacatl, bastard in the underhill.” The boy nodded, and managed to get it out of his boot. PJ’s and boots – good boy. “Back against a wall, kids. Watch out for each other.” He moved his body to block the attacker from the kids and pushed, shoving the hilt of the blade through the bastard.

“Anyone else?” He bellowed it to the sky. He was angry, now, damnit. “Bring it on, you bastards.”

This entry was originally posted at http://aldersprig.dreamwidth.org/491262.html. You can comment here or there.