Two identical infants lay in the cradle. “One you bore, the other is a Changeling. Choose wisely,” the Fae’s voice echoed from the shadows. “I’m taking both my children,” the mother said defiantly.
Once upon a time there was a peasant woman who was unhappy
because she had no children. She was happy in all other things – her husband
was kind and loving, and they owned their farm and had food and money enough. But
she longed for children.
She went to church and prayed for a child every Sunday, but
no child came. She went to every midwife and wise woman for miles around, and
followed all their advice, but no child came.
So at last, though she knew of the dangers, she drew her brown
woolen shawl over her head and on Midsummer’s Eve she went out to the forest,
to a certain clearing, and dropped a copper penny and a lock of her hair into
the old well there, and she wished for a child.
“You know,” a voice said behind her, a low and cunning voice,
a voice that had a coax and a wheedle and a sly laugh all mixed up in it
together, “that there will be a price to pay later.”
She did not turn to look at the creature. She knew better. “I
know it,” she said, still staring into the well. “And I also know that I may
set conditions.”
“That is true,” the creature said, after a moment, and there
was less laugh in its voice now. It wasn’t pleased that she knew that. “What
condition do you set? A boy child? A lucky one?”
“That the child will come to no harm,” she said, lifting her
head to stare into the woods. “Whether I succeed in paying your price, or
passing your test, or not, the child will not suffer. It will not die, or be
hurt, or cursed with ill luck or any other thing. No harm of any kind.”
“Ahhhhh.” The sound was long and low, between a sigh and a
hum. “Yes. That is a fair condition. Whatever price there is, whatever test
there is, it will be for you and you alone.” A long, slender hand extended into
her sight, almost human save for the skin, as pale a green as a new leaf. The
hand held a pear, ripe and sweet, though the pears were nowhere ripe yet. “Eat
this,” the voice said, and she trembled with the effort of keeping her eyes
straight ahead. “All of it, on your way home. Before you enter your own gate,
plant the core of it beside the gate, where the ground is soft and rich. You
will have what you ask for.”
shitty MS Paint 3 minutes doodle, nto entirely accurate: When you have your pinky hooked on the “bottom” edge of the phone for the extra security so it doesn’t slide out of your hand that easily, you’re wreaking damage on your hand, since the pinky is extremely askew from it’s resting position. You might have noticed that when you hold your phone like that for long time it begins to hurt, like when you are gripping a pen too tightly for example.
Green lines - the fingers are going their natural way. Red line - the pinky is way off, that’s bad.
Me: Oh, good thing I never-
Me, looking down at hand: By talos this can’t be happening
Having a pop socket on my phone has been a GAME CHANGER for this
I don’t know of the pause after “smooth top” where he’s clearly considering if he needs to make the innuendo or not, or his reaction to the taste is the best part of this one
you are forgetting about “”BEAT UNTIL SOFT”honey i dont need instructions”
Today’s project of the day is a comedy about an arranged marriage between a vampire prince and the daughter of a warlord who turned his whole army into werewolves, with both sets of parents trying to use their child as a spy. One problem with that plan: the kids were secretly childhood friends and have genuine feelings for each other.
To avoid their parents realizing they’re more loyal to each other than the politics behind their impending marriage, they decide to pretend to hate each other.
The daughter is also a werewolf, the whole point of that was to keep the soldiers from turning into vampires (curses cancel each other out) so she’s got it too!
Vampire lineages are maintained through turning children— vampires age and they’re sterile, so they mostly kidnap orphans to keep their families going. Feeding on someone doesn’t ALWAYS make them a vampire, usually it just kills them, but if you keep someone alive and have a vampire feed off them repeatedly they’ll turn eventually.
Adults are turned as well, but that whole ‘thrall to the vampire that bit you’ thing is a rumor, it’s just because most vampires were RAISED by the vampire who bit them.
This is how the main characters know each other— they’re in their 20s now, but when they were little the not-yet-werewolf lived with her grandparents, who owned a butcher shop, while her not-yet-warlord father was off being a soldier, and the not-yet-vampire was an orphan who lived in the same village. The kids used to play together and the not-yet-werewolf stole from the shop to feed her friend.
However, a homeless kid who smells like blood because he’s been lurking around the butcher’s is going to be prime pickings for vampires, and he went missing around age 10.
They’re around 23 when they’re introduced for the “first time” as part of peace talks and the amount of effort they have to put into not just tackling each other is unreal. They missed each other! The werewolf thought he was dead! When they do finally get a moment alone they have a big dramatic hug and there is significant happy crying.
Personalities, public and private!
The vampire does a great job of playing the aloof, intimidating prince, but he just has a really good poker face. He’s screaming internally at all times. When you take the mask off, he’s really something of a drama queen, extremely emotional and passionate. He’s wary of revealing his true personality to the court, because he’s honestly pretty afraid of his sire, and a lot of the comedy comes from the drastically different impressions his staff and retainers have of him.
The werewolf, on the other hand, is rowdy. She plays up the wolf thing to cover for the fact that she’s always been very take charge and opinionated, often to the point of outright rudeness. She’s a pushy sort of affectionate, the type who will happily fight your battles for you. However, because she’s a young woman being ‘sacrificed’ to vampires, a lot of her father’s soldiers are very protective of her, and she’s not above playing the innocent virgin or shy, weepy lady if it benefits her.
The vampire prince’s name is Ambroz the third, according to the court. His real name is Walter (Walt for short) but he’s supposed to take his sire’s name, it’s a royalty thing, and nobody was going to take “prince of the night, Walter” seriously anyways.
The werewolf’s name is Zelda, and it has always been Zelda!
Some other Comedy Bits:
—The werewolf guards being useless the days around the full moon and various characters being able to get away with wild shit because the guards are play fighting or got restless and started running laps
—Ambroz has a young attendant who completely buys into his mysterious edgelord act and thinks he’s the coolest thing ever, this kid can’t decide if he’s crushing on Ambroz or wants to BE Ambroz.
—on the other end of things, Ambroz’s maid has had him figured out ever since he moved into the castle and serves as an extremely exasperated older sister. Ambroz, stop crying, sir, I will help you find your shoes. Yes I know your sire will be furious if you lost them. You are a grown man, sir.
—Zelda is DEFINITELY not a virgin but regularly plays at not understanding extremely basic sexual concepts to keep people from figuring out she’s thoroughly deflowered her fiancé
—Zelda’s best friend is constantly trying to find herself a goth gf lady vampire and is very much not a werewolf so she keeps nearly getting turned instead
I’ve named the best friend Luna, because it’s funny for the only non-werewolf in the werewolf camp to have the moon name. She’s known Zelda since they were 13, so she missed knowing Ambroz as Walter.
You can REALLY tell how much time she and Zelda spend together, they can organize a whole scheme with a wink at this point. She plays herself off as a ditsy farm girl to go with Zelda’s sheltered princess act.
In truth, she’s a casanova who is VERY popular with young ladies who have been reluctantly married off to older men. In any court where the women didn’t literally want to eat her, she’d be under somebody’s skirts by the end of any and all social gatherings.
