sleeping hook dark fairy tale au

“Everyone had heard about you, you know. The beautiful, sleeping princess locked away in a tower guarded by thorns guarded by a dragon, laid to slumber on a bier of gold and pearl, wearing a crown of diamonds so clear and pure it was as if they had been plucked from the night sky to crown your brow. I remember what they used to say—in yonder tower, dreaming of true love’s kiss, lies the sleeping beauty.”

“And after? What did they say? When I woke with true love’s kiss?”

“That you married your prince, and he became your king, and that you live very happily with him.” Killian’s eyes were quiet in the dark, penetrating, and Aurora shivered under the burrowed cloak, burrowing deeper into the scratchy warmth. “But that’s not what happened, is it?”

She would not cry. She had no tears left. They had dried up, like rain in the desert.

“No. That’s not what happened at all.”

sleeping hook dark fairytale au

“I have a name. You might use it,” the queen said, skirts hitched up in her hands as she navigated over thick roots and slippery moss.

“I might,” Killian agreed. “But I won’t.”

“Do you even know it?” It was half-accusing her words, and he turned to look at her and saw how thin her hair was, how pale her skin, her grey her lips. The death potion had long since left her system, and still there was a dead light in her eyes that made him uncomfortable. He had seen it, and recognized it from the first, but had not cared. It hadn’t suited his purposes.

“No,” he admitted slowly, and knew it was a line he was crossing. He had never much use for them, anyway, nor much respect. “I suppose I don’t.”

“Aurora.” There was a slight hesitation over the beginning of the word, as if she had not uttered it in a long time and had forgotten the sound of it, the taste of it. Her own name. The queen angled her chin then. “I am Aurora.”

fic where lydia is a rusalka

There was water in her lungs, water in her stomach, water in her hair, water everywhere—she was breathing it in, like it was oxygen but it wasn’t. She could feel it twist poisonous and black inside the chasm of her chest. Oh, God what’s happening to me get me out of here! Someone! Someone!

Her fists shoved against the clear surface. It rippled like water but compressed like stretched plastic as she pounded against it, refusing to rend, to let her leave. The air bubbles that escaped her silent, screaming lips clustered at the top, unable to reach surface.

Please!

A form materialized just above, edges distorted, cast in shadows. Derek, she realized, more by the broad set of shoulders than anything else. Derek.

Take. Eat. Mine.

No!

But she already pushing her hands upward, punching her way at last through the casing over her watery grave. Derek grabbed at her shoulders, yanking her half up out of the water as she kicked and sputtered wildly. She could smell him. He was earthy, like the woods at night, and she was hungry—and for some insane reason she could feel the bubble of a song on her lips.

Take. Eat. Mine.

“Hel—”

Her words refused to come, fleeing into the back of her throat, and her arms closed around his shoulders. He was surprised, but her grabbing and by the shocking amount of strength stored away in her half-drowned body. He flailed, grappling for purchased on the mossy bank, but it was too late for him.

Too late, and Lydia dragged him into the water with her.

fic where lydia is a rusalka

Okay, Lydia thought, don’t freak out. Freaking out was so counterproductive in this sort of situation, and a sure fire way to get her killed. Don’t freak out. Focus on breathing. In and out. Count to ten.

Her face must have been more pinched and panicked than she thought because Derek slid a wide, rough palm over her lips. “Don’t scream,” he ordered tightly.

No freaking duh. Did she look like a moron? She couldn’t exactly retort with that, but the blaze of her green gaze spoke volumes.

Something slithered along her sandaled feet. Something furry. Oh God, a rat.

“Lydia,” Derek hissed because she was suddenly climbing him, clawing at him, desperate to get her feet off the ground. His hand slipped away.

“Oh God. Oh my God. Ew. Ew.” She could handle dead bodies and gore and lizard-creature from the black lagoon ex-boyfriends. But rats? “Get me out of here, get me out of here right now.”

sleepy hollow, ichabod x abbie fic

It’s not paranoia, Abbie comforted herself, even someone without the cop mentality that immediately leaps to worst-case scenarios would be reaching for a weapon when they heard the rattling of pots downstairs.

She crept down the hall, knowing where to step without making a noise, bare feet muffled on shagged, cheap carpet and spun into the kitchen with her gun drawn.

Ichabod raised an eyebrow.

“What,” Abbie said through gritted teeth, “the hell are you doing? Do you have any idea what time it is?”

“Yes. Dawn.” Ichabod cast a look out of the cheery lace curtains over her window—Abbie’s mom’s idea, not Abbie’s. “I always wake with the dawn.”

She pulled a breath of frustration through her lungs and reminded herself that she had invited him to stay—not that he had anywhere else to go—and he had just finished a two hundred year dirt nap. He was going to need time to adjust, and she was going to need to not strangle him while he figured things out.

“Well, I never wake up at the ass-crack of dawn. On Saturday.”

post-apocalyptic world with supernatural original fiction

On the bright side, Tink thought, the day couldn’t get any worse. Having a stare down with a raider and his gang, burly arms crossed over his shoulder, and a dangerous, lethal grin on his face—this had to be the lowest of the low.

Leather creaked over powerful, thick legs astride a dirt bike. Scraggly strands of blonde hair fell over his shoulders, as he pushed his black helmet off his head. The six members of his gang circled her like sharks scenting blood in the water, and she knew that beneath their helmets they all had the same colored eyes as her—a bright, liquid gold.

The leader leaned over the handles of his bike, lips peeling back over row of slightly uneven death. “Well, well,” he drawled, “isn’t it late for a little half out all on her own?”

She smiled sweetly, even as she grounded the heel of her boot into the dirt, ready to lunge. The bones of Old York City loomed above her, silent sentinels of steel and stone slowly being reclaimed by an indifferent nature. The former Financial District had been blown apart, a gust of power straight down its middle, leaving the roads and sidewalks uneven. It was far from safe, but it was usually empty. Usually, Tink thought sourly, until a gang of Raiders decided to roll through and ruin her day. It figured, though, since her day had actually gone fairly well. She wasn’t a fan of splunking, but it had turned up daisies, at least, and she’d been on her way home with a heavy backpack.

“Oh, I know,” she said, mockingly sugary. “That’s way I’m on my way home.”

“Home?” the leader parroted, and his golden eyes rolled upward in an exaggerated motion of disbelief. “Not many halfs have a place to call home. Mind if we tag along? We promise to play nice.”

“Gee,” she drawled, smacking her lips. “I dunno. See, I live down Houston Street way, and Pride doesn’t take kindly to halfs trampling on his territory.”

“I ain’t afraid of no vamp,” the leader said, overly loud to cover up the sudden silence of his gang. “Pride thinks he’s some big touch guy, but he hasn’t been out of his territory in what—twenty years?”

Victorian lady detective original fiction 

“Oh! It’s Mr. Haysworth!”

“What?” Julianna was leaning onto the window seal, peering out the parlor’s window, partially humming with restrained energy.

“It is—it’s Mr. Haysworth. Oh, and he’s walking this way. Oh, he’s coming to the door.”

Octavia all but barreled her sister over. “He is certainly not.”

“He certainly is!” Her sister sent her a knowing look through lidded eyes. “Perhaps he’s come to call on you.”

“Don’t be daft—he hasn’t.” But he was walking up to the door. “Oh, blast. I was poking around last night and he might have—”

“Poking around? Oh, Tavia, you didn’t.”

“Of course, I did. Don’t look so surprised. And now he’s come to tattle, the damned man. He can’t stand it, you know, that I’m just as clever as he is. No, cleverer!”

Julianna turned, springy curls slipping free of its twist. “Yes, but he is very attractive, isn’t he? And he is clever. I don’t think it would be terrible married to him—I couldn’t bear a simple man.”

Octavia’s mouth pressed into a unhappy line. She didn’t think Mr. Haysworth was attractive at all. Well, he might have been if he wasn’t blasted arrogant. Octavia had already decided to hate him for the rest of her life, and she was happily wedded to the notion.