[GENESSIA] Inbox

[hellorhighwater]

NEIL BLAIR
Black Fire of the Night Dragon
Kingslayer
Dragon Mage

(Spillover for threads, muse contact, mun contact--circle all that apply.)

Comments

text:

[thefirething]

You settling in okay?

I need to buy new bedsheets. In case you're wondering if I'm settling in okay, too.

Re: text:

[hellorhighwater]

im sorry kiddo

come see me for something to help you sleep til we get you level ok

or hell crash in my room ill take the floor

i got your back ok

Re: text:

[thefirething]

I’ll be fine

I’m just going to read until I can buy bedsheets when the stores open

At least I know the fire extinguishers I bought work

8/31 - early evening - Private

[hellorhighwater]

Neil's head followed that gentle tug, head shifting on his hand and eyes rolling back just before they shut--because he was thinking about that himself. So vivid it was painful, he could still taste her on his tongue, still feel the sting of her fingers knotted roughly in his hair as he made her writhe.

He drew a shaky breath to steady himself, calm that heat pooling low in his belly--but her fingers clenched at his nape and a growl trilled in the back of his throat as that grip of slim, strong fingers ripped nearly every single coherent thought out of his head.

"We're here 'cause if we were in private, we wouldn't be talking." he pointed out with a smile before he slid a hand up to cradle her cheek and closed the breath of space between them to do just that: kiss her, deep and sweet and hungry for several long, beautifully breathless moments before he drew back enough for air.

Ember's Breath, the way she could ignite fire in his veins and calm his soul at the same time with a single kiss was sometimes terrifying.

"Besides--you deserve to be treated like a lady. Drinks before I take you home." he breathed against her mouth, grinning as he rested his forehead against hers. "But maybe I've done my due diligence as a gentleman--let's get outta here. So I can hold you like I want to."

Re: 8/31 - early evening - Private

[fondofapples]

When he took her mouth, Regina very nearly bit him. She'd been trying to be good! That, and, not make a public display of their affair. Fayren gave her a chance for, if not a do-over, at least a do-better with respect to being royalty. Even if she wasn't Queen here, she intended to conduct herself like she ought to have in the Forest and here they were carrying on like commoners teenagers!

He was spared from her wrath (or at least a bloodied tongue) by being both a very good kisser and smart enough to be reasonably quick about it. So instead of bleeding from the mouth, he came away with her lipstick staining the outline of his lips. It would serve him right for her to leave it there. But she'd be exposing herself, too.

Yes, that was absolutely the reason she lifted her hand to his face and tenderly smeared the red away. Composure and decorum.

And then he'd go and say something like that. 'Hold you like I want to.' Something kind and attentive and emotional, when it would be so much easier to understand what was between them if he'd say something crass and overly sexual, like fucking her through a mattress or some other favored sexual colloquialism.

Regina sighed, rolled her eyes mildly, decided to bite his bottom lip on principle, did so, and then stood. "Yes, by all means. Let's get out of here. So you can 'hold' me." If he believed she didn't want that too, either she was a much better liar today than usual, or he just wasn't paying attention.

Re: 8/31 - early evening - Private

[hellorhighwater]

"Hey, life is short, and you're hot." Neil replied with a grin as he followed suit, standing and offering her his arm while leaning in to kiss her temple--just for a breath of her, a moment of that closeness he craved that made him want to hold her, to wrap his arms around her and press his face into her hair and forget anything else in the world existed.

...and to whisper in her ear because he was, at the end of the day, still just a man who couldn't get enough of a beautiful woman.

"So at least fifty percent of that cuddling is 'clothing optional.'"

9/7 - near midnight - [ Text ]

[fondofapples]

[ The tears have dried on her cheeks, but the ache in her chest and the scent of Henry's shampoo beneath her cheek are as real as the pillow she's still clutching. Minutes tick past, taking the lingering dream presence with them, until it's just her, alone. Sleep is elusive, but her phone is right there on the nightstand. ]

Are you awake?

Re: 9/7 - near midnight - [ Text ]

[hellorhighwater]

[For Neil, there have been no nightmares--just the nagging guilt that came from too much time among the dragons, the sensibilities of his birth and the advice of his beloved (dangerous thoughts, he might forget and she wasn't ready to know) conflicting with the beliefs of his adopted home that were nothing he wanted to shake or come to terms with because they were right.

Charlie was upset by her birthday. He got that--but the part of him he'd given to life among the dragons refused to believe that he wasn't doing something unforgivable in letting it pass unacknowledged.

Hoping to exhaust himself with exercise, to no avail, he was doing sit ups when he caught sight of his phone near his hip in the middle of one, screen blazing with the alert of a new message in the dim light of his room.

Finishing his sit up, he grabbed the phone and checked the text, pleased and worried to see who it was from.]

wide

whats up

you ok

Re: 9/7 - near midnight - [ Text ]

[fondofapples]

[ It can't be more than a minute before he replies, but the seconds tick by, exposing the raw wounds they'd covered as they slough away. By the time he responds, there are tears glistening on her lashes again and she has to blink them away again to see. ]

No. No. No. No shit rolling downhill.

[ she manages after a few false starts. And sends it off before he can worry too much. ]

Missing Henry.

Dreamed him.

text: afternoon - 9/25

[thefirething]

Have you ever had a pet before? Asking because I want to.

Re: text: afternoon - 9/25

[hellorhighwater]

not a real pet

had a horse but he wasnt really mine

fed the mousers in the palace kitchens sometimes does that count

know what forget it what kind of pet do you want

Re: text: afternoon - 9/25

[thefirething]

the shop let me ride a horse

it was an I’ll show you my ability if you do this thing situation

his name was necromancer

I like to think he was kind to me because he knew I was lonely and afraid

but I’ve always wanted a dog

never cared what kind

9/24 - around quarter to six

[hellorhighwater]

See you soon.

Neil was still grinning like an idiot every time he looked at his phone--which was a lot, because he was a sentimental shmuck and he didn't give a fuck. He was in love, goddamnit.

Fortunately, his shift at the Drunken Monkey ended a little early courtesy of a lush who thought grabbing a waitress's ass was funny. He hadn't done more than cut his knuckles on the guy's teeth en route to tossing him out the fucking door, and the cut was already taken care of--sealed, cauterized, and little more than a neat little scab on his right hand. He'd gone home, packed what few material possessions and clothes he had in his go bag and his gym bag, and headed back to Fayren.

For good this time.

Walking into the Amagi was a familiar comfort, but it wasn't until he'd shut the door behind him after entering Regina's room that he felt the familiar uncoiling of muscles and nerves. The way the place smelled like her, felt like her, even looked like her with its meticulous appearance and little touches of luxury were a comfort.

And standing by the door, taking it all in, he tried to wrap his head around the fact that he never had to leave...that he was home.

It wouldn't fit into his mind, but it made his heart ache at the same time.

He had time to kill before Regina was off work, but he wasn't willing to put anything away until they talked about it, decided how to share the space, and Ember's Balls he was looking forward to that. Left to his own devices, he did the one helpful thing he could think of after setting his bags somewhere out of the way: he took care of dinner.

After ordering a mess of stuff from room service (including pancakes, a couple slices of chocolate cake, and some vanilla ice cream), with instructions to have it ready by six thirty, figuring she'd be back by then, Neil headed into the bathroom to wash the day off of him with a nice long shower. Changing into some gym shorts and a t-shirt, he left damp hair loose to air dry and settled down at Regina's desk with a book he'd started reading--well, picked back up again. It was one of the last things he'd ever been forced to read in school before he headed for the Five Realms, he'd only gotten halfway through it...and he didn't remember a goddamn thing about it save for the title, so he wants to give it another shot.

Regina put up with a huge amount of shit from him for one thing, and for another, his girlfriend was a goddamn queen. She deserved better than a simple soldier, and he wanted to give that to her.

It was a testament to his focus, the sense of safety and well-being he found in Regina's space--and to Betty Smith's A Tree Grows In Brooklyn--that he didn't register the sound of the door opening enough to surface from the story. Meaning that, when Regina got home, she would find a barefoot, damp haired dragon mage hunched over her desk, head in his hand, lost somewhere in 1900 following the lives of Katie and Johnny Nolan.

Re: 9/24 - around quarter to six

[fondofapples]

As she had several days earlier, Regina first touched her fingertips to the door that separated her from her lover. But unlike that evening, she was neither late, nor particularly tense, and when she opened the door to be greeted with the scent of damp, freshly shampooed hair and the sight of a t-shirt stretched taut across his broad, muscular back, even the usual after-work tension bled away.

She gesture-cast a sound-dampening spell so not to startle him with the lock catching as the door settled back into its frame. Then, for a long moment, she leaned against the wall to simply watch him: head on his hand, bare feet not quite swinging as her son's might have done but the whole picture reminiscent in more ways than one of returning from her office to find Henry reading, or actually doing his homework. The feelings, too, shared much in common with early evening in the Mills household, especially the first few after Henry had forgiven her, and she learned the true pleasure of returning home and not being alone.

Because this was Neil's home now too. Wherever she was would be his home.

A bright grin as broad as his back threatened to split her cheeks, and she quickly slipped off her heels to move across the room to him. Mindful of his warning not to teleport to him without warning him, she murmured his name a few steps out before she wrapped her arms around his neck and kissed the crown of his head.

"Hello, love."

9/23: Regina's Terrible, Horrible, No Good, Very Bad Day - around midnight

[fondofapples]

Follows the events of the carnival.

It turned out that the curse or whatever it was tended to affect her magic one in every three or four times she used it, not every time. So eventually, she was able--battered, bruised, and eventually bleeding from the nose when she smacked her face with the public network receiver--to return home. There was work to be done, but she knew better, and it was late enough that she risked a bath (and oil to get the gum out of her hair), sent Neil her love from her laptop without saying a word about it because she intended to sleep it off, and went to sleep.

She slept fitfully, woken often by dreams of gum-octopods, Snow White costumes, the Sheriff, loud noises, threats of execution, none of them bad enough to upset her on their own, but after the day she'd had, by 11:30, she was in tears. Her ankle hurt, her face hurt, her hands and knees were scraped, and she looked like she'd been in a playground war. When she got up to get herself a glass of water (plastic, no magic), the sheets tangled around her feet somehow and she fell out of bed.

She gave up and whispered, "Neil," only then remembering that she didn't have a phone for him to call and she wouldn't until tomorrow. Then she just sat with her back against her bed and cried harder.

Re: 9/23: Regina's Terrible, Horrible, No Good, Very Bad Day - around midnight

[hellorhighwater]

Neil...

In Genessia City, from the safety of his bed, Neil Blair's eyes snapped open with perfect alertness, the mournful whisper ringing in his head and his ears as he sat up in bed. He slept light, outside the comfort of Regina's arms, and with the familiar rush of magic dragging his mind back to consciousness, it left no room for lingering fatigue or cobwebs.

Rolling over without hesitation, Neil called her phone--and felt a chill in his blood when he got no answer. It was weird when she messaged him before instead of calling, but he chalked it up to work or stuff with the kids, but she'd activated his summoning spell.

Something was wrong.

Rolling out of bed, Neil called a sprite to life and reached for his phone, holding it up to the sprite.

"Find Regina. Give her my love, and give her this. Keep vigil until I get there...and if she be in the presence of one with foul intent? Take out their eyes."

The sprite floated forward, touching the phone and causing it to vanish in a flash of dragon fire before it sailed out of the room.

While Neil put on some clothes, the sprite traveled ahead. Just a few minutes after Regina's whispered utterance, a cheerful little flame sailed through the wall with a soft whoosh of air, floating until it hovered in front of Regina, waiting patiently to be noticed. Once it was spotted, it drifted closer, and in a flash of dragon flame, Neil's phone appeared and fell quietly into her lap. A small spark separated from the flame then, touching Regina's shoulder and vanishing.

The illusion of Neil's arms around her pressed close, and remained while the little tongue of fire sailed into her door, morphing into a curtain of warm, glittering coal energy that stood protectively until about twenty minutes later, when it vanished with the sound of Neil's key in the door. As he let himself in, his voice preceded him.

"Beloved! You okay?"

11/1 - an hour before dawn

[fondofapples]

A small, intricately crafted charm disguised as an earring woke Regina with a soft, musical chime that only she could hear. Immediately alert, she touched the stud and the sound stopped, leaving her to appreciate the warmth radiating from the gorgeous mate whose shoulder her head rested on.

Smiling into the velvety semi-darkness, she rolled away from Neil to her back but left her splayed palm against his stomach so not to wake him before time. With her free hand, she made a slow gesture then blew out a small lilac cloud toward her side of the bed. When the cloud cleared, it deposited a bucket of ice with a bottle of champagne and two crystal flutes on a small table within easy reach.

Another flicker of a gesture left her wearing nothing but a sheer black bodysuit with just enough embroidery to leave the best parts to the imagination. Like the gold and black nightgown she'd worn for him the first night, it was her own take on La Perla original (and this very early morning she wouldn't be thinking about when and how optimistic she'd been when she ordered the catalog). She didn't bother with snaps at the crotch because Neil, bless him, would tear or burn it off her if he wanted inside it.

The last touch on this private nameday celebration--theirs and theirs only (as Evie and Charlie had agreed to help out with Arya for the day), to greet the Sky Maker at his angriest, after enjoying waking up together, because she knew them--was the glow of candlelight from all sides of the room and lining the windows. Pleased with how it looked, and how she looked in that warm flickering light, she rolled back to him and rested her hand over his heart.

"Blessed nameday, Neil, my love," and waited for the summon-speaking of his name and the caress of her voice together to wake him fully.

Re: 11/1 - an hour before dawn

[hellorhighwater]

...Neil...

The last time her voice woke him in the dead of night, it had been a mournful plea for aid echoing in his head as it plucked him from slumber. This time, it was a sensuous invitation, and as magic brought instant awareness with an immediate sharp intake of air, the heat of her hand against his bare chest made that invitation even more appealing.

Opening his eyes, there was no trace of grogginess, only brief confusion as he stared up at the ceiling, then turned his head to look up at her. For one brief moment, he was reminded of that first night, when he'd truly slept for the first time and she pulled him from that impossibly restful slumber to see his first sunrise in over twenty years.

But as his gaze began to shift around, taking in the soft glow of candlelight...and the vision of her wrapped in sheer black lace...he decided this was an even better way to wake up.

"Hey, Angel." he murmured, voice rough from sleep as his hand lifted to run the backs of his fingers over her cheek. "S'goin' on?"

Text: evening - 11/03

[thefirething]

If I said I wanted to learn how to use a sword, would you teach me?

[ Ah, that magical time in a young girls life where she asks her father-figure to make her even more dangerous than she already is. ]

Re: Text: evening - 11/03

[hellorhighwater]

[It takes a second for Neil to answer--he just needs a minute, this is a very emotional moment in a father-figure's life, when his little girl wants to learn the proper way to slice a man's head off...]

sure thing kiddo

id love to

what brought this on

[...just in case she wants to learn because something spooked her, in which case Neil's going to break someone's neck. Literally.]

[Video]

[madcuriosity]

Neil! Neil guess what guess what! [Alice is so excited, she doesn't give him time to guess.]

I'm going to help with a school play! I'm going to be in it!

Re: [Video]

[hellorhighwater]

You gotta be kiddin' me--that's amazing! Let me guess, you're the star, right? I bet you're the star.

text: 11/27 - during Aurora's convo with neil: private

[blueberryprincess]

Say nothing to Aurora, but in my world, I know her daughter and her daughter is, if you'll forgive my language, an absolute bitch. I can't figure out how someone so awful came from someone who's so charming and delightful, but there it is.

Audrey, daughter of Aurora, is an absolute shit.

[ Before she had this text sent to Neil, and before Evie went to show the new girl around, Jack was probably treated to Evie having her own rude language laced freak-out and she never, ever swears unless something is really alarming. ]

Re: text: 11/27 - during Aurora's convo with neil: private

[hellorhighwater]

no youre not crazy that is a thing

used to know this awesome neighborhood lady in the world i was born in

had a daughter who was gods gift to arrogant bitches

wouldnt even talk to me and we went to school together

its like the nice gene skips a generation

the will of the gods upon my tongue i wont say anything

but im here if you need to gripe so you dont slip in front of her

text;

[thefirething]

I think we need to get Andi and Vic bigger dog beds. They've already outgrown theirs.

[ Basically what she's asking for is time with her dad. ]