"Waking Up Together" for Darkstalker and Clearsight

A sweet sunlit moment in early OTQ, as per request. They were so sweet and naive back then lol

The last remnants of sunset shine through the window. I blink my eyes open, yawning.

Huh. Heartfire let us sleep in. How merciful. I laugh a little to myself, and bury my face in Clearsight's shoulder, willing myself to drift back into whatever dream I was having, knowing deep down that it's futile.

"Your breath is awful," she mumbles tiredly, rolling away from me and lying facedown into her pillow

I burst out laughing. "Good evening to you too," I say, shoving her.

"It's true," she says, a smile tugging at her mouth.

With a heavy sigh, she snuggles up close to me, resting her head on my chest.

"We're not getting up until Heartfire says we have to, or the kids come over and bug us, right?" she asks, her scales stained a warm orange-red in the twilight.

"No way," I murmur, playing with her talons in mine, and watching how the light hits them.

She sighs. "What do you think we'll get stuck doing today?"

"Coronation planning. Battle planning," I guess. "Probably. Ugh." I make a face, and she laughs.

"What's that face? You look like you're chewing on a lemon." She pokes my cheek, bursting into another fit of giggles.

I absently wave my talons over her forehead, drawing out a flower crown. She gasps, reaching up to try and touch it. "What are you doing?!" she says, giggling, and reaching up to run her claws over the flowers. I wind morning glories around her horns and a daisy bracelet around her talons.

"A pretty flower crown. For a pretty queen," I say, grinning.

"They're so pretty!" She lights up, picking out one of the daffodils and tucking it under my horns. "There. For... an also very pretty king." She nuzzles her snout to my cheek, beaming.

"You're making the most ridiculous face right now," I tease.

"Oh, shut up," she mutters, shoving me.

***

"Flowers" for Darkstalker and Clearsight

Ok so this actually corresponds with this idea I've been toying with—I headcanon Darkstalker's birthday is in early August (August 12 to be exact, although idk if dragons have the same months as us, but you get the idea), which is right around when they're going to be running in the woods looking for Eclipse, on the run. I think for his birthday normally Clearsight would keep it simple. She gave him usually very sentimental little presents, and took him out nice romantic dinner, but obviously a dinner date is not really an option in the middle of the woods, so I was thinking she could pick a really nice bouquet of flowers and write a sweet little note. They sorta accept that it's not gonna be the best birthday he's ever had, and then they keep flying on their route to the Sky Palace and find this gorgeous, hidden waterfall/lake area, and go swimming, and Darkstalker is very happy just to get to spend time with his wife. This is the "flowers" portion of that day lol. (No promises this will fit into all the craziness, I have so many cute fluffy scenes I want to write, but it would destroy my pacing if I did all of them—which is what this book is for.)

"Hey." I nudge my husband, grinning. "Wake up, sleepyhead."

I've been up since sunset, trying to gather a bouquet of flowers while he was still asleep. I wrote him a note yesterday, so I don't have to worry about that.

Darkstalker blinks open tired eyes. "What?" he asks, yawning. "What is it? 'S something wrong?" he asks sleepily.

"It's your hatching day," I grin, shoving him. "You're nineteen today, silly."

"Wow. I feel like a new dragon," he says wryly. "You know, the excitement really wears off once you get into double digits," he says with a sigh.

I present my bouquet of lupins and daisies. "Well, these are for you," I say proudly.

"Oh. They're beautiful, honey." He nuzzles his snout against mine, smiling tiredly.

"And I made you coffee." We've been rationing it out; you can't find any here in the Sky Kingdom, and it probably wouldn't be safe to, even if we tried. "This is the last cup we have left, by the way, so enjoy that."

"No, this was yours," he protests. I can tell his heart's not in it, though. "We should split it."

I snatch the cup back, and take one sip, and then hand it over to him. "There? Feeling less guilty? It's all yours," I say, grinning.

"Thank you, honey," he says, rolling his eyes. "I understand this is a massive sacrifice for you."

"Shut up. It's not like we have the ingredients to make a cake here. Or an oven, for that matter. It was the most special food item we had left. I figured I wouldn't get the same response if I offered you the last of the dried persimmons."

"True," he admits, laughing. He presses a kiss to my forehead. "Thank you, darling."

(She gives him a sappy letter after this, but I didn't feel like writing that bit for some reason)

"Dance with me" and "Kissing in the Rain" for Darkstalker and Clearsight (I miss them a lot okay) (human AU)

This is kind of two prompts in one. There's this scene where they're stuck in the Sand Kingdom and it starts randomly POURING with rain, it lives in my mind rent free. So here is a humanized version of that scene. Complete with descriptions of pretty dresses, as per the request. (I just think Clearsight deserves to have pretty, like, 1950s sundresses.)

warning: they are sappy and married and very in love

"You know, if we never started working for the queen, we would have made really good criminals," Darkstalker muses, his arm thrown over my shoulder. "We could have cool code names! Everyone would fear us. No more boring, mild-mannered Darkstalker and Clearsight. We could be... oh, come on, help me out here..."

"We cheated at poker at one sketchy casino," I remind him, rolling my eyes. "The owner of which was definitely smuggling poisons. I wouldn't exactly call us hardened criminals. By the way, our kids are never finding out about that."

"Oh, yeah. I mean, Shadowhunter would lose her mind. She'd probably be mad we left her out of our criminal escapades, actually," Darkstalker muses.

I laugh. "You're right. She would. I mean, Brightmind is already a bad enough influence, right?"

"Right," Darkstalker sighs, putting his hands in his pockets. It's weird, dressing so normally, after months of ball-gowns and capes and being decked out in jewelry. Darkstalker wears a white button-down, tucked into beige pants, with suspenders. The first couple buttons of the shirt are undone, and his hair is all tousled up. I think he looks very dashing.

The stars are obscured by dark clouds that have been gathering for the past little bit. You can barely see the glow of the moons through the cloud cover.

A drop of rain rolls down my forehead. I frown. "Honey, am I going crazy or is it starting to rain?"

Thunder cracks in the distance.

"I've never been to the desert before," Darkstalker says wryly. "But I'm guessing that's not normal."

I fidget with the little pouch in my pocket. (This dress has pockets!) It's a nice cream-coloured white, with delicate pink floral patterns, and I know it's not going to be very practical for travelling, but after everything we've been through, I figured I deserved a pretty dress. And I did pick out a more practical outfit for all the walking we're going to be doing over the next who-knows-how-long, searching for our daughters.

"Come on! Let's dance!" I shout, grabbing onto his hand as the rain starts to pour down on the dusty streets.

He grins, spinning me around, then pulling me close, one hand on my waist. I accidentally step into a puddle, and we both just laugh. After everything we've survived, I can handle a little rain.

"You know what? This beats stuffy court parties any day," he says over the downpour. I can see people rushing out of homes and businesses, glancing up at the sky. I couldn't care less. He lifts me up in the air, ever-so-gently, and sets me down. I shriek, then burst into laughter, and he follows suit a moment later. 

I punch him lightly in the arm. "Hey. You can't just do that without warning me."

I lean into his shoulder, his shirt basically translucent at this point, dark curls plastered to his forehead. We're really just stepping back and forth now.

I look up to meet his eyes, brushing my fingers over the back of his neck. I stand on my tiptoes and pull him in for a kiss.

"I'm sure this is going to be the talk of the town tomorrow," I murmur as we break away for air, a smile tugging at my lips.

Darkstalker laughs softly. "I think they can handle it. We'll be out of here soon anyway."

Thunder cracks in the distance, even closer now. I run my hands through his hair, and he cups my face in his hands. I can feel his heart racing through his shirt. I kiss him like we are sixteen and desperate, I kiss him like we're dying, like we might never get a chance to kiss like this again. We have a lot of lost time to make up for, after all.

We pull away, gasping for breath.

I laugh, brushing my thumb over his cheek. "You have the stupidest face on right now."

"Shut up," he mutters, rolling his eyes. "So do you."

I laugh, and press a kiss to his forehead.

"You know, was waiting for the right time to do this," I say after a moment. "But this feels pretty romantic." I pull the pouch out of my pocket, and he raises his eyebrows. I wonder if he already sort of knows what I'm gonna say next. "When we got our things back... there's one thing I never told you about."

I pull the little pouch out of my pocket, undoing the drawstring—looking up to meet his eyes; trying to guess if he's figured it out already.

I pull out our wedding rings, a little grin spreading across my mouth.

"No way," my husband breathes. "I thought—"

"You got to propose the first time. It's only fair." I put mine onto my ring finger, and hold out his with shaking hands. "So. Darkstalker. Will you marry me? Again?" I giggle.

He laughs. "Yes. Always, yes."

"Here. Let me." I fumble with his hands and slide it into his ring finger—gold and obsidian. I always thought that suited him perfectly. I kiss the back of his hand, and slowly look up to meet his eyes.

"You know, you're a lot better at this than I was," he observes. "When I proposed, I think I chickened out about five times before I finally got the courage."

I laugh. "Don't worry. I thought it was adorable."

"Friends to Lovers" for Darkstalker and Clearsight (yes i did all the ones for them in a row bc i feel like it so shush) (Everything is the same but they don't have powers AU)

Ok, in a universe without their powers, I like to think they would have been best friends for a long time before they fell in love--like, they only got together in their last year of school or maybe even later type thing, although they fell for each other when they were around three/four. I think in some ways, their relationship would be so much easier if they couldn't see where it was going before they already started, and they could have taken things a lot more slowly. Because she had no reason to be afraid of being in his class, in this AU Clearsight skipped a grade like the principal says she could on her first day of school. 

Anyway the tension in this is driving me MENTAL which i think means I did a good job.

This pine tree has always been our spot at lunchtime. When we don't wander into the city on our break, as third-year students are allowed to, we always hang out here, comparing lunches and watching everyone else in the courtyard, occasionally joined by Listener or Whiteout. It feels like they're a million miles away.

"So what's your stance gonna be?" Darkstalker asks. 

"For what?" I ask, shredding a long piece of grass in my talons.

"Uh, the one on NightWing-RainWing relations, and whether our trade deal is... oh, shoot, what's the word..."

"Mutually beneficial," I say, rolling my eyes. "And I haven't decided, duh. I need to do more research. I'm gonna head to the library after school, if you wanna come."

"Bleck." He makes a face. 

"Come on! It'll be boring without you," I wheedle. "We could get snacks from the bakery? I mean, I spent the last of my dragonetsitting money last time, but if you beg your mom, we could do that."

He sighs. "How do you have this much fun learning? I'm just gonna outline what we learned in class and say it's mutually beneficial, Professor Wisdom clearly thinks that's the case. I am very good at pretending to know things."

I shake my head, sighing.

"Fiiiine. I'll come. But only because I like hanging out with you, not a bunch of dusty old scrolls." He shoves me. 

"Yes! I knew I could persuade you!" I shout, feeling very smug right about now. "If you want, I bet my dad would let you sleep over. We don't have school tomorrow, and everyone else is doing something fun." He stays over at my house so often, there's a drawer of his things in my room. My house is generally a lot more fun for sleepovers--and my parents are less likely to burst into random arguments, and make everything weird and awkward. Which sucks, I really like Foeslayer and Whiteout, but Arctic kind of ruins everything, and I can tell Darkstalker doesn't like spending any more time around his family than he has to. So whenever we hang out, it's always at my place.

He perks up a little at that idea. "Really?"

"I mean. I don't know. I think it'd be fine." I shrug.

"Awesome," he says, shooting me a secret grin. 

My heart does a backflip. I duck my head, and smile shyly back at him. Which is weird, because this dragon has known me since I was one  year old. We grew up together. I tell him everything, and he tells me everything, like each other's living diaries. There's no part of me he hasn't seen; no reason to be nervous.

"You're coming to debate club this afternoon, right?" I ask

"Yeah. Of course. Who else is gonna beat you?" He snorts.  

"I would say the same thing about you," I say, grinning. "I have to keep you in check. Otherwise, you'll think you're some kind of genius."

"You don't think I'm a genius," he asks, pretending to be injured with a talon to his chest.  "Clearsight, I don't even know you."

I roll my eyes and smile, looking away. He sighs, and leans into my shoulder. I adjust my wing, tenting it around him. 

"Hey, do you wanna go to the dance together next month? As friends?" he asks, looking up at me.

I force a smile. "Of course I wanna go with you, dummy." 

As friends. That's all we are. Constant and immutable, like we were tied together somehow from the moment we met. By each other's side, no matter what.

I'm okay with that, I promise myself. Just friends.