enemies to lovers, it's my favourite trope {lionel x ines}

[Cait]

INES IZAR

I name them Larsen and Lonora.

Admittedly, they’re not the most original of names. The inspiration had come from history. Larsen, for the hard-shelled creature that had followed me through the blizzard all day. He hasn’t left my side – I don’t think he’s going to. It reminds me of the past I can’t escape, even after a name change ten years in the making. Larsen is the girl from the orphanage; Larsen is the bodyguard putting his steel heart in my hand adoringly.

Lonora is something different. She is elusive, magnetic, flying just out of reach. Nekane never talked much about her family. I learnt a lot of the Izar history myself – from following Vasco’s presidential campaigns to stalking Yani until I had the courage to approach her myself. But the sisters she has no pictures of and the parents she says divorced when she was just a little girl evade me. Lonora is the grandmother I adopted. Someone that could be fictional – I know I’ll never meet her, even if she wasn’t already long gone – but reality is never as it seems. The beautiful beast in front of me lets me sit on her back as we pad softly through the woods. I trust her guidance better than I trust my own.

I guess it’s only natural for like to call to like. I’m not surprised to see another fowl like Lonora at the edge of the wood we’ve padded into. They greet each other like best friends – maybe something more, if the way my heart skips a beat at the sight of their reunion is anything to go by. I’m glad she has a companion to navigate the Arena with. That she’ll have someone to keep her company when I no longer can.

It’s too bad for the guy on the other side of the forest.

“Jesus. You look awful.” Lionel’s face splits into a shit-eating grin, and I see the blood-red of his gums blend into the bruises that are already blossoming across his face.

I shouldn’t provoke him – God knows what he’s gone through this morning, how unstable and potentially bloodthirsty for revenge he might be right now. But he had scared me half to death only a few days ago. It felt fitting that he got a taste of his own medicine.

“And yet. Still an improvement.”

scavenging roll for the charred cabin

ptcgHTou9T1-7

1-7

[k!ah]

 
lionel estrada

I had been slumped up against the feathery side of Mouse when he shot to his feet. The large fowl makes sounds I could only describe as chirps of joy as he puffs out his chest before eagerly greeting the the fowl that had crossed the distance between them quickly. Rolling in the snow, my leg screaming from the unpacked movement, and my body instantly longing for the warmth of Mouses body I watch as he floss his chest once again before gently brushing a large feather cheek against the the other fowls almost as though they were... lovers?

Of course the creature I managed to befriend was tangled with another. I swear to god if this one came with a rider I think I would simply die right here, right now-

“Jesus. You look awful.”

Sighing heavily, my eyes roll into the back of my head as I peer around mouse to see Ines Izar glaring at me from atop of the beast that Mouse greeted like he was basking in sunlight for the first time in days. I note the way she studies me and I grin widely at her as I give her a small mocking wave before rising my hands in and flaring my fingers mouthing the word boooo.

“And yet. Still an improvement.”

My grin widens and I come up to stand beside Mouse, painfully aware of the way I limped with each painful step. I lean on Mouse for support as I stare up at Ines. "I'm so glad that you find this version of myself to be to your taste," I gesture down at my bruised, bloodied and broken body, before bending into a mocking, elaborate bow that had my body screaming. I just couldn't help myself, could I? "I would hate to disappoint," I say, trying to hide the way my breath comes out in unsteady pants as the waves of pain begin too easy just enough for my mind to become less cloudy.