APRICITY // technoblade x reader DISCONTINUED

4 - Captivity and Change

Quiet murmuring brushes against your consciousness, dragging you back into the waking world. You shift in your– it's mot your bed. Where are you? You frown and scrunch your nose as you sit up slowly, rubbing your eyes with the back of your hand.

You're laying on a hard stone slab, only a thin blanket covering you. The slab is pressed up against a stone wall. The small, square room you're in is made of three walls of stone bricks and one wall of thick iron bars. A chill runs down your spine and you sit up straighter as you realize that you're in a jail cell.

The murmuring that had awoken you appears to be coming from two people dressed in wardens' robes on the other side of the bars. You fling your legs off of the slab that serves as a cot and stride to the bars, trying your best to look less terrified than you feel.

"Why am I here?" you call to the wardens, making one of them flinch in surprise. The other turns to you, her face cold and impassive as she speaks.

"You're a suspect in the killing of Director Arya, and a prominent one at that. You were found holding her sword with her blood on the blade, unconscious on the path to the library. Not to mention the Level Eight grimoire you destroyed laying in pieces around you and the key to the vault around your neck."

Your blood runs cold. "I found her like that! She was in the vault. There were– there were no wardens or– or anyone to tell, and I–"

Your breath catches as you reach towards your neck, to the offending heavy, brass key, and find nothing. Both skeleton keys are gone, leaving you with only a lighter neck, a heavier heart, and a sickening feeling in the pit of your stomach.

The warden turns away, flicking her hair towards you. "Save it for the Magister."

"The... the Magister?" you ask quietly.

The warden turns to face you again, her eyes piercing right through you. "This is a murder of a Director of a Great Library. This is out of the library's hands, and straight into the Magisterium's."

You stiffen at the mention of the sorcerers' government. They were the supreme governmental authority, held in check by the libraries that held the spells and resources they needed within the grimoires. If they were handling your case, well.

That was practically a death sentence. 

You clamp your mouth shut and let go of your white-knuckled grip on the iron bars, where you had pressed close a minute before. "Oh."

The warden looks you up and down before turning back to her friend once more with the finality of a closing door. "The Magister will be here in three days," is the last thing she says to you.

Three miserable days pass by as you huddle in the cell, anxiety growing with every passing day. The hours feel simultaneously too short and too long, and by mid-morning on the third day you've given up on any pretense of comfort in favor of pacing your cell nervously. Suddenly, out of the corner of your eye, you see the warden supervising your cell snap to attention as the door to the holding cell room opens.

Your pacing grinds to an abrupt stop as you turn to face the bars, holding your shaking hands behind your back. You pull yourself up to your full height as the new Director (a warden captain, the clear next in line) marches up to your cell. He doesn't say a word, though his dark eyes are judgemental and knowing as he opens the door to your cell and locks a set of iron manacles onto your wrists. You furrow your brow and glare at him, but don't break the silence as he leads you through the halls of the only home you had ever known. The light streaming in through the atrium's skylight makes you squeeze your eyes shut, your vision still accustomed to the dim lighting of the cells.

The warm, creamy scent of parchment and ink reaches your nose and you breathe in deeply as you walk, trying to drink in the atmosphere before it slips through your grasp like sand. All too soon, you reach the grand oak doors to the outside. Your eyes trace along the gouges left by the Malefict's claws, proof that this isn't all just some fever dream you've had as the warden accompanying the Director unlocks the door.

Outside is a crowd of librarians, archivists, and apprentices, watching you and murmuring among themselves. You catch the eye of a few you had known, but to no avail. one after the other, they drop your gaze as you walk by. Shame threatens to grow in your belly, warm and sickening, but you push it aside. You've done nothing wrong, and if you're going to be punished for that, so be it.

At the edge of the crowd is a carriage, built from dark mahogany wood and carved with ornate details. Inlaid gold swirls to a focal point on the door of a key, candle, and dagger, the crest of the Magisterium. The windows are covered by thick red fabric, preventing you from seeing the magister inside. Four horses paw at the ground in front of the carriage.

As you reach the end of the crowd, fingertips brush your shoulder. Niki snags the corner of your robes and tackles you in a hug before the Director can block her path. Hurriedly, she speaks into your ear, words blending together as she buries her face in the crook of your neck.

"I kept trying to visit you, or find a passage in and get you out, I promise. I would have found a way in with a few more days' time!"

You hug her back as well as you can with the chain linking your wrists together. "I know, Niki. I love you."

"I love you too, y/n. Don't forget me." Her voice raises as you two are dragged apart, and you see her eyes shine with tears. You can feel hot tears begin to prick at the corner of your eyes, but you blink them away with a final, desperate glance at your best friend before you face the carriage once more.

A tall, lanky boy dressed in a sharp suit steps off of the front seat of the carriage, carefully setting down the reins as he opens the door of the carriage, revealing the sorcerer inside.

The Magister steps down from the carriage gracefully, hits boots hitting the gravel with a soft crunch. He stands tall and proud, surveying the crowd impassively. A thick, blood-red cape drips down his broad shoulders, swishing to an end at his ankles. An ornamental boar's skull covers his face, and delicately pointed ears poke out from the sides. However, the thing that surprises you most is the long, pale pink braid draped over his left shoulder, because you recognize it.

This is the same magister you'd met before. He seems to realize at the exact same moment, stiffening almost imperceptibly. The Director breaks the spell, though, by pushing you forward roughly. You stumble but straighten up, turning to glare at him with righteous indignation. He stares right back, unaffected, even as he addresses the Magister.

"She's yours to take to trial in L'manburg, Magister Technoblade. Thank you for taking her off of our hands."

Now that you're closer, you can see as his crimson eyes narrow beneath the eye holes of the skull mask, but he nods respectfully to the Director. He doesn't speak, though, as he steps aside to allow his servant to help you into the carriage. The boy, whose face is oddly unmemorable but seems to be around seventeen, offers his hand and boosts you into the main cabin. As you turn to thank him, you meet his mismatched eyes and he quickly averts his gaze. You frown as he shuts the door behind you abruptly, and all you can really remember about him is his bright green eye—eyes? You're not quite sure—that almost seemed to glow.

The carriage dips once more and you see the door on the other side open, revealing the pink-haired magister as he swings himself into the carriage. He sits diagonally from you, facing forward in the carriage, and leans forward to rap against the panel separating you two and the driver. The carriage jolts into motion, gravel crunching beneath the wheels, and you push aside the curtain to watch the Library's towering spires disappear into the distance.

hey!!! thank you all for reading so far :) i might actually upload tomorrow too, since I'm actually getting somewhere with chapter 5 currently. see yall next update!