I ASKED FOR ALBUS/GELLERT AND IT'S A CANON PAIRING AND I ASKED FOR IT BEFORE WE EVEN KNEW IT WAS CANON I WIN SUCK IT BEEYOTCHES.
AND IT'S ALBUS/GELLERT NON-CON. F**K. SQUEEEEEEEEE!!
*breathes*
Okay, Capslock coming off. For the moment.
I loved this. Loved the lushness of the prose--usually I praise "spare" writing all over the place, because richer prose needs different kinds of characters and setting to make it work--they need an archaic feel, or at least an archaic, lofty narrative voice to allow clever adjectives to flourish. Very few authors I know in fandom pull it off. Most in-between prose just feels purple or boring to me. This was not at all purple--it was mauve, affected, fitting to these characters and this setting, oh, so very perfectly. Every so often an odd piece of speech would hit me and I would just writhe at the loveliness of it: "smutch," "a salamander quickness," "invert" (whatta euphemism!), "the puzzle of bone and bulk." Beautiful.
And then the NON-CON. Eee, I warned you the capslock were gonna go back on. I swear to you, I never saw it coming. I looked right past the headers and plunged into the story and--here's what happened: somewhere around the kissing I was looking over at the scroll bar and saying, "Wait--not that I'm not enjoying this, but isn't porn a prerequisite of this fest? This isn't that long a story, from that scroll bar; how're we gonna get there before the end, unless it's a quick frot against the gate--seems unworthy of the Grindelwald this author has created--or a cut to another scene, which, again, seems unworthy of this author." And then Gellert said that Incarcerous and my brain started to boil. F**k.
I adored the sex. Absolutely adored the perversity of it, adored Gellert's blithe language (SUCH a kink of mine!) as he has his filthy way with his new toy! Plant bondage! Hair bondage! Spontaneous handkerchief gag ("Don't worry, it's quite clean. Shh"--MOAN!)! Albus's tears! I think I fainted a little with the--what the hell do I call it?--the nipple torture, god, I just have to quote Gellert completely here: "They won't break, of course. The hairs, I mean; I'm not certain about your nipples. They were a delicious apricot colour to begin with, but they are quite purple now. Perhaps if you keep very, very still, you'll be able to save them. I confess that I have grown fond of them even on such short acquaintance, and I should not like to lose them now." *faints again* I had similar light-headed joy with this line: Albus was punished for his struggles, the fetters dragging his legs further apart until he was brutally hobbled,--such another perfect kink moment of mine! And then, later, this lovely bit of language: and bore the shock of severance in his own mouth. YOW.
I love that Gellert was quite happy to get himself off at the end of it, not remotely pretending that his own arousal or climax doesn't matter--hell, no. And then this beautiful moment to display Gellert's arrogance: "Not even one quarter of an hour and the world turns upon its head. That is how you make time."
And you hit me perfectly with the ending: you touched on my sexual humiliation kink by giving me the moment of delicious terror that he's just going to leave Albus there, exposed, but then you tempered my disbelief that he would risk such a thing with the explanation that the entire scene had been charmed hidden, not because he's nice but because he's careful and leaving Albus there to demonstrate how very not-nice he is. Eeee. Beautiful draw-together of the ending and the early moment of description of the birds, Albus's reason to have been out there in the first place, and the means of his deliverance.
I had this big paragraph here about how I didn't know who wrote this, not at all--except now I have a suspicion because I kept thinking, while reading, "This author is doing a lot of the same things so-and-so does with her writing and I love that," except it didn't dawn on me until just now, hel-LO, so-and-so is actually in this fest, so, yeah, maybe I do have a guess! If not, then I've found a new favorite author to add to the list, so I'm thrilled either way. "Thank you" is inadequate, completely inadequate. This was glorious. &hearts