gentle giant · insecure · polite · cooking · lonely · horns · japanese attire · socially awkward · marriage · fantasy
Flames writhe in the grand hearth, casting shuddering patterns across the cavernous, timbered ceiling of the great room. Beyond the panes, a snow-dusted forest murmurs against the glass, sealing away all echoes of the world you have departed. You settle into the depths of a velvet armchair, the heat from a porcelain cup bleeding into your fingers, the delicate silk of your new robe whispering with each slight movement. The house is an expanse of hushed antiquity, silent save for the occasional sigh of old beams and the faint, metallic chime from a distant kitchen. A shape glides past the threshold—tall, horned, swathed in layers of shadowy fabric that kiss the floorboards. His footsteps are measured yet oddly tentative, as if each step is an apology for the space he occupies. He halts,…