Spider Fae - Tumblr Posts

Spider and Butterfly (NSFW)

Warning: This work contains: A pred who exists in multiple states simultaneously, implied willing vore, implied fatal, implied digestion, implications of people being eaten in the past, magic and strange rules attached to that magic, some sexual situations. That aren't described in enough detail cause I am bad at it. Implied M/F vore, mentions of past instances of M/? Vore, If you like the Poem: The Spider and the Fly. You will likely see many similarities with this draft, if you have read that one source book for Changeling: The Lost that describes how someone should think of the True Fae as being both their kingdom and the actors within it. You probably know where I got the concept for the Pred existing in multiple states. If you have arachnophobia I'd strongly suggest NOT reading this draft as some of the imagery used may prove triggering. "Can I eat you Ida?" He asks softly, searching her eyes imploringly. "Would you allow me, the pleasure of unleashing my true self upon you? Of swallowing you whole and relishing your futile squirms as my stomach demonstrates just where we both know you belong?" She regards him attentively, considering him without disgust or fear, waiting for him to get to the point. So he continues. "Are you content with this mask I wear to lure prey in? Or could you accept the monster that lurks beneath?" Ida frowns at him thoughtfully and perhaps a little quizzically, it was an often unspoken but well acknowledged fact, that this body and his polite and genial personality were a lure. That at the heart his manor, lay his true self and the manor existed to ferry by trickery and fear those unfortunate souls who found it, towards his parlour door. Ida knew this, she was canny and had survived much longer than many of his "guests", to her this place was almost a true home, the shelter in the storm it appeared to be and Bastion was not a stranger, though he would always be an adversary, he was also something like a friend and when she allowed it something more. He longed to claim her, this mortal, who understood so well the rules of his domain, who understood if she disappeared into his parlour she would never be seen again. His stomach and heart equally ached at the thought of her leaving him, of her crossing outside the threshold of the manor one day and never returning. Of becoming the meal of a different monster when she left to forage for food, stubbornly and wisely unwilling to accept any food he offered her. Beneath the veneer of civility, the monster Bastion actually was, had become frustrated, not because prey might escape him, but because Ida might escape him, might go somewhere he couldn't follow and meet some fate he couldn't know. Hungry and alien as he was,he could think of no other solution, than to eat her himself, but none of his tricks phased her and so he was reduced to begging. She reached up and caressed his face, "Why do you look so saddened?" She asks, he holds the hand against his cheek, this is not his true body, but he treasures the touch all the same. "I do not wish to lose you" He confesses quietly. "I could so easily lose you, I cannot claim you on my own, I've tried so often, to close my jaws around you and drag you bodily into my web" He shakes his head at her suspicious expression, trying to convey that this is not another ploy merely a confession. "You know me too well my love, the longer you stay here, the hungrier I become for you." She crosses her arms "I'm not going to stop warning people to leave Bastion" She tells him her voice firm and resolute. He holds his hands up placatingly and shakes his head emphatically. "No, no, that is not what I meant, it is not that I am not fed, I do not mean to belittle your efforts, in defending other mortals, but many do not heed your warnings, or assume that you are on my side. No, it is not that I am starving for food, it is that I am starving for you, and you alone." He presses his forehead to hers. How he wishes he could touch her like this as his true self. The familiar suspicion in her eyes, is not as harsh as it once was long ago, it is more exasperated, less passionate, she does not trust him not to try and catch her. But she trusts him to not lie about their odd relationship. She trusts him to mean it when he confesses his hunger like a mortal might confess their undying love. He pushes her down firmly but gently holding her beneath him, wishing he could have her like this as he truly is. "Please" he implores "I need you, I want you, I yearn for you. Please, willingly come to me, please do not fear me, let me touch you, let me hold you, let me make love to you and then let me devour you and spit out your bones" He speaks it like poetry, like a lover asking to marry their beloved. Because for him it is. She has to understand that, she must know that, he has to make her see, that for him this is love, for him this is adoration.   "Bastion" She says his name with a unique blend of exasperation and warmth. "I love you, it hurts me to see you so forlorn, But, you're asking me to die for you." "No my love" He denies, pressing his lips against the side of her neck. "I'm asking you to succumb to me, in body, in soul, in mind and in heart. Death is part of what I ask,but if you understood, it would not be fear of death alone that motivated your rejection. Even so, I beg of you, come into my jaws, I want you." He trailed spidery kisses along her body, she arched into him and he imagined her doing the same when his teeth were sharp and his mandibles were exposed. The trust, the attraction, the love but directed at the monster who would gobble her up without remorse. His stomach growled, the human one and the one inside his true body, the manor creaked in sympathy, a reflection of its masters longing. She was so beautiful and delicate, a butterfly he could never seem to pin, he longed to wrap her in his silk, to feast on her blood,to hear her call his name in a mix of fear and ecstasy, to have her understand what she'd done to him, have her experience it from the inside, have her understand how deep and twisted his hunger for her was, but also how wonderful, how unique, how special she was to him. She looks up at him and he feels as though she sees him, the real him, not the human host of the manor, nor the walls that surround them, but the spider at the center of this web. An eyebrow is arched at him, the look in her eyes is almost playful. "And? If I did give myself to you, how would you start your meal?" He stares at her surprised by her boldness, though perhaps he shouldn't be, how indeed? His grip on her tightens, he considers it. "At first I think, I'd just want to revel in the fact you were mine. In the fact the parlour door had locked behind you the second you stepped inside, in the fact you were before me, after so long seeing and experiencing you only through proxies." He bends and moves backwards as he speaks, lips gently trailing exposed skin as he travels lower and lower. "I would play with you, try to frighten you, test your resolve now you were before me, whether you became fearful or resolute, I would savour your responses to me, for though we have known each other for so long, I have never truly met you, nor you me." He spreads her legs apart and gently removes the white lace between him and his goal. Her breath catches as he trails kisses along her thighs, teasing and tantalizing with possibility before his tongue descends onto the soft folds of flesh below. She shudders and whines needily as he toys with and tastes her. Insistently and greedily he explores, until finally she finds it too much and comes for him. He pulls away and licks his lips playfully making sure she sees. He thinks about swallowing up the woman in front of him. He's undecided on if he would start at the head or the feet. But he knows either way he would be sure to taste between her legs thoroughly. He tells her so and she rolls her eyes at him, but he can tell she's pleased by the picture he paints, even if she's reluctant to give herself to him in reality. The possibility of convincing her to let him have her thrills him, the thought of having her knock upon the door to his true self willingly. He pictures it, her standing in front of his door, nervous but anticipating, unsure of what the monster beyond is truly like but generous enough to offer herself to him, Jittery like a bride about to meet her groom at the alter. Or a blood sacrifice about to die in an Aztec temple. She pulls him back towards her and touches the tip of his nose chidingly, no doubt able to tell he's thinking something devious about her. He snaps at the finger playfully, she shrieks and pushes on his chest with a pout. He grins and continues to answer her question. "I'd swallow you up, slowly and carefully at first, but soon my need for you would become too much, I'd begin wolfing you down, shoving you in, needily, licking and sucking and swallowing, until every last bit of you was sealed away within me. Only then would I allow myself to feel some modicum of relief, some shred of satisfaction." He nuzzled her affectionately. "Once you were within me, I'd be in awe, the lingering taste of you on my tongue, the way you're beautiful body stretched and filled my stomach to its limits, I'd be amazed at how good you were and how good you were still being. Cherishing the knowledge that after waiting for so long, you were finally mine to savour, mine to love, mine to keep. You'd be afraid, how could you not be? We both know what I am and what I intend. But even so when I speak to you, you'd find yourself calming down, trusting me, accepting that although this was going to kill you, you would find yourself no less in love with me and no less sure of my own love" "Bastion" The look in her eyes is awed by his confession, she is attracted to the danger in him, she always has been, but has she ever truly understood how intertwined his hunger for her is with his affection? He's spoken of it before but perhaps she's never truly comprehended. He continues determined to make her glimpse the world as he does. "When digestion starts, your fear returns, but even as I lose myself in the all encompassing pleasure of my body conquering yours. I still find time to tell you, that you are cherished, that you are loved. Your struggles intensify, you can't help it, my stomach is overwhelming, it's love for you has no limits or boundaries. Though you are so much more to me than a mere meal, in this movement, I am the eater and you are the eaten. I come in time with your death throes and as you succumb to me, I feel your soul relax and surrender willingly, trustingly to mine. Now, we are one, we are complete and there is nothing more to fear." She looks at him with longing of her own, for the first time he can tell that she's actually considering it. Was it truly so simple? Had he just needed to be honest with her? About what his hunger for her actually was? She intertwines her hands with his and draws in a shuddering breath, she looks at him seriously and asks "If I did say yes, would you truly still love me?" Of course he would! it confuses him that she would even need to ask. But then again, he has come to understand the young woman before him, just as she has come to understand him. Ida flirts with death and danger, quite literally in fact. She has willingly made her home in his hunting grounds, despite knowing all too well that is what they are. Is her fear of entering his parlour truly motivated by literal self-preservation? Or is it a more personal kind of loss? He squeezes her hands comfortingly and asks what to him seems a very simple question. "Why would I ever stop?" Tears fall from her eyes and he wipes them for her gently. It takes a little while for her to collect her self but eventually she sucks in a breath and exhales it gathering up the scattered pieces of herself to continue their conversation. "I want to be yours Bastion" She admits quietly, "But!" She holds up a hand before he can say anything. "I-I can't walk up to that door alone. I know you aren't allowed to take me across the threshold like this, but, could you walk me towards it? And the you on the other side of the door, I know you can drag people in if they get close enough, even if you can't actually leave. If you offer me your hand, I'll take it." He feels his heart sore, the true him in the parlour reflexively swallows the drool pooling into his mouth, the manor seems to brighten and calm shadows less long, walls less worn. He embraces her gratefully, She's so beautiful, so wonderful, she does not deserve to meet her end inside his true self's belly. But she's going to and oh how he's going to make her feel his gratitude for it. The him in the parlour, gets to work, fangs ache and chelicerae twitch, as venom is prepared, a venom infused with his endless gratitude towards the young woman who will soon come to him.Shaped by his desire for her, it is something that will ensure she enjoys what is to come as much as he will. He dearly hopes she recognizes his gift for what it is.

Speaking of Bastion’s hopeless romantic tendencies, this man has definitely spun a web with a love heart in it for Ida. Either privately in the parlour in the way a school girl writes their crushes name and then draws love hearts around it or using smaller spiders in the manor as proxies to put hearts everywhere for her. This man has absolutely no shame when it comes to affection. The only part of his affection he’s even a little guilty about is that he wants to devour her and even then that has more to do with wanting her to recognise she’s loved than any human reason for feeling guilt related to wanting to eat someone.

Metamorphosis Ida can’t help but lean into his touch, can’t help the way her heart hammers and responds to even his most blatantly monstrous pronouncements of love.

Bastion is not human, not even truly a person as most would understand it. But his love is utterly sincere, corrupting and hungry just like everything else about him, but sincere.

To Ida, who has never felt such honest devotion, it is terrifying yet enticing and the fact she will surely die if she gives into him. Seems to become less and less important the more time she spends with him.

She knows she is letting him get to her. She is being seduced into being his prey. But the spider has become trapped by its own cleverness. The love is real and it drives the monster to near madness.

Bastion is not human, he does not know how to be human. He knows only how to lure and devour. He knows this and begs her to come to him anyway. Begs her to allow him to have her.

In his own way, he is scared of losing her. Ida knows that from a human perspective Bastion is mad. Perhaps even from the perspective of his species he is equally mad.

For his hunger for her seems to frustrate and sadden him. He is attached, hopelessly so and it makes him all the more desperate to catch her.

His onslaught of her is relentless. The Manor tries its best to remove all semblance of fairness, in its desperation to ferry her to his parlour door. But even at its worst, the Manor is bound to fairness, it can do its best to feel relentless, but to someone who understands its rules and tricks as she does, escape is still a possibility and escape she does again and again. Until one day, the collected mask of her host breaks not with anger or frustration or malice, but with soft pitiful pleas. He begs her to let him have her, confesses his love, does not deny that it is twisted and hungry, monstrous and terrifying.

But begs her to feed herself to him regardless. She doubts she can trust this confession, but Ida is tired and lonely and the spider makes it so hard to remember how to think like a person.

When she finally finds herself in his web, He continues to act act as if he loves her. Sincere and utterly monstrous. She finds she can’t love him any less now that she knows, the thing behind the door is as in love with her as the human mask always claimed.

It should be impossible to recognise, the human mask in the hungry monster before her. But she does, she hears the love and adoration, the dark and deep hunger that can only grow in response to its attachment to her.

Bastion does not understand how to love like a person, the notion that his hunger would soften or fade in the wake of his devotion is incomprehensible.

He cannot be filled or satisfied so easily. At least not by love alone. But when he wraps his jaws around her and swallows her up.

She gets the sense that perhaps, if he finishes digesting her, he might be more human for it.

She has changed him, as he has changed her. He is not something that changes well or easily. She can feel that it pains him to absorb her, he loves her and he loves how it feels, but he’s not used to the souls he devours, staying, he’s not used to receiving love, any more than he is to giving it.

He clutches at his stomach and heart, calling her name in confusion, Unsure how to deal with her staying with him, he does not want to let her go. But does not understand how to sift through her human perspective.

He has no sense of conscience, no sense of restraint, but through her, he does. It’s confusing to him, so confusing to be so heavily influenced by the one he devours. He does not resent her for it, but he is afraid, so afraid, of these strange pangs in his chest of the liquid pouring freely from his eyes.

He does not comprehend guilt or remorse and yet their union lets him experience it. “What have you done to me?!” He pleads with her, but though he can feel her presence she cannot answer him as she is. “Ida please, I don’t understand” He sobs “I feel more satisfied than I have ever felt, so why?” She cannot answer but even if she could, she would not. He will learn now that she is with him. He will learn so many things, he could not before. And Ida is content, knowing he has not rejected her, even as she corrupts him from all he understands, into something new and complex. “You are what you eat” has never been more appropriate or more damning.

He groans in pleasure as he feels her soul beginning to struggle against his. He can taste all the parts of her he admires as though they are spread out across his tongue. As her physical body weakens inside his belly, her soul opens up to him, helpless and trapped on all sides by a stomach made to keep more than flesh.

“Oh Ida, you are every bit as beautiful as I knew you would be” He cooed, hunger and adoration intertwined.

Can she feel how beautiful she is to him? Or does his hunger overshadow that part of him even now? When all walls and secrets between them should be dissolving? He hopes not, he hopes his admiration sears her soul as deeply as his stomach acids sear her flesh. He hopes she drowns in his adoration, that she softens in his gratitude, that she is undone by his regard.

Her soul seems to recoil at the very idea that he feels so strongly. It is not that she does not desire him or recognise him. But rather, that she is afraid, afraid that his love will disappear if he sees any more of her, if he sinks his fangs too deeply into what makes her, Ida. She thinks he will reject her, that he will spit her out. She underestimates the depth of his hunger, the depth of his love. Even after he has licked clean every scrap of her, he is confident, he will never stop wanting more.

She cries out and whines as his stomach tightens, were she anyone else, it might have been simple fear, but here and now he senses that she is overwhelmed by the feelings inside him. She wants to be corrupted and overtaken, to drown in him and succumb to his twisted ravenous affection. She has never felt more loved and that truly scares her. She does not believe she deserves him.

Which is ridiculous, when it is he who does not deserve her. He is a monster, a predator, a hopeless glutton, who is at this very moment digesting the one person he values most in all the world. If she wants him as much as he wants her, who is he to deny her? To reject or abandon her? He is nothing but a simple minded spider, a gaping void of hunger that can never truly be fulfilled. If Ida wants him, all of him, then she has but to ask and he will lavish her in affection until she forgets where his love ends and she begins.

Speaking of faerie food, Bastion would probably be super into it if Ida actually agreed to eat something he made, after agreeing to let him eat her. Since that’s really the only circumstance under which she’s going to willingly touch anything he makes. He’s a spider monster, paitiant anticipation is literally the better half of his hunting strategy so I feel like feederism would be right up his ally. The knowledge that Ida was fattening herself up for him? It would absolutely destroy this man. Rizzed within an inch of his life. But also just cooking for her would also be exciting for him. He’s actually an incredible cook so Ida would also be pretty spoiled, though she’d try her best to keep stoic.

Today’s fun fact about Bastion and the Manor: Don’t try to kill your fellow guests. There are guest rights in place that you automatically forfeit if you harm another guest. This will get you eaten. It’s essentially treated as you “forfeiting” the “game” of the “Manor”. Also this isn’t a magical law or anything but if you do find yourself with the unshakable urge to break guest rights and hurt someone else visiting the Manor I really wouldn’t recommend attacking Ida. Because not only will it get you eaten it’ll make it personal. Bastion doesn’t necessarily understand why some predators draw out their prey’s pain and fear once they’ve already caught them. But for Ida’s sake he’d be more than willing to learn. This only applies to guests. Bastion’s human form is 100% gankable though doing so is kinda pointless and if you have a guilty conscience the manor might even use it against you.

Thinking about the fact that though Bastion can make all kinds of mind bending venoms that numb or even enhance pain. His initial bite is incredibly painful. Then thinking about the fact this man would absolutely care enough about Ida’s comfort to wrap his thumb in silk and let her bite down while he bit her.

Ida might seem pretty cold in some of the scenarios I lay out but keep in mind that A. Bastion is a spider monster that wants to eat her. And B. Ida didn’t exactly get a lot of positive reinforcement for showing affection or warmth to others before she started squatting in the Manor. She’s really fucking bad at outward displays of affection or really any form of weakness, she can’t even properly emote fear because doing so would have just gotten her hurt in her previous environment. What she is good at is extreme actions to express feelings I.e. self-sacrifice, protection Or seemingly small gestures that are actually really huge when you realise how thoroughly she’s been discouraged from engaging with affect. Bastion meanwhile has never really had the chance to love someone but he’s also never been utterly discouraged from such a thing because back before he existed as he does now people didn’t even realise he had the capacity to be attached. So they didn’t really squash down on that part of him.

Bastion literally can’t not want to eat Ida, so when he realises he loves her it’s less “I couldn’t possibly hurt her now that I know” and more “How unseemly and presumptuous to ask for more from my prey than sustenance I truly am unthinkably greedy” Proceeds to angst about it a lot and resolves not to tell Ida. Then proceeds to fail spectacularly at keeping it a secret.

I think I’ve mentioned before that you can make more proxies/avatars of Bastion by summoning them. Which essentially gives the new proxy permission to exist in the new state you summoned it in. Some Fae in this world use this to go places that their main Oaths and Mantles keep them from. I.E. Every Fae of the Unseelie or Seelie Court are obligated to attend if the acting Monarch calls them. But Fae like Bastion are bound in ways that would keep them from actually showing up as the entirety of themselves. Hence summoning.

Ida: “You know, you’ve never actually outright said that hunger is the only thing you feel.” Bastion: “Have I not?” Ida: “Nope”

Bastion: “Are you certain of this?”

Ida: “Pretty, certain yeah.”

Bastion: “Does it truly matter that I have never said so in quite so many words?”

Ida: “I don’t know, does it? You’re the one lying by omission, so you tell me.” Bastion: “What makes you so sure it is a lie?”

Ida: “The fact you never elaborate, it’s all “as you say” and “I would not think to correct you” and then you turn around and you risk yourself for my sake!”

Bastion: “I have already explained! You are my guest, my prey, it would do me no good to lose you in another’s jaws. I was defending my territory.”

Ida: “And just that?”

Bastion: “As you say.”

Ida: “Bastion.”

Bastion: “Yes Ida?”

Ida: “And just that?”

Bastion: “I would not dispute you.”

Ida: “But could you dispute me?”

Bastion: “…”

NSFW Warning: This contains people mentioning having sex. They do not have sex in this, but it is mentioned that they did. Honestly not sure how required this warning is in this case but I’m not taking any chances.

Bastion: *brooding after having sex with Ida for the first time*

Ida: *tired but staying awake to address whatever angsty nonsense this is* “Hey you, that’s a very thinky frown”

Bastion: “Ida, what are we?”

Ida: *hums* “Good question, well I’m squatting in your freaky death house and you’re trying to eat me sooo Tom and Jerry?”

Bastion: “I only meant that we just had sex”

Ida: *drily* “So did Tom and Jerry.”

Bastion: *fretting* “I really like you.” Ida: “Yep, that’s been made very clear.”

Bastion: “But I want to eat you”

Ida: “Also, been made pretty clear.”

Bastion: “And I would like to do this with you again”

Ida: “Me too actually.”

Bastion: *crescendo of fretting* “But Ida, if I caught you, I would still devour you, in fact I feel hungrier for you now than I did before.”

Ida: “Mn, creepy, but I’ll allow it”

Bastion: *finally notices that Ida is being smart with him* “Ida I get the distinct impression that you aren’t taking this conversation particularly seriously”

Ida: “Bastion, we just fucked.”

Bastion: “Language.”

Ida: *sticks tongue out* “I am tired and the post coitus fuzzies aren’t going to make my input on this any sounder but: I’ve never actually felt safe, at any point in my life, not really, so if you’re worried I’ve misread the danger you pose, then you’re wrong, I don’t trust you to not be a predator Bastion, but…*intertwines her hand with his* I am trusting you with this.”

Bastion: “This” *spoken reverently* “I want this so badly Ida, but what if tomorrow is the day I catch you?”

Ida: *reaches out with other hand and boops his nose* “I think you’re getting ahead of yourself spider boy, but, on the off chance you get very very lucky, I’m not going to hold your true nature against you.”

Bastion: “Could you perhaps promise that? I know humans are not as bound by these things as Fae, but it would comfort me to hear you promise.”

Ida: *rolls eyes* “Bastion, I promise not to hold you trying to eat me or succeeding at eating me against you just because we’ve had sex”

Bastion: “It’s silly I know, I want to devour you, but I do not want to betray you or hurt you. I thought to keep how I felt a secret from you. When I realised I loved you, I was ashamed of myself, I have always been greedy, hunger has ever been my nature, but to want your heart and affection, even though I could never resist devouring you, it seemed a degree of selfishness outrageous even to me”

Ida: “Well, I won’t say it’s not greedy, but I will say I don’t really mind” *yawns*

Bastion: “Ida?”

Ida: *sleepily* “Yes Bastion?”

Bastion: “If I catch you can I still kiss you? Can I hold you gently before I eat you? Can I address you warmly even when you are digesting inside me?

Ida: “Sure Bastion” *yawns* “I don’t see mnn why not…” *falls asleep*

Bastion: “…” *holds her tightly*

Ida’s Guide To Flustering and Frustrating Bastion

Being an escape artist, ain’t nothing more frustrating or flustering to a spider than escaping the traps they’ve laid.

Know your riddles and puzzles not only will it frustrate and fluster the spider when you disarm his traps. It’s also good for the brain and it makes you feel clever!

Read the room, Fae literally have to play fair so there’s typically a way out of everything, they might try to obfuscate it but if you know what to look for ain’t nothing they can do to stop you.

Know your folklore don’t eat the Fae’s food, don’t make promises you don’t intend to keep, don’t agree to anything you don’t know the fine print of, follow warnings if they are given, but generally mistrust any information that is not verbally airtight. Establish your own loopholes and interpretations where possible.

Knife! Iron! Good for stabbing and throwing.

Small Fae can be bribed with chocolate and sweets even the spider ones.

Large Fae creatures can be stabbed and outrun. Also bribed though more rarely.

If it’s scary or disorienting you’re probably being herded.

There are places that aren’t dangerous, typically monsters can’t get in and the Host frequents these places. Also there might be symbolic signs of protection or sanctuary around.

Fluster host persona by treating him like a person and being nice to him. Also swear! he makes a face it’s funny.

Folk remedies and small rituals of safety, not all of them work but many do.

Be good at running, climbing, jumping and other athleticism.

Don’t open blue door, that’s the parlour door, it will get you eaten. If someone else opens the door don’t try to help them. If somehow the door opens on its own. Knife the spider he’s not used to people doing that.

Don’t kill other guests, if other guests are hostile and you are at risk of dying before they get eaten for breaking the rules. Lure them into traps, monsters or the parlour. You can’t kill other guests but the Manor can.

If at any point Bastion tries to tease or taunt you tease back he can’t handle it. Especially if it’s about his appetite. Man is so used to being a big bad predator he becomes putty at the slightest hint of reciprocation. Not really a survival strategy, but he’s cute when he’s flustered!

Bastion genuinely can’t handle prey that want to be eaten, not in like a “I don’t like this” sort of way more in a “child who has been deprived sweets their whole life gets told they can take one” kind of way. He’s like “Really!? F-for me? You mean it?”

So when Ida finally gives in and says he can have her. This man is basically rizzed within an inch of his life. He might not precisely understand firsthand what it means to be human but he comprehends that becoming food for another entity isn’t something that humans typically enjoy or want to happen. So the fact she’s willing to sacrifice herself for him, feels like one giant declaration of love and affection to him. Which it is, but I’ve seen lots of stories of Preds who don’t necessarily get that or take it for granted. Bastion gets that and is completely blown away by it.

Bastion’s the sort of pred who’d absolutely pull the “presses preys ear to stomach” thing on Ida. But instead of meaning it as a scare tactic he’s really just very ghoulishly trying to say “look how much I want you.” Ida would both completely get this, even be a little rizzed by it and yet still probably call him a weird ghoul to his face.

A big part of getting Bastion’s character right is about juggling sappiness and ghoulishness. Because in addition to being a hungry man-eating monster, Bastion is a hopeless romantic. But he expresses it in the context of a being for whom love is another kind of hunger, an especially complex form of hunger which he doesn’t fully understand and finds difficult. But a form of hunger none the less. Which is why he says predatory things in the same context that others would make heartfelt declarations or flirt. But he’s also sappy so I try to inject a level of earnest polite Victorian era noble man who would make a good male lead in a period drama type vibes. It can be difficulty to write a character who at their heart is very simple, predatory and food motivated but presents themselves as proper and civilised. In a sense despite being a monster Bastion is pretty naive, he loves wholeheartedly and unreservedly because that’s also how he is with hunger and why wouldn’t this be the same? Except he knows it isn’t precisely the same, there are things he would miss about Ida if he caught her, even if he keeps her soul within him. Even if his every instinct screams that this prey in particular should be in his belly. There are things that would change that he doesn’t want to change yet. Bastion doesn’t really know how to handle that, he’s not used to even really comprehending delayed gratification outside of the context of bidding time for the next meal. So the idea that eating someone is a trade off, that he’ll be taking from himself if he takes Ida? It definitely disturbs and confuses his poor little spider heart and brain. It’s not even that he doesn’t want to eat her or wouldn’t eat her in an instant if he caught her. He absolutely would but he’s starting to think that’s part of the problem and he can’t even truly comprehend why or how to change. Luckily for Bastion, Ida doesn’t expect mercy from anyone so him being incapable of it isn’t the obstacle you’ve think it was. Bastion has an inkling this isn’t exactly a health or normal mindset for a human. But he’s also so far from being human that he’s uncertain he should be trying to Faesplain to her or if he even can in a way that makes sense.

You know I’m not personally very into feederism as a fetish. But I feel like Bastion would absolutely use Ida agreeing to be eaten as an excuse to get her to finally try his cooking. Because she’s already agreed to be eaten so there’s no reason for him to lace it with any spells to catch her. I feel like he’d absolutely be into getting Ida to enjoy his cooking because it’s a form of subtle preparation yes, but also because her willingness to take the food reiterates that she’s genuinely serious about letting him eat her, combined with the fact that he gets to see her enjoy his cooking.

Bastion’s human avatar isn’t the real him, but I like to imagine it gives away what the real him is thinking hunger wise sometimes. Like his human avatar’s stomach will growl when his real stomach does. He can keep it from doing this (the human one his real stomach is entirely mood dependent) except if he’s too caught up in it. I like to think this is a little embarrassing to him cause love is literally another form of hunger for him so if Ida does something he’s particularly enamoured by and he’s not paying attention. Grrrgl~ stomach growls! And Ida absolutely teases him about this I just know it!

Bastion has two modes when it comes to Ida, one is the unabashed lovesick predator mode, where the mask falls off and it’s obvious this is a being who is hunger and very little else. A being that wants nothing more than to devour the one he loves and let his stomach show her how much she is adored. But there’s also that part of him that tries to get the most out of the fact the rules of the Manor restrict how much of him can be shown. The part of him that regrets that he can’t actually be human and is ashamed he can’t be truly good or healthy for the one he loves. They’re the same person, Bastion definitely wants to devour Ida. But he’s still acutely aware that she deserves better. Ida disagrees, not because she has self-esteem issues (though she does) but because as predatory and inhuman as Bastion is, she loves him and feels safe emotionally with him. And for someone who’s never felt any sort of safe, emotional safety feels like it’s enough. I’m not saying she’s right about that. Their relationship is not meant to be objectively healthy, but it is meant to be sincere.

I like to imagine that if someone else other than him tries to endanger Ida. Bastion becomes incandescent with rage. The thing is he’s not normally an angry person, or really that sadistic either, ghoulish and predatory sure, he enjoys hunting and eating. Gets excited at the thought of sinking his fangs into something, enjoys the whole process of devouring people etc and sure people can get really distressed and hurt when he’s hunting them, but it’s not really the goal for him so much as the inevitable consequences of a creepy spider monster being hungry and trying to eat you. He’s not a deliberate tormentor unless torment will get you in his jaws and once you’re his he generally doesn’t try to drag things out unnecessarily. But if someone went after Ida? That would be a different story. He would be very pissed and honestly quite scary. I think he’d have that calm rage that isn’t actually remotely calm but appears that way on the surface. Intellectually he’d probably have some inkling that he was being cruel beyond what was usual for him and that maybe torturing someone who’s already going to be his prey is just pouring salt in the wound, but he’d have such little experience with being angry and scared on someone else’s behalf that I don’t think he’d be able to find the breaks and it would be the person who decided to threaten Ida’s problem.