TACENDA // Technoblade X Reader

16

You found yourself unable to get Colin's words out of your head. They ate away at any other thought like parasitic worms, until they had swelled up to fill your entire brain, and you thought only of the way he had suggested killing you and the twins so easily like it would be nothing. 

Even if he had truly meant it as a joke, it made you sick to your stomach. 

You closed the book you had been trying to read and set it aside onto the floor beside you, leaning your head back to rest it against the wall you were propped on. You had come to the ballroom for it's quiet peace and hopefully an escape from Colin's words bouncing around your head to no avail. 

You should have just left after the meeting ended. Talking to your father had been pointless, and talking to Colin had made you sick to the stomach, and for nothing in return. Your time would have been better spent in the garden with Technoblade - those conversations were probably more productive than any of the negotiations meetings you had been in. 

You closed your eyes, focusing on the gentle sound of the castle breathing around you - the footsteps in the hall, the creak as wind rushed past the windows, the shift of the air around you as the twins popped into existence-

You opened your eyes to be met with two pairs of purple ones. Deirdre and Tarquin, both sitting neatly on either side of you, like bookends. 

"You weren't in the garden." Tarquin said. 

"Did you need something?" You asked. 

"Only the pleasure of your company." Deirdre replied.

You smiled, resting your head on Tarquin's shoulder. His cheek came to rest on the top of you head, and Deirdre slid down the wall to rest her head in your lap, letting you run your fingers through her hair, gently detangling the black curls.

You sat in companionable silence for a moment, just soaking up the touch of the twins and the comfort it provided. They weren't warm like humans, but there was a certain solidity to the weight of their hold that calmed you and washed the unsettling sick feeling from your stomach, grounding you again. 

You sighed, looking down at Deirdre in your lap. "It's been quite the day."

Tarquin hummed in agreement, and you could feel it where his jaw touched your head. 

You paused again, not quite sure how to broach the topic. "I talked to Colin."

"And?" Deirdre prompted. "The usual delusional rambling?"

"He made a joke about killing you both. And me." You said, voice dropping to something more hushed, like the walls around you would hear and tell someone. "At least, he said it was a joke."

The more you thought about it, the more you thought that it wasn't so far fetched for him. It was obvious that his one track mind was set on the throne, and he had never liked the twins. If he needed an excuse to start a war, killing someone in the family and blaming it on someone else was a perfect excuse. It happened in dramas all the time.

You'd just never imagined yourself as the family member getting killed in the story. 

You could feel Taruqin stiffen slightly, and Deirdre's eyes slid past your to connect with her brothers. She said something you couldn't understand - Endspeak - and Tarquin replied. Their conversation was swift, and then Tarquin was easing your head off his shoulder, leaning it back against the wall so that he could disappear. 

You watched the purple wisps of teleportation remnant drift to the ground until they melted away. 

"Where'd he go?" You asked. 

Deirdre simply shrugged, her eyes coming to land on your again. 

"He's not going to Colin, is he?" Your heart froze for a moment. Your brother barely tolerated the twins when they were being civil, if Tarquin was going to say something to him about what he'd said, Colin would rip him in two and come for you next. 

"No, no." Deirdre assured you. "Merely a precaution."

You relaxed some, nodding. "Right." 

Deirdre brought a hand up, tilting your head to look down at her and grinning. "You know he couldn't kill us, right?"

"You sound so confident." You said. 

"Well." Deirdre disappeared only to reappear in front of you, legs neatly crossed underneath her. "There's this funny little trick I can do-"

You let out a little laugh, smiling at her antics. "You think you could take him in a fight?"

"Undoubtedly." Deirdre said. "Your brother is a fool if he thinks he could defeat myself and Tarquin at the same time. He might be good with a sword, but a sword is no good if you opponent can disappear at will."

The air shivered around you again and Tarquin reappeared, sat next to Deirdre now, cradling something in his hands. He looked down at it with a sort of grave solemnity, and you peered into his hands, curious. 

An eye looked back up at you, the glassy orb swirling with green and blue mist. 

"What is it?" You asked. 

"An eye of Ender." Tarquin said, holding it out to you. You took the orb in your hands, cradling it just and gently as he had been. "Just in case."

"If something happens, and you need us, break it and we will come." Deirdre said, the teasing edge that she had been using dropping from her voice. 

You looked back down at the eye in your hands, rolling it over to move the swirls of color. It was maybe the most beautiful thing you had ever seen. "I'll keep it on me wherever I go." 

Deirdre smiled. "That's the idea."

Just holding it in your hand made you feel safer - the idea that if anything were to happen, the twins would be at your side in an instant was a comforting one. You trusted them with your life, as your father trusted them with his, and you knew that if it came down to it, either of them would trade their lives for yours. 

It was an unpleasant thing to think, but with how things were going, maybe a necessary one.