Happy New Year friends! May your 2024 be the best year ever 💖
Thank you so much to the people who messaged me and gave me tips about India, they were so useful and I had a bloody great time I went to Hyderabad & Hampi, which was absolutely spectacular. Highlights were visiting temples, seeing the sunrise and sunset from a gorgeous viewpoint, watching a monkey steal my brother's breakfast (hilarious), and getting to celebrate NY in a sari. 10/10 experience, would do it again, and I absolutely intend to return to India again one day to visit and explore more cities!
I know quite a few people have asked questions from the last chapter, so I've included a little Q&A below. I hope that helps, if you have any more questions please do not hesitate to ask!
Q: Do you plan to include the Authens in future chapters?
A: I'm not planning to introduce the Authens in this fic, I think they are so cute in the manga but I won't have room to fit them in anywhere in this story! Plus we don't know a lot about them yet so I don't feel I know their characters well enough. Sorry!
Q: Was Damian a test subject?
A: Yes, Damian was actually a test subject, although he was unsuccessful. At this point it hasn't been explicitly 'confirmed' in the narrative (yet) but he and Anya know enough of the pieces to put it together themselves and they have more or less accepted it as the truth.
Q: Can you explain the interaction between Damian and Anya a little more?
A: Ah, sorry about that! This whole story is a massive exercise in writing for me, so thank you for your patience and for asking questions. That helps me to understand what I can do better.
In the last chapter, we saw Damian make his renewed commitment to Anya in his mind (r.e. the Blessing of the Hands), after which Anya became guilty and inititally attempted to confess about Plan B, but she became afraid and changed track to talk about Damian's flashback at the lab instead. At this point Damian wondered if what Anya saw in his memory/flashback matched what she saw in the lab, which would imply that he was indeed an experiment, and though she did not say it out loud she implied to Damian that his suspicions were true. After this, Damian wrestled with his conflicted feelings about being an unsuccessful experiment and still wanting approval from his father, and feeling guilty about expressing this to Anya because of her past as a test subject.
Q: Will Damian and Anya see "Star Wars" on their date?
A: They sure can! I wasn't going to focus on the movie much so you can imagine they are seeing Star Wars if you prefer hahah
CW: Some references to weight loss and difficulty with eating.
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Damian drifted in and out of sleep, unable to maintain his periods of wakefulness for long. He tossed and turned, sweating out his nightmares, fitful and feverish as his father's face flashed in his unconscious vision. Clouds of pink and green swam behind his eyes at seemingly random intervals, and at times the absence of them was enough to jolt him awake with alarm. He had vague memories of feeling the emptiness on the other side of the bed, and the ache in his heart only subsiding once he had found the source of strawberries and mint, existing like a beacon in his subconscious.
Once he found the beacon, he returned immediately back to sleep.
Colours and smells and images filtered through his vision, blurry and of a paint-like quality, sometimes covering the image of his father's face as if someone had taken a clumsy paintbrush to him and smeared his features. Flashes of something else filtered in at times, and though he couldn't decipher exactly what it was, Damian couldn't help but feel…safe. And warm. Like someone had reached into his mind and gave him colours and dreams that soothed the ache and tamed the fear.
When Damian eventually awoke, he felt as though his entire body was lighter. The pressure had lifted somewhat from his shoulders, enough for him to actually rise from the bed without too much difficulty, more awake than he had felt in a long time.
"Mama, I think he's waking up -"
Damian blinked hard as the world around him came into focus, only to see the worried faces of Yor and Anya at his side.
"How long have I been asleep?" he rasped, his voice dry and scratchy.
Yor took a quick breath and moved to answer Damian's question, but Anya got there first.
"Damian," she said, with utmost seriousness. "It's been a year."
"What?!"
"Only joking," she smiled, and then leaned down to give him a quick kiss on the cheek. "It's been three days."
"Are you feeling any better?" said Yor, and Damian frowned.
"Uh, I feel…"
The growl of his stomach pierced the silence.
"Hungry?" said Yor hopefully, and Damian's face reddened as he nodded.
Yor awoke on Boxing Day with an empty bed and a killer headache, but her morning was made ten times better by the glass of water that Loid had thoughtfully put next to her side of the bed. She nursed it and massaged her temples as she thought of what she had seen the day before.
Over the past few months, Yor had seen Damian on a one-to-one basis many times, mostly through training him at the staff gym in City Hall. She had not only seen his growth in strength, but also his improvement of form and technique, and of course that came with a certain amount of muscle gain.
But when he entered the apartment, the floorboards where he stepped sounded different. Something about the creak of the wood scraped against her ear, vying for her attention. It only took a few seconds for Yor to conclude that it must have been because the distribution of his weight had changed - and then he turned the corner into her line of sight, and Yor's stomach dropped. He did not look well.
And then they ate together, and it was worse than she thought: she saw the pain in his eyes as he struggled to swallow, the queasy expression on his face as he tried to eat through his nausea.
It had only been two weeks since his father's arrest, and Yor couldn't bear to think about much he had been neglecting himself, all because he was suffering alone. Of course, Yor couldn't blame him for any of it. Donovan's arrest had rocked the country, creating a seismic shift in the nation's politics, but more than anything, it was a devastating earthquake in Damian's own personal life. Life as he knew it was over, and an uncertain future awaited all of them.
Anyone would struggle with that. Anyone would find it difficult to sleep, or eat, or to look after themselves, or manage to do even the simplest of tasks. So, the moment that Yor's eyes skimmed over the subtle gauntness of his expression, the almost indiscernible change in his footsteps, Yor promised herself that she would do whatever she could to help.
If his changed appearance showed Damian's loss of appetite, the days after his arrival made it clear that he had barely slept in the past two weeks. At first, Yor wondered if Damian was just tired from all the festivities, or if his hangover was worse than she realised, but as the first day came to a close and Damian still hadn't emerged from the guest room, she only became more worried.
When Yor tried to ask Loid about it, he shrugged.
"I think he needs this. Perhaps he's been too hypervigilant recently, and now his body is overcompensating at the first chance to relax."
Of course, Anya had been listening, and she quietly added that his awful nightmares had been keeping him awake, too. (Yor wasn't sure if her daughter seeing other people's dreams was normal, but she took it in her stride and didn't ask any more about it.)
As time wore on, it did not escape Yor and Loid's notice that Damian only ever fell asleep around Anya. Occasionally, Damian emerged from the guest room, eyes barely open, and gravitated instantly to wherever Anya was at that time. Twice, Anya had been watching Spy Wars on the television, and when he plopped himself next to her on the sofa, he was asleep again in a matter of seconds, his head on her shoulder. Once, when Anya retreated to her room to study, a near-sleepwalking Damian followed and collapsed onto her bed.
When Yor went to check on them a few hours later, she found Damian lying on Anya's lap, still fast, while she played with his hair, concentrating intently.
"I'm trying to give him some good memories," Anya admitted quietly. "I hope he'll see them in his dreams, and then maybe he will feel better when he wakes up."
Yor nodded, not saying anything, but her eyes had widened in awe. She had no idea that her daughter's power had grown so much.
After Damian finally awoke, Yor watched with caution as Damian slowly rejoined normal life.
It was an unspoken agreement at the Forger's to not talk about the news. The same story that had destroyed Damian's life cycled through the programmes and the newspapers day after day, with the public's anger only worsening. It was easy to forget, as long as he stayed inside the small apartment - he was far too conscious about leaving the building and being potentially spotted by ravenous paparazzi.
But they didn't push him to leave the flat, knowing the stress that awaited him outside, and instead worked on getting back to some semblance of normality, while trying to forget the revelations that rocked the outside world. In the meantime, mornings were a lot more interesting than Damian had experienced before: he and Yor would move the furniture around to practise the techniques in the martial arts videos she gave him, before joining Loid and Anya for breakfast.
After that, Loid encouraged Anya to do her homework - to 'get it over with', as he put it - while Damian instead chose to read one of Loid's books that he had lying around the flat. Meanwhile, his own school work remained in his bags, and he had no intention of even looking at it. Why should he try, if his father had given up on him? If his family name had been ruined and dragged through the mud? What was the point of getting a high grade, if his classmates probably hated him, and thought they would be better off without him?
Damian's mood darkened as the thoughts swirled even more in his mind, and couldn't concentrate on the sentences in front of him as he continued to ruminate, until Anya's voice pierced through his thoughts.
"What year was that treaty signed between Ostania and Etaly? Was it in 176X or 167X?"
Damian paused his reading to think of the answer.
"It was technically 176X, but after the industrial revolution there were additional changes made to the agreement to account for the change in technological exports, and the train routes connecting the two countries."
"Oh right," Anya nibbled on her pen. "So what was it about the routes?"
"There were geographical challenges in putting down tracks on the terrain, so then they had to negotiate the borderlands," Damian said automatically, and then glanced over at her over his book.
Anya had stuck her tongue out as she wrote, with one finger resting on the lines of the textbook that she was referencing.
"Anya," he said, deadpan. "Why are you asking me? You have the textbook right in front of you."
"I know, I just want to make sure that it's correct."
Damian frowned. "By asking me?"
"Yeah," she affirmed. "Textbooks can be misprinted but your memory is perfect."
Damian hummed sceptically, but he continued to answer her questions throughout her study session, and after some time he found that he had migrated to sit opposite her at the dining table, where she had spread out her textbooks and notes.
He told himself that it was just easier that way, so that she could get his attention easily.
"Why don't you study with me?" she cautiously asked him, eyes flicking over to where he sat, and Damian sighed with his entire body, his forehead meeting the table. Even the thought of the homework waiting for him made him sag with hopelessness.
Anya observed him quietly for a second, and then leaned back on her chair with her arms crossed. "If you won't study, then I won't either."
"Don't do that," his voice muffled against the wood of the table, and he turned his head to look at her. "You might actually get a Tonitrus Bolt. At this rate, you're just one away from being put on Expulsion Order."
At that, Anya groaned for real.
"Don't remind me!" she grimaced. "It's been giving Papa anxiety every day."
"So, do the assignment," he said firmly.
"Only if you do it with me," Anya replied stubbornly.
Damian risked a glance at her, only to see her exaggerated pout. Somehow, she still made it look cute.
Still, he knew that it was pointless. All of it was. He couldn't bring himself to do any of it.
Anya softened on him.
"You should study for yourself, too," she said quietly. "Your future is still important."
Under his breath, Damian grumbled something that sounded like 'what future', but Anya tapped her foot against his under the table.
"Don't say that," she scolded him gently. "It makes me feel sad."
Damian stared at her, his eyes roaming over her sad expression, and the way her shoulders slumped, and he felt his resolve wither away in the face of it. He never could stand when she looked at him like that. It was unbearable.
"Ah, well," he sighed. "We can't have that, can we."
He raised himself from the table and went through to the guest room, and when he returned, he laid his homework and pens out in front of him, next to hers.
"Which project do you want to do first?"
The bells for New Years had stopped ringing some time ago. Lights twinkled around the Christmas Tree, and paper ribbons from the party poppers lay strewn across the floorboards and furniture. In the stillness of the night, Damian couldn't look away from the coloured lights flashing in Anya's eyes, while she was mesmerised by the tree itself.
"I hope Becky got home okay," she remarked quietly, keeping her voice to a whisper. "It's so late to travel back to her house."
"I hope she gets stuck in traffic for declining the space on your floor," he snorted, and Anya giggled.
"Can you imagine? Me and her cramped up in there while you, Ewen and Emile have to squish in your bed together?"
Damian eyed the sleeping form of Ewen, located somewhere under a pile of blankets on the floor, while Emile snored on the sofa.
"It can't be worse than what they ended up with," he said honestly.
In any case, it was better that they were there at all. He didn't even think they would show. For all intents and purposes, their families thought that they were at Becky's house - without Damian. Even though Damian understood why they all decided to fabricate a lie, he couldn't deny that it still stung just a little bit.
Loid and Yor Forger were the perfect hosts, and were happy enough to supervise the teenagers into the New Year, before the effort of the festivities caught up with them, and they retreated to sleep. In classic Becky fashion, she decided to retreat to her life of luxury, while Ewen and Emile were convinced that they could party into the early hours of the morning, but both collapsed with fatigue quickly after the midnight bells.
And then somehow, only he and Anya remained, whispering to each other in the quietude of the early hours.
"Do you want to go to sleep?"
Damian shook his head. "Not yet. I'm enjoying this moment with you."
Colours splashed across her cheeks, both from the lights and from her growing blush, and she smiled shyly.
He loved seeing that smile on her. Her eyes sparkled with uncontainable joy, and it was enough for him to learn how to let go of the fear of speaking with his heart. After all this practice, it was getting easier.
"You're being cute."
"I can be cuter."
He allowed himself to be a little proud that he didn't even stutter, and it was worth it to see the glint of anticipation in her eyes.
"How?"
"Like this," Damian whispered as he rubbed his nose against hers, both smiling. "And this," he said, and he peppered her face with fluttering kisses.
Anya giggled again. "That tickles!"
And this, he spoke to her in his mind as he placed a gentle but lingering kiss on her forehead, her cheek, her jaw. Fingers wove through her hair as he tilted her face upwards, where he captured her lips in a final kiss, equally soft and tender.
Her smile pressed against his lips, and when she broke away, her eyes sparkled with quiet delight.
"Yeah, you're right. That was cute."
"Does that mean I win?"
She snorted. "Maybe," but then her gaze fell onto something outside. "Oh, look! It's snowing!"
"It's been snowing this whole time," he replied with an eyebrow raised at her. "Are you telling me you didn't notice?"
"It's the first snow of the year!"
"And?" said Damian, genuinely wondering where Anya was going with this, but when he saw the mischievous look in her eyes, he groaned. "Oh, no . Absolutely not. No way."
And so it was that less than ten minutes later, both Anya and Damian stood at the entrance to the apartment, with their winter jackets covering their pyjamas, and the ends of their pyjama trousers tucked into their boots.
"This is a bad idea," Damian hissed at her under his breath. "What if there's… you know…"
"It's three in the morning!" she whispered back. "There's nobody outside, trust me. And if I hear someone coming, I'll tell you straight away. Okay?"
Damian knew when he was defeated, and Anya stuck out her tongue at him, before tugging him through the door. Damian wanted to resist, he could feel his body tensing up just from the thought of going outside, but before he could argue with her, they were already down the stairs and out the front door -
And all he could see was white.
Damian immediately closed his eyes against it, heart pounding, breathing hard, but when no sounds of cameras snapping followed, no smell of antiseptic, he opened one eye slowly. Then the other.
White, everywhere, but it wasn't harsh or intrusive like the flashing cameras of the paparazzi, or the clinical lights of the lab. It was a gentle white, almost sepia toned beneath the steady amber lamplight. Inviting and warm, just like Anya, with her gloved hand held out to him.
"Are you coming?"
Flakes of snow continued to drift down, landing in the woollen knit of her hat, in the ends of her hair, in her eyelashes. His breath billowed around him, and his hands shook inside his gloves, but he reached out to her just the same.
In the early hours of the night, they were the only people there. The only ones making a sound, as though the whole world had gone completely still, all for them.
With her hand in his, Damian took one experimental step, then another, fascinated by the crunch of the freshly laid snow packing beneath his soles, and the way that Anya kept her gaze on him. Steady and sure, guiding him slowly to the outside, the first time that he had left the house in weeks.
"Is this okay?"
Damian allowed the winter air to fill his lungs, slow and deep. It stung the inside of his nose and his throat, but the frigid burn made him feel more awake than ever. Combined with the snowy landscape around them, and the silence all around them, with only the sound of their boots crunching in the snow, Damian allowed his tense shoulders to drop, and tried to steady his own heart.
"Yeah," he breathed, his voice only a little shaky. "Yeah, I'm okay."
"Great," she sighed with genuine relief, before a wicked spark glinted in her eye. "Then you might want to get down."
"What- argh!"
Damian spluttered as he batted the excess snow from his scarf, wiping the melted flakes from his chin. "You're gonna pay for that!"
But Anya had already started running through the snow, laughing as she went.
Damian shook his head to himself, but he couldn't stop himself from grinning. She really was a menace.
He gathered a snowball in his palm and ran after her.
Damian sighed and fastened his Imperial Scholar's cloak around his shoulders, although it felt far heavier than it usually did. It was just a painful reminder of how hard he had worked for nothing.
The Christmas holidays passed much faster than Damian was happy with. Being with the Forger's was like being able to breathe, and the thought of having to go back to Eden College filled him with the sort of dread that tightened his chest, constricting him. He wanted to hide away in the safe haven of their apartment for as long as possible, but at some point, Damian was forced to face up to the fact that he couldn't very well just skip school . Even though the Desmond scandal had far from died down, and he just knew that everyone would be whispering about him, he also knew that it was time to face the world.
Luckily, the dorm rooms were relatively quiet when Loid drove him back the day before the start of the new term, but even the familiarity of his room gave no comfort.
He slung his bag over his shoulders and appraised himself in the mirror one last time. The circles under his eyes had lightened significantly over the holidays, but he still couldn't bring himself to smile normally. It just felt too strange, too heavy.
Eventually, Damian flicked his hair out of his eyes - not that it made much difference, and it just fell right back - and pulled on his dwindling reserves of courage.
Voices hushed as soon as he entered the refectory with Ewen and Emile, and it felt like the air itself had dried up. The atmosphere was heavy and metallic, and though Damian tried not to notice, the eyes of a thousand pupils bore into his back, making him break out in a cold sweat. Even the stares of people trying not to stare hung over him like a thick fog, unnerving him.
Damian's stomach growled, but just the smell of breakfast wafting through the air made him feel sick. He allowed Ewen and Emile to join the queue before him, while he tried to settle his nerves, but it didn't get better even as they found somewhere to sit in the corner of the refectory.
"Hey Boss, are you gonna eat that?" Emile pointed his fork towards Damian's breakfast, but Ewen nudged his shoulder.
"You can't just eat his food because he hasn't finished it!"
"No it's fine, you can take it," Damian mumbled and pushed his plate towards Emile. "I'm not hungry."
While Emile polished off his food, and Ewen tried to talk about the Christmas holidays (doing everything possible to avoid talking about That ), Damian tried, and failed, to block out the sound of a thousand people whispering his name.
Desmond Desmond Desmond Desmond Desmond Desmond Demond.
It was like a chant, taunting him. Desmond this, Desmond that, Desmond scandal, Desmond heir, Desmond brother, Desmond guy, Desmond kid, Desmond asshole, Desmond Desmond Desmond. Slicing him with a million tiny paper cuts layered on top of each other.
"Damian!"
Damian jolted. His surname had become an oppressive cloud, that his given name pierced through completely.
Becky sat herself next to Damian, while Watkins joined the table on her other side.
"Honestly, these people," she tutted. "Mindless, all of them."
"Good morning, Damian," said Bill formally. "How was your Christmas?"
Bill turned to look expectantly at Damian, and he felt his mouth dry up.
"Er, fine," he managed.
Bill nodded to himself, as though Damian had just given him the correct answer, before tucking into his own breakfast, but Damian couldn't quite stop himself from staring at the giant next to Becky.
Did he imagine it, or was he suddenly on a first name basis with Watkins?
Damian didn't know what else to say, or to think, because the oppressive atmosphere only seemed to get heavier, suffocating him.
"I'm going to class," he announced quietly as he stood from the table. "See you guys later."
He left immediately, not waiting to see who was behind him, he just needed to get out of the refectory and he needed to get out now . Damian gravitated towards his locker, hoping that he could pretend to look busy for a bit longer while everyone still whispered about him. He used the open door of his locker to at least try and hide his face a little bit, but it didn't work as well as he had hoped.
Desmond Desmond Desmond Desmond Desmond Desmond -
"Damian!"
Damian jolted once again at the sound of Becky's voice, and he turned to stare at her quizzically until she had caught up to him.
"Anya's late again, right? I'll walk with you to class."
Damian didn't blink, and he continued to stare at her as something niggled at the back of his mind. It was almost indiscernible until it hit him:
Desmond Desmond Desmond Desmond Damian.
His name cut through it all, and for a long second, Damian wondered why Becky would choose to speak to him using his given name. She and Bill both…
Damian stilled as it came to him, so obvious that he almost laughed, but still so shocking that he caught his breath.
Was this… their way of showing support for him?
"Well?" said Becky expectantly as she adjusted the strap of her satchel. "Are you coming or not?"
It snapped him out of his thoughts.
"Uh, yeah," Damian cleared his throat as he fell into step with her assured strides, trying to hold back the unexpected surge of emotion that washed through him. "Thanks… Becky."
Becky glanced at him from the corner of her eye. "Don't get emotional on me now."
Damian gave her a tired chuckle.
"Wouldn't dream of it."
Emile and Ewen did not take long to arrive, and they each took their usual seats on either side of him, both talking about something completely not related to what was going on around them - not that Damian could even concentrate on their words. He hid his shaking hands beneath the desk.
At the teacher's entrance, everyone quietened, and Damian made the mistake of hoping that the rest of the class could pass without incident, but there was a clear ripple of tension as soon as the teacher spotted Ewen and Emile. His eyes darted between the register in his hand, and the two boys sitting down, and he cleared his throat, clearly uncomfortable.
"Mr Egeburg, Mr Elman, I thought you were aware that you have both been transferred to the other class?"
Damian's stomach sank, and he held his breath.
He should have known that his school days would not even be close to normal. Of course there would have been yet more consequences to the Desmond scandal that he wouldn't predict. Because of course the Egeburg's and Elman's would not want their firstborn heirs to associate with a Desmond . Once a source of pride for them, their sons' association with Damian now brought nothing but shame, and it left Damian feeling empty and sick.
Would this torture never end…?
Ewen's voice was the first to break the silence.
"Nah, we've always been in this class. Administration probably got mixed up."
"Yeah. Someone's obviously just made a mistake," Emile added pointedly.
The teacher held their gazes for a lengthy second, before he gave a heavy sigh, clearly too tired to fight them, and he began the class.
The air trapped in Damian's lungs finally left his body.
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Another quiet chapter for you all.
I want to thank you all so much for your continued support and encouragement last year, I can't believe that the Seven Secrets of Starlight is 1.5 years old already! (2 years in July!) That's one hell of a timeline, and the fact that so many of you have stuck with this for so long is honestly so inspiring to me. Thank you so, so much, from the bottom of my heart. I will raise a toast to another year of comedy, drama, fluff, angst, and love. I truly can't wait for the journey!
Finally, I want to make an announcement.
After thinking about this carefully for a long, LONG time, I have decided that after the next chapter, I will post the Seven Secrets of Starlight on a fortnightly schedule instead of weekly. This is because I want to set aside time to finish my Froger and BillxBecky stories, and also because I have SO MANY Damianya WIPs spinning in my brain I want to get them out somehow! (Many of them already fully planned! Including SSS Part 2!)
I want to write all the time, but I've been forced to accept that I can only produce one chapter per week maximum! I do have a full-time job, and a wedding to plan, etc etc… So, I'm thinking that I could alternate between writing SSS and writing all the other stories I have planned, of which there are many ðŸ˜ðŸ˜
The new schedule will look something like:
Week 1: SSS. (Posting)
Week 2: Froger. (Writing and/or posting)
Week 3: SSS. (Posting)
Week 4: Bill x Becky. (AO3 only: Writing and/or posting)
Week 5: SSS. (Posting)
Week 6: Other WIP. (Writing)
Etc., and I will rotate through the stories! Thank you so much for your patience and understanding. 💖 I have so much in store that I am really excited about, and I really appreciate you for your amazing and continued support and encouragement! I really wouldn't be able to do any of this without you ðŸ˜
Next chapter: Wednesday 17th January (2024!)