Teylafen prompt battle entries

[tielan]

The masterlist for the prompt battle is here if you're interested in seeing the range by character/pairing and author.

The second set of fic offerings from me:

Spirit Of Athos, Teyla & Halling, PG

The heart and spirit of Athos is its people.

So Teyla was taught when she was eight. So she has taught the children in her turn.

On the eighth anniversary of an Athosian child's birth, he or she is taught their first Ring-code and taken to the Ring of the Ancestors to enter it and pass through the Ring to another world.

Jinto's first Ring-code leads to Domaos, where the weather is almost always rainy, and the Ring sits in the midst of dampforest, some way from the drylands and the caves where the Domaos live. The leaves beneath their feet slip and slide as the party of eight - five adults, Jinto, and one other Athosian child - make their way through the forest towards the relative shelter of the Domaos caves.

Halling takes the lead, his son moving close behind him. Two adults follow them in single file, then walks Khaila, Jinto's close-cousin and a year older than he, and Roshana follows on silent feet.

And then there is Teyla, bringing up the rear.

No trouble is expected on this journey. The first Ring-code - the first journey through the Ring of the Ancestors - is always chosen for its safety. Over time, and with the depredations of the Wraith, things change, but the first Ring-code bestowed is always one known to be 'safe'.

Athos has few enough children, they have no desire to lose more.

Jinto will learn more Ring-codes as time passes. With each moon, a new one is given him to memorise by another adult - never the same one, that knowledge may be spread and shared. And he will come to understand his place in Athosian society as a keeper of the knowledge that makes his people who they are - the ties of trade and blood and fellowship that bind all Pegasus.

Teyla pauses on the rise of a hill, looking back into the mist and a fragment of song drifts up to her.

Jinto is humming to himself.

Tears sting her eyes, blurring her vision as the mists conceal the forest. Jinto's mother sang that song to him as he lay in the cradle and Teyla made tea for the new mother. Then, she hummed in harmony to Fielle's song, her delight in the birth of another child. Now, she hums the harmony beneath her breath, remembering her friend's pleasure in her son.

Halling turns towards his son with pride and grief writ clear upon his features, even as he speaks softly to his son. He, too, remembers this song.

After a few words, Jinto hugs his father, not yet too old to bury his face in his father's side.

They all pause for breath and memory, Fielle was loved by all who are here on Domaos today - and is missed deeply among her people.

Yet grief is part of life, as is death and pain and suffering. The Athosians know its burden, but it does not stop their progress.

Jinto draws himself up and looks back along the line as he has been taught, checking those who have accompanied him on this journey. He wipes away the remnants of his tears and nods to Teyla, grave as any greybeard, before taking his father's hand and continuing on.

The heart and spirit of Athos remain only as true as its people.

You would be proud of him, Fielle, Teyla whispers to the wind.

- fin -



Unlike Minds, Teyla & Ladon, PG

The marines allow Teyla into Ladon's room without more than a querying glance.

Ladon notes this. "They trust you."

"It has been over two season-sets," she says. "Years, as they count it."

He nods, almost to himself. "Please, Teyla, daughter of Tegan, be seated."

The formality of his words hits her hard - the memory of who she used to be, who she thought he was, long ago. Teyla takes the seat in the corner of the room, facing the marines who watch Ladon's every move.

"I have no ale for the guest-cup," he says. "Will water do?"

Teyla meets his gaze. "You do not need to offer the guest-cup."

"It's true, I'm a 'guest' here in Atlantis," Ladon says mildly, "but these quarters are assigned to me and I have little else to offer but the guest-cup. What I know of Kolya I've told Dr. Weir."

"Which is not why I'm here," Teyla interrupts. "If you have told all you have to tell, there is nothing more to say. But I came to speak with an ally...and one who was once a friend."

"Who is still a friend if you will accept it," Ladon says, and his eyes are honest and his gaze direct. "The Genii have had no quarrel with Athos except over Atlantis."

She arches a brow. "After using my people to access the city during the storm?"

Ladon shrugs. "That was Cowan's leadership. He thought nothing of betrayal for his own ends."

"Yet you betrayed Cowan to gain leadership." She tests his anger.

It finds no purchase. "For the betterment of the Genii. And because we fight the same enemy."

Teyla understands only too well. While she has had her doubts and her fears in Atlantis, working with the Lanteans who are both much alike and so very different to her own people, the most important thing is that they fight the same enemy.

That enemy is not the Genii.

Even if Ladon is little more than a prisoner, here in Atlantis.

He leans back and his hands fold over his stomach as he surveys her. "You've changed, Teyla."

Teyla's eyes narrow at the implied criticism, but she answers coolly. "You are not exactly the farmer's son I danced with at the Harvest Festival all those years ago."

His confidence echoes that of a night many years past. "That was not what I meant, Teyla. Your time in Atlantis has made you harsh."

"My time in Atlantis has taught me many things," she says more sharply than she intends. For all his quiet, on these things - the things close to her heart - he still has the ability to goad her. "We do not always agree, but what they are doing is...important to me."

"And is John Sheppard important to you, too?" Ladon knows her too well. "I have done all I can for him from here, Teyla. To do more, I must return to the Genii and make my own inquiries."

Teyla knows it; just as she knows that the Lanteans will be reluctant to let him go, fearing that if this one advantage is lost, they will have nothing. It is a balance between the grasping of slim hopes and the willingness to let loose the greatest hope they have.

"I will speak with Dr. Weir," she says, standing. "More than that, I cannot promise."

Before she leaves, he turns her to face him, bending his head down for the touch of forehead to forehead - the 'meeting of like minds' as the Lanteans would say. "And we are friends?"

Teyla touches her forehead to his. "We are friends."

- fin -



Cascade, Teyla/John, NC-17
Yes, it's another crackerrific AU...

As the door swings shut behind Teyla with barely a sound, the only noise in the locker room is the damp cascade of water on wet male and wet tile.

She strips off her clothing, piece by piece, then steps into the shower recess and pulls the curtain closed behind her. Steam billows around her, laced with the unmistakeable scent of a Prime in full heat, desirous of two things: sex and blood.

John Sheppard doesn't move from beneath the scalding spray, giving no sign that he is aware she is in the small space with him.

But he is. Oh, he is.

A personal electricity sizzles beneath her fingers as she trails her fingers down the hollow of his spine, a lure as unique as the elixir that, when blended with her own personal body chemistry, allows her to walk in the daylight without burning or to touch silver without reaction.

His head tilts back, and she can see the edge of his face, his eyes completely closed. "You shouldn't be in here." His voice is still clear and low, with little gruffness, although tense currents run taut beneath the surface, an undertow of desire. "What if the others come in?"

"Then they will see but not remember," she murmurs, referring to the psychic strength of vampire females. She splays her fingers across his buttocks and feels the gluteous muscle beneath flex as she rubs her nipples lightly against his back. "But if you hurry, then they will not even see..."

John turns, with the calm deliberation of purpose that she has come to expect of him, even in one day's acquaintance. "I prefer to take my time," he tells her, and the hazel-green of his gaze flashes silver, even as his incisors grow long and sharp.

Teyla's fingers brush his erection, cup him, cradle him, but her gaze never leaves his face, although the thunder of blood - her pulse and his - nearly drowns out even the constant patter of water against tile. "Then take your time," she says, letting her own incisors lengthen as she tilts back her head in an invitation no Prime would ever mistake. "But take."

He does.

His hands are claws, digging into her shoulders; his body is hot steel, burning her flesh where he presses against her; his bite is ecstasy, life renewed in a rush of colour and taste and sensation.

A vampire's kiss is always death - if only the 'little death' of orgasm.

Teyla does not leave him unscathed. No female would, but especially not one of their kind.

As he thrusts in her, a slow torment of movement that pants his breath past her throat, she scores his cheek, breaking the surface, drawing up the blood that is life and desire to them. And the hot, salt tang of him shudders through her body as he groans with pleasure.

Then John's fangs scrape her collarbone and she moans in reciprocal delight, his shoulders hard and tense beneath her hands, his hips pressing deeply into hers. And suddenly everything is exquisite fire and fierce sensation, brilliant and beautiful and vividly, utterly right...

Teyla loses herself in the moment.

And when her shattered senses can even begin to register again, the only sounds that echo in the cubicle are the panting sighs of desire well-satiated, and the musical cascade of the water crashing over them.

- fin -

And two graphics:


Teyla & John, fear


Teyla & team, choices

The last of my battle entries is actually the first in a seven or eight-part series. I'm writing the third 'chapter' now.