inkedinserendipity:

He hadn’t meant to buy red.

Taako mutters a curse under his breath, wondering how many spell slots he’ll need to burn to smuggle blue hairdye out of Garfield’s store. Cons: spell slots. Pros: he doesn’t have to interact with fucking Garfield.

He manages it, eventually, slipping out of the fantasy Costco with a small bottle of blue hairdye tucked in his pocket. He’d even left the red behind. Equivalent exchange and all that. Besides, it’s not like he was gonna use it.

When he gets back to the dorm, he beelines straight for his quarters, with the

full-length mirror and the

messy clothes and the shirts that say Second Best Brother and the phoenix token he pawned when he was a really little kid, though he can’t quite remember where he got either of them. And as always, when he sits at his vanity, there’s a brief moment where he’s not himself; where the fading blue streaks in his hair flare to red and the corners of his eyes static over, his heterochromia swapping eyes at a dizzying speed. 

Taako shuts his eyes, shakes his head to clear it. Something’s fucked up with his face. He knows that. Something’s fucked up with most of him, actually. Rings help to lessen the ache in his head whenever he looks at his own hands, and tights help disguise the shape of his calves, but for some reason, not even makeup helps the fact that his face doesn’t feel like it’s his. 

Whatever. 

He stains his hair deep blue, deep, deep blue, as far as red as he can get. On principle, Taako doesn’t dye his hair red. Green, orange, purple, sure; but never red. He tried it once, and his head had pounded so badly he’d woken up by the side of the road in some podunk town, head swimming with half-remembered visions of forests he’s never been to and animals he’s never known. 

He tilts his head from side to side, and nods, satisfied. He caps the bottle and stands from his chair and notices, absently, like something he’s known and forgotten, that his umbrella wears that same red.

And just as quickly as that thought formed, it’s gone.