Title: From the Darkness We Rise
Fandom: Rise of the Guardians
Pairing: Pitch Black/Jack Frost
Categories: Action/Adventure, Angst, Hurt/Comfort, Romance, Future Fic
Length: Super Epic (157,461)
Warnings: Depression, Minor Character Death, Unhappy Ending (however, there is a sequel with a happy ending), Violence (brief mention of violence being acted on a child as well)

Author on LJ: not_poignant (inactive)
Author Website: Tumblr

Author's Summary:
Twenty two years have passed since the defeat of Pitch, and Jack lives alone, touch-starved, with only the company of a solitary Nightmare. One evening the Man in the Moon sets him on a path that will lead him to unexpected relationships, draw the attention of the Guardians to a new coalition of villains, and challenge Jack's every notion of what it is to be good, evil, and what it is to live in the shadows.

Review:
I feel like I should flail around and start off by hoping really hard everyone doesn't get scared off by the warnings, haha. Quite honestly I didn't know what I was getting into when I started to read From the Darkness We Rise. I saw it. I clicked on it. I was sucked into the fic for the next couple of days and am so delighted that there's a (longer) sequel that promises a happy ending (because that ending, folks, made me whisper a tiny, fervent, little noooooo to myself). I even double checked on the happy ending part because I don't do unhappy endings as a general rule.

You don't need to know anything about the books that the fic also draws from (because I don't know a single thing about them and I came out of the end just fine). You have Jack, who is so utterly lonely, and you have a Nightmare who keeps him company. Then you have Pitch, who is so very different without his shadows, who is like an entirely new person, except still himself. Somehow. I think it's author magic, honestly. Then you get sucked into this overarching plot with the Seelie and Unseelie, and how sometimes there are a lot worst things out there than a bunch of nightmares (like a faerie that enjoys eating children among other things. You don't see this happening in the fic except for one instance where it's off screen and briefly mentioned, but that one scene is why I mentioned it in the warnings).

A lot of the fic is the struggle of Jack who has to deal with this overarching loneliness and a sense of loss. Jack's struggling emotionally, can't bear to show anyone, and is determined to try to keep going his own way. Except, oddly, there's Pitch who he's feeling strangely drawn to, and they end up having this relationship that turns into something more than both expect.

And it works. It takes a while, and there's plenty of distrust on both sides, but you can feel them slowly getting to know one another, to trust one another, and the slow burn is amazing. There's this dark sense of doom that seems to drift lightly over the fic because our heroes (along with the rest of the crew and several new additions) have a very slim chance of winning, but they're so willing to try even against the odds they face.

It's a bit rough in the beginning. At times I had to sort of squint at the characterizations and wonder if they really would do or say the things that they do, but it just sort of makes sense in the end and the way the characters evolve is brilliant. Then that ending. Oh boy. Punch in the gut. But there is a completed sequel and there is a happy ending there. So you may as well just read everything, haha.

From the Darkness We Rise