#Brotherhood of the Blade

[cookie-de-baunilha]

percy: needs so much therapy and would willingly attend therapy

john: needs so much therapy and needs to be dragged, kicking and screaming, to therapy

#love couples with this dynamic #outlander #lord john series #lord john and the brotherhood of the blade #brotherhood of the blade #lord john grey #john grey #percy wainwright #percy beauchamp #john x percy

[littlecrabbs]

One thing I love about Outlander is the unique character dynamics, and I wondered what were other ppls favorites. You can also rank these if you’d like, cuz all of them are great in their own way.

#thought of this while rereading Botb #ngl John - Hal is high up there for me #outlander #poll #ljg #ljg series #lord john series #brotherhood of the blade #the Scottish prisoner

[brotherhoodoftheblade]

You cannot tell me that DG (back before she lost her mind and dropped the ball at the homestretch) didn’t mean for us to read this scene:

“....It’s coming is a gift, which I accept with gratitude, but when it’s gone, there is no sense of abandonment or deprivation. I’m only glad to have had it for as long as it chose to remain.”

“And you’re saying your relationship with Manoke is the same. Does he feel that way about you, do you think?” I asked, fascinated. He glanced at me, cleared startled. 

“I have no idea.”

“You, um, don’t...talk in bed?” I said, striving for delicacy. 

His mouth twitched, and he looked away.

“No.”

We lay in silence for a few moments, examining the ceiling. 

“Have you ever?” I blurted.

“Have I what?”

“Had a lover that you talked to?”

He cut his eyes at me. 

“Yes. Perhaps not quite so frankly as I find myself talking to you, but, yes.” 

(An Echo in the Bone, Ch.95)

...and draw a straight line in our recollections to the times John lay abed with Percy in BotB, speaking of intimacies they shared with no one else. Because obviously, Percy was the only lover of his he really talked to about deeply personal matters in bed. (That we were shown anyway. He probably confided in Hector at least about some things, I hope.)

“Shall I tell you a great secret?” Percy’s voice was soft, breath warm in his ear. Grey reached a hand through the sheets, slid it over the high round of a still warmer buttock.

“Please,” he whispered.

“My name is not Percival.”

.....[Percy] laughed a little unsteadily, took a deep breath, and lay down on his back, drawing the sheet up over his chest.

“My name is Perseverance,” he said in a rush.

“Per -” Grey lay completely still, holding his breath and concentrating fiercely on his belly muscles. 

“Go ahead and laugh,” Percy said from the dark, with exceeding dryness. “I won’t mind.”

“Yes, you would,” Grey said, but was still unable to quell the bubble of mirth that rose up the back of his throat, and being there firmly suppressed, emerged through his nose in a strangled snort. To keep from committing further offense, he said the first thing that came into his mind.

“What’s your middle name?”

Percy laughed, sounding a little easier, now that the dreadful confession was made.

.....Just now, he was realizing exactly the magnitude of the the gift Percy had given him. 

He was the only one who knew. Percy had been right; it was a great secret, and John felt the weight of his lover’s trust, warm on his heart.

He groped for Percy’s hand and found it, slightly cold. They lay silent for a bit, holding hands, bodies warming to each other. 

..... “Shall I tell you a great secret?” Grey whispered, at long last. ...

“Please.” Percy’s hand tightened on his.

“My father was murdered.”

..... Somewhere in the telling, Percy had gathered him into his arms, and held him now, close against his body. His head lay in the hollow of Percy’s shoulder, and the curly hairs of Percy’s chest brushed soft against his lips as he spoke. ...

Percy’s hand smoothed the hair away from John’s face, gentle. 

“Your mother likely thought whoever’d killed your father had got you, too.”

“Yes, she did.” For the first time in the telling, a lump came into his throat, recalling his mother’s face when she’d seen him, filthy, trailing hay and mud across the Turkey carpet in her boudoir. “That’s - that’s the only time she cried.”

Percy’s arm tightened round his shoulders. He could hear Percy’s heart, a muffled steady thump beneath his heart.

“And you?” Percy said at last, very quietly. “Did you weep for your father?”

“I never did,” he said, and closed his eyes.

(BotB, Ch.18)

~*~

Percy did return to the matter a few days later, though. No doubt it was a matter of Percy’s own upbringing in a religious milieu, Grey reflected. Or perhaps it was only that Percy had never been with a man willing to discuss philosophy in bed. Grey hadn’t, himself, but found the novelty mildly diverting. 

They had left the barracks separately and met in Percy’s rooms for a few stolen hours. Where, after the initial delights of the flesh had been tasted, Grey found himself with his head pillowed on Percy’s stomach, being read to from a collection of legal opinions. published a year or two previous. 

.....

“So,” Grey remarked, “we must be exterminated, because our pleasures are insufficiently ecstatic?” 

Percy’s brow relaxed a bit, and he closed the book.

.....Still, he considered the matter, enjoying the peaceful rise and fall of Percy’s breathing beneath his cheek. 

“I think a gentleman conducts his affairs with kindness and with honor,” he said, at last. ...

Percy gave a short laugh.

“Kindness and honor? That’s all well - but what of love?”

Grey valued love - and feared it - too greatly to make idle protestations.

“You cannot compel love,” he said finally, “nor summon it at will. Still less,” he added ruefully, “can you dismiss it.” He sat up then, and looked at Percy, who was looking down, tracing patterns on the counterpane with a fingertip. “I think you are not in love with me, are you?”

Percy smiled a little, not looking up. Not disagreeing, either. “Cannot dismiss it,” he echoed. “Who was he? Or is he?”

“Is.” Grey felt a sudden jolt of the heart at the speaking of that single word. Something at once joyful and terrible; the admission was irrevocable.

Percy was looking up at him now, brown eyes bright with interest.

“It is - I mean, he - you need not worry. There is no possibility of anything between us.” Grey blurted, and bit his tongue to keep back the sudden impulse to tell everything, only for the momentary ecstasy of speaking of Jamie Fraser. He was wiser than that, though, and kept the words bottled tight in his throat. 

“Oh. He’s not...?” Percy’s gaze flicked momentarily over Grey’s nakedness, then returned to his face.

“No.”

It was late in the day; light skimmed across the room from the high attic windows, striking the dark burnished mass of Percy’s curling hair, painting the lines of his face in chiaroscuro, but leaving his body in the dimness of shadow.

“Is friendship and sincere liking not enough for you?” Grey was careful to avoid any tone of pettishness or accusation, making the question merely one of honest inquiry. Percy heard this, and smiled, lopsidedly, but with answering honesty.

“No.” He stretched out a hand and ran it up Grey’s bare arm, over the curve of his shoulder, and down the slope of his breast, where he spread his palm flat over the nipple - and took a sudden hold of the flesh there, fingers digging into the muscle.

“Add that, though...” he said softly, “and I think it will suffice.”

(BotB, Ch.19)

That their story will never have a happy resolution - after all that they were, and could’ve yet been, to each other - is just tragic. 🥺😭😭😭

#*sits here loathing DG again* #John and Percy were literally the only LJG pairing set up within the integrity of the narrative to actually have a true shared love #John and Manoke are a joke as romantic pairing - John barely knows the first thing about the man bc he's never cared enough to know #John and Stephan have a lovely friendship and occasional FWB thing but John himself both by his own actions and self-knowledge... #knows what he feels for Stephan isn't romantic love but only physical attraction coupled with genuine friendship #and sorry not sorry but John/Jamie will only ever exist in fanfics - DG will never make them canon #and honestly if she did after 25 fucking years it would feel like such slap in the face to John because someone who really loved him... #would've figured out their shit decades ago rather continually hurt someone they're supposed to care about #not to mention that John deserves so much more than to play third wheel to Jamie/Claire #I mean seriously WTF is Gabaldon even doing with John's character anymore?!?!?! #OL is the most frustrating fucking fandom ISTG #at this point only the fanfiction DG loathes so much is actually worth reading lol #my random ramblings #Lord John Grey #Percy Wainwright #john x percy #Brotherhood of the Blade #lord john series #quotes #anti diana gabaldon

[for-my-reading-pleasure]

I just realized that Jamie laying on the floor in the Dunsany’s chapel after Geneva’s death is the same as the penance he paid for taking the Lord’s name in vain while staying in the monastery of St Anne.

#brotherhood of the blade #outlander #james alexander malcolm mackenzie fraser

[babyblueetbaemonster]

Another day another slay

#tes #oblivion #dark brotherhood #lucien lachance #blade of woe #this is the first time i draw oblivion lucien and i made dis #sorry not sorry #i draw a meme #i bet you won't expecting this #pov: mr lachance gives me the blade of woe

[sailforvalinor]

Another thing to add to the list of reasons Alphonse Elric is my favorite character in FMA is that he fights with swords, spears, giant flying dragons, etc because if he’s gonna get stuck as a soul bonded to a suit of armor then dangit, he’s gonna commit to the aesthetic

#personally I headcanon that he was already into knights tales and the like before The Incident #I love how he and Ed have very different styles/aesthetics—Ed is into cool stabby stuff (or wicked-looking chainsaw-seque blades in the #manga) and meanwhile Al is knight-core chivalric paladin #fullmetal alchemist #fma brotherhood #fmab #alphonse elric

[tira3sii]

Penitus oculatus burned down my sanctuary can’t have shit in falkreath

#please notice the blade of woe through the heart symbolizing Astrid’s betrayal. please #my art #skyrim #ocs #skyrim oc #dark brotherhood #the listener #bosmer #bosmer oc #dark brotherhood oc

[skyrim-forever]

Alright which table you sitting at?

#skyrim #the elder scrolls #meme #tes #dark brotherhood #thieves guild #college of winterhold #thalmor #imperial legion #stormcloak rebellion #nazeem #just nazeem on his own :P #jarl balgruuf #the blades #the companions #dark brotherhood baby #forgive me for missing characters #bards collage isn't here because it is lame #I said what I said

[biboomerangboi]

Thinking again about Sokka and Aang shaving each others heads during the quiet moments of the war.

#the bonding the instinctual trust of giving a friend a blade to put to your skull #brotherhood #atla #sokka #aang #Sokka and Aang #avatar the legend of aang #avatar the last airbender

[cookie-de-baunilha]

it’s always “percy is weak” “percy is a coward” but you know what people don’t give him enough credit!! bc if i was dating some guy and felt so intimate/close to him to the point of telling him all about my daddy issues and childhood trauma that i’d never told anyone before and then asked him about love and he replied “but you’re not in love with me are you” i would off myself idk

#he’s stronger than me fr #i love you john but you’re the WORST boyfriend #like you could hear percy’s heart shattering into a million pieces when john said that shit #outlander #lord john series #lord john and the brotherhood of the blade #brotherhood of the blade #lord john grey #john grey #percy wainwright #percy beauchamp #john x percy

[brotherhoodoftheblade]

Oooh, I’ve never seen this bit of BotB discourse by DG before! ✨👀✨

Ah, Percy’s “spiritual fractures”, his fear that he’s damned and there’s something “wrong” him, coupled with his earlier experiences as a whore, had “a lot do with his eventual betrayal” - that’s similar to what I’d guessed earlier about the psychological underpinnings behind Percy’s actions. 

(I’d link that post but I don’t have time to hunt it down right now - have to get back to work soon. I really need to make myself some sort of table of contents at this point, it takes forever to find things. Mostly because I’m so damn long-winded, no doubt. lol Also, titles, labels? Never heard of them. xd)

And yeah, I’d doubted Percy really thought John would care enough to be hurt by him sleeping with Michael - especially when he himself knew it meant nothing - but to see it confirmed from the horse’s mouth is additionally sad. I will honestly never forgive her for what she did to Percy. smfh

“John’s never seen himself as anything but [an honourable man]” - pffttt, yeah, I can tell. 🙄 And it’s a huge part of his problem, the way he can’t even see the way his increasing rigidity and narrow-minded ideals are actually fetters obstructing him from emotional and mental growth. But that subject could be it’s own rambling post and I have to go! ^_^;

#my random ramblings #Lord John Grey #Percy Wainwright #john x percy #Brotherhood of the Blade #lord john series #Outlander #quotes #Diana Gabaldon

[gotham-ruaidh]

Hi @gotham-ruaidh I've been thinking lately about the bizzaro triangle that is Jamie, Claire, and John, and I always feel bad that John gets the visceral responses that he doesn't know where they come from... Obviously, there are things Jamie will NEVER tell him about but do you think he'll ever explain the bit of the past that I don't see how he could avoid associating between LJG and BJR

Ah, but John *does* know a bit about what happened with Jamie.

There’s a passage in the novella Lord John and the Brotherhood of the Blade (set during the years while Claire was gone) where Jamie and John have the following heated exchange - and Lord John makes a heartbreaking realization:

[John speaking to Jamie] “I tell you, sir—were I to take you to my bed—I could make you scream. And by God, I would do it.” Later, he [John] would try to recall what had happened then. Had he moved, reflex and training cutting through the fog of rage that blinded him? Or had Fraser moved, some shred of reason altering his aim in the same split second in which he swung his fist? Hard as he tried, no answer came. He remembered nothing but the shock of impact as Fraser’s fist struck the boards an inch from his head, and the sob of breath, hot on his face… His vision cleared, eyes watering—but he saw neither the paddock, the wagon whose wheel he grasped, nor the house and lawns beyond. What he saw was Fraser’s face. When he had said that—what demon had given him that thought, those words? I could make you scream. Oh, Christ, oh, Christ. Someone had.

#outlander #lord john grey #lord john and the brotherhood of the blade

[starmaniswaiting]

Lord John Grey

'He paused by the window, looking up into a lavender sky, fingers pressed against the icy glass. No stars tonight; the snowflakes came down out of the dark, rushing towards him, endless, uncountable. Silent, too, but not like the stars. Falling snow whispered secrets to itself.'

— Lord John and the Brotherhood of the Blade

#lord john grey #moodboard #lord john series #lord john and the brotherhood of the blade #outlander

[spooky-donut-ghost-house]

My long ass headcanon for The Dark Brotherhood

The Dark Brotherhood is actually being manipulated by The Night Mother

See they don't kill for Sithis but they think they do

Sithis is the embodiment of nothing it wants nothing as it cares not for the affairs of mortals because it is the nothing it is the void it doesn't care that there is an entire murder cult that kills in it's name because it wants nothing

The Night Mother isn't real she isn't the bride of Sithis she never had children from Sithis she never killed this kids for Sithis and she was never killed by townspeople hell she's not even a real corpse she only takes on the appearance of a mummified dunmer corpse

This is due to the fact that The Night Mother is actually Mephala

This to me seems like something Mephala would do being the daedric prince of deceit

Have a murder cult that kills for her but makes them think she is the dead bride of some unholy god of death when that unholy god of death isn't actually a god of death but a god of nothingness and they actually kill for her rather than Sithis

Now you may be wondering "well why does Mephala only speak to The Listener? And if Sithis doesn't care about anything related to mortals why does Lucien Lachance say Sithis doesn't want Cicero dead?" Well those who are The Listener mostly end up also being Mephala's champion so if she wants to appoint someone as Listener she would have to deem them worthy so that's why she only speaks to The Listener

As for Lachance it could go two different ways

Either Mephala is tricking Lachance and making him think he is in The Void and knows what Sithis wants when it is actually Mephala's realm of Oblivion and he is actually knowing what she wants instead of Sithis but he thinks it's Sithis OR Lachance's ghost could not actually be Lachance's ghost and be another one of Mephala's acts of deceit or could be one of Mephala's daedra disguised as Lachance

Now why does Mephala want Cicero alive? Because due to his obsession with the old ways of The Brotherhood it makes him more easy for Mephala to control unlike Astrid and the other members of The Brotherhood and once Astrid is dead it makes the other members of The Brotherhood easier to manipulate and carry out Mephala's will

As for The Black Sacrament it's not a prayer/ritual to Sithis or The Night Mother but a ritual to Mephala

You may have also noticed I use it/its/itself pronouns for Sithis

This is because Sithis doesn't have a gender because it would be kinda odd if the god of nothing and The Void had a gender imo

#tes #tesblr #the elder scrolls #the elder scolls online #eso #tes arena #daggerfall #battlespire #tes adventures dawnstar #tes adventures redguard #morrowind #oblivion #tes blades #skyrim #tes legends #dark brotherhood #the dark brotherhood #skyrim cicero #skyrim astrid #lucien lachance #mephala #sithis #night mother #the night mother #daedric prince #daedric princes #daedric #daedra

[chex-mex]

Cicero and Xio being best assassin friends along with a lil spectral Lucien.

The more the merrier. Look at my clowns go! 

#chex-mex'sart #skyrim #oc #cicero #lucien lachance #the dark brotherhood #gotta keep a consistent art posting regiment but its #mostly because of work and a complicated commission i need to work on #cicero my guy you're really up close and personal on xio's space #keep doing your thing king #did i give cicero the blade of woe? yes #he absolutely tears with it

[nikolasromanovartbook]

Peha at the beginning of the Path

#digital art #wacom tablet #the elder scrolls #oblivion #dunmer #dark brotherhood #art #profugo&peha #oc art #oc #champion of cyrodiil #my art #blade of woe #sithis