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katsukisbeatingheart · 4 years

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capella and rigel

au where you don’t see color until you meet your soulmate. they come to you one at a time the longer you’re together.

word count: 2,530

a.n.: you guys are BREAKING MY HEART you’ve been so sweet and receptive with the last one ( sing to me ) im such a mess ( ´༎ຶv༎ຶ`) i SEE YOU i WILL kiss you i am not playing. anyway!! im posting these soulmate works in an order backwards from which i started - which is funny, because that way it goes from least angstish to most.

here are the others!

Shinso

Sero

Bakugou

ao3

When the blue exploded, you weren’t ready for your world to change with a rushing suddenness. You were blindsided with the odd experience of a first time that felt like memory.

First off, you didn’t know how you knew blue would be it, but you did.

When someone told you that’s what color that sweater you liked to wear all the time was, you just knew. When someone told you that’s what color some of your favorite fruits were, you just knew. When someone told you that’s what color the sky was, you just knew.

When someone told you that’s what color the ocean was—because it reflected the sky—you cried because you just knew.

There was something revelatory of such a relationship—the rhapsodic truth that two forces of nature could be reflections of the other, even with completely opposing standpoints.

In your greyscale vacuum, you were none the wiser to a life that could promise that yet. From a young age, you hoped and prayed for that day to come, until it became a hapless strain of static that took a backseat to growing up.

In general, you hadn’t known what to expect; you imagined that cats were probably the color of sprinkles on ice cream, trees were balloons floating in the air, and pavements were the color of spring. When you looked up to the night, you thought that stars might be like lighting a candle. You thought that might mean yellow.

And even when it was so dark, you hoped the sky would still be blue.

It tore through every crevice of your vision, crowding your sight and singeing your senses.

Blue wasn’t supposed to come to you in a maelstrom on a previously peaceful Sunday morning. It wasn’t supposed to burn through the pages of one of your favorite books, or weld your utensils together.

It was supposed to bump into you on a tramline station, at a park, in a crowd, and then apologise quickly; it was supposed to be in widening eyes and stuttering breaths that gave you a name you’d knew like an old friend you had yet to meet.

It wasn’t supposed to be in so much pain.

It wasn’t supposed to cause any of it, either.

You’re on your back, starry eyed and afraid all at once, suffering the memory of your first time seeing color. It’s burning you, you realize, and the tears evaporate before they touch skin.

Blue fire is attention grabbing—it’s blue, you know it is—and watching it move like you imagined blue waves would was mesmerizing. It soaked the ground with scorch marks, scarring bedlam and terror into the earth.

Your eyes blown wide catch every moment, frozen in blue.

Though, as more of the hue crops up in all different directions, your eyes are suddenly the only part of you that can’t sit still. If the fire does anything else better than burn, it’s cast light—as it throws your vision farther than usual.

You don’t miss a single detail.

The sea of people around you scatter in fear— there’s chaos but you just can’t move—and you’re anchored to the ground like roots of a tree that didn’t get to choose its growing place. You’re trapped somewhere off centre in a spiraling vortex of entropy simultaneously inhaling and granting your newfound freedom.

Across the street in spots on a mailbox, the smallest pieces detailed the metal in cool colored rivets; in the scorching bed along the stone wall cafe lay crisped, blue calla lilies; the delicate hue accented in little flora shaded your spilled and shattered tea glass.

With the proximity of unimaginable heat, noise, and overall calamity shuffling so quickly around you, you felt encased in time. An hourglass tipped in your throat and the scalding sands ran through your veins. The inferno raged on until you noticed your place in it. It spun in a tempest around you and everything melted away.

Your vision shifts and you find the catalyst to be a tall, dark, and lanky shadow of a man. He contrasted the unyielding light—that he was producing, you agnised—to an almost sardonic degree. He held his hands in his pockets and shoulders in a slouch that said all of this was of no consequence, concern, or effort to him. He looked bored.

That is, until he saw you, too.

Freezing blue eyes glistened back at you in a cacophony of emotions.

There’s comprehension, apprehension, indignation—you try to settle on one, though absolutely fruitless with a whirlpool of your own at your feet.

You tried to speak your disbelief, a sense of joy, a simple admission to life, but your voice died on your tongue. The fumes coiled at your throat, still you held your ground. It was all you could do in your dormancy, and it was all you were going to do on the precipice of eruption.

It was like watching someone conduct a hurricane, what he did next.

His hands hummed an unknown melody to the flames, and you watched and waited and listened to the music that poured out if him—quickly becoming a little more afraid at the prospect of becoming an unwittingly unwilling participant from the audience.

However, the coiling and dissipation of the blue told you that this was the grand finale, and in a voiceless and motionless dance, he swayed out of sight under the haze of blue hellfire—so searing it was cold to the touch.

•.•.•.

When the heroes arrived, the police whisked you away to take your statement and check for injuries. It was like talking—and mostly listening—through a thick pane of glass, though. You said very little, and perceived even less.

What were you going to do? Include in your witness report that the perpetrator was your soulmate? That fact alone changed everything, and you knew that if you were to speak up about it now, the authorities would take you in. You weren’t about to be used as an asset when you had barely any time to process the truth yourself.

Everything was running smoothly, until the heroes came around to check on the injured. An expressionless man with two-toned hair and a nasty scar over his eye stepped before you, an ‘Are you alright?’ soft on his lips, contrasting the sternness in his features.

You took one look at the color of his left eye and fainted against the ambulance doors.

•.•.•.

Waking in a sweating bundle on your bedcovers was not a good way to end the day. It skewed your sense of reality, and you had to wrestle away the idea that the whole thing might have been a dream. The headache didn’t help, but it was proof you know what you saw. And what you were currently seeing.

A lot of everything else was still in greyscale, but your eyes weren’t lying to you as you took in your room. Blue comic books, pens, decals, posters, pictures; the laundry overflowed your basket, spilling in a pile of blue onto your carpet.

Blue eyes in the corner of your room.

“What did you see?” you whispered. He’s there like the shade of gossamer window curtains, a figureless concept of existence, and yet you speak knowing he’s suddenly the most solid thing there.

“You.”

You inhaled sharply, barely a pinprick to the weight in the room.

“You know that’s not what I mean. I’m not a color.”

“You were the brightest thing there. Might as well have been.”

“Impossible,” you laughed, waving your hand absently to dismiss your incredulity. “You set everything on fire.”

“Makes no difference,” he affirmed in a tone that sounded rich, drawled, and deep like molasses and a smoky room. There was silence as his voice drizzled along your skin, a safe distance in the uncertainty. It doesn’t break, even when you speak the opposite of what you should be uncertain about.

“You shouldn’t be here.”

“Yet here I am.”

There’s a flutter by your open window, and you unfold yourself from your stagnant place on your bed. Without argument, you wisp to its side, facing the world like it was unchanged.

His presence is permeable next to you, yet you were sure you had never felt anything as real.

Everything and nothing was the same.

“What do you see?”

“Still you.”

You glance to the side and see an almost facetious simper gliding across his features, even though you knew he was probably being anything but flippant.

“Dabi.”

He shifted almost imperceptibly, coiling with the dark to a time and space closer. He smelled like amber pine and sawdust, collecting evening dew.

“So you do know who I am.”

You picked at the peeling paint along the sill. It was still white.

“I follow the news. I’ve seen your face stuck to faded alley posters.”

“Now what would you be doing in alleyways?” He chuckled lowly through thinly veiled, amused bewilderment.

So he didn’t know who you were.

Just as well, it wasn’t like you lived a life of any consequence.

Truth was, you were simply a curious person with an awkward and clumsy sense of direction—finding yourself on adventures you could easily get yourself out of, only with a little time, effort, and backtracking. Even though you’d much rather see it through to the end, no matter how dark, twisted, or ugly.

The truth wasn’t meant to be pretty.

But he didn’t need to know that.

And if this were to keep up anyway, he’d find out soon enough.

You peered at him through your eyelashes and his shape almost disappeared. Instead, you leaned forward into the open world, trying to catch life as it moved below you. Your eyes spotted grass and trees, and you gasped before you could stop yourself.

“They’re green.”

“So I’ve been told.”

You turned your head to face him, chewing the inside of your cheek.

“I’ve never seen green before.”

He’s quiet as he stares at you. He had leaned against the wall beside you, hip and head propped like he wouldn’t rather be looking anywhere else. You stare back softly, still not used to the visceral experience in eye contact.

“What do you see?” he asks like holding glass. You’re tempted to keep it to yourself for at least a day longer—safeguard the truth like you were the only one in the world who could see colors. An innocent secret you’d never have to share with anybody.

And yet here was a thread presented to you by the universe, asking to be pulled from the tangle.

You looked at his frayed edges and twisted knots, feeling your own pull tighten like a lifeline.

“Blue,” you breathe. He’s beside you now, angled to the open window, eyes still burning answers and questions—so many questions—across your very surface.

You both stretch out, casting your eyes up to the night sky, in your own world like he wasn’t who he was and you weren’t who you were. Collected in a jar of your own making, you spill your breath across the open air, and he’s there with you like a pooling splash of ink you don’t want out. Oh, the memories you could write with him.

“So these are the stars, huh?” his tone hasn’t lifted from that tedium, but he talks like he’s standing among them.

Tears prickled the corner of your eyes. You couldn’t tell whether from happiness or nostalgia or disappointment or confusion or another nameless thing—you only knew that you were looking at the stars. You were looking at the night sky and suddenly seeing the stars, and—

“Some of them are blue.”

Dabi traces the bottom hemline of your sweater with his thumb, breathing clearer air than he had in a long, long time.

“There’s yellow up there, too.”

The tears spill down your cheeks, but his hand is there to catch them with cracked fingertips.

“You know,” you begin with a small sniffle, “I don’t remember the night being this… luminous.” His face splits in to a grin.

“That’s your fault.”

You roll your eyes, peeling back to lightly shove against his arm. You had barely touched him, but his heart beats as though he’d been caught in an earthquake. He’s unsteady, and grows more and more terrified by the second of the anchor in your eyes. He’s not strong enough to try and move it.

You watched him pull back, startled by the alertness in his movements. He sweeps his legs up and over the side, perched on the windowsill as though he made to jump through it.

“You’re leaving?”

“I thought you were the one who said I shouldn’t be here,” he grinned, though not without that bitter glint in his already harshly blue eyes. Your lip finds its place pulled between your teeth.

“I think there are still some things I want to see.” You glance to the side, searching for words in the spots of color blooming along the edges of your world. “With you.”

Dabi bridges small gaps between you two—some rickety and many burnt, but still there—leaving space for you to jump ship. His fingers brush warm trails across the skin of your face again, like forfeiting a whittling candelabrum to the shaking hands of a blind man.

You suppose someone like him defies all laws, even the ones of the natural world as he ghosts down the siding of the building, just another wandering shade looking for its way back.

In a day of unforseens, you try and convince yourself that it was the stars that got to you. It’s easier to place blame on things you can’t control, and part of you feels liberated knowing this was just not one of those things you were meant to expect. You let your hopes and predictions solidify the labyrinthian ground you walk on.

But as you lean through the window, you call out to him and realize you’re swallowing your assumptions like antifreeze.

“Wait!”

His head turns to the side to catch you pouring out of your mundane and into his living underworld.

“You have to come back.” The yellow on your sweater burns into your irises, and he has never been more wary of his place in the universe. Especially when it glows back at him through the eyes of a future he didn’t know he even had.

“I want to know what sunrises look like.”

The tempest in him glares up at the beacon your window—no—you provide and he feels a weird, opposing sense of mitigation and incertitude. A ubiquitous tangibility his first instinct declares a malignant impediment.

Still, he can’t help but feel as though a tide were in the process of crashing his lifeboat—a stray piece of driftwood—on to obscure shores.

That can’t be all that much of a bad thing, he considers.

With a small, barely there and imperceptibly honest smile, he places a two fingered tap to the crown of his forehead—throwing an ignition to the wind in a quiet promise.

The light fades, and you clutch the matchstick, watching the blue disappear with him into the dark of night.

#dabi x reader #dabi x you #my hero academia x reader #bnha x reader #mha x reader #bnha reader insert #mha imagines #bnha imagines #bnha dabi x reader #bnha x you #mha x you #bnha soulmate au #soulmate au #shinsou hitoshi x reader #a123

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this-lioness · 5 years

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Keeping busy

My goal is to get 10k words written by the end of September, but at this rate that is going to be a struggle.

I’ll talk more about writing stuff in another post, though, because that’s really sort of a separate entity. For once it’s less about lack of desire and more about lack of actual time. Shit’s been crazy for like two weeks straight now.

Rosie had her vet appointment last Wednesday, and did well. She still has pretty persistent diarrhea, so in addition to the second round of Panacur (which starts Tuesday) they’re trying her out on a pro-biotic, and something else for colitis / intestinal issues. We’re on day two of both, still no improvement, but we’ll keep at it. They thought she looked better, brighter and healthier overall, though, and she gained almost a pound!

The cabinet doors have all arrived (I’m pretty sure, we need to take a complete inventory, but it looks like everything), which means that we can start working on the cabinets at any time. I picked up a palm sander last weekend, which will help enormously in the sanding / priming / painting cycle.

Part of the kitchen “back splash” is covered in this stuff called Z-brick, which was popular in the 1970s. It’s essentially a faux thin-brick panel, except it isn’t in sheets like actual panel. Rather, you have to basically chisel the shit off the wall, and it’s going to take a lot of the underlying sheetrock with it.

To that end we’ve decided to just whitewash the z-brick where it sits, since it’s really not all that awful to look at. The balance of the back splash is just exposed wall, so today I was talking to Marc about doing a custom tile back splash.

I’d like to either buy some hand-painted Italian tiles, or buy fired bisque tiles that we can paint, fire and glaze ourselves at one of the local paint-your-own ceramics places. It would be really nice, especially, to do one of those six-piece mosaics with a kind of custom illustration... maybe cats and berry plants.

We’ve also been hitting the cat room / office / geek room conversion pretty hard. I think I already mentioned that we moved the treadmill into the cat room, and last weekend we emptied a bunch of crap from the studio and Marc framed and built a floating shelf along the whole width of the back wall:

There’s now room enough for the laptop, external monitor, tablet, printer, AND an area to paint, plus plenty of storage underneath. He really did a bang-up job, I spent most of Wednesday working and it was super comfortable and cozy.

In the days since he assembled two new bookshelves, and brought down two more from the attic, filling them with the trades that he’s decided to keep from his initial collection.

We ALSO found a used sleeper loveseat at a yard sale on Saturday for just $25! It was a bit of a struggle to get it upstairs, but now it’s in place in front of the studio / geek room TV, and I’m looking forward to long winter afternoons camped out there with a laptop and some cocoa. Plus! Extra room for guests.

We’ve since moved a fourth bookcase (this one small and low) into place behind the sofa. We’ve got one more to move downstairs, as well, at which point he can start filling the remaining space with books, figurines, whatever he’s decided to keep.

This means there’s now room in the attic to move the Glowforge and the little computer desk. Rather than having it take up a huge, awkward chunk of the studio, I can now just tote the laptop upstairs to do my cutting as needed.

The room has an inset closet that right now is being used as extra art storage. One of my goals this weekend is to really do a deep dive into the materials that I have and sell / trade away stuff that I know I’m not going to use. I have a hoarding problem with certain craft stuff, but realistically I know that a) it’s too much of a PITA to take out and use and b) there are other types of art that are more easily accessible and fun to use. Time to get rid of the excess.

The linocut stuff, for instance. I really enjoyed the hell out of it, but if I’m being honest it’s a fucking hassle from beginning to end. It makes a huge mess, making prints is a mess AND a headache and -- big surprise! -- nobody wants to buy the prints.

The bottom half of the closet will be art storage, and the top half will be more display. Marc has designs on making a kind of diorama display for his He-Man figures, which I think is just brilliant. It would be fun to do a whole painted backdrop for it!

Things are winding down in the garden. We have a couple handfuls of blackberries that are waiting to ripen, and I’m starting to eye up how I’m going to bring in the outdoor plants for the winter. It turns out that the elephant ear is going to have to get dug up and overwintered as a rhizome (!!!!), and I’m going to need to find somewhere to stash the brown turkey fig, as apparently both need to have a kind of winter dormancy to stay healthy. Lugging the latter up to the attic is not an option so, haha... this will be exciting.

We had a visitor in the back yard earlier this week, as well:

Marc was closing things up for bed when he called me downstairs. I saw it on the patio at first and was like, “Oh, is that another kitten!??”

Spolier alert: not a kitten.

I’d noticed a kind of hollow dug under one of our fence panels, and I guess now we know what made it. He was very polite, took a few bites of cat food and then went on about his way. Hopefully he and Fidget give each other a wide berth, as I don’t relish having to give a tomato juice bath to a half-feral cat.

Rosie was VERY excited, however, and I think a little put out that we didn’t let her play with / consume it.

My worries about giving her Panacur were unfounded, by the way. We mixed it into some baby food, added in a little juice from a can of chunked chicken, and she inhaled it. We’ve since had to give her some apparently nasty-tasting pills, and as long as it is located somewhere in her bowl she doesn’t even pause for breath. It’s gone in seconds.

She continues to be amazing and wonderful.

#oc #home improvement #adventure #cats

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trinuviel · 6 years

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Azor Ahai, The Prince that was Promised and the Red Sword of Heroes (part 5)

This is the fifth installment in this series of posts on the subject of the prophecies of a chosen saviour in A Song of Ice and Fire. (Part 1, Part 2, Part 3, Part 4) In part 2, 3 and 4, I came to the conclusion that Daenerys Targaryen fulfills the conditions of the prophecy of Azor Ahai reborn, which would make one of her dragons Lightbringer, the Red Sword of Heroes. However, I do find myself skeptical when it comes to the idea that one kind of magical monster (dragons) will save the world from another kind of magical monster (White Walkers). Therefore, I am starting to doubt that Daenerys Targaryen is the promised saviour.

The figure of a prophesized savior is a common trope in fantasy fiction. Used uncritically, prophecy can easily become destiny in fantasy fiction. However, that is not the game that GRRM plays when he says that battle of Good and Evil is waged within the human heart. The hero has to choose to do the right thing! However, I’d suggest that he might go even farther. The text contains several warnings about putting your trust in prophecy. Those warnings are not just for the characters in the story but for the readers as well.

In this post, I’d like to put forth a radical suggestion: That we should distrust very nature of prophecy itself! We should ask the text whether the prophecy of Azor Ahai reborn is a promise or a warning.

Interestingly enough, the author himself has suggested that it is possible that things aren’t what they seem:

“I have always found grey characters more interesting than those who are pure black and white. […] I did not want to write another version of the War Between Good and Evil, where the antagonist is called the Foul King or the Demon Lord […] Before you can fight a war between good and evil, you need to determine which is which, and that is not always as easy as some Fantasists would have you believe.”

“Prophecy is one of those tropes of Fantasy that is fun to play with, but it can easily turn into a straightjacket if you’re not careful. One of the themes of my fiction, since the very beginning, is that the characters must make their choices, for good or ill. And making choices is hard. There are prophecies in my Seven Kingdoms, but their meanings are often murky and misleading, and they seldom offer the characters much in the way of useful guidance.” (GRRM)

WHEN PROPHECY IS A WARNING

I have come be very suspicious of the prophecy of Azor Ahai reborn for several reasons. Ironically, one of the reasons is this quote from Melisandre, who one of the most ardent believers in AA:

“If sometimes I have mistaken a warning for a prophecy or a prophecy for a warning, the fault lies in the reader, not the book.” Melisandre (ASoS, Davos V)

Through conversations with @fedonciadle, @shinynewrevulsions and @lostlittlesattelites, I have come to the conclusion that the prophecy of AA reborn could very well be a warning rather than the foretelling of a promised saviour. One of my main problems with the prophecy of AA is the fact that it is so fervently espoused by the priesthood of R’hllor. The cult of R’hllor is consistently portrayed in negative terms throughout the text, especially with its dependence upon blood magic and human sacrifice – both of which are framed negatively by the text.

"Bloodmagic is the darkest kind of sorcery. Some say it is the most powerful as well." – Lady Taena Merryweather to Cersei, (AFfC, Cersei VIII)

"Fire is a cruel way to die.” – Jon Snow to Gilly (ADwD, Jon II)

Blood magic is considered the darkest and most evil of magic, and fire is considered one of the most cruel and excruciating ways to die. Any religion that employs such practices is pretty damn evil – and therefore we should be suspicious of what kind of saviour they espouse.

Melisandre herself isn’t evil as such but she commits horrific acts in pursuit of what she deems is a higher goal. She does evil (burning people alive) in the service of what she believes is good (saving the world) – and in her view the end always justifies the means.

Stannis ground his teeth again. "I never asked for this crown. Gold is cold and heavy on the head, but so long as I am the king, I have a duty . . . If I must sacrifice one child to the flames to save a million from the dark . . . Sacrifice . . . is never easy, Davos. Or it is no true sacrifice. Tell him, my lady." Melisandre said, "Azor Ahai tempered Lightbringer with the heart's blood of his own beloved wife. If a man with a thousand cows gives one to god, that is nothing. But a man who offers the only cow he owns . . ." "She talks of cows," Davos told the king. "I am speaking of a boy, your daughter's friend, your brother's son." (ASoS, Davos VI)

Even in the myth of AA, it is an act of human sacrifice and blood magic that creates the magic weapon. One of the things that started to make me suspicious of the prophecy is Salladhor Saan’s concluding remark to Davos Seaworth after he has recounted the story of the forging of Lightbringer – and I think this quote is very important.

“Too much light can hurt the eyes, and fire burns.” (ACoK, Davos I)

FALSE LIGHT

Light is often associated with Truth on a symbolic level – and it is certainly a concept that has an important place in the cult of R’hllor. The high priest of the Red Temple in Volantis in not called the Flame of Truth and the Light of Wisdom for nothing. However, just like fire can both warm and devour, light can both illuminate and blind. In that sense, both fire and light are paradoxical as they can both be beneficial and destructive. They are both a pharmakon in the sense that they can both be a cure and a poison. The Long Night is the absence of light and fire protects against the cold. However, too much light blinds and a fire unchecked destroys.

The priesthood of R’hllor seeks the truth in the light of fire but if you stare directly into the light for too long, it blinds you. A light that is too bright overwhelms the eye and leads to temporary blindness.

Then there’s the question of a false light, which Maester Aemon brings up in relation to the glowing sword that Melisandre has given Stannis:

“…we all deceive ourselves, when we want to believe. Melisandre most of all, I think. The sword is wrong, she has to know that . . . light without heat . . . an empty glamor . . . the sword is wrong, and the false light can only lead us deeper into darkness, Sam.” – Maester Aemon to Sam, (AFfC, Samwell IV)

A false light that will lead into darkness! Ironically, Aemon then decides that Daenerys Targaryen is the hope of mankind and it is possible that he is just as blind as Melisandre. Maybe he too deceives himself because he wants to believe that a promised saviour exists. It is a less frightening thought than the idea that the prophecy itself may be misleading.

Speaking of false light:

Atop the Hill of Rhaenys, the Dragonpit wore a crown of yellow fire, burning so bright it seemed as if the sun was rising. (The Princess and the Queen)

During the first Long Night, the Others were defeated in a final conflict that is called the Battle for the Dawn. While a fire may give light in the darkness, it must not be mistaken for the sun. The followers of R’hllor speak of light and darkness as absolutes but what they fail to understand is that there are different kinds of darkness. There’s the darkness of the night and the darkness of shadows. The latter come into being when something blocks a source of light. Then there’s the darkness of the earth, which is a different kind of darkness altogether:

There he sat, listening to the hoarse whispers of his teacher. “Never fear the darkness, Bran.” The lord’s words were accompanied by a faint rustling of wood and leaf, a slight twisting of his head. “The strongest trees are rooted in the dark places of the earth. Darkness will be your cloak, your shield, your mother’s milk. Darkness will make you strong.” (The Three-Eyed Crow to Bran, ADwD, Bran III)

Notice how darkness here is described in language of protection and nourishment, and it is a darkness related to the trees and the land. It is darkness as a chthonic power; a place of dormancy for life during winter. The darkness of the earth holds the promise of life renewed and thus it is different than the darknes of the cold winter’s night, which is associated with the Others, and the darkness of shadows cast by light, which is associated with R’hllor.

DESTRUCTION THROUGH FIRE

Another quote that strengthens my suspicious against the prophecy of AA reborn is what the high priest of R’hllor preaches about Daenerys Targaryen:

“Benerro has sent forth word from Volantis. Her coming is the fulfillment of an ancient prophecy. From smoke and salt was she born to make the world anew. She is Azor Ahai returned… and her triumph over darkness will bring a summer that will never end… death itself will bend its knee, and all those who die fighting in her cause shall be reborn…” Haldon to Tyrion Lannister, (ADwD, Tyrion VI)

Let’s unpack this quote because there are two different things going on. If Azor Ahai reborn triumphs over the darkness, these things will happen according to the prophecy:

Eternal summer.

The faithful who die will rise again.

This actually sounds a lot more like a R’hllorist vision of the afterlife than a real, living world – and it is the product of the rigid dualism of absolute opposites that R’hllorism espouses. There is only light and darkness; the only gods are The Lord of Light and the Lord of Darkness, who have waged an eternal war since the beginning of time. If the Great Other wins, then eternal winter will reign and the dead will be resurrected by ice. If R’hllor wins, the eternal summer will reign and the faithful dead will be resurrected by fire. There is no balance in this promised future.

The other part of this quote ascribes an even greater role to AA reborn:

The promised saviour will not only defeat the darkness of the icy apocalypse but will remake the world. If AA reborn is the Champion of R’hllor and Daenerys Targaryen is AA reborn, then how will she remake the world? Through what means do the cult of R’hllor envision radical change? As always their answer is fire:

"R'hllor," Ser Godry sang, "we give you now four evil men. With glad hearts and true, we give them to your cleansing fires, that the darkness in their souls might be burned away. Let their vile flesh be seared and blackened, that their spirits might rise free and pure to ascend into the light.” (ADwD, The Sacrifice)

But if the world can only be remade through a cleansing fire, then there will be nothing left but death. The paradise that the cult of R’hllor yearns for is not of the material world but of the spirit.

The Volantene waved a hand. "In Volantis, thousands of slaves and freedmen crowd the temple plaza every night to hear Benerro shriek of bleeding stars and a sword of fire that will cleanse the world. He has been preaching that Volantis will surely burn if the triarchs take up arms against the silver queen." (ADwD, Tyrion IV)

If Daenerys is the fulfillment of the prophecy, then her burning sword is her dragons as I’ve already concluded in a previous post. The fire that will cleanse the world is dragonfire and I’d argue that this is not a good thing because what happens when the dragons come?

“When the dragons come,” he shrieked, “your flesh will burn and blister and turn to ash. Your wives will dance in gowns of fire, shrieking as they burn, lewd and naked underneath the flames. And you shall see your little children weeping, weeping till their eyes do melt and slide like jelly down their faces, till their pink flesh falls black and crackling from their bones.” (The Princess and the Queen)

These words are uttered during the Dance of the Dragons by a religious fanatic. He uses the same language as the followers of R’hllor and claims that the sins of the people of KL can only be washed out by bathing in dragon’s blood. This fevered sermon leads to the Storming of the Dragon Pit where most of the Targaryen dragons were killed. The context here is just as destructive and fanatic as when the followers of R’hllor burns people alive but he was not wrong; when dragons are used as weapons, people are devoured by fire.

You cannot build a new world by setting the old one on fire. If Daenerys is Azor Ahai reborn then she is not a saviour but a destroyer – because Dragons plant no trees! The priests of R’hllor deceive themselves and mislead their followers because:

Too much light can hurt the eyes and fire burns!

Does this mean that the prophecies of Azor Ahai Reborn and The Prince that was Promised are just a pack of lies? This issue isn’t as clear cut as truth or lie, which is something that I’ll examine in the next post where I’d like to advance a different interpretation of what Lightbringer could be.

#azor ahai #the prince that was promised #prophecies #lightbringer #dragons #daenerys targaryen #asoaif #meta #a song of ice and fire #game of thrones

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mslouisadee · 6 years

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January Blues, February Brights

Time to get out of a mid-winter January funk. A record crop of Meyer lemons in the greenhouse might help.

It's been tough. I mean, I expected this. Book deadline looming and I just started writing. Even though I lost my job last winter I was fortunate to have a severance package, but it runs out in a month. I'm not ignorant to the fact that I am still quite fortunate, but I also know that changes are on the doorstep, and maybe I haven't prepared enough for them (hello? Health insurance?). Ive been trying to squeeze in doctor appointments and dental work before March. I usually like January too - not only do I love snow, it's my birthday month. I should mention that I've officially reached that time in my life when it's like "birthdays? Really? I'm not talking about it. Then there is this funk which is probably just a combo of everything. Not to mention Post-Holiday Diets, the unusually cold and snowy weather we've been getting here in the Northeast (bomb cyclone and the coldest weather in over 100 years). This all seems to have manifested itself into a "might-as-well-just-wear-sweatpants-all-day-long-and-watch-Netflix" mentality. Not healthy. I have no interest in opening mail. In ordering seeds, or even for looking at nursery sites. I've kind-of lost interest in these things. I dont think that it's depression really, more like the fact that I feel as if I've grown everything and I cant find something new to be interested in. At least, that's what I'm telling myself. I am feeding the birds which is begining to really sound like a very old-man thing - (don't say it). Still, I'm not doing much more. Its really only a function. Thistle feeder is out again, dump more in. I'm not 'watching' the birds, which is probably worse now that I think about it. Guilt feeding. They eat alone, (which they probably like). I had little problem writing for the book however, so I suppose that is a good sign. Sitting in my office with the snow falling outside has been one of the most favorite things to do. Yet my problem still seems like that I don't feel like working, or not working for that matter don't dont feel like buying plants, nor watering the ones I have anymore either. Nothing seems interesting anymore, and I've lost confidence in what I am doing. This week our weather seems to have entered another phase - bit milder (fingers-crossed that it sticks). With these more average temperatures (highs near freezing and lows in the 20's) much of the drama from the early weeks of January has passed. I even am beginning to think about the future more. I actually sowing a bit of seed today -some flats of mesclun. I even smelled the first whiffs of the Sarcococca hookeriana in the greenhouse (which we need to grow in a pot here in Massachusetts - don't taunt me Oregon or North Carolina!). I'm good with the potted semi-tender shrubs like Sarcococca because under glass on a snowy, January day the greenhouse smells just like Tahiti (OK, more like early spring in the Himalaya - whatever...). It warms my soul and I kind of need that lately. At least it provided some hopefulness that I'll 'like it all' again.

Some casualties from the cold include this Canarina canariensis, but after following lots of chatter on the Pacific Bulb Society newsgroup, its bulb-like root may be OK. Many say that I should plant this tender geophyte that has gorgeous orange bell-shaped flowers like in this post, in the ground in my greenhouse, and it might do better. I'm going to try this. I need something to do.

A few freezes didnt hurt the South African bulbs. I kept the soil dry through most of January, which helps the cells expand in case there is a hard freeze. We had the coldest weather in over 100 years with a week of night temps below -12° F.

My book on vegetable gardenings is underway, mostly photo editing and writing at this phase. So, that has been my focus - choosing the best pics, researching at the library at the horticultural society and writing.

The cyclamen are sturdy fellows, able to withstand some very frosty nights with no harm. As long as the roots don't freeze the more tender species like C. graecum, I'm OK. I was able to fertilize them this week on my first visit out the greenhouse this year,.

South African bulbs really don't seem to mind the cold and the wet. These Babiana fragrans may bloom by springtime. As you can see, I never cleaned up the foliage from last season. It's very fibrous and tough and needs scissors to remove it in when the pot is dormant in mid-summer. I figure that this is what happens in the wild (there are no baboons out there cutting the dead foliage down, just digging and eating the bulbs). The iris-like flowers will be pretty though in a few weeks.

Citrus like these Calamondin oranges are blooming, even though half of the plant died from frost.

Other citrus are just not handling this winter all that well. This is what is left of my big Kumquat tree. Not a victim of frost however, but of a misplaced electric space heater.

Tropaeolim - tjhe vining, high-elevsation tuberous types from the Andes seem to relish this weather though. They look so tender and frail, with thread-like stems yet after the hot, summer dormancy, take off covering little trellis' in just a month - blooms will soon follow.

Tuberous Tropeolum grow from round tubers like potatoes. Here is a new species I am growng - T. ciliatum, a tuber that I acquired from a collector in September. Its growth is still small and weak. I think that it will appreciate being moved to a sunnier spot in the greenhouse now that it is getting warmer in there.

Another tropeolum species T. tricolor looked completely dead, and I feared its late emergence meant that something ate the bulb, but it was just last winters growth that I hadn't cleaned up in the summertime (see a trend here?). Not watered since May, I noticed a bit of thread-like growth earlier this week, and after carefully removing the dead foliage found these new stems twirling around.

Last weekend the sun came out, so after journeying out into the greenhouse - sweatpants and all - I coudl see that most of the Dutch bulbs and South African bulbs were emerging. I moved them all to a sunny sand bed, watered them and in just a few days, things have come back to life.

Scilla messeniaca a lesser-known scilla is beginning to show its buds.

The camellias that were planted in the ground always seem to bloom well even in the coldest winters. One snowy night in a blizzard two weeks ago the gas man wanted to see what I had in the greenhouse around 2 am, but I told him that it wasn't pot - but I could tell by his expression that he didn't believe me so, I shown a flashlight through the frosty glass and this thing was illuminated. He said "Wow, what the Hell is that?". "Not pot, I replied."

Camellias in pots are hardy too if the roots dont freeze. More sturdy than the insulating bubble wrap it seems.

The South African plants are remarkable cold hardy. This Erica 'Winter's Flame' is just starting to bloom.

Narcissus cantabricus, a native North African narcissus species blooms early in the greenhouse sand bed. It is sweetly fragrant - like cottoncandy (which reminds me - when was the last time I smelled cotton candy? It's sweetly scented like a vanilla candle from Target.).

If I was to grow one Nerine, it would be this one - N. alata or N. undulata. I have six stems in bloom this year. It too didnt seem to mind a few light frosts in early January.

The chili peppers didnt like the frost. And while many people keep some chili pepper plants from year to year for a while (like Chiltepin type), these probobly wont make it. I do have some Chiltepin and Tepin pepper plants in the house, however.

The biggest citrus I have is a massive tub planted with a Mandarin orange tree. It was hit by the blast of the propane furnice, and I fear that it wont recover.

Moving forward, I have all hopes that I am moving out of this funk I'm in. No worries, I'm a pretty positive guy and maybe I just need a challenge. I can't tolerate 'meh' for long. You're probably thinking that I am just depressed. Maybe - just a little, but most likely I'm not sleeping because I'm scared, bored and for some reason not motivated because of a combination of all of those things - which is probobly completely normal, right? After all - this is a big life change I'm going through over the next few momnths. With my severance runnings out in march health insurance is my greatest concern (Cobra?). IT seems that there is no shortage of freelance projects and consulting on my doorstep, but just how much and how fruitful or consistant it will all be, I dont know. I dont do well with inconsistancy - you know, used to that pay check every two weeks. SOrry for thinking aloud here, but if you've read this far, you can probably see that this is just like therapy for me. Social therapy. I've never collected an unemployment check in my life either, but ick - I may have to. I just feel like a failure too I guess. Yet I promise to not let things get to me too much, this blog which I thought that I would have so much time to redesign and improve, will still go on. I need to move forward and think about the garden again - and what's next on the horizon for my projects. I have jsut started thinking about my annual 'special projects' list, which is a bit overdue. I am thinking about gladiolus again, a genus I have been putting off for a while now because dahlias got in the way - there are so many lovely crosses if you've even attended a gladiolus society show you know what I mean. Then there are fuschias to try again, but raising them in a different way - training them as standards or as large tubbed specimens, and then perhaps exploring how to create a mini-cut flower garden at home, designed to offer cut flowers for every week of the summer and fall, a mini-flower farm, if you will. Last year I was reminded of how great coleus looks in group containers, and I am imagining an entire collection of coleus - growing them in odd or creative ways - espalier comes to mind. - Asian gourds, a big chapter from my book has inspired me to try on a greater scale. Especially after visiting Chow's parents (a Vietnamese friend of mine) whos family grew so many types in their back yard near where I live. Those will definitely be on my grow list this year - including luffa, sponge gourds and bitter melon and how to grow them, because even though many of us know what a bitter melon looks like - who knows how to cook with them? I've learned this year, and want to share it. Oh yes, and dahlias. And sweet peas. And the tastiest tomatoes - Amy Goldman Fowler's great book THE HEIRLOOM TOMATO has reminded me that the tastiest ones are not any of the varieties I have grown in the past. Thank you Amy! Get it and read it closely - it's fabulously rich with information and well researched. See? I'll be OK. There are then other projects which failed once again that I want to retry until I master them. More about those later. Those potted tubs of 19th century Miognonette are going to be mastered - I know it.

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