#sunfire plotline

[xadian-daydreams]

Aaravos' (possible) escape plan;

I think Aaravos has already set up everything he needs to escape in S6.

We know that portals work to remove things from the prison, as that's how Lil Bug Pal got out. Aaravos just needs to be able to create a bigger portal. He already has a portal target in his bloodbond with Viren and/or Sparklepuff.

Aaravos broke the mirror so he could not be spied on, but most likely another reason is he's prepping his exit point. Due to its need to connect to the sister mirror, this mirror is the weakest point of the imprisonment enchantment. Thus, the best spot to create a portal large enough for himself to fit through.

Claudia not only didn't know the prison wasn't a building/structure, she also had no means prepared of getting Aaravos out of the enchanted pearl. (She probably had a dozen spells prepped to get him out a building, but not the space warping pearl). She wasn't releasing Aaravos that day, regardless of whether the dragang turned up or not. However, Aaravos was already moving on with his plans as soon as Claudia was engaged on her mission - implying that regardless of how this event played out, Aaravos' escape is ensured at this point. This indicated that all Aaravos needed Claudia to do to ensure his escape was act as a plausible threat that others are reacting to, if she claimed the prison, that's a bonus, not a necessity.

The dragang should not have moved the pearl - this has weakened the imprisonment enchantment because, A) The pearl is Ocean based and they're moving it away from its energy source. B) Going off Ripples short story (also that the Startouch statues of Aaravos and the Merciful One were built after the creation of the Sea of the Castout) the center of the Sea of the Castout has significance to Aaravos - it represents one of the lowest points of his life. So, it's not a coincidence that the pearl was place there, and that location is part of the imprisoning enchantment.

Skipping from the dragang and adding the Sunfire plot to the mix. Going by the purple mark where Pharos was bitten by Bug Pal when Aaravos possessed him, Pharos is still subjectable to Aaravos' influence. I'm also willing to bet that Pharos is one of those rare Sunfire elves that possess the healing Light-mode form. (His name is based off the lighthouse of Alexandria and in the artbook it says he has a direct connection to the Sun Primal which helps him channel the incalculable power of the Sunforge). Thus, it would seem sensible for fire mage Karim to have light healer Pharos perform the healing of Sol Regem, where Aaravos has a chance to subtly apply his influence.

We know from Tales of Xadia: Corrupted Core, that magical fire has a purification/repulsion effect on the Sun Orb's corruption - with Sun dragon flame being a good counter. (I wonder if Orta will be mentioned in the show). Therefore, Karim begging a healed Sol Regem to try and purify the Sun Orb using the most powerful dragon flame in Xadia seems likely.

Only, due to Aaravos' influence, this purification won't exactly go to plan - at the least, a massive burst of dark magic will happen (similar to what you're trying to stop in the Corrupted Core campaign, but not so apocalyptic). This burst of dark magic will give Aaravos all the external power he requires to create a portal powerful and large enough to escape.

The dragang won't even realise Aaravos is out. This gives him time to make moves before his escape is discovered.

(While I like the idea of Rayla's dilemma over possessed Callum, and there's enough hints that it's bound to happen, I think it will happen later in season 6 over something other than Aaravos' escape).

#tdp #tdp speculation #aaravos #tdp spoilers #tdp season 6 #tales of xadia spoilers #sol regem #sunfire plotline

[kradogsrats]

I feel like there's something interesting going on with Queen Aditi the Merciful, Queen Aditi who is feared and respected by the dragons, Queen Aditi who abolished the duel of blood and ash, and her descendant Prince Karim the student of history, Karim who casually uses archaic Sunfire greetings, Karim who is obsessed with the glory of his people's past, and who demands a duel of blood and ash as a sacred ritual that no king or queen can abolish...

Like, Aaravos definitely removes Aditi at least in part because it perpetuates and intensifies the destabilization of Xadia by the draconic succession crisis, but I wonder if Aditi was also a turning point in some kind of Sunfire culture reformation. Aaravos calls her "arrogant," which could be simply because she was doing shit like stepping in to decide who would be the next dragon monarch, but could also potentially refer to any number of changes she may have instigated that were not in favor of his vision. Maybe to think you can change thousands of years of tradition and culture is arrogance? Either way, she did things like look at an apparently sacrosanct tradition of violence and say, "this is fucking stupid and we're not going to do it anymore."

Anyway, I think that's interesting in the context of s4's Sunfire plotline centered around holding respect and compassion for tradition but also looking to a future that may not include it? Also then s5's dichotomy of Karim addressing Sol Regem as "true King of the Dragons" and Kim'dael naming Janai as "true Queen of Lux Aurea," like... one of those is Aditi's legacy and the other is something older and more brutal, that Aditi may have been pushing away.

#karim #janai #sunfire elves #aditi #the dragon prince

[raayllum]

Rough season outline prediction

5x01-5x02-ish are in Katolis, also likely featuring Viren being out of it. By the end of 5x01, Claudia has bitten the bullet, and she and Terry begin moving Viren (cue the stormy screencap we saw) to start tracking down Aaravos’ prison with their map. Ezran gets a kingdom update and Rayla investigates the coins/dungeons, finding Runaan’s bow. Callum may try to find info on Aaravos / Startouch elves from humans, but the Epic of the Void poem guarded by an Ocean rune in Evenere doesn’t yield as much as he hoped. They resolve to head to the Sunfire elves, also possibly for political reasons. Karim either escapes or is not in jail.

5x03-5x04-ish is where the Sunfire and Dragang plotline merge. Callum and Kazi research Startouch elves to try and figure out where Aaravos’ prison may be. Karim stages a coup with Amaya, Rayla, and Callum in the middle. Corvus and Soren are likely with Ezran and Janai. Janaya stay to try and fix things in their kingdom and/or buy time for the Dragang to leave. Viren has his dark magic induced dream hallucinations and we learn about Soren’s childhood illness

5x05-5x07: Kids run into Nyx, get their boat, meet pirates, boat(s) get destroyed. Claudia starts to fracture further and further apart from Terry and Viren. The dragang are taken to some sort of underwater place by Domina Profundis, who saves them from the storm. Callum and Rayla argue about well - take your pick, honestly. Ezran gets to be a very diplomatic king. Shit going down with Zubeia and other dragon politics maybe?

5x08-5x09: Aaravos gets out and things go to shit. Claudia remains loyal to him, even if Terry and Viren defect on her. Callum and Rayla fully reconcile. 

#tdp #s5 #the dragon prince #s5 speculation #predictions #arc 2 #mine #text post #s5 spoilers #tdp spoilers

[bobgoesw00t]

All caught up with The Dragon Prince and here are my thoughts on what happened in the last episode: ...CLAUDIA CAN SUCK IIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIT!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! I mean, I want her and Terry to be happy, but she's such a FUCKING BIMBO when it comes to dark magic, her dad, and Aaravos, and IT'S ABOUT DAMN TIME SHE GOT BITTEN IN THE ASS BY KARMA! I absolutely love her and Terry as a couple (THEY ARE SO CUTE AND FLUFFY AND WHOLESOME AND OSRGNASOGIJAHGPOEAIRHG TOO CUTE). Still, she TOTALLY deserved to have Rayla slice her leg off for all the bullshit she's done and tried to pull since the series started.

Also, soooo happy Viren gave Aaravos the middle finger and decided to not kill Sir Sparklepuff in the end! He's had the greatest story arc in the last two seasons by far and he deserves to go out on his own terms. Hell, the only reason Claudia came so to getting Aaravos's prison was because she's a STUPID BIMBO AND DIDN'T REALIZE VIREN WAS PERFECTLY OK NOT SURVIVING PASSED THE 30 DAYS!!!!!!!

As for the plotline with Amaya and Janai, GOD I want to bitch slap Karim for being a stupid idiot! He needs to have an intervention at some point before he fucks everything up with the Sunfire Elves...but at the same time, I kind of want to bang him cause DAAAMN HE BE HOT THIS SEASON!!!

Lastly, a few side notes. I totally knew they were going to pull a Yoda with Akiyu the moment she showed up as "TIDEBOUND TINA", I mean you'd have to be a nincompoop not to see that from a mile away. And DAAAAAAAAAMN, WHAT HAPPENED TO FINNIGRIN WAS BRUTAL!!!!!!! He beyond deserved it however and it was nice to see it happen.

This was a good season, and I'm already excited to see what happens next...hopefully, they go ahead and get the Nova Blade as a form of insurance in the chance that Arravos manages to get out of the prison (which, let's all be honest, will probably happen before the show ends xD) and MAYBE, that bimbo Claudia realizes she's been a stupid idiot and comes around to live a happy life with Terry. ...BUT THAT PROBABLY WON'T HAPPEN, in which case, Terry needs to give her an ultimatum: she either gives up her quest for Aaravos, or he'll dump her ass and go to Callum and friends for help.

#the dragon prince #sir sparklepuff #callum #claudia #lord viren #aaravos #claudia is a stupid bimbo #terry #terrestrius #claudia x terry #tdp s5 #tdp season five

[baatarthefirst]

Your thoughts on s4?

I give it a solid 7.5.

I agree with many of the criticisms, but for me none of them are all that horrible.

Yes, Rayllum breaking up off screen was disappointing. But showing it may have slowed down the pacing too much.

Yes, the Sunfire plotline did not connect to the main plotline, but it might soon.

Janai and Amaya were at a reasonable place, but I do feel like the initiating incident probably would've happened much sooner. But sometimes things do happen like that.

The fart jokes...no excuse here. I get what they were going for, but they missed the shot.

The main plot did drag a bit and I think they could have cut some time SOMEWHERE to give Soren a moment with Viren.

But nothing was show-ruining for me. And there were SO MANY good moments! Aarvos possesing Callum, the coins, Claudia's fight, TWO CAKES. Zym putting his paw on Ezran's shoulder, N'than, TERRY.

For me the parts were better than the whole, and I'm okay with saying this season was a set up for the next three seasons.

I hope this will be like seasons 4 and 5 of RWBY, a bit of a rough patch, but honestly not too bad if your binging the whole series where you don't have to wait to see where they're going with it.

#tdp #the dragon prince #Callum #Rayla #Janai #Amaya #Rayllum #Janaya #Claudia #azymondias #Zym #Ezran #Soren #Viren #Karim

[kuno-chan]

Immediate Theories Based Off the s5 Screenshots Shared

Viren's gonna find Jesus via dark magic coma lol

Aaravos is definitely getting out. Almost assuredly. Kazi and Callum are looking up things about him.

Rayla finds Runaan's bow in Viren's lair

The Sunfire plotline and main one will merge

There may be more coup planning via Karim

Rayla is going to fight some pirates

We won't get to see the moonshadow fam released though cries

Rayla and Callum are going to have some more friction, but it'll be more interactive

#the dragon prince #tdp #rayla #callum #rayllum

[eerna]

how did u rate tdp s4? what moments did u like and what u hated

I don't do well with ratings, but here's an off-the-top-of-my-head list of likes and dislikes!

LIKES:

This might not belong here bc it is technically OOC, but I was always annoyed at Rayla saving Pyrrah in s2, so I am glad they went back on it lolololol

The Rayllum dynamic in the first 80% of the season! I loved how stubborn and focused Callum was on being offended without letting it be annoying or hinder the plot

Callum! Before, I didn't really care much for his arc, but I liked him this season! TDP struggles with tone, but the serious edgyness they gave him this season accidentally created the most tonally coherent main character lol. I was annoyed at how out of nowhere his "YOU GOTTA KILL ME" thing was, but based on Rayla's reaction that might have been the point? AND he only said one bad joke way back at the beginning of ep 1, which made him 1000 times more endearing.

This might be Stockholm syndrome but the self-righteous monologues weren't bad this time around? I really loved the earth dragon's Avizandum rant, go off king

Claudia is now EVIL!!!! I AM SO HAPPY!!!! I WANTED THIS SO BAD I LOVED THAT VIREN WAS SIDELINED IN HER FAVOR THIS SEASON LET'S GO EVIL GIRLS LET'S GO

Speaking of which, CLAUDIA AND TERRY KILLING SOMEONE!!! I was expecting it but it was nice to have my expectations met

The coin scene where Rayla is ready to cut a bitch and Claudia makes her regret it was so good!!! Idk why Aaravos said Rayla can’t kill, she killed Viren just fine, and this scene was more in line with that Rayla. However it got ruined by Claudia going back :/

DISLIKES:

the animation. I was one of the rare people who didn't mind the frame rate of s1, but this season's colors and shapes and movements were a gigantic problem for me. The screenplay is worse too. All in all the show doesn't look as competent as it used to.

Janai and Amaya. I am personally offended bc I was HERE for the marriage political drama plotline, but they messed it up at every turn. I ended up feeling like Janai doesn't know Amaya at all and is actually a really naiive, unaware woman, which is a very bad thing for political plotlines.

Rayla. She was so OOC it was insane. I am convinced the writers just didn't know what to do without her and that's why she was in this season. Like, why is she more emotionally mature, who did she have to practice those skills with??? We don't know, because the writers don't know either, as far as they are concerned she was in a coma for 2 years!!!! They could have removed TTM and instead made s4 Rayla paranoid and accidentally neglectful, and then in the end her fears get validated when she sees Viren and leaves Callum in a split second's decision, and then in s5 we can have a breakup story.

the plot is as contrived as always. If I were a queen of a people called "sunfire elves" whose bodies can run so hot they burn things they touch and a human architect showed up with plans to build a highly burnable camp for us, I'd think it was a practical joke. The dragon queen sees someone was murdered in her home while she was away, then a few hours later leaves her young son in that same home and thinks that will make him safe.

the coin scene T.T IT STARTED OUT SO GOOD IT WOULD HAVE BEEN SO GOOD IF ONLY CLAUDIA DIDN’T GO BACK

The timeskip. Honestly was not needed at all. We could have done all the same things with a 2 month timeskip and it would make more sense bc WHY HAVE THE SUNFIRE ELVES BEEN LIVING IN A SUPER FLAMMABLE CAMP FOR 2 YEARS

how do the jokes keep getting worse. How. Why did we need those 5 minutes in which Claudia details how much she loves her bf's farts. I totally get why Viren got a panic attack and fell to his second death right afterwards

the ATLA references also keep getting worse. Someone explain to them they should stop reminding people that they could be watching a better kids' show instead

#eernask #eernanon #eernask talk tdp #tdp spoilers

[christinapotter09]

first and last reaction to episode 10 and daemyra because HBO simply loves to butcher characters

first of all, thanks for the leak and ruining the weekend

I refuse to accept that this was the final episode, if this indeed is the final cut of it.... the cutting of the scenes was funny, just so many things shoved up before our eyes and so many ooc interactions and things happening like... chill out you can make it 1hr+.... why stumble upon it?

to the characters, Daemon Targaryen is a piece of shit, we all know that, he’s been angry and cruel and plain awful in many cases, lets be honest BUT he had one redeeming quality, his love for Rhaenyra Targaryen, he has been through some serious shit like exiling himself to Pentos to try and get over her and when he came back he realised there was no way around his heart’s desire, he stood for his niece/wife and struck down anyone who dared insult her. Married her in the tradition of his house just like he had asked to do that decade ago. 

I do not accept that the same man would be calling Laena “My brave girl” during her torturous labour but when it comes to Rhaenyra starting being in pain he would remain without even a reflex towards her, when she’d be screaming his name, he’d continue to mumble around with lords and generals to a point where a knight would ask him if he should talk with the maester.... and while she’d been birthing on the floor he would finally go and check on her later on.... or that he would leave her alone to wrap their baby dragon on her own while still bleeding and he’d go to the beach (no matter the cut scene from there too which we got in the trailer but not in the episode)

he crowned her congratulations and then he decided to choke her while he wasn’t even understanding the magnitude of what Rhae was saying and how it worked? he’s short tempered, not stupid, he’s going singing valyrian lullabies to Vermithor, he would stay and listen to something important involving Aegon the Conqueror.... she’s shocked and whimpering and he still held on, even tightened his hand around her neck before shaking and freeing her....? and why? because he’s sad/stressed/angry/frustrated? No, the Daemon who was cupping her belly two episodes ago, leading the family to King’s Landing because “What choice do I have?” and he wanted to give her all the choices.... he would never lay a finger against Rhaenyra hours after her horrendous ordeal with Visenya (btw Visenya who? we didn’t even get the name of the poor babe) especially after having lost Laena the way he did. 

the biggest thing is that this is not Daemon’s fault but the showrunners/writers’ 

I AM DONE with inconsistent writing and portrayal, I’m certainly done with character assassination, they cut down his scenes with his daughters and now they cut at least 4 scenes showing him and Rhaenyra interacting after what happened to them. 

a massive blow to this shitshow was the change of Aemond’s crime. turning it into an accident is the biggest shit decision they could make. Aemond loses agency (just like Rhaenyra herself because yes I guess you don’t want her locco Dany 2.0 but that doesn’t mean she has to be a frozen person who simply takes the blows and values the song of Ice and Fire less than the fucking page from that book Alicent sent with the fucker she has for father) so it was Vhagar who didn’t listen to Aemond? BECAUSE ARAX GOT SCARED AND PROVOKED HER WITH FIRE? 

Blood and Cheese will taste completely different and I don’t care what is happening with AemondxHaelena about it, Luke deserved better, so did Aemond’s storyline, the battle at the Riverlands will be completely different, the battle above God’s eye too..... I wonder if Sunfire will also kill Rhaenyra by accident, not listening to poor little Aegon who tried to save his sweet sister? UUUUGH

for the love of the Gods, let the fucking characters have their agency, their crimes and black moments without loading only Daemon with all the evils of the world just because you can’t deal with a plotline from start to finish and above all even if you want to fuck the characters WRITE IT BETTER AND GIVE IT TIME

THIS IS GAME OF THRONES SEASON 8 ALL OVER, we accepted the time skips, we accepted the dark battle of the dawn like shit, we accepted stupid Alicent fully knowing what would happen to Harwin, Rhae and her kids if she got her way proving them bastards to Viserys and then she played shocked when Otto had been planning to kill Rhaenyra the moment Viserys was dead.... We accepted the way you want to tell the story but HBO, this is the same audience with GoT but not with the same patience

Daemyra was beautiful but I don’t know how it can survive after tonight, frankly, why would it?

fool me once, shame on you, fool me twice, shame on me

thank you, HBO for fucking up with this so I can keep my spine straight before SNOW and the shit that is gonna hit that fan, I say this wholeheartedly, you better not involve my darling Sophie/Sansa into that because you clearly don’t deserve the people’s good graces and our love for the universe, GRRM has straight up abandoned the books and you can’t possibly deliver a fucking justified result from the source material

I am done with canon once again

#hotd spoilers #house of the dragon #hbo #daemyra #daemon x rhaenyra

[fandomsandflyingstingrays]

Season 4 Thoughts: Ray Edition

First of all, a disclaimer: all of these might change after I watch the season a second time, it usually takes me going episode-by-episode with full context to form a full opinion. That being said, right now, my feelings on the season are mixed. I definitely think it’s my least favorite of what we’ve gotten so far (not that it’s bad! Just less good). I’ll get into that, but I want to start off by talking about what I liked:

The animation was breathtaking. Everything was so smooth, I loved pretty much all of the character redesigns, and the scenery was gorgeous

I loved that conflict between the humans and elves didn’t end with returning to Zym to his mother, and I loved how that was explored. The show continued on with doing what it does extremely well: making sure that the conflict is never black-and-white. I always thought that both sides had valid points

(Also: Ezran’s speech deserves a point of its own because that was fantastic. You could hear his anger and pain so well as he was talking about it and his conclusion that you have to hold all your emotions to move forward was so wise. Plus it being juxtaposed by the fight with Ibis... incredible)

Janai and Amaya. Their dynamic was so wonderful and sweet and you can really see how they bring out the best in each other. They had better get married and be the best queens the sunfire elves have ever known

Terry, as a character, is fantastic. He’s so sweet and devoted, the way he sees the world is fascinating, and his reaction to killing Ibis and journey with how he dealt with it was very compelling

The whole villain (?) trio was great actually, they still all have very believable flaws and are still likable despite their actions (although Claudia less so than she has been)

TERRY CONVINCING CLAUDIA TO RETURN THE COINS. First of all, because it means neither of them are beyond hope, but mostly because we’re FINALLY GETTING SOME CLOSURE ON THAT PLOT POINT RUTHARI REUNION WHEN

Bait was a little champion. His bond with Ezran in previous seasons was cute, but I adored seeing how connected he was with Callum. And the fact that he was the final push to open Rex Igneous’s door. 10/10

Ezran subverting the whole “we will sacrifice our treasured possessions to you” trope by realizing their gifts to Rex should mean something to him. I love that it was a baked good that got him to talk. Honestly, same

But with that being said, the whole season kind of felt... off, especially in the beginning. It really took a while for the tone to find its footing. The humor felt really jarring at first, and it really switched from super dark to super light very quickly (for example, two minutes of bathroom jokes and a guy coughing up blood as he dies in the same episode). I also wasn’t really a big fan of Rayla’s plotline. First of all, her disappearance was never really explained- it pretty much alienated anyone who hasn’t read TTM, and I’m sure a lot of viewers haven’t. And the way it threw off the group dynamic wasn’t fun for me. I loved the show primarily because even though there was conflict between the characters, they still bantered and fought for each other and there were tons of moments where you saw how much they cared about each other, and that was missing here. I liked that Callum didn’t forgive Rayla right away, but I really do wish he’d at least gotten a chance to explain why her leaving hurt him and have them air that out a bit, because she really didn’t seem to get it. The fact that she never apologized or acknowledged that leaving him with absolutely no word for two years would hurt... I’m so sure she’s smarter than that. I’m hopeful that season 5 will go into Rayla’s disappearance in more detail and kind of negate this critique, but we’ll have to wait and see.

Overall, I enjoyed the season, and I think I will even more once I watch it again! It just took a while to find its footing, and I do think I liked arc 1 better so far

#the dragon prince #tdp #the dragon prince season 4 #tdp season 4 #the dragon prince spoilers #tdp spoilers #tdp callum #tdp ezran #tdp zym #tdp terry #tdp claudia #tdp janai #tdp amaya #tdp ibis #tdp rayla #tdp bait #tdp ethari #tdp runaan #janaya #ruthari #ray rambles

[galactic-empress]

the Sunfire plotline remains my favorite

#Karim is still my silly little guy #Karim hot and underrated #tdp spoilers

[teabreaking]

continuing tdp 💥💥💥 currently most invested in callum and rayla ofc and also I really like the secondary plot of karim in his exile... the relationship between janai and karim was one of my favorite parts of season 4 so I'm excited to see how that goes. sunfire elves have my favourite designs of the whole show they're all so good fr.. I'm only 3 episodes in still they're just about to go to lux aurea which is fun I'm interested to see what it looks like now anddd I love amaya. so much. also a big fan of the creepy aaravos bug guy excellent design

i’m sooo glad you like the janai and karim plotline, because from what i understand, it’s not a very popular one? but it’s nice to see janai grow into her role as queen, and karim is definitely an interesting character as well

overall though i think season 5 just gets more and more interesting as the episodes progress, so i’m interested to know how you’ll feel about the new characters you’re gonna meet soon 👀

#asks

[bamfdaddio]

X-Men Abridged: 1979

The X-Men, those globe-trotting mutants that have sworn to protect a world that hates and fears them, are a cultural juggernaut with a long, tangled history. Want to unravel this tapestry? Then read the Abridged X-Men!

(X-Men 117 - 128, X-Man Annual 3) - by Chris Claremont and John Byrne, Terry Austin, George Perez

See Jean? Dark Phoenix is nothing: this is how you turn evil properly. (X-Men 123)

So, these things have been getting longer. Whoops.

Last year, plotlines tended to bleed over in one another, but this year is a lot more arc-based, jumping from location to location. This is basically X-Men: World Tour. After hitting Antarctica and the Savage Land, our team of merry mutants visits Japan, Canada, Egypt, Scotland and even a theme park! (And really, both Murder World and Disney Land are run by capitalist scumbags who pretend to be in it for the art, the only difference being that Arcade purposefully murders his guests.)

But, before we check in with the X-Men, we return to the Institute. See, there’s a mutual misunderstanding that wouldn’t be out of place in a Shakespearian tragedy: Jean and Charles think Beast and Jean were the only survivors of their fight with Magneto in Antarctica, while the rest of the X-Men believe they were the only survivors and Jean and Beast perished. Since the X-Men have been trapped in the Savage Land, nobody has been able to clear up the confusion.

With their grief driving a wedge between her and Charles, Jean leaves the mansion to deal with her feelings on her own. (She’ll end up on Muir Isle.)

This is adorable! And, if the whole "Empress of the known Universe "-thing blows up in her face, she can always become a barista at Starbucks. (X-Men 117)

Lilandra successfully persuades Xavier to leave Earth as her consort, now that there is nothing left for him. Xavier agrees, but not before having a flashback to the time he met another telepath named Amahl Farouk in Egypt. (The Shadow King isn’t relevant just yet, but he’ll become an important villain later on.)

The X-Men, meanwhile, cross a treacherous ocean on a raft and are picked up by a Japanese vessel. The Japanese do not allow them to call anyone, for some reason. Sure. When they finally dock in Japan - six weeks later - some arms dealer named Magnum Moses has put Agarishima is on fire. Like, literally an inferno of such big proportions that even Storm can’t do much.

What follows is an uninspired, slipshod adventure. For some reason, Misty Knight and Colleen Wing are there too, because the president needed American detectives to investigate Magnum Moses (?) and for some reason, Misty doesn’t know Jean thinks Scott is dead, nor does she mention she just saw Jean to Scott. AUGH. It will take almost a year for Scott to figure out Jean isn’t dead and it becomes increasingly more contrived. I get that Claremont needed to isolate Jean to make her susceptible to, er, a certain someone’s machinations, but holy fuck do I have to suspend my disbelief for all of this bullshit.

The only good things about this little arc are:

Sunfire is still a dick.

Wolverine meets Mariko Yashida, a Japanese girl who actually reciprocates his feelings, as opposed to Jean. I’ve mostly been ignoring his budding feelings for Jean, because I stopped finding love triangles interesting since I was 16 and watched The OC, so I can only applaud this development. Mariko brings out Wolverine’s soft side and it’s very adorable. Later on, she moves to NYC for some reason and they start dating.

There is something sweetly disarming about calling Wolverine ‘beautiful’. (X-Men 120)

Anyway, Magnum is holding Japan hostage: either they give him what he wants - I think that might be money, sorry, wasn't paying attention - or he sinks Japan by activating the fault lines and you guys, I am sooo bored. Unsurprisingly, the X-Men stop him and for once, it’s Banshee who gets to play the most important part.

It’s a good thing I was terrible at science, otherwise I might have to point out that earthquakes and sonic waves don’t work that way! I simply get to be entertained by little rascal Colossus, plugging his ears like a toddler, and Sunfire’s gritty determination to not be impressed by some silly screaming Irishman. (X-Men 119)

Banshee pays a steep price for the victory, however: his vocal chords end up damaged, leaving him effectively powerless for the remainder of the year.

Oh, and here’s interesting fact about the above spread: you may or may not know that Chris Claremont and John Byrne were notoriously terrible at working together; this issue became a particular sore point between the creators. See, Byrne wanted to run the above panel without the sound of ‘Kra-Koom’, believing the art was strong enough to convey the destruction. He was livid when the finished product ended up containing a sound effect after all. I get your frustration, man, but if you want a writer who knows how to say less with more, you should maybe not work with Claremont?

(One of the reasons Claremont liked being so verbose and descriptive in his scripts was because otherwise, the artist would fill in the blanks using his own imagination. It’s no wonder these two found it hard to work together.)

On the flight to the US of A, Colleen Wing hits on Cyclops. It has to be the jawline, right? It can’t be the personality. All of a sudden, a snow storm causes their plane to be diverted to Calgary. The cause of this delay is Alpha Flight, who want their Wolverine back!

When even the narration is all “and they think they’re equal to any team of superheroes”, you know you’re a bunch of C-listers. Ugh. (X-Men 121)

Vindicator, previously known as Captain Alpha. He changed his name after accidentally shooting Moira that one time, which is exactly the kind of hollow gesture this dude would make. Ugh. If you think his new-found remorse won’t let him threaten an airplane chock full of innocent passengers, you would be wrong.

Shaman, doctor by day, magic user by night. Him and his magical little pouch are to blame for the snow storm.

Sasquatch, Canada’s answer to the Hulk. (Hilariously, the theory on why he turns furry instead of green is because he’s closer to the Aurora Borealis and this somehow messes with the radiation?)

Snowbird, a young Arctic goddess. Precious. To be cherished. Barely there for this adventure, sadly.

Northstar, an arrogant, hot-headed speedster, the twin brother of

Aurora, a lover, not a fighter. Together, they have light powers.

Vindicator and Shaman hog most of the spotlight, so Alpha Flight continues to be the ever-loving worst. They’re really wasting Northstar’s first appearance here. Here's why they suck:

Alpha Flight accidentally smashes a plane and keeps threatening to drag Wolverine back to the military against his will.

They push the cover price of the comic to a whoppin’ 40 cents.

Johnny fuckin’ Hudson even provokes Storm into an attack in the middle of a mall.

Shaman lets his blizzard get out of control.

After Storm fixes this mistake for him, Northstar has the gall to knock her out, “because she’s obviously the strongest”. Like, you’re not wrong, but damn, y’all a bunch of unpleasant superheroes.

To stop the fight, Wolverine decides to turn himself in. The X-Men leave, but while flying back, they already make plans to save their teammate. Wolverine saves them the trouble, casually sauntering into the cockpit while claiming that pulling a fast one on them was the easiest thing ever.

To be fair, I understand why you’d want to put a country between yourself and those bozos.

And finally, the X-Men are home! Xavier left them the equivalent of a Post-It saying “off to space”, so they try to pick up their life as best they can. None of them contact Jean’s parents, make an attempt to visit her grave or happen to see Beast on TV and by now, my suspension of disbelief is stretched so far that it could replace Reed Richards on the Fantastic Four.

Ororo, meanwhile, makes a little pilgrimage to Harlem, to the building she grew up in before she moved to Cairo.

I have failed you as a recapper, because I have absolutely no idea how to parse this scene. (X-Men 122)

I think I’d have to write a full-on thesis before I could properly analyse this, because so many things intersect here: poverty and racism, the boundaries of a superhero comic, confronting a (shared) past. I can’t even fully gauge if this is a clumsy, privileged attempt at tackling a serious topic or rather, a valuable moment in a comic that continually tries to expand on its themes of racism, exclusion and prejudice. One thing I will note is:

Luke Cage delivers the sort of trite conclusion that they’re superheroes: they’re better at fighting Galactus than at fixing the human condition. Point is, he kind of has to believe that, doesn’t he? It’s the sort of blind spot we all permit ourselves: you can’t fix everything. None of us have the power to fix the earth, or humanity, or the economy, or whatever: if you’re lucky, you can maybe tend to your own garden and leave it better than you found it, ensuring some happiness for yourself and a few loved ones.

Chasing bank robbers is easy. Superhero stuff. But here? Who do you attack here? These kids, or the system that failed them? You can’t really punch a needle exchange into being. Maybe that’s the appeal of superhero comics: there’s a clear villain, which is so sorely lacking in our day to day lifes. There, we are ruled by systems that are rooted in inequality, patriarchy, gender...

But Storm isn’t like Luke Cage, not in this regard. Before she became an X-Man, she used her powers to help people that came to her. And the whole point of the X-Men - other than beating up villains in colorful spandex - is that they want to change the system. They want to fix things, they want to fix a dark part of human nature, the part that hates which we fear.

Storm doesn’t really respond to Luke Cage here, but we know she’ll keep fighting the good fight, despite insurmountable odds. You can’t fix mankind, I don’t think, but you can sure as hell try.

*coughs*

Anyway!

Black Tom and Juggernaut hire Arcade… to kill the X-Men! I’m not sure why? I thought these two usually attempted to solve things on their own and Arcade’s fee is, like, a million bucks, so…? Maybe Black Tom asked his boyfriend what he wanted for his birthday and Juggernaut clenched his fists and said “I WANT THE X-MEN DEAD” and things escalated from there.

So, Arcade is a subtle villain. While Scott and Colleen Wing are on a date, this happens:

I can’t decide which is funnier: kidnapping people by sneaking up on them with A GARBAGE TRUCK or the fact that Spider-Man deduces this is Arcade’s doing by the noise alone. (X-Men 123)

Spider-Man doesn’t really figure into the rest of the plot, by the way.

Arcade successfully kidnaps all of the X-Men (and their dates: Colleen, Amanda and Betsy). Who is this Arcade? Well, he is an assassin who lets his victims run through a gauntlet of some sort, testing them with potentially deadly results in his Murderworld. He’s like a discount-combo of Saw and the Joker, except a lot less competent and a lot more spoiled rich kid. He barely kills anyone, ever, until maaaybe Avengers Arena, some forty years later.

Arcade veers heavily to the silly side of the silly-to-sinister scale, but he at least commits to a theme. Bonus is that trapping your heroes in a bunch of ricocheting balls fubars them ever-so beautifully. (X-Men 123)

This whole adventure is very silly and has very little bearing on the overarching plot, but it’s a fun enough romp: Cyclops nearly gets squashed by a hydraulic press, Nightcrawler gets attacked by bumper cars with chain saws attached to them, stuff like that. The absolute best part is when Colossus is hypnotized by an illusion of the KGB and becomes THE PROLETARIAN.

His insignia is Vladimir Lenin, y’all.

After various shenanigans, everybody is freed from their respective booby traps, everyone except Colossus. See, Piotr has been feeling down, torn between the exciting new loyalty to the X-Men and the more dutiful loyalty to his family and his motherland. (Also, he’s been feeling like a failure because he came up short a couple a times, aw.) Those feelings are exactly what Arcade has been abusing, but when Colossus comes in for the kill, Storm gives the most heartfelt plea:

I’m not crying, you’re crying. (X-Men 124)

Arcade’s all: “Eh, can’t win ‘em all” and yeets the X-Men out of Murderworld. The story has barely any other repercussions, except we stop seeing Colleen Wing and Betsy (Piotr’s date) after this. To be fair, being kidnapped by a super villain is a good reason to stop seeing someone.

Even more inconsequential is the adventure in the Annual. The only important thing to glean from there is that, when Thor is unavailable, Storm is a suitable substitution. Couldn’t agree more.

The quality of the comic has been steadily ascending throughout the year and ends on a supremely high note: Proteus. Because I think it might be Claremont’s best work so far, I’ll be dedicating a full post to that. (Man, that 10-picture-limit is a real bummer, huh?)

Ugliest Costume: I don’t care, I just want someone to cosplay the Proletarian.

Best new character: There’s actually a few options - Snowbird, Northstar, Proteus - but both Jean-Paul and Narya don’t really show their best sides this year, so I’m going in a different direction. My pick is the Shadow King. He is a very effective foil to Xavier, perhaps even moreso than Magneto. I know I rag on Xavier and his cavalier attitude to bending others to his will a lot, but imagine if you had his powers: wouldn’t you just make people do whatever you want? Just, like, all the time? The Shadow King is an effective reminder of what Charles would have been like, had he been immoral. (Well, more immoral.)

No matter how cool your psychic battle may be, this is what it looks like to the rest of the world. (X-Men 117)

Turns evil: Colossus, for the first time!

What to read: 117, 125 - 129.

#abridged x-men #x-men abridged #cyclops #phoenix #storm #colossus #wolverine #banshee #nightcrawler #Terry Austin #George Perez #chris claremont #john byrne #arcade #colleen wing #luke cage #lilandra #mariko yashida #the shadow king #alpha flight #sunfire #vindicator #snowbird #aurora #northstar #shaman #sasquatch #professor x

[kradogsrats]

idk man like… I’m not surprised, and disappointed is a strong word, but I’m kinda raising my eyebrows at how we’ve gotten more than halfway through s6 titles and have absolutely nothing that we didn’t know already

like sure, arc 2 is clearly the “Callum and Rayla” arc because you can see starting from s4 that episode titles 90% reference whichever plot thread is centered on them when there’s usually a minimum of three plotlines going at once like no wonder no one takes the Sunfire arc seriously, by the episode titles you wouldn’t even know its going on

obviously not every episode can be an Infantis Sanguine, but looking back at s1-s3 there’s a healthy number of episodes where what’s going on with Callum and Rayla is actually the B-plot, with the title reflecting another plot thread in a way that would spark a lot of speculation presented out of context, and we’re just not getting that here

so yeah fully half the episode titles for s6 being woooOOOooo Callum and Rayla are going to/at the Starscraper is getting kinda… yes, we KNOW, them approaching the starscraper was literally the first glimpse of s6 we got

#literally when they started this little game i was like #okay either a) they’re gearing up to drop s6 soon or b) the episode titles are vague af and will reveal absolutely nothing #and option a was always unlikely

[raayllum]

S4 Trailer Timeline Breakdown

Let’s do this + spoilers for all of episode one from the twitter thread at SDCC.

4x01 is Callum’s birthday and Viren’s revival day. It establishes Callum waiting on a book of rune translations from Lux Aurea, likely to try to decipher more about the mirror. Ezran states that Zubeia and Zym will be arriving in Katolis, and Janai proposes to Amaya. She accepts. Out on the balcony, Callum looks up at the moon and we see that he is still in love with Rayla.

Thus, things that are from 4x01 are as follows:

Any scene with Claudia and Viren in the cave

Ezran’s council meeting

Janai and Amaya looking at each other happily

The failed birthday party

Callum out on the balcony

Then we move into what I’ll call 4x02 territory: 

Phyrrah (red dragon from s2 and s3) as well as Zubeia arriving in Katolis for Ezran’s meeting.

Which doesn’t go especially well, as Ezran makes this speech in the Valley of Graves, likely because 1) it’s big enough to house Zubeia, who’s there, and 2) because it was on her orders that Harrow died, and Ezran is trying to bridge that gap / hurt (since the gift he had made for Zubeia, maybe even by Callum, has seemingly been vandalized) and it’s sunset. This probably isn’t the very next day since it would take time even for a dragon to fly, so it could be up to a week later post-4x01, say.

Also in the early days we see Terry seemingly having braided Claudia’s hair, which she has for the majority of the rest of the trailer / season, even if they seem to be somewhere more metal than Storm Spire-y. I’m guessing they start out in Drakewood and then work their way across.

Also likely in 4x02 is the scene with Amaya with the Sunfire elves, including Janai and her future brother-in-law, Prince Karim.

A human is about to be punished, possibly due to stealing a Sunfire artefact (hence bandages wrapped around burned hands) with Janai supposed to dole out traditional Sunfire punishment. I think given the shot misdirect and Amaya’s worry, Janai will choose to free and spare the human, prompting her brother’s ire and kicking off their political plotline for S4.

On that note, the lack of crowd in the shot below while still having spectators make me think that perhaps Karim has challenged Janai to a one-on-one combat duel for the throne and ‘fate’ of their people. In the far left we see who appears to be Miyana under the mask, part of the Six Horns, who was revealed at SDCC 2021.

Then, post-4x02 we have what seems to be what I’m going to call the Ibis Time Thread, as it / his staff / Callum having his staff is one of the clearest through lines the trailer has. We see him and Claudia squaring off in what seems to be the Storm Spire, as it was the last place Viren’s staff was and that seems to be what they’re fighting over, and Claudia’s hair is braided back.

Then we see Claudia and Ibis having a second encounter in a different space. It may be another part of the same area (just without the gold coins) as a continuation of the first fight, or another encounter entirely. It seems Aaravos has had her wait until now to retrieve her father’s staff, given that her hair is braided and half white in both shots.

This means that Claudia needs Viren’s staff, likely as a component for Aaravos to get out of his mirror. If one of Aaravos’ former gifts / relics can be an important component in freeing him, it seems that can be doubly so for the Cube as the Key of Aaravos. (We’ll circle more back to Aaravos’ bits later.)

Sometime after the fight with Claudia, we see the kids holding what’s clearly a funeral for Ibis, with Callum conducting one of the spells and holding Ibis’ staff.

However, arguably the most important piece of information here (to me) is that Rayla is with the three boys in this shot, and with her little pet creature, Stella, on her shoulder. This means from this point on in the season (likely mid-S4) Rayla has not only reunited with the boys but possibly travelled with them from Katolis to the Storm Spire again.

Here we see Zym at what appears to be the Great Gates (possibly to Rex Igenous’ chambers, the Earth dragon at the very end of the trailer) and in Ez and Zym’s poster, so it seems that while the group is there, it’s mostly centred on the young king and his platonic soulmate.

Possibly in their path to get to Rex Igneous, we see Callum use his scarf to douse the light (maybe light attracts the creatures) which is easier said than done when Bait is a glow toad, and this kicks off the battle there with Callum using lightning to protect his little friend.

We also know that Rayla is with the boys and what appears to be a smaller Earthblood child here, since we can see the three fold of her tunic as well as her hip-thigh pouch that holds Stella as Zym flies up to seemingly call a bit of a lightning storm to protect his friends.

Soren, however, is most notably absent (maybe stuck in another area, like the one with the rocks in his solo shot?). Rayla also has both her blades!

Zubeia getting pissed on her baby’s behalf and when we see those creatures earlier, Callum has Ibis’ staff with him and Ezran. This means either they’re not friendly at first and Zubeia steps in / destroys them, or that she gets them to settle down and the boys manage to have a conversation. Again, we know presumably as soon as Callum gets his staff, any scene where he has that is also one that Rayla will be in (just about). 

Then of course, we have Rayla showing in Katolis with Stella in tow, who quickly grabs the cube and has an affinity with the Star arcanum (given that her name literally means “star,” too) in a perfect parallel of when she and Callum first met. That more than anything makes me think this is real rather than an illusion, but I wonder what’s made Rayla feel safe enough to come back - what proof has she found of Viren’s death after all this time, after all?

Then we have a shot of her outrunning some kind of drake-riding Earthblood elf and with her pouch, but it’s void of Stella. She seems to be purposefully baiting him and trying to create some kind of diversion.

Some very keen eyed people have pointed out that she’ll likely fall after this clip, as one of her hands (her one that used to have the binding, I think) slipped and missed slightly, meaning she’ll dangle and then hoist herself up.

It also makes me wonder, what, exactly, Rayla has found to convince her to come back to Katolis. She’d need irrefutable proof Viren was dead and she could’ve found the empty chrysalis, but she probably would’ve assumed as a result that Viren had simply chosen to leave it. So I’ll be curious as how that gets explained and addressed.

I also think that because she’s seemingly 1) fine and 2) returning of her own accord for their first reunion at least, Callum will be pretty furious with her because he’ll have room to be furious at her. Whether that’ll be in their first scene together or a bit later remains to be seen. 

Finally I want to address the few remaining trailer shots / scenes I haven’t so far, namely: 

An eye i think might belong to Rex Igneous and a wider shot of his hoard that matches where we see Ibis and Claudia initially fighting. It’s also hard to tell in the shot below but it almost looks like maybe it isn’t the trio and/or the two groups are together, with Ezran almost standing by Viren (as he’s the main figure we’ve seen clothed distinctly in all white) even if it’s a bit too blurry to tell entirely.

There are also the shots of Aaravos blowing a kiss at the camera, the aforementioned Callum as a pawn with the cube shot, the shot of Aaravos being displeased, and Callum cradling Rayla’s blades. I wondered if, after the Viren as a pawn clip, if the person as a pawn might change in every episode’s intro in S4. Now I wonder if we’ll get three mini arcs: the first with Viren as the pawn, and then the second and third arcs with Claudia and Callum as the pawn in some kind of order (like the key art, since “everything is going according to plan” for Aaravos). I could also see it changing every episode and then having the final episode intro being Aaravos blowing the kiss with the mirror shattering while he sits calmly (we’ve never seen him sit before) as it felt very winkwink nudgenudge to the audience. 

We know that whatever vexes Aaravos cannot be permanent, since he gets out of the mirror this season 100%. I’m also curious, if Callum and Rayla reunite fairly early on, what Callum is doing dark magic for. I still think he’ll have to build a connection with Aaravos before she comes back, but maybe not, even if the light-dark symbolism we’re getting supports it: Callum is angry, alone, and enshrouded with darkness, whereas Rayla’s head is haloed by the moon, giving her more positive light connotations (the way the show always has).

I do think though that the near the end of the season, perhaps while trying to stop Aaravos or something else with Ezran, Rayla will be forcefully dragged away from her blades, and Cube Hostage Exchange Theory (Callum exchanging the cube to Aaravos for her life) could happen, as it was always an “end of the season / final arc” specific prediction over the season as a whole.

Unless Rayla is an illusion carried by Aaravos through little Stella for the season long term, only to reveal the real Rayla all along has been having a truly terrible time (maybe Callum thinking something with Rayla is wrong, the others write him off as letting his hurt feelings cloud his judgement)... there still has to be a Narrative reason for Rayla’s absence to be relevant. I don’t think she would’ve come back if there was a significant problem (she wants to keep Callum safe from dying for her) and we know they are separated again with their aged up designs...

Something circa, “I just got her back, I am not losing her again” before he hands it over, per se. 

And I think that’s everything, but I’m sure I’ll update / add even more thoughts as I go along, with only a little over three weeks before s4 airs! Aaah

#tdp #the dragon prince #tdp spoilers #predictions #the sunfire royal family #rayllum #devil and the lovers #morally ambiguous fam #aaravos #little bit of everything #brotp: the once and future kings #long post #analysis series #analysis #s4 #arc 2 #s4 spoilers #less than a month away what the Fuck #also maybe lil butterfly aaravos catching viren after he falls like a tired sleepy boi but yeah #ezran's council table looking like a keyhole is just there to taunt me

[tenspontaneite]

Beyond the Moon Gardens - Extracts (1)

For lack of anything else to post today, I’m releasing some extracts from one of my non-public fanfictions – Beyond the Moon Gardens – as my participation in the @raayllum valentine’s event.

Information on and context of the story itself is below the cut. The 10k of snippets are also below the cut.

(General overview of the content of the snippets: established rayllum, fluff, domesticity, horn care, silliness, cuddling.)

-

Story information:

‘Beyond the Moon Gardens’ is a successor to ‘In the Moon Gardens’. The former was written in a month in late 2020, and has been worked on sporadically since. The latter was written in approximately three weeks between December 2019 and January 2020. Both are currently incomplete. I do not intend to publish either to the public in full, but may well post further extracts in time.

‘In the Moon Gardens’ is a story about Callum and Rayla getting married; however, the circumstances are deeply unpleasant and the experience is traumatic. ‘Beyond the Moon Gardens’ is considerably longer, and is focused on trauma recovery, hurt/comfort, relationship development, and fluff. The story is structured around a plotline involving rescue and disaster relief efforts in a Sunfire elf city called Lux Marea.

All snippets presented below take place on day 7 of the story’s timeline. They have been carefully curated for fluffiness for the purposes of Valentine’s day, and do not contain any of the hurt/comfort or post-traumatic scenes prevalent in the story at large. Some extracts have been edited to slot together and minimise empty space.

I may potentially post further snippets throughout the week if people are interested.

-

The extracts:

(Snippet 1: domesticity, fluff, city descriptions. Context: Callum and Rayla are staying in fancy diplomatic quarters in the city, where they arrived somewhat earlier in the day.)

Rayla turned away from her reflection and went for the door.

She glanced around, and found Callum in his own robe sat at the sofa in front of the window. Surprisingly, he wasn’t drawing. He was just staring out across the city, looking pensive.

“Not drawing?” She asked, and he startled, looking up at her in surprise.

He blinked. “Oh. I didn’t hear you.” He said sheepishly as she approached.

She snorted, and moved around the sofa’s edge to plant herself down beside him. “So I noticed.”

Callum smiled at her, looking for all the world like the best thing that had happened to him today was her sitting down next to him, eyes settling on her like he’d be perfectly happy to do nothing but look at her forever. She withstood that expression for only a single second before she had to lean in and kiss him. He made a pleased sound, reaching out to rest a hand on her back, fingers stroking reflexively over the thick wool of the robe. “You smell nice.” He said happily, turning his face sideways to tuck his nose behind her ear. He was undoubtedly getting a face full of wet hair that way, but he didn’t seem to mind. “Fruity, sort of.”

“They’ve got a lot of soaps in there.” She said, and her voice came out more soft than amused. Stars, but she loved him. “It’s nice. There’s all these soaps, and towels, and I think bath oils too.”

“You think?” He inquired, curious, still with his face in her neck. He pressed a kiss to her damp skin.

“Didn’t check them out properly or anything, but there was a drawer full of some fancy stuff. Bottles and the like. Looked like it might be bath oils.”

With a final kiss to the edge of her jaw, he pulled back to resume staring at her contentedly. “We’ll have to have a look later.” He said, and paused to give her an appreciative once-over. “That dressing gown looks nice on you.”

She rolled her eyes. “You say that about literally everything I wear.”

“That’s because you look good in everything.” He claimed staunchly, and honestly, he wasn’t looking half-bad in his dressing-gown either. The colour was familiar on him, but the casual comfortableness of it was weirdly pleasing to look at. Made him look cosy and cuddlable.

Rayla shook her head, then leaned in to kiss briefly along his jaw. It prickled a little. “You might want to see if they’ve got razors in there.” She said dryly. “You’re starting to prickle.”

He blinked, startled, and raised a hand to his jaw, feeling along it. Mercifully, he grew facial hair extremely slowly, making it less of an issue on the move, but it did still grow. He’d last made an attempt at shaving some two weeks ago, and that had sufficed up to now. “Elves don’t grow beards, though.” He said, after a moment. “I’d probably better just stick with mine.”

Once or twice, they’d made an attempt at shaving his bristles with Rayla’s swords, which had been kind of nerve-wracking, and plenty memorable. For lack of proper razors to be found in Xadia, they’d eventually ended up getting him a small knife that he claimed was alike enough to a ‘straight razor’ to work, though it periodically needed to be sharpened to an absurd degree. It was all very strange to her, even after a good half year of living with him. “Maybe.” She agreed at last, and gave him a sniff. Fresh from bathing, his state of uncleanliness was far more obvious to her nose than it had been before. “You should be getting washed up first though. You’ll make your dressing gown stink.”

He snickered. “Bet I reek to you now that you’re clean.”

“Just a tad.” She prodded him in the side until he started moving. “Off with you. Wash up.”

Evading her hands, he leaned in and planted a final kiss on her forehead before leaving, disappearing into the bathroom while she shook her head at him. She heard the water start up quite soon after, and eventually ended up staring out of the window like he had.

The city was still bright, both with sunlight and with the ongoing glory of the temple’s radiance. Settling into a sort of quiet lassitude, she watched it with eyes half-lidded, following the patterns of steaming light as though the smoke from a fire.

It was a striking city. Unlike Lux Aurea, which was so much gold it hurt to look at, Lux Marea was a thing of contrasts. The buildings were all built from the same dark stone as the bathroom had been done in, a grey that cast deep black shadows behind the gaze of the sun. And yet – every building was lined with gold. Accents on the corners, or moulding between the bricks, or running in thick channels up the walls…it gleamed, rich and distinct against the stone. Some of the largest, richest buildings had elaborate golden murals on their sides, luridly metallic and shining in the sun. All of that gold was glowing with magic now.

Rayla wasn’t much for aesthetics. But even she could appreciate the beauty in that view. She watched it for a while longer, lulled a little by the twisting patterns of glowing haze rising from the buildings, then stood and went to find something to do.

 -

 (Snippet 2: Calum and Rayla investigate the supplies their fancy bathroom is stocked with, discover bath bombs and are confused, Rayla points out various horn-care items, and Callum makes her very flustered by offering to use said items)

  After that, they went through and classified each of the mysterious drawer goodies a little faster. They found more varieties of lotion, some weird nearly liquid soaps, and a pot of some mysterious mini chalky spheres whose purpose neither of them managed to guess until Callum’s hair dripped on one and it sizzled. “Is it supposed to go in water?” Rayla wondered, befuddled.

“No idea. Try it.” He suggested, and they took the rinsing pot, filled it with water, and dropped the thing in. It fizzed and foamed magnificently, releasing pleasant odours and bits of dried flower as it dissolved, and both of them stared at it with fascinated consternation.

“Is that for baths?” She asked him, befuddled. “What’s the point?”

“…Fun, maybe?” He offered, reaching out to swirl a finger in the foam. “It looked pretty cool, after all. Maybe you’re supposed to throw them in the bath for the fun of it?”

“Fun foam and nice smells?” With a huff, she put that pot aside as something to maybe experiment with if she felt like it. “Well, maybe.” She snorted, and in the last unexplored corner, found something highly important. “Oh thank god.” She said, in that way she’d absolutely picked up from Callum, and he looked over with interest.

“What did you find?”

She brandished it triumphantly. “Toothbrushes.”

“Oh thank god.” He echoed instantly, peering over. “My teeth feel disgusting.”

“You’re not the only one.” She withdrew both toothbrushes from the drawer and set them aside. “Well, at least we know what everything in there is now. Mystery solved.” She went to close it, but was stopped with a hand on her wrist.

“Wait, but what about those?” he asked, indicating the small collection of things she’d already set to one side of the drawer with the horn-scrub.

“Oh.” She’d forgotten he wouldn’t know those on sight. “Right. Well, this thing here-“ She plucked up a narrow, vaguely curved implement with a soft-smooth coating. “-is a horn buffer. For making horns smoother once you’ve already scrubbed all the rough bits out with a proper scrub.” She planted it in his hands, since he seemed fascinated by it, and withdrew a sort of soft spongey thing with a texture like felt. “Horn polisher. Same thing, kind of.” He took that as well, and she pulled out a pot of thick paste that turned out to be exactly what she thought it was when she uncapped it. This one had obviously attempted to smell as pleasant as possible, but it still had a very strong and distinctive edge to it. She wrinkled her nose. “Horn polish.” She said, closing it up again. “To be applied and used with the polisher. And lastly-“ She picked up one of the remaining bottles, “horn oil.”

He looked weirdly interested. “What’s the oil for?” He asked, leaning in. “I mean, I guess the rest of it’s to make your horns smooth and shiny, right? So what about this?”

“It’s kind of fancy and unnecessary, and expensive, so not everyone uses it, but usually you put it on after scrubbing or polishing.” She explained, withdrawing the bottles one at a time. “They smell nice, which is good after the polish, and letting it sink into the horns is supposed to make them healthier and glossier-looking. You can technically put it on multiple times a day if you’re really into your horn presentation, but pretty much no one bothers.”

“Because it’s expensive?” Callum guessed, and she made a so-so noise.

“Well, there’s that.” She said dryly. “But it’s just kind of a lot of hassle, you know? If you’re already washing and doing your hair and keeping your horns not-gross, it’s just extra fuss you don’t really need.” She shook her head. “It’s less effort than full on polishing, I suppose, but I’ve never been bothered about polishing my horns except on special occasions anyway. It’s a lot of work.”

“Huh.” He said, in a sort of weird tone of voice. Rayla turned to him, and found his expression similarly strange. Thoughtful, interested, and a little bit furtive.

She eyed him suspiciously, picked up an armful of the supplies they’d set aside, and stood up with them. “What’s that look for?” She asked archly, setting things onto the broad side of the bath. He followed her lead, picking up the rest of it and standing, looking a little shifty.

“What’s what look for?” he asked innocently, putting it all out in neat rows.

“I know that face.” She told him, unimpressed. “I’ve told you so many times I know that face. That’s your dumb idea face. So out with it.”

For a moment, Callum looked sheepish. Then he cleared his throat, and looked at her, and she reflexively fell silent. “I…was wondering if you’d let me do your horns.” He said at last, and she made a strangled noise in the back of her throat.

“What?”

  -

 (Snippet 3: tail end of the horn-care discussion, domesticity, Rayla bemused by the concept of room service, Callum pestering Rayla for details on how horn care works, and discussion of one of Rayla’s newer hobbies)

 “That’ll be nice, then.” He said, sounding very at peace with the idea. “I can wash and comb out your hair, maybe. Give you some hornrubs.”

Her cheeks heated. “Callum.” She complained. “That’s so sappy.”

He pressed his face close alongside hers, and she could feel his smile against her cheek. “Treat you real good.” He said, very contentedly. “I’m gonna spoil you rotten.”

Rayla managed a strangled, deeply embarrassed sound in the back of her throat. A little indignant, she protested “You can’t just say things like that.”

“I can, and I did.” Callum grinned against her skin, and leaned in further to kiss her near the corner of her lips. “Love you.” He lifted a hand from around her waist, fingers settling at her jaw with a gentle suggestion of movement. Feeling near to bursting with mortification and adoration, she grumbled wordlessly but followed his hand, allowing him to lead her face around so he could kiss her on the mouth.

“You,” she muttered, into his lips, “need to get dressed.”

He paused, then huffed a surprised breath over her skin. “That’s right, I’m still just wearing a towel.” He remembered, ruefully. “At least I’m drier now.”

“It’s been ages, of course you’re drier.” Rayla shook her head at him, then nudged at his arms until he let her go, extricating herself from his embrace. She had difficulty looking him in the eye when she turned, after all of that. “…Get dressed.” She repeated, softer, and shoved the dressing gown he’d hung nearby into his arms. She leaned in, kissed him once on the lips, and then turned away to leave the bathroom.

She settled on the sofa, ensconcing herself beneath the soft blanket she’d found, and stared out at the city while her heart recovered. Sometimes, she loved Callum enough that it was a little hard to cope with, like she was afraid that the emotion in her would rupture if it built too far. He was used to her retreating a little at times like that, just long enough to breathe and feel slightly less overwhelmed.

He took long enough in the bathroom that, eventually, she guessed that he was shaving. That disappointed her, a little. She liked to watch him when he shaved. It was always so strange to her, something quintessentially human; a bizarre banal grooming ritual that reminded her again and again that he wasn’t an elf, he really was a whole different kind of being to her, and his humanity was made of so many little things. He never failed to chuckle at her for how she watched him shaving, but had grown very used to her keeping him company for it.

She sighed, and looked out on the city under the sun, and regained her emotional footing. By the time he emerged, clad once again in the dark red dressing gown, she had her equilibrium back and looked up gladly at his return.

“Where’d this blanket come from?” He asked, bemused, coming over to join her. She held one end up so he could sit down under it with her.

“One of the drawers. There’s a bunch of stuff in here.” She informed, and once he was seated she didn’t waste any time in reaching out to run her fingers along his still-damp jaw. It was so smooth. She murmured, pleased, cupping his face between both hands.

He coloured a little, looking across at her with soft eyes. “You’re so weird.” He told her, sounding utterly besotted, and she leaned in to kiss him lightly along that jawline.

“Love you.” Rayla said contentedly, and drew back just enough to nestle firmly against his side. He wove an arm around her back and turned his head to kiss her at the brow.

“Love you too.”

After a good bit of cuddling and watching the city together, Callum admitted to wanting a drink and Rayla to not knowing whether their waterskins were still filled. They were, as it happened, but-

“You know, if you wanted fresher water, or moonberry juice, we could just ask for it.” He pointed out. “All we’d have to do is open the door and ring a bell and someone would come up, and we’d ask for a drink, and they’d have it up for us just like that.”

She shook her head, utterly exasperated at the idea. “That’s so weird.” She said, and then actually considered it. “…Let’s do it.”

He laughed, and obligingly got up and went to the receiving room to fetch the bell. He mostly-closed the intervening door for her sake, so that when a servant responded to the ring she didn’t feel particularly on edge about it. They couldn’t see her. It was fine.

After a short conversation with the servant, they were off, and Callum shut the outer door before returning. “Five minutes.” He said, and true to his words, there was a knock at the door not too much later. He went to answer it and brought back an actual platter, balancing an entire jug of moonberry juice, an entire jug of water, and two glasses.

“Did you ask for a whole jug?” She asked, disbelievingly, as he set it down on the low table ahead of the sofa. “Or the water?”

“Nope. Actually, they passed along their apologies for not leaving a jug of water in here in the first place. Apparently that’s their usual thing to do, but since they were hurrying for us it got forgot.” He poured her a glass of juice, and then some for himself, and sat back.

She snorted. “What a terrible standard of service.” She said, mockingly. “I mean really, forgetting to leave us wee little glasses and chilled water, what is this place coming to?”

He snickered at an inopportune moment, very nearly making a mess with the glass he’d been in the process of drinking from. “Don’t say that around Vervain, I think she’d actually explode.”

“Right there on the spot.” Rayla agreed. “It’d make a terrible mess.”

They traded a few light-hearted quips on the subject of the accommodations while they had a drink, then they set it all aside for later. Callum, who was clearly angling for it, managed to get her onto the topic of how exactly a proper horn care-and-polish was supposed to go, and she spent pretty much the entirety of that torn between being increasingly embarrassed and increasingly amused. He was so interested, like she was sharing arcane magical knowledge instead of stupid basic grooming tips.

“I mean, I’ve seen you using your horn-scrub on the road sometimes, to file away rough or flaky bits, right?” He was saying, while she leaned over to lay against his chest. He reflexively put an arm around her even while gesturing with the other one. “You kind of go…with the sort of curvy lines in your horns? Like one at a time?”

“They’re called ridges, Callum.” She informed him, incredibly amused. “And yes. You need to file along them all one by one, and be careful to keep the shape too. If you do it badly you’ll flatten out the tops of the ridges and it looks really stupid.”

He stared down at her horns with fascination, and lowered his gesturing hand to trace the shape of – she presumed – one of her horn-ridges in detail. She made a flustered sort of murmur at him, but he seemed too busy to notice. “Right, so, hm.” He almost seemed to be speaking to himself. “Yeah, if you just file it from the top it’d all flatten out. So you have to sort of work around each one? Following the curve?”

“That’s why Moonshadow horn-scrubs are so much more complicated.” She informed him. “We need the wee fiddly parts to get between all the ridges and file it right without losing the shapes. Takes forever. Our horns are more of a pain than almost any other kind of elf’s.” She grinned up at him. “Unlucky for you.”

“Are you kidding?” He asked, incredulously. “This is great. Means I get so much longer to spend on you. You never let me spoil you enough.”

She processed that, and groaned, burrowing her face into the wool gown over his chest. “You’ll change your tune soon enough.” She muttered, but wasn’t entirely convinced. Callum really was an incredible sap when it came to doing things for her. “It takes so stupidly long.”

“I’m counting on it.” He declared happily, and she huffed.

“You’re ridiculous.” She informed him, and after nearly ten more minutes of him trying to wrangle intricately detailed horn-polishing knowledge out of her, just rolled her eyes and said with exasperation “It’s like polishing armour, Callum. Or boots. You just buff it up, then go at it with polish on the polisher for ages. There’s not much of a trick to it.” She paused, but did add “Gets kind of messy though. The filing stage puts horn dust and bits everywhere, and once you start polishing you get like…murky polish liquid all over your hands. Better put a towel down.”

Eventually, after enough sitting around that the cuddling alone wasn’t engrossing enough anymore, Callum did go and get his sketchbook and immediately sat down to begin producing what Rayla was certain would be the first of many, many drawings of the city. He drew it as seen from above first, and Rayla settled in to watch with half-lidded eyes.

She’d grown very used to spending time watching Callum draw. In large part, this was because he tended to spend a lot of his free time doing it, and she was often around when that happened. It was quite satisfying, to sit there and observe as the shapes on the page took form. But even so…

There was only so much of watching him draw that she could do before she started getting bored. Throughout their journeying, it had rarely got to that point. What with the time constraints of camp-craft and travelling, there’d been little enough spare time that Rayla hadn’t felt compelled to find anything else to do. Now, though, she found with surprise that her fingers were itching for her knives.

“Huh.” She said to herself, with interest, and Callum turned his head to peer at her.

“Hm?”

“My knives.” She said, and then realised this wasn’t especially helpful. “My carving knives. Just realised I’m hankering for them a bit. That’s never really happened before.”

“Oh.” He thought, then looked pleased. “Looks like you’re starting to make a habit of it after all. That’s really nice.”

“Less nice when I don’t actually have the knives.” She snorted, and considered her empty hands.

Rayla, on the whole, tended towards active ways of passing the time. She liked to train, and she liked to exercise, and if Callum was free she always liked to go flying with him. But inevitably, after half a year spent together, there had been plenty of afternoons and evenings in their off-time when she was too tired to go out for training, or Callum was spending time drawing and she wanted to be around him, and she ended up with nothing to do.

He’d been the one to gently pester her into taking up some sort of hobby. At first she’d just grumpily sharpened her weapons over and over again, but with enough work he’d got her to try other things. He’d suggested either knitting or whittling, on the basis that both involved the use of stabby implements, and she was a fan of those. Knitting she hadn’t taken to. But whittling…

At first, she’d just done it because he’d prodded her into it, and she didn’t hate it, and there was nothing better to do, so she might as well. But now, considering her empty hands with consternation, Rayla realised for the first time that she actually kind of wanted to be doing it. When had that happened?

He leaned over and pressed a kiss to her cheek. “Pick up some things in the city tomorrow, maybe.” He suggested, and turned back to his drawing.

“Bit of a waste, when I’ve got a plenty good enough set of knives at home.”

“You don’t need to get a full set. But it could be nice to have a couple of the main ones around, for travelling with.” He shrugged. “You can practice on any random bits of wood, right? So it’s mainly the knives you need.”

She snorted. She’d learned enough to know that the type of wood one chose was, in fact, very important. But…yeah, for messing around like she did, random wood was usually fine. If splintery. “Maybe.” She said in the end, already thinking of the knife she used most. “It’s not a bad idea. Clothes and supplies are the priority, though. So maybe if there’s anything left after that.”

“We’ll need cold-weather gear, if we’re going through the Shiverthorns in winter.” He remarked, and huddled into the blanket like the mere thought was making him cold. “Thick cloaks and stuff.”

“Which are expensive.” She reminded. “And also heavy. It’ll slow you down.”

He shrugged. “I figure that’s okay. We won’t be in a huge hurry to get back, after all.”

  -

 (Snippet 4: Callum and Rayla discuss dinner options, watch the sunset, and investigate the light fixtures. Context: in this story, I worldbuild Sunfire elves as some weird blend of French and Roman.)

  He hummed by way of agreement, and pulled her tighter in to his side. “For now, let’s try not to worry about that.” He said, determinedly. “Today our job is to relax and rest up, and that’s it.”

Rayla sighed, and shifted around to lay part-way across his front, face half into the red wool at his chest. “I can probably do that.”

They cuddled for what actually didn’t end up being that long, because there was a knock at the door. It echoed sharply through the polished wood, even with the intervening door closed. Rayla, who’d heard no footsteps of any kind due to the ostensible soundproofing, stiffened immediately.

Callum blinked, then carefully extricated himself from her. “I’ll go get it.” He said, and she didn’t object. She didn’t relish the thought of being seen by strangers when she was in her bathrobe. That was private.

He unlocked and opened the receiving room door, closed it behind him, and then unlocked and opened the outer door. There was actually a decent degree of sound loss between there and Rayla’s current spot, so she couldn’t hear what was being said beyond stray words. After a while, Callum said something in a distinctly goodbye-ish sort of voice and the encounter ended. He considerately locked both doors for her on his way in.

Over his arm, he was holding a neat stack of clothing and armour. “Already?” She asked, startled, and watched as he set it all down on the bed.

“Already.” He agreed, seemingly pleased. “I guess their drying spells really are useful. Look, they’ve cleaned your armour. And our boots.”

Rayla lifted herself from beneath the blanket to go over and look. All of their things looked fresh and new, bereft of the dull beige hues imbued by travel and sleeping in dust and dirt. It half looked like they’d re-dyed some of it, honestly, to get the clean colours back. She lifted Callum’s scarf from the pile, sniffed it, and hummed at it.

“Laundry smell?” He asked, amused, and she shrugged.

“Unsurprisingly.” She considered putting it on him, but in the end decided she was enjoying the look of him in the bathrobe, all cosy and comfy-looking. “What else were you talking about?”

“Hm?”

“With the servant.”

“Oh.” He paused to collect his thoughts. “Dinner stuff. He wanted to tell me the options they’ve got, so we can order ahead of time.”

Rayla made a thoughtful noise, and drew him by the wrist back over to the sofa again. “And?”

“You want me to list it all off?” She nodded, and obligingly he went off listing the various items on the menu, many of which were evidently examples of bizarre Sunfire ideas about cooking. Snails, really? Frog legs? Her nose wrinkled at that one, and Callum’s lips quirked. “They serve glow toad too.” He admitted ruefully. “I mean, I guess I heard they were delicious, but it’s one thing to hear it and another thing to have it on the menu, you know?”

She made a face. “Ez would never forgive us.”

“Bait would never forgive us.” He agreed, snickering.

“And besides – ew.” Rayla shook her head, and waved her hand. “What else?”

He went through all of the selections, drinks and desserts included, and then finished up by saying “He left a sort of booklet thing behind with it all written down, if you want to look over it.”

She stared at him with exasperation. “Callum. You really just stood there and said it all when you could have just handed me the bloody menu?”

“Well, you did ask.” He said, like this was reasonable, and she sighed fondly at him.

“You dumb prince.” She told him, affectionate, and leaned in to kiss him on the cheek before going to look for the menu.

By this point, it was around four in the afternoon, and the sun seemed to be making a very definite bid for descent. She retrieved the Booklet of Food Options and retreated to the sofa with it, where Callum had already planted himself to watch the city. There was a hint of yellow-green in the bright clear sky, and the angle of light from the sinking sun was casting some particularly dramatic shadows. The temple was still gleaming with light off to the side, and the golden circuitry through the city still exhaling. She stared at it for a moment, certain that tonight’s sunset really was going to be spectacular, and then opened the menu to start looking.

It had been long enough since lunch that the sight of so many food options was plenty enough to make her start considering the idea of an early dinner. In an hour or two, maybe. Some of it was too weird or too exotic to consider, but there was a lot that wasn’t.

She passed the booklet over when she was done making selections, but Callum seemed too occupied with the burgeoning sunset to want to look at it. She snorted, leaned in to kiss him on the cheek, and then leaned comfortably into his side to watch the city.

The sun fell over a period of around half an hour, sinking lower and lower, until the sky filled with such intense yellows and deep reds that it seemed almost to have caught fire. The grey slate of the city turned bloody red in the light, every golden trace lit up and shining in the growing dark. The few wispy clouds left in the sky were shining too, until the sun began to pass beneath the lip of the sea on the horizon, and the blue-green edges of the dusk glittered with stars.

“That,” He said, very softly, when dusk was ebbing into twilight, “was a really incredible view.”

Rayla had little artistry in her heart, but she’d appreciated that sunset. She knew that by contrast it must have touched Callum deeply. She looked at him, taking in his expression, finding it every bit as amazed and awed and happy as she could have hoped for. Her heart fluttered, happy for that he was happy, and in the warmth of that contentment she reached over to cup his cheek with her hand.

He looked at her, leaning into the hand, and offered her a small and very soft smile. Her thumb smoothed over his cheek as he lifted his hand to settle atop hers. Wordless, she leaned in to kiss him, warm and brief, and lingered there close by his face for a long while after their lips parted. He sighed very quietly, entirely happy and entirely at ease. It was peaceful in a way she’d dearly missed.

Feeling utterly suffused with warmth, Rayla nestled in beside him, fingers hooking lightly in the soft red wool of his robe. His arm came around her, and both of them sighed, and both of them settled, and it was quiet.

Neither of them felt the inclination to move or speak for quite a while. The sky was dark and full of stars by the time she shifted, and the city’s golden circuitry shining boldly through the shadow. The Moon, ascendant in the sky, was very nearly full.

“Might not be so bad after all, staying here a while.” She said, finally, and pressed her lips to his neck. “Comfy, nice bathroom, nice views…and the food options look kind of incredible, honestly.”

He chuckled, soft and fond. “Bit of a weird honeymoon.” He murmured into her hair. “But I’ll take it.”

She huffed. “Honeymoon.” She repeated, shaking her head.

Well. She supposed if they’d had to go through that whole forced marriage ordeal, they did at least deserve to get a nice holiday out of it. Even if most of that holiday was going to be spent working, the not-working parts of the day looked to be a lot fancier and more luxurious than they were back home.

“Yeah, I guess so.” Was her conclusion, in the end. “Did you decide what you’ll be eating?”

“Pretty much.” He kissed her brow. “You ready to order? It’s still kind of early.”

“Eh. It’ll do.” She shrugged, and listed off her selections. He kissed her again, then gently untangled himself from her limbs to go off and summon a servant.

The room had gone darker while the sun set, and the soft yellow glow of the fireless light fixtures along the walls had grown more prominent. Now a little curious, Rayla took the opportunity to investigate one, and on closer inspection found it to be some sort of…weird bioluminescent plant. Or maybe animal? It had long rigid tube-like structures that had plainly been cultivated into ornamental shapes, that looked almost like some sort of stone, though it had obviously been painted or dyed the usual deep red. It exuded a number of softly glowing yellow-orange tendrils from the openings at the end of the tubes, short and blunt but weirdly pretty.

She reached out cautiously to touch one, and at once the tendrils retracted inside the tube, the light dimming. Startled, she drew back to watch it, but the tendrils didn’t start to tentatively reappear again for another minute, during which she heard the light murmurs of Callum conversing with whatever servant he’d summoned.

When Moonshadow elves wanted light after dark, they just used enchantments, or glowstone, like normal people. Fancy Sunfire elves, however, apparently favoured plants. Or animals. She honestly wasn’t sure which this one was. Some sort of land-coral?

“I ordered the food.” Callum said, when he returned. “They said it’ll be about half an hour. And they’ll bring it all up at the same time so we don’t get disturbed twice.”

“Perfect.” She pronounced, with satisfaction, and then dragged him over to meet the light fixtures. Predictably, he spent a good ten fascinated minutes investigating the weird glowing polyps, and then a while longer sketching one out, and was half-way through that when the food arrived.

 -

(Snippet 5: after dinner, Callum and Rayla engage in some silliness, then cuddle. Domesticity.)

 “I’m so full I’m not going to move for a week.” Rayla announced, after staggering her way back through to their sofa, followed by an amused Callum. “It’s going to take at least that long to digest all of that.”

“That might make it tricky to get supplies.” He said, pretend-thoughtful. “But I’m sure we can work something out.”

She snorted, patted him on the shoulder, and then promptly pulled him into her side when he started looking at her in the imminent-cuddles sort of way. He hummed contentedly, turning his face into her shoulder, breath warming the wool over her collarbone.

“This bathrobe is so comfy.” He said happily, words muffled by wool. “It’s so nice.”

Having had very similar sentiments about his bathrobe earlier, she quite agreed. “Shame they didn’t include wool pyjamas, really.”

He didn’t offer any response for that, just snuggled, putting an arm around her waist. It was almost a little uncomfortable, really, what with how full she was, but she didn’t protest. She just held him close, smoothed her free hand over his hair, and looked out over the city. In the dark, watching the vaporous light rise felt very much like watching fire. It was very entrancing.

Some time later, Callum started to show signs of beginning to fall asleep on her. She looked down at him, snorted, and then nudged him until he stirred. “If you fall asleep now you’ll be up too late.” She informed him as he made plaintive noises at her. “I’m not having you exhausted and useless for your magic channelling nonsense tomorrow.”

“But you’re too comfy.” He complained, and she smirked.

“That sounds like an invitation to be less comfy.”

He opened an eye to peer at her suspiciously. “What do you mean, ‘that sounds’ – hrk!” His words cut off as, unceremoniously, she swept him up with an arm under his back and another under his knees, on her feet with a quick shift of her weight and his. She grinned down at him, finding him instantly and distinctly awake. “….Honestly this is still pretty comfy.” He said, weakly, when he’d spent enough time staring wide-eyed at her to recover his words.

Rayla pretended at thoughtfulness. “That sounds like a challenge.” She said, and he looked alarmed.

“It wasn’t! It wasn’t!” He protested, to no avail; she stepped around the sofa, judged her angle, and tossed Callum at the bed.

He wasn’t particularly aerodynamic, but her aim had been good enough anyway; he sailed neatly between the posts at the corners and impacted decadent Sunfire quilting with a muffled oof. She was laughing at him outright when he turned, staring at her with a sort of red-faced stupefaction that told her exactly what he thought of the whole experience. “Your face right now,” she managed, doubling over to snicker in his direction. Hilarious.

“You know, there’s a saying,” he began, a little dazed. “About trusting someone as far as you could throw them.” He pushed himself up on his elbows. “You could probably trust someone a lot, is what I’m getting at.”

“…I actually do sort of know how far I could throw you, now that I think about it.” Rayla said, thinking back. “It comes up in assassin training sometimes. Throwing teammates at walls and the like, to give them a leg up. I lobbed someone about your size around six, seven metres once.” She paused, and added “Lengthways, I mean. Throwing someone upwards is a lot harder.”

This did not make him any less wide-eyed. “That’s like, over twenty feet,” he marvelled, looking at her with plain admiration. “You’re amazing.”

She huffed, reflexively bashful at the praise, and shook her head. “Amazing at throwing people, at least.” She said dryly, and went over to stare down at him from the foot of the bed. “How’s the bed?”

“…Very nice, actually.” He said, after a pause for consideration. “You’re pretty bad at making things less comfy.”

“You’re definitely awake now though.” She pointed out smugly. “So my work here is done.”

He snorted, sitting up fully to beckon to her. Obligingly, she bent forwards to meet him with a brief kiss. “Hard not to wake up when someone throws you half-way across the room.”

She rolled her eyes. “It was not that far.” She said, and after a moment made the executive decision to fall forwards onto the bed, face impacting the plush duvet and sinking in. Her feet hung from the edge, and Callum giggled.

“Hehehe toes.” He said, and reached out to poke one. He found her four-toed feet amusingly charming every time he was reminded of them, which would have been funnier, except her feet were pretty ticklish and she twitched every time he prodded like this.

“I will kick you.” She warned, and he subsided with another snicker. Instead of messing with her any further, he shuffled over and started playing with her hair. “Mm. Better.” With a sigh, she closed her eyes and tipped her head forwards, face smooshing deeper into the bed. His fingers carded through her hair, nails trailing lightly at her scalp.

“You didn’t brush it.” He noted, carefully working out a couple of tangles, and she shrugged.

“Couldn’t be bothered. ‘Sides, it only tangles again when we cuddle, anyway.”

He hummed, and went through it again more purposefully, parting it carefully around her horns as he looked for and eliminated a few knots. He brushed around her hornbeds and she shivered. Apparently noticing the reaction, he did it again, more deliberately, chuckling at the way she murmured and pushed her head into his hand. “You look like a shadowpaw when you do that.” He said, affectionately, scritching gently around her horns. “Headbutting people’s hands when they pet you.”

“Anyone else and I’d be cutting off their hands, trust me.” She mumbled at him, already a little indistinct and fuzzy around the edges of her thoughts. Hornbed-scritches did that. “…Suppose the shadowpaw’d do that too. Except they’d bite the hand off instead, if they didn’t like you.”

“What I’m hearing is that if you were an animal you’d probably be a shadowpaw.” He sounded very fond.

“Mm. Guess so.” What would he be? Something doggish, probably. Friendly and playful and loyal, and then all teeth and fierceness when threatened. That sounded about right…

She drifted, a little. It was hard not to, when collapsed onto a comfy surface with one’s hornbeds being rubbed. He stopped after a while though, evidently noticing her drowsiness, and stroked a hand over her head between the horns as he chuckled. “Now who’s falling asleep?” He teased, and she made a half-hearted rude noise at him.

“’s your fault.” She muttered at him, indistinct around the duvet in her face.

“Uhuh.” He sounded amused, and stroked the back of her head again.

 -

(Snippet 6: very detailed depiction of horn care, which in-setting is considered intimate)

 She was suddenly very glad he’d interrogated her so persistently on the procedure earlier, because she wasn’t at all certain she’d have been able to tell him anything more sophisticated than ‘um’ when he was literally about to do her horns for her.

“You’re so cute.” He told her affectionately, obviously very aware of her current emotional state, and then finally set soapy hands onto her horns.

“Oh my god.” She muttered, cheeks flaming, feeling the weight of his hands, the subtle pull at the rest of her skull. She had never been quite so aware of her horns as when he started soaping them up and washing them, and it didn’t take long at all for the warmth of his skin to soak far enough through the keratin so that she could feel it in the living horn. A little while later, he applied the coarse-bristled-brush-side of the horn-scrub to her left horn, and she made a tiny embarrassed sound at the ceiling. “You should scrub them harder than that.” She managed after a moment, since he really was being too gentle about it. “Horns are tough, you know.”

He hummed with interest, and obliged, scrubbing hard enough that it pulled at her head a little. The towel-pillow had been a very good idea of his, really. “How much horn care do you normally do?” He asked, curious, getting the washcloth to rinse her horn before scrubbing again. “I’ve seen you file them, but…”

“…Usually just this. A good scrub to make sure they’re clean, and then filing down the rough bits.” Rayla offered a mortified noise. “But it’s been weeks and I’ve not even done that. They’re probably so dirty…”

“Shush, they’re fine.” He huffed at her, and kept on at her left horn until he was satisfied with it, moving over to the other one. Rayla regarded the ceiling with a persistently red face the whole while, cheeks feeling nearly as warm as the half of her body that was still in bathwater. “I wonder if your face is going to be this red the whole time.” He remarked, when he’d apparently finished with the washing.

“Probably.” She muttered, self-consciously, and felt her gut squirm when she felt the first experimental scrape of the fine filing parts on her horn.

Callum laughed softly, and started setting to work with the file. “If you say so.”

For all that he’d never done this before, the muted sensory feedback Rayla gleaned from her inner-horns and her ears suggested that he seemed to be doing fine with it. He readjusted the file enough that she could be relatively sure he was respecting the curve of the ridges, and worked slowly along the shape of each one, from the hornbed to the pointed tip, over and over again.

As she’d told him, it was a long process. It took a long time. Long enough that, contrary to her words, her embarrassment did start to burn out a bit, the red of her cheeks easing until she only felt a little flushed, a little flustered.

“I see why you thought the cloak would be a good idea.” Callum said ruefully, a while in. She could only imagine how much horn-dust and flaky bits of keratin must be littering it. “This does get kind of messy.”

“Told you.”

“For now this is just making your horns go sort of…pale, and scratched-looking.” He commented, working the file around one of the ridges on the underside. “I guess it goes dark again once you start buffing it?”

She made a small despairing noise, but agreed “Yeah, basically. Honestly all you really need to do is wipe it over with a wet cloth and it’ll stop looking like that. But…”

“But I’m not stopping there.” He said, with evident satisfaction, and a little more heat rose in her cheeks.

He was slow and meticulous about the filing, but got through it a lot more quickly than she could have if she’d done it herself. It was hard to work on your own horns – the angle was bad, you couldn’t see what you were doing, and adjusting to get the undersides was a huge pain in the arms. By contrast, doing it for someone else was just…a lot easier.

Finally, he set the scrub down and went for the washcloth again, soaping up and rubbing her horns clear of dust, poring over them for any spots he’d missed. When he was finally satisfied, he said “and now I buff them?”

“Mmhm.” She confirmed, bringing her hands up to hide her face for a moment. So, at her confirmation, he started on that part next. He evidently hadn’t expected how vigorous the buffing and polishing stages of horns were, because she kept telling him to press the buffer harder, and he kept making worried noises about it, and she had to keep assuring him that no that’s how it’s supposed to be, and eventually she start started laughing helplessly at him.

“I feel like I’m going to hurt your neck,” he complained at her, when the strength of the requisite motions pulled at her head. “Or like, hurt your hornbeds, or something.”

“I’ll be fine, Callum.” She assured him, still laughing, mirth and embarrassment squirming in her chest. “This is just how it goes, you know.”

“At least I brought you a pillow.” He sighed, and obligingly kept on. A fair while later, when he was done with the buffing and had washed her horns again, he leaned back a bit to admire his work. “That really is looking a lot smoother and shinier.”

“And you’ve not even done the polishing yet.” Rayla felt very weird then, laying back, eyes fixed on the ceiling. She’d been through embarrassment, and then amusement, and now…now, there was something else. She felt almost calm. Almost settled, like she’d finally started to grow used to this. Like the novelty of his hands on her horns had worn through.

Now, she felt kind of comfortable. At ease, in a way. Her mind was drifting in the way it did when Ethari or Runaan had helped her with her horns before, like this was just a normal thing. A normal thing that took ages, and that one had to daydream through to pass the time.

“I’m actually really looking forward to seeing what they look like when I’m done.” He was saying, as he put the buffing things down and went to get the bottle of polish and the polishing tool. “I’ve never seen your horns all done up before.”

“Maybe now you’ll finally understand what I mean when I say my horns have gone gross.” She pondered, and he laughed. “Finally you’ll know what well-kept horns are supposed to look like.”

“I have seen other Moonshadow elves’ horns, you know.” He informed her, obviously amused, and she heard the cap of the polish opening. A moment later, she smelled it, because there was really no mistaking that smell. “Yours still look nice no matter how long it’s been since you scrubbed them.”

Rayla made a disagreeable noise at him, and he snickered back, and then finally set about the polishing.

She’d told him, earlier, that horn-polish was pretty potent stuff, and that’s why you applied it to a sort of spongy cloth attached to a handle, rather than scrubbing with it by hand. At full strength, it actually melted the outer surface of the horn – just a little, just enough to meld it all down into a smooth, gleaming, perfect surface. Diluted polish was fine if you did it regularly, but with how long it had been for her…she’d told him to keep it undiluted. And it stank.

Her nose wrinkled, even with all the pleasant soap smells competing, and held her neck lax as Callum worked on her horns vigorously enough to pull her head back with every other movement. That was just how it went, so she wasn’t bothered. The towel was enough padding that it didn’t hurt, so she just laid there and let him work.

“Think I might actually nearly be done.” He pronounced at last, sounding genuinely a little out of breath. She’d told him it was hard work, and evidently he’d found that out for himself. He sounded very pleased, though. Like he’d done a good job and knew it, and was plenty proud about it. “Just got to wash all this polish muck off, right? Soap your horns up again.”

“That is the last stage.” She agreed, trying to glance up at him, but all she could really see was the top of his head. “Aside from oiling, I suppose.”

 -

 (Snippet 7: aftermath of horn care, domesticity)

 It was then, by the sink, that Rayla finally removed the towel from her head, and Callum made a loud noise of pure joy at her. She stared at him, alarmed, and then noticed where he was actually looking. Oh.

“Shiny!” He exclaimed, gleeful, and reached out to stroke her horns. “Oh my god.”

“Callum!” She complained, but she was already laughing, because honestly she should have predicted this reaction. He practically groped at her horns, bright-faced and beaming, and she flushed all the while she stood still and let him. “Are you going to let me see them any time soon?” She asked him, dry. “Or are you just going to stand there groping them?” He subsided at that with a very high-pitched giggle.

“Hehehe,” he offered, and then “yes, go look! You need to tell me how well I did.” He took her by the shoulders and turned her to the mirror, his face lingering by her shoulder in her reflection with the enormous grin still very much in residence there. He was such a dork, honestly.

Finally, Rayla tipped her head forwards and inspected her horns. They were…shiny. Very shiny. Every ridge had been filed and buffed and polished to a gleam, and when she turned her head, the light glimmered off of them like they’d been waxed. Her eyebrows went up, and she lifted her own hand to feel along one. It was smooth. Entirely dry, but as she ran her finger along one ridge, it felt so smooth. Their dark colour was actually glossy. “…Wow.” She said, a little admiringly, and tilted her head to watch the light move. “That is shiny.”

He looked absolutely delighted by that response, as if he’d needed her go-ahead to be certain that, yes, that was definitely impressively shiny. She smiled, helpless to stop it, and turned her head to kiss him on the cheek; her reflection mirrored her.

“You did a great job, Callum.” She told him fondly, her cheeks pink at having seen exactly how great a job he’d done. Stars, but the second anyone saw her they’d know exactly who was responsible for those horns. “My horns haven’t been this shiny in years.”

Callum looked at her like she’d hung the Moon, like this praise was enough to render him utterly overjoyed. He tugged her around enough to kiss her, deep and excited and full of energy, so much so that she made a muffled noise of surprise into his lips. It caught her off-guard, and she was feeling a little breathless and a little dazed when he drew away a few moments later. “You have to let me do this again.” He told her, beaming. “I’m going to keep your horns this shiny, just you wait.”

Her cheeks flamed, and she ducked her head, suddenly flustered. “You can’t just say things like that.” She complained at him, and of course he looked utterly unrepentant. He leaned in and kissed her, then moved and kissed her on one cheek, and then on the other cheek, and his hands were already up and stroking along the wide bases of her horns again.

“Smooth,” he commented, gleefully, fingers warm around her horns. His face was very, very close to hers. “They’re so nice.”

The heat in her face decidedly didn’t abate. “Oh my god, Callum.” She mumbled, shaking her head, and he just kissed her again. Feeling increasingly dazed, she said into his lips “you know, it’s a lot faster if you’re doing it regularly. You can skip the filing and just buff and polish instead.”

He considered this excellent news, if the way he kissed her was any indication.

Finally, she summoned the force of will to reach up and peel his hands from her horns, stepping away. It was not easy, because – because when he looked like that, so elated and alive and full of delight, when he kissed her so enthusiastically, it was hard to think of pretty much anything. She looked across at him, incredibly flustered, and couldn’t see anything except how beautiful he was. “You, calm down.” She ordered him, gruffly, and led him by the shoulder to the basin. “We came in here to brush our teeth, you numpty. Not fondle Rayla’s horns.”

“But Rayla’s horns are really really pretty.” Callum pointed out cheerfully, and she made an involuntary noise half-way between embarrassment and pleasure.

“Be that as it may, Rayla and her horns want you to brush your teeth now so we can go to bed.” She said, and she shuffled over to the basin to make good on her words.

 -

 (Snippet 8: Callum and Rayla go to bed finally. Cuddling, fluff.)

 It proved as magnificently soft and comfy as she might have expected, when she peeled back the covers and climbed in. Callum meanwhile was perusing the canopy with consideration.

“Curtains or no curtains?” He asked her, and she considered it.

“Curtains.” She decided, and watched with satisfaction as he reached out and unhooked the bed’s attendant drapery. She reached to the one closest to her, and he got the rest; it all fell into place, a rich dark red that blocked out the light from the room around them and cast their bed into soothing shadow. Something settled in her then, that hadn’t quite been at ease in the unfamiliar surroundings, or the openness of the room. She sighed, and burrowed down under the duvet, laying her head back on the pillows.

He joined her, lifting the covers and slipping in, closing his eyes for a second in obvious profound enjoyment. “This is so much better than hard cold floor.” He murmured happily, and she smiled, tugging him to her with a hand at his shoulder. He went gladly, and within moments they were pressed close, legs tangling, the warmth of his skin comforting against her own.

“Been a long few weeks.” She sighed, resting her forehead against his, and he lifted a hand to stroke her cheek.

“Kind of an understatement.” He murmured back. “I’m glad we’ve got a chance to rest now.” A pause. “Sort of, anyway. Aside from the work.”

She understood his meaning, though. There was something strangely safe about the idea of the time they’d spend here, whether it would be a week or longer than that. This wasn’t home, where there’d be people to explain things to, or where they’d have to adapt their old life to fit around what had happened. This was a new place – unfamiliar, but easier to cope with for that unfamiliarity, in its own way.

Here, she thought, they’d be able to find their footing a little. Settle a little more into their new normal, before the vagaries of travel and normal life needed intrude again.

“Me too.” She agreed, at last, and reached a hand across to press lightly around the back of his neck. He made a soft, pleased sound, then shuffled to give her better access, face smooshed into the pillow. She kissed him on the cheek, and he peered at her with one green eye, a smile fluttering on his lips.

“…Thanks for letting me do your horns.” He mumbled back, eventually. “I liked it.”

Her heart fluttered. “I’ll repay you sometime.” She promised, and moved her hand to smooth down along his upper back, enjoying the warmth of his skin. “Tomorrow, maybe. Give you a nice backrub or something.”

“Sounds great.” He shifted closer, tucking his face against her shoulder with a sigh. She kissed him at the top of his forehead, stroking him gently from the nape of his neck to his shoulders and back. He made quiet contented noises at her, drowsier and drowsier, and steadily began to drift off.

She lingered there, holding him, trailing fingertips over his neck as he settled into sleep. It really had been a long day for him, for all that they’d spent the latter half of it indoors and resting. Now, finally, he’d be able to sleep properly, in a bed comfortable enough to ease the ache of his overworn muscles. Now, finally, without the city’s doom hanging over them, they could rest a little.

Rayla smiled into his hair, nestled against him, and closed her eyes. She wasn’t aware of falling asleep, but it took her anyway; almost between one moment and the next, she was gone.

#rayllum #rayllumvalentines #moon gardens #these snippets will probably not get posted to ao3 #i'd like to reiterate that I have no intention of posting the entire story either #but i hope you can enjoy these extracts regardless #i adore this fic tbh #it's a delight to write #which is probably how i managed to write 120k of it in one month #still proud of that #one heck of a personal record really

[sammysdewysensitiveeyes]

Marauders and Hellions gala issues:

(spoilers ahead)

The good:

Damn near EVERYTHING about Hellions.

Catseye and Roulette cameo at the ball, giving Empath the beat-down he so richly deserves. 

Havok pushing for Madelyne’s resurrection.  I’m not really an Alex fan, but I support him in this, give that queen the second chance she deserves.  I’m guessing that Maddie will hopefully continue to be a plot point in the series.

Nanny gets drunk and tries to stab Sinister, and I also fully support this.

Empath uses his powers to let Peter “feel” drunk without actually drinking, and it’s kinda sweet.  Like he’s doing Peter a favor.  Of course, he’s also fucking around, because that’s what Empath does.

Kwannon and Greycrow hanging out at the bar together, and Kwannon insisting that the Hellions are her “plus one.” 

Kwannon’s amazing dress, she is gorgeous.

Sinister being catty with Exodus about their outfits.

Emma discovering that she reminds Steve Rogers of his mother, GOD, poor Emma. 

Rhapsody!  An obscure mutant from waaaaay back in Peter David’s X-Factor:

She got to show up and play a concert, and that is fantastic.

A nice moment between Emma and Sean.  Judging by the dialogue, I’m guessing that Emma is trying to recruit Sean for Marauders.  He’s supposed to show up in a future issue, so we’ll see how that goes.  Honestly, Sean/Emma is actually one of my favorite ships for Emma.

Also a Tempo cameo.  She’s also gonna show up in a later Marauders issue, so I guess Duggan is setting his pieces up.  I kinda want Duggan to play more with the toys that he already has (some crew members are still VERY underdeveloped), but I also like Tempo and I hope she becomes a regular in the book.  

Delores, the person who warned the Marauders about the poisoned drugs, gets a nice cameo as well.  Glad to see she got a Gala invite.  I’m kinda wondering if Duggan is actually going to DO anything with her character, beyond her just being a friendly human?  The poisoned medicine wound up being a dead-end plotline when it happened.

Pyro gambling with Bishop, Shinobi, that AIM guy and Bobby (and getting suspiciously lucky), only to be interrupted by The Thing.  Who insists on joining the party.  It’s gamblin’ time!  Also, this is twice now we’ve seen that Pyro has a penchant for gambling, which I could totally see for his character.  I could imagine him getting into money troubles over it back in his pre-Brotherhood writer days.  Don’t mind me, I’m just collecting every scrap of potential Pyro character development and hoarding them like a crow with shiny objects.

Pyro and Shinobi actually in a scene together, something that only matters to me and like two other people.  (I kinda ship it, even though they have never even spoken to each other.)

Pyro also gets a background cameo in Hellions, in the same panel as Sunfire.  Maybe wishing his outfit was as awesome?  I’m a little disappointed that Pyro’s jacket only has the flame designs on the shoulders and sleeves, I was expecting something really cool on the back.

Christian gets to do things, and actually has a decent Gala outfit.

For once, I don’t mind an Emma-focused issue, even though I complain about that frequently.  It’s the Hellfire Gala, OF COURSE Emma will be front and center, she’s hosting the whole thing, and she’ll be making alliances and playing politics. 

The bad:

Poor Bobby has nothing to do but stand in the background and look fabulous.  Even Pyro, with his single line of dialogue, got more play than Bobby.  Maybe he plays a bigger role in other issues? 

The Fenris Twins are at the Gala, and apparently part of Emma’s Hellfire Inner Circle.  WHY?  Why are they still there, Duggan?  When are you going to fire that Chekov’s gun?  Please don’t settle it off panel, like you do with some storylines.  You tend to draw some things out forever, then rush through other important plot points, I’m just asking for an even pace, man. 

Poor Sebastian has nothing to do all Gala but sit in his wheelchair and pout, like a toddler with sideburns.

Shinobi’s Gala outfit is an absolute travesty.  I guess you could call it elegant, I call it boring.  Shinobi should be wearing something daring and attention-grabbing on par with Bobby.  It’s.....just his usual suit with a fancier design?  C’mon.  

Callisto’s outfit is also awfully boring.  I was expecting something a little “tougher” from her.  And it’s fine if she wants to wear something more traditionally feminine, but that outfit didn’t seem to be making a statement one way or the other.  It’s just normal dress.

The Gala would have been about 10 times better if Shinobi and Pyro were allowed to wear these exact outfits:

Let the boys be the fashion-icon dandies that they canonically are.

#hellions #x-men marauders #spoilers #wednesday spoilers