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wilwheaton · 11 months

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When you watch The Curse, you are watching two children who were abused and exploited daily during production. No adults protected us.

This was originally published on my blog in August, 2022.

I had a wonderful time at Steel City Comicon this weekend. It was my first time at this particular con, so I didn’t know there was such a huge contingent of horror fans, creators, and vendors who attend.

I love horror, and I was pretty psyched to be in the same place as John Carpenter and Tom Savini, across the street from the Dawn of the Dead mall. Pittsburgh feels like one of the places horror was invented, at least to me.

A number of these horror fans came to see me, and asked me to sign posters and other things from a movie my parents forced me to do when I was 13, called The Curse. I had to tell each of these people that I would not sign anything associated with that movie, because I was abused and exploited during production. The time I spent on that film remains the most traumatizing time of my life, and though I am a 50 year-old man, just typing this now makes my hands shake with remembered fear of a 13 year-old boy who nobody protected, and the absolute fury the 50 year-old man feels toward the people who hurt him.

I told this story in Still Just A Geek, and I’ve talked about it in some podcasts I did on the promo tour, but I’ve never put it out in public like this, in its entirety.

I suspect someone at the publisher would prefer I tease this and hope it drives book sales from people who want to read all of it, but I honestly don’t want to have another weekend like this one where everything is awesome, except the few times people who have no idea (and why should they) put that fucking poster in front of me, and all the fear, abandonment, and trauma come flooding back as I tell them that I won’t sign it, and why.

To their credit, each person was as horrified as they should have been, told me they had no idea (if they didn’t read my book why would they), and quickly put the poster away. They were all understanding. I am grateful for that.

But I really don’t need to tell this story over and over again, so here it is, with a child abuse and exploitation content warning, so I can just tell people to Google it.

After Stand by Me, everything changed. The attention from entertainment journalists, casting directors, and especially teen magazines came pouring in. The movie was a generational hit, beloved by critics and audiences alike, and every single one of us could pick anything to do next.

River’s parents and his agent got him Mosquito Coast, with Harrison Ford, as his next movie. I also auditioned for the role, but I knew even then that River was going to book the job. He was perfect, and I’d have to wait a little bit for my opportunity to come along.

I went on a lot of theatrical auditions after Stand by Me. I had tons of meetings with directors and the heads of casting at every major studio. It was all a very big deal, and I felt like we were all looking for something really special and amazing as my follow-up to Stand by Me.

At some point, a couple of producers contacted my agent with an offer to play one of the leads in an adaptation of H. P. Lovecraft’s “The Colour Out of Space.” The script was titled The Farm. (It would, of course, be changed when the film was released).

I read it. I did not like it. It was a shitty horror movie, and I saw that right away. It was the sort of thing you rented on Friday when the new release you wanted was already out of the store.

My mother, already an incredibly manipulative person, used every tool at her disposal to change my mind. My father threatened me, mocked me, told me “It’s your decision” when it clearly wasn’t. It was all so weird; I didn’t understand why they cared so much.

I told my parents I didn’t like it and didn’t want to do it. I clearly recall thinking it was a piece of shit that would hurt my career.

It wasn’t the first thing that had come our way that I wanted to pass on, and every other time, it hadn’t been a very big deal.

Sidebar: I was cast in Twilight Zone: The Movie, in 1983. The film tells four stories, and I was cast as the kid who can wish people into cartoonland. It was a GREAT role, in a movie I still love. (Note that Twilight Zone had four directors. One of them got three people killed. The segment I was cast in was not that one. I mention this because too many people zero in on this to deflect from what this whole thing is actually about.)

But I was CONVINCED by my parochial school teacher that if I worked on The Twilight Zone, which she had determined was satanic, I would go to hell. (This woman and her bullshit played a big role in my conversion to atheism at a young age, but when she told me that, I was all-in on the supernatural story they taught us in religion class.) I was so scared, more scared than I’d ever been to that point in my life, I cried and wailed and begged my parents to not make me do the movie. And I never told them why, because I was afraid my dad would laugh at me for being weak and afraid. My agent tried to talk me into it, and I wouldn’t budge. It’s the only thing I deeply and truly regret passing on, and I really hate I made that choice for such a stupid reason.

Okay. Back to The Curse.

This time, when I told them how much I hated it, they wouldn’t listen to me. My mother, already an incredibly manipulative person, used every tool at her disposal to change my mind. My father threatened me, mocked me, told me “It’s your decision” when it clearly wasn’t. It was all so weird; I didn’t understand why they cared so much.

That is, until they made me take a meeting with the producers of the movie, in their giant conference room on the top floor of a tall building in Hollywood. All I remember about this place was that it was huge; the table was way too big for the five of us who spread around it, and there were floor-to-ceiling windows on three of the walls, but the room was still dark. There was a weird optical illusion in the center of the table, this thing they sold in the Sharper Image catalog, made from two reflective dishes with a hole in the top of one. You placed an object in the bottom of the bottom dish, and it made it look like that object was floating above the whole thing. They had a plastic spider in it. What a strange detail for me to remember, but it’s as clear in my memory as if I were sitting in that room right now.

One man, who I presumed was the executive producer, was European or Middle Eastern (I didn’t know the difference then, he was just Not Like People I Knew), and I was instantly afraid of him. He was intimidating, and seemed like a person who got what he wanted.

So we sat there, my father who didn’t give a shit about me, my mother who was cosplaying as someone with experience, and me, thirteen years old, awkward as fuck, and scared to death.

I don’t remember what they said to me in their pitch or anything other than how uncomfortable and anxious I was to even be in that room. I tried so hard to be grown up and mature, but I — and my parents — was way out of my depth. I’d done one big movie and that was it. We didn’t have my agent with us, who had lots of experience and would have known what questions to ask.

No, in place of my experienced agent, my mother had decided she was going to be my manager, and she tackled the responsibility with an enthusiasm that was only matched by her absolute incompetence and inability to go toe-to-toe with producers the way my agent did. She was outwitted, out-thought, and outmaneuvered at every turn.

“You don’t have a choice,” my father commanded. “You are doing this movie.”

So we sat there, my father who didn’t give a shit about me, my mother who was cosplaying as someone with experience, and me, thirteen years old, awkward as fuck, and scared to death.

At some point, this man, who is represented in my memory by big Jim Jones sunglasses under dark hair above an open collar, said, “We are offering you a hundred thousand dollars and round-trip travel for your whole family. We will cast your sister, Amy, to play your sister in the movie.”

It all made sense, now. I was only thirteen, but I knew my parents were pushing me so hard because this company was offering me — them, really — more money than I’d ever imagined I’d earn in my life, much less a single job.

I knew that the right thing to do, the smart thing to do, was to say no. There would be other opportunities, and it was stupid to cash myself out of feature films for what I thought was, in the grand scheme of things, not very much money.

It’s incredible to me that I knew all of this. It’s incredible to me that I could see all these things, plainly and clearly, and my parents couldn’t (or, more likely, chose not to).

So after this man made his offer, all the adults in the room ganged up on me, selling me HARD on this movie.

My mother said, “Don’t you want your sister to have the same opportunities you’ve had? Wouldn’t it be fun and exciting to go to Rome? Think of all the history!”

The experience was awful. It was the worst experience I have ever had on a set in my life, by every single metric. The movie is awful, and it is the embarrassment I knew it would be.

I don’t think about this very often, because it’s super upsetting to me. Right now, I’m so angry at my parents for subjecting me and my sister to this entire experience. But I’m getting ahead of myself.

In that moment, I felt bullied and trapped. All these adults were talking to me at the same time, and I just wanted it to stop. I just wanted to go home and get out of this room. I just wanted to go be a kid, so I did what I’d learned to do to survive: I gave in and did what my parents wanted.

The experience was awful. It was the worst experience I have ever had on a set in my life, by every single metric. The movie is awful, and it is the embarrassment I knew it would be.

But here’s the thing: when you watch The Curse, you are watching two children, me and my sister, who were abused on a daily basis. The production did not follow a single labor law. They worked us for twelve hours a day, on multiple film units (while I work on First unit, second unit sets up and waits for me. When I should get a break to rest, they send me to Second unit, then to Third unit, then back to First unit. I was 13.) without any breaks, five days a week. I was exhausted the entire time. I was inappropriately touched by two different adults during production. I knew it was wrong, but I was so scared and ashamed, and I felt so unsupported, I didn’t tell anyone. I knew my dad wouldn’t believe me, and my mother would blame me. Anything to keep the production happy, that’s what she did. That was more important to her than the health and safety of her children. The director was coked out of his mind most of the time, incompetent, and so busy fucking or trying to fuck one of the women in the cast, he was worse than useless. He was a fading actor who was cosplaying as a director, as in over his head as my mother. My sister and I were never safe. Instead of harmless atmospheric SFX smoke, they set hay on fire in barrels and blew actual smoke onto the set. They took buckets of talc, broken wood, bits of wallpaper and plaster, and threw it into my face during a scene inside the collapsing house. My sister is in a scene where she goes to get eggs from some chickens, and they attack her. So they hired Lucio Fulci, the Italian horror master, to direct her sequence. His idea, which everyone was totally on board with, was to throw chickens at my sister. Live chickens, live roosters, live birds. Just throw them at a nine-year-old girl. Oh, and then tie them to her arms and legs so they’ll peck her. All of this happened under my mother’s observation, and with her full participation.

Everything I need to know about who my parents are is wrapped up in that experience: the total lack of concern for my safety and happiness, treating me like an asset instead of a son, lying to me, manipulating me, and using me to get things they wanted, and then gaslighting me about it.

If just ONE of the things I can remember happened to someone I loved, I would have grabbed my kids, gone to the airport, and flown home. Fuck those abusive assholes in the production. Let the lawyers sort it all out. Nobody hurts my children and gets away with it.

My mom says she “had some talks” with the producers. She claims that, once, she wouldn’t let us leave the hotel. (God, what a fucking dump that place was. It was just slightly better than a hostel.) I have no memory of that, but honestly the entire experience was so traumatic, I’ve blocked most of it out.

The movie was the commercial and critical failure I knew it would be. My parents spent the money. I don’t know what they spent it on. I got to keep fifteen cents of every dollar, so . . . yay?

My sister and I hardly ever talk about this. I suspect it was as upsetting and traumatic for her as it was for me. I told her I was writing about it, and asked her if she remembered anything. She told me she’d been lied to her whole life about this movie. Our mother let her believe she had been cast on the strength of her audition. “I was excited to work with you,” she said. She reminded me about some stuff I’d blocked out, including a scene where my character’s older brother (played by an actor named Malcolm Danare, who was kind and gentle, and made both of us feel safer when he was around) shoves my character into a pile of cow shit. When it came time to shoot the scene, the mud they’d put together to be the cow shit looked an awful lot like cow shit. When Malcolm pushed me into it, we all found out it was real cow shit. I was FURIOUS. The director had lied to me and had allowed me to have my entire body shoved into an actual pile of actual cow shit. I don’t remember what I said, but I remember he treated me the exact same way my father did whenever I got upset: he laughed at me, told me I was being too sensitive, reminded me that he was the director and he wanted to get a “real” performance out of me, and concluded, “If it bothers you so much, we’ll get you a hepatitis shot,” before he walked away.

My sister also recalled that, after she survived the scene with the chickens, it was the producers’ idea to give her one as a pet.

Okay, let’s unpack that for a quick second: you’ve been traumatized by these birds, so we’re going to give you one as a pet. That you’ll somehow keep in your hotel, and then will somehow get back to America. It will shock you to learn that neither of those things happened.

She remembered, as I do, the huge fight I had with my parents in our kitchen, where I told them I hated the script and I hated the movie. I didn’t want to do it, and I hated that they were making me do it.

“You don’t have a choice,” my father commanded. “You are doing this movie.”

“This is the only film you are being offered,” my mother lied to me. She made me feel like, if I didn’t do this movie, I would never do another movie again in my life. I had to do this movie. As my father bellowed, I had no choice.

Both of my parents denied this argument ever happened. Can I tell you how reassuring it is to know that my sister, who was also there, remembers it the same way I do?

The makeup department decided they would literally cut my little sister’s face with a scalpel, in three places, and put bandages over them.

But one thing she told me, the thing I did not know, the thing that makes me so angry I want to break things, actually managed to make the entire experience even worse than I remembered it.

There’s a scene after her chicken incident where I check up on her in her bedroom. She’s got cuts and bruises, and I guess we talk about it. I don’t remember and I can’t watch the movie because I’m terrified it will give me a PTSD flashback (I’ve had one of those and I recommend avoiding it). Here’s the thing about that scene: she has some cuts on her face, and those cuts are real. They are not makeup.

I’m going to repeat that. My nine-year-old little sister had actual cuts on her face that were placed there by an adult, on purpose.

The makeup department decided they would literally cut my little sister’s face with a scalpel, in three places, and put bandages over them. My sister told me our mother wasn’t in the makeup room when this happened — honestly, it seemed like our mother was strangely and conveniently absent when most of the really terrible things happened to us on the set — and when my sister told her what they’d done, she “lost her shit” at the production. She was pissed, I guess, which is appropriate and surprising. I wonder what would have to have happened for her to put us on a plane and get us home to safety? I mean, her son being abused daily didn’t do it, and her daughter being CUT IN THE FACE ON PURPOSE didn’t do it.

I just . . . I can’t. I can’t understand or comprehend allowing your own children to be physically and emotionally abused. They were literally selling my sister and me to these people, like we were some kind of commodity.

This was a tough conversation. My sister’s experience with our parents is very different from mine. My sister and I love each other. We’re close. I know it’s hard for her to hear that her brother, who she loves, was so abused by her parents, who she also loves. I was really grateful she made the time to talk to me about it, and grateful the experience wasn’t as horrible for her as it was for me.

As we were finishing our call, Amy also remembered one man, a young Italian named Luka, who was our driver for the movie. I haven’t thought about him in thirty years, but I can see his face now. He was kind, he was friendly, he taught us how to kick a soccer ball, and in the middle of an abusive, torturous experience, he stood out as a kind and gentle man. I mention him because she remembered him, which made me remember him, and goddammit I want at least one small part of this thing to not be awful.

The Curse remains one of the most consequential times the adults in my life failed to protect me. I’m 50. I still have nightmares.

Ultimately, as I predicted and feared, this piece of shit movie cashed me out of respectable films forever. I got offers for movies, but they were always mindless comedies or exploitative horror films. They were never the serious dramas I wanted to work in after Stand by Me. The industry looked at me and River, wondering if one or both of us would become a breakout star. They quickly saw that River was doing real acting work, and I was in this piece of shit. For River, Stand by Me was a beginning. For me, it would turn out to be pretty much everything, at least as far as film goes.

There are thousands of reasons film careers do and don’t take off. Maybe mine wouldn’t have taken off anyway. Clearly, it’s not where my life ended up, and I’m super okay with that now. But when all of this happened, it hurt and haunted me.

The Curse remains one of the most consequential times the adults in my life failed to protect me. I’m 50. I still have nightmares. Everything I need to know about who my parents are is wrapped up in that experience: the total lack of concern for my safety and happiness, treating me like an asset instead of a son, lying to me, manipulating me, and using me to get things they wanted, and then gaslighting me about it.

This annotation is the last thing I wrote before I turned this manuscript in, because opening these wounds is hard and painful. I put it off as long as I could, and I feel like I’m still holding back, because just this small glimpse of the experience has taken me a week to write. I can’t imagine trying to go back and unpack the whole thing. (Note that is not in the book: I’ve made an EMDR appointment to work on this because the nightmares have come back after the weekend).

Fuck The Curse, and fuck every single person who exploited and hurt two beautiful children to make it. You all participated in child abuse, and you all knew better. Shame on all of you. I hope this follows you to the end of your life. I hope that living with what you did to innocent children has been as hard for you as it has been for me, because you deserve no less.

#tw abuse #tw child abuse #tw exploitation #child actor #still just a geek #lucio fulci #trauma survivor #speaking up for the child who was silenced by his abusers

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artsy-waffle19 · 28 days

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They literally put Edwin through every possible gay-romance trope but made it realistic and that's so special to me like

we got the "probably former friend can't handle feelings and turns into bully instead" but it doesn't end with them, making up and being happy, they break apart, things escalate and they both suffer from that situation for a major part of their existence. With a bit of luck and a LOT of growing they manage to talk it out and the victim finds it in himself to forgive his bully but it's never going to be truly fine. But even though they both suffer tremendously, they are faced to deal with themselves in the process and find a kind of peace they wouldn't have gotten otherwise. Because maybe it's better to hurt for a long time only to realise that it really doesn't have to be torture to be the way you are and finally freeing yourself entirely than quietly live without the conflict but also without the realisation and resenting yourself for its entirety.

then there's the situation with the cat king. Older, emotionally unstable guy obsesses over younger inexperienced guy who actually understands him and causes some sort of gay awakening. But instead of some "I can fix him" bullshit with them, ending up happily ever after because "they're the only ones who understand each other"TM we get to see Edwin set boundaries and standing up for himself which benefits the both of them. For Edwin this ends in going "Hey thank you for opening that door to discovering that part of myself but I'm actually gonna have to leave you at the doorstep now" and for the cat king it ends up with him actually feeling seen because for once somebody didn't fall for his probably usual game of "I'm bored so I'm going to make a game of getting that guy to do what i want by seducing him". The fact that they don't end up together is the reason they were good for each other.

Also the situation with Monty which is basically the experience of a lot of queer peoples first relationship. They meet and they're both somehow new to all of this. Being queer, relationships, all that stuff. And they get along and share some interests, they like soending time with each other and technically it's like in a romance book because they meet and one of them is immediately interested and then they talk and they sit on a swingset and they kiss. And there's the excitement about "apparently I'm making my first experience with romance right now" and the worry of "I'm queer...I have it harder with relationships...what if this is the best option i have? what if it's the only one?" so they go through all the romance book tropes but the spark simply isn't there and it ends in one of them getting way more invested tha the other and they eventually end up breaking up in blood. But in a way both of them got an idea about what they actually want in life out of it so even if that sone didn't end well, it did give them something.

And last but not least the "in love with best friend who likes someone else/someone of the opposite gender specifically" but instead of having that best friend be secretly in love with the character all along or suddenly turn homophobic and the friendship being ruined they talk about it and they move on and the friendship isn't damaged and in a way it might even be better because sometimes our feelings are unrequited and sometimes that's okay.

I just really really love how the show took all of those options for cheesy and in a way sometimes even forced romance tropes and went "hey, life is not a romance novel but actually that kind of makes it better because look where it got you now"

#dead boy detectives #edwin payne #edwin paine #dbd #monty dbd #monty the crow #charles rowland #cat king

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thedeathwitchescats · 7 months

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Okay, review time!! If you are one of the oddballs who thinks you cant be critical of something you love I suggest you stop reading now before I ruffle your feathers. Iron flame, second in the empyrean series. I am gonna start with what I was not a fan of and then go into the shit I adored.

1) what in the actual fuck was the pacing of this book?? I can tell you what, it was non existent. There was none. Where I thought there was a lot of filler in the last book there was none in this one. We got snap shots of conversations and then *boom* more plot flew at you. The timeline of this book greatly suffered for it i think bc we end only a couple weeks, if that, after threshing, which happens sometimes in October. This book was actually so wild with times.

2) while it was a spectacular cliff hanger, xaden becoming venin pisses me off. Especially if Rebecca yarros isnt going to have him tell violet. Like if that small tid bit of a conversation we got wasnt him telling vi that he was venin then the entire romantic conflict of this book was rendered pointless and their going to be having the same fucking fight for the rest of the series and at rhat point I give up.

3) I understand that the revolution is trying to take down basgaith and make the world better or whatever the fuck but can someone actually formulate a real plan for me?? Because I feel like their mission is just, giving violet and xaden something to be pissed at each other about.

4) the entirety of cats character. I get that she was set up as a spin on the typical jealous ex. Like having her be bitter about xaden picking violet over her but OH WAIT it wasnt actually about the man it was about the crown, oohh not like other girls. Im a writer too I see the point. I dont care. I think it was trashy. If you wanted her to be a bitter spiteful ex then have her be a bitter spiteful ex, the whole crown thing was shallow.

OKAY haters your time is up now onto the shit that made my heart hurt with joy and sadness

1) xadens arc in this book. I really liked that he went from "transparency is never gonna happen" to losing his fucking mind over violet and giving her everything. I love feral men and he qualifies. I think his arc was really well done and i liked it.

2) I appericiate that violet stuck to her guns for this book. She wouldnt let xaden off without a fight and I loved that. She made him bow and scrape and I was eating it up. It was spectacular.

3) the throne room scene. Violet on the throne. "Im making a temporary point not a lasting vow of maschocism" xaden being feral.

4) that gets its own point actually, just xaden being completely feral this entire book healed a part of my soul.

5) andarna's little speech at the end where she was like "I waited for you violet" made me ugly cry. That was just so hopelessly good I loved it. Andarna in general heals my heart but that part was just *chefs kiss*

6) tarin being completely and utterly ready to eat people this entire book. Just, at every turn "I want lunch their pissing me off " was spectacular

7) every scene their squad was in. Rihannon, violet, sawyer and ridoc are my roman empire. Their bond is so amazing. The fact that they launched a rescue mission for violet. Rihannon being ready to kill xaden at every turn. Ridoc being so platonically and adorably in love with violet. Just- augh happy cries happy cries. I love it all. Their so special tbh.

8) I love xaden actually, just, the whole book every scene hes in lives in my brain.

9) I liked that we saw a small bit of violet being feral this book too. I hope that we get more of that in future books. I want more of violet losing her fucking mind. Hot, badass women covered in blood

10) Liam. Fucking Liam. When violet was kidnapped and Liam was there. Now, do I logically understand that he was a hallucination, yes, do i care?? No. He was a gift from Maleck I will be hearing no critiques on that. It was so fucking sweet and amazing. I love violet and Liam and Liam being dead so horribly breaks my heart. I loved Liam. Liams death lives rent free in my skull.

#i might add more to this later #please #i am begging yall #dont get weird #i am allowed to love this book and have critical opinions abt it #if i start getting threats about my fandom opinions again i might lose my mind #haters get fucked #anyways #i need the third book right now and the fact that i wont get it until next year kills me a little #i loved iron flame #i loved fourth wing #xaden riorson #violet sorrengail #violet and xaden #fourth wing #iron flame #book review #iron flame review #🪓

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that-ari-blogger · 3 months

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A New Face (Separate Tides)

During its second season, The Owl House had hit its stride and wasn't slowing down. This is my favourite season, and that isn't an unpopular sentiment.

Separate Tides is the opening episode of this season, so it needs to recap the previous goings on and themes in a cohesive way for new viewers, and take the series in a different direction that stays loyal to those themes and plotlines. I think this episode does that well.

But this isn't a summary blog, this is a blog where I find something needlessly specific and gush about the implications of that something.

So... The Golden Guard is so ****ing cool.

Let me explain.

SPOILERS AHEAD (The Owl House, The Harry Potter Series)

I've mentioned in the past that The Owl House uses archetypal storytelling to a truly masterful degree. It takes tropes and meets them on a superficial level, then twists them in a way that adds depth and makes the series unique.

For example, the series is directly drawing inspiration from the works of Robert Galbraith, with Willow being the bullied kid with a passion for herbology, and Amity being the school bully who definitely has a crush on the main character. Both take the archetype and shake it up a bit, as is the way with parody, but the baseline is there.

This leans into the themes of being your own person rather nicely, as it makes the deviations from the archetype more important.

I took great pains to point out that Luz is the only character who doesn't fit the mould at all. She has no analogue and is her own person completely. She has nothing to restrict her.

However, leaves the analogue for the actual protagonist of Galbraith's books. Obviously, not every character from the series is parodied, but the chosen one main character seems like a weird one to miss out on.

I would argue that Mr Potter does have an analogue, Hunter Whittebane (Or Hunter Noceda or Hunter Demonne or even Hunter Clawthorn. Whichever name you prefer, its the same guy).

He is a child soldier, raised by his uncle and manipulated into giving his life away for the cause by an old wizard. He bears a scar on his face, and is technically half witch, half human.

Although we don't actually see any of that in Separate Tides. Instead, we are introduced to the Golden Guard, a character who is suave and cool and confident.

The first time we actually see this character is in the final scene of the previous season.

"Worry not, Kiki. We'll be keeping an eye on the inhabitants of the Owl House."

The Golden Guard is a goon, an elite goon, but a goon none the less. He is simply a character whom Belos turns to in order to get the job done.

But, I find the use of vernacular here interesting. Belos doesn't refer to the Golden Guard with any name, or even as a separate entity from himself. Not "he will be watching them" or "this is the Golden Guard, I trust him to get the job done". This character is referred to as "we". He and Belos are connected. This character is simply Belos' eye.

Then, in Separate Tides, it is established that, when Lilith fell from grace, she was replaced by the Golden Guard.

"He always got special treatment because he was the genius teen prodigy. But he's really just a brat."

So, this is a child, but a gifted child. Lilith is dismissive here, but not of the Golden Guard's skill, just his personality. This is someone for whom things come naturally, allegedly, and who has never had to work for his abilities. Allegedly.

"Unfortunately, you won't have the chance."

The Golden Guard's first line is just cool. He is calm and collected. He is in control. And he has just easily captured one of the protagonists.

I also love the little fact that he has spent the entirety of this voyage in a dimly lit room, eating crackers. The room has nothing to do in it except books. So, he was definitely just sitting there, reading, and had to improvise when King burst into the room. He's a bookworm with an ability to think on the spot.

I'm saying this guy would definitely play Pathfinder or D&D if he was given a chance.

Anyway, the Golden Guard's actual introduction comes fourteen minutes into the episode, and it immediately sets this guy up as a threat. He's martially competent, magically adept, and fully in his element. This is a character who revels in control, just like the Emperor.

And that link to Belos is interesting. Because forgive me for asking, why would an Emperor's elite goon be a child? As in, there has to be a connection to Belos beyond what meets the eye for the Golden Guard to be anywhere near where he is.

We don't get told that here, but we do see that this character's skillset is kinda similar to Belos', in theory. He's commanding, and he gets people to do what he wants. But in practice, this isn't Belos at all. This is someone trying very hard to be like Belos, but coming at it from a different angle.

I do, however, think that the Golden Guard's greatest strength as a goon is revealed subtly in this scene.

"The Emperor ordered me to slay one. I'm just following orders."

We've seen through Lilith in the previous season that Belos covets blind loyalty, and that is what the Golden Guard offers him. He doesn't know or care why the Emperor does what he does, he just follows orders.

Essentially, the Golden Guard is a traditional Disney villain at this point. He is fun, bisexual, charismatic, and a physical threat. The Golden Guard we get introduced to is enjoyable to watch, and it sounds like Zeno Robinson is having a blast voicing him.

However, there is one element of the Golden Guard that we get introduced to in this episode that might fly under the radar. The Owl House is no stranger to masks, and people putting on a show to get the job done, but when we are first shown the Golden Guard in this episode, he is taking it off.

The intro sequence of this season features three characters who are under Belos' command. Lilith, The Golden Guard, and Kikimora. It then unmasks them, with Lilith becoming apologetic, and Kikimora becoming more aggressive. But the Golden Guard sits between them, removing his own mask to reveal... a single purple eye.

The eye is the window to the soul, of course. But there is something to the manner in which this is happening. Kikimora has been angered to the point of lashing out, and Lilith has been brought low with remorse. The Golden Guard, however, is lowering his own mask and staring directly at you with an air of "I'm doing this of my own accord. I see you, you see me, your move."

I wonder if agency is going to be a theme with this character.

Final Thoughts

I love Hunter so much it is obscene, and there is a ton of ambiguity about him right from the bat. What is his stake in this? Who actually is he? And why does he have a purple eye?

As for the rest of this episode, Luz's guilt is starting to be expressed. In my opinion that is for the first time, but I have heard it said that this isn't a new character trait for her.

And Lilith... *sighs* There is a sentiment online as to the expedience of Lilith's redemption arc. Some people like it, others think she should have been "punished" more, and I would like to take a third rout.

I don't believe in punitive justice for fictional characters, and I certainly don't believe in telling writers how they should write. I do, however, think that it could have been slightly more interesting if the consequences of cursing Eda were explored more psychologically.

In any case, however, the series we got is the series we got, and I think it is perfectly fine, if not better, as it is. I don't see a point in getting angry online over what could have been.

Next week, I am looking as Escaping Expulsion and boy, do I have thoughts about Odalia Blight. So, stick around if that interests you.

Previous - Next

#rants #literary analysis #literature analysis #character analysis #what's so special about...?#toh #the owl house #the owl house hunter #toh hunter #toh golden guard #the owl house golden guard #We need to see more of Eda in Bloodborne cosplay

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wordsofoleander · 20 days

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🌸 answer me, my prince!

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a suave prince with all he could ever ask for. a starry-eyed editor who longed for more. two unexpected penpals from vastly different worlds.

they were undoubtedly fated to meet, but never face-to-face.

❥ 735 words ❥ tags: au, fluff, slightly angsty if you blink, very very self-indulgent, no beta we die like chads, mentions of cove, qiu, and my ol2 mc! ❥ notes: the hyperfixation was so strong i emerged from inactivity. i finished the comic this fic shares a title with last weekend and refused to move on,,, made for #baxtermcweek (day 4 prompt: au), hosted by @minthe-drawings

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He doesn’t realize how long he’s repeatedly been opening and closing the empty book chest until he slams it shut a little too loud, snapping him out of his reverie. His eyes dart left and right and his ears stay alert in case he accidentally woke anyone up.

He hears nothing, so hopefully the coast is clear. He opens the book chest again, and the letter he’s waited all night for sits perfectly inside, having appeared out of thin air.

He needs not wait to carefully examine the envelope or admire its design (far more cleaner-cut and colorful than what he's received from others over the years) as he immediately gets to reading.

—

Prince Baxter Alexander.

You’re getting better at pressuring me to reply to you faster and faster. It scares me a little.

Regarding your story, I think what you did for their sake was quite admirable. I can’t even imagine going as far as to pretend to be Cove’s fiancée for his protection, let alone for 5 years! But back to you. Since you didn’t end up falling in love with each other, does this mean Lady Ysabel’s lover is much more good-looking than you are? Would you mind getting a portrait of the Laird Qiu for your friend?

—

Silly Iri.

(You’ve never asked me for my portrait. You wound me. Nonetheless, I forgive you.)

You of all people should be able to know that not every long-standing friendship necessarily has the potential to end in romance.

—

Like us?

—

We are a bit of a special case because I do not think of Ysabel every day.

—

(Oh, what am I going to do with you?)

Ever the type to give people the answers they want to hear now, are you? You’re surrounded by far more impressive people in your daily life, people you can actually talk to and see. I highly doubt that you think of me every day.

(PS It’s way past midnight, so I should probably get ready for bed if I don’t want to be late for work. Sleep well, my prince.)

—

Irina Clarice, my sick twisted friend.

What? Is laying my entire self bare to you, heart and soul, in the written word last night not enough for you? After all the times I’ve spent my evenings waiting for your letters?

I specifically chose this time of year to get away from my parents under the guise of avoiding the heat and helping the monks at the scriptorium. Summer, after all, is the perfect time to do something crazy, pursue a new beauty, to start anew. I confess to you that I imagined nightly sneak-outs to rendezvous with someone who’s caught my eye, but all this time, I’ve been holed up in the scriptorium’s writing room, idly and politely waiting by the book chest on my desk in anticipation to see if you have replied to what I’ve written about my latest misadventures. Before I knew it, I’d already spent the entirety of my summer getting to know you. Now I do know you, and there is no one else like you anywhere else in the world.

Tragically, we shall never have the chance to meet, so I don’t think whatever it is I’m feeling in my chest can be called love. My fate is sealed.

Still, whenever the sight of someone so beautiful catches my eye, thoughts of you fill my head, and I become almost upset, complaining that no matter who I meet, they will never be anything like my Iri. So, my dear friend, do not tell me that I do not think of you every day.

I do not recall you mentioning having felt this way towards your childhood companions, nor your devilishly handsome Xander from the antique shop, so I shall regrettably but with dignity take this as a victory.

On a lonely night on the month of heat’s end, Your Baxter Alexander.

(PS Clarence and I are departing tomorrow at dawn for Golden Grove to attend Qiu’s wedding, just in time for the beginning of fall. Bringing the book chest with me would be far too bothersome for such a short trip. I expect to be away for about three to four days.

Even so, worry not your pretty little head and get a good night’s rest without my letters to bother you, Iri. I hope you do not miss me too much.)

#🌸 — fresh from the garden.#🌺 — another step forward.#our life beginnings and always #our life #olba #olba mc #baxter ward #baxtermcweek #baxter x mc week

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sonkitty · 1 month

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Crowley S2 Hair Post #22

(For reference: The Sideburns Scheme)

Crowley, Good Omens 2, Episode 2, The Clue, so were the goats

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Hairstyle Notes

The red hair is not as fluffy and a little longer compared to the earlier minisode portion that started off the episode.

This style is what most closely resembles a "human" reading with short sideburns from the season 2 present day. Crowley is with two humans and no supernatural beings. The humans assume he is human during the scene.

Even though it's the accessory on the head, even the headband itself changed with its appearance in the back. While that looks to be a continuity issue, it's good to keep in mind that Crowley can control his own appearance so is likely mixing this headband appearance with the reading from the space.

...

Earthly Objects

(For reference: Earthly Objects)

Job sits on the ground against some rocks. Sitis touches her own clothing.

Crowley likely receives credit for a miracle touch on a human when he says, "You tell me," and hisses at Sitis. This action looks like compelling someone for an answer though that answer is something Sitis herself decides. The name, "Bildad the Shuhite" is then said.

That name is his alias for these two. It's a human name from the Book of Job itself, and it's going to be reused later when he has this same hairstyle. While these circumstances are understandable in the context they happen, it's also a clue about the potential rule that Crowley isn't allowed to say his own name for any time period during the entirety of Good Omens 2.

Crowley has several questions when first talking to Job. Job says Sitis' name. They both say "God," in a way that I think qualifies as a name.

It's hard to really see much in the way of pockets. Everyone's separated and contained in their own cuts for most of the scene.

While Job and Sitis occasionally make pockets, those pockets are small and hard to notice to begin with. Their thumb joints do suspiciously align with edges of their clothing at times even though the Tied Hands aren't around.

Crowley's headband is like his substitute Belt Head at least. Sitis also wears something over her head.

Crowley still has the threads on his robe making pockets over his chest for where his Tied Hands would be.

When Crowley turns to show his back to the camera, then shows his front again, he does receive some extra lighting over the part of his chest exposed, before his beard covers it. He receives lighting generally in that area sometimes, and it's where the upper portion of his Tied Hands would be in the present day.

There's one cut with Job on the ground and Crowley standing, so a pocket generally exists between them though it doesn't seem to do anything special. There's another cut with Sitis pocketed between Job still sitting and Crowley still standing. Again, it doesn't seem to do anything special either.

For my tangential reading in my desperate attempt to improve my play, I finished The Sandman Volume 3. I'm still re-reading the Good Omens book.

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Story Commentary

From the last scene, the story greatly implied that this part of the minisode is from Crowley's point of view. Aziraphale isn't around, and Crowley himself received stronger focus from the camera work.

When Crowley is talking to Job, the lighting on him is darker and favors his left.

When Sitis arrives, the lighting shifts. It then favors Crowley's right. With more light on him, his hair looks more red. After that, the hair generally stays as more red and favoring his right, regardless of the camera angle.

In trying to study the space and understand what's happening with the hair, the camera work ensures it is known that the space still has a roof—or at least roof edges—of a human-built structure, even if it is damaged and with an open threshold. Light pours in, presumably from that damage.

Crowley is not giving off the impression of someone secretly trying to save goats and children here. Without knowing how the minisode ends, the goats seem "destroyed", and now he's after the children.

Things don't look good. Well, things don't look good for people like Job, Sitis, and Aziraphale. Hell would be rather pleased.

Crowley expects Job to be furious with God and says so.

But Job isn't furious with God. He's furious with himself.

Then comes the main hint of Crowley's sympathy from the questions, "Yourself? Why, what have you done?" Then he looked like he wanted to say something more to Job's answer, but they were interrupted with Sitis' arrival.

We'll get a glimpse of Crowley's real scheme for this minisode in the next scene.

...

That's it for this post. Sometimes I edit my posts, FYI.

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Before the next post in this series, I am going to take some time to review things for The Pocket Trick that I'm hopefully starting to piece together and may update the main Sideburns Scheme post as well.

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Main post:

The Sideburns Scheme

#crowley #good omens 2 #good omens #good omens s2 #david tennant #good omens season 2 #good omens meta #good omens analysis #good omens crowley #crowley good omens #crowley s2 hair project

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girlfromthecrypt · 4 months

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First book I finished in 2024

The Glutton by A K Blakemore is a historical fiction novel; a reimagining of the life of the real French soldier Tarare who was said to have an unfathomably large, at times inhuman appetite. This was the first book I finished in 2024, and I finished it in two days over two long sessions. I'm normally anything but a fast reader and I actually haven't finished any of the last three books I purchased before this. My attention is fleeting, hard to be captured and easily lost.

The Glutton captured and held my attention for the entirety of its length.

I had never read anything by A K Blakemore before, so I didn't know what I was in for, but I was immediately charmed by her style. I don't often enjoy flowery language and poetic prose, but somehow, it really worked for me here. The story of Tarare is a gritty, gloomy and at times disgusting one, but even the darkest parts of this book are told in a narrative voice so beautiful that it makes them seem idyllic. This deeply unsettling contrast had me absolutely engrossed until the end, and when I had turned the last page, I was genuinely sad that it was over. Which made for a weird mix of emotions, given how disturbing the subject material was at times.

And I have to underline that it was, indeed, disturbing.

I have consumed a lot of dark literature and am very desensitized. Most of the time, I don't enjoy horrific fiction because the elements contained within strike me as senseless, gratuitive and void of substance. I didn't have that feeling with The Glutton. There was a lot of grittiness, yes, but it was never just for “the effect”. Every time the writing made me feel uneasy, it directly related to the inner world of the protagonist and the circumstances of his life, the current time period and its hardships. And even if it didn't have any kind of meaning, it was still told in such stunning prose that it almost felt romantic. Again, none of the things that happen in this book are comforting or beautiful, but with the way they're being told, it almost deceives you into believing they are.

Another thing that I loved about this was that the prose never seemed overdone or pretentious. It was more like a steady ebb and flow perfectly tailored to any given point in the story. It never seemed out of place or ill-fitting while at the same time being VERY MUCH out of place and ill-fitting, but it was always intentional and highly effective.

After I finished this book, I felt genuinely empty, and I just knew I was going to miss it. Now, a week or so later, I do. I really feel like this book is something special, and I'm definitely going to pick up The Manningtree Witches (also by A K Blakemore) as soon as I get around to it. The Glutton was not only a huge joy (though joy might not be the best word for it) to read, it actually made me want to read more. That's also why I wrote this review in the first place. I hope more people check this out and like it as much as I did.

#historical fiction #book review #dark literature #bookblr #book recommendations #histfic #disturbing #books and novels #amazing book #a k blakemore #a. k. blakemore #the manningtree witches #the glutton #the glutton review #spoiler free

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adarkrainbow · 7 months

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The Tale of Tale movie analysis (1)

It has been a long time since I did a fairytale movie analysis, and for this month I want to take a look at a movie that has been asked of me before, a long time ago: "Tale of Tales".

For those of you who do not know about this movie, "Tale of Tales" is a 2015 movie, a "European production" (it is an Italian movie, but it received help and collaboration from France and England, hence the "European" etiquette) that is to this day (and to my knowledge) the only movie that adapts Basile's Pentamerone, the titular "Tale of Tales".

The Pentamerone being one of the two foundational works when it comes to literary fairytales, and one of the two great books of classical Italian literary fairytales alongside Straparole's Facetious Nights. Basile's book is very famous for containing some of the earlier literary records of fairytale types such as Rapunzel, Sleeping Beauty, The Girl Without Hands, and more.

The book contains a total of fifty stories, and of course the movie couldn't adapt them all, so it was decided to only adapt three in total. The three chosen are usually considered emblematic stories of the Pentamerone - but they were also selected because they do not echo the more well known Grimm stories. The three selected were, The Flea, The Enchanted Doe, and The Flayed Old Lady - all taken from the first part of the book.

Note that this movie was greatly acclaimed for its extensive use of practical special effects - and there is one thing you cannot deny this movie, it looks absolutely incredible. There is a great effort on the visuals ranging from selected architecture and landscape to careful costume crafting and delightful monsters on screen.

Before going into the analysis of each of the fairytales of the movie, I wanted to point out a few things covering the entirety of the movie. Three details to be exact.

Matteo Garrone, when doing this movie, didn't just randomly selected three stories that were to his fancy. He chose three specific stories that he then tied together with cohesive themes and motifs. The first of which, the most prominent, being "obsession". Each segment is about presenting the obsessions of specific characters, and the bad outcomes of it.

The other shared motif between the three fairytales is "the ages of a woman". Despite the movie having as much male as female characters, Garrone explained very clearly that this movie was about the women, not the men, and that each fairytale represented one of the traditional three "ages of woman". "The Flea" becomes the Maiden story, focusing on the young princess ; "The Enchanted Doe" becomes the Mother story, with an exploration of the character of the queen, while "The Flayed Old Lady" is of course the Crone tale.

But much more importantly for us to understand this movie: Matteo Garrone did one very heavy and important change compared to the original material. The tone. The tone is radically different. Basile's original book, just like Straparole's fairytales, worked by the specific nature of these Italian literary fairytales of the time: they were grotesque farces, and vulgar jokes. In my last post about the Pentamerone I compared these stories to a Brandon Rogers video, because Basile's stories, despite being the ancestors of the Grimm or Perrault fairytales, are nothing like the modern fairytales we are today. They are sex stories filled with caricatures, they are gruesome, gory stories filled with morally-gray characters, they are one huge dark joke filled with poop and farts and vulgar allusions. They are much closer to medieval tales and to the tone of a Reynard the Fox story or some Rabelais books than any other fairytales we know today. But Garrone decided to apply a principle that you can see explored in series such as "Horace and Pete" or "Kevin can fuck himself". Take a sitcom, remove the laugh-track, you have a tragedy. Garrone's movie is still as grotesque as the original stories - but now the jokes are put aside, the most vulgar parts removed, the sex and the gore examined for what it is under a realistic eye. This "realistic", and "non-comical" treatment of the stories make this world of grotesque caricatures and senseless violence and depraved debauchery one not of marvels and fairies, but one of tragedies, of abuse, of horror. But, tragedies with magic, abuse with beauty, horror with happy and hopeful endings - because they stay fairytales after all, no matter how dark they are. Mean, cruel, sad fairytales, but fairytales nonetheless.

[Trivia: The fact that Basile's work was a very rude, crude and vulgar piece of sex-and-violence that can only be compared to Rabelais meeting Punch & Judy, is something many people in the English-speaking world completely missed because the first real popular and widespread translations of the text in English, in the... I think it was the 19th century or maybe a bit earlier ; but these versions were heavily censored. Trying to make the story more like a Perrault or d'Aulnoy tale, they removed many sex references, remove all the poop jokes, and even cut off some stories deemed too vulgar ot gruesome, so that for a very long time people thought they were supposed to be... regular fairytales. This is especially relevant with "Thalia, the Sun and the Moon", Basile's "Sleeping Beauty" variant. Many people point out that the girl in this story gets raped by the prince and that this shows how the fairytale of Sleeping Beauty was built on a glorification of rape, because it is treated as ormal or as some romance. But... no. This rape is treated as a rape and the prince is very clearly a lustful asshole who is taking advantage of the girl - because it is a dark sex-tale. Princes in the Pentamerone are almost all lustful rapists, violent murderers or complete helpless idiots, because the Pentamerone does not work on a "prince charming" logic. Take "The Golden Root" - the handsome, kind, gentle, good prince that seems to fit the bill of the Prince Charming... is part of a family of ogres, and ends up murdering in rage his intended fiancée just to be married to the heroine of the tale. And that's something that many people missed for a very long time - the prince charming archetype is from the French tales of the 17th and 18th century, not before.]

#tale of tales #movie analysis #fairytale movie #pentamerone #italian fairytales #dark fairytales

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jewishbarbies · 3 months

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I didn't know about the antisemitism in hp because while I wasn't explicitly taught "this is antisemitic" I still learned those tropes. I just didn't know they they were tropes. The only thing I knew was nazi propaganda, because that was in textbooks. We didn't learn about everyday antisemitism. We didn't learn about the history of jews in any other country. And that doesn't excuse me or the school I went to. But I know better now, and I can look around and recognise certain tropes. But I can also recognise that jkr was hateful to so many different groups of people. Jews, the Irish, asian people, gay people, trans people, ironically women in general (Ginny Weasley in particular who only existed as a character for Harry to save and get married and have babies with) and women who like "girly" things (Lavender Brown deserved better.)

at this point, so much of pop culture is steeped in these antisemitic things (tropes, imagery, caricatures, etc.) and a lot of fantasy lore in some areas is just antisemitic to its core so while I’m angry I have to sift through the distressing nonsense, I try not to get angry at people who genuinely don’t understand. because you can spread antisemitism while not being an antisemite. the entirety of the witch aesthetic is stolen and twisted from jewish caricatures, antisemitic history, and practices appropriated from indigenous cultures - but that’s just The Witch now. same with goblins. that’s just what That Thing is to people now, so if you want to stop it, you have to throw the whole thing away and barely anyone is actually willing to do that. on top of that, they believe they don’t have to.

with HP specifically, I don’t blame anyone for not picking up on the bigotry from the books they read as children. now, if you reread it as an adult and still don’t get it, that’s another issue. but at least with the antisemitism, it’s much more obvious with the movies and a lot of people try to excuse JKR from it bc of that, when she had such a heavy hand in making those films. she had/has enough sway to change literally anything. and I think a lot of people understood the antisemitism more when they could see just what these goblins were supposed to look like, and that brought it all together. however, there are people obsessed with goblins (I think there’s a lot of neurodivergent people who have a special interest in goblins for one reason or another and that makes it more difficult to let go, in my experience) who absolutely refuse to come to terms with the antisemitic nature of the creature to begin with, when it’s antisemitic originally AND in JKR’s interpretation. I never got into HP so I didn’t know about the goblins, having not seen the movies, and it was really easy to not interact with it once I did. I can genuinely understand how heartbreaking it is to find out something you love goes against what you believe in, bc for jews it’s just part of our lives. we find out creators of and the things we like are nazis or antisemitic every single day. moreso than usual as of late.

imo the racism and general bigotry of JKR should be more than enough for HP fans who claim to care about other people, but it’s hella odd that antisemitism is the sticking point for so many people. they’ll say they’re streaming the movies and playing the games and reading the books but but but they’re not giving money to JKR and therefore not supporting her transphobia and racism, but you mention her antisemitism and the fact that the HP game was just antisemitism the simulator and they immediately dismiss it. her bigotry is embedded in the work. it’s in the imagery of the franchise. hell, there’s a storyline where a villain is a villain bc he wanted to stop the holocaust. that speaks for itself, and should be enough for literal adults.

(on the It’s The Thing Now point, it’s happening with lizard people as well. everyone is calling themselves a goblin and making lizard people jokes and it’s just apart of the young people dialogue now. I could go on for hours but I think I made my point.)

#Asks #anonymoose #antisemitism #anti harry potter #anti hp #anti jkr #went on a rant oops

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hartenlust · 3 months

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reading gods worst article on tma (Narrating the (Queer) Gothic in the Podcast The Magnus Archives, Maria Juko) and its so bad that its funny. btw this got published in a book (Rethinking Gothic Transgressions of Gender and Sexuality, edited by sarah faber and kerstin-anja münderlein, 2024) and I can only assume the editors didn't listen to tma themselves because good lord what are these takes. come with me as I read this mess

strong start when it claims the entities seek to torture and destroy humanity. patently untrue. we know they have some sentience, but the focus on humanity does a disservice to gerry explicitly saying "you think people are so special its only our fear that counts?". also "destroy". how are you going to get fear if the entirety of humanity is destroyed. we know what the entities wanted (or at least what the web wanted) it is explicitly stated in mag 200. it says so right there so explicitly that I find it impressive if Juko missed it.

calls the beholding the antagonist? if you want to call Any fear the antagonist id go for the web, but even then, antagonist is not the role id ascribe to a lovecraftian entity

"with the podcast’s final season set in a world dominated by the Eye that Jon et al. ultimately overcome to save the world" / "The world comes to depend on [jonmartins] relationship, with the two of them becoming queer heroes." save the world??? heroes?

4. stupidly funny implications. interesting citation for georgie but that's not important right now. the point is the fight against evil and the reading alleging tma says being queer will get you Heroic Powers. Juko's forgetting about the queer characters that get Evil Powers (all of them. all of the powers are evil. that's the point.) did the archivist utilize ace and bi power when he became the lynchpin of the apocalypse and tortured strangers

5. "As a case in point, inclusivity starts at the level of casting: female police officer Basira Hussain is voiced by Frank Voss, who uses they/them pronouns." very true but idk. frank voss and jonny sims are just pals, ill allow Some implications from this but the author is using it to imply more intentional focus on inclusivity then I think jonny was doing

6. "First, the podcast’s main character, the asexual biromantic Jon, is bestowed with supernatural powers, challenging not just heterosexual but all sexual norms of society." BESTOWED? stop using the word bestowed here oh my God. he is not a superhero!! did Juko listen to the entirety of tma without any moral grayness happening here??? also ?? jons bestowed supernatural powers are in no way related to his asexuality & biromanticism??

7. christ. this isnt a bad tma take but it is reminding me why I wanted to quit my literature analysis bachelor

8. did jon utilize ace and bi power when he betrayed martin. did martin utilize gay power when he stabbed jon. jesus christ what do you mean humanity's salvation. the apocalypse isnt fixed at the end by the power of love.

9. i guess? if you felt like it? tma really isn't a queer narrative in my option but I guess?? you could read it like that. if you wanted to. I'm unsure if you should though because these people are deeply unwell

10. "And particularly in the first seasons, Jon and his colleagues often fail to control the evil entities, losing for example colleague Tim at the end of the second season, which leads to a rift between some of the Institute’s members" yeah because truly they were thriving before that. they were the bestest of friends before tim died. they all held hands and danced in circles

11. unsure how much longer i can take this. this isn't the X-Men

12. "[Jon] could be defined as an asexual biromantic who uses his love for Martin as a form of power to save the world." no he couldn't. next

13. "With this in mind, Jon’s exploration of the Archives becomes a metaphor for accepting his (a)sexuality." HUH. NO IT ISNT? jons asexuality isn't relevant narratively At All. go home.

14. for the love of god can anyone hear me. its so dark in here. were the beholding and jonah magnus asexuality allies when they helped jon become an avatar. the sentence after this calls jon the hero of the narrative again btw. patently untrue

15. "Only by accepting his power can Jon save the world." jon didn't save the world.

Juko discusses melanie & georgie but her takes on them are pretty normal and decent in my opinion. if anyone wants a pdf of this horror let me know & ill send it. I'm so annoyed I'm considering writing an email about this. btw it called jonmartin "enemies to lovers" trope and also said their relationship "starts heteronormative and changes to a more equal footing, whilst retaining heteronormative elements". about the gay couple.

to conclude: I don't know which podcast juko listened to about a heroic narrative about queer love that saves the world, but its not the magnus archives. did you know that the eye is an asexuality ally?

#op #tma #the magnus archives #long post #this was so bad.#tma spoilers

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lewisinho · 2 months

Note

as the anon that asked for the race list: thank you!

now this is totally up to you if you have the time to spend on this, but this is my first year watching the races, and while I've been doing some background research to get up to speed, there is still a lot i don't know. i trust your judgment so what are some races and/or f1 adjacent things i should look into? i'm going through your McLaren list and have watched the last 4 seasons of dts and the brawn documentary. are there any other books/ documentaries/ races (especially seb's) / old youtube videos that are lost in the void that i should also check out?

again no pressure and thank you!

no problem!

(and btw welcome to f1 and the world of watching some glorified hot wheels every other sunday 😁 it’s great!)

i completely get how daunting it can be as a new fan in the sport. when i was getting back into f1 it also took me some time to get back up to speed with everything, especially all the techy stuff; i honestly learned the most through just watching the races (old and new), bc you get to see all the strategies play out, the pit-stops, the overtakes etc. and the terminology just becomes much easier to understand through sheer exposure. there are also some really cool f1 data analysis blogs you might want to follow on twt/x if you want some more detailed tech analysis and graphs if you’re into that sort of thing: (x)

as for seb, oh there’s a whole arsenal of recs i have!

monza 2008, rise of torro rosso wunderkind; i presume you already know the lore with that one but ig you can never get tired of it.

abu dhabi 2010, world championship no.1 “du bist weltmeister!”

interlagos 2012, the infamous one. this one’s a rollercoaster, chaos everywhere and the manifestation of murphy’s law: anything that can go wrong, will go wrong. amidst a title battle against nando, seb was fighting the weather, bruno senna’s front wing, a damaged side-pod, no radio, and somehow managed to claim p6 to win the championship

malaysia 2013, multi-21 (iconique), he was faster, deal with it. 💅

singapore 2013, domination masterclass from quali to the race. (also just all of his singapore wins...lion of singapore and all that)

india 2013, title no.3 secured, changed tyres on lap 2 and came out p17, was third by only lap 13 and then won the race by nearly 30 seconds. it was also his sixth win in a row. he went on to win three more. speaks for itself. also this:

malaysia 2015, first win with ferrari, can't forget that one, also features sewis’ gay knee-touching on the podium.

germany 2019, CHAOS, in which merc got bewitched by the special livery curse 😅, with crashes, spins, 50-second long pit stops, and also features one of seb’s best drives from p20 -> p2

i also highly recommend watching Floz's fan-made docus on youtube about 'the silver war' (there are also docus for the 2014 and 2015 seasons) as well as the merc v ferrari (lewis vs seb) 2017 fight and 'fight for five' in 2018, they're so much better than dts and actually give a full run-down of what happened during the season, with all the action on-track, with interviews and providing all the context! it's so well-edited as well (you literally feel like you're watching a movie about all of the seasons) and they are just incredibly fun to watch.

in general, i love rewatching races from 2017/18 (literally my comfort seasons), personal favs include spain 2017 (strategy galore and lewis v seb), baku 2017 (for obv reasons), austin 2017; and basically the 2018 season in its entirety...

as for books, there are many driver autobiographies e.g. jb (he’s even got two lmao), mark webbah etc. but i think the best f1 book out there is adrian newey’s memoir ‘how to build a car’ if you want lore + great insight into cars!

i’d also recommend watching some older races (i could do a separate post on which ones are my personal favs) but it’s all up to you in the end! go digging, look around on yt for some highlights and just keep exploring! 🫶💜

#hope this helps!!#sebastian vettel #asks #anon

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about-faces · 10 months

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Hi, I want to read some DC comics about how Harvey transformed from former DA to the criminal mastermind who ruled half of Gotham's Underworld (against the Penguin). I've already read/seen: Two-Face: A Celebration of 75 Years Batman: The Long Halloween Batman: Dark Victory (1999) Batman '89 Batman: The Animated Series Batman: The Audio Adventures

Any other reading recommendations? Thanks a lot for your help. :)

So you're looking for origin stories, or at least ones that shed more light on Two-Face's origin? Well first off, I'm glad you read the 75th Anniversary collection, because that has three of my very favorites: the original Harvey Kent trilogy from 1942-43, the Grace Dent story from Secret Origins Special (1989), and "Eye of the Beholder" from Batman Annual #14 (1990).

Besides those, and the ones you've listed, here are a few others to check out. Some are great, some are mixed bags, and some are downright lousy.

First and foremost, I STRONGLY recommend the 1989 Batman newspaper comic strip, which I loved so much that I posted the whole two-year saga on its own tumblr account. You can start from the very beginning right here, but keep in mind that Harvey's storyline--which runs all the way to the very last strip--doesn't really start until the second arc.

Next, Batman: Dual to the Death by Geary Gravel is a YA novelization of the BTAS origin, seamlessly combined with the two-part Batgirl origin episodes. It improves on both the animated versions in small but crucial ways, and it's highly recommended for BTAS fans. Unfortunately, it's pretty hard to find.

On a similar note, Peter David's movie novelization of Batman Forever can be found more easily, either in used book form or on the Internet Archive, and it's absolutely worth reading. I love the movie of Batman Forever, but it's objectively a terrible take on Harvey. The novelization adds SO MUCH, including an original prequel scene with D.A. Harvey Dent, and his ending is far more satisfying.

Cartoon Network's CGI animated series Beware the Batman (2013) also features a series-long origin arc for Harvey Dent, but it's one of the worst takes I've ever seen on the character. He's a petty, selfish, ambitious little prick, an absolute scumbag, completely devoid of depth or tragedy. Thankfully, few have seen this arc, since the majority of Harvey's episodes were never aired after the series was cancelled, but they're all available to watch for those morbidly curious to see just how badly someone can screw up Harvey as a character.

"The Big Burn" from Batman and Robin, vol 2 #24-28 (2014), also collected in B&R volume 5. After the huge DC reboot, this was Harvey new origin, which tried some very different things with him. A VERY mixed bag, but one that ended in a hugely exciting way that makes the whole thing worth reading. Follow it up with its sequel, "Ugly Heart," from Detective Comics #1020-1024, collected in Detective Comics Vol 5: Joker War.

Finally, watch the entirety of the recently-released/cancelled CW series Gotham Knights, with Misha Collins performing a surprisingly rich, interesting, and flawed Harvey Dent origin arc. The show got a lot of shit, some of it undeserved, but Collins' Harvey was an intriguing surprise, and I fear nothing we see from Harvey in any Reevesverse media will bring half as much care and interest to Harvey as GK did, for better or worse. All 13 episodes can be watched for free on CW Seed, region permitting.

EDIT: Oh right also the Telltale Batman video game! I haven't actually played that yet because I know enough about what happens and the illusion of meaningful choice indicative of Telltale games that I just don't feel like putting myself through that. People seem to like it a lot, though! I just... don't put me in a position of choosing to save either Harvey or Selina if you're just going to cheat and have him go evil anyway.

#ask hefner #harvey dent #twoface #two face #two-face #dc comics

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sebsxphia · 3 months

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Sebbie my sweet, I've been organizing my book collection and making note of books I'd love to add (I think when I move to Montana, I'm gonna need to build a barn to house them all at this point, lol) and I came across a series I could totally see Rhett giving to Amy as an Easter gift.

One year, you and Rhett decide to pop by a vintage bookstore downtown because you and him can never have enough books in the book barn, and while you were poking around the childrens' section, you managed to find the "Brambly Hedge" series by Jill Barkelm (If you love the Peter Rabbit stories, you'll definitely love these books) and almost right then and there, you guys know instantly that she'll love them.

Amy wakes up on Easter morning and finds the books nested in the corner with her little basket full of candy. She's so excited to read them and eager to be read to that you and Rhett just can't refuse. The weather is warm enough for you all to be able to go outside so you and Rhett decide to lay out the old picnic blanket under his grandparents' special tree. You read the first book in its entirety to Amy before Cecelia is calling you both in for dinner and begin the second one before she goes to bed.

Sebbie, I saw this book series and immediately thought of you. If ever I'm able to build the barn for all the books, I'll be sure to let you borrow it whenever you wish (lol).

AAAAAH, MY LOVE! LEMME TELL YOU SOMETHING! LEMME TELL YOU SOMETHING! 🥹🤭 i ADORED this series as a kid! i had the entire collection of the brambly hedge books! unfortunately however, they have since been lost :( i’m absolutely gutted, but i’ve been thinking of buying them again! they go soooooo nicely with my peter rabbit collection 🥹

i’m giggling and kicking my feet so hard that you thought of me my love! you know me so well! 🥹🫶🏻 and yes, paired with rhett, that is the absolute dream to read them with him 🥹 thank you so much for this sweet thought my love! 💌

#💌you’ve got mail #auroralightsthesky <33 #💐 these are for you!!#rhett abbott

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notmuchtoconceal · 6 months

Text

The wind rolled over the sea, dragging the sea against the land. In mountain mists rose the mudflats to the cliffside, where all around was the grey of probability, for the murk of that sea obscured all which glittered from the ripples of its surface, silken as the translucence of a spiderweb through a beam faint in the dark. The seas which roared, their many miles below framed by the oak contouring of these jagged rocks, the attic window of a home through which you no longer looked.

Cpt. Schreibermachen -- your brother Joseph, who we knew as Joey -- craned the axal column of his vertebrae the full facsimile of a three-sixty degree turn which the stabilities of his anatomy would allow -- craning the long and exquisitely tense musculature of his neck, inviting what tuggings they would allow to what sparse growth sprouted there -- some scraggling and beckoning from the spots and scabs which shone as gold veining the granite jetsam of a cavewall -- staring up into the winding cloudwell which was as a sea itself pouring out. A sea itself pouring out and around, peering through the looming densities, always peering where the sun still blistered brightest, for it bleached and acidified all which it could only relentlessly and unendurably hammer upon.

-- It's here, it's here!

Joey bellowed ahead. Brux screeched from behind.

-- Why, why, why? Why would it be here, Joey? It confounds all matter of public record and therefore common-sense, that it should be here! You are a lunatic! You are excitable, irritable, and contemptuous of the facts before you and all around you! You slumber lazily in a silence which is deafening for it is tragic, that your bountiful young intellect, all your talents and potential, should be squandered on such hysterical and meaningless fancies! My poor brother! My poor Joey! Nobody can help you! You're lost and alone in this world, with adversaries all around and no safe haven to shelter you! For who you are and what you are able, you have been marked -- doomed to wander, now and forever, spurned by all you may help and all who may help you! My poor brother! My poor Joey! Why don't you ever call? We used to be so close? Would you like to talk about it? You know you'll always be my special lil guy, Joey...

From the first of the free asymmetrical zippers on his uniform jacket -- the clanging color and metal latticework which composed a public garden of pins, medals, ribbons & cokecaps blushing lushly from his lapel -- he propelled with great rapidity a violet cloak of embossed and threaded fleur di lys glittering in spun gold, and with it obscured the chatter.

-- Continue to ignore him at all costs! My revelations were revealed to me verily in a session late first this morning before last, then early this evening before this! My unconventional methods -- the methods of which remain still too unconventional to explain this present moment, and perhaps still too many future ones at length! -- was arrived upon for my frustrations with the hole always cleaved away by the cookie-cutter upon the sheet left me at last a ball of dough which was in its sum now entirety the residuals of the previous frames off which the gingerbread men did march ;-- bunched up and rerolled anew, until there was only one but none! I was odds and sods, an oddity out committing sodomy and I wondered truly if I was as inverse as it was said, feeling this emptiness so persistently, for I knew once what spectacular shines burst forth within!

Brux was shouting. Shouting into the roaring wind.

-- The more I talk over him, the more his scrawny lil book boy spinal nerves open to new possibility and influence will be confounded and disrupted --forced to talk in my same dilating and contracting rhythms, so all he attempts to exposit becomes as me; a yawning void, suffocating and expanding, crushing you inward, stupidly and glassily, as the puckering lips of a depthless carnival hare more orange'n gold!

Brux was shouting. Shouting as he rolled his cloak across the mud.

-- They were revealed to me in a moment of meditation come trance come transcendent ecstasy as I lay pressed once more grinding against my brother in the dark night of our shared compartment, where I longed only to be one and deathless with him eternally ;-- knowing myself as I could never be! Torn from the wrong side-in, always back out!

Cpt. Drottin strode forward. On his head, the marble idol flecked with streamers of freshly-oiled copper wire, the anemone-eyes of a harness and visor distended from the notched circuitry of its flexors.

-- Bro, I can't see shit with this shit on, bro.

To the sun, his eyes were pressed. To the horizons, his fingers reached, and some distant ether mist rose to take him in hand. His feet, firm and pressed against the ground, felt in the sutures of their bones what currents flowed beneath the earth, and from his love-nut -- tight, swollen, puckering as his balls still fat and swollen with the seawalls he held back ; uncummed, uneaten, the fire in his guts and balls ;-- eyes alit with leaky cock, hungering for potentials unearthly and obscure.

-- All of this I know. No dissent may take into account what I know, when it refuses to see, refuses to hear -- it is not good-faith criticism to call me a lunatic not for what I believe, but only for I can no longer believe not even in you, but what you think you need to obscure yourself!

From Brux's lips emanated forth raspberries as he leapt into the protracted and violent syncopations of the worm.

-- You're approaching JRPG text-dump levels of unnecessary verbiage, Joey! I have no emotional connection to anything you say, for nobody talks like that, nobody thinks like that, nobody really thinks two dickless nerd boys getting it on (not offense to my good friend, Cpt. Drottin. I would gladly rub my dick bulge against yours were it not already too excruciatingly tender to merely hold your hand. Though I confess also ... I see not the need to work up the strength to perform an action which I have fundamental contempt for, and I (full-disclosure) sometimes worry about you. Nevertheless, I hope impromptu public confessions are something you can live with, and like... things don't have to get too weird between us, for you remain my brother and my heart's most secretive longing and any dream of a life without you is but living death) ... but um, no. Dickless nerd boys can rub their cute lil bumps together anytime, Joey! That's why boys being into other boys is for losers! That's why you deserve a wedgie! Fuck pussy, loser! Pussy, pussy, pussy! You talk too much! You're the annoying one! You're overplayed and nobody likes you!

The salt breeze through his hair, Cpt. Psychorrhax allowed his heart to flutter. The weight upon his chest poured fourth its waters as a goblet overflowing and all throughout the channels of him came the calm which rendered as a warm mist the ice which clotted in his veins.

An elbow to his brothers shoulder -- the limitations of the framing did not reveal the cube on which he stood to gain elevation.

-- He grows more enchanting by the day, Cpt. Schreibermachen.

He looked upon Cpt. Haruspex, and found him magnificent.

Joey looked away -- rightfully, manfully -- at more important things.

-- Well, he'll always be all around. Let's never be tempted not to take him for granted. Smack me and remind me what I'm supposed to be doing. Now that you're here with me, I can admit my cognitive faculties have abruptly halted for you are literally holding my hand.

Their fingers encoiled in the other's. The serpent encoiled their wrists.

-- Your buddy Cpt. Drottin lit a fire in the many fine herbs and splinters I've let line the nests of your aviary, and now through the smoke, you see the signals, rising pitiless off the shouldering earth. Why would you ever feel guilt that you humiliate yourself so shamelessly with that idiot when the man you love is a verifiable beast-tamer fit to open a zoo?

It came first upside the head, then down against the jaw.

-- Man I love. Remind me of evident truths with no need of evidence. I trust in you, now and always. Not once have you done me wrong.

Laika met Joey's eyes.

In them, Joey saw no cause for contradiction.

Joey met Laika's eyes.

Through them, Laika endured. Now and always.

-- You believe for real, Joe?

-- I'll make a believer of you, Laik.

-- I believe in you.

-- I believe in you and me.

They drew closer. Their dicks squirmed in their breachers. Proximate. Needful, yet mindful. In perfect synchronization, now with their hearts.

-- It must be now!

As Joey enunciated -- Brux squawked as a rum-beaten parrot.

-- MUST BE NOW MUST BE NOW ! ! !

Cpt. Hlaford strode forth from the mist, weightless and illusory, though a man of heft he remained, and his palm quite persuasive when deployed.

From his body -- every inch of his heaving muscular pec shelf and abdominal ridges and horselike distended glutes rippling in the sheer linen which clung to his scrubbed and wood-oiled body, gleaming as bronze where the heavier canvas obscured naught but woodlands gone sparse, stitched with gold and of a more natural cream clinging only to depths and seams of his body, drawing eyes by conspiracies stitched into the weave towards things he let dangle, things he let reveal by omission.

To him, Joey fell. To him, Joey looked up.

-- Brother, for I am unclean, and may not be clean at this time, I will endure your chastisement and your chastisement alone, for this is the penance I bare in lieu of the purification I cannot yet truly make!

Wally snorted. What assailed forth from his lips smacked Brother Joey across the face phlegmy and inevitable as the cloudburst of a storm which battered at a dingy ill-stocked at sea, remaining upright only for it wobbled as a top in perpetual motion, knowing only its awkwardness alone with the intricacy well enough to keep itself spinning upright. -- Good enough for me, Joe. What matters is ya got outta bed this mornin and yer makin somethin meaningful of your day by fuckin tryin fer more than once. It don't gotta be perfect. Just show up. Make the effort. Learn what differences lie between an apology and an excuse; what marks a timesink from a sacrifice. Tell me what you have made of yourself, Joe. Tell me what you will make of these coming years. - I am scraps of many things, discarded and piled, and though my choices appear arbitrary, I see in them the pieces of a thing they never were in themselves, but collectively may reveal something of what once was, and though what that may may never be again, I see in these shapes the beams of the scaffolding we may erect to raise ourselves once more high as the golden and glittering frescos which bedazzled our eyes! To us all, we are the inheritors... To those who understand, it will be given, for we make available to all what only... finer eyes have sight to see.

Wally breathed the salt air. In his lungs, it lined like crystal mist.

Behind him, stood men six in number, as his number was six, and six was the sum of three multiplied by two, and the addition of three to itself.

As you have said, so it will be so.

Joey knelt to him. By the roots of his hair, he gripped. The water would come first over his eyes, not from his eyes, though in time they too would flow -- for forth from his urn, the water flowed ice and lemon.

Behind him, his men too stood six in number, for his number was three multiplied against itself was nine, subtracted by itself was six, in keeping with the specific dictate of the requirement that each guardian should have present no less than six and no more than eight men, to keep within what he surmised to himself to be the equivalence of a frequency range.

-- As you have given, so I will now be begotten.

They opened their books and rounded their mouths, Joey's men -- they who were not his duplicates, for when you peered at them with the probing discrimination necessary to parse their overflowing Germanic spirit, you could see all the ways -- in which they were not precise replicas, but some were mirrored inversely, some perfectly, one or two visibly malformed and dragging either one foot or the other.

Far from what I have given, you will inevitably now become.

Cpt. Hlaford's men -- their genitals sectioned off by the underside of a felt harness which flared as a cross to compose the bulk of their garments, left only their sturdy and wool-coated legs freely flowing with the clingy taffeta-chintz spun to ribbons and rose petals of metal and pin -- rose strings within the gildings of their frames, for as they held, thee bones of their fingers were one and welded in oscillation to the structure of the handles of their harps, and all which whistled was silver in their jaws.

Whistle while I work.

Cpt. Psychorrhax spun to face the assembly. His numbered numbered eight for that was four and four and four multiplied by itself and divided back into itself would beget once more itself, and so here he found himself halved within the dictates of maximum allotted allowance.

The spheres aligned. The music came.

As their voices rose, fingers wrung down to pluck the strings.

[mancandy cane my ass the sequential ;-- a quartet of slavs]

Brother Jacek stood facing them.

His eyeline yielded to no one and nothing.

Before him, his men stood eight in number, for eight was the addition of three to five, for five was his number and Laika's was four, which was three with the addition of one, or two with one taken away from three.

Cpt. Psychorrhax's men stood tall in taller hats, meeting Brother Jacek's eyes, and they who came with Jacek threw to one another the bejewel'd handles of broadswords and pressed them to the earth. By hand and half, the cruciforms rose in bloom. Dawnlight strode around them despite the grey of the day and the salt of the sea, for the suns shone off their blades and an array of them they would make as their ankles hopped between the blades ;-- not one point, nor edge ever drawing blood.

I>O>

I. O.

I? O!

I< O<

As pillars of fire, their chants roared forth from their throats. Below the earth, Joey cast his sight.

Look to me, Laika. He said without saying, I will show you once.

Above the sky, Joey rose his awareness.

When he looked and thought, there was the sun -- at some arbitrary point and place; a point only seeming arbitrary for they knew not what he knew now, and to say so would be to say too much, for it was not enough to say things that could not be said when they could be more easily shown; easy sometimes necessitating the manufacture of miracles, tawdry things they are that have words to describe them!

Joey's dick squirmed. The fire roared between his bulge.

Laika pressed his back to Joey.

Joey's men pressed themselves to one another.

A chorus-line mid-collision. Their packages ground into their brothers. Their brothers moaned without relent, stupid for they had been surrendered and were now giving of themselves their sight.

Jacek, by his left and by his right, lifted two coils of wire.

Jacek's men, by the bands of their hammers, beat their blades into the earth :-- drove them deep that any stray light of studs or their handles -- would draw not down the malign influence of her grace.

Jacek, around his neck, hung a chain of iron.

Jacek's men, spinning with swords in hand --

stopping at the edge of their brother's arteries,

drawing still by blade-light to trachea,

plunge themselves in pledge

to recite the vows they themselves make real

by the precision of their moment of utterance.

Jacek, in his left he clutched a coil of silver.

In his right, he clutched a coil of gold.

His men, pressing their prostates to the handles of their swords.

Jacek pressed the coils, cross-axial, to his nips.

Joey pressed to Laika. Laika pressed to Joey.

Their eyes met. What secrecies they knew broiled and conjoined and what they remembered only were the tenderensses which drew them once together, for their's were oppositions to which they mutually drove themselves away, not daring to look, not daring to dream -- of they knew all along was the grandeur to which they were well-entitled.

-- I don't understand. I don't think... I need to.

Laika looked to him.

Laika had no words.

The words would never come.

Not if you gave him a million years.

The words would never come.

His teeth grit. His brow quivered. Beneath his leathers, he stewed in a broil of his own making, he needing always excuse to be roasted alive.

Couldn't think. Only focus.

Dick was so hard.

By his eyes, Joey saw the fields.

By his vision, Joey knew the forms.

The earth did not tremble.

Around it, the air was alive with remembrance.

Laika pressed to Joey. Joey gripped Laika and choked.

Beating. Beading.

Churning. Chewing.

Laika remembered. Laika remembered.

Laika remembered.

The earth bore neither pinecones, nor rolling wheat, but stones. The barren earth yielded only its own desolation. The earth bore not plenty, for the earth was beaten and polluted. The earth knew not beauty for she was scarred and dead, crusted inside with the tar of life.

What sprouted was only rubble, only roots in some dead brush, choking some dead facade as his brother's treacherous fingers grasped along his trachea which the ease at which they caressed him, by chin and behind the ear(th), inviting sweetness and protection to contrast that sociopathy he made so exquisite, so charming with his smile.

None by him could bloom. None but him could water. What he brought forth was only death, as you brought forth only plagues, and all who cowered before you were puppets and corpses, fit to be harnessed by strings and fate, cuffed and muzzled as spotty bandits and mutts.

For from his bag, Cpt. Haruspex at last flung himself free, and with a great wind cursed the horizon he saw now shifting; saw with his own eyes growing vast in their breakages the cleaving from the earth as though the first panes of a fractal beginning to unfurl.

-- I bury you forever, Joey! You and all your works! You ...

His eyes went wide in wandering.

The perspective approached him, and he could begin to piece together -- by what he saw, and what he knew --the truth of what now lay before him, and it mattered not -- the matter of public record, which was his comfort and his cudgel, was doomed now to be revealed as naught but fuel for the fire, idle driftwood it was to flank us from the splendid reality we could see by our own eyes how we now and always lived!

For from this rubble, he could see the shape of cornices, the shape of spires, the fortifications of roofing, the symmetry of archways, all those things which spoke not only to the manmade, but the formal categories of the greatest of that last great pretension -- civilization itself.

-- Though it was written in the scriptures, the last great Laurentian plate was demolished at the time of its reinstallation, how can I not help but see -- my voice remaining now with me -- An Apple Lodging to the east, and those umbering Stallones to the west? This land -- tell it like it was ours! Tell me you won't take it from me. Take her from me again?

Rising, the walls revealed themselves.

On them, the frescoes stood.

Joey pulled forth as he saw. By the stylings he traced their shape from the mold of obscurity and dredged them one step closer to his eyes.

-- It's here, its here! A treasure all around and beneath our feet!

FIVE INLAND SEAS RIGHT HERE OUT FRONT

The wind roared. Around them, hurricane beatings of beneficence blew forth abundance no falsity could desecrate, for this was the truth, the last of all great truths, and through them would Joey right the world.

-- No exaggerations could ruin this day, oh this blessed day! It was true, it was true! It was here, it was here! Oh, this blessed day, it's ours! Before him, it rose. Before him, it stood.

Before it, he bowed, and the marshlands he kissed.

-- As a sire's armpit, I savor. I savor you as only the finest, I would!

To the setting sun, now brass in the falling sky, he kissed the earth where it met those walls, and by them he too stood upright.

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sillybouquetsoul · 1 year

Text

Cloud Castles - Chapter 4

Chapter 4: Ballroom Dancing (ao3 link)

Rating: Teen

Word count: 5k

Pairing: Aisha/Sein

Story summary: They dance just out of each other’s reach, but each time brings them closer together.

Aisha and Sein navigate through the dark fairy tale of their own making, one encounter at a time.

Chapter summary: Aisha attends her first ball for her birthday.

Ever since their disastrous 14th birthday party, Sylvia has given up on the twins’ birthday celebrations entirely in the following years. Whatever part of her that wanted to keep up false pretenses was gone the moment she raised her hand on Aisha, and whatever imaginary bridge between her and the twins had burned down since then.

Aisha has no birthday expectations anymore. She and Aida won’t consume desserts that come from Sylvia directly. And Sylvia can’t be bothered to purchase gifts for them.

The closest thing to a gift that she receives on her birthday is a handwritten note from her fairytale friend. She’s been receiving these notes in the past three years. They’re just words on paper, messily written and simple in nature, but they hold more thought and effort than anyone cared to show towards her since Sylvia entered her life.

So on the morning of October 25th, she goes to the library as she usually does. The servants she passes on the way there don’t spare her a second glance—they probably don’t know, and don’t care that it’s her birthday today. Which is fine with Aisha; birthdays stopped feeling special to her since her father died.

But the prospect of reading the birthday note from her fairytale friend does make this day slightly more bearable. When she wished Aida ‘happy birthday’ earlier, her older twin didn’t respond. She only turned in her bed, facing the wall.

Aida always misses their father most on their birthday. Aisha makes a mental note to smuggle some pastries out of the kitchen before dinner time. Hopefully it will help cheer Aida up.

How sad that she must resort to such measures just to survive. It’s all because of Sylvia. Hopefully the next few birthdays will come sooner, so that she and Aida can collect their inheritance and escape out of Sylvia’s thumb.

She finds a new slip of paper in the fairytale book. It doesn’t take long for her to skim through its entirety:

Happy birthday. Time flies by so quickly, and now you’ve reached adulthood.

One day, I will find the opportunity to celebrate this special day with you.

Until that day comes, I hope you have a wonderful day.

If I’m lucky enough to see you today, I’ll be sure to wish you in person as well.

She rereads the note a few times, briefly puzzling over the writer—but never able to reach a conclusive answer—before folding it into a small square. She’ll keep this note with the others.

A few hours later, a maid’s voice draws Aisha out of her book.

“Lady Aisha, I beg your pardon for the interruption, but Madam Sylvia has asked me to relay a message to you.”

At the mention of her stepmother, Aisha’s lips curl downwards in reflex. “What is it?”

The maid bows her head. “Madam Sylvia would like to inform you that she’s hosting a ball at the manor tonight, in honor of you and Lady Aida’s 18th birthday. According to the madam, both of your attendance is required.”

Before Aisha can speak, the maid rushes in to add, “And Madam Sylvia says that if you don’t attend, then she will cut your allowance.”

That conniving bitch.

Thankfully, her voice comes out neutral, betraying none of the rage and hatred swelling to astronomical heights inside her. “Thank you for letting me know. Please tell Madam Sylvia that Aida and I… shall attend.”

The maid bows again and hurries off.

Aisha sets the book down and rubs her temples. Aida is highly amenable and loves socializing, so she won’t have issues convincing her older sister to attend.

But the nerve of Sylvia. How dare she plan for this ball without consulting her and Aida first? Who else is invited to attend? How much money is Sylvia throwing away for this unnecessary expense? There’s undoubtedly going to be multiple-course meals, dessert, drinks, and not to mention musicians. The list of expenses are endless whenever Sylvia is concerned. Budgeting is a foreign concept to her.

Threatening to cut off their allowance if they don’t attend—that angers Aisha most. She may be turning 18, but she’s not of age to claim her inheritance yet. As her legal guardian, Sylvia can still intervene in her financial matters. And Aisha can do nothing about it until she’s of age.

So she’s left with no choice but to attend this ball. As much as she detests mingling with strangers, both she and Aida need to make an appearance, especially since it’s being held for their birthday—regardless whether they consented to it.

Aisha’s wallflower strategy for the ball is simple; if she doesn’t stand out, then she’ll be ignored.

However, Aida is adamant on dressing her to get noticed; not the kind of dress that warranted a subtle, second glance, but the kind that invited a lingering gaze.

“Absolutely not.”

Aisha flings the dress that Aida threw at her onto the bed. Even though they’ve stopped sharing clothes for years, she’s well acquainted with her sister’s preference for bold and revealing dresses. Whatever Aida finds in her messy wardrobe won’t suit Aisha.

“Come on, Aisha. It’s our birthday. Girls should wear beautiful dresses on their birthdays.” Aida says beseechingly, head still buried halfway into her wardrobe as she pulls dress after dress onto her bed. “Don’t you want to impress the guests? Show them how pretty you are?”

“But that just proves to Sylvia that we’re willingly abiding by her plan. I’m not happy to attend a last-minute ball, and I certainly don’t want to give any indication that I’m enjoying it, because I know I won’t.”

“Oh, sister. I’m older than you by a few minutes, and yet you sounded more bitter and jaded than our stepmother just now. Must you be so glum? Why don’t you let those feelings go for tonight, and see where the evening takes you? Perhaps you’ll find a nice gentleman to dance with. Wouldn’t that be wonderful?” Aida pulls another dress out and poses before the mirror.

Aisha watches Aida fit the dress over her body. It’s a dusky pink gown with a scooping heart-shaped bodice. The hem and sleeves of the dress are excessively frilled, to the point of seeming girlish rather than womanly. Aida removes her current dress to try it on.

Never mind. Despite the frills and pastel color, she exudes an air of maturity—the fabric hugs her curves like a second skin. If anyone had reservations about her age, the gown eliminates all doubt.

“That looks good on you.” Aisha says, because Aida always deserves compliments—and not the kind from Carlo, who’s too boisterous and impulsive for his compliments to hold genuine weight.

Aida hums agreeably, spinning around to see the gown from all angles. The skirt flares as she spins, the tiny jewels at the hem catching the afternoon sun. If Cinderella exists, then Aida is her real-life equivalent.

After a few moments, the older twin beams. “Alright, I like this one too. I’ll wear this to the ball then! Oh, maybe I’ll catch Sein’s attention this time! But now,” her eyes meet Aisha’s through the mirror, smug and knowing. “We need to pick a dress for you.”

Aisha holds up a hand. “No need. I don’t want to look good.”

“Aisha!” Aida exclaims in disapproval. “Don’t say things like that. Do you want to end up a spinster?”

She shrugs. The life of a spinster sounds more appealing than having men gaze upon her with lust. “We’re not attending the ball to meet people. It’s Sylvia’s way to assert power over us. Do you really think she’d invite people who will readily befriend us?”

“Well, I believe the best way to handle this is through grace, not by… refusing to dress properly and scowling for the entire time,” Aida sits beside Aisha, folding their hands together. “We’ll prove to Sylvia that we can enjoy ourselves, in spite of the circumstances. She can’t deprive us happiness unless we let her.”

Aisha purses her lips as Aida’s words sink in. It’s rare that her vivacious sister displays such insight, even if she knows that Aida is far from stupid. And Aida does make a compelling argument, when she listens to her mind over her heart.

Except…

“I don’t like people, nor do I like dancing. I won’t enjoy myself at this ball anyway.” Aisha complains.

A bright peal of laughter escapes Aida.

“No wallowing allowed—that’s my job. Remember that it’s our birthday, and smile. Now come, let’s find a gown for you.”

Neither of them leave their room until it’s almost time for the ball. Finding a gown for Aisha that they both agreed on ends up taking a few hours: an exhausting back-and-forth process where Aida gives Aisha a gown, only for Aisha to reject each one. Their taste in dress styles and colors are total opposites, so they never seem to reach a consensus.

Finally, they settle on a compromise. Aisha would wear a white gown—one of the few whites that Aida owns—but cover her exposed shoulders and cleavage with her own shawl. When Aida suggests accessories, Aisha reluctantly accepts a pair of sapphire earrings since she doesn’t own jewelry herself.

“You’re like a fairy godmother.” She comments offhandedly, putting the earrings on.

“What’s a fairy godmother?”

Earrings in place, Aisha moves on to choose a set of gloves. “Someone who uses magic to make girls pretty for balls. Although, you’re definitely doing this against my will.”

“Do fairy godmothers get to dress up and attend balls?”

“Not usually.”

“Oh. How boring. They should enjoy themselves too.” Aida muses, patting rouge onto her cheeks. “It doesn’t matter. I’ll be the most beautiful fairy godmother at the ball.”

Ultimately, Carlo is the one who comes to their door. The door knob rattles as he tries to open it, but luckily Aisha had locked their door while they were changing.

Soon after, they hear three loud thumps against the door, followed by an insistent, “Aida? Are you in there? The ball is about to start, let’s go!”

Aisha catches Aida’s eye and shakes her head. Aida only smiles, unfazed by—or perhaps accustomed to—Carlo’s pushy demeanor. She checks the mirror one last time, and then she joins Aisha by the door. The scent of roses wafts into Aisha’s senses, thick and intense at this proximity.

Aida had found a rose-scented perfume bottle which once belonged to their mother. She may have applied too much at once, but it’s not like Aisha can tell her to remove it now.

Overpowering floral scents make Aisha dizzy, so she opted for an aromatic scent. She’d washed with regular soap and water, and applied drops of clove-scented perfume. It was pleasant and understated; but most importantly, least likely to attract attention.

Aida slides her bare arm through Aisha’s gloved one. “Shall we?”

She resembles a lush rose, with the pink rouge staining her cheeks, the blood red rouge on her lips, and the gown. Standing beside Aida, Aisha felt plain and young. No one could possibly tell that they were identical twins tonight.

Her sister can take the spotlight. Aisha is perfectly content to remain a wallflower.

“Aida!” Carlo cries out gleefully the moment the door opens, lurching towards them.

Aisha gives him a scathing look as he places an arm around Aida’s exposed shoulder. But of course, with Aida around, Carlo is blind to everything else. He doesn’t acknowledge Aisha, already tugging Aida to walk with him, filling the air with enthusiastic chatter.

George Duncan receives them at the ballroom entrance. Beyond the entryway, voices and laughter float in the air, increasing in volume and intensity as they approach the entryway.

“Good evening to you all. Lady Aisha and Lady Aida, I wish you both a happy birthday.” George says with a shallow bow.

“Thank you kindly, George.” Aida greets back warmly. “We’re not late, are we?”

“Not to worry. You’re right on time. Madam Sylvia is expecting you inside.”

After giving each twin an ivory dance card, he motions them forward.

Carlo frowns as Aida slips the dance card around her wrist. “You should only dance with me.”

“I’m expected to mingle with other guests too, Carlo. But I’ll pencil you in for a quadrille. How does that sound? If you can keep up, I might be persuaded to dance with you for longer.”

The halfhearted promise successfully pacifies Carlo, his face lighting up with hope and determination. “I’ll be your best dance partner of the night. Watch me.”

“Whatever you say.” Aida has lost interest in Carlo; she cranes her neck to look into the ballroom.

Behind them, Aisha is faintly aware that this is the last chance to change her mind. As Aida and Carlo descend the stairs together, she hears applause in their wake—probably Sylvia’s doing. But Aisha is alone, lacking a companion to hold onto. She hesitates at the top of the stairs, high enough to see people mingling together in various groups. Entering the fray herself, under the watchful eyes of strangers, suddenly seems daunting.

Perhaps she should go back to their bedroom. This isn’t something she can handle, especially for her first ever ball. She feels like a fish out of water. Her dance card hangs heavy in her hand.

“Lady Aisha, are you alright?” George’s voice interrupts her scattered thoughts.

Aisha looks up, hoping that her rising distress isn’t obvious. She fumbles for an escape. “Actually, I don’t think I feel too well—”

“Good evening.” A third voice joins them.

Both she and George turn around, equally taken aback by Sein’s appearance.

He always appears with uncanny timing, neatly thwarting her attempt to escape.

George clears his throat, nodding at Sein without speaking. Later, Aisha will wonder about the butler’s uncharacteristically cold attitude towards Sein, not even sparing Sylvia’s second son a greeting like he did earlier. Sein, too, barely acknowledges George’s presence.

The dreadful prospect of walking into a room filled with strangers is her biggest distraction.

“Hello, Aisha.”

Sein’s eyes rake over her from head to toe. Aida might have taken offense, but Aisha is pleased that his eyes don’t linger anywhere. Thank goodness she kept the shawl on.

“You look wonderful. Happy birthday.”

“Thank you. You too.”

Sein wears an indigo tailcoat, which is parted to reveal a cream-colored vest and a pleated, white linen shirt underneath, the high collar secured by a brown cravat. A silver, star-shaped brooch is pinned on the lapel of his tailcoat, simple but elegant in design. The black trousers are perfectly tailored to his lower body, emphasizing his narrow hips and the muscle definition in his legs.

Compared to his evening wear, Sein doesn’t seem to have spent much effort taming his hair. Those unruly curls are styled the usual way, having grown long enough to almost conceal one eye.

He looks very good. No doubt he’ll draw eyes from all the eligible women in the ball.

Her desire to escape evaporates when he stands next to her and extends his elbow, a wordless request. She has no choice but to accept it, because the notion of running away in front of Sein deals more damage to her pride than the alternative.

“Is this your first ball?” Sein asks as they descend the stairs. If he’s bothered by her tightening grip on his bicep with each step, he doesn’t complain.

“Yes.” Aisha answers stonily, focusing on a distant point in the ballroom lest she makes eye contact with someone in the room.

“Do you know what to expect?”

“Of course I do. I’ve read about it.” After the maid informed her about Sylvia’s plan, she’d temporarily set aside Hamlet. Instead, she pored over books on ballroom etiquette, though she retained little, based on her anxious state of mind.

Sein laughs, soft enough for her to hear. “Right, I should have known.”

“If you have recommendations or suggestions on how to navigate through a ball without risk of ruining your reputation, I’d like to hear them.”

“It sounds like you already know more than me, to be honest. What more can I contribute to the subject?”

“There’s always more to learn.” Aisha insists, letting go of his arm once they reach the ground floor. Sein folds both hands behind his back, the corners of his lips lifting slightly.

“I suppose that’s true. Let’s see… Are you good at dancing?”

“I can dance, though I don’t necessarily enjoy it.”

“Alright. If you’d like to avoid socializing, then dancing is the best way to occupy yourself. Fill your dance card with names—which won’t be difficult for a lady of your standing—and dance the night away.”

Aisha bites her lip, anxiety swelling as she imagined numerous men approaching her to ask for a dance. Between exhausting herself mentally through socializing, and physically through dancing, she isn’t sure which is the lesser evil. Sein seems to believe in the latter.

However, dancing comes with conversations too; maybe not during jaunty and fast-paced dances like the quadrilles and polkas, but waltzing?

“This is new, seeing you so nervous.”

Sein’s astute observation wounds her ego. But how can she refute him when he’s right?

“I have your mother to thank for that. If her goal is to push my buttons, she’s been quite successful.” Aisha admits. If her real mother were still around, she wouldn’t face this predicament feeling woefully unprepared. Times like these remind her that Aida is the older sister, and with her gone, Aisha is stranded alone.

“I’d apologize on my mother’s behalf, but I sense that I’ll never stop once I start,” Sein says wryly, glancing around the room. “When in doubt, you can also follow Aida’s lead. She’s talking to a few gentlemen. She looks quite happy.”

“Aida is a special case. I’m more wary of strangers.”

“Believe me, I’m well aware of that.”

She fights against the urge to glare at him. In such a public setting, she has to control her expressions. “Please don’t let me keep you. I’m sure you’d like to make some new lady friends.”

Sein doesn’t respond immediately. He stares at the dancing card clenched in her fists for a few moments. Then, as though arriving at a decision, he straightens his posture.

“Are you tired of my company yet?”

“If you have something else to share, just say so.” Half-expecting him to comment on her ballroom etiquette and inadvertently wear on her nerves further, Aisha’s nowhere near ready for what he says next.

“May I put my name on your card for the first dance?”

“What?”

Sein repeats the request, but its meaning is still lost on her. “Family members are allowed to dance with each other,” he adds. “Aida probably has Carlo’s name on her card as well.”

Aisha fumes at his choice of words. “We’re not family.”

Because perceiving him as an older sibling is sickening. It would imply acceptance of him and his family, something that will never happen as long as Sylvia was alive, slowly but surely eating away at the Dimoche family’s wealth and reputation, a living parasite.

Her anger only deepens his amusement. “Then dancing with me shouldn’t be an issue. Just the first dance, and I’ll leave you alone for the rest of the night.”

Oh, how she yearns for the chance to throttle him. Or split his head open so that she can finally study his thoughts.

No one but Sein produces this infuriating effect of simultaneously aggravating and bewildering her. He seems so keen on dancing with her, but why? An errant glance around the room reveals that a number of young women are looking in their direction, though of course they’re interested in Sein, not her. They want his name on their dance cards. He doesn’t lack for choice, and yet he wants to dance with Aisha first.

All these years living under the same roof, and yet she’s learned little about Sein’s true character. She only knows that he doesn’t regret cutting her palm open, and that he won’t hesitate to do it again if she crosses the line again.

After all these years, Aisha knows better.

“Are you going to be violent if my answer doesn’t please you?”

Something flickers across Sein’s face, too fast to be identified. Once he catches onto the hidden question, he brandishes both hands. “What do you take me for? Do I seem so wretched to you?” There’s a bitterness to his light tone.

She takes a few more moments to decide. It takes less time to write down Sein’s name for the first dance.

By the time she realizes that the first dance is a waltz, it’s too late to erase Sein’s name from her dance card. The dance doesn’t start for another while, so Sein leaves her, looking far too pleased with himself. Just as Aisha predicted, he’s quickly swarmed by a group of women, their colorful finery clustering around his tall and dark figure.

Staying near the center of the room makes her uncomfortable, so Aisha takes refuge in the corner of the ballroom. It provides the best vantage point and hiding spot, where she can bide her time until it’s time to dance.

Finding Aida proves easy. Her silver hair is lustrous under the chandeliers, eye-catching from a distance. While Aisha has braided her hair into a high bun, Aida wears her hair loose so that it catches the light with each movement. Deliberate or not, her older sister possesses the innate talent to catch attention.

Carlo hovers around Aida, as usual. But the gentlemen surrounding Aida seem equally intent on putting their names onto Aida’s dance card. They’re unfazed by Carlo’s intimidating size and stature, too struck by Aida’s beauty to pay him much heed.

Aisha has to admire Carlo’s steadfast determination—his eyes don’t stray from Aida once. He may be annoying and intrusive, to the point of disrespecting Aida’s privacy, but he’s also loyal. Like a puppy. Aida’s own puppy.

It’s quite pathetic.

“Hello Miss Aisha.”

Nemo appears beside her. He looks ill at ease, which she surmises is due to his timid nature.

“Good evening, Nemo.” Aisha says politely. Nemo is probably the least annoying person now, compared to his older brothers. He hasn’t done anything to aggravate her in recent years, so there’s no reason for her to be hostile towards him.

Nemo doesn’t immediately answer as he follows Aisha’s line of sight.

“Miss Aida looks like she’s thoroughly enjoying herself.” He says in the hesitant tone that he’s never quite outgrown since boyhood.

Aisha watches how Aida throws her head back with laughter at something someone said. “She is, yes.”

“Can I ask why you’re not mingling?”

“Conversation topics among women my age are strictly limited to fashion and marriage prospects, neither of which pique my interest. On the other hand, conversing with men doesn’t allow me the freedom to express myself plainly, because they always expect women to be simpler creatures than we really are.”

Moreover, most of the men she knows are downright unpleasant company, and her experience gives her little faith in men outside of her small social circle. Aisha folds her gloved hands together.

“You may think I'm jaded, but I’d just rather not waste my time and energy on short-lived relationships.”

Nemo is silent for so long that Aisha wonders if she’s scared him off for good. To her surprise, he speaks up.

“So if you had to choose, you’d still prefer the company of women over men?”

“If I were forced to socialize, yes. But I’m also content to observe. I want to save my energy for dancing later.”

“Oh. Do you have dance partners already?”

“Just one. Sein insisted that I reserve the first dance with him.”

Nemo shifts his weight from one leg to the other. He suddenly seems nervous; well, more nervous than usual.

“I’d like to share a dance with you as well, if you’d have me.”

And isn’t that a surprising offer, especially coming from Nemo of all people. “I thought you’d like to dance with Aida?”

“I believe that Miss Aida is already spoken for. Carlo would also cause a scene if I were to approach her anyway. Mother says I should dance with at least ten women tonight… I think if I could dance with you first, then I’d build up the courage to ask other women later.”

So his ultimate goal is to please Sylvia. Her immediate response is to turn him down, but Aisha mulls over the offer.

Dancing with one Durant son is already ridiculous. Dancing with two of them feels excessive, a direct giveaway that Aisha lacks for dance partners beyond those in her circle—which, to be fair, she is lacking. Whatever will come next, Carlo to bluster into her corner and make an offer himself? If that’s the case, Aisha won’t hesitate to say no.

But this is Nemo, the quietest and often forgotten son. And yet, he still acts out of blind obedience towards Sylvia, as though his unkind mother will finally notice him if he can dance with ten women. Aisha doubts that Sylvia will notice, let alone be happy to see her own sons mingling with her stepdaughters.

She can understand why Sein offered; he finds great pleasure in aggravating her. However, Nemo still retains his innocence, despite surpassing Aisha in height and stature long ago. He hasn’t done wrong to her, but he hasn’t done her any right, either.

“Fine. I can dance with you,” Aisha allows, skimming over the dance card. “The first quadrille.” Because God forbid she waltzes with another man.

Nemo nods eagerly, his shoulders slumping as though a massive weight has been lifted.

“Yes, of course, that would be perfect. Thank you, Miss Aisha.”

Aisha sighs, carefully penciling in Nemo’s name onto her card. “I should thank you as well.”

“Actually… if you’d like, I can introduce a few of my acquaintances to you. I’m sure they would love to dance with you as well.”

That’s another surprise. She’s always assumed that he spends the majority of his days locked in the drawing room.

He probably senses her surprise. “I met them at art exhibits in town. They’re nice people. Passionate about art. Some of them have commissioned me for pieces before.”

The mental image of Nemo engaging with strangers gives Aisha pause. It appears that her perception of him has been outdated for quite some time. Her cheeks grow warm, and she lowers her head so that Nemo wouldn’t see the extent of her guilt and embarrassment.

Not for the first time since she set foot into the ballroom, the urge to escape fills her anew. But she can’t escape now. She needs to play along to Sylvia’s game until the end, and Nemo presents an undeserving chance for her to pass time quickly.

So, her pride sufficiently battered, Aisha accepts his suggestion.

As Nemo promised, his acquaintances are nice and sociable. With something to occupy her restless mind, Aisha relaxes. Some men are already married, or betrothed to another, so she doesn’t need to worry about putting on airs before them. Although the conversations are centered around the arts, she’s still able to contribute her opinions, based on art history books that she’s read.

As the dance program draws near, Aisha’s dance card is filled to a respectable degree. The dread of socializing and dancing has lulled. If she pretends that Nemo isn’t there, that Sylvia’s shrill laughter doesn’t echo in her ears every so often, that the flashes of Aida’s pink gown in her periphery are illusions, then she would enjoy herself fully.

But Nemo is there. Sylvia is making rounds to curry favor with all the attending nobles. And her sister is a constant reminder that she can’t let down her guard.

The orchestral music transitions into a slow, mellow waltz, signifying the start of the dance program. Aisha joins the women standing on one side, heart sinking as she sees Sein take his place opposite of her.

His eyes meet hers, and he inclines his head to her in silent acknowledgement. He seems unaffected by the crowd. Aisha loosens her grip on her gown, hoping that her expression is neutral.

They step forward in time with the music. It’s a lighthearted waltz that she learned a while ago.

It just involves a fair bit of physical contact. Practicing with Aida as her partner is easy, sometimes even fun. Aida always took the chance to tease, tickling her ribs, poking her waist, hugging her close instead of holding her at arm’s length as required. The instructor scolded them numerous times, but Aida couldn’t be stopped. Aisha didn’t take the dance lessons too seriously either, so Aida’s antics never bothered her.

Sylvia loves to keep up with appearances, therefore it’s a given that she also enrolled her sons in dance lessons. Whether they know how to dance properly is a separate matter entirely. Her stepmother’s reputation would suffer if none of her sons, as aristocrats, could dance well.

So far Sein hasn’t stepped on her foot, which is promising. Aisha stifles a flinch when he places his hand against her waist, barely remembering that she has to put her hand on his shoulder.

She straightens her spine, fixes her gaze on his nose, her lips a neutral line. From a distance and to an untrained eye, they’ll look friendly with each other. Siblings who enjoy each other’s company.

“Enjoying the ball?” Sein asks, displaying no discomfort at their physical contact and proximity.

“It’s tolerable.”

“Met any prospective husbands yet?” His tone drops slightly.

She rolls her eyes. “I could ask you the same.”

“The answer would be no.”

“Your mother hasn’t matched you with other noble women yet? I find that hard to believe.”

His grip on her hand tightens until it almost hurts. “My mother doesn’t intervene in my affairs. I choose whom I’ll marry.”

If it were her, and if Sylvia really tried to marry either her or Aida off, Aisha doubts that she gets a choice. He’s a man, so he can be stubborn without consequences. How fortunate. How unfair. He can find work as a piano teacher, even venture out of the estate on his own, explore Smod Street without a chaperone, and goodness knows what else he’s done.

All she has is her books, but books only describe experiences to a limited extent. For instance, the romance books don’t delve into how loud these balls can be. How hot and stifling the air is, with the amount of people breathing and talking and laughing all at once. They don’t mention how close you are to your dance partner, how you feel the heat of his hand and are torn between two urges: to push him away and run off, or to clench your jaw and pretend that you don't feel anything at all.

It’s only the first waltz, and she’s already exhausted.

“No woman has piqued your interest?” She asks, mostly to distract herself until the waltz is over.

“One has, though not because of this ball.”

“You’ve met her before?”

“Yes, I have.”

She waits for him to divulge more, but he merely smiles down at her.

“So you’re acquaintances?” Aisha pushes.

“It’s complicated.” Sein guides her into a spin. For a moment, the chandeliers and shiny faces around them blur away. Then all too soon, his hand returns to her waist, and she finds small relief that he can dance and lead well.

“She doesn’t reciprocate?”

Sein doesn’t immediately respond. His eyes linger, like they’re searching for answers on her face.

“I don’t know. I hope she does. She may not be aware of my affections yet.”

“Isn’t it more fitting to dance with her first, then?” Aisha makes a point of glancing at the other couples. “You didn’t have to dance with me. Is she here?”

“She is.”

“Have you asked her to dance yet?”

“Of course. She accepted.”

“Good for you.”

“Enough about me. What about your other dance partners? I assume your card is full.”

Aisha shakes her head. “Unfortunately I’m not as popular as you might think. But yes, I have secured a few other dance partners. Most of them are Nemo’s friends, including Nemo.”

“How nice of him.” Though Sein doesn’t sound complimentary in the slightest, mouth twisting into a sneer.

“He’s been quite kind to me this evening. I do feel a bit remorseful for treating him poorly when we were younger.”

Sein hums. “Only a bit?”

“He is still related to Sylvia.”

“Ah. So an outsider, even though we’re family by marriage.”

“I’ve never considered any of you as my real brothers,” Aisha reminds him. “I’m sure you don’t see me and Aida as your real sisters, either.”

“Fair enough. And I’m glad we’re on the same page.” Sein leans forward, closer than needed, breath tickling her face. “You’re no sister to me.”

His admission chases a shiver up her back. It sounds like a finality, like she’d confirmed something he’s waited for.

The waltz ends sooner than expected. Sein doesn’t let go of her hand until they’re about to leave the dance floor. Right before she can slip away, he turns her palm up to press his lips on the center. Through the glove, above the scar.

The tremors in her hand persist, long after he pulls away.

#aisha manhua #aisha #sein #aisha/sein #fanfiction #ao3 #ongoing #chapter 4 #cloud castles

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