#bart & ptolemy

[lejay-the-impossible]

Some Ptolemy (and bird! Bart) designs. I think the urge to reread The Bartimaeus Trilogy is getting onto me...

I was too lazy to do research so I have no idea if this lapwing is accurate or not

I'm trying to feed you, Bartimaeus fandom, please don't die yet, I still want you to like the art I will do after my reread

#bartimaeus #the bartimaeus sequence #the bartimaeus trilogy #ptolemy #bart #bart & ptolemy #the amulet of samarkand #the eye of golem #the ptolemy's gate #bartimaus trilogy #bartimaeus fanart #fanart #character design

[fauna-a]

III The Hanged Man

¡Norse AU! Inspired by American Gods and also by Heroes of the Valley. Let’s say that I’ve interpreted this prompt quite literally.

Caith looked at him, upright and pliable like an ash branch, but in here eyes could be read the doubt. Fear, maybe.

Njall had never seen her frightened, not when their village was burning and they were just five or six years, not when the warrior chief had struck her with a backhanded slap because she had stolen a blade and not, when he, Njall, had shown her what he could do with a handful of signs scribbled in the dust. Caith had not been frightened even when the creatures had appeared the first time and had started to kill. She was never frightened.

«It’s madness» she pontificated, her knuckles holding on the rope. «You are not Odin. You’ll die».

«We are all going to die» Njall retorted tersely. «You know it. If we stay here and do nothing, they’ll kill us all. We don’t know what they are, your arrows don’t hurt them, nor the fire».

«And your suicide will solve this, oh sure!»

«I am not killing myself» Njall stressed those words with all the confidence he had. «It’s a ritual, and you know it very well. A way to gain knowledge. And I am not the first one: that ancient mage tried and-»

«And he died!»

«Not because of the ritual!» Njall exhaled. «Look, if you are here it means you want to help me. Don’t you?»

Caith stared at him harshly. Just above her eye there was a little scar that cut vertically her eyebrow; it came from a shove by Njall when they were children. Caith had fallen with her face on the ground and had hit a rock hidden in the grass. They both had cried, that time, Caith because of the pain and Njall because of the fear.

«Fine» Caith straightened her shoulders. «Take off the tunic and let’s start».

The worst part, Njall presumed, was the beginning, as it was for all the things: getting used to the position, the blood running to the head, the air coming more and more laboriously, the rope sawing his skin. Caith, of course, had made perfect knots and had not left him any escape. In that position, Njall could only see her legs, moving nervously back and forth. Then they stopped and suddenly Caith’s face appeared near to his.

«Well, hung you’re hung. I’ll come and check-»

«No! You can’t come here during the ritual, Caith! I must be alone».

Even upside down, Njall saw perfectly the terrible scowl appear on Caith’s forehead.

«And you’re asking me to leave you like this… and alone for nine days? Do you realize what you’re asking to me?»

«I do. It’s a necessary sacrifice to gain knowledge. And the gods’ grace». Njall hesitated. «If you are my friend… If you are my friend, you’ll understand».

Caith’s eyes tightened, then her face disappeared abruptly from Njall’s vision.

«Goodbye, then. I’ll be back in nine days».

During the following hours, Njall tried to focus on something else, for example all the spells and chants he knew, the runes, the symbols; then he tried to not take offense for Caith’s coldness and to not regret sending her away: she was like this, and the ritual had to be done like this too, there wasn’t much to do about it.

The tree Njall had chosen had grown under a cavern, all twisted up to find the few rays of sunlight that filtered from above; so, Njall was quite protected, but it was impossible to know how long had passed. Maybe he fell asleep (or better, lost consciousness) despite the pain, because at some point it was pitch black and cold. He felt like someone had set fire to every single tendon and he gasped like a fish outside water.

He tried to convince himself that this was the hardest part.

After immeasurable time spent trying to cut himself from his own body, wondering why he had decided to do it, Njall gave up: he started to think about Caith.

It wasn’t that he didn’t care about his village and the people; but he couldn’t deny that she was the first reason. Caith was a warrior: she had already fought with those creatures, using blade and arrows and it was just a matter of time before a night ended bad. They were monsters emerged by their nightmares, unstoppable. And hungry for human flesh.

He wondered if Caith knew.

He had his lips completely dry and split, and it seemed like he had no more blood in his veins. He wondered how he could still be lucid.

Any pain was gone, his body was in peace. Maybe he didn’t have a body anymore. It was a relief, anyway.

So Caith was right: he was dead.

«Well, I wouldn’t say» said a voice.

Njall said naked feet drawing near him. Funny, he didn’t feel his body anymore and yet his downturned vision was the same as before.

«You’re not dead at all» went on the voice. «But the nine days are gone, little mage».

«Who are you?» Njall was amazed to hear his voice firm: he would have expected it to be broken, weakened by pain, hunger, thirst.

«Who am I? Haven’t you sacrificed yourself for something? For the gods? I am here. I have seen your sacrifice and I’ve accepted it».

A face appeared above his: it was the same colour as terracotta, all resolute dark eyebrows and sharp features.

«Are you ready?»

Njall didn’t have time to ask for what: suddenly he was on the ground, free from the ropes, and it was as if every pain, every sorrow came back all together.

He started to shiver uncontrollably, coughed, tried to get up and collapsed again.

«Now stay calm» said the voice. «Your friend is coming».

Hesitant steps. «Njall? It’s not possible…»

In a moment, Caith was beside him, putting on his shoulder a cloak, wetting his lips, holding him to warm him. Njall tried to croak out something.

«Very sweet, nothing to say».

Caith turned suddenly, still holding Njall. He tried to figure out who the third person was. He saw that he was young, and grinning. Sunlight shone on the jewels his hair was braided with, tied at his ankles and wrists.

«It has been a long time since I saw someone so pig-headed, you know» his grin widened even more and Njall, even if he was exhausted, worn out, thirsty, felt a vague surge of danger.

«What did you do?» whispered Caith, and, addressing the naked-feet youth «Who are you?»

«The one who accepted his sacrifice» squatted down like this, he seemed a young wolf ready to attack. «I have many names. You call me Loki».

#bartprompts24 #bartimaeus prompt week 24 #bartimaeus trilogy #bartimaeus sequence #bartimaeus #nathaniel #kitty jones #my fic #fanfiction #uhhhh #clearly bart is loki... sort of #the ancient mage is ptolemy #and i know that kitty is the one who sacrifices herself in the books #but odin-->nat i'm sorry #sacrifice himself for knowledge? gaining power? nat ofc #also their names are not scandinavian i know but i was desperate

[whumpster-fire]

Bartimaeus Sequence AU where in Golem's Eye Nathaniel is like "No there is no way I am summoning Bartimaeus again I am not stupid enough to summon a djinni who knows my birth name" but he's desperate to find a competent spirit and then he remembers that Bartimaeus recommended Faquarl's name, and he takes him up on that.

Bonus points if he does summon Bartimaeus but just to confirm that Faquarl was in fact the guy who broke him out of the Tower of London and otherwise fact-check his resume, leaving Bartimaeus torn between not wanting to praise Faquarl or acknowledge his achievements and wanting to get him stuck working with an annoying little twerp.

Double Bonus Points if Faquarl recognizes Nathaniel from the kitchen at Heddleham Hall and figures out what happened, and on one hand thinks the kid will be easier to manipulate than Makepeace, but on the other hand he is not letting Bartimaeus get away with this so he keeps being like: "Oh, well, this sort of thing isn't my area of expertise, but my old associate and worthy adversary Bartimaeus would be perfect for this job." Leading to Nathaniel summoning both of them and the rest of Golem's Eye being a complete disaster of a "buddy" comedy where they bicker the entire time and piss Nathaniel off but he refuses to dismiss either of them because he knows damn well if either one of them wins the "annoy master until he dismisses you first and gets the other one stuck in your service" competition the the other will become even worse.

#bartseq #faquarl #bartimaeus of uruk #nathaniel (bartseq) #crack AU #no idea what would happen in Ptolemy's Gate timeline #since I doubt Makepeace would be that mad over Faquarl being 'poached' #Faquarl trying to get Nathaniel in on his 'summon a djinni into a living body' idea would be hilarious #because of the combo of Nathaniel's trauma from the spectacles incident #and Bartimaeus being extremely vocal about how stupid that idea sounds #also I want Kitty to call Bart and Faquarl out on holding petty grudges for literal millennia

[rosie-tyler]

If i had nickels for every time my blorbos were

A) A powerful immortal being and the epitome of sarcasm and humour who is also a servant to

B) Emotionally tongue-tied tragic hero with parents issues who didn't have any friends or just someone who could call them out on their arrogant behaviour until person A so eventually they change for the better

And even though they bicker all the time they still have a soft spot for each other. Person A sees the good in Person B despite his arrogance while Person B may not admit it but he appreciates person A and is dependent on him for many things

..then i'd have two nickels

Which isn't a lot but it's weird that it happened twice

❗THESE AMAZING FAN-ARTS BELONG TO @pompomoo❗

I hope you don't mind that i used them but if you do i'll delete them!

#i also wanted to add kitty and Ptolemy but wasn't sure how #and i find it ironic that i compared bartimaeus to a wizard and nat to the person who hated magic #anyway i can blame all the merthur tiktoks i've seen lately #and now i wanna rewatch it and reread the bart trilogy but i'm not ready for all the angst™ #merlin bbc #merlin #merlin emrys #arthur Pendragon #nathaniel underwood #bartimaeus #the bartimaeus trilogy #the bartimaeus sequence #jonathan stroud #also someone can say that bart and nat's relationship is nothing compared to arthur and merlin's #i agree that bart and nat have a complicated relationship but you can't convince me that deep down they didn't care for each other #especially towards the end #anyway i just similarities between my fave boys

[baellielurk]

rereading bartimaeus like oh so that's where i got that bit of my personality from

#im always and forever humble but reading bart pov is like a mirror to my brain #maybe it's just the adhd or whatnot #also i forgot that he's uncomfortable 24/7 but god i relate so hard #one would hope it's the winning personality and mental commentary only but no im also itchy at all times #i have only read this series once btw #and rereading it while knowing how it ends... well it is a special kind of torture #nat: *exists* me: 😭😭😭😭😭😭 #tearing my hair out #first mention of ptolemy and i had to put it down

[genderfcker]

so is anyone going to write a stardust thief x bartimaeus crossover or am i going to have to write this myself

#listen. listen. #i just think it would be funny for bart & qadir to meet okay #bart would be so annoying simply because he knows qadir is op #but bart by sandsea standards is probably op too #so it would be super funny seeing them interact #also loulie and aisha and kitty can all vibe together as badasses #and uh #i don't think mazen would like nathaniel that much #now #mazen and ptolemy #on the other hand?? #that would be a fun combo #also i could 100% see bartimaeus taking a liking to mazen and making him his latest human #he'd underestimate him at first and then he'd pull the shadow trick ONCE and bart would be like okay yeah this kid is cool #bartseq #bartimaeus sequence #bartimaeus trilogy #sandsea trilogy #the stardust thief

[pompomoo]

Ptolemy&Nat＋Bart Ptolemy and Nat give me the impression of the sun and the moon, warm and cold colors. The colors of their skin and costumes also contrast with each other. They are polar opposites. But they are both stubborn and make the same choice in the end. They seem to be opposites, but they are surprisingly similar. I like this contrast between them.

#fanart #bartimaeus #nathaniel #ptolemy

[the-nameless-wacky-inventor]

I’m sure it’s on purpose but a little thing that I think really humanizes the spirits is the way they call the Other Place home? There’s something so different between saying they want to go back to the Other Place and saying they want to go back home.

I think it’s especially obvious in Ptolemy’s Gate when Bart has been on earth too long, he says he’s tired and wants to go home and its just like GUYS. 🥺 LET HIM GO HOME 🥺 HE JUST WANTS TO GO HOME 🥺🥺🥺

And just how shocked and horrified he is over the other spirits burning their way back to the Other Place when he wants to know why any of them wouldn’t want to go back home and it just has me 🥺🥺🥺

#Ik it’s probably obvious and on purpose #But it just always stands out to me sldlglhld #bartimaeus #the bartimaeus trilogy #the bartimaeus sequence #bartseq

[nathaniel-underwood-is-an-intj]

Okay I did not have Bartimaeus tells the truth about the walls of Prague on my Ptolemy's Gate bingo list but here we are

Nathaniel treating Bart so badly he starts telling the truth?!?!?!

And it's right after he tells this whopper of a lie too:

Like no wonder Nat won't trust him - he goes from telling probably the biggest lie in the whole series, (aside from constantly lying to himself about how he feels towards Nat) to telling the truth about one of his proudest boasts.

I don't know whether to be mad or impressed tbh

#bartseq #bartimaeus sequence #bartimaeus trilogy #bartimaeus #nathaniel underwood #liveblogging

[hapalopus]

Do you ever think about how Ptolemy's complete lack of self-preservation is what allowed him to be friends with Bartimaeus? And how Bart is nothing but self-preservation, surviving longer than any other djinni in the books? Ptol died when he was 14. Him and Bart had known each other for 2 years. 2 years out of Bart's then 3000 year long life. And because Bart's main goal has always been survival, Ptol's memory has lived on for another 2000 years.

#it makes me emo #the bartimaeus trilogy #the bartimaeus sequence

[eizneckam]

I love how late in Ptolemy's Gate Bartimaeus mocks Nat and humans for being so attached to everything, like pff. silly mortals—

"Had the boy been there alone, without my prompting presence, would he have acted with such speed against the bodies of his fellow ministers? Despite their deformities, their slack faces and oddly angled limbs, I doubt it. He was a human; always, always humans gravitate to surfaces."

And he even makes fun of Nat, pointing out he didn't even like these people in the first place

But hey wait look not twenty pages later when it's time to kill one of his oldest friends enemies ...acquaintances and (emphasis mine):

"He made some movement or other with his fleshy body; I don't remember what. I did nothing, but I was conscious of the boy's immediate command. A stab of pure white light—it faded, vanished, scoured Faquarl from the Earth."

hmmm. did someone get attached there? almost like you couldn't act, even though this was someone you knew and hated? did someone form an emotional attachment bart? hmmmm?

#bartimaeus trilogy #hey did you know these books are good

[lejay-the-impossible]

Visiting Mrs. Underwood.

An illustration for the story I hope I'll finish someday.

#bartimaeus #johnathan stroud #nathaniel #the bartimaeus sequence #the bartimaeus trilogy #john mandrake #bart #nathaniel underwood #bart and nat #martha underwood #ptolemy #the amulet of samarkand #the eye of golem #the ptolemy's gate #the ring os solomon #sketches #fan art

[resinfossil]

Something that struck me the last time I reread AoS was how much more amateurish Bart feels compared to how he is in the other books. From a meta perspective I know that it's probably because it was the first book and jstroud was still finding his voice, but when we first meet Faquarl we do get a comment from him that Bartimaeus must not be feeling particularly confident in himself that day, so there is at least some in-universe explanation as well.

Anyway, I was thinking about Bartimaeus keeping track of exactly how much time has passed since Ptolemy's death, and I was suddenly reminded of this. Which is to say I have a new headcanon: either the last time Bart was summoned before Nat, or the first time Nat summoned him, it was on or around the anniversary of Ptolemy's death.

#bartseq #bartimaeus #bartseq headcanons

[sagechan]

"What We Do in the Dark"

Fandom: Bartimaeus sequence (Jonathan Stroud)

Pairing: Bartimaeus/Nathaniel

Rating: General Audience

Tags: Post-Canon, Post-Book 3: Ptolemy's Gate, Fluff, Domestic Fluff, Sickfic, Major Character Injury, Injury Recovery

Summary: BartNat sick fic. Nathaniel lives (well, almost all of him), Bartimaeus is a brat, they cuddle in bed.

[The link is posted in the comments! I wrote this for @robin-goodfellow a little while ago and finally put it up on the archive cuz I figured out how to make Bart's footnotes work! I don't think the Bartimaeus sequence fandom is very big here on tumblr, so if you're out there come say hi :) Thanks for reading!]

#bartimaeus trilogy #bartimaeus sequence #nathaniel x bartimaeus #john mandrake #natbart #bartnat #ptolemy's gate #post canon #fluff #sick fic #robingoodfellow #sage art #fanfiction #my writing #fanfic

[wifegideonnav]

heyheyhEY hello, I just read your pinned post and you mentioned Bartimaeus... I reread all the books this year, each made me a little bit insane, how did they get BETTER than they were 9 years ago??? Nathaniel is the worst most pathetic yet arrogant soaked poodle-ass teen in the entire world and I love him so much, I want to put him into a tumble dry cycle!!!

PLEASE share your thoughts! (especially ones on bart and ptolemy. I cannot think about them they break my poor brain)

oh my god YES we got another one!!! im embarking on my first reread in forever rn and im literally so excited, i will absolutely be posting my thoughts

and yeah bart and ptolemy 😭😭😭 one of my og ships although it wasn’t exactly conceived like that in my like ten year old brain. i just wanted them to get to be happy together 😭 jonathan stroud you have taken everything from meeee

#asks

[the-faultofdaedalus]

tlt handshake bart sequence

grand lysis handshake ptolemy’s gate

#i’ve cracked it i’ve solved it i’ve done it #im BITING THE WALLS