#you would not only have my full support but also my undying devotion

[chasing-chimeras]

And if I said Apostate Theo x Noble. Grey warden(former templar) Liam.......

idk who you are but i would propose on both knees (and also inform you that a few months ago i typed up an eighteen page outline for almost this exact concept)

#featuring the mage rebellion causing them to flee Markham together and fall in love #and also #lord seeker gerard argent #senior enchanter deaton #liam leaving the order and teaming up with theo to save his brother (mason) from the rite of anulment #mage underground agent corey (with invisibility) #chevalier chris argent joining the party #mage hunter kate argent chasing the party #witch of the wilds kira #magister hayden of house romero #antivan crow tracy #like .....i have given it THOUGHTS anon and i want to scream at you rn #sadly it's currently sitting behind my 3 current aus #and the mha and 100 aus 😩 #but 👀 #if you're a writer 👀 #or willing to become a writer 👀 #and you want to take a stab at it 👀 #and want any advice/input/someone to suffer with 👀 #you would not only have my full support but also my undying devotion #tagging this as #dragon age au #just to be safe bc one of us is now honor bound to write this someday

[ribbittrobbit]

this is it, the wuvvy thoughts are here

ok to preface: i think that Rue is a very compelling flawed character, and i have lots of Rue feelings but I have more Wuvvy feelings.

Alright so Wuvvy is Rue's faithful right hand, she has shaped her life around Rue, following them and leaving her own court and giving up a position as a champion. Notably, Wuvvy has always willingly done everything Rue has asked, maybe even done more than that to the point of anticipating their needs, maybe that liberty will lead to her downfall. She repeatedly reassures Rue, of her love and support in pretty much anything and everything. The phrase "you know i love you, right?" is such a beautiful and tragic summary of her character.

Because she reassures them of her love by word and by action - and the rift is caused when Rue commands her. Up until that point Wuvvy was supportive of Rue's interest in Hobb, maybe not thinking too deeply about it, maybe just to validate Rue's feelings and make them feel good. But when she was made to burn the letter, something breaks. She would have done what was asked of her, but to be commanded at the slightest and maybe first hesitation Wuvvy has ever shown? and when Wuvvy's questions aren't even against Rue, she is deeply in favor of Rue chasing their happiness, she only expresses grief when they doubt themselves. That strikes me as deeply grave betrayal, to command a willing person whose only hesitation was fuelled by good intentions. And an argument can be made that maybe Wuvvy harbors jealousy but I think any of it comes after this moment, any doubt comes back to this command.

So she takes a liberty and acts in the name of Rue's honor, challenging Hobb to a duel for the offence of making them cry.

And Rue, Rue who believes in love and romance but is also volatile and confused and full of secrets and fear. Who is a master of weaving words and placating and putting on a show and putting the correct face on for whoever sees them. Rue chases romance, sheds their glamour, and still leans on Wuvvy for support in the midst of this rift: "but you'll stay by my side" and it's a statement, not a question. They remain assured of Wuvvy's support, why wouldn't they be? when they've been frequently reassured of Wuvvy's undying devotion and love. And what does Wuvvy say in return? "It's been very nice to walk beside you" and maybe that's the problem.

And we see the distance grow between them, they start to be out of sync. Rue says their thing about wanting Wuvvy to learn to exist, being worried that she is "bound by obligation and not love" and what does that even mean? what does that sound like to someone who has taken on obligation out of love? What does Rue expect Wuvvy to find by "existing", romance? why would they presume that?

And the final thing is "your contract is done, you are no longer bound by me". Oh to drop that on a person who does not view this as a contract. Imagine Wuvvy having the most important person in her life so solemnly say something that shows such a profound misunderstanding of her person.

Maybe they are both selfish and their relationship is needlesly complicated by unwavering devotion and inequality. In the end we see Rue chasing romance and the idea of love and being volatile and passionate. And Wuvvy loved a person or the idea of them, never making for a real understanding, never forming a true reciprocity.

tldr: a 10/10 tragedy of a person, wuvvy.

#dont get me started on Hobb #i might fucking lose it if i do #d20 a court of fey and flowers #acofaf #wuvvy #delloso de la rue #i said wuvvy rights and i mean it #this has been my thoughts #come on someone go absolutely nuts over this with me #god do i love a tragedy #if you read all that i love you #also i am kinda insane right now so if i made any pronoun errors or if anything is confusing bec of the pronoun usage lmk but gently please #ive been taught to be a stickler for old grammar because of a classist upbringing and sometimes it confuses me when i use they singular

[its-deputy-caleb]

hey! how would the gang react when they find out you’re pregnant with their baby? (javier, charles, micah and arthur especially pls!!) <3

Hii anon! usually i'd say i hate children cause i do and kids are not for me but you caught me at a good time since i've had a rough week and have been feelin' lonely so i was genuinely so happy to write this (and i'm even proud of how it turned out it felt so natural to write for a strange reason) anyway ily thank you for your ask <333

tagging my fav @kitty-the-outlaw since i agreed to tag her in my works now (ily kitty!) and anyone can request a tag!

Dutch Van Der Linde

Dutch is completely conflicted when he hears that you’re pregnant.

Apart of him is excited about this idea of family because he loves you but also the thought of a child and legacy and all things children makes him feel really liberated.

The other half of him wants nothing more than to stay with the gang, its who he is and he can’t change how he craves freedom from the law and society.

Dutch will plan for months at a time, taking breaks to care for you when he can while he ultimately tries to create best of both worlds where you stay in the gang with him.

He will always be there for kisses but his favourite thing to do is to slowly rub your back when its sore or massage your muscles if you’re exhausted.

Arthur Morgan

Arthur almost burst into tears when you tell him about the pregnancy.

He wraps his arms around you and just goes into full on protective dad mode.

If it’s what you want Arthur will no doubt leave the gang for you, setting up somewhere quiet to provide and care for you.

Don’t even think about lifting a single thing regardless of what stage you’re in, Arthur will literally stay up all hours of the night to get you anything you need and he will do everything for you.

No matter your decision Arthur loves you and wants to be apart of this part of your life, promising to support you every step of the way.

Charles Smith

Charles can’t help but feel blessed when he finds out the news, his heart filling with joy and there seems to be a new way forward for him other than just the gang.

Lots of cuddles and kisses are gonna be in order

He’s so protective and supportive in the best way, reading up on books about pregnancies (not that there is a huge amount of books on women at the time) and using all his knowledge about herbs, medicines and the natural world to ensure that you’re healthy and comfortable.

Charles loves kissing your tummy regardless of its size yet, somehow it brings the two of you together knowing that you’re gonna be starting a family.

Micah Bell

Micah’s first reaction to your pregnancy is to run as far away as possible.

He’ll claim it’s because he’s an outlaw and a family will make him soft but deep down he doesn’t want to end up like his father and he’s terrified of having a kid.

A lot of it is on you to assure him that with some hard work and commitment he wouldn’t be a bad father and eventually he comes around to it.

Micah’s gonna get very protective of you despite not knowing a single thing, all he knows is that you need extra love and attention (from only him) and he won’t let any of the camp help out.

Despite how Micah boasts about a mini Micah Bell the Fourth about to arrive you know he’s gone all soft and you’ll wake up from a nap with him curled up around your tummy with his head resting gently while he sleeps.

Javier Escuella

Javier’s reaction is nothing but excited, sure he hides it from the gang but when its the two of you its clear he’s ready to be a father.

Undying loyalty and devotion are some of the drivers for Javier, you see it in his commitment to the gang and you don’t have any doubts about his commitment to family.

He stays up late making you meals, even introducing you to some of his childhood favourites that his mother used to make for him and his sister. It makes him feel less homesick and he wants to have apart of them in his new family.

Javier would no doubt consider leaving the gang for you, making it clear to you and the gang that you came first but he’d always try to have the best of both worlds.

Javier loves to cuddle you from behind in camp, resting his head on your shoulder so he can watch his hands rest on your tummy because he loves you and wants nothing more than to be with you in that moment.

Bill Williamson

Bill is literally terrified of the thought of having a child.

He stays up late, pacing around camp and stress smoking all of his tobacco as he tries to figure out whether he’s ready or not for a family.

Sitting him down, you assure him with a steady voice (and lots of kisses) that everything would be okay and that you’d do it together as a team.

Eventually Bill realises he’d be a great dad if he put his heart into it. He’s the right amount of protective over you and he balances it with enough dad jokes and support that you’d know the kid will love Bill.

Sometimes when he’s having a bad day Bill will come back to camp and just hug your waist while he kneels in front of you with his ear pressed to your tummy. He loves head scratches at the same time and you can see how comfortable he feels surrounded by his family.

Sean Macguire

Sean hears about your pregnancy when you tell him in secret only for him to jump on the table and announce it to the world that he’s gonna be a dad.

He’s totally clumsy with taking care of you or looking out for you and he needs bit of coaching from the older more experienced gang members advising them that you in fact can’t come on robberies for the next nine months.

Despite this, Sean makes an effort to learn, to put his fair share in and he comes to understand how important it is to take care of you.

He’ll always be there when you need him and he’ll pick a fight with anyone for teasing or bothering you.

Sean’s totally gonna spend all night talking to your tummy even if there isn’t a noticeable bump and he loves going over all his ideas for names and how excited he is for your family to start.

#dutch van der linde #dutch van der linde x reader #arthur morgan #arthur morgan x reader #charles smith #charles smith x reader #micah bell #micah bell x reader #javier escuella #javier escuella x reader #bill williamson #bill williamson x reader #sean macguire #sean macguire x reader #rdr2 #rdr2 writing #rdr2 headcanons #red dead redemption 2 #tw pregnancy

[jjungkookislife]

Quarterly Fic Recs 2021 #2

Hello! I’m back with another rec list! Here are fics I’ve read, loved and thoroughly enjoyed in the second quarter of 2021! They are all very wonderful fics! Each story has its own genre, warnings (and are mostly 18+), so please take that into consideration before reading. If any authors would like me to untag them, please let me know. Enjoy!

Yoongi

before i leave you @hollyhomburg

summary: Yoongi Disappears- leaving behind a shattered pack. 8 months later, Jimin finds Yoongi in an H-mart of all places.

Hoseok

heart-on @junghelioseok

summary: my boss is always telling me how perfect her son would be for me and she promises he’s coming to the next holiday party and don’t worry he’s heard all about me too and ALSO there’s this dude i slept with once a couple of months ago and sometimes he still sends me dick pics when i ask him to at 3 in the morning cause seriously dude’s got a good dick

Jungkook

charmolypi @njssi

summary: Work and pleasure should never be combined — or so the saying goes. But you were never really one to follow the rules in their entirety and neither were the ones around you. Love, lust, interest. Five people. In the workplace. What could go wrong? Everyone just wants to get something, after all.

when you least expect it @johobi

summary: You’re in love with your childhood friend, Taehyung. The problem is, you treasure your friendship with him far too much to ever risk losing it. Oh, and he’s quite the Casanova. At your wits’ end with feelings you can no longer hide as diligently as you once did, you ask him to set you up with someone, anyone, in a last ditch attempt to avoid a heartbreaking conversation.

wherever there is you @jeonstudios

summary: you’ve been drinking, haven’t you?

instant gratification @dovechim

fuckboi@jungkook x cheerleader!reader

haze @yyooni

summary: So you’ve fucked the biggest fuck boy on campus. It’s a one and done. One night stand. A wham bam thank you ma’am. So why does it happen again?

OT7/Multiple Members

because i’m yours @minniepetals

summary: you should have known they’d never let you go after gathering the courage to ask for a kiss

blazed @ironicarmy

summary: Your friends try to cheer you up during Christmastime, but things go south once Hoseok appears with a mysterious brown bag.

Seokjin

one step @cutechim

summary:  attending an ex’s wedding is never easy, but you might just have the perfect remedy—if you can pluck up the courage to take it.

platonic @joheunsaram

summary: Finding a new method for stress relief, you rope in your bestfriend/fwb to try it out with you.

show me yours and i’ll show you mine @ktheist

summary: you’re a horny bunny yet kim seokjin always seems to manage to slide out of your grasps like a fox every time.

Yoongi

before i leave you pt. 7 @/hollyhomburg

summary: Pack omega kim Seokjin knows how to handle things when they go south (or alternatively you get triggered, Yoongi has a panic attack, and it’s a good thing the pack is there to help)

Hoseok

risky business @yoonjinkooked

summary: The person who invented smart glass office walls knew what they were doing. Your secretary fucks you stupid in the office.

snapshot @xjoonchildx

summary: after a day at the beach, hoseok has some surprises in store for his longtime love

keep me warm @ppersonna

summary: camping is always a great time when you’re with your friends, but even better with your boyfriend, hoseok.

it’s you @jinpanman

summary: An accidental confession throws your years-long friendship with Hoseok into disarray.

Namjoon

love bytes @stutterfly

summary: It’s been a year since you first met Kim Namjoon, the passionate, talented English professor at the local campus. He’s always been clumsy and aloof, but he’s on a whole new level in terms of “technologically incapable.” One call to IT was all it took to pull you into his life, and with it a whole string of friendships full of flirtatious banter and undying support.

Your dating situation has been drier than the Sahara for years now, and you’ve wasted too many lonely nights drinking alone, so you try your hand at Tinder. But you’re not getting any bites. When the group finds out, they are more than willing to help–even Namjoon, though he finds it increasingly difficult to deny that he’s hopelessly smitten. You consider their opinions on potential Tinder dates while fighting off feelings you never knew were brewing for the caring soul who becomes the home you never had.

out of my league @/ppersona

summary: Kim Namjoon was never supposed to find out about your years-long hopeless crush on him. And he most definitely was not supposed to find out about it in front of all your coworkers in a company-wide meeting.

so this is love @jinpanman

summary: “So this is the miracle that I’ve been dreaming of. So this is love.”

problem solved @sugasbabiie

summary: Namjoon helps you with more than math problems tonight.

love is @hxseok-honee

summary: they say that love is supposed to transcend time and space and that it knows no limits. but putting an ocean and thousands of miles between two people won’t make things any easier, will it? 

Jimin

potent pink @dntaewithluv

summary: The first time you see Park Jimin you’re instantly entranced by him. And it turns out he lives in the apartment next to the one you’re moving into, so even better he’s your hot neighbor. When the previous tenant confesses to you that he was the best hook up she ever had, you’re that much more intrigued. The first time you meet him, however, you’re deciding immediately that you hate him and want to stay as far away from him as possible. Jimin is determined to be a constant in your life though, and he definitely is that. Both a constant flirt and a constant pain in your ass. Is a ruined second impression enough to prevent you from ever giving him a second chance?

Taehyung

hush, yeah? @kithtaehyung

summary: the innocent accident that started it all

unfinished business @/dntaewithluv

summary: Besides wanting to catch up with some old friends, there’s only one reason you found yourself agreeing to attend your 10 year high school reunion. The boy you were in love with back then is going to be there, and you’re determined to finally make your move. Except, unfortunately, it turns out that Kim Seokjin is very much happily married. Kim Taehyung, however, is very much single and feels like he has something to prove to you after you turned him down all those years ago. One night is all it takes to make you realize you made the biggest mistake of your life.

under the covers @jessikahathaway

spy!au

darling @bloomsuga

summary: “go to sleep, darling.”

as endless as the stars ^

summary: he waited 160 years to meet you again, and now that he has, he’s not letting go. or: “i love you as deep as the ocean and as endless as the stars”

dirty dishes @jaysdimples

summary: when your boyfriend can’t seem to keep his hands to himself so he stirs up a little trouble in the kitchen while everyone else is a few feet away in the next room

devotion @/sweetbunnykook

summary: You and Taehyung were inseparable once. When you come back to your hometown after three years, fate pulls you back to him. And this time, Taehyung won’t ever keep his eyes off of you.

Jungkook

commercial break; twelve @1kook

summary: Anyway, if it was up to Jungkook, Kim Doyeon would not be a member of the Engagement Ring Committee.

tease @adonis-koo

summary:You came with the intentions of your best friend landing a job as a stripper. You never meant to catch the eyes of the king stripper of the establishment- Jeon Jungkook, yourself. With what was supposed to be a harmless way of paying off college debt faster you find yourself falling into a very odd and passionate relationship with your new mentor. Between infidelity, passion and jealousy there’s never a dull moment at Cherry Bomb.

jock!jk @angelguk

summary: going raw with jock jk

evolution of a lover’s heart @jeonstudios

summary: the rules are simple: first one to take the virginity wins.

euphoria @btssavedmylifeblr

summary: At the end of your life, you are given one day to live again with the man you loved. A lifetime’s love story told in a single day.

idealizations concerning real life relations @venusiangguk

summary: jungkook loves to be loved, but he doesn’t love in return.

relax @itsbuffsanta

summary: jk is antsy after the concert, so you help him relax.

employee of the month @/dntaewithluv

summary: Sometimes it truly amazes you how much of an idiot your boyfriend can be. But you also find it impossible to say no to him. Even when it involves letting him fuck you at his work on the same day that he gets awarded employee of the month…

ego 08 @suga-kookiemonster

summary: what’s a girl to do when her sweet, innocent baby lab partner isn’t quite so sweet and innocent? well, he’s a grown-ass man, and you’re about to learn that the hard way.

only you 10 @sweetbunnykook 

summary: Jeon Jungkook, your wedding photographer, helps you escape on your big day upon learning about a secret your groom-to-be kept hidden. You soon fall for this young, passionate photographer. However, you underestimated just how much he was willing to reciprocate that love. Maybe, you think, he’s loving you just a little too much.  

lunchbox lovers @jiminrings

stem major!koo x cold senior!y/n

crunchyroll & rail @/1kook

summary: Never mind the fact you really like Sailor Moon, or that you really want to pay attention to every little detail; the moment becomes Jungkook and his big smile and his red cheeks and the tiny box he produces from within his pocket.

only for you @jikookiekosmos

summary: It’s the night before your wedding and you should be happy…but a fight with your fiancé leaves you second guessing everything. A visit from the blue-haired boy of your dreams is just what you need to make it right.

lillies @dewykth

summary: “… white lines, pretty baby, tattoos, don’t know what they mean, they’re special just for you…”

bluekooberry @kimtaehyunq

summary: Your adoring boyfriend, Jungkook, surprises you with a brand new hairstyle before your trip to visit him for the weekend. He’s excited to see you, feed you, and give you exactly what you want.

bad reputation @noteguk

summary: in which you have to deal with some strange emotions for the first time.

not yet @bratkook

summary: jungkook feels the pang of guilt in his gut when you spot your recent ex out with his new girl, and what better way to make the jerk hurt than to have him believe you were now dating him, the neighbor he had been insecure about your whole relationship

incoming: elite chatboy @kookingtae

summary: welcome to Elite Chatroom, a sex chat company with a wide variety of services such as text messaging, phone call, and video chat. you signed up online for the most basic text service plan not knowing what to expect, but you certainly didn’t think you’d end up actually liking the man behind the screen.

ineffable @euphoria-vmin7

summary: your best friend Jeon Jeongguk has always been amazing and deserved the best, so you’ve hid your love for him. But unbeknowsnt to you, there may be feelings that could change everything between you two…

touch @gardentulips

summary: when you tease and please one another

Multiple Members

friendly fire @kpopfanfictrash

summary: The dynamic: Hoseok; your friend and previous fuck buddy. Jungkook; Hoseok’s roommate and subject of your massive crush. The scene: determined not to drunk-gush about your crush any more (to his face), you decide to seclude yourself from all campus parties. Until, of course, Hoseok guilts you into a favor. Things spiral from there.

the boys are back in town @/dntaewithluv

summary: Getting stood up by your date definitely hadn’t been on your agenda for the evening. Also definitely not on your agenda: bumping into Park Jimin and Jeon Jungkook. Together. On the same exact night. It’s been a while since you’ve seen your two best friends, as well as lovers on multiple occasions, from your high school and college days. A chance meeting, some drinks, and a trip down memory lane is all it takes to reignite the attraction between the three of you. Old habits die hard, but these two? They just might be the death of you.

ruin you @taegularities

summary: “His eyes hold unfathomable darkness that lures you in, captures your very soul, steals any air you are trying to draw. And you know without a doubt that you’re on the path to utter and irrevocable ruination.”

ruin you (once more) ^

summary: Taehyung and Jungkook can’t keep their hands off you. Not even in the elevator.

Seokjin

kairos @luffles424

summary: When your financial aid falls through for your last year of school, you fear you’ll have to drop out and postpone your degree. Until Taehyung gives you a suggestion to make a lot of money, quick. His idea can’t possibly end well, can it?

appetence @luffles424

summary: appetence (n.) - an eager desire, an instinctive inclination; an attraction or a natural bondIt’s time for Seokjin’s rut. Are either of you prepared for this step?

tiny lights, tiny lies @ggukcangetit

summary: you aren’t sure when exactly your best friend’s brother went from being an oddly annoying set of broad shoulders to the shoulders you frequently fell asleep against.

Yoongi

the little things @kimtaehyunq

summary: When the present isn’t exactly enough for you right now, Yoongi is here for you through it all. He makes sure you know you aren’t alone and that it’s ok to feel alone.

cyberslut @kimnjss

summary:  he has no idea who you are… up front, you’re sweet and innocent - but in reality you’re the exact opposite. running your own nsfw account, where your favorite topic is his hands.

yoongi drabble @joonsgalore

life guard au

Hoseok

benefits @cutechim

summary: you and hoseok have taken the ‘friends’ out of friends with benefits, but exclusivity has its own perks.

Namjoon

namjoon drabble @lovetrivia

summary: You’re a hot girl on Twitch and Namjoon is an absolute simp.

Jimin

baby fever @writtenwhalien

summary: Jimin wants another baby, and much to your delight, he’s determined to give you one.

jimin drabble @/1kook

best friend au

small hands jimin drabble @lavishedinjimin

established relationship au

silk and lace @sunshyngal

summary: Min Nara is the newly dumped fiance to the Crown prince of Korea, Park Jimin. She’s not overtly upset , because at least now she can live her life without the pressure of the monarchy hanging over her head. Besides , Nara has a very dirty little secret. While she spends the day as the perfect high society girl with an impeccable pedigree , her nights are filled with lacy lingerie and webcams.  Ignored by the man she’s meant to marry, she revels in the greedy lust of strangers on the internet. It’s her way of saying ‘fuck you’ to a system that sees her as nothing but a toy, molded for the future King. Park Jimin doesn’t know the first thing about his supposed fiancee. And he has no intention of learning either. He knows just what debutante girls are like and he has no patience for the kind. Besides, his girlfriend of three years, the elegant and independent Irene is everything he would ever want in a wife . Or is she?Because in the secrecy of his office , after the day’s work is done , Park Jimin has a very scintillating vice that he likes to indulge in : the beautiful camgirl who calls herself the Temptress. Jimin can’t get enough of the girl’s lush thighs wrapped in silk, the pretty pink of her nipples in see through bralettes and the glittering temptation of the jeweled plugs she likes to stuff herself full with.Jimin thinks she embodies  everything he can never allow himself to have as a Prince : filth, sin and decadence , all wrapped up in Silk and Lace.

Taehyung

nip it in the bud @opaljm

summary: You’re not sure how you ended up here, but maybe a shitty ex and a horrible breakup had a hand in what placed you in front of the tattoo parlor. It was already a nerve-wracking experience, but what you never expected was seeing that the owner and artist giving you nipple piercings was your older brother’s best friend you hadn’t seen in ages. to make things even worse, he got fucking hotter.

taehyung drabble @joonsgalore

sugar daddy au

peanut @jungxk

summary: the making of peanut.

Jungkook

pretty kitty @venusiangguk

summary: you’re jk’s baby, his toy, and now his pretty little pet.

heavy metal @hisunshiine

summary: You come home from a trip to find your fuckbuddy has a… hole-y surprise.

devour @bloomsuga

summary: my sweet angel… i am going to devour you

grain of sand @jungkookiebus

summary: Blind since the age of 18 from a genetic disorder, Jungkook walked through life as if he never lost it, but on one fateful day seven years ago he literally almost runs into you. He fell in love nearly immediately. Fast forward to the present and it’s just another day in your quiet life with him by your side.

under the oak tree @mingoyeob

summary: as the eldest daughter of a duke, it’s your duty to marry at your father’s will. yet you didn’t expect to be marrying jeon jungkook, a knight of low status, especially when he departs for an expedition without another word after your first night. when he comes back three years later, this time as a renowned hero, how will you be able to face him and how will things change between you and your new husband?

jungkook drabble @1kook

dilf!jk

commercial break: thirteen ^

summary: Because for as much shit as you let him get away with, Jungkook is certain you’ll draw the line today.

sh. @wwilloww

summary: How could you say no to a month away in the mountains with your friends after six months of grueling quarantine?

jungkook drabble @lavishedinjimin

daddy!jk

OT7/Multiple Members

the end @jimlingss

summary: It’s been a habit of yours to vent in the form of love letters. There’s six in total. They’re kept secret, hidden in your closet. But on your 30th birthday, what you least expect is for each letter to become reality. All done by the whacky ghost of Christmas future trying to grant your birthday wish.

#jjungkookislife fic recs #jjungkookislife fic recs masterlist #fic recs #fic recs masterlist

[legolasbadass]

Heart of Gold, Chapter 16

Characters: Thorin, Dis, Thrain, Dwalin, Balin, Original Characters

Relationship: Thorin x OC

Setting: Post Azanulbizar, Pre Quest of Erebor

Notes: Hi everyone! I hope you are all well and staying safe! These notes are becoming redundant, but I will still apologize for the long wait I have imposed on you (again)! I had a crazy finals season, and then I had barely any inspiration or motivation to finish/edit this chapter! I have spent the last week and a half editing, so I would really appreciate any feedback on this chapter. I also promise (I know, big word, but I really promise!) that you won't have to wait as long for the next chapter. Some exciting things are happening in the story, and I could not be more eager to share them with you! Without any further ado, here is the long-awaited 16th chapter. I hope you enjoy it! 💙

This is the 16th chapter to my Thorin Oakenshield fan fiction, Heart of Gold, which can be read in full on ao3. Go check it out there to read from the start! Please consider liking or reblogging if you enjoyed this chapter or if you are enjoying the story so far! 

Word Count: 6893

Thorin could not for the life of him concentrate on the council meeting. It felt as though they had been at it for hours. Glancing up at the clock, he saw that it was now four o'clock in the afternoon, only to realize he had no idea when the meeting had started. All he knew was that it was probably too long ago. 

Four o'clock. That meant Dania would be sitting with his mother and sister for tea time. Despite all his best intentions, he could not help but think of her at the most inappropriate times. 

Being the heir was his duty. 

But she was his heart. 

His One. 

Why did his father have to recount their whole eventless journey to Lord Yngvi? It was as though he was inciting Thorin's mind to wander; like he was inviting him to drift down deep, secluded dreams where he and Dania were together, and they faced neither enmity nor aversion. 

In this fanciful world, he held her proudly, boldly, and loved her frankly and openly. That was what she deserved. Nothing less. The image of her being his — wearing his clasp in her braid, his colours on her gown, and his hand on her arm — was driving him mad. That image almost made him stand up on his feet at that very moment and profess his undying love for her in front of all these council members — their opinions be damned. 

But he knew he could not. He must not because he knew what their reaction would be. He knew the frown that would cover their faces and the scandalized revulsion that would flicker in their eyes. And he knew their opinion did matter, regardless of how much he wished it did not.

Dania deserved nothing less than his undivided devotion and to be adored and respected like the jewel she was. That was why he could not forgo their support and condemn her to a life of shame and shunning because she was not the one their kin approved of. Even though he knew there was no one better for him than her, that there was no one better than her to stand by his side and support him through his life. He had to keep it inside. 

He could not stand the fact that she had to suffer because of their closed minds. The sight of her tear-stricken cheeks as she told him of the venture she was forced to undertake to keep their union secret haunted him. He despised all the people in this room because of it. 

But he had to keep it inside. Sulking, he pressed his fists into his thighs to stop himself from screaming in rage at the injustice of it all. 

A hand on his arm pulled him back to reality. Vili was looking at him; concern etched onto his face. Thorin nodded to let him know he was alright and forced himself to concentrate on the conversation unfolding before him. 

"With all due respect, My Lord, we are still recovering from Azanulbizar. At this time of the year especially, our supplies are lower than they have ever been, " one of the council members was saying. He was young, perhaps even younger than Thorin, but already he stood right next to Lord Ynvgi; a sign of the trust his lord had in him, a sign of his influence in this room. 

Most of the council members were young, yet already they occupied the most influential positions and already led their families. 

We are still recovering from Azanulbizar. 

How long would that battle haunt them? 

So many people — too many — had perished, had suffered, or had been forced to grow up too fast just as he had, many years ago, on the other side of the world when that wretched worm had attacked his homeland. 

"I agree with Master Agnar," one of the eldest members said as he stood up. "However, Lord Thrain, like his ancestors before him, is an ally to the Firebeards*." Thorin looked around at those words, assessing where people's loyalties lay. "He has chosen our Halls for his only daughter's wedding — a most joyous occasion — is it not our duty to lend him our hand?" 

Lord Ynvgi gave a slight nod, though whether this was a gesture of agreement or dissent, Thorin did not know. 

"Master Mundi is right," said a younger Dwarf whom Thorin recognized as Master Airi, the one who had warned them of the orcs' numbers before the battle. "Besides, a wedding would be a welcomed distraction from the hard winter we have suffered." 

Several side glances were shared in response. His words rang true, though perhaps they did not form the most persuasive argument. 

At the other end of the table, a tall Dwarrow stood and looked to Lord Yngvi.

"Yes, Lady Ragnhildr," Lord Yngvi nodded. 

"Perhaps a bargain may be struck, My Lords," she began in a silvery voice. "I believe it is safe to say that I am not the only one who would be honoured for the wedding to take place here in Lord Yngvi's Hall. We may even lend Lord Thrain a hand as he ventures further South and finds a place to settle permanently — "

"Lay Ragnhildr, I usually applaud your council, but this is preposterous. We do not run a charity," the Dwarf right next to Lord Ynvgi interjected. 

Thorin heard his father sigh as Lady Ragnhildr smiled scornfully. "Perhaps if you would let me finish speaking my mind, there would be no need to insult my intelligence and hurt your own in the process."

A few, including Vili, had to stifle their snorts. 

"As I was saying," she went on with a side glance to the one who had interrupted her, "Perhaps we may strike a deal. The wedding takes place here, and we offer help as you find a place to settle. In exchange, as soon as your forges are up and running, you must give us a third of the weapons produced within the year, and we have your word that if any orcs, or even Men, come to attack us, we can count on your support." 

She and Lord Yngvi were staring at each other as she spoke, and he was nodding in approval as she went. 

"This is not charity," she said, scanning the table until her eyes landed on Thrain. "Nor is this a favour. This is business. As many of my colleagues have pointed out: times are hard. We will only survive if we can count on one another." 

Thorin found himself nodding in approval. Of course, fulfilling such a deal would be a strain on them, but what other choice did they have? They needed their help. And his father, who was intent on Dis being married as soon as possible —  "for the good of the line of Durin," as he put it — would find even more cause to agree to this plan. 

Thorin had to admire Lady Ragnhildr's negotiation skills. He only had to place himself in her shoes to see that,  given the circumstances, this was the best offer she could make and that it was actually an advantage to both parties. 

Fortunately, Thrain agreed with his son's unspoken opinions. It only took one glance between them, and the king was nodding. "Very well, Lord Yngvi." 

"I am honoured to host your daughter's wedding, Lord Thrain," Lord Yngvi said formerly, but there was something in his tone that hinted at old friends coming together rather than two lords signing an agreement. "Especially since, long ago, I was very close to Lord Viljar, Lord Vili's father," he added for the benefit of the younger council members. "This wedding shall be a celebration of my friendship with him as well as my friendship with you, Lord Thrain.

"There is much planning to get through before that joyous day is upon us," he went on. "But I think this is progress enough for today. I, for one, would like a very large ale." As soon as he said so, the boy sitting next to him stood to fulfill his request. "This meeting is adjourned, for now."

Finally, Thorin thought with a quiet sigh. He was satisfied with how the negotiations had concluded, but all he wanted now was to rest. He still would not get that. There was to be a feast tonight, and then there would be more negotiations tomorrow, and then soon enough, they would be back on the road. 

"Are you alright, brother?"

Thorin turned to face Vili and froze. Images of warm Spring days filled with honeycakes and laughter flashed in his mind, juxtaposed with blood and screams. Brother. Frerin always called him that. Not Thorin. Brother. 

"Thorin?" 

"I am fine," Thorin said firmly, then, more gently, "I am fine. Thank you."

His father, along with Mimir, Dania's father, and Nar, was still conversing with Lord Yngvi, so Thorin made his way out of the council room. He was halfway down the hallway when he realized Vili was walking next to him. 

"So," Vili said tentatively. "How are you, truly?" 

"I told you: I am fine." 

"I am sorry, I did not mean to offend you by calling you brother, I just thought — "

"You did not offend me," Thorin said as he looked at him. "Really. You did not."

"Alright," Vili said with a tilt of his head. "Then, do you want to talk about it?" 

"About what?" Thorin sighed. 

"About what is making you so irritable — so . . . distracted," he said. 

Thorin frowned, his jaw set. "I am not — "

"Come now, Thorin," Vili chuckled. "I practically had to push you so that you'd listen in there. And your jaw was clenched so tight I was worried you would break your teeth."

How insolent, Thorin thought. He hadn't realized it was Vili's place to study him like he was some sick animal. He had half a mind to tell him off, but then his anger might be interpreted as a sign that there was some truth to Vili's observations. There was truth to it, Thorin did not deny that, but he would not admit it aloud either. 

"Is this about Dania?" 

Thorin could not hold back his outburst this time. 

"What does she have to do with any of this?" he demanded, looking down at him. 

His need to protect her — and their secret — mingled with the fear of being discovered, and what that would bring about fogged his mind. He could not let anyone take her away from him. He would not. 

"I — I do not know," Vili stammered. "I just thought — "

Looking around, Vili took a deep breath, then looked back to Thorin with softness and determination in his eyes. "Listen, Thorin, I spoke with Dis and from the things she said — I gathered there might be something between you two."

Thorin eyed him intently for a moment. "You mean Dis told you?" 

Vili sighed. "Yes, she told me," he admitted as he scratched his pale beard. At least he had the decency to sound embarrassed. 

Exasperation stretched Thorin's already overloaded mind. Leaning toward Vili to avoid behind overhead, he groaned, "you cannot tell anyone." He did not even wait for an answer before moving away, though he heard Vili trailing after him. 

***

Staring at the soaked leaves at the bottom of her cup, Dania sighed inwardly. The afternoon was passing away slowly, and with each minute, the respite it had promised was diluted like the taste of honey she chased in her tea. 

Dania was sick of tea. And most of all, she was sick of the idle chat. Dis didn't seem to mind too much. After all, she was being bombarded with questions about her upcoming wedding, which kept her mind occupied and her cheeks warm and red. Dania, on the other hand, felt out of place. 

Sitting on a luxurious, currant red sofa, Dania found herself more easily invested in her surroundings than in the conversation. After all, it went on as it usually did. Ester gossiped, Nal laughed, and Illiana scolded them when they went too far, though a smirk always tugged at her lips. Beside Dania, Lady Adis was silent, while Ester's mother, Lady Inger, and Lady Vigga, Lord Yngvi's wife, participated in the conversation enthusiastically. 

Lady Vigga was also quite the gossiper, though everything else about her was still a mystery. The many beads and jewels in her hair and beard marked her as a lady of high standing. She had a handsome face, though her thin lips and her wide-set eyes made her appear stern. The dark red of her dress did nothing to counter that impression. 

She obviously had expensive taste, if this room was anything to go by. A stone table stood between the sofa Dania and the queen sat on and the other on which Dis, Illiana, and Nal were sitting.  Ester, her mother and Lady Vigga occupied three of the four other chairs, made of some dark wood of which Dania should have remembered the name, and upholstered in faded golden damask. Covering the stone floor was a thick rug, its colours similar to those on the tapestries on the walls. One depicted a large figure with a long beard adorned with dozens of intricate, coloured beads. Dania recognized him as Mahal, their maker. In front of him were seven Dwarves looking up, cowering before him as he raised his hammer.* 

Lady Yngvi had offered this sitting room, along with its adjacent chambers, to Lady Adis and Lord Thrain as long as they remained in his Hall. Lord Thrain, however, had insisted on them remaining in their encampment just outside the gates. Whether this was because of pride or simply because he did not wish to abuse their hospitality, Dania was not sure, but she was grateful for it. 

When they had first entered the sitting room, Lady Vigga warmly welcomed them, but her eyes soon halted on Dania. 

"You must be Dania," Lady Vigga had said with a wry smile. "I have heard a lot about you."

Dania had no idea how to respond to such a greeting. Of course, she was used to people giving her odd looks and whispering behind her back, but that did not make it pleasant. And while she was used to it, it was clear that Lady Adis was not, and somehow she seemed to have taken personally the looks Dania had received. 

"Yes, Dania is quite the accomplished young lady," Lady Adis had responded in the same tone as she placed an arm around Dania's shoulders. 

Lady Adis and Lady Vigga had glared at one another for a moment as the hand on Dania's shoulder tightened its grip. It was a protective gesture, Dania had realized with embarrassment.

Lady Adis had been quiet since then, and Dania felt terribly guilty. Always, her presence seemed to be asking people to pick a side, as it had now. Dania hated it. Yet, at the same time, she could hardly believe Lady Adis had taken her defence. Did she feel obligated to do so? Or did she actually care? Dania knew her enough to know that the answer probably resided in the latter, but she still could not believe someone would go so far as to ruin their afternoon to defend her. Once again, she was immeasurably indebted to Lady Adis, but even more than this, she was profoundly touched.

As though sensing her inner turmoil, Lady Adis squeezed Dania's hand, a gesture that made her feel like a child, but not in a bad way. It told her that it was alright for her to be upset, that she was not weak for feeling so, and that she was allowed to seek comfort — comfort which Lady Adis wanted to give her. 

Promise me that you will tell me if you are feeling scared or lonely ever again. I am here for you, she had said the night the soldiers had returned from Azanulbizar. 

Her touch was a reminder of that conversation they'd had, and Dania was so grateful for it.  

It was the mention of Thorin's name that brought Dania's attention back to the Dwarrows before her. 

"I almost did not recognize him when I saw him yesterday," Lady Vigga said. "He has grown into a very fine young Dwarf. And he looks so much like you, Lady Adis."

"Yes, he does," Lady Adis replied with a small smile. 

"I imagine it must be odd for him to see his younger sister married before him," Lady Vigga said. 

So they had come to it that quickly. Ester shifted in her seat at those words; that alone was enough to provoke the monster inside Dania. 

"Not at all," Lady Adis replied. "I see no reason to rush him into an unwanted marriage. When he finds the right person, he will be ready." 

From the corner of her eye, Dania saw Dis glance at her quickly. Dania left her face a blank canvas, yet she could feel moisture forming in her hands, and the ever-present ache she'd fought so hard to bury bloomed again in her stomach. 

Whatever Lady Adis said, Lord Thrain did appear to be in a hurry to marry his daughter. Dis, like Dania, was only forty-five years old, and that thought did nothing to ease Dania's worries. Of course, they could not force Thorin to marry, but they could very well place him in a position where he had little choice but to consent to it. Dania hoped it would not come to this because she would have no right to get in the way if it did. 

She would not let him sacrifice everything for her. 

"Who said anything about 'unwanted'?" Lady Inger said with a chuckle, sounding as though she was attempting to lighten the mood, yet her eyes spoke a different language entirely. She wanted something. "So many young Dwarrows must have their eyes set on him."

Dania hated the way they talked about Thorin. She hated how they talked about him as though he was a piece of meat; a pawn in their grand game of chess. 

"I do not think my brother would be overjoyed to learn you were using his personal life as tea time entertainment," Dis said dispassionately. Dania wanted to kiss her in thanks for voicing her thoughts.

"Oh, my dear," Lady Vigga said with a laugh, "this has nothing to do with his personal life."

"You are talking about his marriage prospects — that has everything to do with his personal life!" Dis retorted. 

"Not if you are the heir to the throne of Erebor," Lady Vigga said. "Whomever he marries will be a queen one day. This is politics; not love."

"Perhaps these two concepts are not mutually exclusive," Illiana said. "Dis and Vili's upcoming marriage is a political one, but they do love each other." 

Smiling softly, Dania and Illiana exchanged a glance. Dis' cheeks had turned a bright red. 

"If the prince has his sister's sense then, yes; he will learn to love the one who will make the right queen," Lady Vigga said with a wave of her hand as though they were discussing whether one should wear red or blue to a feast. 

"Ah, and the prince is so devoted to his duties. He will make the right choice," Lady Inger said as she shared a look with her daughter. The monster inside Dania coiled its tail and roared. 

Nevertheless, Dania could not help but notice that Lady Adis was silent. Everything — or, almost everything — Laddy Vigga had said was true, and yet the queen's silence appeared to Dania as a small beacon of hope. Perhaps it was foolish. It probably was. Yet Dania clung to it like it was a ray of sun, and she was a flower that had bloomed too early in the Spring and found itself in a dark and barren world. 

"It is getting late," Lady Adis said as she rose from her seat, "and we must get ready for the feast tonight."

"Yes, and what an event that will be," Lady Vigga replied with a too-wide smile. "I look forward to seeing you there." 

Lady Adis nodded, then turned to Dania. "Are you coming, dear?" 

Dania smiled shyly at the term of endearment and stood. She gave a quick curtsy to Lady Vigga then gladly followed Lady Adis and Dis out of the sitting room. A long sigh escaped her lips when the door closed behind her. 

"Yes, I quite agree with that sentiment," Lady Adis said in response. 

Dania blushed, having hoped her most improper display of irritation would go unnoticed, but the queen did not seem to mind. 

"I hope you girls will excuse my behaviour," Lady Adis said as they walked down the curved hallway. "It is not like me to lose my temper in this way. But, then again, I have always despised Lady Vigga, and she was particularly bothersome today."

"You mean to say she was an absolute wretch," Dis said with a grimace, causing Dania to snicker. 

"Dis!" Lady Adis hissed in reproach, but there was an amused gleam in her eyes. Then a dry cough escaped her lips, causing Dis and Dania to stare at her in concern. "I'm alright — the air was just — quite stuffy in there." When her breathing recovered, she went on, "Dania, I do hope you will not let that viper's words get to you."

"It's alright," Dania said with a shrug. "I'm used to it."

"That does not mean you should accept it," Lady Adis replied.

They had made it back to the crowded entrance hall. Beyond the large stone gate, the sun was beginning to set so that the whole room basked in its warmth. 

"Vili!" Dis suddenly called out and walked ahead to where her betrothed had appeared. He smiled widely when he saw her, and the two exchanged a warm embrace, without a care for the stares they were attracting from the crowd of people around them.

"Listen to me carefully, Dania," Lady Adis' voice called her attention away from the couple. "You are a wonderful girl; smart, brave, and above all, you have a kindness that can warm even the coldest of hearts. Many people in this world are close-minded and will seek to tear you down because they refuse to challenge their beliefs. You must not let their words reach your heart."

Dania stared at her with wide eyes, silent as she let the motherly care in Lady Adis' eyes wash over her, feeding her the courage to speak. 

"My Lady," she said hesitantly. "What is it that they say?" Lady Adis frowned. Taking this as a sign of misunderstanding, Dania went on. "Lady Vigga said she had heard a lot about me. . . ."

Closing her eyes for an instant, Lady Adis took a deep breath. "Some — like Lady Vigga — believe that you are not one of us; that you are — "

"An outlander," Dania said flatly, looking down at the ground. She only looked up when she felt a gentle hand on her shoulder. 

"We are all outlanders in this part of the world," Lady Adis said. "And you are one of us. Never let anyone tell you otherwise. Besides, in what world is it acceptable to scorn someone based on where they come from — something that is out of your control?"

Dania nodded slowly. Lady Adis' words seemed contradictory to her. She was one of them, but she could not be proud of the blood that flowed through her. The blood of their enemies. 

As though she heard these thoughts, Lady Adis' grip on her shoulder tightened. "You have nothing to be ashamed of, my dear. You must know that we cannot judge an entire race based on the actions of a single individual. Whatever words you might have heard thrown around behind your back, know that your mother — she did not bewitch your father or do anything ridiculous of the sort; they loved each other, and you carry their love within you every day.

"Lady Vigga was wrong about many things, but about this in particular: not everything is about politics; and in times such as these where grief has its claws on us all, it is more important than ever to cling to love." 

Tears stung Dania's eyes, and she knew Lady Adis would have understood — perhaps even more than she did herself — but they were in a crowded space; the last thing Dania wanted was to give these people more cause to stare at her. 

"Are you alright, Dania?" spoke the deep voice she knew so well and loved dearly. 

She curtsied before nodding, but he could read her eyes better than anyone. Concern marked his features as his mother spoke, but neither of them was really listening. All Dania could think of was the conspiring looks Ester and Lady Inger had shared earlier. Don't let them take you from me, she begged him wordlessly. 

"Thorin, love, are you listening to me?" Lady Adis said, causing both Dania and Thorin to blush. 

"Sorry, amad, I have a lot on my mind," Thorin said as he tore his gaze away from Dania. "What did you say?" 

Lady Adis stared at him for a moment before speaking. "I asked you if all was well? I have not seen your father anywhere." 

"Yes, all is well. There are still many things to discuss, but, so far, we have struck a good deal with Lord Yngvi. Father is still with Nar and Master Mimir; I imagine they were finalizing some arrangements with Lord Yngvi." 

Dis and Vili reappeared at that moment. Dania frowned as Dis looked at her brother for a moment, then at her, a guilty expression on her face.

"Are you coming to the feast tonight, Dania?" Thorin asked her. She could not read his mind, but it seemed to her as though he was deliberately avoiding his sister's eyes. 

"Yes, I am, Lord Thorin," she replied. 

"Speaking of which," Dis interjected, "we should go and get ready, don't you think?" she asked her. 

"Yes, I suppose," Dania said hesitantly. She barely had time to curtsy to Thorin and the queen and give Vili a small smile before Dis dragged her away from the crowd. 

They scurried along the path just outside the gates, passed by the guards, and cut across the encampment until they entered their tent. 

"Mahal, what's your hurry?" Dania said breathlessly as Dis started pacing in the small space between the two makeshift beds. 

"Oh, Dania I'm sorry — so sorry — I didn't think — I thought it would not matter — but of course it does; you told me it was a secret — "

The world froze around Dania. "What?" 

"Thorin already chastised me for it so," — she waved her hands in the air in defence — "there's no need to do it again. It is only that — well, we are going to be married, I should not keep secrets from him. But then Thorin went on and on about how it was not my secret but yours and — "

"You told Vili," Dania said with a relieved sigh. 

"Yes and — "

"Well, start with that next time! You had me worried!"

It was Dis' turn to freeze. "You mean — you mean you are not mad?" 

Dania did not know what she was feeling. How had Vili reacted? He certainly had not taken the first opportunity to divulge the secret to King Thrain — and she doubted he ever would — yet instead of being relieved — if not outright happy — that someone else knew of their love for each other and was not repulsed by it, Dania felt even more dejected. 

Judging by the bits and pieces of information she had gathered, Thorin did not seem overjoyed that Vili knew their secret. She knew how important it was for them to take their time before they could try and convince their kin of the viability of their union and the strength of their bond, but this was Vili, not the whole council chamber. Yet letting even one person know, someone they knew well, and that would soon be part of his family, appeared to Thorin as one stroke too many on the battered barrier that protected their shared heart.  That only reminded Dania of how little they could trust anyone with their secret, and by extension, just how fanciful was the idea of their parents blessing their union.

But Dania was not mad. Despite her befuddled thoughts, despite how much she wanted to scream at Mahal for placing the other half of her soul so close to her yet so beyond her reach, that foolish and naive part of her mind was glad that Vili knew. He was her friend, and he would soon be her best friend's husband. It felt . . . right for him to know. 

Shaking her head, Dania frowned. "No it's — it's Vili. I trust him. You trust him." 

"Thank Mahal," Dis exclaimed, relief flooding her every word. Dania wished she could feel the same relief. 

Dania let herself fall onto her makeshift bed. They were silent for a while before Dis sat down beside her, their knees touching, and she gently grabbed her hand. 

"Amad was right, Dania," she said. "Don't listen to what Lady Vigga says." 

Bitting her lips as a cascade of emotions climbed up her throat, Dania shrugged. "But Dis — she was right. Whoever Thorin marries one day, she'll be a queen — "

"You mean you will be — "

"Dis — " Dania said breathlessly, shaking her head. She opened her mouth to speak but then resigned herself to the fact that she knew not how to translate her feelings into words. "I don't want to talk about this for now, alright? Let's just get ready for the feast."

***

The dining room was even more imposing than the sitting room they had visited earlier. Columns and complex geometric patterns were carved directly into the stone walls and had been polished so skilfully that they shone like marble. Most remarkable were the blue streaks of colour that gave these mountains their name gleaming in the candlelight, rippling through the stones like the waves Dania had once admired on the Long Lake.

Dozens of early Spring flowers and candles decorated the long stone table; an effort made to make the guests feel welcomed, but all it did was make them feel slightly out of place. Dania knew this was not just her own impression. Dis had not let go of her arm since they had walked inside, except to let Dania curtsy.

When the doors opened to reveal Lady Vigga, holding onto Lord Yngvi's arm, all Dania wanted to do was shrink up and disappear, but she was already at the back of the room, and no one paid her any mind. Lady Vigga looked even more imposing than she had a few hours before. She wore purple this time, and the cuffs and neckline of her gown were adorned with golden embroidery that matched the ornamental belt at her waist, attached with a large clasp bearing the sigil of the Firebeards.

Despite having had the chance to discard her travel-worn dress and don her only other gown, which Lady Adis had a seamstress restore to a suitable state, the other Dwarrows' fine attire intimidated Dania. She should have known better than to feel this way. With everything that had befallen them in the past year, fabrics and accoutrements should have been the least of her worries, but they became one of the many things that reminded her that she simply did not belong to this life. Her gown was a dull ash grey where the Dwarrows around her wore bright fabrics, embroidered and bejewelled, and her braids were plain compared to the precious beads that adorned their hair and beards. Even Dis was not so richly dressed, for they could not afford it, but then again, the princess did not require such embellishments to appear more elegant and regal than all the people in this room. Something in her countenance spoke more about her status than any jewel ever could.  

"There you are!" 

Dania and Dis turned around to see Ester, Nal, and Illiana walking towards them. They all wore their prettiest gowns, but only Ester looked like she belonged with the Firebeard ladies. Dania wondered how Ester could wear such expensive fabrics and so many jewels and not feel guilty when most of them had barely had anything to eat during their journey from Dunland. 

"Oh, Dis, you look beautiful!" Ester said. Then, without giving anyone else the chance to speak, she asked, "is your brother here?" 

Dis' hold on Dania's arm tightened. "Er — well, if he is not, he should be here any minute," the princess said. 

"Ester has been talking about him our whole way here," Nal said teasingly. "I do not think I could stand another minute of it!" Me neither, Dania thought. 

"Look, there's Dwalin!" Dis said in an attempt to change the topic. Something flickered in Ester's eyes, but she looked away, perhaps to appear uninterested or perhaps because she truly was indifferent to the warrior's presence. Dania was having more and more trouble understanding her motives. But then she remembered the look in Lady Inger's eyes, and she realized that it was possible that a union with Thorin was not something Ester wanted but that her parents wanted for her. Dania did not know which of these two scenarios bothered her more. 

Illiana was talking about Lady Vigga's offer to give them a tour of the Hall the next day when Dania's attention was stolen by a group of people entering the room, or rather, by one Dwarf in particular. Thorin was standing next to his father and mother, along with Balin, Nar, and Mimir, looking as handsome as ever. His hair appeared to have been freshly washed and braided, and he was dressed in the deep blue tunic he usually wore to such occasions. The colours were more faded than Dania remembered, but nothing could affect the majesty of his presence. 

As she slowly made her way toward her father, Thorin's eyes met her own, conjuring a deep blush from her cheeks. When she was finally close enough to the group, she curtsied, then grabbed the arm her father was extending toward her, but all she could think of was escaping this room to be alone with Thorin and feel his soft lips scorching her skin. As though he could hear her most improper thoughts, the corner of his lips curled up in a smile. That only made the heat inside Dania grow. Damn that Dwarf!

She was glad when they finally took their seats, if only because it might be easier for her to control herself while they sat at different tables. Mimir led her to a table near the main one where the king and his family were sitting with Lord Ygnvi and his wife, so Dania could still see Thorin quite clearly, but she forced herself not to look, or at least, not look as often as she wished to. Her father sat on her right and immediately began conversing with one of Lord Yngvi's advisors while she turned to another young Dwarf who had just pulled up her chair. 

"Oh, thank you," Dania said, startled by his kindness. 

"Not at all," he said with a warm smile before sitting down. "My name is Airi." 

Dania bowed her head in reverence. "It is a pleasure to make your acquaintance, Master Airi. I am Dania."

"Airi will do; not Master Airi," he said with a chuckle. "And the pleasure is all mine, Lady Dania."

It was Dania's turn to chuckle. "I am no Lady."

"Really? Well, you have the countenance of one," Airi replied.

Blushing, Dania looked away, only to find Thorin staring at her through the many people separating them. He looked at her questioningly, but she could do nothing but give a short, almost imperceptible nod and tear her gaze away from him. 

Dania had not thought she could be more confounded by her surroundings until the food was served. There was chicken, roast beef, and sausages, too many kinds of cheese to choose from, freshly baked bread, roasted potatoes, and enough wine to drown in. She had not seen this much food in years. 

"Have you been enjoying your stay in the Blue Mountains so far?" Airi asked her as she delved into the dishes. One taste of the potatoes was enough to convince her to fill her entire plate with them. 

Dania thought of her afternoon with Lady Vigga, but the delicious taste of the wine made her nod in response. "Yes, it is lovely here."

"Have you had a chance to take a tour of the Hall?" Airi asked. 

"No yet, I am afraid," Dania said. 

"It would be my honour to accompany you around the place."

"I would be honoured, whenever that may be," Dania replied as she took another mouthful of sausages. 

"Well, there should be plenty of time for that, given that you will be staying here for a while, I gather," Airi said. "I am certain there are many things that would interest you. The ballroom for one — "

"Is there a library?" Dania asked before she could stop and think twice about interrupting him. She needed to look for other plants to help with her . . . problem, and a library was the place she would find information.

"Yes, of course there is. I could show you, if you would like," he said with a smile. 

"I would like that very much," Dania replied in the same tone. 

"What would you like?" Dania's father asked as he leaned in toward her. 

"I was just telling your daughter that I would be more than happy to accompany her to the library, Master Mimir," Airi explained. 

"You know my father?" Dania asked. 

"I was at the council meeting today," Airi said, nodding. 

Dania turned to her father. "Yes, about that — How did it go?" 

"Quite well, I would say, given the king's fixed ambition." He spoke using courtly equivocations to avoid being misunderstood by overeager ears, but Dania knew he was talking of Lord Thrain's hurry to marry Dis to Vili. "Besides, the important thing is that Lord Ygnvi will lend us a hand when we are ready to make our way further South along the mountains. And he has extended his hospitality so that those who are not fit to travel may stay behind in the meantime."

Dania knew that "those not fit to travel" probably included Dwarrows, meaning she would have to stay behind while Thorin left with his father's chosen companions, for Mahal knows how long. The thought left a bittersweet taste in her mouth. 

"You will have plenty of things to do while we are gone," Mimir said as he noted the slight frown on her face. "There is also much to look forward to before that moment is upon us. Do not fret, gehyith."

Dania gave her father a small smile to ease his worries, but she stopped listening to what her table companions were saying. Glancing up toward Thorin, she saw that he was now conversing with Ester and a Dwarf Dania recognized as her father. They were standing next to the seat Thorin had just vacated to greet them, and she was smiling and laughing at every little thing he said. Somehow, Ester looked even prettier than she usually did. Grinding her teeth, Dania tried to look away, but it was as though an invisible hand was holding her head in place, forcing her to watch as her heart was slowly being ripped away from her. Don't let them take you from me. 

When the desserts were served, she regained some of her spirits — that was the power of a perfect trifle — but her mind was still preoccupied with Thorin and the dismay the thought of their separation was causing her. Mimir noticed his daughter's change of mood, and as soon as the first opportunity presented itself, he excused them and led her toward the exit. Dania was both thankful for and annoyed by this gesture, for now, she would not even be able to steal a glance at Thorin, who would undoubtedly be stuck at the feast for at least another hour. 

Before stepping out of the room, Dania daringly glanced back to the main table, and she noticed Thorin staring back at her, evidently not listening to a word Ester was saying. Even from this distance, she recognized the fiery look he was giving her, full of promises for their next secret meeting. Perhaps her father was right; she did have much to look forward to. 

#the hobbit #the hobbit fanfiction #thorin #thorin fan fiction #thorin fanfic #thorin x reader #thorin x oc #tolkien #heart of gold

[emerald-amidst-gold]

WIP Whenever - ever - ever..

Just because I’m feeling spunky tonight (early morning, really), I’m gonna share a snippet from the upcoming chapter of EEAGV. (yes, I finally abbreviated it. >:D)

Have Mhairi. Have moments before disaster that is rearing to shoulder check Avan into the next AGE. Just...have a lovely woman realizing she’s worth something and knows should never settle for less. :D

***

“Ahem!”

The harsh clearing of a throat that, regretfully, came from Avan had Mhairi drifting from her equally sad, but tender thoughts as she reopened her eyes to glare up at the impatient man before her. You know, she would much prefer shuffling about in an aravel, baking than having to deal with this infuriating excuse of a ‘man’. At least then she’d be around someone who cared for her.

“Yes?”, Mhairi said with every ounce of politeness she could muster, but kept her face blank and indifferent.

Avan scoffed. “You never answered my question.”, he said.

Mhairi lifted a hand to her lips, tapping them in feigned thought. She immediately noticed how Avan’s eyes shifted there, her expression nearly cracking with exasperation and disgust, but she kept it as hard as plaster. There were a few useful tricks she had picked up from her brother. 

“Which one was that? I must have flown away like the da’ean that I am.”, she said with an airy, dramatic sigh before snorting, her face finally cracking into a slight sneer. “Don’t worry, Avan. I heard you. It’s hard not to.”

The auburn haired elf rolled his eyes before taking a step closer, grey eyes shifting up and down her body quickly before they connected with her own. Mhairi schooled her features once again, idly feeling how magic rippled across her palm in anticipation of erecting a barrier. She had done that once already, and she would do so again if pressed.

“Then answer.”, Avan commanded with a tone that he probably thought was intimidating. Hah! She had heard truer authority housed in Cyfrin’s theatrics, and that was saying something! 

“I wasn’t speaking of a touch, Avan.”, Mhairi said with a clipped tone, not wanting to draw this out further than was necessary. “I’m telling you to be more courteous with your words.”

“I thought I was. You must have pretty exacting standards if my endearments aren’t enough.”, Avan said with what she thought was supposed to be a growl. Mhairi had to stave off a laugh at the pitiful sound by pressing two fingers to her lips. Wow. How cute. 

Not.

Mhairi took a deep breath through her nose to stop her rising mirth before tilting her chin upwards in defiance. Even if she was shorter than pretty much every man in the clan, that didn’t mean she would act like it. None of her kin held a candle to Fane’s height or stature. And if she wasn’t intimidated by him, then no man here could hope to do so. 

Well, there was one type of man, or rather, people that could intimidate her, but now wasn’t the time for those thoughts. Miring in the past benefited no one, and she tried not to. It was better to look forward, not back. It was better to look up, not down. 

Mhairi shook her head a bit to dislodge the ghosts of the past before meeting Avan’s questioning, but challenging gaze with one renewed with ferocity. “I do have high standards because I know what I’m worth.”, she said with confidence. That’s right. She was worth more than veiled words of affection. Mother had taught her that. 

‘Halla are independent and proud, da’len. We can whisper soothing words, proclaim our undying devotion, sing songs of praise unending, but if the Dalish do not show that through action, then the halla will see they are not truly valued and wander away with their heads held high. They know their worth and are not ashamed to show it.’ Her mother’s words echoed in her mind, a faint memory of the two of them standing outside the halla enclosement manifesting within like her magic did. She could almost see her mother’s long, platinum hair billowing in the breeze and an elegant hand reaching out to one of the majestic creatures to show she was friend not master. ’Words are pretty, sometimes profound, but action, active care supports those words and shows that that person understands and values your worth - a worth you know from the moment you are born. It will also show you what that other person’s worth is. Only then will you know true love and devotion as your personalities, so wonderfully different, but corely the same, intertwine with each other like a halla’s horns.’ The words trailed off like they were being whisked away with the wind of the forest, flaxen hair and cerulean eyes full of love and tenderness dissipating much like how her attempts at conjuring flame did. 

Mhairi let out a tiny sigh with a forlorn smile. Yes, she knew what she was worth, and she was worth more than what Avan had to offer. If anyone wished to match her’s, then they would have to match both her mother’s and Fane’s. The price was thrice raised and the boy before her didn’t have the funds to pay.

***

#mhairi out here just taking names and saying 'fuck you. i'm an independent woman' #every man has to pass the 'fane check' with mhairi #ohhh it's gonna be fun with cully wully~ #fane is going to nearly tear down the veil when that happens XD #wip #oc: mhairi lavellan #oc: fane lavellan #also...dialogue? who am I? #dragon age #my writing

[yukiwrites]

Scheming, but Loving

Thanks for the support again, @lightningbug-lane! I really like writing for ojou-sama types, so I hope I did Chantal justice! >v<)b

This is a Support Chain C-S between her OC Chantal and Yuri!

Commission info HERE and HERE!

______________________________

C SUPPORT

Chantal: Ah, here you are at last, dearie.

Yuri arrives

Yuri: Expected me, did ya now, Lady? Then I’m sure you know the reason why I’m here and will also have a proper explanation for it?

Chantal: Why, I may need my memory refreshed, Yuri dear, for I am known to do much AND I always do it well.

Yuri: I usually have you all figured out, Lady, but this time you done and confused me out of my wits. What’s your deal? Seeing as you’ve been an Abyssian for quite a while I let your nosiness-

Chantal: Competence-

Yuri: -slide most times, but now I gotta hear it from the horse’s mouth. Spill it.

Chantal: Horse?! The LEAST you could do is refer to me as a graceful doe. Perhaps a butterfly; how about that?

Yuri: With that poisonous mouth? I would say ‘snake’ fits ya better, Lady.

Chantal: Ohohoho! Quite the predator for our little Mockingbird, yes? I quite like this, myself!

Yuri: I see you’ve learned how to dodge the subject quite well -- from observing yours truly, surely -- so the more words leave your mouth, the more I notice I am wasting my time here. If you do not talk, I will have other means of discovering what truly happened.

Chantal: *sighs* But you are a spoilsport, are you not, Yuri dearest? Go on, sit down and let us enjoy a refreshing cup of tea. I have acquired the most delectable sweets-

Yuri: Aha, so this is where it all went.

Chantal: Come again?

Yuri: The budget for this week’s rations to the folks back in Abyss. The bloke to whom I entrusted it said you told him you’d take care of everything and relieved him of his duties. And now, as I have heard, here you are, consuming high-end pastries and expensive tea.

Chantal: ...

Yuri: I honestly didn't expect this coming from you of all people, Lady.

Chantal: Are you done? Also, will you consume that macaron I served you or will you simply accuse me before getting your facts straight? I am the one who expected better of you, dear. Jumping to conclusions? If that is so, surely you only lasted this long in the underworld due to luck.

Yuri: Oh? Then, may I have the truth? Where is the budget for the people’s meals?

Chantal: Aha, so you never suspected me at all and just wanted to rile me into fessing up in a mad rage! Did I get it right? I outgrew such petty overreactions quite some years ago, dear. You’ll have to try harder than that to make me lose my cool. *giggles*

Chantal: Regardless, since I did take it upon myself to acquire the supplies, I shall inform you, since you deserve to know as the second in command here in the Abyss.

Yuri: Hah, wait. You think YOU’RE the boss here? Lady, really?

Chantal: Why, quite. Allow me to tell you about that new business you overlooked...

Yuri: And theeere we go again.

B SUPPORT

Chantal: Hm… So those are their intentions? I suppose that means we will not have peace for long.

Man: It’s as I wrote in the report, Lady Chantal. Things at the capital are…

Chantal: Yes, indeed. I shall take my time to read this thoroughly. You did a good job.

Man: I’m the one thankful to Lady Chantal for giving me the chance to be of use. If it weren’t for you finding me and my wife when you did…

Chantal: Mhm, I it was an excellent choice to invest in your wife’s business, my good sir. As for your services, for now you are excused.

Man: Yes, Lady Chantal. I thank you again, if it weren’t for you…

Chantal: Yes, yes. Off you go, dearie. We have a visitor in case you hadn’t noticed.

Man: O-oh! F-forgive me, I’ll excuse myself now.

Man leaves.

Yuri: Ah, so you knew I was here the whole time? Bummer.

Chantal: You gave your presence away on purpose, did you not, Yuri? ‘Look here, Lady, I’m watchin’ you going ‘round in your business so I can threaten you later with it! Fun, fun, fun!’ no?

Yuri: First, may I tell you that your imitation of my voice and accent is TERRIBLE, but honestly speaking, you could make a living out of it.

Chantal: ...

Yuri: Second: I would only use this against you if our goals collided, but from what I’m guessin’, they’re still very much the same, yeah?

Chantal: Indeed. I only want what is best for the Abyssians, though of course it pays to be informed of the situation over yonder.

Yuri: So, what say you? Same predictions as the last time that man came to deliver the report?

Chantal: Watching me from way back then, hm, Yuri dearie?

Yuri: You say it like you didn’t know! I must admit, you’re good at pretending to be shocked about stuff.

Chantal: Ohohoho! Observing how one conversational partner acts and reacts is the bare essential of being good at what one does, is it not? You have that skill yourself, but you only use it to suck up to nobles whereas I, well, use it to survive, as you well know.

Yuri: … Yeah.

Yuri: Wasn’t that man’s wife the one who started that new business you mentioned before? I dug a bit more after you told me about them. You invested what little you had made over the years of banishment to help her take off and used a few noble contacts you’ve had dealings with in the past to “accidentally” discover her high-end pastries. Now she has clients with full coffers buying from her and her family’s undying loyalty to you.

Chantal: Quite a deal, was it not? I do not take a single step without knowing full well of where it will take me!

Yuri: Heh, for someone so full of herself, you sure know what you’re talkin’ about there, Lady.

Chantal: And you had any doubts? Humph!

Chantal: Now, if you’ll excuse me, I have this report to read… Unless you’d like to come with me? You’ll know of its contents one way or another, regardless, so it is better to enjoy a smart conversation when I can have one.

Yuri: Hah! Lead the way, Lady. And if you have more of those pastries, I wouldn’t oppose to one or two.

Chantal: Mh-hm-hm! Smitten with them, weren’t you? I suppose I can oblige…

A SUPPORT

Chantal: *sighs* I suppose I must admit this is not my forte. As vexing as it is to admit, I do not shine in battle tactics as much as I would wish, so perhaps I should, indeed, leave the protection of the Abyss to Yuri. I can manage holding down the fort during a siege, but the battling...

Yuri: I get where you’re coming from. You wanna be able to do everything without relyin’ on anyone, yeah?

Chantal: WAH!! Huff huff... Goddess protect me, you surprised me, Yuri!

Yuri: Hah! Finally managed to sneak up on you, huh? Aware of my true sneaking prowess now, Lady?

Chantal: *groans* I beg you leave me be. I did not wish to be seen, least of all now.

Yuri: … Alright, sorry ‘bout that tease there, just tryin’ to lift your mood back up a bit. Look, lemme tell you something.

Chantal: I would rather not hear.

Yuri: I’ll tell you anyway, ‘cause it’s something you and I both need to hear: I, too, don’t like-- well, more like I don’t think I can afford to rely on other people. What if they fail and everything crumbles? What if I’m not there to watch their every step to see if everything’s comin’ along like I planned? What if, hell, what if they die doing what I relied on them to do? It’s much easier to just relay orders and keep back-up plans and act on them when the time arrives, yeah?

Chantal: ...

Yuri: Honestly, I still think like that from time to time. Probably will never stop thinkin’ like that, ever, but ya know… Something changed in these years we’ve been together running the Abyss.

Chantal: *scoffs* Finally admitting I am the best choice to be the leader of Abyss, Yuri?

Yuri: Actually, that WAS where I was heading, yeah.

Chantal: *gasps*

Yuri: More like that we’re a great team at this -- together. Sure, you don’t have what it takes to command people in battle, but I do. You can guide the Abyssians under a siege while I can go off to battle and know things will be safe in here. I won’t have to worry.

Chantal: As a… team? Working together? I- I must confess this is something new for me, Yuri dear. As you well know, I haven’t relied on anyone since I was a little girl.

Yuri: Yeah.

Chantal: People wanted to exploit me while my father was away, so I had to grow a wit and a sharp mind before I could even outgrow my playing dolls. I always had only myself to rely on -- on my own predictions, my own investments, my own orders...

Yuri: I know. I get it, as I said. I also don’t think I’ll ever be able to truly rely on someone, but if it’s you taking care of the Abyssians while I’m away? That one I can handle. I know how much you care for everyone here; maybe even as much as I do, hah!

Chantal: Ah, perhaps I do not care to such an extent. *giggles* Your devotion is SO dissonant to your entire ‘man of the shadows’ persona… Truly a sight!

Yuri: I’ll excuse being mocked if it means to have you smiling again, Lady. Only this time, though, you hear? Now, let’s head back to the dorms, yeah? The night’s not getting any younger.

Chantal: Very well. … Thank you, Yuri.

S SUPPORT

Yuri: Lately I’m seeing more and more and Chantal’s people hovering over me. It’s keepin’ me in my toes, really! To think I would need to brush up my sneaking skills just for this one thing… Ah, well, surely it’ll be worth the trouble of giving the slip to that many people.

Yuri: It’s a sight to see, honestly, how she’s been chalking up influence here and there and acquiring more faithful peeps to her side. Now, to chase the lady!

Yuri leaves

Chantal, on her own: The end of all conflict is nigh, and yet this uneasy feeling plagues my very being. I am doing everything just as perfectly as I ever did! Tsk, why is it that NOT KNOWING something can make one feel this way...

Chantal: Ah, and there he is, the source of all my problems.

Yuri: Harsh. Also just so you know, I let you sense my arrival.

Chantal: Oh, I know by now that when you want to disappear, you have every means to, dearie. My spies would know.

Yuri: Are you telling me this openly that you had me tailed because you know I’d forgive you or did that make you so mad you don’t care anymore? Wait, don’t answer, I know.

Chantal: ...

Yuri: It’s both, isn’t it? You’re already so smitten by me you know I’ll forgive you for almost anything you do to me, BUT you’re also seething ‘cause I gave your peeps the slip.

Chantal, blushing: I’ll have- *ahem*

Chantal: I’ll have you know that your sentence makes no sense! The one who has to be smitten by me has to be YOU for you to forgive me, dearie, not the other way around.

Yuri: Hah, well, that’s true, so I don’t need to lie about THAT.

Chantal, blushing: W-what, my ears must be playing tricks on me. Did you just CONFESS out of nowhere like a mannerless cur?

Yuri: Nope. I’m confessing NOW, like a properly mannered cur. Here you go, Chantal. I hope you can accept this. I went through all that trouble of slipping away just so I could surprise you and- hah! See that very face you’re making. Worth it.

Chantal, blushing: I- That is not a very good confession, Yuri! ‘Worth it’? Why, I should just take this ring and, and… and be done with it.

Yuri: By putting it on? Yeah, it looks really good on you as I thought it would. Honestly, I can only say my feelings so openly like this because this is you we’re talking about here. I feel that, with you, can truly be with my equal. I can joke, but you’ll also tease me in return. I can talk seriously and you’ll respond in kind.

Chantal: Yuri, I- I have always feared to show my true weakness. Even now, I am equal parts terrified and overjoyed about all of this.

Yuri: Mhm.

Chantal: E-even so, will you still wait for me? Wait until I can proudly call you my beloved and tell you the depth of my feelings for you? I truly wish to stay by your side until death do us part, but I cannot convey it all just yet.

Yuri: Welp, you just did it, silly Lady. I don’t need any fancy words or promises. I just want us to stay side by side forever. You and me, down the road, Chantal?

Chantal, blushing: Yes, Yuri. You and me, together. I… I love you.

Yuri: I’m quite fallen for you too, if this all is any indication. Hah! Joking, teasing! Don’t give me that look. … I love you, too, Chantal.

#fire emblem three houses #fe3h #yuri fire emblem #fatesona #my writings #support chains #yuki's commissions

[ruoyeming]

My Fav Books, another chaotic list

Another quarantine review fest! I know I ranked my top anime but this is seriously too hard so I’m just going to list them to avoid hours of debate. Enjoy!

1) The Skulduggery Pleasant series

This whopper of a series (now at 15 books jesus christ I didn’t know there were that many I’ve only read about twelve) has a special place in my heart. I was FULLY obsessed with it throughout my tween - and teen - years, and for a reason. This shit just butters my bread like nothing else. The story follows a young girl Valkyrie Cain (who eventually becomes a young woman through the series) and her partner in crime, a fashionable living skeleton called Skulduggery Pleasant. They’re MAGICAL DETECTIVES!!!! Bitch!!! They use elemental magic - water, earth, fire, air - to fight off magic-wielding bad guys and look good doing it. The duo is hilarious and seriously shaped my sense of humour, the dry wit and comedic writing style stuck with me and influenced my own writing style to this day! As the series progresses we get a massive cast of characters but to me they’re all memorable, likable (mostly) and well-developed so that’s not an issue. I have no fukcing clue how Derek Landy comes up with his stories because every book in the series has an absolutely wild (yet unique) plot with its own twists and turns. It gets REALLY dark and depressing at times, gory, brutal etc etc especially in the later books I have no idea why this is labeled as a kids series.

10/10 for badassery, humour, and MAD codependency issues

2) The Feverwake series

This bitch is one hell of a YA series. It’s actually only a 2 book-series which is rare, but that’s not the only thing that sets it apart from other creations of its genre. It’s hard to explain the setup without waffling so I’ll just quote the blurb of the first book: “In the former United States, sixteen-year-old Noam Álvaro wakes up in a hospital bed, the sole survivor of the viral magic that killed his family and made him a technopath. His ability to control technology attracts the attention of the minister of defense and thrusts him into the magical elite of the nation of Carolinia.

The son of undocumented immigrants, Noam has spent his life fighting for the rights of refugees fleeing magical outbreaks—refugees Carolinia routinely deports with vicious efficiency. Sensing a way to make change, Noam accepts the minister’s offer to teach him the science behind his magic, secretly planning to use it against the government. But then he meets the minister’s son—cruel, dangerous, and achingly beautiful—and the way forward becomes less clear.”

As you can tell from this, the series is heavy on its politics but in a grounded, realistic and relevant way which is different to many other YA series. Marxist theory is brought up, and you can make some pretty strong links between the books and real events. The magic also has a semi-scientific explanation which is cool and adds to the realness. Anyways this series is action packed and full of twists, plus there’s a bisexual main character and queer romance at the core!! Wig!!! Very good for moral debate - how far is it acceptable to go to protect the oppressed before you become one of the oppressors? Dark and exciting series.

10/10 queer representation and political themes.

3) Spin the Dawn

It’s probably obvious that I’m biased towards YA books but they’re just so exciting and cool! Anyways this is about a girl living in a kind of alternate universe ancient China where magic exists. Maia Tamarin is a skilled seamstress who dreams of being the Imperial Tailor, a position that can only be held by a man. She poses as her brother to go to the royal palace and enter a competition full of skilled tailors, all vying for the role of imperial tailor. She also meets Edan; a mysterious, annoying, but SEXY mage who seems to know her secret identity? Oho? IMO this would be an elevated book if Edan had been a girl but that’s just me being gay. As the final challenge Maia is tasked with making 3 dresses from the sun, moon, and stars - a mission that takes her to the ends of the world in search of these magical materials (obvs Edan goes with her and they kiss kiss fall in love). It’s a fairly classic YA plot and characters but the combination of Project Runway, Mulan, and kind of Lord of the Rings(??) vibes makes for a very entertaining read. It’s also really fun to imagine what the clothes look like, plus the romance between Maia and Edan is very cute. Second book is yet to be published but sounds lit.

10/10 magic fashion and romance (despite its heterosexuality)

4) Aristotle and Dante Discover the Secrets of the Universe

Usually I steer clear of angsty gay stories because I’ve consumed too much of the depressing narrative which is all about suffering because of being gay, but fuuuuuuck this book is like the definition of bittersweet. Mostly bitter to be fair but it has a happy ending which was lovely after the emotional torment of the book. It’s about two teen boys - Aristotle is angry and repressed, Dante is eccentric but kind, and the two eventually form a strong friendship after meeting at the local pool. It’s kind of obvious that Ari is in denial about a few things, which leads to some real sad boi hours. There’s also a devastating moment around halfway (not sure) through with a car accident which makes the whole thing 10x heavier. Despite all this, the book has its sweet moments - parents play a big role, but not in the way they usually do in queer stories - and like I said the ending is the bandage for your broken heart. I’m not sure what it is about the writing style, maybe the way it just cuts between scenes randomly or perhaps the way the dialogue and actions are so realistic, but it’s so different to any other book I’ve read that it’s stayed in my mind for a while after reading it.

10/10 really good philosophy plus supportive parents

5) The Gentleman’s Guide to Vice and Virtue

Okay if this was a ranked list, this bad boy would be on its way to the top spot. It’s got everything: historical setting, gays, pirates, alchemy, humour, adventure, angst, character development, and some healthy second-hand embarrassment. It’s not complicated or philosophical but reading this book all in one go is like taking five shots and diving into a pool. It’s exciting and witty, but deals with darker themes like child abuse too. One of the MCs also has a disability and doesn’t treat it as something to be cured, which is a lesson our protagonist has to learn. Speaking of protagonists, Henry ‘Monty’ Montague is a great main character. He’s obnoxious, oblivious, and hedonistic yet quick-witted and passionate, and he has a good heart. Sometimes you just want to grab him by the shoulders and shake him for being such an ignorant idiot, but throughout the book he grows and learns to open his mind more (as well as becoming more humble). He’s a great example of a flawed yet likable main character. He is also a bisexual icon.

Oof forgot to even talk about the story. Monty embarks on a tour of Europe, usually taken by lads his age to get all cultured before they settle down and inherit the family company or whatever. With him are his younger sister Felicity, a girl with a brilliant mind for science who isn’t taken seriously by anyone because of her gender, and the lovely Percy, Monty’s lifelong best friend (and crush). Monty ends up stealing a very valuable object that turns the Tour into a manhunt across Europe, and drags the trio into a big ol’ conspiracy involving something that may or may not be the philosopher’s stone????

Issues of race, gender, and disability in historical context are really well done, and it’s an absolute banger of a book.

10/10 very exciting adventure, plus GREAT GAY ROMANCE

6) Heaven Official’s Blessing

HOOOOOO BOY. This is probably my absolute fave on this list. It’s a webnovel (originally Chinese but the full translation is online). Set in ancient china in the cultivation world (difficult as shit to explain if ur not into all of that but I’ll try), basically there’s three realms - the heavenly realm, the human/mortal realm, and the ghostly realm. If a mortal reaches a certain point (good deeds, power etc), they ascend to become a god - or if they fall far enough, they become a ghost. 

I’ll just quote the author’s description again cause I don’t have the brain cells required:

 “Eight hundred years ago, Xie Lian was the Crown Prince of the Xian Le kingdom. He was loved by his citizens and was considered the darling of the world. He ascended to the Heavens at a young age; however, due to unfortunate circumstances, was quickly banished back to the mortal realm. Years later, he ascends again–only to be banished again a few minutes after his ascension. Now, eight hundred years later, Xie Lian ascends to the Heavens for the third time as the laughing stock among all three realms. On his first task as a god thrice ascended, he meets a mysterious demon who rules the ghosts and terrifies the Heavens, yet, unbeknownst to Xie Lian, this demon king has been paying attention to him for a very, very long time.”

It’s hard to describe the enormity of this story and all the emotions it encapsulates, you really have to read it for yourself. But bitch the undying, pure, Hozier-devotion-level LOVE is by far my favourite part of this story. If you’re looking for an epic, god-tier gay romance, then this is it baby!! This story has comedy, action, and downright harrowingly depressing moments, but throughout is this achingly beautiful love between fallen god and last believer.

I don’t wanna give too much away cause there are some big ol’ plot reveals, but oooh this shit made me cry. The protagonist is MY FAVOURITE EVER I didn’t think it was possible to like a protag so much!! He’s legit my fave character! At first he seems oblivious and carefree but he’s just doing his goddamn best after all he’s been through and he’s so fukcing kind and just wants to help everyone for fuckcs sake excuse me I need to go have a breakdown.

Okay I’m back, anyway there’s a great cast of characters, even the background characters are all incredibly memorable and all given their time to shine and develop. My faves include Quan Yizhen, a rowdy himbo who just wants to fight, and Shi Qing Xuan, a friendly genderfluid god who controls the wind. Read this shit I’m not joking it’ll change your life. 

10/10 for everything

#book review #book recommendations

[olivia-longueville]

Coronation of Anne Boleyn

Anne Boleyn emerged from the Tower of London at 5pm on Saturday the 31st of May 1535.  She had spent the previous days in the queen’s chambers in the Tower.  According to contemporary sources, the last day of spring was bright and warm, and the sky was an unbroken azure, spreading out above Anne in a serene canopy.  It must have seemed to her that nature itself foreshadowed her success as the soon to be Queen of England and Henry VIII’s wife.

Anne was dressed in the French fashion.  The coronation procession from the Tower was en-route for Westminster.  It was headed by twelve servants of the new French ambassador to England – Jean de Dinteville, who was King François I’s maître d’hôtel.  This illustrates Anne’s pro-French preferences, which her numerous foes considered unpatriotic, calling her a Frenchwoman.  This, nevertheless, was true in many aspects because Anne loved France, French culture and fashions.

Then appeared the gentlemen of the royal household, who were by tradition the eyes and ears of the reigning monarch whom they served.  Next came the nine judges clad in their scarlet gowns and hoods, followed by the Knights of the Bath.  Then moved the state council, the ecclesiastical magnates, and the peers of the realm.  At last, behind them emerged the queen’s fabulous litter.

Eric Ives describes Anne’s appearance and her attire:

“She {Anne} was dressed in filmy white, with a coronet of gold.  The litter was of white satin, with ‘white cloth of gold’ inside and out, and its two palfreys were clothed to the ground in white damask. In ravishing contrast was the queen’s dark hair, flowing loose, down to her waist.  Over her was a canopy of cloth of gold held up by the barons of the Cinque Ports.  Then came her own palfrey, also trapped in white.  Twelve ladies in crimson velvet rode behind.”

Several more riders and carriages, as well as thirty gentlewomen on horseback, each of them richly attired, were followed by the king’s guard in two files, one on both sides of the street.  All of the servants in the livery of their masters or mistresses were at the end of the long procession.  Most definitely, many of them did not support Anne and viewed her as the usurper of Catherine’s place in the king’s affections, but they participated in the coronation out of duty and fear, for they would find themselves on the receiving end of the king’s wrath.  And Anne was truly magnificent!

Observers reported that some notable people were missing in the cortege.  Neither the king’s sister, Princess Mary Tudor, nor her daughter, Frances, was present, nor Lady Elizabeth Stafford, Duchess of Norfolk.  Anne’s step-grandmother – Agnes Howard née Tilney, Dowager Duchess of Norfolk – rode in one of the carriages, along with either Anne’s mother, Lady Elizabeth Boleyn, Countess of Wiltshire, or Margaret Wotton, Dowager Marchioness of Dorset.  However, the absences of the king’s sister and her daughter, Frances, can be easily discounted: Princess Mary Tudor had suffered from consummation for months and was very ill at the time of the coronation, while her daughter was barely out of childhood.  The Duchess of Norfolk could have chosen to stay away from her ruthless husband, from whom she had separated in 1534 after their notorious quarrel.  Thomas More, another doubter, was also missing, as he deliberately refused to attend.

For the inhabitants of London, this was their first glimpse of the scandalous, extraordinary woman who had changed the life of the country.  For Anne, the coronation procession was her first chance to see the reaction of the English people to her new station.  Hostile accounts disparaged everything: according to a report that reached the Imperial court in Brussels, the crowds did not cheer and take their hats and toques off when Anne passed.  Some say that later, Anne complained to Henry about the cold reception with gloomy throngs on the streets.  At the same time, Eric Ives thinks that spectators were ‘more curious than either welcoming or hostile’, so perhaps the most negative things from the coronation reports should be given little credit to.

Disappointed by their reaction, Anne must have felt a blend of dejection, anxiety, pride, and triumph.  Regardless of their opinion of her, her beloved Hal chose her to be his queen, and soon she would give the country a long-awaited male heir.  Anne was heavily pregnant at the time of the coronation, and I can imagine her placing a hand on her swollen stomach, hidden by her gown, as she thought of a Tudor prince she presumably carried.  Defiance was one of her most controversial qualities, and she had committed her first act of defiance of social norms years ago, when she had accepted the monarch’s marriage proposal while Henry was still married to Catherine of Aragon.  As she contemplated the sullen people who did not want her to be their queen, she probably decided that if defiance was her destiny, she would be defiant again against all the rules if necessary.

What shall this day bring to me, June?

A brilliance with every summer hue:

The cloud-white dream of happiness,

Shot with the primrose sunshine through…

Or shall my coronation bring me pain,

People do not want me, their stillness say it,

The day will see me crowned despite them,

Yet, making ancient rhyme of lovers sore,

As if my joy is dead, my sadness lingers yet.

Oh, Henry!  They love you, their dear prince,

Will you work to make them favor me too?

Some say your love is like a flight of doves –

With wanton wings, with promises and ways,

But flashing white against the sky only to die.

You may love, and sigh, and soon forget?!

I do not believe!  You are my Hal forever!

A thousand roses will blossom red for us,

And a thousand hearts will be gay, I pray,

For the summer of love lingers just ahead,

And our boy is on his way to a Golden age,

Fate will have him born in autumn for us.

The moon and the stars will weave new spells

Of love – for my Hal, for me, and for our boy,

The music of marriage bells will sound to us.

Oh, sadness – stay behind and die in May!

I’ve started writing a lot of poetry as of late, and I cannot explain why I need it. Now I can write both prose and poetry, and it is not difficult for me at all.  In this poem, which I composed to describe Anne’s feelings during her coronation procession, I strove to stress her strong faith in Henry’s love and in her happiness with him, and to remind of their expectation that the child in her belly was a boy.  The reference to England’s Golden Age foreshadows Elizabeth I’s glorious reign, but at that time, Anne and Henry could not know about it.  I hope you like this poem.

Soon the coronation party made its grand entrée into the City of London.  During the reign of Henry VIII, this historical place was mostly confined to that small area with a population of about 100,000 people.  The City was the center of business and finance, where trade guilds and livery companies elected the Lord Mayor every year.  Since the days of William the Conqueror, the City has retained its independence from royal interference.  Thus, Anne’s coronation procession was a significant event aimed at showing the king’s second spouse to the population of London.

There were 6 traditional points for pageants through the city and additional 3 locations, each of them opulently decorated for Anne as a sign of King Henry’s undying devotion to her.  On the 1st June of 1533 after what must have seemed an eternity of waiting, the coronation procession entered Westminster.  The witnesses began assembling in Westminster Hall from 7am, but it was just minutes before 9pm that Henry’s wife appeared there.

Anne must have breathed out a sigh of relief as they approached Westminster Abbey, where she would finally be crowned; she was in a family way, so she must have been tired, in spite of her exhilaration.  Climbing down from her litter, she and her ladies set out along a route carpeted with cloth of blue ray all along the several hundred yards between the dais of the hall and the high altar of the abbey.  Anne was watched by all the peers of the realm and foreign ambassadors, aldermen and judges in scarlet, the monks of Westminster and the staff of the Chapel Royal, all in their sumptuous copes, as well as four bishops, two archbishops and twelve mitred abbots in full pontificals.  The abbot of Westminster had his complete regalia.

Ives describes Anne’s appearance in Westminster in these moments:

“Anne was resplendent in coronation robes of purple velvet, furred with ermine, with the gold coronet on her head which she had worn the day before, though it is not clear that she followed tradition by walking barefoot.  Over her was carried the gold canopy of the Cinque Ports, and she was preceded by the sceptre of gold and the rod of ivory topped with the dove, and by the lord great chamberlain, the earl of Oxford, bearing the crown of St Edward…”

On the way to the high alter, Anne was supported, according to custom, by the bishops of London and Winchester.  The Dowager Duchess of Norfolk carried her long train, and a myriad of her ladies and gentlewomen, each of them accoutered in scarlet with appropriate distinctions of rank.  Perhaps having an enigmatic expression on her face, Anne seated herself into St Edward’s Chair, draped in cloth of gold.  The grand chair was situated on a tapestry-draped dais two steps high, which was itself set on a raised platform carpeted in red.  For a few moments, Anne sat there before she stood up, and the official ceremony of her coronation started.

A solemn mass was performed by the bishop of Westminster.  Archbishop of Canterbury, Thomas Cranmer, who supported and adored Anne, prayed over her as the royal wife prostrated herself before the altar, despite her pregnancy.  She was anointed by Cranmer before she walked back to St Edward’s Chair, where the archbishop crowned her and handed to her the sceptre and the rod of ivory.  It is remarkable that Anne was the first female monarch who was crowned with the crown of St Edward, which was previously used to crown only a reigning ruler.  This was King Henry’s obvious attempt to make others see the significance of his marriage to Anne.

A bit later, the heavy crown of St Edward was replaced with a lighter one, of course for the queen’s convenience.  The service continued: Anne took the sacrament and made the offering at the shrine of the saint.  As his beloved cemented her place in history as the new Queen of England, King Henry watched the ceremony from the special stand from behind a latticework, which had been erected in the abbey so that the sovereign could see everything incognito.

This mystique of monarchy belonged to Queen Anne Boleyn.  At that time, she could not predict that in about three years, she would die on her husband’s orders for crimes she did not commit.  Her emotions must have alternated between celestial delight, unutterable joy, and a feeling of unprecedented triumph.  It seemed to Anne that a golden future stretched before her, a future composed of nothing but hope, new victories, and contentment.

The sun has shone upon all of me and fed

My heart and soul’s rhythms with light,

Raised me from dust to a rose, big and red,

Now I’m Henry’s queen, my life is bright!

A white star-flower of joy I will encounter

As sweet darkness envelops the earth

This night – no, not my wedding night,

But the first night of me being a queen.    

In the dark, my Hal is still my sun of life,

He will guard my body and sleep tonight,

Holding all the starts in the sky true to us,

Reassuring me that we will defeat any foe.

In the morning, as I will open my eyes again,

From heaven, Hal’s sun will stoop to breathe

A flower of our love into the air in our room.

Surely, my life is now not beneath my Hal’s,

For I became his true queen in Westminster,

Beloved forever and feeling his kindness,

His care for our son growing inside me.

All make me believe it will last forever.  

So, from the ashes of my odd sadness,

That lingers in my bosom like a dirge,

Will beauty and hopes grow in my life.

I’ve also written the poem describing Anne’s feelings after her coronation.  I may be wrong, but I do not think she had any fears about her future at that time.  I believe that Anne loved Henry, perhaps not from the very beginning of their romance, but she fell in love with him somewhere along the way.  The long way to their wedding and Anne’s coronation.  Nonetheless, the mentioned “odd sadness” foreshadows that Anne’s happiness with Henry would not last long.  The “odd sadness” lingers “like a dirge”, which foreshadows her tragic death after an awful lot of unhappiness Anne would experience in her marriage to the king after his passion for her cooled off.

And so far, the nobility of England saw Anne being crowned and accepted or were forced to accept her as queen in the sight of God.  Whatever Anne’s fate would be, the mystique of a queen was unbreakable even after her death.

William Shakespeare would declare a generation later:

“Not all the water in the rough rude sea

Can wash the balm from an anointed king.”

_________________________________________________

“Two poems were written by Olivia Longueville

All images are in the public domain. Text © 2019 Olivia Longueville

#Anne Boleyn #queen anne boleyn #Boleyn #King Henry VIII #Tudor History #Tudor period #the Tudors #henry VIII of england #Tudor #henry viii #royals #coronation

[callanthea]

How Lan WangJi’s Character Could Be Improved

@arsnovacadenza​​ recently commented that Lan WangJi isn’t a super compelling character, and I wanted to share my thoughts on this subject!

First and foremost, let’s just make this clear: Lan WangJi is a very good and likable person. He’s always willing to help someone in need, he’s badass, he’s extremely hardworking and studious, he’s very generous and kind, he’s really warm and loving towards WWX, etc. etc. This point is pretty much undeniable. 

However, just because someone is a good person does not mean that they are a compelling character!! 

What do I mean by compelling character? I mean a character who has relatable thoughts, motivations, and development. A character with multiple sides and facets, with various flaws and strengths that are displayed over the course of the plot. A character who you could legitimately see as a real human being.

With these traits in mind, there are two areas of LWJ’s character that I take issue with.

1) LWJ never truly grows much as a character. His only real development was to fall in love with WWX and become less stuffy. This development happens extremely early (when he’s a teenager), and he never changes after this has finished. This is because LWJ never makes any mistakes, so he never has a chance to learn from those mistakes. 

[EDIT: Don’t get me wrong, I very much enjoyed LWJ’s development in the flashbacks when he learned to stop repressing himself. But in the present-day story, he really doesn’t go through any changes at all. Sure, you can say him having finished his character arc in the flashbacks is the whole point, but IMO it’s more than a little awkward for LWJ’s character arc to be over before the story has actually begun.]  

(By “mistake”, I mean something the story acknowledges as a mistake. Defending WWX at SPOILER LOCATION was not a mistake, being unsuccessful in taking WWX back to Gusu was not a mistake. The story never treats these like bad decisions, and LWJ never learns anything from them. LWJ has absolutely no regrets about these actions, and would gladly try to do them again.) 

By the time of WWX’s resurrection, LWJ is already too perfect and has nowhere else to grow.

[Compare this to another Kuudere archetype love interest, He Xiuyuan in Poor and Humble Sect. One of the key plot points in that story is how He Xiuyuan goes through immense struggles to suppress his inner shameful nature and desires. He Xiuyuan was also aware of his unintelligence compared to the MC, and initially wanted to be a mindless follower of the MC. These are real character flaws that must be overcome. And of course, it’s super fulfilling when He Xiuyuan allows himself to chase his true desires and gains the confidence to stand alongside the MC as an equal.]

2) LWJ’s motivations are all related to protecting WWX. The moment that WWX reappears, LWJ drops literally everything else in favor of making WWX stay by his side. Okay, don’t get me wrong--based on the sheer tragedy of WWX’s life before his first death, the only way he would ever get a happy ending would be if someone always stood by his side, believed in him, and supported him. But believe it or not, a person can have more than one motivation. It’s a little uncomfortable that Wei Wuxian is Lan Wangji’s entire world for literally all of the  present-day story scenes. The story would be more interesting IMO if a) Lan Wangji had other obligations/goals besides being so incredibly (almost slavishly) devoted to WWX, or b) Lan Wangji’s devotion to WWX was treated with at least some appropriate consequences by the story.

[Compare this to the love interest in MXTX’s previous novel: Luo Binghe in Scum Villain’s Self-Saving System. Luo Binghe was absolutely obsessed with the MC there, but the MC was realistically very uncomfortable with this level of obsession. This became a point of conflict between the two. Overcoming this conflict made their relationship much stronger and their character development more satisfying.]

------------------------------------------

The combination of these two points leads to something strange: MDZS is not Lan WangJi’s story at all. It’s very very much Wei Wuxian’s story, while Lan Wangji kind of just... tags along. 

I mean, it’s really nice that MDZS is so focused on world-building and plot that the romance can take a backseat. But I find it strange that almost all the side characters are more interesting/complex (IMO) than the main love interest. Literally every other character in MDZS makes mistakes, and then develops and/or suffers as a result. Even Mianmian grows more than LWJ did, despite her very little screen-time.

------------------------------------------

So how could LWJ’s character be improved in my opinion? Again, I have two solutions so far.

1) Play up and analyze LWJ’s flaws over the course of the story. 

LWJ does actually have flaws when you look closely enough, it’s just that the current story doesn’t really treat those flaws as flaws (LWJ doesn’t receive any negative consequences for them). I mentioned that all his motivations are related to protecting WWX--that kind of blind faith can be a flaw! In fact, Lan Xichen suffers because of a similar degree of devotion/faith towards Jin GuangYao. 

-What if the story played up that parallel between the two Lan brothers, and led to their relationship worsening (at least temporarily, before it got better)? 

-What if the public opinion of Lan Wangji went down the drain because of his defense of WWX? Imagine an arc where LWJ and WWX were /both/ on the run.

-WWX’s negative character traits are wonderfully examined through the use of Jin GuangYao and Xue Yang as foils, “what Wei Wuxian could have been.” So, what if LWJ’s negative character traits were similarly analyzed through an antagonist who was LWJ’s foil? (No, I don’t mean Su She. Fuck Su She, he is garbage both as a person and as a character. He has the stupidest motivation imaginable: “hurr durr I hate Lan Wangji for being too perfect, so I’m gonna be evil now.” His entire existence is such an obvious straw man designed by the author purely to make Lan Wangji look good in comparison.) 

I think a perfect third major antagonist would be someone whose main flaw is their undying devotion out of love, which drives them to increasingly villainous acts. Think someone like Wen Zhuliu, but with a bigger role in the story, preferably replacing Su She. Confronting this kind of antagonist would give LWJ the opportunity to grow and prove he won’t make the same mistakes as that character. 

2) Give LWJ a more complex character dynamic with WWX.

I think MDZS would be more interesting if LWJ and WWX disagreed more in the present day. If LWJ was more hostile towards demonic cultivation, if he and WWX legitimately fought over this issue. If LWJ felt more conflicted about WWX’s past crimes when he went berserk at Buyetian. If WWX wanted to reconnect with his old life but LWJ disagreed, and the two had an argument. 

As it is right now, there’s never any real conflict between WWX and LWJ besides the usual “hmmmm should we be a couple???” 

Seriously, just compare the complexity of the LWJ-WWX dynamic to the JC-WWX dynamic or the Three Brothers dynamic, it’s not even fair. 

I’m not asking that LWJ and WWX hate each other, hell no. But you can love someone without worshiping their every move. You can love someone and still think they are making a mistake. In fact, you need conflict in order for a relationship to come out more powerful and resilient than it was before.

-------------------------------------------

All in all, I like Lan WangJi’s character just fine. He serves his purpose in the current story very well. I just do not love him the way I love many other characters in MDZS. I’m disappointed that he didn’t get the full character depth/development/exploration he deserves, especially since so many other characters in MDZS do. Lan WangJi deserves to be more than just the “ideal perfect boyfriend” character. He deserves to be as deep as a real human being too.

#mo dao zu shi #mdzs #grandmaster of demonic cultivation #gdc

[degenerate-perturbation]

Top 13 Most Fuckable Women in Dragon Age (according to me, a lesbian)

Honorable Mention: Shale

Shale is 8 feet tall and butch, which is super hot, but also made of rock, which would make her really difficult to fuck. Shale, however, not only finds sex disgusting, she also no longer identifies as a woman and therefore does not make the main list. But if I possibly could fuck Shale, I absolutely would.

13. Wynne

Wynne ranks last mostly because she’s like a billion years old, and furthermore, she knows more than me, and that intimidates me sexually. If I fucked Wynne she’d be giving me instructions the whole time, and not in the sexy way either. Afterwards she would pat me kindly on the cheek and tell me I did a good job but I’d be able to tell that she was just being indulgent. I would fuck Wynne but I would feel a little weird about it.

12. Morrigan

Morrigan is super hot and kind of evil, which is also hot. However, there is the distinct possibility that she would turn into a giant spider mid-coitus. And beyond that, Morrigan is an obvious virgin and closeted lesbian who doesn’t know she’s a lesbian yet. You’d have to show her how to do everything. Also she’d take your stuff, and possibly your sperm. Still hot, though. I would fuck Morrigan, and I’m not sure if I’d be relieved or disappointed if she didn’t do the spider thing.

11. Cassandra

Cassandra could break me in half, which is a quality I find attractive in a woman, but she’s also, like, a Templar? And kind of a cultural imperialist?  She also doesn’t know that she’s a lesbian yet, so she has some of the same issues as Morrigan. Less likely to steal your sperm. I would fuck Cassandra but I wouldn’t discuss politics with her.

10. Tallis

Fucking Tallis would be the complete logical equivalent of fucking Felicia Day in cosplay, which I am told is the nearest and dearest fantasy of millions of awkward male nerds. I would fuck Tallis because she seems cute and fun, but especially to spite a million awkward male nerds.

9. Velanna

Velanna is probably a virgin but I have no doubt in my mind that she’s a top, and if we fucked she’d hold me suspended in the air with those vines while she called me a dirty shem, and I’d leave the experience aching but hungry for more. I would fuck Velanna and discover dozens of horrifying things about myself in the process.

8. Aveline

Unlike Velanna, Aveline is a married woman and she knows a thing or two about a thing or two. And I bet she has a spectacular full-body blush. Aveline has sweet muscles, big titties, and a caring heart, and would definitely make you breakfast the next morning. I would love to fuck Aveline, if I could manage to convince her I was interested.

7. Merrill

Merrill doesn’t seem to know much about fucking women, but I bet she’d learn fast, and then bring all sorts of fun things into the bedroom. Also she would move into my house and braid flowers into my hair, which is exactly what I want. I would fuck Merrill and then tenderly hold her close and tell her all about how she’s right about everything and that I will support her always and if anyone is ever mean to her that I’ll eat them alive.

6. Sigrun

I don’t actually find Sigrun especially attractive but she ranks this high because I just love her so much. Just so much you guys. Sigrun deserves to be fucked good and then told how valued and precious and worthy and loved she is. Sigrun deserves every single good thing in the world. I wouldn’t fuck Sigrun, but I would make tender attentive love to her, and then devote myself completely to the preservation of her well-being.

5. Vivienne

I would love to fuck Vivienne but this is actually impossible. Madame Vivienne de Fer does not do anything as crass as fucking. Vivienne would scoff at my pathetic attempts at what I call sex. Vivienne knows sexual secrets that I dare not even begin to comprehend. If she lowered herself to do so, Vivienne would fuck me, and only if I was really, really lucky.

4. Sera

Sera would make sex the absolute most fun. There is a non-zero risk of bees, but it is a risk I am willing to take. If Sera wanted to involve bees in our sex life, I doubt I would be able to tell her no. I would joyfully fuck Sera, then high-five her, then we draw cartoons on the wall while naked, then fuck her again.

3. Isabela

Isabela is hands-down the hottest woman in Thedas and fucking her would be an absolute privilege. I would fuck Isabela and then reminisce about it on my deathbed, because I’m certain it would just be that good. Also, I bet she has nice calloused sailor’s hands. Mm.

2. Leliana

Leliana has been around the block, and I rank her higher than Isabela just because I bet Leliana would be a really sweet and attentive lover. She would make eye contact and hum little songs and compliment your hair and it would be an all-around fantastic experience. She also might write a song about you and then travel around singing it in taverns, which is the primary thing I look for in a woman.

1. Josephine Montilyet

Josephine Montilyet is the alpha and the omega of fuckable Dragon Age women. She is beautiful, intelligent, charming and attractive, and also rich, and not even a little bit crazy. You genuinely can’t do any better than Josephine Montilyet. I would fight a duel for Josephine Montilyet, declare my undying love for her, propose on one knee to her, marry her in an elaborate spare-no-expense ceremony, kiss her tenderly at the altar, move into her seaside villa, and there, in the warm moonlight, in her huge bed, fuck her.

Then we raise a big lesbian family together and I brush her hair and rub her shoulders every night.

#alright u animals u kept asking so here it is #dragon age

[kriscme]

One Life to Live

Hi, here’s the latest chapter.   Almost at the end.  This is also on A03 and will be easier to read.    I’m Kris22 over there.  I’d link if I knew how.  As always thanks for Ronja for allowing me to write fanfic of her Hunger Games fanfic “The Chance You Didn’t Take”.  You can read it on AO3 and FanFiction. Chapter 36 “. . . and so Blake’s wedding was called off.   And in the meantime, Celia’s been attending a therapy support group for sex addiction.  They think it’s caused by a fear of emotional intimacy or something like that.   I guess it’s because she’s been hurt.  You know, by Blake.  And that’s all I know.  I haven’t watched it in a while.” “And who’s that guy?” Peeta asks.  He’s referring to a man in overalls and a straw hat crouched in a field of what looks like withered lettuces.  He appears to be examining the soil.   “That’s Celia’s father, Mulch Chastely.” The camera zooms in and ominous music builds.  His hands are stained with a black, greasy substance.  “Oil!” he screams, as the music reaches a crescendo. He shakes his fist at the heavens. “The Knights will pay for this barbarous act!  You’re a dead man, Rigger Knight!”   Then it segues to Rigger Knight who is seated on the porch of the Knight family home as if in wait.   Across his lap is a firearm.  It looks like a bazooka. The scene ends with Mulch Chastely selecting a pitchfork from his arsenal of agricultural tools and marching with grim determination in the direction of the Knight property.   Peeta bursts out laughing.  I can’t help laughing at the ridiculousness of it either. “I told you it was stupid,” I say.

Next, we’re in a large room, mostly empty except for a circle of nine chairs spaced at regular intervals.   People start to trickle in and each of them takes a seat.  Celia is among them, wearing denim trousers and a blue sweater, her long blond hair pulled back into a ponytail.  She looks tired and dejected.  Last to arrive is a gaudily dressed middle-aged woman with bright yellow hair carrying a clipboard.  She’s accompanied by a younger man in expensive sports clothes.   When he sees Celia an expression of deep longing passes over his face.  Celia doesn’t look up. The woman with the yellow hair starts the discussion.  “Good afternoon, everyone.  We’re in for a big, big session!  We have new a member joining us.  I know you’ll make him welcome.  Blake, would you please introduce yourself and share with the group what’s brought you here today.”  

Celia starts at the name and her eyes widen with shock.  As Blake speaks, his gaze never leaves her face.

“My name is Blake Knight and I am an addict.  My addiction is Celia Chastley.  I was a goner from the moment I first laid eyes on her in her family’s orchard when were eleven years old.  She became my best friend, my confidant, the object of my adolescent masturbatory fantasies and my great love.  I didn’t understand you then, Celia, when you broke my heart when we were sixteen.  That you were sacrificing your happiness for mine.  That you recognized the impossibility of our situation when I did not. I shut my eyes and tried to forget you in the arms of another but I was deceiving myself.  I was a coward – too afraid to confront the reality of my undying love for you.  Please forgive me.  Give me a chance and I will prove my constancy and devotion.  To hell with our families. To hell with everything.  Our love is the only thing that matters in this crazy world.  Even now, as my father waits for yours to fall into his trap so he can shoot him dead and plead self-defense, our love will endure.  Will you, Celia?  Please say yes.  I love you so much.” The other members of the group are transfixed, eyes darting between Celia and Blake in mounting expectation.  Celia’s eyes are awash with tears.  She lurches to her feet and throws herself into his arms. “Oh, Blake!” she cries, “If I have only one life to live, I want it to be with you.”  They kiss.  The group stands and cheers.   It then goes to a commercial break for romantic getaways in District 4.  I look at Peeta.  He looks at me.  It’s as if we’re each looking to the other for how to react.  It was funny.  So why aren’t we laughing?  Plutarch’s words ring heavily in my ears, “You and Peeta are Celia and Blake.” “We’re really not like that, are we? “I ask.  “I mean it’s so . . . dumb.”   “No, not quite us, but there are a few things in common.  What Blake said to Celia is pretty much what I’ve been trying to say to you.” “Oh.” I say nonplussed.  Is that what he’s been doing?  “Um . . . which parts?” Peeta shifts closer to me on the sofa so that our thighs are touching.  “Adolescent masturbatory fantasies.” I pull back, frowning, hot words ready on my lips.  

He nudges my shoulder with his.  “It’s a joke.  Well, actually not quite a joke.  You did feature in them quite a lot.  But I was Blake.  Going around with my eyes shut, too scared to open them in case I remembered how much I love you and then to find out that you didn’t love me back.” “You love me?”  I don’t dare look at him. It’s been an impossibility for such a long time, I can scarcely believe it.  He was engaged to marry another woman not so very long ago.  How can this have happened so quickly?  “Since when?” I ask dubiously. If he was expecting a more positive reaction, he doesn’t show it.  He takes one of my hands in both of his. “Since I was five years old and you stood up in music assembly to sing the valley song.” I attempt to pull my hand back but he keeps it in a firm grip.  He can’t just whitewash the past two years like that.  Lace happened.  “Then what has Lace been about then?  She was just a figment of my imagination?” “No.  She was more like a figment of my imagination.  I don’t want to discount what I had with her.  She’s been a good friend and I’ll always be grateful but a lot of what I felt for her wasn’t real.    I’ve gone over this with Dr Aurelius, to make sense of it.   She was a coping mechanism in the same way my reluctance to deal with my past was also a coping mechanism.  I could give her the feelings I didn’t think you wanted.   So, she was sort of you, in a way.  I didn’t exactly have a high opinion of myself then either and she didn’t hold back on telling me how wonderful she thought I was.  I think I just wanted to make myself feel better.”

Sort of like a rebound then.  I want to believe him, I really do.  He’s turned to sit sideways, our knees touching, his face close to mine.  I look at him beneath my lashes.  He’s watching me carefully, with a mixture of hope and uncertainty.  Everything that I’m feeling. “Tell me what you’re thinking,” he says. Be honest. “I’m scared.  What if what you’re feeling now isn’t real either?’ “I’m scared too.  Scared you’ll reject me and there’ll never be another chance. Katniss, I’ve never been more certain about anything in my life.” I turn away momentarily to collect my thoughts. As I do, the television screen comes into my field of vision.  Rigger Knight fires the bazooka at Mulch Chastely.  It misses his head by inches and zooms past to hit one of the oil rigs in the distance.  It explodes into flames and sets off a chain reaction until every one of the oil rigs is a massive ball of fire and thick black smoke.  Mulch’s face is a picture of glee until the billowing smoke is picked up by the wind and headed over the border towards his prized apple orchard.  The drama hasn’t ended for Celia and Blake.  And I know it hasn’t for Peeta and me either.  We still have things to work through.  And there’s also the television special and whatever fallout there might be.  But at least we can do it together.  

I let out a breath.   “Okay.” “Is that yes?” “Yes,” I answer, more firmly this time.  We both lean in and meet somewhere in the middle. A slow, getting-to-know-you-all-over-again kiss.  Soft, tender, shy.   This is real.   Not a daydream, not the reliving of a cherished memory, but real.  In between kisses he tells me he loves me.  And when I get the chance, I tell him I love him too.  Somehow, I end up lying on the couch with him half on top of me. The kisses have long ceased to satisfy either of us.  My t-shirt and bra are hitched around my neck, the nipples wet from where he’s sucked on them, and there’s something iron-hard pressing into my lower belly. “I think we should have an early night,” he murmurs into my ear. “I think you’re right.”  Our first time together should definitely not be on the couch. The television is still blaring and I grapple for the remote to turn it off but not before catching a glimpse of Celia and Blake writhing like eels on a bed with red satin sheets.   We make our way upstairs and down the hall without touching but immediately upon entering the bedroom we fall on each other and start peeling off each other’s clothes.  There’s a struggle pulling off my slim-fitting trousers and he grumbles that I shouldn’t have changed out of my dress.  I fall backwards onto the bed and then, with a final tug, my trousers with underwear still inside them, are sent flying.  I close my eyes and put out my arms hungry to feel his warmth and weight along the full length of my body.  But instead, my foot is lifted high into the air and kisses trailed down my leg until he gets to the juncture of my thighs.  The first brush of his tongue is a jolt of electricity, the final one a lightning bolt.  “Oh,” I say, when I eventually come down.  I hold out my arms and he’s inside me, filling a space so completely, so perfectly, I didn’t know there had been a void until now.   Nothing has ever felt so right.  When we fall, it’s within seconds of each other.  We share a slow, lazy kiss before he rolls onto his back and I nestle into the cradle of his arms.  My head rests against his chest, the strong and steady beat of his heart in my ear, and it feels like home. I wake before he does.  He’s on his back, his face relaxed in sleep.   I rise up on one elbow to watch him. The long lashes resting against his cheeks, the curve of his lips.   It seems such a miracle that he’s here, in my bed, and that he loves me.  I was convinced he was lost to me forever.  That by this time, he’d be in his own bed, in his own house, with Lace beside him as his wife.  And I would be . . .   Well, I don’t know where I’d be.  I don’t think I could have stood living across from them for very long.  So probably searching for someplace else to live like I once planned to.  Certainly not having dinners with them, or having Lace drop by for neighborly chats.   I still don’t really know why the wedding was called off.  That they both lied is the only explanation I’ve been given. Lied about what?  I should ask him.  And other questions I have too.  

I put out my hand to brush a lock of hair back from his forehead and it’s seized and brought to his lips.  “How long have you been awake?”   “Not long.  I didn’t want to interrupt. Do I pass?” “With flying colors,” I say, and lean down to give him a kiss.  His arms go around me and I’m rolled onto my back.   The kiss goes on for a long time.  

“We should start getting ready for work,” I say, although I make no effort to get up. “Not yet,” he says.   And he says it again when we take a shower together.   There’s no sign of Haymitch at breakfast.   Probably slept in after the excitement of last night’s episode of “One Life to Live.”   But we figure that now that we’re genuinely in love, no one needs to tell us how to act.  So, we walk into town together as we’re inclined to do anyway, and then meet for lunch again at the park near the school as it’s conveniently situated for both of us.   Haymitch is nowhere to be seen at dinnertime either.  We delay eating for half an hour in case he turns up but after checking first to see if he’s home – the lights at his house are on – we conclude that he’s decided to leave us alone from now on, and start eating.  And delicious it is too.  Roast pork with crackling to die for.  I guess I’m just a carnivore at heart.   Following dinner, we sit down to watch some television.  One channel is covering the mayoral elections in 7.  Johanna is well ahead in the count and early predictions are that she’ll win by a landslide.  Then Peeta flicks between cooking shows.  I don’t care what we watch.  I lie back on the sofa with my head on the armrest and my feet in Peeta’s lap.   I love having my feet and calves rubbed so much, I think it’s almost as good as sex.   Later, in bed, I decide that it’s not even close.  I am blissed-out, and still tingling from our love-making.  I stretch voluptuously, like a cat, bury my face into his neck and sigh, perfectly content.   His free hand plays with my hair, gently combing out the tangles.   If I could freeze the moment, I would.  So, I guess it makes it an odd time to ask the questions I want answers to.  But on the other hand, maybe there’ll never be a better.

“Peeta, can I ask you some things?” “Sure.” “Why did you and Lace break up?  Was it because she lied about her background?” His hand stills for a moment before going back to my hair.  “No, it wasn’t that.  I mean, I was disappointed she hadn’t told me herself and angry that everyone seemed to know before I did, but it’s not what broke us up.  You remember when I said that what I felt for Lace wasn’t real?” I nod against his chest.  “I’d been having doubts for a while – almost soon after we got engaged actually – but after that night I couldn’t ignore it any longer.  It was seeing you with Marcus that did it.  It wasn’t the first time I’d been jealous.  I was jealous over Max, even Arthur, but I’d put it down to being possessive over a friend.  But Marcus – it was Gale all over again.  He was so obviously in to you and you seemed to like him too.   And he loved nature, as you do, and you went into the woods together, and he had both his legs and wasn’t a mental nutcase. And then to see you walk away with him, with his arm around you, upset over something I had done, when I’m the one who should protect you . . .    

“As for Lace, I’d almost forgotten she was there.  And when I did get around to remembering, she was sobbing her heart out to Arthur.  She’d seemed to have forgotten about me too.”  There’s another pause and a snort of irritation.  “And that Max! “ “What about Max?” I ask warily.  

“It was like he was selling tickets to a sideshow.  Shrugging his shoulders and gesturing to anyone watching.  I don’t know how you tolerate him.” “It has it’s challenges,” I say carefully.   “But he does have his good points. They’re just not immediately apparent.” And isn’t that the truth.  I recall our first encounters and how much he annoyed me.  Still does.

I think I’m starting to get an understanding of Peeta’s relationship with Lace having gone through something similar with Marcus.   Desperately in need of affirmation. To feel worthy of love and acceptance. And something, anything, to dull the pain of rejection – either real or imagined – in the arms of another. At least I can take comfort in that there were no hurt feelings when it ended for Marcus and me. “What about Lace?” I ask.  “How did she take it?” Peeta gives a short laugh.  “She was as relieved to be out of it as I was.  While I’d been projecting an image on to her, she’d been doing the same to me.  In her case, the celebrity she’d seen and fallen in love with on television.  And then she said she realized that she had feelings for Arthur.  I doubt she’d admit it, but I think Johanna’s flirting that night had a lot to do with it.” I smile to myself imagining Johanna’s satisfaction that her scheme had worked.  She’s pretty people-smart, when you think on it.  A useful attribute for a politician to have. “But you didn’t break up straight away.”   Peeta was still wearing the ring Lace had given him the day he called around to apologise for yelling at me and to give me cookies.   “That’s because neither of us wanted to be the first to tell the other they’d made a mistake.  But once it was said, it all came tumbling out.  Whatever we once had was gone except maybe friendship and a few superficial things we had in common.  A marriage wouldn’t have lasted long.”

Another thing that Johanna had got right.  Trying too hard, she called it.  It makes sense in retrospect.  As doubts surfaced, so would efforts to alleviate it in the form of frequent and overt shows of affection and more money thrown at the wedding, as if a lavish display of either could cover the deepening cracks.  One thing puzzles me, though. “Why were you so upset when it ended, then? Johanna told me about the flashbacks.” “I was upset over a lot of things.   All that money wasted, feeling like a fool for letting it get that far, but mostly I was upset over you.   I thought I had ruined any chance I might have had.  And I had no one to blame but myself.” I feel a stirring of guilt. There was someone else to blame.  And that was me.  I ran hot and cold, giving mixed messages of my own.  I could have been more open with him.  Risked rejection, see where it led.  Because I couldn’t really be certain of anything until I did.  And I was the one who put it into his head that Lace was his girlfriend.  And that he should marry her. I open my mouth to contradict him but Peeta starts speaking again.  “You and Marcus were so cozy that night at the pub, holding hands on the way into town and then making plans for a weekend in the woods together.  I just couldn’t get it out of my head, imagining what the two of you were up to.  That’s what triggered the attacks.  It was jealousy, pure and simple.  The same emotion the Capitol worked on to get me to hate you.  And after they were brought under control, there was still despair and self-loathing to contend with.  How could I have been so blind and stupid?” “I – “

“And then having to watch those tapes.  I didn’t want to.  I knew the “to be watched with Katniss” label could only have meant two things.  It was either confirmation that you’d never loved me, or confirmation that you had, which actually would have been worse, since I’d messed things up so spectacularly.” My mind goes back to that day.  Peeta at the door, looking harried and nervous.  That speech about us trying for friendship. It’s obvious to me now that he made it because he thought that’s what I wanted.  His careful examination of any nuances that would give at least some hope that he was wrong.   “I’m so sorry,” I say.  “I’ve messed up too.   You’ve no idea.   I don’t know why you just didn’t leave me to my fate after seeing that video of Marcus and me.  I wouldn’t have blamed you.  Wanted you to, actually.  Weren’t you . . . you know, disgusted?” He pulls me closer and kisses the top of my head.  “No.  Why should I be, after what I’ve done?” My body stiffens at the implication.  That’s right. He’s been in the same situation, only he was lucky enough not to be caught.  He’s talking about what he got up to with Lace.  The Mayor’s party.  When he fucked Miss Facelicker up against a wall.  Hot jealousy surges through my veins and it takes all my self-control to squash it down.  It’s hardly reasonable is it, for me to feel this way?  Not when I practically did the same thing. “Weren’t you even jealous?” I ask.  That would make me feel a little better if he had. “Katniss, all that concerned me was that you were in trouble and how I could help.” His arms tighten around me.  “I want to protect you, keep you safe. And in some way, begin to make up for the poor job I’ve done of it lately.  I just wanted you back.  There was simply no room for a petty emotion like jealousy.” Instantly, I’m ashamed of myself.  Peeta has always been better than all of us. “You could live a hundred lifetimes and not deserve him.”  They were Haymitch’s words, and so true. “Besides,” says Peeta, “You didn’t seem to be enjoying yourself.  And who would?  Being pounded into against a hard surface like that.” Not jealous, huh?  So that’s what he was doing when he kept watching that tape over and over.  He was actually studying my facial expressions and taking comfort that I didn’t seem to be having a good time.   As if Lace would have enjoyed being whisked into a dark corner on an important night of her life to have her new gown pushed up around her waist and thrust repeatedly into against a hard wall.  But I say nothing.  At some point you do have to put aside the negativity and move forward or you might as well give it up right now.  

But one more question.  I’ll always wonder about it if I don’t ask.   “Would it have made any difference if I’d told you how I feel about you?  You know, when you were going out with Lace?  Or before?” There’s a long silence.  I wait nervously for the answer.  Please say it wouldn’t.  Please say it wouldn’t. “It might have.   I don’t know.  I guess it would have depended on the timing.  My mind was so stuck on the impossibility of you loving me, that I might not have heard it.  Or not believed it if I had.  But it could have changed the trajectory and ended my relationship with Lace sooner.”

Haymitch kept nagging me to.  I should have listened to him. Taken that risk and kept on trying until Peeta understood.  But then, how could I have known?   And when would have been the right moment?  Sometime before the marriage proposal, it seems.  But not before he’d slept with her and banned me from using his guest room at night.  And wasn’t it these two things that had crossed a line for me? There was no going back for us after that.  It had changed our relationship irrevocably and we had to come back as two different people.  That’s what Arthur said about Celia and Blake.  And there was something Max had said too.   That if they did get back together, they’d need to bring the same level of experience to it.  Celia had to, at least, try another relationship, otherwise Blake would always be the one who’d broken faith and she’d be the one who hadn’t spread her wings while she had the chance.  Marcus had to happen.  I can’t regret that.  Not only because it would betray what we had, but because I would always wonder what it’s like to be with someone not Peeta, when he’s been with someone not me, and possibly resented him for it. “I did tell you this one time.  That I love you, I mean.  It was when you started to get serious about Lace. We were sitting on your back porch and we got to talking about her.  I kept coming up with reasons for why you should be careful of her but what I really wanted was for you to stop seeing her and to notice me. And then I decided to just come straight out and tell you how I felt.  But you misunderstood my meaning and said I was like your family and what you needed from me was to accept her.  That’s why I never said it again.  It hurt so much to hear it the first time, that I didn’t want to risk hearing it again when there was no sign that you’d changed your mind.  But I should have.  Kept trying.  Maybe – “ Peeta doesn’t let me finish. “And maybe I should have faced my demons instead of running from them.  And maybe I should have asked about the blanks in my memories instead of filling the spaces with what I thought I knew.  And maybe I should have told you of my feelings for you once I became aware of them.  And maybe I should have ended my relationship with Lace when I started having doubts.  I think if we added up all the ‘maybes’ they’d be mostly on my side.  I don’t blame you for any of what happened.  It all started with me.” I shake my head.  “That’s not true.  It started with Snow.  That’s where the real blame lies.”  We lapse into silence for a few moments.   “I wish . . .” I begin. He brushes a tendril of hair from my forehead. “What do you wish?”

I sigh deeply.  “That it could have been different.  That there’d been no Lace.  Or a Marcus. That when you came back from the Capitol there was only the two of us, growing back together.  It seems to me that’s the way it was meant to be but somehow it got all messed up.” “Yeah, me too.  But we’re together now.  That’s what matters.” “I would have liked, at least, for us to have had our first time with each other.  I feel like we’ve missed out on something special.  We should have . . . before.  You know, before we went into the Quell.”   There’s a long pause.  “Didn’t we?” “No.” “Well, I just thought . . . are you sure?” “Peeta, I would remember something like that.   We didn’t.  Why would you think that?” “I don’t know.  I just thought we did.   I remember make-up and showering or something and it was in your room.” “That would have been the night before we went into the arena.  After the interviews.  But all we did was sleep.”   “Oh.  I guess I must have imagined it then.  There are still memories I can’t be sure of but this one seemed so real.” I pull his face down to mine.  “This is what’s real.”  I give him a long kiss and then settle back into the crook of his arm. But before I drift off to sleep, my thoughts go to that night before the Quell.  I recall pulling Peeta into my room and a state between wakefulness and sleep. But between times is a complete blank. I don’t remember showering for instance. Or Peeta showering.  Or of us getting into bed.  But we must have.  Without thinking, I press my hand to my left temple.  Right on the spot where Johanna hit me with the coil of wire.  There’s no pain anymore, but the memories swirl just as they did then as I try to sort out what is true and what is false.  Maybe . . . maybe, it happened?  Peeta and I were very familiar with each other with those kisses on the beach for people who had, up until then, only shared chaste kisses. And it didn’t hurt at all that first time with Marcus.  But I just don’t see how I could forget.   I roll over onto my other side and Peeta rolls with me, cradling my back.  I sink down into sleep, enveloped in his warmth, and dream of seventeen-year-old Katniss and Peeta and their very first time.  

Addendum. The following excerpt was discovered among notes made by Katniss Everdeen for her memoir on the Hunger Games and her role in the Rebellion.  For reasons unknown, it was not included in the final draft.  Historians have speculated that the omission could be due to a number of factors: that it lacked relevance to the central theme of war and oppression, that it was too personal in nature, or because the prose resembles that of a particularly bad romance novel.   It is also notable for the difference in point of view narrative from first person to third person.  Various theories have been put forward.  Does this suggest the introduction of a fantasy element, that this is what author would have liked to have occurred?  Or is it due to prudishness on the author’s part?  As a teenager, Katniss Everdeen had a reputation for purity.  Her memoirs, written when she was in her mid to late thirties, take on the language and tone of the adolescent she was at the time the action takes place.  Could this be teenage Katniss distancing herself from her burgeoning sexuality?  Evidence to support this is her account of the famous “kisses on the beach” which, in her memoir, was confined to prolonged kissing but in actuality was more akin to heavy petting.  In addition, is her tendency to cloak feelings of sexual arousal behind euphemisms such as “that thing,” “a stirring inside my chest,” and kisses that don’t satisfy.  

Contentious, but also worthy of consideration, is hijacked Peeta Mellark’s insinuation that more happened on those “nights on the train” than Katniss Everdeen admitted to.  Was the accusation simply an attempt to embarrass her in front of her friends, or was this the resurfacing of a genuine memory?   Eminent psychiatrist Dr Lucius Aurelius, a descendant of Dr Gaius Aurelius, the same psychiatrist who treated Katniss Everdeen and Peeta Mellark, proposed that Mellark had confused adolescent masturbatory fantasies with reality as a form of wish fulfillment.  At the time, he had great difficulty discerning the real from the not real.   However, it should be noted, that this recollection, no matter how nebulous, is given greater credence by Everdeen’s own telling of this one event.   From “Catching Fire” the second volume of the trilogy “The Hunger Games.”    The omitted passages are in italics.   We walk down the hallway.  Peeta wants to stop by his room to shower off the make-up and meet me in a few minutes, but I won’t let him.  I’m certain that if a door shuts between us, it will lock and I’ll have to spend the night without him.  Besides, I have a shower in my room.  I refuse to let go of his hand.   She showers first and while he is in the bathroom, she searches for something he can change into.   “This might fit,” she says, holding up a voluminous nightgown with a ruffled high neck. “It won’t fit across the shoulders,” he replies.  “Maybe a robe?”   She retrieves her discarded robe from the floor and hands it to him.  Aside from being too tight around the arms, the front edges don’t come together. “Perhaps you could wear it backwards,” she suggests.  “Like a hospital gown.” “That could work,” he says with a wry smile, “Except my backside will be hanging out.  I’ll just wear the towel and hope it stays put during the night.”

“It won’t.  Look, I’ve seen you almost naked before and you didn’t care about me seeing you then. Don’t wear anything.  I don’t mind.  I’ll even sleep naked too so it doesn’t seem so strange.  I often sleep with nothing on anyway,” she says with a nonchalance she’s far from feeling.  She hasn’t forgotten the naked Johanna in the lift or his laughter at her reaction and her so-called “purity”.  She’ll show him she’s neither pure nor has a problem with nakedness, either his or her own.  She starts to lift the hem of her nightgown but drops it again.  “I’ll just turn the lights out,” she says. They get into bed.  She lays her head against his chest as she always does and his arms go around her.  But the skin-on-skin contact evokes sensations previously not felt before. Her breasts are flattened against his side and she’s conscious of her bare pubis, recently divested of its hair, pressed against his hip.  The sensation builds and demands some kind of release.  In an attempt to alleviate it, she moves onto her back, and as she does, she inadvertently lowers her arm and it brushes against the tip of something long and hard.  

He gasps and tries to twist away from her.  “I’m sorry,” he says.  “I didn’t mean – “ “It’s all right,” she says quickly. “That happens to boys, doesn’t it? I’m not offended, really.”  She had known about, and ignored, other times in bed together when his body had acted without his permission.  And this time, with her lying naked next to him, she would have been more offended if his body hadn’t reacted. “Please stay,” she says.  “I need you to hold me.  I don’t care about that.” He lies back down and she lays her head on his chest but it’s impossible to relax.  All her senses are heightened and she’s acutely aware of a corresponding tension in his body.  How are they to sleep?  And they so need to sleep, tonight of all nights.  Who knows when they’ll be able to sleep next?   Maybe if they. . .?   She agonizes over it, uncertain of what to do.  Her experience at this kind of thing is almost non-existent. The most she’d ever done is kissing, and the most she’d ever felt before is a stirring inside her chest.  And then to make the first move?  She knows it will have to be her because she’s certain that he won’t.  He doesn’t even kiss her unless there’s a camera or someone around to witness it.  She can guess why.  It’s because he’s not sure of her.  He doesn’t want what happened before to happen again.   Very gradually, she lowers her arm again, over his ribs, over his taut abdomen.  There’s an intake of breath and she can feel the rigidity of his muscles. Lower goes the arm until it glances against that thing again.  With almost certain death in the arena perhaps only hours away, this might be her last chance to engage with one.   She gathers her courage and puts out a timorous hand to encircle its girth and is amazed at how soft it is over the steel.  He moans but makes no attempt to take her hand away.  She’s unsure how to proceed and moves her hand gently up and down the shaft.  She doesn’t want to hurt him.  He puts out a hand to encircle hers, tightens her grip and gives a firm tug.  He takes his hand away and, taking his cue, discovers that the tighter and faster she employs her hand, the more intensely he reacts to it, until there’s a series of shudders and a viscous liquid spurts out over her hand.  She discretely wipes it on the sheet. “Thank you,” he says, and kisses her softly on the lips.  Then, shyly, “Would it be okay if I touched you?” “Yes,” she breathes.  She moves onto her back and opens her limbs.  Reverently, he starts at her shoulder, trailing his fingers down to her ribs, skirting her breast, and then back up, cupping it fully, thumb brushing against the nipple.  A pulse beats insistently between her legs and she shivers.  

“Do you like that?” he asks.

“Mm,” she murmurs.  She parts her legs a little more in anticipation, willing him to take his exploration there next.  But he takes his time, skimming the curve of her waist and then her hip and inner thigh, perhaps hesitant, perhaps teasing.  Either way it gives rise to the most exquisite torture.  Please, please, she silently begs.   And then his fingertips softly trace the line of her sex, pressing deeper between the slippery folds, finding first a cavity into which he inserts a gentle finger, and then higher up, encountering a hard little nub that elicits the most intense of sensory delights.   “Oh,” she cries, and with that small word she eloquently conveys the place where he should focus his attention. With the lightest touch, he strokes and circles, keenly attune to how her body reacts to him.    He covers her mouth with his own as she hurtles towards the pinnacle, and with one delicate flick of his finger, she tumbles down, down, down into an abyss of the purest pleasure.   “That was amazing,” she says between kisses and he smiles against her mouth.  He’s half lying across her, and she becomes aware of that long hard thing again.  It’s seemingly sprung back to life.  She takes it in her hand feeling its weight and length, and thinks, “This should be inside me.”  She turns towards him and guides him between her legs.  He needs no further encouragement.  Lying fully over her now, he presses his hardness at her entrance and she tenses at the unfamiliar intrusion.   “You need to relax,” he tells her.   She nods and turns her attention to loosening her muscles and more of him glides in.  There’s a kind of burning, but not too unpleasant.  A final push and he’s all the way in.   He moves slowly at first, but then, seemingly overcome with passion, and with a few vigorous thrusts, he finds his release and collapses on top of her, panting against her neck.  She kisses his brow and brushes back his damp hair.  

“Sorry,” he says. “I couldn’t – “ “It’s okay.  There’ll be . . .” she starts to say but then stops. By this time tomorrow, one or both of them could be dead and there will be no other times. She begins again. “I’m glad I did it. And with you.” He kisses her and moves onto his back. His arm is around her shoulders and she rests her head against his chest.  “I love you,” he says.  She doesn’t say it back.  It doesn’t seem the right time, somehow.  But she takes his hand and kisses it.   Do we sleep?  I don’t know. We spend the night holding each other, in some halfway land between dreams and waking.  Not talking. Both afraid to disturb the other in the hope that we’ll be able to store up a few precious minutes of rest. Cinna and Portia arrive with the dawn, and I know Peeta will have to go.  Tributes enter the arena alone.  He gives me a light kiss.   “See you soon,” I answer.

[dishonoredrpg]

Congratulations, CAS! You’ve been accepted for the role of THE WHEEL OF FORTUNE with the faceclaim of ANYA CHALOTRA. What is there to say, really, about Vasylia? What isn’t there to say? She’s marvelous. She’s everything I wanted in a WOF app that I felt was necessary to display their conflict, which is centric to who they are as a character. You hit every point, you crossed every T, and you sure did dot every single I you came across. I kept on thinking that it couldn’t get any better, but the farther I scrolled, it did. You have put, on full display, someone who is rotting from the inside out and is helpless to do anything save for watch, and I am genuinely overjoyed to have you with us. Vasylia has such a broad stroke of potential -- I can’t wait to see what you do with her.

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OOC NAME: Cas PRONOUNS: She/her AGE: 22 TIMEZONE, ACTIVITY LEVEL: BST / I tend to work during the day and write at night, but that suits me since everyone else tends to be a good five hours behind me TMZ-wise. As I’ve recently learned, I’m not actually very... quick when writing haha but I log in every day and try to post a reply at least once every other day. Always around and contactable on Discord for plotting and chatting! I’d say 7/10. TRIGGERS: N/A ANYTHING ELSE?: I tried to write around The High Priestess as much as I could but given they’re responsible for The Wheel of Fortune’s way of life it was difficult to avoid her, so happy to revise any details with the player. Also my background is so long I’M SORRY but tysm for reading uwu This application includes mentions of death, child death, self harm, blood, strangulation and suicide ideation.

IN CHARACTER SKELETON: The Wheel of Fortune NAME: Vasylia FACECLAIM: Anya Chalotra, Diana Silvers, Victoria Pedretti (in order) AGE: 35 (appears 12 years younger) DETAILS: I think what drew me to The Wheel of Fortune was that it would be easy to make their character all about Necromancy. About this sickness they can slowly feel settling into their bones. But they’re a person too, with a name and a history. Their relationship with magic is more complex than feeling the ache of it and the decision to stop it. There’s a heaviness to their story, a burden that they must carry, and I had fun experimenting quite how far that extends beyond the weight of their abilities. I believe it’s important for them to be a person before all this, because they have to have something to return to; there has to be something pulling them back from numbness, from giving the pieces of themselves away. The skeleton is a mirage of contradictions: numbness and intensity; resignation and sheer will; anxiety and power; death and life. I’m always enamoured by characters who inherently contradict themselves. Who, try as they might, cannot reconcile themselves to a single thing. The Wheel of Fortune has clearly shifted between these opposites their entire life, sometimes without even knowing it, and in spite of this dizzying dance from one extreme to another, there are moments where they feel paralysed. I find that so compelling, because as a card The Wheel of Fortune is all about movement, change - and yet, I can’t think of a better way to characterise them. Dealt upright, the card is chance, opportunity, destiny. Reversed: misfortune, disappointment, the loss of one’s way. All these facets are scattered in their body, and this will continue to be so until they carve out their way. They are always in the grip of a power they can’t quite reconcile themselves to, seized by the piercing thought that only lifetime after lifetime of static numbness awaits them, and that they must endure it alone. This power of theirs is a balancing act, and balancing requires commitment, devotion. They’re a conduit, almost, for this raw energy to pass through, and it takes its toll. Already, they have carved out a space in their own heart and, very slowly, it is being filled in with black, rotting dust. You’d have to be a monster not to feel for them; after all, they spent much of their childhood spilling their soul into things that didn’t matter because they were told to. Because they had no idea of the consequences. Necromancy in this world is such a profound experience, at once ingrained in the very essence of humanness and the severing of any real feeling. It goes beyond that, even; some lose their fingers, their limbs, and some are forced to drag their body across this world until the Undying God finally takes them. What does it feel like to feel the movement of life, the very energy that creates animals and people and worlds, the soul of everything, pass through your fingers? It must be one of the most intense feelings in the universe - and yet, it’s deadening. After a while, that raw power can no longer be felt merely in your hands. It’s floating in your body, your hands cut from you, and now all you feel is the heaviness of it, with nowhere to store it except between your chest. This skeleton really resonated with me. I really believe that without passion and heart and intense feeling, the world would be a very dull place. I like the idea of The Wheel of Fortune being totally stifled by this process, swallowed up by uncertainty and receiving very little support to navigate that. It’s a fate they accepted for themselves, willingly, and just as Necromancy lingers hesitantly at their fingertips, they’re not sure they have the strength to pull away. Even further, they are not even certain that’s what they want. Out of gratitude or for their own sake, this is the path they’ve chosen, and it is one they feel obligated to complete. That is the truth they choose to stomach: learn, without sacrificing who you are. Be both. But they’re slipping through the cracks; hesitation hangs at the back of their throat and chokes them. It’s a frightening thought to think that you must simply swallow the void, because all of this must be weathered. All of it must be endured, because that is the price you pay for power. Tldr; they’re a deeply tragic character but, like their card, there is opportunity for change. Their soul has been chipped away, bit by bit, and the weight of their power is beginning to settle into their bones. But it doesn’t have to be that way. The beauty of The Wheel of Fortune is that, with enough tenacity, their future is their own. Stay, leave; give in, break away. All depends on which way the cards are facing! BACKGROUND: I. THE FOOL, UPRIGHT innocence, new beginnings, free spirit The first thing a child sees in its life is its mother, and you are no different. The first thing you know is her, penniless enough that your infanthood would have been nothing short of unremarkable but provided for enough that she could have kept you if she’d wanted to. She has had children before, and she’s felt the billowing warmth that childrearing lends her, but you are stealing something from her. Your mother cannot quite place the feeling, cannot understand what it is you’re doing to her, but when she holds you in her arms she feels her limbs growing heavier, her muscles deaden. You must be, she determines, a punishment - so she resolves to rid herself of you. More important than that, she resolves to make an offering of you. The woman makes the long, arduous journey from Tyrholm, averts road bandits and street beggars and pardoners swearing by religious forgeries; she pushes herself halfway across Markholm with only her conviction to drive her. She commits you to the Temple of the Undying, and this is something she wants known. She wants the great, bipartite deity to know that this largesse of hers is an immolation, a symbol of her devotion. In return, she would have the punishment lifted. And you never see your mother again. The temple names you Vasylia, assuming the role of a strange, distant mother who plucks the word from between the stars. You have no surname and therefore no genesis, nothing to remind you where you come from and who you are. Of course, as you well know now, none of that matters. As soon as you pass the threshold of that sacred place, it forges an identity for you. (Your heritage is a secret that tucks itself away from you, like a shadow that shies from the light. You are the result of a union between a travelling merchant and a beautiful, beautiful woman, and this is all your mother has to protect her in life. Those who covet beauty, who wish to steal it away and display it among their wares, are always equipped with a lie or two. The lie is this: he loves her, he does; devotedly, honestly, purely, and he wants her to join him. To travel with him over pale waves and into the cove of pirates. Perhaps he’d believed in that at first, but it ends as all things end; in fiction. He leaves her as all men leave her, with an enormous pouch of gold. Your mother settles in a village at the border of Volkan Forest. You do not live there long. You never learn your mother’s name. Her name is Estrid.) Life at the Temple is, for the most part, simple. Dull, pedestrian, but simple. Abandoned, you are raised as one amongst many, a single child amidst a whole throng of neglected children. It quickly becomes clear to you that some wield magical abilities, shielded from a world which harshly forejudges them, and some arrive with nothing to them at all. Like you: not even a name. Some of them are sickly, a few of them are malnourished, and far too many of them are the reluctant offspring of poverty, charily offered to the Temple by parents who lament of their penury. But you are not sickly or malnourished or magical, even. You wail out in the dark of night for a mother who doesn’t want you, but which child here does not? At least at first, there is nothing particularly special about you. You are still a child waiting to grow into yourself, and, well, there is nothing unusual about that fact. Your childhood is, in a word, unremarkable. The Temple does its best to inspire loyalty in the offspring yielded to them - you are, after all, an opportunity for life-long indoctrination. Your earliest days are structured by a conformity which they shake into your bones: the Temple teaches you of the wolves and the snakes and the annihilating body they make as one. On magic, their position is less clear. Messages are mixed. Necromancers are a chosen, sacred few. But the other magi are being punished, cursed for a cycle of blasphemy and adultery and theft and anything else they can conjure up. As with all children, you assume the first thing you hear as gospel, but as the years gallop past you, you find yourself cordoned off by a low drone. The Temple is not so united as it seems, and there are people who whisper in disagreement. You think you are beginning to notice the resentment growing around you, but you are still a child - you know nothing. You determine that it is safer to be ordinary. You cannot quite be called pious, but you rise with the morning light. You work hard. You devote time to your prayers and you comply with the codes of silence which linger between them. You restock ink and parchment for the Clerics working sedulously at translation. You trim the rose bushes at the edge of the forest. You are untroublesome and, for the most part, amenable; shapeable. You offer a hand to help wherever it may be required, because that is what you’ve always been taught to do. You are nothing much like some of the other children, boisterous and ambitious, hungry for stories of politics and warfare. Hankering to feel the weight of a bronze rapier in their hands, to run their fingers through enemies’ blood and call it an act of cleansing. The Temple is not cruel, but it is cyclical, and the pattern is not enough - for them or for you. But you do as you’re told, your life moves in a progressive rhythm, because what else is there? You have always needed a hand to guide you. When life drifts in a sequence it all blurs into one, so you find solace in the small things. You revel in the sanctuary of the forest. Its trees keel into spirals, bent by the weight of their branches. You like the stillness of the air, the way that the birds settle on the branches so completely at peace - unaware of the eyes watching them. You learn that silence is not solitude, that the reticences observed by the Temple do not always bring you peace. In fact, they rarely ever bring you peace, and at times they have the tendency to strangle you. You marvel at the way the water refracts in the moonlight, bending with the shape of its brilliance. It moves furtively and secretly, as if beneath the surface there is buried a whole other world that it hopes to keep concealed. You are never the sort of girl with fantasies mirrored from the vellum of a fairytale book, and you never touch things so delicately that you look to be afraid of them. You would never call yourself a dreamer, but there’s an intensity to you which makes it hard for you to stop staring at things. There are only a couple of children in the Temple you ever feel particularly close to, and when you think back, they are the only things you feel are worth remembering here. Curled up on a stony ledge, watching a religious darkness fall over the ancient rock. Organising altars and scrubbing floorboards and observing silences with a dash of humour. You have never truly felt like you belong anywhere, except when you lay down in the grass or you sit on the cold stone and run your fingertips through the water, imagining that you are somewhere else. It makes this place feel a little less dull. II. THE HIEROPHANT, UPRIGHT education, knowledge, beliefs It is perhaps no coincidence that it’s during your sixteenth Summertide that you first raise an animal from the dead, completely by accident. A butterfly, crushed beneath the weight of a snow which is only now beginning to thaw. You cannot describe what brought you to pick it up. Beauty? You have always looked beneath the surface. Macabre as the very idea of it may be, you cannot not help but take it into your hand. You feel its limp body balance in your palm like parchment: you want it to be beautiful again. And as if by magic, it shifts in your palm, it wakes. Half-amazed and half-afraid, you watch how its wings unfurl themselves and its body cracks and distorts itself back into shape. But you are overcome by something strange: the insect sits in the centre of your palm, learning about the world again, but if you were blind you wouldn’t know it. You can’t feel it there. By instinct you clasp your hands around it and bring it into the Temple and, perhaps foolishly, you show them what you have done. The Temple determines that it is no coincidence that your gift for rebirth, the very echo of Summertide, should reveal itself now. It’s an ancient celebration of renaissance. Fate twists, and the Temple has two Necromancers already, devoted to the craft and resolved to educate you. Educate perhaps puts it generously: they test you, push you, assign you tasks to complete without any tangible goal in sight. They never teach you what it takes, what you must sacrifice, what it truly means to excavate that void between life and death. This is the truth of it: you have been chosen by the Undying Herself and this gift is yours to own, but as with all things we take, it demands sacrifice. A piece of you, snapped off from bone; it lingers there at your side. They teach you that you are different, you are special. The other magi can manipulate solid matter and regenerate limbs, but you are sacred. They will not see twenty-five years, but you? You can live for hundreds of years. Your schooling begins small. Insects, mice, small woodland creatures. But it’s a demanding, exhausting process -  still, you continue to work hard. When you’d brought back that butterfly on the third day of Summertide, it had seemed so easy. A case of simply wishing and being. But things are not so easy now. You find it difficult to pour that same longing into the creatures put down in front of you; you are more sophisticated, less candid. But you do as you’re told, make as many successes as you do failures, and for whatever end goal the Necromancers have in mind for you, you progress. Then, as if you have not already experienced enough change, the world spins carelessly on its side. You are eighteen and you have been under the tutelage of the Necromancers for just under two years. You feel you are drifting away from the green beauty of that first instance, the first time you bartered with the universe and it chose to answer you. But you are still just a child and your teachers have lived for hundreds of years. Unfortunately, you learn that Necromancers are dangerous, they’re volatile, they’re lethal, and that includes you. It takes little more than the impetuosity of a boy sat next to you at dinnertime, for him to waggishly swipe the bread roll from your plate - as children are mischievously wont to do - for you to wreak tragedy. The action irritates you, infuriates you, even, because you have less patience for things now. You snatch the roll from his hands. Without warning, he collapses, body limp on the floor. You are puzzled at first, you’d scarcely touched him, but as the Brethren roll his body over on the stone, you realise what you have done. The boy is dead. The boy is dead, and you’re learning your emotions have consequences. But this you’ve forgotten. You’ve scrubbed it from your skin raw, as if that will absolve you. Things are accelerating. You perform your lessons largely in isolation. You are kept away from the other children, particularly those who hope to take vows, because you are dangerous, you cannot be contained. Your tutors take the opportunity to teach you more diligently, more industriously. Your accomplishments are growing: frogs, small birds, rabbits. But the hours are slipping away and you don’t understand what it’s all for, bringing back forest animals contentedly buried beneath the moss. Nevertheless, you move forward. You think you are getting better at this. When you have lived for twenty years, they bring you live animals; they show you how to drain them, how to cleave to your youth. The work you are performing is an honour. You have always needed a hand to guide you. Something has changed in you. The forest recedes from you. You wake and you learn and you perform and you dream empty, hollow dreams in an unbroken cycle. More often than not you lie awake for hours, allowing your eyes to rest on a rotting mark in the corner of the ceiling. You smile still and you try to laugh, but as each chuckle worms its way up your throat you feel it strangle you in the process. Sometimes you cough up blood, thick and hard, and you stare at the red spot in confusion. One day, you catch your hand on a piece of shattered glass and feel nothing. You don’t even flinch. At the wound you simply stare and, out of curiosity perhaps, or a pointed desire to hurt at something, you pick up a shard of glass and feel the weight of it in your fingers. And with all the force you have, you burrow it into your flesh. That, you feel. You drop the glass, wincing, and a hot tear rolls down your cheek. You lie in your bed and wish on a comet for somebody to steal you away from this place. You whisper it into existence. But in the morning you wake and everything is the same. A blur settles into your bones. Things are a cycle, so much more so than when your life had begun. But you know nothing else. You stay. III. THE WHEEL OF FORTUNE, UPRIGHT change, cycles, inevitable fate In your life you have learned much. How to raise animals from the dead. How to canalise energy away from the living and into your bones. You have learned that things change, of course they do, but they also stay the same. For people like you, life motionlessly moves from one event to the next. You remember the day that your life had spun so carelessly on its axis once again with such precision that, at times, you are sure that you are back there. You think that you are back at the Temple, raising rabbits and drawing the lifeforce from dandelions. You think that the clouds are weeping into the earth with salted rain, and the chill of your salvation buries itself into you. By now, you know she is not your deliverance. There is nothing holy in her but power, and how she revels in it. The woman alights on the Temple without a horse, without a thing to carry her here, and if you had ever been a foolish sort of girl you might have assumed she’d undertaken the journey on foot. But you have never been a fool. You are twenty-five years old. A solemn cold which seems to swell in her at once brings you a much-desired quiet and chills you to the bone. To your surprise, all bow to her. Cower from her. Even your teachers are beneath her. With purpose she pulls you aside, ungloves your hands and takes them in her own, and she promises you that the two of you are the same. She does not fear you, and you have no cause to fear her. You are cut from the same dust and made from the same bones - there’s divinity in that. Like you, she can raise the dead, and what’s more: she’s good at it. Perhaps for the first time in your life you are asked what it is that you want. You feel like the decision is yours. She offers you an ultimatum: remain here, raise rabbits and mice and crows, be nothing; or join her, learn the craft, study beneath her, become something. While you are torn between your desire to flee this place and a thick, breathless lump which lingers at the back of your throat unexplained, it is never really a question. It is an answer. You pack up everything you own: garments, mementos, fear and desire, all. You accept willingly, unthinkingly, blindly. You pass through the egress and step into a shimmering new world. Even now, that is the only way you can think to describe this place. This new world you have chosen for yourself coruscates beneath the light as if in dance. It’s a world that winks like glitter - Castle Tyrholm is so unlike anything you’ve ever known. By now you are so accustomed to rough hems and the bland taste of food on your tongue that you have forgotten there was anything else. You only know things bland and bloodless, humble devotions. But here? Here, they dress lavishly. Here, they eat lavishly. Here, they live lavishly. You stand at the fortress’ great, impressive windows and you contentedly watch the way the pale waves lick at the black stone, the way the castle bends over the waves and balances on top of the rockline. It’s more than regal: it’s thunderous, luxurious, rich. Of course, you know a little better now. You know that glitter catches in the corner of your eye. It has the tendency to blind you, to force you to look at things between the sequins of a kaleidoscope, all twisted and torn out of shape. You have been under The High Priestess’ tutelage for two years now, and you feel your life bisecting into two distinct worlds. You must reconcile yourself to that. Statesmanship has very little in common with religion, and unfortunately, that’s all you know. Religion is devotion, fidelity, constancy. Whatever fidelity you see before you has been rigorously shaped, re-wrought in the shadows for years, and that is the only constant here. Still, it does not shake you. Your first lesson is this: you must cut the history of yourself out into stone. You do. You become a silhouette which cleaves to your mentor’s side, a thing that can’t be shaken. Like a shadow you observe the way your mentor manoeuvres; the way she holds her tongue and the way she weaponises it; the way she plumes and crows and deceives as if she’s been doing it for a thousand years. You watch the way that King Septimus’ hands move with hers, shifting in mirrored gestures - like she has attached strings. You become an accepted prerequisite at her side, a creeping outline which follows her devotedly. Part of your status, you brush shoulders with some of the king’s most trusted advisors - you attend assemblies, convocations gathered in the throne-room. You are so far from home now; wherever your home is, wherever it was. You are beginning to learn the meaning of diplomacy: one keeps a knife permanently unsheathed beneath their cloak. Your instructor resolves to fill in the gaps that the Temple left barren: you learn what you must give up for this gift, you learn of all the grief it has caused you. This is a magic you watch her lean into so deeply at times you think she’ll splinter apart - but, of course, she never has. Never will. This is a truth that lies uneasily in your stomach. It lies heavily on your lungs and it chokes you. You can feel your heart climbing up and down your windpipe - you aim to seize it in your hands, to still it, but you can only retch at it. You’ve lost count of all the creatures you’ve poured yourself into, and you wonder where all those pieces of you are now. The fading feeling of your bones makes sense now, at least; the universe is a glutton and it has been stealing from you. You never even knew the rules of the game. The king’s physician brings you animals to practice upon. The High Priestess teaches you the most painless portions of yourself to sacrifice: you learn the things you need and the things you can go without. Your abilities are growing, and with that you feel the weight in your chest shift a little - things are becoming easier to swallow. You learn the importance of giving back: to creatures, to people, but also communities, dynasties. Yours are regular faces in the Farmlands which edge on Tyrholm. Here, you resurrect animals, livelihood; they are indebted to you both. One day, a farmer’s son slips from a ladder, cracks his skull open on the coarse ground. The High Priestess takes the opportunity to teach, to have you bring him back. But too much of you clings to the Temple, the way its cold was settling into your bones. The High Priestess’ dissatisfaction is evident. You’ve been studying beneath her for three years now, and still you have not raised a body. She wants you to look at this world without Necromancy directly in the eye: destruction, death, misery. You cast your eye down to the boy and swallow the lump growing in your throat. Grief. As painless as breathing, your teacher brings their son back. The world is better with Necromancers, she has resolved. Dutiful, devoted, you have resolved that as well. You have always needed a hand to guide you. As part of your schooling, you ride out with your mentor and Tyrholm’s great military army. To squash rebellion, to quell revolt. The two of you are never far from each other - you are a shadow clinging to a shadow. There’s something about the way that you both sit, regal and harrowing above your white horses, lingering like death at the rear of Septimus’ forces. You are a lethal sight, but your power is not enough. Not yet. You arch over the body of a fallen soldier, but something is stopping you. You try, you really try, but you fail. Half-alive, he blinks back at you. A lungful vibrates at the back of his throat. His chest rises and falls with air, but is nothing in his eye to suggest he recognises the figure bending over him. It is half a failure - but half a failure is still a failure. You have given him nothing human. As if flowing over water, your mentor dismounts her horse and puts an end to her experiment. She doesn’t look at you. You don’t look at you. Sometimes, you can’t bear to. But your failures do not last forever. When you are thirty-two, you animate a body. At last. It has taken you seven years, seven long years of unlearning the Temple’s way, but at last, success. Of all the places you manage it, it is on the battlefield, and you are in your element. Surrounded by blood and warfare and death - ah, always death. You are getting better at this. At night, you rest your head down on your pillow and you dream. You dream of your hands, reaching out. The Undying God reaches back. You feel you are becoming one with Her. IV. THE HIGH PRIESTESS, REVERSED repressed intuition, confusion, dissonance You are a vault of fears, but you have spent these last ten years bent on throwing away the key. For the last decade you have been following your mentor indiscriminately, almost blindly, and while you are finally beginning to make progress, you are also beginning to feel that haze gather around your fingertips, weighing down your wrists. You feel yourself swallowing the sensation at times. You don’t like to close your eyes. If you do, you think you are back at the Temple, raising creatures injudiciously, feeling your soul taunt you in the air between you. A cold is settling into your bones again. Your dreams turn themselves inside out and empty themselves when you finally fall asleep, and when you wake in the morning you are confronted with a sense that your emotions have slipped out of you in the night. That you have slipped out of you in the night. Your fingers pressed to rotting flesh, you decide that the bodies you have brought up in halves are warnings. As their eyes roll demonically back into their skull and the listlessness of their breath catches at the back of their throat, you cannot help but think that your half-failures are warning you. That this is what awaits you should you consider to amble down this narrow path. Not death, but instead life: long, death-defying, rotten life. A life of nullity stretches out in front of you, like a void that opens its black mouth and eats you raw. Impassibility is creeping into you, settling into the spaces between your bones and lungs. The taste of blood in your mouth has recently returned to you, though you only notice it when you can taste at all; you cannot determine whether being able to feel it flip thickly over your tongue brings you a sense of peace or horror. When you slip your rings over your fingers, heavy with all the ore you could never have afforded when you were young, you can’t feel them there. You feel ancient impressions dig their way into you. Perhaps you have been foolish. You have been believing that carefully handpicking the parts of yourself to sacrifice can go on forever; that you will never feel the weight of your earliest years again. And while that’s true, you have been slicing off the most unforgiving parts of yourself and offering them up to the Undying God, you feel yourself recede from Her. They are determining that these pieces of you are not enough, and They would have you offer more. When you travel out with Septimus’ forces to quell revolts you feel eyes on you: The High Priestess’ eyes, impatient. In the battlefield you are anxious to stop your hands from trembling. Perhaps you can’t bear the pressure. Perhaps you can’t bear yourself. Your teacher is always left to clear up your mess, always left to do the brunt of the work, but she is never cruel about it. Sometimes you wish she was. Then, you might be better. And yet, you are not all failure. In the last two months you have successfully resurrected five bodies, breathing and seeing and living, and that in itself is commendable. The High Priestess brings you to orphanages, and it is there that you set about your reanimations. While, like always, your mentor bears the brunt of the work, you manage to resurrect four bodies. Three girls, three children, and a boy who has been bound to these walls for too long. At Koldam, much to your own mystification, you bring back another. A Lieutenant, a real piece of chainmail in the king’s military armour. When his undead eyes finally settle upon your face, noticing the way that you lip quivers at your achievement, he breathes a sigh of relief. He looks at you as if you’re an angel, sent from the Undying God to rescue him. You are sent by Her, this you concede, but you are no angel. Whispers of a coup have been present for as many years you have been beneath The High Priestess’ care, but they are thickening now - they are becoming more difficult to ignore. Still, you ignore them, as you must. You are not ready for Septimus to be toppled, you are not ready for the throne to keel over into the pale waves beneath the black rock. You don’t want to watch it drown, you don’t want to watch it to be torn apart like some; more than anything, you want it to stay put. Every time you squash a rebellion, every time a coup fails, you allow your heart to settle in your chest again. But it only lasts a moment, because treason is always being whispered, mutiny is always being accounted for. What you think of Septimus is irrelevant: you aren’t strong enough to fight for a place in whatever new world results from it. There’s still so much you can’t do, so much you don’t know if you want to do, and even now all you want is balance. It is a line you have toed your whole life and it has always got the better of you: religion and politics; life and death; permanence and impermanence; the girl you were and the girl you are becoming. You want the world to stop spinning. You want stability. You can’t know what you want if everything you know keeps changing. You are only loosely beginning to learn the sort of vacancy you have inside you. Perhaps if you knew better, if you were better at knowing what you want, you would say: the world is creeping away from me, I am creeping away from me. Do you still need a hand to guide you? PLOT IDEAS: METAMORPHOSIS: What she wants is stability. If she will live for centuries, she must have something to endure with her. Vasylia’s loyalty is very intricate. She doesn’t quite block out the throne’s transgressions in the same way that Temperance does, but there’s still a degree of selfishness to her fealty. She calls herself a Loyalist not because she believes Septimus is genuinely deserving of her love, but because her body cannot bear the instability. I’d like to see that shift very gradually, though. She can’t cling to this dream of stability forever, not when the path she’s chosen is so weathered by impermanence - and the dream will only become more impossible to uphold if Septimus grows in cruelty. I’d like her to realise that slowly. It begins small: she focuses her attention on those who bear the brunt of his mistreatment. I can see The Star, The Hermit or even The Hierophant factoring into this. And then it grows - whispers intensify. The king’s mistakes become impossible to ignore. Maybe he orders heads to be put on spikes on the castle barracks. Turncoats are beaten and hung as if crucified in the main hall. Equally, it could have nothing to do with violence at all. She may simply determine, like her mentor, that the throne doesn’t suit him. Either way, I’d like Vasylia to move with the developments of the game. She wouldn’t fight for Septimus, but she does tend to ignore whispers of coup. Right now, she is trying to balance the parts of herself she feels at war with; she can’t handle another one. Nevertheless, I want her to be forced to grapple with the fact that this is bigger than her and that she may have to act. I don’t know whether she’s likely to have confided in Vasylia of her intentions (depending on the player), but should the divergence become evident, questions of loyalty would certainly be pulled into the fore. Would she follow her mentor into revolt? There’s an opportunity here for conflict - but also for growth. Growing into the person The High Priestess wants them to be: willing to fight, to take, to reconcile yourself to your powers, hardened to the consequences. I want to see her really become a part of this war rather than hesitating at the edge of it. NO MORE FALSE HEAVENS: The High Priestess never hesitates, she leans into this gift as deeply as her body is able without prying itself apart, and Vasylia believes that this has always been her way. The same can hardly be said for her, though. She is hesitant, at times she has misgivings, and the sight of a corpse almost always makes her tremble. The High Priestess has been guiding her for ten years now and in that time she’s discovered a lifetime’s worth of arcane knowledge, twice as much power as the Temple ever bequeathed her, but there is still so much she can’t do. What causes her to fail is hesitation, placing one foot in the art and one foot out of it. I suppose this is an alternative to plot #1, depending on which way things develop, but I’d like to see Vasylia turn away from The High Priestess. When she looks at her, at The Sun, she recognises what she might become. It is a fate she wishes to escape, and if she is truly committed to that, she may be forced to act. It’s no easy feat to kill a Necromancer, even one as wavering as herself, but severing ties with The High Priestess could breed disaster. She has always needed a hand to guide her in life, but it’d be fascinating to see her break away from that. The world opens its jaw and waits to swallow her whole, and The High Priestess is certain that without her guidance she’ll falter, but she needs to make herself more than what other people have made her. I’d like to develop her self-sufficiency, her willpower, but most importantly, I’d like to explore her desperation, to develop the recklessness which would no doubt begin to grow. Leaving The High Priestess’ tutelage is a make or break moment: and unless something considerable changes within her, it is likely to be the latter. Over time, she needs to determine whether she wants to be a Necromancer or a human-being. How far is she willing to go to excavate that small part of her, and is the act her genesis or her epilogue? THE DARK MARK OF ME: As a Necromancer, she’s used to instilling at least a bit of apprehension in others. The Lovers’ eyes scan Vasylia’s skin for evidence of a pulse, a suggestion that, even now, she is alive. More importantly, though, The Emperor goes out of his way to make himself available to listen to her. Listen maybe isn’t the right word, to have his curiosity sated is probably more apt, and in moments of weakness, her secrets spill out of her like a river. He’s used to getting what he wants, and she will not stand in his way. But the very act of this is dangerous; it could breed conflict, consequences, even bring about Vasylia’s death (!?) should information fall into the wrong hands. I don’t think Vasylia has shared her hesitancy to continue down the path that The High Priestess has forged for her with her mentor - there’s no need to, it’s as easily distinguishable as ink spilled on skin - but there could be disastrous consequences should her concerns spill out. Not from The High Priestess, I don’t think, because I don’t see her as having an aim in mind to destroy Vasylia. Her resolve at least appears to be motivated by cutting away the thorns and making space for her prodigy to grow. Yet, Vasylia’s vulnerability is a weakness, and weaknesses can be exploited. While the dynamic between The Emperor and The Wheel of Fortune is… by far one of my favourite character dynamics you’ve written, perhaps The Emperor’s player would like to use this to his advantage in some way. The Emperor certainly isn’t The High Priestess’ first choice for the throne. So, I’d like to see these words come back to bite Vasylia, to further complicate her oscillation between this path or that. She’s no fool, but she by no means has the experience of her mentor. She studies underneath The High Priestess and lauds her propensity for manipulation and schemes, and while in her experience she’s picked up more than enough tricks, her hesitancy is weakness. She sacrifices her feelings and anxieties freely - because he coaxes it out of her, but also because she needs to purge. Over time, I’d like to see Vasylia’s actions breed consequences, over and over and over, to the point that she can’t run from them. She can only follow them blindly down a path she was always meant to. Maybe this is less of a personal plot point and more of a worldbuilding idea, but given that Necromancers have the ability to kill, I’d like Vasylia to dabble in that in the future. It’s something The High Priestess can do as second nature, as if she was born with the gift, and while Vasylia is better at drawing life into her than pouring herself into things, it’s not something she’s easily reconciled to. Still, I’d like to develop her skill here, figure out if it could be of use to The High Priestess or Septimus (because she serves the former first, the latter second). There’s an opportunity here to flesh out a dynamic between Vasylia and The Sun, who of course kills for a living, but I certainly think it’d be an irreversible path for her to walk down - one that, should she give herself over to it, solidifies her fate. Again, more worldbuilding, but if The High Priestess is the type to gather secrets in her plotting against Septimus, it could be interesting to have Vasylia drop by places such as The Rosewood Maiden in disguise. To gather secrets in a place where secrets are spilled like blood. She wouldn’t even need to disclose her plans to Vasylia if the player didn’t want her to, but I’d love an opportunity to branch out beyond the castle. Much of her life has been limited, either by the Temple or Castle Tyrholm, and it’d be interesting to feel her form an opinion on the ‘outside’ world; to get an idea of the sorts of people she’d be fleeing to should she leave The High Priestess’ care. Alternatively, it could be a good way to turn Vasylia away from her neutrality/loyalty and into the company of revolters. Depending on how things shape up, I’d love to see Vasylia finally become an advisor. Perhaps not to the same degree as her mentor, but in some shape or form, I’d like to have her officially offer advice to the Crown. While The High Priestess’ intentions in extracting her from the Temple are, of course, ambiguous, it’s what she’s been training towards. What would make this even more interesting is: who will she be advisor to? To Septimus? Well, that spot is already taken by her mentor. The Emperor? Well, that depends whether his father can hold onto the throne until he dies. The Chariot? The World? Two vastly different options, but I suppose it depends which of them The High Priestess hopes to install on the throne. Vasylia is already quite content with the notion of serving The Emperor, and that could breed conflict, but it could also change. While Vasylia is getting better at nominating the more sacrificable parts of herself every time she uses it, the sickness is spreading. She’s heard rumours, though. Rumours of a mage with the inexplicable ability to draw from two bodies of magic. I think The Moon could be a source of real fascination for Vasylia. If she fears anything, it’s that she’ll turn herself so irreversibly over to Necromancy that she loses the essence of who she is. Given that The Moon’s abilities lie in healing, I’d like Vasylia to investigate. If there is a possibility of regeneration, she wants it. It could be an opportunity to rehabilitate her self-image, to reconcile herself to this fate of hers, or even to break away from it - depending on what she discovers. CHARACTER DEATH: It depends on when, but yes! Given there’s opportunity for development. WRITING SAMPLE (This can be purely hypothetical if it doesn’t fit into character interpretations and histories, I just really like the idea of Vasylia being at Koldam and bringing someone back on the battlefield!) The air rings with the song of swords, each clang and crash a melodic note copied from a manuscript soaked in blood. Koldam’s men fall like flies and Vasylia watches them from a distance: stumbling backwards, defending themselves clumsily, raising their swords above their heads in such a sweeping motion that she can only think them pitiable as The Emperor’s men bend beneath them. She watches how, as if in dance, Tyrholm’s forces encroach upon their wildly underprepared assailant with efficiency and onslaught. One by one, in a diagonal line, the soldiers thrust their swords into bellies, eyes, hearts, throats. She watches the revolters cry out in pain for a moment and then fall, limply, to the grass as corpses. The grass here has been dry for some time, Vasylia can feel it. It’s been reaching out to her, entreating her, but now it can drink at last. It feasts on blood and looks all the better for it.        “You were right,” Vasylia muses, as if she had ever doubted it, her words melding with the sound of clanging horseshoes and battle. The two women hang at the back of Tyrholm’s defence ahorse, side-by-side. There aren’t many of them in the field, only thirty or forty of The Emperor’s most trusted paladins thrust into the fray. The magi will lend a helping hand should it at all be asked of them. Vasylia would try to lend a hand. She would try to wash past failures from her mind, she would try to think of only life and death and the space that lives between it. “You were right,” she repeats, “Some of them are only boys. The Emperor will bring the King of Koldam’s head to the block and strike it from him.” Her words don’t warrant a response. It’s a statement, an echo, even, of words already made sensible to her. For a moment, The High Priestess is silent. She only reins her horse into a step and around the edge of the battlefield, lingering like the stench of rotting flesh. The woman has been grimly quiet this campaign, like the muscles she no longer feels in her face are holding something back. A thought, a point. Vasylia thinks nothing of it. It’s not unusual. By way of nature, like a shadow she follows.        “That is what you get without careful preparation,” The High Priestess answers, not quite to her apprentice. An ode to the fallen men, a lament to blood staining grass and gore hanging from swords. An afterthought dedicated to the revolters who deigned to dream. By now, Vasylia is well acclimated to her teacher’s manner of speech. There is a sense that her words are not made for the likes of men and mortals, that they’re fashioned for the Undying God, cut out by her tongue like a knife. But the two of them have not ridden out with The Emperor’s forces to remark retrospectively on shortfallings of men, on dead husbands and sons and lovers. There will be enough time for that. What remains of Koldam will pen songs to parchment with their legionaries’ blood and perform them to a pile of ashes and rubble. They are here to resurrect. To bring back what few men they expect to lose, to ensure that such a resounding victory is marred by nothing, not even death. Vasylia has been doing this for years, now, hovering with her mentor at the rear of a military army like two prophets of death. Watching over men who breathe their last breath, selecting those who will rise up from the dirt again. Vasylia supposes that neither of them are much needed here: while they’ve ridden out to clashes of arms that have certainly relied upon life made anew for victory, the swing of bronze here is decisive. Still, The High Priestess had insisted. She has eyes everywhere, but sometimes there are none better than one’s own. Vasylia is familiar with battle by now. Somewhat absently, running her fingers through Hel’s pale white hair, she watches as the blood alloys with the air and she ruminates on her failures. It’s a shortfalling of hers, she thinks. She’s been getting better at raising bodies, at blowing her own breath into the mouths of corpses and watching them animate. The last body she’d brought back had only been an orphan; a girl. As it were, she’d seen a piece of herself in her. A fragment, locked into the body of somebody else, long gone from her. Vasylia’s mind turns; towards failure, towards her own incompetence. She had been in a battlefield not too much unlike this one once, her hands earnestly pressed to the chest of a soldier long gone from this world, blood still seeping from his porous body. One might call it a half-success, she supposes. He’d lived, technically. But what is life when you are nothing more than marrow and bone, flesh and muscle and blood? She had watched in horror as his white eyes rolled up into the back of his skull, how they stared at nothing in particular: the way the clouds had swept through the sky that day and cut into it like an executioner’s knife, opening up a rain which poured down on the earth in judgement. Half-alive, Vasylia was bringing back bodies and never souls, and for a time that simply looked to be her way. The fighting would go on until Koldam was broken and mastered, the hooves of their war horses galloping on the dirt until the ground became a wasteland of torn earth. This is what it takes to hold on to a crown, she thinks. This is what it takes to keep Septimus on the throne, she rephrases, fitting the words into her mouth. Vasylia hopes that such an unambiguous victory would bring her some peace, some balance. But the throne seems to swing perpetually off the bank of a precipice; as if it delights in the sensation of feeling the world ripped from underneath you, suspended in the air. She would pray for Septimus to keep his throne, for The Emperor to inherit it on his death. There was a sense of permanence in that, in things being passed down in natural succession. Vasylia stares in the distance as The Emperor slams an enemy with the flat of his sword in one hand, winding him, while slitting the throat of an enemy with a knife in the other. He’s a strong fighter, a strong warrior - she hopes that when his time comes he’ll be a strong king, too. The air shifts. Out of the corner of her eye, Vasylia watches one of their Lieutenants pierced through the chest with a long blade of steel. Rolling from his horse, he falls motionlessly into the dirt. Something stirs in her. Patriotism? Determination? Grief? Whatever it is, she feels a strange sensation inherit her body and, as if predestined, she dismounts from Hel with such sheer force that the horse almost bolts from her. Vasylia feels the hem of her dress drag through the dusty dirt and, by the time she has reached the man, well, he’s no longer a man at all. Whoever he was, he’s nothing more than a body. Vasylia feels the stare of The High Priestess sear into the back of her head like molten iron. She is watching her, as she always is. Curving over his body, Vasylia breaks apart the chainmail which covers the stab wound, tears at the linen beneath it. She presses her hands to the torn flesh, trembling. On contact they still themselves a little, as if this is where they’re meant to be. She winces as she feels a piece of herself crawl out of her lungs, up her throat, like a sharp, piercing thing with black lacquered claws. When she raises her hands from the corpse they’re painted red in blood, but she has achieved nothing. Determinedly but, as always, with hesitation, she pushes her hands into his chest and tries again. She feels the same claws ladder in her throat, but this time its nails are ice cold, as if turning her insides fleetingly to stone. Is this magic or is it hesitation? Vasylia falls silent for a moment, her hands still planted in the breastbone. She feels the stare of her mentor still burrowing its way into her skin. But then: a splutter of red, a gasp of air which extends infinitely into lungs, eyes, flinching open. Vasylia rolls the body over in the dirt to avoid the soldier from choking, keeled over the body, breath bated. The soldier takes a moment to naturalise himself, for his eyes to come to terms with this foreign world again, for them to peer past the blur and see her. As if by divine providence, a heavy rain descends upon the site and Vasylia feels the thick mud form around them. When the soldier looks at her, blinking away the rain, really takes her in - he does not seem afraid. As a matter of fact, he sighs in relief, allowing a weak chuckle to escape his throat. He takes her wrist in his calloused hand, non-threateningly, as a silent moment of appreciation. Of gratitude. His grey eyes look at her as if she’s an angel, as if she had descended from the Heavens to become his deliverance. But, she thinks, what sort of angel has black wings?        “Lady,” he says, “You ought to cover yourself. You’ll catch a cold.” Vasylia cants her head to meet his gaze through the slit of his helm, eyes the colour of gunmetal grey. She’s drenched in rain; she smells like salt. There’s something animal about the way the salt of his tears creates a tincture with sweat and blood, and though she has seen it many times before, it provokes something in her still. Vasylia is stirred from a pithy moment of intimacy by the tolling of swords and shields, the metallic ringing of warrior’s voices calling for blood. By now, almost all of Koldam’s forces have fallen. Her vision blurs a little as she makes out the figure of The Emperor, whetting his sword on stone. One of his soldiers strangles Koldam’s king at the neck, towing him through the dirt. His crown had fallen from his brow long ago, buried by the bodies of his own men. Vasylia turns her head back to the Lieutenant. She has felt things colder than this. She feels it now. “No,” she hums in response. “It’s only water.” EXTRAS Pinterest board here and mock blog here. Any headcanons which involve other characters are purely suggestions and can be adjusted or removed if they don’t fit! I was gonna make a playlist too but ran out of time but just… just know that I listened to Florence + The Machine’s discography over and over while writing this. The only info u need to know. 01. When Vasylia stands, she does so straight and imposing, but her posture lacks the peremptory impression of The High Priestess. Nevertheless, when she walks through a sea of people they tend to part for her, hesitant to brush hands with Death Herself, perhaps, but this all depends on the vanity of the pool she is passing in. Vasylia’s mannerisms have always been subtle, and that hasn’t changed. You must look closely at her body language to interpret her: wooden shoulders when she’s paying attention, a cant of her brows when she’s interested, the twist of a half-smile when she’s amused. The way that she wrings her wrists at the side of her thighs when they tremble. Many consider her perplexing, at times even inscrutable, as if buried beneath dirt. The High Priestess is perhaps the only person cognisant enough to truly read her, to truly translate her, but for many she emits an air of strangeness. For the most part she keeps to herself, but exceptions have been known. Her language is at its most colloquial when she speaks with her mentor, but it never loses its inflected formality; having lived a life first of religion and second of statesmanship, she has always been like this. When she points things out she rarely indicates with a finger, but rather nods her head towards her subject. Eye contact with Vasylia has the tendency to feel intense, as if her bright eyes are burning into you, but this isn’t a corollary of her magic; this has always been her way. When she speaks, she has the tendency to tap her feet in uncertainty, and when quiet falls between them her breath grows almost silent. More imprudent nobles may have cause to wonder if she’s still breathing. At her most nervous, Vasylia bites at the dead skin of her lip, but this is never done in the public eye. She wears lipstick at all times: red in battle, pinks for stately events, and neutrals in-between. When she passes you by, you think you detect the scent of bergamot following her; only slightly, never distinctly, as if day-by-day the fruit shrinks in size. 02. Marking five years under her tutelage, The High Priestess bestows Vasylia with a glass pendant, shaped to look like a coffin. Inside is a rose which moves cyclically between life and wilting and death entirely of its own accord. The High Priestess reminds her the sequence is an echo of their power, the ability to make and unmake life as easily as breathing. The rose itself is the ensign of Undeath, a blend of snakes and wolves. Vasylia wears it around her neck at all times, as devoutly as a married woman wears a ring, and it marks out her powers.  +  This is something The High Priestess’ player is more than welcome to discard if they don’t see it fitting their interpretation, but I think The High Priestess could be so much more to Vasylia than a mentor. Her motivations in stealing her away from the Temple are clearly self-serving - the possibility of shaping a Necromancer from their youth, making them in some way indebted to you, is just too delicious - but I could see her attempting to make the connection between them more intimate at least. Whether that’s borne out of narcissism or something akin to affection (as much as she’s still capable of the feeling) could be something we could discuss. 03. Vasylia is only able to syphon energy from plants, animals and human beings through touch. Perhaps this is something The High Priestess can do as easily as breathing, as simply as being around life and feeling its energy burrow itself into her, but Vasylia isn’t so capable. She has to make physical contact with her source. It’s what made her mother’s bones feel so heavy when she held her in her arms, it’s what caused her mother to surrender her child. It comes easier to her than raising the dead, than sacrificing a piece of herself and returning it to the universe, but she still has much to learn. 04. For the last ten years, Vasylia has ridden out on the same horse to join The High Priestess and Tyrholm’s military forces: a pale white horse named Hel. She wears a saddle and bridle of deep blues and golds, Valmont’s grassy sigil ironed into the side. The horse learns quickly but stirs at danger - still, she’s been a constant, a companion to her these years under The High Priestess’ tutelage, and she’s fond of her. She thinks her thing worth sacrificing a piece of herself should she ever need to. 05. Vasilya certainly feels the damage sustained to her body, but it’s slight. She occasionally loses the sense of taste; when she coughs she has the tendency to choke up a little blood with it, and this is an effect which has only recently returned to her since her tutelage at the Temple. Vasylia’s sense of touch is at times limited, but it returns as quickly as it leaves her. Her tear ducts aren’t completely dried out, but sometimes in a fit of melancholy her face scrunches up as if in tears but no water flows. Her sight, sense of smell and hearing are all unaffected, and she bears no physical disabilities or wounds. At night sleep often evades her and she rarely manages to achieve more than four hours or rest per night. She feels a great big hole carved out in her, and while that is a sensation she cannot ignore, it isn’t a permanent development. She endures enough that the consequences of the path she’s chosen for herself becomes evident, flaring up to remind her, but she has not lost herself. Not yet. 06. In the Temple, as a result of the incident in the dining hall, Vasylia was forced to wear gloves. Not out of cruelty, but for all their holiness, children blessed with the gift of Necromancy are dangerous. The gloves are made of leather and they protect other members of the Temple from her touch. As she’d quickly learned, emotions have consequences - they would ensure that she wouldn’t have to pay for any more of them. When The High Priestess steals her away from the Temple, she strips her of them. She teaches her never to limit her power, but to control it. 07. In her more introspective moments, Vasylia is wont to visit the castle’s Greenhouse, sitting amongst the foliage. For practice, or perhaps simply by habit, she pushes the blossoms around her over the barrier and back through it, watching them fluctuate between death and life. They’re a small, insignificant feat, thus they rarely sap much from her. Sometimes she simply sits, admires the growth of life. Here, she can think of everything and nothing, and she answers to no-one.

#accepted #accepted: the wheel of fortune

[v-le]

An Ugly Wall of Text from Your Average Inspirit

Hello friends, it seems as if my impulsive posts are more common than my carefully structured and articulated ones these days.

Despite being deep into Week 2 of UC right now, the past happenings with the Infinite members have pushed me to especially look for an outlet to unleash my somewhat “rampant” emotions.

Yesterday, I discovered that basically all the Infinite members (besides Sungyeol at the moment), went on an “unfollow Hoya on Instagram and delete all pictures of him and OT7” spree. As a foreword, I am not saying that I know exactly what happened, nor do I want to pose any viable answers. I simply want to talk about how this makes me feel.

First, Infinite has grown significantly, no, immensely since I first started following them around 2011. It is now almost 2018. To put this concisely, I loved them back then, and I love them even more today. I have matured 7 years since then, and so have they. There were admittedly times in between the years where I was too busy with school, too tired, just too caught up with life, to even pay much attention to them. But never once did I take their existence for granted. I had full faith (or maybe just too much hope) that they would always be there for as long as they could.

During the summer of this year, I began creating an “Infinite Appreciation Post”, which I never exactly got around to finishing due to various reasons (procrastination being the biggest one). Here is the rough draft that I had composed:

After much procrastination, I’ve finally sat down and decided to create this! My journey with Infinite literally grew alongside with my Korean music roots way back in the day. With the passing of their 7th anniversary, and their unfortunately prolonged contract discussion, I found the need to make this post hurriedly. Without further ado…

 THIS IS INFINITE

Adorkable

If you’ve watched Infinite enough on variety shows and other things, you would know that these boys are absolute goofballs. Honestly there are so many memorable moments that have made me laugh/cry, but they’re mostly from their earlier days because, yes, I admit, it was extremely hard to keep up these past 2-ish years with school & such.

A few (of MANY) favorite moments:

I’m not a monkey, but i love     banana

Jjik-jjik boy

Name all the members in     5-sec(?)

“L L L L L L !!” “.......why is     the answer L?”

INFINITE H’s Milk song

Gwiyomi Song Sungyeol Ver.

GAE SHAMPOO

Just Dongwoo laughing

Infinite watching fetus     INFINITE videos

Hoya’s eleupantery skool

   Discography

I admit that Kpop is not really my preference anymore, but when it was, Infinite’s music blew me away. Their sound back in the day was distinct, almost a sort of 80’s style twist, with consistent synths, well-structured progression, and vocals that gave a strong impact. Their songs were, and still are, nothing short of catchy. My all-time favorite Infinite song will most probably be Shot. There is not one second in that song that doesn’t sound like absolute perfection. I think it is safe to say that as of mid-2014, probably starting with Back (or maybe if we go even farther, say Destiny era??), Infinite’s tracks have transformed into mixtures of EDM and orchestral bravados(?). If anything, it is quite unconventional, quite bold, but nonetheless still  Infinite-esque, and of course, catchy.

A few (of many) honorable mentions in no particular order:

Can U Smile (Acoustic Ver.)

The Chaser

Molla

I Like You

Feel So Bad

Rosinante

Sonagi

Last Romeo

Still I Miss You

ZERO

Air

3분의1

Request

Missing You

Inception

Paradise

Hysterie

Wings

Entrust

Infinite’s (Korean) discography is probably one of the only Kpop boy band discographies that I know like the back of my hand. They have created real masterpieces.

 Performances

Infinite’s stage presence is… indescribable. Just watch for yourself. These boys know what they’re doing, and they know that they’re good at it. Whether it be intense dance routines, emotional ballad renditions, or simply a stellar title song performance, Infinite will really, truly, never fail to captivate the audience (which I have been blessed to be a part of twice back in 2013 & 2014). Also, I’d like to give special recognition to  their Immortal Songs Performances because those are on a whole other level. I always wonder, idols, or genuine artists??? Or BOTH?

A few (of many) legendary performances:

Please Don’t by K.Will ft.     INFINITE H

60 Seconds by INFINITE

Be Mine by INFINITE

Still I Miss You by INFINITE

Acoustic Medley by INFINITE

Freeze by INFINITE

Thank You by INFINITE

Sonagi by INFINITE

IS2 Faves

Busan Seagull by INFINITE H

Day ‘Till the Sun Rises by     Sunggyu & Woohyun

In the Rain by INFINITE H

By Woohyun

 OTPs

Who doesn’t love to ship a few beautiful bromances now and then? Honestly, I feel like these boys are so close that they can probably pull off an OTP with each and every member. BUT, here are some of legendary ones:

Woogyu

Myungyeol

Yadong

Myungjong

Woosoo

2Woo

Hoyeol

Gyujong

 Little did I know that a month and a half later, my world would fall apart. The key point I am trying to get at here is that, with all my heart’s devotion, with an undying burn, I supported Infinite even as the years trickled by. I missed them, cherished them, waited for them, believed in them, and thanked them. Thanked them thousands and thousands of times in my head. I knew how much it meant for a 2nd generation kpop group like them to still be alive & whole since debut, and I was so eternally thankful for that.

 I say this all the time, but I never in the slightest expected a member to leave. Not after everything they’ve been through and everything they’ve said. But knowing their personalities and their “brotherhood”, I think it’s safe to say that we all assumed they separated on more or less good terms. Especially since this decision took 3 months to come to, they probably all discussed this extensively and came to an agreement, right…?

And now, the members have explicitly shown a somewhat bold reaction by unfollowing Hoya & deleting pictures of him and the group as whole from their Instagram.

CREDITS: @NASH357_ on Twitter

I’ll say this blatantly: I get that Hoya is no longer a part of Infinite or has any association with them, but you cannot delete photos of him and the entire group as if the past seven years never happened.

I don’t know why or who (if anyone specific) was behind this, and I don’t think anyone will ever really know. Whether the members were forced to do this, and if they, in fact, still talk to Hoya on personal terms, we will never know.

However, I don’t think cutting public ties like that fixes anything. It just made me feel even more conflicted.

 The faith that I had in Infinite was overwhelming. Pardon my excessiveness, but no matter how petty or immature I sound, I want to make it clear that, yes, I fell right into their “We’ll last forever together” trap. Because why wouldn’t I? Is it me being naïve or is the world just being cruel? I think it’s the latter.

The first major emotion I feel is sadness. Pure depression. I wish every single day that all of this was just a bad nightmare. That all of this was just a big accident and that Hoya will return one day. I wish with all my heart that all seven of them are still together. That’s all I want. Together. All 7. Not 6. 7 is everything, everything is 7. But I know that will never happen, and that makes me indescribably sad.

Next, I feel like I’ve been tricked. I feel like I’ve blindly believed in the lies of boys that kept promises they couldn’t keep. I should’ve seen this coming, considering the trends of all the 2nd gen. kpop groups these days. But at the same time, no, I had way too much faith in them. I told myself they’d never end up like the rest of them. That Infinite was different. But they weren’t. They weren’t, and aren’t, different in the slightest.  I feel almost stupid, for putting so much faith into them. Why did I invest so much hope into their future? Was it even necessary? Why did I fall in so deep, when I was bound to get cut anyway? On the other hand, a perfectly reasonable answer: because I am their fan.

Lastly, I feel conflicted. I’m wavering between the urge to scream and cry, or maybe do both?? WHY? Just why? Why did this have to happen to my ultimate group? Why did I have to watch the world fall apart on August 29th, 2017? All I really know is that I miss Infinite. I miss all of them, and even though I kept repeating that phrase throughout the summer while they were taking ages to renew their contracts, little did I know that I would be saying it for the rest of eternity now.

In all honesty, I actually had a fleeting moment of thought in which I almost wanted to give up on them altogether. Not just Hoya, but Infinite, too, just all of them. I wanted to drop this Inspirit gig and completely convert to following singer-songwriters and real musicians like I basically already do. Infinite was my last kpop straw. I never ever, ever, thought I would ever think like that. I almost began to fear myself, because how could I think to throw away everything so quickly, over Instagram followings???

 In conclusion, I am clearly still not really okay. It’s been a little over a month since Hoya left, but my world is still tipped upside down. I’m still really lost, I still really miss Infinite, and I just…. I’m still really traumatized.

  But I’m sure, just like anything and anyone else, I will get over this with time. Time will fade the lines between anger and sadness and I’ll think of this event as just a bad day. Or at least I hope. I’ll get through this. And if you’re in the same boat as me, don’t worry, you will, too! And if you thought I was just plain crazy throughout this entire rant and just judged me the entire way through, it’s okay! Think what you want, but all that really tells me is that you’re not a true fan anyway :’). True fans can’t pick up their heads and smile and tell the rest of the world to get over it that fast. So please, let my lamenting self be. It’ll be okay, one day.

#infinite #hoya #inspirit #my loves #if you doubt my love for them just go look at my main blog gdi

[coruscantholonet]

Full Coverage of the Vreni Medal Services

It was a festive night as Corellian celebrities, business moguls,  and locals alike dressed in their finest to mingle with and to honor the men and women who risked their lives during The Vreni Crisis. Although there was an undercurrent of somberness among those gathered, there was also a sense of relief and closure. "I'm just happy that whole affair is done with...", remarked one party goer, with another stating, "Well I just think it's great that these people are getting the recognition they deserve. Some of 'em were civvies like you and me!"

The ceremony was kicked off with a speech by Councilor Zwee Keiko, transcribed here for those readers unable to attend the open event or couldn't view the live Holonet feed...

"I'm Councilor Zwee Keiko, and I want to thank you all for gathering here today, and to those watching these proceedings live on the Holonet. We've assembled here today in honor of both those brave souls who have risked their lives not just for Corellia, for an attack on one of The Five Brothers is an attack on them all, and our stalwart citizens who had the courage to brave those tortuous weeks in the captivity of the spineless Scourge. So too will we be honoring the lives lost throughout the occupation...we will be erecting a monument on Vreni Island, starting as soon as the last pebble of rubble is cleared, brandishing a plaque with the names of every individual whom The Scourge tore from us. Their names will forevermore stand tall on Corellia as they stand resolute in our hearts.

There had been a few murmurings, I remember, about our CorSec forces teaming up with outside groups in order to maintain the law and accomplish their goals. I, myself, was a vocal critic of a few of these groups, so I understand well our population's hesitancy concerning these forces. But we cannot forget that we would have failed in our mission, failed our friends and loved ones, without the aid of these courageous independent groups. From varying backgrounds they came, not for want of reward...not for self glorification, but to save Confederation lives and serve Confederation ideals. To those gallant men and women, we hope that these humble trophies we bestow upon you today can in some small way properly honor your fortitude and your bravery for your actions on Vreni Island and the extended campaign here in Coronet City.

The first group I would like to congratulate operated under Shaka the Hutt. The smallest of our forces, but many a Scourge terrorist and even the fearsome Val'Kar the Deshade would give testament to their brutal precision. Well, they would if they were still alive, that is! So precise were they in the execution of their mission, that they were able to assist the other platoons by knocking out the Scourge held power station- saving the lives of many hostages, even though they were but a handful. Regular citizens, they. Not enlisted in our military, nor CorSec, these valorous few nonetheless risked their lives so that others may live. You represent the best of our citizenry, and provide a high standard for us all to live up to.

The Scourge's strength had lay not solely on ground forces, but also in the air and orbit. Fearsome gunships were under Nec'rons command and truly would the campaign have been lost without the aid of Jen Cress, Empress of the Galactic Empire, and her skilled starship crewmen. The Empress had reached out to our government with a hand in friendship...even before the Vreni Crisis, she had set up a homeless shelter and vocational school right here in Coronet City. Her and her Empire's commitment to protecting and improving Confederation lives ended not solely with destroying enemy gunships, were it not for her evacuation craft our hostages wouldn't have made it off the beach. I can only hope that this will lead to a bright future, a friendly alliance, between our two governments.

The hostages could not have found their safety aboard the Empire's vessels were it not for the Green Jedi. The fiercest fighting during The Liberation of Vreni happened between the jedi and the bulk of the Scourge's forces on Vreni's very streets. Through waves of Scourge fighters, through insidious anti-personnel turrets these heroes waged battle against The Confederation's enemies. And still while the fighting was at its darkest, through the din of blaster fire and the smoke of mortars, these jedi stood fast in the tenets of their order: protect life. Far easier would it be to have killed all Scourge, yes, but doing the right thing is seldom easy. Thanks to the jedi, Vakira Crane lived to stand trial as had many other terrorists. Thanks to the jedi, thousands were safely ushered to rescue craft, and due mercy was given to those who had been corrupted by Scourge rhetoric.

Our heroic men and women in CorSec not only assisted the jedi during battle, but bravely rushed in through the tumult to, quite literally, save not just lives but the island itself. CorSec's bomb squad performed their duty admirably, under the worst conditions imaginable, and for that our children's children ought to be thankful. I witnessed those explosive devices firsthand, and trembled at the thought of Nec'ron using such destructive force. These CorSec officers did not bat an eye, did not flinch in the performance of their sworn duty-not on Vreni Island, not against the Scourge agent Bones- and even now, at this moment, those fearless souls continue to protect us. A testament to duty, to honor...officers, you will always have our undying thanks for all you did and for what you continue to do day after day. Officers, you are the brightest stars in Corellia's night sky.

Of course, none of this would have been possible at all without the Mandalorians providing the distraction needed for all of these groups to function. I don't need to stand here and explain what a Mandalorian is. Their efficiency and professionalism are so great that it's become a legend in and of itself. Fortunate were we that these armored men and women lent their aid to us in our time of need. The mere sight of these Mando'ade sent the whole of the Scourge into a panic so completely that this group is single-handedly responsible for capturing the detestable copkiller Noj Peesejama AND taking down the ruthlessly brutal Bofa Treat gang boss, Nenthus Rordul. Each of the groups mentioned previously would have suffered greatly, in my mind may have even failed, without these Mando'ade. They are truly, in their words, jatnese be te jatnese."

The Councilor then handed the ceremony off to CorFed diplomat Alaina Obdris and Prime Minister Victoria Scatter, who had a speech of her own...

"Thank you Councilor Zwee for the most amazing speech. I don’t think I could of say it any better. Good day Citizens of the Coreilla.. I’m so glad to have you all here today for such a special occasion. As you all know for the last couple of weeks we have been dealing with a lot of issues. This involve having Nec'ron the leader of Scourge to take control of Vreni Island. During the time of his control of the island we have lost quite few of our citizens and the once beautiful island which was Vreni was turned to a near warzone.  

Yet we still managed to rescue the rest of the hostages and detain many Scourge members including this Nec'ron. I couldn't stand here and tell you about such an accomplishment without also telling you all the brave individuals that worked with helping us bring justice to this awful incident. I as your Prime Minster, The Corellia confederation and the rest of Corellia can't even say how much to thank you all.  Therefore these individuals are receiving a medal as the symbol of the government's thanks for their services."

Each of the aforementioned groups and individuals received medals based on their actions during the Crisis. The Battle of Vreni Service Medal went to those who actively fought on the island during it's liberation, The Corellian Joint Service Medal to those whom served with covert activities, support roles, and the successful operation to take down Scourge agent Bones, and finally three jedi received The Corellian Gold Service award for their roles in defusing explosives at the culmination of the Sith temple takedown near the beginning of the Crisis.

Each group had a chance to say a few words in front of the audience before posing for pictures...

SHAKA THE HUTT: "Thank you and thank you to those who volunteered their time and risked their lives. The Baron could not join us today but I would like to tell you that 54 hostages were rescued solely by his bravery and no doubt fast talking and maybe a bottle of Whiskey or three. Thank you Prime Minister for allowing us to be of assistance."

EMPRESS JENN CRESS: "I would like to take this moment, to say a few words. To the people of Corellia, and to the people of the galaxy. First, your welcome to us has been gracious, and kind, and I thank you sincerely, the Empire thanks you, from the bottom of our hearts, We are moved by your hospitality, and your grace. We have been proud to have helped the people of Corellia. The Imperial Mission is often close to full, but we always will make room for more. To the Brave men and women who fought for our glorious Empire, I have never been prouder. Your steadfast devotion to the cause of The New Order is unwavering, and your strength is inspiring.To the people of The Galaxy, The Galactic Empire has offered it's hand in friendship, to all worlds. Not just the five brothers of Corellia, The Empire is a Galactic Empire is not mine alone, it is yours. All of yours. Every living soul in the galaxy. It exists for you. The Empire began nearly 300 years ago, a dream of a united galaxy. Each world standing strong, represented by strong hands, secure, and at peace. Each united in harmony with each other, a Constellation a galaxy wide. A dream of many peoples, as one. One Empire, under a New Order. An Order of security, of prosperity, of progress. There have been mistakes, in the past, and many things have been done, unspeakable. There have been ups and downs, victories, and defeats, Interregnums, and usurpations by those who did not have the best interest of the galaxy in their hearts. But those days are in the past. And the Empire looks ever forward. People of Corellia, People of the galaxy. Today, in the spirit of unity that saved the souls of Vreni island from the scourge that threatened the mores of civilization itself, I ask you, when Civilization itself is threatened. When the very foundations of what makes us human is challenged by evil and disorder. To whom may you safely turn to protect you, to shepherd you, to join hands with you as beacons of light in a galaxy all too often clouded by darkness? You know ,in your hearts already the answer. I know this to be true. Remember. The Empire began with the salvation of the Old Republic, We are it's torch carried into tomorrow. And when it is lit across every world once more, All Stars shall shine as One."

Perhaps the most flamboyant acceptance speech came from one of the Mandalorians honored, one EKUWA SKIRATA, who gifted the crowd with a bit of flexing and holding her medal case aloft: "Soron bal Min, Ni narir bic! Wooooohooo!", which sent some much needed levity throughout the crowd. Before tossing the microphone back to our Prime Minister, she added: "I aint got no big speech but to Noj Peesejama, if you're watching this from your cell, I told you I was going bust your ass again and I diiiiiiid!" Another member of the Mandalorian group also had a few choice words to say, though they certainly do not reflect the opinions of this editorial staff: "You are all soulless Aruetii so I will make this short and easy to understand, abandon your silly aruetii ways and join the mando'ade, or at the very least make sure if you are going to be weak to have the foes be strong if we are going to be fighting them for you so we might have fun fights!"

Speaking on behalf of CorSec, Sergeant  SHEPHERD: "Good evening, My name Is Sergeant Shepherd. I want to first extend my gratitude towards the Mandalorians given I was apart of their team for the Island siege. However, I'd like to remind everyone here...That you're guests, Under the banner of temporary unity. Even if that means for a few hours. I request you all act cordially with one another through the rest of the event. On that note, I'd like to extend my thanks to the factors that brought us here, tonight, Without their wicked intentions, without their plans for the worst...we may not be here tonight, so I'd like to thank all of you, for being here to support one another....Thank you."

The Green Jedi, represented by one TAAJ OUSAN, accepted their honors and medals with the sort of humility we've come to expect  and declined a chance on the microphone.

Many awardees were unable to attend the event, but we're told that they haven't been forgotten and will be duly receiving their medals by other means. With that the ceremony ended, though many partygoers still lingered to mingle, dance, and enjoy the buffet spread. In all, a satisfying if not jubilant ending to a dark chapter in our Confederation's history.

((  If you didn't get to attend the ceremony but participated in the Battle of Vreni or the Raid on the Scourge Compound in Coronet you can receive your mesh representation of your award from Sҽɾα Rυɳσ A.K.A. Mιɳxყ (Sera Swords) .  If you have any problems getting in touch with her, can poke me.  As some of you are aware there was a falling out a half a year ago with some of the co-owners of the sim.  This included the one who controls the LRS server. To cut a long story short they've deleted all our item tables, and locked our people out of the server so it's very difficult to maintain/edit/adjust/etc.  Due to this LRS is seen as a bit of a dead end.  Why now? IDK.   So we're going to hold off on creating anything new for LRS as we prepare to switch to another combat system.  Hence why we didn't do them in LRS.  ))

#SWRP #SecondLife #Corellia #StarWars #Vreni #Roleplay

[chorusfm]

Matt Nathanson – Some Mad Hope

Few albums sound more like growing up to me than Matt Nathanson’s Some Mad Hope. Last year, for my 26th birthday, I wrote a blog post where I chose one defining song from every year I’ve spent on the planet. “Car Crash,” the opening track from Some Mad Hope, was my pick for 2007. For me, that song—and this record in general—marked the end of youthful innocence and the beginning of something a little more complex and a little less black and white. It’s tough to imagine a better record for that moment in life than Some Mad Hope, which effortlessly pairs pop hooks and anthemic arrangements with emotionally weighty lyrical work. What is tough to process is the fact that this record—the one that marked the start of my journey from youth to adulthood—is now 10 years in the rearview. Some Mad Hope would prove to be Matt Nathanson’s breakthrough, but it wasn’t his first record. On the contrary, in Nathanson’s catalog, Some Mad Hope holds the status of being the sixth LP. He’d moved the needle slightly in the past. His cover of the James hit “Laid” opened American Wedding, the final film in the initial American Pie trilogy, and his fifth album, 2003’s Beneath the Fireworks (produced by future Springsteen collaborator Ron Aniello) spawned reasonably well-known tracks like “I Saw” and “Curve of the Earth.” But until this record, Nathanson tended to be known as an artist who put on a fantastic live show, but could never quite translate the energy and fun of his concerts into compelling studio records. To be fair, it’s tough to convey what Nathanson does live on an album. Practically a court jester in a live setting, Nathanson cracks jokes during song breaks and develops a quirky, informal banter with every crowd he meets. It’s a rare talent—one captured perfectly on his 2006 live album At the Point—but one that really doesn’t do you much good in the studio. To truly make an album worthy of his potential, Nathanson had to do two things: 1) find the right sound and 2) write songs that would crawl inside people’s brains and live there. Some Mad Hope managed to be the record where both of those things happened, but it didn’t come easy. In the years since, Nathanson has gone on record about being in a dark place when he was writing the songs that would make up his sixth album. When I spoke to him in 2015, in the lead-up to that year’s Show Me Your Fangs, he told me that, while he loves Some Mad Hope, it’s also a snapshot of a heavy time in his life. The centerpiece track, an aching almost-power-ballad called “Wedding Dress,” is a song about “coming dangerously close to divorce and the wreck of a marriage.” Nathanson has called it the song in his catalog where he was being the most honest. The honesty may have almost broken Nathanson, but it did the opposite for his career. What makes Some Mad Hope one of the best pop singer/songwriter records of the 2000s is the tension in the lyrics. Up to this point, Nathanson had always been able to write catchy songs, but these were on another level. There was so much ache and hurt in the lyrics, songs caught between reflecting on better times and dwelling on the possibility of ending a marriage. The cold hard truth in the songs, combined with tight production work from Mark Weinberg and Marshall Altman (known nowadays as an accomplished country music producer) made for a record that could stand on its own, without live performances and comedic banter to prop it up. For good reason, Matt’s decision to be unflinchingly honest gave him the first hit song of his career. “Come on Get Higher” went to 59 on the Billboard Hot 100 and became a top 20 hit on Mainstream Top 40 radio. Breezy and intimate, “Higher” tends to get written off as a “Your Body Is a Wonderland” clone by people who never gave Nathanson a real shot. But the balance of the track—between the lovelorn, carnal bliss of the choruses and the sobering, regretful loneliness of the verses—makes it something more than meets the eye. “I miss the sound of your voice/Loudest thing in my head/And I ache to remember/All the violent, sweet, perfect words that you said” goes the second verse. Find me a pop song on the radio today with a better turn of phrase about lost love. It was that chaotic clash—of perfect happiness and bitter heartbreak—that I latched onto when I first heard Some Mad Hope. On the surface, these are love songs. That’s why someone could hear a lyric like “In your wedding dress, to have and to hold/And even at my best, I want to let go” and think the song built around it was expressing undying devotion instead of massive, restless doubt. But most of Some Mad Hope isn’t about love in the now; it’s about love in the past. “I remember hearts that beat/I remember you and me/Tangled in hotel sheets,” go the opening lines of “Still,” a song about remembering the tender moments you spent with someone who is long gone. And in the dirge-like “Bulletproof Weeks,” it’s “What happened to bulletproof weeks in your arms?/What happened to feeling cheap radio songs?/What happened to thinking that the world was flat?/What happened to that?” Some Mad Hope is a spectacularly human record. It’s about only recognizing the beauty of what you have when it’s gone. It’s about getting what you want and then being so unsure of yourself that you tear it down. It’s about running away because you’re scared to stand and fight. It’s about restlessness and stupid mistakes and regrets you’ll carry for the rest of your life. And in the end, it’s about dodging the bullet, recommitting, and doing the work to save something rather than let it become a faded photograph. It’s about doing what you need to do so that you don’t end up like the guy in “Bulletproof Weeks,” asking “What happened?” when you look back at the people and things that used to mean the world to you. All those messages caught me at the perfect time. When I bought this record on a class trip around October of 2007, I was a month from 17, newly licensed to operate an automobile, and in the midst of the most restless patch of growing up. I had a lot of things going for me: I had a great group of friends and a supportive family; I was the lead in the school musical; I was doing well in my classes. But I was yearning for something more, something amorphous that I couldn’t describe or name, and certainly not something I could reach out and grab. I felt like I was on the cusp of something, but I didn’t know what it was. And at the same time, new pressures and worries were looming: feelings I had for a girl who wasn’t available; the impending cloud of college applications; my dwindling bank account, thanks to the fact that I’d started driving just as gas prices began to skyrocket; a borderline emotionally abusive director that made the aforementioned musical more of a nightmare than a dream come true. A year previous, responsibility had seemed little more than a far-off blip on the radar. Suddenly, it was here, and I wasn’t sure I could handle it. Looking back now, those worries seem so slight and insignificant—especially compared to what Nathanson was actually singing about on this album. But therein lies the beauty of great songs: they find you and hold up mirrors to your life, completely separate from the artist’s intentions. I wasn’t going through a divorce (obviously) and I wasn’t even in a relationship, but the doubt, anxiety, and deep dissatisfaction running through the songs here resonated with me. So did the yearning sense of escape captured by anthems like “Car Crash,” “Heartbreak World,” and “Gone.” I may have been feeling empty, but I was also feeling the added freedom that growing up affords. I appreciated the humanity in those songs, tales of running away and starting over that sounded so unbridled and exciting—even if the dark side of leaving everything behind was always lurking just or song or two away. “I want to feel the car crash, ‘cause I’m dying on the inside”; “Let’s move out of Los Angeles/And drive until this summer gives/Forget the lives we used to live”; “Gone, let it wash away the best I had/Gone, and when I disappear, don’t expect me back.” These songs seemed to ask, “Can you drive fast enough to outrun your troubles?” As a teenage boy with his first car, I wanted to find out. Of course, the implicit answer the album gives is “No.” The crashing “Detroit Waves” is a song specifically about what repeated departures and goodbyes do to a relationship. “And when you’re warm enough to share your sheets/And cold enough to make it seem like I was only there/Long enough to disappear,” Nathanson sings bitterly at the top of the second verse. The point is clear: you can’t run away without leaving something behind. In “Falling Apart,” the narrator can’t decide whether he’d rather stay and be the man his partner deserves or “break loose and run.” But “Sooner Surrender,” the album’s penultimate track, was always my favorite. The aching regret of that song is so real and so pronounced, to the point where you can almost taste the bile on the back of your tongue as the lyrics describe a late-night bar where everyone is having fun but you. You, alone with a drink and your own self-imposed loneliness. “I miss when you were everything,” the track concludes. What a gut-punch. Eventually, Nathanson and his wife figured out a way to fix things and stay together. Me? I got over my restlessness and learned to be comfortable in my own skin. But I’ll never forget how Some Mad Hope made me feel a little less alone that fall, when I was growing up and felt like I wasn’t ready for any of it yet. There was comfort and commiseration in the sad songs and possibility in the call of the road, but the song that hit the hardest might have been the last one, where the excuses stopped and the lesson came full circle. “I kept falling over/I kept looking backward/I went broke believing/That the simple should be hard,” Nathanson sings in the first verse. Later, it’s “Well it’s hard to change the way you lose/If you think you’ve never won.” Those lines were my reality check after an ocean of self-centered brooding. I was overthinking my own life, and I was missing things in the process: friendships; romance; youth as it’s supposed to be. If I could go back, I would change a lot of things about that year, but I would never trade the soundtrack. --- Please consider supporting us so we can keep bringing you stories like this one. ◎ https://chorus.fm/review/matt-nathanson-some-mad-hope/