#Shifting Shadhavar (Almas)

[cloudhoppinggriffon]

{Almas / Poptarts/Crowd Verse } Spotting Gordon at the Cristo residence one evening while the foals were playing and Almas usually took his nap, he happened to be awake when he saw the griffon looking worse for the wear. Usually he stayed away from Gordon but today he spoke up, "You look like you've seen a ghost?" his voice traveled over from the sofa where he lounged. Jocasta, Snow and Posie were playing nearby.

Indeed. He’d been worse for the wear ever since that incident involving the siren mare, Adagio. Nightmares had plagued him, and sleep was a commodity since then. And to no surprise, all of them had focused around the same familiar haunting figure: Anagyros, former lich that was the shadhavar’s slavemaster.

A tired set of eyes looked up to the furred pony in the distance, taking a few seconds to process his words before shaking his head.If the lack of sleep wasn’t a good enough sign, it was the lack of any of his religious items along his body; barring the holy symbol around the neck. He couldn’t take it off, wouldn’t. It eased the nightmares, to some extent.

“..You don’t know half of it..” He uttered, shuddering from the residual dread that lurked in his mind.

[snakehorses-moved-blog]

headcanon: shadhavar and sex/gender

More shadhavar Headcanons

Okay, so this is something I’ve been meaning to get into detail with for a while.

The shadhavar ability to change sex physically. Because it’s important to note that most shadhavar don’t consider themselves gender fluid despite technically having that ability.

Let me not get ahead of myself. First thing’s first.

1.Ability to Change Sex

Most shadhavar have the ability to shapeshift, at least to a small scale. So included in this is the ability to become both male and female. (And sometimes intersexed.) This also changes their biology to the chosen sex. It is an ability that was not used liberally by most. So the rumor that shadhavar were all “hermaphrodites” spread among ponies because one day they might see a certain shadhavar as male and the next day pregnant (in female form). So they assumed the shadhavar was simply hermaphroditic. But this isn’t the case usually.

They used this ability mostly for survival reasons. For example, if one sex was scarce and reproduction needed to happen, some shadhavar in the den might switch sexes to reproduce.

2.Gender vs. Sex

Most shadhavar only identify as one gender, be that male or female. And that is usually the sex they were at birth. Their default form is what they were born as. For example, Almas is male and Elmas is female. Both twins could change their sexes if they wanted to, but they don’t consider themselves gender fluid because they just don’t do it often enough and they do not live in that gender. For example, Almas has never lived as fem!Almas. He can turn into her, sure. But he’s never identified as “she.”

But this does not mean a shadhavar wouldn’t become male to sire young or female to bear them.

This ability is kind of unique to their species (and maybe the changelings) so it doesn’t have much of a human equivalent. For a human to change sexes, they have to undergo surgery, change their pronoun, sometimes change their name and so on. When you can zip in and out of a sex and gender, it’s not as much of a life-changing event.

3.Pregnancy & Fertility

So, what happens if a male shadhavar wants to bear a foal or foals? Well, he would become female and get pregnant and throughout the pregnancy would be “stuck” in the female form. Some might have changed their pronouns and names during the process. But not much is known about the practice. If a shadhavar tries to change sex during pregnancy it won’t work because it could kill the offspring.

Likewise, if a female shadhavar wants to father a foal or foals, she can switch to a male form for the process.

4.Lack of Research

The shadhavar are still very mysterious to Equestrian history and how they handled these unique abilities isn’t as well known. For Elmas and Almas, they identified as female and male, respectively and don’t often consider their sex shifting abilities when identifying themselves. However both can do it.

An example of Almas using the ability is in his shapeshifting to accommodate his alter personalities. Lovely, Parasol and Crumpet are all female, both in gender and sex.

~~that’s what I’ve got for now. Feel free to ask questions!