#7kpp week 2018

[teaandinanity]

For Day 5: Family

Valeriya and Lyon and A BABY because Valeriya would absolutely be like, ‘look, I know the idea of seven kids horrifies you on a visceral level - I have no idea what my parents were thinking either, unless they simply WEREN’T which would not actually be a surprise - but you NEED an heir because your closest cousin is an idiot and I can’t imagine you’re any more sanguine than I am about the idea of inflicting him on your duchy.’

So eventually the bibliopile has three people, not two.

Lyon’s probably re-reading something not-very-important so he can multi-task and listen to Valeriya try to teach Nadia to read.

[quilleth]

It’s doone!! Day 7 for 7kpp week: Spring/ Winter.  Obviously, this is for spring; Elisabeth is a plant nerd so she gets spring and flowers even though technically lilacs are here in early summer but shhh

The weather here lately can’t make up it’s mind and even though i don’t like being warm, I’m wishing it was spring! (dammit nature make up your mind. it was 70 yesterday and has dropped into the 30′s over the course of today and now we’ve got a winter weather advisory!)

I do have another drawing i want to make of her because I really liked the thumbnail.  And maybe also a couple of other drawings because i am a nerd and got carried away with making thumbnails.  But for now this is all I had

EDIT: The companion winter piece is now done too!!

[timelord-in-hogwarts]

“Not with a club the heart is broken, Nor with a stone;  A whip, so small you could not see it,  I’ve known” - Emily Dickinson

Day 1 - Heart

[mer-birdman]

Chapters: 1/7 Fandom: Seven Kingdoms: The Princess Problem (Visual Novel) Rating: Not Rated Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings Relationships: Jasper/Revaire Widow Characters: Revaire Widow (Seven Kingdoms), Jasper (Seven Kingdoms), Baron Namaire (Seven Kingdoms) Additional Tags: Original Character(s), Blind Character, Minor Character Death, (More Tags To Be Added As Chapters Are Posted Yo) Series: Part 2 of 7KPP Event Collections Summary:

Day 1 (Heart) — Lady Melinoë of Revaire remembers her late husband.

Hey! Day 1 of 7KPP Week is up! And I actually have a thing written! (Non-7KPP followers, I apologize in advance for the coming week of spam)

[ellebeebee]

Heart

Eyyyy, Happy 7kpp Week 2018 y’all~!

Usual Sabine/Zarad stuff.  I liked playing with this theme 8)

1616 words, Revaire!MC/Zarad, general

-

Cordelia would never be so vulgar as to yawn, but it seemed Emmett and Clarmont were not above cracking their jaws against the winding down hours.  And even Cordelia looked a little slack around the cheeks, and she blinked rapidly, turning her lashes into fluttering butterflies struggling to prop her eyes open.

Clarmont threw his hand down on the card table with a rueful smile. “If I had any idea how quickly I would be bankrupted at the Summit, I might have stayed home.”

Cordelia let the gentlemen push her winning toward her with a small smile.  It wouldn’t do, after all, for a lady to scrabble and stretch across a table.

Beside her, Zarad pushed Sabine’s game chips over along with his own. “I am afraid we always sit at the card table with the princess to our doom.”

“She sure is--” Emmett started, interrupted by a tonsil-revealing yawn. “--the best here.  Sorry.”

Cordelia gave him a practiced and indulgent smile. “I hope you all have enjoyed yourselves.  I certainly have, but I am afraid I am quite tired.  I think I shall retire.”

“I think that is a good idea,” Clarmont said.  He stood to pull Cordelia’s chair.

“Oh, no!” Sabine protested.  She fluttered the fingers of one hand, a champagne flute in the other. “Oh, don’t go, loves!  I haven’t lost nearly enough yet!”

Cordelia, Clarmont, and Emmett smiled and made their apologies.  They left the parlor, leaving the dwindling little clusters of chatting delegates and the ever-deepening shadows.  It had become the habit of the more night- and company-inclined guests to linger together in the parlor for after-dinner drinks.  For the last few days Zarad and Sabine had run a cards table with rotating partners as their friend’s obligations changed.

Zarad leaned back to the little rolling cart with its ice bucket and pulled the champagne bottle out.  His silken robes slid a bit more open (shocking that such a thing was even possible!) and the low candlelight went gliding over his desert moon skin.  He caught her looking and gave her one of the smuggest smolders she’d witnessed yet.  She returned a very arch brow.

“Congratulations are in order,” he said, pouring the bottle’s last drops into his glass.

“Excuse me?  I know you are a little unique in the head, but you can’t have already forgotten that I am considerably lighter in the purse tonight.”

“Now, now,” he said. “You don’t have to be so modest with me.  You’ve succeeded in your greatest ambition, dear.  Quite an accomplishment!”

She sipped at her glass and didn’t dignify him with a comment.

Undeterred, he leaned forward with a smile and a wafter of spiced perfume. “You’ve finally gotten me alone, all to yourself.”

Sabine stared at him. “You know, you have gotten quite presumptuous of lately.  Assuming you know my mind before I do.  Quite ungentlemanly.”

“Gentleman?  I should hope I would never be called that.  I don’t know how well I could bear such an insult.  And the only thing I know is that I am helpless to stop the heights to which I bedazzle you.”

She placed her flute on the green felt of the card table and pulled some the discarded hands closer to them.

“I don’t believe that a bit,” she said, using a finger to flip some cards over, one by one. “In fact, I think-- no, I know you have caught on to more than you show.  So show me.”

He gazed at her with quizzical smile. “Show you?”

“Tell me which card I am.”

And she flushed then-- because his the muscles around his eyes relaxed that small bit that told her he was looking at her with the constant mask had lifted.  Lifted just enough for her to peek under-- but it was enough.  Those peeks felt like being trapped together, nose to nose, beneath a veil.  She wouldn’t say it, but he was right.  He bedazzled her with his night eyes.

Zarad looked down at the cards, his crooked smile curling back up.  His fingers danced over the remains of their games.

“It depends,” he said, tone low, “Which version of you we’re speaking of.”

She tilted her head, long earrings swinging. “I have versions?”

“If it is the Red Baroness of Revaire we speak of--”

He pushed a card face-up toward her.  The queen of clubs, wielding her scepter in a threatening fist.  The queen of violence.  Of aggression, self-service.

Zarad’s fingers left the queen of clubs to pick up another card. “If it is the public Sabine, the baroness you present to society--”

Beside the queen of clubs, he laid down another.  The queen of diamonds.  The materialistic woman.  Wordly and unmindful of greater concerns.

He gazed at her as he selected and put down a third card. “But beneath even that--”

The queen of hearts.  The queen of love.  Love both romantic and platonic, and the people’s queen.

Sabine propped her chin on a hand; Cordelia would be horrified at such a casual and unladylike pose.  But she couldn’t help it.  He was so dangerous, because he made her want to drop each and every facade and game.  She smiled at him.

He gazed back for a long moment.  He blinked and dropped his eyes to the cards, surprising her.

She tapped the queen of hearts sitting by her two sisters. “And this is the true Sabine?”

He smiled and stared at it. “I wonder.”

Before the moment went too long and too close, Zarad’s hand reached for the cards again.  He plucked one up, brows back down into their flirty set and his eyes glittering.

“As for myself--” He laid his card down with a flourish. “The jack of hearts: the constant servant and devotee to his queen.”

The jack and queen of hearts stared up at them from the green felt.  They certainly looked a pair, with their matching red ink hearts and twining roses.

Sabine hummed. “Again, you are always so slippery.”

“Oh?”

“In some games the jack is the highest ranking, and in others it is the lowest.  Your jack plays at the lover, but he is a trickster.” She raised a brow at him; he smiled vaguely. “I believe it is my turn?”

She reached forward and shifted through the mess of cards.  When she found it, she glanced up and carefully laid it down before him.

The king of hearts.

They were two of the last delegates left in the parlor, and she could feel the eyes of the servants at the edges of the room.  She was afraid there was a particular pair of violet eyes boring a hole in her head, but at the moment nothing mattered more to her than the eyes in front of her.

The king hearts is unique of all the kings, not holding his weapon before him.  Rather, his hand held a sword aloft, stabbing backward and appearing to go straight through his skull.  The suicide king, he’s called.  The king of sacrifice, of ill-fated ends.

She watched him stare at the card, and she watched him command the muscles of his face into a smooth facade.  She summoned her own soft smile, as aware as he of the eyes in the room on them.

“I worry,” she near-whispered, “That the path you’re on is treacherous and unforgiving.  It is narrow-- too narrow to allow you the comfort of your true thoughts and feelings.  That you kill the Zarad you deserve to be constantly.  Every day.”

She ran a finger up the side of the little paperboard card. “But you know, there is a different interpretation of the king of hearts; that he is not stabbing himself, but brandishing his sword high in victory.”

Her finger walked from the card across the table to his hand resting on the felt.  She slipped her fingers beneath his.  Their eyes met.

“That is the Zarad I see,” she said, voice so low it was little more than a silent mouthing.

His eyes roamed over her.  Then darted beyond her, and back again.  He smiled. “Then the situation is worse than I feared; you have become so bedazzled that you are quite seeing things.  It seems it is time for us to finally part-- no, don’t cling, dear, we must be strong.”

She slipped her hand from his with a wry glare, just as Jasper materialized silently at her shoulder.

“My lady--”

“Yes, Jasper,” Sabine said, standing.  Zarad stood as well, and she eyed him. “I was just giving some wasted advice to this fool I found here.  But I had best be on my way now.”

Jasper gave a half-bow and stood aside waiting.  She gave one last raised brow to the usual sparkling smoulder in Zarad’s eye, and she dipped into the habitual curtsy before turning.

And she stopped.  Because she’d laid her hand on the back of the chair she’d been sitting in as she turned to sweep her skirts free of the card table and its ornate chairs, and on the hand she’d so thoughtlessly dropped to the back of chair now laid Zarad’s hand.  His fingers caught her pinky and ring finger, and they lightly squeezed before letting go.  When she looked up, his smile did not pull a bit out of place or his eyes register anything out of his usual nonsense.

She did not fare so well.  The suddenness had surprised her, and so her defenses were quite helpless against the strange intimacy of such a small thing.  Heat rose in her face.

Jasper cleared his throat.  She whipped around and walked from the parlor, a silly smile barely bit down about her lips.

[now-sleeps-the-crimson-peta-blog]

7KPP Week 2018: Day 3, Dawn/Midnight

Djamila, the Mourning Dove of Corval, facing another dawn, and the loss that might come with it.

I haven’t really drawn in *ten years*, and it’s my first attempt at semi-serious use of GIMP. Here’s to hoping the results are not absolutely terrible?

[nexttrickanvils]

Day 1 of 7kpp Week 2018: Heart

The world was a cruel and cold place and the only way to survive it, Christanne believed, was to harden your heart and make it just as cold. It served her well, helping her during an unhappy marriage of convenience, the rumor mongering surrounding her “dear” husband’s passing, and surviving Revairian high society in general.

But here in the summit, something changed. She didn’t expect to... care for some of her fellow delegates, Penelope in particular, she’s developed a fondness for. Back home, she didn’t pay much mind to servants but she still put her all into defending Imogen. Then there’s Zarad. At first she saw him as nothing but an opportunity but soon she found herself enjoying his company.

Christianne could almost feel all the ice she covered her heart with start to melt... and she didn’t know how to feel.

[awaylaughing]

Day 1 - Heart

ft. Yaen, Jiyel’s darkhorse candidate, and the complications surrounding love.

“That doesn’t explain how someone can love something, and not something similar,” she said.

Zarad shrugged. “The heart is fickle? It’s all dictated by the stars? The Gods tie is with invisible red strings and we cannot love anyone not on the other side?”

“So you think it’s random?” she guessed.

Zarad shook his head. “I think that nothing can be exactly the same as another thing. It stands to reason then that when you fall in love, it’s with an entirety and anything similar that lacks all of that won’t work.” He caught her look at him. “But who knows – my head is full of fluff, ask any of my former tutors.”

[leahazel]

via PF: End Of Year Writing Blanket Box

anxiousgeek's End Of Year Writing Blanket Box:

Total number of completed stories: hard to say, but around 35 I would guess, maybe more if I count the ones I wrote but didn't post, or the ones that are still in progress.

Total word count: AO3 says more than 80K, and even accounting for some weirdness that sounds about right.

Looking back, did you write more fic than you thought you would this year, less, or about what you'd predicted? More than I would have guessed for some months (notably, February and June). Less than I'd've liked for others.

What pairing/genre/fandom did you write that you would never have predicted in January? Fallen London. Yuletide will always do that.

What's your own favourite story of the year? Not necessarily the most popular, but the one that makes you happiest? "Masters of the Hunt", without a doubt. Not a happy tale, but it's full of hints and subtext. Really gets into the guts of what I'm trying to do with Verity.

Did you take any writing risks this year? What did you learn from them? I took risks with my original fiction, for sure. And everything Verity-related is a risk. I learned that the way to improve at writing plotfully is to keep practicing. Which in retrospect sounds like it should be obvious.

From my past year of writing, what was....

My best story of this year: Gisette and Marguerite's story for 7KPP Week. I feel really good about both their character voices.

My most popular story of this year: For 2018 PurimGifts, a Wonder Woman movie-verse fic, "The Princess Returns".

Story of mine most under-appreciated by the universe, in my opinion: "Masters of the Hunt" didn't get quite as much attention as I'd hoped, especially in relation to how hard I worked on it, and I feel "Party Favors" was also under-appreciated. I felt similarly about my Yuletide treat at first, but after reveals it got a flurry of kudos.

Most fun story to write: The entire body of D&F, if I'm honest. Including bits too spoilery to share. Not just the smutty parts, either.

Most difficult story to write: "The Wicked and the Wise" practically gave me hives, I was so anxious about it.

Most Unintentionally Telling Story: An original piece, actually. But I don't remember if I properly wrote it in 2018 or 2017, so maybe it doesn't count. For fic, I feel like this a bit whenever I'm writing about Verity shoving down her anger to keep a good face on things. Which is often.

Do you have any writing goals for the new year? I want to progress Allegra's backstory. I also want to diverge what pairings I write, and to write more gen and more NPC POVs. And original fiction goals, of course.

[ammeh7]

7KPP Week  - Day 7 (Winter) - SFW version

So I apparently lied when I said I was only writing for one day of 7KPP week. I blame all you amazing Adorable Army creators for showering my brain in 7KPP inspiration and tempting me away from the fic I was trying to finish. XD

This is for the “winter” prompt--but it’s really more “the rainy season,” because Shahira running out and dancing in her first Hisean rainstorm is something that’s been kicking around in my head for ages. 

When I started writing it I was fully intending for the fic to be entirely SFW...but then my brain was like “Okay but seriously, look at the scenario you’re putting them in, do you actually think this would end without anyone getting frisky?” and I was like “Okay brain that’s a fair point.” This version has the frisky bits removed, though, for anyone who prefers their fic frisk-free. (Or at least frisk-light--fair warning that this is still well into a T rating.) If you’d prefer to read the full version, it’s here. 

Shahira had, in the long days of speculation before departing for the Summit, wondered if she might return to somewhere where the leaves bloomed red and gold in autumn, where flakes of ice fell from the sky in winter. At the dinner to see them off, she’d cupped her hand around the tiny bowl of kulfi, a rare treat, and wondered what it would feel like to step outside and have that chill envelop her whole body.

Instead, she ended up in Hise, where it’s green year-round, where the heat doesn’t quite reach the street-sizzling levels of Corvali summers but comes paired with a muggy humidity that presses in on all sides and manages to make it feel even more oppressive.

And where she’s free to do whatever she wants.

In some cases, though, what she wants to do is precisely what she was doing before. She’s hardly about to let her sterling reputation as a party-planner go to seed merely because she’s moved to a country with no courtly culture, for example. So here she is in a side room of her new father-in-law’s office, huddled over a menu with a no-nonsense chef who once served Revairan nobility, planning a welcome dinner for the group of Corvali ambassadors arriving to next week to hash out all manner of negotiations on matters that were that were too trivial to quibble over during the Summit. The chef hadn’t offered her name, and Shahira hasn’t asked, just in case she was supposed to have known already. She’ll figure it out after the woman leaves. She knows she’s probably being silly, projecting inner court machinations onto a guileless interaction, but some habits are hard to shake.

“This menu will make them feel at home, for certain,” Shahira muses, trailing her finger down a list of hors d’oeuvres, “but you don’t want them to feel like they’re at home. That will just invite comparison, and you don’t want to end up in a Corvali cuisine competition against a Corvali noble’s mental ideal of Corvali food. You’d be setting yourself up to lose. No, you want them to feel like they’re in Hise.”

The woman snorts. “I’ve tried serving Hisean food to foreign dignitaries. A lot of them stare at their plates like I dumped a live crab and a rock on there and told them to figure it out.”

“There was a dressmaker who visited Corval court every few years,” Shahira begins, “whose gowns always had a selection of features perfectly calculated to make the ladies of Corval go ‘Ooo, so Wellish!’ and the ladies of Wellin go ‘Ooo, so Corvali!’ He travelled back and forth between the two countries, selling gowns faster than he could make them, because they were so exotic. You want your menu to be those gowns.”

The chef narrow her eyes. “Gowns, huh?”

Shahira nods, and continues her story. “Eventually word of those gowns’ popularity got out to a proper Wellish dressmaker, who sent an assistant with a selection of his wares all the way to Corval court, hoping to make a fortune—and after a month, his assistant had to pack every last gown back up for the trip home, because not a single lady of the inner court wanted one of those odd-looking bulky things. The key is to offer something that’s familiar enough to be comfortable, but foreign enough to feel exotic.”

“I think I could make that work.” The woman purses her lips in thought as she scans back over the menu. “Sounds fun, actually.”

Whatever else she might have been going to add is cut off when Hamin bursts into the room, giving the two of them a jaunty wave as he swipes one of the dessert samples from the plate in front of them. “You might want to head home, Norna,” he says when he’s done chewing. “Big storm coming in an hour or so.”

She nods, gathering up her papers and heading out the door with a quick promise to check in the next day once she’s had time to put some ideas together.

Shahira grabs another one of the samples herself, absently takes a demure bite. She has got to get this Norna to teach her how to cook.

“And here I thought I was making progress on training you out of your court table manners,” Hamin sighs, shaking his head exaggeratedly. “That is, at best, a two-bite pastry.”

Shahira blinks down at the dainty in her hand, still mostly whole with a nibble off of one end, and shoves the rest of it in her mouth in one go. Her cheeks puff out like a ground squirrel and she has to fight to keep any of it from spilling out as she struggles not to laugh, but it’s worth it for Hamin’s face.

“I was serious about the rain,” he says, chuckling, once she’s finally managed to swallow it down. “We should probably head home too.” He grins like a giddy child over the word “home”—it’s barely been a week yet that that’s been the same place for both of them.  

“Do we have to go hole up inside?” she asks, even as she stands and brushes off her skirts. “I haven’t seen a proper Hisean rainstorm, yet.” People had told her she’d arrived towards the end of the dry season—which was hardly dry compared to Corval, but all the rain so far had been in the middle of the night, or come and gone so fast that it had already tapered off by the time she’d ended her conversation and gotten to a window.

Hamin frowns thoughtfully. “It can be pretty dangerous to be outside during one, Glitter. The winds can be fierce, and sometimes trees get knocked over. It’s not safe to be standing under them.” He strokes his chin, considering, and finally grins. “If you are set on experiencing a Hisean storm out in the open, I think I know just the place, though.”

To her inexperienced eye, the skies look clear when they step outside—but as Hamin leads her through the town and down a footpath into the forest, he points out the signs on the horizon, the slight change in the air.

“You are sure about this, right?” He asks as they walk. “Once the storm starts, we won’t really be able to turn around and head back home until it’s over.”

Shahira nods. “We didn’t see much rain in Corval, believe it or not. I want a chance to properly marvel at it before I become jaded and desensitized like all you strange folk who grew up with ‘rainy seasons.’”

Thinking back on it, she’s been waiting for that chance for years. One wall of the Imperial palace had looked out onto a bustling market. There were plenty of windows where a lady of the court might look down and watch the activity below, posh merchants bartering with wealthy clients over silks and jewelry and perfumed oils. There was one particular window, though—in an area of the palace where Shahira was not, strictly speaking, supposed to be—that was perfectly situated to offer a glimpse of the true heart of the market in the distance, where harried mothers and brassy housekeepers haggled fiercely with plainly-attired but shrewd merchants over things like fish and soap and lamp oil.  

Shahira had been peeping out that window one day between teas when the first rain in several months rolled over the city, covered the market in a sudden downpour. She’d watched the farmers who’d ridden from miles outside the city to peddle fruits and vegetables from a worn blanket tear off the scarves they’d been wearing to shield their heads from the sun, tilt their laughing faces to the sky and dance in the street with competitors they’d been trying to out-shout moments earlier, celebrating the simple miracle of rain.

She’d never wished so badly to be part of the world she could see outside her window.

 Hamin leads them through the forest for quite a ways, down a well-hidden footpath and then along the edge of the stream it leads into. The stream starts to follow the edge of a cliff, and eventually widens into a shallow pool, shielded on three sides by the cliff face, with a waterfall tumbling over the far edge. Along one side the cliff curves inward, creating a slight natural shelter over some mossy boulders.

“It looks like something out of a painting,” she marvels, hitching up her skirt and splashing over to inspect some pink and orange flowers growing out of a crevice in the cliffs.

Hamin grins. “Thought you’d like it.”

In the time they’ve been walking, the sky has started to darken, and by the time Shahira has explored every corner of the pool, there are black clouds overhead, sounds of wind shaking the trees in the distance.

Hamin strips off his vest and sets it on one of the boulders under where the stone creates an overhang. “I figure we don’t want to walk back in wet clothes,” he says, untying the scarf that he uses as a belt and tossing it over to join his vest. “So you should probably get naked.” He waggles his eyebrows.

“It’s good to know you’re always looking out for my best interests,” she chuckles, pulling off the loose open vest she’s been wearing over the strip of cloth crossed over her breasts. (All the exposed stomachs in Hisean attire make a great deal of sense now that she’s experienced how the humidity here makes fabric cling suffocatingly to the skin.)

She pulls off her skirt next—an airy orange fabric covered in silver embroidery dotted with chips of turquoise and flat mirror-like disks of silver. It’s one of the things she brought from Corval, taken up a few inches to end at the ankle instead of the floor but otherwise left alone. Under it, she has a plain white underskirt that falls a little past her knees to protect the fabric from sweat and oil.

She pauses a moment to forcibly remind the part of her brain devoted to guarding her reputation that she’s married, and in Hise where getting caught carousing in public would result in a few weeks of good-natured ribbing rather than a lifetime scandal. She’s distracted, though, by a rumble of thunder in the distance, and blinks in startlement as a fat drop of water plops down on the bridge of her nose.

Another two fall on her head and shoulder in rapid succession, and she holds out her hand to catch one—but she barely has time to examine the size of that lone drop before they’re swarming, the bead of water in her hand quickly swallowed into a puddle. She throws her arms out and tilts her face to the sky, twirls around in amazed delight.

“It’s raining!” she exclaims.

“I’m guessing this is a Corval thing?” Hamin calls back over the drone of rain hitting the pool and the surprisingly loud sound of trees shaking in the wind. “We should kidnap more of you, if all of you are this cute when you see rain.”

“Don’t you dare ruin my treaty right after I’ve managed to wrangle our countries into an accord, Hamin of Hise,” she threatens, laughing, then grabs his hand and pulls him into a wild dance, jumping in joyous circles like the farmers she’d watched in the street so many years ago.

It doesn’t take long before she’s soaking, hair plastered to her face and back, underskirt clinging to her thighs, no longer sure where she’s wet from the rain and what’s been splashed up by their dancing.

Hamin picks her up by the waist and lifts her. He grins up at her, blinking the water out of his (still) startlingly green eyes, and spins them around in a circle.

Her body slides against his front as he sets her down, and she throws her arms around his neck and kisses him, tangling her fingers in his wet braids.

“You know, you never did finish getting naked,” he husks into her ear when they finally part.

“Good point,” she says, looking down at the sopping fabric clinging to her body. “I’d hate for my clothes to get wet.”

{Gee I wonder where the NSFW bit was}

Once the rain has stopped, they wring the worst of the rain from their clothes. Hamin laughs at her disgusted face when she pulls on her damp underskirt. “You’ve never worn wet clothes before, have you?”

“Historically my clothes and I have seldom had opportunities to get soaked in water unless one of us is bathing,” she replies. “I’m grateful to have the opportunity.” She tugs at the underskirt sticking to her leg and wrinkles her nose. “Less so for the wet clothes.”

“I’d happily take something like that over wet pants.” He points at the way his pants are clinging to his inner thighs. “Less chafing.”

She looks at her embroidered skirt, considering. “I do have one to spare, if you’re interested.”

--

Hamin’s second mate is just walking away from the porch when they get back home—clothes rumpled, hair in damp disarray, and Hamin resplendent in an orange skirt embellished with turquoise.

It says something about Hise, or perhaps his relationship with Hamin, that after a brief double-take he just falls in step with a grin and starts talking their ears off.

Humidity or no, she thinks she’ll like it here.

(If you noticed that Shahira uses weird terms to describe the fact that it’s raining--though I think there’s just one instance of that in this version--that’s not me trying to be poetic, it’s intended to be a joke about the fact that she hasn’t had enough exposure to rain to drill the phrases stereotypically used to describe it into her subconscious.

The idea of the palace having windows from which ladies of the inner court could observe part of the market is based on the Hawa Mahal.)

[teaandinanity]

Modern AU Valya! 

She’d be so much happier in a world where she could just go to university. I imagine she probably studies international relations and law and then accidentally gets into an argument with a Ph.D. student who everyone knows is already published four times and Never Wrong when she grabs a book he wants and it turns into an impromptu ethics debate that makes one of the baby philosophy majors start taking notes until they get thrown out of the library - and then they end up dating because she follows him out and goes, ‘can we continue this over coffee?’

Lyon does not realize they’re dating for probably a month, except Valeriya keeps inviting herself as his plus-one and eventually one of the Deeply Obnoxious guys in his program comments on him finding a hot girlfriend who hangs on his every word, and one of his friends is just like, [thumbs up].

And he’s like, ???

And it turns out Obnoxious Guy hit on her and she was like, [points] ‘I’m here with him and he’s a 10 and you are a 4 on a good day when your hair is behaving. Your hair is not behaving. Move along.’

So they finally have an actual discussion of feelings a month in and finally progress beyond coffee dates and hand-holding and philosophical and/or scientific debates to snuggling on sofas while having philosophical and/or scientific debates and are really very happy until Valeriya’s family come to visit and she wants to die of mortification.

[quilleth]

7kpp week day 3 Dawn/ Midnight

Since what I wrote that would fill this prompt is mega spoilers, have some silly doodles!

Elisabeth is not a morning person

Annabelle, gothic heroine about to find out that noise is just the wind

[timelord-in-hogwarts]

“I fear a great many things. I am afraid of war, I am afraid of loss and above all I am afraid of being unable to prevent either of the first two.” - Clara Khurshid

Day 2 - Fear

[timelord-in-hogwarts]

Day 6 - Modern!AU

Meet the Quintet, the collective brainchild of me, @quilleth and @mer-birdman, a huge five-way shitshow we love way to much. They are all in love and it’s beautiful and yes, Kade’s shirt says “Nice Ass” (it is supposed to say Nicest Asshole, but hey, am not picky)

[teaandinanity]

Day 4:Nostalgia

Valeriya’s take on this prompt was so sarcastic, you guys.

Lyon asks why she wanted to talk to him, like seeking out a gentleman’s company isn’t the clearest way a lady has of expressing interest in him.

[snip]

Valeriya studies him out of the corner of her eye, as they walk towards the gazebo, and wonders if she’s about to make a very great fool of herself. From anyone else, she would take that question as a gentle rebuff and respect it, but...

Lyon doesn’t play games like that. It’s one of the things she’s come to like about him - like very much. She can always be certain where she stands, rather than needing to make educated guesses about the terrain, because he’s invariably honest with her. He appreciates (she’d say ‘demands,’ but that has unfortunate connotations in her mind) honesty in return.

She can safely offer it, at least:

“Because you’re interesting to talk to. You’re smart, and a good person. I… like spending time with you.”

She just likes him, really. To a humiliating, terrifying degree.

They ascend the short steps up to the gazebo proper, and she thinks -

He’s come to the events she’s hosted and accepted this more private invitation as well, so at least some of this… fondness, that’s an acceptable word. Some of the fondness must be mutual. She hasn’t received much positive evidence to that her regard is matched in it’s degree, but she can’t imagine he’s ever been shy in telling people he thinks they’re not worth his time if those are his true feelings.

If he didn’t like her, she’d know it.

But she can’t be certain whether he does feel… something comparable to (reciprocal to) her own feelings. Can’t know unless she asks.

And she’s not going to, because the idea of leaving herself that exposed - to ridicule, yes, but also to genuine pain - is terrifying..

He’s silent for a long moment, but it doesn’t worry her the way silences in company often do. She actually feels comfortable enough to tease,

“Come now, you’re a scientist; you can’t condemn conversations with the aim of getting to know one another better without experiential data. Here, I’ll go first: Ask me anything you want to know - but it can’t be something you would find in a book.”

“...Alright.”

His face is never wildly expressive, but it seems warm and open, or at least receptive, which is why the bottom falls out of her stomach like she’s missed a stair when he says,

“Most people think you killed your husband.”

She swallows, hard. He doesn’t sound like most people who say that, but long experience tells her it doesn’t matter how it’s phrased. It’s always, always, an attack.

Most people think she killed her husband - and they’re almost right.

She almost did. She’s young even now; two years into widowhood, she is still not yet twenty. She was a child when she was married, and she was terrified.

She looks down.

“I know.”

She’ll tell the truth, but he won’t believe her. No one else did.

Why would they? She had a plan for how to do it, a plan that would have worked, and sometimes that evil, comforting certainty seemed like the only thing keeping her sane. Another year, and she likely would have done it.

“I didn’t. For the record.”

She didn’t, but she could have. She didn’t, but she thought about it so often that sometimes she was confused to see the man alive across the breakfast table. She didn’t, but just barely.

Most people think she killed her husband because she wanted to.

“... You aren’t a bad person,” Duke Lyon says, and she tries to work out how to keep the sudden surge of feeling from translating directly into copious tears and, consequently, A Scene. She doesn’t want to traumatize him; he might never say such a lovely thing again if she starts crying.

She hates crying. It’s idiotic; it upsets people, if they’re worth knowing, and if they’re not, it just tells them where to aim.

He’s looking at her and he has to see the shine in her eyes but all he says, almost gentle, is,

“I believe you.”

--

“I won’t say Duke Lyon said anything about you,” the Matchmaker tells her, “because that would be a lie.”

Valeriya isn’t safe here, and she knows it, so it’s easy to breathe through that sharp pain, exhale out and hold herself together.

He stated a disinclination to marry, and made her no promises yesterday. And she did say love had nothing to do with political alliances. It doesn’t; for the two to coincide would be a miracle, and what has she ever done to deserve one? Miracles ought to come naturally to people like Princess Penelope, good and fresh and hopeful.

Or, unnaturally, to people like Lady Avalie, who can no doubt engineer them from whatever happens to be available.

The Matchmaker continues,

“But then, he barely said two words about anything, so I wouldn’t put much stock in that.”

She blinks, but - she’s tentatively willing to call that encouragement. And after all, if the Matchmaker doesn’t want anyone crying at her - and she quite clearly said she has no patience whatsoever for tears - then surely she doesn’t deliberately set out to break hearts.

Not that it would have broken Valeriya’s heart. She’s not willing to admit that much, even to herself.

“Truly? I’ve never found him so reticent as that.”

The Matchmaker barks out a laugh, as if she’s just told a joke.

“That does not surprise me in the least, but you aren’t stupid enough to suppose he’s like that with everyone. He may have barely spoken the whole time he was here, but when I suggested that you would make someone else a charming partner, his glare told me everything I needed to know. I wouldn’t have thought he had the least interest in the Summit or anyone here, but he communicated quite clearly that he is, at the very least, interested in you.”

Keen green eyes study her.

“You have quite a decision to make, young lady.”

“Momentous, perhaps,” she agrees, “but not difficult.”

It’s interesting; her first marriage was the same sort of choice, important but easy. In that case, though, the choosing felt like laying her head on the block and waiting for the axe to fall. This feels like the inverse of that; like a stay of execution, rising to her feet when she thought she’d never do so again.

The Matchmaker says, “ah.”

Valeriya understands, suddenly, what people must mean about her own smile being unnervingly in the vein of a threat display; the Matchmaker looks like she smells blood. “You’ve reached an accord already, then.”

That would be overstating it. They spoke, but there was nothing binding in the exchange.

But if he expressed enough interest to be an option, then her own choice is easily made.

The Matchmaker continues to look predatorily intent.

“So: The elusive genius duke, hm? I’m to suppose you really have feelings for him?”

Everyone knew she didn’t love her first husband; she never tried to pretend. She is a fine actress, a skilled liar, but a lie needs to be built around a grain of truth, and a performance needs to be plausible. She never could have maintained such a facade. People used to ask that, just to be rude. So by all rights, she ought to be used to it, but she still feels her face do something exceedingly unpolitic for a half a heartbeat before she wrangles it back under control.

Let that be a lesson to her, she supposes. She’ll need to work on her masks. These feelings are new, and as such, she’s not accustomed to hiding them. Feeling this intensely is new, too, and makes everything else so much harder to hide.

Because, yes. She does ‘have feelings’ for him.

The Matchmaker laughs again.

“Already so alike, the pair of you. That was a very speaking glare. I’m sure he’ll be thrilled. Now get out, I have a dozen more of you fool children to sort before dinner.”

--

“Each Summit, I find a few examples proving that love is possible between all types of people, in all circumstances, and that not even being highborn is enough to completely murder your heart. It is these few couples that keep alive what little faith in humanity I still have.”

Valeriya hopes that, should she survive to grow old, she manages to attain even a fraction of the Matchmaker’s complete indifference to other people’s opinions; the woman is perfectly comfortable expressing her absolute disdain for something like three quarters of the room, even when it’s full of royals and nobles and notables from all seven nations.

Something else to aspire to, in addition to being a better person. Although - possibly the two are mutually exclusive.

The matches are announced, one after another, a list of names she recognizes but no one she truly knows. But finally, the Matchmaker looks at her and, just perceptibly, raises the goblet she’s holding in acknowledgement.

“Lastly, Lady Valeriya and Duke Lyon.”

There is a round of toasting, and then a roar of conversation, and then Prince Jarrod laying violent hands upon her in a way that is distressingly familiar and leaves her with the usual clench of reflexive terror in her guts and the cold, comfortable certainty that she could kill the man hurting her, if she had to. Not in the immediate and decisive way Princess Ana could, but poison is a great equalizer.

But she’s not going to be that frightened girl anymore; she’s committed to being a woman worthy of the man she’s been matched with. So she uses words, instead.

They even work; Prince Jarrod lets her go.

--

It takes a surprisingly long time to extricate herself from other conversations. Why are so many people seeking her out, sad-eyed and wistful, as though she were a prize and not a poison? She can feel less familiar eyes on her, too, not just those she knows; strangers stare, expectant, entitled, profoundly irritating. It makes her skin prickle and itch between her shoulder blades as she turns her back on the assembled crowd and heads for her duke, instead.

Lyon is frowning in a corner, having maximized his distance from everyone else, continuing in his habit of being accidentally perfect by thus providing her with a ready-made excuse to pull herself away, too.

Even frowning like that, he makes her smile just by existing. He does look very much like a wet cat at the moment, though; anyone could be forgiven for supposing he was displeased with the match. If that were really the case, though, it wouldn’t have happened at all.

“On a scale from ‘one’ to ‘the library is on fire,’ how much do you want to run out of this room right now?”

His scowl deepens, and she giggles. The sound is alien and gentle and too-fond and she’d feel naked for whatever her face is doing except that since her intended is ensconced in the corner, she’s faced entirely away from the room. He’s the only one who really sees her, and that’s as safe as being unseen.

“Are you regretting whatever it is you said - no, forgive me, the Matchmaker said you didn’t say anything. Are you regretting whatever you didn’t say that got you stuck with me?”

She wouldn’t say it if she thought he might agree. It’s bizarre and heady and liberating to be able to say something self-deprecating secure in the bone-deep knowledge that it simply isn’t true, and it won’t be used to hurt her.

He’s scowling, and she keeps smiling because he isn’t scowling at her. Not really.

“You’ll be amused to know that the Matchmaker thinks we’re very much alike. Apparently we have the same glare when people ask uncomfortable questions related to feelings. I’m afraid I’m not yet up to duplicating that fearsome frown you’re wearing at the moment, however.”

He looks uncomfortable, and so she says again, more gently,

“Do you hate it?”

“Hating to be… a spectacle is not the same thing as…”

“Hating me?”

“I… don’t regret it. I would have regretted it much more if it were someone else’s name being matched with yours.”

He has a talent, somehow, for saying precisely the thing that will fill her heart up to overflowing. It feels like it must be growing, increasing its capacity, because just a week ago it was dehydrated down to the size of a walnut, small enough to keep clenched in a fist, and now it is full, full, full.

He believed her. He chose her.

He leaves quickly, after that, escaping the crush of people, but he leaves her smiling and feeling entirely equal to weathering both their shares of the crowd’s congratulatory fervor with equanimity and something approaching good cheer. She’s feeling so optimistic tonight that she’s willing to believe a full quarter of the proffered congratulations may even be sincere.

--

She does, eventually, make her own escape. All the romance in the air ought to be turning her stomach, but instead, she thinks of Lyon and tosses herself onto the bed to muffle her giddy laughter in the pillows. She can’t remember ever feeling like this before.

She’s dealt with too many people, and she’s exhausted, but she’s so happy.

--

She wakes up to a scream and her heart leaps into her throat. She throws herself out of bed, snatches up her dressing gown. She’s heading for the door when Jasper hurries in.

There’s been a murder. Naturally. She should have expected as much, from the trajectory of her life so far.

At least this time, she has a better alibi.

[teaandinanity]

Day 1: Heart

OOPS I’M LATE sorry. I actually had this written early, but I got an unexpected Fun Thing tonight and that took precedence over proof-reading.

Meet Valeriya, my second Widow who exists because I have no self-control and I enjoy Suffering. In the tradition of Me Writing Characters, she does gets a feeling and goes, ‘What is this? I didn’t order it, send it back.’

(This is mostly a re-write of the intro and the first date.)

[snip]

She does not expect to be surprised in the course of the introductions, but Duke Lyon makes her smile; a real one, not the polite social mask. She surprises him into laughing, and she, in turn… smiles. And means it.

It’s an odd thing, finding herself pleased that someone is so exactly themselves. She doesn’t, as a rule, like people very much. They’re useful, or necessary, or they make life less terrible because they radiate goodness like a fire radiates heat, but they are almost invariably exhausting.

The duke is quiet, and doesn’t trouble himself to hide that he apparently has even less use for most people than she does on her worst day, but for all that, there’s something about him that she genuinely likes. They talk about history; he looks surprised to find her well-informed, but enters into the conversation willingly enough and entirely disproves his own claims of being a disagreeable conversationalist. He unbends significantly, given a subject he’s interested in, but even in the midst of an animated conversation, she still feels peculiarly peaceful in a way that’s almost better than being alone. She feels like she could spend all day in his company and feel energized for it.

It’s bizarre.

She wants to find out why, but propriety demands she continue making the rounds. It will have to wait.

She smiles at him, before she takes her leave, and tells him.

“I don’t know what you were talking about; I had a lovely time conversing with you.”

The strange thing is, she actually means all of it.

--

She settles at the table, even though he has certainly not made her welcome. This is a public space, and she very much doubts the librarians will allow him to take his entire hoard of books back to his room. That will probably deter him from simply fleeing. So they’ll have a chance for conversation, however little interest he may have in it.

She feels a bit like she’s ambushing him, but everyone knows she doesn’t experience guilt or remorse when going after something she wants; she’s sure he won’t expect mercy on that front.

“What were you reading,” she asks, “before I so cruelly interrupted?”

He still looks like he’s not sure why she’s here, but she really was just… seeking him out, to spend time with him. Which is idiotic - she very clearly heard him state an absolute disinclination to marry for politics (or even to have come to the Summit at all), and rumor already says he’s equally uninterested in forming diplomatic ties, or politicking.

He doesn’t strike her as the sort of person who says anything other than exactly what he thinks, so he can’t be a prospective match and he won’t be a useful contact.

And yet, here she is, all the same.

“The Historian Kellem Ives’s philosophical treatise on the ethical impetus upon those with the power to act upon significant events to intervene versus maintain neutrality to allow for unbiased documentation in terms of the impact on perdurable public good.”

She blinks, but that - makes perfect sense, actually. Maybe he’s more inclined to take an active hand than she’d thought. He’s considering it, at any rate, or there’d be little point to reading such a treatise.

“Does he have anything interesting to say on the subject? I can think of few people for whom such considerations would be more relevant than to delegates at the Summit.”

“It is an interesting discussion, but I’m uncertain as to its pertinancy in this case. It seems to me more of a treatise on regret, having made a decision he tries to justify living with.”

“Ah. And it is too soon in our own sagas for the actors to be burdened with an excess of regret.” For most of them, anyway. “Still, it seems unlikely that you should coincidentally be reading something so potentially applicable to our present situation. Do you have concerns about your own role here?”

“It isn’t coincidental at all. Unedited first edition copies of Historian Ives’s work are almost impossible to find, even at the Jiyel Royal Archives.”

He hasn’t quite answered her question, but that’s a kind of answer in and of itself. For the rest - she laughs.

“I see; you are more interested in taking advantage of the Isle library than your position as a potential agent of change.”

“I… I confess, I haven’t become of one mind on the matter. And you, Lady Valeriya?”

She’s been told that when she smiles like this, she looks like a cobra spreading its hood; that she is a venomous serpent, and wearing this smile, she looks it. Duke Lyon does not seem alarmed or intimidated in the least, and she likes him all the better for it.

“I am usually a creature of many minds, thank you for asking.”

Not alarmed at all; he looks impatient. It’s delightful. No one with sense has been impatient with her in years.

“No, what are your thoughts on this matter?”

She hums. That’s a good question, really; self-interest is all well and good, of course, but that’s not why any of them are here - not really. Even those who consider themselves entirely self-interested are here in the broadest historical sense because Princess Katyia brought seven nations to the table in pursuit of peace.

This is a novel situation, though; no one’s asked her to debate ethics in…

Ever? Possibly ever.

“Well,” she says slowly, “I think the idea of maintaining historical neutrality makes a poor substitute for creating history you can be proud to own, instead.” She warms to the subject and her hands get involved. “Accurate accounts are all well and good, that future generations might learn from them, but they do nothing to address the ills of those suffering in the present. Present harm must take precedence over a hypothetical future in which an unbiased account of said harm could potentially be of use.”

“You speak so passionately on the subject, I can almost forget your argument is essentially flawed.”

She thinks she might have been less shocked if he’d slapped her, and she’s grinning with too many teeth and leaning forward in excitement as her pulse ticks up. Why does anyone say Jiyelians are cold and boring to talk to? This is better than piquet.

“How so?”

“We do not have the power to predict or control the ripples and after-effects of our decisions. How can we in good conscience play with hypothetical fire, knowing full well that not only can we be burned by it, but so too can anyone who is around us, or even many innocents we will never see or meet?”

Ah. He IS worried about his role here - and it’s reasonable for him to be so, given the weight given to the word of a Duke. If he does exert the power he has, it will be considerable, and he’s plainly unused to the application of it. But the sort of people who ought to worry about how their actions will affect others are always those least likely to do so; the ones who cause the most collateral damage so often simply don’t care who they hurt.

She settles back into her seat, studying him.

If he’s inclined to act, she thinks Duke Lyon will do it for the right reasons - and do it with the care and good sense to minimize consequences, however uncomfortable he is with politics.

“To be human is to err, but it is only in doing nothing that we could truly fail. When our fear wins, we leave the field clear for those who do not care what damage they wreak. To be wise enough to recognize the weight of the responsibility, compassionate enough to care what results, and brave enough to try, regardless - that is what we should all aspire to. We owe our best to the people who are depending on us, but no one can reasonably demand that we be more - or less - than human in the attempt.”

There’s a turn of something almost distressed around his mouth, at that.

“How can you speak of failure so lightly?”

Oh, she doesn’t. Failure is terrifying, and she has spent her life walking on the narrowest rail above it and praying her balance holds. She is here for the sake of her own ambition, true, but -

Not only that. No one will ever believe her, but she is here for more than that.

“Because the worst failure of all is the failure to try. History looks kindly on those who have tried to do the right thing for the greater good. They do not always succeed, and sometimes their success comes at great cost, but even in their failures they give us something to aspire to. We all wish to believe that no matter how dark things may get, how selfish or cruel those around us may be, some people will always be brave and good and just.”

It may be a lie, but it is a beautiful one; she retreated into stories and history to hide from her marriage for a reason.

She concludes,

“So even the failures inspire and teach the future, like your historian’s accounts - but they don’t need some mythical ideal of neutrality to do it.”

--

Getting to know the duke - let alone winning his trust - seems like it might be one of the most difficult things she could choose to do with her time on Vail Isle. Why that should sound so wildly appealing, she does not know.

The original version of this was 10 pages in google docs but I’m saving the second half for tomorrow because a) that is Too Much and b) I don’t actually like what I wrote specifically for the prompt. Also I’m playing a mad shuffle game with everything I’ve produced so far and NONE OF IT WILL STAY WHERE I WROTE IT by which I mean ‘I wrote something for Heart that ended up for Family and something for Fear that ended up for Heart and another thing for Fear that is Not Cooperating and I have no idea what’s going on anymore.’

Writing is so fun y’all.