#The Ten Arch Mages

[jiubilant]

To the esteemed Arch-Mage Trebonius Artorius, the missive reads in the High Chancellor’s own hand, Guildmaster of Vvardenfell—

“No,” says Wit at once, staring at the parchment through those ridiculous lorgnettes.

Skink-in-Tree’s-Shade has read the missive so many times that he’s memorized the number of imperatives. He smiles. “Go on.”

He watches his friend’s eyes scan, faster and faster, the words that will turn Artorius a handsome puce. Upon receiving this letter, you will step down from your post and grant the title of Arch-Mage to Master Wizard Skink-in-Tree’s-Shade. From this day forward, Skink-in-Tree’s-Shade will handle all Guild matters in Vvardenfell. You may keep the title of Arch-Mage, but you will retire from active participation in the affairs of the Guild.

After that comes Ocato’s vicious signature, and his several et ceteras, and the wings of the Emperor’s seal. When Skink’s certain that his friend is reading the missive over again, rather than laboring nearsightedly with the script, he reaches for it across his tidy desk. “I thought we might open the Shir.”

Wit says, in a strangled voice, “You must step down.”

A pause.

“Perhaps you have misread,” says Skink, his empty hand outstretched. “Artorius must step down. I cite the first line.”

He sees the shiver travel from the other man’s shoulders to the tip of his plumed tail. He lays the missive gently atop Skink’s notes. Then he stands, smashes the lorgnettes against the desk with an animal cry, and stalks out of the room.

He’ll be back within ten minutes. Skink sweeps the twinkling glass into a pile—the handle of the shattered eyeglasses, bent in the middle, glints resentfully at him from the rug—and pours two cups of the deep, sparkling shein from the Shir.

One of his couriers, just yesterday, had intercepted the correspondence and laid it in his silver letter-tray. He’s had time to bask in its contents like a lizard in the sun. He’s also had time to contemplate the dangers to his person that have stirred Wit, the raptor, to hiss and snarl at the apprentices—he can hear the man’s voice echoing down the hall, berating Tusamircil for his grimy retorts. The Guildmaster of Vvardenfell, of course, must concern himself with matters more perilous by far—

Wit bursts back in, feathers abristle, and nearly slams his tail in the door. Eight minutes and a half.

“They’ll kill you,” he snaps, snatching his ruined lorgnettes from the rug. He points them at Skink like an accusing finger.

Skink takes a tranquil sip of shein. “Who will kill me?”

“Who—what—that baboon Artorius!”

“Artorius?” He hates to laugh at poor, bumbling Trebonius. The chuckle escapes him anyway. “How?”

“The Telvanni!”

For years Skink’s walked the wizard-lords’ tightrope as steward of Wolverine Hall, earning their grudging approbation. “Why?”

“Me!”

“You!” He stands to take Wit by the shoulders, looking with affection into his narrow face. “My steady right hand. I have one more task for you.”

The man looks wrathful enough to bite him. “What?”

“Give it to him,” says Skink.

“What?”

“The missive.” Skink smiles at him. “To Artorius.”

The wizards of Vvardenfell’s Guild—every one of them except, perhaps, for Gadar—would break their staves for the privilege of giving Artorius the boot. Skink watches a spasm of mirth, a swift and unwilling reflex, flit across his friend’s face. Then resignation. Then something fragile, almost pleased, that has nothing to do with Artorius at all.

“You're a fool,” he grumbles, and reaches for the shein. "Archmage."

[kradogsrats]

Fic: Coins for the Eyes

sfdjksdljfl so I haven't written any Ouroboros-verse (Viren-Harrow bodyswap scenario AU) in forever but I wanted to get this out just in case all my "Claudia finds coined Kpp'Ar and it crumbles the last unstable pillars supporting her worldview" prayer circle manifesting for s6 actually works.

—

The next day, Claudia stayed in bed until after the noon bells, sitting with her knees drawn up to her chest and her folded arms resting on top of them.

She’d been only a child when Kpp’Ar disappeared. She barely even remembered those weeks, now—Soren on the edge of death, Kpp’Ar vanishing without a word, their mother dwindling to a speck on the horizon. Then her own first attempt at magic, followed by many, many more as she threw herself into the only thing that had made her feel like the future might hold something besides loss.

They never found out what happened to him. Her father’s duties as high mage seemed to crowd out every chance he had to investigate, and the Puzzle House was sealed by royal decree not long after she and Soren navigated it. After King Harrow was crowned, it seemed like everyone was determined to never speak of Kpp’Ar again. He became just another person who abandoned her without explanation—another ghost haunting her heart.

Ten years later, and she’d finally found a clue. A clue her father may have had that entire time.

He must have still been looking for Kpp’Ar, hoping to work out how to save him. It was the only explanation that made any sense, but it still hurt—he’d never said anything, even knowing how much it ate at her that Kpp’Ar was gone. If he’d told her, they could have worked on the problem together—she could have helped. She was smart and strong and eager, and they could have done so much if only he’d let her—

Like he let you help with saving King Harrow from assassins?

She shook the nasty voice out of her head, squeezing her eyes shut. “Stop being such a child,” she said aloud. “Maybe you weren’t strong enough then, but you are now. So fix it.”

It was Kpp’Ar she had first gone to with questions about magic. She had learned not to do the same with her father unless absolutely necessary—even after he started properly teaching her, he had little patience for explanations and tangents. Now they were both gone, but there was still someone who might be able to give her answers.

After finally dressing and coiling her hair into a severe knot at the back of her neck, she stepped out to face what remained of the day. She stopped by the high mage’s office, but Aaravos was nowhere in sight when she pulled the mirror’s cover away. Rather than wait for him, she scribbled a note on a scrap of paper and stuck it face-first to the glass with a blob of half-dried glue.

She spent the rest of the afternoon in the library, prowling the shelves for books on metallurgic magic and elven runes. When she felt like she couldn’t read anymore without screaming, she climbed up to the battlements and watched the sun slowly sink below the western horizon.

Aaravos was waiting when she returned to the office, his sunset-fog eyes and elegantly arched brows visible over the note stuck to the mirror’s face. She pulled the paper off and let it fall to the floor, picking up the slate and chalk.

The pinprick lights dusted over his indigo skin twinkled as he raised a hand, the usual glowing letters trailing behind his fingers to hang in the air. You say you want answers. You need only ask.

“Good evening to you, too,” Claudia muttered under her breath. The chalk squeaked as she wrote on the slate: Have you ever seen something like this? Then she drew the coin from her belt pouch and held both up to the mirror.

He motioned for her to bring the coin closer, leaning in to examine it. She turned it so he could see both sides—Kpp’Ar’s twisted face on one, and the strange, split-wheel symbol on the other—switching between them when he gestured with a twisting motion. His face was so close that his nose seemed like it might brush the glass, close enough that she could see the pale curve of his eyelashes and the stray hairs that fell across his face, all highlighted by the glow from the bright notches of light across his cheekbones. His eyes flicked briefly up to hers, and he slowly straightened.

I have, he wrote. For once, he didn’t wait for her to ask before offering his explanation. The complete essence of a human trapped in gold, body and spirit. A cruel, if effective, punishment for enemies.

Claudia swallowed against the tightness in her throat. She closed her hand around the coin, holding it tightly for a moment before tucking it back into her pouch.

When she looked back to the mirror, Aaravos was watching her. It is someone you care for.

She nodded slightly, then sat down in her chair and rubbed the slate clear. He was like a second father to me, she wrote out. I’m a mage because of him.

It wasn’t something she’d ever admitted aloud—that it had been Kpp’Ar who truly nurtured her love of magic, not her father. She never doubted that her father loved her, but he’d shown no interest in teaching her until she was already getting in trouble for messing up spells she’d learned on her own. When he finally saw she had talent, he’d trained her rigorously in building and using it. Kpp’Ar had spoken of magic as something to love—powerful, but also wonderful and weird and sometimes silly. Something fun, not just a tool to be used for greater ends.

I’m sorry. Aaravos looked at her with sympathy, his face somehow softer and more genuine than ever before. It hurt some, to be looked at that way, but she also felt a little better. Like someone cared.

Rather than continue to meet his eyes, she wiped the words from the slate again and busied herself with writing. Who could have done this? After a moment, she added, Can it be undone?

He can be freed, though it is both difficult and costly. The next part of Aaravos’s reply came slowly, with clear hesitation. As for who: I will say only that the spell cannot be cast without the aid of a powerful relic, of which kind there is only one.

She stared at him, perplexed—was she supposed to somehow know the relic he spoke of? He held her gaze at first, but then his eyes shifted slightly, focusing on something behind her. A shiver ran down her spine, and she turned slowly to scan the room.

Her eyes immediately fell on her father’s staff, propped against the doorframe.

“No,” she said reflexively. She turned back to the mirror, shaking her head. It couldn’t be that. It couldn’t be. It was a mistake—she was tired and upset, and it made her misinterpret things. Aaravos would correct her.

Aaravos only looked back out at her, that same knowing sympathy on his star-speckled face.

“No,” she said again. “No, no, no—that’s impossible. Dad wouldn’t. He wouldn’t.”

She began to shake, her vision swimming. Her chest tightened like a vise until it stopped her breath. The slate and chalk slipped from her numb fingers and hit the floor with a crack she barely heard.

That her father could have done this to Kpp’Ar—not just kept secret from her what had happened to him, but lied to her for more than half her life—she couldn’t even process it. He’d barely investigated Kpp’Ar’s disappearance because he’d known what happened all along. He’d let her think Kpp’Ar had abandoned her. Like her mom had abandoned her.

Like he eventually would, too.

Aaravos was still watching her when she looked up again. More glowing letters drifted in front of him. Are you all right?

Claudia wiped her eyes angrily and nodded. She picked up the slate, making a face at the long crack that had formed across one corner, and one of the larger pieces remaining of the shattered chalk.

How can I free him? she wrote, calm and precise.

I can help you, but not like this. He gestured expansively to the glass and glowing words between them. We must first be able to speak to and hear one another. I know a small ritual that will allow that. After completing it, we can begin.

She rubbed out her words and wrote again. What do I have to do?

Aaravos smiled.

[amayadartan]

14

Chapter 13

Arch makes a revelation....

In pic starting from top and going clockwise - Arioch, Olly, Cruz, Abriella, Dartan, Arch, and Amaya in the center

“Would anyone like the good news or the bad news first?” Arch asked, looking around the room and now seeing they had been joined by Arioch. “And don’t you ever do anything like that again, or you’ll not be the one having fun in Caligo.” There was something about the glow that flashed around the mage that made everyone a bit uneasy; and Arioch just nodded, not sure he wanted to find out what the fuck the mage really was.

“Bad. At least that way the only way to go is up.” Olly finally answered. He figured someone had to, and he wanted to get Dartan away from Amaya as soon as possible.

“We are going to need to keep them closer together.  If he’s far from her again, we’re going to have a repeat of the asshole’s behavior.  I’m sure they can be in different rooms, but not different wings of the castle.” Arch answered, which made every other male’s jaw tick. “However, I believe that I’ve figured out the key to why they are here.” Brows rose and glances were exchanged around the room.  “The spell worked exactly as it should have.  Whether she was to be bound to Dartan “Dar-tan” or an angel “Dare-ten” is debatable, but the spell worked exactly as it was designed.  The spectre is just an egotistical asshole, and she the unwitting victim of a pronunciation issue.”

Abriella’s brows knit together.  “It was a protection spell for her hunting for some kind of relic from Earth.  Why would they now be in Imperium and bound together as mates?”  The logic was escaping her, but she was sure Arch had figured that out as well.

“Whatever it was she was looking for, it’s now here for some reason.  It wouldn’t be the first mystical or magical item from Earth to find its way down here.  It could even be in the Palace itself, although I have a feeling it’s closer to wherever they were teleported in at.”  Abriella nodded in understanding, now starting to put the pieces together.  “Binding the angel or asshole, in this case, to her ensures that the weak human doesn’t die here or get abandoned because the selfish prick decides to trace off home.  This explains why Dartan couldn’t trace with or without her, and why none of us could do so with either of them as well. It also explains why he can’t be far from her, if he tries to abandon her, he goes insane and has to get back to her.  His presence was there to be protection.” Arch explained as Abriella and Cruz both rubbed the bridges of their noses in unison, something that amused him.  Sometimes for being so different in personality, they were very much the same in action.

“So, how do we break it?” Olly asked, still not happy about the fact that Dartan would have to be moved closer to Amaya. Currently he had put himself physically between the two of them. He was going to see to her needs and protection personally, and once it was over, he’d take care of her in Imperium.  He’d already made up his mide.  Fuck the spectre and whatever he wanted.

“She has to find whatever she was looking for.  Wherever it is here in Imperium, until it is found, she’s bound to him.”  Arch said plainly, as if it was the most simple thing in the world.  

"Is there any way to keep this idiot from getting her killed?" Olly asked, looking over to where Amaya lay in the bed.  Dartan already seemed to be doing a fine job of injuring her, she didn’t deserve to die because her spell was fucked six ways to Sunday.  It would be easier if they could just kill him and keep her safe themselves.  He and Arch would be able to do it.  Maybe even draft Cruz into it.

"Abriella or Cruz are going to have to make her immortal.   We can't let her go back topside anyway, not after all she's seen down here and could accidentally spill.  She can't live out the rest of her life down here as a human, she’s too fragile.  It’s not like we don’t have other newb immortals."  Arioch's voice from behind Olly had all heads turning.   He wasn't wrong, and they all knew it.  

"He's right.  Like your friend Delilah, she will need to become immortal and reside in Imperium from now on." Arch agreed.  It seemed new residents were multiplying faster than rabbits in the Palace.  Or chinchillas, given the gardens newest residents. 

"That will not be a problem, it’s done.  Who is going to help her with that adjustment?" Abriella looked around the room expectantly. She knew her friends, those not already helping others who had just arrived in Imperium would no doubt help, and even some of those who were helping probably would pitch in.

"I can as we're searching." Dartan’s dejected voice came from the floor.  As much as he'd been infuriated at her for fucking up his life, at least it would go back to normal when it was over.  Hers was now forever changed. 

"NO!" Arch's voice was firm and at a higher volume than normal.  He was quite sure he was not the only one in the room that felt that way, but would currently be the one with the most tact. "Olly and I will both help her.  You will just stay close enough to retain your sanity, and Arioch will make sure you stay in line" Arch turned to face the spectre.  "I understand you did not ask to be involved in this, nor did you intend for her to be injured by your actions…TWICE…but things are as they are.  When this is done and you go back to your life, she will stay with us.  We will help her.  Cross me and I will make you regret it, eternally."  Again Arch glowed and everyone, including Cruz and Abriella, backed up. 

Arch turned to Olly, their eyes meeting for a brief second and there was something unspoken that passed between them.  "I will go prepare the room next to my old one for her.  I'll move back to it for a while.   That old wing will be quiet and peaceful." Olly nodded to Arch then turned and headed off leaving Arch to finish up anything else that needed done for Amaya.  

Cruz's eyes narrowed at his oldest and closest friend slightly. "Isn't that just down the hall from your potions lab, Arch?"  His head tilted.

Arch winked before turning back to Abriella. "You know, old friend, I think you might be right.  How fortunate.  I might have to move to my old room right off it."  He didn't even try to hide his grin.  "Now, how long before we can remove her from the infirmary, dear?  I don't want our guest to feel like a prisoner."  

Abriella had to fight laughing.  No one could ever say that the males in the palace were not devious, or that she did not adore every single one of them for it. "Tomorrow.  And we will need to get Dartan set up with quarters down the hall.  Far down the hall." She sighed and looked to the spectre, "the only reason no one is going to cause you pain is that we now know that it will cause her pain.  I can only guess that you were spared the effects of the mushrooms because you lacked a corporeal form.  However, let me assure you of something, you pull another stunt like today and once the spell is complete, I will take supreme satisfaction in introducing you to my demons in Caligo. You will behave and remember that she did not ask for this situation any more than you did.  And she is NOT your wife."  Abriella’s eyes swirled silver then went completely black before returning to their normal hazel.  A sardonic smile graced her lips before her attention turned to Amaya and her expression softened.   A soft kiss was placed on the human's forehead then the Queen disappeared.

[inbabylontheywept]

Ars Longa, Vita Brevis

Magic did not make beautiful things. How could it? Raw chaos was not known for its subtlety, and that’s all magic was: Madness and energy. A corruption that ran deep along the soul of the world. Entropy itself.  

But tools don’t need to be beautiful to be useful. A mage would always break under the strain of such power, but they could move mountains before the final crack. Elves could trade their eons for centuries, and dwarves, their centuries for decades. And humans, very rarely, could trade their decades for years. But such trades were rare indeed, for it took a genius to compress the great work into such a short period. There had been a few over the centuries. But most were still learning the simplest of tricks when the bitter end came for them. 

And it was, always, a bitter end. Magic poisoning trickled into everything, dosing out a toxic melange of maladies. Cancers commingled with infections as metabolic errors mixed with the ravages of time. Froth filled lungs choking out desparate gasps were as common as great fungating tumors, tearing their way out of the body in a twisted facsimile of birth. 

It would be too generous to say that many mages died screaming. The truth was, most did. Nearly all. They died terrible deaths, and they lived terrible lives, rotting from within as they channeled the end of all things through their bodies. Their spines bent into arched curves, and their skin greyed, and their eyes turned bloodshot as the blood leaked from every capillary. Just before the end their whole body would stain the way their eyes did, like spiderwebs etched in blood. 

Sylas had been stained that way for the last century of his life. It was a mystery how he lingered on, eking out misery and power in equal fortunes. To sit there in the moment of his death, at the apex of his power, without teetering one way or the other…

It was certainly a way to be among the most powerful magi in a myriad. It was a testament to the depth of his suffering, that even in a cohort as envious as the scholars of rot, there were none that dared follow in his footsteps. A better object lesson about the cost of power could not be found. His veins leaked half empty, his skin sagged and tore in some places, stretching hideously in others. He festered, undying, undead, twisted and knotted with disease and madness alike. 

But a better man for holding the line would not be found. 

He’d been standing in the center of the bridge, watching his cloaked opponent draw closer for almost ten minutes now. He was patient for a dying man, but he’d been dying for almost a century now. He knew he had time to wait. More time than he had patience for walking, at least. His body was twisted from misuse, better at acting as a conduit for raw power than it was for movement. Walking hurt. Standing…hurt less. 

His vision had spent the centuries fading away with the rest of him. The shape was familiar, even when it was at the far end of the bridge but it wasn’t until the man had moved within forty steps that features could be made out. 

Healthy skin. Pale, but in way that suggested scholarship instead of sickness. Hair that grew in a shining golden crown thick and unruly. Sylas had only met one acolyte that had kept their hair past the harrowing. A human from four centuries before…  

And suddenly, impossibly, Sylas recognized the man in front of him. 

“Holloway,” he said in lieu of greeting. This had been a ritual between them once - a dumb joke that they’d kicked back and forth in all those years ago. 

“No,” the man replied warmly, hands already gesturing to the space around them. “Not a hallway. A bridge.”

He’d made that joke the first time they met, in this very place. The lone bridge from the twilight aisles. It was also the last place he’d seen him - Back fading into the mists are he journeyed home to join the fight against the necromancer of Mithrain. In a kingdom two-hundred thousand strong, only a few dozen had survived. 

He’d barely been an acolyte when he left. The stupid fool had never stood a chance. How had he - 

Sylas’s thoughts were interrupted by a dawning awareness that something had gone wrong. He could feel the ambient levels of magic drop. He’d feel this before, watching teams of war-mages work in tandem. Even he couldn’t manage it alone - his mastery could come from doing more with less. One man doing this was like - like drinking away the rising tide. Eating a cow without spitting out bones. Madness. 

And there was only one person in sight that could be the cause. 

He dodged instinctually. There was no telling what hit the spot where he stood before - it wasn’t comprehensible to the mortal mind. Mana bolts were seen by the gaps they left in the world around them. By the places that one’s mind slid away from, no matter how hard one tried. 

Even Sylas had never managed to form one by himself. 

Flames roared to life along both sides of the bridge. The old elf’s back heaved under the strain of the channel, even as he curled the flames into each other, forming a quarter league long arch of fire. 

Then, he compressed it. 

The threat of it was enough to interrupt the second bolt from forming. The elf had been expecting a counterattack, but his old friend seemed to be a little more cautious than that. He felt a wall of mana clash against his own, probing for the artery that connected him to the inferno. 

He pushed back, drove his mind like a sharpened spike into the consciousness probing against him. Memories bled back, strange ones - theorems on the nature of magic, on the nature of death. Gradients directing the flow of soul towards something deep and dark. 

Holloway winced. The move would’ve broken a lesser man, but his mind was as incorruptible as his flesh. Sylas felt something clamp around him, and he realized that the weak spot he’d found was intentional. A ruse. 

The link he held in the physical world, the thing that connected him to the fire, tore without breaking. The spell flared out silently. 

He was dead. He stared defiantly, and was confused to see something gentle looking back. 

“If I wanted you dead, I would’ve turned back and waited,” Holloway said, not unkindly. “I have time. More time than anyone.” 

Mana flowed up the still trapped conduit, burning and bright. Sylas was used to feeling it corrode him, feed into the cancers and sores that had taken root in his body over centuries of abuse. 

But this was different. 

It burned, but in the way that fire did.The rot drank it, and instead of corrupting him, it corrupted itself. Sylas could feel the horrible beauty of it, of cancers blossoming within cancers, of amoebas blighting his infections. It was like witnessing death fall upon its own scythe. 

It was so obvious now that he could feel it. The decay of his body wasn’t truly death, but an extant form of life. From the minute forms that swam in his pus, to the rootlike cancer nodules that grew under his skin - he wasn’t a fallow field. He was teeming with life. Drowning in it. If absorbing magic is what spawned this in him, it would feel the same once it drank deep of the same cup. 

It was beautiful. The cure was in the poison! Of course it was. Life flowed in the gradient of death, and magic flowed with the gradient of life. He’d just needed to stop fighting it. 

He looked in wonder at his friend. Struggled not to writhe with the venom burning itself out of his body. Holloway walked carefully up to him, laying a hand across his burning brow. 

“We shared memories through the link you made. I think you saw the steps I took, learning how to live long enough to become the new necromancer of Mithrain. But I saw you vowing to save the world from the end of all life - and from preventing another Iithin from happening. You remembered me.”

Sylas couldn’t answer. It had been so long since living felt harder than dying. 

“I am the new necromancer of Mithrain - but I am not here to be the end of life. I am here to kill death itself, to set the serpent upon its tail. Ten years it took to learn how to save myself. Four hundred more to learn how to save the living. And now, at last, I can save the dead.” 

He looked across the bridge, towards his homeland of Ilithin. The tomb state of stone and bone and ancient loss. He was imagining something, and for the first time since he’d gone through his harrowing, for the first time since the seed of rot had been planted in his heart, Sylas imagined a world where magic could make something beautiful. 

[feuerwizard]

for @recitedemise || cont.

Caleb arches a single eyebrow, hidden smirk playing upon his lips as he watches Gale frantically react to their current predicament. Not much of an adventurer now, are we, Mr. Dekarios? The once prestigious archmage is unlikely to maintain his composed demeanor for long in the presence of the Mighty Nein, with vibrant personalities and wild antics. Much like this.

“You're panicking for no reason, magier.” With a calm demeanor, he wipes away the beads of sweat forming across his forehead before retrieving his worn spell book from its holster on the side. “Neither of us are equipped to dig ourselves free. We would be better off resting for the evening—either our friends will find a way to reach us first, or we will free ourselves in the morning.” This blazing heat would not do though, Caleb thinks to himself, flipping through the pages of his book in search of a particular spell that would provide relief without draining him of his energy.

Ah, here we go.

“It has been a while since I’ve cast this, but it should assist with the heat.” Caleb's hand rummages through his components pouch, the soft rustling of materials filling the air. His fingers brush against various objects until finally, they come across a small, familiar crystal bead. He takes it between his fingertips, relishing in its smooth texture and cool temperature.

Gently placing the crystal bead on the ground, the wizard begins his ritual. Within a minute, a ten-foot dome of glowing amber encircles him—the temperature in the magical shelter drops significantly, a comforting and protective sanctuary for two mages. Perfekt. Caleb's tousled head pops out of the dome, a playful glint in his blue eyes and a mischievous grin on his lips. “If you are going to walk around with your clothes off, at least come inside here.”

[illarian-rambling]

Thanks for the tag @frostedlemonwriter!

Writing Share Tag

From HO book 1

With a wet creak, the front door was wrenched open. Turning, Izjik saw that standing in the doorway, slightly out of breath from forcing the thing open, was the most beautiful elf she’d ever been blessed to lay eyes upon. To be fair, it wasn’t as if Izjik had seen too many elves in her time. However, she could immediately tell that this one was stunning.

The woman’s hair was that sort of glassy black you could almost see your own reflection in, and her face would’ve put a midwinter’s sunrise to shame. Even her telltale pointed ears, which Izjik usually thought looked kind of like a sunfish’s fins, seemed enchanting and ethereal when complemented by this vision’s moonlight gaze. Her tits were a perfect ten.

“Can I help you?” the beauty asked, arching one immaculate brow in confusion.

“Wow, uh… I’mmmm— I’m Izjik.” Her voice shot up almost a full octave only to be pulled down at the last second into what she contrived to be a seductive purr.

“Ooookay, well, hello, Izjik,” the woman hesitated. Spirits, her voice could’ve raised the dead! In a good way!

“I’m Dr. Evanna Snowraven. Mnakat has told me you have some matters you’re interested in learning a bit more about?”

Izjik heroically refrained from answering the question in any way that could’ve been construed as inappropriate.

“Uh, yeah,” the halawemavar responded instead, “about that. It would probably be best if we talked off the street.”

“Ah, one of those queries,” Dr. Snowraven chuckled.

The woman gave a grim half-smile. Izjik got the feeling she wasn’t the first Fabaeilite who’d come to the city’s one and only academic with some peculiar questions.

“Well, come in,” Dr. Snowraven gestured.

From the street, Mnakat gave a little cough.

“Yeah, I’m just gonna go…” He winced, already slinking off into the night.

Izjik didn’t blame him. No matter how attractive they were, halawemavira and sciency people didn’t mix. Something about their people’s lack of a written language always clouded the air with that extra, judgmental weight.

Dr. Snowraven was silent as she led Izjik down a damp and winding staircase. As the halawemavar followed attentively behind, she wondered how old the elf was. Elves could live to like, five hundred years old, right? She doubted they’d look five hundred. They’d be all boney and shit. But if so, how would that work?

Izjik followed that train of thought all the way into the building’s basement. Looking around, it was no pristine study that greeted her, and nothing even close to the wonder that had been her short-lived jaunt into Master Chitlal’s mage tower.

I promise she has game guys. Ok, maybe not, but the butch swag is there.

I'll tag @teethcrunchrr @vyuntspakhkite-l-darling @sergeantnarwhalwrites and anyone else who wants to play :)

[greypetrel]

WIP Wednesday

Tagged by @transprincecaspian, the quickest wip wednesday of the West! (I'm imagining you with a poncho now, jsyk).

Not much drawing-wise this week either, the outfits are consuming my free time very very happily (I still have two asks to go xD). But this one doodle of the Dark Lady AU...

Adar will, actually, stand on the door from 23:30 to wait for their return. The Lady may trust the man, but he doesn't until he'll prove himself to be trustworthy. Adar by name and de facto.

And some piece of writing, Science Bros are up to it again, and they kinda forgot to notify the exact nature of their latest experiment... (RIP poor Lysette, she'll have grey hair)

Life went on, as they all slowly untackled the Emprise. Until a Templar silences someone in the training grounds. For the most remarkable happening in the last weeks, it could have been something way better than that. A loud commotion from one of the fences, light, and that peculiar sensation of cold as the leftover wind reaches the other fence.

Cullen is running, fearing the worse. He knew joint drills were a bad idea, they were too soon, he- - he stops in front of the back fence to assist at Lysette helping a trembling and very pouty Inquisitor up, knees trembling under her and head shaking as she leans in the Templar’s arms. “I told you it was a terrible idea, your Worship!” “Nonsense. Better done here than in batt- Uuuuurgh, down, down, put me down.” The elf gets put down and dry heaves on the sand, back arching up with the gesture. The poor Templar patting her back and a distressed Dorian jumping up and around from a barrier of four Templar shields solidly planted in the ground. It looks under control enough, but as a crowd of curious people is forming around the fence, and just to be sure, Cullen must ask. “Maker’s breath, what’s going on here?” The trio perks up, Lysette jumping back up for a nervous and all too stiff salute, Aisling looking a little green, and Dorian just glancing up at him and going back to his friend. “It’s an experiment, Commander, everything is all right. Lysette was helping us and following my order.” “You ordered her to silence you?” “I didn’t want to, Commander, but the Inquisitor insisted.” Of course she insisted. Of course she did. Cullen sighed, entering the fence and crouching down too. “At rest, knight.” He addresses Lysette, who takes a deep, relieved breath at the lack of scoldings. “Are you fine?” He then asks Aisling, worried. “It’s like my bowels are upside down and…” She raises a hand, trembling, and clumsily snaps her fingers. Beside the clack, nothing at all happens. She does it one and twice more, frowning. “…No, nothing.” “It’ll take half an hour to reappear, it’ll be gradual and I think it won’t be particularly enjoyable.” Cullen sighs, and now both mages are looking at him, puzzled. “Half an hour??” They exclaim, in chorus. “Yes?” Aisling turns to Dorian, frowning with reproach. He perks up, snorting loudly and puffing up his chest. “How was I supposed to know? Templars back home aren’t able to silence at all, how am I supposed to know before Maevaris get us some books, if even there are books?” “You told me ten minutes!” “I said fortisne. It means that maybe but also that I don’t know!” And there they go, starting bickering quickly, to quickly and in a language too mixed to really follow. But if Aisling has the strength for this, she’s not as bad as she could be, even if trying to stand up more than that, crouching on the ground, sends her back down with a grimace. Calmer and reassured that nothing major happened, Cullen, who still can do so, raises up and turns to the fence. “Nothing to see here, get back to work!” Some huffs of protest raise in the air, but everyone slowly starts to disperse back to their respective task. In a minute, there’s more clamour of swords against sword. Not that it makes the science bros stop going back and forth in any way, but it’s something. As for the Commander, tho, he turns to Lysette, still there looking worried between him and the Inquisitor, unsure of what to do. “Can you please explain what’s going on?” “Ah… I understood that it’s for the Emprise du Lion, Commander. They want to see if there’s a way to counteract silencing in a safe and controlled environment, before leaving… Or I think so, they started talking science and I got lost.”

tagging: @melisusthewee @ndostairlyrium @shivunin @zenstrike @rowanisawriter @scribbledquillz @dungeons-and-dragon-age @oxygenforthewicked @rosella-writes @dreadfutures @demandthedoodles @idolsgf § (ignore the tag if you don't want to do it of course! Also good morning to you all!)

[varlaisvea]

WIP Wednesday today!

This was the thing that started it all! This was the start of what is now a novel-length fic that I have not posted. It got moved to the prologue, and now might get left out entirely, though I hope I can find a way to include it!

Pairing: Razum-dar & The Vestige (canon)* Words: 5.3k Rating: T, alcohol and allusions to sex Summary: After a fraught visit with Raz's family, Razum-dar and the Vestige have a drunken heart-to-heart. Or something vaguely analogous. (Takes place after the ESO: Elsweyr quest "Home Sweet Home") (*Note: For lulz and challenge reasons, I wanted the Vestige to be the same as they are in-game in ESO, where the canon Vestige lacks a soul and knowledge of their past. Much like the written content of ESO, this Vestige POV also contains no mentions of the Vestige's name, race, age, gender, or any other identifying characteristics. But in a fun and cute way, at least I hope!)

-----

The food was good, and the overall mood was pleasant, but I’ve certainly been to less tense family dinners. And I don’t even have a family.

“Where are you headed now, my friend?” Raz asks me, after we both say our goodbyes to his family. “If you are not sick of this one by now, you are welcome to travel with Raz to Elden Root.” He does not look enthused about going to Elden Root.

“What’s in Elden Root?” Raz sighs heavily. “The closest portal to Eyevea. Raz dislikes travel methods that disassemble and then reassemble your entire existence, but he does what he must for the Dominion.”

“What’s in Eyevea?”

“All Raz knows so far is that he is meeting a Psijic who claims to have important information, and apparently has very questionable motives.”

“Sounds like the type of work you’re best at.”

“Yes, subterfuge is one of Raz’s many, many sleek specialties, as you well know,” he says, buffing his claws. “But this one has a feeling about this mission.”

I feel a little guilty that I’m more intrigued than concerned, but I’m going to chalk it up to faith in Raz’s abilities. “Sounds like it’s not a good feeling,” I say.

“Just so.” He sighs again. “Her Majesty would not send the captain of her guard, Brogomir, to personally retrieve Her Majesty’s most valuable agent, Razum-dar, from a vacation she herself imposed on him—to send said extremely dashing agent to a secret, inaccessible mage island in a pocket dimension, where anyone with political business is distinctly and explicitly unwelcome—if this were not a very weighty matter for the Dominion.”

“You make a good point,” I say, and now I am even more intrigued, but also concerned.

“To meet a member of the Psijic Order, no less! We know how the Psijic Order feels about the Mages Guild, yes?”

Right, totally, I guess I remember they have beef or something? I nod.

“This is why Raz suspects that Her Majesty could use your help, if you do not have more urgent business.”

He seems more cautious than normal. I think there’s something he’s not telling me. Then again, there always is. “Elden Root’s as good as anywhere, then!”

“Ah, fragrant, as the folks back home—uh, here—would say. Raz will meet you in Elden Root, then!” He heads off without another word—he seems like he’s in a hurry to leave Merryvale.

Despite all I’ve accomplished, I haven’t been in this reality very long, so there are some things I don’t understand yet. For example, why do people always want to meet me somewhere when we’re going to the same destination? It seems like traveling together would leave less chance of getting separated or side-tracked.

Nevertheless, somehow when I get to the inn in Elden Root, Raz has already been there long enough to book us some bunks at the inn, find a quiet place to drink, and make a pretty good dent in a bottle of moon-sugarcane rum. He has found a place not too far from the inn, but a lot nicer: the roots of the Great Tree are wide enough to sit ten people from side to side, and the one Raz is sitting on overlooks a waterfall and the river; the setting sun lights up the arches of the Elden Root Temple in the distance. He even brought a blanket to sit on.

As I get closer, I see he has scrapes all over his face and neck that he definitely didn’t have when we left Merryvale. “Whoa, what happened to you?”

“Five-claw!” he says, as if he didn’t just see me in Merryvale. “So glad you could make it! Please, do not worry about old Raz,” he says, pouring a drink. “There was some confusion after this one placed an order for supplies—” he holds up the bottle of rum. “The vendor called out ‘order for Raz’ and a tall, intimidating, very muscular Orc went and grabbed all the parcels! Raz, this one, had to confront him—”

“Oh, no…”

“—it turns out his name was Roz, spelled differently. A simple misunderstanding!” Raz laughs.

“So… what happened to your face, then?’ I ask, sitting down next to him on the blanket.

“Well, this one and the Orc Roz decided to split one of the bottles of rum. Events unfolded, and we found ourselves in a… heated… conversation.”

“Oh,” I say, grimacing. “Seems like it didn’t end well.”

“Ah, no, Raz should have been clearer—this was the type of ‘heated’ ‘conversation’ that typically ends very well.” He is already drunk, so that joke delights him. “Contrary to what this one’s mother says about him, he can say no to a pretty face, he just does his best not to make a habit of it, yes?” He takes a drink. “And, you must agree, it would be grievously unjust for this pretty face to deny due consideration to all reasonable requests.” He grins.

I roll my eyes. How did he even have time for that? “Right, so… the Orc.”

“Yes, Roz. You may be wondering, how is kissing accomplished with so many differently-shaped fangs involved? Or maybe you do not need to wonder at all, ha!” He tips his cup to me. “But this evening, Raz was reminded that the answer should be very carefully.”

I search my pack for something to eat—it’s been about two or three hours, so I’m hungry.

“You are a member of the Mages Guild, yes?”

I nod. “And the Psijic Order.”

“Of course you are.” He shakes his head and takes a drink, then looks back at me. “Raz did not want to sound concerned,” he says, “but the truth is he is very glad to have you along.” He finishes what’s in his cup. “Arriving in Eyevea will be possible with your help—this one did not exactly have a plan of his own.”

“Glad I could—“

“—And, as an additional benefit, Raz will now have time to threaten you appropriately!” Raz says cheerfully. “Raz assumes it is healthy to have one’s ego culled from time to time, but it was quite unfortunate that you saw what this one’s family thinks of him.” He refills his cup generously. “Raz is glad you have also seen how adept he is at killing, because he is going to swear you to secrecy about his relationship with Mother and Rakhzargo.”

I roll my eyes again as I take a bite of my Longfin Pasty with Melon Sauce. “Who would I tell, Raz? Surprisingly, the subject of how much your family likes you has never come up in conversation with anyone but you,” I say, with my mouth still full for extra mockery.

He laughs. “And it should stay that way, yes? Captain Brogomir’s arrival was what made Raz’s mother and brother change their tune, so luckily Brogomir did not hear them calling Raz a good-for-nothing drunkard,” he says, with an obvious note of bitterness. ”You are the only one who knows.”

“Heh. You think Brogomir didn’t already know you’re a good-for-nothing drunkard?”

“Funny, five-claw. Raz knows Ziz Kurah, incidentally.” I realize how much he doesn’t sound as playful as he usually does when he threatens to kill me. He sounds… kind of hurt, actually. I look up from my meal to see that he’s already nearly done with the cup of rum he just poured. Maybe it’s best to change the subject. “So… what’s next?”

Raz finishes what’s in his cup. “Tomorrow we go to Eyevea and meet with this Psijic. Raz does not know much more than that.” He uncorks the bottle to refill his cup. “Tonight,” he says with a dark sigh, pouring himself a generous amount of rum, “this one intends to get very drunk. One reason we’re staying at an inn—this is frowned on at the Altmer embassy.”

It’s obvious the time in Merryvale upset him. Raz and I have been through a lot together, I realize—he’s one of the closest friends I’ve made in my travels. But I’m not sure if he wants to talk about it, or just get drunk about it. Either way, I wasn’t doing anything this evening. “Could I be helpful with that, too?”

Raz grabs another large bottle of rum from his pack, and sets it down proudly next to him on the blanket. “Ah, five-claw! Truthfully, this one is just as relieved to have you with him on this evening’s journey as he will be to have your help tomorrow!” He reaches into his pack, pulls out another stone cup, and pours me what’s left of the bottle he’s been working on. He lifts his cup to me so we can tap them together.

I down mine—pleasantly sweet—and I’m a little relieved to see Raz take a subdued sip of his. The last rays of the sun shine brilliantly though the tree canopy and make the top of the waterfall appear golden. We share a long, cozy silence.

“So,” Raz says finally, “how did you like Merryvale? Raz must seem like a different cat to you, now that you’ve seen where he comes from.”

“It’s a beautiful place.”

“Yes, and you met this one’s beautiful neighbors, to whom Raz made many beautiful promises when he thought he would never be coming back to Merryvale.” He takes a long drink. “Raz thanks you in advance, as he knows you will also not be telling anyone how that ended.”

I swish around the rum in my cup, then finish the rest of it. “Did you really think you were never going back there, when you told them?”

He sighs, and finishes what’s in his cup. “Sometimes love makes people do irrational things,” he says. “And now you know, this one has been in love at least three times, so… that’s very irrational, yes?“

“If making promises you don’t plan to keep counts as being in love, then it’s been many more than three,” I say, laughing, downing the rest of the rum in my cup. “Come on Raz, you’re a better liar than that.”

“Raz did say at least three times,” he says, without much humor in his voice. He sighs and leans his head back, covering his face with his hands. “Raz is only a good liar to people who have not seen his mother steal all of his confidence with a steely precision that would make Rajhin jealous. Thankfully, that is most people.” He refills his cup, then mine. “But leave it to Mother to get right to the truth, yes? And you have now met Raz’s neighbors in Merryvale, so you have seen this truth firsthand.” He sighs at length, like he’s about to say something he doesn’t want to. “It is very embarrassing to have an admired comrade find out that this one is actually the selfish, manipulative bastard his detractors curse.”

“Hey, I don’t think that about you! How could anyone who really knows you believe that?”

“Raz is telling you, Mother does really know him.” He doesn’t sound upset, just resigned, which might be worse. “Raz knows his reputation; he knows that many of his acquaintances would readily believe a rumor that he is just as much of a snake to his friends as he is to enemies of the Crown. He also knows he is charming enough to easily re-convince them otherwise.”

As with many things he says, I can’t tell if he’s implying seduction, deception, intimidation, or pure charm, but before I can ask him to clarify, I realize that the very fact that I have that question—and that he is more than capable of any combination of those—proves his point. I take a sip of my drink and nod, convinced.

He takes a long drink and looks out at the river, sighing. “But it would not change the fact that, for example, he hurt three lovely Khajiit he grew up with, because his ego was too fragile to see beyond his own whiskers.” He takes another sip, then gestures toward me with his cup. “You must not tell Raz that did not lower your opinion of him.”

“Well, it’s… definitely not one of the more noble things I’ve seen you do.”

“Ha! So diplomatic! Prior to then, you had mostly seen Raz disregard common decency in suave, roguish service to the Queen, and look so-sleek doing so. You had not seen him do it in selfishness, and so clumsily to boot.” He sighs, and drinks. “The folks back home in Merryvale see right through this one.”

“You’ve changed a lot since you last saw them, huh?”

Raz sighs. “Immeasurably.”

“For the better?” I ask, finishing my drink.

“Unquestionably.”

“From the perspective of someone who doesn’t know them, I don’t think they see through you. I think they look at you and see Razum, the sweet-talking troublemaker who left Merryvale many years ago.”

Raz appreciatively nudges me with his elbow. “Raz sees what you are trying to do, my kind friend, but… this one is very much still the arrogant liar who made sweet-toothed promises to his neighbors to get what he wanted, because he was too much of a coward to tell them he could never be happy with a life spent harvesting moon-sugar.”

“Being an arrogant liar is what makes him so valuable to Her Majesty, right? And his sweet-toothed promises too, I’m sure.”

He tips his cup to me.

“See? You’re still an ass, I’d never deny that, but I can’t see you doing something like that to someone now.”

“No, Raz is a much better liar now; he does not have to lie just to make pillow-friends. He finds them naturally on the strength of his sleek and elegant lies for Queen and country!”

I laugh, and we sit in tipsy silence.

After several moments, Raz sighs and says, “and… to be fair… this one’s neighbors still had to make him fear for his life in order to get an apology out of him.”

“You eventually gave it?”

“Yes… this one just had to get over himself a little first. But once I did, I listened to all of them, and apologized truly. And I apologized that they had to force it out of me. As Raz said earlier… sometimes it truly is valuable to see reflections of your less-respectable qualities.”

“But actually reflecting on them, being willing to apologize for them, and doing your best to make them right… those are good qualities you now have that you didn’t back then. Why is it so hard to believe that you’ve grown up, at least a little?”

“Heh, fine. I suppose you are right, five-claw. And Raz did not exactly give Kideya and Rakh-ja much of a chance to see that.”

“I can’t blame you for trying to put up with as few cutting remarks as possible,” I say. “It really started to bother me. You’ve saved my life before.”

“Raz admits, he did not fully realize what he was asking you to do in staying quiet through their insults, since he was so used to them.“ He finishes what’s in his cup. “Perhaps that is something else he should spend some time thinking about. Sometimes we all get used to things we should not, yes?”

I nod. “Especially the most resilient of us.”

He refills his cup and takes a sip. “But! Perhaps new moons have risen for Raz’s family relations! This one is not ready to trust it just yet, but he now finds himself in the shocking position of having received an apology and an enthusiastically glowing admission of pride from his mother.” He gestures at me with his cup. “Nicely done, as usual.”

“You act like I lied to her, like it was some sort of scheme! All I did was talk about you honestly.”

“Ah, heh. Perhaps Raz needs some time for it all to sink in. Or more drinks.”

We share another long but comfortable silence, both of us taking the occasional sip of rum. The moons are visible now, but the last rays of the setting sun still filter through the trees. My arms and legs are starting to feel pleasantly warm, and my head feels satisfyingly buzzy.

Raz breaks the silence again. “Rakh-ja was telling this one that he is in love with a Bosmer who had come through to help at the farm. They write each other letters.” He grins.

“That’s adorable,” I say, smiling at the thought. “I guess that’s what he meant when he saw Brogomir and said he wished he got letters from tiny elves.”

“He said that? Ha!” Raz seems pleasantly surprised.

“I thought he was joking!” I finish my cup. “Maybe technically telling the truth—cryptically, in plausibly deniable way—is a talent that runs in the family,” I suggest. I think I said all of those words right.

“Let us hope so, for the future Rakhzargo-dar!” Raz says, raising his cup. “Anyway, it is not so far to Elden Root from Merryvale, so Rakh-ja is doing as many extra chores as he can, so he can take days away from the farm.”

“Aww.”

“I left him a little pouch under his pillow—enough coin for his next caravan ride, and Raz’s personal favorite Bosmeri poem. Raz has had much success, being versed in poetry of the various races of Tamriel. He wishes Rakh-ja the same success.”

I refill my cup, and we silently toast Rakhzargo’s budding relationship.

“He must be pretty serious about this mer if he’s willing to do all that… stuff,” I say.

“Yes, in Raz’s lifetime he has done many stupid, embarrassing, laborious, dishonest, and/or dubiously legal things for love—well, mostly for… love-adjacent pursuits. But he still cannot imagine being so in love that he is willing to do extra chores,” Raz shakes his head in disbelief.

I laugh more loudly than I’d intended. “Raz, everything you do could be characterized as ‘being so in love that you are willing to do extra chores!’” I try to temper my laugh, which is only possible to do by taking a sip of rum.

Raz sets down his cup in mock offense. “How dare you suggest this! What would ever give you that impression!” He touches his hand to his chest in dramatic shock.

“In your defense, even Her Majesty considers the Crown’s official business a ‘chore.’” I am learning jokes! I am hilarious. “You have always promised me you would tell me the good Ayrenn stories when we were drunk,” I say, finishing the last of what’s in my cup. “Here we are.”

“Ah, it is a sadness, but you have unfortunately missed the short window where Raz is both drunk enough to be willing, and sober enough to do so coherently.” He downs what’s left in his cup. “But! Suffice it to say… the truth is much more complicated than that, five-claw.” He gets very quiet. Then, to my astonishment, Razum-dar volunteers more information than is sufficient to answer a question. “Maybe once Raz loved her,” he says, shaking his head. “Maybe he still does. No, probably, he still does.” He sounds so sincere that I’m momentarily confused.

I shake my head to sober up a bit, because this is the good stuff, despite Raz’s warning. “She never felt the same?”

He smiles. “In our younger days, Raz was so smitten with her, but back then, she never felt any deeper than a drunken mistake or two. Well, four, to be precise. And a half.”

He probably doesn’t want to hear how sweet it is that he remembers how many. “Half a drunken mistake, huh?”

“Yes—four eighths.” He shoots me slick smile to indicate that he will not be elaborating. “Anyway, now, Raz’s old friend Ayrenn is the Queen. She considers those days behind her, and truthfully, so does Raz.” He fills my cup, then his, and takes a sip.

I am honestly not sure whether to believe him. “Hm… you ‘probably’ still love her, but those days are also ‘behind you’?” I look at him sideways while sipping my rum.

His mouth is full so he wags his finger at me while he swallows a gulp of rum. “That is a very unfair characterization,” he says, swaying a little. “Just because Raz said those words in that order…”

I intensify my sidelong gaze.

He sighs. “Raz understands your skepticism, five-claw—this one would also disbelieve Razum-dar in this conversation.” He leans his head back sleepily. “But… this one’s life, reputation, physical safety, and personal pride are all already devoted to Queen Ayrenn and the Dominion. More than that… that is too much devotion, yes?”

Very diplomatic, but I can tell there’s more. I stare at him expectantly.

When he opens his eyes and notices me staring, he sits up and stares back at me for several moments, then takes a long swig, and sighs with disgust. “Fine,” he says, leaning his head back and closing his eyes again. He speaks quietly, and with very little bravado. “Raz has known Ayrenn for a long time. He was, of course, embarrassingly smitten with her, instantly—he is from Nowherevale, Anequina, and she was a beautiful Altmer princess who saw that Raz was smart enough to keep up with her and clever enough to be very valuable—of course in addition to entertaining, charming, and handsome. Ayrenn appreciated and cared for this one very much—and in many ways—but she is an Altmer noble, yes? It did not even occur to her that it was possible to have romantic feelings for someone who is not Altmer. Which was fine, as such things could never be possible for us.”

“Oh come on!” I say, forgetting that he is telling me his own feelings, rather than a very good story about someone else. “Royalty have romances with people they aren’t supposed to all the time! Having a secret affair with one’s close advisor of a different race is kind of boring, actually.”

“Ha! Just so,” Raz says, “but, that is not the impossibility.” He takes a long drink. “It is bittersweet, yes? Time moves faster, for this one, than it does for Ayrenn. We are around the same age, but Ayrenn was still gaining height, when she met this one. Perhaps you have noticed her detractors call her a child? This is because she is still a kid, by Elf standards—barely old enough to have a profession. She has had to grow up a lot, and her bedding-Khajiit-as-an-act-of-rebellion days are over—by now, it has even occurred to her that it is possible to fall in love with someone who is not a High Elf. She has always seen Raz’s good qualities, such as the ones you just forced him to admit to, even when he very clearly failed to display them. And her appreciation for him only strengthens. But while her idea of love has matured somewhat… Raz has matured much faster. As have his ideas about love. ” He looks out over the river and sips his rum.

I have some feelings about time and the way we all move through it, but I am drunk and getting personal information out of Razum-dar; this is not an opportunity I will waste. I nod thoughtfully for a respectful length of time. “Hm,” I say quietly. “That addresses the ‘those days are behind you’ part, but not the ‘still love her’ part.”

Raz glares at me. “Raz is very suspicious of people who listen to him closely enough to notice his strategic omissions.”

He sits back again with resignation, and sighs. “There is a piece of Raz that is still the selfish, overconfident, and so, so, so stupid young cat this one was when he met Ayrenn. And there is a piece of Ayrenn that is still an obnoxious High Elf princess who has never known real danger, hunger, or struggle. Those two idiots will always have a feeling about each other that is not love, but as close to it as they are capable of, and just as irresistible. Said idiots live only in our memories, in the moment in time when they both got to be in the same place. Otherwise they are gone, and this is very much for the best—for us, for the Dominion, and for the mudcrab fight rings and live slaughterfish dealers of Tamriel.” He smiles the I-will-not-be-elaborating smile again. “But those two jackasses will also live as long as we do, yes? This is more than enough—one of us is an Elf, after all.”

It’s just nice to hear him say nice things. “Raz, I am glad you’re my friend,” I say. My head is swimming, but in a nice way. The moons are very clear. It’s nice.

“Heh. Raz has not seen you this drunk before, five-claw,” Raz says, distinctly drunkenly. “Perhaps spending time with Kideya had the same effect on you that it did on this one.” He pours out the last of the bottle, some into his cup and the rest into mine.

“I’m going to say something,” I announce… “I don’t think Kidi… Kedd… Kend… your mother ever really gave up on you. Some of my best Razum-dar stories… she believed them very easily. Like she suspected all along.”

He laughs a little sadly. “You are kind to your old friend Raz, truly. But this one suspects her extracredulousity may have something to do with the messenger. It is not every day you meet the Champion of Anequina, slayer of dragons, Moon-Hallowed, savior of Tamriel and Nirni, hero of the Dominion, and so on.” He does a lazy but sincere toast to me, like he can barely lift his arm.

“Raz!” I don’t know why this embarrasses me so much, but it does. “Here I thought I was just a normal… uh… adventurous citizen to her. You told her all that?”

“Yes,” he says without hesitation, “this one had no choice. While you and Brogomir were arranging for a messenger to Alinor, Raz was testifying to your good character—so Mother would know he was not inviting a degenerate like himself to dinner. Unfortunately, Mother initially mistook Raz’s friendly admiration for a sign that perhaps there could be grand-kittens for her, down the road.”

I recoil in mild disgust. “Oh.”

“Yes,” Raz says emphatically. “No offense, but Raz had to stop that line of thinking immediately. So, he told her about you saving the world—anyone would admire the legendary defeater of Molag Bal, the one who stopped the Planemeld. Mother was stunned that her good-for-nothing son has frequently fought alongside someone whose deeds were foretold by the Elder Scrolls.” He swishes the last of the rum in the bottom of his cup.

“Ha, well, I am a little embarrassed, but we absolutely cannot have your mother expecting you to settle down.”

Raz nods. “Raz knows he’ll someday have to tell Mother the truth: unless something goes very, horribly differently than Raz has planned, there will never be kittens, and he is thorough about making sure of this. He chooses duty over all else. He has mostly stopped telling people that this is what truly makes him happiest, because it is rare that anyone believes it.”

I’ve never really thought about it before, but of course, of all people, Razum-dar would have words for something I’ve felt but never articulated. “Yes!” I say, slapping his arm in friendly agreement. “They’ll just tell you that you’ll change your mind when you meet ‘the right one,’ or when you get too old to hold a weapon.” I take a long swig. “Anything is possible, even that, but that’s not what I want for myself.”

Raz nods emphatically. “Ha! This one is glad you understand, five-claw! Of course you do!” He waves his almost-empty cup at me. “Even Ayrenn tells this one that he will slow down and find someone to grow old with. Raz thinks she just doesn’t want him to be alone, as she knows she will be—she will have to marry someone she does not love, almost certainly. But this one? He will never be alone! He has friends all over Tamriel.” He gestures again at me with his cup, nearly spilling what’s left in it. ”And, of course, he has pillow-friends in every city, for when a situation calls for deep friendship."

“Ha, cheers to deep friendship,” I say, lazily but sincerely toasting, barely able to lift my arm.

“Now, you…” Raz continues to point his almost-empty cup at me, “must have pillow-friends on different planes of existence. Raz is envious. You must tell him your secrets sometime.” He finally finishes the last of what’s in his cup, which he emphatically sets down next to him, upside down.

I nod with exaggerated modestly. “Ha, I’m flattered, Razum-dar,” I say curtly, “but if I tell you my secrets, I’ll have competition—“

“—very handsome, charming, cultured, clever competition,” he says, knitting his brow with mock concern. “Hm, yes, Raz deeply sympathizes with your problem. Fine, this one will get to different planes of existence without your help. Eh, except tomorrow, when he needs your help." He reflects a moment. "Ha, if the Psijic we are meeting is somehow not an insufferable stuck-up dweeb, perhaps this one will ask them if they would like to bring Raz to Artaeum for a night, and... stretch out time.”

“… I might know someone in Coldharbour you’d get along with,” I joke, laughing, finishing my cup and likewise smacking it upside down onto the wood of the massive oak tree’s root.

“This one has been there once or twice. Ah, Raz’s vision is blurry, it is like he’s there right now,” he laughs. “Is it by any chance the lovely Bosmer trader near the Hollow City wayshrine?”

I wasn’t actually thinking of anyone; I thought he’d know I was joking. “No, I—“

“Or, oh, the sleek and muscular Argonian blacksmith with the—“ he mimes tall horns.

“I could barely get him to talk to me; perhaps you’d have better luck? But, if you’re into big horns and shapely tails—“

“Not even you could introduce this one to the… sexy… Prince of Schemes.” He can’t finish the sentence without giggling, then breaking into full-on laughter.

“Mm, his voice though,” I say, also laughing. “Hello, handsome—” I say in a very bad impression of the Lord of Brutality and Domination.

“—the… Planemeld… is nigh… if you know what I mean…” Raz says seductively, lowering his voice ridiculously to do an equally bad impression.

We are both very drunk and laughing, wiping tears from our eyes about our not-all-that-funny jokes.

“You’re right, though…” I say, through giggles. “I probably couldn’t introduce you.” I start laughing at my joke before I can even say it. “We’re… not on very good terms right now.”

I’m laughing, Raz is laughing, pretty moons, nice friend, good rum. As I laugh, I lean my head back against the tree, and I realize how tired I am.

I wake up in a leather and hide bed, in an unfamiliar communal inn room, with the moons shining directly into my eyes through the window, and my head spinning. I’m still in my traveling leathers, but my boots are off my feet. The blanket Raz and I were sitting on earlier is wrapped around me, and there’s a large jug of drinking water on the floor next to me. I know for sure I couldn’t have done all that myself. I sit up, chug about a third of the water, and manage to get off most of my leathers before stumbling back into bed, turned away from the moons this time, smiling about a joke I don’t remember.

[krystalklear21]

1st of Hearthfire, 4E201 Dear Diary, It has been quite a journey since I arrived in the rugged and untamed land of Skyrim. A decade ago I, Dr. Otto Octavius, renowned Imperial scholar and Battlemage, decided to leave the comforts of the illustrious Imperial City to seek new knowledge and enlightenment in the far reaches of this province. The College of Winterhold, a stage fit for my intellectual prowess, welcomed my arrival. I indulged students with my wisdom for the past ten years. Occasionally I invite Calcelmo, a worthy rival, and Marcurio, a sorry excuse for a mage, for our heated discourse and roundtables during Dwemer seminars and lectures. Skyrim's turmoil, Stormcloaks versus Imperials, and the Dragon resurgence, all are mere distractions. Yet, their impact on the arcane, and by extension my research, cannot be dismissed. Now, I'm on an errand to locate the Dragonborn, thanks to Savo's trivial task. I, an esteemed scholar, reduced to a messenger boy. The Arch-Mage seems to believe that the Dragonborn, whoever he or she is, has potential as a student. Alas, my clueless assistants, Sameth and Myvrana – adequate yet unrefined minds - shall continue my work in my absence. My assistants gifted me this diary in their farewell. How quaint. Amidst this inconvenience, Skyrim's mysteries beckon. The pursuit of knowledge drives me, each Dwemer cog unraveled, revealing the secrets within. Until my quill dances again, Dr. Otto Octavius Aetherial Physicist and Dwemer Scholar

[mudaship39]

Lysander/Luciana Norwood character bio part 3

Occupation:

Scion of the Noble and Old House of Norwood. 

Scion of the Ancient and Powerful House of Delacroix. 

The Noble and Old House of Norwood have domains over the creation of mage schooling, magical research, & magical tools. 

The Ancient and Powerful House of Delacroix have a domain over the creation of weapons, armor, & shields. 

Guild Grandmaster of a Vanguard Guild an S rank Guild Order and Adventuring Guild

He/she/they are the high elder of the knight and paladin order. 

Commander of Timberwolf Mercenary Company.

Warlord of a City State. 

Shopkeeper and traveling merchant of Esoteric Emporium for magic users and Arcane Apothecary

Floating Magic Tower Grandmaster 

Chairman and CEO of the corporation Arcane Affinity. Arcane Affinity is the business of arcane supplies, magical weapons, & esoteric research that made his/her/their noble family their fortune. 

He/they as a grand magister on the magical council and circle of magi is a multi class magic user that is an imperial alchemist, master enchanter, arch mage, grand magician, high priest/high priestess, seer/oracle, supreme witch, grand sorcerer, great warlock, & master wizard. 

High King/High Queen of the Human Federation. King/Queen of the Human Kingdoms. Chieftain and Warchief of the Indigenous Magical Human Nations.

Place of Residence: When in magical human federation land he/she/they live at the Norwood Manor on the Norwood Estate. While in Indigenous magical human land he/she/they live in a dome shaped oblong, rounded, undulatory, & sinuous home. It has peaks and spires. It is rib vaulted. It has catenary arches. It is made out of gemstones and magical metals. It is filled with magiteck for accessibility. 

Citizenship: Tirione Kingdom, Human Federation of Magical Human Kingdoms and Indigenous Magical Human Nations, Alliance or Coalition, Federation of Aehinara, Continent of Aehinara, Contingent Landmass of Eisio, Giant Planet of Kaishi

Affiliation: 

Human Federation of Magical Human Kingdoms and Indigenous Magical Human Nations. 

Alliance or Coalition. Confederacy of Indigenous Goblinoid and Giantkin Nations. 

Federation of Aehinara

Sword and Shield Knight Order

Paragon Paladin Order

Vanguard Guild Order and Adventuring Guild

Cerberus Mercenary Company

Magic Council

Arcane Order 

Education:

High School graduate.

High School Diploma.

He/she/they were part of the magical go, magical shogi, & magical chess club. 

U-13 (or under 13), U-15 (or under 15) Magical Dueling first place champion, second place runner up, & third place finalist who took part in magical duels with a rapier, short sword and shield, & long sword.

 U-18 or under 18, U-21 or under 21, & 21 and over Magical Dueling first place champion, second place runner up, third place finalist who took part in magical duels with dual wielding short swords, one handed long sword and shield, and two handed great sword. 

U-13 or under 13, U-15 or under 15 Magical Archery first place champion, second place runner up, & third place finalist who took part in magical archery with a magical traditional bow and arrow, a magical crossbow, & a magical modern compound bow.

 U-18 (or under 18), U-21 (or under 21), & 21 and over Magical Sharpshooting first place champion, second place runner up, third place finalist who took part in magical gunslinging using a magical flintlock pistol, magical revolver revolver, magical semi automatic pistol, magical flintlock rifle, magical ten shot lever action repeating rifle, & magical carbine. 

U-13 (or under 13) and U-15 (or under 15) Magical Spellcasting first place champion, second place runner up, & third place finalist who took part in magical duels with a wand, magical baton, & grimoire.

 U-18 (or under 18), U-21 (or under 21), & 21 and over Magical Spellcasting first place champion, second place runner up, third place finalist who took part in magical duels with a mage stick, broomstick, & scepter. 

He/she/they/they took drama and theater where they met the Night Elf Bard.

He/she/they were the treasurer, vice president, & later student body president. 

He/she/they took honors classes and AP classes. He/she/they in high school were on the principal’s honor roll and was valedictorian. 

College graduate.

Associates Degree in Arithmancy

Masters Degree in Language.

Dual Major in Goblinoid and Giantkin

Minor in Common and Elvish

Master’s Degree in Military History.

History Major in Elvish History 

With emphasis in Dark Elven History

Minor in Draenei History

PHD in Magical Philosophy. 

Doctorate in Demonology and Necrology. 

He/she/they taught as a professor at the magical four year university. 

This is the magical four year university that they were alumni of where they were an English major that received their associate’s degree in Common (English).

They graduated cum laude as someone who graduated in the top twenty percent of their class. 

They were a Common (English) major that received their bachelor’s degree of the arts with a dual major in Goblin, Troll, Giantish, and Orcish.

Club member of the Divination, Numerology, Astrology, & Astronomy Club

He/she/they were club president of the Indigenous magical students association. He/she/they were vice president of the magical human students association. 

At the magical four year university they were the star-player of the magical sports team. 

He/she/they taught magical philosophy as a magical philosopher at a magical Ivy League School. 

This is the magical Ivy League School that they were alumni of where they were a Philosophy and Ethics major that received their doctorate degree in magical philosophy. 

He/she/they graduated magna cum laude as someone who graduated in the top ten percent of their class. 

He/she/they were part of the men’s and women’s magical basketball, baseball, softball, ice hockey, field hockey, soccer, volleyball, track and field, & rugby magical collegiate sports teams.

He/she/they were part of the magical fencing club sport team as Lysander. This is where they met the High Elf Cleric and Paladin.

He/she/they were part of the magical kendo, sai, kobudo, spear, kalaripayattu, stick fighting, bo staff, silat, & nunchucks melee martial art club sport team. 

He/she/they were part of the magical mixed martial arts (imagine karate, capoeira, krav maga, savate, muay thai, jiu jitsu, kickboxing, hapkido, judo, aikido, taekwondo, etc.) club sport team. 

He/she/they were part of the magical monk class martial arts (imagine bak mei, wushu, changquan, hung gar, xingyiquan, shuai jiao, wing chun, san da, choy li fut, shaolin kung fu, & wuzuquan) martial arts club sport team.  

He/she/they were part of the archery crossbow, traditional composite bow, & modern compound bow kyudo club sport team as Luciana. This is where they met the Wood Elf Druid and Ranger. 

As an equestrian that was part of the equestrian sports club they were a rider of magical mounts of alicorns, unicorns, & pegasi. 

He/she/they were an instructor at a magical military academy as a gun witch, battle wizard, & war mage. 

He/she/they at the magical military academy fought other fighters in tourneys with magical two handed greatswords, spears, two handed warhammers, & two handed battle axes. 

At the magical military academy they were the star player of the magical mount riding team as a rider of a drake and wyvern. 

He/she/they were part of the magical military martial arts competitive sports clubs at the magical military academy.  

He/she/they graduated from the military academy as a second lieutenant.

He/she/they graduated summa cum laude as someone who graduated top one percent of their class. 

He/she/they graduated from the military academy with a master's degree in History with a major in Elvish military history with an emphasis on Dark Elf history. 

He/she/they graduated from the military academy with a minor in geography. 

He/she/they as a grand magister who is a multi class magician graduated from a magical academy with certificates in metaplanes studies, astral studies, conceptual magic, quantum magic, magic theory, and theoretical magic.

Researcher and archiver at the magical library at the magical Ivy League university.

Companions:

Allies: 

Rose Winfield is a Magical human squire.

Nicholas Kaylock is a Magical human initiate.

Lillian Colfield is a Magical human aspirant.

Tobias Jenkings is a Magical human pageboy.

Adelaide Camden is a Magical human page girl. 

Zachary Leighton is a Magical human courtier. 

Helena Dixon is a Magical human apprentice.

Asher Covington is a Magical human esquire.

Phoebe Mast is a Magical human lady knight.

Preston Kahler is a Magical human knight.

Pierre Barnes is a Magical human lancer knight.

Josephina Lytton is a Magical human knight sergeant.

Liam Morgan is a Magical human knight lieutenant.

Henrietta O' Keefe is a Magical human knight captain.

Reginald Marple is a magical human knight templar.

Royce Harvey is a Magical human knight commander.

Cynthia Barrington is a Magical human paladin.

Joel Bradford is a Magical human high paladin.

Phillipa Belleville is a Magical human grand paladin.

Noah Marfont is a Magical human star paladin.

Daniella Blackwood is a Magical human paladin justicar.

Ian Asquith is a Magical human paladin commander.

Cornelius La-Minnings is a Magical human knight and paladin guild chapter master.

Harper Weston is a Magical human elder. She is the subordinate of High Elder Lysander/Luciana. She is Lysander’s/Luciana’s protege.

Peerage of Lysander/Luciana Norwood:

Genevieve Slater is a Magical human lady in waiting. Attends Lysander/Luciana when she/they is Luciana Norwood.

Luca Merriweather is a Magical human diplomat.

Tiffany Fitzgerald is a Magical human chancellor.

Jacob Weston is a Magical human minister. 

Vivienne Ashdown is a Magical human orator. 

Theodore Lynch is a Magical human baronet. Peerage of Lysander/Luciana.

Diane Carlyle is a Magical human baronetess. She is part of the peerage of Lysander/Luciana. 

Oscar Richfield is a Magical human baron. Peerage of Lysander/Luciana.

Charlene Haganis is a Magical human baroness. Peerage of Lysander/Luciana.

Michael Whitely is a Magical human viscount. Peerage of Lysander/Luciana.

Eleanora Ashbridge is a Magical human viscountess. Peerage of Lysander/Luciana.

Walter Beaumont is a Magical human count. Peerage of Lysander/Luciana.

Lily Bexley is a Magical human countess. Peerage of Lysander/Luciana.

Victor Herington is a Magical human marquess. Peerage of Lysander/Luciana.

Carolina Brighton is a Magical human marchioness. Peerage of Lysander/Luciana.

Clark Mavis is a Magical human duke. Peerage of Lysander/Luciana.

Gabriella Gainsborough is a Magical human duchess. Peerage of Lysander/Luciana.

Darby Rutherford is a Magical human archduke. Peerage of Lysander/Luciana. 

Viola Pierpont is a Magical human archduchess. Peerage of Lysander/Luciana. 

Harrison Tate is a Magical human vizier. He is the advisor of High King/High Queen Lysander/Luciana.

Margaretta Pierson is a Magical human grand vizier. She is the advisor of High King/High Queen Lysander/Luciana.

Members of Luciana/Lysander Norwood’s Court:

Courts are a web of conspiracies. It is a place of scheming, power plays, intrigue, & machinations. This was a decadent court.

Chika Nakagawa. Female Ambassador.

Artist. Sponsored artists. The monarch’s favorite artists. A group of the finest actors, cooks, dancers, directors, fashion designers, models, musicians, painters, photographers, playwrights, poets, sculptures, singers, theater thespians, & writers, etc in the empire, confederacy, & federation. They weren’t there for their own ambition. The monarchy and the upper class are inclined to support the arts. They wanted to show off their investments. So these artists are their accessories to show off. Though being in the court of a monarch is a good way for artists to increase their patrons.   

Bodyguards. Cadre of fogeign bodyguards. An elite group of highly trained, disciplined, & competent male, female, & two spirit hobgoblin, orc, troll, oni, goliath, & giant mercenaries. Mercenaries who distinguished themselves on the battlefield stood a good chance of being hired for a bodyguard job as a permanent exclusive contract. They are now a group of a praetorian guard to the monarch.   

Ahmose Idogbe. A male butler. The chief supervisor of all male manservants of a house.

Katlego Mba. A male castellan. The Castellan oversees the defense of a stronghold.

Andromeda Farmakis. A female chamberlain. Chamberlain makes decisions for the royal household in the monarch’s absence.

Liona Keawe a female chancellor. An officer of an order of knighthood who seals commissions.

Albus Ovius a male chapelmaster. A person in charge of music-making.

Nicholas Dupont a male chaplain. A member of the clergy attached to a private chapel, institution, ship, regiment, etc.

Phillippe Leclerc a male offerer of the Household. The holder who paid the wages of some of the servants above and below stairs.

Concubines. Full of male, female, & nonbinary members of more humanoid species such as aasimar, draenei, dwarves, elves, giants, gnomes, halflings, humans, ogre, oni, orcs, teiflings, & trolls.  

Alexander Seidel is a male confessor. A priest who hears confessions and gives absolution and spiritual counsel.

Anna Wolff is a female constable. A person holding a particular office, most commonly in criminal law enforcement.

Courtiers. Important not because of their inheritance or offices but because the regent has an affection for them. There is a certain charm, boldness, cleverness, honesty, strength, & beauty that caught the monarch’s eye. Their influence on the leader is not easily measured. 

Mira Benes is the Court Jester or Royal Fool. A professional joker or fool at a medieval court. They are typically wearing a cap with bells on it. They are usually carrying a mock scepter. A member of the household of a nobleman or a monarch employed to entertain guests. Jesters were also performers who entertained the common folk at fairs, carnivals, and town markets. Jesters are often thought to have worn brightly colored clothes and eccentric hats in a motley pattern. Jesters entertained with a wide variety of skills such as song, dance, playing musical instruments (a lute or a harp), spoken word poetry, storytelling, acrobatics, juggling, telling jokes, and performing magic tricks. Much of the entertainment was performed in a comic style. Many jesters made contemporary jokes in words or songs about people or events well known to their audiences. A halfling bard who was a former member of the king/queen’s guild party. They were a court wizard and spymaster for the sovereign in secret. They have the king’s ear and can speak freely using truth to power as an honest advisor under the guise of silliness. They are a power behind the throne. They are a very dangerous bard who spies on people for the king in other nations.  

Cup-bearer. A person who serves wine, especially in a royal or noble household.

Court Mage. The Court Mage has access to knowledge and cosmic powers none of the others understand and may be critical on the battlefield. Court mage was an arch mage. The court mage was a magic user for a sovereign to provide mystical advice and give magical services. This court mage was an alchemist, wizard, & sorcerer. They have high standing with other mages and the king/queen. Has bad relationship with other court members. 

The Chaplain. The Chaplain is the religious leader of the noble household.

Dapifer. An official who is appointed by the legal ruling monarch to represent them in a country, and may have a mandate to govern it in their name.

Doorward. A person given the responsibility of being warden of the king’s door: protecting the king’s property.

Falconer. A person involved in falconry and hunting.

General. The General is the highest military commander.

Gentleman of the Bedchamber. A person involved in waiting on the King when he ate in private, helping him to dress, guarding the bedchamber and water closet, and providing companionship.

Gentleman Usher. A person or people responsible for overseeing the work of the servants “above stairs”, particularly those who cooked and waited upon the nobleman at meals, and saw to it the great chamber was kept clean by the lesser servants. This person was also responsible for overseeing other miscellaneous services such as the care of the nobleman’s chapel and bed-chambers.

Grand Master/Grand Mistress. The supreme head of various orders, including chivalric orders such as military orders and dynastic orders of knighthood.

General. The General is the highest military commander.

Great Officers of the Crown. A person or head of a religious order or order of knighthood often conferring with the King and other members of the royal court.

Guard Captain. The Guard Captain is the commander of the house guard.

Harem. There is intense competition between them to carry the monarch’s favor. There is a tense relationship between them and the high queen of the magical humans and them and the empress of the Homo magi. Guarded by eunuchs. Ruthless and power hungry courtiers who had amassed a lot of power. 

Head of the Church. High Priest or Archbishop. 

Herald. An official employed to oversee state ceremonial, precedence, and the use of armorial bearings. Employed to make proclamations, carry official messages, and oversee tournaments. The Herald is an expert on nobles, heraldry, and etiquette.

Horsemaster. The Horsemaster oversees and tends to the domain’s horses, alicorns, unicorns, & pegasi.

Intendant. A title given to a high-ranking official or administrator.

Keeper of the Seals. A person entitled to keep and authorize use of the Great Seal of a given country.

King of Arms. An Officer of the King. A king of arms is the senior rank of an officer of arms. Only a king of arms has the authority to grant armorial bearings and sometimes certify genealogies and noble titles.

Knights are soldiers with noble rank. Former knights and paladins of knight and paladin orders. A knight is a person granted an honorary title of knighthood by a head of state or representative for service to the monarch, the church, or the country, especially in a military capacity.

The Ladies-in-waiting are noble daughters who act as servants for the royals while they look for husbands. A lady-in-waiting or court lady is a female personal assistant at a court attending to a royal woman or a high-ranking noblewoman. A lady-in-waiting was often a noblewoman but of lower rank than the woman to whom she attended. She received compensation for the service she rendered. A lady-in-waiting was considered more of a secretary, courtier, and or companion to her mistress than a servant. She functions as companion and secretary to her mistress. In courts where polygamy was practiced, a court lady was formally available to the monarch for sexual services. She could become his wife, consort, courtesan, or concubine.  A royal woman in the magical human kingdoms was free to select her ladies. The decision was not chosen by the sovereign, her parents, her husband, or the sovereign's ministers. 

Maid: The chief supervisor of all female manservants of a house.

Maid of honor. An unmarried noblewoman attending a queen or princessA Maid of honor is a junior attendant of a queen in royal households. The position is junior to the lady-in-waiting.  

Majordomo. A person who speaks, makes arrangements, or takes charge for another. Typically, the term refers to the highest major person of a household staff. They are a head servant who acts on behalf of the owner of a large or significant residence. A majordomo is a person who speaks, makes arrangements, or takes charge for another. Typically, this is the highest major person of a household staff. They are a head servant who acts on behalf of the owner of a large or significant residence. A majordomo is also someone who oversees the day-to-day responsibilities of a business enterprise. They were usually also in charge of finances.

Marshall. Grand Marshall. The Marshall oversees the training of the troops.

Master Assassin. The Master Assassin deals with threats in the most permanent fashion.

Master of Ceremonies. Official host or organizer of staged events. Sometimes the one to give speeches or present performers. 

Master of Coin. Chief financial advisor charged with managing the crown’s money. Advised the monarch on commerce, trade, & economy. Oversaw all regions affecting transactions.

Master of the Horse. A person connected to all matters with the horses and formerly also the hounds of the King, as well as the stables and coach houses, the stud, mews and previously the kennels.

Master of the Hunt. Grand Master/Grand Mistress of the Hunt. A person responsible for the royal hunt. Often overseeing the care of the king’s hunting dogs and other animals cared for under the King.

Master of Robe. Officer in charge of the monarch's wardrobe. Especially for important events like coronations or annual celebrations. 

Page boy or page girl. A person of low rank who works as a servant to the King. A page girl or page boy is traditionally a young male or female attendant or servant of a noble. They also have been used as a messenger at the service of a nobleman.

Pantler. A servant or officer in charge of the bread and the pantry in a great family. In charge of pantry and food supplies. They are also responsible for serving the royal table.

Pursuivant of Arms. An officer of ranking below a herald. A pursuivant is a junior officer of arms. Most pursuivants are attached to official heraldic authorities.  These pursuivants of arms look after matters of heraldic and genealogical importance.

Royal Quartermaster. The Royal Quartermaster oversees the funding and the gear of the agents including poisons and magic items.

Royal Secretary. A person responsible for communicating the sovereign’s wishes to the other members of government.

Sage. The Sage is an expert on history and all kinds of lore. The sage may double as a tutor, herald, and court mage.

Secretary. Secretaries are generally responsible for communicating the sovereign's wishes to the other members of government. At times and places it may have a number of other duties. In most cases the royal secretary is a close adviser of the monarch.

Senescal. Administrator or supervisor. A senescal was in charge of domestic arrangements and the administration of servants which meant the seneschal might oversee hundreds of laborers, servants and their associated responsibilities. They would have a great deal of power in the community when much of the local economy was often based on the wealth and responsibilities of such a household.

Spymaster. The Spymaster keeps everybody informed about the state of the realm and any threats. The head of clandestine intelligence. This person handles the more delicate affairs of the court and country. They gather information not meant for their regent’s ears. They find blackmail is such a dirty word. They make minor and great nuisances to the king quietly disappear. A former rogue assassin and double agent. Was a member of the king’s adventuring party as a rogue. Their loyalty to the king is always questioned by other members of the court.  

Squire. Squires are knights-in-training who work as servants of knights.

Standard-bearer. A person who bears an emblem called an ensign or standard which is either a type of flag or an inflexible but mobile image, which is used as a formal, visual symbol of a state, prince, military unit, etc.

Steward. A steward is an official who is appointed by the legal ruling monarch to represent them in a country. They may have a mandate to govern it in their name. It is synonymous with the position of regent, viceroy, governor, or deputy. 

Stolnik. A person responsible for serving the royal table, then an honorary court title and a district office.

Treasurer. The Treasurer oversees the domain’s finances and sometimes literally its gold, silver, copper, & platinum coin reserves.

Viceroy. The Viceroy has the authority to rule in the monarch’s place. The chief advisor of the monarchy. They are the mentor of the high king/high queen. 

Warden. The Warden oversees a specific area of the domain like a forest or a village.

Former Companions:

Squire that he/she/they are training as a knight and paladin. Left his/her/their tutelage as a knight corporal. Promoted to knight commander and paladin commander. Is now chapter master of a knight order and paladin order. 

Apprentice that he/she/they are training as a magic user. Is now Senator of the Magical Government. 

Current Companions:

They all have a mark of life. They have attained the understanding of magic and they crafted a mark of life on the forehead of their warforged companions. This allows them to follow more complex commands of the user without direct input, allows them to speak, and allows them to remember things. 

Blade. Warforged Automaton. Envoy. Rogue. Assassin. Spy. Light Armor. Created by a goblin artificer. 

Church. Warforged Automaton. Envoy. Cleric. Druid. Combat Medic. Healer. Unarmored. Created by a draenei artificer. 

Book. Warforged Automaton. Envoy. Entertainer. Bard. Trained actor, cook, dancer, musician, painter, photographer, playwright, poet, sculpture, singer, theatre thespian, & writer. Is with them to catalog their memoir. Created by a gnome artificer. 

Scout. Warforged Automaton. Skirmisher. Scout. Gunslinger. Ranger. Sniper. Sharpshooter. Archer. Recon. Composite plating. Medium Armor. Created by a gnome artificer. 

Commander. Warforged Automaton. Heavy Assault. Paladin. Cleric. Shock Trooper. Juggernaut. Heavy Plating. Heavy Armor. 8 foot tall. 500 pounds. Created by a dwarf artificer. 

Enforcer. Warforged. Automaton. Fighter. Bodyguard. Heavy Plating. Heavy Armor. 7 feet tall. 450 pounds. Created by a draenei artificer.

Clockwork Assassin. 

Clockwork Servant. 

Clockwork Soldier.

Clockwork Guardian. 

[blooboy]

I feel like a druid and wizard fighting would result in the druid getting pissed they can't cast spells from counterspell, turns feral and attempts to viciously tear the wizard apart, but also can't do that because of the wizard having mage armor and casting shield. Another thing is that this could feasibly last a while as long as they don't straight up use power word kill while they're in animal form, as the only damage that transfers out of wild shape, is the leftover damage from that that took the remainder of your hp in wildshape form, meaning that as long as the remainder is low and you've got enough uses, you just keep getting back up because you quote "Got that dog in you." With this in mind, it leads me to believe that they are the class that naturally survives encounters the best out of all of them, which is extremely impressive for a spellcaster class. Meaning that this would also be the class that would be the most likely to be in an abundance in comparison for high leveled classes. That is until 20th level where the druid ignores somatic and verbal components, and suddenly you've got a pigeon terrorizing an old man, as the primal force of nature ruins their life for a bit until the druid gets knocked out of wild shape for the wizard to realize nature didn't turn on him as he first assumed, it was just beef with another oldy that can live ten times longer than natural, and that the elf he had beef with 500 years ago turned into an arch druid with a seething grudge and the power of nature as their tool of revenge. Now one of the major tactics of druid that is extraspecially terrifying due to the action economy is summons, so you see this guy turn into a bear and a pack of eight wolves surround you as this bear starts harnessing the power of mother nature to ruin your life for littering (placing metal armor on the ground as you enter a stream in the middle of the woods to bathe) Now with that lifespan finally brought up after high level play, I don't not believe they would get bored with their abundance of time and start creeping on daily lives just people watching, because they're too disconnected on an age gap level, but still too physically fresh for their mind to deteriorate from age related issues, meaning that the odds of a wood elf archdruid that's lived for 4,000 years, swoops by one village daily for the past 500 years as a bird and screams extra loud for Billy to get out of bed to do his chores is more likely than you think.

[raiiryuu]

[  STEPPING  BACK  ]:      while they’re both attending a particularly lively and crowded party, both muses, craving a moment of peace and fresh air, accidentally go to the same balcony. unwilling to leave, they sit together, and begin to talk as the party spins on behind their backs. // from chico

⚡︎ SETTINGS WITH POTENTIAL ⚡︎ -@quiiscnt

Laxus was grateful for the glass doors separating the balcony from the main hall, their slow slide closed behind him muffling the din from inside. He could still hear most everything fairly well but it was less distinct, easier to tune out. The cooler air was a relief, as well, prompting a slow breath as the tension in his shoulders finally started to ease.

He leaned one arm on the railing while the other dug into a semi-hidden pocket in his coat, pulling a small cigar case free and holding it level with his other arm. He paused a second, tracking footsteps as they walked past the balcony doors, then once they'd moved on he chanced tugging a cigar free and holding it between his teeth while the case was closed up and returned to its spot. Hands shielding the end from the slight breeze, his lightning magic striking precise points caused a flickering light almost like a flame as he got it to light and then settled back, looking out over the city lights below.

These streets had been mostly rubble, a few months ago. But if Magnolia could do anything after housing Fairy Tail so long, it was rebuild. He watched a family walking down the street, heading home from the day's celebrations -- a kid that couldn't have been older than ten bounced between his parents, one of his hands in each of theirs, crowing about how Miss Erza told me I could be a Fairy Tail mage someday! The thought brought a slight smile to his face, but it slowly faltered as the kid's voice changed in his mind, the parents replaced with a familiar figure.

Grandpa, aren't you taking part in Fantasia? I promised I'd watch it with you this year, didn't I? Oh! That's right!

He shook his head to clear the memory from his mind, huffing a smoke-laden breath through his nose as he heard the doors open behind him. He instinctively moved his cigar to hang over the balcony, ensuring the smoke wouldn't blow back toward the figure still silhouetted in the doorway. The scents of coffee and lavender hit him a moment later, and he arched a brow.

"....Chico? Been a bit."

[trin-llewellyn]

Trin’s eyes narrowed as she looked up from her desk, a quill in one hand; outside, silence had fallen over the floating city.

“Fuck.”

The word was uttered without inflection or emotion, said more with an air of resignation than anything else. She watched through the open window as the clouds outside rolled in, pewter-coloured and heavy with rain. The dozing cat on the corner of her desk cracked his eyes open to narrow slits, whiskers twitching as he regarded the impending deluge. He turned his head to look over at the seated mage and stretched out a lazy paw towards the window as thunder rumbled low in the distance.

“You’ll want to—”

“Yes, thank-you, David,” Trin snapped as she set the quill down and raised her wand: with a tight swish-and-flick of the rune-etched yew branch, the window slammed shut… a split second too late.

Papers lifted from her desk amidst a blur of wings and the sound of panicked flapping; bile rose in her throat. Hatred— an emotion she had never felt and could not quite place— blossomed in her chest as she laid eyes upon it.

The quacking— that vile quacking.

“I have asked you repeatedly,” she intoned firmly, “to please return to your own dimension or plane of existence.” She stared at the duck.

The duck stared back, its eyes beady in the increasingly dim light.

“Quack,” it replied.

“Yes, you’ve mentioned that,” Trin replied dryly. It was the only time in her life she would ever employ sarcasm correctly, and her only witnesses were a mistakenly transfigured ex-student and an extra-dimensional duck.

“You are stuck in a time loop and you do not even belong here,” she added.

“That’s what I’ve been trying to tell you,” the duck replied, and a second once-in-a-lifetime moment occurred as Trin’s eyes widened, leaving her momentarily agog. David-the-cat rose up and arched his back, fur bristling and ears flat against his head at the new and horrifying duck development.

Trin, having quickly recovered her senses, spoke:

“You speak Common,” she stated. On the desk, the quill sprang to life and began to scribble notes messily across a piece of parchment.

“… You can understand me?” the duck asked.

“Yes, though I am uncertain as to why,” Trin replied. She raised a bony finger and tapped her chin twice. “Do you object to—”

“Yes,” the duck interrupted, “I object to being experimented upon. I’m not even a duck!”

“I disagree, based on visual evidence and the fact that you have shat on my floor every time you’ve flown in here.”

“Everybody poops, Trin,” David pointed out as he backed away to a corner of the desk furthest from the duck, bottlebrush tail straight in the air.

“Yes, but does it have to be on my floor? It should go outside, preferably on that horrid statue by the Eventide bank,” she replied.

“It doesn’t matter where I shit!” the duck honked insistently. “Listen— I was sent here to check in on you—”

“Check in on me? Are you from the Kirin Tor?” Trin demanded. “You have to tell me if you are, it’s the law.” The duck slapped its little webbed feet impatiently on the dull marble.

“No! We were keeping an eye on you—”

“The Tor?”

“The Bronze Dragonflight,” the duck clarified.

“I did not know the Tor were in league with the Bronze Dragonflight.”

“They… they aren’t— is she right? In the head?” the duck asked as it turned its gaze on David-the-cat, who shrugged inasmuch as a cat could shrug.

“Jury’s still out on that.” He hunkered down into a compact loaf as Trin snapped her fingers between the two.

“Explanations! I still require explanations!” she said sharply. The duck looked back at her. Rain began to patter against the window.

“Your experiments— your temporal experiments— are of interest to us. Not enough to warrant us putting a stop to them,” it added quickly as Trin opened her mouth to protest, “but enough to send someone out to… gently correct the things you get wrong.”

“And what have I gotten wrong?” she asked haughtily.

“Just the one thing, actually— your conveyance factor calculations ten years ago, when you—”

“Sent Andrew accidentally back to the War of the Ancients,” Trin interrupted. “Yes, but I brought him back and wiped most of his memory. He sometimes still dreams about it, but I do not think he actually remembers anything.”

“He hit on Illidan and was nearly eaten by a dragon,” the duck pointed out.

“Yes, but he doesn’t remember it,” Trin insisted, “and I’m certain she doesn’t, either.” The duck sighed, inasmuch as a duck could sigh.

“That isn’t the point. The point is that what you’re doing is dangerous, and occasionally someone is sent to… look out for things. And to gently correct mistakes.”

“You said I’ve only made one mistake, and I corrected that one myself, without aid. Once I realised I’d forgotten to carry the two, I did the correct calculations and got him back in less than two days,” she pointed out.

“Yes, but if you hadn’t—”

“But I did.”

“But if you hadn’t—”

“But I did.”

“Guys?” David interrupted. Trin and the duck turned to look at him. “Uh, not to get in the middle of this, but just to recap— the time-locked extra-dimensional duck that’s been terrorising us for over a decade can now speak Common and has revealed themselves to not be a duck, but actually a Bronze dragon— likely a lesser one— who was sent to keep an eye on your experiments with time,” he said to Trin. “And you,” he added as he trained his yellow eyes on the duck, “need to tell us why you can suddenly speak Common.”

“I don’t know,” the duck admitted. The three lapsed into silence as the rain outside continued to fall. A minute later, Trin raised her hand— though for whose benefit, it was unclear.

“It could have something to do with the Dragon Isles being rediscovered.”

The duck blinked.

“The what?” it asked before vanishing on the spot before their very eyes.

“The Dragon— oh, bother,” Trin sighed as she looked outside to see the clouds beginning to thin on the horizon. The rain slowed and quickly trickled to a stop. David rose to his feet and jumped down from the desk.

“There’s always next time,” he said as he padded silently towards the kitchen. Trin looked down at the quill, which was hovering over a piece of parchment upon which the word ‘duck!’ had been written in increasingly wild and uneven script. She waved a hand and the quill fell motionless on the desk once more.

“I suppose,” she mumbled, her voice heavy with disappointment.

[thearcanacheck]

Wizards

Wizards are typically defined by their education and, in days of yore, it was up to the Master Wizard to teach their apprentice the widest spectrum of magic possible so they may choose their own focus of independent study. Times have changed, of course. Now, apprentice wizards enjoy a buyer’s market and may choose from a long list of masters and schools. Below are a few of the more modern environments a Wizard may cut their teeth in.

Medical School: Although priests have cornered the healthcare market, there are mages who wish to study human anatomy from a more secular perspective. Wizard-doctors may fulfil a variety of roles, beyond Curing Wounds:

Diagnosing illnesses (Divination)

Heating or cooling patients to make them more comfortable (Evocation)

Shocking patients to make them less comfortable (Evocation)

Performing transplants (Transmutation)

Analyzing mental illnesses (Enchantment)

Forging hospital paperwork (Illusion)

Assisting in post-mortem reports (Necromancy)

Wizards and Artificers have also been developing “Scroll-Surgery.” To put it simply, a tiny (and waterproof) spell scroll is implanted in a patient’s body to do beneficial things like regulate electricity or pain. Less-beneficial effects are possible too; spies are often found with scrolls of “Fireball” or “Modify Memory” etched in their molars.

Astralspace Engineering: These are Wizards who specialize in studying the countless cosmological planes which appear to be everywhere and a long way off at the same time. If you need a submarine to plunge to the depths of the Elemental Plane of Water, an inflammable suit to trek the expanse of the Nine Hells, or a list of the top ten restaurants in Sigil, these are the Wizards to turn to.

Business School: Business Wizards perform a wide variety of roles in the modern-medieval world despite not knowing much magic. Well, actually just two:

Court Wizardry: Kings are always in need of magical advice, and the same goes for lesser feudal lords, wealthy merchants, military leaders, etc.

Supply-Chain Management: Artificers are the undisputed lords of magical-item manufacturing, but once you’ve got a cursed magical ring, you need someone who can get it on the shelves.

Community College: Certain towns may be too small to support a large University and too big to rely on 1-on-1 apprenticeship. In such cases, a Wizard may come down to the public meeting place and train prospective Wizards en masse. If a student shows promise, the head wizard may write a letter of recommendation, helping them secure a scholarship to attend a larger university miles away. If a student doesn’t show promise, they may still walk away with a cantrip under their belt. Some accredited Wizards see teaching as merely a way of earning income, while others may see it as a way of earning the respect of their Alma Matter.

With Wizardry becoming more and more specialized over the years, there are a select few who still wish to embrace the full spectrum of magical knowledge. Among these Wizards, there are no master, no arch-mages, grand-chancellors or post-graduates. Every student of  studies one topic enough to become a mere dilettante and then moves on to the next.

Below is a description of the 5e homebrew subclass: Liberal Arts School

Liberal Arts School

Wizards who want to study everything. Their skills, proficiencies, and expertise would put your average skill-monkey to shame – and may even multiclass a little without neglecting their Wizardry!

Expert Savant: At level one, you become proficient in one tool of your choice and may also pick one skill you’re proficient with and gain “Expertise” in it. At level 10 you may pick a second tool proficiency and a second “Expertise.”

Integrated Education: At level 2, your education is expansive, all-encompassing, and somewhat muddled in your mind. You may choose three non-intelligence skills and those skills will always be intelligence-based for you – instead of their usual ability.

On top of that, you can pick one spellcasting class that you could normally multiclass into (For example, if you want to choose the Bard class, you’d need a charisma of 13 or higher). Whenever you choose a new spell to learn, you may choose from this class’s spell list. If you come across spell scrolls for this class, you may copy them into your spellbook. These additional spells do not count as Wizard spells for the purposes of calculating spell save DCs and attack bonuses.

Unemployable: By the 6th level, the time you’ve spent below the poverty line has certainly left its mark on you. You only need half as much food, water, and short/long rest time as you normally would.

Performance Enhancer: At level 10, you’ve learned a magical technique that could probably get you expelled from university. As an action, you can make a motion with your hands to send magic coursing through your brain. For the next 5 minutes, you can cast any un-prepared 1st level wizard spell in your spellbook and you may concentrate on two spells at once.

When the minute is over, you can no longer concentrate on spells until you complete a long rest. If you try to use this feature while you are suffering from the aftereffects, there is a 50% chance that you instead gain a level of exhaustion.

Declared Minor: At level 14, you’ve spent so long studying wizardry… it’s gotten pretty dull. You gain the benefits of one level in any other class besides wizard, with the following three catches:

HP maximum only increases by the amount the wizard class would improve normally.

Your number of spell slots only increases by the amount it normally would for a wizard.

Your character level for cantrip scaling (and similar purposes) only increases by one.

For example, if you were a Fighter 6 and Wizard 13, you could effectively become a Fighter 7, Wizard 14. So go nuts!

[saltytothecore]

Re the ask meme, I want to know about drunk cat Essek. Also Verin started it if you feel like doing two

drunk cat essek This is just fluff. tooth rotting fluff. caleb has a night in, essek has a night out, essek is intoxicated and decides he'd rather schnuggle with caleb than continue his night out

“Beauregard, you got my husband drunk.” Caleb means to sound affronted, but it comes out amused instead. “Your husband got your husband drunk. I’m just the messenger.” “Goodbye, Beauregard.” Essek grumbles into Caleb’s neck.

Verin started it this one is from AifL, but Verin and Essek have an ongoing prank war aka why Essek has War Caster (and Verin has Mage Slayer lbr)

Verin is graviturgically stuck to the wall, some ten feet up. Essek hasn’t even looked up from his book.  “Ugh, what gave me away?”Essek taps the side of this nose. “The oil on your knife.” “Seriously?” Essek must be in a good mood, because he doesn’t just drop Verin, but sets him gently back on the floor. The feeling of his magic is eerie, and it still tingles, but he is precise, and he leaves Verin back on the ground perfectly on balance. Only then does Essek look at him, closing his book but keeping his place with a finger. “Seriously.” Verin twirls the knife between his fingers, but puts it away. It’s only ceremonial anyway, barely even sharp. They’ve sparred with real weapons, but never in the Manor, where Mother might see. She’d have a fit, especially because Essek hasn’t been— Won’t— Verin cuts the line of thought off. He wants to have a good visit, and he can’t if they argue about consecution again. Arguing with Essek is a losing proposition anyway, not even Mother can make him budge if he’s dug in on a point, and she can wear down the Queen in an afternoon. “Next time, baby brother,” Essek says with a grin, reaching out and straightening the sash on his dress uniform. Verin waves off his hand, and immediately ruins Essek’s work by pulling him into a hug.  “Don’t call me that, bubby.” He can tell Essek is rolling his eyes, but he pats Verin’s back before pulling away. “Besides, I was going easy on you, I know you’re out of practice, pushing all that paper around.” Essek arches his eyebrow over that awful little smile, smug and mean. But it’s just a reflex, because it softens into something more familiar. Still a little smug, but also very fond. “Whatever you have to tell yourself.” Somehow that sounds very much like I have missed you to Verin’s ears.  It’s hard, sometimes, seeing the man his brother has become. The court forces all the worst parts of his personality to fore, simply as a matter of survival. It’s a greater relief than Verin knows how to speak that the Shadowhand can still be his bubby, at least in private.

[captain-aralias]

WIP Wednesday!

happy wednesday everyone - and thank you for tagging me @martsonmars @you-remind-me-of-the-babe @confused-bi-queer @takitalks

i asked the fic’s original author @facewithoutheart for some advice about the end of our/my @co-wipadoption fic (in which baz loses his memory of simon). 

today’s WIP Wednesday is therefore a screenshot of a comment she left about my excellent baz characterisation: 

written out (and with a bit more context) under the cut, plus tagging in return:

Baz and Penny spend hours comparing different memory spells, but by ten o’clock they’re no closer to fixing this specific problem. Fortunately, Baz is still being really nice about it.

“Don’t worry,” he says as Penny leaves for the night. “I still remember how to put my own pyjamas on. I can last the night.”  

“We will get your memories back, though,” I say, not sure who I’m trying to reassure here. (Both of us, maybe.)

He arches an eyebrow. “You know you don’t need to sound quite so heroic when you say that?”

“Yeah, well.”

“But what else can one expect from the Greatest Mage?” He arches an eyebrow. “Seriously?”

“People don’t really call me that,” I say awkwardly.

Baz grins. “Only on special occasions? When you’ve been really good.”

I laugh, even more awkwardly and hope Baz won’t notice that I’m reacting to him again. (But it’s his fault. He’s implying … And the way he’s looking at me… Merlin. It’s not right.)

tagging: @whatevertheweather @fatalfangirl  @cutestkilla @bookish-bogwitch @palimpsessed @moodandmist @angelsfalling16 @kherub @artsyunderstudy @forabeatofadrum​ @prettylightsbigcity​

obviously i’m going to edit one of those eyebrow raises out...​