#elistan

[tenth-sentence]

"The left hand is the hand of the heart," he said, placing Goldmoon's left hand in Riverwind's left hand and holding his own left hand over them.

"DragonLance Chronicles: Dragons of Autumn Twilight" - Margaret Weis and Tracy Hickman

[skull-bearer]

Chapters: 9/? Fandom: Dragonlance - Margaret Weis & Tracy Hickman Rating: Mature Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence Relationships: Dalamar the Dark/Raistlin Majere Characters: Raistlin Majere, Scrounger (Dragonlance), Dalamar the Dark, Andras Rannoch, Horkin (Dragonlance), Baron Ivor, Dunbar Mastersmate, Original Characters, Gunthar uth Wistan, Tika Waylan Majere, Caramon Majere, Kitiara uth Matar, Lemuel (Dragonlance), The Tower of Palanthas, Otik Sandath, Crysania (Dragonlance), Elistan (Dragonlance), Bertrem, Ladonna - Character, Steel Brightblade Additional Tags: Man Out of Time, Knighting, Good and Evil, And what they are, Istar, And the traumas therein, Aftermath, of everything, Trees, And the many uses thereof, First Meetings, Mages, The Conclave, Undead, Recovery, Hurt/Comfort, Falling In Love, Mages being adorable, being heroes, and villains, and what that means, Raistlin being awesome, Dalamar being the Witch Lord, And the problems therein Series: Part 2 of Invictus Summary:

The war is over. The peace is presenting problems of its own.

Chapter 8:Palanthas, the Bay of Branchala The Baron and his forces face the Grove. It does not go well.

[is-a-vampire]

to be fair to Tanis here, if I was Laurana I would 100% 'cheat' (or whatever you call being with someone else when a man who isn't actually with you demands you remain single so he can decide what to do because he's in love with another woman) on him with Elistan after all the shit he pulled, so...

"You're literally in love with another woman and refuse to commit to me in any meaningful way!"

"Okay, well, you have a male friend, so,"

I would walk away from this conversation straight to Elistan's bedchambers.

[milfmorrowind]

TES Summer Fest 2024: August 14th - ghost or hungry

@tes-summer-fest

this work has also ben posted to ao3

Lyswen’s stomach would not stop growling. It had been two days since any of them had eaten a good meal, and the meager handful of nuts she’d found on the ground that morning had long since been run through. They needed to find something substantial to eat, and soon. She crossed her arms over stomach, hoping to relieve some of the discomfort.

Cordell glanced over at her. “We’ll find something soon, Lys.”

Lyswen cringed. She hadn’t realized she was being that obvious, and now felt guilty for making Cordell worry. He did enough for her as it was. She didn’t need him thinking she couldn’t handle herself.

Ahead of them, Minsa raised a closed fist. Immediately, the group halted their trek. Minsa cocked her head to one side and sniffed the air.

“Campfire,” she said. “Close by.” She sniffed again. “They’re cooking something. Hide.”

With that, they all scrambled to their positions. Lyswen grabbed the nearest tree branch and pulled herself up onto a limb with a barely suppressed grunt of exertion. She did better than Arvan, at least, who lost his grip and fell to the ground with a winded oof. Lyswen winced as she watched his head hit the forest floor. Thankfully, he had the good sense to stay down.

Minsa dropped into a crouch and creeped forward through the greenery. Lyswen stared anxiously after her once she disappeared out of sight, listening carefully for her whistled signal– or screams of pain. She sat there for what felt like ages, but heard only rustling. Then, silence.

The whole world seemed to freeze for a moment there. She’s dead. Dead, or worse. Lyswen’s heart pounded in her ears. She looked around her, trying to catch a glimpse of one of her companions but found only Arvan, looking up at her with pure, unadulterated panic in his eyes. She swallowed and prepared herself to slip off the branch.

Minsa’s head poked in through the greenery. “All clear,” she said matter-of-factly.

Lyswen nearly fell out of the tree. Cursing, she caught herself and jumped safely down. In front of her, Arvan scrambled to his feet.

“Gods, Minnie, you scared me half to death!” Arvan brushed the dirt and twigs off his legs and fixed her with a scowl. “Why didn’t you signal?”

Minsa shrugged. “Didn’t need to. They’re dead.”

“Please tell me you didn’t kill them, Min,” Cordell said as he slipped out from his hiding place.

She shook her head. “Dead when I got there. Let me show you.”

She led them through the brush to a small clearing. In it was a pair of small canvas tents, a campfire, and, perhaps more interestingly, the corpses of what appeared to be four bandits.

Cordell knelt down next to the closest body. “They haven’t been dead for long. A few hours, at most.”

“I can’t believe whoever killed them didn’t strip the bodies,” Lilas remarked.

Lyswen looked around the clearing. Not only were the bodies untouched, save for the crossbow bolts piercing their backs, but the area around them looked relatively undisturbed. Even the fire had been left burning, though it was now little more than embers. The entire scene brought her a distinct sense of unease.

“Well, we might as well make the best of it. Look around, see if you can find anything of use.” Cordell stood and put his hands on his hips. “Especially food.”

The group of them filtered across the campsite. As they came across useful and semi-useful items, they shouted out their finds to the others.

“Jerky!” Arvan called from a tent.

“A lute,” Lilas said, strumming it experimentally.

“Rope!” Elistan shouted from an open crate.

“And grappling hooks!” his younger sister Lillisan piped.

Minsa unceremoniously flipped over one of the bandits and rifled through his pockets. “Throwing knives and an herbalism kit,” she said levelly.

Cordell kicked at the coals of the fire. “I think this kollopi is past saving. But clearly there’s food in the area. Minsa, Elistan, I think you should go hunting. We’ll stay here tonight, unless anyone has any objections.” No one spoke. “Very well. Lyswen, have you found anything?”

Reluctantly, Lyswen turned over the body at her feet. While one of the crossbow bolts in his back snapped under the weight, the other emerged from his chest with a squelch. Lyswen suppressed a gag and soldiered on. The man’s armor was relatively simple– just a leather chestpiece and pair of bracers. As she freed his arm from under him, a bow fell from his hand.

Lyswen carefully picked up the bow. It was wood, made in the Nordic style. Running her fingers along the edge, she could tell that someone had carefully carved a swirling pattern down its entire length.

“A bow,” she called out. “And a good one.”

Most of the group trotted over to her, though Lillisan kept rummaging through her crate. Minsa reached her hand out towards Lyswen, who somewhat reluctantly handed over the bow.

The scout turned the bow over in her hands and carefully tested its strength. “This matches the quiver by the fire. It’s well made.” She handed the bow back to Lyswen.

Cordell gave it a look over himself. “It is. I wonder what these people were doing here. I don’t think any of their gear was made in Valenwood.”

“I think the bow’s from Skyrim. And they look like Nords,” Lyswen offered.

“They do,” Cordell agreed. “You like that bow, Lys?”

She caught herself just before her fingers tightened around it. “It’s nice.”

He nodded. “Keep it, then.”

Lyswen’s breath caught in her throat. “But– that’s not how we do it.” And it wasn’t. As a general rule, they pooled everything they found and shared it evenly. In the case of something especially valuable or useful, like the bow, any person who wanted it could make a claim. The group would then decide who should have it, Cordell being the last voice by default. Lyswen knew she should offer the bow up and make her case for it later, but the concept of giving it up made her realize just how desperately she wanted to keep it.

Cordell shrugged. “You’re right that that’s not how we do things, but I can’t think of any reason that you shouldn’t have it. Min and I have bows already, and Elis has his sling. Lillisan’s too young to use it even if she wanted to, and Arvan and Lilas don’t hunt. You’re a fairly good shot with my bow, you might as well have your own.”

“But…” Lyswen looked around her, expecting someone to object, and praying that none of them would.

“Just keep it, Lyswen,” Arvan said, finally breaking the silence in a bored voice. “Clearly no one else wants it enough to claim it.”

“Does this mean I can have the lute?” Lilas called from over by the fire.

Cordell rolled his eyes. “As if anyone else even knows how to play it. Yes, you can keep the lute.” Lilas gave him an appreciative wink and began picking out a song. “Lyswen, you go with Minsa and Elistan. Min will show you the ropes, and hopefully the three of you can find us some real food. Sound good?”

Lyswen breathed a sigh of relief. “Sounds good.” Even though she hadn’t eaten anything, the hunger in her stomach seemed to have abided, at least for now.

[oterojgoinfla]

Check out this listing I just added to my Poshmark closet: Guess USA 2 pc swimsuit size small top medium bottoms beaded adjustable knot.

[korrektheiten]

Ch. Fleischhauer: Okkult TV #1 - Das Dämonisch Weibliche: Ivan, Janosch, Charly & Elistan im Gespräch http://dlvr.it/SswKyY

[vokunsefahliil]

ESO PCS

Since my collection of PCs has grown since the last time I played ESO, I might as well write up a little reference list for y’all (and myself XD)

Brigette Storm-Sword

My Vestige

Nord Two-Handed Dragonknight

Ebonheart Pact

Has finished the main story, Morrowind, Elsweyr, and the Clockwork City, and is running around Orsinium right now (lots of unfinished sidequests all over, though!)

BIG GORL, SOFT GORL

Pls... just let her go back to Skyrim and build furniture and make clothes and cook for her friends... she’s too soft for all this fighting...

Everybody loves her and it’s kind of hilarious to watch all these Dunmer fawning over the big soft Nord

Smooches Garyn Indoril bc screw canon

Elistan Bluebrook

A priest of Auri-El who fell victim to the Worm Cult

Bosmer Archer Templar

Aldmeri Dominion

Is... halfway through Reaper’s March?  Also, what is a main story?  He’s not a Vestige, so... ya

Tiny chatty boi who hates shoes and plays the concertina like Kass from BotW

The very definition of ‘I’m a healer, but- *cocks gun*’

High INT, high WIS, MASSIVE chaotic energy

Smooches Prince Naemon because, again, screw canon

Rayya al-Hegathe

Hero of the Covenant but not a Vestige

Redguard Destruction Staff Sorcerer

Daggerfall Covenant

Just got to Glenumbra, she hasn’t been getting much attention lately XD

Sheltered noble girl who unfortunately doesn’t understand much of how the world works...

Spoiled... brat...

Good intentions but a little pushy sometimes

Smooches Darien because... he’s Darien Gautier, okay?

Tychirendiil Elsinal

Psijic relic-hunter and one of Vanus’ oldest friends! ...until Mannimarco pushed him into a time rift and he got stuck in there for over 300 years :I

Altmer Dual Wield Warden

Aldmeri Dominion (technically)

Almost done with the Summerset questline (I’m... putting it off bc I’m not ready)

Dramatic as hell and loves showing off his tits

Gender?  Don’t even know her!

Vanus is basically his little brother but it’s hard to keep saying that when Vanus ends up being 300 years older

Smooches one of my friend’s characters!

Vaynith Sarethi

Bad bitch Dark Brotherhood assassin who decides she doesn’t want to kill people anymore and ditches them for the Thieves Guild

Dunmer Dual Wield Magickablade

Ebonheart Pact (technically)

Finished DB, working through Thieves Guild now :P I like the Thieves Guild progression much better tbh

Acts like a bitch but is actually a big softie

Seafoam is HER lion now, Fortunata!

She only likes three Brotherhood members -- Elam, Kor, and Hildegard -- everyone else can go fuck off

Smooches Raynor Vanos bc he’s a good boi

Azjadhi-daro

Anequina merchant girl who travels the province with her senche-raht little brother and helps the rebel cause

Khajiit Nightblade (I haven’t played enough to pick her style yet!)

Aldmeri Dominion (technically)

She’s a baby, so not very far into anything -- she literally just got to the dragon-attacked camp

A Good Girl who just wants things to go back to more or less normal so she and her brother can get on with their lives

Super meticulous bookkeeper -- also knows all the dirt on everybody

Dragons?  Hisses at ‘em like Khamira

Smooches Prefect Calo bc what can I say?  He’s kinda cute.

.

Please feel free to send me questions about them!  I love talking about my characters but I’d like to know what you guys want to hear!

EDIT: Turns out that most of the pictures didn't show up so here's hoping.

[imaginefe]

to apologise for the cursed v*lter take this good boy

[nightbloomwitch]

All the Wizards I've Loved Before: Inspirations for the Darkling - Dragonlance Legends: Time of the Twins - Book 2, Chapters 1-3

<--- Previous post

I’ve pulled it together now, sorry about the brief detour. Obviously we’ll revisit those points about immortality properly when we cover the Vampire Chronicles later on.

Yes I did see the news about the DitW graphic novel and I cheered. It’s so funny to me that this character Leigh hates so much will always be the one thing the series is known for.

I can't wait to see how she tries to convince us not to care about ethnic persecution and attempted child murder this time.

"cool motive, still murder", remember?

Also can’t wait for the drama that ensues if the comic adds new information or changes anything at all from the prose version. If you’ve read The Dark Tower comics, then you know exactly how wrong comic adaptations can go for tragic bad wizard backstories. Do ur worst Leigh, you will never fuck over bad wizard defenders as violently as Robin Furth did.

Every day of my life I praise Gan that Furth herself confirmed the comics aren’t canon, thus sparing me from an eternity of losing arguments with Kingverse nerds.

I’m not even going to attempt to explain all the time-travel quackery in this series until at least the second book, and even then only if I absolutely can’t avoid it.

Suffice to say for now that Caramon, Tas and Crysania have been sent over 300 years into the past, to the last days before the Cataclysm – the apocalyptic event that devastated the geography of Ansalon and signaled the departure of the gods from Krynn until their eventual return in Chronicles. Presumably Raistlin is around here somewhere as well, since he needs to get to Crysania once she’s been woken up.

Krynn was a different world 300 years ago, and in fact it was quite a bit more like Ravka, except that the Shadow Fold equivalent event that resulted in the near-destruction of the world was caused not by an overwhelming swathe of darkness, but by a ruinous blaze of light.

At that time, the most powerful city-state in the world was the shining city of Istar, capital of the Empire and seat of the Kingpriest, who was both the head of state and the supreme priest of the church of Paladine.

The Cataclysm was the gods’ retribution against the Kingpriest, who sought to purge the world of the creatures and philosophies of Evil, and even to become a god himself. The gods sent him many warnings that his ambition threatened to destroy the Doctrine of Balance that preserves the existence of all life on Krynn, however the Kingpriest and his followers refused to heed the omens, and so the gods sent ‘a burning mountain’ from the heavens (a meteor) to destroy Istar.

The true clerics – those who had genuine faith in the gods, rather than the Kingpriest – were taken directly to the afterlife before the devastation began. This is why Crysania had to be sent back in time – the only one with the power to restore her soul to her body is a true cleric in direct communication with Paladine.

However, as long as she’s alive, there’s a danger that Raistlin will convince her to help him open the Door to Darkness, and so Par-Salian’s true intention is for Crysania to be taken in the rapture along with the other clerics, where she will be beyond Raistlin’s reach forever, and, since the only other true cleric in the present time is Elistan, who is on his deathbed and can be trusted never to give in to Raistlin anyway, the mages can stop him without needing to fight him directly.

---

The narrator for Chapter 1 is Denubis, one of the lower-ranked clerics of Istar.

“This time the cleric looked more closely into the shadows formed by the huge marble columns supporting the gilded ceiling. A darker shadow, a patch of blackness within the darkness was now discernible. Denubis checked an exclamation of irritation. Suppressing the second shudder that swept over his body, he halted in his course and moved slowly over to the figure that stood in the shadows, knowing that the figure would never move out of the shadows to meet him. It was not that light was harmful to the one who awaited Denubis, as light is harmful to some of the creatures of darkness. In fact, Denubis wondered if anything on the face of this world could be harmful to this man. No, it was simply that he preferred shadows. Theatrics, Denubis thought sarcastically.

“You called me, Dark One?” Denubis asked in a voice he tried hard to make sound pleasant.

Ooh, who could this be?! Let’s jump ahead a few chapters and get a really good look:

"Standing on the fringes of the crowd was a black-robed figure. He stood alone. Indeed, there was even a wide, empty circle around him. None in the crowd came near him. Many made detours, going out of their way to avoid coming close to him. No one spoke to him, but all were aware of his presence. Those near him, who had been talking animatedly, fell into uncomfortable silence, casting nervous glances his direction.

The man’s robes were a deep black, without ornamentation. No silver thread glittered on his sleeves, no border surrounded the black hood he wore pulled low over his face. He carried no staff, no familiar walked by his side. Let other mages wear runes of warding and protection, let other mages carry staves of power or have animals do their bidding. This man needed none. His power sprang from within – so great, it had spanned the centuries, spanned even planes of existence. It could be felt, it shimmered around him like the heat from the smith’s furnace.

He was tall and well-built, the black robes fell from shoulders that were slender but muscular. His white hands – the only parts of his body that were visible – were strong and delicate and supple. Though so old that few on Krynn could venture even to guess his age, he had the body of one young and strong. Dark rumours told how he used his magic arts to overcome the debilities of age.

And so he stood alone, as if a black sun had been dropped into the courtyard. Not even the glitter of his eyes could be seen within the dark depths of his hood.

“Who’s that?” Tas asked a fellow prisoner conversationally, nodding at the black-robed figure.

“Don’t you know?” the prisoner said nervously, as if reluctant to reply.

“I’m from out of town,” Tas apologised.

“Why, that’s the Dark One – Fistandantilus. You’ve heard of him, I suppose?”

“Yes.” Tas said, glancing at Caramon as much as to say I told you so! “We’ve heard of him.”

The resounding hush that accompanies Fistandantilus everywhere he goes is reminiscent of people’s reactions to the Darkling, particularly in the early scenes in S&B (the tent scene and the presentation to the King).

S&B is very thin on physical descriptions, but I think of all the novels and films we’re going to go through, the above passage is the closest to all the physical descriptors given of the Darkling across the series. Along the same lines as the contrasting descriptions of hands given in the Chapter 11 post, Mal is described as “broad” a couple of times, whereas the Darkling is “lean” in S&B and “all lean muscle” in The Tailor, and in WWSF he’s almost androgynous with a “slender-reed build”.

The other details about power great enough to span centuries need no explanation, though of course it’s important to note that Fistandantilus has attained his greatly elongated lifespan through dark magic rather than having been born immortal, and the implications of this are explained further in the below sections. Unlike the Darkling, he feels no need to invent ridiculous cover stories about untimely deaths and secret heirs, but instead wears his perpetual youth as a badge of his absolute mastery of the dark arts.

(Note from my inner editor: This passage is nonsense because how are we able to see such detail of what his body looks like inside these voluminous robes. Cut it out).

---

Dark One

Is a bad wizard even worthy of his black robes if he doesn’t have at least three different names and titles?

Leigh doesn’t think so, and neither do most of the writers on our list. My word count is going to explode wonderfully once we get to the Kingverse and I undertake the tortuous but fascinating labour of laying out and explaining each one of the legion of titles for the Dark Man.

For future reference, the full list of the Darkling’s titles is:

The Darkling

The Black Heretic

The Shadow King (in R&R prologue)

The Starless Saint, the Starless One, The Saint With No Stars (in The Lives of Saints)

His past pseudonyms are given as:

Leonid (the first Darkling), Staski, Kiril, Kirigan, Anton, Eryk (in RoW)

Eryk, Arkady, Iosef, Stasik, Kirill (in DitW)

Raistlin is a Hero of the Lance (yes, really, a hero), and the Master of Past and Present (not as good as it sounds, I only call him this when I’m making fun of him), but oddly enough it’s Fistandantilus’ title of ‘the Dark One’ that was semi-appropriated for TGV.

Where the title ‘Darkling’ originally comes from is something that, surprisingly, Leigh never seems to have been asked about, even after all the fuss and bother about changing it into a ‘slur’ on the show.

Dr Johnson’s dictionary defined ‘darkling’ as:

“a participle, as it seems, from darkle, which yet I have never found. Being in the dark, being without light: a word merely poetical.”

‘Poetical’ is the key, here. Historically, the word appears to have been used only in poetry, and was so rare that even Johnson couldn’t find evidence to speculate on the etymology of it. The only pre-20th century prose usage I can find is from Coleridge, who was, of course, a poet.

Like so many words, the earliest recorded use of the word ‘darkling’ is in Shakespeare, not as a noun but as an adverb meaning ‘in the dark’ or ‘in a dark way’. Shakespeare used it three times – Act 2, Scene 2 of A Midsummer Night’s Dream, Act 1, Scene 4 of King Lear, and most interestingly:

CLEOPATRA: O sun,

Burn the great sphere thou mov’st in. Darkling stand

The varying shore o’ the world!

Act 4, Scene 15, Antony and Cleopatra (c. 1607)

In modern English this line, from Cleopatra upon seeing Antony’s dead body, might be rendered as, “O Sun, burn away your orbit. Let all the shores of the world stand in darkness!”

The image of the sun breaking free of its orbit and burning out relates very well to Alina’s powers burning out and leaving her ‘orbit’ by being transferred to the otkazat'sya, as Mal’s corpse lies nearby.

As for the ‘shores of the world’, the other appearance of ‘darkling’ I want to draw specific attention to is Matthew Arnold’s 1867 poem Dover Beach:

And we are here as on a darkling plain

Swept with confused alarms of struggle and flight,

Where ignorant armies clash by night.

The whole of Dover Beach connects incredibly well with TGT and I intend to return to it in full in the eventual Shadow Fold post.

Here’s another good one:

I had a dream, which was not all a dream.

The bright sun was extinguish'd, and the stars

Did wander darkling in the eternal space,

Rayless, and pathless, and the icy earth

Swung blind and blackening in the moonless air;

- Lord Byron, Darkness (1816)

According to Leigh’s 18 May 2012 blog post for Pub(lishing) Crawl, The Darkling was her original working title for S&B, but she thought it was too similar to Kristin Cashore’s Graceling, and she even considered changing the character’s name.

The other potential title she seemed to like the most, saying she was “smitten” with it, was The Black Shore, and I wonder whether she loved that title so much because it evokes both Shakespeare and Arnold’s poem.

Presumably at some point ‘darkling’ became a noun meaning ‘creature of darkness’, and I have very occasionally seen it used that way in other places, but if there’s any evidence of the transition, I can’t find it.

The only thing that ties the word ‘darkling’ directly to any of the other wizards on our list is this description of the Ageless Stranger in Book 5, Chapter 7 of The Gunslinger:

“He darkles. He tincts. He is in all times.”

This description recurs a few times in The Dark Tower (series) in relation to different characters. As for where Stephen King got it from, who knows. What does it mean? Unlike the Stranger, I only have so many hours, so we’ll have to come back to it later, along with the question of why wizards always seem to have so many names.

---

Fistantandilus was vaguely alluded to in Chronicles, but this is the first time in the series that he’s appeared in person and so the narration goes out of its way to confirm that he is, at this specific time, a human (hence why light does not harm him).

The reason I point this out is because it will become relevant Later. The D&D alignment system which dictates the actions characters of various religions and species are and aren’t permitted to take against other characters, far from strangling the story, is actually an extraordinarily good device for keeping the writers honest. There are no moral double standards in favour of the heroes; everyone must act in accordance with their alignment or face the consequences.. Switching alignments is possible,but it’s a momentous occasion when it happens, since it often results in in permanent excommunication from family, friends, and socio-political groups.

Although Fistandantilus is human for now, Dragonlance doesn’t intend for the reader to consider him as a human most of the time.

Fistandantilus is the type of character I refer to as an ‘Outsider’. In this specific genre of psychological metaphor stories about epic battles between light and darkness, where light is personified in an ‘ego’ character and darkness in a ‘shadow’ character, due to the requirement that the ego and shadow be ‘integrated’ or reconciled in the end in order for psychological healing (outwardly manifested as world saving and world healing) to take place, the ego and shadow characters are not ‘hero’ and ‘villain’ but rather they are both protagonists who antagonise one another with opposing moral codes, until they must put aside their differences and combine their strengths in order to defeat the true villain who is endangering the world.

The Outsider is not always physically powerful in his own right (and in fact usually isn’t, since the majority of the story is focused on the rivalry of the ego and shadow characters), but may be a character who lurks in the background and tempts, corrupts or coerces other characters into carrying out his will. Since the ‘shadow’ character embodies humanity’s ‘dark’ or negative qualities such as selfishness, jealousy and fear, it’s the shadow character who is more vulnerable to the Outsider’s manipulation. In some cases, the Outsider need not even be present in the story, and might be a villain who was already defeated, but it’s the lingering effects of the trauma inflicted by the Outsider that must be overcome.

In SFF it’s common for the Outsider to be non-human, or a human who has willingly surrendered their humanity, which exempts the reader from any need to sympathise with them, and exempts the characters from needing to abide by any in-universe moral standards regarding the treatment of humans. This is useful in D&D settings where committing ‘murder’ of any sentient being is considered to be the worst sin, because killing an undead isn’t counted as murder.

Although he’s technically alive in the past, as we heard in the previous chapters, Fistandantilus learned magic that allowed him to escape from death and bind his soul to the Tower of High Sorcery until he could claim a new vessel for it. Mortality is one of the defining traits of humanity on Krynn, and trying to extend one’s natural lifespan is a grave sin, because it’s an act in defiance of the design of humans as they were created by the god Gilean at the beginning of time. Thus, there’s a clearly defined and indisputable justification in Dragonlance for why humans trying to become immortal is in violation of the laws of nature. When he used magic to extend his mortal lifespan, and later became a spirit and tried to claim another body, Fistandantilus lost the ‘right’ to be treated as a human, both by the other characters in the story and by the reader.

This ego/shadow/Outsider plot structure is the structure of Legends. Fistandantilus in his original lifetime was a rogue operator – a mysterious but legendarily evil figure who had no known origin, no allegiances, no weaknesses – and the Black Robes of the present day have no desire to see him return. It’s the possibility of Fistandantilus’ return by his possession of Raistlin that convinces Ladonna to go along with Par-Salian’s time travel plan.

Raistlin is not an Outsider. He’s a human, from the same hometown as most of the other heroes; he went to school; he did mercenary work with his brother. As much as he likes to pretend otherwise, he has friends and family who care about him. Until the events of Chronicles, his life wasn’t remarkably different from anybody else’s (Krynn being full to bursting with adventuresome types). Raistlin is the ‘shadow’ character in the possession of the Outsider, and so the goal of the story is not to defeat him, but for the ‘ego’ characters (Caramon and Crysania) to redeem him by breaking him away from Fistandantilus’ malevolent influence, and preventing him from sacrificing his own humanity in his attempt to become a god.

This is a plot structure we’re going to see several more times, in both its most simple and most complicated forms in the Stephen King novels, and in the Vampire Chronicles as well, where Lestat and his allies who try to exist by human(ish) standards are often pitted against the really evil vampires and demons and so on.

TGT seems to be attempting something along these lines but it’s very muddled because there’s a character missing. Alina is the ‘ego’ and the Darkling is the ‘shadow’, that’s straightforward enough, but the Darkling is also the Outsider.

As we said above, the ego and shadow characters are usually both humans, but the Outsider is usually a non-human so it can be destroyed without breaking the moral bounds of the story. If anything, it seems that Alina is the ‘ego’ and Aleksander (being the ‘human’ aspect of the Darkling) is the ‘shadow’, with his persona as the Darkling being the Outsider (representing the use of merzost that corrupted him) but ‘Aleksander’ can’t be separated or redeemed away from the Darkling, due to the story’s insistence that use of merzost for any reason is unavoidably and irreversibly corrosive to one’s humanity. According to the end of R&R, Aleksander’s humanity was worth mourning, but it wasn’t worth saving, and in RoW Alina seems to no longer care about Aleksander at all.

There’s an odd turn in the sequel books where the Darkling’s humanity is no longer represented by Aleksander but rather by Yuri, but I’ll elaborate on that in a future post.

---

“Why does the Kingpriest keep him around the court? Why not send him away, as the others were banished?”

He said this to himself, of course, because – deep within his soul – Denubis knew the answer. This one was too dangerous, too powerful. This one was not like the others. The Kingpriest kept him as a man keeps a ferocious dog to protect his house; he knows the dog will attack when ordered, but he must constantly make certain that the dog’s leash is secure. If the leash ever broke, the animal would go for his throat.”

Ah, this sounds familiar. I’m sure it’s coincidence, but I like the way the dog metaphor relates back to all the other dog/wolf metaphors listed in the Chapter 7 post.

The ‘sinister court mage’ character type in modern fiction probably goes back to tales of John Dee in the court of Elizabeth I (who was possibly the inspiration for Spenser’s Archimago and/or Busirane in The Faerie Queene, and Shakespeare’s Prospero in The Tempest), as well as Marlowe’s Dr. Faust in the court of Charles V, with some later influence from the assorted evil viziers (or Wazirs) from Sir Richard F. Burton’s translation of the Arabian Nights. Of course, the most famous Slavic ‘court mage’ was the rogue monk Grigori Rasputin, whose historical life shares a handful of superficial similarities with the Darkling’s, but instead Rasputin was primarily the inspiration for the Apparat:

I also love that you've got a religious mystic, an adviser to the royal family who's one of the more sympathetic figures at court. Are you trying to rehabilitate Rasputin?

I wanted to play with the idea...that when you abdicate power, when you give it to someone else, bad things happen. It doesn't matter if you give it to somebody good or somebody bad. The easy thing is with great power comes great responsibility. Yeah, yeah, yeah. But there are a lot of ways to abdicate power. You can hide power, you can delegate it...One of the appeals of Rasputin is he has the answers. One of the appeals of the Darkling is he has the answers. These people turn to Alina because they want her to have the answers. It's a very compelling thing to look to someone else to lead. And I wouldn't say that I was trying in any way to rehabilitate Rasputin, who, frankly, given how hard it was to kill him, I wouldn't want to bring him back. But the Apparat is meant to evoke a lot of our suspicions and fears about the particular character. People who don't know anything about Russian history know that name.

- The Atlantic, 20 June 2012

The Darkling’s political meddling has the most in common with Flagg’s performance in Eyes of the Dragon, so we’ll defer an in-depth discussion of the trope to that book.

“The doors swung open, emitting a glorious light. His time of audience had come.

The Hall of Audience first gave those who came here a sense of their own meekness and humility. This was the heart of goodness. Here was represented the power and glory of the church. The doors opened onto a huge circular room with a floor of polished white granite. The floor continued upward to form the walls into the petals of a gigantic rose, soaring skyward to support a great dome. The dome itself was of frosted crystal that absorbed the glow of the sun and moons. Their radiance filled every part of the room.”

Resemblant of the palace of Istar is the bright opulence of Ravka’s Grand Palace:

“...we were climbing the white marble steps to the Grand Palace. As we moved through a spacious entry hall into a long corridor lined with mirrors and ornamented in gold, I though how different this place was from the Little Palace. Everywhere I looked, I saw marble and gold, soaring walls of white and palest blue, gleaming chandeliers, liveried footmen, polished parquet floors laid out in elaborate geometric designs.”

The point of including Fistandantilus in the Kingpriest’s court is to once again emphasise Dragonlance’s philosophy of balance between light and dark. The Kingpriest is the world’s most powerful user of light magic, and Fistandantilus is the only one who can balance him with powers of darkness. It’s once Fistandantilus disappears from the court that the final days begin, because then the Kingpriest’s path on his quest for godhood is unobstructed.

I think TGT is trying to take this approach to the Darkling’s presence in Ravka’s court, but it’s not communicated well because the Darkling is the primary villain, whilst the Lanstovs are an impotent secondary distraction, and so much of the story’s moralising focuses on scolding Alina and the Darkling for using their magical powers. In a way, the King and the Darkling do keep one another in check – the King (with the support of the otkazat'sya peasantry) and the First Army prevents the Darkling from just taking over the country himself, whilst the Darkling prevents the nobility and the church from carrying out pogroms on the Grisha population.

The design of the Grand Palace is contrasted with that of the Little Palace, which is built of dark wood. The diamond-encrusted Grand Palace is presumably supposed to indicate the unfeeling ignorance of the nobility, but the Little Palace with its painstakingly carved wood paneling and mother-of-pearl-inlaid-everything is not very much less grandiose, merely a bit more naturalistic, and the detachment of the Grisha from the common people is also drawn attention to through the Darkling’s pantomime insistence on peasant-inspired food and clothing.

In Legends, the Kingpriest and Fistandantilus are both equally bad – one is trying to rule the world by becoming the supreme god of Good, the other by trying to become the supreme god of Evil, and for either of them to succeed will cause the end of existence – whilst both must be removed personally, the story’s ultimate solution in the end is not to eliminate the church or the wizards or the powers of light and darkness, but to ensure that the balance between them is maintained by teaching people on both sides to be good and to love and respect one another.

In TGT, the King and the Darkling are both equally(?) bad, but the King is villainous mostly on a personal scale – his primary crime being his assault of Genya, with the poverty of the peasants being as much a consequence of the centuries of invasions by other countries as much as anything internal to Ravka – whereas the Darkling has world-ruling ambitions which are couched in similar terms to godhood in Dragonlance. The two are not equals in ambition or competence, and so the Darkling is made out to be the more credible and sinister threat. Both the King and the Darkling must be removed personally in the end as well, but the conclusion of TGT doesn’t come out the same as Legends, because of TGT’s stances that darkness is evil and must be purged, and that an excess of Grisha power renders one inhuman and unfit to rule (until RoW, apparently).

There’s a lot of story to go yet, so we’ll wait until the end of Legends to consider the differences between the conclusions in proper detail.

---

“You mentioned the Dark One. What do you know of him? I mean, why is he here? He-- he frightens me.”

…

“Who knows anything of the ways of magic-users,” he answered, “except that their ways are not our ways, nor yet the ways of the gods. It was for that reason the Kingpriest felt compelled to rid Ansalon of them, as much as was possible. Now they are holed up in their one remaining Tower of High Sorcery in that cast-off Forest of Wayreth. Soon, even that will disappear as their numbers dwindle, since we have closed the schools. You heard about the cursing of the Tower at Palanthas?”

…

“That terrible incident!” Quarath frowned. “It just goes to show you how the gods have cursed these wizards, driving that one soul to such madness that he impaled himself upon the gates, bringing down the wrath of the gods and sealing the Tower forever, we suppose. But, what were we discussing?”

“Fistandantilus,” Denubis murmured, sorry he had brought it up.

…

Quarath raised his feathery eyebrows. “All I know of him is that he was here when I came, some one hundred years ago. He is old – older even than many of my kindred, for there are few even of the eldest of my race who can remember a time when his name was not whispered. But he is human, and therefore must use his magic arts to sustain his life. How, I dare not imagine.” Quarath looked at Denubis intently. “You understand now, of course, why the Kingpriest keeps him at court?”

“He fears him?” Denubis asked innocently.

Quarath’s porcelain smile became fixed for a moment, then it was the smile of a parent explaining a simple matter to a dull child. “No, Revered Son,” he said patiently. “Fistandantilus is of great use to us. Who knows the world better? He has traveled its width and breadth. He knows the languages, the customs, the lore of every race on Krynn. His knowledge is vast. He is useful to the Kingpriest, and so we allow him to remain here, rather than banish him to Wayreth, as we have banished his fellows.”

The grisly tale about the Tower being cursed is the sort of thing you could imagine forming the basis for one of the stories inThe Lives of Saints, but what happened wouldn’t be told in detail until later books, so we’ll skip over it.

Once again the comparison between Legends and TGT serves to emphasis how the Darkling doesn’t work as an Outsider character. Rather than abandoning the Grisha, he forms the Second Army and builds the Little Palace for the protection of the Grisha and of Ravka because he sees himself as being part of those groups and subject to the social contract of mutual rights and responsibilities with them, as opposed to Fistandantilus who does nothing to protect or defend anyone but himself, because he has no interest in other mages, no known homeland, and no national allegiance.

Fistandantilus lurks around the Kingpriest’s court seemingly for no other reason that because he can, because it brings him a perverse joy to be the only mage to be indispensable enough to remain. It’s proof that he’s more powerful and more feared than any of his fellows. Although wizards as a social class are being persecuted, this is no concern of his; he’s exceptionally self-serving even for a Black Robe.

I think the chatter about Fistandantilus’ use to the court because of his vast knowledge is implicit about the Darkling in S&B, though there aren’t any quotes to support it. The Darkling (under a succession of false identities) has also traveled the world extensively:

“Aleksander had traveled throughout Ravka, to places he and his mother had visited before, to distant lands where he’d gone on his own to study. He knew the secret ways and hiding places of Grisha...”

We get a regrettably brief glimpse at one of his youthful adventures in WWSF, but other than that all his centuries prior to the trilogy, and all the wondrous things he must have learned about, are left to our imaginations.

---

If there’s one argument I’m likely to beat to death by the end of this exercise, it’s that the ongoing Grisha/Fjerda/Shu Han conflict and the overwrought analogy of the Grisha as fantasy Jews is what killed the whole story.

Fistandantilus is a cut-and-dry villain because he has never cared about anyone or anything other than himself, and he conspires against and takes advantage of people in his own social groups, not for any kind of ‘greater good’, but rather for his own gain and no other reason.

The Darkling’s status as the leader of his own oppressed minority group and the very person who originally built, and subsequently spent hundreds of years maintaining, all the social infrastructure that protects them from harm makes him too sympathetic. Regardless of how many Genyas there might have been along the way, it’s inarguable that he has saved far more lives than he has ruined. He’s not completely in the right, he does need to be stopped from destroying the world with the Shadow Fold, but unlike Fistandantilus he’s not completely in the wrong, either, because the cause is worthy.

The Darkling creating the Second Army and the Shadow Fold is the only thing that's kept the Grisha alive and kept Ravka from losing the war. The story acts like the Darkling is the main problem but in fact he's a symptom and a victim of it. No one can 'move on' from the war or the persecution because it's still happening.

In Legends, the war is over, but everyone has PTSD. Raistlin really is the main problem now, but the story still acknowledges that all of this is because he's suffering. He talks a good game to Crysania about how there are all these neglected and impoverished populations suffering out there in the world and he’s the only one who can do anything about it, but he’s not part of any of those groups, and no one has asked for his help nor has he gone to anyone and offered it; he’s denying people self-determination because he’s the chosen one and the cleverest and most powerful wizard ever, and so he thinks he knows better than anyone else. The failed time travel plot relates to the theme that you can't change the past, but you can heal from it and create a better future. But that theme only works because the war really is over.

---

Full disclosure: ‘Outsider’ is a term I made up because I have never seen this famous and very common plot structure seriously written about anywhere. My term comes from Stephen King’s ‘Outer Dark’, which was named after the Cormac McCarthy novel, which was named after Jesus’ line from Matthew “But the children of the kingdom shall be cast out into outer darkness”.

If there is an existing technical term for this type of plot/character I WOULD VERY MUCH LIKE TO KNOW, PLEASE.

---

‘Darkling’ is very cute and almost twee, like‘Inkling’. The childlike FF black mages (like Vivi) could be called darklings, but it’s not much of a title for an ancient and mighty sorcerer, is it? It only works for him in the books because he’s such an ickle baby and he’s stuck at about 21 years old.

I was really disappointed when I read that the book was originally titled after the Darkling, it seems that Alina barely exists even in the author’s mind, she’s just a vessel for Leigh to get revenge on this conglomerate imaginary wizard (for whatever reason). LotR is named after Sauron but that’s the only other epic fantasy villain title I can think of. Even Stephen King names his fantasy novels after the heroes. It’s more like naming a horror novel after the monster (Dracula, Phantom of the Opera, IT).

---

I wonder whether Leigh just plain forgot that Raistlin is the chosen one and personally saved the world in Chronicles and is an official capital-H Hero in-universe. That won’t be the last time, either. He’s very good at Hero-ing actually, I am so proud of him.

Fistandantilus is great, he’s only my 4th favourite of the Black Robes but that’s not much of a slander because Dragonlance has the best total cast of anything ever.

Less than zero redeeming qualities, this guy, he is without doubt the most evil human who ever lived. You can tell that Leigh never read any of the books beyond the original 6 because Fistandantilus’ later-revealed backstory was designed to show what Raistlin would have been like without Caramon, which is to say really fucking terrifying and absolutely nothing like the Darkling. Leigh underestimates both how good and how evil he can be.

It’s always funny seeing perspectives of people who are totally oblivious to fandoms. Raistlin is the most beloved character in all of D&D history other than maybe Drizzt on a good day. Strahd is the new hotness but he’s just a pretty face and doesn’t inspire the same bottomless pathos.

The fact that Leigh thought she could retool him into a villain and murder him is a level of insane hubris that’s worthy of Fistandantilus. That’s exactly what Fistandantilus tried to do to him and IT DIDN’T WORK BECAUSE OTHER PEOPLE LOVED HIM TOO MUCH, tell me more about how you didn’t learn anything from the story at all lmao

I wonder if she thinks Lestat is the villain of his own novels too.

Next post --->

[netsimmer]

I searched "Blades" on tumblr and it:

I promise I'm okay! I'm looking for Elder Scrolls: Blades and the Blades, Dragon Guard, and just Elder Scrolls things in general for @elistan-and-co , my Elder Scrolls blog.

ANYWAY!

[meldelen]

Dragons of Autumn Twilight - A review (that will mostly get me blocked by the fandom)

*stares into the distance* I am glad it exists. 

How mean some people are with criticism, really. I’ve been reading fantastic literature since I was a child, and for the record I started with The Lord of the Rings. That's why I have very little patience and empathy with those who throw garbage to the Dragonlance saga as something cheap and unworthy, comparing it to Tolkien's work. Well, I am a Tolkien fan as much as I am a Dragonlance fan. Whatever some may claim, they are not bad books. It's not a bad saga at all, even if it came out of a Dungeons & Dragons game. The world is well built, the characters are diverse and well defined, the story is entertaining and easy to follow, and if you stay loyal for at least 6 books - the main core, which is the Chronicles and Legends - you get to have a lot, much love for this story.

And now we are going into this adaptation to animation cinema. I saw it yesterday in fear and terror due to the bad reviews I had read. Truth is, it hasn’t been as bad as I expected.

Yes, compressing Dragons of Autumn Twilight - the first book of the Chronicles - in an hour and a half film is risky and the result is that the pace is overwhelming and many events and details have been removed, does this surprise anyone? 

Yes, combining 2D and 3D animation is a terrible idea, it looks awful.

Yes, the animation of the characters - not the design itself - is quite awkward and limited.

Well, maybe Goldmoon shouldn’t look THAT white, after all. She’s canonically a WOC, even if her hair is golden and silver. She should look like Riverwind, at least for the skin tone.

BUT - the soundtrack is beautiful and enough immersive, the voice acting is more than correct - I actually enjoyed Kiefer Sutherland as Raistlin -; the characters are well defined; the movie is fast-paced and entertaining, even too brief. In fact, I kinda regret that at least the second and third parts of the trilogy were never adapted, because we were left in a cliffhanger at the end. Unfortunately, with the reception it had, it was expected they tried no more.

The main problem has been a lack of budget. This story needs a serious and deep investment; I would say a generous series in the style of Game of Thrones on HBO or The Witcher on Netflix ... because one film, or several, are not enough to adapt well the complexity of the world of Krynn and this story. As long as this doesn’t happen, I am glad that this film exists. I would take it as a modest work of animation for fans and to introduce children to the world of Dragonlance. Why not? I wish these beloved books were better known and loved, because they are totally worth it. Meanwhile, this movie would serve as an introduction. Of course, everyone must read the books.

In short, I give it a 6 out of 10. It’s decent enough, it’s entertaining, it shows some care. And in the name of Raistlin, my favorite character, who’s mostly well portrayed - when I was expecting a catastrophe  - I absolve this cringy little treasure of all its sins.

Did I say you should read the books? You cannot imagine how far they will take you.

Average reaction of the fandom to this movie.

Moments that make it worthwhile:

- Raistlin. His voice, his crooked smile, that horrible cough - I spit my coffee the first time I heard it I swear to God - and it’s hilarious he doesn't bother to cover his mouth. - A goblin spits out a very thick... spittle... on Tanis' forehead. - Caramon staring at Tika's breasts and butt, swaying them around the inn. - Flint, sounding suspiciously like Gimli from The Lord of the Rings, dressed as a woman, with huge fake boobs, saying, "I want to make one thing clear. This never happened." - Tasslehoff yelling: "Where are the gods when we need them!" and Fizban replying, "Here, let me." Only fans will understand why this is so funny. - Caramon lifting Tasslehoff up to his face level. I didn't know I needed this. - Raistlin and Sturm being mean to each other. This cannot be more canon. - Laurana kissing Elistan on the mouth and dancing with him. WTF?! ??!?! - Raistlin casts a friendship spell on Bupu. Bupu hugs his waist. Caramon comments, "It looks like you overdid a little." - Tanis sighing: "I wish Kitiara has survived all of this, wherever she is". Change to the scene with Kitiara turned into a dragon highlord, completely invested in the Evil’s plan and smirking wickedly. - A draconian licks longly and slowly Laurana's face. - Raistlin throwing hints about the promiscuity of his stepsister and about Laurana flirting with Elistan for the sole purpose of tormenting Tanis. - Did I already say that Raistlin is great? - The human form Khisanth chooses to speak to Lord Verminaard is that of a practically naked succubus. - Also, although this is what Dragonlance fans are used to, the same happens to Takhisis. - AND Raistlin.

[tenth-sentence]

"Fizban."

"DragonLance Chronicles: Dragons of Winter Night" - Margaret Weis and Tracy Hickman

[cosmik-homo]

Going into the tag for Margaret Weis and seeing not one but two Deep Profound Elistan qoutes is hilarious cause I know for a fact she hated that guy, hated writing him hated him being around just all around couldn't wait to leave him behind and like. A Sherlock Holmes situation

[dalamars-nipple]

Modern Day AU

Okay, so a friend ( @aperturebots ) and I were thinking up modern day Dragonlance stuffs and I wanted to share how we’ve viewed some of the characters:

Dalamar: 28 year old computer science and game design graduate from England. He packed up his life, sold his Harley Davidson and moved to the Big Apple to work for a games firm as a coder. Raistlin is in charge of his training and also offers him a room in the 3 bed house he shares with Caramon and Tika. Dalamar has a kind of side job as a bare-knuckle fighter which he is surprisingly good at and doesn’t understand American culture at all; never tipping, refusing to have anything to do with guns and being overly British, such as that one time he bought and wore overalls for a week because they’re dungarees damnit!

Raistlin: 26 year old games coder with bronchitis. His health is tenuous at best and a recent reaction to some meds have altered the pigments in his hair, eyes and skin, leaving him horribly pale with amber eyes and ashen hair, while Caramon’s is still a luscious brown. He’s skinny as a rake and has multiple allergies, most notably gluten and peanuts. He writes awful cheesy fantasy novels on the side and while usually they don’t yield much profit, he is dating one of his fans, Crysania. He has an ugly rescue cat named Dog that is vicious and only seems to like Raistlin.

Crysania: 27 year old Philosophy graduate. Her family is rich; her grandparents are surgeons, her Dad is Elistan, head of a local church and she has a personal driver named Denubis. Crysania is currently unemployed and has a disease degrading her eyesight, which combined with her horrible lack of common sense is making it hard to find work. She is a fan of Raistlin’s trashy novels and asked him out for coffee at a book signing, which he accepted. She is allergic to cats.

Caramon: Twin to Raistlin and personal trainer at the gym. He has anxiety problems, especially where Raistlin is concerned and worries about him near constantly. He’s dating Tika, a second year culinary arts student.

Denubis: Crysania’s driver. He served a tour in Afganistan and lost a foot, though he isn’t sour about it and enjoys his new job.

Elistan: Crysania’s father and a surprisingly practical Christian. His view on cruelty in the world, such as Raisltin and Crysania’s afflictions is one of God testing the kindness in people’s hearts. It serves him well enough that Raistlin doesn’t mind coming around for dinner.

Dog: Raistlin’s cat that hates everything but Raistlin for some bizarre reason. He is intelligent and knows Raistlin is trying to keep him away from Crysania, something he finds particularly annoying at bedtime as Raistlin tried to displace him from the man’s bed. Dog has given him warnings and will act on them if Raistlin keeps at it. He hates Tribble.

Tribble: Dalamar’s cat. She is a long haired cat and loves humans, but was adopted by Dalamar young and so hates cats, as the only cat she has met is Dog. She likes being carried and exploring, but is harassed by Dog enough that Dalamar has invested in a Mewgaroo.

[milfmorrowind]

SO in writing some stuff for tes summer fest I believe I have nailed down names and personalities for all of Lyswen's friend group, aka the valenwood irregulars! I thought I'd do a little introduction for all of them <3

Cordell: The oldest, which by child logic makes him the de facto leader of the group, although he would say that no one's in charge. At some point I said that he was a decade older than Lyswen, but in retrospect the age gap is more like 7 years. He's got a big heart and is more generous than he can really afford to be, which tends to get him into trouble. Every member of the group is sort of a sibling to the others, but Cordell has the biggest big brother energy of all of them. He hunts with a bone bow that belonged to his mother, and carries a few knives for practical purposes. While he's larger than most of the others, he's unlikely to hold his own in a fight.

Minsa: Roughly the same age as Cordell (two years younger at most) and a scout. Minsa is a mer of few words, but she has remarkably keen senses. She's the sneakiest of all of them and has the most knowledge of the flora and fauna of Valenwood. Minsa is a pretty practical and serious person, but every once in a while someone manages to get a smile out of her. Lyswen still isn't quite sure what her story is, or how she became so knowledgable; she's clearly been with Cordell for a long time, which would imply that she was orphaned fairly young, but Lyswen isn't even sure that she IS an orphan. Minsa hunts with her bow and has a bit of alchemy experience, making her the default healer. Her name is sometimes shortened to Min or Minnie.

Lilas: Somewhere between Minsa and Cordell in age, Lilas is something of a bard. He's by no means the strongest or fastest member of the group, but his enduring levity and sense of humor provide a frequently much-needed respite. Lilas has more magical knowledge than any of his companions, and while his skills are not especially practical, they are occasionally useful. I imagine most of his knowledge is in illusion and alteration, which occasionally helps them sneak in or out of places, but isn't really what you need when you're, say, trying to find dinner. Lilas generally gets along with everyone, but his perpetually easy-going attitude can get grating at times. He is especially close with Cordell. At the time that they adopt find Lyswen, the group consists solely of Cordell, Minsa, and Lilas.

Arvan: Most members of the group were orphaned or otherwise separated from their parents at a relatively young age. Arvan is the exception to that rule, having lost his parents to an illness at 13. Arvan adheres more strictly to the Green Pact than any of his companions; the rest of them have all picked a few berries or nuts in times of desperation, generally rationalizing it by saying that they aren't actually harming the plant in question, but Arvan won't participate (he tried to punch Minsa in the face the first time he saw it happen. That did not go over well.). Arvan is pretty tanky, with his fists being his main weapon. He's also the designated pack mule of the group, which is a responsibility he will gladly bear in exchange for first dibs on dinner. Despite their initial difficulties, Arvan is closest with Minsa. She's just about the only person who finds his terrible jokes funny.

Elistan: Elistan is one of the more recent additions to the group, having stumbled across them in the last few years. He's been fairly tight-lipped about his past, but the others have been able to gather that he and his younger sister, Lillisan, have been on their own for quite a while. Elistan is very protective of Lillisan, and is constantly worried about putting her in harm's way. Along with Minsa, Elistan is one of the group's primary hunters, but he uses a sling instead of a bow. Elistan's name is sometimes shortened to Elis.

Lillisan: Bright eyed and perpetually cheery, Lillisan is one of those people who you just can't help but love. Being so young, she's not exactly the most valuable asset to the group, but she is sweet and loving, and her small size makes her by far the best climber. Lillisan is naturally closest with her brother, but everyone absolutely adores her. Elistan sometimes calls her Lilli, and the others occasionally use that nickname as well.

[barkoturktv]

Karamollaoğlu: Bu hakikaten haysiyetsizlik!

Saadet Partisi’nin Kahramanmaraş Elistan 7. Olağan İlçe Kongresi’nde konuşan Temel Karamollaoğlu, AKP Grup Başkanvekili Bülent Turan’ın 100 farklı belediye AKP'ye geçiyor iddiasına sert sözlerle cevap verdi. Bülent Turan, AKP Küçükkuyu Belde Teşkilatı'nın 7’nci Olağan Kongresi'nde "Birileri kavga ederken AK Parti'nin nasıl büyüdüğünü beraber göreceğiz" demiş ve “Yüze yakın farklı belediyelerden AK Parti’ye katılım olacak" iddiasında bulunmuştu. "BU HAKİKATEN HAYSİYETSİZLİK" Saadet Partisi lideri Karamollaoğlu, Bülent Turan’ın bu sözlerine, “Bu hakikaten haysiyetsizlik” diye cevap verdi. Karamollaoğlu, “Bir de bununla övünüyorlar. Böyle bir mantık olur mu ya? Ülke böyle yönetilir mi” ifadelerini kullandı.  Temel Karamollaoğlu’nun açıklaması şöyle: “Yakında 100 tane belediye AK Parti'ye geçiyormuş. Vay canına! Nasıl olmuş bu iş? Belediye başkanı diyor ki 'Kusura bakma, ben mecburum bunu yapmaya. Bu beni utandırıyor ama mecburum. Borcu ödeyemiyorum, benden önceki belediye bunu başıma bela etmiş. Hükümet de diyor ki gel benim yanıma ben öderim.'Bu hakikaten haysiyetsizlik ya! Bir de bununla övünüyorlar. Böyle bir mantık olur mu ya? Ülke böyle yönetilir mi? Bunun adına demokrasi denir mi? Buna insanlık denilir mi? Belediye başkanlarının 100 tanesi geçecekmiş! İktidar partisine geçmeleri belki sağlanır ama ben inanıyorum ki samimi olan herkes bundan dolayı bu iktidara hınç besler.” Read the full article