#i had planned to add like a little sketch as a companion to this but maybe some other day lmao

[omaano]

SW Hades AU June Update

Other monthly updates: May - June - July - August

This month I’ve had some time to organize my notes and plans for my Star Wars meets Hades AU - I have a massive table for all of the characters, which original Hades game character they had been modeled after, and whether they need portraits/tokens/keepsakes/crests/etc. it’s colour coded and everything. (Fennec had to be cut out from the lineup and I’m hopelessly heartbroken about the whole thing* 😭)

Everyone has an icon who needs one (I’m sorry about the Echo and Fives one, okay? But they come as a package deal, and I also wanted to make sure that Echo is easily distinguishable from all the other clone characters and not just the average looking clone guy next to Fives who - by order of elimination - must be Echo), and everyone has a crest who needs one (except for maybe Barriss… I feel like that the Jedi order symbol doesn’t fully fit her, but for now I will keep it as a place holder. I can't come up with anything better for her at the moment T^T. The froggie returned to the “chtonic companions” line (it is exactly the plushie that Echo and Fives would give Grogu), and now there is Batcher too! If you notice any similarities between Batcher and Boba’s old rancor rag doll, it’s mostly because I took that one and modified it to fit the lurca hound, since they have a similar back ridge pattern.

I also think that it could be a cute in-universe thing if the Batcher doll had been modified from the rancor. Timelines are very flexible in this AU anyway, so it could be totally plausible.

Speaking of! I have a character sketch for Omega and Batcher!

It took me a while to settle on which version of Omega I wanted to put into this AU, but I am very happy with what I could come up with in the end. I had some trouble with what to do with her face, since Hades is really lacking in young teenage characters, and even Melinoe and Eris from Hades2 didn’t prove to be of much help, so I allowed a bit more of my own style to slip back in. With everything else I think it hit a nice enough balance. I mixed her s2 and s3 appearance into one outfit and gave her back her hat and old crossbow (I know she got a new one from Echo, but I prefer how this one sticks out over her shoulder).

This seems to be a girls’ update, since the next sketch I want to share concepts Bo-Katan and her Nite Owls! I’ve wanted to add them to this AU for ages, but all that armor and posing had just seemed too much of a hassle up until I had to seriously distract myself from some irl stress. So now I’ve got the trio to stand in for the fury sisters as first bosses. (I'll need to adjust Koska a little, I see it now)

God bless whoever’s decided to make one of those 30 cm action dolls of these guys, they had been so helpful when it came to looking up reference details! (While we are at details: I made Koska left handed (I think? Or opposite handed at the very least) because I had been coming up with their composition under the impression that she had her flame thrower in her right vambrace like Din and Boba do, which, upon further inspection, she does not ^^;)

Some in-universe thoughts regarding them: 1) Din can very much lose the Darksaber to whoever kicks his ass if he runs with is as his weapon of choice, and then has to return to reclaim it from that enemy (he doesn’t want to but they are in his way), and if he loses it either to her or another enemy Bo-Katan will most definitely have an opinion on the matter. 2) Boba is more than happy to swoop in as a “godly call” against Koska. If he has the option to claim the Call boon from Boba, it's a pretty good indicator that it will be Koska waiting for him at the end of the level. 3) After a while and enough encounters Axe starts showing up around and in the arena on this AU’s equivalent of the Elysium level. Paz would do anything not to have to talk about that minor detail. (Din: "Why does Axe Woves keep calling you baby girl?" Paz *steam escaping from the edge of his helmet* "how about we stop talking for a while." <- This meme has been on my mind for months, now you have to suffer it with me XD) After that it’s a boss fight of Din vs Paz and Axe.

This post is getting a bit long, so I will leave my progress with Obi-wan’s background to the next update. I will also make a separate post on the new little portrait icons, but I really liked how cute Rex and Omega looked next to each other in the big lineup Q^Q

*the only thing that made me dedicate myself to this decision with a heavy heart is that Fennec had been in the Bad Batch, and that would give me the ideal excuse to imagine her in a Hades2 inspired AU where she is helping Omega (as a stand in for Melinoe). I’ve thought a lot about this even before the test version of the game came out, and a lot of it would track now that I’ve seen some game play and story and characters but. Let’s not be delusional, I can barely keep up with this project, and the Hades2 art style, while super pretty, has a twist on the first game's art style that makes me want to cry when I think about replicating it ^^; so that just remains a nice little thought experiment.

Ventress went through the same thing, mostly because I think that in a strange way she would fit very well with Hecate's role. Especially after that s3 episode where she had her cameo with her new fancy haircut.

[goodeapple]

be nice to your neighbors.

i have a million and two wip's in my Ysilla folder and somehow, i have to add one more.

i am an exhausting person. love y'all lots!

pairing : Aemond x Ysilla (Rhaenyra'sDaughter!OC)

warnings : Aemond is a simp & Ysilla is a plant nerd. Awkward flirting. Fluff. No smut :(

word count : 2,500+

It’s so fucking early. What self-respecting tattoo shop is open at 7AM on a Sunday? On God’s day? Aegon hasn’t stepped foot in a church since he was thirteen which explains the hours, but why the fuck is Aemond here and not him?

Aemond wasn’t exactly planning on going to church today, but maybe if he had the option, his ass would be in a pew next to his mother right now instead of perfecting a sketch for an appointment that isn’t even until next week. His Americano is lukewarm, steam long blown away by the small oscillating fan tucked up on a high shelf. A row of overstuffed books, on everything from Classic Americana design to Valyrian legends he wants to detail on paper, fill up the rest of the ledge. The next one down houses a line of knick knacks he could never force himself to part with- a tiny tacky snowglobe from Harrenhal, his grandfather’s Hand of the King pin from when he was in the courts, 8-tracks from his mum’s rebellious punk phase before she went to college, and at the end, a framed photo of him and his siblings the day they opened the shop. Three identical terrified grins are spread over their faces, nervous anticipation bleeding through the black-and-white snapshot. Little pieces of his life in his little corner of the world, where he gets to do what he loves. 

And the most important little worm to him sleeps the day away in her glass vivarium by the door. Vhagar lounges under her UV bulb, baking on a large smooth stone after inhaling her breakfast. His little crocodile without the teeth. The soft garden green bearded dragon with her yellow belly has been his constant companion since he rescued her from a Oldtown pet shop when he was a pre-teen. He hid her under his bed for a full seven months before his mum found her one day when she was searching for missing socks. It was an impressive feat, one even she had to acknowledge after blowing her fucking top. 

Aemond darkens the curve of the kraken tentacle he’s sketching, a piece for a client coming all the way from the Iron Isles. The little suction cups still need more depth and he hasn’t even begun to flesh out the texture of the skin yet when the bell hanging above the shop door tinkles, signifying an end to his blissful solitude. 

“Hello? Helaena, you here?” 

Aemond drops his pencil, shoving off from his desk, grumbling as he goes. There’s still a hint of sleep in his eye and he rubs it away as he walks up the hall to the lobby. 

“We don’t take walk-in’s on the weekends and we don’t have any appointments scheduled ‘till 9. So, are you sight-seeing or are you just overly punctual?” He doesn’t mean to sound like a dick, it just comes second nature. 

The back of the head that greets him as he blinks open his eye is a pretty one, thick brunette curls pinned up with gold butterfly clips. The girl abandons the magazine she’d been leafing through, turning at the sound of his voice. The wide-eyed look that’s spread over her face emphasizes plum-shaded irises, framed by palm leaf eyes. There’s a pair of beauty marks peppered on the dawn of her cheekbone. A rosy mocha mouth is pouted before it curves up into a charming bend of itself. 

“I’m sorry, I'm not here to get any work done. I was just coming in to give something to Helaena.” The woman shimmies the large gift bag held tight in her fist as proof. “I’m a friend.”

Aemond shrugs off his disappointment. “Oh, my bad.” She’d be a gorgeous canvas. The golden brown of her skin would take color like a fucking champ. Black would be even better. Really make the contrast pop. The smooth peak of her shoulders from underneath the oversized cream cardigan she wears is a tantalizing taste of something he wants to indulge in. “She’s not here yet.”

Her expression collapses and Aemond regrets causing such a look to dim her face. “Oh damn, she told me she’d be in at this time.” 

Aemond thinks maybe he should call his big sister, considering he hasn’t received her standard “i’ll be there in 10, I PROMISE 10 MINUTES AEMMY!!” text today, when the girl’s face blooms into one of recognition.

“You’re Aemond, right?” 

“Uh, yeah- yes, yes I am.” He coughs, straightening up a bit, manners braided into every core memory he possesses. His mom is, in Aegon’s terms, a “tightass”, but damn him if he doesn’t know how to treat a woman.

“I always see you coming in and out of here, and well, you and Hel and Aegon all look alike, so I put two and two together and made four that you’re the missing piece of Three Headed Dragon.”  She gestures to the air, implying she’s speaking about the name of the shop. The gold chains layered around her neck, some with pendants and some without, jingle with her movement. Aemond likes the softness of the sound. “And when she came in for a succulent recommendation a few months back, I asked about you and she told me your name, and… yeahhh. I just didn’t want you to think I was some weirdo who’s been waiting for the perfect moment to get you alone.” 

“Oh no, I wouldn’t think that.” Aemond looks very serious, even knitting his brows in a thick, no-nonsense line, but he has to bite his lip to keep from snickering, which she notices. 

She breathes out a laugh, dipping her head in surrender. She turns to the entrance, and Aemond is worried she might leave. He doesn’t mind her company, which is a miracle considering the hour. 

“Hey-”

“Is this your’s?” She points to the hyperrealistic direwolf stencil he’d cranked out last year during an artist’s block that he couldn’t shake for the life of him. The piece is gruesome, wicked lines and keen edges that intimidate even him, and he drew the damn thing. 

“Uh, yeah. Good guess.” The black frames adorning the gallery wall are a mixture of his and Aegon’s work, all in varying shades of grays and blacks. His brother’s signature new school style is easily distinguishable to Aemond, but he admits some of their earlier sketches are more uniform than not.

“You do beautiful work.”

Aemond’s eyebrows raise and he lets the compliment warm him.

“I appreciate that. Many wouldn’t call that beautiful, but I think it has a certain magnetism to it.” He looks the woman over, using the excuse of actually searching for ink so that he can appreciate her willowy arms and the peek of shapely legs through the dash in her skirt. “Do you have any?” Aemond gestures to the wall, before gesturing to her. She shakes her head no, freeing an errant curl that falls over her forehead. Aemond picks at his joggers to keep his fingers from doing something stupid. 

“Oh no. I’m not the biggest fan of needles. Self-admittedly, I can also be a bit of a flake, so permanent artwork on my body kind of gives me hives.” She shivers and Aemond thinks her modesty is adorable.

“That’s a shame.” 

Mystery woman snaps her fingers, spinning on her toes to pin him with a look, and Aemond basks in the scent of jasmine and sea salt that wafts his way.

“If I change my mind, I know who to go to.”  She blinks suddenly, her pointed hand gliding behind her to rub at the back of neck in a bashful way. “That is, if you’d ever want to. Or, if you’re like, accepting clients.”

“For you? I think I could make an exception.” Aemond leans into the counter, settling to her level. The way the flush of her cheeks drips into the creamy sweep of her chest makes him hungry. She drops her hand, edging forward on timid toes.

“Well, aren’t you sweet.”

He doesn’t really know how to reply to that. He can feel the tips of his ears heat up, and when she tucks her lock of hair back in place, Aemond wishes he would’ve done it for her. He can see a thin line of dark walnut bracing the white of her eyes with how close he is, so close now he can smell the cinnamon on her breath from the condensating chai latte she holds in her other hand. 

“Aemond!” The back door slams and his sister’s voice floats up the hall. 

“Fuckin’ A, I’m sorry I’m late. I hit construction traffic and I had to get gas or I would’ve been pushing my Volksy here, and then I needed a coffee, believe me.” A white-blonde head of super short hair is unleashed when his sister yanks off her crocheted bucket hat, and she gasps as she catches sight of the shop’s first patron of the day.

“Good morning, muffin, I was trying to get here as fast as I could!” Helaena is a tornado of violets, lavenders, and magentas, purple her chosen color of the day as she spins into the room, tucking her backpack into the lockable cabinet by Aemond’s knees. 

The girl’s smile is a thing of beauty and even if it’s for Helaena, Aemond will keep it for himself. 

“Good morning, Hel. No worries, your brother’s been keeping me company.” 

Helaena spares him a look, sending a delicately sharp elbow right into his ribs. 

“Has he? It must be your lucky day- he usually scares off the customers that aren’t on the schedule.”

Aemond throws a sturdy blunt elbow into her shoulder and revels in the wince that she tries to hide. 

“Mmmm, not scared off yet. But if you would’ve given us a few more minutes, who knows?” A wink is sent his way, showing she means it in all good fun. Aemond fires a smile back at her, curling his lip up in a smirk he knows carries some weight to it. She swallows- he can see the jump in her throat, before she damn near flings her reason for coming in onto the counter.

“Here! She came in yesterday towards closing time, a special delivery just for you.” 

Hel snatches it with greedy hands, unknotting the twine laced through the handles so she can stick her whole face into the bag. 

“Oh my word, it’s beautiful!” Helaena exclaims, wonderment turning her tone soft and breathy. Aemond can’t stunt his curiosity, knocking his sister’s head out of his way to peer into the gift bag. 

“It looks moldy.”

Mystery woman looks mildly offended by his assessment, but it’s his sister that thwacks him in the chest.

“Shut up! You and Aegon practically drowned my cactus when I went on holiday last summer; what do you know about plants? It’s stunning and wonderful and all mine!” Helaena pulls out the plant with careful hands, gathering up the trailing vines like she’s lassoing a rope. 

Hel oooo’s and ahhh’s , rubbing the silver spotted leaves between her fingers, smelling the somewhat heart-shaped sprouts for any lingering fragrance. Aemond’s surprised she doesn’t pop one in her mouth and give it a taste. 

“A cactus?” 

Aemond shrugs, happy to have the woman’s attention back on him, even if it is at his expense. “It looked thirsty.” 

The giggle she gifts him makes his 5AM alarm worth it. 

Helaena claps her hands together twice, calling attention to her like she’s a nursery school teacher. “Tell me about it- what’s its name and how do I keep it alive?” 

“It’s a Scindapsus pictus, but satin Pothos or silver Philodendron is easier to remember. Even though it’s not technically a Pothos or a Philodendron, it’s in the Araceae family, which can be confusing, y’know? It’s naturally from the Hills of Andalos but it can also be found from Tyrosh all the way to Pinkmaiden.” 

The siblings blink at her, both enjoying how she waxes on about something obviously interesting to her, even though it sounds like Dothraki to them. The brunette takes notice of the silence, tapering off her anecdotes while wearing a quiet, bemused grin.

“Anyways,” she twists the ring around her pinky in circles of nervous energy, “lots of light, water her like once a week, and she should thrive.”

“She’s perfect! Oh thank you for picking her out for me, darling. I’ll take such good care of her. ” Helaena has a way of hugging you with her words. It fills you with the warm and fuzzies, and the girl looks filled to the brim with them. She sighs though, shouldering the strap of her bag into place. 

“I gotta get back to the shop- my early lunch break can’t go past 7:20, or Miss Olenna will be pissed if I’m not there to let her windowshop the roses.” 

Helaena flutters around the counter, gushing promises of midday coffee dates and takeaway dinners before sweeping up the other girl in a rocking embrace.

The woman beams, happiness a good look on her, before pecking his sister’s cheek in parting. She pushes open the shop door, ducking out before catching it right before it closes. Her head ducks back in, and the same stubborn curl from before has come loose again, twisting around the corner of her eye. 

“It was nice meeting you, Aemond.”  

“Likewise…” Did he not catch her name once the entire time? Fuck him and his so-called manners. 

Her smile is so bright, it burns itself behind his eyelids. “Ysilla.”

“Likewise, Ysilla.” Aemond rolls her name off of his tongue, discovering he quite likes the taste of her. A gorgeous name for a gorgeous girl. 

She bids him a little wave of her hand before shutting the door softly. She looks both ways before darting across the roadway and into roots., an aptly named nursery that bursts at the brick with vegetation and flowers. 

Aemond turns on his sister with alarming agility. 

“Alright, share with the class. Who was that?” 

“That’s Ysilla, Aem. Duh. She runs the plant shop across the street.” 

He resists the urge to flick her in the forehead. His trainers are new and he doesn’t want her size seven foot print scuffing them up. 

“I’ve never seen her before.”

“Well you would, if you ever bothered to come out of your room and meet our neighbors. She’s been in charge for about a year and a half now. Mr. Forel is an old flame of her grandma’s, or something like that, and she needed a job when he was thinking of retiring. So, perfect timing, I guess.” Hel fluffs the leaves, turning the plant pot this way and that, trying to decide which angle is most appealing. She carts it around the shop, holding it up to the spaces she’s thinking of occupying it with. 

“What are you two, besties?” Aemond is so not jealous. Nah, never. Nope. No way, no how. 

Helaena pauses, looking thoughtful before resuming her decorating.

“I’m kind of trying to be, but she goes to class after she’s done at the shop and if she’s not doing that, she has three brothers she helps take care of when her mum is working. So I stop off when I can and chat with her so we can catch up.” 

Helaena cheers as she steps off the footstool she keeps around for high reaching access, admiring the vines cascading from the partition wall that divides the waiting room from her piercing studio. 

“She’s pretty, isn’t she?” His sister is obviously speaking about the plant. 

Aemond stares through the window across the street, the tan stucco building a bright bustle of life next to the high brow boutique to its left and Hot Pie’s bakery to its right. The numerous hanging pots from the ledge above the doorway would 100% split his skull if he wasn’t paying attention to where he was walking. Big glass windows are crowded by giant emerald fronds and stalks of leafy sprouts. The flower pots mirroring each side of the doorway are starting to wilt with the season, but the vibrant highlights of color splash a last breath of life against the stone. 

If Aemond squints, he can catch a dark head of curls bouncing behind the register. 

Maybe a plant wouldn’t be a bad addition to his shelves. 

“Without a doubt.”

.

.

.

ps: i have another modern!au in the works of these two little fuckers, which is much longer, much angstier, and much more fun to read. should be out very very soon ;))

[mara-brekker]

Request you want a request? I am happy to ask!

Can you please write a Kax x reader from shadow and bones? Could it be a "she fell first but he fell harder"? But add a little bit of angst in the please, maybe having him yell at her for always being there and she listens to him and gives him space and stuff. Idk just a thought

Ur Wish is my demand

My Investment

Pairing: Kaz Brekker x reader

Words: 1127

Warnings: angst, Kaz yelling? xD mention of blood

.・゜✭・.・✫・゜・。.・。.・゜✭・.・✫・゜・。.・。.・゜✭・.・

I've known Kaz Brekker for a few years now. I saw him for the first time on the streets of Ketterdam. Three men touched me and asked me if I was alone.

One of my many problems was not being familiar with the streets of Ketterdam. My father never allowed me to leave our big house. He always said that weird people would catch, torture and kill us. He listed countless names of these people I didn't know, but only one of them stuck in my mind: Dirtyhands.

But when said and his brown-haired companion helped me out of the mess and, as I learned, Nina offered me a place to sleep, it was soon to become clear to me

...

Kaz Brekker.

For some the devil himself.

However, no one saw the sparkle in his eyes, or his beauty in general. His smile made me blush every time, but I never really noticed that he was only smiling at me.

I knocked on his office and after a "mhh" I entered. "You came"

"You called." His eyes sparkled.

I slowly approached his desk, which had a pile of plans on it. Kaz got up and walked over to me. "I wanted to ask you if you could get me something." I nodded. I didn't care if it was relevant to all of us or just him, I would do it. "I need a box." He pointed to a sketch and I just nodded again. "The content is..." he looked at me "very important to me. But I can't get them. The crate will be found in a carriage. Jesper and I are out tonight and I guess I won't be able to get her before the carriage leaves.” He pointed to a map of Ketterdam as he talked. "I'll do it," he smiled, but only briefly. I was about to leave when Kaz said my name and I turned to him. "If the city guard or anyone else gives you trouble and you can't make it out with that box, leave it." I just looked at him in horror. "Kaz, it would only be a job half done if I returned without the target." But he just shook his head. "I really shouldn't have sent you. Just drop them if you're in danger.” Nodding, I left his office to go change.

…

I didn't care what Kaz said.

I will take this box with me even if one of my legs is in danger. I was standing in a dark side street where I should see the carriage that should come right now. The first thirty minutes passed when the people in the carriage didn't want to get off. But when they did, guards stood at every door. I saw a friend of my sister's walk past me and quickly asked her if she could help me distract the men. Of course I had to put down a few coins for it, but the female charms were reliable because both guards were now talking to her at the horses. So I crept quietly to a door and opened it quietly. I saw a box similar to Kaz's sketch on a bench and picked it up. Just as I stepped out of the carriage, a city guard ran up to me.

I ran and suddenly one guard became three and they even followed me onto the roofs. Unfortunately, the box was unwieldy to carry and one certainly couldn't climb it. I only felt a slight twinge in my left hip, and when I touched it, my hand covered a warm, red substance.

i was bleeding

I tried to run, climb, and jump, but the box made my pain worse and I dropped it. Like Kaz said.

It was easier to lose them now, and so did I. I arrived at the hiding place with a limp.

"Kaz she will surely come soon." I only heard Jesper's voice.

When Kaz saw me, there was relief in his eyes. However, this quickly faded and turned into anger. "My room. Now."

When I got to the top, I had no more strength. I had to take care of my wound as quickly as possible.

"I see you didn't manage to get her." I just covered my wound and tried to breathe calmly. Kaz must have seen from my look that I wasn't feeling well since he was walking towards me now.

"Take off the vest." I did as he said and he examined the wound. He hastily went to one of his closets and pulled out a needle, thread, and bandage. When he stood in front of me again and stared at the wound, his hands were shaking. He wanted to help, but for some unknown reason he couldn't.

"I can't," he said, looking at me. "That's ok" I answered and took the utensils from him to make myself comfortable on a chair. I picked up my shirt and started sewing. "You had them didn't you?" he asked and I nodded. "Why didn't you drop her sooner. I told you the same thing!” he now started to get louder. "Why do you think I said that? Just so that doesn't happen here. You are my investment and cannot be hurt and prevented. And then for nothing.” It wasn't anger that could be heard but something like fear. He was afraid for me.

"Why do you think I gave you this job? Because I trust you! I can't lose you too.” I could see tears in his eyes now.

“In these boxes were only pictures. Worthless pictures of me and my brother!” he said in panic. "You didn't look worthless to me."

"What do you mean?" he asked and I reached into my waistcoat pocket and pulled out said photos.

"My photos" there was the smile from him.

"As grateful as I am to you." He looked at me intently. "Don't ever do that again. You have no idea what I would do to myself if you died out there.” he said while tucking a strand of hair behind my ear.

"My brother was older than me..." he began to talk. That evening I learned his great fear of further loss or why he avoided touch. But what I loved hearing from him the most was why he had called me his investment.

.・゜✭・.・✫・゜・。.・。.・゜✭・.・✫・゜・。.・。.・゜✭・.・

I Hope that I don’t have any mistakes in it :)

[a-drama-addict]

oh fuck its sigrid time can i get a 1, 2, 8, 17, 19, 22, 30, 31, 40, 42, 52, 61, 65, 69, 72, 74, 78, 85, 87, 88, 89, 91, 92, 93, 94, 95, 104, 105 OC LORE ATTACK

holyshit thank you OKAY UHH SIGRID TIME [ask game]

1. What is their backstory and why did you choose it?

Haunted One! Mostly because the things i read about the origin looked scrumptious, and then i was like.. i could add things to amplify her.. weirdness to put it like that. I just thought "I could make a person whose trying so hard to be good but somehow just can't and she can't remember why" AND RAN

2. What is their class (+ subclass) and why did you choose it?

Bard warlock! Bard because I like the art metaphors I could use for it. (Sig and Orin being artistic murders, the normalest sisters) Warlock, great old one, because I was thinking "Her patron could be Bhaal, and then when she breaks away from him she loses those powers" BECAUSE WELL THATS FUN

8. Where did your character live before the events of the game?

Sigrid grew up in Baldur's Gate! Specifically lower city, she had an adoptive family she got dropped in by Sceleratis, and lived with them before Bhaal crept in like teenage hormones when she was 13. She then (after some. events with her family) mostly lived and trained in the Bhaal temple under the city. She spent a lot of time trying to 'seduce' people into following her into an alley, or the temple. She never actually slept with any of her victims, really just used the fact that she looked somewhat alluring to her advantage.

17. Does your Tav's starting armor reflect them? If not, what would they wear instead?

...not really. I love the bard starting clothes tbh, silly jester outfit. Buuuut realistically Sigrid would never wear that. Given the fact that she was practically dead in a pod for months before crawling out (thanks for the lobotomy orin), she'd be more likely to wear the broken padded armor. Fits her more :)

19. What's your Tav's personality like at the start of the game? Does it change as the game goes on?

OH Sigrid's kind of an ass at the start of the game. She's got a constant headache, (thanks for the lobotomy orin), says mean things just to say mean things. She rarely cares to help others, only agreed to actually help the grove after recruiting Karlach and Wyll because they were like "Oh come on, we can't not help them"

She's pretty aloof, serious case of resting bitch face to accompany her, tries to plan almost everything as if she's playing chess and everyone's an opponent she has to beat, everything needs to be her way.

Later in the game she definitely warms up, it's like socializing a feral cat.

Sigrid warms up to almost every companion (not halsin tho, sorry halsin). And she learns.. a lot? In theory? About herself, who she actually is outside of all of.. what she knows.

Her personality later in the game is more.. calm. She's still pretty quiet, more reserved, but definitely is more warm to the others. She get a pretty wry sense of humor, becomes more compassionate and organized. She grows to like challenges, liking the diversity in the things she experiences. She grows to like her creativeness outside of making weird murder art of corpses and guts- she picks up sketching and painting in act 3- and generally speaking she's more... happy and optimistic and would gladly help most people that need it. Still kind of a little shit tho

22. What is your Tav's first impression of the other companions (Astarion, Gale, Karlach, Wyll ...)

Shadowheart: Sigrid's initial reaction was pretty.. neutral. Shadowheart intrigued her, the secretiveness felt familiar, relatable, and she wanted to charm her way into knowing those secrets without prying.

Lae'zel: Gay panic tbh. Like yes her canon romance is Karlach but if i could've done polyamory with Karlach and Lae'zel? Sigrid has two hands. But initial reaction was admiration, attraction to some level. The 'cruelty' that Lae displayed actually intrigued sigrid in much the same way Shad's secretiveness did.

Astarion: Well, getting nearly stabbed is always a way of introduction, not necessarily one Sigrid appreciated tho. Definitely only asked him along reluctantly. Were bitching at each other a lot

Gale: "Who let this pathetic man outside (affectionate)" She likes Gale a lot. Her initial reaction reflected that too, she liked that she could just listen to him yap, without having to do most of the talking.

Wyll: Sigrid doesn't know what to make of his... whole deal at first. "Who is this goody-two-shoes?" Is mostly her thought. She definitely loves Wyll later on, she just needs to warm up to him, she does enjoy the persona thing he's got going on.

Karlach: GAY PANIC PART TWO. walking up to her with wyll twirling her hair and shit. She definitely likes the... looks, but she also isn't as annoyed with what comes out of Karlach's mouth compared to the others

Halsin: Neutral. She needs him, its mostly a personal gain thing at first, doesn't end up liking him.

Jaheira: WELL FIRST IMPRESSION WAS BEING HELD DOWN BY VINES. She doesn't really blame Jaheira for being cautious though. So.. positive? She vaguely recalls some things about her through it all

Minthara: GAY PANIC PART THREE. Technically they first met in the goblin camp, and briefly spoke, but that doesn't really count to her. Minthy and Sigrid definitely hit it off, she liked the.. way she spoke of things. Taking over the absolute with Minthy definitely.. appealed to her

Minsc: "This is a good human shield."

30. Who does your Tav think of when they go to sleep at the goblin/tiefling party? Or are they lucky and do they get to spend the night with the person they want?

Oh Sigrid spends the night with Karlach. It was definitely a few weeks of flirting, glances, accumulated to a very.. interesting conversation. Burns her lips. And one of her palms, but very worth it. She definitely.. proposes other ways to 'relief' their tension before fixing Karlach's engine. ("babe what if we just.. jack off in front of each other?") She's a romantic.

31. What does your Tav think of the Underdark and the Myconids?

SHE LOVES THE UNDERDARK!! SHE LOVES THE NATURE AND THE CREATURES THAT LIVE DOWN THERE!! she absolutely relishes in spending time with Myconids. Probably her favorite allies she's made throughout the journey, because well.. Mushroom people are her friends. Which makes her happy

40. Did your Tav agree to kill the Guardian or did they go talk to them instead?

Sigrid talked to the Guardian. Mostly because at that time she trusted the Guardian more than she did Vlaakith. She still doesn't trust vlaakith lmao, but definitely trusted the guardian. HATES THE EMPEROR THO FUCK THE EMPEROR

42. How does your Tav react to the shadow curse? Are they scared of the dark?

Ohhh Sig hates the Shadow curse. It's something that she can't.. traverse without being absolutely terrified, she doesn't show it much. It's noticeable in small ways, she's more jumpy, growly. (She growls when agitated)

52. What does your Tav think of Dame Aylin?

Sigrid fucks very heavily with Aylin. She's.. captivated almost, she doesn't know much about deities or gods outside of like.. the ones her companions have talked of (THANKS FOR THE LOBOTOMY ORIN-). So seeing the daughter of Selûne... is mesmerizing. They get along pretty well.

61. How does your Tav feel about Baldur's Gate? Is it their home? Is it their first time in the city?

It feels familiar, yet new, a feeling of a home she's had once but can't remember. She knows the quickest way to Elfsong, doesn't remember ever being there. She knows which store has the best meats and fish, doesn't remember why she knows. A lot of things just familiar with no idea why it is familiar. But definitely a sense of belonging.

65. Does your Tav go to the circus? Do they like the activities?

Sigrid is so excited for the circus. She loves putting on the face paints, the love test with karlach, the wheel of fortune thing... she's like a kid tbh. Just running around all excited

69. Does your Tav run into Orin? If so, what's their first opinion?

YEP. The moment she sees Orin something.. clicks. Like yeah orin obviously talks of Sigrid as "slaughter-kin", which gives her a moment of.. realization almost. It's curiosity, mixed with fear and hesitance- she wants to know more but is scared to make a move, scared of what the truth is.

72. How does your Tav enter the city?

She threatens local police <3 and it works <3

74. What do they do at Gortash' coronation?

Nothing. She watches. She doesn't want to cause a scene, as much as she wants to stomp her boot into Gortash's face for what he's done to Karlach. But she also knows that doing something rash like that will just cause more problems than solutions.

78. Does your Tav help the Wavemother?

Nope <3 She doesn't care to, like yeah technically she figures out what happens but Sig doesn't side with her at the end.

85. Who did Orin abduct from your party?

Halsin! wasn't in a hurry to save him tbh. She did, but not in a hurry

87. Did your Tav side with Gortash or did they agree to kill him for Orin?

Well, Sigrid killed Orin first. Then destroyed the Steelwatch. She definitely took more enjoyment from killing Gort, she didn't actually want to kill Orin- some.. part of her still felt affectionate to her. She wanted to help Orin to get free from Bhaal same as she.

88. Does your Tav successfully resist the Nether Brain?

YEP GOT A NAT 20 ON THAT 99 DIFFICULTY ROLL! IN ONE GO. WAS VERY FUNNY TO ME ACTUALLY.

89. Does your Tav side with the Emperor or do they free Orpheus? Do they become Illithid to use the Nether Stones or does one of their companions do it? Do they give the Nether Stones to the Emperor/Orpheus?

Sigrid frees Orpheus, then lets him turn Illithid. She doesn't want to go through that herself, OR let Karlach. She gives him the Nether Stones, wholly trusting Orpheus with this.

91. Does your Tav get a happily ever after?

Yeah. <3 In my own personal canon, Sig, Wyll and Karlach go to avernus to help Karlach's engine- successfully. After a year or so they manage to do it and get out. AND karlach and sig get married :))))

92. Where does your Tav end up after defeating/siding with the Nether Brain?

Sigrid and Karlach move to Baldur's Gate, somewhere near where Karlach's childhood home used to be. They regularly get visits from Shadowheart, Lae'zel and Wyll. And they regularly track down Astarion to check on the fella.

93. What do you think happens to the party, afterwards? Do they go for drinks? Do they go their separate ways?

I like to think they stay in touch, meeting maybe once every month. I mean- they're practically family to one another. THIS is what Sigrid has yearned for, the familiarity and companionship.

94. Years after the game, what do you think your Tav is up to?

Sigrid ends up writing books, doing commission painting and occasionally playing music in taverns for money. (I headcanon Karlach becomes a weapons smith with the help of Dammon and Fytz! look at them being regular people). They're definitely.. resting mostly. They don't get up to a lot of shit, maybe the occasional trip to Waterdeep or Athkatla! They become boring <3

95. What do you think of your Tav's development throughout the game? If you compared them to who they were at the start, what would be different?

Outlook on life definitely changed, and definitely gained empathy. She used to be very selfish, very self-centered. She thinks of everyone she cares about, she wants to be better, she wants to live doing things she's proud of. That's a far cry from the person whose only thing she valued about life was the fact that it ended.

104. Who did your Tav romance? How did this romance develop throughout the game? What happened at the end?

KARLACH!!! It was definitely kind of.. not 'love at first sight' but Sigrid got interested pretty quickly. She was never one for touch herself, never found a purpose for it until she wanted to touch someone. Touch Karlach. Not even sexual necessarily, just hold her hand, snuggle up against her, trace the lines of her smile.

It wasn't a slowburn by any means, they.. basically realised pretty quickly the 'oh shit, i might like this bitch more than just an ally or friend'

They definitely end up just being married, maybe a kid? Not sure about that one yet. But theyre very sappy and in love through it all

105. Anything you want to say about your Tav! Give a random headcanon, answer a random question, say whatever you want!

Hmmm. Sigrid growls a lot, she makes a lot of 'animalistic' noises. She growls when annoyed or enticed, she purrs when she's content, she snarls and bares teeth when angry. Definitely bitey, scratchy, likes wrestling. Definitely just sometimes goes to Karlach to wrestle with her as a form of bonding and then they have gay sex afterwards

[infelious]

this was for eirichel week but i lost some steam after day 3 due to irl things lmao

iirc the theme was night

[kindaeccentric]

When I was writing my university bachelor's degree thesis (that I'm still to defend) about Penny Dreadful as a modern adaptation of Frankenstein I noticed how the original novel's homoeroticism is realized by the series in an interesting way.

In the way he is presented, it seems to me that Victor secretly desires men, but thinks that only through creating a perfect one by himself he's allowed to touch other man's skin. His endeavour to pierce the veil between life and death is an excuse, since Victor from the series grew up lonely after the death of his mother and he searches for companionship, for someone who would love him unconditionally, like his mother used to. He believes he can find such love only in a person he creates himself, brings from the dead, and who would see him as his only friend, calm and obedient. Yet his first instinct is to make a man, not a woman, and a handsome man at that.

I can imagine both Rory Kinnear and Alex Price are not everybody's cup of tea (I do find them attractive, they are quite charismatic), but the way the original Creature and Proteus are shown makes them attractive. Proteus we see through Victor's eyes, when he is tending to his body before its even reanimated, when he sketches him (a sure sign of affection) and when he teaches him how to eat in a way that becomes seductive, because of how the camera lingers on his lips and then, in a closeup, on his fingers running down his long throat, immediately bringing to mind erotic imagery. Some may argue that Victor tries to emulate the relationship between his mother and himself taking the parental role and projecting onto Proteus the role of his childhood self, and as much as it is partially true, their relationship bears these marks of hidden desire on Victor's part from the start. The image at the end of the first episode when Proteus is born shows Victor trembling, teary-eyed, looking at the body, a torn and stitched back together, but human body, of a naked man. He's afraid, but not necessarily of the man, but of finally getting what he wanted, it's a fear resulting from excitement. Then the man is touching his face tenderly and Victor, still trembling, cannot stop himself from a little smile. Their faces are softly illuminated by the orange light of the gas lamp, creating an intimate atmosphere of a warm bedroom. Victor practically gasps hearing his own name smoken by Proteus. I doubt all of it was intentional in the way I read it, but it doesn't change the fact that the final scene can be easily interpreted this way.

Then the original Creature, with the violence surrounding his return, presents him as highly masculine, smart, powerful, a direct opposite to the delicate, clueless Proteus Victor could easily form into whatever he wanted. The Creature throughout the entire series is perceived as ugly by some and easily tolerated by others, making his ugliness purely subjective, since, despite his small deformities he remains strangely alluring with his gothic qualities (black long hair, black lips, white skin, yellow eyes, proportional features) of a dark brooding gentleman. With blood on his face he becomes vampire-like (vampires always a symbol of hidden desires and 'depraved' sexuality, the Creature and Victor becoming a mirror image of Vanessa and vampire Mina, both Creature's and Mina's monstrosity an indirect result of Victor's and Vanessa's desire towards having a same-sex companion). The Creature touches Victor's face, a callback to Proteus doing it, but the Creature is not gentle, he smears blood all over Victor's face (blood in vampire narratives was always a symbol for other bodily fluids, that's why it seems so sexy, it also gained another meaning in the 80s, due to the HIV epidemic, which no filmmaker can shake off if they tried, I could discuss it more with The Lost Boys, but no time for that right now).

The dynamic between Victor and the Creature is a reversal of Victor's budding relationship with Proteus, experience winning over innocence. Victor is under another man's rule, and it terrifies him, because it would force him into a position of having to admit his attraction, whereas as the one in control he could have still easily deny it. The Creature, with all his attributes, symbolizes carnal love, he's all 'body', where Proteus was virginal, pious love (to an extent). In one of the scenes where we see Proteus he looks up into the skylight at Victor's apartment and appears angelic, as if in a halo of white light.

It's revealed Victor never had a woman, and the series wants the viewer to believe it's because of his awkwardness and passion for science that consumed him, but his dedication to creating himself male companions instead of searching for a living female one is exactly what makes him seem more queer coded.

It's clear that the lack of paternal figure results in Victor quickly becoming close with older men he encounters (Sir Malcolm, Van Helsing), but it also puts him into a position where he's constantly surrounded by men, with whom he feels more at ease, and is intimidated by women. The rivalry between him and Ethan is that of siblings, until the moment when Ethan teaches him how to shoot a gun. It might be a stretch (it is a bit of a stretch, I admit), but a gun often, especially in horror, alongside a knife, represents manhood and masculine power. Victor allows Ethan to touch him and encourages him to show off with the gun, which is a scene all too familiar from many other movies where the role of Victor is reserved for a woman and the interaction is flirtatious (can't pull examples out of thin air, but if you saw over 1400 movies like me you know I'm not lying). All this adds to the general image of Victor.

The Creature and Victor, when they are on a walk, have a very revealing conversation in which the Creature points out how quick Victor was to grow attached to his more perfect man, and Victor doesn't deny it, he admits that he did in fact feel affection towards Proteus, although the meaning of it as the scorned past partner expressing jealousy over the love he didn't get while someone else did is largely subtext. When the Creature says that he's lonely, Victor answers 'I cannot love you' (paraphrase, because I can't find the exact quote right now) and the Creature, disillusioned, mocks him, 'I do not want what you cannot give' suggesting that Victor, by making himself a meek obedient man, is selfish, cruel, manipulating, and a coward, therefore could not have loved Proteus truly. Then again, Victor cannot bring himself to love his original Creature, because he's not the ideal man he envisioned and by then the Creature being too aware of his flaws of character. The Creature/Caliban/John Clare knows that Victor is 'monstrous', not just because he's someone who desecrates dead bodies, plays God and abandons his creation, but because of his queer desire. It's important that in the case of Penny Dreadful 'monstrosity' signifies many different things, literal (being a vampire werewolf, witch, and so on), metaphorical (bad deeds, like letting your son die a horrible death, cheating, killing etc.) and wholy subjective, merely condemned by ignorant society (Sembene's blackness, Brona's sex work, Lily's want to be equal or greater than men, Vanessa's want for sexual freedom, the Creature's ugliness, Angelique being transgender and other cases), so it's NOT that much of a stretch this time.

We also have the whole problem with Lily. Victor is so attached to Lily (who takes up both Elizabeth's and creature's bride parts in the novel) because he believes that only by possessing a good woman he'll be redeemed for his 'sinful' desires, but he's foolish to think that. This belief reduces a woman to a semi-maternal, semi-virginal angelic ideal with no sexual urges or agency, like virgin Mary. Lily is a true replacement for Victor's mother, and his imagined redemption. As long as she's similar to Proteus, in that she's not sexual, and pure like an angel. Yet Lily is not a woman in that sense. She is another of Victor's creatures, so she partially also takes over the role of the original Creature from the novel, a male. She's not an ideal of a Victorian obedient wife, she has power, or tries to have it, but power in the context of patriarchal society is masculine by nature. The moment she drops her pretenses of a weak delicate wife-like girl Victor does not want her like this. He doesn't want a woman that is sexually liberated, because he doesn't like women in this way, and yet, by being similar to the first Creature (from Victor's perspective, from hers John Clare is similar to Victor-a man, I could delve into Brona's sexuality, but later, this thing is already way longer than I intended) she's 'the man' he wanted.

There is also Henry. Henry Jekyll takes the role of his namesake in the novel, Henry Clerval, Victor's closest friend, and a character most often cited to have homoerotic tension with Victor. It's true that some of the eroticism might be accidental, stemming from the prevalence of homosocial interactions in 'Frankenstein' which in turn is a result of misogynistic nature of 19th century Genevian society and in-novel universe reflecting it, but like I mentioned before, it still feeds into the queer reading of the text and translates beautifully into Jekyll and Victor being both extremely misogynistic towards Lily and their mutual homoerotic tension. In the scenes where Henry purposes his plan to Victor he practically seductively purrs it into his ear, Lily becomes merely a female buffer that allows for that interaction, a female presence which is an excuse for male closeness (here I have a couple of examples actually: Dead Ringers, Sir Gawain and the Green Knight, Scream (in a roundabout way, through murder) and a couple others, but that deserves its own article). I won't even mention more references to the novel, because that's a lot already.

Penny Dreadful, although I believe largely unintentionally, expands on what is already there through the changes it introduces in relation to the novel's plot. I have nothing else smart to say, I just think it's worth considering.

*I use the word 'queer', because that's the umbrella term we use in academic writing for years now and even our lgbt+ group at university is called 'queer', so don't come at me with stupid takes

[legends-live-in-memories]

Picture Perfect

AYO! its me back with more content for the second time this week while i ignore my other wips again. this is a lil gift for @queen-o-leen who i promised wholesome content for! I hope you like it!

Timinette/Timari Oneshot 1.9K words (not related to my other timari oneshots)

Summary:

“Tim spends a nice day in a park in Paris and takes a picture of a pretty girl.

He somehow gets an almost date out of it.”

no warnings this time. completely family-friendly. I know i surprise myself with this one too.

without further ado

He would be the last to admit that Jason was right and that time away was what he needed at this point in life but it can’t be ignored that, for the first time in possibly three years, Tim was having a wonderful day. He was having a wonderful week actually. After one too many unsuccessful cold cases and the simmering anxiety of off-world missions, his family, primarily Jason, for some reason, demanded that he take some time off and away from his unusual brand of normal. How that meant being sent across the Atlantic Ocean to Paris of all places, he wasn’t entirely sure. Alfred probably had a hand in that decision given that, as part of his forced vacation, Tim was not allowed to actually plan any of it. Him. Timothy Jackson Drake. The guy who stalked and manoeuvred his way into Batman’s house and team. The guy who tracked and found said man when the universe thought he was dead but was actually drifting through time. Yeah, Tim was not pleased about being led blind on his vacation. 

At least Paris was a nice city. And he brought his camera. He figured he could use this time to get back into old hobbies and what better hobby to start up again in the city of love than photography? He’s taken pictures of every tourist attraction worth visiting by his second day and began to take candid shots of people and animals. Would Damian like the animal pictures? Maybe, if they came from someone who wasn’t Tim. Is he going to try and give them to him anyways? Absolutely not. He liked his liver where it is, thank you very much. They would serve as great bribing material however. But that’s a thought for another day. 

Right now he was working on capturing what could possibly be described as the stereotypical outing with friends. He’s sitting along some bushes near the entrance of a park and staring at a group of teens his own age hanging around. He spots a brunette with thick curls of hair animatedly speaking with a guy in a vibrant cap. She’s waving a camera herself, and he appreciates her taste in equipment. Her eyes spark with fox-like mischief while the cap guy has a peaceful aura about him; like an old turtle. Next he sees a blonde, her hair is in a ridiculously high ponytail and she’s in a deep conversation with a red head off to the side of the whole group; her words are rushing out of her and she’s a buzzing bee with excitement. Another blond is in the area, but he sits in a broad patch of sun possibly napping with an open book on his chest. Very cat-like Tim supposes. He barely pays them more than a second of thought however. No. 

His focus is on the quaint beauty directly in his line of sight. She’s poised up against the giant tree trunk with a sketchbook in her lap and pencils surrounding her. Her hair hangs by her shoulders in twintails and it’s a colour so dark it seems to absorb the shade of the tree. She’s scribbling furiously on the page before her and her tongue is slightly peaking out to the side. Her forehead is creased with stress lines and her shoulders hunch slightly over her frame. She’s the vision of deep concentration and dedication and Tim would be a fool not to capture her. He’s gotten wide shots of her companions but now he wants to focus on her. 

Looking through the lens of his camera he zooms in on her profile. When his camera focuses, he spots a constellation of freckles across her cheeks, barely there, almost blending in with her complexion but Tim is nothing if not hypervigilant. He goes to take another photo when a bug flies into view. It’s a ladybug. It lands precariously on the tip of her nose and it’s just the thing that breaks her out of her work-induced trance. Tim is watching her now, long forgetting to click the shutter. Her eyes cross as she stares intently at the black-spotted creature and its presence seems to amuse her. She’s giggling to herself, as if sharing an inside joke with the bug and reaches a slim finger to swipe the insect gently from her nose. She inspects it and smiles a smile so soft that not even a feather could compare. He feels like an intruder. More so than one who takes pictures of cute strangers in public. 

Coming back to his senses, he takes another picture, the final picture, and lowers the camera from his face. He looks back at his temporary muse and finds that she is already looking at him. Her head tilts in confusion. Apprehension. Possibly a bit of fear. Which is valid given that Tim was pointing a camera at her from across the public park. What should he do though to quell her fears? 

He felt his face lift into a grin; he didn’t need to look at himself to know it was awkward and forced. A shrug of his shoulders and a flimsy wave of the camera in his hand was the only thing he did. Before he could begin to stumble over himself in apology, however, she surprised him. With a cautious hunch, her shoulders brought up to her ears, and an embarrassed smile to match his own, she slowly flips her sketchbook around and he comes face to face with, well, his face. It was a portrait of him. She had drawn a portrait of him. And she was showing him. Feeling embolden, he flips his camera to show her the screen but she’s too far away. He gets up on unsteady legs, cramped from his uncomfortable position, and begins a slow stride towards her. She meets him in the middle.

“Hi.” He barely speaks those words. They’re more like an exhale or a sigh of relief that he hadn’t scared her off. 

“Hi, I hope you don’t mind the drawing.” Her voice is high and light. Like a spring breeze. She’s daintily waving at him and he sees that her fingers are rough, and calloused. Unexpected but he finds it rather charming. Before he could get another word in, she’s off like an engine. “I just saw you there, and you had your camera so I figured you were taking pictures of us and thought that if you were then you wouldn’t mind me sketching you in kind but I should have asked and I’m sorry for breaching your privacy—” 

“Wait, slow down.” He fears that if he hadn’t interrupted her when he did she would run out of oxygen. Did she even breathe during her spiel? A voice in his head, that sounds like Cass, utters a soft ‘pot, kettle’ and okay, he sees a lot of himself in her mile-a-minute style of speaking. 

“No need to apologize. I’m flattered, truly. You were right, I was taking pictures of you. And your friends!” he hastily adds that last part. He turns his camera so the display screen faces her and he feels himself hold his breath in anticipation. 

A blush rises to her cheeks, red like the ladybug that interrupted her. He quite likes that colour on her. His eyes drift to the sketch and he’s further impressed by her skill. She has an eye for detail. He notices a bird in the background. It’s a robin. That piques his interest and lights a flicker of fear within him. 

“May I ask,” he begins slowly, unsure of what that little addition could mean. Did she know? How could she? Was his identity compromised?

“Why did you draw a robin in the background? It’s lovely but I’m curious,” he finishes. He’s going to play dumb until he has more information. She seems taken off guard by the question and raises her shoulders to her ears again in an embarrassed hunch.

“Well,” she starts, but she seems unsure and the words die on her tongue. She tries again.

“I just saw it fly by and then it landed behind you. So I thought ‘why not?’ and drew it. It seemed fitting.” She wasn’t looking him in the eye and now he felt kind of felt like a jerk for baselessly accusing some random girl. Of course it was just a coincidence. This bat-paranoia was going to be the end of him one day. It’s by sheer miracles and luck why it hasn’t already. 

“Oh, no worries. It just surprised me because it’s my favourite bird.” Right. Lie to the pretty French girl. But what else could he do? Tell her the truth?

“Then it’s a cool coincidence, huh?” She seems encouraged by that tidbit of information.

“Yeah, pure luck on your part.”

“What?” She seems more startled at that than Tim thinks she should be but before he can think deeper into it she speaks again and he would be a fool to not give her his undivided attention.

“Why did you take a picture of me with the ladybug? If you don’t mind me asking.” That stumps him because, to be honest, he does not know why himself. It just felt right. So he tells her as such.

“Well that would be another coincidence because ladybugs are my favourite insects.” She gives him a full smile alongside that statement and the brilliance of it almost blinds him. He wants to capture that smile for eternity. 

The thought strikes him. He doesn’t want this moment to end. He knows by the Friday of next week he’ll be flying back to Gotham where it’s business as usual and Red Robin won’t have time for commitments and puppy love. But right now? Right now Tim Drake is on vacation with a week and half left and all the time in the world to entertain the idea of a spring romance. Making the decision, he goes for it and takes the chance.

“I was getting a bit hungry. Do you know anywhere that’s good to eat at?” It’s an offer, open to interpretation. If she just lists some place, he knows where her interests lay. If she offers to escort him somewhere, then she’s taken the bait for exactly what it is, an invitation for more; whatever more is. He hopes she takes the bait. 

“Yes I do actually! My parents own a bakery just outside the park.” Her enthusiasm is uplifting and the offer of a place so personal is a good sign in Tim’s book. “Let me show the way, and I could join you if you would like.”

“Perfect. That’s wonderful. It will be my treat since you’re going out of your way on my account.”

“Nonsense. Like I said, it’s my parents’ bakery. They’ll be more than happy to give some complimentary snacks.” She loops her arm around his and begins to drag him to the park gate. She’s strong and her grip is firm and Tim feels lightheaded at the ease with which she pulls him. He can’t help but be swept up in the tides that is this girl. 

“I’m Tim, by the way. Tim Drake.” He offers his name, something he should have done at the beginning.

She looks back at him over her shoulder and he’s caught up in the oceans of her eyes. They’re alight with joy. 

“Nice to meet you, Tim. I’m Marinette Dupain-Cheng.” 

“Nice to meet you too.”

They’re almost by the bakery now, he can smell the fresh baked goods from here, and he can’t wait to sit down and get to know this girl better. Maybe get her number by the end of their lunch.

Yeah. Tim was having a wonderful day.

[not-xpr-art]

Art Advice #11 - My Creative Process (take 2)~

Hi! Long time no write lol...

For this art advice post I wanted to go through the full process of one of my digital pieces (a companion to THIS post about my traditional process!), unfortunately I forgot to take screenshots of every part so... there will be some steps missing but I hope this can still be an interesting/informative post!

As I said in my last one, this is just my own process for creating something and am in no way saying this is the ‘right’ way of doing it! I just hope you guys enjoy seeing how I create my work lol!

My Creative Process (take 2) ~

As with anything in life, my creative process starts with an idea. And for this piece, my idea was for my own version of the historical figure Katherine Howard. I actually had originally planned to draw a portrait of her with a dog, but thought that might be a bit complicated & may not be recognisable as her, so went with the simpler design instead.

Once I have an idea, I start looking for reference images. And in the case of this piece, I picked a couple portraits by Hans Holbein that have been attributed to being of Katherine. This art is a sort of character design, so the references are mostly guides more than things I follow religiously (particularly for her face).

Also see my post on references HERE for more information and advice on using references!

I then sketch out my idea. 

I often sketch the face more detailed than the rest of a figure, usually because that is the thing I’ll start painting first. If I’m fully following a reference, I will sometimes make the sketch super simple (so just the basic shapes of the head/body/etc), whereas something like a character design, or perhaps a person I haven’t drawn before, I’ll often put a lot more detail and time into the sketch! Honestly it just depends on whether I know I’m going to actually need the sketch or not lol...

I then put the base colours down under the sketch (usually with a flat brush), and then merging them so I can use the sketch as a guide for the shadows and highlights. 

This also helps me get an understanding of what colours are going where, and how the piece will look overall! Of course, this isn’t set in stone, and as the piece goes, I sometimes change my mind about the colours. But it’s always good to start somewhere, in my opinion!

I then begin to blend the piece, usually starting with the eyes! 

I use fluffy/textured brushes to blend for work like this, although I do something continue to use the flat brush for painting if I want a more painterly look! In a way, I approach digital painting in a very similar way to traditional oil painting, since I do all the painting on just the one layer. 

I like to get the face & hair mostly done before I work on the rest, and then will work from top until bottom, focusing on particular areas and textures one at a time. 

And, ahem, this is where I completely forgot to take any more screenshots of my progress... But essentially it’s just the same thing as the face. I use the fluffy/textured brush to blend the basic shapes, shadows, etc, and then go in with a smaller (still textured) brush to add the details! 

Top tip for painting gold digitally: most painting software has a filter called ‘Add’ which is perfect for adding the shine of gold (because it often adds a slight yellow tinge to the shine that makes it look more realistic!) I also use the ‘Add’ filter for other highlights, such as the eyes, since it really gives a satisfying pop of brightness!

This is the next screen shot I took where the piece is mostly done lol (sorry that she no longer has dimples, I just couldn’t get it to look like anything over than a dirty smudge lol...)

All that’s left is to add the finishing touches, often adding some filters to make the colours jump out a bit more! (and, in this case, adding a frame!)

And here is the final work! 

This piece probably took a little over 8 hours to complete in total btw! It went almost entirely the way I wanted it to, which I’m happy about (since sometimes a piece, particularly for character designs, just goes all to hell... perhaps one day I’ll make a post about one of those pieces lol!?) and I love how it looks tbh!

I hope that this post was somewhat interesting! 

As always, if you have any questions about my process or my art in general, feel free to send me an ask! <3

[msommers]

LITTLE INQUISITION MOMENTS.

WHERE WAS YOUR CHARACTER WHEN THE BREACH FIRST OPENED? WHAT WAS GOING THROUGH THEIR HEAD IN THE IMMEDIATE AFTERMATH?

in the denerim market, worrying over the coin she had just spent allowing her brother to pick out what he wanted for his birthday, and doing her gosh darn best to hide it from him (even though he's old enough to understand such things, she still doesn't want to burden him any more than necessary). 

i don't? think?? that she would have been able to see the breach all the way in denerim, or even just. perceive the entire event at the conclave happening at all in the moment. so, technically: still fretting about the family coin, beginning to plan out their meals for the week and hoping garahel wouldn't be too upset that they couldn't have something special to eat that night. ((later when she has learned about what happened at the temple of ashes, she’s a little afraid. the world is spiraling into chaos further by the day and it’s an uncomfortable thought.))

HOW DID YOUR CHARACTER FIRST HEAR OF THE INQUISITION? WHAT DID THEY THINK?

in a letter sent to her by queen meredith, giving her further details on what happened at the conclave and proposing that jorina should join the forces + supplies that the crown intended to send to the budding inquisition as support. jorina had served as a skilled cartographer to the crown for probably at least?? 5 years at that point and meredith believed she would prove to be a valuable member of the inquisition if she were to join, and jorina wasn’t one to argue with the ding dang hero of ferelden. she believed that the inquisition could do some good for the world that was getting more frantic and desperate with each passing day and she was off to join their ranks (after making certain that her family would be well off until she could start sending some coin back their way). 

WHAT DID IT FEEL LIKE THE FIRST TIME THE HERALD SEALED A RIFT WITH THEM PRESENT?

i mean,, honestly,,, bewildering might be a good word for it. jorina doesn't know the first thing about magic, let alone the fade, so her witnessing the sealing of a rift didn’t necessarily pique anything overtly positive in her. it probably made her feel more safe, though. she's a very security oriented person and getting to see an open gateway that brought demons over into the physical world?? absolutely lovely to have it confirmed to work right before her eyes. get those things OFF of her earth, thank you. 

WHAT WERE THEIR LIVING ARRANGEMENTS IN HAVEN?

whatever all of the other scouts were given, i suppose. i don't really know what it'd be but i'm assuming some kind of tent or barracks situation?? she wouldn't have made much of a fuss about it given that she was almost always out on missions anyhow, avoided making any personal touches to the place because she was so focused on the work. 

WHAT ROLE DOES YOUR CHARACTER PLAY IN THE INQUISITION? DOES IT CHANGE AT ALL THROUGHOUT THE COURSE OF THE GAME?

jorina's a scout and cartographer! she's sent out (along with aleksi and maybe two or three others) to get a lay of the lands before the inquisitor and co make their trips. she draws up maps of the spaces, takes excessive notes and adds sketches of local landmarks, flora, fauna, that kind of stuff, anything to send back as much information to the inquisition as she can. firm believer in making note of every little thing because you never know what detail may come in handy down the line, no matter how small (and no matter how tedious and time-consuming it feels for her companions).

i imagine through the course of the inquisition's events that jorina is given more and more responsibility in the field, until she's ultimately promoted to head scout (aka the same level as lead scout harding, just allowing for split responsibilities between them). she's very dedicated to her work (some might say Too dedicated, take a break girl) and consistently delivered fantastic results, earning the attention and gratefulness of those above her who would later decide to give her that new title. 

i fully believe jorina needed that year (?? maybe not as long, but near to it) before she was promoted to be good at her job as head scout, because it gave her the time necessary to get to know the other scouts well and develop her own skills. knowledge on those fronts helped her down the line when she would be left in charge of scheduling and assigning jobs, being able to group people who would work well together and avoid any conflict that could come from failings in that department. (aka her charisma isn't great please do not force her to talk more than she has to, just take your job assignment and go do it thank you she has other work to do) 

IT’S YOUR CHARACTER’S TURN TO COOK A MEAL FOR THE PARTY. WHAT DO THEY TURN TO FIRST?

either some kind of bread with cheese baked into it or a stew, or both if she has the time. i think those would have been the things she made A Lot back in denerim for her family and even if she might be dreadfully bored of some variations, she finds comfort and enjoyment in the familiar process of cooking them anyhow.

WHEN IT’S THEIR TURN TO TAKE WATCH AT A PARTY CAMP, WHO DO THEY HOPE THEIR PARTNER WILL BE?

the obvious answer is aleksi, and the back-up harding. but if we're going for the fun points as in which inquisitor’s circle companion?? i think jorina would enjoy the company of blackwall and varric the most. blackwall is content to sit in the quiet with her while they both work on their own things and trade occasional comments, and varric is somebody that i could see successfully helping jorina out of her shell for a while with conversation and much needed laughs. (for fun, i think the person she would most hope to avoid that alone time with is cole. not because she doesn’t like him or anything, but because she’s Quite afraid of hearing him delve into her thoughts and openly drag her across the ground with them. she’d like to keep all of that private and shoved deep down, thank you)

IF NOT IN THE PARTY, WHAT ARE THEY DOING DURING THE ATTACK ON HAVEN? AND DURING THE RETREAT?

jorina was one of the scouts posted a little beyond haven at the time to keep watch for any important messengers or potential danger, so she was one of the two or three people that i imagine came bounding through the gates with news of the encroaching forces. she was probably bouncing around different elevated platforms to take potshots at the advancing enemies before being called back to the chantry and then being sent to scout ahead through the pathway that chancellor roderick had informed them of. she would have been working herself to exhaustion during the retreat and ensuing journey to skyhold with constantly scouting ahead and checking on those she cared about who had been hurt in the fight. could have used 39 hours of uninterrupted sleep upon finally reaching the new base, but she was probably up and about after 7 whenever she did get around to resting tbh.

IF PRESENT, WHAT WAS THEIR REACTION TO THE DAWN WILL COME BEING SANG WHEN THE HERALD WOKE UP AFTER THE LOSS OF HAVEN?

i’d love to put something funny or fake deep here but honestly i don’t think she was present for it. i think jorina would have been well ahead of the temporary camp set-up there between the mountains and at most would have heard distant singing carried through the winds, unable to understand what was being sung exactly. (if she was there she’d probably just want everyone to be quiet so the injured could rest ngl)

WHAT DO THEY THINK OF THE HERALD BEING MADE INQUISITOR? DO THEY THINK IT WAS THE RIGHT CHOICE, OR WOULD THEY HAVE PREFERRED SOMEONE ELSE (ONE OF THE ADVISORS, CASSANDRA, EVEN HAWKE OR THE HOF)?

would have loved for meredith cousland to become the inquisitor simply because she knows and has relative trust in her, but i don't think jorina would have any negative opinions on a herald becoming inquisitor as long as they're a Good person. has significant less trust in an inquisitor who supports the narrative of being andraste’s herald though, i don’t think that would rub her the right way.

WHAT ARE THEIR LIVING ARRANGEMENTS IN SKYHOLD?

just because i think it's funny, i like to imagine she often took to retreating up in one of those ignored rooms at the tops of the towers. they were quiet, essentially removed from the crowds, and gave her a nice view of things. it probably wasn't fixed up or decorated until she received her promotion and it was clear she'd be spending more time there on occasion, so she put in a request with josephine and had it fixed up so it could be a Proper room instead of somewhere she hid away on occasion.

i think she'd have the basic furniture in there (bed, wardrobe, desk, two or three trunks for storage, a few bookshelves) and most of her time inside would be spent working at her desk or relaxing in bed. she probably adds to it over time (and aleksi probably does as well tbh) with this and that, but the additions she'd care about most are the things gifted by aleksi or sent to her by her family. i imagine her brother might become an assistant to a blacksmith?? and she'd probably have a few little things from him around the room, proud of them even if they aren't of Masterwork quality yet.

WHAT DOES YOUR CHARACTER DO DURING THEIR OFF HOURS AT SKYHOLD?

according to everyone around her: still too much fucking work. it's hard for jorina to remember that it's good to simply Relax or spend time on light activity, so she needs somebody to remind her of that from time to time. when she does get around to those off hours a lot of them are spent with aleksi, reading, or being quiet company to whatever her friends are up to. i think she might also love spending time in the skyhold garden when it's not full of too many strangers and she can enjoy some peace, maybe sketch up some of the flowers or familiar figures if they're around and she's feeling up to it.

ASSUMING YOUR CHARACTER IS RELIGIOUS, HOW DO THEY KEEP THEIR FAITH IN SKYHOLD? DO THEY PRACTISE OPENLY?

jorina isn’t religious, but!! her mother was and she respected that. and i think jorina would have painted a vhenadahl onto one of the walls of her skyhold room in honor of her mother, inspired by the times she would pray at the tree.

DO THEY NEED ANY PREPARATION OR LESSONS BEFORE ARRIVING AT THE WINTER PALACE?

this is a trick question because everybody was given lessons on etiquette and dancing by josephine, you can't fool me.

that's a joke to cover up the fact that 100% yes jorina needed all of the lessons and preparation that she could be helped with, and even then it wasn't enough to help her feel fully Comfortable while at the event. she was only in the background gathering information and it Still felt dreadful for her, too many judging eyes and people openly speaking about betrayal and deception. (the only highlight was her time spent with aleksi, he helped her from getting too bothered or worked up and she was Very grateful.)

WHICH MAIN QUEST AFFECTS THEM THE MOST? IN WHAT WAY?

i mean…probably in your heart shall burn?? obviously because of the terrifying haven battle and its aftermath, and then all of the rough work she went through during and after. i think it helped jorina see just how far she could go if she pushed herself into more of an active and direct role while others were too busy to make decisions (nothing huge, but noticeable to her and the scouts with her in the moment). on top of that, this quest marks where jorina realized how in deep she was for aleksi which was Really big for her! she hadn't experienced caring for someone else so Deeply outside of her own family before, so it felt like being smacked in the chest with a red templar’s gauntlet when jorina first spotted him after being separated in the fight and she was hit with a wave of emotion. 

WHAT DO THEY DO WHEN THE INQUISITOR JUDGES PRISONERS? DO THEY WATCH OR MAKE THEMSELVES SCARCE? IF THEY DISAGREE WITH THEIR DECISION, DO THEY EXPRESS THAT LATER?

if she's present at skyhold while a judgment is occurring i think jorina would watch, because in some way she thinks that it's right to. that even though her part in it may have been Small, she still aided in the capture of many of skyhold's prisoners and she believes that she should witness the deciding of their fates because of that. i don't imagine that she'd go around looking to throw her displeasure at anybody, but she'd probably admit to any disagreements with a decision made if the topic came up and she was asked.

HOW DO THEY CELEBRATE CORYPHEUS’ DEFEAT?

lots of sleeping with aleksi (both in the rest way and the naughty way), so many baths meant for actual relaxation instead of just cleaning, singlehandedly proving that the maker is real by being the one to suggest attending the [end of game] grand hall celebration that would undoubtedly be packed with people that's a goddamn miracle right there. you know the normal celebratory stuff. she'd invite her family to visit after a while, when things have calmed down and she believes significant threats are no longer a worry. she's wanted to show her siblings and father around the place for a long while, what better time than after their victory when everyone’s spirits are so high?

WHAT DOES YOUR CHARACTER DO IN THE YEARS BETWEEN THE END OF DRAGON AGE: INQUISITION AND TRESPASSER? FEEL FREE TO WRITE A CODEX ENTRY LIKE THE ONES WE RECEIVE FOR OUR OTHER COMPANIONS.

alright well originally i was gonna write some letters from jorina’s siblings and her dad here but my brain will just. Not allow me, so.

i imagine she still would have had her responsibilities to the inquisition and had to have done some traveling and the like, but i don’t think it felt pressured by time anymore and jorina would have felt more free to enjoy the places she visited. time with aleksi is a given but still important. 

her sister’s letter would have been about the time the family spent visiting skyhold, talking about what they liked and who they missed. would have mentioned whatever job she had recently gotten in/near denerim (haven’t decided on it yet), and a promise to stay out of trouble at the end because she’d caused some stress while jorina was away.

her brother’s letter would have had an update on his apprenticeship with one of denerim’s blacksmiths and how their father is doing, and a question about when they would see jorina and aleksi again because he misses them (and asaara). probably some other tidbit but i didn’t come up with it lmao

her father’s letter would have had questions about jorina and aleksi’s travels and talk about the family potentially moving away from the alienage with the coin that they’d been able to save up over the last few years with her help, though he wasn’t sure where they’d go. would have rounded off with some sweet words of support and an awkward thanks for all that she’d done for the family while he wasn’t able to step in.

[dahlia-coccinea]

Wuthering Heights - Chapter 3

This is a somewhat difficult chapter to discuss fully in a single post. It introduces so many important themes and has the first glimpse of the story of the earlier inhabitants of the Heights. Sorry if this is too long - I've tried to keep my comments concise. It is difficult for me to not mention every tiny detail I like lol 

We learn that Zillah has worked at the house a year or two and is aware that Catherine’s old room is off-limits but seems to know little else. It shows that despite the emotional unloading that Heathcliff does to Nelly he is very reserved about all that has happened in the past. 

It seems the house has been ruled by chaos for years and there is an instinctual need for the inhabits to defend themselves against it. We see this when Lockwood first climbs into the box bed and closes the doors he says he “felt secure against the vigilance of Heathcliff, and every one else.” The need to shut out the world and crawling into small spaces is repeated later in this chapter with Catherine's diary details how, with Heathcliff, in an attempt to avoid the cruelty of Hindley and Frances “made ourselves as snug as our means allowed in the arch of the dresser,” and closed off the world by fastening their pinafores together. 

We get some other interesting glimpses of Catherine and Heathcliff early friendship. It is quite popular to say that Heathcliff is Catherine’s whip and he is a blank slate for her, but I think this diary entry is another example of their oddly egalitarian relationship. First, we have this scene of Catherine lashing out against their ill-treatment:

I took my dingy volume by the scroop, and hurled it into the dog-kennel, vowing I hated a good book. Heathcliff kicked his to the same place. Then there was a hubbub! 

That Heathcliff swiftly follows her lead certainly shows a reciprocation of the other’s attitude and worldview - or simply that if one is going to get in trouble then the other will follow suit. Still, I do hold that he doesn’t just mimic her or do as she wishes. We get a number of examples that show neither play a clear leader in their antics with one happening shortly after this incident. Catherine's diary continues: 

I have got the time on with writing for twenty minutes; but my companion is impatient, and proposes that we should appropriate the dairywoman’s cloak, and have a scamper on the moors, under its shelter. A pleasant suggestion—and then, if the surly old man come in, he may believe his prophecy verified—we cannot be damper, or colder, in the rain than we are here.

Here Heathcliff takes the lead in coming up with more plans to get further into trouble and it seems Catherine is more than pleased to go along with it. 

There are other, now iconic, details of Catherine’s character in this chapter. Such as this description of the box bed from Lockwood:

The ledge, where I placed my candle, had a few mildewed books piled up in one corner; and it was covered with writing scratched on the paint. This writing, however, was nothing but a name repeated in all kinds of characters, large and small—Catherine Earnshaw, here and there varied to Catherine Heathcliff, and then again to Catherine Linton.

And later:

Catherine’s library was select, and its state of dilapidation proved it to have been well used, though not altogether for a legitimate purpose: scarcely one chapter had escaped a pen-and-ink commentary—at least the appearance of one—covering every morsel of blank that the printer had left. Some were detached sentences; other parts took the form of a regular diary, scrawled in an unformed, childish hand. At the top of an extra page (quite a treasure, probably, when first lighted on) I was greatly amused to behold an excellent caricature of my friend Joseph,—rudely, yet powerfully sketched. An immediate interest kindled within me for the unknown Catherine, and I began forthwith to decipher her faded hieroglyphics.

Catherine holed up in the box bed and writing on every spare bit of paper she can get her hands on and scratching her name in the paint, tell of someone who has no one to talk to. She’s alone and is compelled to at least make sense of herself with ink and paper. Nelly does say later on that “there was not a soul else that she might fashion into an adviser” beside Nelly herself. Which is a poor adviser, considering how Nelly disliked her throughout her childhood. 

Adding to Catherine’s loneliness is the endless abuse of Heathcliff and herself, at the hands of seemingly everyone in the house. In this short excerpt from her diary, we are told Hindley’s treatment of Heathcliff is “atrocious,” and that now he is the new master they are no longer allowed to play, and “a mere titter is sufficient to send us into corners.” Heathcliff has his hair pulled by Frances, Catherine’s ears are boxed by Joseph and they’re both berated and verbally punished by him. Finally Hindley “seizing one of us by the collar, and the other by the arm, hurled both into the back-kitchen” where she says that outside on the moors “cannot be damper, or colder.” Upon their return and proceeding punishment she says she’s cried until her head ached. Consistent with what we later hear her tell Nelly, that Heathcliff’s miseries are her own, it is not her punishment or ill-treatment that makes her so upset but the casting out of Heathcliff. She writes: 

“Poor Heathcliff! Hindley calls him a vagabond, and won’t let him sit with us, nor eat with us any more; and, he says, he and I must not play together, and threatens to turn him out of the house if we break his orders. He has been blaming our father (how dared he?) for treating H. too liberally; and swears he will reduce him to his right place—”

Critics that suggest Catherine is glassy-eyed and naive idealist really gloss over these excerpts in my opinion. There is a constant downplaying of her abuse compared to the other characters among those that seemingly think she’s the only character with moral agency and therefore the cause of all problems in the story. 

I love how strange the encounter that Lockwood has with the book “Seventy Times Seven, and the First of the Seventy-First,” and the following dream is when first reading Wuthering Heights. Hardly anything in WH is superfluous and when rereading it this makes much more sense. This is quite an interesting segue into meeting Catherine’s ghost, and later learning more of her life. Forgiveness is such an important aspect in the book and will come up many times. Notably, while on her deathbed, Catherine tells Heathcliff she has forgiven him and that he should forgive her. 

I think it is amusing and also very interesting how in Lockwood’s dream he’s walking with Joseph (in itself is very metaphorical) and Joseph tells him he should have brought a “pilgrim’s staff” and that Joseph’s staff is really just a “heavy-headed cudgel.”

It’s unsurprising the appearance of Catherine’s ghost is so iconic. It’s impossible to discern if it is merely Lockwood’s dream or him actually encountering her spirit. There are details about her that Lockwood, at this point, does not yet know. Still, he does make many attempts to logically explain what happens. Either way, the imagery of the scene is both frightening and tragic. 

We get some really interesting glimpses of Heathcliff’s character in this scene. Normally he is very collected and if his emotions are out of control they tend towards anger, but here we see him truly terrified and unable to maintain composure after finding Lockwood in the room.

Heathcliff stood near the entrance, in his shirt and trousers; with a candle dripping over his fingers, and his face as white as the wall behind him. The first creak of the oak startled him like an electric shock: the light leaped from his hold to a distance of some feet, and his agitation was so extreme, that he could hardly pick it up.

Even after Lockwood identifies himself Heathcliff is said to have found it “impossible to hold it [the candle] steady” and was “crushing his nails into his palms, and grinding his teeth to subdue the maxillary convulsions.” It is interesting that Heathcliff doesn’t become so angry that he throws Lockwood out. It’s another oddly humanizing moment for him. An overly dramatic author would likely have him behave like a complete monster, but he instead tells him to finish the night there and not to scream like that again. This is a scene that I wish we could have some perspective from Heathcliff. Not only is he startled by a noise coming from Catherine’s old room but then Lockwood adds to his distress by rambling about Catherine saying:

And that minx, Catherine Linton, or Earnshaw, or however she was called—she must have been a changeling—wicked little soul! She told me she had been walking the earth these twenty years: a just punishment for her mortal transgressions, I’ve no doubt!

This and Lockwood’s further talk which makes it apparent he has snooped and glimpsed a little bit of Catherine’s and Heathcliff’s past, does set Heathcliff off: 

“What can you mean by talking in this way to me!” thundered Heathcliff with savage vehemence. “How—how dare you, under my roof?—God! he’s mad to speak so!” And he struck his forehead with rage.

Lockwood doesn’t quite understand this reaction saying:

I did not know whether to resent this language or pursue my explanation; but he seemed so powerfully affected that I took pity and proceeded with my dreams; affirming I had never heard the appellation of “Catherine Linton” before, but reading it often over produced an impression which personified itself when I had no longer my imagination under control. Heathcliff gradually fell back into the shelter of the bed, as I spoke; finally sitting down almost concealed behind it. I guessed, however, by his irregular and intercepted breathing, that he struggled to vanquish an excess of violent emotion. 

And later when watching Heathcliff call for Cathy through the window:

There was such anguish in the gush of grief that accompanied this raving, that my compassion made me overlook its folly, and I drew off, half angry to have listened at all, and vexed at having related my ridiculous nightmare, since it produced that agony; though why was beyond my comprehension. 

At one point Lockwood also believes Heathcliff to be “dashing a tear from his eyes” during their conversation. Of course, he is confused because he doesn’t know that one of Heathcliff’s few fixations has been looking for signs of Catherine for the last 17ish years. 

I’ve mentioned this before, but something that doesn’t happen in the book because Heathcliff never narrates it, but I think if someone retold the story or made a film adaptation it could be interesting to explore, is how Heathcliff came to find Catherine’s writing on the wall. She must have written it shortly before she talks to Nelly since she’s already considering marrying Linton, and Heathcliff must still be living at the Heights since his name is there also. When Heathcliff returns three years later we know that he takes over Catherine’s old room so really he should have discovered it the first night there, probably after having visited the Grange. 

@astrangechoiceoffavourites has mentioned this in one their posts, but another great aspect of the book is the background happenings that are very realistic for the time and particularly farm life. Cats and dogs roam about, Heathcliff mentions that the house goes to bed at “nine in winter, and rise at four,” and there are mentions of chores, etc. The details create a realistic backdrop and ground the characters in reality. I feel like the novel is never overly sentimental because of this and it really strengthens it. 

After Heathcliff comes down to the kitchen where the household is starting their day, we are instantly reminded how terrible Heathcliff can be when he swears at and threatens to hit Cathy for not making herself useful and working for her keep. Ironically, he tells her, “You shall pay me for the plague of having you eternally in my sight,” when, as I’ve mentioned before he has her sit at the dining table with everyone else. He also could just send her away if he despises her so much. 

I see a lot of similarity between the glimpse we get of Catherine Earnshaw from her diary and the current situation Cathy Heathcliff is in. Their situations are certainly different but both are in a similar state of abuse and neglect and both are quite self-possessed and antagonistic towards those that try to control them. They also are associated with books (Catherine filling them up with writing and Cathy reading) and have an affinity for animals. In this chapter it is mentioned that while Cathy is reading she has “to push away a dog, now and then, that snoozled its nose overforwardly into her face.” There are other similar encounters, such as when the dogs at the Heights come to greet Catherine Earnshaw upon her return from the Lintons. 

I’m sure I’m forgetting points I want to make in these posts. I’ll probably to a larger summary after I complete the book and try to tie together some of the ideas I’ve mentioned. Its also difficult because I keep wanting to bring up things that happen later in the book and I want to make a note of it now - but I’m also trying to reread as impartially as possible. Which is really an impossible task lol. 

@astrangechoiceoffavourites

[imaginedhaven]

Rules of Engagement: Chapter Eleven

Link to Masterpost

Holy crap, we’ve cleared 50,000 words of this. Things are really starting to pick up now, so if I had to guess this will probably wind up being... maybe around 75k-80k in total? It still has to be WRITTEN, though, so... lol.

Also, we’re going to start earning that warning in the masterpost for canon-typical violence from here on out. Just so you’re aware.

Enjoy!

~*~*~

“So, let me make certain I have this absolutely clear,” Aedion drawled in a way that immediately set Rowan on edge.

Rather than reply and risk growling rather than speaking, he nodded, the movement tighter and less smooth than he would’ve liked.

“Aelin came here to Rifthold fully intending not only to continue her relationship with the prince, but to apprehend a criminal—not just any criminal, but an assassin—who was originally from Terrasen and moved to Rifthold.”

Rowan gritted his teeth and gave another silent nod.

“She elected to do this for reasons you are aware of, but that she has not told me and that you refuse to tell me.”

Another nod and another clenching of his jaw.

“And so the two of you have been sneaking out at night, which Captain Westfall”—the name came from Aedion’s lips as though it were a curse in and of itself—“condoned, if not outright allowed.”

The captain spoke up then. “Given the information presented to me, I had little other choice.”

“I’m not finished,” Aedion snarled, and the captain fell silent. “While you were sneaking around the slums of Rifthold, you got into more than one brawl, and you destroyed at least one business, which as of now still has yet to recover, if it ever will.”

This time it was harder to stifle the growl, but as Aedion’s expression didn’t change he must have managed it with at least some success.

“And then last night, it all finally comes to a head when Aelin allows herself to be abducted by said assassin. And you allowed all of this to happen.”

Rowan’s grip on his temper, already tenuous due to the nature of the situation, finally slipped enough for him to snarl at the other warrior. “Do not presume to think I made my decisions lightly,” he growled, “or that I have not spent a single moment wishing it could have been myself in her place.”

The shifter—Lysandra—delicately cleared her throat, and Aedion immediately turned his attention toward her. “If we’re done yelling at each other about whose fault it is,” she said pointedly, “then perhaps we can come up with a plan for how to handle the fact that our princess is missing?”

Rowan nodded shortly, and unfurled a roughly-sketched map of the city over his desk. He watched as the captain’s brow furrowed, likely at the idea that a foreign soldier had been able to acquire this much information about his city, but Rowan chose instead to focus on the plan he had been given. “Aelin’s request was that she be given twenty-four hours as a head start,” he began, “and I see the merit in that. If she’s not able to get the information she requires now, this assassin will go to ground and it could be years before we hear of him again.”

“It likely won’t be years,” the captain interrupted, ignoring Rowan’s scowl. “I did some research on my own into the man she’s hunting. He’s too proud to go completely unnoticed for that long.”

“Be that as it may, this is our best opportunity.” Rowan tapped on a building on his map. “She was taken here. Her captors didn’t notice me following them. It appears to be a stronghold of some sort, almost a guild hall for cutthroats and killers. I think it’s unlikely that they would move her from this place.”

“Unlikely but not impossible,” Aedion retorted. “We should keep an eye on the place.”

“Once you’re satisfied with my explanations, I intend to go there myself. If you can promise to adhere to the plan, you may join me.” He had long since given up on keeping the frosty bite from his tone, but he fisted his hand at his side to keep it away from his blades.

“And how can I trust that this is actually her plan?”

It was the mark of a good soldier and guard, to be skeptical of his statements. If this were any other situation, Rowan would even be grateful that Aelin had someone such as this as family and protector. But this was not any other situation, and Rowan carefully called up a hint of the ice that swirled within him in the hope that it would cool his temper before he killed Aedion. “Whatever Aelin did or did not tell you is between you and her, and I refuse to be pulled into that fight. The only thing that matters right now is making certain that she exits that building safely. Are you going to help with that or not?”

Aedion growled, eyes glinting in a way that strongly reminded him that this male was indeed related to Aelin of the Wildfire, but nodded. “When do we leave?”

“As soon as we’re finished here. Captain? Lysandra? Anything to add?”

Captain Westfall cleared his throat. “If I may, I can’t keep Dorian from noticing she’s missing all day long. Do we have a plan for that?”

Rowan frowned thoughtfully, and Aedion and Lysandra glanced at each other. “That’s a terrible idea,” the shifter said as if in response to some unspoken question.

“It’s the best one we have,” Aedion replied. “This entire plan, such as it is, hinges on secrecy. And you had best believe I’ll be having words with Aelin about coming up with better plans later, but right now we’re stuck with the mess she left us in.”

“Have we considered just telling Dorian?”

“No, he’s right,” the captain interjected. “The less Dorian knows about this for now, the better. He’s terrible at keeping secrets like that from his expression; if we tell him everyone will suspect something is amiss.”

Rowan quickly turned his attention to the guardsman, frown deepening. He very much suspected that this was not actually true, and that the prince was far better at keeping secrets than he wanted anyone else to believe. Perhaps the raw magic that lived in his core was less well-controlled than he had believed?

Ah, of course. The magic. It wasn’t public knowledge that the crown prince of Adarlan was burdened with such a strong gift of magic. It was likely the captain was aware of the secret, and didn’t want any upset to risk a flare-up of the young man’s power at an inconvenient time.

Rowan carefully set aside the thought that Aelin’s disappearance would possibly cause an emotional disturbance in the young prince that was severe enough to unleash his magic. Better to think his control was simply a work in progress like Aelin’s rather than wonder how close they could’ve possibly gotten in a few short weeks.

Lysandra sighed, interrupting his thoughts, and when he looked up at her he froze for a moment as Aelin’s face looked back at him.

It wasn’t truly Aelin’s face, though. Lysandra was trying to adopt her usual confident smirk, but the gesture looked stiff and unpracticed. If he looked more closely the color of her eyes was ever so slightly darker as well, and the scattering of freckles across the bridge of her nose was in the wrong pattern. It was deeply unsettling to be looking at this face that both was and was not his carranam, and Rowan quickly looked away. “It should be close enough to fool the prince, for a short time,” he managed.

“So we’re decided, then,” Aedion declared.

“I still hate this plan,” the shifter cautioned.

Captain Westfall scowled as he stood. “It’s the only plan we have. I’ll do what I can to limit your interaction with the prince. I’m assuming you don’t want a guard sent to the building?”

Rowan nodded. “Best not to call attention to our movements. But be ready, in the event that we do not return.” He suspected all would be well, but it never hurt to have a backup plan.

The captain nodded, the motion tight and precise as he would expect from a soldier of the man’s status, and quickly left. “You can get there on your own?” Rowan asked Aedion.

The younger male stared at the map carefully, then nodded. “I can get there.”

“Good,” Rowan said. And then he flew from the room in a flurry of wings and frosty air.

~*~*~

“You take me to such nice places,” Aelin purred as Arobynn led her into another chamber, slightly larger than the previous one. Her arms and legs remained chained, but with slightly more freedom of movement she could carefully roll her shoulders and her ankles in preparation for moving quickly should an opportunity arise.

“Such a valuable player in the game should be treated with exactly the respect she commands,” Arobynn replied smoothly, though Aelin carefully suppressed a shudder at the bite beneath his words. She needed him to keep talking, to give her time to find the truth beneath the layer of lies she knew he would present.

“Well, I do believe the next move is yours. I await it eagerly,” she smirked.

She glanced at his face, focusing on the way his eyes didn’t move at all when he smiled. “I have a proposition for you, my dear.”

Oh, how she wished she could free a single arm. It was all she would need to make him regret the way he was speaking to her, as well as the bargain she believed he was about to suggest. Instead, though, she relaxed into one of the chairs as he sat in the other. “I’m listening.”

“See, we each have something the other wants,” he continued. “I have information I know you seek, and I would very much like you to stop being a pain in my ass.” Again, that undercurrent of rage slipped through his ironclad control, and Aelin hid another smirk. Riling people who claimed to have excellent self-control was a talent she had developed from the moment Aedion had come to their home from across the sea. It seemed this man was no exception.

“I’m afraid I don’t know what you mean,” she replied.

“Ah, so you weren’t aware when you and your… companion… trashed the Vaults that I had a significant investment in the business?”

“One of your hulking brutes didn’t like that I beat him fair and square. I could hardly control what happened next.”

“And the safe being cracked open before you left?”

“Complete coincidence, I assure you.” She was well aware that he would have no proof it had been her who had broken open the safe, and she knew that refusing to admit to what he suspected would only make him more angry. That was good. She needed him angry enough to let information slip.

“I see. Then I presume you don’t want to know how your parents died?” Another biting remark overlaid with false sincerity, velvety smoothness underlaid with sharp fangs and claws.

Aelin went cold, sensation fading from her limbs as she stared at him. “I was there. My parents died of an illness.”

“Ah, yes,” he drawled, kicking his legs up and over the arm of his chair. “An illness no healer could cure, or so I heard. I had left Terrasen by then, of course, but word spreads quickly when rulers fall.”

Aelin bit her tongue to hold in a sharp reply before glancing back over at him, expression carefully uninterested. “And assuming I can believe you’re telling the truth,” she said, “what would you ask in exchange for this information?”

“Why, what could any man want from a lovely princess such as yourself?” he asked, and Aelin once more carefully mastered her own expression to hide any disgust. “You have power, and yet you cannot access it without aid. I have that information and more, and yet I lack the power that would ensure my own safety. I’m certain we can come to some kind of… arrangement.”

“That’s a high price you ask,” she replied. “And you haven’t done nearly enough to prove you’re worth such an arrangement. After all, it is I who would need to convince the lords of Terrasen to accept you. If you can’t convince me…” Aelin deliberately yawned, and cheered internally as Arobynn gritted his teeth, silver eyes alight with anger.

“If knowledge regarding your own parents isn’t enough to convince you,” he snapped, “then what about information regarding your former lover?”

“It’s quite bold of you to assume I did no investigating when I discovered his body,” she retorted.

“Ah, but I would wager you have yet to learn who bid me send him to Orynth in the first place, and who gave the command to cut his life so tragically short.”

The callous admission that he had passed that command along lit a fire in her veins, and she reached for it before recalling that she was bound in iron. The wildfire fizzled, mere sparks that slipped from her fingers. “And what assurance could you give me, that you would tell me and that you have proof?”

Arobynn stood, and Aelin did finally cringe as he slid two fingers under her jaw to tilt her head up. “My dear, do I look like a man who leaves anything to chance? You’ll have your proof once I have our agreement.”

Aelin jerked her head back, freeing herself from his grip. “That’s a shame, for there will be no agreement until you’ve presented your proof.”

Almost immediately, Arobynn’s casual expression melted into steely anger. “What a shame indeed,” he murmured. “Perhaps you would care to enjoy some more of my… hospitality… first.”

As the man stepped away and opened the door, someone else entered the room. Aelin carefully stood as well, but even with a single glance she knew this wasn’t a fight she would win. Not with her limbs and power both bound by the iron chains clamped around her ankles and wrists.

At Arobynn’s nod, the newest arrival to the room gave her a predatory grin and dragged her toward the wall. Her face made contact with the wall as he shoved her against it with a hand between her shoulders, and while she was stunned by the impact he attached her chains to hooks affixed to the wall. “Do let me know if you decide to change your mind,” Arobynn called, and then the door closed behind him as he left.

Aelin heard the sound of a whip cracking, and as if from a distance she heard herself screaming as fire spread along her back.

~*~*~

Lysandra finally relaxed into her role as she sat beside the prince for the evening meal. True to his word, the captain of the guard had kept him busy for most of the day, giving her time to overcome her nerves at having to pretend to be someone like Aelin. Oh, she had acted before. She had played roles for clients and courtiers alike, and she had certainly changed her face many times.

None of them had felt nearly as important as this. Everything was on the line, completely dependent on Dorian believing her performance as his potential future wife.

It’s only for one day, she reminded herself as her fingers twisted around each other. She had complete faith in Aelin’s ability to execute a plan, as well as Aedion and Rowan’s ability to keep her safe. It was up to her, now, to give them the time they needed.

Dorian’s parents seemed to be completely unaware of the swap, and Lysandra had spent enough time listening to Aelin’s tutors to be able to follow the light political conversation that was taking place. Even Dorian was engaging with her just as he would with Aelin, and when he grinned at an offhand remark she awarded herself another point for her acting.

As the meal came to an end, Dorian looked over at her again. “So tell me, did you want me to do something terribly predictable and show you the gardens? Or can we skip that part?”

Lysandra laughed in reply as Dorian grinned. “Perhaps another time. I still have to read several of the books you’ve loaned to me, if I hope to finish them during this visit.”

Dorian stood, then, and turned to face her with an ostentatious bow. “Then I hope you will grant me the honor of allowing me to escort you back to your rooms, Your Highness.”

Lysandra chuckled and shook her head in what she hoped came across as a fond gesture. “You’re impossible,” she accused.

The prince laughed in reply. “I assure you that I am not,” he said. “I am here, after all. Unless you’d care to discuss the philosophy of such a statement, of course.”

“I rather suspect we would be here all night,” Lysandra grinned back as she stood, allowing him to take her arm and lead her away.

It was easy enough to allow Dorian to escort her back to Aelin’s room after the evening meal, though she couldn’t help a moment of surprise when he followed her into the main seating area. He glanced at the book Aelin had left open on her desk, humming thoughtfully as he read a few sentences. “Ah. I thought so,” he muttered.

“What are you talking about?” she asked, mimicking Aelin’s easy grin as she relaxed into a chair halfway across the room.

He turned to her then, and a chill in the air matched the frost in his eyes. “If I invited you to share my bed tonight, shifter, would you demur like the princess you claim to be? Or would you say yes, believing she’s already given into my charms?”

~*~*~

In another situation, or if he were simply an observer and not a participant in this conversation, Dorian might have been amused at the nearly-comical widening of not-Aelin’s eyes. Instead, though, he only felt a cold rage at the deception.

To the shifter’s credit, she immediately dropped the guise of Aelin and returned to her usual appearance. “I told them this was a terrible idea and we should just tell you,” she grumbled. “What tipped you off?”

“A few things,” he replied, “though the most suspicious to me was that this book is open to where Aelin left off last night when I left. She hasn’t read it today.”

The shifter—Lysandra, if he was remembering correctly—nodded. “I didn’t think you would come back here,” she confessed.

Dorian sighed. “Why don’t you start by telling me exactly what it is you’ve all been keeping from me today, and why the captain of my guard appears to be working with you.”

That was the part that was the most shocking to him, if he were being truly honest with himself. He had never once had cause to question Chaol’s loyalty, and he didn’t want to begin now. He only hoped there was a reasonable explanation for why he had been so eager to ensure he spent as much time as possible embroiled in his training and studies.

As he thought about the possibility that his captain and friend was conspiring with these people, as good as he believed Aelin’s intentions to be, he had to take several deep breaths to stop a layer of frost from forming on his hands. His control over his magic was much better than it had been when it had first manifested, but strong emotional responses still riled the power that slept within him. Unless he wanted to entrust his deepest secret to agents of Terrasen, he needed to keep his feelings in check.

The frost finally ebbed, and the shifter began to speak. “Your captain is only involved insofar as to keep you removed from all of this,” she said quietly. “We provided him with enough information to ensure your safety, nothing more.”

“That still leaves a foreign princess, her most loyal soldier, and a blood-sworn of Doranelle in my capital city, with a purpose of which I am not aware, causing an unknown amount of chaos.” Dorian fought back a sigh at the thought of the headache this would no doubt cause for him, and that was if he was fortunate enough to avoid worse fates.

“They’re… dealing with a threat that could bode ill for you and Aelin both.” The woman was clearly trying to decide how much to reveal and how much to hide, and if he wasn’t the person she was trying to deceive in this manner he would have respected it far more.

“What is the nature of the threat?” he asked.

She sighed. “A former crime lord of Terrasen, who left a few short years before her parents died. He’s created a new home for himself in Rifthold, styling himself the King of the Assassins. She’s been attempting to find him for years, to bring an end to a career that’s gone on for far too long already.”

Dorian sighed. “And I presume if I ask you’ll have absolutely no idea why a crown princess of Terrasen is involved in hunting an assassin, and didn’t simply leave it to her warrior cousin.”

“It isn’t my story to tell,” she replied, looking away.

“Of course it’s not,” he grumbled. “Apologies. I believe you when you imply that this wasn’t your idea and that you’re only involved out of necessity. But this puts me in a… delicate situation.” That was an understatement; if word of Aelin’s actions got out it could be disastrous.

“I understand,” she sighed. “Which is why I wanted to tell you what I could.”

Finally, he nodded. “And when do we expect her to return?”

“By morning,” she answered.

“Very well. I will do what I can to keep this quiet and out of the public eye. But I will be asking Aelin about this later.” It was the best he could offer, and by the look on her face she understood completely.

Without another word, Dorian turned on his heel and returned to his office, asking a guard on the way to send Chaol to him. It appeared they had much to discuss.

~*~*~

“I detest this plan,” Aedion hissed in the direction of the hawk on the nearby roof as the sun began to set. “We should be going after her.”

The hawk took flight, circling the square before landing behind a box and turning into Whitethorn in a soft flash of concealed light. “We have to trust that Aelin can get herself free,” the warrior said. “We’re foreign actors in Adarlan’s capital city. If we break into that building without cause, it puts Aelin and her prince both in a difficult situation.”

It was interesting, how a subtle difference in Whitethorn’s tone was able to so clearly indicate that he wouldn’t mind causing a little trouble for the Adarlanian prince. “You don’t like Dorian,” he realized.

The statement earned him a scowl from his Fae companion. “I have no feelings one way or the other about the prince.”

“You realize my senses are better than a human’s, right? I could hear that you don’t like him.”

Whitethorn’s response was the carefully crafted words of someone used to diplomacy. “I have no reason to dislike him. And we’re not talking about this. It’s almost time.”

Finally. He’d hated sitting in this alley waiting for something to happen. “Time for what?”

“If Aelin is going to keep to her schedule, she’s about to make her next move.”

“You think she can get out of there without us?” It wasn’t that Aedion didn’t trust his cousin’s abilities. No, he knew she was a capable fighter and a powerful magic user. But he knew that she would be unlikely to use her magic unless absolutely needed, given the possibility of a tense political situation if she were recognized.

When he turned to face Whitethorn, the other male wore a small but ferocious grin, eyes positively glowing. “It’s not her I’m worried about,” he responded. “Anyone who crosses her on her way out will deserve exactly what she gives them.” And judging from the look on his face, Whitethorn would revel in their suffering.

The house they watched over was quiet, its occupants likely asleep given that their profession meant being out at all hours of the night. Aedion sighed. “I still don’t like this,” he admitted several minutes later.

“Given that I don’t like it either, I could hardly expect you to.” For all his posturing, and for all the strange glee that had come over him when he had spoke of what Aelin would do to those who crossed her, now the warrior was tense, eyes dark with what Aedion suspected was worry.

Even though the Fae beside him was sworn to a queen that was not his own, Aedion realized he wouldn’t rather have anyone else at his side for this particular mission. He had watched Whitethorn and Aelin grow close over the previous weeks, closer than anyone would’ve suspected. He didn’t know much about magic, but he suspected that sharing it as they could was a rare gift. If he could trust anyone to feel the same urgency he did to ensure she got out of this alive and as unharmed as possible, it would be this warrior.

Suddenly Whitethorn’s head tilted and his eyes narrowed, much like Aedion would have expected in the male’s other form. “What is it?” Aedion asked, only for the other male to gesture for his silence.

Soon enough, Aedion could hear it as well. There was shouting coming from inside the house, at least two masculine voices. He couldn’t make out the words, and based on Whitethorn’s expression he couldn’t either, but something had changed. As he watched, the warrior pulled two knives from his boots and twirled them gracefully around his fingers. It was a good choice, and Aedion went for his own knife as well, knowing his sword would be nearly useless in these cramped alleys. “We stay here,” Whitethorn was saying. “Those are male voices. I haven’t heard Aelin yet, which means they haven’t discovered her. We only go in if it’s absolutely necessary. When she leaves, she’ll come this way. If anyone else makes it this far…” The grim smile on his face indicated their fate clearly enough.

Three men burst through the door of the building, exchanging panicked instructions before departing in different directions, and Aedion and Whitethorn crouched behind a cart to conceal their presence. One man ran for the alley they had chosen for their hiding place, and before Aedion could do anything the Fae warrior was already in motion, clutching the man to him in a twisted parody of a lover’s embrace before drawing a blade across his throat. “They’ll notice when this one doesn’t come back,” he whispered as he dragged the man behind their cart. “We don’t have much longer.”

A slim figure stumbled out of the door next, and Aedion grinned. “We don’t need much longer. That’s Aelin.”

She was almost unrecognizable, golden hair turned red with blood and darkened with ash, but there was no mistaking the eyes that met his, pained but determined. Then those eyes shifted away and he knew she had seen Whitethorn standing beside him. From the sharp intake of breath at his left he knew the warrior had seen her as well, and soon he had abandoned all talk of secrecy to cross the small crossing in several quick strides.

Aelin moved, trying to meet him halfway, but her motions were fumbling and clumsy. She said something to the warrior that Aedion couldn’t quite hear, smiling up at him…

And then as he watched, she collapsed into the male’s arms.

Whitethorn quickly lifted her, carrying her into the alley and out of sight. By the time they reached Aedion she was already unconscious, either from pain or from exhaustion. Judging by her face, Aedion suspected it was a combination of both. “Get her out of here and back to the palace,” he said quietly, adjusting his grip on his knife. “I’ll stay here and make sure you’re not followed.”

Green eyes met his, clearly searching for something. Aedion didn’t know what the warrior was looking for, but finally he nodded and adjusted his grip on Aelin.

Before he could get far, though, Aedion called to him again. “Oh, and Whitethorn?”

“Yes?” he replied, expression tight with concern.

“Take care of her.” And then Aedion turned his attention back to the house with a grim smile. He didn’t know what its inhabitants may have done to his cousin, but he had absolutely no problems with delivering justice to any of them foolish enough to come his way.

~*~*~

Tagging:

@ireallyshouldsleeprn @queen-of-glass @fangirlprincess09 @sassys-world @morganofthewildfire @superspiritfestival @perseusannabeth @sis-it-dont-add-up @jlinez @julemmaes @emilyoftheshadows

[charm-person]

some fanned fiction for all the beyond the mountains fans out there xoxo

Kitty and Nat have laid out their bedrolls on the ground and are lying supine, gazing up at the sky. Him is finishing up feeding the horses and hitching them to the back of the wagon for the night. Once he finishes his nightly routine of petting Twister and Tornado’s faces and telling them they’ve done a good job today, he joins his friends on the ground.

At this point, Nat is already locating prominent asterisms in the sky and pointing them out to Kitty. “There are the Towers,” he says, pointing out a group of stars in some vaguely rectangular shapes.

“A long time ago, there was a city of magicians enthralled by the night sky. They slept during the day and woke up with the stars. The most powerful among them concocted a plan for a ritual to blot out the sun and create eternal night. The time came for them to perform their ritual, but nothing happened. Then, travelers seeking the city found that it had disappeared into thin air. Some say that for their hubris, the Sun pulled them from the earth and banished them to the stars forever.”

Realizing that he has been talking for quite a while, he suddenly feels embarrassed. “So that’s the story of the towers,” he finishes awkwardly.

“Very interesting!” says Kitty, earnestly. “What else is there?”

Easing slightly, Nat scans the sky for other recognizable figures. “See those bright stars making a cross shape? That’s Cryonyx, the ancient white dragon.”

“I always thought of that as a buzzard,” Him interjects. “And there below it is the carrion it’s after. A coyote or something.”

Nat looks puzzled. “I’ve never heard that story before. Where’d you learn that?”

“Oh, it’s not really a story or nothin’. I just thought that’s what it looked like.” Arrow squawks as if in agreement.

“You made that up yourself?” Kitty asks, intrigued. “I love that! I can just picture a little Him, looking up at the desert sky, finding pictures!” She sounds delighted. “Tell us more.”

Now it’s Him’s turn to feel sheepish. “Ah, err…”

“Here, let’s take turns,” Nat suggests. “Okay, so that’s the buzzard. See the wings, Kitty? Right, so up and to the right, there’s kind of an elongated V shape. See it?” His companions nod. “That’s Toro, the ox. He guides lost travelers. Hmm… some people say he’s real, you know? I read that, once. People see him when they’re lost in the desert.”

“Have you ever seen him, um, Him?” Kitty asks, very interested in these stories.

“An ox? Just walkin’ around?”

“Or a bull, perhaps,” Nat says. “But you don’t really get lost, do you? You know your way around pretty well.”

“I guess,” Him says.

Nat prompts Him to point out another asterism he’s come up with. They go back and forth, comparing and contrasting the figures they both see. Sometimes Nat points out groups of stars that the others can’t make out, and he remembers his companions can’t see the night sky as well as he can, so he skips those stories and moves on to another shape they can actually see.

After a while, Him notices that Kitty has been just quietly listening to the boys talk. “Do you have any stories from your neck of the woods, Miss Kitty?” he asks.

“Hmmm,” she ponders, tapping a well-manicured finger against her lips in thought. “Truthfully there’s not many stars you can see in the city of sin. It’s pretty well lit-up and there’s not much difference between night and day in a place like that.”

The boys are intrigued. “I have a hard time even imaginin’ that,” Him says.

“I wonder if we’ll ever actually end up there,” Nat adds. “It would be interesting to see it. Although you’re probably bored of it at this point, right?”

“Well, I like the city. It’s the people that are the problem.”

They all sit on that for a moment, thinking about what it would be like if they ended up there. Him tries to believe that they won’t get into any more unlawful business; Nat tries to imagine what Kitty’s mom and her crew are like.

“Anyway,” Kitty says, “I don’t have any stories about the stars, but I do have stories I heard as a child. They mostly involve devils, but…”

The others, including Arrow, encourage her to go on. She shares some folk tales from her childhood, and Nat does the same. After some hesitation, Him also shares stories his mom had told him when she was still around. They talk until Kitty and Him realize they’re completely exhausted, and they go out like a light. Nat stays up, keeping watch. He takes out a journal and sketches out Him’s own personal constellations along with the official Perrenian ones he learned in astronomy and astrology classes. On another page, he quickly paraphrases Kitty and Him’s childhood stories before he can forget them, trying hard not to smudge the ink.

[dragonswithjetpacks]

Campfire Conversations

-dragonswithjetpacks

Summary: Astarion is bored at camp. And his target for the night... is Ferelith. Through persistence and bribery, she indulges him in casual conversation.

Read here on Ao3.

Despite the three bedrolls she had placed next to the fire, Ferelith still found it difficult to gain any comfort. She rolled up one side, placed her pillows against, and even placed a rock behind them to prop them well enough to use as a backing. She sat upright, flipping through her book, sketching in magic symbols and making small notes. At her side was another set of smaller books, one she would thumb through on occasion to double check her accuracy. All was quiet other than the whispers from the fire, which was precisely what she had asked for. But then again, there was always one who was never too keen to listen to what she wanted.

"What are you doing?" he announced his presence, bending over her shoulder as he peered into her book.

Ferelith blinked disapprovingly, giving him a side glance from the corner of her eye.

"Ah, yes, you're quite right," he sighed. "I don't care... I'm bored."

Again, she said nothing, but he took her silence as an invitation. He stepped over the log onto her blanket, with his boots still on, making her cringe as the dirt made a subtle foot print. He sat next to her, propping himself on one of her pillows. It appeared it was not good enough. And he removed it, fluffing it to perfection before placing it behind him once more.

"That was accident," he winced at the wrinkled and dirtied mess he left in his wake.

Kicking his feet to the side, he straightened his corner and brushed the dirt off lightly. It mattered little, as she had already to planned to wash it the moment he placed his boots onto her finely stitched threads. Her annoyance was made quite clear with a loud sigh, her book slowly lowering to her lap.

"I suppose I'm the one lucky enough to oblige you tonight," her face was calm but he could feel the irritation burning into him. "What would you ask of me?"

"You could light someone on fire," he shrugged with his bottom lip sticking out.

Her eyes shifted upward in thought of the idea. "I could. But I'm afraid I'm not so amused by your form of entertainment."

"You would be if you'd let me show you," he raised a brow.

Much to his disappointment, the only reply she gave was yet another one of her famous blank stares. He wondered where she went sometimes when she looked at him like that. Any normal person would have thoughts filled with disgust, though that was only humorous and much to his liking. But Ferelith was different than most. The look was usually empty. It was only until recently he noticed her eyes would often widen and her lip would curl upward at one corner. At least he knew he got some kind of rise from her.

"Where did you get those books?" he asked when he noticed he was losing her attention.

Ferelith was not easily distracted. When she was focused, there was nothing that could tear her eyes away. He had discovered this, unfortunately, through a series of trial and error in an attempt to know her true nature. Most things ended in eye rolls, rarely out of annoyance, but mostly with sarcasm. There were also multiple occasions where he was completely ignored. Which he found rude, but reasonable. It was actually a bit of a surprise she was speaking to him, now.

"A bookshop," she replied, tilting the book back up.

"Not an ordinary bookshop."

Her eyes flicked in his direction.

"Let's see," he picked a few of them up, many no bigger than a pocket book. "Arcane, Illusion, Mystic Runes... my, my... these look handwritten for personal use."

"Put those back where you found them, please," she commanded without so much as a glance.

"These look like spell books," he began to flip through the pages of one. "If I had to guess, anyway. I'm usually decent at guessing, though."

"You know if you look through the grimoire of another without permission, you'll gain the hex of that grimoire."

He suddenly dropped all three. Ferelith smiled wildly, her eyes still scanning the runes in her larger book. He hadn't noticed before, but while she was writing with one hand, the other held a book in place, often darting to another to scour through it's pages. It was like they had to separate minds of their own. The hand writing or sketching was moving very fast, but her penmanship was impeccable. He leaned over - careful not to disturb her- and saw she was copying whatever she was scanning from the other, smaller books.

"These are your grimoires?"

"No," she replied.

"So how is it you are able to look at them?"

"I have permission."

"I don't understand how someone so straightforward can have so much mystery about them," he shrugged. "It's somehow both annoying and attractive."

"That's precisely the impression I aim for," she smiled again, smaller and sweeter this time.

The sigh that came from him was intentionally loud enough for Ferelith to look up from her work. She observed her companion pull himself onto his feet, placing his hands on his hips next to her bedrolls. He looked about the camp when suddenly, he had a reasonably good idea. She had hoped his walking away would mean he had given up. On the contrary, however, she watched him walk over to Gale's things and begin to rummage through them. Suddenly, Ferelith was intrigued with the rogue. More than likely, she was interested to see if he got caught. Unfortunately, he did not. Instead, he came waltzing back across the camp with a rather large pep to his step, a large bottle in one hand and a goblet in the other.

Careful not to defile her blankets a second time, he seated himself next to her, closer than before. He fought with the cork inside the bottle for a moment, but sent it sailing into the air with a loud pop with the edge of his knife. He poured himself a glass, brought it to his nose, and inhaled it deeply followed by a satisfying exhale. He looked to Ferelith, who had regretfully not been able to look away. He had to admit, he won half the battle. But as he held up the wine as an offering, he felt there was more of a fight to be had. Ferelith rolled her eyes. Reached over to a flat stone next to her blankets.  And grabbed her empty goblet. She reluctantly held it out as he poured the contents into her cup. There was no hesitance as she brought it to her lips, her eyes dropping back down into the book without any further acknowledgement to Astarion.

"I don't even get a thank you," he complained.

"Thank you," she said before looking into the goblet a second time. "This is actually... quite nice."

"I hear the words, but I don't really feel the gratitude."

Ferelith looked up, finally giving him the contact he craved. There was always something unsettling he found looking into her eyes. They were yellow. But not like fire or the sun... no. Her eyes were pale. Like that of a once green plant craving attention; something to hydrate it, nutrients from the soil, or even just love.

"Fine," she said, tapping the ink to make sure it was dry before snapping the book shut. "I will indulge you."

"Words I've been waiting for all night," he shook his head and leaned forward.

Ferelith sat her work beside her, pulling her knees up and turning to her side. Her robe was of black lace and didn't do anything to add to comfort or practicality. But if there was one thing the traveling band of misfits learned about the warlock, it was that she wasn't always about the practical use of an item. She was very fond of beautiful things. And as she considered Astarion, she was inclined to admit the she was fond of his beauty as well. He knew this, using it to his advantage and tempted her at every chance he received. Ferelith was fully aware of the predicament she had somehow placed herself into. Which gave her more reason to ignore him. And as obvious as she made it, that did not prevent him from trying. Relentlessly.

"Tell me about the books," he said, propping his arm onto the rock they were leaning on.

"They were the last of a collection I was working on in the city."

"Anything interesting?"

"Just old spells and runes. Nothing anyone uses anymore. I've been transcribing them. They're spell books of old witches: long forgotten, tossed aside, half rotten old books."

"Witches you say?" he recoiled.

"Oh, yes. I believe there are a few useful things in here for banishments of the undead. If you're interested."

"Gods, no," he laughed, taking a sip of his wine. "But tell me more."

"I have one necromancy tome," she rolled over onto her knees. "And it's interesting. Not what I'm looking for, but interesting," she began to fan out her collection on the blankets.

Astarion leaned forward to examine them further.

"My job at the bookshop was to take these old grimoires and write them down into the bigger blank tomes. The ones that I found useful, I kept for myself. This is what is left of my findings. And the remains of my last project."

"What did you mean by 'what you were looking for'? Is there a certain spell you're seeking?"

"Not necessarily a spell. Just a translation."

"Have you had any luck?"

"A few words here and there."

"May I see the book you're translating?"

"Absolutely not," her eyes felt as cold as her reply.

"Ah, I see I'm reaching my limit for the night," he said with a tone of disappointment.

Astarion had grown accustomed to his interactions with his warlock companion being cut short. Rather it was her own doing or the work of another, he found their conversations always disrupted. It was a shame, truly, as he assumed Ferelith was the type to hold secrets. Even some that did not belong to her. The woman had been alive for quite sometime, though not nearly as long as he had. But he imagine there was something worth telling within the few lifetimes she had lived.

"Not necessarily," she replied lightheartedly. "After all, you've found this lovely bottle of wine."

"Humoring me for the sake of the wine, then?" a brow went up in confidence.

"I doubt I'd humor you for little else," her smirk was mocking his excitement.

"Remind to thank Gale in the morning, then," his mood went undisturbed. "I'd like to know how it is you intend to humor me now that books are off the table."

"Is that all you think I talk about?"

"I don't know," he shook his head, knowing she took the bait. "I've never heard you have a full conversation. With anyone."

"I converse very well, thank you," she took a sip of her wine. "I've just been lacking good company."

"You wound me," he lowered his gaze, but the tone was of sarcasm and he watched the corner of Ferelith's mouth turn upward.

Success.

"What is it you wish to discuss?"

"Discuss? I've no taste for lectures, my darling. I require something a bit more refined, something provocative. Tell me something interesting."

"Something interesting?" she appeared to be offended, her voice raising in pitch. "Well for one, when you strike a conversation with a person of interest, it's usually polite not to demand it from them."

"Very well," he rolled his eyes. "Tell me something interesting, please. I know you've got something just waiting to be told."

"If you're looking for exciting tales, I'm afraid you've come to the wrong colleague."

"No? Nothing, say, of your youth?"

"I assure my you, my early years are beyond dull."

"Surely not," he tilted his head down. "You have nothing? Dangerous spells? A jilted lover? A need for vengeance? Everyone has a decent vengeance story."

This time Ferelith laughed, tilting her head to the side away from him. But the sight of the smile caused him to straighten where he sat, leaning forward to see it fully. She rose a hand a to cover her mouth, but it was not enough for him to go without noticing... she was embarrassed.

"No vengeance here, I'm afraid," she looked back to him, her eyes meeting his. "But I suppose if you're interested in a horrible love story, I could tell you of my stay in Neverwinter..."

"Horrible as in tragic... or horrible as in just bad."

"Both," she nodded a finger to him.

"Even better!" he seemed overjoyed.

"Fine, fine. But I'll need a refill," she said passing her goblet to him.

Like the gentleman he was, he poured it for her. A bit too close to the edge, but he was eager for her to start the story to notice. She took a long drink, letting the contents give her the courage she needed. This was a bit of a defeat for her, but she was willing to let it go for the sake of his amusement. It was something to catch her attention, but to make her laugh was a feat of it's own. There was a sliver of a thought that perhaps she had misjudged him.

"This story is so humiliating. I can't believe I'm telling you," she shifted in her seat.

"Get on with it, then," he urged her to continue.

"Mind you, I had never been to a city before. Not even close to one. And I had just gotten a taste of what it felt like to wield magic. I found myself in the streets of Neverwinter in search for more knowledge. But I had no idea how to survive. There were so many others like me, just a crowd of beggers looking for work."

"Yes, I am aware. There are plenty of people swimming the streets looking for a better life in the city. A plague on society. Honestly."

"Indeed," Ferelith sighed, recalling the annoyance of the people who tormented her for those years of her life. "I offered my services. But found little coin in it. No one took my work seriously and no one was willing to give me the chance. I found myself resorting to other means of earning an income. Means that required a certain charisma."

"The vagueness of your statements is dramatic, but do go on."

"I acted as a smuggler," the bluntness returned. "It gave me good coin and the jobs I was hired to perform often involved a change of wardrobe. I was no good with the actual act of stealing or sneaking. A sleight of hand on occasion, but never anything that tactful. I was only a cover for whatever it was that I was charged with moving. It eventually earned me enough to rent a loft where I proceeded with my studies and transcribing work."

"Just a moment," he held out a hand to pause her. "The coin from working jobs like that... I don't believe that's enough for what had acquired."

"You are aware there are other ways of obtaining what is needed," the complacency in her tone was met with a guiltless stare. "Seduction."

"I'm starting to believe this woman you speak of is no longer with us," he teased with an exaggerated smile. "This talk of charisma and seduction, I've yet to see it."

"It's not for you to see," the wrinkle of frustration set on her brow and she turned her head, taking another long drink of wine. "I was young. And equally ignorant."

A long pause fell across Ferelith as she looked down into her cup. She could feel the affects and wished it would make the rest of the story a bit easier to tell. It was only a reminder of her failures. She wondered why she chose this to tell of all things. A jilted lover was not worth what she lost. With a deep breath holding back her hesitancy, she pressed on.

"There was a man who requested my services. He was a young human noble from a prosperous family of wizards. Nothing to himself, really, but he had access to the city. The fool that I was decided he was an easy way out of the slums. I charmed him, convincing him he was infatuated with me. And when it wore off, he was too polite to deny that he had invited me out for dinner."

"Commendable, if not a questionable choice," Astarion hid his surprise.

"The idea was to charm him at least in the beginning. And it worked," she shrugged. "I had charmed him enough times that he had fallen in love with me. Not entirely on his own, but still... it was his decision to place a ring on my hand."

"A ring?" he nearly choked on his wine. "You were betrothed?"

Ferelith slowly shook her head.

"You were married?"

"I was," her reply was far too calm for his liking.

An image flashed into his head. A memory he had once borrowed from her. He recalled the face of a young elven. Handsome. Proper. Filled with joy. But the way she spoke of him did not reflect the feeling he had felt when she looked at him that night. Then again, it was a human she had wed.

"Well," he cleared his throat. "I've dealt with this sort of thing in the past, but I don't think I've-"

"Astarion," she cut him off, causing him to look at her. "He's dead."

"He won't be a threat, then. Good," his face lightened. "Not that I was worried. But his death makes things much easier."

The sweet smile of hers came back onto resisting lips. The flirtatious advancements were completely unnecessary, as she was already glowing with a buzz from the wine. She blamed that rather than admitting she was getting any sort of feelings from Astarion at all. His confidence told him otherwise and he refused to be wrong. The more straightforward he was about it, the further it would take him.

"You didn't kill him, did you?"

A laugh burst from her, nearly causing her to spill her wine. "By the Hells, no. It's been nearly twenty years since his death, Astarion."

"I'm only making sure," he shrugged, a victorious grin spreading. "One can never be too careful."

"I take it your life has been threatened by other lovers of your past?"

"Other lovers?" he snapped his head, his brow lowering and his eyes watching her reaction deviously. "Are you considering yourself as a lover?"

Ferelith opened up her mouth to object. But her thoughts had halted her from answering. She did, in fact, word her previous sentence to include herself. Deciding there was no way around, she stared at him blinking unapologetically.

"I'm going to take that as a yes."

"No," she found herself unable to hold back.

"It's too late, I've already taken the first answer into consideration. And I'm very pleased to accept. You can't take it back, darling."

He took a sip of his wine, quite satisfied with the outcome and himself. Ferelith was not finished. However, the night had seemed rather pleasant and she felt genuine joy from their conversation. She allowed him to have his victory, if for anything, for making her laugh. It would be nice to have at least one good thing to remember him by if there ever came another time she considering slitting his throat.

"You'll have to tell me about them," she swirled her goblet.

"They're not important," he waved a hand casually. "Besides, you still haven't finished your tale."

"It's nothing, really," she looked down, not wanting to go into further detail."I lived the luxurious life of a noble for sometime. But it wasn't enough for me. I was greedy, stealing from the hands that were already willing to give."

"Naughty girl," his eyes widened.

Again, Ferelith smiled. "I was eventually discovered with nothing to blame but my own pride. I left behind everything. All my work, gone. Everything I cherished, gone. All my beautiful things... gone."

"Do I sense a bit of regret?"

The smile faded into a disgusted frown, a crease forming at the bridge of her nose. "The only thing I regret is allowing another man to become involved. If it wasn't for him, I would have likely inherited my own estate."

"And so the plot is revealed," Astarion tilted his goblet. "Alas, the husband was not the jilted lover after all."

"No. Just an impatient fool."

"So... you did intend to kill the husband."

"For purposes I'd like to remain unknown, I refuse to acknowledge you," Ferelith sat down her empty goblet. "But I feel no guilt for him. Either of them. I am only convicted with my own stupidity for allowing myself to lose everything that I had worked so hard for."

"It's a shame to lose such status... but still, there's nothing wrong with a fresh start," he replied flatly.

"Sometimes," she said with a sigh, "you must be stripped of everything before you can know true power."

Astarion looked at her with a cause for concern, noting the kindness in her voice. He seemed surprised and even somewhat shaken, lacking a voice for a response. But he quickly recovered and the usual smirk crept onto his face.

"If that's a way to say you'd like to remove my clothes, then I'd love to know your true power."

"Alright," Ferelith placed her hands across her lap. "I believe I've had enough for one evening."

"Already?" he whined. "We haven't finished the bottle."

"You are more than welcome to finish it... alone."

"No, no," he sat it down beside her. "You'll be up all night working. Take the bottle and relax. You've earned it."

"I'm flattered," she took the bottle by the neck. "Good night, Astarion."

The elf rose to his feet, dusting off his knees, leaving behind the empty goblet he brought with him. He gave one final bow to his companion.

"Good night, my darling."

[thepeanutbutterwizard]

Ninjago/Avatar au Pt6

The second half of Book 2 (hopefully)

(Part 1, Part 2, Part 3, Part 4, Part 5)

So Garm finally reads the letter from Wu. It starts off as a normal pseudo-journal entry, but after it mentions finding the Garms old armor, but no body, it turns into more of a normal letter. Wu says that he’s missed his brother since he was banished, and that he hopes that they’ll be able to see eachother again soon if Garm is alive, and ends with Wu saying that he normally burns the letters he writes to Garm, so that no-one else finds them, but that he feels hopeful that this one could actually get to him. It’s touching stuff.

Lloyd picks up earthbending almost immediately, unlike Aang. The element Lloyd is going to struggle to learn is fire (if you don’t count his airbending being self-taught. He picked up airbending really, really fast, but bc he’s been making stuff up and trying to do what Maya did with her waterbending [Maya’s had decades to hone her style tho, not just three-ish years, but he’s like someone learning ballet only from YouTube, for only a couple of months] since there are no more airbenders [or so they think, bc none of them saw Morro airbend at the North Pole]), and I’ll get into why that is when it comes up. They haven’t had Garm start to teach Lloyd any firebending bc they’re trying to go in the order as much as they can, but Garm has finally convinced Kai to learn more than just the basics, and he picks it up really quickly.

Meanwhile, Morro is taking care of an injured Wu (and accidentally making him suffer through poorly-made tea). Now, Morro is onboard with Wu wanting to leave the Fire Nation behind; unlike Zuko, Morro isn’t trying to win back the favor of some distant parent, the only family he’s ever known is Wu, and he’s not about to abandon Wu for a bunch of people who would probably kill him as soon as they could no matter what he did for them, and Harumi made it clear that no-one in the Fire Nation is going to be extending them any mercy.

Once Wu wakes up, Morro does yell at him for doing something as stupid as taking a hit from a well-trained firebender to protect a stranger (Wu hadn’t gotten around to telling Morro ‘hey, you know that guy with the big burn scar who’s traveling with the Avatar? That’s my dead-but-not-really-dead older brother. Pls stop trying to stab him’, and Morro wasn’t there when Garm revealed his identity in the North Pole), until Wu tells him that Garm is his brother. This leads to Morro yelling out ‘You mean to tell me that the Avatar is my cousin?!?!’ And that how Wu learns that Lloyd is Garms son (’wait, what?’ ‘Have you really gone this long without noticing that the Avatar calls your brother his dad?’ ‘I’ve had a lot on my mind, give me a break!’), and now he thinks that Garm and Maya are married with three kids, one of whom is the Avatar.

They make their way to Ba Sing Se, with the help of the White Lotus. Wu isn’t the leader of them (he isn’t super old in this au, imagine what he looked like in S9, with the mustache), but he is a fairly respected member. I still haven’t come up with a Jet character who would work, and I am open to suggestions. If I do find a good character, they will definitely throw hands with Morro (mb Shade? Just cut out the romance subplot in S1 and pick a couple of EM’s to be the other freedom fighters?). And yes, Wu does get his tea shop in the upper ring (Steep Wisdom), and Morro tries to be happy and supportive, but even though he is fine leaving the Fire Nation with Wu, it does still feel like he wasted years of his life, both in chasing the Avatar and just trying to prove himself to everyone back in the Palace, so he’s pretty grumpy.

Now back to Team Avatar: at Maya and Garms insistence the kids have been picking out their little mini-vacations. They know that they only have a limited amount of time before the comet arrives, but Garm and Maya want these kids to be able to be, y’know, kids, at least a little bit, in spite of the fact that they’re growing up in a war-torn world. Kai want’s to check out that glacier-spring place by the desert, it’s kinda underwhelming, but they get fruity drinks out of it. This whole time Kai and Cole have been getting closer to each other. Kai feels a little guilty, like he’s betraying Zane’s memory, but talking to Maya and Garm about it does help him start to feel better, and it helps his over-protectiveness start to abate a little.

Jay wants to pick a really cool mini-vacation to impress Nya, and he asks the people who are in the glacier place if there’s any place around those parts, and ends up learning that about a year ago some lady showed up saying something about a huge spirit library in the desert that she was looking for. They never saw her again after that, and figure that she must have died out in the desert. When pressed (and payed) one of the artistically inclined staff members roughly recreated the sketch of the library, and vaguely remembered the area on the map she said she was going to search, and with that Jay has his mini-vacation picked out.

They set off and find the library. Cole chooses to stay outside with Ultra (who can’t fit inside) bc he thinks they’ll be safer if the only earthbender stays outside incase something goes wrong, and if they need to get out of there fast he’d only slow them down with his legs. Everybody else heads into the library and meet Wan Chi Tong (did I spell that right? I’m too lazy to check), who agrees to let them use the library if they 1) don’t intend to use the contents of the library against anyone else and 2) contribute something to his library.

Lloyd and Nya both use their wanted posters (they both thought they were awesome [Lloyd bc he’s 13 and Nya bc you can’t convince me that Nya wouldn’t be thrilled to have a wanted poster bc she’s been fucking with a tyrannical regime] and incredibly accurate considering the art had to have been done by someone using other people’s descriptions, and they totally intend on framing and hanging at least a few of their posters up in their rooms when all this is over), Kai has a copy of a poem that Zane wrote for him, Garm has his brothers letter (he doesn’t want to give it up, but he has nothing else), Jay has a blueprint from one of his inventions, and Maya has a copy of a story in a series that Koko had brought back to the South Pole over the years. Wan Chi Tong comments that about a year ago a researcher had arrived and had offered him another part of the the same series. He mentions that they should be careful, as she never left, and has been primarily researching the Avatar.

Everyone has an idea of who this mysterious researcher could be (except Jay), but they decide to be cautious all the same, just incase she isn’t who they think she is. They all start discreetly searching for anything that could be used to help them fight the Fire Nation, and they end up finding and empty placard saying something about ‘the Darkest Day in Fire Nation History’, but when they go to check part of the section on Fire Nation (that library was enormous, y’all cannot tell me that Zhao was able to destroy absolutely everything that the library had on the Fire Nation. It could only have been the last few decades/mb centuries of Fire Nation history), as well as a campsite that was full of scrolls having to do with the Avatar and different bending techniques (and a few misc scrolls about random things like cooking, engineering, etc). As they’re poking around the campsite, who else comes around the corner but Koko!

She has her nose buried in a scroll as she’s walking, so she doesn’t notice them all until Lloyd happily calls out ‘Mom!’, and goes in for a hug. Koko drops the scroll and has a happy reunion with her son and husband, as well as with Maya, Kai, and Nya, and she and Jay are introduced to each other. Koko explains that she’s been able to stay in the library so long was bc she managed to get the fox assistants to like her enough to start bringing her food and water. She also explains that she’s been doing nonstop research into the Avatar State, the Air Nomads and airbending, and the Fire Nation (though she’s really quiet about that part so they don’t catch Wan Chi Tongs attention and ire) and shows them that planetarium thing and that she discovered the eclipse. (How did she make it out to the library without a flying companion or something? SHe’s just that much of a badass.)

Koko had been saving up supplies and charting a course out of the desert, and planning to leave the library as soon as she could, but now that they’ve showed up with Ultra she can just grab her things and go. Someone, probably Jay, gets a little too vocal about how they have a chance to beat the Fire Nation, and cue Wan Chi Tong sinking the library and trying to add them to his ‘collection of specimen’. Garm and Koko are a dynamic duo, with Garm distraction the angry spirit while Koko gathers all of her scrolls and supplies together while Maya gets the kids to the exit.

Meanwhile, Cole is holding up the library, and trying to help Ultra fend off the sandbenders that showed up to capture and sell the dragon. Cole is able to put up a bit more of a fight than Toph was (meaning that he was able to get one or two good hits in) bc being in the desert doesn’t impair his vision (the sand does tank his mobility just as much as it would anyone with prosthetic legs tho), but he isn’t able to stop them or even hold them off long enough for everyone else to get out. Cole, despite being initially afraid of the large dragon, had quickly grown to be one of Ultras favorite people in their group (like, third favorite. Kai will never admit that he’s jealous), and is pretty upset that he wasn’t able to save him. More on Ultra later.

So Lloyd is really upset about losing his companion, just as much as Aang was. He doesn’t act out (for lack of a better word) as intensely as Aang, since Ultra wasn’t the last thing he had left of his people like Appa was for Aang, but Lloyd is still rightfully pissed off. He takes off shakily on his glider, leaving everyone behind before trying to search for Ultra and the sandbenders, ignoring his families protests. Koko starts working on getting them out of the desert using the route she had plotted out (using the sun and shadows to orient them and get started in the right direction), and starts planing out how long her food and water (she had the good sense to bring those from the library) will last between all of them. The answer is: not long enough.

Kai (and mb Jay too) is the one who has the bright idea to drink the cactus juice, bc while Kai, like Sokka, (and Jay tbh) is smart enough to know that drinking a strange liquid out of an unfamiliar plant is a bad idea,but the fact that it is a stupid idea doesn’t stop him. Wait, y’know what? Jay definitely tries the cactus juice, but instead of acting as out-of-it and inebriated as Kai does, he acts like he does in S9, weirdly chill and disconnected from reality. He’s still tripping balls, but he’s reacting to it differently from Kai. Cole just ends up carrying Kai piggy-back, even though the sand makes it harder for him to move (he’s crushing, and he’s the only one [adults included] whose physically strong enough to carry him for long periods of time) (also Kai awkwardly and drunkenly flirts with him. Everyone pretends not to notice for Coles sake) and everyone else takes turns holding onto Jays wrist and leading him through the desert or else he would have wandered off and died.

Lloyd gets back to them, landing hard in the sand, holding back tears bc even though he’s upset and could use a good cry he knows that they need to conserve as much water as they can. He’s got his family there to comfort him (even if Kai and Jay are kinda incapacitated atm), which does help him a bit, but he’s still rightfully upset. They find the abandoned sandbender skipper thing, find the vulturewasp hive, and come across the sandbenders. Cole is able to pinpoint the sandbender (no idea who this guy would be, Ninjago character wise) who lead the others to take Ultra via his voice bc Cole a) was trained in a myriad of performing arts thanks to his father, primarily singing b) has perfect pitch and c) never forgets a voice bc of that.

Lloyd goes full Avatar State, but is comforted and calmed down by his parents while everyone else books it. The sandbenders tell them that they sold Ultra to some guys who were going to take him to Ba Sing Se, and then they take them out of the desert (with the sandbenders getting the Death Glare from all of Team Avatar the whole way. Koko totally punches the sandbender who lead the others to steal Ultra once they’re out of the desert.)

They make their way to Ba Sing Se on foot, with Lloyd trying to get a handle on his emotions (and worrying everyone in the process), and they run into a family with an expecting mother/wife (I am also taking suggestions for who these characters could be. I’m pretty tired while typing this so I can’t think of anyone) and try and get on a ferry to Ba Sing Se. Cole, whose father is well known and wealthy, uses that fact, his double amputee status (he ‘accidentally’ slips out of one of his prosthetics. Kai catches him before he hits the ground), and his acting skills to get them tickets without passports.

And we get best girl Pixal back! She helps Team Avatar help the pregnant family go through the Serpents Pass, and it goes pretty similar to cannon, except instead of a situation where Sokka is overprotective of Suki, Jay picks up on how much Pixal likes Nya, and sees that Nya, his crush, reciprocates those feelings, and gets a bit passive-aggressive w/everyone, but Pixal especially. It doesn’t last long, bc Jay is a hormonal teenager who realizes he’s being a dick fairly quickly, but it does help fizzle his crush on Nya a bit (sorry again to any hardcore Jaya shippers who were hoping for that in this au, but it’s really not my cup of tea).

They also help deliver the couples baby, but Maya and Koko are the ones helping take care of that. Team Avatar get to the outer wall, just to see a huge Fire Nation drill heading closer and closer to the wall, ready to start tearing through it...

[userdokja]

Not from around here. | Kylo Ren x Reader. || Three.

Summary: Reader is from earth, living a normal boring life. What happens if one day she randomly teleports and ends up in space, with people who had laser swords and troops who can’t shoot in the right direction? And then meets a very handsome man?

Warnings: None? My Writing and Grammar. 

Prologue || One || Two || Three 

Masterlist 

--

You forgot about sleep and focused on your father's journal because it was the only thing that reminded you that you weren't insane.

He wrote the rules and effects of your abilities, one of the things that you kept in mind is that when you teleport in a realm and stay there for less than a minute everything would still be the same when you back and time will not pass, however, if you spend more than a minute in that place time will resume.

You managed to take a small nap before you were called by the Supreme Leader to go to the training room, you were tired but you knew that it wouldn't be an excuse since you felt like he as already doing you a favor by training you even if he goes on missions. When you entered the room, you were greeted by the usual silence.

"Sit," he instructed you, you nodded and sat beside him, copying his position as well. "You look exhausted."

"I am. Thanks for noticing." You sighed, you put the notebook down beside you on the floor.

"Where were you last night?"

"I went back to my 'world' and... I talked to my mom about stuff, it's not that important." you shrugged.

"It's bothering you." He said. "That's not going to be very helpful with what I'm teaching you today." He stood up as you stayed on the ground. He took the staff you worked with on your first day and threw it in your direction, this time you weren't able to catch it.

You cursed under your breath as you picked it up, you pushed yourself up from the ground.

"We're really doing this now?" You asked.

"You need to gain your focus again." He stated.

"And this is how you're planning to do it?" You whined, you already regret not sleeping at all.

"Can we do something else?"

"Like what?" Kylo furrowed his eyebrows. You could see his frustration coming up. "I don't know, eat something?" Kylo scoffed at your suggestion.

"I'm serious."

He groaned in annoyance before nodding.

"Really?" you beamed at him widely.

"Yes, I'll have someone send us some food," Kylo replied, he looked at you for a moment, he couldn't help but let his lips curl up into a small smile as well, your effect on him is definitely uncontrollable.

----

You were om the floor, already digging in your food, you noticed that Kylo wasn't eating yet.

"Why aren't you eating?" You asked once you swallowed the food in your mouth.

"I'll eat later." He said in a low voice.

"Come on, I feel uncomfortable here just eating by myself while you're just standing there." He looked at you and rolled his eyes, you grinned at him and motioned for him to sit in front of you. "I've succeeded once again."

"Just because I need you to focus."

"So when am I like.. going to a fight with you guys?" You asked.

"When you've trained enough." He answered.

"But-"

"Can we just.. sit here in silence? Please?" He sighed for like the millionth time in the past hour. "You're very talkative."

"Alright, I'm sorry." After that, you stopped talking like he asked, you just stole some glances at him as you ate, you couldn't help but admire his dark hair that fell on his shoulders.

You felt comfortable around him, and you didn't know why. You've only just met him and knew so little about each other and yet you felt like you could trust him. Hell, you just talked to your work mate for the first time even if you've seen each other for years!

Your eyes lingered to the notebook beside you and remembered what your mother said about something pulling you back, maybe your mother was the one that kept you dad in your world, and she was the reason why he stayed. You don't know a lot about him, mainly because he died when you were young and never actually got to know him.

A few moment later both of your were finished with your meal, you rested for a while before you start with your training again.

"Why can't we train with the force stuff? I mean, I've already learned enough about this whole defending myself thing. Can you still not use it on me?"

"I can only use it on you if you let me, if you let your guards down." You nodded and then shrugged.

"Can we practice with it?" You insisted. "I wanna know more about it before I go home."

"Go home?" Kylo furrowed his eyebrows.

"Well, after I find out everything I know and do what I have to do." It wasn't like you missed it, it seemed like the only thing you'll miss about home is that you get to spend time with your mother. "It's not like I'll miss everything about it though, to be honest almost everything sucked back home."

"What's it like there?" Kylo grew curious about your realm, and how different it was from his. "Peaceful?"

"I wouldn't say it's peaceful. But it's beautiful, it could be so much more if only the people took more care of it." You picked up the notebook from the floor and looked through the pages. "I'm sorry If I have been.. very tiring to work with, my only explanation for it is because there was nothing like this back home, I think it would be more fun if I had... companions but I chose not to."

Kylo hummed in reply, then asked "Why not?"

"Most people out there aren't worth talking to, I wanted to find someone interesting." You said. "Then I found you, the scary and powerful Supreme Leader from outer space, who's actually a bit cute." He looked at you weirdly.

"I've killed a lot of people and you think I'm cute." He scoffed. "I could kill you here already."

To his surprise, you just laughed at him. "Alright, scary man." You twirled the staff around. "Let's get back to work."

----

That night, your whole body was sore and it felt like it was going to fall apart if you don't get some rest. You sat down your bed and took your shoes off, you thought about Kylo and how closed off he was.

He barely smiled and if he did, it would be just a smirk, you realized that everyone was so afraid of him aside from you. But why weren't you? He already told you about how he could kill you in cold blood, but everytime you think of it... all you saw was someone so misunderstood.

You rubbed your eyes and lied on your bed, you let out a breath and tried to relax. You were sure that the reason you were here was because of him, but why him? The supreme leader of the people who wants to take over the entire galaxy.

You picked up your Dad's notebook, something that you wanted to focus on more. You looked for the last page you read and saw a small sketch of your mother's face in one of them, you smiled to yourself as you looked at it, your heart warmed as you thought of how they were so in love.

Something you wished you could experience soon.

-

-

-

What do you guys think? I wanted to add on how Kylo and Y/n aren't very close and aren't even friends yet, so that if ever they become close you could see the progress.

Sorry about the boring chapters, I promise that I have plans for it and not just writing what randomly comes into my mind.

-

Permanent Tags: @aintnouseofpretending @just4muggles @heartbeats-wildly @lookinsidemyhead

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Series Tags: @i-just-wanna-run-hell @treestarrrrrrrr @rintheemolion @pan-lokistan @petalduck @mintchip17 @drawlfoy

[arianaofimladris]

A place called home

An escaped prisoner faces the mistrust of his kin and seeks a place that would accept him.

https://archiveofourown.org/works/20375554/chapters/64439761

Part III

 "You should be more careful with that stranger."

Alcarino turned and saw a guard still watching the door suspiciously, his hand on the sword grip. Oelon was one of the Sindar who had decided to join Maedhros. Never had Alcarino seen him so wary and displeased, though their acquaintance was rather brief.

"Mistoron?" Alcarino feigned mild surprise, even as he already suspected where this was going to lead. "I don't think he would have the strength to actually do something, least of all intentionally. He's famished and worn out."

"He may be a spy." Oelon puffed and folded his arms on his chest. "You know of his lot. It would be regretful to see you harmed. We all value your skill."

"Yet you don't seem to trust my abilities," Alcarino observed coldly. "Lord Maedhros hasn't deemed any company necessary, nor does he see Mistoron as a danger."

"The lord's judgement in that matter is biased and you know it."

"Is it?" the voice behind Oelon was so cool it could freeze the air. "Why didn't you come to me to voice your concerns instead of bothering Alcarino?"

The Sinda turned on his heel and faced Maedhros, for it was he who had approached them so quietly. "I only mean...” Whatever he intended to add, the words seemed to stuck in his throat.

"Speak no more." Maedhros's eyes blazed brightly. "I have heard about these concerns. And I know Mistoron has already experienced the hospitality you speak of." He spat out the last words with disgust. "I will not have anyone call Himring uninviting. Everyone who wishes to dwell here is welcome to do so and to be a part of this fortress. Have I made myself clear?"

"Yes, my lord," Oelon bowed his head, but mistrust did not leave his features. Alcarino hoped he would wise enough not to voice his unfounded doubts again.

***

But the matter returned and sooner than Alcarino anticipated. The evening had not yet come when Oelon reported that Mistoron was missing from his room. He dared not vocalize his doubts in front of Maedhros again, but he had no such trouble talking to the healer.

"I told you! It wasn't wise or safe to let him move freely around the fortress and now he's gone somewhere!"

Alcarino sighed inwardly. He believed when Oelon claimed that their new companion was not in the room he had been offered. He also doubted Maedhros would act rashly towards a former prisoner of Morgoth, more likely towards Oelon, yet he wished to be present nonetheless, so he followed the guard to the great hall, where Maedhros was likely to be found among his people at this time of day.

As they entered, Alcarino looked around. There were fewer elves than he expected, and the lord was absent as well, so perhaps there was some additional training or meeting he wasn't aware of. Yet there was no need to disturb Maedhros, whatever he was doing.

"Do you really regard Mistoron as a threat?" Alcarino asked Oelon and pointed to the right.

There, curled on one of the benches standing alongside the wall opposite to the windows facing the inner yard, slept their missing guest. Whatever had chased him from his room, clearly had not got him here, as he seemed to be at peace. He was wearing the fresh clothes he had been given, but as he slept, he kept what little he possessed pressed against his chest.

“I wouldn’t disturb the lord if I were you,” said Alcarino. “And let Mistoron stay wherever he pleases, since he is not our prisoner.”

***

Alcarino settled for making sure their guest was well fed and his wounds and sores tended to, but otherwise kept his distance and watched him from afar. Mistoron rarely hid within the walls of the room he was given. Most often he could be found in the hall. He mentioned briefly that the bustle of normal life around him made him feel safe and most of the Noldor didn’t mind him joining them if he wished. Alcarino asked no questions and did not return to the matter of resetting his hand.

On the third day it was Mistoron who sought him out. He came to have his wounds checked, then hovered as the healer cleaned his tools.

"My hands yearn to pick the tools and for once make something of my choosing," he blurted finally and stopped as abruptly as he began, looking at Alcarino with sudden fear what his outburst would bring.

But the healer nodded in acknowledgement. "For that you will have to wait till you are healed.”

Bracing himself, Mistoron looked up. “Do it. If it is as you say, please fix my hand.”

“Thank you,” Alcarino offered him a gentle smile. “Is there anything you would like to know beforehand?”

Mistoron opened his mouth, but the words seemed to have left him. “You... You said you would put me to sleep?” He asked finally. “That I will not...”

“You will not be awake. You will sleep for several hours afterwards,” explained Alcarino and motioned Mistoron to sit back again. “Your hand will probably bother you for the next few days, until the swelling goes down, but I have means to help. You will not be left alone in this.”

Sinking in the offered chair, Mistoron heard little of what the healer said later as he explained the details of the surgery. There. He did it. He would let this strange Noldo touch... hurt him. The idea paralysed him, though he tried to convince himself that the healer was right. He could probably still refuse and run away, but he had no one else to go and talk to. Nobody here was close to him, though the few he had made acquaintance with seemed to care about his wellbeing. And the only person who knew what he had experienced...

“If you ask him, he will come to assist me and stay,” the healer offered him a kind smile. “Lord Maedhros. If you want. He will understand.”

"No, no," Mistoron shook his head fervently. He wished not to bother the lord. "If only..." he stopped, a wave of shame forcing the words back down his throat.

"I cannot offer you what I don't know you need," Alcarino reminded him gently.

"I... CanIhavemorefoodfirst?" Eyes shut, he didn't dare as much as draw a breath, feeling his bluntness was too much.

But the healer was nothing but kind, though he shook his head in denial. "For what I am about to give you, it's best to have an empty stomach, lest you feel ill. But if you wish so, there will be food for you waiting when you wake.”

"I-I'm sorry.”

"There is no need. Please wait here for me.”

***

It went better than Mistoron expected. Just like the healer had promised, he remembered nothing from the surgery and woke in his own bed as the sun was already setting. Alcarino had given him medicines and left more food than necessary, but Mistoron didn’t feel like eating. He laid and rested, so a sudden knocking startled him.

"Enter," he called, wondering who wished to see him, since the healer had promised to come again in the morning.

The door opened.

"My lord-" Mistoron sat at once, ready to rise, but Maedhros motioned him to stay seated.

"I just wanted to see how you fare," he said, his flamed eyes examining the new member of his household. He had a scroll tucked under his right arm, which made Mistoron wonder whether he had come straight from some meeting.

"Oh, please," Mistoron awkwardly pointed at the only chair in the room and, despite earlier dismissal, he sat straight in bed.

The lord must have realised how imposing he was standing there, towering over Mistoron, for he sat casually, as if it was common of him to step into his people's quarters for a chat. "How do you feel?"

Mistoron blinked in surprise. "Umm... Confused," he admitted. He wasn't unwell and the freshly re‑broken hand didn't bother him, but his mind seemed foggy and some thoughts seemed to escape him before he managed to grasp them. He felt weak and Alcarino had warned him to be careful, since the procedure of re‑setting his hand had been taxing to his malnourished body, but otherwise he was doing far better than he had expected.

Maedhros glanced at the concoctions left by the healer and nodded in understanding. "Oh yes, these things tend to do that with your mind. It will pass. Meanwhile, if you feel up to it, I would like you to have a look at this." Maedhros unrolled the paper, which turned out to be a plan of a chamber. Mistoron moved closer to have a better view. "You said you were a carpenter and I have a commission for you. We need a set of chairs and matching shelves for my council room."

"Oh." What the lord spoke of was a representative place then, one where he probably met the King's emissaries and other important guests.

Seeing that he had Mistoron's attention now, Maedhros continued, his own interest visible. "I rarely have the pleasure of designing anything these days, but at least I sketched the room for you with vague ideas where I would like to have the new furniture placed. It desperately needs refreshing. I know you are not up to work yet, but I am curious to see your ideas."

"Of course, my lord," Mistoron uttered, overwhelmed by the amount of trust he was being given. The Lord did not even consider that Mistoron's work might not be to his taste. He seemed genuinely interested in possible new ideas and designs and Mistoron remembered what he had heard of Feanor his father and of the Noldor, as well as their love for crafts. The few times he had seen Maedhros so far, he had first and foremost been the Lord of Himring. Now it seemed their meeting was private and the lord allowed himself to enjoy the idea of designing and planning, even if he himself would not participate in the process of crafting.

"I believe you have met Istime," Maedhros continued. "She agreed to work with you, but also to show you our ways around here. She will join you when you are ready. Just don't overdo yourself. Alcarino is a good friend, but he is a better healer and can be stern for your best interest. It is wise to heed his advice." Maedhros left the sketches on the desk and stood up. "You are welcome to join us whenever you wish, if you feel up to it," he reminded Mistoron again.

“Thank you, my lord.”