#they captured her so well

[deeplyridiculouslyinlove]

My favorite Moiraine moments in The Eye of the World

EOTW only spoilers below the cut

1. “[The mist] follows the river as if drawn with a pen,” Moiraine was saying in satisfied tones. “There are not ten women in Tar Valon who could do that unaided. Not to mention from the back of a galloping horse.” (Chapter 12)

This is "Siuan Sanche waits for only one woman" energy right here.

2. “I suffered more injury to my pride than anything else,” the Aes Sedai said irritably, plucking at her cloak blanket. She looked as if she had been a long time ill or hard-used, but despite the dark circles under them, her eyes were sharp and full of power. “Aginor was surprised and angry that I held him as long as I did, but fortunately he had no time to spare for me. I am surprised myself that I held him so long. In the Age of Legends, Aginor was close behind the Kinslayer and Ishamael in power." (Chapter 51)

Not babygirl being surprised (and a bit self-satisfied) that she held off a powerful Forsaken for so long BUT ALSO her pride being wounded that she couldn’t do it for longer.

3. Even Aginor seemed stunned. Then his head lifted, cavernous eyes burning with hate. “Enough. It is past time to end this.” “Yes, Forsaken,” Moiraine said, her voice as cold as deep winter ice. “Past time.” The Aes Sedai’s hand rose and the ground fell away beneath Aginor’s feet. Flame roared from the chasm, whipped to a frenzy by wind howling in from every direction, sucking a maelstrom of leaves into the fire which seemed to solidify into a red-streaked yellow jelly of pure heat. In the middle of it, Aginor stood, his feet supported only by air. The Forsaken looked startled but then he smiled and took a step forward. It was a slow step, as if the fire tried to root him to the spot, but he took it. And then another. “Run!” Moiraine commanded. Her face was white with strain. “All of you, run!" (Chapter 50)

"I'm as strong as I have to be" 😭

4. In Algomar’s private garden, under a thick bower dotted with white blossoms, Moiraine shifted on her bed chair. The fragments of the seal lay on her lap and the small gem she sometimes wore in her hair spun and glittered on its gold chain from the ends of her fingers. The faint blue glow faded from the stone and a smile touched her lips. It had no power in itself, the stone, but the first use she had ever learned of the One Power as a girl in her royal palace of Cairhien was using the stone to listen to people when they thought they were too far off to be overheard. (Chapter 53)

Obsessed that her version of the all-knowing Merlin character is an affinity for eavesdropping--maybe it's mystical wisdom, maybe it's being a nosy bitch (affectionate)!

5. Her eyes fell on Mat as she stepped through the doorway and she hissed as if she had touched a hot stove. "Get away from him!" Nynaeve did not move, except for turning to stare at the Aes Sedai in surprise. In two quick steps Moiraine seized the Wisdom by the shoulders, hauling her across the floor like a sack of grain. Nynaeve struggled and protested, but Moiraine did not release her until she was well away from the bed. The Wisdom continued her protests as she got to her feet angrily straightening her clothes, but Moiraine ignored her completely. The Aes Sedai watched Mat to the exclusion of everything else, eyeing him the way she would a viper. (Chapter 41)

Sorry I didn’t hear you I was distracted thinking of canonically tiny Moiraine dragging Nynaeve across the room like one of those mothers who finds super strength and lifts the car off her kids.

6. Moiraine climbed down from Aldieb's back. Calmly she removed something from her pouch, unwrapped it. Rand glimpsed dark ivory. The angreal. With angreal in one hand and staff in the other, the Aes Sedai set her feet, facing the onrushing trollocs and the fade's black swords, raised her staff high, and stabbed it down into the earth. The ground rang like an iron kettle struck by a mallet. The hollow clang dwindled, faded away. For an instant then, it was silent. Everything was silent. The wind died. The trolloc cries stilled. Even their charge forward slowed and stopped. For a heartbeat, everything waited. Slowly the dull ringing returned, changing to a low rumble, growing until the earth moaned. The ground trembled beneath Cloud's hooves. This was Aes Sedai work like the stories told about.... Abruptly Moiraine wavered, and would have fallen had Lan not leaped from his horse to catch her. "Go on," he told the others. The harshness of his voice was at odds with the gentle way he lifted the Aes Sedai to her saddle. "That fire won't burn forever. Hurry! Every minute counts." The wall of flame roared as if it would indeed burn forever, but Rand did not argue. They galloped northward as fast as they could make their horses go. The horns in the distance shrilled out disappointment, as if they already knew what had happened, then fell silent. Lan and Moiraine soon caught up with the others, though Lan led Aldieb by the reins while the Aes Sedai swayed and held the pommel of her saddle with both hands. "I will be alright soon," she said to their worried looks. She sounded tired, yet confident, and her gaze was as compelling as ever. "I am not at my strongest when working with earth and fire. A small thing." (Chapter 18)

She's ridiculously proud of her fog along the river and then just a few chapters later channels EARTHQUAKES and WALLS OF FIRE like she's not one of the last Aes Sedai of a dying age and SHRUGS IT OFF.

7. "The The Wisdom won't help. She says she can't. But the stories--" She raised an eyebrow and he stopped and swallowed hard. Light, is there a story with an Aes Sedai where she isn't a villain? ...

She used the staff to pull herself to her feet. “Take me to your father, Rand. I will help him as much as I am able. Too many here have refused to let me help at all.” “They have heard the stories too,” she added dryly. (Chapter 7)

Rand is lucky he's the Dragon Reborn or he and the Two Rivers folks would have been met with some wasps.

8. Thom Merrilin stepped forward grandly and held up one empty hand, turning it slowly. Suddenly, he gestured with a flourish and a dagger twirled between his fingers. The hilt slapped into his palm and, abruptly nonchalant, he began trimming his fingernails. A low, delighted laugh floated from Moiraine. (Chapter 12)

This peek at the girl who watched court bards at the Sun Palace in Cairhien is so cute it makes me almost willing to ship her and Thom in the books.

9. “The Dark One is after you three. One or all. And if I let you go running off wherever you want to go, he will take you. Whatever the Dark One wants, I oppose. So hear this and know it true. Before I let the Dark One have you I will destroy you myself.” It was her voice, so matter of fact, that convinced Rand. The Aes Sedai would do exactly what she said if she thought it was necessary. He had a hard time sleeping that night, and he was not the only one. Even the Gleeman did not begin snoring until after the last coals died. For once, Moiraine offered no help. (Chapter 13)

This is controversial but I personally adore this speech where she threatens to kill them all and then acts petty about healing them just because she hears Rand talking badly about Aes Sedai.

10. “Do they have sheep in Tar Valon? That's all I know. Herding sheep and growing tabac.” “I believe,” Moiraine said. “That I can find something for you to do in Tar Valon. For all of you. Not herding sheep, perhaps, but something you will find interesting.” (Chapter 48)

I giggled.

11. Rand made ready to put Cloud to a gallop right away, and everyone else settled their reins with the same urgency. Everyone except Lan and Moiraine. The Warder and the Aes Sedai exchanged a long look. “Keep them moving, Moiraine Sedai,” Lan said finally. “I will return as soon as I am able. You will know if I fail.” Putting a hand on Mandarb’s saddle, he vaulted to the back of the black stallion and galloped down the hill heading west. The horns sounded again. “The Light go with you, last Lord of the Seven Towers,” Moiraine said, almost too softly for Rand to hear. Drawing a deep breath, she turned Aldieb to the east. “We must go on,” she said, and started off at a slow, steady trot. (Chapter 18)

11. I can't help but think how much they've grown since New Spring when I read this and it makes me want to cry.

Bonus: Every scene of Moiraine greeting the cats at Basel Gill’s inn. (Chapters 41 & 43)

Bonus Bonus: The way Rosamund delivers Moiraine's "it will be as the wheel wills" in the audiobooks after Loial says he is worried the bridges in the Ways are breaking and they might be trapped in there and die. (Chapter 45)

[lgbtlunaverse]

There's a version of the "don't go grocery shopping while hungry" rule specifically for writers where you should never under any circumstances be allowed to touch your draft within 3 hours of reading a really good story. Because sometimes when you read something great your head goes "fuck this is so much better than my stuff I should make that more like THIS instead!" Look at me. That's the devil talking and you should close the document NOW.

[astearisms]

fionna and cake drawings before and after watching the episodes so far. it’s nostalgic and somehow cathartic and poignant and relatable and—it just started

[kaijutegu]

Sushi date

[sunwoozs]

felix's makeover ♡ | by RISABAE

[kettleghost]

love hiw you draw betty like a freak... luv a good freak of a woman

WOE!!! BETTY BE UPON YE!!

[natsmagi]

arashi drawing bc oomf asked so nicely 🫶

[sentientsliotar]

Annabeth doesn’t know what Disneyland is

Your honour I would die for her.

And Percy’s response was so wholesome

“Just be a kid.”

I love them so much.

[solcarow]

seafood trio portraits !

+ some alts. with spoilers !

[cockworkangels]

max <3333

[starflungwaddledee]

Have you noticed that Red Butterfly is keep following you?

And no, most of the butterflies don't follow anyone but scents of nectar.

starstruck regained +5 points of emotional health! she remembered this is meant to be an adventure, and looks forward to seeing some exciting things! just not this particular butterfly, it seems.

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[xiphactinusfish]

Commission of my oc Safina by @littlestpersimmon

I def recommend following @littlestpersimmon on Patreon/buying art prints. His art is so luminous and lush and I am obsessed.

Thank you for drawing Saf so beautifully!!!!!

[lynpheas]

i commissioned my friend to draw flora with this tattoo i’ve been imagining her having and it’s so lovely aaaa 😵‍💫😵‍💫 thank you @mint-mango ily forever mwah <3

[myokk]

“Class, today we’re going to repot the baby mandrakes because they’re getting a bit too big for their current homes! Aren’t they cute?”

[diazmaximoff]

I fricking hate DeckNine's upcoming game for so many reasons, but I find Max's little dance really adorable. I hope Hannah Telle was having the time of her life with motion capture - go get that bag girl!

(Also, I've officially became a DontNod-only-truther, sorry🙏)

[variousqueerthings]

thing about rose, for me, is that she wasn't there first -- this in a "she was first in nu!who in the sense that this was the first person to travel with nine, and the first person since the timewar, and the last person that nine was with, to the point that ten was born out of that experience/modelled on her."

and in that framing, I am a big fan of her haunting of the narrative, because it start outs with her placing herself inside the doctor's ribcage and rebooting their ability to want to feel things, but unfortunately rose is still a human, like every human the doctor travelled with before, it's just that the doctor forgot how to steel themself against that inevitability because of the circumstances around meeting rose

this is The thing that I find tragic about martha, because I think she could have been that person, if she'd been the first person post-timewar to travel with the doctor, but because she's coming in during bleeding-heart times, she's got to deal with triage instead. and yes, there are wonders, and yes, there are good times, but for a lot of it, it's shrapnel, and I think if it hadn't been, she would have had a very different attitude towards *waves hands* space and time travel and aliens and the universe (one where she wouldn't be the person trusted with something like the osterhagen key)

and donna had a sense of that Space the doctor was in post-rose (she canonically stopped the doctor from dying in runaway bride) and stepped away from it, and didn't get back to the doctor until some of that hole-in-chest had been bandaged up, which martha did a great job of, but didn't get to really benefit from, and I think that's the sad thing about martha jones, is that she absolutely got a taste of the beauty and the splendor, but never without all the violence and heave weight that was put onto her

which, again, she seems to have been very aware of, considering she joined UNIT and Torchwood. her eyes were barely ever rose tinted (no pun here) during her whole journey in the story. martha really is in my opinion the most tragic companion (that I've met so far, I know Adric straight up dies, but maybe he had some fun times before that?), because yes, donna loses her memories and rose is in a parallel universe, but that's more tragic for the doctor -- they've both built lives

in donna's case there's probably a lot of imperfection in that life, but clearly a lot of joy as well, with her and her husband and her kid and her mum, and I'm sure she'd have preferred to be the donna who saw the universe and was splendid, but martha never gets to forget, and has to continue her life one step out of sync of everything she could have been

which, maybe her life is pretty flipping fantastic, but we really don't know, which is the biggest thing I side-eye about the first nu!who era. that whole weird ending with the sontaran and mickey is like... anti-character work, it answers nothing and it makes very little sense

all I know about her at the end is that she more than anyone saw the doctor's life and became a soldier (still a doctor as well, but...) because that was the work she saw needed doing, and she's the kind of person who does what needs doing. but is she... okay? youknow?

but going back to the original point, is that framing martha through the lens of rose is all well and good in the sense that rose is the reason the doctor is at that emotional point when he meets martha -- although donna absolutely had a very big hand in that as well -- but once we've established that, martha's arc is martha's arc, and it's dull to me to frame it as the "rebound" arc or even particularly about alloromanticism (including -- and this is why i get why people do it in fandom -- some shit said by rtd, which is just less interesting than what I get out of it, so shhhh)

she's got so much going on, and her relationship with the doctor changes the trajectory of her life, and it's in many ways a more interesting and far less straightforward trajectory of bad-to-better that many companions get -- it's a wonderfully complicated narrative that (and again, I get that some of this comes from within deliberate framings of the text, even though I think it's more than open enough to do more with, death of the author and all that -- but certainly not all of this is text either, some of it is ignoring what is actually there) is done a disservice by not going through the real messed up fascinating extraordinary shit that's going on during her era + arc in s4

but also... is she ok? I want to know. it's one of my top three burning questions, since we're getting a bit of best-ofs of the noughties DW era, some of your crimes can be righted by a simple bit of martha mr davies