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[ferocious-notes]

Thanks to DA kiss week for getting me to finish this!

Happy reading to all the old man smoochers out there on Day 2: "Tavern."

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“Now this is what the Inquisition felt like,” a tankard in hand, Harding made a sweeping gesture with her arm, taking in the whole of the lively scene. 

Emmrich regarded the celebratory atmosphere that had quite overtaken the Grey Hold. A giddiness had captured every surviving Warden following the destruction of the Eruption and the spring of new life in Lavendel. What would come next for their Order was still very much a question, but not one they would contemplate tonight. Though Emmrich, himself, could not help but wonder what the felling of the last archdemon would mean for a certain Warden Thorne and the life she might live beyond the Blight. 

“A lot of nights at the Herald’s Rest were like this.” Lace leaned back, her gaze turned up to the flickering candles in the iron chandelier above their heads. “Warm fires, good food, friends! We’d stay up way too late telling stories, singing songs. Even the Inquisitor would visit the Rest when she could.” 

A wide, toothy grin bloomed over her face, “I remember one night when she came to play Wicked Grace with Varric and her advisors. Commander Cullen lost his shirt to Lady Josephine! And his pants!” She giggled, took another swig of ginger beer, and wiped her mouth on her sleeve, “he had to run all the way back to the barracks in his smalls!” 

Rook’s chuckle reverberated against Emmrich’s back as she twined her arms around his waist, her chin coming to rest on his shoulder.  “Hey now, that’s a thought!” 

“Strip Wicked Grace?” Lace lifted an eyebrow, her mouth pulling into a smirk. 

“Ah, no thank you, not my game, I’m afraid.” Emmrich patted Rook’s hand, craning his neck to look at her, “do try to spare an old man his blushes, darling.” 

“No, not that,” she laughed. “Though, I am very partial to your blushes.”  

Rook had been no more immune to the dizzy gaiety of the evening than her brothers and sisters in arms. Even Emmrich, in whose bed she now rested nightly, had never seen her so unburdened. Or, indeed, so incredibly drunk. 

Emmrich shook his head as he beheld the smile of his soused beloved, silly and crooked. He tried not to laugh at how the bloom of her naturally rosy cheeks spread over the rest of her face, the result of drink rather than embarrassment. There was not a hint of shame in her expression, only loose joy and sloppy affection that threatened to spill all over him. His breath caught at the sight of it and, when he could exhale again, he huffed a laugh of shock.  

He had once confessed to Harding that he worried his attachment to Rook would make him a figure of fun amongst their company. A man of late middle age succumbing to the trite fate of his archetype by attaching himself to a young lover whom he could never possibly satisfy. An old fool trailing after his own lost juvenescence.  

The reality of their relationship had been very different from the start, not in the least because, truth be told, Rook was a seasoned battlemage of five and thirty, not the blushing virgin his mind had catastrophised of its own accord. The sweeping romance he had planned for them had easily given way to a comfortable, if passionate, companionship he had never expected. Her devotion to him as loving, deep, and, blessedly, reciprocal as he could have ever wished. Certainly in so short a time. To say it was overwhelming would have been putting it rather mildly. 

Unbelievable would have been more apt after so many false starts at love. 

Perhaps even frightening given the uncertainty of their futures. 

Yet, as he stared into her eyes, brimming with intoxicated happiness, he saw one more unexpected wonder in the lines of her eyes and the tilt of her smile. 

There was no other word for it. She looked completely besotted.

Barely recovering his breath, Emmrich suddenly found his mouth invaded by an extremely fervent, if graceless, kiss that tasted overwhelmingly of smoked whisky, but also spiced cake and fig, burning and sweet. 

Unused to such a heated public display of affection, his hands hung in the air for a few seconds before finding purchase on her waist, praying that the hall was loud enough that only she was privy to the small whine that managed to escape the back of his throat as his body surged to press against her.

“I’ll be right back, love,” she patted his head, nearly catching her foot on the seat as she hopped off the bench. 

“Wow, she’s ah…affectionate tonight!” 

Emmrich cleared his throat and smoothed his hair back into place, “she is rather deep in her cups, isn’t she?” He absently straightened his collar pin, “I hope she doesn’t do anything she comes to regret later.” 

“Nah,” Harding rested her hand on his shoulder. “Well, maybe how much she’s had to drink, but nothing else. It’s nice to see her so happy. Actually, it’s nice to see you both happy. Together.” 

Something Emmrich had not realized he was holding, tight in his chest and shoulders, loosened. 

“Thank you, Lace. That’s…very good to hear.” 

The corner of Harding’s mouth tightened as she stared into her drink for a beat, contemplating. 

“I’m sorry I said what I said about not rushing things. That Rook…well. I was worried, since she’s a Warden and…you know, Rook….that she might not take things as seriously as you. But I was wrong. About her.” 

But had she been wrong about him as well? How seriously had he taken their connection when he was to be an unchanging fixture of the Grand Necropolis and she a guardian against the Blight until death took her? What would their future hold, he wondered, now that Lichdom had been thoroughly abandoned and she, presumably, had the whole of her life ahead of her liberated from her oath? 

“Though, no offense,” Harding pulled him out of his racing thoughts, “but, I don’t think I’ll ever get used to seeing you two…together together. Kissing. It’s kinda like walking in on your parents.” 

“That’s quite alright,” he twisted one of his rings, “I’m not certain I’ll ever be used to any of it, really.” 

“Aw! That’s so sweet!”  

He felt the tips of his ears go red, coughed, and cleared his throat again. “But really, dear Harding, parents!? Is that not a bit dramatic?” 

Rook bounded back to their table with all the grace of a Mabari pup unused to the length of her own legs and flung herself into Emmrich’s lap. He scrambled to catch her around the waist before she slid off of him and hit the floor. 

“My dear, I fear you’re going to be rather worse for wear come tomorrow morning.” 

“Worth it,” she settled against him, arms around his neck, her face tucking into the crook of his shoulder. 

He shook his head, unable to control a besotted smile of his own, and kissed her cheek, any notion of decorum flung to the wind of her merry tempest. 

The din of the hall gradually quieted as three Wardens who’d been in a circle playing dice, picked up an assortment of musical instruments. The hush was first broken by the strum of a lute, joined by whistle and frame drum. 

“Rooook!” Lace groaned, her face turning as ruddy as her hair, “you didn’t!” 

Rook laughed uproariously, her feet swinging, as the lute player began to sing,

Scout Lace Harding,

Swift and cunning,

Her arrows cut you

Down to size…

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le miserable. there's just one of him

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What I love most about Emmrich is the very heart of him: his softness.

He is tender in a world that tells men to be anything but. A gentle soul, kind and thoughtful, with a mind as rich as his heart is open. He honors the living, and he reveres the dead. He is sweet without irony, sentimental without shame. A romantic in the truest, quietest sense. He loves fully, without condition or calculation.

Emmrich wears his heart not just on his sleeve, but in everything he does.

He is an orphan who built a family from the idea of home and a pile of bones, who chose love and warmth when the world gave him none. He is what we’ve been starved of in stories for too long: a male character allowed to be openly affectionate, unguarded, kind. A soft man cast as a love interest, not despite his gentleness, but because of it.

He’s not brooding in a corner, growling threats, or pinning someone to a wall with a smirk and a “kitten.”

He’s knitting a scarf to keep Rook’s neck warm in winter. He’s making tea. He’s listening.

Once more, and this matters: he is soft. He pines, he longs, he yearns, he picks flowers.

And we need more men like him in fiction, because we need more kindness in the world.

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Spite is hilarious

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green's my colour.

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flowery tea ♡

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Listen- I love lace Harding with all my heart… but I do think Dagna would have made more sense with her arc :/

(Saying this at the tail end of Harding week feels bad)

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He GIVES the best hugs, no past tense, I refuuuuse that, and I needed to see these hugs realized so, here, indulge 💖

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WIP Whenever and Last Line

Tagged by @redheadsramblings

I'm a slow, perfectionist writer, so I don't know when WIP will ever be posted. But maybe even snippets are enjoyable... these are from two different scenes, but basically the same timeline.

****

Turning on his side, he retrieved the red rose he’d laid on the table before forcing himself to bed depressingly alone. He pressed the silken petals against his lips, inhaling the scent that still clung to the wilting bloom. He freshened it with a twitch of magic from his fingertips.

It was, Rook had explained, a damask of the color that King Alistair Theirin, then a young Warden, had presented to his lover, not his queen, but the Hero of Ferelden. A thing of beauty in a blighted world, the king had said, describing both the rose and the woman. 

A Lothering Rose, she had called it. A common token of love from one Grey Warden to another.

Cutting an open blossom from a bush adorning the Warden’s grave, Rook had slipped the flower through the top buttonhole of his waistcoat, directly over his heart. She’d given him a coy glance over her shoulder as she walked to the Eluvian, Shoud’s Kiss tucked behind her ear. The veilfire lamps made the thin ring of blue around the green in her irises blaze like lyrium, and his mind stalled, malfunctioning spectacularly like one of Bellara’s artifacts.

****

Last line

In what was perhaps the most tender gesture Rook ever witnessed between them, Manfred placed a gloved hand on Emmrich’s head, a low coo wheezing from his chest cavity as he stroked his necromancer's hair. 

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oh, he fell asleep :')

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The Rupert Giles to Emmrich Volkarin pipeline is a slide:

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WIP Wednesday

Tagged twice today by @redheadsramblings! Thanks for letting me play!

This is a WIP I might actually finish some day, so get on board for hurt/comfort and mutual pining. A short story following the prompt, "What happens when your healer's wounded?"

When I told my husband - a perennial healer in Co-ops - this prompt he just said "you're fucked."

Rook et al. figure it out.

“I could drown in your veilfire eyes, darling” Emmrich slurred. 

“Best not,” she covered him back up with the oil cloth blanket, “you know I can’t swim in after you.” She tucked the blanket in around him as his eyes drifted closed again. 

A smile pulling at her mouth, she shook her head, and jumped down from the bed of the cart. Harding frowned at her, eyebrows raised, her arms folded across her chest. 

“It’s just the poppy talking,” Rook shrugged, though she felt her cheeks grow warm. “He’ll be mortified when he wakes up. If he even remembers.” 

“Uh-huh. Right.” Lace planted her fists on her hips, “you know he’s got it bad for you, don’t you?” 

“No.” Rook bent to pick up her field pack, hoisted it up and on to her back. “I don’t know that, and neither do you.” 

Harding kicked at the mud and scoffed. 

“Rook,” she said, her voice stern and motherly, “just be careful with him, okay? He’s…well, he’s not fragile, but he’s…sad sometimes, more than he lets on. I know what Wardens can be like…”

“Do you?” Rook gave Lace a hard stare, a surge of anger suddenly cracking through her chest. 

Harding knew her better than that. 

Maker’s balls, she knew Evka and Antoine better than that! 

Wardens, it was true, had a well earned reputation for being reckless with feelings, flippant with bonds of friendship and love beyond their oaths. Rook had always counted  herself and her friends as exceptions who proved the rule. She thought…hoped, anyway, that she showed it to those she cared for, Lace Harding included.

Harding let her head drop backwards, looking up at the grey sky, “ugh, I’m sorry, I didn’t mean that. I know you’re not… I just worry about him. I’m not even sure why. It’s not like he can’t take care of himself.” 

Rook fiddled with a loose thread on the tip of her gloved finger, avoiding Lace’s eyes just as much as Lace was avoiding hers.

“Because,” she sighed, “he cares so very deeply. About everyone. And he lets us know it. It’s very…” 

“Vulnerable,” Lace supplied, nodding. 

“I was going to say stupid,” she smirked, stuffing her hands in her pockets, “but yeah, that works too.” 

“You were not,” Lace punched her in the arm, eyes crinkling as she smiled. 

“If you say so,” Rook chuckled as she massaged her arm. Her face grew soft as she glanced back at Emmrich swaddled in the bed of the cart as it pulled away, “I worry about him too, Lace. More than I should, I think.”

Harding’s brow pulled, a line forming between her eyebrows. She cocked her head to the side, looking at Rook as if trying to read the confused feelings Rook was only beginning to sort out herself. Lace’s eyes went wide for a moment then dropped to the ground, growing sad as she sighed.   

“Be careful with yourself too, then,” a gentle hand rested against Rook’s back and she bit the inside of her lip to keep her throat from tightening as they began to follow behind the cart,

“Be careful with yourself too, then,” a gentle hand rested against Rook’s back and she bit the inside of her lip to keep her throat from tightening.

“Ahh,” she waved Lace off, a grin on her face as they began to follow behind the cart, “you know me. I’m always careful.”

“Yeah,” Harding laughed, “that’s exactly the word I’d use to describe you. Careful.”

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Username Origin tag

Tagged by @redheadsramblings

“Ferocious notes” is taken from the first line of the Billy Colins poem “Marginalia,” which describes people’s interactions with literature. I thought that was appropriate for a sketchy personal/fan forward blog and pretty on the nose for a fan fiction writer.

I’m also an archivist/librarian irl, so the bookish stuff always appeals.

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OC inspiration 'Rook'

Are there any characters from fiction that inspired your OC creation, either in their physical appearance or personality?

So I don't think i have any direct inspirations for my Rook, but here are a few characters that I think have had some influence on my character. Maybe unconsciously. Ultimately, this is going to reveal how varied my media consumption is.

Explanations under the cut.

Brother Cadfael: So, @smoreofbabylon caught this very early. The name 'Avis Thorne' is very close to a character in the Brother Cadfael series - Avice of Thornbury. Originally, I picked Avis for its relation to birds (Rook as in the corvid), but eventually started incorporating herbalism into the character, which is very Cadfael coded indeed. Also Cadfael is a warrior given over to the contemplative life, which feels right to my Rook as a Grey Warden.

BJ Hunnicutt: Controlled Chaos. This is a man who pulls pranks to feel normal in a completely unnormal situation. But he's still a calm and sweet family man, who will always be there for you when you're suffering. But the pain in him is clear.

Adora: An unexpected hero. Remaking herself from the Frightzone, and then remaking the Frightzone. She doesn't know where she comes from, but she knows who her friends are and she'll fight to the death.

Mrs. Audrey Hall: Calm, collected, totally in control of her household. When I think about dialog for Avis, I default to Mrs. Hall and Helen Harriot from All Creatures Great and Small. Not just because of the accent, but because of how they command their spaces with firm gentleness.

Anders: This character is so Anders coded. A blond mage from Kinloch hold, who became a Warden, lots of storm magic, who once dropped a building on Darkspawn?? She even turns spirit healer when there's an emergency. I'm sure if Varric thought about it he might have had reservations. I even think she can't swim because the stopped teaching apprentices after Anders escaped.

Emily Lacy: This was the actress who i originally wanted to base Rook's look off of. She's brash and self-serving, but she makes it to the end of the series. Survival is key to Emily Lacy.

Buffy Summers: I think more than any character, my Rook is influenced by Buffy Summers. A natural leader who never meant to be one. Punny beyond belief. And very much influenced by love and friendship and found family.

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Have we become so fearful, have we become so cowardly – That we must extinguish a man because he carries the blood of a current enemy?

STAR TREK: THE NEXT GENERATION S04E21 | The Drumhead