#I just wanted the goth girl and the big demon to frickle crackle and now look. it’s got anxiety.

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Happy WBW! 💕

Are there any legends, nursery rhymes, fairy tales, etc that are passed around between characters in any of your WIPs? What lessons and morals are they meant to teach?

Happy WBW Ella!!

I am. Notoriously bad at extracting Teachable Moments™️ from stuff but! How about the Mothers in Arsonist Chronicles? Sometimes myths walk among us or cause big wars problems on accident right? Throwing it under a cut because it’s gonna be long and for cw child loss reasons.

So, there are only two true gods— Life and Death.

“But what about The Deep!!”

[kicks The Deep into his tantrum hole] Don’t worry about him.

So! Life and Death. It’s said that Life emerged when the first flower bloomed, and she filled the world with plants and animals and warmth. But she was lonely, and sad, and when that first flower wilted and returned to the soil, another goddess grew: Death. Together they brought balance to the world. Something was still missing, though: the plants all made new plants, the animals found mates and made babies — the Mothers wanted that, too.

So Life climbed all the way to the top of the highest mountain, plucked wisps from the clouds, and Made angels. And that was all well and good! But Death wanted children of her own, so she whispered her wish into the wind — boom, now we’ve got Fae.

But now we’ve also got a BIG problem: Life Makes, Death Takes. When Death Made the Fae, she upset the balance. Fae weren’t like angels; they tried to Make things too — that is Not Supposed to Happen. They Made more Fae from animals and plants, and Death was mortified. Her children were messing up her lover’s creations, and in a fit of crippling guilt, she confessed to Life what she had done. It was fine, Life told her. They were just curious (and the fauns were rather cute).

And then one day, one of the high Fae snatched a seraph right out of her cradle and left a permanently glamoured bat and a few golden trinkets in the baby’s place. She loved the seraphim with their bright white wings and wanted one of her own, and besides, it wasn’t stealing if she left a replacement child and a few gifts, right?

Wrong! Very wrong! That is so incredibly incorrect! What the fuck, Ayla! Angels have specific dietary requirements, Ayla!

You would be correct in assuming the baby did not make it, you would be further correct in assuming that grief can drive people to do really out of pocket shit, and sometimes that shit is starting a fucking war.

Oopsie!

Death was utterly beside herself. Inconsolable. A child! A baby! She tore the shadows from her bedroom walls and draped herself in darkness, hid away and weeped for days until Life, distraught her lover was in such pain, finally found where she’d been hiding.

It wasn’t her fault, Life said, for wanting to Make something beautiful. Death begged again and again for forgiveness, to let her fix her mistake, and Life shushed her, whispering:

“Be still, love. There is nothing to forgive. Rest now. Be still.”

So Life Made humans to take care of the world while she was caring for Death — with plenty of restrictions, of course, she learned from their mistakes. Then she Made the Veil to separate the mortal world from her warring children. She Made Sanctuary for the angels and let the Fae have the rest. Pretty sick deal, right? And it only came with two rules:

No Fae in Sanctuary; and

Do NOT interfere with the humans.

Easy peasy. No problem.

… or was it?