#I never loved maven

[lilyharvord]

All you hoes claiming Maven is King Ruthless/Angst boy extraordinaire have clearly never met Prince Corrick “I have murdered and tortured many MANY people and have to physically hold myself back so I don’t make the woman I love hopelessly sad even when she’s not around but I will do those things if I have to at the expense of others because I love my brother and will do anything to keep him on the throne and will do vile things to save my skin and the skin of only those I care about” of Kandala and it fucking shows.

[captain-bubble-wrap]

Christmas time engagement with Quinn, yeah? Something to make me feel less #foreveralone or whatever

#foreveralonesquad

Gold-coloured holiday lights reflected off the dark water of the bay like diamonds scattered against black velvet. The distant sound of several Christmas songs played from storefronts in the distance. All around downtown Vancouver, laughter could be heard as the city bustled with last minute shopping and dinner plans. It was a magical time of the year, the last fleeting moments of Christmas Eve right before everything shut down.

Quinn had three days off before the season resumed pace as usual on Friday. You had spent the day with your family in Vancouver, before Quinn and yourself would catch a flight to Florida in the early hours of the morning. The day had been wonderful! You helped your mom in the kitchen like you always had, while Quinn and your father talked hockey and the outlook of the Canucks for the playoffs. Your own personal Hallmark movie, that was what today had felt like.

The goodbyes had been hard but then you remembered it would be harder for Quinn in the coming days. You were fortunate enough to have your family outside the city proper, but his were thousands of mile away. You couldn't imagine what that must feel like, but you were appreciative that he had given up some of his rare time off to spend the day with your family instead of catching a flight the night before. There was also another agenda, that Quinn had, that involved needing to spend the day with your family: he wanted the permission from your father to ask for your hand in marriage.

He was an old-fashioned, hopeless romantic at times and this was one of those instances where it was almost necessary. He couldn't picture doing it any other way and thankfully your father appreciated the respect the young man had shown in asking him. Getting the chance to ask him had been harder than he had expected. The kitchen had butted up against the living room, in one large, open-air styled space. They could hear you and your mother just as easy as you could hear them, but just asking your father to leave the room would have been weird for Quinn to ask. He had to get creative. So, while he was having a short conversation with you about lunch, Quinn had texted your father about the idea of leaving the house on the premise of picking up something from in the city.

[Quinn: I need to talk to you about something. Can you make an excuse about us needing to leave the house?]

Your father didn't question it, and brilliantly spun the tale of Quinn and himself needing to pick up some wine that he had forgotten he had ordered. Both of you had looked at your father with mild confusion. He didn't drink wine, hated it actually, but the man probably had his reasons. So, when the two of the moved to leave, you gave Quinn a kiss goodbye as did your parents. Even after all these years, they still seemed to be in love. That was all you wanted in life; you wanted a marriage like they had.

No sooner had the car left the garage, your father turned to Quinn and asked him if everything was okay.

"Is there some kind of problem?" Your father asked.

"No, no, quite the opposite. I um, there was something I wanted to ask you, but I didn't want anyone to overhear it."

"Yeah?" He replied, eyebrow cocked in interest.

"I wanted your permission to marry your daughter."

Brakes were applied instantly, lurching the occupants forward in their seats. Quinn was wide-eyed and nervous, fearing he had said the wrong thing. He was now pained with regret.

"Are you serious?"

Quinn swallowed hard, his brows knitted making his face look more troubled than usual. "I am, yes."

In an instant, your father busts into a wide smile and laughter. "My god, that's great to hear! I always knew you were a good one, Quinn! Shit, you had me nervous there for a minute!"

The car returned to its forward momentum; Quinn sighed a full-bodied sigh of relief. "That makes two of us," he said, fighting a wave of dizziness.

"You're a good match, the two of you. I'm happy she found you, Quinn, truly. She loves you like no other. I would be happy to give you my blessing. When were you thinking of asking her?"

"I was hoping tonight before we left the city."

"Perfect! Since she was a teenager, I swear she's dreamed of a Christmas engagement," your father laughed, shaking his head over the fairy-tale moment that was being orchestrated. "This is just…wow. I'm at a loss for words!"

Dinner had been wonderful: full of laughter, embarrassing childhood stories, and new memories to be recounted years from now. Now, however, it was time to get ready to head to the airport and travel the eight hours south. Your parents had given you each a hug, and your mother both a kiss before finally letting you leave. Your waves goodbye continued until you left the driveway.

"That was nice," Quinn said, holding your hand as he drove.

"It was! Thank you for wanting to go!" You reply, turning in your seat to look at him. He always made you smile: from his brown curls, to that sly little smile he had grown accustomed to.

"I have somewhere I want to take you, before we get to the airport."

This strikes you as odd. "Are you sure we have time?"

"Oh yeah, it's fine." He brings your hand to his mouth for a kiss which makes you blush. "It will be worth it."

There was an area of the bay that was absolutely dripping in golden lights; strung from every lamppost for as far as the eye could see. With your hand still in his, the two of you began walking beneath the lighted glow of the numerous archways beside the waterway. There was a slight breeze but the temperature was mild enough and no rain. In fact, it had tried snowing a couple times that day but had ended moments later. White Christmas' were rare in Vancouver, it was just the nature of the region.

"Are you warm enough?" Quinn asked, checking in after a few minutes into the night air, he was fussing with the ring box in his coat pocket. It was like he had to reassure himself that it was still in his possession.

"Mhm, I'm okay."

"Are you sure?" Before waiting for your answer, Quinn let go of your hand and put his arm around your waist, pulling you in close. Your head found his shoulder, and your arms around his waist in a compromise. Still you walked, unsure just where he was taking you. You tried to stay in the moment but the looming stress about catching a late-night holiday flight was still lurking in your mind.

In the distance, there was a garden gazebo, absolutely ablaze with light. It looked so beautiful against the dark backdrop of the bay. You found your feet being steered in its direction, Quinn placing a kiss to your temple.

"Here, sit down a moment," he spoke, taking a seat beside you. "I wanted to thank you for everything you've done for me this year. For being with me through all my ups and downs, the playoffs, my moods, and my injuries. You've been my everything. You've kept me grounded and my feet going forward."

You smile, letting him talk without interrupting him.

"I owe you so much. You've been with me through the celebrations and the tears and there's no one else I'd have rather had by my side but you."

You watch him smile, as he shifts his weight, and before you can react he's on one knee, the black ring box in his fingers. "There's no one else I'd rather ask: will you marry me?"

Hands cover your mouth as you gasp. Of course, you had hoped he would have one day asked for your hand, but you hadn't dreamed it would be today. A fanciful daydream, sure, but you tried not to get ahead of yourself.

"Oh, Quinny! Absolutely! Yes~"

He's grinning ear-to-ear, putting the stunning diamond on your finger. As soon as it's placed you grab his face for a kiss, the warmth of his skin soothing your cold fingers. Minutes could have passed before you two parted ways but it didn't matter. Never, in your life, could you remember being so happy.

"You'll want for nothing with me," he whispers, your foreheads touching, lost in each other's eyes.

"I never have," you reply, tears now streaming down your cheeks.

"Only happy tears, okay?" He asks, kissing each and every one of them away.

"Only happy ones."

"I love you," Quinn smiles, holding your face in his hands.

"I love you. I love you so much!"

Moments pass, just exchanging sweet little promises to each other before Quinn remembers the night isn't over yet.

"Come on, sweetheart, lets get you warmed back up. I don't want you to get chilled." Another kiss is placed on your lips, one you could tell he didn't want to end. "We've got a flight to catch."

"Quinn?" You sniffle as he stands to his feet.

"Hmm? Something wrong?"

"No, nothing. I just… thank you, for everything."

"Sweetheart, you don't need to thank me for anything. I'd give you the stars if I could reach them."

[imjulia-andilikecats]

Cal Fighting For His Love in the First Half of War Storm

[aerticent]

the genuine pain Evangeline feels over standing complicit in her Father’s death destroys me. This man who has done nothing but strip her of her freedom and force her into (abusive) engagements and undermine her value within the Rift and she’s still haunted by his death. She realized early on that the Cygnets want him as well for Maven and chooses to stay silent and when that passes and she’s given a second chance to say stop his death she stands and simply watches it happen. She outright tells Cal she hopes Iris’s gods aren’t real because she doesn’t want to know what they have in store for her. She thinks that the act of her keeping this information from Volo is proof to everyone that she’s a terrible person GOD

[the-court-of-dreams]

ONYX STORM SPOILERS

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Quotes that KILLED ME in Onyx Storm

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1)

To the ones who don’t run with the popular crowd, the ones who get caught reading under their desks, the ones who feel like they never get invited, included, or represented. Get your leathers. We have dragons to ride.

Books have always been a safe place for me. I still remember picking up The Hobbit when I was still a kid, closing my bedroom door and going on an adventure. I'm almost 25 now and I still love going on adventures. From magic schools to institutes, hidden cities to castles, forests to enormous capitals. With cars and ships and horses and broomsticks and dragons. Every story, a new adventure. Every book, a new journey. Oh, how I love travelling!

I only ever had one friend who loves reading as much as I do and our conversations about books, the hours we spend making theories, and analysing everything that happened... they are some of my most beloved moments. ( @strovilos , you are the joy of my life) My other friends don't understand as much, it's okay. I' ve always been the kid hiding books under my desk, staying up past my bedtime with a light under the covers. So yeah... that dedication really got me.

I was invited to places, but I almost never felt included while being there. That was okay too.

I always preferred riding dragons anyway.

2)

Xaden is mine. My heart, my soul, my everything. He channeled from the earth to save me, and I’ll scour the world until I find a way to save him right back.

Wow, that didn't take long at all, huh? Straight in the fucking feels.

3)

I could reach the rank of Maven, lead armies of dark wielders against everyone we care for, and watch every vein in my body turn red as I channel all the power in the Continent, and I would still love you. What I did doesn’t change that. I’m not sure anything can.

Such a good start for me and my fucking heart. Thanks, Rebecca... I really appreciate it.

4)

If I’m to be court-martialed for helping Braxtyn defend his people, then I shall welcome the trial. All who channel from dragon and gryphon alike should flourish under the wards, and now Aretia will be that haven should one of the others ever return.

Lyra... I fucking stan!

5)

So with all the love in my heart, put your fucking uniform on, because we need you.

Look, I'm not saying that Ridoc is my favourite character in this book... but... Ridoc IS my favourite character in this book.

I died with the whole squad dynamic, but the four of them will always hold a special place in my heart, I fucking love these kids.

6)

Even hundreds of miles away, he’s still taking care of me and doesn’t even know it.

I KNEW this godsdamned book would be full of angst....BUT DID IT HAVE TO BE ALL OF IT??? DID IT REBECCA????

7)

You might be angry when you realize I didn’t wake you to say goodbye. But it’s only because I no longer fully trust my ability to walk away.

—Recovered Correspondence of His Grace, Lieutenant Xaden Riorson, Sixteenth Duke of Tyrrendor, to Cadet Violet Sorrengail

FUCK ME MAN....Come on...WHYYYYYYY????

8)

But the thought of you being out there, beyond the wards, facing down a known attack of venin, triggered something in me I’ve never felt before. It was hotter than rage, and sharper than fear, and cut deeper than helplessness, all because I couldn’t get to you.

Fuck you.

9)

I would have killed anything and anyone in that moment to reach you. No exceptions. I would have channeled every ounce of power beneath my feet without hesitation if it would have landed me at your side.

Double fuck you.

10)

If I’d been there, beyond the wards, I would have drained the very earth to its core to keep you safe.

TRIPLE FUCKING FUCK YOU!!!!

11)

Pain isn’t new to me, Jack. She’s an old friend I spend most of my days with, so I don’t mind if she sings to you.

Violet Sorrengail... you are the most badass bitch to ever badass. (I feel like that's SUCH a Remi thing to say. Fucking finally.... iykyk. Shout out to @skyfallscotland for writing fucking masterpieces. Getting notifications from you always makes my day. If any of you are into fanfcition, i STRONGLY recommend reading everything this girl has written. You can start with Fear and Flame. Thank me, and HER, later.)

12)

“We live by the Codex—” I try again.

“I live by you. When have I ever given a fuck about the Codex or the Code of Conduct?” He cradles my face and leans down, resting his forehead against mine. “I am yours and you are mine, and there’s no law or rule in this world or the next that will change that.”

I love them so much it hurts.

13)

Love of my life. You have nothing to be jealous of.

😭😭😭😭😭😭😭😭😭😭

14)

“There’s no magic here.” He tugs me against him. “No power. No lure. No taunting reminder that I can save everyone if I just reach for it and take what’s offered. It’s only…peace.”

For the first time since fetching the luminary, I seriously debate Tecarus’s offer.

When I tell you this book was PAINFUL for me....I'M NOT FUCKING KIDDING.

15)

"...Sgaeyl…" He glances up at the trees as if he can see her in the sky above us, a look of longing on his face.

If I had a dollar for everytime this book broke my fucking heart.

16)

“My consort,” Xaden replies casually. “Violet Sorrengail.”

I'm deceased.

17)

I can’t quit watching Xaden’s eyes in case their flecks change back to gold whenever I see him during Signet Sparring.

They never do.

Like my heart will never again NOT be broken for these two.

18)

“The pain. The mess. Give it to me. I’ll hold it. I know that sounds ludicrous, but I’ll find a way.” I lace our fingers. “I will hold everything you don’t want to feel because I love every part of you.”

This ship... this fucking ship...

19)

“Seems Catriona has found someone worth lagging behind for.”

I loathed her in the previous book....but gods did the poor girl go through it in this one....

20)

“There is no cure for me.” He presses a kiss to my forehead. “That’s why you have to become better than me. There’s only you.”

I seriously don't know why I'm putting myself through this torture.

21)

When things get…shitty, I hope you can look down at it and imagine us sitting there together when this is all over. That’s the vision I’m going to cling to: you and me, holding hands, looking over the city.

This right here broke whatever soul I thought I had left. It just hurts so much when the characters cling to a future that I fucking know isn't going to happen.

22)

It’s almost like this room is removed from time itself, a tiny corner of the world where we simultaneously live together yet don’t.

Rebecca literally...WHYYYYY????

23)

I didn’t reach for any form of power because even in that state, I knew it could take me back to day zero, and day zero doesn’t give me you. I clawed my way back to myself and left.

Screaming, crying, throwing up.

24)

While most deities allow temple attendants to choose their timeline of service, only two require a lifetime of dedication: Dunne and Loial. For both war and love change souls irrevocably.

For the love of Gods, please let this be some kind of clue.

25)

I love you more than this city. Do not die defending it.

Screaming. Crying. Throwing up.

26)

At some point I’ll stop looking for her, right?

I KNOW Andarna had her reasons... but my girl Violet did not deserve that after everything she's been through.

27)

His smile instantly becomes a core memory.

MY smile instantly becomes a core memory....as in I don't think I'll have one again.

28)

You’re not a weapon of destruction. You’re not venin. You’re the artery power chooses to flow through. You’re life.

I fucking ship this SO MUCH. I love me some enemies to lovers, slow burn, full of angst shit.

29)

When push comes to shove, I'm not the best of us. She is.

YES VIOLET, THAT'S YOUR BESTIE!!!!!!

30)

“That’s a little menacing,” I admit to Feirge. “Then let us be menaces,”

I ADORE multiple povs. I've been waiting for Rhi's and Imogen's pov for 3 books, and I was NOT disappointed. Wish I could have more of them though.

31)

She’ll rip the very sky apart before she and Glane accept defeat.

GO IMOGEN! GO! GO! GO!

32)

The flame of perpetual rage that lives in my chest burns hotter. Fuck that horde. Fuck the venin who ride them. Fuck that unholy vortex of a tornado at the end of the northern field, and fuck the orders to stay grounded in these winds.

FUCK! I love this girl so damn much.

33)

I’m glad it’s you with me. Parapet to Malek’s own doorstep. I’m so sorry I have to go first this time.

To be honest, I didn't really care about Quinn for three books now... but I SOBBED in these 3 pages.

34)

And you should tell him, Gen. Tell him, and you find some happy.

And the fact that she preached for my second favourite ship of the series with her dying breath??? Miss Quinn, you have my heart. I didn't care for your existence for three books, but man, did you get me in the end.

35)

“We made it a good one.”

This one cut me so fuckign deep I had to stop for a good ten minutes. I did not see it coming. I did not think I'd care. I still don't understand why I did. But I really, really did.

36)

“I’m not leaving you!” He leans in and slides his hand behind my neck. “I’m not leaving you, Imogen,” he repeats, softer this time.

If these two don't end up together, I'm gonna make it everybody's problem. I PROMISE!

37)

“You have been the gift of my life,” I tell Tairn.

I've read some theories that Tairn will die in the end... First of all...HOW DARE YOU? And second of all... REBECCA DON'T YOU DARE, I WILL-

38)

She was the first to choose me, to elevate me above all others, the first to see every ugly side of me and accept it all, and every single person in this fucking canyon will die before they remove a single one of her scales.

The fact that Xaden channeled for Violet but really turned to save Sgaeyl... I did not expect that. And although it was painful as fuck to read through... to me it was perfect and a job really well done.

39)

Shadow brings quiet. My soul departs like pieces of ash from a fire, flaking free and drifting away as power consumes the space it once inhabited. I’m no longer on the ice—I am the ice.

Xaden...baby...no....

40)

Save them, the last remaining pieces of me beg, holding on with teeth and claw to keep from being torn away, too.

I will never... ever... recover from this.

41)

“I love you.” Violet’s voice cracks the cold, and a silken thread of warmth wedges itself in the opening before it seals shut, locking it in place.

No. Wait. I grab for that thread with desperate hands, clawing to keep her as more of my pieces are blown away, lost to the void. She is warmth and light and air and love.

This was so fucking painful to read I literally have no fucking words.

44)

I love her. That is the emotion I cling to, the fire of pure power burning at the feeling’s edges, and I know if I take it any further, it will be the next and final piece to float away.

😭😭😭😭😭😭💔💔💔💔💔💔

45)

“What did you do?” My head snaps toward Imogen, and a deep sense of foreboding takes root in my chest. She slowly lifts her gaze to mine.

“What you asked me to.”

How THE FUCK am I supposed to wait who-knows how long for the next damned book???

All in all, I really enjoyed this. I never got bored and I didn't mind the side missions at all.

The xaden×violet of it all shattered my heart. I definitely loved their relationship more than the previous books (It really reminded me of their dynamic from one of the best pieces of literature I've ever had the pleasure to read, a fanfiction piece called Storm in the quiet by @justallihere. She is truly the best.).

I just knew this was coming, and all of their trying would lead to this... it tore my heart apart. I love heavy angst in my books, but it hurts like a motherfucker when you have to wait for the next book in a series. I've promised myself I would never start an unfinished series ever again but oh well....

I loved the side characters so much, and I feel like I got to see them more and get to know them better in this one.

Ridoc is the best comic relief character I've read in a long, long time, and I love him so much (I almost had a heart attack when I thought the cook actually stabbed him.)

Aaric is a little shit and I'm so here for it. His exceptionally well written character was one of the highlights of the book for me.

Imogen and Garrick are my babies and I want them to end up together SO FUCKING BAD.

Also, the Drake and Mira crumbs? Chef's kiss.

I have to admit I was very fed shipping wise.

Unexpectedly, I also laughed my ass off in this book... so I'll probably make another post with all the times I died of laughter. Who would have thought?

My soul will definitely need mending and a good dose of fanfiction to get me through the long wait. To the people who are gifted enough to write these fanfcitions, you are my heroes. Cheers!

Final thought, Xaden Riorson, THE MAN that you are.

Accurate image of me after finishing Onyx Storm:

[mavens-confessional]

Private School Confession… this might trigger some, might also make you cum…idk .., it’s a long read so buckle up

The same year that my step-brother did those things to me (see previous post), I went back school and found that my teacher was one of the nuns who had also taught me in elementary school. I was now 14 and in 9th grade. This nun always took an interest in me and I was teachers pet when she taught me as a child. She seemed delighted to have me in her class and commented about what a pretty young lass I was turning out to be. She was Irish, as most of the nuns were at this school.

One day, a boy in my class took me behind a building at recess and tried to French kiss me. I was so nervous, but I let him kiss me on the lips, but he pulled me closer and tried to put his tongue in my mouth and I literally ran away from him with my heart beating a mile a minute. Well, it was all over school in about 20 minutes. I was so embarrassed and one of the boys called me a tease.

The next day at lunch, Sister Margaret called me and asked me to come to her office. I was a straight A student and never got into any trouble, but I knew it was about the incident the day before.

She had me sitting in front of her desk, and she looked at me and asked “Did you kiss that boy yesterday?” My face was burning with shame. Because we were taught that only “bad girls” did things with boys. I looked down and said “Yes, Sr Margaret - but only a little, and then I ran away”. She came and stood in front of me and said “Now you know Maven, that was sinful. You are a good girl, and God wants you to be pure.” I nodded and felt tears welling up. She grabbed my chin and made me look at her and said “Did you let him touch you?” “What? I., um.. no Sister”

“Well, that’s a good lass, but I think we need to make sure the sin is gone from you”. I was petrified because our school still used corporal punishment. I knew I was going to be spanked and that had never happened in all my years going to this school. I couldn’t help crying. I felt so shamed.

“Stand up” she said. I did as I was told. She sat in the chair I had been in. “Now, I’m doing this for your own good, and I want to teach you how to cleanse your soul, so God will love you, and you’ll continue to be a good girl. If you learn your lesson, you’ll continue to be my favorite student and we will forget about this whole incident. Is that understood?” “Yes Sister”.

“Now, be a good girl and bend over my lap.” I thought this was odd because they usually made the boys bend over the desk and used the paddle. But I thought maybe I’m a girl and she will go easy on me. I laid across her lap. She told me to hold on to the chair legs. I did as told.

Next, she lifted up my plaid skirt. I was wearing just white cotton panties. She put her hands on my little ass and asked:

“Maven - did that boy touch you here?” “ No Sister!” “That’s a good girl,” she said, while she was massaging my right buttock. She suddenly spanked me over the panties. It wasn’t very hard, but I felt very strange because her other hand was grasping my thigh, very high up and close to my groin. I felt myself getting hot all over. She spanked me again and this time it was harder. “Maven, did you like it when that boy kissed you? Tell the truth.” I was crying freely now, because the spanking was so degrading, “um..,I…I did, but I was scared because I know it’s sinful to…to..” I stuttered. “It’s sinful to what?” She asked, while she rubbed her hand around on my buttocks. “It’s sinful to be lustful” My voice cracked. I felt so hot and embarrassed, and….my heart was racing. Her other hand suddenly cupped my crotch - I gasped. “Yes Maven - lust is a sin! Did you let him touch you here in your private parts? Don’t lie - God knows if you are lying!”

“No no, he didn’t Sister - I swear!”

I was panicking. She was still cupping my crotch and I knew how warm it felt because my whole body was burning up. She removed her hand from my buttock and began to stroke my hair, and pet my pussy with her other hand. I was breathing so hard, my head felt like it would explode hanging down over her lap. I was getting aroused and I didn’t know what to do.

“Now Maven, why do you feel so warm down here?” She was stroking me through my panties and I could not help it. I was aroused. “I..I don’t know Sister…please..” I felt so humiliated. She moved my panties and touched my little virgin pussy with my peach fuzz pubic hairs barely growing… I was in complete shock. I felt so helpless and I was mortified that she was looking at and touching my private parts! “Maven - I think you have lustful thoughts. And how to we repent from lustful thoughts?” She was actively stroking my clit now and I was getting hotter and wet, and I was paralyzed with fear? Pleasure? She held my prone body with her sturdy arms and I knew better than to squirm. “We confess Sister,” I said through a stream of tears. “Yes my good lass - we confess. Now tell me the truth - does this feel good” “Yes, Sister,” I stuttered with burning shame. “Do you want to be my good girl? And keep being teachers pet?” “Yes…Yes Sister”. I whimpered, as I succumbed to how good it felt to have someone else touch me. “God willing, I will get this lust out of you - and you will be forgiven. Do you understand?” “Yes Sister!” I cried. I didn’t understand, but I was too freaked out to know what was happening. She pulled my panties down and they fell to my ankles, falling onto my saddle Oxford shoes and my lacy socks. She spread my legs wider and continued to rub my clit. “Do you ever touch yourself like this when you’re alone at night Maven?” “Yes,” I sobbed. She spanked me “and do you bring yourself to orgasm?” I nodded, too ashamed to answer and crying uncontrollably. “You know this is a sin! Bad girl!” She spanked me while rubbing my clit faster. I was so wet and I started to moan and buck my hips onto her lap. I couldn’t help it. She felt the wetness and spanked me again. “That’s a good girl. Come on Maven - God is watching. Show him the lustful little whore you really are and he will forgive you.” I was so confused and so aroused l. No one but my mother had ever seen my vagina. Not even during PE class, not even my best friends. But she kept rubbing my little mound and knew exactly what rhythm was making me wet…and I couldn’t believe Sister Margaret was doing this to me. And my God - she was about to make me cum. She put her finger inside my tight little cunt and continued to rub my clit with her thumb - I bucked and moved my hips like a wild animal. I was feral in my need to climax and make her happy. She was really finger fucking me now - and I felt an inevitable orgasm building. “Oh My God!” I exploded on Sister Margaret’s finger and I writhed with waves of pleasure like I’d never had before. It was the most intense orgasm of my young life and I was still a virgin. I was panting and sweating and crying all at the same time. She pulled her finger from my cunt and turned me over. She held me like a child - and then she put her fingers in my mouth with all my wetness on them. She says “Taste your lustful sin! Clean my fingers and cleanse your dirty whore soul in front of me and God!” I sucked on her fingers and tasted my sweet and tart taste. She smiled and said “Now that’s my good lass Maven. You are now purified under God. You are forgiven.” She gave me a hug and patted my pussy which gave me little convulsions of pleasure. I didn’t want to leave her arms. She wasn’t even pretty but I didn’t care. She did something to me that made me want to please her. She stood me up and told me to put my panties on. I was in a daze, and did as I was told. I stood there in my wet sweaty white panties. My mouth tasting of my pussy. “Now go enjoy recess - and I’ll be watching you. If I see or think that you are being lustful, you will come back here and be cleansed whenever I think it’s necessary - do you understand?” “Yes Sister” “And this is private. This is only between you and God - and I am his intermediary - Do you understand?” “Yes Sister” She took my face in her hands and kissed my forehead and said “You were always my favorite lass. I will make sure you continue to be a very good girl!” And then she steered me out of her office.

I still can’t believe this happened to me, But this was the beginning of a four year education for me.

[skyfallscotland]

🐉 ONYX STORM PROLOGUE, CHAPTERS ONE & TWO MY THOUGHTS: (god bless the dutch 🇳🇱)

So not totally verified yet, but it seems legit. This is absolutely the scene I expected us to be starting with, and despite the translation it does read like Rebecca. Thank you so much to @thestarseternaal for sharing it with me! You can find it here.

Ok, let's fucking goooooo! 🤘

· That trigger warning list? "The death of an animal" 💀😬 The "descriptions of sexual acts" though, thank god, though it's not looking promising for the two of them so far.

· Garrick and Bodhi KNOW?! Ok that I didn't see coming?

· "I can't blame him for wanting to know what he is" ANDARNA 😭 "I'm as much in the dark as he is, and you trust me." 😭 I want to hug the baby

· "Magic feels different when I change colours. When I used my power, it was like the venin transformed, weakening-" Ok so confirmed, she's the solution they're looking for *sigh*

· It's going to be unfortunate if the allies we're seeking are just Poromiel, and I think they are given both the excerpt prior to the prologue and the fact the Target edition map had only a few places in Poromiel on it and no Isles. I guess we're not looking for Andarna's family over there until books four and five? 😞

· Wait...what? Leadership knows what Andarna is? Everyone knows? Who TF told them? I was certain they didn't see? I can't believe we spent all this time worrying about people knowing she was a baby when she bonded and y'all just told everyone she was a super special rare breed right off the bat. SMDH.

· Aotrom's only 22? 😭 I'm older than Aotrom? RIDOC and him are the same age, that makes so much sense!!

· TAIRN CALLS XADEN "THE DARK ONE"? 😭 I feel like I'm not going to like Tairn much this book, and I feel like he's gonna ☠️ but that's for my theory post.

· "His soul is no longer his own" "That's a bit dramatic." VIOLET I LOVE YOU 🖤

· "You mean whether I'll support you in the thousand ways you want to face death to heal someone who's beyond redemption?" Oh Tairn...why do I get the really, really bad feeling you lied about Naolin?

· The truth-sayers have let Caroline Ashton off the hook? Hmmmm suspicious. Everyone's evil, I just know it.

· "Devera and Kaori will be back soon. They’ll straighten out the command structure once the princes have signed a treaty that hopefully grants us grace for even leaving in the first place." Ummm princes plural? So I guess Cam hid for nothing? Well not nothing, but he's...back with his fam? Also why would they be signing shit? Where's the damn king?!

· "The rarest signet, which appear once per generation or century, have been documented twice simultaneously with an equal counterpart, both during critical times in our history, but only once have the six most powerful walked the Continent at the same time. As fascinating as that spectacle must have been, I would rather not witness it again in my lifetime. – A study of signets by Major Dalton Sisneros" Ok could be a weird translation but I'm confused by this. The counterpart thing could be either a rider and a venin (ie. one of the venin can distance wield and we're getting a distance wielder) or dark and light, ie. shadows and light. Also six like the first six and they all had partners within themselves? Three pairs? Or? What even were their signets because I can't believe we've NEVER FUCKING ASKED? I've literally never seen that mentioned and it seems...so fucking relevant.

· Perhaps a more outlandish theory, but I think the venin with the silver hair who distance wields might be Xaden's mother. I'll elaborate later, but 😬😬

· Ok well, 1. I'm fucking crying already, and 2. "Even if I reached the rank of Maven, led armies of dark wielders against everyone we care about, and if I had to watch every vein in my body turn red because I had drained all the powers of the Continent, I would still love you. What I’ve done doesn’t change that. I don’t know if that’s even possible." That's a little bit storm in the quiet, I love it when the vibe is proven ✨correct✨ 😭 @justallihere

So all in all, 1. As expected, every excerpt, hint, and thing we've thought about it over in one-two chapters, 2. This is going to hurt so bad and I think it will go as I expected, and 3. I'm still not ready 😭

Send help 🥺

[kelpweedkelpweedingkelpweeds]

Reading analysis about Cal while screaming into the void known as an empty room and here to publish my unneeded thoughts about my blorbo.

Cal deserved more screen time, he deserved more chapters of his POV and honestly VA did him so dirty 😔

Because our dear RQ characters are definitely unreliable narrators, the reader’s perception of characters is based on their own POVs and how other characters perceive them. Unfortunately, every character describes Cal as a lovesick puppy, a mopey matchstick, a dense moron and everything in between. It's not that these are wrong, they're part of his character, but these are incredibly surface level traits which leads to the general perception of Cal’s character being superficial, bland and boring. It seems like his only purpose in the story is to be Mare’s love interest because Maven betrayed her.

However, he has a whole lot of untapped potential. My man did not get betrayed by Mare, betrayed by his brother, find out his mother was murdered buy Elara, get forced to kill his own father, lose everything he had and got sentenced to execution all in 1 day for people to call him boring. Honestly, when I listed it out like that, I truly realised how crazy the whole situation was. Within the span of a day he lost any form of stability he had even known in his life, and found out that one if not the closest person to him (maven) was a lie. If that isn't traumatic, I really wouldn't like to hear whatever other definition of trauma there is out there. I think the only reason we very much overlook Cal's trauma is because 1. It happened in real time, 2. He's no longer a child, 3. We didn't see it from his POV and 4. In this scene he and his father are technically the "bad guys".

Here's the thing though, he has never talked about it. Not once. Never. The closest we ever saw this man to losing his mind was when he was planning the Corros prison break. He'd never mentioned this trauma from any POV, not even his own. Maven told Mare about how Elara messed up everything in his brain, and how he never recovered from it. For Cal, we never found out how he dealt with it and how close to the brink of insanity he was. If he ever just felt like exploding and destroying everything. Nobody except Mare ever asked him if he was ok. He had every right to go mad. But he didn't. Some miraculous way, Cal managed to maintain some semblance of sanity and that is unimaginable mental strength like holy shit.

Another way too glossed over plot point was why he chose the crown over mare in the epilogue of KC. This one I get genuinely frustrated over sometimes because there were so many reasons for him to make that decision. I know many people have talked about this before but I'm just going to repeat it 1. It's the best political move in the situation. Cal isn't stupid, no matter how many people seem to think he is. He knows better than to let the place of King open for anyone to snatch up and that it was the only way the Silvers and the Scarlet Guard would ever work together. 2. To him it's his moral obligation. Cal's loyalty and sense of duty is a huge part of his character. All his life he's been told it's his responsibility, his destiny to become king and serve the people. Not only that, the crown is his family's legacy and considering the fact that he was the one to behead his own father Cal likely feels even more morally obligated to become king. The words he said to Mare, "I love you and I want you more than anything else in this world". He uses the word "want", but how can a want, a desire ever compare to what he believes is a need, an obligation? It's not that he didn't love mare enough like Evangeline suggested, or that he fell prey to the power's lure like Mare insinuated in the epilogue. He did what he full heartedly believed was right, and unfortunately this was barely touched upon in war storm which made me want to tear my hair out.

This yap session is nearly done, just hold on a bit longer. The last thing that DEFINITELY should have gotten more words was his ultimate decision to abdicate. All we got was him reading Coriane's diary, Evangeline telling him "if it's not too late for me, it's not too late for you" and then the decision. WHERE'S THE IN-BETWEEN THOUGHT PROCESS? He read through Coriane's diary and realised that she wanted her son to have a different life, and of course he probably had some thoughts about it. Considering how he knew the Scarlet Guard and Montfort weren't with him, how he still loved Mare, perhaps realizing what his life could have been with an alive mother was what tipped him over the edge. Perhaps it was loyalty to his mother he never had the chance to know, loyalty to the little of her forever bound in a gold-covered book, buried in the graveyard known as time. Maybe he asked Julian who seemed to want him to reconsider his decision as king, but we'll never know because it wasn't written 😭😭😭

Cal is incredibly kind, loyal, warm, passionate, motivated, and indecisive, and I love that about him. His story could have been a tragedy, a prodigy put on a pedestal that had everything and was forced to be everything, reduced to nothing in an instant. But it wasn't. He found love in a girl that took everything from him, and rebuilt himself a far better life from the ashes of nothing. Normally the circle between characters I like and characters I respect rarely overlap, but somehow this 6'3 adorable ass dork stuck himself straight in both and this is why I will defend what his character is and could have been. Thank you for attending my Tedtalk, it's literally all my thoughts about this man exploding into text and falling onto a Tumblr post.

This is me getting distracted from writing Fated god send help I just can't stay on track

Funny story I wanted to copy this essay into a document for fun just to see how many words and guess who highlighted a portion of it and clicked space by accident. Hahaha (that whole thing was 1000 words btw I need to learn to shut up)

[the-best-skibidi-rizzler]

RQ Maven

I wish in the RQ books they explored Maven's love for theatre, like it's so ironic how he says he loves plays and shows but then you find out his whole life is pretty much an act. I think it would be so interesting to know why he liked it too, did he like the actors ability to pretend? The chance to escape the real world? I was so surprised that VA like never mentioned it again, maybe because by the time we got to his pov so much was happening? but then Cal never mentioned it either so ¯\_(ツ)_/¯

[captain-bubble-wrap]

Hello, babes. How was practice? I'm Maven, your tumblr hockey mom. Below you'll find a complete masterlist of imagines, series, and OC chapters as well as prompt requests!

One more thing before you go:

- I don't do hockey romance novel-type writings. I play by reality and the way of the sport.

- I won't write the reader as the Taylor Swift of the hockey world where she's in the limelight at every game she attends, caught on camera, noticed by fans, ect. The reader isn't a celebrity~

- I'm more confident with fluff/domestic slice-of-life things, but I'll dabble in the spicy stuff, just not as eagerly or as often as the other.

- Minors, DNI with the you-know-what, or I'll ground you!

Submit your requests with their corresponding order number with any added details you'd like! 🩷

🎀 Fluff prompt starters:

F1-- "Can we just stay in bed?"

F2-- "You're cute when you make that face."

F3-- "Have you had enough to eat today?"

F4-- "Don't get up, I'll do it."

F5-- "You don't get enough sleep."

F6-- "Could you play with my hair?"

F7-- "Are you okay? Your face looks a little red."

F8-- "You're cute when you're half asleep like this."

F9-- "Can we share the blanket?"

F10-- "Just one more hug before I go."

F11-- "Do you want anything while I'm up/out?"

F12-- "Teach me?"

💔 Hurt/Comfort prompt starters:

H/C1-- "How long have you felt like this?"

H/C2-- "I know you're mad at me, but would a kiss make it better?"

H/C3-- "Please don't shut me out right now."

H/C4-- "Shh, it was just a bad dream. Whatever happened wasn't real."

H/C5-- "It's okay to cry."

H/C6-- "You lied to me."

H/C7-- "I didn't know where else to go."

H/C8-- "Let me help you, please."

❤️ Romance prompt starters:

R1-- "I'd feel a lot better if you'd let me take you home."

R2-- "They don't compare to you. No one does."

R3-- "I've always wanted to walk home in the rain."

R4-- "You've never looked so beautiful."

R5-- "Let me tell you how much you mean to me."

R6-- "Will you dance with me?"

R7-- "I'm going to marry you one day."

🫦 Dark Quinn starters: (currently on a hiatus from these atm)

D1-- "Look at me or I'll stop."

D2-- "It kills me to think of you with anyone else but me."

D3-- "You're not leaving dressed like that."

D4-- "Are you trying to make me angry?"

D5-- "If you're on your best behaviour, I'll reward you."

D6-- "I don't care what your friends have planned, you're not leaving this apartment tonight."

D7-- "I crave your affections, but I crave your silence more. Quiet, princess."

Pretty Boy Blues | You notice Quinn dealing with some troublesome skin issues, and you ask to help him. | No content warnings apply

Last Call | You're late getting home from a night out with the girls. Quinn's pacing waiting for you. Where could you be? | Implied alcohol consumption

Sleeping Beauty | Quinn learns of you having fainting spells while he's been away on the road. | Implied depression-induced eating disorders

Post-practice Cuddles | Quinn returns from practice in pain and needs your to help to get his mind off of it. | No content warnings apply

Take Your Pick | You let Quinn pick your outfit for the day. | Suggestive themes; implied sexual interactions

Baby me | Quinn refuses to take his medicine. | No content warnings apply

Plague-bringer | Quinn tests positive for Covid. | No content warnings apply

Leave Me Where I Lie | You get sick in the middle of the night and Quinn comes looking for you. | No content warnings apply

Princess on Board | Quinn and yourself go on a short road-trip and you're well prepared, crown included. | Implied daddy dom/brat aesthetic

Partners in Crime | Quinn insists on helping you make breakfast. | Mild bratty-reader aesthetic

Kitchen Kisses | Quinn and yourself stay in on New Year's Eve and welcome the new year alongside a batch of cookies. | No content warnings apply

Detour | Quinn has other plans before you fly out of Vancouver for the holidays. The ring box in his pocket might be why. | No content warnings apply

From Me: With Love | You finally get to give Quinn his custom gift for Christmas | No content warnings apply

When it Rains it Pours | Your day goes from bad to worse while trying to get the apartment ready for Quinn's return. | Mild reader bodily injury, mentions of blood

A Night In | Quinn picks you up for your birthday but takes you to his apartment instead of a restaurant. | No content warnings apply

Two Lines | Your cycle is late. Are you pregnant? | Anxiety themes

Tease Me | Quinn is week-to-week with his hand injury and is getting bored of not being on the ice. | Mild adult themes

Just Because | Quinn brings you a surprise to apologize for something out of his control. | No content warnings apply

Knock, Knock | You rush to Quinn's apartment following the high-sticking during the Lightning game. | Brief descriptions of bodily injury, blood, and mild adult themes

Cold Sheets | You're struggling with insomnia when Quinn comes looking for you in the middle of the night. | No content warning apply

Broken Glass | Your car gets totaled en route to Rogers Arena. | Graphic descriptions of bodily injury, emotional distress, and reader in pain

Broken Glass Pt 2 | Weeks after your car wreck, Quinn gives you one simple rule to follow. | 18+, dominate partner, emotional manipulation

Coupons | You go grocery shopping with Quinn before he leaves to go back on the road. | Separation anxiety, and mild depressive thoughts

Bang-bang, Kiss-kiss | You break off your relationship with Quinn. | Emotional distress, anxiety, heartbreak, and blame

Damaged Goods | You attend a home game and all hell breaks loose. | Depictions of bodily injury, and blood

Imposter Syndrome | Med school woes weigh heavy on your heart, and Quinn is there to reassure you that everything is fine.

Chapter I | A Chance Meeting

Episode 1 | Season opener: Flames v. Canucks

Episode 2 | Thanksgiving

Chapter I | Red String of Fate

A Second Cup | You have an unfortunate run-in with Jeremy Swayman | No content warnings apply

A Casual Approach to Romance | Connor Bedard waits till the last minute on Valentine's Day.

Seeing Double | When Auston Matthews takes you and your best friend back to his house from a party, there's a decision to be made. [18+ 🫦]

An Honest Excuse | Auston's got to get to practice, but you have other plans. [18+ 🫦]

[ball-of-butter]

i love that red queen puts family as the chief unit of love even above true romantic love like that for some reason is SO overrated in ya media. i dont think of the characters within friendship or romantic groups first, i unconsciously catergorise them into their family.

cal loves mare but cal will put maven first always and he loves his dad and his image so much he’s willing to sacrifice his character and relationship with her to fulfil the expectations set by his family and its not until realising what his MOTHER wanted for him that he lets go. and mare loves cal but she will always put her siblings and parents first which is why everything started with gisa and shade’s loss and it ended with her sister and the loss of her brother too. maven loves mare but he loves elara more even if she twisted him and elara loves maven more than the entire kingdom and thats why she twisted him. and elara couldn’t enact her plan to make maven king without getting rid of his love for cal first!! when shade gets killed mare HAS to kill elara because that is the only way she can make sure her pain is even with at least one person.

cameron does everything for her brother’s safety, she was willing to abandon her morals and dehumanise anyone standing in her way if thats what needed to happen. and after morrey was safe she quit— nothing was worth losing herself over except him. farley and shade’s love was so pure that it brought life and family to the farleys who were already broken with the grief of being halved. their love brought a daughter named after the death of the woman that destroyed the family, and it was so healing.

and that is what KILLS me about the samos family!!! that compared to all this unconditional loyalty— the samos family is a continuous act of playing at love and loyalty, when in reality volos and larentia could not care less about their children because they dont know how to. silver society never showcases this love and so then you have so many parents fucking up their kid in so many ways but doing it out of love because thats how they see it— all except volo and larentia.

so the samos family is an exception. i cant think of evangeline without thinking of elane and ptolemus and i cant think of ptolemus without thinking of evangeline and wren. thats their family. and at least evangeline and ptolemus experienced real love with each other, even if they were never taught it (evangeline’s fear over shade’s death was proof that she could imagine a world without him and it was one of the few times she was genuinely scared in the series).

[lilo-jacos]

Red Queen Headcanons!! Pt. I lost track, five maybe?

- Maven was definitely a dino chicken nuggie kid

- Bree would have been so popular when he was serving in the war (key word serving💅🏼)

- Elara was a secret workout junkie. She loved softball and volleyball in highschool, some soccer. At the palace she would secretly go on runs and had her own training area.

- Elane is a swiftie and turned Evangeline

- Cal learns a lot of recipes from Ruth and Sara, it helps him learn cooking skills since he's never had to have them and it offers a way for him to connect with the two new sides of his family.

- Farley likes baking, she puts her hair up in a bun and gets to work

- Mare would LOVE going to concerts. She takes Kilorn and Gisa when it's something they would like, too. The first time Mare took Gisa to her favorite artist she sobbed and screamed every lyric. They had music events in the Stilts but no one ever super popular that Gisa would take a break from work to see.

[mariacallous]

“Don’t mention the word ‘liberalism,’ ” the talk-show host says to the guy who’s written a book on it. “Liberalism,” he explains, might mean Hillary Clinton and Barack Obama to his suspicious audience, alienating more people than it invites. Talk instead about “liberal democracy,” a more expansive term that includes John McCain and Ronald Reagan. When you cross the border to Canada, you are allowed to say “liberalism” but are asked never to praise “liberals,” since that means implicitly endorsing the ruling Trudeau government and the long-dominant Liberal Party. In England, you are warned off both words, since “liberals” suggests the membership of a quaintly failed political party and “liberalism” its dated program. In France, of course, the vagaries of language have made “liberalism” mean free-market fervor, doomed from the start in that country, while what we call liberalism is more hygienically referred to as “republicanism.” Say that.

Liberalism is, truly, the love that dare not speak its name. Liberal thinkers hardly improve matters, since the first thing they will say is that the thing called “liberalism” is not actually a thing. This discouraging reflection is, to be sure, usually followed by an explanation: liberalism is a practice, a set of institutions, a tradition, a temperament, even. A clear contrast can be made with its ideological competitors: both Marxism and Catholicism, for instance, have more or less explicable rules—call them, nonpejoratively, dogmas. You can’t really be a Marxist without believing that a revolution against the existing capitalist order would be a good thing, and that parliamentary government is something of a bourgeois trick played on the working class. You can’t really be a Catholic without believing that a crisis point in cosmic history came two millennia ago in the Middle East, when a dissident rabbi was crucified and mysteriously revived. You can push either of these beliefs to the edge of metaphor—maybe the rabbi was only believed to be resurrected, and the inner experience of that epiphany is what counts; maybe the revolution will take place peacefully within a parliament and without Molotov cocktails—but you can’t really discard them. Liberalism, on the other hand, can include both faith in free markets and skepticism of free markets, an embrace of social democracy and a rejection of its statism. Its greatest figure, the nineteenth-century British philosopher and parliamentarian John Stuart Mill, was a socialist but also the author of “On Liberty,” which is (to the leftist imagination, at least) a suspiciously libertarian manifesto.

Whatever liberalism is, we’re regularly assured that it’s dying—in need of those shock paddles they regularly take out in TV medical dramas. (“C’mon! Breathe, damn it! Breathe! ”) As on television, this is not guaranteed to work. (“We’ve lost him, Holly. Damn it, we’ve lost him.”) Later this year, a certain demagogue who hates all these terms—liberals, liberalism, liberal democracy—might be lifted to power again. So what is to be done? New books on the liberal crisis tend to divide into three kinds: the professional, the professorial, and the polemical—books by those with practical experience; books by academics, outlining, sometimes in dreamily abstract form, a reformed liberal democracy; and then a few wishing the whole damn thing over, and well rid of it.

The professional books tend to come from people whose lives have been spent as pundits and as advisers to politicians. Robert Kagan, a Brookings fellow and a former State Department maven who has made the brave journey from neoconservatism to resolute anti-Trumpism, has a new book on the subject, “Rebellion: How Antiliberalism Is Tearing America Apart—Again” (Knopf). Kagan’s is a particular type of book—I have written one myself—that makes the case for liberalism mostly to other liberals, by trying to remind readers of what they have and what they stand to lose. For Kagan, that “again” in the title is the crucial word; instead of seeing Trumpism as a new danger, he recapitulates the long history of anti-liberalism in the U.S., characterizing the current crisis as an especially foul wave rising from otherwise predictable currents. Since the founding of the secular-liberal Republic—secular at least in declining to pick one faith over another as official, liberal at least in its faith in individualism—anti-liberal elements have been at war with it. Kagan details, mordantly, the anti-liberalism that emerged during and after the Civil War, a strain that, just as much as today’s version, insisted on a “Christian commonwealth” founded essentially on wounded white working-class pride.

The relevance of such books may be manifest, but their contemplative depth is, of necessity, limited. Not to worry. Two welcomely ambitious and professorial books are joining them: “Liberalism as a Way of Life” (Princeton), by Alexandre Lefebvre, who teaches politics and philosophy at the University of Sydney, and “Free and Equal: A Manifesto for a Just Society” (Knopf), by Daniel Chandler, an economist and a philosopher at the London School of Economics.

The two take slightly different tacks. Chandler emphasizes programs of reform, and toys with the many bells and whistles on the liberal busy box: he’s inclined to try more random advancements, like elevating ordinary people into temporary power, on an Athenian model that’s now restricted to jury service. But, on the whole, his is a sanely conventional vision of a state reformed in the direction of ever greater fairness and equity, one able to curb the excesses of capitalism and to accommodate the demands of diversity.

The program that Chandler recommends to save liberalism essentially represents the politics of the leftier edge of the British Labour Party—which historically has been unpopular with the very people he wants to appeal to, gaining power only after exhaustion with Tory governments. In the classic Fabian manner, though, Chandler tends to breeze past some formidable practical problems. While advocating for more aggressive government intervention in the market, he admits equably that there may be problems with state ownership of industry and infrastructure. Yet the problem with state ownership is not a theoretical one: Margaret Thatcher became Prime Minister because of the widely felt failures of state ownership in the nineteen-seventies. The overreaction to those failures may have been destructive, but it was certainly democratic, and Tony Blair’s much criticized temporizing began in this recognition. Chandler is essentially arguing for an updated version of the social-democratic status quo—no bad place to be but not exactly a new place, either.

Lefebvre, on the other hand, wants to write about liberalism chiefly as a cultural phenomenon—as the water we swim in without knowing that it’s wet—and his book is packed, in the tradition of William James, with racy anecdotes and pop-culture references. He finds more truths about contemporary liberals in the earnest figures of the comedy series “Parks and Recreation” than in the words of any professional pundit. A lot of this is fun, and none of it is frivolous.

Yet, given that we may be months away from the greatest crisis the liberal state has known since the Civil War, both books seem curiously calm. Lefebvre suggests that liberalism may be passing away, but he doesn’t seem especially perturbed by the prospect, and at his book’s climax he recommends a permanent stance of “reflective equilibrium” as an antidote to all anxiety, a stance that seems not unlike Richard Rorty’s idea of irony—cultivating an ability both to hold to a position and to recognize its provisionality. “Reflective equilibrium trains us to see weakness and difference in ourselves,” Lefebvre writes, and to see “how singular each of us is in that any equilibrium we reach will be specific to us as individuals and our constellation of considered judgments.” However excellent as a spiritual exercise, a posture of reflective equilibrium seems scarcely more likely to get us through 2024 than smoking weed all day, though that, too, can certainly be calming in a crisis.

Both professors, significantly, are passionate evangelists for the great American philosopher John Rawls, and both books use Rawls as their fount of wisdom about the ideal liberal arrangement. Indeed, the dust-jacket sell line of Chandler’s book is a distillation of Rawls: “Imagine: You are designing a society, but you don’t know who you’ll be within it—rich or poor, man or woman, gay or straight. What would you want that society to look like?” Lefebvre’s “reflective equilibrium” is borrowed from Rawls, too. Rawls’s classic “A Theory of Justice” (1971) was a theory about fairness, which revolved around the “liberty principle” (you’re entitled to the basic liberties you’d get from a scheme in which everyone got those same liberties) and the “difference principle” (any inequalities must benefit the worst off). The emphasis on “justice as fairness” presses both professors to stress equality; it’s not “A Theory of Liberty,” after all. “Free and equal” is not the same as “free and fair,” and the difference is where most of the arguing happens among people committed to a liberal society.

Indeed, readers may feel that the work of reconciling Rawls’s very abstract consideration of ideal justice and community with actual experience is more daunting than these books, written by professional philosophers who swim in this water, make it out to be. A confidence that our problems can be managed with the right adjustments to the right model helps explain why the tone of both books—richly erudite and thoughtful—is, for all their implication of crisis, so contemplative and even-humored. No doubt it is a good idea to tell people to keep cool in a fire, but that does not make the fire cooler.

Rawls devised one of the most powerful of all thought experiments: the idea of the “veil of ignorance,” behind which we must imagine the society we would want to live in without knowing which role in that society’s hierarchy we would occupy. Simple as it is, it has ever-arresting force, making it clear that, behind this veil, rational and self-interested people would never design a society like that of, say, the slave states of the American South, given that, dropped into it at random, they could very well be enslaved. It also suggests that Norway might be a fairly just place, because a person would almost certainly land in a comfortable and secure middle-class life, however boringly Norwegian.

Still, thought experiments may not translate well to the real world. Einstein’s similarly epoch-altering account of what it would be like to travel on a beam of light, and how it would affect the hands on one’s watch, is profound for what it reveals about the nature of time. Yet it isn’t much of a guide to setting the timer on the coffeemaker in the kitchen so that the pot will fill in time for breakfast. Actual politics is much more like setting the timer on the coffeemaker than like riding on a beam of light. Breakfast is part of the cosmos, but studying the cosmos won’t cook breakfast. It’s telling that in neither of these Rawlsian books is there any real study of the life and the working method of an actual, functioning liberal politician. No F.D.R. or Clement Attlee, Pierre Mendès France or François Mitterrand (a socialist who was such a master of coalition politics that he effectively killed off the French Communist Party). Not to mention Tony Blair or Joe Biden or Barack Obama. Biden’s name appears once in Chandler’s index; Obama’s, though he gets a passing mention, not at all.

The reason is that theirs are not ideal stories about the unimpeded pursuit of freedom and fairness but necessarily contingent tales of adjustments and amendments—compromised stories, in every sense. Both philosophers would, I think, accept this truth in principle, yet neither is drawn to it from the heart. Still, this is how the good work of governing gets done, by those who accept the weight of the world as they act to lighten it. Obama’s history—including the feints back and forth on national health insurance, which ended, amid all the compromises, with the closest thing America has had to a just health-care system—is uninspiring to the idealizing mind. But these compromises were not a result of neglecting to analyze the idea of justice adequately; they were the result of the pluralism of an open society marked by disagreement on fundamental values. The troubles of current American politics do not arise from a failure on the part of people in Ohio to have read Rawls; they are the consequence of the truth that, even if everybody in Ohio read Rawls, not everybody would agree with him.

Ideals can shape the real world. In some ultimate sense, Biden, like F.D.R. before him, has tried to build the sort of society we might design from behind the veil of ignorance—but, also like F.D.R., he has had to do so empirically, and often through tactics overloaded with contradictions. If your thought experiment is premised on a group of free and equal planners, it may not tell you what you need to know about a society marred by entrenched hierarchies. Ask Biden if he wants a free and fair society and he would say that he does. But Thatcher would have said so, too, and just as passionately. Oscillation of power and points of view within that common framework are what makes liberal democracies liberal. It has less to do with the ideally just plan than with the guarantee of the right to talk back to the planner. That is the great breakthrough in human affairs, as much as the far older search for social justice. Plato’s rulers wanted social justice, of a kind; what they didn’t want was back talk.

Both philosophers also seem to accept, at least by implication, the familiar idea that there is a natural tension between two aspects of the liberal project. One is the desire for social justice, the other the practice of individual freedom. Wanting to speak our minds is very different from wanting to feed our neighbors. An egalitarian society might seem inherently limited in liberty, while one that emphasizes individual rights might seem limited in its capacity for social fairness.

Yet the evidence suggests the opposite. Show me a society in which people are able to curse the king and I will show you a society more broadly equal than the one next door, if only because the ability to curse the king will make the king more likely to spread the royal wealth, for fear of the cursing. The rights of sexual minorities are uniquely protected in Western liberal democracies, but this gain in social equality is the result of a history of protected expression that allowed gay experience to be articulated and “normalized,” in high and popular culture. We want to live on common streets, not in fortified castles. It isn’t a paradox that John Stuart Mill and his partner, Harriet Taylor, threw themselves into both “On Liberty,” a testament to individual freedom, and “The Subjection of Women,” a program for social justice and mass emancipation through group action. The habit of seeking happiness for one through the fulfillment of many others was part of the habit of their liberalism. Mill wanted to be happy, and he couldn’t be if Taylor wasn’t.

Liberals are at a disadvantage when it comes to authoritarians, because liberals are committed to procedures and institutions, and persist in that commitment even when those things falter and let them down. The asymmetry between the Trumpite assault on the judiciary and Biden’s reluctance even to consider enlarging the Supreme Court is typical. Trumpites can and will say anything on earth about judges; liberals are far more reticent, since they don’t want to undermine the institutions that give reality to their ideals.

Where Kagan, Lefebvre, and Chandler are all more or less sympathetic to the liberal “project,” the British political philosopher John Gray deplores it, and his recent book, “The New Leviathans: Thoughts After Liberalism” (Farrar, Straus & Giroux), is one long complaint. Gray is one of those leftists so repelled by the follies of the progressive party of the moment—to borrow a phrase of Orwell’s about Jonathan Swift—that, in a familiar horseshoe pattern, he has become hard to distinguish from a reactionary. He insists that liberalism is a product of Christianity (being in thrall to the notion of the world’s perfectibility) and that it has culminated in what he calls “hyper-liberalism,” which would emancipate individuals from history and historically shaped identities. Gray hates all things “woke”—a word that he seems to know secondhand from news reports about American universities. If “woke” points to anything except the rage of those who use it, however, it is a discourse directed against liberalism—Ibram X. Kendi is no ally of Bayard Rustin, nor Judith Butler of John Stuart Mill. So it is hard to see it as an expression of the same trends, any more than Trump is a product of Burke’s conservative philosophy, despite strenuous efforts on the progressive side to make it seem so.

Gray’s views are learned, and his targets are many and often deserved: he has sharp things to say about how certain left liberals have reclaimed the Nazi jurist Carl Schmitt and his thesis that politics is a battle to the death between friends and foes. In the end, Gray turns to Dostoyevsky’s warning that (as Gray reads him) “the logic of limitless freedom is unlimited despotism.” Hyper-liberals, Gray tells us, think that we can compete with the authority of God, and what they leave behind is wild disorder and crazed egotism.

As for Dostoyevsky’s positive doctrines—authoritarian and mystical in nature—Gray waves them away as being “of no interest.” But they are of interest, exactly because they raise the central pragmatic issue: If you believe all this about liberal modernity, what do you propose to do about it? Given that the announced alternatives are obviously worse or just crazy (as is the idea of a Christian commonwealth, something that could be achieved only by a degree of social coercion that makes the worst of “woke” culture look benign), perhaps the evil might better be ameliorated than abolished.

Between authority and anarchy lies argument. The trick is not to have unified societies that “share values”—those societies have never existed or have existed only at the edge of a headsman’s axe—but to have societies that can get along nonviolently without shared values, aside from the shared value of trying to settle disputes nonviolently. Certainly, Americans were far more polarized in the nineteen-sixties than they are today—many favored permanent apartheid (“Segregation now, segregation tomorrow, segregation forever”)—and what happened was not that values changed on their own but that a form of rights-based liberalism of protest and free speech convinced just enough people that the old order wouldn’t work and that it wasn’t worth fighting for a clearly lost cause.

What’s curious about anti-liberal critics such as Gray is their evident belief that, after the institutions and the practices on which their working lives and welfare depend are destroyed, the features of the liberal state they like will somehow survive. After liberalism is over, the neat bits will be easily reassembled, and the nasty bits will be gone. Gray can revile what he perceives to be a ruling élite and call to burn it all down, and nothing impedes the dissemination of his views. Without the institutions and the practices that he despises, fear would prevent oppositional books from being published. Try publishing an anti-Communist book in China or a critique of theocracy in Iran. Liberal institutions are the reason that he is allowed to publish his views and to have the career that he and all the other authors here rightly have. Liberal values and practices allow their most fervent critics a livelihood and a life—which they believe will somehow magically be reconstituted “after liberalism.” They won’t be.

The vociferous critics of liberalism are like passengers on the Titanic who root for the iceberg. After all, an iceberg is thrilling, and anyway the White Star Line has classes, and the music the band plays is second-rate, and why is the food French instead of honestly English? “Just as I told you, the age of the steamship is over!” they cry as the water slips over their shoes. They imagine that another boat will miraculously appear—where all will be in first class, the food will be authentic, and the band will perform only Mozart or Motown, depending on your wishes. Meanwhile, the ship goes down. At least the band will be playing “Nearer, My God, to Thee,” which they will take as some vindication. The rest of us may drown.

One turns back to Helena Rosenblatt’s 2018 book, “The Lost History of Liberalism,” which makes the case that liberalism is not a recent ideology but an age-old series of intuitions about existence. When the book appeared, it may have seemed unduly overgeneralized—depicting liberalism as a humane generosity that flared up at moments and then died down again. But, as the world picture darkens, her dark picture illuminates. There surely are a set of identifiable values that connect men and women of different times along a single golden thread: an aversion to fanaticism, a will toward the coexistence of different kinds and creeds, a readiness for reform, a belief in the public criticism of power without penalty, and perhaps, above all, a knowledge that institutions of civic peace are much harder to build than to destroy, being immeasurably more fragile than their complacent inheritors imagine. These values will persist no matter how evil the moment may become, and by whatever name we choose to whisper in the dark.

[feysandarcheron]

Onyx storm spoilers and book 4 theory

This is mostly me rambling my thoughts but i feel like there’s something here, just walk with me. I really think love will have something to do with saving xaden. His love for violet was emphasized way too much in OS to be a coincidence:

From what we know, venin turn solely for power’s sake, whereas xaden initially turned out of his love for violet and then fully turned out of his love for sgaeyl.

In OS, everyone made a huge deal about the potential for xaden to hurt violet, but violet feels confident he never would. She even tells ridoc that would be the hypothetical red line, and thinks that if xaden hurt her then he wouldn’t be him anymore. And he never crossed the line.

Xaden said even if he was a maven commanding armies, he would still love violet.

Each time xaden is “on the ice” it is violet that brings him back.

At the end of OS, Theophanie tells violet that venin cannot love, and violet is shocked.

At the end of OS, even though xaden is full venin he still loves violet. But that is his absolute last piece of humanity that he is holding on to.

This all reads as foreshadowing to me, that in the next book xaden’s love will be put to the test against the corruption of his soul and power. Xaden may be put in a position where he needs to let go of the last of his humanity, where he could hurt violet, or where he has to watch Berwyn (who he cannot harm) hurt violet - but his love for violet will ofc ultimately prevail.

Based on the above, i think love will be key to what happens with xaden next book, but we know from OS that love cannot cure him out of being venin. The irids tell violet that there is no cure for venin, because “the power exchange kills the soul… and death has no cure.” Notice how the death of the soul is equated to death.

Whatever the solution to stopping the may be (like the theories about wielding from the sky, andarna, or siphoning, etc.), i think it involves taking all of the power from the venin, leaving them with no soul to sustain them - and i think this is what kills them. I think venin are immortal because they live off of power. If you take that power away, they die because their soul is dead. I think something similar happened with Theophanie - she said she could never return to Dunne’s temple or she’d lose all the power that’s kept her alive all these years. When violet stabbed her with the knife from Dunne’s temple, i think she died because it stole all her power, leaving her with nothing at all.

So… my theory is that they will find a way to take the venins’ power away, killing them. But xaden will be able to survive because he still maintains a shred of his soul. His love for violet will save him.

[imjulia-andilikecats]

I just finished reading @hrizantemy Mare Barrow's Critic Post, and here are my thoughts. I'm a die-hard Mare Barrow fan and will be touching on other topics/events that happened in Glass Sword, so please read with caution.

TW: Branding, Dead Baby

As someone who actually started caring for Mare during her corruption/fall arc in Glass Sword. It's no surprise to me that a lot of people would dislike her but it doesn't mean I'll ever get used to it.

Your criticism is mostly focused on the pivotal moment when Mare captured Cameron, which highlights her hypocrisy and her mental/moral decline at the end of the book.

However, you dismissed A LOT of events that led to Mare becoming this.

To start, Mare didn't become this hypocrite overnight:

Glass Sword began fresh after Maven's betrayal, with Mare still suffering from PTSD and guilt for what she did to Cal (and other characters, such as Lucas and her three handmaids).

For the majority of the book, Mare and her companions are in a bloody race to get to the Newbloods before Maven gets to them first while also being hunted down and killed themselves.

With their first encounter with dead Newlood, they quickly got ambushed, and Maven branded her.

Imagine the physical and mental tools that Mare suffered whenever they found a dead Newblood and a bloody letter. Maven hunting her down and mentally taunting/threatening her with his letters.

I would be, pardon my language, tweaking too, if my enemy leaves a message on a dead baby.

Mare has a lot of unaddressed trauma with problems that keep piling up on her that she doesn't have the resources or skill to fix. Unfortunately for her, she doesn't have access to a therapist; she is far away from her family. She never had a healthy way of coping with her trauma. Cause she is too desperate to save a Newblood and survive the day. She never gets to breathe in this book.

Also, the reason Mare broke protocol was when they encountered Jon The Seer, and he told her that the person they would meet would be their chance to infiltrate Corros Prison, and that unfortunate person was Cameron.

Mare, desperate, had Shade capture her. To save Julian, Sara, Newbloods, and even Silver elites being held captive by Elara.

Everyone did not approve of her decisions and often called her out:

Cal and Farley are very vocal about Mare's plans and choice of action.

With most of her plans being shut down and her behavior getting checked when she oversteps.

They don't see her as a leader even if Mare acts like one.

A good example is when Mare discussed the plan to infiltrate Corros Prison, and only a few of the Newblood recruits wanted to join. Mare even noted that they were either scared of her or they didn't know her.

Only when Kilorn, who spent time with them, spoke up about their need to save the others where they were more persuaded to join.

During the attack in Corros Prison when Mare called for Cal to help her. He ignored her because she killed guards who were begging her for mercy.

Later, when Shade died, Mare was not comforted or pitied. Farley slapped her for being dense and insensitive. Cal pushed her into a different room to tell her off, asking what was wrong with her, why was she reading Maven's letters, and even questioning if she was even capable of love.

Mare faced the consequences of her actions:

After Mare and the colonel broadcasted Elara's head. Barely anyone was talking to Mare.

On their way to their mission, they were quickly captured by an angry, grieving Maven. Mare offered herself to spare the others. Maven wanted justice for his mother, so he accepted.

He put a collar on her, dressed her in rags, and paraded her before a crowd of angry Silvers who wanted nothing more than her dead and commanded her to kneel. This happened on her 18th birthday. She is just a kid.

Mare made mistakes. She was not only called out for it. She suffered the consequences and wholeheartedly apologized to Cameron for what she did. Even offering to fight anyone who tried to question Cameron.

I know my response will be dismissed as a Mare stan. But you got to give credit to Aveyard. She created a flawed FMC with ACTUAL flaws that aren't just relatable but realistic, and she actually faces the consequences of her actions and is not being glorified by the characters or the narrative.

[married-to-google-translater]

Maven when Darling gets seriously hurt in an accident

Panic....

First comes panic, then comes worry and after that comes anger towards the person/thing that would have caused your suffering.

If it was someone who hurt you... well they'd be fucking dead. Maven should take care of that. He would do this because he loves you...

"If you're not ready to kill for the person you love, are you sure you really love them?" - Maven

Another person he would hate with a passion would be a doctor who has to deal with you. He would understand that they are taking care of you, but do they have to be that close? Do they have to touch you that much? Why are they staring at you for so long? Maven doesn't care about the doctor's gender.

Maven would like you to be transferred to a home care facility as soon as possible. He would like to take care of you. However, Maven does not want to risk missing something.

Maven would be there all the time to comfort you. "Ssssssh sssssh honey I know it hurts. Don't worry I'm here with you. No I'm not going anywhere... I'll never leave you alone again."

This man means what he says.

Maven would also become much more overprotective after this.