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nautiscarader · 3 years ago

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Marichat 1

Smutember day 1 - Strip Poker, Marichat (ML)

(Ao3)

With apologies to anyone, who knows how to play poker.

Also I hope you will apprciate all the ice puns. You will soon see why.

What killed the dinosaurs? THE ICE AGE

===========

At this point, Marinette thought she'd be used to having a boyfriend with a slightly unusual method of dropping by. She heard the scratching on the trapdoor, and when she opened it, she was welcomed with an upside-down face of her feline companion.

With his trademark agility he indeed dropped in, landing on all fours and jumped back up, his tail coiling around her waist to bring her into his arms.

- Quite a bold move, kitty. - she smiled. - Well, you know me. - How did you know I'd be free tonight, though? College is forcing me to stay a lot in the libraries, even in the evening... I was about to hit the hay... - she pointed to her rather skimpy clothing. - I guess it was a bluff.

His hands slid up and down her thighs, while her legs gently parted his. It was true, her university did embark a toll on her private life, giving the two way less time to spend together.

And as the two were about to kiss, a word from him gave Marinette an idea.

- How about strip poker? - Marinette asked, raising her eyebrow - If you think your bluff game is so strong... - Sounds like a slightly more complicated way of getting you out your clothes, princess... - Chat replied cockily.

Marinette gave him a gentle kiss and jumped onto her back. She straightened the sheets, took the deck, shuffled it, and shot Chat with a smile.

- I assume an alley cat like you-you know how to play poker? - she added with just a tinge of hesitation. - Ah, of course - he replied with a similar moment of worry - Were you thinking of some other, simpler game? - Well...

Marinette began, and she lost control of her deck, temporarily scattering cards all over her laps.

- There-there is this card mini game in this, uh, app game called Mister... - Penguino! - Chat finished, and coughed, sounding a bit too excited - I heard, I mean. We can, uh play that simplified version, just to humour you. - Yeah, I mean, even pros need a break once in a while.

The two shared a long, silent connection, as Marinette shuffled and dealt the cards. She hid her face behind them, wishing she could have seen the tooltips that automatically suggested the desired highest combo...

She sneaked a quick look at Chat, but she was used to him hiding his thoughts, and it seemed for once he might have an upper hand, or claw...

She repositioned a few cards, and with a firm move, she put two of them down, sending her opponent a faint smile.

- I've got... one pair of snowshoes! - and she proudly uncovered two queens. Chat smiled back. - Guess I've invited you to ice-skate ring for a date.

And revealed four cards from his hand.

- Two pairs.

Marinette's smile faded, and knowing he wouldn't look away, she undid her ponytails, tossing away her hair ties.

- Come on, that barely counts as clothing. - Chat protested. - Be glad I undid them both at the time. - she smiled and took more cards.

This time, the pause did not last as long, as Marinette didn't even wait for Chat.

- Four of a kindle! - Eh, pass.

And with that, Marinette watched as he ditched his gloves. After a few ties, her winning streak returned, as she got a regular Strait, followed by Icy Strait, much to Chat's surprise.

- In hindsight, I should have thought this through, wearing one-piece outfit isn't the best strategy...

Marinette just nodded, watching as he lost his shoes and Chat Noir-themed socks. And she had to restrain herself from giggling when she looked at her next hand.

- Full Igloo! in your face!

Chat Noir swallowed, and knowing that she will watch every move of his slowly pulled down the golden bell, revealing his lean, but muscular chest, and, as he let his costume fell to the floor, Marinette's eyes fixated on his...

- Boxers!? - Marinette protested - What? - they were bundled with socks - And he pointed to his pawprints his boxers were dotted with.

Marinette grumbled. It seemed her luck has ran out temporarily. Two Snowmen and one Ho-Ho later, she found herself without her jacket and pants. She suddenly found herself wished she had worn socks...

But then, with a triumphant smile, she laid down five cards down.

- Slushy Strait.

She spoke, looking at four cards Chat put down that were nowhere close to topping hers.

And with a faint smile, Chat stood up and reached to his boxers, where a faint trace of his erection was visible. Marinette bit her lip, and watched as the dark material slides down, until his biology performed an admirable jolt, when his cock sprung to life once he was freed.

- Well, looks like you've won. - Chat sat down, and was about to shuffle the cards back when Marinette stopped him. - Not yet. You still have your mask.

Adrien swallowed loudly, as Marinette's smile widened to an almost Cheshire-cat length.

- My... My princess... - Deal the cards. - she cut him off quickly, trying not to have her mind clouded with the image of his cock.

But the smile faded away equally quickly. Next turn forced Marinette to take her top, and in two more, she found herself whether to choose her bra, or her panties, which have revealed her readiness already. And knowing that, she opted for them, hoping the sight of her sex would throw her opponent off.

Chat smiled, watching as Marinette lifted her legs into the air and undid her panties, pretending to hide her puffy lips from him, when in reality she made sure that her night lamp would show a few droplets of her arousal.

The two stared at each other and reached for more cards. This time, her face remained frozen and motionless, and she put down five cards.

Chat Noir, with equally stoic demeanour, did the same.

At the same time, they both revealed them.

- Icy Slushy Strait! - Marinette howled - Finally, I will know the identity of my boyfriend... - Five of a kindle. - What?!

Marinette watched, as Chat flipped each card, one ace at a time, finishing with a comedic depiction of a medieval jester.

She looked up, unable to believe his luck. Instead of any explanation, she just saw a glimmer in his green eyes.

She reached her hand behind her back and undid her bra, rendering her completely naked, while Chat licked his lips at the sight of her breasts.

- Can we stop pretending? - Yeah, I guess.

Marinette grumbled, and she welcomed the feeling of his lips on hers, as he jumped onto her, pinning her naked body to her comfy bed.

But he wasn't interested in immobilising her, as Chat was clearly drawn to her sex, now positively glistening with her juices, and a single lick of his made Marinette howl, as her legs flailed around his head.

Chat drove her insane for a couple of minutes, knowing she wasn't even trying to hide her oncoming climax. The feeling of his fingers, instead of claws brought a much needed comfort and tenderness to his foreplay, especially when he traced her clit.

And just as with the final hand, this one brought Marinette to her loss. She buried her face in a pillow, while she soaked her lover with her arousal, thrashing around him, much yo his pleasure.

Adrien thought she would remain like that for long, but her shaking arms were soon around his neck, as she brought him onto her.

She let out a moan under his pleasant, heavenly weight, but when his aggressive behaviour drove him between her legs, she had to stop him.

- Ah, ah, ah - Marinette spoke, as Chat looked at her, stumped - Forgot about something?

She reached to her nightstand, and to his surprise, she produced a condom in a black package depicting a handsome man with green eyes and cat ears, clearly from the same set as his underwear.

- I feel I should file for copyright claim. - They make ones with Ladybug as well... - Marinette added with a mixture of annoyance and odd bit of pride in her voice - I know we were stripping down, but this will suit you.

She let out a giggle when his cock twitched in her hand, as she coiled her fingers around him and slid the condom on, feeing each of his vein under her fingertips.

- Sorry kitty, but I'm not ready for your kittens yet... maybe next month...

She joked and gasped, as Chat positioned himself between her legs, feeling his tip brushed her wet opening.

Spoiled by his delicate treatment before, it was time for Chat to utilise his pent-up energy, as he slid inside her with ease, earning another languorous moan from his lover, as she dug her nails into his back.

With each thrust, she spilled his name into his ear, feeling his cock spreading and tearing her in half, as buried himself deeper and deeper.

- Chat... Chat... Chaton!

She knew he was on the edge of his climax too, brought by their shared taunting, and though she preferred long, slow love-making, she would gladly welcome another "little death", as it was called in her language.

She listened to his guttural, low groans, and when his back arched, so did hers, almost as if to give him chance to reach her depths, while he filled his condom with seed, and her ears with her name.

The two joined bodies pulsed and shuddered, as Chat delivered his potency into the rubber, her body milking him for more in a futile attempts at executive the biological imperative Marinette protected herself from.

Their groans and moans subsided, as their lips met, and with that, the gentle creaking of the bed stopped as well, replaced by smacking sound of their hungry mouths.

- Well, looks like I won, Chat huffed, lifting himself from his position, marvelling at the sight of Marinette's slightly sweaty body and her ruffled hair. - Are-are you sure?

Marinette's lips curled in a cocky smile and she showed him her hand, holding four aces and a joker she must have picked up when they were basking in their shared afterglow.

- But... - But what kitty? Look, my sleeves are empty - she raised her arms to mock him further - My princess, that's cheating! - All's fair in love and war - she spoke without missing a beat - Your mask, Chaton

Cold sweat rushed down his spine, strengthened by her piercing gaze and a sly smile. For quite a while neither of them spoke, each fixated at their partner's face.

- Although, I can accept this as alternative.

Marinette spoke and grabbed his cock, sliding underneath it, until it hovered over her face. Her fingers pinched the tip of the condom, filed with his seed and she stuck her tongue out, waiting for her reward as she slid it from his length.

Inch by inch, as Marinette disrobed her lover, globs of his potent spunk landed in her mouth, guided by her skilled tongue that traced his undercock, causing him to shudder and twitch.

And even after the condom was off, Marinette squeezed it to ensure that none of his hard and tasty work would be wasted, letting out loud and unabashed sounds of satisfaction as she tasted her salty treat, making sure to not look away from Chat's enamoured face.

Despite being disrobed, Marinette won, proudly wearing a smile and his cum on her face.

- That... that was quite a move, Marinette. - Chat admitted and bowed gently, sneaking a kiss to her ankle, as he helped her collect her clothes. - Always pleasure to win with someone, who knows how to lose. - she giggled in return. - Next time you will be the one begging for mercy. - Oh, I sure hope so.

Marinette raised her arms and put her wrists next to the headboard of her bed, as if she was tied. She watched, as his cock twitched again through his latex clothes.

- Oh, and by the way... I'd still win. - he said as he climber up - I still had my tail.

He closed the door, and only after a while Marinette let out a gasp when she realised how his tail could have been attached to his naked body once he got out of his suit...

#marichat #smutember #day 1 #miraculust #lemon #mlnsfw #nautiscaraderfics #smutember 2021 #smutember2021

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kieraelieson · 4 years ago

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Chained to a Wall

Oooh for a prompt, how about chained to a wall with Logan? Maybe with a sort of medieval fantasy like world? Prompt by Anon

Logan woke groggily, lifting a hand to his head and surprised at the chain attached to it. It took him a moment to shake off enough of the fuzz from his mind to realize he was in a cell, chained to the wall with only a few feet of chain.

A boy walked by, and froze, turning to him with wide eyes. “He did it! You’re really here!”

Logan was more than a little confused. “What’s going on?”

The boy seemed to have many thoughts passing through his mind, his forehead creased in thought, and when he spoke he completely ignored Logan’s question. “Are you happy?”

“Am I— am I what?” Logan asked, completely confused.

“Happy.”

Logan shook his head. “I don’t- I suppose not. I’m more confused than anything else. What’s happening? Why am I here?”

The boy’s mouth opened, and then shut. “I don’t think I’m supposed to tell you.”

That was at least something. This boy was someone’s servant, most likely, judging by his clothes, and judging by the obvious magical residue spotted on his face and glasses his master was probably a magician. So Logan had been kidnapped by a magician. He would have guessed for ransom except for the question of whether or not he was happy. That certainly made things more confusing. Perhaps revenge? He didn’t think he’d made enemies, but perhaps revenge against his parents.

“What can you tell me?” Logan asked.

“Ummm… hopefully, you’ll only be here for a month.”

“That seems like a strange thing to be allowed to tell me.”

The boy frowned. “Well, I don’t know. It’s not a promise. Especially if you get happy it’ll take longer.”

“I fail to see why that has any significance.”

The boy’s face screwed up in thought. “I don’t think I can tell you either. I have to ask my—uhhhh, my master.” And then he turned and ran off.

Logan just sighed. This was certainly not how he’d expected the day to go. He got up, testing his limits. He couldn’t quite reach the bars of the cell with how far the chain let him go. There was a small bed, which was surprisingly soft for something in a cell, and around the bucket in the corner was hung a curtain. There was a spigot which trickled out water, and a small grated drain. The cell was clean too.

It was reasonable, if bare. Which only confused him more. Why kidnap someone and put them in a cell if you intended on treating them reasonably? He would’ve thought that cells were for prisoners you intended to make miserable, and otherwise you would give them a proper, though well locked, room.

A door down the hallway opened, and Logan felt a spike of fear through him at the sound of heavy footsteps. But his confusion only grew when he recognized the man that appeared.

“Janus? You… why?”

Janus’s face was as even and smooth as stone. “I don’t wish you harm. But you will stay here.”

Logan stood up. “Why?! What does this accomplish?! My parents have always favored you! You would merely have to ask, and almost anything could be yours.”

Janus didn’t betray a single emotion. “I will not tell you my purposes.”

Anger rushed through Logan. “You are insane! Nothing will come of this! No matter how ‘unhappy’ you make me, it won’t get you anything you wouldn’t have already gotten without this treachery.”

“Unhappy—? Patton. Patton, come back down here!” Janus called.

The boy came running. “Yes?”

“What did you tell him?”

Patton suddenly looked very worried. “I didn’t say anything you said not to! I told him it might be a month.”

Janus sighed, dragging a hand down his face. “And why is he saying things about being unhappy?”

Patton frowned in confusion. “I thought that was the point?”

Janus sighed again, but it was mixed with a slight chuckle. He knelt and put his hands on Patton’s shoulders. “That is not what I said. But let’s not talk to Logan about any of that any more, ok?”

Patton nodded readily. “Sorry.”

“Why don’t you go get dinner into trays now, ok?”

“Ok! Bye, Logan!” Patton waved and ran off again.

Logan was still confused. He was getting incredibly mixed signals.

“So what is this?”

“I’ve already said I won’t explain my purposes. But, essentially, you are my prisoner until the time I release you. Patton was correct, I estimate it will take a month for me to be ready to let you go.”

“But why?”

Janus raised an eyebrow slightly. “How many of the meetings your father holds do you attend?”

Logan frowned. “Most of them.”

“Then you ought to be able to figure it out on your own.”

••^*^••

Logan had been in the cell for a week now, and was incredibly bored. Patton visited many times each day, and Janus would often come have cryptic conversations with him in the evenings, but that still left him bored. And restless, not that he could do anything about it. Other than pace at the limit of the chain, back and forth, over and over, still trying fruitlessly to figure out why he was here and why he ought to know.

And then Patton came skipping down, holding a cookie in each hand. “Da—- Janus said we could both have one!”

Logan put on a bright smile. “Thank you, Patton! You know, I was curious, we both have glasses, but I’m wondering how different they are.”

Patton’s head cocked to the side in clear interest. “Oh. I don’t know.”

“Why don’t you come in? We can sit on my bed and have a picnic with the cookies and test each other’s glasses.” Honestly, Logan didn’t think that Patton would fall for it, though he hoped he would.

“Ok!” Patton fished a key out of his pocket and opened the cell door.

That had been even easier than Logan would’ve guessed. Patton came right in and sat on his bed.

Logan sat down calmly, trying not to startle Patton, before he grabbed him, holding his arms tightly.

But Patton still didn’t startle, just trying to tip his head to look at Logan. “You’re not very good at giving hugs.”

Logan let out an annoyed sigh. “This isn’t a hug, I’m trapping you. Call Janus.”

Patton shrugged slightly. “It’s kind of like a hug.”

“Just call him.”

Patton opened his mouth, and then shut it again. “It’s weird.”

“What is?”

“Calling him Janus when we’re at home.” Patton gave a brief pout, and then took a deep breath and shouted. “Janus!”

Janus didn’t come quickly. His steps seemed even more slow than usual.

“Yes?”

“Logan’s trapping me.” Patton said readily.

Logan didn’t even have a chance of looking threatening, not with Patton acting as if it was just all a poorly executed hug. But he could still try. “I know Patton isn’t your servant.”

Janus raised an eyebrow lazily. “And what is he then?”

“He’s your son. You wouldn’t want him to get hurt.”

Janus clapped slowly. “Congratulations, it only took you a week to realize what most women whisper about after the first meeting.”

Logan frowned.

“Comfy, Patton?”

Patton nodded. “I’m good!”

Logan sighed in defeat, releasing Patton.

“I’m sorry to say it, as I’m sure it’s frustrating, but you’re in my house, Logan. You won’t be winning any of these little battles.”

“But why are you keeping me here!?” Logan yelled. “There’s no benefit to you! And once I get out you’ll be arrested for treason!”

“Come on out, Patton,” Janus said.

“You are not the man my father thinks you are!”

For once, there was a flicker of something over Janus’s face, but he just closed the cell, took Patton, and left.

••^*^••

Logan was provided with books after that, and Patton was strictly forbidden from entering his cell.

And then one day Janus came downstairs, looking uncharacteristically annoyed. “I’ve lost a bet. You have the option to come upstairs for dinner tonight.”

Logan was surprised, but nodded. “Yes.”

Janus came into his cell, putting a spell over the cuff on his wrist before taking the chain off. “You won’t be able to leave the house. I’d rather not have to fight over it.”

Logan nodded solemnly, though he had little intention of passing up an attempt at escape if it presented itself.

When they made it up to the dining room Patton was standing next to the table, which was laid out with nearly a feast, and he looked both very tired and incredibly proud of himself.

Janus bowed slightly. “I am very pleased to attend, Patton.”

Logan also bowed slightly.

Patton’s bow was much less formal, more like a happy little bob.

The dinner was formal, and Logan was allowed to ask about the outside affairs, though he did not always receive answers. Patton was gently cut off several times throughout the dinner, just before he could say something that Logan desperately wanted to know about. Logan also was cut off every time his temper flared, and it made him feel very much like he was Patton’s age again.

But then Patton started excitedly telling Logan about his garden, and how things had grown in the last three days since the last time he’d rambled about it, and Janus asked Logan about the contents of the books he’d been reading, and the conversation grew into something far more enjoyable.

After dinner, where, in Logan’s experience, it was common for the adults to move to a sitting room with wine, Patton ran off, and came back in a few minutes with a tray. There were three steaming mugs of hot chocolate, and they all sat down on comfortable couches in another room to drink them.

Patton cuddled up to Janus’s side, and they all sat still, and comfortable, mostly staring into the fire.

Once Patton set his cup down Janus wrapped an arm around his shoulders and rested his hand in his hair, petting gently. Patton relaxed into it, and gradually fell asleep and slumped over into Janus’s lap.

“I don’t understand you,” Logan said quietly.

Janus just kept petting Patton’s hair, even though he seemed to be sound asleep. “You don’t need to.”

“I… I think… I might agree with you on the reason for your keeping me here, if you would explain it.”

“I believe the same. However, as much as it pains me to consistently anger you, it is necessary.”

Logan scowled. “What, so after kidnapping me and holding me here for two weeks you just want me to trust you that it’ll all turn out alright?”

“Actually, I would prefer you didn’t trust me. Patton wasn’t far off when he said that if you were to become happy it would require a longer stay.”

“And what’s wrong with being happy?!” Logan snapped, though he was careful to keep his voice down. “If this is supposed to be some kind of lesson I highly doubt I’m learning anything worthwhile.”

“It is not a lesson.”

“Then what is it?!”

Patton stirred slightly, and Janus glared at Logan, but soon Patton was breathing evenly again.

“I can’t tell you. Telling you would entirely defeat the purpose.”

Logan scowled, and drank the last sip of his drink, which was by that point cold.

••^*^••

If the goal was to make him miserable they were certainly succeeding. Once he’d almost gotten Patton to tell him everything he knew, which resulted in a spell being cast over Patton that caused him to clap his hand over his mouth whenever he spoke about what Janus decided was ‘secret information’. It made Patton a little grumpy, and made Logan far more annoyed.

And then the books stopped coming. Only the same books, repeated over again, whenever he’d finished the ones he had. It was beyond frustrating. Especially when he was no closer to either an explanation or escape.

And… while he would never, ever admit to it, he found himself getting homesick as well.

In a way, he wished he could just fall asleep and stay asleep until the time was up. Until he could go home again. And for an entire day he tried to. He ignored Patton, and Janus, and just laid on the bed, trying to fall asleep and stay asleep. And barring that, to silently think about why he could be here.

He wasn’t getting any answers.

The cell door swung open, and he ignored it until he was suddenly swooped up into a bridal carry.

He didn’t bother protesting. It was probably what Janus wanted anyway.

“Pouting like that isn’t doing you any good,” Janus said, carrying him out of the cell and upstairs.

Logan ignored him. Until he was taken outside. He hadn’t realized how much he’d missed it.

Janus plopped him down on the ground, and Logan sat up and looked around. It seemed he was in Patton’s garden, which was soon confirmed by a dirt covered Patton appearing and holding out a pear to him, wrapped in a cloth.

“This is the best one from today! You can eat it!”

Just being outside raised his spirits a lot, and Logan smiled as he took the pear. “Thank you.”

Patton beamed, and then went back to whatever he was doing.

“I doubt you will ever favor me the way your father has,” Janus said quietly, looking out at the garden. “But someday, when you’re king, remember Patton kindly.”

Logan nodded slowly. “I will.”

Janus sighed heavily, as if in relief, and Logan really looked at him for perhaps the first time since he’d been kidnapped. He seemed tired, and worn, and there were faint marks on his clothing. And they were on his sides and back, not on his front as Logan would expect from spell residue.

“What do you do?”

“I’m a court magician.”

“I know, but what have you been doing, specifically.”

“I can’t say.” Janus said tiredly. “If I could tell you, I certainly would.”

Logan turned to look out at the garden. “I believe you.”

••^*^••

Patton ran down the hallway, nearly slamming himself into the bars of the cage. “They did it, they did it, they did it, they did it!”

“What happened?!”

“They broke the curse!!”

“What curse?”

“Your curse!” Patton fumbled with keys to get the cell open and tackled Logan in a hug.

“I don’t understand.”

“Dad can tell you now!” Patton hastily undid the cuff from Logan’s wrist, and then there were other steps running towards them.

Logan barely had time to register that it was his father before he was scooped up in a massive bear hug. He gripped back just as tightly.

“Logan, I’m so sorry, I wanted to see you, truly. If there had been any way.”

Logan just hugged tighter, feeling suddenly like he might cry.

Janus had arrived at some point, and cleared his throat. “We can move upstairs, and explain everything to Logan.”

Logan could barely stand the waiting until they were upstairs and seated. “What was all this?”

“The kingdom to the west, you remember the truce we have with them was unsteady,” his father started.

Logan nodded.

“There is a faction, both of our own people and of theirs, that believe we should have taken them over long ago.”

Logan nodded. He’d heard of this briefly.

“This faction managed to get someone close enough to put a curse on you. We don’t know when exactly, only that it was several years ago.”

Logan nodded solemnly.

“They activated that curse roughly a month ago, and sent us a threat in such a way that we thought it was the other kingdom.”

Logan nodded very solemnly.

“It said that the effects of the curse would strike suddenly, in your happiest and most unsuspecting moment,” Janus said.

Logan turned to look at him, many things slotting into place in his mind.

“We’ve been trying to find them and to break the curse this whole time,” his father explained. “As a last option, Janus had a spell that would track the curse in reverse, but it would take time, at least several weeks.”

Janus nodded. “In the cuff, it’s why I kept it on you.”

“We had hoped to find them before that, but they were too well hidden. But once the spell worked we found them, and the curse is broken now.”

Logan nodded, his mind swimming with all of the information it had wanted for so long.

Janus slipped off of his chair, to his knees, head bowed. “Regardless of necessity, I deeply apologize for the way I’ve treated you.”

Logan and his father spoke almost exactly at the same time. “Please, get up.”

“You did well,” Logan said.

His father nodded firmly. “Janus, you are the main reason Logan is still here and well. You have my gratitude forever.”

Logan nodded. “Anything you want within my power to give, I will do it.”

Janus shook his head, but Patton suddenly piped up. “He needs a vacation!”

Janus froze, but didn’t say anything against what Patton had said.

Logan’s father spoke immediately. “Yes. Janus, please, rest. Take your time and train Patton.”

Logan was completely surprised to see Janus’s eyes grow wet as Patton ran over and hugged him tightly.

“Thank you.”

#bad things happen bingo #kiera's bthb #chained to a wall #sanders sides #misunderstandings #kidnapping #logan sanders #patton sanders #janus sanders

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blackenedwhite97 · 4 years ago

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Trials ( An Erasermic x Reader Medieval AU Ch.11-12)

TABLE OF CONTENTS:

https://blackenedwhite97.tumblr.com/post/643722830321696769/trials-an-erasermic-x-reader-medieval-au

CHAPTER 11

The next time you awoke the long glass ceiling was filled with inky darkness, a dull amber glow barely vignetting the far edge of the sky. There was no longer a hustle and bustle in the hall beyond the closed heavy doors to your wing, and across from you Hizashi breathed softly in his sleep. He had changed his clothes since you'd fallen asleep, he was wearing a similar forest green tunic to the one he had one when you first met him and his hair washed and haloing out around him. You too had been changed in your sleep, your oversized traveling clothes replaced with a fresh white linen dressing gown. Next to Hizashi, stretched out across a still made cot, was Shouta. He had yet to change fully, his pants were still the same black worn trousers he'd been wearing for the last handful of days but he'd peeled off the heavy top layers and was wearing a thin linen shirt not so dissimilar to your dressing gown.

The door creaked open every so slightly, wavering golden light spilling into the room in a clean molten ray. A man, peered in, his features silhouetted by the torches in the hallways, his head was more than a foot or so higher than the average man's head when standing tall. The edge of his broad shoulder peeked through the door as well, and a huge hand wrapped around the edge of the door. He slowly pushed the door open, trying to keep the heavy door's moans to a minimum. As he entered the room you got a good look at his full size, he was enormous. His shoulders were as wide and Shouta and Hizashi's side and his arms reminded you of the brutal strength in an ox's legs, you could see defined mounds of muscle through the rich red velvet that encircled his arms.

"Hello." He whispered softly, looking at you. You could see the faintest outline of his face in the light from the hallway, a kind smile across his lips.

"H-hello." you greeted back, choking on the dryness in your throat.

He walked towards you, for a man his size he was exceptionally quiet. He wasn't soundless like Shouta could be but his foot falls were light and controlled like he had lots of practice roaming around in the small hours when everyone was asleep. The closer he got the more you could see, he had golden hair that was neatly combed back, two clocks in the front refuting the lay flat, and glowing blue eyes. The doublet he wore was a rich blue quilted velvet, the long sleeved tunic beneath it made from red velvet, the clasps of the doublet were gold and the shoulers were lined with little tufts of white fur. He was dressed unbelievably lavishly, his clothes fitting to those of a king.

"My name is Toshinori." He greeted, sitting down smoothly on the cot next to you.

"Toshi- Lord Toshinori?" you gasped. You tried to sit up, maybe even stand, tried to make an effort to greet the lord properly.

"Please," he raised a hand to stop you, "it's alright. I take it Shouta and hizashi have told you a bit about us then?"

"A-a little bit," You muttered, still acutely aware you were speaking to a lord you threw in some formality for good measure, "m-my Lord."

"Good." He was still smiling but there was an air of awkwardness about it. "You may call me Toshinori when we aren't speaking under official circumstances, Y/n."

"Of course, m-Toshinori." You smiled politely. A Lord, who didn't want to be referred to as a Lord, at all times? You suddenly understood Shouta's horrendous display of court formalities a few days ago. "How did you-"

"I spoke to Shouta earlier today, after you and Hizashi were tended to he came to speak to me. He informed me of your meeting and of some of the details of our travels, you've had a very exciting week." The way he spoke warmed you to your bones, kindness seeped outwards from him in thick wafting waves.

"That's a nice way to put it." you responded. Exciting. Try traumatic.

"Yes," he chuckled deeply, "I've been told I tend to sugar coat things."

He fidgeted awkwardly with a clasp on his doublet and sighed, his eyes were far away in thought.

"Regardless of what you've experienced, Y/n, you are safe here." He looked up at you.

"What is here?" you asked, wanting so badly to understand how a man you'd only just met could make that promise so assuredly.

"Hhhhm, where to begin. What do you know?" he asked, a sparkle in his eye.

"About this place?" You collected your thoughts for a moment before speaking. "Shouta and Hizashi say that it's their home, that the people who live here have special abilities like- like me."

You tried to stop yourself out of habit, the idea that you could exist here without hiding this part of yourself would take some getting used to.

"Before that, though... I suppose just the legends of towns folk and gossiping children whispered about the great disappearing fortress in the mountains, a home to the creatures that stalk the mountains at night." You paused for a moment, remembering how you'd passed through a set of trees and then all of a sudden the walls were rising up before you. "You don't have an army of ghouls and spirits in secret do you?"

"Not that I am aware of." Toshinori laughed. "I'm ever so amazed at how those stories have kept over time, probably for the best..."

He trailed off, he looked far away again, this time he was looking at something specific. He cleared his throat softly as he came back.

"Well, I suppose I'll start from the beginning." He shifted further onto the bed. "My name is Toshinori Yagi, I grew up far away in the west. I'm the second born to the House of Yagi and was, once upon a time, first in line for the throne. That was, until my mother found out I was different, to her I was dealing with dark arts and witchcraft, but to me I was suddenly plagued with abilities no sane man would ever ask for."

He looked at his hands, as if they held a script.

"My mother, she was very religious you see, and she could not have a son who would go so far against God so as to practice witchcraft so she motioned for my father to kill me." Toshinori was speaking casually, as if he'd told this story many times over. "He was a kind man, my father, and he couldn't bring himself to order an execution. Instead I was ordered into exile, and sent into the world with nothing. I wandered, I wandered and found pity from a farmer who let me stay in his stables and later a traveling merchant who let me ride with him to the east and again from an old woman who'd lost her son and couldn't till her own land any longer.

" I stayed in a village not far from here for months, and while there, I learned of the local myths surrounding this fortress. At the time it was said that it was empty save perhaps a pack of wolves that had made a home in a portion of the crumbled wall. I stayed in that village until the winter frost began to form and farm work ran out for me." Toshinori paused, it was only a brief moment of silence before he started again, his voice slightly more grim than before.

"I needed somewhere to stay, shelter that wasn't haphazardly pitched tents that filled up with smoke every night. I found myself in the hills and looked up to the mountainside at the great stone walls of this fortress and decided that, even if it were just for the winter, that there had to be somewhere here I could make a home.When I arrived, however, I found that the village folk had been sorely mistaken about the fortress being empty and decrepit. This is where I met the woman that would change my life, the woman who would teach me how to control these new abilities of mine and the woman who would make all of this possible." Toshinori gestures around.

" Her name was Nana Shimura and she was like us, special. She let me stay the winter and eventually the spring and then eventually she realized she wouldn't be able to get rid of me. It wasn't long until Nana was able to help me control my own strength, she was a great teacher, after all. One day, in the late fall, I'd been on my way back up the mountain with some supplies from town when I happened across a man who was wandering the forest looking for a woman he'd been told could help him.

"He said that he'd heard of a witch who lived in an old fortress haunted by spirits that could help someone who suddenly found themselves plagued with dark abilities." Toshinori cleared his throat. "He had originally wanted to be healed, wanted to be stripped of his abilities."

"I-is that possible?" You blurted out, you had been trying so hard not to interrupt but the idea that you could theoretically go back to a normal life sparked something in you.

"Not in any way that I know of." Toshinori hummed. "We were curious too but we were never able to find anything that supported what this man believed Nana could do. Instead, he came to stay with us for a while."

Toshinori paused again as if you waited for more questions, there was a part of you that would have gladly taken the opportunity if the other, rational part of you hadn't been screaming at you for having just interrupted a Lord. When you didn't speak he continued.

"It was in finding that man that I realized that Nana and I were not alone, that there must be more people like us. I wanted to make somewhere for people like us, ostracized, unjustly convicted," Toshinori's fists balled, his knuckles paling. "somewhere for us to seek refuge."

"A safe haven." You muttered dreamily.

"Exactly." He hummed. " I was in line for the throne and even that couldn't save me. I realized very quickly I was lucky, though. Had I been born ro any lesser family my neck would have been on the chopping block, or my body hanging from a noose. And so, I welcome all sorts to Kaer Yuuei, and we became a fully functioning community in no time. We were small in numbers but with our abilities being so vast and varied we found new ways to thrive. Now, we're the largest settlement of our kind."

"There are others?" you asked, shocked.

"Yes." he looked saddened, his fingers picking at his knuckles. " There was one to the south, but it has been annihilated in recent years by House Noro.

Your blood ran cold. The name, Noro, seemed to follow you everywhere.

"There are two more far to the east, smaller settlements that work together rather well. We've had brief dealings with them in the past." He continued. "But they were all formed only after I began my work here."

"Y-you started this place on your own?" You stammered. He seemed so kind to begin with, but the more he spoke to more you understood there was something deep within him that went beyond just kindness. He spoke about his own family so blasé but when he spoke of the shuddering of others, his hands trembled. He was that special sort of person, the sort of person your mother had been. He was a good man. It was rare to find anyone who would go beyond the law and the church, someone who went beyond just staying in line. If someone like him had been in your little village...Shouta and Hizashi had, you reminded yourself. They were also good men. You glanced wistfully at them as they slept.

"Not on my own," Toshinori smiled, blush creeping across his face. "I had help."

Toshinori followed your eyeline, watching the two of them sleep for a moment before looking away.

"I met those two nearly ten years ago." He smiled. "Hizashi came riding up the mountain side one day, a barely conscious Shouta sliding from his saddle. They had come from the southern country, and Shouta was in a bad way. They had had dealings with the House of Noro."

You straighten up at that name, Noro. It was understandable the fear that Shouta had expressed at the idea of witch hunters, especially given what they thought you all were, but there'd been something more to his ration when Hizashi had told him about seeing the crest. Something you hadn't been sure at the time you were able to ask about, in fact, you still weren't.

"That's a story for him to tell, I'm afraid." Toshinori smiled at you. "Shouta wanted to go back south when he was able to travel once again, but it was Hizashi who convinced him to stay. Instead they traveled to the surrounding towns to keep an eye out for any signs of House Noro or their victims who had fled north. It was they who pioneered our efforts to find and protect others like us outside of these hills."

"Hm." you breathed. "Even if it hadn't been them who found me, I'd still have them to thank."

You were both silent for a moment, something hung heavy over Lord Toshinori's head.

"I hope you don't feel as though you are in debt to us, y/n." He looked up at you, a very grim look on his face. "We don't even want you, or anyone here for that matter, to feel as though they owe us their allegiance. We-"

He sighed heavily.

"Many of us have experienced the same fate, experienced the same kind of baseless hatred. We- we can't just stand by and watch others burn." His lip...quivered. You could barely see it in the dull light but there was a twinkle of tears welling up in his eyes.

"I'm afraid, whether you want it or not, I do owe you all my life." You chewed your lip. "But, if the only way for me to repay that debt is to thrive, in spite of what had been done to us...well, I think I can do that."

Toshinori smiled wide, a laugh shaking his shoulders. He wiped his cheek with the back of his hand and sniffed loudly.

"A-are you crying?" Shouta asked blearily from his cot, rubbing his eyes.

"It's not my fault this time, I swear." Toshinori laughed softly, realizing he had to be quieter lest he want to also wake Hizashi. "She's a good one."

"Yeah," Shouta smiled sleepily and looked at you through heavy eyelashes. "I know."

You smiled back. He was so...relaxed. Even during the calm points in your travel Shouta still seemed aware, or alert, or at least uncomfortable. For the first time since you'd met him he seemed fully relaxed, like he'd been able to leave his constant vigilance at the gate. There was something about the way he slumped back against the headboard to this cot that warmed you. You suddenly felt as safe as he seemed to, waves of relief washed over you. You hadn't realized that you'd been holding on to so much fear until just now, even when Toshinori had promised you safety you'd been reluctant to let go.

You were, for the first time since this had all begun, really looking forward. Not staring with empty eyes at a horizon, fooling yourself into thinking you were trying to think of the future, when really you were too stuck in the present and the past. A sudden flurry of thought hit you, like who would you meet, what would you eat, would you become a healer here, what would you do for a living, where would you live.

"Uh," you swallowed. "W-where am I going to live? I mean, how does this work, here?"

"We'll have to find you a place." Toshinori leaned back comfortably, as if problem solving was his natural state. "You may have to stay in the training barracks for a while, or possibly the dorms at the school until we can get you settled."

"She can-" Shouta started abruptly, then slowed himself down. "She can stay with us, for the time being. We've already been traveling together so-"

"If Y/n is alright with that, I suppose." Toshinori pondered. "Of course, if you want more privacy you could always-"

"I would like that." you rushed. "I-I uh, don't really want to...be alone."

A wild blush crept across your face and you looked down at your hands. It was strange, you felt inexplicably safe with both of these men, perhaps it was the vulnerability the Lord had just shown you, but you felt as though they could be trusted with that information. However, you were a fully grown woman who lived on her own for the better part of her adult years now and admitting something like that was mortifying.

You felt the edge of your cot dip and looked up to find Shouta sitting at your feet. He placed a hand on your leg and ran his up and down your leg in long soothing motions.

"You don't have to be." he hummed, sleep still thick in his voice. He was half awake but his instincts were still telling him to comfort you. You heart swelled.

"Settled." Toshinori declared. "You have time to get settled, to build a life Y/n. Don't worry about the future just yet, alright?"

CHAPTER 12

Winter

6 months Later

The world had frozen overnight, what had started off as a mild winter had quickly become snow up to your knees and breaths freezing on your lips. You peered beyond the bushes, the buck knee-deep in snow, its snout rummaging around for frozen berries of a snow capped bush. You slowly shifted your balance so you were perched up on one knee, your other leg propped to balance you. Slowly you lifted your semi-translucent shimmering bow, an arrow notched and ready to be drawn. You hoped the bush would give you enough cover to hide the dull purple glow that radiated from your bow as you aimed. You'd been able to somewhat control the amount of light and the opacity of the items you conjured since coming to Kaer Yuuei but there was always a residual purple glow about everything.

You stilled yourself and dre your bow, lining up a shot towards the lower front of the buck's abdomen. You could feel the strain of the bow under your fingers, with every passing second your arms began to sway more and more under the draw weight. You held your breath and released the arrow, somewhat cloaked by its transparent nature, you could barely see it fly over the snow. The buck shunted sideways with the force of the blow and scuttled into the treeline, disappearing over a bank of snow that had piled up around the base of the trees. You dropped the bow, the astral conjuration blinking from existence before it could hit the snow.

You dashed through clearing after the buck, with a wound like that, especially now that the arrow had been dismissed, it wouldn't take too long for the buck to pass out. A thick trail of blood had melted through the snow, the buck only made it a few rows of trees before its legs gave out. Its eyes were glazed over and its breaths were shallow and laboured and you had to grit your teeth and close your eyes and you summon a long blade to make its final moments easier. You looped a thick rope around it's rear hooves and begna your trek back to Kaer Yuuei, towing your bounty behind you in the snow.

The sun had begun to set by the time you made it to the gates, as the mountain side grew darker the golden lights of Kaer Yuuei grew brighter.

"Y/n!" Kirishima greeted, smiling brilliantly. He was one of the boys you'd seen opening the gates of the first day you arrived and over the last six months you'd learn he was one of Shouta's students. "There's an emergency council at the hall, just got called a few minutes ago. I'll take the buck to the butcher so you're not late."

As if the buck hadn't weighed over two hundred pounds, Kirishima wrapped the rope around his hands and hauled it off down the road with ease. You jogged through the layers of the fortress, noticing the streets were less busy than they normally were. This meant that either the snow had deterred folks from leaving their homes or that the council was dire. Councils were held in what you had assumed to be Lord Toshinori's manor when you first arrived at Kaer Yuuei, however you later found out that he only lived on one of the upper floors and the rest of this building was used by the public for gatherings, councils and a place to host large celebratory meals.

The door was just barely cracked open and as you slipped in you were met with a broad pair of shoulders, you ducked to the side and apologized for the near collison. A hand grabbed yours and tugged you away towards a pillar that left a bit of an empty pocket behind it, away from the overly crowded room. You followed, looking up to see Hizashi grinning at you. His nose and cheeks were pink as if he'd just come in from the cold and he still had a great furry hood pulled up over his head.

"You're late." he mumbled under his breath as the two of you settled next to the pillar. The room was filled with a low rumble of voices, the council had obviously not started just yet. You could hear a few words here and there, some were just talking idly and others wondering why the council had been called.

"The snow slowed me down." You responded, taking off your thick fur lined mittens. "Where's Sho? I thought you two had class together today."

"At the front." Hizashi's usually dopey grin faltered. "He got called away by Toshinori earlier today, I think something's happened. I heard whispers of a scout returning late last night in bad shape."

" I heard there were some sightings of House Noro not too far from here, a little south but still too close for comfort." A sultry, feminine voice hummed behind you.

You looked over your shoulder to see a familiar face. Nemuri was a beautiful woman with long dark hair and icy blue eyes, a coy smile seemed to be permanently affixed to her lips. Nemuri had become one of your closest points of contact since coming to Kaer Yuuei, she had been friends with Hizashi since he was a kid. They went their separate ways as teens, Hizashi leaving after the bandit attack on his village and the two of them reconnected years later, here.

Hizashi swore under his breath and crossed his arms.

"Makes sense." He grumbled. "That's why'd they call Sho."

You were about to ask for clarification on the rumor but Toshinori's booming voice rang out, silencing the room.

"I understand the shift change is going to happen soon so I'll make this as quick as possible." He started, his voice sounded tired. Hell, he looked tired, his normal shining yes were weighed down by dark circles. "A week ago one of our agents went missing, he turned up again last night. He'd been intercepted by a group of riders while returning from an investigation out west and was abducted."

There was a collective breath. You could feel the tone of the room change all in one moment, there was a tense fear beginning to creep into everyone. Yourself included.

"Whilst in captivity our agent was able to obtain important information. Namely that the riders who abducted him were of House Noro, this was verified by Shouta who examined a letter with a crest our agent had managed to collect." Toshinori glances sparingly at Shouta. You weren't able to see much of Shouta through the crowd but you could tell he was slouching, and there was a dark look on the half of his face you could see. "What's more is that he was able to find out that the Noro family have been enslaving gifted people and forcing them to work on their behalf. While we are not entirely clear to what these gifted individuals can do, our agent was able to find out one of the slaves had a tracking abiltiy."

A smaller man, perhaps he was regular sized only to be dwarfed by Toshinori, stepped forward with a linen bag and handed it off to the Lord.

"From what our agent was able to gather this individual is able to track the general direction of an individual, using an object with immense personal value. During their escape our agent grabbed an item he'd seen the tracker using." Toshinori opened the bag and reached inside. You shifted to the side a bit to peer through a set of large shoulders, trying to get a better view of the item and he pulled it out.

"We believe that this item is how they've managed to get so close to us." he declared, withdrawing his hand.

From his fingertips dangled a necklace. The chain was silver, warped in places, and in the center hung a polished turquoise stone surrounded by silver filigree. That necklace, the last time you'd seen that necklace it had been glittering in the sun a handful of yard from you, hanging at a vender's stall and labeled a witch's medallion. You'd dreamed about that necklace a few times since you'd made it to Yuuei, about how it hung around your mother's neck, how it looked against her always clean linen dresses, how you'd wanted it for yourself so badly as a child. You'd half thought about going back to find it or asking the next person who would be passing through your old town to buy it for you.

Your stomach dropped, and suddenly the room was too hot and your mouth was dry. Your breaths felt heavy, like running your hand through water. The men in front of you were radiating heat, scorching waves of sweat. Hizashi and Nemuri too, and you pulled back. Your back met someone's chest and you huffed a rushed apology and ducked away, yoru shoulder brushed someone and then another, no where you ducked to was safe. The room was positively sweltering now, sweat was pooling under your jacket and every person you came in contact with felt like a hot iron pressed into your body, breaths coming harder and harder with every contact. You scrambled for the door, trying to dip and weave and stay away from stray shoulders and out cropped elbows. You pushed on the heavy doors with all your weight and were greeted with a cold wind, littered with snowflakes and you stepped out into the night.

Hizashi clamoured out after you, you name on his lips. He'd been calling you names you'd realized as the cold snow granted you more clarity. He's been calling your name the whole time. You didn't have the breath to speak, you didn't have the breath to think. You barely hand enough to be feeling the panic that was rising in your chest. You slid down to your knees in the show and buried your bare hands into the fresh icy powder trying to grip for more clarity.

"Y/n," Hizashi's arms wrapped around you and you could feel his chest pressing into you back. He'd slip down into the snow with you. "what's happening?"

His voice was soft, comforting but a little frightened. He placed his chin on your shoulder and in an instant just having him wrapped around you your breaths came easier.

"The-" you panted, swallowing hard. He waited patiently, looking his finger through yours. "The necklace, Hizashi-"

"What about it?" he asked, directing your frantic thoughts as you trailed off.

"Mine." you hiccuped. Hot tears were swelling in your eyes now, the panic was giving way to guilt now. "Me. They're tracking-"

"It'll be, okay." Hizashi shushed you softly.

It wasn't true. It hadn't been true, not ever. You were meant to die in that cage, you cheated death when they showed up and this was punishment for that. You were the reason why this new life of yours was going to be taken away.

"Stop." you huffed. "Stop- lying."

Hizashi's arms tensed, you'd hit a nerve. He pulled away and stepped around you so he was crouching in the snow, his emerald green eyes boring into your own.

"I'm not." he declared. "We'll fix this, we always do. We'll take care of you."

You felt your bottom lip quiver and the tears that welled up in your eyes fell. You'd needed saving so much during your time with Shouta and Hizashi and you tried not to feel badly about it but you couldn't help but feel guilty now. Not only was you who needed saving but now all of the gifted folk who were in danger because you were the one they were tracking. Hizahsi grabbed your face with both of his hands and stared in your weeping eyes, you could see him breaking apart slowly. He sighed and dropped his head to yours, leaning against you. His breath floated up into the air and surrounded you.

"I'll talk to Toshinori when the council is adjourned, we'll figure this out." He sniffed.

You nodded against him.

"I- I just need some time-" you sniffed hard. "time to collect myself. I'm going to head home."

He helped you up, again you were reminded of how strong he was despite his lithe frame.

"We're not losing you." he smiled sadly at you.

He looked at you for a moment, lingering long enough to stew in whatever emotions were boiling up inside of him. He blinked them down, cleared his throat and turned back toward the hall. He turned back briefly, jutting his child out toward the east wall where your shared home was and ordered you away with a soft "go".

You obliged and started off towards home, snow crushing beneath your heavy boots. Your hands were burning now with that awful sting of freezing skin. The snow that had melted against your skin was freezing now into thin sheets of ice and you found yourself being able to wipe it off on your coat in thin layers of white. Your cheeks stung, the spilled tears leaving you skin raw and susceptible to the cold.

By the time you made it to the wall, you were so frozen that you could feel the warmth radiating from the apartments stacked against it. You sprinted up the staircase to your door, wishing desperately that Hizashi and Shouta had gotten a ground level home as your foot slipped out from under you and you gripped the rickety wooden railing for dear life. There was a dull glow through the warped glass window, a luxury you hadn't yet gotten used to, windows that didn't need shutters. You pulled on the latch and was greeted by warm humid air and a small dying fire in the hearth. Another luxury you weren't accustomed to, fires that were tended to throughout the day for you so your home was warm when you returned. Living in Kaer Yuuei was somewhat a dream at times if you were honest.

You still remembered the first time you'd stepped foot in your new home, despite the fact that Hizashi and Shouta had spent the whole day with you in the hospital. You'd never lived higher than ground level, and you felt as though you had to walk softly everywhere so as not to disturb your lower neighbors. Hizashi got a good laugh at that one, watching you tiptoe around for days before telling you that they lived over a storage room.

Back then the living space was a little different, there were three rooms. The main room was the largest and had held a bed big enough for the two of them on one side, a fireplace on the other and a worn out chaise lounge that looked as though it had once existed in a castle somewhere was sat in the middle. When you'd ask about it later Hizashi would grin and tell you that it was stolen from a rather unkindly noble during a move from one city to the next, however he would be very adamant that it was not he who did the thieving. The other two rooms were smaller, one a store room that was on the other side of a small door on the far side of the bed and the other a lavatory through a door on the other side of the bed. Along the far side of the room there was a line of twine strung up around the ceiling, pieces of parchment with dexterously drawn scribbles, letters with misspelled words and small crafts hung from it. A fraying thick knitted blanket and a bundle of furs were draped over the chaise lounge, obviously seeing very little use in the hot summer days. At the foot of the bed there was a large dented drunk and a small furry animal curled atop it snoring.

"Uh, w-welcome home." Hizashi smiled. "We'll obviously have to change some things around now that you're here."

It was around the same size as your cottage, only in your cottage you'd managed to pack in a counter, a kitchen table, a padded bench you used as a bed for your patients, a large chair with a footrest you usually slept in, two bookcases of herb bunches and glass vials and fireplace. Compared to your cottage this was rather spacious.

"There's a lavatory through there." Shouta pointed to the closest door awkwardly as if he was showing his new home to his parents awaiting judgement. It was strange, you realized, seeing their domestic life after having spent the entirety of your time with them sleeping in the wilderness and running from armed mercenaries. "But there's some hot springs in the caves behind the hall where most of the fortress tends to bathe."

"A hot spring?" you repeated. "This place is starting to feel like a resort."

"Yeah," Shouta looked lost in space, staring wistfully at nothing in particular. "it's pretty nice here."

You looked around again when a thought sprung itself on you. There was one bed... and a couch. It wasn't that you were opposed to sharing a bed with them, in fact the three of you were essentially sharing a bed by combining your bedrolls in the bottom of the wago for the last few days of the journey and before that Hizashi had woken up nearly cuddling you a few times. It was more that you were unsure of where you stood. It was one thing to admit you found each other attractive and another entirely to act upon those attractions.

"So," you toed your boots together awkwardly and looked at the chaise lounge, "is that mine or, uh- are we going to get a cot?"

Hizashi's brow shot up and his eyes darted back and forth between you and the chaise lounge.

"No." He snorted, incredulously. "You're sleeping in the bed!"

Then it dawned on him, the real question. A bright pink blush sprung up in his cheeks and a small nervous grin formed at his lip.

"Well," He began one long stammering sentence, "only if you want to- or feel comfortable- i mean we don't have to- we can take the - although i don't think we'd really fit and-"

He was rattling off half finished sentences faster than you could piece them together, a thin veil of nervous sweat forming at his brow. He started to nervously laugh between sentences, blushing more furiously than before. You fought off a smile and side eyes Shouta to gage his reaction to find him openly grinning. He looked pleased, both with the offer and with Hizashi bumbling. His eyes flickered to you and there was a silent moment between you, something you were starting to realize was going to be a hallmark of your relationship, these wordless conversations. He nodded softly answering the silent question of whether you really belonged here. The question had tugged at the back of your mind since you woke up after Toshinori's visit, whether your attachment to them was a circumstance of how you met and whether theirs was some sort of saviors complex. Whether you were really meant to be here with them or if you were encroaching on their lives. But it melted away with the way Shouta looked at you, with such a dreamy softness. You could feel the contentment with this life in his eyes, you could see love in his eyes.

You strode over to hizashi and took his fidgeting hands in yours, his mouth instantly unable to form real words. You take a split second to muster up all your courage, this certainly felt harder than running away from murderous mercenaries, and places and kisses on Hizashi's lips. It was short but sweet and just as you pulled back he let go of your hands and gently clasped each side of your face and pulled you in, this time for a longer more passionate kiss that pulled the breath right from your lungs.

Behind you you heard a low laugh and when you separated Hizashi rested his forehead against yours but one of his hands began to fish around his pocket. He giggled softly to himself and apologized under his breath, still obviously flustered from the kiss. Then a coin was being tossed over your shoulder and Shouta, silent as ever was behind you, catching it. Hizashi's hand returned your cheek and instead of kissing you against he stayed pressed against you for a moment.

Then you realized what just happened.

"Wait." You pulled back. "Did you- did you make a bet about me kissing you?!"

"Yeah." Shouta hummed behind you, he pressed forward his chest meeting your back. You felt the instinctual want to just melt back into him but fought it. "I was sure it'd be with him first."

"H-how were you so sure I'd kiss either of you!" you huffed, albeit playfully.

"Oh no." Hizashi laughed. "I'm the only emotionally adept one here, aren't I?"

"W-hwat you do you mean?" you pouted.

"Shouta bet you won't kiss either of us and that I'd have to do it." he smirked.

You looked over your shoulder at Shouta who seemed unbothered by any of the statements being made.

"I'm not as bad as him," you turned back to Hizashi, "am I?"

Shouta scoffed behind you, pulling away and stalking over to the bed where he freely fell backwards on top of the plush mattress.

"No," Hizashi pulled you closer, looking down at you with heavy lids. That same liquid love swirling in his eyes as Shouta's. "He wouldn't have gone in for the kiss at all. That was a very romantic way of telling me to shut my mouth."

Your own words echoed in the your mind. I don't really want to be alone. You wouldn't have to be and even if it wasn't meant to be forever, it felt pretty good for now to be with them. Maybe their hero complex would wear thin and maybe their bathroom habits would put you off but that was a someday problem. For now, falling asleep in their arms, your boys on either side of you felt pretty good. No more cold night, no more hard bruising cages, no more estrangement.

***

That was six months ago and everynight they still held you and you them, every day you still looked into their eyes and found love and every morning Hizashi took way too long to get ready for the day. The apartment now had a much larger bed, it had to be custom framed to fit all three of you comfortably, and the once lavish Chaise lounge was unfortunately given to Nemuri who had more room for it. A writing desk had replaced it, somewhere for the three of you to draft reports of your patrols.

You woke up, Hizashi's arms draped over you loosely. He was a snorer, and with his gift even a shallow breath could resonate down your spine. You blinked hard, clearing the sleep from your eyes and looked around the room, the space Shouta usually occupies was empty and letting the cold in. You lifted your head and looked around finding him slouched over at the writing desk, penning something absent mindedly.

"Hey." you mumbled, sitting up and sliding off the edge of the bed. He didn't respond, keeping his eyes on the page. You stood fully and took a few steps towards him.

"Did Hizashi, uh- tell you?" You asked, clearing your throat awkwardly. "And Toshi?"

"Mm Hmm." He hummed quietly.

"Oh, good." you nodded to yourself. "Is there any plan, anything I can do?"

"No." he grunted shortly. "Just stay out of the wood for now. Actually for you, not travel. Period."

He hadn't looked up at you. His writing got more sloppy, aggressive even. You could see frustration boiling up inside of him and you could tell it was directed at you. That guilt that you'd momentarily forgotten about hit you in the chest leaving a heavy stone plummeting to your gut. You didn't know the full story between Shouta and House Noro, you just knew that he had a run in with them years ago. This must have been a nightmare for him, having them so close to Kaer Yuuei, his safe haven. And it was you who lead them hear no less, unintentionally, which made it worse because he probably felt like he couldn't really be upset with you.

"Sho," you muttered, your voice cracking. That got his attention, he turned around to look at you, his expression hard to read. "I'm sorry. I'm- if I hadn't come here- I'm the weak link here."

Shouta stood and strode towards you, there was a strange sort of power in the way he moved. Like he was trying to cut through a crowd of people with a specific destination in mind. But when his hand reached your shoulders and pulled you close to him he was gentle and you felt as though he was swaddling you in safety.

"I'm sorry." he breathed into your hair. "I didn't mean to sound like that. I- I'm just..scared."

You looked up at him startled. You had been half ready to get the full force of what anger you thought he held towards you, and the fact that you received the exact opposite was jarring enough. However, Shouta flat out admitting he was scared was more perplexing. Over the last six months you realized that Shouta had no problems admitting to a few things, namely all of his annoyance and misunderstanding of social conventions or when he forgot to do or get something. Those were more so things Hizashi seemed to get hung up on and would try to play it cool over. Shouta had more trouble admitting his own emotions, Hizashi said that he was much better at expressing positive emotions more readily, but you'd never really heard thim admit to being upset or scared willingly. Hizashi was like a magician when it came to getting Shouta to talk about his feelings, a very persistent and borderline irritating magician.

"I know." you muttered. " Me too."

He sighed and pressed you against him.

"What have I told you about my life before Kaer Yuuei?"

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bitch-for-a-rainbow · 5 years ago

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Now Everything is gone (I'm left with wounds of battles that I never won)

Lex’s face split in a hard smile as he looked her up and down.

“I will admit, with all the rumors I’ve heard about you I expected a bit more. For one, I did imagine you taller. It’s rather... disappointing.”

Kara smiled. “And I imagined you with more hair.”

His features twisted with rage. Pain flared across her face as one of the guards backhanded her. She spat blood onto the once white stones. Something dripped down her cheek, that guard had been wearing a metal gauntlet, it was pointed at the knuckles.

“This is the great Kryptonian warrior queen, the Last Daughter of Stars. The Girl of Steel.” He scoffed. “And here you are.”

“Here I am.”

...

Or Medieval AU where Kara is the queen of Krypton, Lex is a king hellbent on genocide, and Lena just really hates her family.

CH. 1: An Ivory Dagger

The birds on the tapestries seemed to dance in the dim flickering light of the candles. A small red glare still twisted the colors of their wings, the remnants of fast-fading sunlight. Kara sat stiffly, fingers bunched in her skirts, as the lady in waiting bustled about her, adding candles and straightening pillows. The servant did her best to ignore the dirt and assorted plant life that adorned Kara. The manor received few high-class guests as of late, not on this side of the mountains, not now. The lady-in-waiting-- Eretlen, she believed was the woman’s name-- would have to take what she could get. Eretlen gave a coarse huff, dumping (a little unceremoniously) a new dress on the chaise as she left the room. Kara had insulted her by refusing her offer of attendance. A necessary evil. The less time she spent around these people the safer they would all be. If Eretlen had seen the wound... Kara’s fingers tightened on her dress. Eretlen had been dealt with, it was time to focus on the High Captain. Most women of her stature would have found great difficulty in removing the many layers and skirts, but Kara had been forced to learn quickly. She did her best to scrub the past week or so from her skin with the small basin of water and rag that had been left for her. The water turned pink as she washed her side. A twisted gash was there, four-pointed where the barbs of the arrow had torn at her flesh; the veins around it darkened green. It was getting worse. She was running out of time. This setback would cost her more than she could afford. Her fingers fumbled with the ties of her new dress, blue silk, expensive-- Rao, how long had it been since she felt silk?--, exhaustion settling in her bones. The pulsing nausea and pain threatened to topple her over. She managed to get the last knot of her chemise tied and was reaching for the corset when the High Captain burst into the room. She jerked around, grabbing (rather belatedly) at the silk dress and did her best to recover what little modesty she could. Cheeks burning and jaw tight she opened her mouth to speak but he raised a silent hand.

“My apologies for the… interruption, but I do think we should speak with some urgency.” His mouth was cracked with a smile, it did not reach his eyes.

“Could the matter not wait until I had finished dressing?”

“No.” His face did not change. He barely blinked. “What, exactly, would a young woman like yourself be doing on this side of the mountains?” Kara cleared her throat.

“I was a part of a merchant caravan. We lost a wheel and had already used our spare. As you may have noticed, being stuck in the night out here isn’t exactly… Pleasant.” His smile slipped, mouth twisting into a grimace.

“I’m sorry. I’ve lost men myself to the night raids here. Were there any survivors?” He was buying it. Thank Rao! He was buying it.

“Not to my knowledge.” She tried to be nonchalant as she brought the corset over her head and began threading it. The High Captain at least had the decency to look embarrassed. He cleared his throat,

“I do apologize for the inconvenience, but on this side of the mountains you really can never be too careful, Mistress...”

“Danvers. Allura Danvers.”

“High Captain Lockwood of the King’s third division.” He proffered a hand but Kara simply stared at it until it was dropped. He burst in while she was half-dressed and expected courtesy? “As I was saying, there was a skirmish last week about two leagues from where you were found, a group of Kryptonian militants ambushed one of my scouting teams.” Kara did her best to keep her face blank. Ambushed? A scouting team? He dared-- “Luckily there was a squadron in the area and the scouts managed to set off a warning. The squadron went in and quickly rounded up the rabble.” Kara barely managed to hide a wince as she pulled the lacing taut.

“I hope none of your soldiers were hurt. Were the poor scouts alright?” Her mouth seemed to curdle at the words, but they would be expected.

“Oh, yes of course. One man suffered a nasty knock to the head but the secondary squadron arrived just in time.”

“Well, that’s a tremendous relief.” Kara placed a hand to her chest, then feigned a sudden realization.

“Wait! You did catch all of them, right? I wouldn’t like to think they ran into any survivors from my group.” Someone else had to have gotten out. Surely she wasn’t the only survivor. Someone had to take this news back to Argo. Someone.

“There was one.” His eyes had suddenly become icy, the comforting smile gone. “I’m sure you’ve heard of her, she does sit on the Sun throne.” Kara’s blood turned to ice. “She was supposedly quite badly injured in the fighting, an arrow to the gut. So, Mistress Danvers, would you mind terribly to remove your clothing?” Kara froze. She pasted on an expression of righteous indignation and stood.

“Excuse me? How dare y--” He crossed the room in three strides.

“Remove it, or I will do it for you.” His hand was tight around her wrist, a knife pressed against her neck. Kara let out a slow breath, raising her chin. The door might as well have been miles away.

“If you are going to kill me, Lockwood, I’d much prefer to die at least partially clothed.” He smiled, this time, it did reach his eyes.

“Well, look at that. It is a pleasure to finally meet you, Kara Zor-El.”

…

Someday, Kara was going to burn this entire castle to the ground. Of course, she’d have to escape first to do that, a prospect which seemed ever more unlikely by the day. King Lex Luthor of the Cadmian Empire strode into the cell looking distinctly out of place. The thin slats of light that shone through high windows far above Kara’s head illuminated the large motes of dust that gathered from the floor onto his cloak, dampening the gold embroidery. His lips curled with distaste as he glanced around the blood and filth. But all of his discomfort melted away upon the sight of Kara. She was still only dressed in a shift and corset, now more grey than white, with red-brown stains of dried blood. She kneeled on the hard stone, hands chained over her head, shackles glowing a faint green. Her side burned, an agony she could barely describe. Lex’s face split in a hard smile as he looked her up and down.

“I will admit, with all the rumors I’ve heard about you I expected a bit more. For one, I did imagine you taller. It’s rather... disappointing.”

Kara smiled. “And I imagined you with more hair.”

“This is the great Kryptonian warrior queen, the Last Daughter of Stars. The Girl of Steel.” He scoffed. “And here you are.”

“Here I am.”

Lex smiled again, crouching to eye level with her. “I’m going to kill you, Kryptonian, and when I am done with you, I’m going to hunt down every last one of you filthy creatures, and I will burn them all. Don’t worry,” Lex’s smile grew vicious, “I’ll make sure they survive the smoke long enough to be killed by the flames.” Lex turned to the guards, then stopped, looking back.

“And one more thing, I’ve already dug up a nice plot to bury you all in.” Kara’s jaw tightened and she fought to keep her face calm. Bury them? Yes. Someday, she would reduce this place to less than rubble. Satisfied with his threats, Lex finally spoke with the guards.

“She’s scheduled for execution tomorrow morning, make sure she’s properly broken in by that time, I’d prefer she not become a martyr if we can help it.”

He spared one last glance for her before stalking from the room, the cell door clanging behind him.

“Well,” the guard who had slapped her stepped forward, signaling the others to move as well. “You heard our orders.”

Kara sighed and gritted her teeth. This was going to really suck.

…

She had never been as grateful for the Luthor obsession with black stone as she did now, back against a wall, desperately pressed into the shadows. Three guards walked past her, torches in hand, armor clanking almost as loudly as her heart beat inside her chest. With her cloak gripped tight in one fist, she hurried down the hall as quickly as she dared, bag jostling on her shoulder.

Three lefts, down two flights then a right. Three lefts, down two flights then a right. Three lefts, down two flights then a right.

As she rounded the last left, she very nearly swore and threw herself backwards, ducking into a nearby storage room, three palace guards marching past where she had just stood. Damn. She was running out of time, the alarm would sound soon and then--

An enormous, clanging tone shook the room.

Damn.

…

The guards dropped Kara to the stone and stared as warning bells rang out across the castle. She coughed and readjusted her shift, bloody hands slipping on the stones as she tried to push herself onto all fours.

At least the shackles had been taken off.

They lay a few feet away, horrible glow still clawing at her flesh. The bells sounded again, Kara realised they were going in a pattern, four rings, a pause and then two. What did it mean? The guards looked between her and the direction of the castle, then sprinted out of the cell, barely remembering to lock the door behind them. Kara reached across to her back, hissing as her fingers met torn flesh. The whip they had used lay several feet away from her. Her chemise was torn across her back, to give them more access, her now unusable corset hung off her, kept up by a few spindly threads. The guard whipping her had been quite offended when Kara had related his swings to that of her rotted mother’s corpse, perhaps antagonizing the man currently beating her with barbed leather was not her smartest plan, but if she was going to die in the morning, she would die with spirit intact. Her back did throb terribly though.

The sound of metal against metal snapped her from her thoughts. Someone was unlocking her cell. She pushed herself upright (well, on her knees still, but more upright than she had been). The door pushed open; Kara steeled herself for the guards… and instead found a pale, dark-haired woman wearing a green cloak stepping inside, staring back over her shoulder. There were two sacks over her other shoulder and keys in her hand. The woman turned, and without wasting a second began to pull items from the smaller sack. Another cloak, blue, a pair of boots and a finely crafted sword, branded with the Luthor house crest. What in Rao’s name--

“I see you’re already unchained. Hurry and put those on, we have very little time.”

Kara gaped. “Who? What? I-- What’s happening?”

The woman looked up at her with barely concealed terror, “I’m rescuing you, and if this goes well you will be rescuing me. Now please hurry, I set a false trail but that won’t buy us much time.”

She stopped and looked back at Kara, green eyes searching, “You are Kara Zor-El, correct?”

“Yes.”

“Can you stand?”

Kara grimaced. It was taking all of her energy just to kneel here. “I’m not sure.” The woman swore, “Well, I can’t say I didn’t think it might be a possibility.”

The woman reached over and began tying the cloak around Kara’s shoulders; she froze as she caught sight of Kara’s back. She threw the cloak aside.

Kara heard her mutter something that sounded like “Bloodthirsty egomaniacal bastard.” Did she mean the king or her guard? Dazedly, Kara reached over and pulled on one of the boots. The woman fished another weapon from the sack, a small dagger with an ivory, jeweled sheath.

Kara stared. “Well, that certainly won’t draw attention.”

The woman shot Kara an irritated look, “We can pry up the stones for money and bribes.” She unsheathed the dagger and began cutting the sack into strips. Kara bit back a hiss as she wrapped the strips around her torso. Her hands moved with a practiced care. Not a medic but perhaps…

“You’ve seen combat?” The woman’s hands stilled on the linen

“More than I would have liked to.” Kara nodded.

“Have we ever met on the field?”

“My brother generally kept me well away from the infantry.”

“That’s not an answer.” An almost smile ghosted across the woman’s face.

“Depends on how you define meeting on the field. In person? Once or twice.”

“Are you going to tell me who you are?” Kara asked, pulling on her other boot.

The woman tied off the bandages and sheathed the dagger, attaching it to her belt. She hoisted Kara to her feet-- this woman was stronger than she looked. With one of Kara’s arms slung about her shoulder, the woman handed Kara the sword.

“Lena.” She pushed open the cell door. “My name is Lena Luthor.”

Kara choked on air.

#Supergirl #Supercorp #Medieval AU because reasons #Fanfic #Kara Danvers #Lena Luthor

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campfiretechnology · 4 years ago

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A Practical Guide to Actually Writing Your Rough Draft

So you want to write a book.

Welcome to the club. In this guide, I’m going to do my best to define a concrete, executable plan to actually write a fiction novel. If you follow this guide to the T, you will produce an 80,000- to 100,000-word rough draft in 4 months.

If that sounds appealing to you, then you’re in the right place. Let’s get started.

Phase 1: Get Organized (1 Week)

Writing a book is not an easy task. You’re looking at 80,000 to 100,000 words – for simplicity let’s assume 80,000. If you write 1,000 words per day, that’s an 80-day undertaking. And that doesn’t allocate any time for planning.

What all this actually means is that if you’re serious about producing a novel efficiently, you need to get organized. Specifically, you need to organize your story information – characters, plot outlines, worldbuilding notes, etc – and your manuscript – the actual document that contains your novel.

You should spend your first week getting comfortable with a system to organize this information.

Story Information

You may be tempted to dive right into the writing part. This a bad idea unless you really know what you’re doing. To start, you’ll want to establish a system of keeping track of little bits of information about your story. This can be everything from character traits and backstories to extensive lore about the story’s setting.

Luckily, there are a variety of tools available to help you with this sort of organization, both free and paid. Here are a few, sorted from least structured to most structured:

A Plain Old Document – This could be in the form of a Google Doc, Microsoft Word document, etc. If you go this route, I’d suggest organizing it under the following headers: characters, world, and plot. However, this method isn’t quite as organized as the options below, so read on.

Spreadsheets – This involves using Google Sheets, Microsoft Excel, or smarter spreadsheets like AirTable to store information. This method is a little more structured. For example, you could have a spreadsheet for your characters, with each row corresponding to one character, and each column corresponding to an attribute like “eye color”, “height”, or “backstory”. Then, whenever you need one of those details, you can just search for the character in the spreadsheet and navigate to the correct column.

Story Planning Software – There are software programs designed specifically for keeping track of story information. We suggest Campfire Pro, the writing software that we make here at Campfire Technology. It’s certainly not necessary to follow along with this guide and write your first book, but it’s worth checking out if you want to get organized!

Campfire Pro’s Timeline View

The particular system you choose isn’t all that important – what matters is that you find one that works for you and you stick to it throughout the writing process. You’ll want to continually update it as you write so it’s always there as an aid when you get stuck or forget a key detail.

Manuscript

You’ll need somewhere to actually write your manuscript. There are a lot of options in this area as well, also ranging from free to paid.

For the simplest free manuscript editor, check out Google Docs. It has everything you need to write your novel, though people do say it can struggle a bit on slower computers with really long documents. For a more robust solution, check out Microsoft Word. Both of these options include a sidebar in the document that can show all your chapter titles so you can easily navigate between them.

Scrivener’s manuscript editor

Finally, I’d be remiss to ignore Scrivener, a desktop application for writing books that offers the ability to reorganize entire chapters by just dragging and dropping – something that neither Word nor Google Docs can do. It’s a very common choice for organizing manuscripts.

Once you’ve chosen your system of organizing the story information and manuscript, you’re ready to move on to the next step.

Phase 2: Plan (1-3 Weeks)

Writers differ immensely in how much they plan before sitting down to actually write the manuscript. Some, like Stephen King, prefer to do very little planning. These folks are affectionately referred to as Pantsers – they like to fly by the seat of their pants with their writing. Others, like Brandon Sanderson, are architects who plan out in great detail how the story will unfold. These writers are called Plotters.

There have been brilliant writers of both kinds. However, we strongly recommend that every writer do at least a little bit of planning. Specifically, you should develop the story seed.

The story seed consists of three elements: a character, a place, and a predicament.

The character is the main character of your story. You don’t need a ton of detail here, but you should aim to have a rough idea of who your main character is. If you’re stuck, try to establish some backstory, a few personality traits, and some physical attributes.

The place is where your story takes place (or for Pantsers, where it begins). Again, aim for at a minimum a rough understanding of the setting – is it the modern United States, a medieval village, a galaxy far far away, or somewhere else entirely?

Finally, the predicament is what happens to the character in the place. If you’re a Pantser, then this predicament should probably occur at the beginning of the book – what happens to the character that kicks off the action? If you’re a Plotter, it should be the more overarching conflict that the entire book is about.

Here’s an example of a story seed for a Pantser:

A 10-year-old orphan in London discovers that he is a wizard.

Here’s the same story seed but for a Plotter:

A 10-year-old orphan in London must stop the return of the most powerful Dark Wizard of all time.

You should be able to develop this story seed in one week. Then, if you’re a hardcore Panster and you’re about to explode because of how much you hate planning, you can move on to Phase Three. That basic story seed is all you need to get started. If you’re a Plotter like me, you might want to spend as much as another two weeks planning. Read on.

Detailed Plotting

For a Plotter, the story seed does not represent a snapshot of the beginning of the story, but rather a summary of the story as a whole. As such, your predicament should refer to the major conflict that your character overcomes in the story. In Harry Potter and the Sorcerer’s Stone, the predicament is Lord Voldemort’s attempted return to power.

Once you have that predicament, you have a lot of plot to fill in. There are a few different structures you can use to help with this. The three-act structure provides a set of scenes or “story beats” that should occur on the way to the final conflict. The Hero’s Journey and Save the Cat provide similar frameworks. Learn about these, and then either choose one, merge them into your own framework, or ignore them all!

The Hero’s Journey in Campfire Pro

With any luck, the characters, plot, and world of your story will develop in parallel as you plan. For example, a decision about a character trait should influence what that character does (the plot). Similarly, a decision about the world could inspire part of a character’s backstory. If you feel stuck, just pick one aspect of the story and start adding detail – the rest will flow from there. Just make sure you’re keeping track of all the decisions you make using your organizational system. Fill in those spreadsheets!

As a Plotter, the end goal of all this planning is a book outline. If you’re writing an 80,000-word book, that means you need perhaps 10-25 chapters with word counts varying from 3,000 to 8,000 words. How you decide to break it up will depend on your writing style and your story – but you should aim to have an outline containing what happens in each chapter and an estimated word count.

Now, Pantsers and Plotters, is the moment you’ve all been waiting for.

Phase 3: Write (12-14 Weeks)

Finally, you think to yourself. I can finally do what I’ve been wanting to do all along. Pat yourself on the back, and start writing. But make sure you stick to a schedule and stay organized.

Stick to a Schedule

Create a schedule and stick to it. Google Sheets can help with this!

Perhaps the most important thing to do if you want to actually finish your book is establishing a schedule and keeping to it. Set a minimum daily word count and number of days per week that you plan to write. It’s best to start low here – say, 500 words per day, 5 days per week – and then increase these amounts over time as writing becomes a habit.

If you like using Google Sheets, you’re in luck. We’ve put together a writing schedule template where you input the total target word count, the number of weeks you want to spend writing, the number of days per week you expect to write, and the date you start writing. The template computes your daily target word counts and will show you a progress bar as you get closer and closer to finishing the book! Just make sure you’re signed in with a Google account, and you can use File -> Make a Copy to copy the template to your own account and start making edits.

If you’re dedicated to getting your book done within the 4 month timeframe defined in this guide, make sure your daily goal eventually gets high enough. For example, if your target word count is 80,000 words and you have 12 weeks to write, you need to produce just over 6,650 words per week. With a five-day workweek, that’s 1,330 words per day on average. If you start at a lower goal than that, you’ll eventually need to compensate by going over if you want to reach your goal.

Your mileage may vary. Find a daily word count that works for you!

Just make sure you never go more than three days without working on your book, even if you only write a few hundred words. You’ll find that the story fades in your mind quite quickly if you don’t work on it for days on end. Keep the momentum going, and write as often as you can.

We have a lot more tips and tricks about this in our blog post Start Writing Strategically.

Stay Organized

Remember the organizational system we said you should make sure to have? Make sure you keep it up to date as you write. For Pantsers, you’ll thank yourself later when you’re writing chapter 38 and don’t have to sift through pages and pages just to find a character’s last name. Plotters, though you may have a lot of that information already nicely organized, your manuscript will almost certainly change course at least a little bit from the original plan. When it does, update your plan, or you’ll find yourself having the same issue of losing track of all those little details.

Keep your manuscript organized as you write.

When it comes to your manuscript, make sure you use headings or sections to break up the document into its chapters. That will allow for easy navigation between the different chapters, and will keep you grounded. Never get lost in your own book!

Conclusion

Hopefully this post has done its job, and you’re now a confident writer with a concrete plan to write a book from scratch. You’re about to open a new tab in your browser and search for the organizational system that’s right for you. Then you’ll pick the right manuscript editor and develop your story seed. If you’re a Plotter, you’ll add more detail to your characters, plot, and world until the story is broken up neatly into chapters, with each one moving the story along.

Finally, you’ll write the darn thing, and with some luck – publish it.

See you in four months.

Weekly TL;DR: Get organized, plan, and write your rough draft in four months using this practical guide. Don’t forget to use our writing schedule template.

If you have any questions or comments, join the discussion on our Discord!

#writing #writeblr #writingtips #writingadvice #writers #writblr #CampfireTechnology #campfirepro #campfireblaze #writingcommunity #howtowrite #writeabook #nanowrimo

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scbibliothecarius · 5 years ago

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National Book Lover’s Day

This is somewhat atypical of my previous posts, due to being a “holiday” for book lovers (as well as not falling on a Monday).

I’ve loved books since I was a child, my parents (especially my mother) read to me growing up and eventually turned me into the book lover I am today. I think it is pretty easy to say that I am a bit of a bibliophile, I am fond of books over a wide range of subjects.

Today, I’d like to go over some of my favorite books.

1. The Adventures of Sherlock Holmes

The first time I read Sherlock Holmes I was in 2nd grade. I, for the most part anyway, grasped the basic plots of the books and dearly loved the deteriorating paperback copies of the short stories. (The copy in question being a gift from my mom.) I read these stories feverishly. The one story that I recall the most was A Scandal in Bohemia. This story stuck with me for a long time due to Irene Adler’s character having such an apparent mark on Holmes despite never appearing in the stories again. My 2nd grade mind was fascinated by Holmes’ deductive prowess as well as his interest in a wide variety of subjects. This has carried on to this day, despite the BBC’s best efforts to turn my opinion of the character sour.

2. The Scarlet Pimpernel

I’ll be the first to admit it: I love pulp fiction. Actual pulp fiction, things that were published in magazines, fantastical stories and whatnot. They were, perhaps, somewhat stereotypical, but everybody loves a good hero story. The Scarlet Pimpernel predates these concepts by about a decade or so. It’s a typical story of a hero disguising himself as a fop (ala Don Diego de la Vega, Bruce Wayne, so on and so forth) but being a hero underneath a mask (Zorro, Batman, etc.). Sir Percy Blakeney’s heroics and the Romantic concepts that such heroism represents are something I’d always admired. Unlike Holmes, I read this book as an assignment in middle school, several years ago. I loved the book then, and I continue to do so to this day.

3. Maus

This is a bit of a left turn here, at least when compared to the previous two entries. Maus is a graphic novel (or comic, if you’d prefer those terms) that was written and drawn by Art Spiegelman. It is a sort of biography of himself and his father, juxtaposing their experiences in the (then) present and early past (circa late 70′s and early 90′s or so) and the more distant past (the 20′s-40′s). I read this book in 7th grade, well, a part of it at least. I read the rest of it later, after convincing my parents to let me have a copy. Historical narratives are always important, regardless of the medium they are presented by. To call Maus an important work is an understatement, and it’s success and literary importance has proven that comics and graphic novels and the like are just as worthy books as that of more traditional literature like short story collections or novels.

4. Mort

Fantasy and satire oftentimes go hand in hand, I could regale you with a number of examples from antiquity or medieval eras, but I’ll spare you the lecture. In this case, Terry Pratchett is a master, and Mort is one of his more famous works. Being the first novel in what some refer to as the “Death Trilogy”, it centers around the titular character, Mort, and his apprenticeship with Death...learning much about life in the process. The humor and interactions between characters are something I’ve always enjoyed in this work, and the character of Death is certainly one of the most popular in fiction. A sympathetic Death is not necessarily an original or new concept, but Prachett’s vision is one of the most memorable and expertly executed.

5. Fahrenheit 451

This is my favorite book of all time. It’s rather hard to top. The first time I read this was in fifth grade or so. My brother was reading it for a class in middle school, and I begged him to let me borrow it because I found the cover interesting. (Namely the famous art by Joseph Mugnaini, featuring the main character Montag wearing a blazing uniform made of paper.) I read it very quickly, savoring every moment especially the increasingly tense final third of the novel. This novel is what sort of...clicked my love for books in me. I had always had a love of literature, as you can see in the previous examples, but I had never really...-really- thought about my feelings about -why- I loved books. This was the text that opened my eyes. I would end up reading it again a few times over the course of my academic career as an assigned text, but I would always drift back to it even in my spare time. The memorable first lines still echo in my mind: It was a pleasure to burn. It was a special pleasure to see things eaten, to see things blackened and changed.

To say that I was not changed after this novel would simply be a falsehood. This was the novel that has influenced me to be who I am today.

#my favorite books #books #literature #library #library science #MLIS #information #library and information science #fiction

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jiminscaramel · 6 years ago

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I have a really weird request! A kihyun fluff (+ smut if u want) With some sort of masquerade/ball theme? Like glamorous and ballroom-ish and elegant? Be creative with it though! I want you to have fun! Thank you!! (I love ur writing ;))

Hi anonie! I’ve set this in a modern day au rather than a medieval one so I hope that’s ok. I’m not 100% satisfied with the finished result but the idea has stricken me so I’d actually like to make this into a longer and more detailed oneshot (perhaps with some smut) or a two part series. Regardless, I hope you like!

[WARNINGS] fluff, a lil angst

You flutter on the edge of the ballroom, watching everyone else excited by the thrill of the unknown while you sulk over your half finished flute of champagne. You hated these mandatory social gatherings, hated your obligation to interact with everyone else even more and your expectancy to fulfil your duties as the heiress to the company seemed to loom even closer overhead.

But what you did enjoy was in fact the mystery. The lavish gowns and jewelled masks provided an air of mystique that no other charity dinner did and perhaps it’s why you’re a little more disappointed that your promised “date” hadn’t showed.

The description of his attire so far hasn’t matched anyone in the ballroom and your faith in his showing is slowly dissipating with every sip of your drink. You place it down on a passing tray and take another, choosing to nurse this one a little slower.

Your skirts start to itch and your corset starts to hug your ribs a little too closely, your face getting slick behind your ceramic mask. You stare down at your dress, admiring the way the emerald silk shimmers in the light of the chandeliers and the way the diamonds twinkle like the stars above.

Your ears perk up to a little shift in the noise level and you notice a slight commotion further away. You brush it off as the shenanigans of the drunken CEOs, always misjudging their alcohol intake, relying on liquid courage to get through the nights of meeting other executives.

The mini orchestra finishes one song, pausing to prepare for the next and it’s in this moment, this lull in time, he chooses to strike. Winding and weaving through the throng of sirs and dames, swiftly fabricating out of thin air, he sidles up beside you. You barely have time to notice before he plucks your glass out of your hand and discards it behind you, his hand slipping around your waist and waltzing you to the dance floor, your skirts fluttering behind in your wake.

Your eyebrows raise in shock behind the mask as you finally get a moment to asses him, gasping in disbelief when you realise it’s him. Your lips purse together, unimpressed at his tardy yet suave entrance. The orchestra begins the next song and you sway to the rhythm, gracefully gliding across the marble in his arms.

“Unimpressive. I’d rather you show up on time with much less of an entrance than two hours late.” You deadpan, your hand firmly gripping his gilded shoulder.

“A tough nut to crack. As expected by the heiress.” His lips curl into a smirk before shooting a not so furtive glance over his shoulder.

You notice the disturbance in the crowd again and observe one of the security personnel frantically searching the floor. You frown and decide to prove deeper into his late appearance.

“And why are you late?”

He’s too busy looking over his shoulder to hear so a quick, firm squeeze to his shoulder is enough to get his attention.

“Hm?”

“Why are you late? Just so I know what to tell my parents when I dismiss your interest in being my suitor.” Your eyes simmer behind your mask; first he’s late and now you can’t even hold his attention?

“I… I got lost,” he lies, bold-faced.

“Try again,” you quip back, not falling for the lame excuse.

He spins you around dramatically in time to the strings, guiding you further from the staircase and closer to the balcony doors. You dont see the security on the edge of the floor anymore and instead spot them winding discreetly through the crowd.

Coupled with his nervous glances and the strange behaviour of the guards, you easily put two and two together, surely getting four.

“They’re looking for you, aren’t they?” You sigh and lower your head in shame. This is the last time your parents set you up with a date.

“I lost my invitation,” he admits, though his eyes seem to twinkle mischievously behind the slits of his black and emerald mask.

“Maybe that was for the best. So far you’ve done an awful job in swooning me.” You reply drily, although there is a slight mistruth to it.

Off the bat he is unique, unlike anyone you’ve courted before and almost childlike in his behaviour. He’s lively and, although you don’t want to admit it, a little humorous. Perhaps he isn’t such a lost cause.

The music comes to an abrupt halt and the ballroom is filled with shouting as someone spots him. A string of profanities are yelled in his direction as security gain on him, though something tells you he won’t go down that easily.

Using the crowd’s confusion to his advantage and his proximity to an exit, he unceremoniously slips out the balcony doors, pulling you along behind him. You bunch up your skirts to avoid tripping on the hem, quickly descending the steps that lead into the garden.

You frown as he navigates his way expertly through the garden you’d grown up in, leading the way to your secret and most treasured spot.

The shouts and commotion of the ball slowly fade away behind you, losing the security in the cover of shrubs and trees and the blanket of the night.

You don’t trust anyone in your life, not even your parents; the nature of your future job and current title call for you to be alert at all times, trusting no other soul but your own, yet something tells you it’s ok to follow him. You trust him and yet have no idea why.

You silently crawl through the little opening in the shrubs and step into your familiar clearing sheltered by the weeping branches of the trees above. It’s almost cave-like, only made out of twigs and leaves. A little pond twinkles on the other side of the clearing, housing the koi fish you’d looked after since you were a child.

You both take a minute to catch your breaths, hunched over with your hands on your knees, chests heaving with the painful memory of running.

“How did you know about this place?” You demand, wanting answers.

“You still haven’t figured it out yet?” He gasps in between breaths, removing his jacket and placing it on the grass.

“Figured what out? Who areyou?” Your heart starts to flutter as your childhood memories come flooding back, assaulting your nostalgia. There was only one other person you’d shared this space with, only you hadn’t seen nor heard from him for years.

It couldn’t be–

He reaches up and removes his mask, tossing it to the floor also. The thick brush overhead obscures any light the night has to offer and his cheeks are flushed red but it’s undoubtably him.

“Kihyun?” You whisper, afraid that if you speak his name aloud, the mirage will disappear.

He rolls his eyes. “Took you long enough.”

Your jaw clenches, eyebrows knit together and your heart starts racing again for another reason entirely. You hadn’t seen him in years and this is how he shows up? Late, wanted and under the guise of someone else?

You shove a hand into his chest, pushing him away. “I haven’t seen you in years,” you hiss. “You never wrote, called, texted. Nothing! You left and cut me off. I thought we were friends! You were my best friend.”

“I know,” he admits, his hands up in surrender. “It was out of my control. There was nothing I could do.”

“You could’ve looked for me. I looked for you. I searched everywhere and your name never came up once.”

“I changed my name.” But he offers no further explanation.

You tear up at the unexpected reunion, hurt beyond words yet happy beyond explanation. The last time you’d seen him had been in this very spot, eight years old. He hasn’t changed, aside from the obvious. His eyes still sparkle with no good, his cheeks still full and round like you remember. But the things you don’t remember are the things that have made him into the man he is before you; his defined nose, broad forehead and sharp jaw. His lithe frame and agile feet.

“I’m sorry,” and it’s genuine, his apology. It soothes the ache in your heart you’d been nursing all this time, calming your nerves. Though it doesn’t seem to quell your anger, as fresh and raw as the moment you’d realised he’d left and was never coming back.

He grasps your hand in his and pries your fist open, lifting it up to his face and presses a kiss to your palm. He places your open hand over his heart, his eyes prompting and questioning.

“You remember,” you whisper, memories of the time spent together flashing before your eyes; kissing each other’s palms in promise and holding them to your hearts. It was a silly, childish ritual, one that only served as a special sort of handshake. But this, this means so much more.

“I’ve never forgotten,” he hold out his free palm for you to do the same, but you intertwine your fingers through his instead, pulling him closer.

You lean up on your toes and press a sweet, gentle kiss to the corner of his mouth. Suggestive but chaste. “I just… fucking missed you.” You lean your head on his chest and hold him close, vowing to never let him go again.

“I missed you more.”

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raptorginger · 6 years ago

Text

Stacks of Pretty Paper: chapter 1

for @sofondabooks

Ben reached under his glasses to pinch the bridge of his nose with his trademark annoyance. He heaved an exasperated sigh and hissed through gritted teeth, “Did any of you read Thomas for today’s session?”

His ten graduate students all squirmed guiltily in their hard plastic seats, their faces flaming. Anxious hands fidgeted with copies of the heavy tome and shuffled print outs of the articles also assigned as supplementary reading. The small seminar room felt like it shot up ten degrees in temperature as they all fidgeted nervously under the power of his righteous anger. Ben counted to ten in his head before he released his nose and looked up. All ten students sat up straighter like they’d been electrocuted, gaping at him like he was about to swing the sword at their execution. He maneuvered to the front of the class, his large hands clasped behind his back. Of course, he hadn’t expected them to read Hugh Thomas’ 500 page monograph The English and the Normans: Ethnic Hostility, Assimilation, and Identity 1066-1220 in one week. That wasn’t the point. The point wasn’t for them to read every word. The point was to teach them to read the important ones. So far, this was a lesson his students had failed to grasp.

He leaned over the long table, bracing himself on the scarred faux wood surface with his fingers, tension visible in every muscle, every nerve, as he waited for one of these overworked, overtired, “adults” to say something. Ben felt his Alpha side rearing its ugly head in disappointment, and he tamped it down. Nonetheless, all ten bodies flinched as if he’d struck them. Out of the corner of his eye, he saw a hand timidly poke up.

“Yes, Marta?” he said, relieved. It would be Marta. As an Omega, a mated Omega but an Omega all the same, she could probably sense his displeasure more acutely than the others.

“I-I believe Sir Thomas’ point is that even though the English majority was initially hostile to the minority of conquering Normans, those Normans were quickly assimilated, and within a generation, thought of themselves as English, not Norman.”

Another student, Duffy, spoke up, adding cautiously, “To add to Marta’s point, the English at the time were made up of several different ethnic groups, but they all saw themselves as English. They had a history of rapid integration of new groups.”

“Yes, very good. Let’s work from there. What factors led to the Normans’ integration?” Ben said, trying to sound more pleasant. More pleased. Duffy and Marta grinned and looked to their classmates, who looked relieved as they all let go a collective breath. Discussion picked up from there, and Ben more or less let his students take the floor, interjecting whenever they started to get off topic.

He knew most of them were bullshitting, but he didn’t care. Anything to get through this three hour weekly seminar as painlessly as possible. He had his own work to do. He’d gotten an email earlier that day saying his Interlibrary Loan order had come in, and he was anxious to get it. He’d also had a hold placed on the new monograph on Old English vocabulary for months, and he’d been told it had been returned and it was finally his turn to check the damn book out. Nothing was going to stand in his way of having a productive day at the library. Not even that impossible woman. That new librarian. He hadn’t met her, only communicated with her by email, but she’d proven aggravating and obstinate. This Miss Johnson had taken over this summer when the old librarian, Doctor Ackbar, had retired. Ben much preferred Doctor Ackbar’s old fashioned approach to Miss Johnson’s new one. Doctor Ackbar had bent over backwards for the academics of Chandrilla University, allowing them unfettered access to the library’s materials and resources. Under Ackbar, Ben never had to worry about his reserves being placed back out in general circulation or his permanent loans being recalled. Ackbar had believed, and rightly so, in Ben’s opinion, that academics like himself were the lifeblood of the University, and it was the job of the University to keep them happy. Miss Johnson had other ideas, apparently. The first week of classes he’d received a rather curt form email saying that all reserves and permanent loans were being recalled and placed back in circulation. Ben had sputtered at his laptop screen in shock, and he almost threw the thing against the wall as he read on.

“There has been a culture of elitism and arrogance among the faculty of our prestigious university, among members of certain departments in particular, that the Library can no longer abide. Our materials are for every member, faculty, staff, and student alike, and I intend to see that fair and equal use is restored. Therefore, I demand the return of all loans and reserves dated prior to the start of the year by this next Tuesday. Permanent loans and reserves longer than one month will no longer be tolerated,” the email had said.

Ben had roared in anger and threw a panicked look around his office as he tugged his dark hair in frustration. He had maybe twenty books out on permanent loan from Ackbar, all meticulously annotated and bookmarked for his research on medieval ethnic terminology. He’d had to spend days-days!-at the department copier, copying pages and re-annotating everything. He’d made one of the student assistants take everything back to the library, unsure if he could set foot in the building without throttling Miss Johnson to within an inch of her miserable spinster cat-loving life.

“You know, Professor Solo, Miss Johnson isn’t that bad,” the student, Evan, had said while Ben shot off an angry email to Miss Johnson. Just who did she think she was?!

Ben had glared at Evan, but he didn’t back down.

“Seriously! She’s super helpful if you’re looking for something specific! She, like, knows everything and knows the library backwards and forwards,” Evan had insisted.

“That’s what happens when you’re one hundred years old and have no life,” Ben had muttered under his breath.

“Umm, Professor? She’s not...old,” Evan had chuckled on his way out of Ben’s office.

Ben had rolled his eyes and resumed his aggressive highlighting. An email notification pinged his inbox. Ben grit his teeth, seeing it was from Miss Johnson.

“I’m sorry that my new policies are an inconvenience to you, Doctor Solo, but you are, in fact, one of the worst offenders after Doctors Snoke and Dooku. Several students and faculty have inquired about materials that have been loaned out to you, and I’d like to see that those materials are made available to the people that need them. I am given to understand that there was an unofficial policy of faculty loaning out materials checked out to them long term to others and then returned to said faculty member instead of the library, but that can no longer be borne. It is against library procedure and best practices. Again, sorry for the inconvenience.”

Ben’s least favorite coffee mug had shattered against his office wall after he’d finished reading that missive.

As his seminar began to wind down, Ben began to pace anxiously, waiting for the clock to strike ten. When it finally did, he called out to his class, “Office hours are cancelled for today. If you have any questions on Thomas, email me.”

He was out the door almost as fast as they were. He rushed to his office and grabbed his leather satchel and shoved his laptop inside. He check the front pocket to see if his notebook was tucked safely inside. It was. He threw a few pens and pencils in before grabbing his keys and slamming his door. He walked hurriedly down the hallway, pointedly ignoring Doctors Holdo and Nammit, who were leaning against their own doors, chatting animatedly about whatever is was modern history professors chatted about as they held cups of stale office coffee. He could feel their eyes on his back as he sped down the hall and towards the elevator. He knew he had a reputation as an unsociable hardass, but he didn’t care. He believed in his work, not in all the bullshit rigamarole that his colleagues did. He should be judged on the quality of his research, what he put forward into the academic world, not on his ability to hold a wine glass and make chit chat with donors and Fellows.

He shoved open the door to the History Building with unnecessary force, staggering back as the sun hit his eyes. His pace slowed. It was a bright, beautiful day. One of those days photographers managed to capture for a brochure. The air was fresh and crisp, slightly cool with early fall. Smiling students with backpacks slung over one shoulder strolled across the sidewalks that crisscrossed the campus. Tired grad students, heads hung low, dashed from one end of campus to the other. Professors with paper cups of expensive coffee strode smartly in pairs, carefully avoiding the groups of undergraduates. The leaves on the trees still held their green and fluttered delicately in the breeze. The University practically sparkled with vitality and life.

The library was thankfully close to the History Building, and Ben was in a good mood when he pushed into the revolving door. A few students scurried past him, avoiding his gaze. Not that he paid them any mind. His tan tweed coat with worn leather elbow patches, his sharp modern glasses, and his bourbon leather wingtips all screamed hardass uptight professor. He did wear jeans, but he preferred dark rinse, and he had them all perfectly tailored at Saks. He was pretty sure the students could tell, and that made him even more intimidating. Tailoring jeans was a concept beyond them. Ben preferred things that way.

He loved the library, even if he didn’t love who was currently running it. His home away from home. He made his way to the main circulation desk to inquire about his reserve. His good mood quickly soured when the student assistant informed him that Miss Johnson had not yet made the book available.

“Where is she!?” Ben snarled at the frightened young Beta girl.

“F-f-fourth floor,” the girl stammered out, pointing up the stairs.

Of course she’d be on the fourth floor. His domain. Ben stomped angrily away from the circulation desk to a nearby set of stairs tucked unobtrusively beside the elevator bank. He quickly climbed up, taking the stairs two at a time until he reached the second floor where the Interlibrary Loan office was. The office was quiet, students and older staff members moving around desks and carts quickly. Paper slips fluttered and crinkled as they moved by, the smells of dust, Mylar, and paper strong in the enclosed space. Ben felt more at ease surrounded by the familiar smells. He inhaled deeply, trying to relax further, but an unfamiliar scent caught him by surprise. It was very faint, but it tugged at him insistently. Female Omega. Unclaimed female Omega. Another patron, maybe, Ben mused. Long since gone. Or, perhaps, a scent absorbed by one of the books on loan. Too bad, he thought.

Another student worker slid his pile of books over to him, typing quickly and scanning the barcodes.

“Yale wants this one back quick. They’ve only loaned it for the week,” the student murmured apologetically.

Ben groaned. That would be how this day goes. Another day at the copier. “Fine,” he grumbled, grabbing the stack and heading out of the office.

“You’re welcome. Alpha jerk,” he heard the student mutter sarcastically under his breath. He ignored him and made his way up to the fourth floor. He kept to the wall, running his fingers along the ledge of the waist high windows until the neat rows of desks and armchairs started. He bounced his palm over seat backs, counting in his head until he reached the sixth. There, he stopped and set his things down. He was alone up here, unsurprising for such a beautiful fall day. He reached into his bag for his laptop, situating the device in the middle of the desk. He set his notebook beside it, and his stack of books on the other. He tugged a folded piece of paper from his pocket, call numbers scrawled hastily on the wrinkled paper. Most were crossed out, meaning he’d already gotten what he needed from them. A few were yet to be examined. Ben’s eyes went to the first number on the paper and then up to the guides on the ends of the shelves. Five down, one back. He started forward slowly when it hit him again. The alluring scent of the Omega, and this time he could scent her individual notes. Lavender. Bergamot. Mixed with the cellulose of the books around him, Ben could swear he was in heaven.

“Omega, where are you?” he whispered quietly to himself. He began to meander through the stacks, running his fingers over old bindings and sniffing occasionally. If the scent began to fade, he’d change direction. What began as aimless wandering became an almost desperate hunt as her scent led him deeper into the maze of the stacks. It was only him and the Omega. His Alpha instincts were kicking in the longer it took to find her, the glands in his neck itching and beginning to throb the stronger her scent got. Find her, now!

Finally, he spied a mostly empty cart at the end of one of the shelves, a paper sign taped to the side that said “For Reshelving.” A water bottle sat beside the few books. He’d found her. He slowed his pace, his steps turning quiet and almost predatory as he approached the shelf. He could hear a faint humming as he stepped into the aisle between the stacks. He leaned against the corner for support as he watched her for a moment. Tall and slender, she was dressed casually but professionally in a dark grey pencil skirt, creamy silk blouse, and a deep purple cardigan. Her warm brown hair was swept up in a messy bun, and a gauzy pale grey scarf was tied loosely around her neck, concealing her scent glands. Her skin seemed to glow, and Ben could see golden freckles dancing on her cheeks. Even in heels, she was struggling to reach the shelf where the particular book in her hand belonged. She used one hand to lever herself upwards and stretched to tuck the book into its proper place. Her blouse went up with her arm, giving Ben a brief glimpse of her bare abdomen. She stumbled a bit as she caught his scent, her nostrils flaring delicately and a blush creeping into her cheeks.

“There you are,” he purred approvingly as she settled back on the floor.

She turned, startled, her hazel eyes wide and sparkling. Her pretty pink lips parting slightly as she looked him up and down, taking in the Alpha before her. A look of confusion clouded her face, and then her eyes turned flinty. Ben took a step back, confused. Omega is angry. Omega is displeased. She crossed her arms protectively over her chest and glared at him.

“Professor Solo, I presume,” she said in a quiet, clipped voice.

“And you, Omega, are?”

She inhaled sharply at the use of her designation, as if he’d insulted her, her lips coming together in a tight line. “The bane of your existence, according to you. Miss Rey Johnson. The librarian.”

Oh HELL no, Ben thought as his mouth dropped open in disbelief.

#reylo #reylo fanfiction #fanfiction #prompt #Alpha/Beta/Omega dynamics #reylo a/b/o #reylo au #modern au #college university au #professor ben solo #librarian rey

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awhitehead17 · 6 years ago

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Hello! ♥ The other night I saw the movie Ladyhawke, and it occurred to me to ask you this prompt! AU medieval fantasy, no capes: Tim is a nobleman, Conner one of his bodyguards, they fall in love secretly. But bishop Ra's wishes Tim, when he is refused, he casts a curse on the two. At night, Conner turns into a wolf, by day, Tim becomes a hawk (or a sweet robin ♥). Always together, but eternally divided. Will they manage to break the curse? Maybe with the help of the thief Bart?

Hey, sorry this has taken me so long to answer but I’ve finally be able to complete a story for you. The prompt was certainly interesting, I’ve done what I can to incorporate the film’s plot into it as well as giving it my own twist. I hope you enjoy what I’ve come up with :D

“Well at least we found him.”

Conner looks over to the other side of the room whereBartholomew Allen was stood on a table and energetically re-telling the storyof how he escaped the dungeons of Drake Castle.

Conner snorts before taking a sip of his drink, “You’d thinkthat he’d lay low and hide instead of going around bragging about escaping. Itwon’t be long before he’s captured again.”

He places his drink down on the wooden table as a smallchirp comes from next to him. Conner looks down at his small companion who’sperched on the edge of the table. A small red robin looks up at his with blackbeady eyes, he chirps again in an almost aggressive manner which causes Connerto roll his eyes.

“I know that we need him. I’m just saying that the more hegoes around bragging about it the quicker he’s going to get found.”

The name Bartholomew Allen was quickly spreading around theland, the story on how he escaped Drake Castle and essentially escaped anexecution. Bartholomew was a thief and had been caught by the Royal Bishopguard’s, he was sent to be killed but managed to stop that by breaking free. Connerneeds his help, he needs to know how Bartholomew broke free from Drake Castlebecause he needs to break in.

Finishing up his drink he stands up from the table and startswalking over to where the thief was. The red robin instantly follows him andsettles on his shoulder. Conner walks over and stands just to the side of thecrowd that’s formed around Bartholomew and waits. Once it seems like he wasdone with his story telling Conner grabs his attention.

“Bartholomew, can I have word?”

The thief pauses and looks him over, after a long momenthe’s nodding and shrugging his shoulders. “Sure.” He jumps down from the tableand walks over next to Conner and Conner simply leads them away from anyoneelse who may listen in.

“You broke out of Drake Castle, correct?”

The thief grins cockily at him, “I certainly did. Do youwant an autograph? For me to tell you how I did it, how I fooled them all andescaped to my freedom?”

Conner looks at him with a blank look, unimpressed with hisattitude. “I need your help. I need to break into Drake Castle. I figured you’d be the best person to help me.”

There’s a long silent pause between them as Bartholomew digestsConner’s words. The thief’s eyes go wide as his jaw drop opens in shock, “Whywould you want to do that?” He asks in whispered shock.

“It doesn’t matter why. I need to get in the castle, the wayyou came out will be my way in.” Conner’s not willing to offer the reasonbehind his desired actions, it’s none of his business.

The thief’s expressions hardens to where he’s now glaring atConner, “Absolutely not. I will not help you get into that monstrous place. Iescaped there for a reason and I will not ever go back.”

Conner opens his mouth to try and persuade him to help but asudden shout of panic interrupts him.

“It’s the Bishop’s guards!”

Conner looks sharply at Bartholomew to see that the thiefwas now wearing a look of horror.

“Look, I can get you out of here, if you agree to help me.”Conner tells him, trying some form of compromise.

Bartholomew looks at him wide eyes before they narrow onceagain, “No. I’d rather take my chances.”

Conner snarls at him, feeling annoyed and angered, “Fine, yourhead be it.”

He leaves him then, walking away from the thief to the backdoor of the bar. The guards would be coming in through the front rather theback so Conner makes his escape that way. He could have easily just stayed thereand watch how everything plays out but he’d rather not.

He goes around the building to where he left his horse andstarts to untie the rope that stopped her from getting away. From inside the buildingsudden uproar happens and Conner rolls his eyes. He did say it wouldn’t be longuntil he was caught again.

Straddling his horse he starts to leave. He gets around tothe front and stops at the sight of the guards stood there waiting, some whereon their horses while the others have gone inside. Moments later the building’sdoor was slamming open and the missing guards start to wonder out, one of whichwas carrying the struggling body of Bartholomew.

Conner watches from the side as the guards saddle up and asthey restrain the thief to the back of a horse, once ready they start walkingaway and Bartholomew’s body drags painfully along the dirt as they go.

The red robin that was still perched on his shoulder beginsto rapidly chirp at Conner. Conner glances down at him before shaking his head,“No. He made his choice. It was clear, this is what he deserves.” The birdchirps again and even delivers a painful peck against his neck. “Ow! Alright!I’ll go get him.”

The bird whistles happily and flies off his shoulder over toa nearby tree. Conner rolls his eyes, sometimes he really hates him.

They ride for a good couple of hours before finally findingsomewhere where they can take refuge for the night. It appears to be an abandonedfarm, the land surrounding a small house was dried up, the grass was overgrownand full of weeds and there was surprisingly no animals around.

Conner brings up his horse to the front of the house andties her down so she couldn’t go anywhere. He then turns to his passenger, “Canyou go see if there’s a well behind the back somewhere or some form of watersource?”

Bartholomew surprisingly doesn’t say anything to him, hesimply slides off the horse and disappears around the back of the house. Connerwatches him go. Freeing him from the guards clutches had been surprisingly easyand that makes Conner wonder on what kind of people the royal bishop was hiringnowadays. All Conner had done was come up behind them, sliced the rope that wastying Bartholomew to the horse and get the thief up onto his horse and getaway. Okay maybe not that easy, there was some blood drawn but not from him. Ithelped that the thief was quick on his feet and understood what Conner wasdoing, it helped him get away from the guards quickly before he too was caught.

His little companion suddenly chirps from his shoulder andgains his attention, Conner glances down to find the bird looking up at thesky. Conner follows his gaze and finds exactly what he was looking at. The skywas beginning to merge into a red and orange colour hue indicating the end ofthe day. Conner smiles sadly but knowingly at the bird, he gently pets his headwith his finger.

“I know, another day over of us being together but apart.”He says quietly.

That’s when the thief comes around a corner carrying abucket full of water. He smiles at Conner and walks over to his horse andplaces it where she has easy access to it. She immediately goes to it andstarts drinking up the liquid.

“So there’s a full well in the back garden, works perfectlyfine too surprisingly. I’ve done your horse a bucket and found some cups that Icould fill up for us both.”

Conner smiles appreciating the thought, the thief may becocky and big headed but at least he can think on his feet. “Thank you.” Hesays sincerely. He goes to his horse and detaches a couple of bags which wasstrapped to her and starts to walk towards the house, “Let’s go inside, I canmake a little bit of dinner for us, hope you’re not too picky.”

Following behind him, Bartholomew grins, “I eat just aboutanything.”

Tim lets out a groan as he fully stretches out his limbs. Nomatter how many times he has to go through the transformation, it’ll always be anexperience which is discomforting. Going from a small robin to a fully grownhuman just wasn’t fun.

Once he feels stretched he gets up onto his feet and takes amoment to get used to his human body once again. Once settled he walks over towhere a brown bag is and opens it up to find his clothes folded neatly in it.In his head he thanks Conner, loving how thoughtful the other man was.

He slips on the clothes and makes his way through the housethey’ve taken refuge in. It’s not very big, it has one main room which servesas the main living area, there’s one bedroom to the left of it and another onethe opposite side to the right and what resembles a toilet room with even alarge wooden tub inside of it. At least whoever had lived here was wealthy.

A glance in the opposite room of the one Tim just came outof he finds the thief. He was curled up on his side on a mattress made fromstraw covered in rich red fabric and had an empty bowl next to his side. He wassound asleep and unaware of Tim’s presence.

Tim allows him to sleep, he simply walks into the roomcollects the bowl from the floor and exists. He places the empty bowl on thetable that was in the living area before wondering back to the room heoriginally was in.

It was as he was sitting down on his own straw mattress thathe sees a bowl next to the bed, this one was full and was even slightly steaming.Tim frowns before picking it up, he feels it’s warmth and then realises thatConner must have made it and placed it next to him before he transformed. Tim’sheart swells once again at how thoughtful he could be. It wasn’t a lot in thebowl, simply water with a mixture of herbs that they carry around with them,some vegetables that Conner collected earlier that day and even some lumps ofmeat. It wasn’t a lot but at least it was something. Tim eats it despite it nottasting brilliant, Conner had gone through the effort of making him it so theleast he can do is eat it.

Once he was done he places the bowl on the floor and sitsback on the mattress. Moments later a large black wolf was stalking into hisroom. Tim startles for a moment, he hadn’t even realised that the beast was inthe house, before letting himself relax at the familiar sight of the one heloved.

The wolf trots over to him, Tim instantly reaches out tostroke the animal’s head. The wolf leans into his touch before leaning forwardto lick his face. Tim frowns but lets out a soft laugh as the wolf starts toexcitedly climb on him while he licks his face.

“Okay, okay, that’s enough Conner, that’s enough.” He getsout and finally manages to get the wolf off him. The wolf settles down on thefloor next to the mattress and whines at him as Tim wipes his face. Tim rollshis eyes and once again strokes the top of his head in a lovingly way.

The wolf lies down and places his head in Tim’s lap andlooks up at him with wide eyes. Tim pouts as the animal lets out another lowwhine, “I know Conner, I know. I miss you too.”

Tim lies back on the mattress, he doesn’t move as the wolfgets up and climbs onto the mattress with him and as he settles down next toTim. Tim puts one arm around the beast and snuggles as much as can into thefur. This is the closet they can ever get to cuddling. When Tim’s in his robinform, he’s too small to do anything of the sort so they have to wait untilnight when Conner is a wolf to do this.

They lie like that for a long time and Tim just ramblesabout anything that’s floating around in his head. He knows that he won’t getan answer back but at least he knows that the man - currently wolf – islistening to him. Eventually though he starts to slip off into sleep as the nightwears on, the sad thing about it is that when knows when he wakes up he’ll beback in that tiny body of a bird and Conner once again will be human. It’s aruthless cycle which just isn’t fair.

As expected Tim wakes up in his robin form, next to him wasConner, sprawled out in his human form. Tim misses the times where he couldtouch the man with his own hands, to feel his bare skin with his own.

Next to him Conner woke up and sat up. He glances down towhere Tim was and sadly smiles at him, the man reaches out and pets the top ofhis head with a gentle finger, in response Tim gives him a little chirp inacknowledgement.

Their peace was interrupted when Bartholomew shows up in thedoor way of the bedroom, “So what’s the plan for today if you have one? Are wegoing – Oh hey, the little guy stuck around?”

Without invitation the thief wonders into the room andcrouches next to the mattress, he reaches out and pets Tim on the head, unlikeConner’s his administrations were rough and sort of painful. Tim allowed itthough, there wasn’t a lot he could do to actually avoid the thief. He wantedto stay close to Conner so flying away was not an option.

“Yeah, he’s my companion, so be gentle with him.” Connersays standing up. The man puts on his clothes for the day and packs away theones Tim was wearing during the night.

As he does that the thief stands up and watches him, “Ah sothe little robin is your pet then?”

“He’s not a pet!” Conner snaps at him.

Bartholomew reels back, surprised at the sudden anger, heputs his hands up in a placating gesture, “Okay, sorry.”

Conner pinches the bridge of his nose, “I apologise, Ididn’t mean to snap. But no, the red robin isn’t my pet, he’s my companion andis very important to me okay.”

The thief only nods and wonders out of the room. As Connergoes to follow Tim flies up and lands on the man’s shoulder and perches there,Conner sends him a smile as he settles down.

The day went slowly as they potted around the house,Bartholomew seemed reluctant to leave Conner’s side and Conner was simplytaking his time to try and come up with a plan to break into Drake Castleundetected.

The most interesting part of the day was when it was nearingthe evening. The peaceful silence the farm house’s occupants had fallen into wasabruptly broken when Conner’s horse lets out a loud neigh in the way that meansit’s scared.

Reacting to his horses distress, Conner rushes outside tosee what was wrong. Bartholomew follows behind him and Tim flies after them.Once outside they could see why Conner’s horse was distressed, surrounding thefarm house was a handful of guards who were all armed with weapons.

Tim immediately recognises the armoury they wear and theweapons they were holding. They’re the exact same guards they had to deal withthe day before, guards that belong to the Royal Bishop of Drake Castle.

Tim watches from the sky as the guards surge forward andattack Conner and Bartholomew. Conner instantly uses his size, strength andfighting skills against his opponents and knocks them down, Bart on the otherhand uses quick agility to dodge and avoid the guards coming his way.

From the sky Tim feels useless, there’s nothing he can do inthis tiny form of a red robin. He needs to help but how? He suddenly gets anidea, he may not be able to physically attack them but at least he can try todisarm them from their weapons.

Tim dives down and approaches the nearest guard, he fliesover to their hand and violently pecks at it, mostly aiming for in betweentheir fingers. After a few pecks they let go of the sword and it falls to thefloor with a clatter. Tim immediately flies over to another one and does thesame. He’s able to do this to three guards but unfortunately the forth onewasn’t that easy. As Tim attempts to peck at his hand the guard starts tryingto swat him away, it causes Tim to fly around so he can avoid getting hit.

One lucky sweep of the hand manages to catch Tim in the wingand sends him spiralling to the floor. Pain erupts from his side and his wingas he crashes to the floor, he comes to a stop but finds he cannot move at all.Pain is radiating from his whole body as he lies on the ground practicallystunned from what’s just happened.

“Tim!”

There’s a shout near him and then suddenly he’s being pickedup and cradled in warm, gentle hands.

“Tim?”

Through the pain Tim recognises that it’s Conner whom isspeaking to him and even is holding him but Tim couldn’t do anything toacknowledge him. He couldn’t make himself to make a sound and he certainlycould force himself to move.

Within Conner’s hands he gets jolted around as Connercontinues to fight the Bishop’s guards who were still attacking them. When itall calms down Conner is shouting again, “Bartholomew!”

Moments later the thief appears at Conner’s side and Timfeels himself being transferred into another pair of hands. These hands were alot more fragile than Conner’s, less warm and a lot less gentle. He getscradled in the thief arms as Conner speaks to him, “Get him out of here! Findsomewhere safe and I’ll catch up. Take my horse and go!”

The thief hesitates, “What about you?”

“I’ll be fine now go.”

There’s more jolting as Bartholomew runs over to Conner’shorse, he has to dodge and fight some of the guards along the way as they werestill attacking them. Once they’re dealt with, the thief finally gets to thehorse and saddles up. There’s a moment of hesitation where he doesn’t seem toknow what to do with Tim, after a while he grabs a brown bag hanging from the horseand gently eases Tim inside, “Sorry little guy, but I think this is the safest foryou right now.”

Thankfully it was the bag where Conner stores their clothes,so at least Tim had something soft to try and nest in. It wasn’t at allcomfortable. Everything inside of him hurt and riding on a horse in a bag whichis flying about as the animal runs does not help.

Tim loses track of time while he’s in the bag. There’sreally nothing else on his mind other than the pain he was feeling buteventually they come to a stop and Tim feels the bag being moved whichdislodges him and sends shooting pains through his body.

The next thing that is happening is that there are wordsbeing spoken by two different voices. Tim tries to make out what’s being saidbut his mind is in a haze after everything that’s happened in the last coupleof hours. The bag is then being moved once again and placed onto a hardsurface, it gets opened up and a hand comes in to scoop Tim out of the clothes.

Tim gets placed on the hard surface next to the bag. Nowthat he’s able to see what’s around him he finds that two people are lookingdown at him, one of which is Bartholomew and the other is a blonde hair ladywhom Tim didn’t recognise.

As more words were shared between Bartholomew and the womanTim could feel his body tightening. His joints and bones start moving insidehis body as he begins to grow in size. Tim lets out a pained sound as his wingis jerked around with the transformation from a red robin to a human.

In what seems like forever Tim eventually finds himself backin his human form. While it felt good to be out of the robin body, it washowever extremely painful. Most of the pain he was feeling was coming from hisarm, once glance at it tells him why. It’s broken. The broken wing he had whilein the robin form had transferred over to his human so he now has a broken arm.

Someone touching his shoulder gets his attention. He jerksin surprised and lets out a moan as he looks at who touched him. It was the blondelady, she was frowning at him in an almost concerned way. Just behind her Timcould see Bartholomew staring at him wide eyed.

“Wait, you’re the bird? You just changed from a bird to ahuman? How? How did you do that?” The thief asks in complete shock.

Tim grunts as the woman gently takes hold of his arm andexamines it. He looks over at the thief, “It’s a long story.”

The woman pulls away from him and walks away, Tim followsher with his eyes and it’s just then that he realises that they’re in a house,a dining room by the looks of it. He watches as the woman begins to collect avariety of jars and as she starts to do something with them.

From where her back was turned to Tim, the lady speaks,“You’re cursed aren’t you?”

Tim frowns at her. How did she know? Who even was she?

“How did you know?” Tim voices.

She doesn’t immediately answer, Tim watches as she mixesingredients in a bowl before transferring it into a cup. Once done she walksback over to Tim and forces the cup into his uninjured arm’s hand.

“Drink this it’ll help you with the pain.”

“What is it?” Tim asks cautiously.

She gives him a bland look, “It’s a special concoction,it’ll speed up your healing process of your arm once I’ve set it. I promise Imean you no harm. As for who I am, my name is Cassandra Sandsmark.”

She once again grabs his arm and before Tim could protestshe jerks it to the side. Tim screams in pain as his arm moves. Even afterCassandra had moved away Tim couldn’t get past the pain his arm was radiating.

“Drink it.” Came a demand from his right.

Tim shakes his head, unable to do anything else except focuson his arm and how it was throbbing and stinging. The next thing he knows ishis head is being forced backwards and the cup is being lifted to his lips,having no other choice Tim swallows down the liquid as it enters his mouth. Hishead falls forward when it’s let go and he’s left breathing heavily.

A long moment passes by but soon enough Tim could start tofeel the pain easing down from his arm, it makes the limb feel numb and thepain becomes almost absent. He looks to the woman, “Thank you, I guess.”

She smiles at him, “No problem. Now, I have to know, whocursed you?”

Tim sighs and looks away from her to Bartholomew, he looksparticularly interested in finding out the answer. Tim doesn’t blame him, hesort of has a right to know. “My name is Timothy Drake and yes, I am the princeof Drake Castle. What had happened was the Royal Bishop had confessed his lovefor me and I had refused him as I don’t feel the same way. My heart belongs toanother soul, you already know him, and that’s Conner Kent. Conner was one ofmy body guards and we ended up falling in love, when the Bishop found this outhe was enraged and casted a curse upon us. At night Conner transforms into awolf and by day I transform into a red robin. We are always together buteternally divided, we can’t see one another in our human forms.

We ran away from the castle because of this curse. My familywould outcast me if they found out and Conner wasn’t in much condition tocontinue being a guard. We ran away together in hopes of working out how tobreak this curse and Conner’s come up with a plan to simply kill the Bishop inrevenge. We need your help, Bartholomew, in getting back into Drake Castle sohe can achieve this.”

It was silent for a long time after Tim had finishedexplaining his situation. Cassandra looked thoughtful and the thief lookedpuzzled.

Eventually the lady breaks the silent with a small smile, “Wellthat explains some things but for now you need to rest and when you wake up yourarm will be back to normal. You can sleep on my bed for tonight.”

Tim doesn’t argue as she shows him where he’ll be sleeping. He’squick on settle on the bed where sleep immediately over takes him.

As he walks up to the house Conner couldn’t help but feelweary. Like the farm they had taken refuge in, this house is out of the way andburied within the woods. The only reason Conner had found it was because hefollowed Tim’s and Bartholomew’s scents, and they lead him here. After he’dgotten away from the Bishop’s guards Conner had transformed into the wolf, takingthe advantage of the beast’s capabilities Conner had followed their scents andby the time he reached the house he had transformed back into a human.

He gets to the door and knocks on it, moment later a ladywith blonde hair was opening up. She looks at him and raises an eyebrow, “Conner,I’m assuming?” She asks.

Conner frowns, “How did you-”

“Timothy has told me everything, he and Bartholomew are waitingfor you.”

Conner shuts his mouth from where it had opened in shock andwalks into the house. The lady closes the door behind him. Conner goes throughthe house and finds Bartholomew sat on the floor with a robin perched on hisknee. They look up as he enters and the bird immediately flies up over to himand perches on his shoulder. Conner smiles and gently pets his head.

“All better I see.” He says, noticing how the bird was nolonger in pain.

The thief stands up and walk over to him, “Yeah, Cassandra madehim drink a potion and set his arm back, he woke up completely healed likenothing ever happened.”

Conner finds the lady standing beside them, lookingthoughtfully at the bird. “Thank you.” He says meaningfully.

She smiles back, “It was no problem.”

“Conner,” he turns to the sound of his name and looks atBartholomew, “I’ve changed my mind. I’ll help you get into Drake Castle” Conneropens his mouth to question why but he gets beaten to it, “The reason being isbecause it’s not fair on what’s happened to you both. Tim told us about it lastnight, I don’t think it’s right so I’ll help you get into the Castle then youkill the bastard that’s done this to you.”

Conner glances down at the Robin on his shoulder beforelooking at the thief, his change of heart was welcoming, “Thank youBartholomew, it means a lot.”

He grins in response, “No problem and call me Bart, everyoneelse does.”

“Also, relating to your situation, I was looking into lastnight and there may be a way to break the curse.”

That certainly gets Conner’s attention, he snaps his head tothe side and stares at the lady, “What? Is there? How?”

She looks unimpressed with the questions being fired at herbut thankfully she answers anyway, “From what I can gather, this curse of yourscan be broken if you were both to face the bishop in the flesh on a day withouta night and a night without the day.”

Conner blinks at her trying to comprehend what she justsaid. “I’m sorry, what? That makes no sense.”

She puts her hands up in a placating gesture, “I do not fullyunderstand myself, this is just what I’ve come across.”

“Well it’s stupid and doesn’t make sense.” Conner statesbluntly. Any optimism he was briefly feeling has now completely evaporated, heturns to Bart, “We need to get a plan together so we can enter the Castlewithout being noticed, then I can work out a way in which I’ll confront theBishop.”

Bart shrugs, “Sounds good to me, it won’t be though, youprepared for that?”

Conner grins, “More than you’ll ever know.”

Several days later, Conner finds himself following behind Bartas they make their way through the sewers of Castle Drake. Apparently this wasthe way Bart got out so this is the way they get in. Trying to ignore the vilesmell, they navigate their way through until they come across an opening. Slippingthrough it they emerge within the depths of Drake Castle.

Once they’ve found a quiet place to hide Conner turns to Bart,“Right I want you two to stay here and out of sight. This could easily go wrongand I don’t want you guys getting hurt or found if it does.”

“You sound like you’re saying goodbye.” Bart pouts at him.

Conner doesn’t say anything as he picks up the red robin offhis shoulder and carefully places him on Bart’s shoulder. He gently pats it onthe head with his finger, “It could very well be a goodbye, I wish it wasn’tbut I don’t know how’ll it will all play out. If I know you two are safe then Idon’t have to worry. Thank you for everything Bart.”

Conner steps away from him and leaves before the thief couldsay anything.

Now being an old body guard to the prince really does haveit advantages. Conner easily works his way through the familiar grounds. Heknows where all the best hiding places are so the guards patrolling within theCastle wouldn’t find him, he knows the most popular routes of patrol and caneasily work out his own route to follow so he doesn’t bump into any guards ashe goes.

Eventually he gets to where the quarters are located of thoseassociated with the royal family. The royal family had rooms at the very top ofthe castle, their associates had room a couple levels underneath them. Shiftingthrough his memories, Conner works out which room belongs to the Bishop.Pausing outside of the door, Conner unsheathes his sword before storming intothe room.

Thankfully the very man he was after was there. He was kneltdown by an alter with his hands clasped together, his lips forming words which Connerassumed was a prayer. Conner stands in the middle of the room with his swordheld up in a defensive position, he startled a bit when the Bishop suddenlyspeaks out to him.

“I was wondering when I’d get a visit from you. I thought itwould have been sooner than this.”

“You are going to pay for what you have done, Ra’s.” Conner growlsat the man as he stands up.

“Is that so?” the Bishop asks raising an eyebrow at Conner.

Conner glares and raises his sword higher. He watches as theBishop picks up his own sword and as he steadies himself to fight, once readythe two of them lunge towards one another, swords clashing as they meet. Connersteps back and swipes his sword, the man easily dodges and strikes back withhis own thrust. It becomes a dance, one of which grows tiring very quickly. Conneris surprised to find that the Bishop was skilled in handling a sword, his frailand skinny body would suggest otherwise.

Conner messes up and Ra’s takes the advantage, he sweeps Conneroff his feet so he lands hard on his back on the floor. The sword gets knockedout of his hand by a swift kick to his wrist, it goes clattering to the otherside of the room. The Bishop then kneels down and presses one knee on Conner’schest and his sword appears pointing at his neck.

Conner glares up at the man as he struggles underneath hisweight, he isn’t scared of dying. If he dies now at least died for what hebelieved in, the only thing that bugs him is that he let Tim down. He wouldhave disappointed the love of his life.

His struggling stops as the man above him suddenly getsenveloped by a shadow, even the room gets encased by sudden darkness. Conner frowns,he twists around to where the window was to try and get an understanding of whatwas causing the blackness. He freezes when he sees a solar eclipse happeningoutside the window.

The sun was being covered by the room, stopping any lightfrom appearing at all. That’s when it clicks, ‘a day without a night and a night without the day’. Cassandra meanta solar eclipse. He needs to go and find Tim and Bart.

A burst of energy surges through him, he’s able to get theBishop off him and tosses him to the side. Conner scrambles to his feet and rushestowards the door. Sprinting out of the room into the corridor Conner makes hisway down it as fast as he can. He needs to find Tim. However he only getsaround halfway before pain was exploding in his leg. He crumples to the floorand clutches his leg in pain, seconds later there’s a weight on top of his andhe’s being forced onto his back.

The Bishop appears above him, his face twisted into an unpleasantsnarl, “You’re giving me a headache boy, it’s time to be done with you.”

As Conner sees the sword rise up, he comes to terms thatthis is it. He braces himself for the pain about to come and ultimately fordeath.

“NO! Conner!”

It never comes.

There’s a voice speaking out, a voice so familiar that it sendschills down to Conner’s bones. Above him the Bishop looks enraged, his attentionwas elsewhere and Conner follows his eye line. Standing at the end of thecorridor where two people, one of which was Bart and the other… the other was Tim.

Tim in his human form, looking scared and frightened at whatwas happening before him. Tim looking as beautiful as the last day Conner sawhim like this.

The Bishop climbs off Conner, he drops the sword down by hisside as he stands up. With a scream of rage he starts running towards Tim,screaming out curses and types of revenge. In one quick movement Conner rollsover to his knees and grabs the abandoned sword, clutching it in his hand heaims it like a spear and throws it at the running Bishop. Seconds tick by andsoon enough the sword was penetrating Ra’s from behind, he stumbles to a stop beforecollapsing to his knees and then finally falling down onto his side. Bloodpools out from him and starts to cover the corridor’s floor.

Conner breaths heavily and looks away from the fresh corpse towardsthe two people at the end. A long moment goes between them before he startsstruggling into a standing position, his leg was throbbing. “Tim?” he questionsstill not believing it was the other man.

Tim was running towards him then, seconds later he barrels intoConner which causes them to fall over. Laughing, Conner hugs Tim tight andburies his face into his neck. Tim forces his head away so he can press theirlips together in a bruising kiss. As they kiss Conner runs his hands over Tim’sbody, loving the way he feels up against him. He missed him so much and now he’sfinally back in his arms, they were together once again.

They separate and just stare at one another, Tim’s handswere on his face and Conner’s were on his back. They share a smile before theywere both laughing, “I missed you so much.”

“Missed you to Conner.”

They hug and kiss some more before finally pulling away fromone another. Tim stands up and helps Conner to his feet, Conner takes the advantageand throws his arm over the shoulder’s of the man beside him. They both watchas Bart comes strolling towards them, a smile plastered on his face.

Conner smiles back, “Thank you Bart. We wouldn’t have beenable to do this without you.”

Bart shrugs, “It was no problem. You guys deserve to behappy, I’m glad I could help.”

Tim’s arms wrap around his waist and give him a squeeze, “Thisis in need of a celebration. I can now speak to my parents and discuss what hashappened, we can finally live happily.”

“I like the sound of that.” Conner says back looking down atthe love of his life.

It’s a good day, the curse has been broken and Conner finallyhas the man he loves back in his arms.

#timkon #Tim Drake #conner kent #bart allen #ra's al ghul #cassie sandsmark #fanfiction #medieval au #no capes au #ladyhawke #prompt

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douxreviews · 6 years ago

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Game of Thrones - ‘The Iron Throne’ Review

And now their watch has ended.

In what was supposed to be Supernatural's final episode – but turned out to be a full ten years too early – writer Chuck bemoaned the fact that 'endings are hard'. And they really, really are. I can think of so many finales that have disappointed me in various ways over the years. And just this week, I've watched two endings that have been a long time in the making (the other one was the end of twelve years of The Big Bang Theory, which I quite liked, for the record).

And in the end, I think I'd put this in a fairly favourable spot in my all time Worst - Greatest Finales ranking list. It wasn't perfect (only Sex and the City has managed to stick a perfect ending, and they wrecked that with the movies). But it was pretty good, generally speaking, and there were moments of true greatness.

Daenerys and Jon

So, I didn't hate last week's episode for its developments in Daenerys' storyline. I haven't exactly loved her descent into the Mad Queen, for all the same reasons as everyone else – the show is dangerously close to implying all female rulers are lunatics, Dany's descent into madness and tyranny has been rushed and doesn't quite feel earned, and it's a bit saddening to watch a character we've loved so much for so long become a villain instead of the powerful, wise ruler we all hoped she would be.

Having said that, I do think the seeds for this have been planted since the beginning – it may be rushed, but it hasn't come out of nowhere. Daenerys has been promising the Dothraki that they will pillage the Seven Kingdoms, raping, burning and killing (which we have been told numerous times is what they do) ever since Season One. We all loved Khal Drogo because he was cool, but he was not a fluffy bunny and nor is Dany. She crucified the Masters in Meereen, and while her execution of Sam's father and brother could be justified on the grounds that they refused to bend the knee, it wasn't her only option, nor did she have to do it immediately, on the battlefield, by dragon fire. So while it makes me a little sad – and makes my "I'm not a Princess, I'm a Khaleesi" shirt a bit dubious – I can see that this has been where Dany's story has been heading all along, and I can understand it, and I'm OK with it.

I was a bit disappointed that Jon ended up killing Daenerys though. I was sure Arya was going to do that – it almost feels like their big kills ended up the wrong way around, with Jon the soldier denied the chance to kill the Night King and Arya the ninja assassin denied the chance to kill the dangerous tyrant. But Jon is truly a son of Ned Stark (by adoption) and if he has decided someone has to die he will swing the sword himself – though perhaps it's the tricksy Targaryen side, or the trained undercover agent of the Night's Watch, who does it by taking advantage of her (and Drogon's) trust.

Drogon's reaction was interesting. It felt like perhaps even Drogon thought what he had done with Dany went too far, and that his mother had been corrupted by her desire for this hunk of metal. (When she touched it, I said out loud I thought she should sit in it quickly if she wanted to - we were denied a shot of her actually on the throne, after all that!). Presumably that's also why Drogon let Jon live. Of all the individual character endings we saw in this episode, I think Drogon and Grey Worm's were the saddest - they've both been through so much, and they're both totally alone.

Tyrion and King Bran

I don't like the 'Bran the Broken' title, as appropriate as it might be for a pseudo-medieval society, so I'm just gonna call him Bran.

I have to confess, I really didn't see this one coming. Since he became the Three-Eyed Raven, Bran has been emotionless and rather difficult for either audience or in-universe characters to connect with. His warging ability hasn't really come into play since the death of Hodor, so the power he has doesn't seem to have played much of a role in the last stages of the wars, and the implication that he has some knowledge of the future makes him kind of a dick for letting the entire population of King's Landing get torched (was this a Dr Strange-style one chance in 14 million situation? If so, we haven't been told that).

From a books-reading point of view there's a certain sense to this. The first book in the series, A Game of Thrones, opens (as they all do) with a Prologue from the point of view of a character who immediately dies, then shifts to the first main character point of view chapter – Bran's. Bran, like Jon, is such a traditional fantasy character it almost hurts – a noble but disabled boy who suffers and undergoes lots of hardship, but discovers he has magical abilities which give him an advantage over his enemies and eventually allow him to triumph.

But the television show – oddly, considering Benioff and Weiss have known the ending all along - has never really focused on Bran's story in that way. He's an important character, sure, but not all that significant - he disappears for an entire season! And whatever happened to "I can never be Lord of anything, I'm the Three-Eyed Raven", Bran's statement to Sansa in Season Seven? Now he's King of all the remaining kingdoms? Really? I will defend their attempts to sow the seeds of Daenerys' madness throughout, however clumsily, but the television series really hasn't prepared us for this one, and it really doesn't feel earned.

The most satisfying aspect of the resolution to the leader of the Now-Six Kingdoms, though, is the new Small Council, which is a thing of beauty. The new political set-up – essentially an oligarchy with a lifelong selected leader – is Tyrion's creation, finally fulfilling the political and diplomatic promise he showed way back in Season Two. Tyrion is Hand of the King once again, but this time without dragons or his psychotic family around him, and that gives us hope that he will do a good job. Brienne as head of the Kingsguard makes me very, very happy, almost as much as Bronn, Lord of Highgarden and Master of Coin. Davos as Master of Ships makes perfect sense and it's great to see him survive too, while the only possible objection to Sam as new Archmaester is that Maesters are supposed to be celibate and Sam has a partner and nearly two children to support - but perhaps, as Archmaester, he can change that rule.

The only sad part about this scene is the huge space where Varys ought to be. There is no Master of Whispers for the moment, and his absence is really felt. Plus it would have been awesome to see Varys serving under yet another King as the eternal survivor. Of all the deaths this season, Varys is the one I would change if I had the power. He deserved better, Tyrion.

The Starks

The most satisfying moment of this episode by far for me was seeing Sansa, looking like Elizabeth I (long red hair, white dress), crowned Queen in the North. For one thing, this was absolutely essential to avoid the implication that women with power are all utter lunatics who need to be assassinated. But it was also a truly fitting and satisfying end to not just her character arc, but that of the Stark siblings in general. The Starks belong in the North and Robb's crowning as King in the North was one of the great punch-the-air moments of Season One. Jon kinda made a mess of the job, but to see Sansa take up the reigns was a great moment. And whereas a war with Daenerys would likely have ended in disaster, with her brother on the throne in the South, we can hope the two kingdoms will work closely together from now on.

Arya's ending was probably the least satisfying of the three (Bran is barely human any more, never mind a Stark). There was nothing wrong with it, exactly - she's gone off to discover America, we guess. (Let's hope this universe *has* an America and she's not just going to keep sailing until she starves to death!). It just came a bit out of nowhere, and seemed rather a shame after she went to so much trouble to recover her identity as Arya Stark. Jon's was the most predictable, but no less satisfying for that. He belongs in the true North, with Tormund. I think it's safe to say, from the look on his face as they rode away, that Jon won't be returning to Castle Black (and I don't think he ever intended to stay there – that's why he told Tyrion he would never see him again). He and Ghost will run wild in a land without kings or titles and be much happier for it.

And so there we have it – it's been a wild ride, but now it's all over. Some endings were great (Sansa, the Small Council), some were fine (Jon, Arya) some were baffling (Bran) and some frustrating (Drogon, Grey Worm) but while the series may not have entirely stuck the landing, for me, it hasn't crashed and burned either.

Coming up with an ending everyone was going to be happy with was always going to be completely impossible, so while I may not agree with all their decisions, I want to give a shout out and all our thanks to Benioff and Weiss. They've created a phenomenal series with a great cast, fantastic production values and absolutely amazing music. (Seriously, go back and listen to both the musical score and the sound design on this season. It is phenomenal. Ramin Djiwadi's music is as beautiful and astonishing as ever and the eerie, disconcerting sounds that play as Daenerys attacks King's Landing are incredible. The use of the series' themes has been great too, from playing out Cersei's downfall with 'The Rains of Castamere', to the theme tune playing as Daenerys approaches the Iron Throne in this episode).

Bringing these sprawling books to the screen has been a huge achievement, and carrying on when the books ran out to give us a conclusion to this story is no less an achievement for the fact that it hasn't entirely satisfied everybody. Perhaps it's unfortunate that this aired within a month of Avengers: Endgame, which managed the end of a saga a little better - but Endgame has its detractors too. I'm not sure any of us will really know how we feel about this ending until we've had time to let it sink in, but for now, I say thank you Benioff, Weiss and Martin - thank you for the ride, and thank you for all the gory, sexy fun we've had along the way. More than anything, thank you for making an epic fantasy show one of the biggest on television! For someone who still remembers when reading The Lord of the Rings in school made you a social outcast, that means a lot.

Grumpkins and Snarks:

- RIP: Daenerys Targaryen, Stormborn, Queen of the Seven Kingdoms, of the Andals, the Rhoynar and the First Men, Protector of the Realm, Lady of Dragonstone, Mother of Dragons. Sniff.

- I didn't expect the scene where Tyrion finds Jaime and Cersei's bodies – that was truly heart-breaking (and kudos to Peter Dinklage, as ever). Oh Jaime, my love, I so wanted you to die a hero. At least you didn't die a villain, which is something.

- Grey Worm was really under-served by this finale, and this whole season. At least he lived, I guess?

- The final straw that really drove Jon to kill Dany was his desire to protect his sisters, both of whom would have been dragon meat in the long run because he had told them about his parentage. Just how much of what happens on this show has been caused by attempts to protect Arya and/or Sansa? And sometimes Bran. Which worked out, I guess?

- The two noblest, most honour-obsessed characters (Jon and Brienne) both became Kingslayers (Daenerys and Stannis). Which, unlike rain on your wedding day, is truly ironic.

- I'm so happy that Brienne didn't turn out to be pregnant. If the most awesome female character on the show ended up reduced to Lannister baby mama in the finale, I'd have been really pissed off.

- Look how much Robyn Arryn has grown up! I'm absolutley amazed his character made it to the finale, and seeing the kid who first appeared on screen being breastfed as an adult is definitely disconcerting!

- I was disappointed by the lack of Hot Pie, but choose to assume that means he's still alive and happily cooking pies in the busiest inn in Westeros.

Final analysis: Hey, it's still less divisive than How I Met Your Mother's ending! Three out of four dragons.

Thanks to all who've read our Game of Thrones reviews and articles and joined in the endless conversation and speculation over the years. It's been epic!

Juliette Harrisson is a freelance writer, classicist and ancient historian

#Game of Thrones #Jon Snow #Daenerys Targaryen #Tyrion Lannister #Sansa Stark #Arya Stark #A Song of Ice and Fire #GoT #Game of Thrones Reviews #Doux Reviews #TV Reviews

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phosphorescent-naidheachd · 7 years ago

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Evaluating Sansa’s Betrayal in AGOT

@ John Hodgman, I cordially invite you to fight me over these comments in your 2016 intro to A Game of Thrones: The Illustrated Edition: “After all, it’s Sansa’s escapist addiction to the old tales and the romantic pablum of Florian and Jonquil that fuels her great, catastrophic betrayal of the actual humans around her.”

Although I’m a huge Sansa fan, I’m not one of those people who believes that she bears no culpability for the consequences of having told Cersei about her father’s intention to take them away from King’s Landing. BUT. To call her actions not merely a betrayal or even a catastrophic betrayal, but a “great, catastrophic betrayal” is utter bullshit, and by focusing solely on Sansa’s “escapist addiction” to romances, you’re flattening the factors behind her (admittedly poor) decision to trust Cersei, and indeed the factors behind her willingness to buy into those romantic songs in the first place. I understand the point you’re making, but I also think you’re rather overstating it.

Let’s break this claim down piece by piece, shall we?

1. Sansa’s “escapist addiction” to romances

There’s no denying that Sansa loves romantic tales and ballads, nor that---thanks to a sheltered childhood---she mistakenly believes them to be unalloyed truth. However, look at the context of her upbringing. Sansa has been raised in a patriarchal society that encourages her to believe in these songs, largely because they reinforce existing social roles and make her easier to control. Moreover, it’s clear that as of the beginning of AGOT, no authority figure has seriously tried to teach Sansa otherwise. I don’t believe this was done maliciously---I think that her parents and Septa Mordane don’t want to disillusion her quite yet, and assume that there’s still plenty of time left to teach her the realities of the world before she leaves Winterfell. (And if it weren’t for the death of Jon Arryn, they might even have been right! Though I also think there’s an element of self-delusion at work in this line of thinking, as I’ll get into later in #2.) I also get the sense that Sansa sometimes slips through the cracks a bit because she isn’t a ‘problem child’; Sansa is far from perfect, but she’s generally well-behaved and she naturally fits into the idealized Westerosi conception of a noblewoman. The gaps in her education and emotional maturity aren’t as immediately glaringly obvious as, say, Arya’s are, and that makes it easy for a busy adult to put those gaps on a back burner to deal with some nebulous time ‘later’. (Arya slips through the cracks too, but it’s a different set of cracks, if that makes any sense. Despite their differences, both Sansa and Arya are failed by prescribed Westerosi gender roles, but that’s a discussion for another day.)

Also, anyone who is reading ASOIAF for pleasure doesn’t really have a foot to stand on regarding enjoying escapist fantasies, IMO. The world of ASOIAF may be “brutal”, as you say, but that doesn’t mean visiting it isn’t a form of escapism. Fiction of any form is inherently escapist, even as it often acts as a mirror that forces us to confront aspects of our own reality. (I don’t know if I’d entirely agree that GRRM has “captured the authentic meanness of the medieval world” either, by the way---he notoriously makes certain aspects of life in Westeros worse than they were in RL medieval Europe---but that’s also a conversation for another day.)

To be certain, Sansa internalizes fictional narratives more than your average reader of the series, but that’s partially because, at least on a surface level, her life easily could become one that belongs in the songs she loves. For instance, long before King Robert suggests betrothing Sansa to Joffrey, it’s not wholly in the realm of fantasy for her to dream of marrying a prince; considering her position in life, it’s a solid potential actuality. (Once again, more on this later in #2.) Sansa doesn’t fully understand what being part of a song would mean for her---that is to say, high romance generally necessitates high tragedy---nor does she fully appreciate the responsibilities and costs associated with becoming royalty, but considering she’s eleven/twelve years old in AGOT? That’s perfectly normal for a noble girl her age, even within the context of the universe of ASOIAF. (Are there exceptions to this? Absolutely. But that’s what they are: exceptions.) Just look at Alla and Elinor and Megga Tyrell!

Furthermore, while there’s an element of escapism to Sansa’s love of songs---when we first meet her, Sansa can’t wait to go South and have her ‘real’ life begin---I would argue that Sansa doesn’t actively indulge in much escapism or self-delusion until after the Baratheons arrive at Winterfell. Even after seeing Joffrey’s cruelty at Ruby Ford, she forces herself---and him---into the narratives that she loves and has been implicitly taught that she should emulate right up to the point where denial becomes impossible (i.e. her father’s execution). This is because one of Sansa’s innate survival/coping mechanisms is her ability to lie to herself as much as to others; we see this most clearly in AGOT and in AFFC.* So when the events at the Ruby Ford occur in AGOT, Sansa’s initial instinct is to ‘forget’ what actually happened. (This is aided by the fact that Joffrey had been plying her with wine---far more, we’re explicitly told, than she’s ever been allowed to drink before.) It isn’t just that she doesn’t want her golden prince and fairytale future to have been a lie---though that’s certainly a key motivator!---or callousness towards a peasant boy or frustration with her sister’s refusal to play according to societal rules (though these are both certainly present), but it’s also that she’s being questioned about events in front of an audience... in front of individuals with tremendous power over her, both because they’re royalty and because they’re her future family members.

As Sansa has undoubtedly been taught, once a woman is married, her first loyalty must be to her husband and his family over the family of her birth. And while it’s true that betrothed is not the same thing as married, betrothals seem to be taken relatively seriously in Westeros. You can certainly argue that had Eddard Stark been aware of Joffrey’s true nature earlier, he would have broken the betrothal, but A. Sansa has no way to know that, B. breaking a betrothal is much easier said than done when dealing with royalty, especially when you’re going to be in close quarters with them for the foreseeable future, and C. as we’ll realize later, Ned is perfectly willing to let the (pretense of a?) betrothal stand if it will allow him to further investigate Jon Arryn’s death. What happened on the banks of the Trident was terrifying, it happened quickly, Sansa was tipsy, and if she speaks out one way or the other she’ll have to make a choice between her sister or the man who is going to be her husband... with deeply unpleasant consequences for herself (and likely Arya as well) regardless of which version of events she chooses to support. With all of this in mind, it’s easy enough for her to convince herself that it’s all a blur. So while Sansa’s (likely subconscious) decision to ‘forget’ what happened on the banks of the Trident isn’t admirable, it is understandable.

Ultimately, it isn’t Sansa’s fascination with romantic songs that fuels her poor decisions so much as it is the society that encourages her to believe in them. If notions like ‘baseborn < trueborn’, ‘outer beauty = inner goodness’, and ‘proper behavior = rewards’ weren’t given weight in real life---even if only on the surface---it would be much harder for her to cling to the version of reality that the songs are peddling.

Once again, none of this is to say that Sansa lacks all culpability for her actions due to her socialization. Sansa’s decisions are her own. My point is merely that her “escapist addiction” to romances isn’t the true root of the problem... it’s the society that created and perpetuated those songs to begin with.

*In AFFC, Sansa has consciously begun the process of being Alayne all the time as per Littlefinger’s words. (How well she’ll succeed in this---at least in the short term---is impossible to predict until we get TWOW.) She also has subconsciously transformed the memory of her encounter with Sandor Clegane during the traumatic Battle of Blackwater Bay into one that fits better in one of her beloved romances; in this altered memory, rather than threaten her in a sexually-tinged manner while holding a dagger to her throat, Sandor merely steals a kiss and a song.

Note that Sansa began this subconscious transformation of her memory in ASOS by adding in a kiss and taking away the dagger: “He'd come to her the night of the battle stinking of wine and blood. He kissed me and threatened to kill me, and made me sing him a song”. By the time AFFC has rolled around, however, she has seemingly eliminated the memory of his threats altogether, while still keeping in the kiss and using language vaguely reminiscent of a wedding’s cloaking and bedding: “She could still remember how it felt, when his cruel mouth pressed down on her own. He had come to Sansa in the darkness as green fire filled the sky. He took a song and a kiss, and left me nothing but a bloody cloak”.

2. Sansa’s betrayal of her family in King’s Landing

Sansa and Arya are both criminally unprepared for life at court in AGOT. This is somewhat excusable in that if Jon Arryn hadn’t died, they wouldn’t have needed to be prepared yet. However, anyone with a particle of political sense could have seen that there was a solid 90% possibility of Sansa becoming betrothed to Joffrey someday. There just aren’t that many daughters from the Great Houses of the right age in the Seven Kingdoms at this point in time. Add in the fact that the current king considers Eddard Stark his brother and was once betrothed to a Stark himself, and the likelihood of Sansa being chosen doubles or even triples.

So why haven’t Sansa’s parents and septa furthered her political education beyond knowing her sigils and courtesies? (Both of which are certainly important, but there’s only so far Sansa can go on them alone.) Sansa’s a tad young for a betrothal, but she’s not so young that her parents shouldn’t be making plans in that direction... Catelyn, after all, wasn’t much older than AGOT!Sansa when she was first betrothed to Brandon Stark. And even if they haven’t started making plans for Sansa, it’s very odd that Robb, the heir, is still unbetrothed at fourteen/fifteen.

The real reason, of course, is the Doylist one: GRRM needed to write it that way for the plot to work, just as he needed both Stark girls to be poorly chaperoned and without a proper retinue of ladies-in-waiting. From a Watsonian perspective, however, the primary answer is that both of the Stark parents---but particularly Ned---are suffering from PTSD from the events surrounding Robert’s Rebellion and subconsciously don’t want to teach their children these things or to plan too far ahead into their futures; to do so would mean acknowledging that their children are growing up and will eventually have to leave their circle of protection. This is especially true for their treatment of Sansa and Arya, since according to chivalric sexism, noble girls are ‘innocent’ and in need of protection longer than their male counterparts. Ned Stark in particular seems to feel the urge to shelter and indulge Sansa and Arya, likely due to the trauma of having watched his 16-year-old sister’s death. Besides, there’s always something more immediately urgent, which makes it easy for both parents to procrastinate. This isn’t to say that the Starks didn’t impart valuable lessons to their children, but at the end of the day, they still neglected certain key areas of their children’s education.

Unfortunately, not only are the Stark children unprepared for court politics, but no adult takes any steps to fix this problem once they know that the King is riding to Winterfell. No ‘onscreen’ steps are taken to prepare the Stark girls after Sansa’s betrothal to Joffrey is fixed, nor while traveling on the King’s Road, nor even during their time at King’s Landing. In fact, the closest we see to Sansa getting an education on what ruling might mean is when her septa takes her to watch her father acting as Hand in the throne room, and he is less than pleased about it: “He caught a glimpse of Septa Mordane in the gallery, with his daughter Sansa beside her. Ned felt a flash of anger; this was no place for a girl. But the septa could not have known that today's court would be anything but the usual tedious business of hearing petitions, settling disputes between rival holdfasts, and adjudicating the placement of boundary stones”. On one hand, Ned does have a point in wanting to protect his eleven-year-old daughter from hearing about the Mountain’s deeds; talk about nightmare fuel! On the other hand, he can’t protect her forever, and he brought a seven-year-old boy to watch an execution; there’s clearly a bit of a gender-based double-standard going on here.

Instead, the girls are poorly chaperoned by a single elderly septa, which is just begging for trouble... and trouble indeed arrives, starting with the events on the banks of the Ruby Ford. If Arya had been properly chaperoned, she never would have been able to run off to play with Mycah (the butcher’s boy), and if Sansa had been properly chaperoned, she wouldn’t have been placed in a position where she was the sole eyewitness to the incident with Joffrey, Arya, and Mycah. But that’s just one incident, you say? Don’t worry, there are plenty of others, the clearest one being the time that Septa Mordane gets drunk and falls asleep at a feast, leaving Sansa entirely at the mercy of Joffrey, Sandor, and anyone else who might walk by.

Moreover, Ned knows that the Lannisters aren’t trustworthy. He knows that something is rotten in King’s Landing. Arya gets a very vague warning (“We have come to a dark dangerous place, child. This is not Winterfell. We have enemies who mean us ill. We cannot fight a war among ourselves”) from him, but Sansa doesn’t even get that. I’m not saying that he necessarily should have told Sansa about his investigation, mind you---that’s a large burden to place on any child, AGOT!Sansa is not good at intentional deception yet, and she likely wouldn’t have initially believed him anyway. This doesn’t change the fact that Ned should have told her something to help prepare her for the very real dangers of King’s Landing. He should have known better than to believe that keeping Sansa ignorant would keep her safe; just look at the brutal murders of Aegon and Rhaenys Targaryen for a start...

Yes, the Queen and Prince are directly responsible for Lady’s death, and yes the king is indirectly responsible for not stopping it, but once again: Sansa is a preteen girl. Of course she doesn’t want to believe that the family she’s going to marry into is truly at fault for the loss of her direwolf or that all of her long-held dreams are just illusions. It’s easy as a reader to say that that event and the murder of Mycah should have been warning enough for Sansa, but from Sansa’s perspective it’s not nearly so clear, especially since Joffrey framed his torture of Mycah as traditional courtly behavior (i.e. ‘defending’ Arya, who is a highborn maiden and the sister of his betrothed). For one thing, Sansa doesn’t have all the clues we as readers do to let us know that the Baratheon-Lannisters are Bad News(TM). (In fact, unlike the rest of the Stark children, Sansa has no notion that there might be serious enmity between the houses of Lannister and Stark---as opposed to just between Jaime Lannister and her father---until it’s too late.) For another, while her father might have protested Lady’s execution, he still went along with it in the end without much of a fight, so it’s not as though the royal family are the only ones to have ‘betrayed’ her. Besides, her father is still friends with Robert and she’s still betrothed to Joffrey... that wouldn’t be the case if the royal family was untrustworthy or cruel, would it? Of course not.

When Ned tells the girls that they’re leaving King’s Landing, he never actually explains why and he refuses to let them so much as say goodbye to anyone. It’s only natural that Sansa is confused and upset by this! From her perspective, this drastic action came out of nowhere. She certainly doesn’t understand that going to Cersei is dangerous or a betrayal. She sees it as ‘my father’s being unreasonable, so I’m going to go to my mother(in-law-to-be) and ask her to talk some sense into him and fix everything’.

While Cersei was the one to push for Lady’s death, Sansa has otherwise only ever gotten a sympathetic impression of Cersei; when around Sansa, Cersei has appeared solely as a courteous queen and the dignified victim of her husband’s drunken abuse. If Sansa wants to stay in King’s Landing, who else can she go to? Her father refuses to listen to her protestations or to explain anything to her, her septa only says that she shouldn’t question her father, and most of her other acquaintances don’t have any sway over her father’s decisions. That only leaves the Royal family, but Sansa finds King Robert too intimidating to approach alone. (“The king could command Father to let her stay in King's Landing and marry Prince Joffrey, Sansa knew he could, but the king had always frightened her. He was loud and rough-voiced and drunk as often as not, and he would probably have just sent her back to Lord Eddard, if they even let her see him.”) And although Sansa believes herself in love with her “gallant prince” Joffrey, she seems to find him intimidating too, if this quote of hers from a feast is any indication: “Sansa looked at him and trembled, afraid that he might ignore her or, worse, turn hateful again”. Ultimately, that leaves Cersei as Sansa’s only real choice.

Sansa is short-sighted and selfish when she tells Cersei what little she knows of her father’s plans, but she isn’t actively trying to choose sides in a war, let alone betray anyone. She’s a preteen who just wants her life to go back to what it’s ‘supposed’ to be according to what she’s been taught; what, up until now, it more or less has been. Right now, the worst thing she can imagine happening is what’s already happening---her father forcing her away from the glittering court, from her beloved Joffrey, and from her future as Queen. She knows her father will be angry with her for disobeying him, but it will all work out for the best this way, right?

3. How “great” and “catastrophic” Sansa’s betrayal actually was

Finally, let’s tackle the “great, catastrophic” part of Sansa’s betrayal. When Sansa goes to Cersei, she’s largely only confirming what Cersei already knew. And how did Cersei know this information? Because Eddard Stark himself told her as part of his warning. (In fact, if we go by the calculations by the brilliant people who put this exhaustive ASOIAF spreadsheet together, there were 3-4 days in between when Ned confronted Cersei and when Sansa went to her.) The only new information Sansa provided Cersei with was that her father wanted to get herself and Arya away--something that Cersei had likely already surmised--as well as the date, time, and location for that departure, thus giving Cersei a more complete and specific understanding of Ned’s plans.

In practical terms, this means that the primary consequence of Sansa informing Cersei was to negate Ned’s ability to get Sansa, Arya, and other members of the Stark household safely out of King’s Landing before shit started to go down. (Of course, keep in mind that even if Sansa hadn’t gone to Cersei, the success of that plan wasn’t a forgone conclusion.) Now don’t get me wrong, if Ned’s plan to get his household out of the city had worked, that would have been a tremendous improvement over what happened in the original canon timeline, not only for Sansa and Arya, but also for the many innocent Stark retainers who were killed by guards at the Red Keep and for poor Jeyne Poole. That said, it wouldn’t necessarily have changed all of the catastrophic things that happened to the Stark family as a whole. Chances are good that Ned still would have been executed for his ‘treason’ or been quietly offed in his cell. And once Ned was killed, the North’s involvement in the war became pretty much inevitable. Any consequences beyond that are difficult to accurately predict due to the butterfly effect, but I highly doubt the Starks’ lives would have been all rainbows and butterflies. There’s a war ahead, and their enemies include people like Petyr Baelish, Tywin Lannister, and---unless they end up allying with (f)Aegon in this AU---eventually Varys and Illyrio Mopatis. The remaining Starks’ lives probably would have been less traumatic than in canon, but that’s not exactly a high bar to clear, y’know?

Conclusion:

What happens to the Starks in ASOIAF in general and in AGOT in particular is catastrophic... but Sansa’s actions in AGOT are not the primary cause. Petyr Baelish, Lysa Arryn, the Lannisters, the Boltons, the Freys, Varys... even Ned and Catelyn Stark themselves are more immediately at fault for what befalls the Stark family than Sansa. (Which isn’t to say that all of the above parties are even remotely equally culpable!)

One of Sansa’s tragedies is that she embodies and does everything her society has told her she ought to be and do as a Westerosi noblewoman and she still gets screwed over. Everyone gets screwed over by the Westerosi patriarchy, highborn and low, man and woman; even girls who naturally fit into the mold of Westerosi womanhood and possess almost every possible societal advantage aren’t safe. As many of our protagonists of ASOIAF learn, following the chivalric rules of the songs will aid you to a certain degree, but it will only protect you as long as everyone else is playing by those rules too; and, as Petyr Baelish warns Sansa---though admittedly not without external motives---“life is not a song”.

That said, a portion of the ASOIAF fanbase has misunderstood part of the point of this series. Yes, unalloyed belief in the romantic songs is stupid and will only lead to self-delusion and disaster and heartbreak, but that doesn’t mean that we should discount the songs altogether either. Don’t get me wrong: many of the messages propagated by Sansa’s songs are bullshit. The good are not always beautiful, and the beautiful are not always good. Most people aren’t entirely ‘good’ or ‘bad’. ‘Moral’ choices are not always rewarded and ‘immoral’ choices are not always punished. In fact, there isn’t always a clearcut ‘right’ moral decision available, just different gradients of bad ones. Heroism isn’t always sallying forth with a sword, and sallying forth with a sword is not always heroism. A person’s social status or adherence to social ideals is no indicator of their quality as a person. And so on.

However, it is in romantic songs like the ones that Sansa so loves that we also find ideals worth striving towards... ideals like selfless love, loyalty, justice, kindness, duty, and mercy. Just because those ideals may not reflect reality or may be warped by an imperfect society is no excuse not to try to make them reality when and where we can, whether we are successful in it or not. In fact, it is because reality does not always reflect or reward these ideals that they are so important. Without hope for something better and a willingness to work towards it, we’re left with a world filled with only Tywin Lannisters, Petyr Baelishes, Cersei Lannisters, and Gregor Cleganes... and that would be a sad world indeed.

When Sandor Clegane says the following to Sansa in ACOK, we aren’t supposed to agree with him: “There are no true knights, no more than there are gods. If you can't protect yourself, die and get out of the way of those who can. Sharp steel and strong arms rule this world, don't ever believe any different". The truth lies somewhere in between the brutality of so much of the world and the perfection of the songs. Most knights may not be ‘true’ knights and the ‘truest' of knights may not be actual knights at all, but that doesn’t mean that the concept is without value. That doesn’t mean that the purpose of ‘true’ knights is worthless. You shouldn’t count on being saved by the actions a ‘true’ knight or by acting like a ‘true’ lady, but you should evince the best qualities of those roles yourself.

ASOIAF is absolutely about death and betrayal and despair, but it’s also about love and loyalty and hope. It’s about existential romanticism and existential triumph. It’s about looking the abyss in the eye, but refusing to let yourself become it.

I think you understand this, at least in part, because you yourself say in the introduction that “This [the fact that so many of the characters suffer, often pointlessly, and fail] may sound very bleak and cynical, but it ends up being the glory of the novel. Because it makes the triumphs, when they come, more earned, human, and exciting. It reminds us of and honors our own victories, helps us make sense of our own reversals, and warns us against our vanities.”

A Game of Thrones may not be “very kind to fantasy”, but I would argue that GRRM is quite fond of fantasy; he just wants us to remember that neither the trappings of high fantasy (crowns, tourneys, magic, wars, etc.) nor true heroism ever come without a cost.

In conclusion: I understand where you’re coming from, and I understand that you didn’t have the necessary amount of space in your introduction to go into this level of detail, but... (ง'̀-'́)ง

#am i overreacting here due to YEARS of fans saying that sansa is The Worst Ever(TM) for making this mistake? quite possibly lol #but this is a meta that's been percolating in my head for quite a while & was going to be written even before i read hodgman's intro #sansa stark #asoiaf meta #sansa stark meta #a game of thrones meta #asoiaf #a game of thrones #meta #asoiaf women #things done by phos #long post #team sansa #cersei lannister #eddard stark #arya stark #septa mordane #joffrey baratheon #sandor clegane

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thelioncudgel · 6 years ago

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On Eren and killing two men at age 9

With the whole “is Mikasa giving up on Eren?!” panic caused by the recently released chapter 109, I’ve seen several SnK fans reevaluate Eren and Mikasa’s infamous first meeting and come to some conclusions that are rather unfavourable to Eren. Because I’m nothing if not biased towards my favourite character and because the internet is nothing if not a medium through which to scream one’s opinions into the void, here’s my defence of young Eren’s actions on that rainy day.

Seeing the bloody corpses of two brutally murdered innocents at age nine is traumatising. Even if you didn’t personally know the people in question, even if you’ve seen death before, it’s traumatising (not to mention Eren might’ve even been informed that Grisha was doing a home visit to check Mrs. Ackerman for a pregnancy). Given the face he makes after catching sight of the Ackermans’ corpses, given that it takes him several long moments to come back to reality and realise his father is speaking to him, I'd say Eren is no exception. It should come as no surprise to anyone that trauma of this sort can cause drastic changes in mindset and erratic behaviour, especially in such young victims. Though in Eren’s case, I believe it’s in his nature to react to fear, righteous anger and sadness with a desire for revenge on those causing them.

Eren doesn’t set out to find and rescue Mikasa because he’s a bloodthirsty little psycho and wants to kill her kidnappers just for the hell of it; he does it because of his frankly ruthless inborn sense of justice. He could just stay out of danger and go wait for the Military Police to arrive like Grisha ordered him to, but instead he decides to track down known murderers to rescue a girl he’s never even met before, because he’s afraid that the MPs might not make it in time to save her. It’s extremely reckless, but shows impressive moral fibre and bravery for a nine-year-old.

Some people seem to think that Eren just straight-up shanking the kidnappers was extreme, but to me it was actually the best course of action he could take. Again, he’s nine years old, and thus by definition smaller and much weaker than the 2+ adult thugs he’s up against, thugs who are working together and clearly not too fussed about eliminating those who get in their way. Knocking someone out without a baseball bat or chloroform is more difficult than TV would have you believe, especially when you can’t even reach your targets’ heads. If Eren went with the more peaceful route and tried to sneak past them to free Mikasa, there was a chance he’d be discovered and abducted as well, or just killed like Mikasa’s parents. If Eren took the kidnappers by surprise and managed to kill them before they could fight back, though, he and Mikasa would be safe beyond all doubt (“Win, and you live”): so that’s the path he chose. And when you think about it, if there hadn’t been a third kidnapper or if Eren had known about him beforehand, Eren’s plan would actually have gone off without a hitch.

As for Eren killing the thugs “in cold blood”, I haven’t re-read the manga’s earlier chapters in a while, but in the anime at least, Eren has tears in his eyes as he stabs the kidnappers’ leader over and over, and frankly looks just as much terrified as angry; and I always read the repeated stabbing not as a fit of psychotic violence but instead as Eren frantically making sure the kidnapper would be unable to retaliate and possibly hurt him or Mikasa: “Don’t get up anymore!” Even Eren’s screams of “This is what you deserve!” sound kind of like he’s reassuring himself that he’s justified in killing them. (Though admittedly, the fact that Eren only needs a few moments of panting to calm down before freeing Mikasa while looking suddenly completely unbothered is unnerving.)

To sum things up, I never found Eren’s willingness to kill the kidnappers to save Mikasa unnatural or scary. If anything, it was a wise choice, and is probably the only thing that saved Mikasa’s chance at a normal life—and his and Mikasa’s lives in general.

That, and Mikasa’s right: it’s a cruel world they live in, a much harsher world than the safe, cushy one most readers of SnK were born to. Of course Eren wouldn’t have the same qualms about executing murderers as the average 21st century person: Eren was born in Shiganshina, only a Wall away from titan territory, so not only has he probably heard titans moving around, clawing at the Wall and groaning from time to time since childhood, he’s probably seen several Survey Corps platoons come back from expeditions to the outside world in bloody tatters as well. Moreover, Eren is the son of a renowned doctor in a mostly-medieval town—and the best friend of a “heretic”, living in a society where people who wonder too loudly about the outside world are at risk of being “disappeared” by the government. My point is, even at age nine, Eren has no doubt seen some shit if his lukewarm reaction to the whole Moses thing in episode 1 was any indication. To Eren, death isn’t just some vaguely frightening idea he won’t have to confront until he’s old and grey—death is a fact of life, so of course he wouldn’t have the same moral objections to dealing it out to slavers as a 21st century first-worlder.

You could argue that Eren’s lack of reaction after killing the kidnappers is abnormal, and I’d agree on some level. It is weird for a nine-year-old to be able to rationalise and come to terms with killing two people so quickly, but there’s a good explanation even for that:

Eren is a very straightforward kid who sees the world in black and white. In his eyes, you stop being human the moment you kill an innocent—even more so if you kill two of them in their own home and go on to plan to sell their young daughter off as a sex slave. In Eren’s mind, the Survey Corps fight titans because they’re monsters who kill humans for sport and steal away humanity’s freedom by forcing them to live penned in within the Walls; and the kidnappers are more or less the same on a smaller scale, since they killed the Ackermans and wanted to steal their daughter’s freedom by selling her into slavery. So why shouldn’t Eren kill them, if it means saving Mikasa from that fate?

Again, Eren didn’t set out to murder himself some criminals, but to rescue Mikasa. While I don’t support the death penalty, in my opinion, putting down three unrepentant murderers and flesh traders to save a traumatised, freshly orphaned little girl from a life as a sex slave shouldn’t weigh too heavily on anyone’s conscience. And I’m not surprised it didn’t seem to weigh much on Eren “Determinator” Yeager’s. Obviously the guy who one day wouldn’t let having his leg bitten off and his face dragged across an entire rooftop’s worth of tiles stop him from saving his best friend, wouldn’t let a small thing like killing some “beasts in human form” stop him from saving an innocent little girl. Sure, that kind of resolve, that willingness to take a life if necessary, is scary to see in a nine-year-old, but that’s just the kind of person Eren is.

Now I’m not denying that Eren has screamingly obvious anger issues, since I’d like to believe I’m not completely stupid. But he’s not a psychopath by any means. Eren cares deeply for his family and friends, and really is a friendly, loyal, empathetic guy between his bouts of admittedly frightening rage. Really, it’s the fact that he feels so deeply, positive and negative emotions alike, that make him such a fearsome opponent to his enemies. It’s because of his strong sense of justice that he’s willing to kill. It’s because he loves so much and so hard that he’ll never forgive those who hurt his loved ones.

You can like Eren Yeager or hate him, but that doesn’t change the fact that his actions the day he saved Mikasa were calculated, sane and, in the context of SnK’s bloody world, even right.

#snk #aot #snk 109 #eren yeager #mikasa ackerman #my post

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transannabeth · 7 years ago

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book battles: the queen’s poisoner

the queen’s poisoner by jeff wheeler

note: listened to on audiobook on kindle unlimited

2.5/5

i know that probably seems like a low rating (booktubers i’ve seen tend to say 3s are mediocre at best) but i’m not sure how i want to rate yet and this feels right, plus i have a very mixed opinion of this book

[click to read more]

the first thing i have to say is that this review is spoiler free and relatively short in comparison to what i actually want to say in full. i finished this book about a week ago and i’ve been thinking about it on and off and i think i’d like to do a full video review on this maybe, but we’ll see

so i listened to this audiobook and it is l o n g. it’s 10 hours which actually isn’t that long, and the book itself (goodreads says about 336 pages) isn’t all that long either. however, this book for me was slow. i’m actually amazed i got through it because it honestly felt like it was dragging so much. it would feel like hours passed without anything happening. about 23% into the book i started thinking ‘ok when will this pick up’. the answer was that i started to get invested in the actual plot about an hour before the audio finished.

so not great

something that i think dragged the book along was the clunky exposition. as it’s the first book in the series, there was a lot of word building to be done, but i could hardly keep up with all the names that were tossed around. i think that may have been easier for me to grasp if i were reading instead of listening, but lords’ names would be said and i would have no idea if that person had been spoken about before. at times, the exposition was pretty clunky, especially when characters were expositing during dialogues. there were a few times where a character sat another down and just talked for a while and suddenly you were like oh but the fact remains that there wasn’t a lot of foreshadowing to those moments and it usually just felt like an info dump to me

i wanted more about the magic, more about the superstitions and religion. i think that may be a part of the next book but i don’t know if i’ll be reading that one frankly

character wise, it was...ehhhh. i actually kept thinking for the first half of the book the author was going to do a time jump and age owen up, and i’m actually really disappointed that they didn’t. partly because eight year olds can’t do that much even in medieval times and partly because owen didn’t feel like an eight year old

i know he’s gone through a lot and everything is very intense, but i’ve worked with eight year olds and honestly the only time owen felt like an eight year old was with evie— who was my favorite by the way

at first, evie annoyed me but she quickly became my favorite. she had a good energy and she was fun. she made owen seem like a little kid, she made me enjoy the book and it seemed to pick up with her around, even if they were just jumping in a fountain

other thoughts really quickly: i thought it was relatively predictable. i don’t really care for politics so that may have been why i didn’t enjoy it that much. the king and elyse bothered me no matter what was happening and made me want to stop even more. people of color..where?

overall, i liked this book’s concepts more than it’s execution of it’s concepts. i like it more now that i’m not listening to it and just thinking about the parts that i like, but honestly, the listening experience wasn’t that great. if you noticed i didn’t really name any other characters, it’s because i didn’t really care for any of them all that much, yes including owen’s mother figure. that’s just how it goes sometimes, you know?

2.5/5 stars

also. stiev. the audiobook pronounced it like steve. it was impossible to take seriously

#the queen's poisoner #the queens poisoner #book reviews #booklr #book review #battlingbooks #not pjo #ive got one more review to post maybe tomorrow and ill be caught up and ready for next week #lmk if you hate these

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warsofasoiaf · 7 years ago

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Medium Cavalry Continued

Continued from here

Thanks for letting me post my little essay and for your reply. This has helped me get put a few half-baked thoughts into words and look at them.

I’d agree with you that a lot of our disagreement is over terminology rather than actual history, with only some minor disagreements about interpretations of history, which I’ll get to a little later.

Regarding terminology, what do you consider the “battlefield”? If most actions are small scale raids, where one side has stopped to put on mail before ambushing or surprising another side who are riding without armour, does that conflict take place on a battlefield? Are the skirmishes between scouts taking place on a battlefield? These scenarios constitute the largest part of medieval cavalry warfare in the period under discussion, with full scale battles being relatively rare. Even then, in the lead up to them the scouting continues, and the rearguard or a flying vanguard might be unarmoured. In these scenarios the knights are acting as light cavalry, and yet they are capable of donning armour, getting into formation and making a disciplined charge on the enemy.

I think this is our key element of disagreement. You see the knight’s primary purpose as acting as heavy cavalry, while I think that the primary purpose of a knight was to do whatever was required of him, which included acting as light cavalry almost as often as acting like heavy cavalry.

Regarding infantry, I definitely agree that large elements of it were frequently of poor quality, especially if there weren’t any dismounted knights there to stiffen them. Mostly these were town militias or peasants raised in defence of their county, but the experienced mercenary infantry and the knights themselves in some cases (especially in early Anglo-Norman warfare) could also form large parts of an infantry force and stand ready. That they might only need to stand two deep in order to stop a head on cavalry charge speaks volumes for the inability of the period’s cavalry to break through in a direct attack, unlike other contemporary heavy cavalry or much later heavy cavalry.

In some rare cases the infantry could even attack with some effect - at Hastings, for example, the Anglo-Saxon infantry (I generally disagree with the use of the term huscarl to describe them, but that’s a topic for another discussion) very nearly defeated the Norman cavalry after their feigned flight. Bishop Guy of Amiens' Carmen de Hastingae Proelio, the source written soonest after the battle, mentions that the Anglo-Saxons advanced mostly in good order and that William’s cavalry were only able to pick off those who had broken away from the formation. The cavalry was unable to sustain them and were in danger of fleeing once the rumour of William’s death went around. Only the renewed attacks following William rallying his men again managed to turn things around again and destroy the infantry which had come forward. This record has led to some speculation that the Anglo-Saxon advance might have been less of a headlong rush than a planned maneuver that was either executed too soon or which wasn’t fully supported by the center.

Of course, Hastings is something of an exceptional example. Almost all infantry of the period was defensive in nature, using natural barriers (or “crown” formations) where possible to offset their obvious weaknesses.

As to training, there’s recently been some dispute over that. Aldo A. Settia has recently shown evidence of the Italian militias training, and casts doubt on whether the militias north of the Alps were any different (JMMH vol. 11). Infantry were also a big part of tournaments, and while we don’t have much information on how often they actually fought in them and whether they were used against cavalry or infantry most often, I don’t see why they can’t have trained through these less lethal battles as knights were*. The battlefield is a third, harsher method of training and, quite apart from mercenaries who went from war to war, we see those towns more involved in warfare develop quite a bit of skill in war craft.

*I only just now realised the potential implications of this. I’m so glad we had this conversation!

Regarding how knights attacked, while I agree with the idea that, when they could they looked for weak points or attacked on the flank, but disagree in that I think this was not universal. At Bourgtheroulde, for example, the rebels charged straight on against what was a force of mostly dismounted knights with a forward line of archers. Other battles have conflicting or unclear descriptions. The Battle of the Standard might have seen a successful flank attack that failed by be followed through, or it might have seen an unsuccessful charge against one wing. It all depends on which author you read.

I’m looking forward to your further thoughts!

I’m actually going to tag this “hergrim” along with the other aspects of this discussion. It’s a fine one and I want people to be able to find it quickly and have it all on one page for easier consumption.

I actually don’t see our disagreement as a major thing. You are saying that a knight was capable and often did perform a light infantry role when the objectives demanded as such, and I don’t deny that. All units are meant to fulfill the strategic and tactical objectives set out at the initial level. Knights were often exceptional horsemen, and they might need to perform scouting in an era where riders were the primary method of reconnaissance. Just like any other unit, all were subject to the whims and needs of the mission. Knights often charged in gaps or on flanks, and I agree this wasn’t universal, simply a common technique and a good best practice. Even Alexander’s Companions looked to charge and exploit gaps. At least from what I understand which may be wrong or right, your designation of medium cavalry is to denote that they were often called upon to perform light cavalry, and that their armor and barding wasn’t heavy enough with the later-era plate or the Byzantine cataphractoi so as to warrant a new term, to help draw a distinction. I certainly can appreciate the idea and effort, anything that makes the study more precise is welcome. I consider though, the knightly role in European combat, this heavy cavalry role, to be so critical to the function of the knight that the term is sufficient, and that the light cavalry functions that the knight could carry out were simply part of the nature of war; all things must bow before the need to accomplish the objective.

The issue of “what is the battlefield” is a question that frustrates much, and the answers have a lot of implications for modern warfare from a tactical and moral standpoint. It almost feels like the Potter Stewart standard at times, it’s clear what a battle is when we see one, with lines being drawn up and armies moving into position. Ambushes are battles, merely not setpiece ones.

While I agree that a good infantry formation can avoid a head-on charge with discipline, training, and equipment, there was also flanking, gaps to be exploited, sudden movements or collapses, that did make even experienced infantry lines vulnerable to exploitation by cavalry, and we do see plenty of examples in history of a successful, well-positioned knightly charge causing enough disruption to force a rout. Depending on the specific type of battle, the proportion of levy troops versus professional, semi-professional, and quasi-professional troops in the composition of infantry would have vastly differing levels of drill, control, and morale.

I’m not sure about the objection of huscarl, I’ve always heard the term used as a personal infantry retainer of a landed noble, which was what the Anglo-Saxons used as their experienced infantry core along with their thegns. supplemented by the less-experienced fyrdsmen. As always with everything, reality is far more complex, but that can be handled at another time.

As for the infantry and training, it primarily comes down to the economics and structure of the medieval government. The knight’s fees to support the knight and the personal retinues could get full training, and then depending on the strength of the government, there were efforts to fund training and equipment with varying degrees of success. The Asize of Arms, for example, was a great idea though the training component was not very well-enforced, simply because the royal government lacked the ability to inspect the use of the practice ranges. Medieval governments were much better at ad hoc initiatives, securing goose feathers from the people to make arrows for a war effort and the like. So we see, as far as infantry is concerned, a sliding scale of readiness and equipment based on holdings and wealth, with again, the Asize being a wonderful tool to help break it up for the time period. My own personal scale, professional, semi-professional, and quasi-professional, I’ve discussed shortly here. Not an official designation that I’ve made into categories, that would be a hefty project requiring so much investigation into kingdoms and eras, but a nifty short-hand I use on this blog to help explain that any random dude pulled off the medieval battlefield and examined could be quite different than the next random dude.

At Hastings, I’ve heard that theory that the good order suggests that it was an advance that was either prompted too early, or a signal was misinterpreted somewhere. I’ve also heard that it was an early move that later turned into a too-far advance, Godwinson wanted them back on the good ground and took the bait. Sadly, I’ve not seen enough compelling evidence for any theory to be more true than another.

-SLAL

#medium cavalry #hergrim #tactics #strategy #cavalry #submission

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douchebagbrainwaves · 4 years ago

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IF YOU CAN FIND JUST ONE USER WHO REALLY NEEDS SOMETHING AND CAN ACT ON THAT NEED, YOU'VE GOT A TOEHOLD IN MAKING SOMETHING PEOPLE WANT THAT MATTERS, NOT JOINING THE GROUP

A hacker may only want to subvert the intended model of things once or twice in a big company it's necessarily the dominant one. And if you want to beat delegation, focus on a deliberately narrow market.1 We wrote what was, 700 years ago, fascinating and urgently needed work. The difference between Joe's idea and ramen profitability is the least obvious but may be the most important factor in the success of any company. VCs to invest in their portfolio companies. They just had us tuned out. The wrong people like it. As an outsider, you're just one step away from getting things done.2 These people might be your employees, or you have to make a lot of squawking coming from my hen house one night, I'd want to go straight there, blustering through obstacles, and hand-waving your way across swampy ground.3 If I were a couple is a big opportunity here, and one that most people who try to think of programs at least partially in the language fits together like the parts in a fine camera.4

It's easy to see how little launches matter. But surely a necessary, if not better, at least. They haven't decided what they'll do afterward. Fritz Kunze's official biography carefully avoids mentioning the L-word. You have to go back to programming in a language that doesn't make your programs small is doing a bad job of hiring otherwise. In the real world, you can't repeal totalitarianism if it turns out you can do all-encompassing redesigns. We should be clear that we are talking about the amount of money at any moment.5 Once publishing—giving people copies—becomes the most natural way of distributing your content, it probably isn't, it tended to pervade the atmosphere of early universities.

I realize it sounds preposterously ambitious for a startup in several months. If you take VC money, they won't let you sell early. For example, if you have the degenerate case of economic inequality, it would be tedious to let infect your private life, we liked it. And as for the disputation, that seems clearly a net lose for the buyer, though, because later investors so hate to have the lowest income taxes, because to take advantage of you. Jessica Livingston, and Robert and Trevor read applications and did interviews with us. For example, it would keep going, but there are signs it might be.6 They remind us where we come from. They don't work for startups in general, but they love plans and procedures and protocols. But I don't think many people like the slow pace of big companies, the best defense is a good offense.

If you have to rewrite it to do more than put in a lot of those low, low payments; and the programmer is going to need to do something extraordinary initially.7 The Pebbles assembled the first several hundred watches themselves.8 The reason investors can get away with being nasty to. The evolution of technology. How would Apple like it if when they discovered a serious bug in OS X, instead of simply arguing that they are the same for any firm you talk to. Let me conclude with some tactical advice. They haven't decided what they'll do afterward. I had a choice of a spending the next hour wandering about, was there any sort of work I liked that much.

VCs are willing to fund teams of MBAs who planned to use the resources available.9 The paperwork for convertible debt is simpler. Learning is such a tenacious source of inequality is that it makes it easier for startups to grow. In cold places that margin gets trimmed off. There is no longer much left to copy before the language you've made is Lisp. Do not, however, tell A who B is. Perl is as big as the ones I've discussed, don't make a direct frontal attack on it.

Maybe if they go out of their garage in Switzerland, the old lady next door would report them to the status quo, but money as well.10 Jessica was its mom. Hacking is something you write in order to read Aristotle.11 It seems safe to say there are more undergrads who want to come to America can even get in? They want there to be a deal; so there must be a reason. Whichever route you take, expect a struggle.12 Want to make someone dislike a book?13 You had to grow fast. Not necessarily. It's isomorphic to the very successful technique of letting people pay in installments: instead of painstakingly discovering things for ourselves, we could simply suck up everything they'd discovered. After further testing, it turned out to be an old and buggy one.

You'll certainly like meeting them. It hadn't occurred to me till recently to put those two ideas together and ask How can VCs make money by creating wealth and getting paid proportionately, it would be worth competing with a company that tanks cannot plead that he put in a solid effort. It's striking how often programmers manage to hit all eight points by accident.14 But it would not be for most biotech startups, for example. Wealth can be created without being sold. In a sense, at least for a while in Florence. But it's harder than it looks.15 For example, one way or the other, like a skateboard. If you ever got me, you wouldn't have a clue what to do, because it will have a large Baumol penumbra around it: anyone who could get them published.16 If you take VC money, they won't let you. Money is a side effect of making them celebrities.17 Cross out that final S and you're describing their business model.18

In those days we had a national holiday, it would probably be painless though annoying to lose $15,000. Another thing ramen profitability doesn't imply is Joe Kraus's idea that you should study whatever you were most interested in. I wasn't even learning what the choices were, let alone which to choose.19 Before we had kids, YC was more or less our life.20 In my case they were effectively aversion therapy. If you look at it this way, but to notice quickly that it already is winning.21 And when you see something that's merely reacting to new technology in an attempt to preserve some existing source of revenue. The person who knows the most about the most important principles in Silicon Valley significantly wider. But schools change slower than scholarship: the study of ancient texts had such prestige that it remained the backbone of education until the late 19th century. Think of some successful startups. Partly because some companies use mechanisms to prevent copying.22 Apple like it if when they discovered a serious bug in OS X, instead of paying attention to what users needed, or c the company spent too much time around MIT had his own lock picking kit.23

Notes

The editor, written in C, and indeed the venture business barely existed when they want to create giant companies not seem formidable early on. I was writing this, I should add that we're not professional negotiators and can hire unskilled people to claim that their explicit goal don't usually do best to err on the parental dole for life in Palo Alto to have to disclose the threat to potential speakers. One year at Startup School David Heinemeier Hansson encouraged programmers who wanted to make it harder for Darwin's contemporaries to grasp this than we can respond by simply removing whitespace, periods, commas, etc. Steven Hauser.

Basically, the LPs who invest in it.

Well, of S P 500 CEOs in the Neolithic period. Within an hour most people come to you; who knows who you might see something like the intrusive ads popular on Delicious, but you should. Though in a place where few succeed is hardly free. 16%.

So if it's dismissed, it's probably good grazing. Mueller, Friedrich M.

Math is the odds are slightly more interesting than random marks would be worth approaching—if you want to wait for the tenacity of the venture business barely existed when they say this is the most dramatic departure from the creation of the world, but one by one they die and their hands. It seems we should be working on what you launch with, you won't be trivial. So it's hard to grasp the distinction between money and wealth. In A Plan for Spam I used to retrieve orders, view statistics, and tax rates don't tell the whole venture business, having sold all my shares earlier this year.

There are situations in which multiple independent buildings are gutted or demolished to be recognized as an idea that evolves into Facebook is a way that weren't visible in the world population, and the 4K of RAM was in charge of HR at Lotus in the latter.

This is an instance of a problem later. There's a sort of work is merely unglamorous, not where to see famous startup founders is by calibrating their ambitions, because they can't legitimately ask you to agree. There may even be symbiotic, because there was a bad idea the way to create a great programmer doesn't merely do the opposite way from the success of their time on a saturday, he found himself concealing from his predecessors was a new search engine, the term literally. Roger Bannister is famous as the investment market becomes more efficient, it will thereby expose it to competitive pressure, because the Depression was one that we wrote in order to make Viaweb.

San Jose. Like early medieval architecture, impromptu talks are made of spolia. The Quotable Einstein, Princeton University Press, 1983.

Emmett Shear, and they succeeded.

This is a facebook exclusively for college students. Any plan in 2001, but you get paid much.

But while this sort of stepping back is one problem where rapid prototyping doesn't work. For the price of a city's potential as a kid was an executive.

E-Mail. Instead of making the things you sell.

Hackers don't need that recipe site or local event aggregator as much time it filters down to zero, which was acquired for 50 million, and he was notoriously improvident and was troubled by debts all his life. He did eventually graduate at about 26. Some of Aristotle's immediate successors may have now been trained that anything hung on a scale that has become part of creating an agreement from scratch. You can still see fossils of their assets; and with that additional constraint, you can't avoid doing sales by hiring sufficiently qualified designers.

If they were.

No VC will admit they're influenced by confidence. A P supermarket chain because it has to grind.

To a kid. So where do we draw the line? I'm using these names as we think.

And perhaps even worse in the computer, the only companies smart enough to convince at one point a competitor added a feature to their software that doesn't have to act against their own itinerary through no-land, while we were quite sore from VCs attempting to probe our nonexistent database orifice. Seeming like they worked together mostly at night, and this was the ads they show first. Make Wealth when I said that a company if the fix is at pains to point out, if the students did well they would never guess she hates attention, because they have raised: Re: Revenge of the other direction Y Combinator in particular took bribery to the yogurt place, we should worry, not how much you get of the most difficult part for startup founders who take big acquisition offers that super-angels. Ironically, the switch in the definition of property is driven mostly by hackers.

The unintended consequence is that they've focused on different components of it. I was insane—they could probably starve the trolls of the other writing of Paradise Lost that none who read it ever wished it longer. If you look at what Steve Jobs got pushed out by Mitch Kapor, is rated at-1. No, we don't want to take care of one's markets is ultimately just another way in which practicing talks makes them overbuild: they'll create huge, analog brain state.

After a while we were quite sore from VCs attempting to probe our nonexistent database orifice. I got it wrong in How to Make Wealth when I became an employer. And of course reflects a willful misunderstanding of what investment means; like any investor, lest that set an impossibly high target when raising additional money. Instead of the reason this trick works so well.

If a man has good corn or wood, or some vague thing like that. Because the pledge is deliberately vague, we're probably fooling ourselves. Money, prestige, and average with the other sense of mission.

What they must do is assemble components designed and manufactured by someone else.

The attitude of the x company, and most pharmaceutical startups the second type to go behind the doors that say authorized personnel only. Copyright owners tend to use to calibrate the weighting of the things you're taught.

When I talk about startups.

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