#Melisande Shahrizai

[queer-book-character-tournament]

Character, book, and author names under the cut

Will Darling/Kim Secretan- The Will Darling Adventures by KJ Charles

Phèdre nó Delaunay/Melisande Shahrizai- Kushiel’s Dart by Jacqueline Carey

Gideon Drake/Nico de Varona- The Atlas Six by Olivie Blake

Rhy Maresh/Alucard Emery- Shade of Magic Series by Victoria Schwab

[zareleonis]

"Kushiel's Dart II," acrylic & colored pencil, 10.75x15", 2016 by Tran Nguyen

[goblins-riddles-or-frocks]

melisande shahrizai if you read this I’m free on thursday night and would like to hang out. please respond to this and then hang out with me on thursday night when I’m free

[vifetoile]

Melisande Shahrizai, Phedre no Delauney, and the angel Kushiel

An illustration for Kushiel's Dart. It's super sketchy but I really like it. I might develop it more.

[nanshe-of-nina]

Kushiel's Legacy GIF sets || Melisande Shahrizai

To describe Melisande Shahrizai is, as the poets say, to paint a nightingale’s song; it is a thing which cannot be done. She was three-and-twenty years of age at that time, though time never seemed to touch her, either way it flowed. If I say her skin was like alabaster, her hair a black so true it gleamed blue where the light touched it and her eyes a sapphire that gemstones might envy, I speak only the truth; but she was a D’Angeline, and this only hints at the beginning of beauty. “Melisande,” Delaunay said, pride and amusement in his voice. “This is Phèdre.” As I am D’Angeline and Night Court-born, you may be sure, I am not easily awed by beauty; but I am what I am, and there are other things that awe me. The Shahrizai are an ancient house of courtiers, and many, knowing little of the nomenclature of Terre d’Ange, suppose they are of Shemhazai’s lineage. It is not so. The namesakes among the descendants of Elua’s Companions are intertwined in such a way that only a D’Angeline scholar can comprehend them. I, who had studied such things, had no need of history to tell me House Shahrizai’s lineage. When I glanced up politely to meet the blue eyes of Melisande Shahrizai, her look went through me like a spear, my knees turned to water, and I knew that she was a scion of Kushiel.

[hussyknee]

There's something about Kushiel's Mercy that doesn't feel like an Imriel book. It feels like he's regressed somehow. The mass brainwashing spell in the first hundred pages smack dab in Terre D'Ange feels jarring. The magic in the other books is much more arcane and exotic, both plausible and implausible because it doesn't happen in Terre D'Ange, where it's all about court intrigue.

And I still don't care about Sidonie. Like I'm glad Imriel's finally happy but I don't feel this grand love of theirs. It feels like telling instead of showing. She's almost a cardboard cutout of a Strong Female Character for the sake of plot, which is strange because all the other women are so three dimensional.

Otoh, Melisande shines like a jewel in this one scene. I hated her throughout (SHE GOT ANAFIEL AND ALCOUIN KILLED DIEEEEE) up until she said in her letters that she had loved Imriel beyond reason and counted all his tiny fingers and toes and wouldn't let anyone feed him but her. It was the first human glimpse of what had until then been a completely awful, cruel, cold-blooded woman. And now in this book—her grief and helplessness at what had happened to Imriel, finally realising all the pain she had caused and the weight of her crimes, accepting that her son owes her nothing and he deserves to hate her— it's really sad and touching. This is the scene that finally makes her a remarkable character for me because, while evil does nothing for me, repentance is something I live for.

And I mean repentance instead of redemption, because some characters can't be redeemed in a narrative without diluting the tragedy of their victims. Redemption demands the shifting of focus from the pain of the victims to the guilt of the perpetrator. It's that choice that holds up a mirror to the real world— who we find worthy of forgiveness, why we want them redeemed and why we make the choice to let the reality of the victims become background for the villain's interiority. It's the difference between villain apologia and villain appreciation. At this point, Melisande's repentance enhances her character as a villain while not losing focus of its cost. I really hope the rest of the book doesn't muck it up.

[floatsonabigballoon28]

Turns out it was Cassiel's protection from bare embarrassment as my friend slumbered next to me that night.

--

The way I cried out untouched when Melisande cut her skin a thousand times.

My Kindle cutting out just when Melisande comes to ask Kushiel's Chosen if she's free on the Longest Night

Homophobic really

[nightmarefuele]

@kinomorebi || astarion.

She wonders if they're stalling.

The last time they were commissioned a hunting party of this size, there'd been a small colony of needle blights intumescing on the Cursed Lands. She hadn't even quite needed the numbers then—might've been simpler, in fact, without them. All that metal-plated trampling around. The stop-starting, Waiting here, We need to rest.

The day's as golden out there, overtop the swathe of darkwood trees, as the encroaching dusk. She'd rather not rest. All these Courcel swords for a few, hunger-blind vampires, when the spawn are more than likely crouched up someplace waiting out the sun.

‘Might I petition you for whatever is the holdup, Sir Blain?’

Melisande's voice floats, but manifests no pretense of request.

Blain half-turns his face. He's a drop in the inert river of soldiers dappling down the valleyside. He tries to pretend he doesn't have to look up to see her; that the black, glossed stallion shifting on its legs isn't in his way. ‘Some animal. Maybe. Not to worry, Lady, not to—’

There's a whimper before the bark—the Courcel dogs smell something, and she does, too. She nudges her heels back and peels off into the undergrowth.

She finds them in a clearing, backed by the wet smell of mildew and moss. Pulls up, folding over the reins. The wind whips her eyes into a sharper gaze; yellow, a green sort of gold. Like something smoldering in a midday dark. They're a three-person guard in the cavity beneath her, each of them faltering when she appears. Perhaps because they've heard strange whispers; rumors of dark, ancient things. Or perhaps not—her name carries the only real weight, here.

They're blocking her view of their quarry. The dogs strain at their leashes, snapping and wet in the teeth. Melisande heightens up on her spine.

‘What's this, then?’

[algolagniaa]

goblin pig friend super super judges me for finding Melisande Shahrizai hot which is the tiniest bit hypocritical considering she is the goblin pig friend

[lightsaroundyourvanity]

the thing about melisande shahrizai is that at the end of the day she does kind of win and that wins my heart

[malkaleh]

Aloe vera, palm tree!

palm tree ⇢ do you have a fictional villain you shouldn’t like but love regardless? Listen Melisande Shahrizai has committed like at least eleven different kinds of treason before breakfast, caused genuinely horrible shit to happen to the protagonist and her loved ones. But also she’s a competent as hell hot woman (see I don’t actually think she would have been a bad ruler). Also I am so so here for the villain who genuinely loves three (3) people (in this case it’s her son (and her grandchildren), the main character and the main characters mentor figure) and really really genuinely does not want anything to happen to those people and is Extremely Angry when it does. (She absolutely did not intend the horrible things to happen to the protagonist).

Aloe vera is answered <3.

[zareleonis]

Details of "Kushiel's Dart II," acrylic & colored pencil, 10.75x15", 2016 by Tran Nguyen

[goblins-riddles-or-frocks]

[vifetoile]

in related news, I kind of want to draw Phedre no Delaunay and Melisande Shahrizai as a duelist and the Rose Bride, except... I'm not sure who would be which.

[nanshe-of-nina]

Kushiel’s Legacy GIF sets || Suriah

“I do my best.” Jareth smiled gently. “You remember Suriah? She is my Second now.” …  At the far end of the hall, a table was set on a dais for Prince Baudoin and a select few. Suriah was there; the Prince was feeding her tidbits by hand. Melisande Shahrizai looked amused. “She was the Winter Queen.” “It gave her a lot of status.” Jareth's voice changed, turning pragmatic, adept to adept. “People still tell the story every Midwinter, I'd have been a fool to choose anyone else.”  He had never been a fool. “No,” I said, agreeing. “You made the right choice.” Even from a distance, I could see that her pallid beauty had already peaked, and there was no evidence in her of the unexpected steel that lay beneath the delicate veneer of the few rare adepts who survived the loss of youth's tender bloom. I did not think Suriah would live to make Dowayne, and I felt sorry for her. “She was always kind to me.”

[ladyadrasteia666]

Hello! This is a sharing question! "What's your favourite quote that says something about love?" After answering go share and ask other people!

Oh, gosh... I have answered this question before, but I think I can choose a different quote this time.

This quote is beloved by me, and said by a character named Melisande Shahrizai in the book "Kushiel's Dart" by Jacqueline Carey. The book may be a bit of a rough read, but it's filled with sensuality, political intrigue, espionage, and conspiracy. Highly recommend it. Anyway... To the quote!

"Oh, love and hate are two sides of the same blade," she said cheerily enough, motioning for a servant to take my cloak, "and an edge finer honed than yon Cassiline's dagger divides them."

It is to say that the true opposite of love or hate is apathy. Hatred and love are both driven by a type of passion, and that edge can flip either way with ease.

Hope you enjoy the answer dear! May you have a wonderful and safe holiday. Much love!

🫶🫶🫶