#Rapha's Bloodlines tag

[gravedangerahead]

It might sound like I claim every single ship I like is autist4adhd, but you have to take into consideration the fact that I'm always right and have great taste

[acesydneysage]

Reasons why The Indigo Spell is my favorite Bloodlines book:

Witchcraft! So much cool witchy stuff!

Sydney and Adrian aren't together yet, and there's resisting and pining and oh, but they give in and make out every 50 pages or so

HOPPER THE TINY DEMON DRAGON

How much of a goner Sydney is from page one, she thinks about Adrian constantly and misses him the second they're apart, while telling herself that the idea that she's "already halfway in love with him" is crazy

How insanely bad Adrian is at "loving from afar"

Adrian making heart eyes at Sydney while she throws fire balls

Sydney watching Adrian paint and going MINE

Crossword in the airplane scene, just how well Adrian knows her

Sydney actively going against the Alchemists, questioning what they tell her and being resentful of how they used her

"His face was the picture of perfect politeness and restraint, meaning something disastrous was probably about to happen."

THE DANCE

Oh no, I'm completely horrified at the idea of having to touch and dance with a vampire, I'm not thinking about when he kissed me at all

Sydney and Ms. Terwilliger actually developing a mentorship, Ms. T driving herself to the ground to protect Sydney and Sydney saving her

Talking about Ms. T: "He looks like he would do anything for you" She met him once! Captain of the ship! Well, Jill's first mate, anyway

Sydney and Adrian playing supernatural detectives!!!

The kiss at the college party

Adrian looks at Sydney's aura and almost explicitly states that she's demisexual

"I'm a quick study"

Alicia is a cool villain

Malachi Wolf is back and has a squirrel cookie jar, and Sydney can't wait to tell Adrian about it, momentarily forgetting she's supposedly leaving for Mexico

The whole melodramatic set up for their kiss and first date in the end is so, so Adrian, and he found a place Sydney would adore

If anyone wants to explain what their favorite book in the series is and why, please tag me :)

[gravedangerahead]

Zoe Sage's ever expanding lesbian polycule now thought to cover as far as Russia, say experts

[activatingaggro]

[OC]TOBER DAY 1 (OLDEST)

My blog has been pretty dead as of late, so I’m going to be doing the OCTober’s meta posts, too. uwu Because I do love meta.

For quick reference: all Inktober material (reblogged stories from the writers!inktober, my writer!inktober stories, and these meta) will be tagged #inktober for easy TS-ing. These certainly shouldn’t spam up the dash, but y’know, just for your ref! <3

And starting off with a backfill for [OC]tober:

Who’s your oldest character?

The Shepherd - aka Ha’aheo Wilcox - is my oldest character, in terms of chronological age. She’s a fuchsia who’s the equilivalent of 70 years old, however old that adds up to in your personal headcanon, and she’s been running the Imperial Education Program since she was in her first century. It’s evolved since then from her personal pet project into a massive, sprawling enterprise, and she’s viciously proud of it, for all that she’s aggressively aware it might die with her. She has plenty of descendants, like Sappho Wilcox, but her bloodline produces lawyers and police officers, mostly, not professors and deans.

So she raised up Raphae Irrigo to replace her instead, and with his failures, she’s moved onto trying to groom up @cloudbattrolls Chiloa and @rebatrolls Vadaya to potentially replace him - because if Raphae won’t shape up on his own, he’ll shape up through fucking competition.

Shepherd’s a character who’s primarily defined by the fact she does not see those below violet as fully being people. They’re tools to be shaped for the Empire’s greatest benefit, a fact that dictates her entire character. She is a pretty rare antagonist for my bunch in that she’s not actively malicious, which I feel makes her more terrifying than, say, ID, Sipara or Riccin: all of them are highly emotional in different ways, and easy to lead around as a result. They’re all invested in what they do, whether it’s for entertainment, gratification, or power.

Shepherd is not. When push comes to shove, it is, at the end of the day, entirely business:

[story snip cut for body horror]

“They’re wearing indigo,” she says, brisk, and you jerk hard enough to startle. Or you would’ve: there’s an iron grip on your shoulder suddenly, fingers firm enough to bruise as they hold you in place. “Still.” There’s no ire in her voice, just impatience. You can feel the impact of the knife hitting your ports, for all that you can’t feel the actual slice of your wires.

(You don’t need to. You shouldn’t be thinking of them. It’s not your blood catching on the blade. The wires aren’t actually a part of your body. There’s nothing here to hurt, even if you could feel it.)

“Why are they wearing indigo, Kazumi?”

“Ah…” He blinks at you, wide-eyed, his mouth twisted to the side. But whatever answer he’s looking for, you can’t supply it, not with the Shepherd sitting right there. “They.. it’s a part of the program, ma'am.”

“They’re putting the helms in their colours?”

“.. yes, ma'am.”

“Ridiculous,” she says, flat. “How are they supposed to learn their places if they are being treated as highbloods? Look at me, Kāyata.”

The knife klacks against the edge of your port, loud enough that you can hear it.

“ Kāyata.”

And then you feel the pinch of fingers digging into your cheeks as she pulls your face to look at her. “They can’t even obey orders.”

This plays a part in why she’s frequently mentioned by characters, but she’s only appeared in two drabbles over two years. Shepherd is one of the largest antagonists in my personal setting, but her power lies mostly in her distance. She’s not sympathetic, she’s not relatable, and she doesn’t want to be. She’s an adult, among a bunch of young adults and teenagers. She’s not on their level, she has no desire to ever be, and that distance is what keeps her fucking scary, I think, on both an OOC and IC level.

[gravedangerahead]

[acesydneysage]

I really wish Richelle had done more with Sydney and Eddie's cover as twins. I know every other character is a foil for Sydney, but they truly are so alike in a lot of ways and they love each other so much. I can't believe there isn't so much as a "Where's your twin?"

They should have faked twin telepathy. The younger kids should have come up with funny stories about them as children. Adrian could definitely do a lot with it. It's such a wasted opportunity

But I know in my heart they kept that as an excuse for him living with them post-canon

Also, let me know if you wanna join a Bloodlines fan community

[acesydneysage]

This is definitely sydrian for me

Sydney Sage: She's just like me for real 🥰

Adrian Ivashkov: He's just like me for real 🫠

And they're both my babies

[acesydneysage]

I'm very curious about what Adrian's art is like and what his style would eventually settle into. Gonna talk about a bunch of aesthetic stuff that I have very little actual knowledge about, but I think it's fun to consider it.

The man is old, old money, literally aristocratic, so you expect certain artistic sensibilities of him. But when Sydney describe his taste it always seems interestingly dissonant to me. It makes me wonder about both of them.

His fashion sense is more standard, it's simple and is usually compared favorably to other people by Sydney, who has pretty conservative taste. Although it's a bit more daring then people who don't care it's still not outlandish, as you see in Sonya's wedding, where he's wearing blue instead of plain black but looks very normal compared to Abe. He's trendy, and sometimes dressed inappropriately for the occasion but not accidentally

But his taste in decor seems to be downright kitsch, it's kind of delightful. Sydney claims his sofa really clashes with the yellow he picked for his walls. While his choice in second hand furniture and his happiness with it might have more to do with his financial limitations and his joy in actually having some autonomy, making his own choices and doing this adult thing by himself (I believe he describes his place in court as a glorified dorm), I doubt the paint would have been more expensive in a different color, he chose that one.

Yellow is also the color of Sydney's aura, which is part of it, but he probably wasn't consciously thinking of that so early on, and there were probably more muted options. From Sydney's perspective his decor seems to be an affront to good taste, but also something she's immediately fond of because it shows his personality so clearly. In the golden lily she says both drive away the shadows (of the bad memories in the apartment, of her own troubles).

:read more:

Again, Sydney has pretty conservative taste, but Eddie is usually the representative of normality and he seems to agree that it's all a bit much. He also thinks a similar color on the Ivashkinator is ugly. Meanwhile Sydney likes it because it's the historic original color, and Adrian likes it because it matches his walls (and Sydney's aura, perhaps more consciously this time). I love it when Sydney and Adrian arrive at the same place through different routes.

Finally, the actual art he makes. It's very early on and he's still exploring his style. He makes a lot of different things for his first homework (nerd) and when he's supposed to make a self-portrait he ends up gluing together parts of very different pieces which he wasn't satisfied with.

There's a lot of very abstract stuff, and Sydney teases him about some of it but she's clearly fascinated by his art and loves a lot of it. Some of it expresses his emotions in a very direct way, some of it gets sloppy when he's drunk. It can be very earnest or very pretentious, probably normal in a young artist.

But this post was actually prompted by a post about how people who paint "badass pictures of skeletons with fire and motorcycles" should get more credit, and Adrian definitely appreciates them. He has more high minded stuff, but he's also here for the Van Wizard School of Art. The skeleton pirate biker was an absurd thing he came up with while desperately reaching for stuff to say, but he made it into a shirt and actually wore it.

He also does some more surrealist things, we see a painting of a building which gets smashed during his fight with Marcus. Surrealism matches his themes in a very obvious way considering how important dream walking and delusions are in his arc. Something inspired by the dream world and the subconscious mind would be directly linked to that.

I know nothing about art, but I really love looking at stuff by Hilma af Klint and Remedios Varo, and I wonder what he'd think of them.

Hilma did abstract that was very inspired by the spiritual world with beautiful vibrant colors that seem cheerful to me.

Remedios did some amazing surrealist work, which I find somber, strange and striking.

Okay, I'm done now

[gravedangerahead]

top 5 va/bloodlines chars and top 5 locked tomb chars <3

Resisting the urge to write Sydney Sage 5 times because I really do love other characters

10. Lissa Dragomir

9. Rose Hathaway

8. Angeline Dawes

7. Malachi Wolfe

6. Hopper

5. Jill Mastrano Dragomir

4. Jackie Terwilliger

3. Eddie Catile

2. Adrian Ivashkov

1. Sydney Sage 💜💜💜💜💜💜💜

The Locked Tomb

10. Jeanmary and Isaac, poor darlings

9. Ianthe and Coronabeth and their crunchy toxicity

8. Abigail Pent

7. Mercymorn (and Augustine)

6. John Gaius

5. Pyrrha Dve

4. Cam & Pal (I don't think they get to complain about being bundled together)

3. Gideon Nav

2. Nona

1. Harrowhark Nonagesimus my poor little meow meow

Ask my top anything!

[gravedangerahead]

Kieron Moore trying for a double role as Adrian Ivashkov as well. They're gonna be identical cousins like Vanessa Hudgens in those Christmas movies

[gravedangerahead]

Mercy/augustine and sydrian for the ship bingo 💜

Hiiiiiiiii!!! 💜💜💜💜💜

Mercy/Augustine

I thought about fated enemies for them, but they're truly not, they just decided they hated each other from the get go and I think that's beautiful

Sydrian

[acesydneysage]

This amazing Tumblr glitch, though

Assigned Sydrian Fancast A Tumblr

[gravedangerahead]

Hey there! I'm Rapha (the R is pronounced like an English H). This is my new pinned post.

First things first, these are my pets, Luke, Cisco and Mel:

This is my main blog and it is chaos. I'm not very good about tagging things. I post mainly in English, occasionally post quite a bit in Portuguese, and you might see some reblogs in Spanish or French as well

I talk about whatever my current interests are.

My Bloodlines series/sydrian specific sideblog is @acesydneysage . It only has my own stuff there, so I can have any hope of finding it ever again when I need it.

Some poll tournaments I organized:

Torneio Sexyman Brasil - Encerrado em 2023

Masterpost do Torneio Brasileiríssima - pausado indefinidamente

[gravedangerahead]

Bloodlines did come out a few years later and we didn't get an Alchemist revolution either, even though it seemed so so obvious and there were even rebels, so it might be more a matter of Richelle being a frustratingly reformist centrist liberal

So we get a more progressive unelected 18 year old monarch who's a bit more sympathetic to dhampirs and still has to contend with a conservative council, and some vague nod at possible attempts to reform the Alchemists (who we know to be torturers and brainwashers at that point)

From what we know of how toxic the Guardian mindset is? Rose should have dropped the "they come first" mentality and even if we didn't have a full on revolution at least the resolution to her character arc should not have been becoming Lissa's guardian, she could have been an advisor on dhampir rights or something, working on a way to give dhampirs a voice in government (and Moroi commoners too)

Thinking about how if Vampire Academy ran even slightly more dystopian or came out even a couple years later, Rose probably would have lead the Dhampirs in a revolution against the Moroi.

[acesydneysage]

Adrian does something like this every time he and his co-workers take a newbie out after hours for the first time, and all the people who already know him act exasperated but they still play along because it's funny and sweet

[acesydneysage]

I expected Adrian to look twinkier