#abelas fic

[evanhereonearth]

Thank you for opening prompts! I have one that has been bothering me for a long time, but i can't write it myself, so i need help( ...

Solas healing the unconscious Lavellan and helping and protecting her in her dream in his wolf form like in this codex by Adan.

https://dragonage.fandom.com/wiki/Codex_entry:_Patient_Observations

I know I know this is pretty popular topic for fics and art, but it's actually canon and I love this idea soooo much... I need all the details I just can't resist

Interlude, Tarasyl'nin

Day One

It was not supposed to happen this way.

Solas fights to keep his visage still despite being the only person within twenty paces of the prisoner. She is, after all, the only one in the Chantry dungeon.

Her hand spits and sparks with the Anchor's power even now, flashing green light through the cell. Even with layers of earth and rock between Solas and the open sky, he does not need to look to know it responds to each and every one of the Breach's fits and starts.

It will kill her; it is only a matter of time.

Yet, somehow, it has not killed her yet.

For all his years and experience, Solas is at a loss.

She should not have been able to walk physically in the Fade, not one of these creatures of today's world. Even a mage, or what qualifies for one here. His lip curls with the thought; it is akin to calling an Orlesian poodle puppy a wolf. He has awoken in a time where every living soul simply thinks Orlesian poodle puppies are wolves.

Yet she is elven. Perhaps that can explain it. Some remnant of the People in this distant shadow.

Her body thrashes as the Breach expands, and Solas instinctively reaches out to take hold of her left hand. His mana reacts to the touch even as his skin bursts into tingles where their skin makes contact. The Anchor jerks with such violence that he can almost hear it screaming.

"Need a Templar over there, mage?" one of the guards calls out, perhaps alerted by the sudden burst of light from the Anchor.

"No," Solas replies shortly. "This is no new development. A Templar negating magic would only seek to mask her symptoms, and for there to be any hope of understanding, I must see her symptoms as they arise."

It will not be long before Adan returns from his rest break. The apothecary has also suggested Templar involvement. Solas grits his teeth with the frustration of the thing. He could easily be overruled if something here does not improve.

The Breach once more wobbles back into equillibrium, at least as much as such a thing can be said. Solas places his thumb on the prisoner's wrist.

Her heartbeat flutters in her pulse, fast as the beating wings of a bat clawing its way through the air. Solas removes his thumb, using it instead to push back first her left eyelid, then her right. Pupils still dilated, so black they engulf all but a ring of verdant moss green at the edges of her irises. They remain evenly blown, however. A small mercy that this woman at least escaped without a concussion.

No small feat, considering she tumbled approximately twenty feet out of a rift to hit the ground.

As usual, she responds to none of his minstrations.

The Anchor ought to be his, but Solas has long since learned the futility of clinging to what ought to be instead of what is. What is dictates what is possible to change.

What is stretches his patience and his fortitude as tight as the veil itself around the Breach. He stifles an ironic chuckle. His own handiwork, the veil, the product of his own cleverness battling with his relative inexperience with blood magic and pure desparation. Even a year after waking, he can scarce believe he succeeded--and even scarcer believe the price.

For now, it is moot. He is weak. He was never equal to his ancient foes, and he is not, apparently, equal to this modern enemy.

Nor is she.

Solas gazes upon the prisoner. He has avoided looking at her face, only allowing himself to see blurs of pale skin and a smattering of freckles cast with green the colour of her eyes in lines he does not wish to acknowledge.

But he must. Acknowledge what is.

Here is what is.

First: He failed to appropriately caluculate the possibility of his orb not killing Corypheus. Corypheus lives, Solas's orb is in his possession, and this Dalish woman somehow thwarted Corypheus's ritual to claim the Anchor.

Solas would be a fool not to be thankful for that twist of fate.

Second: The Dalish woman has survived, despite all odds to the contrary. Survived the blast by instinctively using the Anchor to tear open a rift into the Fade and close it behind her--there is little other possible explanation--and survived walking in the Fade even with her middling connection to it after millennia of this world leaching away everything that made the People his People.

Third: She lives still, and the Anchor, while spreading, while certain to kill her eventually, is not spreading as quickly as he thought it would.

Fourth: The Anchor is far from the only threat to her life. The human Chantry in all their blind hubris may well murder her out of their own hysterical fear; they may do the same to him if he cannot help her sufficiently to keep her alive long enough to attempt to seal the Breach.

Fifth: The Breach is an abomination. Solas cannot linger too long on the emotions of its effects; if he allows himself to feel the pain of every spirit torn through the rifts or the Breach itself, he will tear himself to pieces.

Sixth: This woman is the best and only chance they have to seal the Breach at all. The Anchor may consume her, but she is no longer expendable.

A final thought, more fancy than finality, is that ironically, she may also be his single best hope for surviving this calamity.

He forces himself to look upon her face.

Her features are delicate without being dainty, the grace of a rapier against one of the Seeker's broadswords. She carries forward the strong nose bridge of the Elvhen, high cheekbones, a jaw well-defined with a chin that almost makes her entire face appear heart-shaped. Her lashes flutter in her fitful sleep, crescents of black against her too-pale skin. Despite her flesh being sallowed by her body's struggle to live, her freckles stand out in warm relief. Not unlike his own, Solas supposes, a dusting of them, invisible even at a few paces, but up close, they soften her. It's oddly charming. A single darker freckle dots the upper right corner of her lip. Not far from there, the indentation of a dimple rests.

A fleeting thought hits him like a lightning strike, that if she were to smile, that dimple may bury her right into the heart of him.

Absurdity. Solas shakes off the thought.

Black hair tangles in waves and loose curls around her head, a single curl remaining defined just behind her left ear. A perfect ringlet, pristine despite her predicament.

An odd detail to notice.

He is avoiding the rest, but he must let himself see.

The green inked into her face. It dances across her cheekbones, up the bridge of her nose, fans out over her forehead. He's heard the guards snort and scoff at the "tree" on the "knife ear's" face, but Solas knows it is no tree.

Even the Dalish think it is a tree, branding themselves slaves in their ignorance. Fools. And she is, very obviously, a Dalish fool for doing the same.

But Mythal's vallaslin is no tree.

It had to be hers, did it not? Perhaps he could look upon any of the other Evanuris' blood writing without flinching, but Mythal's? One would think that after ten millennia of struggle, the pain of it would have subsided somewhat. Mythal is thousands of years dead.

Yet here she is again, reminding Solas of how deeply her bindings worked their way into the flesh he never wanted. His still bears the scar; even when he cast her out of his skin, he needed the reminder to never allow someone such power over him again.

Mythal's vallaslin is no tree. It is not even veins, blood or lyrium or otherwise, despite its resemblance. It is neither of those things.

It's him. It's every spirit like him.

Mythal who nearly emptied the Fade of its Wisdom, built bodies for all like him, branded them all with their own self-portraits. "We are the best of both physical and Fade," she told him once as she wheedled him into following her into the depths of despair and ruin. Out of love. Love she always professed to return, but like a mother overrun with children beyond counting, his place as her favourite mattered little when all were only tools to her.

Solas tightens his lips, staring down at the prisoner. He seldom allows himself to even think so candidly; his love for Mythal, her turning away over and over to become what he despised, the glimmers and scraps of hope she tossed him until that final dreadful day, the reminder of his failure to reach her. All this time.

His own vallaslin had hardly healed on his face before he knew it to be naught but a reminder of everything he'd given up, everything he'd lost. Everything he sacrificed.

And now here it is, branded again on unwitting skin.

It was not supposed to happen this way.

For a moment, Solas is not certain what he means. His own existence? The Anchor? Corypheus? This tragic creature sleeping before him?

He has no answers. He does not even know her name.

Only that he must save her life.

His mana stirs as he delves through her, seeking any remaining injuries that could impede the progress of her healing mind. If her body strengthens, perhaps she will wake.

For this moment, at least, they share a fate.

***

Thank you so so much for this prompt!!! I got carried away and will have to probably do a Part 2 and Part 3. >.>

My little hearrrrt.

[rawrzimon]

Chapter 262 - Assault on Erimond Estate

Athena and her forces are brought into a quickly planned slave breakout at the estate of shamed Magister Erimond.

[kai71007]

This feels like a shot in the dark, but i need help from the encanto fandom

I've been SEARCHING for a very specific fanfic and i just cant find it for the life of me

Its a Camilo centric fic, i don't remember a lot but i do remember Camilo getting dresses from one of the townsfolk and trying them on and dealing with discovering his gender identity (im pretty sure the dresses were some sort of donation or he was supposed to give them to his sister/cousins but he ended up trying them on and really liking it)

Sorry that's a terrible explanation but maybe someone can help (PLEASE OMG I NEED TO FIND THIS FIC 😭😭)

[creatures-and-doodles]

This exact drawing defeated me three times along the years, but I happen to be very stubborn and will try again, I am going to win >:v

[echoes-sounds]

Anyone got any good solavellan or fenhawke fic recommendations? I’ll also take Abelas and Lavellan.

[teamdilf]

Solas tracks down Abelas and asks him to find Iris’ niece in Starkhaven.

For weeks, he searches for Abelas in the Fade, altering his sleep schedule because they’ve long lost a sense of what time it is in Thedas, leaving him wondering if they should track down a clock to reduce the frequency with which Iris wakes up Dorian when she calls him. He eventually finds the man sleeping in a coastal Antivan town and calls for him, appearing in his dreams as a man and not the wolf guise he so frequently wore when he entered his agents’ dreams.

“Fen’Harel.” Abelas bows his head in unnecessary deference.

“Solas. I use the title no longer.”

“I’d heard whispers to that effect. Murmurings that you were imprisoned in the Fade and that your lover opted to join you in exile. What truth is there to that story?”

“It is an accurate retelling of the day Elgar’nan fell.” He doesn’t reveal that his life powers the veil - no agents of his ever learned the truth of the veil and, while he doesn’t think Abelas would ever target him, he can’t trust that the information would end at him, either.

“Why you chose exile when you had won is a mystery, I’ll admit.” Abelas stares at him; he’s learned the man won’t come out and ask directly, but the question is implied.

“There was wisdom in the words offered by Iris and one of the agents she’d sent to stop me. I come to ask a favour, presuming you have not found a new calling to keep you busy.”

“If I have?” That Abelas asks this reveals the man is liable to be sunning himself on a beach, desperate for an occupation to keep him busy.

“Then I would depart and find someone else to help.”

[lambshots]

CRF, ch 37

[kaija-rayne-author]

Chapters 10 through 12 of my fix Solavellan DAV fic is up.

[galadrieljones]

Riptide

❤️ masterpost ❤️

Dragon Age | Solavellan | Abevellan | Amerivellan | Mature ❤️

Over the past ten years, Sene Lavellan, through her romantic pursuits, her gritty fight for the south, friendships that will last a lifetime, finds herself forever in love with a ghost, yanked down by the riptide, Solas. She is hunting wolves through time and space, anguish and joy as she pursues him without end. But as she learns that she does not have to fight alone, Solas must learn that the only possible answer for him, and the only true fate, is the love they share.

Only @ AO3

Chapters will be published every week or so!

Part I: Abelas

Chapter 1: You're Welcome (9/23/24)

Chapter 2: Inertia (9/25)

Chapter 3: The New World (9/27)

Chapter 4: Digging (9/29)

Chapter 5: Lighthouse (10/1)

Chapter 6: Paper Flowers (10/3)

Chapter 7: The Storm Coast (10/5)

Part II: Ameridan

Chapter 8: Inquisition Folklore (10/7)

Chapter 9: Last Call (10/9)

Chapter 10: Fireflies, Marshes (10/11) - NSFW

Chapter 11: Dragon Slayer (10/13)

Chapter 12: Winter's Bone (10/15)

Chapter 13: Unlocked Doors (10/17)

Chapter 14: The Dragon, the Redhead, and the Wolf (10/20)

Chapter 15: Who Are You Now? (10/22)

Chapter 16: Goodnight, Halamshiral. (10/24)

Part III: Fen'Harel

Chapter 17: What the Dread Wolf Takes (10/26)

Chapter 18: Valor (10/28)

Chapter 19: Haven (10/30)

Part IV: Solas

Chapter 20: All New, Faded for Sene. (11/30)

Chapter 21: Sweet Sorrow (12/6)

Chapter 22: Wise Men (12/13)

Chapter 23: Possession (12/20)

Chapter 24: Lovers at War (1/3)

Chapter 25: The Dread Wolf's Girl (1/10)

Chapter 26: Weight (1/17)

***Chapter 27: Snow (1/24)***

SPOTIFY PLAYLIST

Beginning in Part IV, this fic contains spoilers for Dragon Age: The Veilguard ❤️

[rawrzimon]

Chapter 261 - Song of the Forest

Athena works to set up defenses with Abelas while preparing to storm a Tevinter estate.

I'm getting close to the end! Two major plots after this current one and then I'll be done! Finishing at 300 chapters feels like a good, round number, right? Then to move on to a DA:V Sequel. Art forever done by the lovely @stupidere

[wegotisms]

Sweet Panacea (Solavellan Fic)

Another one from forever ago I can't find on my blog anymore. Super fluffy fluff for the dragon age feelies.

AO3 here

---

The cold of the stone floor seeps through the soles of her bare feet, but it is not why she shivers. She feels the weight of the purple bags under her eyes, the slump of her shoulders, the heaviness of her head; her body aches for sleep, and yet she pads silently towards the rotunda, one hand gripping at the fabric of her tunic, the other worrying at a lock of long, blonde hair.

Dalla pauses in the doorway, watching the elf hunched over a wooden table, his head in his hands as he digs through some ancient tome. She shifts her weight from foot to foot and wraps both arms around her waist. She should go. She should turn around and drag herself back up to her quarters and close her eyes and try to forget it. He has better things to worry about than her nightmares.

And yet his name slips from her lips, so quiet she hopes he doesn’t hear.

“Solas?”

He looks up at her and his face falls, concern etched across his features. “Vhenan,” he says, pushing away from his desk to stand, “what’s wrong?”

Dalla whimpers, the words caught in her throat. Tears sting at her eyes and she shifts her gaze to the floor. He deserves better than to see her facade of strength and confidence crumble. She really shouldn’t bother him with this. She should go. But her legs are so heavy and then his arms are around her, and she sags against his chest and the tears come. In one swift movement Solas bends and hooks an arm behind her knees, scooping her up in his arms and carrying her over to the white couch on the far side of the room.

He sits and cradles her against him, his cheek resting on her head, a hand tangled in her hair and massaging her scalp. His chest rumbles as he begins to hum for her, a melody slow and sweet. It is an old elvhen lullabye, she knows. She had sung it for him once, asked what the words meant, but she can’t remember them now, as her tears soak into his shirt, as she clings desperately to him, shoulders heaving. He holds her tighter and she loses herself in him, in his strength, his warmth, the soft scent of elfroot and ozone.

He feels like home.

He’s still humming by the time her tears stop. Her eyes are puffy and red and she buries her face in the soft wool of his shirt, sighs against his chest.

“Ir abelas,” she mutters, pulling away from him. “I didn’t mean to bother you.”

“Vhenan,” he says, hooking his finger under her chin and tilting her head up to look at him. “Ar lath ma.” He kisses her nose and then rests his forehead against hers. “Dirth ma, what troubles you?”

“Mmhmm?” He runs his fingers lightly over her arm, tracing the crimson lines of her vallaslin.

She can’t say no to those dusty blue eyes. “Mnh.” She rests her head against his shoulder and nuzzles into the crook of his neck, her lips brushing against his skin. “I had a nightmare.”

Dalla sucks her teeth, searching for the words. They stick to her ribs, but Solas’ gentle touch coaxes them from her. She wrings her hands in his shirt as the words spill from her lips, barely a whisper. “I dreamt I couldn’t remember her face.” She sniffs. “My mamae.”

His hand moves to her cheek, his thumb brushing across her tattoos. “Can you remember her now?”

She nods.

“Tell me about her.”

Dalla closes her eyes. “She… her hair was the color of the moon. And long.” She brushes her hands down her chest. “She always wore it down and loved to have me braid it.

“Her skin was the color of the earth, like mine. She chose Mythal for her vallaslin, green like the forest, like her eyes. I would trace them and she would tell me old elvhen stories….” She takes Solas’s hand from her cheek and clutches it in her own. “Babae always said I took after her, but her nose was smaller and she had… these big lips and round cheeks.” She relaxes against him. “She was soft and warm.”

“She sounds beautiful.”

“She was. She was the most beautiful thing in my world.”

“As you are in mine.”

Dalla smiles and spreads his fingers, kissing each one before clutching his hand against her chest and lifting her head to press her lips against his. He kisses her back, gently, his mouth demanding nothing, allowing her to melt into him with a soft sigh.

“You will not forget her, vhenan,” Solas says, breaking from the kiss and tucking a lock of hair behind her ear, “I promise.”

“‘Ma serranas.” She pecks him on the nose and settles back against his chest, curling up against him. “Do you mind if we stay like this for a while?”

 Dalla awakens to sunlight trickling into her quarters and she stretches across her bed, yawning and running her fingers through her hair. She doesn’t remember coming to her quarters -- though Solas is stronger than he looks. The thought of him carrying her to bed makes her heart beat quickly in her chest and she smiles. She feels like a lovestruck teenager, but, she thinks as she stands and walks over to her wardrobe, she can allow herself this indulgence.

“Of course, my heart,” he says, planting a kiss atop her head and humming, his arms strong and warm around her, the melody soft and sweet on her ears.

--

She hums an elvhen lullabye as she begins pulling her tunic over her head, but pauses when she notices something leaning against the wall near her desk.

Her hands fly to her mouth. Did he really…? How could he have known? Had he walked the Fade for this? For her? Tears sting at her eyes. She had known he painted, but had never known he could create something as beautiful as this.

The canvas is stretched in an oaken frame and she bends to touch it, recoiling her hand slightly before ghosting her fingers over the paint. The colors, the shapes -- it’s just as she remembered. Dalla is a child again, gazing at her mamae in wonder as she pulls back the string of her bow, as she bends to scrape bark from a tree, as stories spill from her lips.

It’s almost like her mamae was never gone.

Dalla runs from her room, sprints down the stairs and bursts into the rotunda, smiling so hard her cheeks hurt. Solas is standing towards the wall, paintbrush in hand, and he barely has time to turn toward the rapidly approaching footsteps before she crashes into him, throwing her arms around him and nearly sending both of them toppling to the floor.

“Thank-you,” she mutters against his skin.

He smiles and wraps his arms around her, smearing paint down the back of her tunic and planting a kiss on the top of her head.

[pikapeppa]

Fic authors self rec! When you get this, reply with your favorite five fics that you've written, then pass on to at least five other writers. Spread the self-love ❤️

Oooh don't mind if I do since I'm on a kick of rereading a bunch of my own writing currently! 🤣 First off: tagging back to you, lovely @johaerys-writes, and forward to @crackinglamb @alyssalenko @sinsbymanka @vorchagirl @chloefraazers @mwasaw @himluv @ocean-in-my-rebel-soul @contrivedchaos and anyone else who would like to play! Please, anyone and everyone, join in!

So okay. I thought wayyy too hard about this and had A LOT of difficulty choosing because I actually really enjoy rereading my own fics 😅 but I did my best! Answers below the cut for anyone who wants to keep reading:

- Fall Into The Tide: Dragon Age, Sten/f!Mahariel, ~54k words. The premise of this fic is that Mahariel decides on a whim to follow Sten on his maritime journey back to Par Vollen. This was actually the first fic that came to mind as a favourite, and to date, I feel that it's the best thing I've ever written; I'm really proud of Sten's characterization and the emotional beats. I still cry like a baby every time I reread it LOL.

- Lovers In A Dangerous Time: Dragon Age, Fenris/f!Hawke, ~525k words. This is my Fenris the Inquisitor fic. I just finished rereading it and I had a lot of "wow I wrote this? Good job me" moments while reading it! 😂

- Until We Meet Again: The Witcher, Geralt/f!Reader, ~250k words. The point of this fic was that I personally want to fuck Geralt so I made it everyone else's problem BAHAHA. This fic completely mutated from self-indulgent smut to accidentally-falling-in-love in a totally unplanned way, and I'm so thrilled with how it turned out!

- Just Hold On, We're Going Home: Samurai Champloo, Mugen/Fuu/Jin, ~38k words. SamCham is my favourite anime, and the end of it is so heartwrenching to me, even though it's a happy ending. So I wrote this fic to heal myself 🤣 This fic was entirely a gift I wrote for myself on the assumption that no one would actually read it, and it's been lovely to see how many people were craving a poly happy ending like I was!

- The Love That Grows From Violence: Dragon Age, Felassan/f! Lavellan, ~181k words. This is a post-Trespasser fic where a bitter Lavellan falls in love with Felassan, who was made Tranquil rather than killed in the Fade. This fic holds a hugely special place in heart partly because the idea was BRILLIANT (it was suggested to me by a wonderful reader-friend!), and because writing this became my cozy escape during the worst of COVID. I'm really proud of some of the emotional beats in this fic and the lore aspects, and I really hope that Veilguard will not end up proving me entirely wrong or I might just die LOL. 

HONOURABLE MENTIONS (I CAN'T HELP IT, THIS WAS REALLY HARD):

- Even The Hardiest Desert Blooms Need To Get Wet Sometimes: Horizon Forbidden West, Drakka/Aloy, ~365k words. I JUST REALLY LOVE DRAKKA, OKAY? I JUST LOVE HIM. A LOT. I had a ball writing every chapter of this fic just because I adore the disaster Desert gremlin, and I always love the opportunity to write texting in fics, which I got to do here a lot, so this fic makes me a very happy girl 🥰 The only reason this didn't make my top five is that I don't actually reread it very often!

- Inadvisable: Dragon Age, triple romance for Solas/f!Lavellan, Abelas/f!Lavellan, Felassan/f!Lavellan (different Lavellans LOL), ~668k words. This is my modern AU university fic collaboration with my beloved friend and artist Elbenherz. IT WAS SO HARD NOT PUTTING THIS FIC IN THE TOP-FIVE; the only reason it didn't make the cut is because it was either this one or The Love That Grows From Violence, and I just have such cozy-fuzzy vibes/memories of writing TLGFV. 

If anyone decides to check out any of these fics, I hope you enjoy! 🥰

-- love from your friendly neighbourhood Pika xoxo

[buttsonthebeach]

Fic Game

Thanks for the tag, @nerdanel01! This is a super cool one! Rules: You will be given a word. Then you share one sentence/excerpt from your WIP(s) that starts with each letter of your word! I was given "LIGHT."

Everything is from the next chapter of The World Was Wide Enough.

L - Now, later that day, she replayed it over and over again. The longing and the promise in his eyes and how it sang straight to the longing deep in her chest, made her remember every kiss that came before. She’d wanted that kiss. She could imagine it now, how she would have nodded, how he would have come to her, cupped her face in his hands, pulled her to him, and kissed her like it was the thing that would save them both. How she would have melted into him and how he would have held her as long as she wanted. Each grateful sound.

I - It was beyond her, all of it. And all she wanted was for Solas to be there, because she knew he’d be able to make something of it - or at least share a story that helped her cope with the gnawing fear the whole experience left her with. That the world was truly more vast than she had ever understood, that its very bones were alive. What else had she taken for granted her whole life?

G - You gave up the symbol of our people and for what? A pair of pretty eyes and a spray of freckles, who called you beautiful and turned and left you on the spot? You let them dress you in shem clothes and go by the title of a shem god? And for what? They thanked you for sealing the Breach. They believed the Maker cleaned your face of the heathen marks. They still hunted us.

H - He’d offered to go sleep elsewhere, in case she wanted the space. She’d told him no. She was the one pushing and pulling now, as he’d once done to her. Saying no to the kiss and yet fitting herself against him as he slept, her small body cradling his larger one, not missing the way he melted into her, breathing in deep the smell of his clothes as she drifted off.

T - To see their faces. To say I am sorry, ir abelas, I am sorry. But the more she wanted to the more the eyes receded from her, the angrier the voices sounded, the darker the woods appeared.

Tagging @galadrieljones, @thebookworm0001, @wotzka and anyone else who would like to do it!

[bodysnatch3r]

mien'harel [gen; adult]

CHARACTERS: Solas; Felassan; Mythal; Ghilan'nain; Andruil; Imshael; Geldauran; Anaris; Abelas; Original Elvhen Characters.

RELATIONSHIPS: Solas & Felassan; Solas/Felassan (Slow Burn); Solas & Mythal; Solas & Original Elvhen Characters.

RATING & WARNINGS: Mature; Graphic Depictions of Violence; Major Character Death. This fic does not follow Veilguard's established lore for Solas, as it was drafted much earlier than the game's release.

A spirit is called from the world that dreams into the world that wakes. He is given the name Solas, and then he is told to forget he ever was a spirit at all. He grows up as the son of a scullery maid, a servant of Mythal the All-Mother, and knows no life but the life of the incarnated. Until his brother is kidnapped by Andruil, on the hunt for fresh blood to feed her Champion's vile experiments. Solas attempts to petition Mythal for his brother's release, but is offered an alternative instead: work for the Mother of the Evanuris, rise through the ranks, and gain enough power to free his brother himself. But unknown to him, and to the other Evanuris, history is being nudged (or perhaps shoved), and Solas will soon find himself in the position to change the course of Elvhenan forever.

PART ONE: ALL NEW

CHAPTER NINE

The marriage of flesh to Fade was one Solas had never had to think about. But ever since they'd walked into these caves, the edges of what he knew as real were growing thinner by the minute. The world was now covered by a muslin veil, was covered by the thinnest layer of lyrium dust, cast about his perception of things as they were and not as they should have been. Imshael was taking that veil and bending it to its will. It plucked it like a chord. It brought it crashing down upon Solas' head, suffocated him with it, cast it tight over his mouth and face and pulled and pulled until he could not breathe. He inhaled, and the magic the demon had cast filled his mouth with cotton. He could not bid his body to move. He could not bid his magic to blossom. He watched in horror as the thing that led them there crawled through the air and gripped Felassan's mouth open with an approximation of hands, clawed and grey. Slack-jawed, vacant Felassan. Felassan whose violet eyes had turned white, whose irises had vanished, whose pupils were specks. “What are you doing to him?” Solas thought he howled. He had no way of moving his mouth. No vocal chords to vibrate, everything gone pale and terrible and dying. And still. The horror burning through him, and the world just standing still.

READ FROM THE BEGINNING

[thedragonagebigbang]

Bang Creator Interview: Tumblr: @fatale-distraction  |  AO3: Fatale_distraction |  Wordpress: History Will Say This Was Just a Book Blog

The Collaboration period has begun! In these quiet months before works are due, we want to foster a sense of excitement, camaraderie, and celebration among our participants. To that end, all participants were given the option of a formal interview by our mod, Dema, or an informal “ask-game” survey. We hope you enjoy getting to know our phenomenal creators as much as we have! 

Woman single-handedly ruins decades of work using one simple technique you won’t believe!

Fataleity and Dema talk rarepairs, Swayze-coded Cullen, punk rock Solas, and Shenanigans

Dema: Starting very, very basic: how long have you been in the DA fandom? What about it inspires you to write?

Fataleity: ​​Gosh, it’s probably been around fifteen years or more? I played DAO not too long after it originally came out and while I haven’t always been active in the fandom, I’ve been a fan since then. I’m super inspired by the characters and the lore, in particular anything relating to the elves. I love that the DA universe took typical elven lore and kinda flipped them upside down.

Dema: Do you have a favorite bit of Elven lore? Or if “favorite” isn't the right word, a piece of lore that particularly struck you?

Fataleity: Along with everyone else atm, I am really fascinated by the Evanuris and the idea of Ancient elves like Abelas and Felassan. I also love that each Dalish clan has different customs, different levels of knowledge, etc, but are still connected by a common history and language, lost as they might be, and try to lean into that in my writing.

Dema: So, you played all three games more or less as they came out, but when did you start writing fic for DA? What prompted you to start?

Fataleity: It’s been a while, but I believe it was around the release of Inquisition that I started actually posting. As far as writing, it would have been from the start in private notebooks or sharing with a friend of mine. Inquisition’s release was when I started getting into the tumblr fandom and seeing others posting their work, and figured if others were going to, why shouldn’t I?

Dema: Oh wow, right from the beginning! You’re an OG! What was your first published DA fic about?

Fataleity: It was a short one-shot of Leliana and Zevran during Inquisition. They crack me up as a couple. It was mostly banter and porn tbh, very little if any plot, lmao.

Dema: Oh my god, this was a pairing I did not know I needed until this moment. Fabulous, thank you.

Fataleity: You’re welcome. It’s a good one.

Dema: So do you tend to be more inspired by the canon characters or by your OC's? Or if not "inspired" per se, do you write more of one than the other?

Fataleity: I wanna say it's about even? I’ve noticed that recently I’ve been writing more from the perspective of canon characters than I did when I first started writing, even when writing about OCs. I think it's fun to try to emulate their voices, and also their reactions to some of my OCs ridiculous behavior.

Dema: Who is your most ridiculous OC?

Fataleity: My Inquisitor for sure. She’s the youngest of a very large Dalish family so she’s a little childish for her age, very affectionate and kind, but she has a powerful sense of justice. She’s best friends with Sera and the Chargers, so she gets herself involved in all kinds of shenanigans.

Dema: Gotta love the shenanigans. Did she romance anyone?

Fataleity: She romanced Solas primarily, but I have also shipped her with Krem and Fenris. I did a few OT3 fics of her, Krem, and Solas that I think came out pretty sexy. 

Dema: Krem is under-shipped, I fear.

Fataleity: I do my best to fix that. I’ll put him with anyone who will treat him softly. Or not. Depending on his mood I guess. He deserves the world and more.

Dema: Thank you for your service. This is like asking for your favorite child, but do you have a particular canon character you really love to write?

Fataleity: Krem for sure. Great narrative voice, great jokes, and since he’s not as canonically developed as other characters, there’s a lot to play with.

Dema: Do you do anything in particular to get into the heads of the canon characters? I find that's such a challenge (a fun one!) to adopt the voice of a character I didn't create, and am always curious how other people do it.

Fataleity: Getting super familiar with the source material is obviously very important. For some characters that’s easier than others, so I will also rely on similar characters from other media that I feel resonate strongly to the character I’m trying to portray. Also simply putting myself in the character’s shoes. “If I was this particular character with this particular background, how would I react to this particular circumstance based on my prior experiences?” I feel like I’m also pretty influenced by whatever media I’m consuming at the time. For instance, writing 90s Cullen around the same time I rewatched Dirty Dancing, he ended up VERY Swayze-coded.

Dema: Omg, incredible. Is there any non-DA media inspiring your fic for the Bang?

Fataleity: I’ve been listening to AURORA’s newest album a lot. My partner and I are also watching a lot of comedic detective shows recently, so I feel like that sense of humor is going to be a big influence by the time this is done.

Dema: Man, I feel like any follow-up I ask to that question will have to be redacted, ha! What's the most out-there piece of media that has inspired a fic for you?

Fataleity: I don’t recall if there was a particular piece of media that inspired this, but I created a Y2K dragon age AU specifically so I could cram the characters into specific period-appropriate outfits, specifically young Solas as an early 80s late 70s punk kid. I think It might have stemmed from rewatching That 70s Show. This is also where Swayze-Cullen came from.

Dema: Was there a musical number. Please say yes. 

Fataleity: I tried to shoehorn my Lavellan into having a band on top of everything else, so there were definitely musical numbers. Krem was playing the solo from Freebird. ABBA was involved.

Dema: Amazing. God, I am dying to see some Solas 80's punk fanart now.

Fataleity: I would die. I would pay blood, sweat, tears, money, and my first, second and third born children.

Dema: Anarchy patch on his leather jacket…

Fataleity: Piercings. The piercings alone, man. I made him a college professor so he got rid of most of the piercings, but he kept a few. “The ones that would hurt most if I wanted to get them done again.”

[Dema and Fataleity have an increasingly suggestive emoji exchange.]

Dema: Sorry, I'm incorrigible.

Fataleity: As am I.

Dema: Do you find you write a lot of AUs?

Fataleity: I think I imagine more than I actually put down in words. My favorites are definitely different time periods. I’m a sucker for costuming.

Dema: Same. Costumes tell you so much about the culture and the characters! Do you tend to have visual references when you are writing, beyond what is provided by the games?

Fataleity: If I have a particular outfit or setting in mind, especially for AUs. For those I’ll have Pinterest boards or the like. If I’m doing something more based around existing settings, I’ll look up a reference as needed, but I don’t tend to have, like, a vision board or anything for those.

Dema: If you have any visuals for your Bang fic, will you give us a teaser? 

Fataleity: https://unsplash.com/photos/purple-flowers-near-mountain-during-daytime-S73YlRU8hy0 

Dema: Oohhh the vibes! I’m looking forward to it. On a very different note, if your bang fic had a clickbait title, what would it be?

Fataleity: “Woman single-handedly ruins decades of work using one simple technique you won’t believe!”

Dema: Perfect. Thank you for your time, Fataleity! 

Fataleity: Of course, this was fun! 

[galadrieljones]

AO3 Year End Roundup 2024

Thank you for the tag, @myreia ❤️

Tagging: @thevikingwoman @im-immortal @vir-tanadahl @pikapeppa @roguelioness and any other of my writing friends, who I am completely blanking on right now. Ily.

—Words posted: 193,053

—Additional Words Written: Unknown, countless on the editing room floor lol

—Grand total of words: ???? Let's round up to 200k lol

—Fandoms: Dragon Age, The Walking Dead

—Works: 3 (two wips, one one-shot)

—Highest Kudos: afterglow (twd/bethyl)

—Highest Hit One-shot: My only one-shot last year was Possession (Dragon Age/Emmrook), and tbh I have no idea what's normal for a ship like this, and so I am happy with the response in any case lol.

—New Things I Tried: Sene and Ameridan developed into a very unique ship for me, in that they are largely, platonically in love. Romantically, their hearts sort of belong to Solas and Telana, but this does not deter them from cultivating a great love between them. As Sene describes it, they are friends who have "expanded the definition of friendship." I like their devotion to one another in that it sort of demands so little beyond itself. It is truly spiritual and very comforting to write.

Also, in both my major fics this year, in two separate fandoms, I am writing couples who are reuniting after having not seen one another physically in ten years (bethyl and solavellan). It's a little strange how that turned out. The emotional maturity involved in this sort of pursuit has been eye-opening. I feel I could not have written these fictions 5-10 years ago in my life.

—Fic I Spent the Most Time On: Likely afterglow, though churning out the first three sections of Riptide in like a month was quite challenging 😅

—Fic I Spent the Least Time On: Possession. It came to me quickly, as I had this idea for Emmrich and Rook falling in love almost vicariously through their pursuit of more information on Solas and Sene during their time in the Inquisition. It was always based on the plot of the A.S. Byatt book Possession, which I love. I wrote it first as a chapter for Riptide, but I realized it could easily stand alone with few tweaks. I wrote the whole thing in probably two sittings.

—Favourite Thing I Wrote: One of my favorite single scenes that I wrote last year is probably, weirdly enough, the scene with Sene and Abelas in the Crossroads, discussing Abelas's past with Solas and Mythal in Chapter 21 of Riptide. At this point, Sene and Abelas have been broken up for a long time, and Abelas is married to another woman. But their devotion to each other is still very strong, as friends and comrades at arms, and I enjoyed exploring these tender, platonic moments between them, how they know each other so well, and how they comfort one another in such a strange and difficult time that really only the two of them, given their respective relationships to Solas, can appreciate.

—Favorite Thing I Read: Most of what I read is for work, and I read many stories last year that inspired me. I reread a lot of work by two of my favorite authors as well: Ann Beattie and Joy Williams. Their work brings something so interesting and dark to this notion of femininity and what happens when a female character gets into this place where she is constantly feeling the need to justify herself to a man, as something slowly withers away inside of her. Meanwhile, in the face of her acceptance toward resignation, he simply seems to flourish, unaffected by matters of the heart, and this is a necessary feature of their duality. One of my favorite short stories ever is Ann Beattie's "The Burning House," published originally in 1979, which is really a perfect encapsulation of this kind of thing.

—Something I Finished: Just Possession. I think...???? Lol

—Miscellaneous Highlights: In both of my fics this year, I have focused on my heroines first, which is not typical for me. Usually, and in the past, I have focused foremost on my tragic male heroes and their singular journeys, ie: Daryl and Solas, and how learning to be loved has been a motivating factor for them and their pursuits. But this year, I have been much more motivated by the heroine's journey. I guess I am still really proud of my characterization of Beth Greene and her life in the Civic Republic in afterglow. I am also really proud of how in-depth I've gotten with my Lavellan, Sene, and her journey in the ten years between Inquisition and Veilguard. In both afterglow and Riptide, we see women trying to move forward with their lives in the face of immense loss, which has evolved and continued to take from them over a period of ten years. They become harder and sadder because of it, but also much wiser and more aware of their potential. They find productive ways to wield their anger, and they grow. They make friends, and they try to find happiness with other people. These relationships don't work out, but they provide valuable tools and wisdom in order to light the way forward, to a grander destiny.

—Writing Goals for 2025: I would simply like to finish my long fics. Lol. I have no idea what else the future may bring.

—Final Thoughts: Last year was a bit of a turning point for me in my writing, as I feel it has matured quite a bit, and while the process was somewhat slow, it feels like it's found its footing now. Very clearly, I can see how my writing for both solavellan and bethyl has changed and grown up in a massive way, mainly via the themes and focus on different kinds of love, how love changes over time, and the pursuit of stoicism and self-actualization on one's on. Riptide, which spans eleven years of Sene's life, sees her changing dramatically from beginning to end, finding a great deal of calm where she used to just be sort of mad with anger. It definitely feels like a more mature companion to my first solavellan fic The Dead Season, in which Sene was very young and still trying to figure out who she was with Solas, let alone without him. Afterglow, meanwhile, feels like a much more mature companion to my first bethyl fic Magnolia, as it is focused on Beth, and how she has grown up as well over the past ten years.

I guess we're all getting older lol (in a good way). That's the theme of the year for me.