#ahhh i just remembered the other best thing about Sebastian is how much Varric hates him it's SO funny

[potatoesandsunshine]

aaaaahhhhh 1) you posting the name of your Dragon Age WIPs made me remember that I forgot to post the name of any of mine damn but 2) because I trust you implicitly and you are the only person who has ever made me question my staunch opinion of NEVER learning anything about Sebastian, I gotta ask about your 'hawkebastian bad ending' AND/OR also...josie...yes, please talk to me about josie....

<3 <3 <3 oh i WILL talk about both

hawkebastian bad ending is also the working document for the potential hawkebastian ‘good’ ending timeline, and also the place I took notes during my most recent DA2 playthrough (Jessalyn Hawke You Are Everything To Me). I won’t try to sell you on Sebastian because I think this might be one of those ‘the version of this character that exists in my head is better than the one in the game’ situations—but the version that exists in my head is incredible. We meet him in act 1 and his family is all dead, foreshadowing how all of Hawke’s family will be dead, and I find him so miserable and tragic and compelling. Playing this save and doing the rivalmance for him also lets Hawke say a bunch of anti-Chantry stuff and I hate the Chantry so it’s a huge win. 

The Jessa/Sebastian dynamic is so so extremely reputation to me. Delicate is their song. Call it what you want is also their song. Also don’t blame me is their song. Basically if it’s on reputation (and I like it) it belongs to them. And I thought it would be so much fun for my aggressive, direct Hawke to fall head over heels at first sight for the Worst Possible Person.

It takes a bold man to shoot a piece of paper out of the Grand Cleric's hand. Jessa's heart gives a tremendous thump.

These two characters are desperate to escape the loneliness vortex inside of themselves and they do that by secretly getting married in the middle of act 2 after killing a bunch of bandits and having life-affirming sex in a barn that they both decide they need to Take Responsibility for, telling literally no one besides the Mother at the provincial Chantry in the middle of the woods around Tantervale, and then talking themselves out of it by the time they return to Kirkwall. This leads to either the ‘bad’ timeline, where Jessa kills Sebastian at the end of the game when he threatens Kirkwall and demands you kill Anders, subsequently going back to do a takeover of Starkhaven and naming herself regent (a weird Loghain parallel which I’m super into?); or the ‘good’ timeline where she kills Anders and they return to Starkhaven to rule together (but she always remembers that he wants her as a weapon before he trusts her as his wife). There’s definitely not a ‘happy’ timeline for them! They are always at their happiest in that barn, alone together.

   "I have this dream," she says, in that odd, soft way of hers. Her fingers card through his hair, more touch in the last day than he's had in the past year. He is hers, utterly, blasphemous as it is.

   Rain is still coming down on the dilapidated barn. The air smells fresh and new, and the wind is cool enough to raise goosebumps all over her skin.

   "Tell me?" he offers—he offers, like it's easy, like he's not starving for any piece of her, like he won't die if she stops touching him.

   "We never came to Kirkwall. We went somewhere else, somewhere kinder. My brother is a knight and my sister is happy and my mother is quietly proud of them." She is so very vulnerable, even with her hand at his neck. So very lost and lonely, a bird with a broken wing, searching for a safe perch.

   He has never—not even when she walked into the Chantry with blood under her nails, proclaiming his justice done—been more drawn to her. He has never felt so hollowed-out with need. He tries to be a virtuous man. He tries to be a good man. But right now, with her hand in his hair and his cheek against her chest, he wants to keep her. And he knows she wants to keep him—Hawke never wants to let anyone go.

   "And you?"

   "Oh, I suppose I marry someone sweet and have a lovely garden." Her nails scratch his scalp gently. A cat would purr. "We choose each other, and we're happy."

   "Jessalyn," he manages, pushing through the comfortable fog she has him in. "Jess-ah." Her grip on his hair tightens.

   "We choose each other," she repeats, more focused, her eyes boring into his. And he knows what she's going to say, as she tilts his face up into hers and catches his mouth in a brief, fierce kiss. And he has never, never wanted anything so badly.

   "I pretend it's you," she whispers, and he cracks clean through.

-------------------------------------

josie.... is actually the document where I write send your letter, i’ll reply (please ignore how that fic has not been updated since 2021, it is not dead I am still tinkering with it!) It’s actually a fic about Josephine witnessing a friendship blossom between Trevelyan and her sister Yvette! I thought Yvette was so much fun during WE&WH, and I love writing about how outsiders see video games happen, so she was a perfect way in to these characters. Josephine deals with her lover becoming best friends with her sister, the dismantling of the Inquisition as an organization, and the realization that she’s done the work and gets to have the happy ending. The first two chapters are finished, but the third is still in the bullet-point outline stage:

Letter from Kirkwall. Josephine has been settling matters in Antiva. Evelyn spent three days in Otswick before leaving, getting a room at the Hanged Man, and becoming a comtesse. Letter from Varric—don’t let her go back to Otswick, Ruffles. She gets all mixed up. Letter from Evelyn—I miss you, I love you, I’ll see you soon.

Trevelyans got kicked out of Orlais for breaking sumptuary laws headcanon here, an ancestor who discovered the right combo of pigment for Mock Imperial Blue and subsequently had to flee the country. Painting connection to Yvette :)

There are whispers in Antiva for months preceding Yvette Montilyet’s inaugural exhibition. They move beyond the circles of artists; three of the merchant princes requested to see the paintings in advance and five others sent spies. All were easily dealt with—the princes regretfully informed by the artist that the work was in no state to be viewed, the spies turned away by a few Friends and one resident assassin with a habit of walking the Montilyet estate at night. There is such a kindness to Evelyn. It is nonexistent when security threats arise.

What is their life together like? The Herald of Andraste resides a very short distance from Antiva City, and is often found in the studio of a novice painter. Yvette has had fine teachers, but she has not made a name for herself yet.

Beyond a brief presentation to the Queen of Antiva, the Herald has attended no formal court events. She has refused to sit for anything more than a sketch, even for the artist most in favor with the Empress of Orlais. 

Her portrait will be the centerpiece of Yvettes first exhibition. 

Josephine hasn’t seen it either.

It is not a portrait of the Herald of Andraste at all. It is Evelyn, only Evelyn, in the solarium. // Dressed simply—quiet blues and greens, no hint of the formal dress from Halamshiral. Her hair is in a cloudy bun, each wisping strand shot through with sunlight. Across her shoulders, poking fun at a chain of office, is a daisy chain. // She faces the viewer, hands resting in her lap. Everything about her posture speaks to regality; her chin is raised and her shoulders are squared. And then there is her expression. // The serious line of her mouth pulls up at one side, lips pressed together. Her eyes are lively, engaged. // Josephine’s breath catches, somewhere around the time she sees the freckles bunched up on Evelyn’s nose. This is—it is— // The opposite of every portrait, every rumor. There is no declaration of divinity or piety, no assertion of power. Not a single overt symbol. It could be any noblewoman. // Josephine reads the title, Lady Trevelyan Discussing Literature. // Yvette has captured the moment before Evelyn laughs. // No, they will not be parting with this painting. Not for anything.

No declarations of love come for Yvette in the wake of the exhibition, which she pouts over for a time. No censure comes from the Chantry for a disrespectful depiction of the Herald of Andraste, which lets Josephine breathe a sigh of relief.

Her mother has the portrait installed in the family gallery. Evelyn takes to haunting there, too.

The Anchor always hurts her, even now. They have separate bedrooms, connected by a door, and it is not uncommon for Evelyn to begin the evening in Josephine’s bed only to vanish in the night. The pain keeps her awake and restless, and Josephine is yet more grateful to Yvette, who is one of the only people capable of distracting Evelyn.

More than once, the two are discovered giggling next to the kitchen hearth by an indulgent cook. 

Basically, They Are In Love and even when things are tough, they work out :)