#alex × darlington

[i-can-stab-you-in-the-eye]

“Galaxy Stern,” Darlington said, his eyes flashing gold,

“I have been crying out to you from the start.”

[galaxyspeaking]

His monstrous queen, her gentleman demon

[ekbelsher]

Leigh Bardugo asked me to draw Darlington from Ninth House! (I dropped my phone. She’s one of my all-time favourite authors). The sequel to Ninth House, HELL BENT, came out this week :)

[liveandbreathemusicals]

[kimikofrenchie]

hey sorry your boyfriend died and he came back hornier. yeah he’s more or less the same but all he can think about is going down on you. sorry i know you just wanted the gentleman back but he’s more of a demon now. yeah sorry

[rosiethorns88]

Dropping the latest Sketch-a-Wish, voted on by my lovely Patreon members for January! Featuring a tense scene from Hell Bent by Leigh Bardugo!

Spoilers for Hell Bent below!

This is one of the few examples of me putting in the WORK for the background, only because it's such a character itself. Il Bastone is a real world setting from Ninth House / Hell Bent, and even though they are scant, there were luckily a few interior photos available for me to reference to create the Virgil bedroom, where Alex and Darlington are having a tense conversation in this scene. I took some liberties on the design but a lot of the structures, accents and patterns were either pulled from the interiors or exterior facade of the Anderson Mansion. (especially the stained glass windows and painted tile fireplace!).

I spent a ridiculous amount of time on the painting over the fireplace to capture a small world-building segment from Hell Bent that I think has a modest symbolism of Alex's and Darlington's new relationship here. A fun little puzzle for those who want to try to research it!

[macaulaytwins]

Daniel Arlington III the man that you are,,,,,,

[devotionconsumed]

my favorite dynamic is girl who is a murderer and unhinged with her twink pretty boy bf

[demi-god-teeth]

“Welcome home. Welcome back. We missed you. I missed you more than I should have, more than I wanted to. I went to Hell for you. I'd do it again”

Alex Stern and Daniel Arlington (Darlington)

Ninth House / Hell Bent by Leigh Bardugo

[phy-be]

His monstrous queen. His gentle ruler.

[i-can-stab-you-in-the-eye]

H E L L B E N T

by Leigh Bardugo

People shouldn’t have to march through the world fighting all the time.

[galaxyspeaking]

Her eyes were dark and full of stars.

A bit of Darlingstern from Ninth House to change things up 🖤

[ekbelsher]

Concept sketches of Daniel Arlington from Ninth House by Leigh Bardugo (the second sketch got chosen, but I kind of want to finish the first one when I get a chance!)

[epitaaph]

“Is that what those things are?” she asked. “Around your wrists and neck? Marks?” “These?” He leaned forward, and the change in him was instant, the glowing eyes, the curling horns, the broadening of the shoulders. Without meaning to, Alex found herself scooting back in her chair. He was man and then monster in the space of a breath. The golden bands glowed at his wrists and throat.

“Yeah,” she said, trying not to show her fear. “Those.” “These marks mean I am bound in service. Forever.” “To hell? To Golgarot?” He laughed then, the sound deep and cold, the thing at the bottom of the lake.

Hell Bent by Leigh Bardugo, page 412.

[i-read-and-then-i-draw]

“He’d told himself he was giving her a chance, being fair to this girl who had washed up on his shore. But he’d let himself think of her as someone who had made all of the wrong choices and stumbled down the wrong path.

It hadn’t occurred to him that she was being chased.”

another year, another reread of Ninth House

[a-mythologynerd]

The thing about Darlington is at first glance he seems so much more tame and straight laced in comparison to Alex, and, like he is to an extent, but its all about the packaging. (And isn't that the thing between these two anyways from the very start?) I just always get reminded how many of his character traits aren't some dignified or morally superior dichotomy to Alex and her ruthlessness. The thing is, Darlington is just as ruthless and ambitious, he just didn't have to confront it until Hell. The desperate, starving, consumption motif is so clear from Alex's very first chapter but it's not til later that you realize Darlington is the exact same way, just about things other than the extreme level of survival Alex had to endure. Instead, Darlington was able to scrap by and keep the legacy going, serving something and keep the roof over his head. It makes it less obvious then that he is also a survivor and has that same drive.

You can especially see it in the way he tries to prep himself (the exercises, the learning, the training) for the long awaited "grand adventure," the way he treats his study of the arcane (I mean seriously, you cannot paint that boy as the lawful good archetype if he decided to devote himself into brewing a mythic possibly fake archaic drink that might MIGHT let him see the great beyond just because he had to believe there was more to this life, he had nothing left to lose, and he just had to find out and couldn't be satisfied with only some instead of all), and even more clearly, the dream vision he is granted in Hell. Dawes gets a dream of academic success, Turner professional success, Darlington has a dream where his house is never empty and there is always more people, knowledge, and he finally knows the secrets of every mystery in the world. He just hides all this better. He has the polish, the East Coast rich vs LA rich, and the austere Puritanical upbringing that makes him seem as Alex puts it, "expensive." But the reason these two work (and the reason I am insane about it) is because of this shared character trait of never being satisfied and always wanting more (what's really interesting is Alex seems to want more comfort and security and Darlington wants more risk and adventure and that's what drives the conflict). I'm drawn to the parallel someone on here once said about how Darlington is a sword and Alex is a cannonball. Same effect just different methods. Different packaging. Add in the questions of who is the rabid dog, who is the soldier, the servant, the monarch, Dante, Virigil, Beatrice, Orpheus, and Eurydice? I just love how these two characters seem SO diametrically opposed at first glance but are actually so alike in childhood, character, and ambition.