#and so my memory of it is very vague

[somer-writes]

i had an ask come up that has vanished XD i belive it was kane25 (?) i tried tagging you but idk your handle off the top of my head so i cant bestie :(

also bc its disappeared im sorry if i dont touch on everything

you and i have very similar thoughts! time obvs recognizes his sword style in twilight and twi knows a lot of the same songs (although that much hasnt come up yet besides eponas song).

time might be optimistically assuming that his sword skills were passed down through his family line bc we dont know in lu canon how much they know about twi's upbringing. but if time does know that twi didnt learn his skills until his journey, then reasonably he can assume twi has some living kin and would want to know more about them.

we do see in sunset that time wants to know more about this legacy of his twilight mentions in his delirium so maybe that will come up more!

the idea of eponas song being passed down is super sweet!! i couldnt agree more <3

[egophiliac]

I don’t think we’ve ever seen you draw knight of dawn before 🤔 what are your thoughts about him? Or take?

I've drawn him a couple of times, just really little/in the background. but I should draw him more, I love this guy a lot! I have many, many thoughts about him and the way he parallels Silver...and also I think it is extremely funny that his ghost is stuck in a ring. especially considering where that ring has been for the last 16-ish years.

[aylendoesart]

Nico in the jar

[lazylittledragon]

i honestly think part of the reason why my relationships always end horribly is because no amount of honey/baby/beautiful does ANYTHING for me but one time my friend told me i laugh like i'm getting paid for it and i've thought about that every single day of my life

[idle-compy]

fits from my dream bc those decided to stick in my brain rather than the actual plot

(click for better quality)

[sysig]

Stick figure skeletons (Patreon)

[something-nunholy]

As a treat, I have compiled what little I have of the language system I have for Andrean Weather Witch Dialect and the hierarchy/titles of the WW tribes (including how it looked when Stormy was born)

Weather Witch Andrean Dialect

Tharma is the root word for all kinds of storms. As the islands of the weather witches never really have any other kind of weather than storms, this is a very important root word.

Thar’mastu indicates a hurricane or tempest. Strongest kind of storm.

Tharmast’ indicates a regular storm. Still more powerful than most other realms, but average for the WW Isles of Andros. Includes strong gales, hailstone, powerful rain, dark cloud cover.

Thama, however, is a lot less intense, more like the gentler rainy seasons. Can be used to indicate a stormcloud or a light rain or a more gentle breeze. 

Ar indicates strong, large or powerful. The amount of emphasis on the ar in Tharma relates to the strength of the storm and so ar develops into an indicator of higher intensity. Because a softening of this sound is difficult to achieve, the a’ of the ancient people develops into Ak as a more certain sound. Ak refers to something small, little or weak. This is usually unoffensive – more of an endearment. Offense is only taken in the grander terms: artar is used to indicate something MUCH bigger and stronger than oneself; aktak is used to indicate something especially weak, puny or pathetic. Artar is a sign of great respect. Aktak is a sign of serious slander.

Family Terms

Ma - Mother

Ar’ma - Grandmother

Ba - Aunt (first sounds babies make and Aunt is usually wielder of all serious power, so it is respectful that baby's first word is for her aunt)

Stra - Sister

Weather Witch Hierarchy of the Blessed Bloodline

Artar Thar’mastrata - Empress of all Andrean Weather Witches and leader of the largest tribe.

Ar Thar’mastra – First Sister to the Empress and Mother of her Daughters.

Artar Thar’stra – Immediate successor to the Empress (Typically First Daughter/Daughter blessed by Tharma). Infertile.

Ar Thar’stra – Second daughter of the Empress – or unblessed daughter. Will carry on the family line. Nieces are dubbed Daughter of the Artar Thar’stra.

Thar’stra – Any subsequent children that Tharma blesses the Ar Thar’masta with. Very, very rare occurrences (children are not in line of succession).

Artar Thastra – First Daughter/Blessed of the Ar Thar’stra (immediately succeeds the Artar Thar’stra upon their death or succession).

Ar Thastra – Second Daughter of Ar Thar’stra. Typically looked upon as a spare who will live a normal life and birth the next Artar Thastra, but is usually doted on. 

Thastra – Any subsequent children of the Ar Thar’stra. Very, very rare occurrences. Do not inherit unless something happens to other daughters, forcing them to become Ar Thastra.

Tharma grants children to the Blessed Bloodline either by Divine Intervention or Divine Conception. It is generally considered that if a third child is born (always a daughter) something will happen to one of the first two children, forcing the bloodline to need a spare child. A lot of these titles do not get used regularly but are more of a formality.

Stormy’s Family:

Artar Thar’mastrata –  Tempera (Akthama’s Ar’ma | Stormy’s Grandmother)

Artar Thar’stra – Asta’sa (Akthama’s Ar’stra | Stormy’s Older Sister)

Ar Thar’mastra – Kulama (Akthama’s Ma | Stormy’s Mother)

Ar Thar’stra – Akthama (Stormy – although she was still referred to as Ar Thastra more casually as the title was considered a lot of responsibility for an infant)

The war killed Stormy’s Mother’s Mother and her Ba | Aunt before she was born (hence why her sister was Artar Thar’stra). Stormy was born when her Ma was already quite old and her stra was already an adult (20 when Stormy was born) fighting for the Ancestral Witches. Asta’sa was a favourite of the Ancestral Witches and Griffin’s replacement when she defected.

Weather Witch Hierarchy of lesser tribes (much less ceremony or complication)

Thar’mastata - Leader of a Tribe (not related to Tharma, or a more distant relation)

Ar Tharstra – Immediate successor to the Thar’mustata (not always blood related)

Tharstra – The others in the immediate line of succession who come behind Ar Tharsta

[palaceoftears]

Mahi thinking about how forming a family outside the palace would be :c and Gulsah not being capable of letting go💔. They hsve been together for 10 years after all, she doesn't know better than serving her, Mahidevran IS her family as much as Suleyman and the rest is it for Mahi, and so that's why both master and servant were ready to do anything to keep their beloved ones, which only turned to divide them even more after their actions threatened not only a rival, but also the familiar in question (Mahi putting poison on Suleyman's table, Gulsah risking Mahidevran's position by attacking Gulnihal). The two of them also overstep their respective positions by doing so. Mahidevran, a concubine, requires from Suleyman the loyalty he should have for a wife, Gulsah wants to be valuable for Mahi but also to make decisions for both or them, equaling her humilliation to her sultana's when she's just her servant (maybe she also sees herself as Mahidevran's wife 👀, this dialogue is kind of confirming that atp she can't see herself as someone else's soo). And Mustafa works as some type of union between both Suly-Mahi & Mahi-Gulsah, ofc he's an stronger one for the first pair, he's their son, but I think his care for Gulsah recovering may also have influenced Mahidevran giving her other chance, she's been shown to be a second (or third, shall we make ibro and gulsah compete for the role?) mother for him after all, in certain way that makes all of them family too.

There's also the fact that Gulsah is someone her sultana can rely on, the only one that she could truly trust for so many time, she knows every little facet of hers and I think in a palace where you have to always put a facade on, it must be a relief. That's why this just comes as a sincere wish from Mahidevran (in contrast to later, when she just wants to get rid of her servant by marrying her off), for Gulsah to escape what she can't, and it parallels her letting go off Nergissah, only that this time she accepts Gulsah's useful loyalty and keeps her at her service, while in s4 she reachs that selfless stage for which she can actually send her closest ones away. Same that she wanted to do to the only one that serves her at that point, Fidan, even if the later refuses (and Fidan is another old woman so there's not many chances for her, similar to Sumbul/Hurrem but even w less posibilities since she's as poor as Mahi). But what both scenes share is Mahidevran's idea of family as a salvation from sorrow, a new start that she can't give to neither Gulsah or Nergissah and Fidan.

During e25 Mahi herself is trapped in a situation she can't do much against, only staying patient untill she explodes later in the season, while, after Mustafa's death, she's already experienced the happiness of the new start of a family, her granddaughter being all it's left from it... An orphan, in the "spring of her youth", sent to an unknown powerful future husband, whose child she could name Mustafa. It is a little similar to Mahidevran's own story, to the untold part of it and what we know of her before Suleyman's accession to the throne, that she took refuge in his love, they became a family, possibly the reason for her to begin again and never mention her past out loud (and seemingly not even remembering it). And with a new family it comes a new identity, makes a lot of sense Nur refers to Suleyman as a paternal figure for Mahidevran, he's the patriarch of the new household she goes to after all, he gives her life a new meaning, she's his "spring rose"/gulbahar and everything she does has to please him (he even says he's "proud" of her when she gives birth to Mustafa). It caught my attention that, as much as she takes on a maternal role during all of Nergissah's life, she also shows a little bit of that side to Gulsah here, who also shapes her identity in relation to Mahi, dedicating her life to make her happy and proud (and, like Plami pointed out here, Gulsah's name meaning forecasts her ambition for more while ties her all the most to her master). For both women, the struggle is they can't make more mistakes since the families they belong to could discard them (Mahi can send Gulsah outside, she sent her to Edirne once, same place Suleyman warns he could exile his haseki to in e23) but can't truly adapt to the new situation either, what they consider their home it's very unstable and it's doomed to break. As a result, Gulsah will eventually change sides and Mahidevran will redirect her efforts to Mustafa, they're going to become traitors, with the difference Mahi will have the opportunity to begin again far from Topkapi, to form another family with her son, even if once again it will prove to be unstable (tho this time not for internal factors between them, but for external ones).

In certain way, Mahidevran is a nomad through all the series, from an unknown place in the past before she was an slave, to wherever she may have gone to be educated, to Manisa's palace, to Topkapi, to Edirne, Topkapi again, Manisa again, to Amasya and later Bursa. And what's important about that for this post is that everytime she tasted the peace and happiness of family she had to lose it, being it via Suleyman falling out of love with her, the sudden deaths of baby Suleyman, Fatma hatun & Ibrahim pasha or by how the Amasya fam was murdered. She could never rely on the security and the simpleness of the family lives she describes to Gulsah and Nergissah. By the end of the show Mahidevran is symbolically an orphan not only of the parents we don't know, also of the men that gave different meanings to her life inside the system, Suleyman and Mustafa. Still, a little bit of her hope survives with Nergissah escaping this life full of suffering and I find it poetic and very telling that, while we see the damage the succession wars are bringing and Suleyman's obsession for loyalty, Mahi is ready to give up all she has (even if little, but she transfers the servants that remain with her to her granddaughter) for Nergissah to find peace in a new home.

[vaguely-concerned]

it really is hilarious how little objective quality has to do with how much I'll love an RPG. larian makes games that are objectively very good, but don't really resonate with me personally when I play them, for whatever reason. bioware makes games of wildly erratic levels of quality that cause my soul to vibrate at pitches heard only by dolphins and god.

[icewindandboringhorror]

I occasionally wish to reach out to old friends/acquaintances I haven't spoken to since high school/some other even earlier time in my life, but I have SOOO little social energy even for required tasks (like making dr phone calls or etc), I never have any leftover for extra ones, and it would be very odd to message someone I haven't spoken to in like 5 years out of the blue but then take 4 entire months to respond back lol.. My natural curiosity with nostalgia/collecting details of the past/etc. (literally if I were born a little earlier I would definitely do scrapbooking or something lol) is very strong, but, alas, not strong enough to beat out the Social Issues Demons apparently

[aggressiveguitarnoises]

why am i so interested in south american cultures and history. and why do i keep stopping myself from learning about them

[blue-eli]

Realised it’s @khoc-week so even though I don’t have the energy to do it daily have this I did a while ago but never posted.

Arxeht my beloved. They came to me in a dream where I was a replica (of multiple people but looked most like Vidar) made by apprentice Nort/Xemnas, who was the fifteenth member of the organisation and also had my knowledge of hit video games Kingdom Hearts and kept getting randomly thrown through space and time.

[rookflower]

we need a warrior cat who has crow in their name and is cool because crows fucking rule and I'm mad that the primary crow- cat we have is crowfeather who is aggressively mid at best and actively sucks at worst.

[cuteniarose]

The consequences of my poor financial decisions are here!!

[freakinator]

once ash stream is over im gonna rewatch the entire unstableverse so i can put story beats in a doc

[aroaessidhe]

2024 reads / storygraph

The Girl In Question

YA thriller, Sequel to The Girl’s I’ve Been

a girl who was raised as a con artist is reconnecting with her older sister and trying to live a normal life after high school ends, while she can

but her murderous stepfather is free from prison, and she knows it’s only a matter of time before he comes for her

along with her girlfriend, best friend, his girlfriend, and dog, she plans a 10 day trip into the wilderness to a fire lookout to enjoy the summer. But a few days in her stepfather comes for her and kidnaps one of them, and they’ll have to do whatever they can to stay alive

twisty & nonlinear