#brass is made of

[chalkrub]

more svanhildr - trying new things, like a brave boy

[rhowena]

The single most frustrating thing about the endless "well, maybe we should just release Predathos and get rid of the gods" arguments is that it not only strikes me as a bad choice, but it isn't even the party's bad choice. It's always felt like they keep insistently floating the idea because it's what they think they're supposed to do, because other people are mad at the gods and want to get rid of them, because the Archheart thinks it would be a great idea to leave and force their siblings to come with them, because someone else is going to do it anyway so it might as well be them, because Matt as a DM is enamored with the thought of shaking up the setting that way, because the anti-god NPCs the party has encountered are so much louder and angrier and more aggressive about demanding that everyone agree with them. People-pleasing is a TERRIBLE reason to unleash the apocalypse.

[kata-kemi]

Vesper - Fire Genasi Rogue, a loyal member of The Black Backfire Company. My beloved dnd rogue, but also a nasty villain in my other DM's campaign! Her personality summed up is: "Feeling cute, might dig dirt on you later and blackmail you with it >:3c" while also glowing in the dark with her lava vein/scars.

[lesbianmaxevans]

Gabi Mosely || 2.08 Missing While Haunted

[zhalfirin-binds]

WIP - Herbst im Mumintal

Finally I got around to do the last moomins book (moominvalley in november). It took me forever to decide on a leather and cover art but at last the leather is pared and on.

The darker parts in the picture above are from where I pressed the moist leather down with thick iron rulers (like 5mm thick!). I like to do that instead of paring to press down the edge of the leather (tbh a combination of paring and pressing down would probably give an even smoother result, but it's not a fine binding and this will do nicely) another up of this method is, that, if the rulers have been placed carefully, they create a nice guide of where to put the cover papers.

Before hot stamping the title I evened out the backside of the spine stiffener. This doesn't need to be done, but I don't like how the spine curves otherwise and I also wasn't sure if my title stamping would fall on the edge of the turn in. If it did, it ended me up with uneven pressure and could possibly ruin the stamping. To prevent that I picked a thin piece of cardboard the thickness of the leather cut it about 1mm more narrow than the spine stiffener (to avoid a visible edge on the covered spine in case there was the smallest bit of skew). I also cut the piece to even out a bit longer. so it covered a bit of the leather turn ins. I do that to cut the leather away and have a perfect fit for the cardboard piece to even out the leather. It's just way easier to cut the leather straight along the inset piece than trying to cut the inset piece the exact shape of the leather.

[kaxtwenty]

"Once something is accomplished, others will follow the path."

[mildmayfoxe]

i meant to post this yesterday but when i saw my sister yesterday she was wearing the shirt i made her in 2019 for her college graduation present !!!! here’s a pic from when i finished it

its this cute little windowpane check linen tunic with a contrast light green patch pocket & i matched the bias tape…. i always forget i can sew! and the top stitching on the pocket was so neat when i looked at it yesterday too! i’m so touched that she still has it & it’s holding up & looking good. i should make more clothes

[lesbianaelwen]

thinking about how, in calamity, time and distance weigh on the narrative like how evandrin haunts it, but just like how evandrin isn’t dead—“the ritual didn’t work. what’s the most logical explanation?”—the docking into cathmoira every seven years is not the only way to see these family members. but the narrative is weaved in such a way that it isn’t until we’re in the thick of the finale, and people are vivisecting on teleportation pads and overcrowding airships and fleeing through portals in trees—and then patia teleports the orb and library, guaranteeing her end. loquacious turns down the offer to return through the gate. nydas does not leave on a ship or his dragon, and zerxus does not leave on tempest, and cerrit does not leave with his kids (although he does leave for them time and time again). it’s never even a choice for laerryn. and it all matters, and it truly was never an option to begin with—“we all go down with the ship”—but that’s not what I’m talking about.

there’s all these ways to get around, it’s the age of arcanum after all. if you can’t do it yourself, you surely know someone who can (for a fee or a favor, of course).

so, to follow to a logical explanation,

nydas never visited his brother, his family?

zerxus never went to see his son?

how many times do you think patia or laerryn offered to teleport for a visit? how many times did zerxus almost ask?

[ineedmorepronouns]

guess what jewelrykin is taking a jewelrysmithing class!!

[freyjuseggr]

god okay last sword post i prommy but my friend made me a new stick and 1 he said "This thing is 29” of pure unadulterated malice" and 2 he named it harambe 2, which the original harambe is a different single handed stick (i believe is 34" but dont quote me) that is about 32oz of gorilla tape (hence the name and it was made in 2016) so i am going to have Short Smash and im Sooo excited

[idontrobgraves]

(let's try this again and hopefully for the only other time)

Hello Mr. Drebber, I have a few questions to ask. First, is your prosthetic arm made of brass or gold? If made of gold have you considered making a brass version that would be lighter, more durable, and more cost effective? Second, do you like spiders, mainly jumping spiders? Third, how does your hair always look so gorgeous and clean? Lastly, how do you have such complete control over your spine? Also, I absolutely love the style you have, goth and steampunk are my favorites.

"FIRST: My arm is made of gold. I have indeed made an arm made out of brass before, but the design was not to my liking, so I made a different one made out of this material.

SECOND: I do. Spiders are grotesque creatures and I adore them.

THIRD: ...Considering my hair is a bit damaged, I make sure to be very gentle and careful with it. That is all.

FOURTH: Practice and a hint of luck from my genes.

P.S: I thank you for your kind message. 'Goth' and 'steampunk' are indeed styles I find fascinating."

[baddiesonic]

Tmnp shopping trip

I wonder what he did….

Also should I draw my other tmnt au’s as ponies?

[meatcatt]

Remake of this drawing i did at the beginning of the year. I am so happy with how much I have improved in such a small amount of time. BL, Scholar, FOTC, CBS, Arsonist, and TSS belong to @skyistheground

FAE, and Collector belong to @smokeysflipside

Ghost, NWM, and Botanist belong to me :) Alternate versions under the cut!

[ehlnofay]

Pax should have said no.

Damn it all, they should have said no. Should have said go to hell and fucked off back – stop contacting me, sort out your own shit – but they didn’t, fuck knows why, and now they’re stuck here.

(They know why. They know exactly why; absolutely anything would be better than fucking off back to Cyrodiil. What’s for them there?)

But there’s nothing worth staying for here either, and now she’s crammed in between strangers on a long table, everyone dressed in fabrics she’s never seen with dyes so saturated they seem almost gory, eating stuff that isn’t food and talking loud enough to make her want to hurl a glass into the wall. It’s bizarre. The woman next to her, ruddy-faced and bald, wears a headpiece that shines like the sun the Isles doesn’t have; the other side is taken up by a stranger in a bone-white porcelain mask who has not moved but to swill the wine around in their glass. There’s scarcely room for Pax’s chair. It all feels like such a baffling pantomime of aristocracy (she's known the real thing well enough – feasts and toasts and luxurious gifts she had no use for, and if she doesn’t stop thinking about it she actually will throw a glass), bright colours and rich settings and a god taking offerings at the head of the table.

At least, Pax thinks, no-one tries to talk to him; they’re too busy fawning over their lord. Which is probably to be expected; but it all feels so strange, so unsettling, the way they all lean in towards it like flowers turning to face the sun, like seaweed dragged at by the inescapable pull of the tides. They grow towards it through the cracks in the air, matter moving toward the inevitable centre, as if they can imagine nothing more than this.

(Even more unsettling is the way it responds in kind, listening attentively to anyone who speaks to it, leaning in as though to kiss them, as though to swallow them whole. All hell, why did Pax agree to this? Why did they come?)

(They should have told it to fuck off. Should have said no way, I don’t want to help you, don’t want to get involved in anything you’d need my help for. I don’t owe you anything. I don’t need anything from you. I don’t want anything to do with you. I’m done.)

(Pax is done. Pax is sick to death of all this shit; doesn’t want to deal with this, the vaguely described problems of a god that picks people apart like it’s unravelling a thick yarn shawl. Doesn’t want to deal with anything like this. He’s had his fill of gods.)

(Why is he still fucking here? Why did he agree to this? This is no better than eating in that weird fucking inn in town. This is no better than –)

(That’s a lie. It’s a bit better than Cyrodiil. Just as much a shithole, but it pulls the rug out from under him often enough that he doesn’t have time to think too much.)

“Not hungry?” says a prowling voice, coiling catlike into the plaits in their hair, and Pax jumps enough to jostle the masked bastard sitting ramrod straight next to him.

He looks up.

At the empty placemat across from him sits a figure veiled in gossamer, glittering in the glow of the lit-up lichen on the distant throne; the fabric of its endless shawls pulls apart at the ends, peeling away from itself, shedding patches like iridescent insect wings every time it shifts. If Pax squints, they can see through it to the grand marbled wall behind.

She glances back at the chair at the head of the table, where something lounges, eyes dripping gold, intricately carved cane laid across its knees; its too-many fingers are laced with the hand of a man whose gown blooms floral. Flatly, she says, “What the fuck?”

“Aren’t you hungry?” Sheogorath asks, pouting; she can hear it laughing down the other end of the table. “It’s a proper feast. We pulled out all the stops.”

Pax shifts their eyes away to peer down at their plate. “You have served me worms,” she says. She flicks the dish with a fingernail. “In jelly. With flowers.”

“Larva, actually,” Sheogorath replies. It’s still at the other end of the table. It doesn’t seem eager to explain this. When it smiles, the gossamer falls away; its whole face splits in half.

It’s all so fucking stupid. Pax takes a deep breath – in through the nose, ignore all the odd spiced smells, and out – and does not yell at it, or try to hit it, because she’s gotten herself into a situation where that’s not really an option, because she’s a fucking idiot. Why didn’t she just say no?

(She knows why.)

The Mad God’s teeth flash bright as the ornate silver cutlery. Its chair scrapes back from the table. “It melts in your mouth,” it tells her, eyes glittering, “but I won’t make you try it. Walk with me?”

The figure still sits at the head of the table, snatching something from someone’s plate, always, always laughing. Its limbs sprawl like tentacles, like the silken threads of a tapestry, to encompass the whole room. The dinner guests stare as though bewitched, bedevilled, beguiled. Not one of them is looking at Pax. If he were to drop dead with his face in the food his corpse would not be discovered until sunrise.

Pax sniffs and shoves his chair back from the table. He lets Sheogorath (the second Sheogorath – but it must be, what else could it be?) lead him through a narrow door into some winding hallway, the walls lined and rimed with ornate coloured-glass windows. (It’s so much quieter. Still as garishly bright, but Pax is getting the sense that that is inescapable, here; the clothes they wear, as crumpled and covered in travelling-grime as ever and startlingly out of place against the odd jagged finery of the dinner party, seem unimaginably dull in comparison. Everything seems unimaginably dull in comparison.) Outside the windows, they can catch glimpses of the city – its winding, lamp-lit streets, the jumbled mess of its architecture, the sky arcing above it like a child’s attempt at watercolours. Pax wants to smash it, tear it down.

There’s no sun here, but still it’s night. The sky has shifted to purple and black.

“Isn’t it nice?” says their companion; when they look back, it’s nothing more than a shifting impression in the stained-glass window, a series of hairline cracks. It still manages, somehow, to smile at them.

It’s not. The sky is a shadow and the flamboyance of the palace is scraping at their spine. “Sure,” Pax says flatly. When she flexes her fingers, the bruising staining the base knuckle of her thumb aches.

Sheogorath looks at her – an ancient man leaning on a stick, a flickering painting, a bloody corpse, a little girl in velvet-red skirts, a breath. In its mercurial shifting she catches the flowery blossom of the man at the table’s collar, an unpleasant glimpse of her own braided hair, the smell of sulphur. It tips its head. She can’t focus on it anywhere but for the eyes.

“You don’t like my dinner parties,” it announces, as though it’s a revelation, a tragedy; its body crumbles like sea cliffs slowly eroded by the ways. It’s annoying – bloody obnoxious, and incomprehensible, and kind of weird that it noticed, that it would even care. (She’s never liked dinner parties. Nobody ever commented on it before.)

I’ve had well enough of them, Pax could say, or no, I don’t like you, but it’s the fucking Mad God, Daedric Prince of – Pax doesn’t even know what, he’s never known much about this shit, only that it’s well worth avoiding. Prince of the mad and the missing and the foolish, of breaking and breaking and putting yourself back together backwards. She should have said no, but she didn’t, and who knows what would happen if she went back on that now?

It's slinking closer. All that stay static enough to make out are eyes and teeth.

“Pax, yes?” it says, soft-voiced – a hand lands on his arm, small and dry and shivering, the skin as thing as a mouldering leaf. “You have no obligations here. If you want to be on your own, be on your own. We’ve plenty of space for it.”

Pax’s eyes narrow. He does not jerk away from it.

In the light of the coloured sky, the coloured windows, its face is phantasmagorical. “If you don’t want to be here,” it continues – still so skin-pricklingly gentle – “then your hand will not be forced. I’ll speed your way home if you wish.”

They can’t help but twitch at that. It’s setting their teeth on edge. (It’s lying – has to be. After its ages of coaxing them in, meting out information, not telling them where they were until they were on its doorstep, it would not give them the chance to leave.) Rough, still covered in road-grime, Pax asks, “Why should I believe you?”

(None of them have ever given them the chance to leave.)

Sheogorath, a figure of hollow skin and bone, inclines its head. “I wouldn’t lie to you, Pax,” it says. Its eyes are wide and bulging, whites on full display like a frightened horse; it grins again. “Others might. But we’re not a monolith. We’re not even especially similar.”

Pax bites down on the flat edge of their tongue. “That doesn’t mean anything to me.”

The light coming in through the windows flickers. The Mad God turns to meet it.

“I’m the youngest,” it says, its voice glittering like mist on the air. “Did you know that? I don’t remember the world without you in it.” Its form spasms, volatile, wings and limbs and eyes like a snail’s on stalks sprouting and choking and subsiding back into its mass. “I’m closer to you than any. I understand, almost.”

“That doesn’t mean anything,” Pax repeats. She’s gritting her teeth, tonguing at her gums where two are missing. Are two devil-gods not enough to deal with for a lifetime? Is there really going to be more of this now, too?

Rolling through the air like smoke, the voice says, “It will.”

Pax presses purple-green knuckles to her mouth. Her teeth dig into the soft meat of her lip.

Sheogorath turns to face her, hair moving as though blown by the wind, as though tugged by the tides. It sighs. “You don’t believe me,” it says. Its tongue pokes through its teeth. “That’s perfectly fine. Clever, even. But if you want to leave, all you need to do is tell me so.” It pauses, then; the train of its strange, gnarled crown shifts over its shoulders when it moves its head. “Or just leave. The door is still open.”

“You’d be fine with me just leaving,” Pax rasps around his knuckle, “after weeks of not leaving me alone?”

(Of begging him to come, poorly-hidden agitation giving way to blatant franticness, half-swallowing the fear that choked its face in every mirror it spoke to him through. Of begging him still, after he got here, after he met it – begging in a roundabout manner, casual as anything, its every motion reeking of fear. Its abject terror when he turned to leave. You’ve come this far. Why not hear an old man out? Pax told it that it wasn’t an old man, that he didn’t give a shit either way, and it slid through a child, a monster, a sulphur-burned body coughing blood, his own shuddering form in armour he hasn’t seen in months, and it said please.)

(Regained its composure, its gentleman’s face, immediately afterward. But it – the Mad God, unknowable, inconsolable – said please. Pax still doesn’t know what to do with that.)

The Mad God, now, shrugs. Taps at the hairline cracks in the stained glass windows. “I’d prefer you didn’t,” it says, one pair of hands braiding something intricate into its beard. The hand on the glass slips down. “I told you. I do need a champion.”

“And I told you,” Pax bites, something aching and ugly surging in their gut, “not to call me that again.”

A smile, bloody-mouthed and beaming. “But we will abide,” says Sheogorath, and digs its fingers into the cracks of the stone. One brick slides loose, mortar dug up under its nails. It offers it up.

Pax licks their teeth and takes it.

The brick shivers, momentarily – crumbles, in their hand, like sand slithering through their fingers, and left in their palm is a hardy slip of bone. Spiked and sprawling, carved with intricate patterns; it arranges itself around an oval of empty space, the perfect size for four sharp-knuckled fingers.

“You can always leave,” the Mad God tells them, and for a moment it does look so very young and strangely, staggeringly hopeful. “But give it a chance. I think you could love the Isles, if you choose to.”

[peterfields]

[zhalfirin-binds]

Toolmaking workshop in Greece with Dimitris Koutsipetsidis

What better than combine vacation and hobby/work one enjoys?

I had the pleasure to attend a toolmaking workshop held by Dimitiris at his bindery in Athens and what a joy. Within 1 day we learned the basics of cutting and shaping brass tools with files and/or power tools (it can be done solely with files, but let's be honest here, power tools make some of the steps waaaaaay easier and faster) as well as preparing the handles and setting the brass securely in the handles.

I did not expect to go home with 5 brass tools to call my very own to be honest. He picked wonderful shapes to start with that will be very versatile to use in different designs. In addition, and after having tried our hands on all the basic shapes (straight lines, convex and concave curves which really make up pretty much every shape), we had the chance to go for a shape of our own choosing.

It was a wonderful experience so many thanks at Dimitris' for putting this workshop together I learned a lot and had a lot of fun.