#but clever storytelling you look back on like OH | Explore Tumblr posts and blogs

chiropteracupola · 1 year ago

Text

it's the time of year again for another original spooky story... and thus we present to you:

"THE RAT PIPER"

“…..Now, all you who’re here, what story would you hear? Shall I tell you the tale of the boy who taught himself to speak to bees? The story of the sailor who won a mermaid’s heart? The story of the old inn and the ghostly hand?” The storyteller looked down at the children surrounding them and watched as they clamored, each cheering for a different old favorite out of all her tales. She smiled, teeth still bright in a worn, warm, age-freckled face.

“Oh, but those are far too often told, I think. I’ve another story, just right for a winter night like this one…”

“A new story?” asked one of the children, his eyes wide with hope.

“In that you have not yet heard it told, it’s new. But I shall begin first off by telling you just how old this story is.” The storyteller nodded to the boy, and began her tale….

——

Listen. There was, and there wasn’t, and there was a girl called Tamsen, and she was a child of only a few more years than you back when your grandfathers were young. She was a piper’s daughter, and went with him when he traveled to play the flute and the fife at betrothals and weddings and dances and sometimes funerals, for some people like that sort of music for a dirge. When her father was not piping away at music that would make trees shake their leaves just as you nod your head and clap your hands, Tamsen played the flutes as well, and even what she piped on an old tin whistle felt like a song that might make a forest lift up its roots and dance.

But Tamsen was a hungry-hearted girl, as many children are, and the space between her father’s notes never seemed enough to please her. So off into the woods she went, when the work of the day was done, and on the battered whistle her father had used as a boy, she played his songs and her own for no one but the forest. Or, so she thought.

The woods have a way of knowing when someone is wanting, and cascading through the branches above and the roots below and in every network of the forest, the song of such a hungry heart traveled far and wide. And something that had been waiting a terribly long time for such a tune to be played heard, and oh, how quickly he came skittering.

In that clearing in the forest where Tamsen went to whistle, a stump of an ancient tree served well enough to stand on. It was cracked across in places, all hollow beneath where its roots once had fed deeply from the earth of those woods. And up from one of the cracks came clambering a man barely the height of Tamsen’s two hands put together. He scrambled to stand a little in front of her on the stump, expression sour as he dusted splinters of wood from his fox-red hair and long blue coat.

Tamsen looked down at him with more curiosity than apprehension at first, cataloguing him as if she could manage to fit him into any notions she’d had before of the sort of creatures that might dwell someplace underneath a tree stump. The little man had a sharp face like a weasel’s and a pointed beard, and bright, clever eyes like a pair of polished silver buttons, which looked back at Tamsen with just as little worry as she’d felt. Tamsen, being a rather over-bold girl at the best of times, reached out and grabbed at the back of his coat, hoisting him up to her eye level.

“What the hell are you?” said Tamsen, holding out the little man in front of her at arms’ length.

“Do you kiss your grandmother with that mouth, tall girl?” said he, smiling like a knife blade.

“My grandmother lives two villages past the edge of the forest, and I only see her when my father is there to pipe at a betrothal or a wedding or a dance or a funeral, for some people like that sort of music for a dirge, and even then, I don’t kiss her at all, with this mouth or any other. What’s more, I don’t see what you mean, talking of grandmothers when I asked a question of you.”

The little man crossed his arms and pouted, kicking his feet in the air as if to emphasize his point.

“If we’re aiming for politeness now, one ought not to shake their acquaintances about like sacks of potatoes!”

“Oh. My name is Tamsen. How do you do?” she asked, and as she made her clumsy, father-taught bow, she made the mistake you must never make if you happen to be a character in a story. She gave her name to a creature of a sort she did not know, and so swung open a door to a place she had never intended to visit.

“Gannet will do for now, if you must call me something,” said the little man. That was not his name, of course — the sort of thing that he was did not have names as we know them to be, but we shall call him that as we tell the story. We are not that sort of thing, and we are fond of names. Now, we shall go on with exactly what he was doing, and the sort of power he liked to offer.

Gannet held up an ivory whistle, as long as he was tall, and Tamsen took it. It was carved all over with animals, long and twisting and tangling tails and legs together in a marvelous woven pattern.

“Now, tall girl, that’s no flute for betrothals and weddings and dances and funerals, even though it can play the right sort of music for a dirge. Play it just right, and you can pipe down a thunderstorm that will rain so long and hard that the mountains themselves will be washed away.”

Tamsen raised the whistle to her lips and blew, a note as sweet as coming inside from the cold, as sharp as an autumn wind all braided with dry leaves.

“Why did you give this to me, just like that? I haven’t got any money, I can’t give you anything in trade for it.”

“The whistle must be played, tall girl! And I cannot do it myself,” said the little man, pointing out his height with a sweeping gesture of one hand. “You’ve got the music to play it properly, so play it you must! Now, a tune, if you would, and we shall see who comes to dance.”

She played again, a song quick and merry as any young person running to visit their lover, and the wind came up and sang along with a voice all its own. The little man shivered within his coat, for the day was cold, and with a rush of wings, a thousand birds slalomed through the trees and spiraled around them. Tamsen gasped, nearly dropping the whistle, and the whirlwind of wings slowed.

“Tall girl, it’s you who’s called them up! Play on, they want their dance!”

Tamsen, you know, had a piper’s soul, and all the cleverness in her little finger that most have in all their body. So up she stepped, and making the same bow and scrape that her father made before he played, whistled up a song for the birds to dance to.

Scarlet and ash, black and white, a swirl of feathers patterned out a dance Tamsen knew. This song was a courting song, the sort played when the young folk just grown-up enough to be thinking of sweethearts would be dancing the night away. Tamsen had often stayed up to see them, and now, found the beating of wings and the fluff of feathers just as marvelous as the tapping of boots and the swish of skirts as the couples joined and turned and parted. For as long as she played, the birds danced for the two watchers in the clearing, and just as the song ended and Tamsen lowered the whistle from her lips, they were gone again in a flurry of color. She stared after them, breathless with awe, the surging pride at what she’d wrought filling her from the soles of her boots to the tip of her nose.

“With a talent like yours, no doubt you’ll find fortune in no time!” said the little man, bright and self-assured. Tamsen considered for a moment. She was the sort to like being petted and praised a good deal, and she got little enough of that as it was.

“How exactly might one go about doing that?”

“Well, say you were to set out on your own, see a little of the world, have a try at finding out just what that whistle there can do. And I’d come along of you, of course, for on one hand I should very much like to see you try your paces and on the other I have rather an interest in finding out some fortune for myself as well.” Now, to Tamsen’s mind, that sounded just the sort of thing she should like to do, and her hungry heart, which had begun rather to gnaw at the inside of her ribcage, bit a little harder in her chest as if to say “yes, yes!” But a bit of her father’s instruction beyond the methods of the music had worn on her, though not enough to keep her home.

“I’ll get my coat, then, for I’m not supposed to go far off without it. And then we shall go a-fortune-seeking!” And off she ran back to the little house where her father the piper dwelt, slamming into the front-room as brisk as the autumn wind. Tamsen took her coat from the hook by the door, put a loaf of bread in its pocket, and laced her boots up tight once more, for one bootlace had come a little loose in running.

“Pa, I’m leaving to seek my fortune!” she called, for her father was beside the hearth in his usual chair, not quite expecting her to be home or to be away.

“You’re doing what now, Tam?”

“Leaving to seek my fortune! Tell Grandma I love her! Bye!” And with that, she stepped out the door and back into the wind.

“What took you so long?” said the little man, who had been waiting at the hollow tree until she returned.

“I was hardly five minutes.”

“Well, everything’s slower when you’re small. Slower to get from place to place, slower to get attention…”

“What if I carried you, then? If we’re traveling together, it would be better if you could keep up.”

The little man paced back and forth, considering.

“Fine, then, but carry me careful. I am more fragile than you think.” Tamsen snatched him up by the collar and set him on her shoulder. “Not so rough, tall girl!” He wavered, wobbling, for a moment, then got a hand around the shoulder seam of her coat and held on tight.

“Onward!” said Tamsen, and off she went, running along the path with the wind at her back and the little man clinging to her shoulder like a rat to a railing. After a few minutes, she paused and turned to him. “Where exactly are we going?”

“Over the edge of the world and back again, even to the deep waters below where Chance and Luck swim like fish in a fishbowl. But you know the stories well, tall girl! Bold knights and brave ladies must quest first before they find where Fortune dwells.”

“That’s all?” said Tamsen, and gave a little hop and skip that made the man squeak with surprise.

“Of course not! We shall meet with adventure and you shall play the whistle for a betrothal and a wedding and a dance and a funeral, and you shall play the whistle for Fortune itself and see what comes of it!” And so they went, and the sun turned about the sky as it spun hand in hand with the moon, and the road passed beneath Tamsen’s feet as easily as the notes of the tune she played as she walked.

But before too long had passed, she came to a fork of the path, and what had been the road that led from the wood now was two, one that led down to the water and the other to the town. Down the road that led to the town, the miller’s daughter and the smith’s daughter were walking arm in arm, the smith’s daughter smart in her blue Sunday coat and fine silk cravat, and the miller’s daughter with her white petticoat all showing where the hems of her faded skirts came short. They saw Tamsen as soon as Tamsen saw them, though Gannet had seen them earlier and yet said nothing.

“Where are you going, little girl?” said the miller’s daughter, looking down the length of her nose at Tamsen.

“I’m not a little girl, I’m a piper!” said Tamsen in return, with a sharpness she regretted.

“She’s the piper’s daughter, that she is,” said the smith’s daughter, “and I’m sure she is as good a piper as ever her father has been. He played at my father’s marriage, you know."

“I’m a better piper than ever my father will be,” said Tamsen, sour and eager to defend herself, and behind her braid, Gannet laughed a little laugh to himself. “I can whistle down the birds from the trees and the rain from the mountains, so I can!” And she spun the ivory whistle between her fingers as her father had taught her, and made it shine so that every carved creature all down the length of it seemed to twist and dance in the last of the sunset’s light.

“Sing me a dress, then, Tamsen?” asked the miller’s daughter, then, with a little hope behind her haughtiness, and smoothed down the faded front of her skirts where water and wear had half washed the print from the calico.

“Well, it may not keep you warm, but I shall see what I can whistle up for you.” Tamsen blew the whistle, and remembered a song that her father had played at a dance, years and years before. It was a rollicking, rambling song, and her fingers flickered up and down the flute and made the tune ring out, just as bright as ever it had been. The wind came up, and whirled a gown of fallen red maple leaves, weaving stems and vines into a trim bodice and a wide skirt.

“Tall girl, don’t dawdle! Fortune’s waiting, come along!” Gannet tugged on one of her braids, and Tamsen turned and put away the whistle.

“Won’t you come with us instead and go dancing?” asked the miller’s daughter, plucking at her crackling-bright hems, her smile shy but just as bright.

“Let her go her own way, my apple,” said the smith’s daughter, and took her by the hand.

“I’m going to find my Fortune,” said Tamsen, “and perhaps I’ll come back some other day when I’ve got it in my hand.”

“You can’t just go around saying such things out loud!” said Gannet, half-offended, into her ear. His breath was very cold, and Tamsen shivered as though the wind had crept in and laid its cold fingers all along the edge of her cap. But she ignored him, and, standing up on her tiptoes, tucked a last bright leaf into the smith’s daughter’s buttonhole.

“There. Now you match, and may be on your way, and we will be on ours.” The smith’s daughter grinned and bowed, and the miller’s daughter curtsied, and Tamsen made her bow in return before they parted ways. Down the road to the river they went, Tamsen with her heart light and Gannet’s fingers clutching at her collar, and the whistle at her mouth all the way. As it had not been a long way from home to the turning of the road, it was not far to go to reach the water, and Tamsen was glad of it, for she had begun to tire of running, for all that the road to the place where Fortune dwelt seemed to be a smooth one indeed.

“This way, tall girl!” said Gannet, all sprightly and sharp, and pointed down the hill and out toward the broad horizon. The water lay out before them both, wide and dark and as smooth as the road had been, but Tamsen could not run down the current of it as she had run down the road, and beneath her coat, a shiver stroked her spine at the sight of it.

“I haven’t money for the ferry,” said Tamsen, in an attempt at practicality, and Gannet scoffed.

“Show them what you can do, and there’ll be reward in it for the both of us!” So down to the docks Tamsen skipped, and halted just before the ferry.

“I can play for my passage,” said Tamsen, drawing herself up as tall as she could. Gannet made a fierce face. The boatman smiled slow, and the boy perched near the prow put out a tar-smudged hand and hauled the two of them over the side.

“Would you whistle us a wind, lass?” asked the boatman, pointing to the whistle in her hand. Tamsen nodded, and played a shanty that spun up the waves to whiteness and sounded like a seagull’s call.

“I know this one!” said the boy, grabbing at Tamsen’s sleeve. “Do you know the words to it, miss?”

“No,” said Tamsen, setting down the whistle as the wind went on. “My father taught me the tune of it, but I’ve never heard it sung. Has it got a story to it?”

“It ends unhappy,” said the boy.

“Lots of songs do,” said Gannet, smiling sharp as ferrets’ teeth.

“Aye, but some don’t. Why don’t you play a happy song, the kind where everyone ends up all right at the end and they have a feast?”

“Feasts are a tricky thing too, lad. Oh, when you’re serving up and it comes time to carve in, you never do know just what’s on your plate. Meat’s messy, and it goes rotten quick as false-told tales. Better dry bones for me, strong and simple just as songs are.” Gannet snapped his teeth and smirked, and the boy shivered away and didn’t speak to them again, although Tamsen could always see him just at the edge of her vision, keeping a fixed look on Gannet out of the corner of his eye.

The boy did not speak to Tamsen or Gannet again, and his father did no more than smile softly as Tamsen played the last sweet chorus of the song, but sang the verse that told of sorrowful shipwreck, and the king’s fair bride dead before she ever was married, and all the captain’s bravery come to nothing. But though the shanty that Tamsen had chosen was no story of a smooth sail, they came to the other side of the water in good time, and the boatman wished them well as they went on their way, but the boy said nothing, and Tamsen clambered down alone.

And now that the further shore of the water lay before them, there was nothing else for Tamsen to do but to walk, and to play the whistle, and to walk again. To another town they came, larger than any one that Tamsen had ever seen, and so it was nervously that she passed the slow-swinging gates and into the empty avenues within.

“Where is everyone?” she wondered, but there seemed to be no one else but Gannet to hear her, and no sound but the padding of her own footsteps. That, and something more. A rustling, a skittering, a scratch-of-nails-on-slate sound, coming from everywhere at once. Tamsen spun, and saw a crooked shutter swing out on its half-rusted hinge, the wind picking at paint gone cracked and peeling with heat and sun and the fingernails of time. Her feet felt unsteady on the cobblestones, and scraps of paper and sackcloth blew about before her.

Tamsen knelt, plucking a bit of paper from the ground, the back of it dark and yellowed where glue had gone long dry. It was a label, but the writing of it was a mystery to her, for the paper seemed to have been chewed half out of existence by a myriad of tiny pointed teeth.

“Gannet, do you—“ she asked, the wind clawing at her coat and rolling dust over the toes of her boots, but before she could finish, Gannet shrieked “Tall girl, here!” and she snapped upright as if tugged by a marionette-string. Now the cobbles were all too solid, though Tamsen wished that they were not, for down through the windows and out through holes in the plasterwork and from every crevice of those long-left houses came a flood of rats, skittering and scuttling so that the streets rang with the sound of their claws all a-scrape against stone. Rustle and scratch and down came rats from roofs of moldering thatch, creak and squeak and clatter and out came rats from the cracks between boarded-over doors. Tails twined together in a wriggling mass of scaled skin, mangy fur showing through the spaces in between.

Tamsen put the whistle to her mouth, the instinct to do so as quick as a lightning-bolt and just as snapping-bright, but her fingers were frozen, and everywhere around them the rats were running. Gannet got a foothold in her braid, and climbed atop her cap, his sharp little fingers digging into her scalp, and Tamsen nearly shouted with the start of it, for his hands were clay-cold in the sun of that town that had been left to the rats.

“I don’t know what song to play!”

“Whistle, tall girl! You’ll know!” And so Tamsen placed her fingers on the whistle and played, and the rats rose like a river. They flowed up out of gutters and drains, poured out of windows and doors, scampered in a tidal wave of skittering feet and piebald fur. Gannet slipped down, but clung to Tamsen’s coat collar, pressing himself up against her neck with all his strength. All around Tamsen’s feet, the rats swirled and spiraled, dancing to her tune. She breathed in, and played faster and louder than before, and stepped up, up onto the backs of the rats, dancing with them light as leaves.

“Tall girl, have you lost your mind?” Gannet grabbed hold of her hair with sharp little fingers, but Tamsen only laughed into the whistle and played on.

“They’ll take us to find Fortune!” And the rats did, cascading along under Tamsen’s feet as she strolled along their backs. Rats can run a long time, if they’re caught up in such a thing as music. And human children can run a good long while, just the same. They’re not so fragile as one might think, both children and rats, though their bones are more brittle and their bodies smaller.

And so the day turned to night, and to day again, and the rats ran on, and Tamsen played the ivory whistle far past the point where she’d have gasped for breath before. But something new and wild had come up like the wind now, in her lungs and in her mouth, and over and over she played that song that told of lost loves and the fading ends of summertimes and bright beauties faded.

At last the rats slowed, for the town was long gone by, and the forest had faded first into chaparral, and then to plain, and then to nothing but sheer white stone, marked with deep and gaping cracks. Just as quick as they had come up from the houses and the holes, the rats scuttled down between the stones, and hardly before she knew it, Tamsen was all but alone again. The last notes of the song rang hollow on the empty air, and she looked to Gannet, questioning.

“What am I to do now?”

“Why, play on, tall girl! What else?”

“And Fortune?”

“The whistle must be played, the year must spin! With summer’s end, the piper calls the harvest in! There are to be dances, and betrothals, and weddings, but in the autumn must the funerals be held.”

“What—“

“You’ve had your betrothal and your wedding and your dance and your funeral, and now it’s time to play your dirge. Party’s over, tall girl.” The man crossed his arms, his face skeletal, his teeth sharp. There was an odd light to his eyes, once which Tamsen had rarely seen before. He clawed his way back to her shoulder, and though she tried to shake him free, he only dug his sharp fingers the more fiercely into her coat-sleeve. As he spoke again, he was right against her ear, shrill and demanding.

“Now, play the whistle, play it well! Pipe me one last tune!”

And Tamsen put the whistle to her lips and played a song her father had played after nearly every funeral. Not mournful, and something you danced to, to be certain, but slower, softer, the song the coffin-bearers might walk in step with as to the grave they went. The last song of all.

The wind came up, and the ground shook beneath her feet. Tamsen nearly lost her balance, and felt Gannet’s sharp hands grab at the back of her neck as he slipped off her shoulder.

The stones cracked and split, heaving up to reveal deep chasms beneath. Tamsen clambered to perch atop a spar of rock, missing a few notes as she played one-handed. And up out of the earth came the dead, dressed in bones clean and clattering, and danced. First a cascade of birds, somehow still flying despite their wing feathers having long rotted away, then people, of all ages, bones rattling as they stepped from foot to skeletal foot. Tamsen noticed one skeleton missing a leg, others with cracked-in skulls or fractured rib-cages, though it seemed not to impair them as they dipped and turned. Watching the dead in their dance from her place atop the jutting stone, she began to recognize familiar movements, familiar steps, though all danced to the same tune. Some made the box-step of a hornpipe, while others twirled their partners back and forth, skeleton after skeleton rising up to join the swirling rings of dancers.

Then, last of all, a new tide of bones, smaller than the rest, shook from the earth and solidified, scampering underfoot. A hundred million skeletons of rats, their bones bleached and shined, their tiny toe-bones skittering and clicking on the stone.

“You made this place.” The certainty settled on Tamsen’s shoulders like a pall, heavier yet than Gannet’s weight on her shoulder. “You’re not Fortune, are you.”

“Oh, but I am, tall girl! Fortune’s as much me as it is anything else, you see. There’s a fortune that’s your luck, and a fortune that’s your fate, and a fortune last of all, that is your death. The world turns, tall girl, and Fortune turns it, but my hands are small, small! I cannot gnaw through the threads of life all on my lane!”

“And exactly what is it you do, then?” Tamsen’s sharpness served her well, even as Gannet preened and smirked so near to her ear.

“Every year I take one, a clever tall girl or a bright tall laddie, no matter who so long as they can play. And every year they play the flute, and down at Fortune’s hands they go to clay.”

“It’s them, isn’t it?” Tamsen asked, but the certainty of the truth was already on her lips. Gannet only smiled, and she played on. The music came harder and faster and sputtered and crackled in her lungs, and her fingers moved so that she feared they might slip from their sockets entirely. If she did as Gannet asked of her, she’d die here too, and the next year, her skeleton would be among the dancers. But the music had her in its grip, Fortune had its hand wrapped tight around her shoulders and— and she was the piper. She called the dance with her tune, left right left right, hop and step and cross and back with every note. And just as she had begun it, Tamsen could end it.

She took a deep breath. Then Tamsen dropped the whistle from her mouth. The dance went on without her playing, the rattle and clatter of the skeletons keeping time in perfect morbid percussion. Tamsen watched for a moment, ignoring Gannet as he tugged at her hair and shouted at her to keep playing. She got a hold on either end of the whistle, then, and brought it down on her knee. It snapped in two with a crack, and every empty-eyed skull out of all the dancing dead turned to look at her.

The house of Fortune went silent. Not a clatter or a creak of bones, just a thousand empty sockets pointed like eyes, and Tamsen, her face set, staring back. Gannet, still clinging to her coat, shrieked, more shrill and piercing than the whistle had ever been. The world seemed to shiver under the weight of such a sound as that.

Tamsen reached up and caught him by the coat collar, and ripped him from her shoulder. He dangled from her hand, limp, eyes shut tight. Then he opened his eyes, steely-silver, and then, as if he had opened another set of eyes, somewhere else, he was gone, and Tamsen’s hands were empty. She let out a long breath that she hardly realized that she had been holding, and the silence broke, too, as she dropped the shards of the whistle to the ground. A clatter and a crack, and all the twisting and twining of the carved ivory creatures was no more movement than the wind blowing low over the drought-cracked ground.

The wind came up, catching at her coat-sleeves and her braids, and the skeletons turned to one another, looking lost. Tamsen watched them stumble about, then put her hands to her mouth and shouted.

“Go home!” The skeletons turned to face her again. “You found your fortune, all of you, didn’t you? Your families are waiting for you back in the world — go there! I think…” and at that, her confidence slipped a little, her voice half a whisper. “I think they miss you.”

Then, gaining confidence again— “What are you waiting for! Go!” Tamsen stared, standing, panting, and a hundred pairs of empty eye sockets stared back. The foremost of the skeletons cocked its head to one side, as if in confusion, and turned to its fellows, gesturing wordlessly. There were a few sharper cracks amid the general clatter, as of bones being hastily snapped, and when the spokesman turned back to Tamsen, it had in its hand a long leg-bone, all drilled with holes to make a flute.

“Oh,” said Tamsen, all the air knocked from her lungs. “Oh.” She took the flute carefully from the bony hand that held it — bowed over that hand as best she could as she did so. The skeleton, though it always had shown its teeth, seemed to grin at the prospect.

“…I’ll give you a dance for the way home, if you’ll have me.” Tamsen said the words very quietly, but the skeleton appeared to hear her, and curtsied, knee-bones clattering. And so she placed the flute of bone to her lips and blew, and the wind stayed where it was, but Tamsen was a piper down to the hungry heart of her, and all the wind she needed to dance the rest of the way was the breath curling in her lungs.

——

“And what happened to Tamsen afterwards?”

“Well, friends, this story is over, you see. The tale is done, the mouse has run, and whoever catches it shall make themself a fur hat out of it. That is the way of the world. But perhaps, if you are good and quiet, I’ll spin another story and show you the weaving of it.”

#em writes stuff #oc time again hehe #the rat piper #HAPPY HALLOWEEN LADS I'VE BEEN WORKING ON THIS ONE FOR TWO YEARS #and the cover art? well it is from two years ago when I started writing it. but What of It. go! read!

76 notes · View notes

rippleclan · 8 months ago

Text

RippleClan: Moon 47

James has been impatient toward the end of Weedfoot’s pregnancy. When he hears Weedfoot has gone into labor, he drops what he is doing and sprints for the nursery, where Weedfoot is bringing a single kitten into the world.

[Image ID: Weedfoot and James stand around a newborn, cream-furred kit. Under Weedfoot, it says - CONDITION: PREGNANT, + CONDITION: RECOVERING FROM BIRTH. Under the kit, it says NEW PLAYER: SCALEKIT, 0, MALE, LONESOME.]

(James: 123, male, elder, charismatic, den builder, formidable fighter)

(Weedfoot: 96, female, deputy, charismatic, steady paws, formidable fighter)

(Scalekit: 0, male, kit, lonesome)

Halibutdusk gazes up at Silverpelt and feels, finally, the grief is beginning to subside. Just as Wildclaw finally recovers from greencough, news reaches the Clan that Froggy has died.

[Image ID: Halibutdusk and Wildclaw sit together, watching Trumpetpaw, Tempestpaw, and Mosspaw. Under Halibutdusk, it says - CONDITION: GRIEVING. Under Wildclaw, it says - CONDITION: GREENCOUGH. Wildclaw says “They look like both of them, don’t they?”]

---

Halibutdusk found a cool corner of camp to sit and watch his Clanmates share tongues. It would be one of the last nice spring days for the year, the historians predicted, so it would be good for the Clan to enjoy sunhigh as much as possible before the sand began to burn their paws. Halibutdusk still preferred the shade cast by the southern rock wall. The spot also gave him a good view of the three apprentices sharing tongues outside the apprentice’s den.

Tempestpaw, Mosspaw, and Trumpetpaw laid side by side, each working on knots in another’s fur. Trumpetpaw’s slim-cut fur meant there was little for Tempestpaw to groom, but Mosspaw found plenty of tangles in Tempestpaw’s fuzzy coat and harshly licked them away. Tempestpaw would squirm and protest, but Mosspaw kept on grooming.

“Having fun over here?” Wildclaw plopped down beside her brother, nesting into the sand. Halibutdusk gave her a little room, but Wildclaw groaned and said “Hal, Fennelspot says I’m symptom free. I won’t give anyone greencough.”

“Forgive me for being careful,” Halibutdusk said with a slight roll of his eyes. He moved back beside his sister and started sharing tongues with her.

“You seem better too,” Wildclaw noted. “Still your typical subdued self, but there’s something different about you today.” Halibutdusk sighed and turned back toward the apprentices.

“Mom was right,” Halibutdusk said. “Training Trumpetpaw has been good for me. It… it makes Shadowdrop’s absence a little easier to deal with.” Wildclaw kneaded the sand. She stared at her paws.

“I’m not sure how you’ll feel about this,” Wildclaw muttered, “but I got back from patrol a little bit ago. We spoke with a loner who wanted to cross through our territory and reach the southern farms. They knew Froggy, and they let us know… that he passed in his sleep.”

“Oh,” Halibutdusk said. His chest itched with a sudden, strange anxiety. He barely knew his father, only spoke to him on occasion, but…

“They look like both of them, don’t they?” Wildclaw hummed. Halibutdusk looked back to the apprentices. Trumpetpaw and Mosspaw managed to get Tempestpaw onto her back. Tempestpaw giggled violently as her siblings worked on knots on her pale belly. Trumpetpaw and Mosspaw couldn’t help but laugh with her.

“They do,” Halibutdusk hummed, leaning against his sister.

(Halibutdusk: 39, male, warrior, gloomy, masterful storyteller, clever)

(Trumpetpaw: 8, female, warrior apprentice, troublesome, plays in mud, lover of stories)

(Tempestpaw: 8, female, caretaker apprentice, troublesome, loves to eat)

(Mosspaw: 8, male, caretaker apprentice, shameless, stares at fire)

(Wildclaw: 39, female, caretaker, fierce, trusted advisor)

Palepaw proves herself skilled at handling the Clan’s disputes and is named Paleseed. Her brothers are named Waspdawn and Lavendertwist.

[Image ID: Paleseed, Waspdawn, and Lavendertwist pose with pride. Under Paleseed, it says LEVEL UP! PALEPAW -> PALESEED, PICKY NEST BUILDER -> STEADY PAWS, NEVER SITS STILL -> FAST RUNNER. Under Waspdawn, it says LEVEL UP! WASPPAW -> WASPDAWN, INTERESTED IN CLAN HISTORY -> LEARNER OF LORE, EYE FOR DETAILS -> CLUE FINDER. Under Lavendertwist, it says LEVEL UP! LAVENDERPAW -> LAVENDERTWIST, LOVES TO SING -> GOOD SINGER, + NEW SKILL: GOOD STORYTELLER.]

(Paleseed: 13, female, mediator, insecure, fast runner, steady paws)

(Waspdawn: 13, male, codekeeper, strict, learner of lore, clue finder)

(Lavendertwist: 13, male, warrior, playful, good singer, good storyteller)

Carnationspeckle, Tempestpaw, Mosspaw, and Wildclaw are ambushed by rogues!

[Image ID: Mosspaw faces off against a tortoiseshell with a yellow collar. Under the tortoiseshell, it says NEW PLAYER: LEMMY, 23, FEMALE, COLD, DEEP STARCLAN BOND. Tempestpaw faces a black molly with a blind eye and white markings, while Wildclaw and Carnationspeckle fight a brown tom.]

---

“This is the most boring part of being a caretaker,” Mosspaw groaned as he dug out the roots of tall garlic mustard flowers. Dirt caked between his paws as the pile of plants grew at his side. Tempestpaw’s pile was much bigger than Mosspaw’s, and she set about her digging with a fervor Mosspaw could not copy.

“It’s not so bad,” Carnationspeckle said, spitting a stalk out of her mouth. “We’re getting rid of invading plants that hurt our territory and don’t serve much purpose to us. In fact, be extra careful when you pick them up. You could get sick if you swallow it.”

“Rattlepelt wants us to bring a few stalks back to camp though,” Wildclaw called from where she stalked along the trees, looking for more garlic mustard. “She can make some kind of yellow dye from them.”

“It’s still boring,” Mosspaw huffed. He sat dramatically beside his pile. He sniffed the leaves and sneered. “They smell weird, too.”

“Why are you complaining?” Tempestpaw asked. She lifted her head from where she had been happily burrowing, her nose coated in dust. “You wanted time away from nursery duty with Clammask.”

“I’ll go back to nursery duty now, thank you,” Mosspaw grumbled. Wildclaw rolled her eyes and dug at a new stalk of garlic mustard. Mosspaw jumped over his old pile and went off to find garlic mustard stalks away from the eyes of the other caretakers.

The patrol wasn’t too far from the Great Northern River. Mosspaw followed the sound of the humming current until he found a new patch to weed. The garlic mustard grew along a thick patch of shrubbery. Mosspaw bent down to pluck a small stalk out clean. Suddenly, he yelped and jumped back. A thorny vine stretched around the garlic mustard. It had left one of its tiny loads embedded in Mosspaw’s gums.

“Ow ow ow,” he muttered, rubbing his face on the ground. The thorn slipped out. Mosspaw spat a little blood on the grass beside it.

“Young black tom!” someone called. “Do you hail from one of the five Clans of warriors?”

Mosspaw looked up, still sneering from the phantom pain of the thorn. Three cats stood on the other side of the Great Northern River. The first, the one who had yowled to Mosspaw, was a brown tom whose long fur dangled on a thin frame. A long scar ran along his left side. He cocked his head at Mosspaw, as though trying to get a better look at him. A black molly with small white markings stood beside him. Vicious scars trailed around half of her face, leaving one of her brown eyes a mangled mess. The third visitor was a tortoiseshell. A yellow leather collar wrapped around her neck. With the way her colors laid on her pelt, it was like her tail was always in shadow.

“I said,” the brown tom yowled again, “do you hail from one of the five Clans?”

“Yes?” Mosspaw said. Wildclaw appeared by his side a few moments later, called by the yowling. She glared at the strangers and her ears pressed back.

At Mosspaw’s confirmation, the brown tom looked back at his companions and nodded. They stood beside a path of stones that jutted in and out of the water, turning the river paw-deep. With the brown tom’s signal, they hurried across the Great Northern River, eyes locked on Mosspaw.

“Mosspaw, back!” Wildclaw snapped. Mosspaw obeyed immediately, skittering backward, low to the ground. The brown tom launched at him with a mighty caterwaul. Wildclaw intercepted his pounce and pinned him to the ground.

“What’s going on?” Carnationspeckle and Tempestpaw hurried into view, the latter still clutching a garlic mustard stalk in her jaws. Carnationspeckle gasped as the other two mollies hissed and sneered at her. Wildclaw and the brown tom spun in a fury of claws and teeth. Carnationspeckle hurried to her former apprentice’s aid, fangs digging into the brown tom’s scruff. The black molly ran at Carnationspeckle, but Tempestpaw got to her first.

“Lemmy, take the tom!” the black molly yowled as she smacked Tempestpaw across the face. Mosspaw snapped out of his shock when the tortoiseshell, Lemmy, stalked towards him. His courage flooded back in.

[Image ID: The brown tom, Achilles, yowls “Consider this an official message from the Witch Hunters!” while the black molly and Lemmy stand behind him. Under the brown tom, it says NEW PLAYER: ACHILLES, 75, MALE, DARING, ELOQUENT SPEAKER. Under the black molly, it says NEW PLAYER: PEARL, 33, FEMALE, CAREFUL, EXPLORER, CLEVER.]

“Some advice from me to you, stranger,” Mosspaw snapped, ducking under Lemmy’s swing. “If you’re going to attack someone, don’t go into battle with a collar around your throat. It lets me do this!” Mosspaw jumped over Lemmy’s head. He spun around and attached onto her back. He grabbed onto Lemmy’s yellow collar, the leather thick and foreign in his mouth, and pulled it tight against Lemmy’s throat.

Lemmy choked and wiggled under Mosspaw. She strained under his weight, desperately searching for air. As her movements began to slow, Mosspaw let go of her collar. Just as he slid off Lemmy’s back, the black molly dug her fangs into Mosspaw’s scruff. She threw him down. Mosspaw’s head hit the ground hard. Lemmy stared at him, stars fluttering around her.

“Give us your final message for the world of the living,” Lemmy growled. Mosspaw struggled and squirmed under the black molly, but she had him pinned tight. What could he do, what could he do?

“If I have to die,” Mosspaw gulped, a strained laugh slipping out, “at least I get to look at a pretty face like yours.” Lemmy blinked. Her mouth hung slightly open. It seemed she couldn’t quite process what Mosspaw had said.

“Pearl, Lemmy!” Lemmy and the black molly, Pearl, stepped away from Mosspaw. Mosspaw squirmed away as soon as Pearl moved. Did that really work? The brown tom scurried away from Wildclaw, Carnationspeckle, and Tempestpaw. Blood dripped into his eyes from a deep scratch on his head. “We’ve made our point. We’re leaving.”

“Yes, Achilles,” Pearl said. She and Lemmy ran up to the brown tom, Achilles, completely forgetting Mosspaw.

“What point?” Wildclaw snapped, spitting the rogue’s blood out of her mouth. “Why did you attack us? Who are you?”

“Consider this an official message from the Witch Hunters!” Achilles yowled with a dramatic swing of his tail. “We will not tolerate a perversion of the Other Side!” Pearl and Lemmy proudly stood behind him, panting hard. Achilles flicked his tail back. He led his two companions back across the river without a second glance. Carnationspeckle ran to Mosspaw and groomed his scruff. Wildclaw cleaned a small claw-wound off her paw. Tempestpaw shook out her pelt.

“Can anyone explain what just happened?” Tempestpaw huffed.

(Mosspaw: 8, male, caretaker apprentice, shameless, stares at fire)

(Tempestpaw: 8, female, caretaker apprentice, troublesome, loves to eat)

(Carnationspeckle: 49, female, caretaker compassionate, fish-like swimmer)

(Wildclaw: 39, female, caretaker, fierce, trusted advisor)

(Achilles: 75, male, rogue(?), daring, eloquent speaker)

(Pearl: 33, female, rogue(?), careful, explorer, clever)

(Lemmy: 23, female, rogue(?), cold, deep StarClan bond)

25 notes · View notes

magnorious · 11 months ago

Text

The Reveal that Changed Percy Jackson

*Spoiler Alert*

I’m talking about the Nico vs Cupid scene in book 8, House of Hades. I picked this scene, even though there were a great many in the original series that defined Percy Jackson as a story far more meaningful than just “cool tweenage demigods with magic and superpowers who fight evil”.

When this book came out, Nico vs Cupid was almost all anyone talked about. Why? Because Nico came out. Nico, an explicitly gay character in a book published by Disney, in a rather high profile series. Nico, the little angsty brat displaced from the timeline, comes out of nowhere with a world-shattering reveal.

House of Hades is already the darkest book in the series and, I think, the most polished and successful with this tone and how it feels so complete. While Percy and Annabeth are in Tartarus, the constant clever and horrific callbacks to quests from prior books quite literally come back to haunt them. The others trying to carry on without them, the ridiculously high personal stakes, the drama, the storytelling, it spares no expense in this book.

The Nico vs Cupid scene was something else, though, and all these years later… I’m not so sure it was done for the better.

—

Independent of the Big Reveal, this scene does a lot of things we’d never seen before in this series, namely this: Cupid is scary, and no one expected him to be.

Percy Jackson, though it does have its serious moments, is the series where the god of wine wears leopard print shirts and the god of the seas has a fishing chair for a throne. These characters quip and joke even when they’re trying to be intimidating and Percy’s personality, snarky and sassy and very rarely shooting straight, undercuts a lot of the attempts at looking competent and threatening (and we love him for it).

They’ve fought gods and monsters and demigods and characters have died really tragic deaths, but for the most part, these serious moments all come when we expect them to.

This scene comes out of nowhere and for anyone who hasn’t read the book in a while, here’s the context: Percy and Annabeth are in Tartarus and Nico is kind of the de-facto leader in their absence, knowing the most about Tartarus of the remaining crew. He and Jason are sent on a side quest to go retrieve the Staff of Diocletian from Cupid and Nico is not at all happy about this venture, but we don’t know why beyond that he’s Nico and he’s never happy.

Right out of the gate, Cupid is not at all who we expect him to be and this fight scene, absent of Percy, is suddenly very serious. Cupid doesn’t quip, he doesn’t show himself, and he fights dirty. The god of love, not the god of war or anything we expect to be violent and dangerous.

He’s whispering in characters’ heads, throwing them around like ragdolls, and taunting Nico ceaselessly all in Jason’s POV. Cupid gets some seriously badass lines, too.

“I’ve been to Tartarus and back,” Nico snarled. “You don’t scare me.” I scare you very, very much. Face me. Be honest.

Love is no game! It is no flowery softness! It is hard work—a quest that never ends. It demands everything from you—especially the truth. Only then does it yield rewards.

“Oh, I wouldn’t say Love always makes you happy.” [Cupid's] voice sounded smaller, much more human. “Sometimes it makes you incredibly sad. But at least you’ve faced it now. That’s the only way to conquer me.”

In all this, unfortunately in Jason POV, we’re primed only once by a previous god finally acknowledging that gays exist in this universe. This universe, based on Greek Mythology, famous for its not-straightness. Even then, audiences have spent 7 and a half books accepting that there won’t be any gays. No one is expecting this from Nico.

So when it comes, when Nico reveals he has a crush on Percy… the fandom lost our minds.

—

And I’m not so sure that’s a good thing, looking back. On the one hand, obligatory “we need representation,” but on the other, there was this one reviewer who knew what was up long before anyone else did.

She’d said something along the lines of raising damning concerns that Nico’s entire character arc was now defined by his homosexuality, that this scene frames all his anger, all his hate, all his rage and depression, about this one aspect of his character, and diminishes him because of it.

All these years later, I’m disappointed to say I agree with her.

This book series’ only major canonical gay (so far) is forced out of the closet with a proverbial gun to his head

Now, Nico likely never would have come out without that gun, but the way it happened, especially in front of Jason who he’s not friends with, showing Jason his memories because it’s not Nico’s POV and Jason has to see somehow because Nico sure won’t detail those scenes himself is... not good?

Jason handles it well, as well as he can given that this is Nico, and Cupid is an explicit villain so him forcing Nico out is in-character and not my problem. The narrative forcing Nico out is the problem—that this is a big reveal both to Jason and the audience is the problem.

The book isn’t new and with respect to when it was written and who wrote it, it’s not a terrible scene or terrible representation. But it’s not just forcing Nico out of the closet, either.

All of Nico’s character development is retroactively pinned on his sexuality

I get it. Nico’s… 14? 14 and from an era where being who he is was a death sentence, with zero education on the matter. Internalized homophobia is a thing (though Nico doesn’t actually seem to hate himself for being gay, he hates himself for crushing on Percy. Nor does he hate other gays or the concept).

Nico, though, is the one demigod who can summon any ghost he could dream up to teach him to hate himself a little less. He could have summoned the ghost of Freddie Mercury and what a dazzling mentorship that would have been.

The way the scene is framed makes it look like all of Nico’s rage comes from this one relationship, when it comes from so much more. He’s a son of Hades, a god no one trusts or likes and is synonymous with death, evil, and deceit. His sister, his last living relative, died on a quest as just a teenager. He has no friends at camp, powers that scare people, and is almost a century removed from everything and everyone he knew in his old life.

And he went and left camp *only* because of his crush on Percy? Not for any other reason?

When he does get his crush on Will, that only makes it worse. Nico did have friends, even if he didn’t believe it. He did have Percy and he’d earned the respect of his fellow campers after the Battle of Manhattan. He back-slid in HOH for this reveal, as if a romance is the only thing that could make him happy.

Cupid’s message is the narrative’s message: The only way to conquer love is to face it [in combat]

With a gun to his head, in front of a veritable stranger, instead of in, I don’t know, therapy with Apollo? There couldn’t have been any other way to fit this reveal in? He couldn’t have made his own group therapy session with other ghosts? Persephone or Demeter never sat this boy down for The Talk with a literal captive audience?

And that it’s a “reveal” at all, in incredibly dramatic fashion, a plot twist for shock value. The book couldn’t drop hints in Nico POV? Couldn’t casually state it anywhere at any time in the previous 3 books? Couldn’t treat it at all like this is normal and not a life-or-death situation?

I just feel bad for the kid. Nico can’t be the only demigod who has a guilty, unrequited crush. Cupid is forcing this out of him because that crush happens to be on another boy.

It’s in Jason’s POV

This world shattering, deeply personal reveal, and the character who’s having it isn’t even the narrator. Jason is a fine character and I know why it’s him out of everyone who could have gone with Nico, but this should have been solely Nico’s moment, not Jason’s commentary about Nico’s moment, being a non-consenting voyeur into Nico’s very personal memories about Percy.

Even if it’s not Jason’s POV to retain the surprise, it certainly starts to feel like Jason’s POV to retain the surprise. Jason can still be present, but even then—Cupid needed Nico to face Cupid, not Cupid and Jason.

—

It sucks because the scene as a whole, removed from the context, is incredible. The choreography, the pacing, the intensity of the battle, Cupid as a villain and Nico and Jason’s desperation to just stay alive.

Its impact on the series can’t be ignored. Blood of Olympus is no one’s favorite. It’s a terrible last book and not all that great as a book, period, but the ending?

Among other travesties, Nico confronts Percy, tells him he had a crush on him, and then *immediately* starts pining after Will. Percy doesn’t get the chance to talk to him, stunned at this reveal. They never have a heartfelt conversation about it, what this means for their friendship, how Percy never noticed or how this makes him feel, if he’s at all guilty for potentially leading Nico on and being a bad friend.

We get none of that. Nico just finds a pretty blond boy after, what, four years pining after Percy? One awful confrontation with Cupid and a few lines of dialogue traded with Jason and all his angst and moodiness is cured off-screen.

Can’t Nico go five minutes where he figures out who he is before he’s trading one crush for another? Can he not define himself independently of who he likes for just a couple chapters? He tells Jason after the Cupid fight that he’s over it, but… c’mon, he’s absolutely lying there, or he wouldn’t have been so hurt and upset and hesitant to reveal himself.

I love that he’s popular now, I love that he does have a healthy relationship (one that eclipsed the whole fandom for better or for worse), but the way he went about becoming popular still leaves a bad taste in my mouth. Nico did walk so the rest of the series' extended universe could run. We did get Solangelo, we got Apollo being Apollo, we got a world based off Greek Mythology that stops straight-washing history. It's just a shame that he had to be forced out the way he did, and that his whole character is now defined by his relationship with Will.

#percy jackon and the olympians #percy jackson #pjo #nico di angelo #solangelo #house of hades #blood of olympus #retrospective

34 notes · View notes

rorytunes · 3 months ago

Note

how do you come up with lyrics when you're writing a song?

Oh I love this ask so much. This will be a rambly and long response with a lot of examples. I have many thoughts. I'll preface this by saying I'm really weird about my lyrics so this might not work for you. Plus I'm not actually very good. But hopefully something is helpful!

For me, lyrics are devices for storytelling most of the time. It's different from writing prose in that you have to be conscious of how the whole line sounds as well as your idea.

I try to make a habit of studying other people's lyrics, both the masters, and just people I really look up to. This is my biggest piece of advice. Study!!!!

For example, I like the twisting wittiness of Alex Turner and Pete Wentz's lyrics, so I'll try to pop that into a mix, or the subtle irony in The Smiths' work. I'm a HUGE nerd, and by proxy a huge fan of the very nervy and dense lyrical style in the things Ryan Ross writes, hence I follow some of those patterns as I see them in my work and find ways to enhance them. I did the same for the imagery in David Bowie's work, Leonard Cohen's poetic devices, Bruce Springsteen's storytelling. I take inspiration and figure out why I like them and why I might not like my own work.

Easy way to write a song, I find, is to twist a whole bunch of sayings, pop culture references, or similar:

From I'm So Tired by Fugazi:

From Fluorescent Adolescent by Arctic Monkeys (if you haven't heard this song, take a look at the other lyrics. This is a really snappy song with some very clever twists)

Here's The Nerve by the Brobecks, presenting an idiom, and then twisting it into something attention grabbing:

Some of my favourite lyrics use similar sounds and rhymes within themselves. Alliteration works really well. Here's a lyric from Zealots by the Fugees:

They keep the interesting sounds with a subtle inner rhyme on that first line, close it out on the second. They do the second with raps/format/parallax, and they also use alliteration. It makes for a VERY satisfying rhyme scheme that's also fun to sing.

This next one is from Piledriver Waltz by Alex Turner:

The alliteration creates an interesting soundscape, with the imagery and the reference to the Heartbreak Hotel. Also note how "back booth" rhymes with "how to lose". He follows these "ooze" sounds in the rest of the verse as well

My favourite subject was (kind of still is, I only just graduated) literature. This has given me a very sound-focused angle to my lyrics, and as such, I'm never satisfied unless the sounds in my work carry the right emotion. This is why different methods rhyming can give work a really interesting angle.

On that note, I use unexpected twists to create an effect. Take a look at Sugar We're Going Down:

There's no rhyme here and it creates an anxious tension that fits the song. Love that unresolved feeling a lot

Reading a lot, both prose and poetry, REALLY helps with finding imagery and vocabulary inspiration. I like Rimbaud, Emily Dickinson, Gabriel García Márquez, Kafka, and Yeats at the moment.

One thing I've been doing that helps me a lot is spending 10mins or so before bed filling up a page in my notebook with everything that comes to my mind. I'll read over it in the morning at take it all in. Usually it's a bunch of random crap but sometimes I'm a bit clever with it.

If you don't have a plan, lyricism is going to be a bit tricky. One of my main issues is that I run out of ideas a lot, and this gives me disjointed lyrics. This is can be fixed (albeit frustratingly at times) if you plan out what you want to say, and have a clear idea of your message/story/whatever. Of course if you're just being abstract you can disregard the main throughline a bit but I'd still recommend a general plan.

Hope something here helps. I pressed the post button too early so this is an edit, and I didn't get to say everything I wanted. Feel free to ask questions!

#rory talking #lyrics #writing #writing tips #ask #long post #research

9 notes · View notes

twisted-tales-of-all · 1 year ago

Text

Summary: Connected storyteller Haru's request- 'Hello! Seonghwa with 2 + 12 for the smut prompts please! Thank you for doing these also!'

2 - "You look so good with my hand wrapped around your throat." || 12 - "You don't have to be gentle with me, I don't break easily."

Pairing: Seonghwa x afab!reader Genres/tropes: model!AU, makeup-artist!AU, smut, drabble Word Count: 641 Warnings: quickie, semi-public/risky sex, Seonghwa is a sly mf (affectionate), slight choking/breath play, protected sex, implication of more to come

As you finish preparing your workstation, the model you'll work on arrives, closing the door behind him before professionally greeting you, "Hello, I'm Park Seonghwa. Please take good care of me today!"

Turning to face him, you find a stunning masterpiece of a man. Tall, slender, unstyled hair that manages to fall almost perfectly, and a clean face that will make your job ridiculously easy. You introduce yourself and instruct him to sit down and get comfortable.

He doesn't talk much, so you concentrate, softly touching his face with your tools to apply the subtle look suited for the bright cameras.

With a cheeky smile, he breaks his silence, adding a teasing tone to his words, "You don't have to be gentle with me. I don't break easily."

Shocked, you stare wide-eyed at him, only inches from the wonderous features of his face. Your face heats up as you catch your eyes roaming down to his lips - the only part of his face that still needs make-up added.

"You know, I think your lipstick color might suit me. Mind if I try it?"

"Oh, sure!"

You turn to grab it from the collection, but he quickly wraps his hand around your nape and pulls you in for a kiss. Although your eyes remain open from his impulsivity and clever way of initiating, you find them closing as he pulls away in a desperate attempt to hold onto the feeling of his soft lips on yours. He takes a look in the mirror before deciding against the color smeared on his lips.

"Maybe I was wrong. Let me give it back."

This time, he wraps his arm around you at the waist, pulling you into his lap. He begins leaving a trail of kisses down your neck, careful not to mess up your fancy work shirt. You can barely believe that this is happening, claiming to yourself that it's a dream you'd rather not wake up from. As he tugs lightly on your shirt to ask for permission to go further, you warn him that people could walk in.

"Then, if you're up for it, let's make this quick."

Nodding, you stand up again, quickly dropping your slacks to the floor. He mimics your actions before lifting you onto the empty vanity next to yours. As he unwraps a condom that you didn't even see him grab, he reminds you to be quiet so that nobody comes in to make sure you're alright.

"Sounds like a problem for you. I'll just be put on a list to never work with you again, but it could ruin your reputation, Mr. Professional Model."

"Sassy, eh?" He lines himself up as he speaks, "I'll keep you quiet then, for the sake of seeing your beautiful face near me again."

As he eases himself in, he wraps a hand lightly around your neck but doesn't apply pressure. He leaves his hand there as he pounds into you sloppily. Whenever it looks like you might make noise, his grip tightens. He watches your reactions closely for this reason, trying to make sure you're enjoying yourself but not too much to alert anyone passing by the room.

He finishes rather quickly, pulling out and discarding the condom immediately. As you both get dressed again, he admits, "You look so good with my hand wrapped around your throat."

"So then, come see it again. Let me fix your make-up before you go out there."

As he sits back down, he swears, "Believe me, I will. You didn't even get to cum. I have to fix that."

Before he heads to his shoot, he borrows one of the liners to write his contact information directly onto the back of your hand. As he opens the door, he leaves you with a wink and a burning desire to do more.

#cultofdionysusnet #kpop scenarios #kpop imagines #kpop drabbles #kpop requests #kpop smut #ateez imagines #ateez scenarios #ateez drabbles #ateez requests #ateez smut #park seonghwa #ateez seonghwa #park seonghwa smut #seonghwa smut #seonghwa imagines #seonghwa scenarios

84 notes · View notes

evolutionsvoid · 10 months ago

Text

As you can imagine, there are some species out there that almost everyone loves. Then there are species that most people absolutely hate (don't lump me in with them, though). And of course there are many that people are mostly neutral on, not having much to say about it really. No emotional opinions, no crazy stories or tangents to be found. A large amount of creatures land on this option, as they don't really do much to sway one's thoughts, be it good or bad. Of course, there will always be the few folk who are very vocal of their thoughts, but that doesn't do much to dent the public's mental image of a certain species. But sometimes there are particular creatures who garner incredibly polarizing opinions, where people either really like them or furiously despise them. Hardly any in between! Each person you ask will have their own loud thoughts about it, jumping from "oh they are wonderful!" to "KILL EM ALL, I SAY!" in a single group of people. It's crazy! To have such wildly different opinions on one single species! You wouldn't think it possible, as how can a creature evoke such array of feelings? Well, if you ever met a harpy, I think you would quickly see why.

I feel that harpies are a species that don't need much of an introduction. They are a rather famous species and tales surrounding them have spread far and wide. But to make sure everyone is well aware, harpies are a species of bird that are found in a wide variety of ecosystems. They are highly adaptable and ever so clever, so as long as the climate isn't too extreme, they tend to find a way to make it all work. Obviously, one cannot talk about the harpy without bringing up their appearance, as that is one of the big reasons why this species is so well known. Overall, they have a somewhat owl-like build and appearance to them, but with some differences here and there. They do not have zygodactyl feet, rather more anisodactyl but the back toe is very flexible and capable of rotating. Compared to most other birds, they are actually very dexterous, capable of gripping, twisting and a variety of other things! The other feature they have are the clawed thumbs on their wings. While some see sharp pointy bits and immediately assume weapon, often these digits are for grooming or helping clamber through cluttered branches and tight spaces. And, of course, there is their face. Honestly, I imagine some people think I am stalling since I didn't bring this up first. The face of a harpy looks rather flat compared to other birds, and the feathers atop their heads are very thin long and fine. They hang limply down from their skulls, giving the impression of a flowing mane of hair. Their beaks seem quite small, despite a wide mouth hidden beneath their feathers. And with big eyes like that and easy to see nostrils, some folk see a human face upon these birds. And some other features, of course...

Yes indeed, the harpy has often been seen as a human bird hybrid, with some folk believing that they are some strange mammal bird mix or the result of some terrible curse. Furthering the point are the prominent "breasts" upon their chests, two features that humans cannot seem to tear their eyes away from. Unfortunately, I think they are a big reason why some folk and stories paint harpies in a very....seductive light. Flowing hair, bright lively eyes and large plump breasts, things that drive human males wild (supposedly)! I guess me being a dryad makes me ignorant to the appeal, as we lack the bulbous milk sacs that are so unique to mammals (though some human artists and storytellers may say differently on that). In truth, the two bulbs upon their chests are actually air sacs, used in boosting their calls and songs. Males of the species have much larger ones than the females, which causes endless confusion in humans. These sacs are why harpies are often believed to be an all female species, despite that making no sense (and before you point at dryads, remember we are a species whose majority identify as female). And even when you get someone to remember that there are male and female harpies, they will point to the ones with the biggest pair and say that one is the female. No, the males are the ones with the notably large "bosoms," but believe me that is a battle we will never win. Regardless, the males have larger air sacs to make their songs louder and to puff them up nice and big when it is time for courtship. I am sure there are some humans getting a real kick out of all of this...

When it comes to diet, harpies are opportunistic omnivores that are open to eating....well...anything. Fruit, bugs, nuts, small rodents and anything edible you leave lying around. Though their small beaks are not suitable for cracking open hard shells or tearing open carcasses, they usually find a work around. One is their wide mouths and stretching throats, which allow them to straight up swallow a lot of their food. A harpy doesn't need the cutlery to chop up a dead rabbit, they just throw their heads back and choke the whole thing down in one go. Always kind of funny to put that image side by side with the seductive, beautiful bird maidens that people like to fantasize them as. Your lovely bird woman is downing a rotting pork bone right now. And good to bring up food like that, because harpies will absolutely pick stuff out of the garbage. In fact, it is why they tend to set up their nests near villages and cities, as there is always something edible being thrown away. And if it isn't being tossed out, they may figure out a way to get anyways.

One of the reasons harpies are so well known and can cause people to have wildly different opinions about them is their cleverness and trickery. They are incredibly smart birds, able to learn from watching others, memorize patterns, use tools and mimic behaviors. For example, their beaks are not well equipped for cracking tough nuts, so harpies have learned to dump these foods onto roads with heavy carriage and caravan traffic. The horses and wheels will do the job, and they will swoop down when all is clear to collect their reward. They can also learn schedules, like when a farmer goes to feed their livestock every day, and when best to sneak in to grab some grains for themselves. On top of this big brain is incredibly vocal mimicry, which allows them to regurgitate pretty much any sound they have ever heard. And this includes speech! Harpies can mimic the sounds of dogs barking, swords clashing, children playing, and phrases they have heard while sitting upon the roof tops. A harpy can replicate a voice so well, that they tend to fool people who cannot see them! If a harpy was in another room out of sight, and they called to you in the voice of your partner, you wouldn't suspect it came from a bird! You wouldn't think twice! With incredible memories and smarts, they can remember dozens of words and phrases, and spit them back out flawlessly.

However, I must dampen the excitement for a moment. The thing I want to point out is that while harpies can mimic speech and sound like they can talk like any other dryad or human, they cannot actually talk. At least not in the way we interpret it. Harpies are not speaking or trying to convey the actual meaning of these words, they are simply spitting out noises that they have heard. They don't actually know the definition of these words, they just know the usual response to these sounds. Like if I were to say, "hey, can you hand me that key?" in front of a harpy enough times, they may start saying it too. But the thing is, they aren't asking if you would hand them an actual key. Most likely, they see you giving me a shiny object, and think this is the phrase that makes others hand over shiny things. They don't understand it as a request for a single, specific object, they don't even know it is a question. To them, there is no "yes or no" to come from this, they say the noise and the shiny toy is immediately handed over. If not, they get confused or agitated. So if you ever go to a circus or show where they present a fully "fluent" harpy who can sure talk and act like a real deal person, remember that it is the result of countless hours of training and a very tight and staged script. "But Chlora, they sometimes pick out random people in the crowd to talk to them, and they follow along without a hitch!" Yeah, "random." Do you seriously need to have a dryad tell you what a "plant" is?

This vocal mimicry is used for a variety of things, be it wooing mates with elaborate songs and performances, or scaring away predators. Harpies will memorize the sound of dangerous animals in the area, and use them accordingly to spook potential threats. If someone is getting too close for comfort, the rattle of a manticore's scales will certainly make them change their minds! They may even use the sounds of people to scare pests and problems, as a human voice startles quite a few critters! Combined with their wit, and you will find scenarios where harpies found that particular phrases or noises can lead to some interesting results. A good example came from a village that was thrown into a full blown panic when the horn from the watchtower sounded. This alarm was used for approaching dragons or armies, and the people were ready to start a full scale evacuation. Thankfully, before things got too out of hand, the folks in the watch tower spotted the harpies nearby and declared a false alarm. It turns out the birds learned that this big horn noise made all the little people scamper away and leave their valuable tasty things behind.

Another case revolved around a trade route that was besieged by bandits. A nasty gang had set up shop in a wooded part of the road, where they could hide and ambush lone traders. Each time, they would loudly demand that the victim leave all their belongings behind and run, or face the consequences. If you emptied your pockets and fled, they would let you live. Refuse, and they would gut you. Many carts and traders were robbed, but eventually authorities tracked down the bandits and captured them. But days after the arrest, another robbery occurred. And then another, and another. People believed that the guards had taken the wrong men or missed a few of them. Only after thorough investigation did they find a group of harpies who had learned to mimic the loud demands of the bandits, and noticed that this noise made people drop their shinies and run. This revelation also brought to mind the cases where the "robbers" attacked fruit carts and other food laden travelers, despite these targets carrying very little coin. But when threatened with your life, a lot of folk don't stop to think if it is truly bloodthirsty criminals or a bird that is screwing with you to get some free apples.

With this trickery and mimicry in mind, you can start to see why some people would like them or hate them. Harpies are very capable of mischief, and are always fans of easy food. If they can find a way to rob a fruit stand, or swipe a meal from a distracted customer, they will gladly do so. They also like shiny or colorful objects to decorate their nests with, so they will totally fly off with trinkets and coins if they see an opening. Then there is the fact that harpies are incredibly sociable and in need of enrichment, so they do a lot of things for fun or to strengthen bonds with their flock. Groups of harpies can come up with their own games and ideas of "play" which may or may not be fun for the people affected by them. Some games can seem like them just screwing with people, stealing things or being nasty little vandals. They grow close to other harpies and other creatures who are nice to them, and can absolutely hold a grudge if someone wrongs them. Their memory can be applied to faces, and they will totally remember your face if you do something to anger them. In a way, harpies are also mimics when it comes to behavior, as they will copy the way you treat them and do the same to you. Villages with good relations with local harpies typically are very kind to the birds and do not antagonize them, while places terrorized by furious birds are probably guilty of doing something heinous to them previously. So if you find someone who likes harpies, then the birds probably like them. If you see someone who hates them, know that the harpies hate them too.

As I mentioned previously, harpies grow close to the beings who are nice to them and join them in their socialization. This means that anyone can create a bond with a harpy, provided they put in the effort and give plenty of gifts. Offerings of food and trinkets can get their attention, as well as helping them when they are in a bind. Rewarding certain behaviors can even lead to things like trade, where harpies will bring you goodies that you like to get prizes in return. I have met many folk who have developed relations with the local harpies, and find them very good company. Joining in their games or even doing things for them to watch with amusement, there is plenty on can do to make harpies interested in you. However, before you get it in your head that you want a pet harpy, know this: harpies can live for over seventy years, need a lot of social interaction and are very easily stressed. These animals are not toys, they are not things you can push aside when you get bored with them. Harpies need to socialize, they need to play and they need to make sure their bonds are strong. Ignoring them, leaving them for long periods of time or not treating them right will agitate them, stress them and cause their health and mind to deteriorate. Cages are also a terrible thing for them, as they need lots of space. They also get jealous very easily if they really like you and can throw fits when they feel left out. So when it comes to harpies as pets: absolutely not! If you want harpy friends, look to your local flock of harpies and try to strike up relations with them. Harpies make good neighbors and friends, not pets!

Chlora Myron

Dryad Natural Historian

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

"Harpy" (also why is the picture so dang big)

Harpies were inevitable, and I am sure some folk were expecting something more wild, but I absolutely adore this look. I find them very charming! Maybe you will get your more monstrous versions later!

Also I am positive I forgot some things in this entry. But there is always a chance for further ones!

#bird #harpy #mythical creatures #art #drawing #monster #creature

23 notes · View notes

andy-wm · 1 year ago

Text

The 3D Teaser: the first four seconds.

Some people never read the prologue of a novel. And that's okay.

It's not vital. It often plays no part in the events that will unfold in the book, and you can skip it knowing you will still enjoy the story. But what it does ... is it gives context to the narrative you are about to read. It could (and usually does) change your prespective on the events in the book. It gives you insight.

And that's what the first four secods of this teaser is.

It's the prologue.

This is where it starts...

Jungkook, in white, ascends the stairs.

The fact that the MV opens with this scene means it's important. Not just for the structure of the story, but for impact. For our experience.

Why the stairs?

Firstly, we've seen the use of stairs in BTS narratives so many times... in the intro VCRs for concerts, for photoshoots, for choreo. It’s a recognised part of BTS's visual storytelling.

So this is very significant, taking that same visual cue and using it for one individual, in a way that clearly echoes of so many BTS photoshoots and videos. It ties JK to BTS through this familiar - almost ceremonial - ascension of the stairs - even down to the measured pace of his steps.

The aesthetic is also very familiar. Styling artists in a single colour right down to their shoes is a hallmark of K-Pop - and BTS,

The blue and white palette in the opening scene is very clearly reminiscent of Yet To Come. Even the style of outfit is the same - loose fitting off-white jacket and trousers... and that's no accident. This insert feels like a reminder that he remains part of the group, and that he (and his solo work) is intrinsically linked to BTS.

It ALSO says 'this where I left off... This is my best is yet to come'. It's a link from the past to the present.

This is his story.

Beyond the BTS link, stairs physically transport you... whether ascending or descending, moving towards a destination or moving away, stairs move you in three dimensions.

Clever, right?

Here's the most import part of this four second prologue:

BTS usually descends the stairs coming towards us physically and metaphorically. In this case JK is climbing OUT of the picture. He's moving away, BEYOND the BTS framework and into a different space.

Its not insignificant that we cannot see what's at the top of those stairs. Where do they lead? How far do they go up?

Unknown.

We don't know if he can see what new plane or platform he's going to be on either.

But he's walking confidently and at a measured pace. He's not running recklessly and he's also not tentative. He is (as expected) sure of himself and his direction.

And it may look like he's walking away from us but he can go steadily forward because he knows,

He’s got ARMY right behind him when he says so.

Are you crying yet?

I am.

But it's ok, because there's one more important thing to remember.

Those stairs? They're not going to disappear.

I am absolutely confident that he will be coming back the exact same way he left. Probably with that trademark Jungkook swagger (maybe with a giggle, maybe with a tear or two, maybe with the blisteringly hot reentry of a space shuttle. Who knows.)

What we DO know is that he will be coming back down those stairs before 2025.

All WE can do, is be behind him when he asks us to.

💜

Oh, one last thing... If he smashes that hydrant and the MV turns into a wet tshirt competition again, please send flowers to my husband because I will expire.

(and MY god I NEED those shoes!!!!!)

#jeon jungguk #jungkook #전정국 #jungkook 3d #jungkook ft. jack harlow #3d single #3d Jungkook

34 notes · View notes

ao3fujoshevik · 2 months ago

Note

1 and 21 for haku ❄ !!

and 25 and 6 for kabuto! 👓

26 BONUS ROUND who is ur favorite akatsuki member and why

ahhh ty!!

haku:

1. Why do you like or dislike this character?

oh, there’s a few reasons!! I really appreciate how much his gentleness affects those around him. Naruto coming in to the Waves arc was very self-centered, but Haku is how he established his nindo. In general, I really appreciate his narrative importance and the themes he introduces, but I also really just like his vibe.

excellent character design as well!!! and his mirror technique is just so cool and creative and idea to take from just ice.

but he’s a good kid who shouldve gotten to grow up. 🥹😭

21. If you're a fic writer and have written for this character, what's your favorite thing to do when you're writing for this character? What's something you don't like?

in terms of what I actually do *when* writing, haku is mostly written to the “born to die” album haha. but my fav thing is to like. make him think he is soo so calm and composed rn even as he’s actively losing it.

don’t like….. hm. I struggle with wanting to make him more active, but his preference is to Wait and See, which I worry makes for less engaging storytelling even if it just is his character.

kabuto:

25. What was your first impression of this character? How about now?

first impression: I knew he was Bad Guy going in due to Spoilers, but I really liked the subterfuge angle to his story and the early tensions in his loyalty. as a fan of spy fiction, it really appealed to me. While I liked his backstory, I disliked how it resolved, with him just becoming like, a nun.

I think I tend to focus more on the early character of Kabuto for that reason, but I worry I miss out on the details of his personality that are revealed as he McLoses It after orochimaru.

I still think he’s a delightful spy character, and an example of like someone designed to be disposable, in high risk positions, desperately trying to make himself worthy of being kept. There’s this idea in spy fiction of how once someone goes undercover, goes “out in the cold,” they can never really come back, and I’m really compelled by how lost he is as a man more loyal to people than villages in a deeply nationalist setting.

That he goes from pawn to queen interests me as well, because when he does have the power to do what he wants, he is aimless without anyone to use it for.

tl; dr: first impression: oooh cool nerd spy guy. current impression: angsty spy guy nerd

6. What's something you have in common with this character?

i love wearing a ponytail and a high collar shirt, it must be said. But probably his nerdy qualities lol. as someone who frequently looks up the wiki pages to see what abilities characters have, I can definitely relate to the card collection 💜

and favorite akatsuki member ….

for a long time it was Tobi, but now I have to say Deidara. he’s forced in as a 14 year old but just fully accepts being part of akatsuki. he’s petty and vindictive and loud enough that it makes people underestimate how clever he is, but he never pretends to be anything else. I like his technique; in general, I appreciate how he and Sasori have the clearest vision of themselves and their place.

Like the opposite issue of Kabuto, lol. Deidara is completely clear-sighted and open about who he is and why he does what he does. he’s so refreshingly honest and communicative in a setting full of deception and miscommunication. also he has good hair.

thank you againfor asking!!! v fun to answer:))

(numbers from this ask game!!)

#me looking at my fav characters like ‘’i am not immune to pretty boys with long hair’

3 notes · View notes

opposingsigns · 1 year ago

Text

Klaus- The Baldurian Bard

When I first started drawing my play through, I was wracking my brain trying to think of something a bit more witty for their quest title- but the tag is just too catchy 😂

I had fun writing them a quick Origin dialogue as if they were a companion to travel with (see below the cut), and wanted to give them their own iconic design. I know the base bard build calls back to Volo’s design as a scholar and a bit as a jester (what a mood, I love that), and I wanted to keep that idea in mind. With all the small glittering embellishments, I wanted them look as though you had caught a performer behind the scenes just before they had finished getting ready. Are they about to entertain you with a clever act or they the ring master directing it from the sides with a knowing smile?

Klaus is non-binary and uses they/them pronouns. I should draw it from the back later, but I wanted the vest to function not only like a men’s corset but also a binder! I think we should be having more fun with fantasy binders.

Origin Selection Monologue:

Hello there Adventurer- care to hear a tale before you write your own?

I’ve spent my life in Baldur’s Gate, and I can say with certainty I’ve seen it all: from the smallest taverns on the outer city banks to the grandest court halls in the Upper City. The gift of song has its perks, and I’m well known to my audience as someone who trills the sweetest of tunes.

Or rather, I used to be.

Everyone loves a good storyteller. A pint or three of ale, and I’ve found many people think themselves one. I provided a listening ear to the songs and secrets of The Gate’s People- but secrets can come at a high cost. Some would pay a fortune to grasp the neck of the person that holds them.

I adopted a new name, a new identity, and flew from Baldur’s Gate to leave my past behind. I planned never to return. What a fool I am to forget the oldest story of them all.

You may call me Klaus, shall we tell the tale of ‘The Grand Journey Home’?

Bonus thoughts:

Me, drawing the background: oh actually I’ll leave the bird out, it’s a nice nod to their lore 🤭 (<<< is the only man who would get the reference and knows the lore)

Also I have a new brush pen for line art and I’m in love with it.

#baldurs gate 3 #bg3 #baldurs gate fanart #bg3 fanart #bg3 tav #dnd #dnd character #dungeons and dragons #baldur’s gate oc #my art #klausbg3

11 notes · View notes

fangirlshrewt97 · 2 years ago

Text

D20 - Dungeons and Drag Queens Ep 1 Notes

Hey @lurkerviolin,

My notes ran too long so I thought I’d post it as a text post 😅. I do realize some of these are incoherent, and lacking my usual amount of emojis but I typed it in my laptop instead of phone so...

Also I think i kept switching up all their pronouns cause I wasn’t sure which was the right one? 😅😅

Anyways here we go:

This theme song is already so chaotic lol

God still so strange to see Brennan all made up, but he looks great

It's so nice to see how the Queens are all so engaged. Brennan is radiating such incredible Storyteller energy right now, it's amazing.

Lololol oh no Monet! "We have someone who works in identity theft" lol

Jujubee is so entranced as Brennan is describing Everdeep. Mood.

Oh my gosh the Queens are so funny. The riffing about the gem's origins.

EQUAL OPPORTUNITY FOR WITCHES!

Hmm yeah she did talk to her own mother like that ...

The way it was written by Tuna Turner! I don't know how much the Dropout people asked the Queens to lean on puns but they are doing amazing. Bob especially is SO into it.

The growl from Alaska lol

Hmm, has Bob played before? They seem more accustomed to the game play.

Ok yeah I think Bob might be my favorite so far

Jujubee is a close second, they are so enthusiastic but so lost. It's endearing. "We went to Cher's last first concert to gether." lolol

Cause they're an inch from 5' feet lolololol oh my gooood.

These interjections are such a gift. They just make the story so much funnier

Lieutenant Alvin the chipmunk lol cute!!

Jujubee forcing Brennan to narrate as Alvin was such a Mood. Yes, make him work!

Zaria Hex: Beware her death drop *I snorted, oh my god, ingenious*

SHE ATE THE SEED LOLOLOLOL

"9.30" "Yeah, it's late for you Grandma" lol

Alaska's growling accent is an excellent character choice

Bob entering the bar and immediately describing what they are seeing, are we sure they are completely new to this?

Oh my god I love Kashra, look at that build!

Daggy is also really handsomely designed.

Makes sense for the two fighters to be able to down the drink no problem.

Aww two nat ones

"If your perception's a one, that means you are delusional" lol

Oh my god Jujubee is too cute, with how often they get confused.

A racotour is when you contour with a rat LOLOLOL

"Oh, he's a pimp"

This is a greatseason for newcomers to DnD. Brennan is such a good teacher

Bump is kinky! LOL

Gertrude is so clever. I love how quickly Bob and Monet understood the concept of the game.

A 24?! She is going to pulvarize him!

Lololol, just so you know when you turn 36 yourknees know when it's going to rain.

Idk who Michelle visage it, but I like how Jujubee says Brennan. Yeah he may be the DM guiding them in the adventure, but to them, he's also like a younger kid/brother-type.

I remember Raphaniel casting Detect thoughts in Ep 1 of the ravening war and just getting blasted with horny thoughts lol

"Twyla! Don't look around! Don't freak out!

Oooh Wallace... I like that idea, yeah his clasp is a different colour cause he's an undead pretending not to be. Solid guess.

Oh damn they went from initiative to beast assault. Zero to 60 indeed.

A Cat Tree??? So out of left field. God, you got to love first time players just doing the wildest moves.

Amazing Grapple. Like a To-Go container.

It's probbaly Swallace, drop the 'S', no one will know . LOLOL

This Mark Ronson gag is also so funny.

Cousin KK, incredible.

Ooh, Brennan is so good about tying far flung stories together.

Aww Jujubee really liking Brennan'sflowery descriptions! Cute.

I really like how Brenan incorporates all their random additions into his narrative. As a DM, really letting the players's additions become part of his world. It's very kind.

Lol, the caption for the guardian being "Stoned for days, Darling". All these taglines are so clever!

Oh my god, the camera jumping back and forth between Monet and Jujubee instead of Brennan as he is trying to do a play. Far more entertaining, good call Director/editor

Alaska's voice for Princess is so fitting and so funny.

"Just straight up the same one?" Judgey much, stone guy?

Brennan is so good with descriptions of what is happening.

OOOOH They look so into it in the next episode. This looks like a cool side quest, can't see what comes next.

#d20 #dungeons and drag queens #my reaction notes #brennan lee mulligan #dimension 20

25 notes · View notes

aviculor · 6 months ago

Text

It's the last day of my vacation and I'd be remiss if I didn't watch a movie.

I don't know when MaXXXine got its digital release, but here it is in full HD rather than a camera recording with "WIN REAL MONEY AT SLOTS.NET.RUS.EXE" plastered on it. I've heard middling reviews about this, but I loved X and I respected the vision for Pearl so I've been looking forward to finishing the trilogy. We're following Maxine Minx, the final girl from X who's trying to get her big break in Hollywood several years later and there's a serial killer on the loose. I can probably guess the twist based on the "Pearl and Maxine are basically the same person" concept of X and the fact that Pearl was all about Pearl killing people for allegedly being in her way of stardom. I'm sure Mia Goth has given another stellar performance if nothing else. There is a new Dead Meat Podcast ep about this, so I'll be checking that out afterwards.

As you would expect, the arc phrase "I will not accept a life I do not deserve" is back. We see a young Maxine doing the Pearl dance, which is a connection that just raises further questions. Is it a real dance move? Is it a reference to something? Is it meant to imply that Maxine actually is a long-lost relative of Pearl and being played by the same actress wasn't just a narrative parallel? Or maybe it was just meant to highlight that Pearl actually was just floundering around like a small child at her professional audition. Another call-back is that Maxine has dyed her hair blonde, while the talent scouts in Pearl were looking for an "All-American Blonde". That's a real juicy piece of environmental storytelling considering we're following Maxine struggling to become a "real" actress after having already made a name for herself in the adult film industry. A career move she has come to regret and resent.

Oh, well, now I have a different theory about where this is going.

"The Texas Porn Star Massacre". Clever.

It was certainly a creative decision to have the detectives' final standoff against Maxine's dad be entirely offscreen.

I'm noticing a lot of...passiveness from Maxine despite ostensibly being a confident girlboss movie star with X factor. She just stands there silently while her director or her co-star or whoever else is there basically monologues at her. She follows orders and directions from people without question. In order to keep her role in the film, she was literally told to just obey whatever she was told. She stated verbatim to the director that she would do whatever she says. Then she essentially stumbled into other people solving her problems for her without much action on her part. The PI chases her into the Bates Motel, but does she kill him in a scene homaging Psycho? No, he gets stopped by security before he can enter. When the PI was lured into the alley and Maxine was facing him down in a car, I thought for sure she was going to run him over as a nod to the end of X, but no, her agent and the bouncer are the ones who got their hands dirty on her behalf. Then the climax comes and the detectives save her from her father rather than her saving herself, and she's not even present when her father is mortally wounded. When the police show up, it *looks* as if she had taken matters into her own hands and acted with agency, but she actually just happened to be in that place at that time. I feel like all this is clearly deliberate. I'm looking forward to hearing other people's thoughts and if they picked up on this too.

I'm not sure what to make of the ending. I'm glad everything worked out in the end? I'm glad nothing bad happened to her or her career after she blew someone's head off with a shotgun while surrounded by police helicopters telling her to drop her weapon? Was any of that even real or was Maxine still fantasizing?

I think I did like this film. The way people were talking about it, I was worried. It wasn't outstanding, but it was a lot better than I was led to believe. There were hints towards the "fear of aging" theme of X, but they definitely could have made it more prominent. If they did a better job of tying together what X and Pearl had going, the ending might have been a little stronger.

#horror #maxxxine #pearl #x

3 notes · View notes

serensama · 5 months ago

Text

In Sacrifice, Glory: Chapter 5

Thank you @illneverrecover <3 Read on Ao3

Cassandra had been muttering under her breath since their meeting with the Templars. Every so often she would burst out with a ‘Has Lord Lucius truly gone mad?’ or ‘How could he do this?!’ startling them to no end. She remained distracted as they searched for clues for the friend of Red Jenny, with the warrior often walking into the back of Varric and never rising to the occasion to any of his barbs. The dwarf looked at Elissa and Solas completely at a loss as to how to break the Seeker from her thoughts, and they all silently agreed to give her the time to adjust to the knowledge there was a newer, more sinister leader of the Seeker order.

It was not until another elf made herself known at their rendezvous point did she snap out of her self-imposed daze, the loud and lairy rogue bright enough to shock someone back from the brink of death.

“Y-You, you are the Friend of Red Jenny?” she asked, mouth slack and surprise plastered across her face, her expression only deepening the more she heard the woman talk.

“Well yeah, one of them anyways. Name’s Sera. This is cover. Get round it. For the reinforcements. Don’t worry. Someone tipped me their equipment shed. They’ve got no breeches,” she giggled, a look of pure cheekiness upon her young face.

“Breeches?” Cassandra echoed, completely confused and struggling to catch up with what was happening. She looked between her companions to see if she was the only one who felt as if she no longer understood the Common tongue with the way this stranger wielded it. Cassandra glanced at Elissa who only shrugged but readied her staff for whatever was to come their way.

Thankfully the fight was quick and the Herald and Sera seemed to understand each other and made light work of recruiting the archer and her network of ‘people’ to aid the Inquisition; their brief interaction ended with Sera skipping away from their group with a promise to meet them back at Haven.

“That is by far the oddest elf I have ever met,” Cassandra baulked after her as she shook some blood off her blade.

Solas made a strangled noise at the back of his throat and gawked at Cassandra. “Oh no Seeker, this has nothing to do with her being an elf at all, we have all had the pleasure to bear witness to what a storm looks like trapped in skin,” he groused, shaking his head disbelievingly.

“Yeah, and yellow plaid slacks,” Varric chuckled as he pulled out his book and wrote something down that made him snort at his own cleverness. Elissa tried to peek over his shoulder but he noticed and snapped the book shut from her prying eyes with a small smirk.

“What, are you writing a note to buy some for yourself? Sorry to break it to you Master Tethras but you couldn’t pull it off,” she tutted with mock sincerity which earned her a light snicker from Solas. “Solas on the other hand could definitely make those trousers work.”

Solas abruptly stopped laughing which caused Cassandra to snort inelegantly; allowing for Varric to write an additional note about them all undisturbed. Elissa could only imagine the tales the dwarf was spinning about them, but she yearned to be there when it was all over; sat by the fire to hear him recount their tales just like he had about Hawke and their friends. She could envision it, everyone- right there with her as they listened to the storyteller well into the night. The madness they were currently fighting, nothing more but an entertaining memory to warm them for years to come.

A distant tolling of a clock let her know just how late it was, reminding her that she had yet to rest since leaving Val Royeaux earlier that morning. Elissa suggested that they head back to their lodgings and get cleaned up and get whatever rest there was to be had. They had to have their wits about them, she knew that for sure. She could almost hear Leliana in her ear, a faded memory playing in her mind. ‘You cannot enter an Orlesian event without arming yourself. Douse yourself in etiquette and only speak if you can promise a chance of intrigue; pair it with the right shoes, Lissa- and they cannot touch you!’

Unfortunately for her she only had the boots the Inquisition had commissioned for her, it would just have to be enough for First Enchanter Vivienne... whoever the hell she was. Elissa squeezed her eyes shut to try to block the ringing in her ears and the creeping pain across her temples as the memory faded away, the pit of worry in her stomach descending ever further. Each time she gained a memory it was always accompanied by pain. She could not shake the feeling that whatever her mind was hiding from her was so sinister, that it may be better to continue on as she was. That whatever her past held, was better left forgotten.

---

Orlesians.

She couldn’t have been bloody Orlesian. The only one she could stomach for any great length was Leliana. Of course she understood pomp and pageantry but these people took it to a level she could not grasp. A part of her appreciated the beauty of it all; their architecture, their fashion and the general opulence the empire held- but if she had to listen to another Orlesian noble harp on about some random Vicomte or Baroness she would try to drown herself in the shallow fountain in the centre of the room.

She had already managed to convince a Comte and Comtesse that everything they heard about her and the Inquisition was true. She was just about to tell them that at night bluebirds came down from upon high, to lift up her blankets and tuck her in and sing her sweetly to sleep. Unfortunately a particularly sour fellow interrupted her and started challenging her to a duel. She was about to accept and thus escape the inane drivel of the salon when ice encased the man, not letting him move, let alone breathe.

Did she do that? She had thought that was getting her magic under control but-

“My dear Marquis, how unkind of you to use such language in my house... to my guests. You know such rudeness is- intolerable.”

Oh thank goodness. It wasn’t her.

Their host, a fiercely clad woman in ivory and silver, turned on her heel to address her. “My Lady, you are the wounded party in this unfortunate affair. What would you have me do with this foolish, foolish man?”

Elissa did not bother to glance over at the frozen Marquis in case the irrational thought of smashing him to bits with her staff proved too tempting.

“I did not come here for the Marquis or to take heed of any nonsense he or anyone else may espouse. Truthfully he bores me, so I leave him to you, to do as you please with him,” she replied, trying to sound as aloof as possible to play to the crowd that had stopped to watch their every move. She slowly released her held breath to ensure her nervousness remained hidden; relieved their host had chosen to spare the idiot, publically humiliate him true, but spared him nonetheless. Whilst she certainly didn't like him, she would never wish him dead.

Once the Marquis made his shameful exit and the rest of the party had spread out to continue with their Orlesian style revelry, the mage motioned for Elissa to follow her to a more private area to talk.

“Allow me to introduce myself, I am Vivienne, First Enchanter of Montsimmard and Enchantress to the Imperial Court,” she declared so confidently that had she offered her hand to Elissa, she would have taken it and kissed it without a moment’s hesitation. “I wanted to meet you face to face, it is important to consider one’s connections carefully. As the leader of the last loyal mages of Thedas, I feel it only right that I lend my assistance to your cause.”

She bristled at the term “loyal mages” but decided not to prod at the snap happy First Enchanter lest she be turned into the next ice sculpture of the salon.

“Why seek me or the Inquisition out, Lady Vivienne? You seem quite well off here already as First Enchanter and Enchantress to the Empress, what’s in this for you?” Elissa questioned wanting to understand this woman’s motivations. She watched as the Enchanter smirked and tilted her chin up, somehow making herself seem even more larger than life than before.

“The same thing anyone gets by fighting this chaos. The chance to meet my enemy and to decide my fate. I will not wait quietly for destruction,” she declared, her body language screaming at Elissa to dare to contradict her.

She had to give it to the evening’s host, she was every bit as fierce in persona as her bold choice in attire. Perhaps she had found another Orlesian she didn’t immediately want to kill by choking them with their own frilled collars.

“The Inquisition will be happy to have you, Lady Vivienne,” she smiled as she called over a wandering server with sparkling wine and took two long stemmed glasses, one for each of them. Vivienne quietly thanked her and offered the rim of her glass for Elissa to clink against her own in celebration.

“Great things are beginning, my dear. I can promise you that,” she proclaimed before taking a long sip.

“Oh of that I’ve no doubt First Enchanter,” Elissa agreed, raising her glass up in salutation to the frost mage. “No one dressed as fabulously as you are could promise no less.” Vivienne’s mouth pouted and twitched at the corners, Elissa surmised that was the Orlesian equivalent of a smile.

“My darling, oh I do think I actually like you. Well done,” she acknowledged as she moved back into the thrall of nobles, leaving Elissa to her own questioning whether gaining the Enchantress’ approval was something to be applauded or feared.

---

“I just got back Leliana,” Elissa groused as she stared down the Spymaster from across the war table. At least the redhead had the humility to look abashed by her request. To think she had just literally swung her leg off of Charlotte and handed her reins to Master Dennett, when a scout raced out letting her know that her presence was requested inside the Chantry. Maker be praised that she didn’t need to relieve herself first, perhaps have something to eat or even try to pretend the inside of her thighs weren’t burning something dreadful due to the travel to and from Val Royeaux. If there was one thing Elissa was damned sure of, she was going to teach the former Left and Right Hands of the Divine some bloody patience.

“I understand that Herald, and I would not think to ask if it were not important,” she implored as she pointed to a mark on the Hinterlands. “This is the last known sighting of the Warden.”

Elissa scratched at her neck in irritation, racking her brain for a reason why Leliana thought it imperative for them to find some random Warden, it wasn’t even about Darkspawn, what good would the Grey Wardens be?

“Surely it is more important for me to get to Redcliffe and meet with Fiona and see if she and the other mages would join our cause? Can we not look for him on the way back after speaking to her, or better yet, after we’ve finished what needs to be done with the Breach?” she asked, pointing at the map herself. “It does not make sense that we wander around the entire expanse of that countryside looking for one man, that has nothing to do with what we’re trying to accomplish here.”

Leliana looked like she wanted to smack Elissa on the back of the head but instead plotted the proposed course she would take with her finger in order to find this Warden Blackwall.

“I am not sure that is entirely true Herald,” she stated, waiting for Elissa to show curiosity at what she said before continuing. “The Grey Wardens have now disappeared both in Ferelden and in Orlais, and we need answers as to why. My last contact here within the Wardens has stopped responding to me and I hear no reports at all from Vigil’s Keep… we cannot rule out that they know something that we do not, and knowledge is everything. Warden Blackwall is the best key to get that knowledge.”

Elissa sighed heavily and acquiesced, she knew that Grey Wardens were important to their world and with all the craziness that had been happening, she would be foolish to discount the possibility that something had happened to them too. She was not happy about it, but she would do it. The weary mage gathered up all the missives relating to the Warden and carefully placed them in her pack before giving the Sister a withering glare.

“I did not mean you had to go right away Elissa!” she called out as she made her way out of the Chantry.

“There’s no need for me to get comfortable if all I’m to do is leave again, I’ll just restock on some supplies and be on my way,” she sniped over her shoulder, waving to Josephine as she passed her office. “See you when I see you.”

Josephine rushed from behind her desk to see the Herald stomp off into the village, clearly annoyed but still kind enough to say hello to everyone who greeted her. Leliana looked over at the diplomat and shrugged, unsure if she should go after her and try to make nice before she left the camp again.

“Did you tell her why you were sending her out there instead of one of your scouts?” Josie asked, already knowing the answer.

Leliana shook her head and pursed her lips, thinking of the best way to reply to her Antivan friend. She retreated back to the war room knowing that the ambassador would follow until she received her answer.

“No Josie, I did not tell her the reason I sent her,” she relented as she carefully slid herself onto the corner of the table.

“Was that not your mistake then? If you told her why you thought it was important maybe she would have been more understanding?” she reproached her, looking far too similar to a Reverend Mother admonishing her young initiates.

“Because the last time I told her something she passed out Josie,” she bit out more harshly than she intended. “So I thought, if she were to meet with a warden, talk to them, perhaps that would help jog her memory naturally and she wouldn’t have to go through more pain.”

Josephine gave her a sad but understanding smile and motioned for Leliana to make room for her on the table to sit beside her.

“Alright, that makes sense. But why did we have to send her? We know where he is and we could have invited him here to Haven, ready to speak to her,” she asked, trying to understand her reasoning. Leliana opted to keep those reasons secret, mainly because they were not hers to say. She had gleaned from her time with both Elissa and Alistair that not only could they sense darkspawn, they could also sense other wardens. If Elissa could feel whatever it was they felt when looking for the Warden, perhaps that was the key to unlocking who she was.

“The more she is seen out in the field, doing the people’s work- they will see through the lies the other clerics have been spewing about her, about the Inquisition. She needs to be seen amongst the people and not someone leading an army to take over Thedas,” she said instead, not entirely a lie, but definitely not the whole truth. It would be of great benefit indeed to their cause for the people to see Elissa as one of them, though it would be even better if they saw the Herald of Andraste was also the Hero of Ferelden.

Josephine linked arms with her and lay her head on Leliana’s shoulder, enjoying the reprieve from her never ending mountain of correspondence.

“You do realise you will have to somehow make it up to her, yes? She had been on the road for quite a while with little to no rest... she probably feels more like the Inquisition’s lackey than any sort of Herald,” she said, jostling her friend slightly when she did not reply.

“I know, I’ll speak to her when she gets back...” Leliana faded off at the sharp look Josephine gave her, “...after she has had a long rest and is ready to discuss things with me.”

Josephine smiled proudly and nodded her approval at the Spymaster’s change of tactics then hopped off the table.

“A fine plan, perhaps you could make a night of it then? I could give you one of the bottles of wine I’ve brought along from my family’s vineyard and you can both get drunk and bond like two noble ladies sneaking into the cellar after a ball.”

“That sounds awfully like something you are suggesting from your personal experience, Lady Montilyet,” Leliana chuckled as the diplomat’s mouth opened and closed in surprise.

“Of course not Sister Leliana,” she gasped, smoothing down the front of her blouse. “I would never sneak and I would also never wait until aftera ball, all the best wine would have already been drunk.”

---

The bloody pack would not stay fastened to Charlotte no matter what she did; she could not tell if she had managed to forget how to secure the damned thing in the two hours she was back in Haven or if the bag had somehow broken. Elissa pulled it down to inspect it closer, only for the loosened flap to open and spill out her newly acquired provisions. She threw her bag down and raised a shaking hand to shield her eyes from the midday sun, unsure if she was going to swear or scream or cry. Maybe all three, she deserved to treat herself.

She heard someone greet her and looked down at her feet. A man was bent over picking up her dropped items, brushing off the dirt and snow from each object before carefully placing them into her pack.

“Oh Commander, you don’t have to do that-” she started, ducking down to help him.

“It is no trouble,” he interrupted her, giving her a warm smile. “Sometimes this is the Maker’s way of telling us to stop for a moment.”

“Is this the Commander’s way of ordering me to stop for a moment?” she questioned, grin playing at her lips at the way he paused at her gentle teasing.

“Not so much an order as it is wise counsel. It will do you well to take a second before heading out to -?”

“The Hinterlands. Leliana wants me to go out and search for a random man in a random place,” she frowned as she threw the rest of her belongings into the pack to save any further embarrassment at having the head of the army pick up after her, like the parent of a petulant child after throwing a hissy fit.

“Certainly, and as uh, important as that mission sounds, it would serve you better to have some rest and go back out there with your head screwed on straight. I’ve seen many great soldiers not come back because they were too tired to think clearly,” he explained as he secured her bag and attached it to the back of Charlotte- who did not look impressed to be travelling so soon, much like her mistress.

Elissa could not argue it was indeed wise counsel. She remembered seeing soldiers come back from a campaign and some so weary they did fall off their horses. She hissed when a sharp pain exploded from the back of her eyes and she fell against her horse for support. Cullen’s gloved fingers gently took hers in hand- she had not realised she had clasped them around her face- and pulled them down to examine her.

“Herald, are you alright?” he asked, panic colouring his voice. Elissa slowly opened one eye and then the other, afraid another pang would hit her. The world unblurred and she was looking into warm pools of honey, scanning her face and hands frantically for any injury. “Did something hit you? Are you unwell? I should call for Solas-” he scrambled, already waving for the nearest scout to come to him.

Elissa stilled him and waved back the running scout, apologising for scaring him over nothing and that she was perfectly fine.

“Fine is it? Is that why you’re still holding onto my arms to stand upright Herald?” he said, calling her out on her little white lie.

“Jokes on you Commander, I was just holding onto you because I’m trying to steal this fantastic surcoat of yours, it is far prettier than anything I own and- ah!,” she gasped as another bout of pain attacked her senses, her fingers clinging onto his armguards.

Ignoring her protests he guided her over to the closest tent and sat her down, he had thought to carry her but he was not sure what that would do to her pride and for the troop’s morale. To them, she really was the Herald of Andraste and he was not going to shatter any illusions that kept their spirits high.

“Please stay here, have something warm to drink and you can get some rest-”

“Truly, Commander, it’s fine, I’m fine-”

“No, you’re not. So now it is an order. You will stay here until I or Solas give you clearance, do you understand me Herald?” he asserted as he pressed a cup of freshly brewed tea into her hand, wrapping his hands around her smaller one to make sure she had a safe grip on it.

Elissa stared up at him, even as he knelt down and crouched forward; he was so much bigger than she was. Everything about him was large and strong. The pain she felt swiftly receded and replaced with a rush of something else, his touch and manner firm but gentle... Elissa get a grip, he was just helping because you’re their Herald of Andraste, stop deluding yourself woman. Just drink the damn tea.

“...I’m not hearing a ‘Yes Commander’ there, Herald,” he smirked, thoroughly enjoying the way she licked her lips as she looked up at him. The Maker preserve him, he was going to be struck down by lightning.

“Yes Commander,” she whispered as she brought the cup to her lips, watching him watch her with rapt fascination. It was not until he recognised his gloves that he realised his hands were still wrapped around her hand and the cup.

Cullen could feel his face flood with colour to the tips of his ears as he released her suddenly and fell back, almost losing his balance.

“Commander! We need your assistance here Ser!,” a lieutenant called out to him, allowing him to escape and save face. He repeated that she needed to rest and that he would be back shortly but to call out if she needed anything, not quite able to meet her gaze for fear he would combust.

He hadn’t meant to flirt with the woman, he had only wanted to help her. He had seen her ride in with the others and was glad to see that they were all in one piece and seemed in good spirits which surprised him considering the reports that were sent from their trip to Val Royeaux. However they did come out of it with new merchants and allies so it was not all for naught.

Cullen still hadn’t made up his mind about the Herald since his last chat with her. He could clearly see that they looked like the same person but it was just too fantastical to think of someone coming back to life just to help them out of the mess they were in. The Maker had long abandoned them, or so said the Chantry, so why would he send her?

As he watched her head into the main camp he could not help but watch her walk away; he was not a blind man, and she was for all intents and purposes a very beautiful woman- one who happened to look like Elissa Cousland’s twin. Back in the day, there were talks of the Hero of Ferelden being a warrior whose beauty dazzled both the darkspawn and the Fereldan nobles into submission. Bullshit. Even as angry as he was back in the Tower, he knew the woman could fight and had both talent and spirit enough to defeat demons and abominations, it was not just about her appearance. Yet he had to admit, looking as she did probably assisted more than inhibited her... and probably why she was so free with her charms; he doubted anyone would deny her whatever she wanted, especially if what she wanted was them.

One of the recruits slipped and he helped them up with a hearty pat on the back, Cullen told them to take a quick break before heading back out to complete the drills, when he remembered that it had been more than an hour since he had left the Herald. She was probably long gone by then, already taken that horse and rode off into the Hinterlands to do what was needed, why would she heed his order? Still he made his way to where he left her to find her sitting closer to where the soldiers trained, hands holding the empty cup and watching them go through the exercises with a look of wonder and appreciation on her face. He could not help but be amused by the sight, after all he probably looked exactly the same when a group of Templars had arrived in Honnleath and he trailed after them day after day, completely awed by their skill and knowledge.

Cullen took a seat beside her but she did not notice, her attention too focused on the recruits using a sword and shield. Her eyes darted back and forth as they sparred and her smile grew wider each time one of them managed to successfully complete an attack or block one. He watched her from the corner of his eye as she placed the cup down and leaned forward, her chin resting on the heel of her mark-free palm, grinning as the spar grew more intense. Finally the more experienced soldier managed to find an opening and struck the recruit in the side, winding the young man and causing him to fall to his knees and surrender.

“Oooh poor dear, he should have kept that shield up,” she muttered to herself as she clapped for them both nonetheless.

“Have you ever held a sword before Herald?” he asked, genuinely interested if the woman had any skill for melee combat with something other than a staff. She sat still and continued to watch the other soldiers so he had thought she hadn’t heard him and was about to repeat himself, when he noticed her shoulders moving up and down slowly and her lips pressed tightly together to hold in her laughter. What was so funny that she had to- “Oh, you’re just as bad as my men!” he scoffed as her giggles bubbled out of her.

“My apologies Commander, but truth be told, I don’t remember if I’ve ever held a sword.”

“Well, would you like to try? Oh- Herald would you stop laughing!” he crowed, unable to hold back his own grin at her japes. “Would you like to train with the troops? Only if you’re feeling up to it of course.”

“Why Commander, I thought you would never ask.”

Elissa beamed and stood up with her hand extended to help him to his feet which he accepted happily. As he pushed himself up he realised he was standing too close to her to be considered proper, with less than one arm’s length between them. Cullen stepped to her side and led her towards an open area where she had more room to practise without too many soldiers to stare at her.

Cullen went over to a nearby weapons rack and picked out one of the training longswords, probably the same weight as her current staff, perhaps even lighter.

“Try this one Herald, tell me how it feels.”

“Cullen if you keep making it this easy to make everything you say into a double entendre we will literally be out here all day,” she smirked as she manoeuvred the sword in her hands to see what felt most comfortable for her.

“Truly, that mouth of yours will get you into trouble one day,” he snickered before realising what he just said, throwing his hands up in the air in mock surrender. “Let’s just begin with a basic attack. Now first put your left foot forward and the right behind you- yes like that. Now make sure your hips are facing your opponent and not on an angle. Sword held at your shoulder height.”

“Like this?”

“Yes. Now grip the handle firmly, starting with both hands, and what we want are smooth, fluid motions. We want to close the distance between you and the enemy, but when you move forward ensure you move out of their line of attack- whether that is to the left or right is up to you- this way you are ready for any counterattack. From here bring your sword down in one straight swing down towards their head and neck.”

Elissa looked at him unsure of herself, she had just gotten used to her staff and that had taken weeks. She could only imagine how long she would have to be at the training dummies before she could do anything that looked remotely like an attack. She had to remind herself that he was very used to seeing men and women take their swings during training and she couldn’t embarrass herself that badly in front of him.

Ah, stupid girl. You made that sound like a challenge. Not only will you not stop flirting with him, you will now be able to show him how bad you are at actually holding a sword. Double entendre or not. Bravo.

“Is the sword too heavy, Herald?” he asked when she stood there unmoving, silently berating herself. “I can get you another, perhaps we have a wooden training sword somewhere-”

“By wooden sword do you mean that toy sword that one of the tavern server’s son plays with?” she questioned incredulously, almost offended at the idea she looked that weak she could only lift a child’s play thing. Cullen didn’t answer except for a shrug as his smile broadened, his silence enough to light a fire under her to prove him wrong. With her self-consciousness all but gone, Elissa moved toward the practice dummy and swung down, easily slicing the burlap where the neck would have been.

The Commander blinked a couple of times to register what happened; most times people who had never held a sword would miss or move very clumsily, however the Herald moved with no hesitation and in one clean sweep. It could have been beginner's luck of course.

“Again Herald,” he instructed, gaze fixed at the sword in her hand.

Elissa nodded and completed the exercise another three times without being prompted, each swing powerful and effortless as if she did not have to think about it at all. However he supposed after weeks on the road the training with Cassandra could have prepared her much better than anyone expected- even if with a completely different weapon. He called over a recruit and told him to run to the tavern and ask for an assortment of vegetables varying in size, whatever they had that was already turning and about to be thrown away or fed to the animals.

Whilst he waited for him to return, he continued to observe the Herald who had started to move with more confidence and had experimented with different angles of the sword to hit the top of the head, the shoulder, the top of the arm- in almost a practised pattern. He could not deny that she held great promise and could not discard the idea that she had previously been trained, or at least began her training in swordsmanship prior to the Conclave.

The scout returned with a small crate of cabbages, onions and potatoes to pass to Cullen. Thanking him as a dismissal, Cullen carried the humble assortment of produce towards a nearby wooden post where they were about to build a new dummy to train on. Carefully he balanced the largest cabbage on top of the post and called the Herald over, still practising the simple attack.

It was one thing to be able to attack a large target, if she could control her sword to accurately slice the vegetables up there could be no doubt she was either a prodigy or she had been previously taught.

She came over to him and wiped the sweat that had already formed around her hairline, her sword held up with the tip in the air and the flat of the blade against her shoulder. The proper way to travel with an unsheathed sword; not that he had taught her that, nor was it something she would have had the opportunity to see from any of the soldiers around camp.

“Herald, could you please try to aim for this cabbage using the move you’ve been practising?” he said, gesturing to it.

Elissa stared at him as if he had grown another head.

“Come now, you were doing a fine job with that now dummy. If that was a person they’d be well and truly dead.”

“Yes, but that dummy had an unnaturally large head. That cabbage is much more head sized and not attached to anything else I can stab,” she rebutted, trying her best to dissuade the Commander of this idea.

“Unfortunately for you, you’ll find most people have more head-sized heads than not,” he pointed out, stepping outside of her sword’s range so she could begin. “Please, just try your best. If we find this is not something you’re able to do yet, it is something we know we need to work on.”

“Has anyone told you how annoying it is when you’re being logical and right?” she mumbled but still fell into the correct stance.

Cullen laughed through his nose and tried his best to suppress the smug smile that threatened to bloom across his mouth. “Not today... or at least not out loud, Herald.”

Elissa took a deep breath and then another, completely focused on the cabbage with its browning edges and smaller area for attack. She imagined the arc of her blade, the way it would cut through the air and where it would end. Her feet moved and then her arm, smooth and clean, the cabbage lying in twain on the ground. Not a perfect cut down the middle but still, if that were a head- the person would not be alive to mock her for a less than stellar hit.

Without missing a beat Cullen took out a large potato and set it where the cabbage was upon the post.

"Again, please,” he asked, his hand motioning towards the brown vegetable.

“Commander-”

“You did not think you could hit the cabbage. You did. Just try it, please.”

Elissa huffed and got back into position, shaking her head in disbelief. The man was being stubborn and pushing the limits of her abilities.

The arc of your blade. The sound of the air it cuts. The point of your sword when the swing is done.

Two portions of the potato lay near the man’s feet and he let out a low whistle of appreciation. She had great control, strength and aim, that much was assured.

“Hey, would you look at that! I did it! Commander did you- what the actual-... Cullen!” she screeched as he threw an onion at her without warning. Instinctively she cut down the projectile enough to deflect it from hitting her. “What the heck? Are we just pelting the Herald of Andraste with spoiled vegetables now? I expected this when I first woke up from the Conclave not bloody weeks after, man!” she ranted with no particular heat behind her words.

“My apologies Herald of Andraste,” he saluted, his eyes fixed on her as he grinned. “I just had to see.”

“See what? If I’d look better with a black eye?” she voiced, cleaning the juices off the blade on the back of her forearm. “I’ll save you the wondering, I do not. Just ask Cassandra when one of the rogue Templars out in the Hinterlands managed to land a punch on me. Looked like an angry little badger for a week. Though it smarted for longer than that- the bastard.”

Cullen’s smile quickly faded at the thought of someone from his previous order hitting her and turned solemn immediately. Of course he knew that everyone there was in danger and anyone at any time could get injured or killed; but the idea of her being hurt in particular, did not sit well with him. It was probably because she did not sign up like he did, joined the Inquisition out of necessity and not out of free will. Probably because she was so easy to get along with and helped boost the people’s determination by her mere presence. Something like that. Probably.

“I am sorry to hear it Herald, and no, it is not something I would like to see on you,” he said gravely, something in his tone making Elissa look up at him. “I uh, I mean anyone. Anyone within the Inquisition of course. I hate the idea of anyone under my charge getting hurt, of course.”

“Of course,” she smiled politely, the warmth not quite reaching her eyes as they normally did.

“I just needed to see if you were able to hit a moving target and you could, quite well considering the size of the object,” he praised her, pointing at the ground where the pieces of onion had landed. “It is not something a green swordsman could do, especially when they were not expecting it. You have been trained Herald, the only question is how much.”

Elissa rested the sword against a nearby dummy and pondered on his assessment. She had to admit that she felt more at home with a sword than she did with a staff, something familiar and comforting in the movements. Perhaps that earlier memory of the army was of her in an army. Was she part of the King's Guard? Made sense why she knew what the name of the pub in Denerim was...

“... I would like to test this, but the only way to do it is get you out there and to fight someone. Would that be something you’re interested in doing?” he questioned, already thinking of the best suited soldiers to call upon.

“What? Oh, yes that would be fine,” she agreed, not quite understanding what she had consented to until Cullen returned with a handful of his troops who looked a little too thrilled to be chosen to help train the Herald of Andraste.

“Are you ready Herald?” he asked as one of the newer recruits walked toward her with his sword still sheathed.

“Good day Herald, it is a pleasure to meet you. My name is Devon,” the young man said. Elissa looked over the lad and he couldn’t be a day over 18, a child fighting a war.

“Good day Devon, thank you for helping me today,” she replied as kindly as she could, hoping he wouldn’t notice the tinge of sadness in her voice.

“Not at all Herald, it’s the least we could do,” he chirped excitedly, drawing out his training sword.

“Begin!” Cullen yelled out, surprising the two fighters.

Elissa registered that she was starting to panic, going from dummy to flying onion to person was a massive change in the space of an hour but it was too late to object. Devon was side stepping in a circle and she followed in suit, not entirely sure what she was doing but it was better than becoming a still target for him to wallop.

“Devon, we’ve established the Herald can walk, please do something else,” Cullen instructed from the sidelines, watching the both of them intently.

“Yes Ser!” he called out before flashing Elissa an apologetic expression and swung at her, which she clumsily evaded. He tried again but she managed to parry his swing and rotate the blade with such force the sword flung out of the soldier’s hand.

“Next!”

“What, next?”

“Good afternoon Herald, my name is Edmund,” he said quickly before running at her with his sword ready to thrust into her abdomen. Elissa squawked as she jumped out of the way, almost tripping over her feet as she put more space between her and her opponent. She calmed herself and set herself in position to brace for attack and allowed Edmund to rush her, eyes fixed on him like a hawk, reading his movements to effectively block each incoming swing. She had stopped thinking and allowed her body to take over, it seemed to know what to do and her thoughts were only getting in the way.

There, she thought as she realised how open he left himself whenever he tried to attack from above. Without a second’s hesitation she reared back and placed a well-aimed kick to the left of his groin, hard enough to push him back and pretend to stab him through the stomach where he lay.

“Lysette, your turn!”

“Lysette? She’s a bloody trained Templar!” Elissa panted, whipping her braid back with a flick of her head.

“Do not worry Herald, I will not harm you,” the taller warrior said, saluting to her before pulling out both her sword and shield.

“I have a new found empathy for your recruits Commander,” Elissa quipped, sending him a glare which he accepted with grace.

“I’ll be sure to relay that to them all,” he replied proudly. If all of the new recruits learned to fight like the Herald then they truly stood a chance to defeat whatever was coming. “Keep your wits about you now, this will be a real fight. Lysette might be a newer Templar but she has been well trained.”

It hadn’t escaped Elissa that more of the army had noticed their sparring and had stopped their training to look, no matter how hard the Lieutenants had tried to refocus their attention. Lysette looked ready to dive into their duel whilst Elissa suddenly felt like the tavern server’s son with a toy sword playing at war. Lysette, armoured and imposing with her sword and shield, bowed graciously before charging at her.

The Templar was indeed well trained, with precise strikes and practised defence, it was all Elissa could do to stay on her feet and not have her head rung like a bell. Lysette pressed her advantage forcing Elissa to retreat from her step by step.

Elissa wanted to surrender, there would be no shame in it, she was outmatched. She was just not at the other woman’s level and she should have been proud that she lasted for as long as she had. But the words would not come out of her mouth, too bitter for her to say; the words just fizzled on her tongue as she bore her relentless strikes one after another. Her pride would not stand for it. She would rather be knocked unconscious than to say she would give up, and once again she cursed her predilection for putting herself in circumstances that could get herself killed.

In her mind, she pretended to be a seasoned warrior, determined to at least put up a fight. She blocked, parried and attacked, and though she may have looked a fool- at least she wasn’t a quitter. Elissa’s blunted longsword continued to fend off Lysette's once confident advances, slowly turning the tide for the mage.

Elissa knew she had to end things quickly in fear she really would fall to a well-aimed blow as she could feel the effects of the fight start to weigh down her arms. She spotted a shield on the ground near where Devon and Edmund stood and seized her moment; stealing and attaching it easily as Lysette hunted her down. Did she know how to wield it properly? Who knew, but she did know that her left arm felt like it was missing something whilst she fought and she knew she would only be balanced with a shield to hold on to. Or maybe hide behind.

The additional heft on her arm briefly slowed her movements as she adjusted herself, but found she was filled with a renewed vigour, this is it, this is who she was. Sword and shield, this was the Elissa she should be.She parried Lysette's strikes and delivered a series of powerful shield bashes that pushed her adversary back awestruck. Both women, exhausted and battered, locked eyes in a moment of mutual respect. It would be shameful for Lysette to keep fighting an opponent who was obviously well trained but just not at their best, and thus she withdrew to not debase herself by continuing.

“A draw for now then,” Cullen said as he dismissed the other recruits. “A testament to you both.”

“A rematch though? In time?” Elissa called out to the Templar, who simply saluted to her again with a genuine smile on her face.

Elissa waved goodbye to everyone before she sunk down to the ground, driving the sword into the ground and holding onto the hilt for balance. Cullen had someone bring over a water skin and offered it to her, which she thankfully accepted and guzzled down more than half the contents, only pausing to gulp an equal amount of air.

“Would you like to hold a sword, he says, need to know if I’m trained, he says- truth of the matter is the Commander of the Inquisition is just a sadist with a cute smile,” she wheezed, emptying the remainder of the skin’s contents. Swinging and fighting with her staff was one thing, her muscles had become accustomed to moving in a completely different way and there were no jarring vibrations from the clash of steel to contend with. However, no matter how tired and sore she was, she could not remove the large smile off her face.

Cullen knelt back down and rested his arm against his raised knee, a shy smile playing at his lips.

Oh curse that scar, how is it right that a scar could add to someone’s looks? Bloody ridiculous.

“In truth, I had started with the intention for you to sit and maybe have something to eat, so you could rest and travel safely. I had not meant for you to massacre my troops so efficiently,” he admitted, massaging the back of his neck awkwardly. Elissa rolled her eyes comically and exhaled loudly, looking over the sheepish man. She proffered her hands out as a sign of peace and the Commander took them willingly, helping her up like she was just another training sword. She supposed wearing such heavy armour and swinging around weapons all day would tend to make one quite strong.

Elissa took a moment to steady herself and did not relinquish her hold on the Commander’s hands, not that he seemed like he was in a hurry to reclaim them.

“At the very least, Commander, I had a lot of fun and we can now be sure of two things.”

Cullen looked at her and raised his eyebrows in wait for her revelation, quite aware he was still holding the Herald’s hands but in no rush to release her. She was tired after all, she may be unstable on her feet.

“Whoever I was before I woke up here, I was a warrior. Whether that was to hide my magical abilities or if they were just dormant, I do not know,” she explained looking up at him, marvelling at how tall he seemed but if she was just bold enough to stand on her tiptoes...

“And the second?” he queried, his voice naturally lowering, much to his surprise, as he tried to ignore how well her lashes framed her eyes.

“That as a warrior, I have in fact, held many, many swords,” she affirmed, her mouth spreading into a smile that spanned from ear to ear.

Cullen let go of her hands and raised his own in defeat, releasing a peal of laughter loud enough for some nearby troops to hear over the din of the training yard.

“You are impossible, Herald, even when exhausted you are impossible!”

Chapter 6

#dragonage #dragon age #dragon age inquisition #dragon age origins #cullen x inquisitor #alistair x warden #alistair x warden x cullen #alistair x inquisitor x cullen #dragon age 2 #dragon age fanfic #cullen x warden #alistair x inquisitor

3 notes · View notes