#character: merrill

[queenaeducan-writes]

Day 1: Vhenadahl

Written for @cityelfweek day 1! One of my favourite parts of DA lore is how many of our Elvhen companions cannot be neatly categorised into one of two boxes human society designates for them. I wanted to start the week writing about that overlap with Merrill and the city elves she lives among for, at this point, most of her adult life.

“Ir abelas,” Merrill mutters as she makes the first cut. The sapling branch surrenders easilyl to her shears, falling to the earth with little more hurry than a feather from a bird’s wing. She pats the trunk fondly. “I promise we’re almost through.”

When the wind stirs, it’s almost like it’s answering. She smiles, satisfied, and moves onto the next branch. Though she had promised to be done soon, she does not rush the task before her. From the rare traveller that passes through, she has come to learn the vhenadahl is the beating heart of the Alienage, and unique as the community it represents. Some exist only as stumps, sitting places for elves to gather and chatter, others grow in impossible ways, defying the desert sun to offer shade to the People on hopelessly hot days. As she understands it, the one in Hossburg is just a cutting, the old tree felled in a mighty storm.

Merrill, for her part, has become quite proud of Kirkwall’s. Mighty it grows, and tall. The paint they had decorated it with on Summerday has begun to fade in the fierce sunshine of August, pigment clinging brightest where the boughs gather the darkest shadow. Soon, the elven new year will be upon them, and they will hang ribbons in her branches and paint patterns in her bark once again.

She reaches for the next branch, snipping deftly. The slice of the blades are so sharp, she doesn’t hear the quiet gasp behind her.

“Why are you hurting the tree, hahren?” A small voice asks. Merrill pauses her pruning to look down, met by the sweet face of Libi, Elara’s daughter. Her wild blonde hair is freshly tamed and combed into two thick plaits. She’d broken from a pack of nearby children to accost Merrill with her question, dolly held limply by her side.

“Oh.” Merrill’s teeth drive into her lower lip, impressing a faint line. The Alienage’s children don’t often address her, content to let her be an oddity. The strange, Dalish lady they could imagine all sorts of things about, as children are like to do with things they do not understand. It doesn’t trouble her, she had been no less strange to her clan, and no better with their children. “I’m not hurting it, da’len. I’m helping.”

She lifts her hand, rubbing the trunk of the tree like she strokes the side of some great, friendly beast. “You prune the branches to help it grow. Think of it like… if you had an arm-” Merrill sticks her thumb against her forehead, fingers splaying out like leaves on a branch- “growing out of your forehead! Or… a leg in your ear.” She tilts her head, like the imaginary appendage weighs it to one side.

“That doesn’t sound so bad,” Libi remarks, perhaps considering the extra toys she could tote around with her if she had an extra arm.

Merrill laughs. “You might be alright,” she says, “but trees will tip over.”

Libi nods with a stoic understanding. She steps over to the pile of sticks Merrill has gathered through her morning’s work. “What will these be for?”

The shoots are still green, flush with water, and will make for poor kindling. Among the Dalish, it had made them the ideal spit to roast their dinners on, but there is no shortage to their use. “They may dry clean laundry, or make for a little slingshot.” She strays in her task to pluck one that diverges like a fork in a river, separate ends just far apart enough to tie something between them. “Maybe a little loom?”

“A sword,” Libbi declares, leaving no room for argument. With her free hand, she reaches out, but thinks twice before snatching it. Merrill can almost hear mamae’s voice reprimanding her for her lack of manners. “May I have one?”

“Uh, of course! But choose wisely, da’len.”

Libi takes her words to heart, deliberating until she finds the narrowest stick in the pile. She brandishes it like a rapier, then, apparently satisfied with her decisions, bounds back to her friends as though no time has passed. A little ‘thank you’ follows her retreat, manners not entirely abandoned now that she had what she came for.

Merrill smiles, taking heart in the fact that they had parted as friends. The parents had taken to calling her hahren for her knowledge, but without children to teach, it often felt an empty title. It’s only when she hears the whip of a twig against bare flesh that she realises her mistake. That afternoon, the shade of the vhenadahl nurses many a skinned knee as a little war plays out beneath its boughs.

[greenfinchg-illustration]

[shoutydwarf]

When DA4 drops I want y’all to remember these things:

- Tevinter’s closest and only ally is Orzammar (‘ally’ is an overstatement but they have a business arrangement involving lyrium & trade that the imperium cannot function without)

- There is a class in Tevinter called the Ambassadoria that consists of dwarven dignitaries from Orzammar to oversee trade

- They have their own thaigs AND a provings ground.

- Minrathous is protected by “juggernauts”: GOLEMS. Gifted to them by Orzammar.

- Orzammar has embassies in EVERY major city in Tevinter.

If bioware reduces them to common thugs and merchants like they always do I’m gonna bite someone. If Varric “Not Like Other Dwarves” Tethras is the only dwarf companion or major dwarf character we get i am nibbling someone’s ankle. BioWare still hasn’t made up for what they did to Oghren. Prime opportunity to revisit dwarves that don’t hate or disown their culture in order to fill some hollow stereotype or predictable antithesis. Go back or else.

[ruushes]

throuple of all time to me

[girl-gwoe]

Dont save me, please...

Another tarot dragon age art :>

[flashhwing]

rational brain: I don’t want Anders to ever appear in a dragon age game again, as I don’t believe they will give him any semblance of a sympathetic portrayal

monkey brain: where is Anders is he here I wanna see him

[little-demy]

PC and the F4

Took me a while but finally drew PC Merrill with the f4. Currently drawing them for future references also for height comparison between all of them✨

I might drew more of Merrill interaction between each of them in the future, but for the gist of it Merrill is the closest to Robin (he thought of him as a little brother). Sydney is a friend. Merrill is indifferent to Kylar (though he noticed Kylar is stalking him). And Whitney is technically a rival.

Something else down below!

The Initiate; Merrill ; Ivory Wraith

[nananarc]

i woke up from my feverish slumber to sketch these because i cannot take it no more let me escape into dragon age or give me death

In order from up-down left-right:

Dreadwolf's Embrace

Inquisitor 'An Lavellan

Champion of Kirkwall with a garland of daisies

________ Timelapse will open on 18th Sep 2024 for Patreon members (patreon.com/nananarc). Commission Info on my website (nananarc.art/)

[2mucheyeliner]

Some elves for this year's pride month 😊 (Yeah I know I'm late)

[swiftzeldas]

i don't know where i am. there's a man here, he abducted us and he's going to kill me. i only have a few hours left. please, i'm begging you. somebody save us.

anya taylor-joy as casey cooke in split (2016)

[quatarisprite]

i spent an unreasonable amount of time on this

[lightcantrips]

something about characters that stay soft and warm despite their world being callous and cold. something about characters that struggle to keep and protect that softness, who get angry when it's threatened. something about characters who are kind and loving even when others do not offer them the same grace, not as an act of self-harm but as an act of strength. characters who choose, every day, every minute, every second, to be better than what they've been given. i love u

[witsserviceablesubstitute]

"Which DA2 character would side with Solas? Fenris or Anders?" It's Merrill. It's definitely Merrill.

Blue Wraith shows that Fenris is working through his biases, and I do believe Anders would too after going to extremes and then having distance from the cesspool of abuse and red lyrium that was Kirkwall. But it'd be Merrill who aligns most with a goal that could destroy magical constraints and allow the beings of Thedas and spirits of the Fade to exist together once more in an imagined utopia. She'd be pretty easily convinced that the Dalish, as they currently are, were blind and stuck in their ways too. Merrill is an easy choice for me.

Merrill, Fenris, Dorian, and Isabela make the most story sense to return I think 🤔.

[scarfacemarston]

It's here! My Ko-fi!

Credit to the wonderful @tacticalhimbo for creating this for me. He has done a lot of wonderful writing and creative work for me, so check him out! Please note or reblog to help out, if you're willing! I could really have help spreading the word so I can have some commissions and be able to pay my bills! Characters from all fandoms listed are welcome, but specialties are: Abigail Roberts Marston, John Marston, Bucky Barnes, Yelena Belova, Natasha Romanoff, Peggy Carter, Steve Rogers, Dragon Age's Fenris, Cullen Rutherford, Merill, Isabela, Harvey Dent, Poison Ivy, Daniel Molloy, Armand and SO many more.

[little-demy]

PC Merrill

I've been playing DoL for some times, so I'd like to share some sketches here, mainly sketches of my PC

Teacher's pet and every students' idol. The gentle big brother figure of the orphanage. Yet in fact Merrill has always been empty from the beginning. With no memories of his parents and only remember that he's been in the orphanage ever since childhood, he kept a mask while learning how to be "human"

Older sketches below: