#graywave

[shoegaiz]

101023

[gbhbl]

EP Review: Graywave - Dancing in the Dust (Church Road Records)

From beginning to end, this is a fantastic release, and from beginning to end, it will make you feel.

‘Dancing in the Dust’ is the latest offering from Birmingham’s masters of dark and heavy shoegaze, Graywave. Out May 31st, 2024, via Church Road Records. Chances are, like me, you have heard most of this EP already, and chances are, like me, you’ve loved everything that has come from it so far. With each single release, Graywave have shown just how important their style of shoegaze is, and even…

[sonicziggy]

"Undone" by Graywave https://ift.tt/FknEX4u

[gzeidraws]

Commission of Shinon and Tana for 𝗚𝗿𝗮𝘆𝗪𝗮𝘃𝗲𝘀!

[nasuversekinkmeme]

I wanna see Gray having a crush on Waver! Bonus points if it's completely unrequited, and Waver doesn't even register her flirting attempts as anything other than her being painfully awkward.

Gray and her very unfortunate crush on her teacher <3

[fancylances]

OC Kiss Week / Day Three / Sunrise

pairing: Wilhelm Atursen (he/him)/ Annika Graywave (she/her)

genre(s): fantasy

Wilhelm had slept fitfully, if at all. And when he wakes, it’s with a sense of urgency set deep in his chest. He sits up, blinking through the sleep haze, to find himself alone. Beyond the normal noise of his inn coming to life outside his door (the twins getting to work—Lysander stoking the fire and getting breakfast on, Lyla singing a low, beautiful tune as she sweeps), the telltale sound of equipment and armaments being packed and slung makes fear flood through his chest. He scrambles out of bed and into his trousers.

It’s well past freezing outside, and tiny flakes of snow drift from the sunrise-streaked clouds. Despite that, Wilhelm finds himself running through the open door of The Sellsword’s Rest in untied boots and a half-open tunic.

Annika looks up from her pack, and so do her three traveling companions. She doesn’t blush, but Wilhelm—forty-five-years-old war veteran Wilhelm Atursen, owner and proprietor of the last inn before the Wastes—certainly does. Which leaves little speculation in the minds of her companions as to what exactly is going on.

“Where are you going?” Wilhelm asks her. Comes to a skidding halt in the snow and mud beside her and tries not to look as panicked as he clearly feels.

“We’re mercenaries,” Annika answers, and her rough fingers (fingers he remembers holding his wrists as she’d ridden him into the mattress) effortlessly knot the last strands of her long yellow hair into their many braids. “We go where the boss tells us. Today, it’s…” she trails off, thought lost, and turns to Ares Starling—their money man—who takes over without a missed beat.

“Ah, there is a fantastic grove just south of here in the Glass Mountains. Quite well hidden from your common adventurer types. There, the water springs hot from the ground and everything grows green amidst the snow—or so they say. Mister Del’Gramm needs the pink petals of a flowering tree that grows there, and he’s paying quite the small fortune for it.” Starling stops and finally looks Wilhelm up and down—clearly there’s one person present who hasn’t got the whole picture. “Are you taller, or have I become shorter?”

“So we’re going to the grove,” Annika supplies, slings her pack over her shoulder as she turns back to Wilhelm. “If we’re not caught in another snowstorm, we’ll be back in no time.”

“No more than two weeks,” the wizard Rysse adds. And she turns quickly to engage in conversation with Starling, who she deftly maneuvers away from the increasingly private conversation between the fighter and the innkeeper. Erik signs something to Annika—who smirks and nods—then holds up one hand with forefinger and thumb forming a circle to Wilhelm before turning and joining the others.

Wilhelm runs a hand through his thinning blond hair as he watches them go, only to find his free hand trapped by one of Annika’s. She’s much closer than she was a moment ago, looming over him in a way that still makes him weak in the knees.

“Can I call you Wil?” she asks lowly (sweetly).

The breath rushes out of him. His voice shakes, but not from the cold. “I dont… I don’t even know your last name.”

She leans down and takes his mouth with hers. He falls into it so easily.

“Graywave,” she says against his mouth. “South Point, Hyra. We used to sail ships on the Mezzo Sea.” 

She kisses him again. He finds it hard to breathe (breathing isn’t important; not as important as the way her mouth moves with his, the way they melt together). He grips her close, fingers pressing into the freckled flesh of her muscled arms.

This time, though, it’s Wilhelm that pulls back (just an inch, but it feels like miles away from her welcome warmth). She blinks at him.

“What is this, Annika Graywave?” he asks, looking hard into her eyes (eyes he’d seen ripple with electricity the night she’d saved their village now looking into him). “Because I’m not…” He doesn’t know exactly what he’d been going to say—he’s not the type to sleep around, or hop into bed with someone just for a lark? He can’t deny that he’d been loved and left, but he’d also done the leaving once or twice himself. Maybe labeling this, just knowing what she hoped to get from him in return, would make him feel more at ease; calm the unending storm of butterflies in his stomach.

“I don’t know,” she says after a moment. “I like you.”

“I—I like you,” he laughed. Gods, how old is he?

“And I’ll see you soon.”

This time, something hurts deep in his chest when he says: “Is that a promise?”

+++

Wilhelm strides back through the front door of the Rest, trying to quell the hard thrumming of his chest. When he looks up, he finds every one of his employees gathered by the fireplace in the center of the greatroom. Almost as if they’re on a string, Lyla, Lysander, Ivan and Oriana turn in the same movement to stare at him.

It’s not the first time he’d felt younger than he is, but at least Galie has a decade on him when she scolds him like a teenager. Fighting the stares of these four young pups is something else entirely.

“All right,” Wilhelm sighs, and he straightens his back just enough to cross his arms and stare down his nose at them (disapproving father look to battle their inquisitive stares). “Go on, ask.”

“Which one was it?” Ivan, apparently the bravest of them, asks.

“Annika,” Oriana and Lyla say with one voice.

“Got to be Rysse,” Lysander adds, grinding a fist into his palm he’s so sure.

Wilhelm rubs his face, long-suffering and embarrassed to the point of weariness. “Even if I think it’s none of your business—” At least most of them have the grace to look embarrassed. “—I’m going to tell you just to keep you from wagging your mouths.”

“Sorry, Wil,” Lyla is first to apologize. “You don’t have to—”

“We won’t tell anyone,” her brother cuts her off, rising to his feet. “Honest to the gods. You can fire us if we talk.”

“Lysander!” Oriana hisses.

“It’s Annika,” Wilhelm says quietly (as if that will keep them from hearing, somehow, in the empty room). “Now, don’t say—”

“I knew it!” Ivan crows. “Boss, how in all the realms did you…?”

He (and everyone else) immediately cuts their chattering. Wilhelm has his face hidden in one of his hands, and his shoulders shake noiselessly. Lyla rises from her chair, a hand ready to touch a shoulder for comfort.

The shaking turns into loud laughter, and Wilhelm throws his head back, grinning like an absolute fool.

“I have no idea!” Wilhelm laughs, pressing his hand to his forehead in disbelief.

Relief and laughter in answer echo in the main room, and after a few scant minutes of reprieve, Wilhelm orders them all back to work. There’s an inn to run, after all.

[spicywhenspeaking]

shuffle your favorite playlist and post the first five songs that come up. then copy/paste this ask to your favorite mutuals <3

My favorite playlist is my everything playlist so it’s alll over the place!

It’s like you’re seeing into my soul 🤣

[gbhbl]

Single Slam: Zeal & Ardor, Arkness, Graywave, Candy, Below the Stones, Born of Osiris, Nouri Yetgin, Pallbearer, Callas, Hillbilly Vegas, House of Ousey, and HammerFall!

Today’s single slam features Zeal & Ardor, Arkness, Graywave, Candy, Below the Stones, Born of Osiris, Nouri Yetgin, Pallbearer, Callas, Hillbilly Vegas, House of Ousey, and HammerFall.

Today’s single slam features Zeal & Ardor, Arkness, Graywave, Candy, Below the Stones, Born of Osiris, Nouri Yetgin, Pallbearer, Callas, Hillbilly Vegas, House of Ousey, and HammerFall. You can read our thoughts about the latest singles from these bands below. Zeal & Ardor – to my ilk Inventive and iconoclastic, Zeal & Ardor isn’t just a band; it’s a living and breathing entity. Like any other…

[kim-poce]

15. Witches Are Meant To Burn: Portia's Gods

I posted the wrong chapter yesterday sorry

First | Previous | Next | Masterlist

A long time before the continent was named Graywave, there was a war. Not to start a history essay, but after years of being pushed back deeper into their own territory, several indigenous tribes formed an alliance with two main goals: drive away common enemies, and help each other so they will never face the danger of extinction again. It happened centuries ago, and Allies of Portia has grown into a stable and formally recognized country that shows itself to outsiders as one state.

Within the country, however, the cultural difference is often like day and night, most people whose field of study is Portia are focused on the common history and only go deeper into a few subcultures.

“We are lucky Podium is located near Kiona,” Tina said, after explaining the basics, but also letting it clear that Portia has just too much in it for a crash course to be enough to actually learn all of the basics. “Kiona is in Viné state, which is one of the most open tribes, if this cave was more to the south we would take years to be allowed in. If ever.”

“There are several dialects within Portia, but for the most part of their history, their language was mainly, if not exclusively, verbal. So, given how old Podium is, it’s not weird that there are no books in some of Portia’s language. What is weird is the lack of other traces; pottery, accessories, and carvings! Many tribes love carvings! Sometimes they tell stories, which would fit so well with the rest of Podium, but as of now, I haven’t seen a single thing that looks Portia made.”

“Maybe there are things from the tribes annihilated before the alliance,” I said, it was a pretty common theory among the groups working in the library, there are too many traces left behind by cultures we didn’t even know existed. “After all, the territory wasn’t the main reason foreign wished to end the locals’ culture.”

“Yes,” Tina nodded, “Most subcultures within Portia fall right into the heathen category, there was no belief in fate as we know, it was the opposite, many of Portia’s subcultures believe that you should take the rein of your life, so you can see how quickly this became a cultural war which aimed genocide instead of land. On the subject, I was thinking if maybe you should accept Melanie, since she is a local it just feels right.”

“If I decide to add a local to our team, it’ll be a scholar who already studies the field, Tina.”

She shrugged.

“Ok, so if there is too much about Portia for a crash course, how can we tell if something is Portia made?” Igor asked.

“Okay, here,” Tina lend out folds to everyone, “As the index says, the first part is the description of how the runes are formed, the second part is subcategorized by tribe, which is subcategorized by time, and goes from most important and used runes to less known ones to the ones we saw, hence we know existed, but doesn’t quite know what meant. There is a chronological timeline in case you need to recap, there are references at the end, the ones marked with the stars are books I borrowed and you can have access to, and the ones marked with a point are books that will come quickly if you order to location and the ones unmarked are only available in faraway libraries.”

I skimmed through the first pages as my other students stared at Tina.

“You had just a few days,” Hector pointed out, astonished.

“And this was hand-copied!” Sandra added.

“You call this a crash course?” Livia asked.

“I mean, it’s my field,” she shrugged.

“You should accept the job the academies are offering,” Lucas suggested.

“I’m a student, not a professor, just read it and ask me if you have any doubts.”

“Tina,” I called, looking at the two copies she hadn’t held out, “Will you give it to Melanie?”

“Knowledge is to be shared, my master said so,” she smirked. “The other one is for Cloud.”

“Is Cloud still sick?” June asked, “They must not be used to the climate, shame I wanted to tell you that they picked such a great name for themselves! I picked a boring one for myself, June, who names themselves like this?”

“You?” Tina tried.

“Shut up, my name is perfect!”

“I’m sure you will love them, June, they seem to be the same flavor of a troublemaker as you,” I said.

“Hey!”

“Master, before I forget, there are talks between the students about taking copies out of the area again. Since the fire stopped everyone is feeling like this ‘no work from home allowed’ thing is overkill.”

I sighed. This was bound to happen at some point. “Please keep looking into it, if things stay like this we may need to build a temporary dorm near a town around here, so they can ‘take the work home’ without going home.”

“Okay, Master.”

Livia tilted her head, “Why does Lucas call you-”

“I gave up asking.”

“Knock knock,” Melanie called from outside the tent, “May I go in?”

“She was shyer at first,” I murmured.

“Yes, Melanie, we are done talking,” Tina shouted.

She had brought food, so there wasn't really anything I could say to complain, we talked about the weather, which was somehow hotter than usual, and talked about Portia. Melanie told more about how the runes were not only meant to communicate, and why they changed from season to season, and from subject to subject. She was good at explaining.

“So, while this one means water, you can’t use it for the raining reason, because the high spirits, or gods as you may call them, of water and rain don’t like each other. You must use this one when the middle spirit of wind allows you to, and if she doesn’t you must use this other one.”

“Their politics are complicated and they seem to make this everyone else's problem,” Hector said.

“You’ll get the rain spirits angry at you,” Melanie said, half serious, half joking, but she didn’t deny it. “They are complicated being but-”

Melanie flinched at the sudden loud sound, akin to thunder, coming from outside.

The area where Podium is located is deserted, the ground is mostly sand and rock, with dry-looking bushes, common to the biome, here and there. The tents where the scholars lived were made of very thick fabric since the main issues were privacy and wind. Most of the work was done inside Podium, and the copied books were also kept in a well-protected part of the cave.

There is no rain here, at least it wasn’t supposed to rain in this particular area apart from a couple of drizzles in the coldest winters, but there was no one who wouldn’t recognize the sounds of the storm even if the water wasn’t dripping inside the tents.

We put Tina’s copies inside a protected chest and walked outside, there were a few more things we deemed important to keep safe but our curiosity took the best of us, like the innate curiosity that attracts people to the Hand of Cave, like the particular curiosity that makes me look for the witches, whatever they are, this same feeling moved my legs out of the tent, Melanie and my students just behind me.

We looked up. Or tried. The storm was too strong to allow us to keep our eyes open, the thin white dresses were suddenly not enough to protect us from the cold. The sky was dark as if it wasn’t the middle of the afternoon, the lighting and thunder grounded us to reality, too loud and bright to be an illusion.

I looked around, expecting to see people running from one side to another trying to save their notes from the rain, but everyone was astonished while looking up to the sky.

“What god did we anger this time?” I asked mindlessly.

“Not mine,” Meliane said, making us all stare at her. “What? She isn’t that petty.”

—

@kathea, @extemporary-username, @wolfeyedwitch, @blu-jay-2779, @rose-pinkie, @latenightcupsofcoffee

[sevspoems]

𝙰𝚜 𝚝𝚑𝚎 𝚖𝚎𝚛𝚌𝚢 𝚘𝚏 𝚗𝚒𝚐𝚑𝚝

𝚃𝚊𝚔𝚎𝚜 𝚖𝚢 𝚌𝚘𝚗𝚜𝚌𝚒𝚘𝚞𝚜 𝚖𝚒𝚗𝚍

𝙸 𝚜𝚒𝚗𝚔 𝚒𝚗𝚝𝚘 𝚖𝚢 𝚍𝚛𝚎𝚊𝚖𝚜

𝚆𝚑𝚎𝚛𝚎 𝚎𝚟𝚎𝚛𝚢𝚝𝚑𝚒𝚗𝚐 𝚒𝚜 𝚏𝚒𝚗𝚎

𝙾𝚗 𝚝𝚑𝚎 𝚋𝚘𝚝𝚝𝚘𝚖 𝚘𝚏 𝚝𝚑𝚎 𝚕𝚊𝚔𝚎

𝚃𝚑𝚎𝚛𝚎 𝚕𝚒𝚎𝚜 𝚊 𝚝𝚛𝚎𝚊𝚜𝚞𝚛𝚎

𝚆𝚘𝚛𝚝𝚑 𝚖𝚘𝚛𝚎 𝚝𝚑𝚊𝚗 𝚊𝚕𝚕 𝚘𝚏 𝚝𝚑𝚎 𝚐𝚘𝚕𝚍

𝚜𝚘𝚖𝚎𝚝𝚑𝚒𝚗𝚐 𝚢𝚘𝚞 𝚌𝚊𝚗'𝚝 𝚖𝚎𝚊𝚜𝚞𝚛𝚎

𝙸'𝚖 𝚗𝚘𝚝 𝚊 𝚐𝚘𝚘𝚍 𝚜𝚠𝚒𝚖𝚖𝚎𝚛

𝙱𝚞𝚝 𝙸 𝚠𝚒𝚕𝚕 𝚍𝚒𝚟𝚎 𝚊𝚐𝚊𝚒𝚗 𝚊𝚗𝚍 𝚊𝚐𝚊𝚒𝚗

𝚃𝚘 𝚊𝚌𝚑𝚒𝚎𝚟𝚎 𝚝𝚑𝚎 𝚐𝚕𝚒𝚖𝚖𝚎𝚛

𝙸𝚗 𝚝𝚑𝚎 𝚜𝚎𝚊𝚕𝚎𝚍 𝚌𝚑𝚎𝚜𝚝

𝙸𝚏 𝚒𝚝 𝚖𝚎𝚊𝚗𝚜 𝙸 𝚠𝚒𝚕𝚕 𝚍𝚛𝚘𝚠𝚗

𝙻𝚎𝚝 𝚖𝚎,𝚘𝚑 𝚙𝚕𝚎𝚊𝚜𝚎 𝚕𝚎𝚝 𝚖𝚎.

𝙸 𝚠𝚒𝚕𝚕 𝚍𝚒𝚎 𝚝𝚛𝚢𝚒𝚗𝚐, 𝚛𝚊𝚝𝚑𝚎𝚛 𝚝𝚑𝚊𝚗 𝚐𝚒𝚟𝚒𝚗𝚐 𝚞𝚙

𝚈𝚘𝚞 𝚊𝚛𝚎 𝚠𝚘𝚛𝚝𝚑 𝚒𝚝, 𝚢𝚘𝚞 𝚊𝚛𝚎 𝚎𝚟𝚎𝚛𝚢𝚝𝚑𝚒𝚗𝚐

𝚂𝚘 𝚙𝚕𝚎𝚊𝚜𝚎 𝚘𝚙𝚎𝚗 𝚞𝚙 𝚝𝚘 𝚖𝚎,

𝙻𝚎𝚝 𝚖𝚎 𝚑𝚎𝚕𝚙 𝚢𝚘𝚞 𝚐𝚎𝚝 𝚘𝚞𝚝 𝚝𝚑𝚎𝚛𝚎,

𝚈𝚎𝚜 𝚝𝚑𝚎 𝚝𝚑𝚒𝚗𝚐𝚜 𝚊𝚛𝚎 𝚑𝚎𝚊𝚟𝚢,

𝚂𝚘 𝚕𝚎𝚝 𝚖𝚎 𝚌𝚊𝚛𝚛𝚢 𝚜𝚘𝚖𝚎 𝚘𝚏 𝚝𝚑𝚎𝚖.

𝚆𝚎 𝚠𝚒𝚕𝚕 𝚛𝚎𝚊𝚌𝚑 𝚝𝚑𝚎 𝚜𝚞𝚛𝚏𝚊𝚌𝚎 𝚘𝚏 𝚝𝚑𝚎𝚜𝚎 𝚍𝚊𝚛𝚔 𝚠𝚊𝚝𝚎𝚛𝚜,

𝙰𝚗𝚍 𝚠𝚑𝚎𝚗 𝚠𝚎 𝚐𝚎𝚝 𝚘𝚞𝚝, 𝚝𝚑𝚎 𝚠𝚑𝚘𝚕𝚎 𝚠𝚘𝚛𝚕𝚍 𝚠𝚒𝚕𝚕 𝚋𝚎 𝚘𝚞𝚛𝚜.