#i think that Fenn in particular is really proud of me. because he knows my lowest lows and how little i feel im capable of on those days.

[roboraindrop]

I have very much earned my bedtime today dksjslhfh I am SLEEBY but I think that my f/os are really proud of me for all of the hard work that I put in today (': I can't wait to get into bed and snuggle up to them 🥰🥰🥰

[bard-llama]

WiP Wednesday: A Single Spark

I don’t think I’ve shared this whole scene before, but it’s one of my favorite scenes I’ve written, ‘cause there’s so much going on with everyone as they try to figure out where their political alignment is.

Premise: This is from a fic series called A Single Spark where Foltest orders the forest burned to destroy the Scoia’tael - only it does a lot more damage than just that (and the Scoia’tael survive, because they actually know how to care for forests and periodically burn the underbrush. Also, Roche and Fenn risked going into the forest to warn them, ‘cause Foltest has gone off his rocker.) With the help of Triss and Keira, the Blue Stripes manage to help the locals keep Ellander and Flotsam from burning down, and after the fire has burned out, everyone tries to figure out where things stand now that they’re technically all traitors in Foltest’s eyes.

Iorveth’s voice was entirely reasonable as he said, “all we want is the right to live freely. Is that truly too much to ask!?”

“He’s right, John,” Roche found himself saying and saw Iorveth turn to him in surprise. This was going to sound callous, but, “just look at the numbers. If we want a single chance to stop this from happening again? We need nonhumans. Is granting equality really that much to ask?”

The look on Iorveth’s eye made him feel strangely warm and he cleared his throat. 

Natalis shook his head, expression openly uncertain. “We are fighting for a Temeria where our king won’t burn down forests. But I don’t have the authority to promise that kind of change. The nobles would never support it.”

“Hang the nobles!” Roche swore. “They’ve already made their stances clear! If they stand for the reckless destruction of Temeria, then who cares what they approve!?”

“I know you’ve never been fond of us,” Maria Louisa La Valette chided calmly as she walked into the room, “but not all the nobles have betrayed Temeria, thank you very much. And that is a good thing, because I believe I have exactly what you need.”

“Oh?” he scowled. 

“You should know better than any,” Louisa sniffed, looking down her nose at him, “if we are to have a real chance of opposing Foltest and his loyalists, we’re going to need a viable option for someone to rule in Foltest’s stead.”

Roche opened his mouth to protest – and then his brain finally kicked into gear and reminded him exactly why Louisa La Valette would be the one to make this point.

“Foltest won’t claim them if they oppose him,” he reminded her softly. He didn’t particularly like Louisa La Valette all that much, but she was a proud woman and, unusual amongst her peers, she was actually invested in her children’s lives. And she knew Foltest, probably as well as he did. She had to know how this action would cause Foltest to respond.

Her throat moved in a quick swallow before she nodded sharply. “I know. I’ve discussed this with my family, and we’ve made the decision.”

John Natalis coughed light. “Pardon me for interrupting, my lady, but what–?”

Louisa cleared her throat, sweeping her eyes over the assembled group – not that there were many of them. She was the highest ranked noble present, and he had no doubt that she saw that as meaning command should automatically fall to her.

Unfortunately for her, neither Roche nor Natalis were the type to turn over command in the middle of a crisis. Which meant they had 3 commanders, a Scoia’tael elf who probably wouldn’t listen to any of them, a mage who rarely did anything she didn’t want to do anyway, and another noble. Great. No way that was going to be a problem.

“My children, Natalis,” Louisa said, gesturing towards the door as a young man with dark hair opened it and guided two small children with lighter hair inside. All of them were Louisa’s children, but considering the old Baron (may he rest in peace) had had black hair, and Louisa herself had dark hair, it was clear to anyone who looked that the young twins had a different father than the older boy.

Roche knew that people often did not look, but even so, there had been more than a few rumors about Louisa’s affair with Foltest. They were discreet – Roche knew this because often times he would be the one providing the discretion – but they were both nobles to their core. Nobles never noticed the servants, never thought about the fact that servants could gossip just as readily as other courtiers did. 

Natalis had obviously heard said rumors, because he stared for a long moment at Ari, the oldest child, then assessed the twins in silence for another long minute. Then he cleared his throat. “My lady, what precisely are you proposing?”

“I am proposing that Foltest’s children be his heirs to the throne,” Louisa was calm as she delivered the news, and in any other circumstance, her declaration would be cause for Roche to panic. A dispute over the line of succession could destroy a reign if rulers weren’t careful. But Foltest had been planning to claim the children as his own, once the right politically expedient moment had arrived. They were bastards, so there would still have been some dispute over the rightfulness of their claim to the throne – but Foltest had only one other child, and if their claim was viewed more strongly than hers...

Shit, Roche really should’ve invited her. He hadn’t even thought of it, and–

The door opened again and this time, Triss Merigold entered with a white-robed priestess of Melitele who was technically the Crown Princess of Temeria. Technically, because while the reality was that Foltest was her father, no one knew that. To the world, Princess Adda the White was Foltest’s niece, daughter of the late Princess Adda of Temeria. 

To a noble, a sister’s daughter was less respected than the primary family line – aka Boussy and Anais, Foltest’s direct children – but she was at least considered legitimate. Sort of. The cover story Roche had concocted when Adda had appeared – and he did mean appeared, as in, out of thin air in many ways – was that the late Princess had secretly married a nobleman, who had then hidden their child from the King after the Princess died. He’d had to specify that the nobleman had hidden Adda from Foltest, because none of them had known about Adda’s existence until a witcher lifted the curse from a striga. Eight years after the late Princess’s death. 

The public had accepted the story, fortunately, but the fact was that until the curse had been lifted, Adda hadn’t known anything but the life of a monster that hungered for human flesh. She was cured of that, but its effects remained even as the Sisters of Melitele taught her how to be a person. Roche was proud to say that he’d played some small part in that, in raising the young woman standing in the doorway.

He also had a recurring nightmare where Foltest decided that his former-striga daughter was too nonhuman to be tolerated. She wasn’t, of course. Adda was human. The witcher had cured her. 

Sure, maybe Roche had noticed little ways in which she was still a little… effected, shall we say? Like the way that her growl made all the hairs on the back of his neck stand straight up. Or the way that she could hear people moving two rooms over when Roche certainly couldn’t. Or the way that she preferred her meat rare enough to still be bleeding. 

Little things. Not enough to make her not a human, though. It wasn’t as if she was an elf or a dwarf or a halfling or something. She was human. And just a little superhuman as well.

Triss Merigold cleared her throat and addressed everyone assembled in the room. “May I present Priestess Adda the White, Crown Princess of Temeria.”

Natalis, Keira Metz, Duke Hereward, and Louisa all bowed courteously, some noticeably lower than others. Belatedly, Roche remembered that he was supposed to bow too, which got him some odd looks from the others, but Adda just smiled at him. Iorveth didn’t move a muscle, looking at them all balefully.

“Gentlemen,” Adda’s voice was soft, yet it easily commanded the room, “ladies, I understand this is a strategy meeting to determine what to do next about Foltest.”

Natalis cleared his throat, “yes, my lady.”

“Wonderful. If you wouldn’t mind filling me in?”

“Of course,” every single one of them said, automatically assuming that she was addressing them as the leader. He’d known that was going to come back to be a problem.

Triss rolled her eyes and called on her fellow sorceress. “Keira? Would you mind?”

“Of course, your highness,” Keira nodded. “We haven’t exactly accomplished much.” The mage’s voice was scathing as she flicked a glance at Iorveth. “Roche brought Temeria’s Most Wanted Terrorist to the meeting, which understandably bothered some people.”

Roche rolled his eyes. “And Iorveth made the surprisingly rational argument that if we want to change Temeria, why not give nonhumans equal rights and protections, too?”

“The people would never accept it,” Louisa dismissed easily. 

“I rather think the nonhumans would,” Adda said, soft words ringing in the silence that followed. “I am not sure that working with the Scoia’tael is the right answer, but why not make this change as well? I assume you’re already intending to ask for Foltest to step down.”

“And his children,” Louisa emphasized, squeezing each of the twins’ shoulders. Anais and Boussy mostly just looked uncomfortable. “Will take their rightful place as his heirs.”

Triss arched an eyebrow. “Rightful place? You do recall that you are speaking to the Crown Princess, don’t you?”

“Who is Foltest’s niece. Not his direct descendant.”

Roche rolled his lips together, determined to take the particular secret that meant she was wrong to the grave.

“Niece?” Anais spoke suddenly, eyes fixed on Adda. “You’re Papa’s niece?”

Adda blinked down at Anais for a long moment and then knelt down and smiled. “I am. It’s nice to meet you. I didn’t know I had other family.”

And there was a rebuke in that that had Roche wincing, but nonetheless, there was something incredible about watching this meeting of Foltest’s three children. It was only right that they should know each other.

Louisa’s hand tightened around Anais’s shoulder. “I’m sure they’d be delighted to get to know you,” the noblewoman said, eyes sharp and hard, “provided you do not contest their claim to the throne.”

“My lady,” Triss interrupted, “with all due respect, they’re children. Adda is of age.”

Louisa was not moved, but Adda cleared her throat, smiling at Anais and Boussy as she rose. “I’m sure something can be worked out. More importantly, I would like to know where everyone stands on the nonhuman issue.”

“More important?” Louisa muttered, but obligingly shuffled her children to be seated around the table. Natalis, Keira and Hereward were all already sitting at the table, and Triss and Adda joined them.

But Iorveth didn’t move, and Roche twisted back to cock an eyebrow at him.

“That ‘nonhuman issue’,” Iorveth grit out, “happens to be my life, my people’s lives, and the survival of our entire species in the face of those who seek our eradication.”

Roche blinked, taken off guard by the venom in Iorveth’s words. But then, he supposed he’d never really thought about it like that before. To him, hunting elves was just – well, just following orders. He’d honestly never thought much about the experiences of nonhumans from their perspective. Foltest had never been interested in hearing that intel and Roche had never even thought to gather it.

Swallowing down the turmoil of emotions that thought caused, Roche looked at Iorveth and forced himself to see. To see beyond the enemy commander and the wily opponent and the talented warrior, down to the elf underneath all of that. To Roche, that Iorveth was an elf had never really mattered. Well, obviously it did, because those were Roche’s orders, but he’d just… never really thought about it. Iorveth was a terrorist, a criminal. Who cared that he was an elf?

Except… except Iorveth was a terrorist because he was an elf, wasn’t he? Because he wanted freedom and equality for his people. His elven people.

Weird how Roche had never thought about that before. It made him feel… something. Something uncomfortable and sour and a little too close to guilt for comfort.

“You’re right,” Adda said, and the whole room stared at her. She simply bowed her head to Iorveth. “I apologize for minimizing your fight. While I don’t personally agree with your tactics, I can understand what might lead you to taking such actions. That does not make them forgivable,” she was quick to say as Duke Hereward jumped to his feet, “but you are right to remind us that there are real people behind these issues, real lives affected by what we decide.”

Iorveth looked gobsmacked, but then, so did most of the room. Adda was certainly different to what they were all used to with Foltest.

The elf still didn’t join them at the table, but he did reluctantly ghost slightly closer, leaning against the wall behind Roche, which Roche was weirdly okay with, considering Iorveth could conceivably knife him in the back at any time. 

But why would he? At the moment, Iorveth needed him, needed his acceptance to keep from getting slaughtered. Of everyone in this room, Roche would bet that only Anais and Boussy were unarmed. Iorveth wasn’t stupid enough to start a fight he couldn’t win, and seven against one, even this one, was a fight he could not win.

“Your highness,” Hereward said, shifting uncomfortably. “You almost sound as if you support the nonhumans.”

“That would be because I do, Duke Hereward,” Adda’s voice was firm and spoke of absolute faith in her words. “I believe that Temeria should be an equal Temeria for all Temerians, regardless of species. That is the Temeria I stand for.”

Roche tried not to gape. It probably should not have been as much of a shock as it was to hear Adda’s words. In retrospect, she’d always been very insistent that Melitele looked after all people, no matter what their ears looked like or how tall they were.

“That’s absurd,” Louisa scowled. “Temeria is a human land. If nonhumans want their own land, let them go somewhere else.”

“You are sitting on top of the ruins of the city I was born in, dh’oine. This was my land long before it belonged to you.”

Louisa and Ari bristled, and Roche could see Natalis frowning in thought even as Hereward closed himself off entirely, clearly uninterested in anything the elf had to say. Keira looked phenomenally unimpressed, and Triss mostly just looked concerned, but he kept his focus on Louisa. If any of them might try to stick a blade through Iorveth’s throat, it was her.

Without really thinking it through, he held his hands up placatingly, “there’s no need for this to get heated–”

“Heated!?” Louisa snarled. “What happened to the Blue Stripes commander who defended Temeria against the nonhuman threat? You stand there and let him tell lies, you bring him here and vouch for him – what has he promised you?”

Roche frowned. “My loyalty is to Temeria, and it isn’t for sale,” he said firmly. “This is a meeting to determine our next steps, as people who are all considered traitors to Foltest now.” And oh, that hurt something deep in his chest, made it ache with the memory of everything Foltest was to him. Had been. Now? Now, Foltest was clearly mad, and Roche had to think of what was best for Temeria. “We’re talking about standing against the King and all his armies. If you believe we few have the capability to stand up to those forces, then you’re deluded. Even the men in your own service aren’t enough, Lady La Valette, and to send them into battle without support would mean a slaughter. Hundreds of Temerians dead, for no other reason than because you could not sit and discuss what might be possible if we worked together. Is that really something you want on your conscience?”

Natalis cleared his throat authoritatively, “what is it you’re proposing, Commander Roche?”

“I’m not proposing anything. I’m saying that the leader of the Scoia’tael is literally here, in this room. And all he’s asking is equality for his people. That sounds like the beginning of a negotiation to me.”

Hereward scoffed, wrinkling his nose. “Negotiate with elves? When have you ever known an elf to keep their word!?”

“Have you ever known a human to keep theirs!?” Iorveth growled, low in his throat, and the sound reverberated around the room, setting more than a few people on edge. 

Roche had to try hard not to smirk. These people didn’t understand Iorveth in the slightest. Maybe some elves were liars and oathbreakers. Hell, plenty of humans were liars and oathbreakers too. But Iorveth? Iorveth had his own sense of honor. It was warped by his morality, of course, but it was there. Why else would Iorveth save him in exchange for warning the Scoia’tael of the coming fire? Why else would Iorveth send his men out to look for Fenn?

“Enough,” Adda said, quiet voice somehow cutting through all protests.

The end result of this is gonna be 3 factions warring for control of Temeria.

The Loyalists

Foltest and his cronies, including a mage. They say a king can do whatever he damn well pleases and that’s the way it should be. Foltest fully intends to keep his position as king.

The Pragmatists

Louisa La Valette, John Natalis, Keira, and the others that stand with them that say kings shouldn’t be able to abuse their powers that way. They want Foltest to step down and his children to take the throne.

The United Temerians

Roche, Iorveth, Adda, Triss, and others who stand with nonhumans. They say that while Temeria is undergoing this change, why not include nonhuman rights as part of it. They want Foltest’s ‘niece’ to take the throne.

Of course, before this can happen, there’s all the build up with the forest fire which I still gotta write. But eventually, some of this ‘verse will actually be published and I am excited for that.