#imogen centric

[quietblueriver]

Very short thing set immediately after ep 95 because it wrecked me and I had a second to Kermit-style spew some feelings. Imogen-centric, as I am wont. Pls excuse any typos and the probably wild overuse of the comma.

-

Long moments pass, the ridge of Laudna’s nose pressing just underneath Imogen's jaw, her arms linked around Imogen’s waist as Imogen does what she can not to break in half. 

It’s second nature, to run her fingers through Laudna’s hair, a familiar action, easy, meant to soothe them both, meant to keep them grounded, together, tethered. Imogen knows exactly how much pressure to use, how to move gently to avoid hurting Laudna or coming away with a small creature’s worth of hair in her palm. She’s done it a hundred times before, a thousand, but this time, there’s a prickle in her mind and her hand slows on the second full pass as she tries to figure out what’s different, what’s wrong. Except it’s what’s right, actually. Or what would be right, if Laudna were someone else. The strands are softer, thicker, falling through her fingers easily. Almost like Laudna’s…

Imogen’s rigid as the thought takes hold, and Laudna shifts against her with a small questioning noise. It takes everything she has to try to relax, but it’s apparently enough, cool lips grazing the skin of her neck as Laudna settles again. 

Fuck. She can’t be sure, no matter how many times she lets the strands glide over her skin, whether there really is something different or whether she’s just looking for Delilah everywhere now, and she hates it, hates that her life has been so disrupted, so shaken, that even this almost mundane intimacy can’t be trusted. Her world tilts just a little more, and surely, surely, she’s finally upside-down.

The body that has helped to keep her here relaxes further into her, trusting and vulnerable, even as Imogen tries not to show her panic, tries to hide the way she keeps her breath shallow because she’s scared she’ll smell something other than earth mixed with lavender.

Fighting back the angry, screaming sob that seems to live perpetually in her throat these days, she feels, a little distantly, the cold sigh against her neck.

The exhale shifts into a phrase that Laudna has repeated more times than Imogen can count in the last half hour: “I love you.” 

There had been a momentary relief the first time Laudna said it, free of the stain of Delilah’s echo, something pure in the middle of their absolutely fucked, world-breaking conversation. Laudna, just Laudna, telling Imogen she loves her. 

But each repetition sounds less like reassurance and more like desperation, more like a plea. It’s me, it’s me, it’s me. She wants so badly for that to be true.

But Imogen has never been allowed to live in what she wants to be true.

Maybe it is still Laudna, soft and true and hers, but they’re too far gone now for Imogen to trust it.

She knows that those words are a perfect weapon for Delilah, an ideal means of self-preservation. There is no better way to keep Imogen on the line, to give Imogen–and maybe Laudna, too–hope that some part of Laudna has been preserved from Delilah's influence, than by making it seem as though she can’t touch their love. 

She almost can’t bear their corruption, but the only thing worse than hearing those words like this is not hearing them at all, so she takes them dipped in poison, feels them feed the rotten and writhing truth inside of her. It’s a truth that she has been avoiding since that night in Whitestone, and now it’s crawling beneath her skin, coiling in her stomach, refusing to be ignored any longer: 

Something is wrong. 

Laudna is wrong. 

And what is Imogen supposed to do with that? 

“I love you, too,” she whispers, and it is a truth, too, as it has always been, but, face pressed into dark hair that she’s suddenly afraid to breathe in in case it’s the thing that topples them both, Imogen has no idea how much of Laudna there is left to love.

[finncakes]

ep 48 doodle page ^^

[conditionaljewel]

“Worry not, child.” Laudna could hear Delilah’s voice as they plunged into shadow. Complete and total darkness. Laudna was alone, but there was always Delilah. A unique loneliness. And even here, in death, long after Laudna’s last breath had left her, Delilah remained. “Death is but a waiting game.”

Laudna and Delilah’s spirits, entwined as though they were one of the same thread, traversed through the shadow, passing by nothing and everything all at once. Surreal, suspended animation filled the gaps as they drifted through the weaves of reality, gently gliding through space and time and other realms, alien but familiar all at once. Time made no sense here, neither did direction; there was no up or down, there wasn’t a north or south. There just was. And together, their two distinct yet similar purple auras mingled amongst one another as it traversed deeper, further into the shadow.

Surroundings shifted quickly here. Buildings became mountains became oceans became forests became more buildings became plains. They were in free fall, if you could call it that. Laudna couldn’t control anything, and while it didn’t seem like Delilah had control, she did seem to have some level of influence, and she was exercising it.

Laudna could feel Delilah’s spirit surging within hers at times, now more than she had before, sensing and seeing it much like she always had just out of the corners of her eyes. Now, in this alternate space of existence however, Delilah was able to truly exert her otherworldly capabilities, and she’d be damned if she was going to lose Laudna.

However, for a moment, as they continued to spiral through these realms and times and places, Laudna felt a pulse of arcane energy through the air. There was a very distorted, muffled voice calling out from beyond the void, seemingly from another realm. She could not make out the words clearly, she didn’t know who was speaking, she wasn’t even sure if it was a human speaking. She could only hear Delilah reply, “Poor thing. I would if I could, But I ask you to bring her back, too. For both of us.”

They continued to fall, spiraling, tumbling. Everything they past by them so fast, and yet it was endless. It just seemed to go on, and on, eternally. Had it been only hours, perhaps just minutes? Had it been a century? Time is a weird soup, she thought. Especially when you’re dead.

A piece inspired by a few scenes from the Shadow Whitestone / Laudna is Dead arc that I couldn’t stop playing in my head from Laudna’s perspective, from a dead perspective.

Full piece also below the cut.

Laudna was dead.

The blade had stuck through her, as she was held aloft by Otohan. The gruesome sight far too much for Imogen to behold, as Laudna’s body fell to the ground with a thud, dust kicking up from the impact. Imogen unleashed a torrent of psychic energy that filled the space, like a bomb going off. A devastating crater left in her wake. Otohan scattered to the four winds.

But Laudna knew none of this. She was already dead.

The dark embrace of the shadow within, the light extinguished in her eye. Laudna was gone to the outside world. Within moments, sure, she and the rest of the Bells Hells would reappear in Bassuras where they were, as they were, but that had no bearing on Laudna. She was already gone.

Though her body would not stir, her spirit began to move on. Rather, the spirits moved on, for Laudna was not alone in her body. Delilah had remained, just as she always had, entwined with Laudna as they began to move beyond the veil.

Outside these shadowed walls, the Hells panicked in trying to revive Fearne, needing her to ensure that at least one more of their friends amongst Laudna or Orym, who had also fallen, was saved. Were it not for a lack of energy and resources, the Hells would have saved all three of them, but the odds were against them this time.

A mournful, sorrowful group of friends surrounded their loved ones and held them close. Huddled together, frantic, panicking, they now had to make a choice. No one should ever have to make this kind of decision. It’s all that was left to do, or they would lose them both. They couldn’t bare it.

A coin flip. Time stood still.

A pregnant pause turns into impassioned sorrow, tearful despair.

The despair turns into a promise.

————

“Worry not, child.” Laudna could hear Delilah’s voice as they plunged into shadow. Complete and total darkness. Laudna was alone, but there was always Delilah. A unique loneliness. And even here, in death, long after Laudna’s last breath had left her, Delilah remained. “Death is but a waiting game.”

Laudna and Delilah’s spirits, entwined as though they were one of the same thread, traversed through the shadow, passing by nothing and everything all at once. Surreal, suspended animation filled the gaps as they drifted through the weaves of reality, gently gliding through space and time and other realms, alien but familiar all at once. Time made no sense here, neither did direction; there was no up or down, there wasn’t a north or south. There just was. And together, their two distinct yet similar purple auras mingled amongst one another as it traversed deeper, further into the shadow.

Surroundings shifted quickly here. Buildings became mountains became oceans became forests became more buildings became plains. They were in free fall, if you could call it that. Laudna couldn’t control anything, and while it didn’t seem like Delilah had control, she did seem to have some level of influence, and she was exercising it.

Laudna could feel Delilah’s spirit surging within hers at times, now more than she had before, sensing and seeing it much like she always had just out of the corners of her eyes. Now, in this alternate space of existence however, Delilah was able to truly exert her otherworldly capabilities, and she’d be damned if she was going to lose Laudna.

However, for a moment, as they continued to spiral through these realms and times and places, Laudna felt a pulse of arcane energy through the air. There was a very distorted, muffled voice calling out from beyond the void, seemingly from another realm. She could not make out the words clearly, she didn’t know who was speaking, she wasn’t even sure if it was a human speaking. She could only hear Delilah reply, “Poor thing. I would if I could, But I ask you to bring her back, too. For both of us.”

They continued to fall, spiraling, tumbling. Everything they past by them so fast, and yet it was endless. It just seemed to go on, and on, eternally. Had it been only hours, perhaps just minutes? Had it been a century? Time is a weird soup, she thought. Especially when you’re dead.

After quite some time, their momentum started to slow. The surroundings, once just blurs of passing realms and planes, starting to come into a bit more focus. The backgrounds passing them by of forests and valleys and gorges now shifting into more clear, albeit twisted, dark versions of themselves. Mountains steeped in darkness, forests and valleys bathed in shadow. All sign of any kind of life or civilization in ruin, tattered, destroyed. This was a wasteland.

Their momentum had now come to a near halt, leaving their spirits simply floating in the air now as a single shimmering wave of gold energy with a slight blue threading within and around it began to push its way toward and through the space around them. As their spirits floated high above what appears to be a city, this gold-and-blue aura washed over and past them. Laudna’s energy showed no reaction; however, Delilah’s spirit seemed to emit an energy burst that, at least for the moment, seemed to cease the surges of Delilah’s energy and magic that Laudna had been sensing.

As the wave of magic continued on its path past them and dissipating, the spirits slowly fell toward the city. As they crept closer and closer, Laudna’s spirit became aware that this wasn’t an ordinary city. There were houses with roofs shaped like boats, and a giant tree in the middle with barren branches. Upon getting closer to the tree, there appeared to be a cage strung high within its boughs. Laudna, still unable to exert any control over the situation or her spirit, lingered within Delilah’s as they both proceeded through the city’s ruins towards the tree.

As they began to encroach on the tree, Laudna could begin to make out more details. Massive roots bursting through the ground emerging from its base; its trunk scarred; its boughs empty and leafless. It was The Sun Tree, except it wasn’t alive. It seemed dead, decaying. And there in its boughs, as the two of them began to float back up into the air, there was a cage. Made of branches, tangled and entwined as deeply and knotted as tightly as Delilah had been trying to cling to Laudna.

There at the opening of this cage, Laudna and Delilah floated together briefly again for a moment. “In you go,” Delilah said, and it was now, as Delilah began to extricate her spirit from that of Laudna’s, that Laudna could hear her a bit more clearly. Delilah’s voice was now a bit more raspy and jagged, but still bearing the soft and artificial airs that her voice always held. It were as though Delilah were now another person talking to her face to face.

As Laudna’s spirit was forced into the tree, its branches and stems closed in place, leaving little gap or space for Laudna to make anything out beyond. The spirit of Delilah was now hovering just in front of the cage, and Laudna, through what form of vision she had now as a spirit and in this space, could see the face of Delilah flicker in and out of the spirit that opposed her. “We haven’t a lot of time, I must keep you safe,” Delilah said.

There was no sense of anything in this space. Laudna was locked in the cage within this shadow manifestation of the Sun Tree, in a deeply scarred, destroyed, alternate Whitestone. She sensed that this was of Delilah’s making and design, even if it was also her own afterlife that she was experiencing.

While she still couldn't see clearly through the tree’s branches that held her in containment, every now and again she could hear Delilah speak to her. She would call out to Laudna, trying to entice her and wear her down even further, demoralize her. “Your friends aren’t coming for you,” she would tease Laudna. “They left you, they don’t care about you,” she would continue. Laudna didn’t want to listen, but it is hard to block out the noise when it is surrounding you, and seemingly coming from within. That’s when it's hardest to ignore. “They don’t love you.”

Laudna was used to Delilah’s lies and deceitful tricks. She had heard her rattling in her head for so long, it wasn’t anything new. But now that Laudna was in this dark and twisted Whitestone, a place she hadn’t been in so long let alone this horrible, decayed and twisted illusion of the city she once called home, it hit harder. It hurt more, it hurt worse. All the remarks and comments that folks have hurled her way throughout life were now being directed at her by the one woman who bore witness to it all. Delilah knew exactly what to say and do to make Laudna feel however she wanted, or to get her to do her bidding. Now, even in death, she was still just a puppet, a plaything for Delilah to toy with for eternity.

Laudna closed up from this, and shut down within herself, as much as a spirit could at least. The sense that Delilah would torment her for the rest of her days, when she had always thought that maybe, once she died for good, she’d finally be free was slowly washing away. This was becoming Laudna’s worst nightmare, and she couldn’t escape it. She couldn’t reach out to anyone, she couldn’t speak with Imogen, there was nothing she could do. Laudna was stuck here.

————

Much time had passed in the waking world, in the light. However, here in the shadow, there was nothing to distinguish night from day, one hour from the next. Laudna wasn’t even sure if time were passing at all. Surely, in this forgotten realm of existence, this next plane of the life cycle, the afterlife as it were, time is a blur anyway. What may have been a matter of seconds could have actually been decades, even centuries.

She had to continue to hope that there would be someone to come for her. She’d woken up from this deep sleep once before, why wouldn’t she again? Even if it was because of Delilah, there was other magic in the world. She trusted Imogen, she knew that she’d do anything she could.

“But what if she can’t,” Delilah said. This being their shared domain, Delilah could still peer into Laudna’s essence and detect her thoughts without much effort. Her voice was thinner, like it had faded some. “But what if she doesn’t?”

“She will!” Laudna screamed back at her. This was the first that she was able to muster any strength within this form to say anything, not even having been sure she was able to. “She will.” This time, much softer, quieter. Was she doubting, now? Was Delilah getting through to her?

“Ah, but see my child, you know I’m right,” Delilah sneered at her. “She isn’t coming, no one is coming.”

Delilah got up close to the cage’s branches now, peeling them back the slightest bit, her face now flickering through the spirits flame-like body. “It’s just you and me.” Delilah’s voice was beginning to get slightly thinner, frailer, Laudna could hear now that she had gotten closer. It wasn’t a drastic change, but it was still noticeable in this moment.

Laudna attempted to scream “no,” but even with all the anger and rage that she was able to feel in this moment, what came out was a much softer, quiet, broken voice. Laudna felt weak, and she began to get fearful about the “what ifs,” just as Delilah had enticed her. She was right where Delilah wanted her.

Delilah closed the cage’s branches back up to their usual state, leaving Laudna with the slimmest of views of the surroundings once more. Laudna cried out to Imogen once more, her voice raspy and weak.

As Delilah left the vicinity of the Sun Tree, she suddenly felt an unexpected arcane pulse from deep within the shadows. Laudna, too, felt this faint but familiar pulse of arcane energy through the air, but she did not hear the distorted, muffled voice that accompanied it like last time. Delilah did, however.

“Whatever it takes,” she replied to the voice. “It won’t be long now. I’m fading.” Delilah let the pause hang in the air for a moment before finally adding, “And I’ll take her with me.”

Delilah continued to float away off into the shadows off into some unknown direction, while Laudna was left in the cage hung in the tree, puzzled and confused, even more scared and alone. She continued to try to call out to Imogen, reaching out with her mind, but to no avail. It seemed she was too weak in this spiritual state, or the tree’s cage was preventing her from doing anything, or maybe both; she wasn’t sure.

If Laudna could sit down dejected in the corner of this cage, she would have at this point. She was beginning to feel lost and hopeless, fearful that this was to be the rest of her existence in any shape. She kept focusing on Imogen, thinking of her as much as she could with what little energy she had until Delilah would decide it was time to tease her again.

————

Everything was dark and still. In the waking, living world, a handful of days more had passed. There was no telling what was going on from within the shadows, but Laudna was not giving up. Though Delilah continued to torment and provoke Laudna through the tree, Laudna did not let Delilah break her. Her resolve in these moments would be unmatched elsewhere. Delilah was not perturbed however; she figured she would get Laudna to crack sooner or later.

It was one of these moments, as Delilah was present before Laudna, that Laudna noticed a shift in the energy of the shadows. Something was new, fresh in this realm. As Laudna continued to withstand Delilah’s commentary, Laudna was able to pick up on a small, golden fleck that seemed to be floating through the space. It was tiny at first, so very minuscule in the grand scheme of things as compared to Delilah’s existence here. But as the fleck seemingly got closer, it began to get a bit bigger.

Laudna trailed it in what little perspective she had from the tree as it meandered about above the town until it seemed to settle in a space not far from the square where the Sun Tree was located, where she was being held. This spirit seemed noticeably smaller now, as compared to Delilah’s and even Laudna’s, and she was confused.

The gold spirit began to float up toward the tree, seemingly unbeknownst to Delilah. However, just as the golden spirit came up to what can only be described as eye-level with Laudna, the spirit vibrated and hummed, before completely dissipating with a snap.

Laudna remained puzzled, wondering what she had just witnessed. That was new. Was Delilah doing something? She hadn’t been listening to her crooning, having managed to tune her out for the moment. Delilah ultimately grew tired and disappeared once more, leaving Laudna alone as she was wont to do.

Now alone, Laudna had renewed her efforts in trying to reach out to Imogen. She wasn’t positive that the golden spirit was Imogen, but she wasn’t sure that it wasn’t malicious, either. She was so unsure of anything here, it was hard to even be sure of herself, and what this place was. Was she sure this wasn’t some sort of post-death hallucination, something she never experienced before? Was this something beyond death? She was worried, she was getting weaker, colder, just like Delilah was. She could see it, she could sense it, but she could feel it herself too.

It did not seem like a lot of time passed here, however, as suddenly in the far off distance of the shadows, Laudna saw that same gold fleck reappear. This time, it was stationary, it didn’t seem to be moving. That was odd, last time it was vibrant and at least seemed to hover.

And then several other colors began to spill out from the golden fleck. Each color emerged from this golden fleck at first a fleck itself before becoming slightly larger, yet still far out in the distance shadows away from the Tree. There was what appeared to be a long translucent strand that was attached to each of the flecks — one of emerald green, one of red, one of fiery orange, one of a forest green, one of yellow — but as they descended beyond the horizon and within the shadows, the flecks and strands all disappeared. Laudna was unsure if they were attached to this gold fleck or if it was different; she wasn’t even sure that what she was seeing was real. What were these flecks? Were they more spirits? Did more people die that Delilah had control over? Was someone coming to save her? All these thoughts ran across her mind as these colored flecks appeared, until the last colored fleck emerged: a very familiar, distinct, light-purple color fleck. Laudna would know that purple anywhere.

“Imogen.”

————

Delilah can be seen flittering about the space now as she has noticed this golden spirit floating in the air, and these other colors spirits progressing through the shadows, seemingly determined on making their way toward the Sun Tree.

These spirits emerge, just barely within vision of Laudna from her perspective within the tree. She can only see them overlapping with one another, weaving in and out as they traverse through this space. Laudna still cannot make out details beyond the immediate square that the Tree has resided in all this time, but those translucent threads that maintain their connection to something above them become visible for the briefest of moments every once in a while. Laudna starts to get the sense that, whoever or whatever these spirits are, if they are indeed Imogen and her friends, they are coming to rescue her.

Laudna continues to watch and sees Delilah’s spirit as she bounces from one part of the shadow to the next. One moment, there’s a flash and she’s floating from one neighborhood alley to a barn. A few moments go by, and another flash, as she sees Delilah float back across the city now to a house in a different part of town. She’s being pushed back, she’s retreating.

These spirits continue to progress, beginning to encroach on the Tree’s grounds. Laudna starts to reach out with her mind, trying to shout whatever she can through the cage, but she still cannot be heard or perceived by anyone. “Please, Imogen, save me,” she thinks.

“She can certainly try,” Delilah says to Laudna, as she suddenly reappears in front of the Tree. Her spirit now seems to be roiling more than before, her face flickering in and out more frequently. She seemed distressed, angered, but determined. “I will deal with this incursion, don’t worry,” she said as she seems to push herself off of the Tree and descends down below to the Square. The colored flecks have emerged from the city’s shadowy maze, and now stand before Delilah, the Sun Tree, and Laudna.

The six colorful spirits, all with their translucent gossamer strands ascending up into the space above and disappearing, stand before Delilah’s spirit and seemingly hold court. A parlay. Laudna cannot clearly see them from where she currently is within the tree, she cannot hear them, but she can just barely make out the pulses and vibrations as the various spirits are all talking. She sees a lot of vibrations come from the red one, quite a few from the orange and greens as well. Then she sees the light purple one, the one she hopes, wishes, assumes is Imogen’s spirit, begin to vibrate along with the red one.

Then, suddenly, Laudna hears Delilah’s voice call out clear as day, “Laudna, darling?”

Up in the tree, the branches that made up the cage containing Laudna’s spirit began to shift and open ever so slightly, just enough of a gap to let her friends see that Laudna was inside. To Laudna, however, having been watching through clouded view and muffled ears, things came into focus as the cage opened. She could begin to hear the ambient sounds of the ruins of the city scape around her, the brushing and creaking of the tree, and the vibrant colors of her friends’ spirits now sharpened.

As she looked out from the tree down to her friends, the spirit that had a light purple coloration began to emanate as a voice rang out. “Laudna?”

Imogen, having called out to Laudna in the Tree behind Delilah, its branches now peeled back exposing her spirit, seemed to react to this and emitted a similar resonant pulse. “Imogen,” Laudna said weakly.

“We’re going to get you home, we’re gonna get you home, okay?” Imogen cried out; her spirit vibrating intensely as these words rang out towards the Tree.

“I forgot how much I hate it here,” Laudna responded. A slightly stronger vibration came from Laudna this time, but still faint comparatively.

“Can you get out? Can you get out of the Tree?” Imogen’s spirit drifted a few feet closer, seemingly reaching out to Laudna.

Laudna’s spirit quivered before it pulsed once more, stronger still. “I think that depends on you, darling.”

Imogen’s spirit vibrated at this, though not from any verbal response. A second passed before she did finally reply, “I need you to fight her.”

“I haven’t been able to fight her for thirty odd years.” Laudna’s voice weakened slightly here, but still stronger than not.

Imogen’s spirit vibrated brightly once more. “We’re here now. We’ll help.”

As Imogen said this, Delilah’s spirit flashed the same familiar bright, deep purple and the tree began to close. Laudna’s spirit again became obscured behind the branches, the sight and sound of the proceedings again blocked out.

Laudna tried to call out to Imogen once more but was unable to reach her, it seemed. As she screamed louder and louder for Imogen, not a sound was heard on the outside. Delilah had her full control over Laudna’s ability to perceive, whilst assuming the focus of the rest of the Hells.

Laudna’s spirit shifted in space trying to find any way to peer out into the square. She couldn’t see or hear anything, until she managed to find a small opening in the branches where she could just barely see Imogen’s spirit squaring up with Delilah’s spirit, until suddenly Imogen’s spirit erupted into an intense, powerful reverberation that resulted in an audible scream, one that was able to pierce through whatever veil that this cage held over Laudna. Laudna knew that was Delilah’s scream, and she also knew in that moment that Delilah was in trouble.

Down below, battle had erupted as the spiritual forms of Bell’s Hells began to attack Delilah. Within moments of that scream, whilst the various other colors all leapt into motion and appeared to focus their attacks on Delilah, one spirit in particular appeared out of nowhere beside Laudna as she watched on. She could not hear any voices or yelling from within her cage now, but on the outside, it was Orym who had been flung into the tree in an attempt to break the cage open and free Laudna.

Meanwhile, Chetney and Fresh Cut Grass down below continued to aide Fearne and Imogen in attacking Delilah, absorbing the brunt of her spell attacks and trying to keep focus. At one point, several skeletons appear from the ground beneath their feet, appearing to Laudna as spectral black-and-white spirits, only to see them disappear one by one. Throughout the course of battle, they begin to attack the tree as Orym proceeds to hack away at its branches. As Laudna watches on, she sees Delilah’s spirit emit a massive reverberation, at which point the spirit she perceives as Fresh Cut Grass sees its leash dissipate, and their spirit vanish.

Laudna watches on in disbelief as this happens, and while the remaining party members continue to focus their attacks on Delilah, Fearne and Imogen learn that damaging the tree will also damage Delilah. They begin to strike out at the tree as Orym take another whack at a branch, when suddenly Laudna sees the tether tied to Orym’s spirit get snapped, and his spirit vanishes as well.

Laudna is fearful now, having watched two of her friends vanish from this space within moments. She is unsure what is happening, now unable to see anything as the battle has shifted, smoke beginning to pour from the trunk of the Sun Tree that’s been slowly catching fire thanks to Fearne’s pinpoint accuracy. Laudna’s spirit continues to flicker in the space as she tries to observe the fight, as she catches them coming back around a corner.

Just as that happens, Laudna gets a visual on Imogen as she sees a streak of lightning headed right towards the cage. In a panic, Laudna screams. Delilah screams as well, as the Sun Tree is split in two, its trunk parted down the middle, its boughs broken, the cage split. Laudna’s spirit was briefly free, out in the open, when an ear-shattering scream filled the space.

A bright white light filled the space, illuminating everything within the shadow for the briefest of instants, and then everything vanished. The colored spirits and flecks, all disappeared; Ashton, Fearne, Imogen, Chet, even Delilah was gone. Laudna was the only one here in this space. But this space wasn’t even Whitestone anymore, it wasn’t the Sun Tree. It was nothing, but this time, truly nothing. There wasn’t any ground to stand on, any buildings, any land, there nothing. Laudna, still as a spirit, was just floating in what felt like an endless vacuum of space.

She wondered what happened, did something go wrong? Are they okay? Where did they go? She continued to float, unsure if she was ascending or descending, neither, or both. Where was she supposed to go, was there anywhere to go?

All these questions filled her consciousness, when suddenly a familiar golden fleck appeared, only this time it was much larger. This fleck had the same makeup and flickering body as the spirits of Delilah and herself, and much like those of her companions. Upon getting closer to this spirit, she recognized it as the one that had been in the shadows not long before, guiding her friends it would seem.

As the golden spirit was nearly upon her, she could begin to see a face shining through. She did not recognize this face, but she thought it kindly and warm, friendly. Suddenly, the face disappeared and the golden glow began to take on a hue that which was forest green in nature, mingling in amongst the dominant gold. A voice then came through, one she recognized. It was clear, and it echoed throughout the space softly. She could hear it was Orym, and she could hear that he was trying to reach out to her.

“Laudna, I know I don't know you any better than the rest of the gang, but I know your history. You deserve to be more than a footnote in Delilah's story. There are people here who need you. They need your life and your heart. I don't know what Bells Hells will be without your darkness, Laudna. Or your light.” Laudna could hear the emotion in his voice, a slight quiver as he spoke. “We don't want to leave anyone behind, least of all you. I got to get that blood flowing through your veins again. Please. Come back.”

The golden spirit continued to vibrate with this forest green hue for a moment, and she tried to call out to Orym, unsure if he would hear her. The spirit pulsated and the color shifted back to just the gold. A new voice was coming through, and the gold had gotten more yellow, but this voice she couldn’t hear at all. She could only hear a very low droning, as though someone were talking into hands, and she were trying to listen from another room through a wall. She could not make out what was being said, or who the voice belonged to, whether it was someone she was familiar with or not, but after another moment the spirit’s yellow hue faded and was back to the gold it was initially.

Laudna called out once more into the void, her spirit still floating around this golden aura, trying to get within reach of it but still not quite close enough. As she used every bit of her essence that she could muster, another shift in the spirit before her, this time to a light purple color. Laudna focused, knowing without a doubt, that could only be Imogen.

But then, her voice. She could hear her! She could hear Imogen! But, she sounded distant, far away. Not quite muffled, but it wasn’t clear. Not distorted, but like Orym, her voice was echoing throughout the space, but with a much greater intensity that diminished the message, but Laudna could still pick up bits through the discordant echoes and reverberations.  

“You know you saved my life right? If you hadn’t come into town when you did, I don't know how long I would have lasted.” The words rang out, echoing back and forth off nothing, an odd soundscape that would have otherwise driven any living person mad. The strangest cacophony, but Laudna fought through it and continued on. Laudna hurtled her spirit toward the golden aura with every bit of energy she could muster in this state, still unsure even now how this was happening, but she didn’t care. Imogen was reaching out, and this was Laudna’s only chance. Imogen’s words continued to call out through the space to her.

“These last few years have been everything. And through it all, through all the laughter and all the hardships, she was with you. She was choking you.” There was a pause, as the vibrations lessened for a moment. The gold still radiating the flashes and pulses of purple energy, the vibrations picked back up. Now, the purple energy was beginning to swirl more intensely around and within the golden aura before Laudna, lingering closer and closer. Laudna continued to chase the spirit down, not feeling as though she were making any progress but not relenting.

“If you come back, I don't know how you're going to feel. I don't know if you'll feel free, or if you'll feel empty. But I want you to know, whatever... whatever hole she's leaving, I'll be there to help fill it, all right? I'll be there for you.”

Imogen’s words were still clamoring for Laudna, as Laudna continued to try and reach out and give a response, a reply. No words could come out to her, she was so enthralled with the spirit before her, feeling as though she were being held back on a leash. It was so close, but so far. “Imogen,” she tried calling out, just a whisper.

“I'm not going to tell you to come back, I'm not going to try to compel you to come back, because that choice, Laudna, is yours now. No one gets to control you anymore, all right?”

Imogen’s voice trailed off for a moment. The vibrations from the now purple-and-gold aura before her diminishing and fading in color, before one last pulse was emitted.

“Imogen,” Laudna tried again, louder this time but her voice still raspy, jagged, cracking.

“Just know that I love you, and I'm here.”

Within an instant Laudna’s spirit, almost feral in nature if a soul could have such a state of existence in this realm, leapt at the aura as though it were suddenly unleashed. Freed from the shackles that held her, Laudna pounced into the purple and gold spirit, screaming out “Imogen!”

Laudna’s purple spirit began to infuse with the unknown gold and Imogen’s purple, creating an arcane twister than spun throughout this shadow. Light began to burst through pockets between the two distinct, separate purples, until suddenly everything disappeared in another blast of white.

————

Laudna’s body lay still on the ground, the glow that had been emanating from her during the Resurrection ritual fading. All of those sitting around Laudna looked at Pike asking if it worked. Pike reached out to check for signs of life from Laudna’s body. Unable to tell if she was breathing, Pike slapped Laudna across the face.

Laudna shot straight up, provoking a gasp from everyone else in the room. Ow, she thought, as she looked around and saw her friends, and a few folks she did not recognize, sitting around her. Fearne and Chetney at her feet, Orym and Fresh Cut Grass on either side of her a few feet away now, Ashton just off to the side standing behind Orym.

Her heart skipped a beat, which is saying something for her, when she did not see Imogen initially. At that moment, she felt a hand on her shoulder. Laudna turned around to see Imogen sitting there just behind her, nose bloodied. For a moment, it were as though time had frozen as they locked eyes on one another. Imogen was trembling. She was back. Was she back?

The silence broken by Fresh Cut Grass. “Laudna, you’re back,” only to be quickly followed by a puzzled, “are you back? Are you okay?”

“Say something only Laudna would know, quick!” Chetney blurted out.

Time stood still.

Laudna looked back and forth at each one of her friends, still in shock, now a bit of pain, and much disbelief. Wait, was this real? Am I alive? Quick, say something…

She took a breath, her voice cracked. “I… I don’t…” She looked from Chetney as he said this back at the rest of the group, before looking at Imogen, and put her hands to her cheeks, trying to muster energy, words, anything.

“Have you found anything else out about your mom?”

Imogen looked at Laudna as tears swelled up in her eyes. Oh, Laudna, Imogen thought into her head as she reached forward and pulled Laudna in for a hug, wrapping her arms around her tight and holding her closer than ever before.

Laudna squeezed Imogen back in this warmest of embraces.

A pregnant pause had turned into impassioned joy, tearful happiness.

“I’m so glad you’re back.”

The promise fulfilled.

[imogenkol]

— SHIP SONGS

I was tagged by @marivenah and @chuckhansen to post 5-10 songs for a (actually two) ship! Thank you dearies!!! 💕💕💕

Tagging: @socially-awkward-skeleton @detectivelokis @sstewyhosseini @queennymeria @indorilnerevarine @jinfromyarikawa @roofgeese @corvosattano @rhetoricalrogue @nokstella @jackiesarch @shellibisshe @phillipsgraves @florbelles @unholymilf @jendoe @simonxriley @aceghosts + anyone else who wants to!

YOU SHOULD KNOW WHERE I’M COMING FROM - BANKS

What if I say I would break your heart? // What if I say I have problems that made me, me? // What if I knew I would just rip your mind apart // Would you let me out? // Maybe you can stop before the start // Maybe you can see that I just may be too crazy to love

BETTER LOVE - HOZIER

Staring in the blackness at some distant star // The thrill of knowing how alone we are, unknown we are // To the world and to the both of us // I confessed the longing I was dreaming of

CIGAR - TAMINO

Right then, she kisses my skin // I don't know what this is or where to begin // This fills me up with bliss // Don't tell me this was a dream // And she, shows me that life // Isn't all about explaining your time //No, it's the perfect time to lay all night

BE YOUR LOVE - BISHOP BRIGGS

Stone cold, out of sight // Too dark to trace the light // Don't leave me when I'm alone // Oh, and I'll be here when daylight's gone // I'mma be your love

STAY - RIHANNA FT. MIKKY EKKO

Not really sure how to feel about it // Something in the way you move // Makes me feel like I can't live without you // It takes me all the way // I want you to stay

WORK SONG - HOZIER

When my time comes around // Lay me gently in the cold dark earth // No grave can hold my body down // I'lI crawl home to her

BLOOD BANK - BON IVER

Then the snow started falling // We were stuck out in your car // You were rubbing both my hands // Chewing on a candy bar // You said, "Ain't this just like the present // To be showing up like this?" // As a moon waned to crescent // We started to kiss

HYMN FOR HER - AMES

She's the autumn air // She is everywhere //Oh, this is my hymn for her // My hymn for her // My soul has stirred // I'm speaking tongues // Am I worth of her love?

RIVER - LEON BRIDGES

Oh, I wanna come near and give уа // Every part of me // But there is blood on my hands // And my lips aren't clean // Take me to your river // I wanna go

DEVIL’S BACKBONE - THE CIVIL WARS

Oh Lord, oh Lord, what have I done? // I've fallen in love with a man on the run // Oh Lord, oh Lord, I'm begging you please // Don't take that sinner from me

[artschooldemon]

Nearly done chapter 5!

I just have one more section and then all I’ll have to do is think of a title and edit any mistakes I find!

[ascendantloser]

eat up children i am finally posting another fic

[utilitycaster]

ashton-centric memes ft. imogen, fcg, and laudna

[rq-gift-exchange]

2024 Fourth Wing Gift Exchange Masterlist

Xaden/Violet

Violet Sorrengail's Guide to Spinning a Scandal by @caeli0306 for Cee_Darling (Cee_hoc)

Zihnal Must Hate Us by aspensquake for overjoyedisland

you will be healed and come back again by zencetera for HLizR50

Quiet Day In by lynnthere_donethat for shoo0637

Questions, Comments, Concerns by Kobo for aspensquake

Some Version of You by @booklover721 for caeli0306

Stolen Moments by Meyelemon for amberswansong

Fill Your Empty Spaces by @korrinamoe for sliebman10

Lights by Emjen_Enla for booklover721

Nothing Up My Sleeve by Nivaria for Kobo

Coming Home by @sliebman10 for tinyghosts

Get In, Loser, We're Going Shipping by oopsireaditagain for Meyelemon

I'm With You by ShadowMami for Aethelefaie

Bodhi/Ridoc

Pink Pony Club by @yanny-77 for everyone in the Rider’s Quadrant Discord Server and anyone who participated in the exchange

Perfect Storm by @hoeelliexx for Yanny77

Red: Basgiath’s version by @bestbookfriends for alltoowellread

Garrick/Imogen

I Belong In Your Arms by @sarahydeart for Lydibug522

Death of a Hero by @alexandia03 for siobhanbooks

The Odyssey of Imrrick by @ubiquitouslyme for AlexanDia03

Haven't Told Her by @sarcasticmothwrites for kalix_glaeser

I Think I’m in Love by @istarbel for justanothersarah

Homesick by @widebrimmedhatsblog for istarbel

Aaric/Sloane

The Grape Escape by @alltoowellread for korrinamoe

Yield by HeadCanonHeadCase for Fireheart_Rose

I’m Still Me by @hlizr50 for HeadCanonHeadCase

Brennan/Naolin

This can't be real by Portujules for Fantasy_bookwyrm

Resurrect My Heart, Too. by @greeneyedwildthing for Jeyfeather1234

Like fireflies to a flame by Jeyfeather1234 for Madame_Ladle, @benetnaschshugo

With You by ILoveMyThighs (curlyhairedkatniss) for shoo0637

Poly Ships

Xaden's Day Off by @alittlegirlwaitinginagarden for SuebsWrites

Thunderstorms and Sunshine by @tegantales for widebrimmedhat

Never Not Mine by amberswansong for TheBookworm_Writer

Enchanted by @suebswrites for Ubiquitously_Ubiquitous

Solace by @taumoebaa for Starfall_Spirit

Dragon Centric

Scales of Devotion by @witch-and-her-witcher for ACourtofLadyDeath

A Ray of Light in Shadowed Clouds by SaraNova for zencetera

Last One Standing by @acourtofladydeath for xadenviolet

X-reader/OC

Together At Last by We_were_beautiful for ScrumptiousDinosaurWizard

Our Time by @garricks4thwingqueen for We_were_beautiful

Together by HeadCanonHeadCase for Garricks4thwingueen

Liam/Violet

Learning in Aretia by overjoyedisland for to_be_real_now

Close to You by Cee_Darling (Cee_hoc) for Nivaria

Dain ships

Heart It Races by amberswansong for Portujules

Measure Up by SaraNova for Nedeit

Thnks fr th Mmrs by @copperfirebird for gemmaspumpkins

Liam/Jesinina

A Scribe's First Rider by Scarlet_Aeon for GreeneyedWildThing (TheWrittenMaze)

Bodhi/Sloane

These Games We Play by @starfall-spirit for hoelliexx

Other/Ship Neutral

Visiting Home by @quihi 

The Book Cat by justanothersarah, SuebsWrites for taumoebaa

How to not kill a dragon by Nedeit for lynnthere_donethat

Hangman (Teach Me How Not to Cry) by tinyghosts for Nedeit

just keep your head above by copperfirebird for Scarlet_Aeon

Letters from the Family Sorrengail by gemmaspumpkins for Quihi

Dear Brennan by SuebsWrites, Yanny77 for copperfirebird

Pulling Rank by HLizR50 for E_Hyde

A twist in fate by Fantasy_bookwyrm for copperfirebird

The Idiots of Basgiath War College by @siobhanbooks for oopsireaditagain

With Best Intentions by Nivaria for ShadowMami

[cringefaecompilation]

Like honestly if you look at the way the first two campaigns went, it shouldn’t be a surprise that this world-shaking threat has emerged. With characters that might have started out feeling like the NPCs of true heroes’ stories. With VM they were the archetypal heroes. Two of them were THE leaders of their homeland. They were celebrated publicly and we’ve seen their ongoing, massive impact on the world. The MN were unmoored antiheroes who fucked around in the shadows. Their name was put forth for a multifaceted mission to help stop Ludinus and the Vanguard to virtual crickets because no one has heard of them. Now you’ve got this group of people who are basically nobodies but who care so much about keeping one guy from deciding the fate of the world. These guys are all intrinsically connected to wildly different facets of what Ludinus has been fucking with for hundreds of years but easily could have ignored the call; which, let’s be real is what the Nein did for much of their story until Ludinus was revealed to be connected to Trent. These people crafted characters that are so deep and developed and flawed but all some people can do is complain that this story isn’t a carbon copy of C2? We all want balance, and for the Hells to have a break, but if I see one more YouTube video about if C3 is worth watching that’s just 20 minutes of some straight white guy talking about how much they loved the Mighty Nein I might lose it.

well, uh... it's not so much "oh, people just want this story to be exactly like campaign 2!" as much as it is "people are pushing forward the exact same argument that campaign 3 sucks because it's not character-centric over and over and it's getting frustrating"

which is a fully fine opinion to have, it's just when the campaign is treated like it is objectively bad because it's not character-centric is when it upsets me. we have a great story here and a lot of interesting stuff to focus on that affect how we see the world and the characters feel more integrated in it than ever but oops! i guess it sucks because we don't have The Hero's Journey and The Chosen Ones or A Ragtag Group of Misfits Found Family that mess around and have cutesy conversations with each other while ignoring the all the fucked up conventions of their world as Just The Way It Is!

(and it gets worse when the message gets spread that the characters have no personal stakes in the plot asides imogen and are only doing it for the sake of being altruistic little NPCs which um. lol. lmao even. wasn't aware having empathy was a negative trait)

tl;dr how it feels reading bad faith criticism of campaign 3

[revvethasmythh]

Looks like Sam/FCG is getting on peoples nerves (fandom wise) the last few episodes. Saw someone say that FCG was hypocritical, and putting others in danger, relying on the changebringer too much. Someone was also annoyed with the FCG’s insistence on going to Imogen’s hometown when she clearly didn’t want to. It seems like I only see criticism and hatred to FCG and not to Imogen or Laudna or any other character when their being annoying or assholes.

You know, anon, fantastic timing on sending this because I've been debating whether I wanted to write something about this exact topic for a little over a week. Because, at least imo, I agree that I've seen quite a bit of...disgruntlement? anger? mean-spiritedness? over FCG's more (intentionally! it's part of the bit! and, like, his character development!) annoying traits, most recently his turn to blind faith with the Changebringer coin, but it's certainly something I've seen pop up other times in general. And I think it's interesting that FCG seems to exists within the confines of a sort of....conditional tolerance by a lot of people? And that condition seems be to whether he's supporting their favorite character (or, god forbid I talk about this, favorite ships) in a way that they like to see. It's like, as along as he's supporting who the viewers want him to be supporting in a way they see fit, he's fine. Hell, you even get the "fcg/sam riegel supremacy" comments sometimes if they do something the viewer particularly approves of. But the second FCG deviates from that and does something solely to further their own story, or even just, well, doesn't cast guidance on Imogen, it's like we're backtracking to this really strong point of negativity regarding them that really just seems to culminate in the idea that their behavior is plain on old annoying and could they stop, please?

It's an interesting dichotomy. And, like, this isn't really about whether people actually like or dislike FCG as a character (a person's opinions about him as a character is actually not the point here!), it's the fluctuation of the opinion that stands out to me. The loud approval if he does something the audience deems as "good" and the loud dismissal if he does something the audience deems as "bad" or "annoying." Hence "conditional tolerance" is sort of the phrase I've landed on to describe the phenomena. This is something I think has shown up in shades with other Sam Riegel PCs as well, though to be fair I wasn't active in the fandom pre-90s in the M9 campaign. But I feel like something similar did happen with Veth in parts of the M9, as memory serves. I feel like it has to have something to do with people's inability to look past the "bit" and see the deeper character work that seeded into those bits. If the audience member is assessing the character's actions as nothing more than a silly bit that's getting in the way, perhaps they become quite aggravated by it? (Also, I'm not going to get into the specifics of how people's christian-centric view of religion is absolutely affecting the way they're responding to the "blind faith" thing, but. You know). Like, there is something to be said here about people not wanting to actually delve deeply into the character work happening in Sam's PCs, I'm sure. It's a...unique way of engaging with his characters that is simultaneously so annoying to me as fan of Sam's PCs and also, like, weirdly fascinating as someone who did reception studies in grad school? Like, it is genuinely a unique, if irritating, aspect of the fandom discourse.

[dadrielle]

A short list of things I hope will happen during the Team Split:

*Pâté ended up with Imogen and they have bonding time shenanigans

*Yu shows up to collect the crown and ends up grumpily joining with team Uthodurn and spends more time bonding with Fearne and needling Imogen

*Team ? is either in the Shadowfell or Blightshore and shit's Laudna-centric over there for awhile

*If in the Shadowfell, Laudna gets to curbstomp whatever is left of Delilah.

*If at Blightshore, they meet other Hollow Ones and Laudna is like what...the fuck.

*Either way, Ashton and Orym fall in step behind Laudna and she ends up acting as leader for that crew

*Imogen and Laudna have a sending conversation every night before bed like the pining gay idiots they are

*Speaking of idiots, I am just generally looking forward to the lack of restraint/braincells Team Uthodurn will have

*Ashton lays his backstory out on the table for Orym like he said he would

*OH ALSO: Imogen drops one of her psionic spells to take Silvery Barbs as a new psionic spell, thereby being gay, strategic, and a menace to Matt

[quietblueriver]

A little Imodna fic re: Imogen’s trip through Ruidus and Laudna’s reaction to it. Angst and fluff and comfort bc they deserve it.

When the dream is over, Imogen has feelings about her trip through Ruidus, about what she wants and whether she’s wanted.

After the others leave, she and Laudna get some time to talk about it.

-

It’s quiet in their room.

Imogen’s curled toward the edge of the mattress, knees tucked up just slightly, the thick comforter keeping her almost too warm. Normally, she’d turn to Laudna, press close so that the cool of her body balanced out the heat of their bed. Tonight, she doesn’t.

She knows Laudna is awake, can hear the push and pull of thread through her latest project, feels the light touch of fingers on her shoulder every few minutes, gentle enough that they wouldn’t wake Imogen if she were sleeping. She’s not sure if Laudna thinks she is sleeping or if she’s letting Imogen pretend. Which is another way of saying Laudna’s either not paying enough attention to notice that Imogen is awake and caught in her thoughts or she doesn’t feel the need to check in. Either way, and despite herself, Imogen feels it like a slight.

A feeling that causes the weight of shame and an ever-lurking sense of failure to rise up and make the heat almost unbearable. She worms a foot out as quietly as she can, ears hyper-aware of the rustle of fabric she can’t stop.

Laudna’s sewing continues uninterrupted. Imogen’s chest grows somehow more full with her feelings and all the words she’s biting back.

Even now.

Even after their trials with Nana Morri, after all that angsting over honesty and communication and trust, Imogen is quiet.

There are options. She’d known that before they’d been thrown into a pit and attacked by murder wasps and tricked into doubt. There have always been options.

She could turn over. She could reach out her hand and grasp Laudna’s wrist and let Laudna see her eyes. She could ask Laudna to talk to her, could tell her about the thoughts circling and circling through her mind, the ones that have been there since that night in the basement with Delilah.

She doesn’t. She’s tired. And she feels, if she’s honest with herself (and maybe that was the exercise they all needed first, because Imogen’s fairly certain she’s not the only one of the Hells who has difficulty living in her own truths sometimes), like she has been the one bridging the gap, or trying to, without any indication that it’s welcome. Like her honesty and vulnerability have recently been met with hesitancy and hedging and eyes toward a future very different from the one that Imogen had thought they both wanted.

The doubt, an old friend, had begun growing louder in that basement with Delilah and had reached its peak tonight.

The question about giving in to Ruidus was genuine. They’d talked about it before and put it to the side, but now that they’re closer, now that they’re getting ready to really go and do this, it felt important to raise again. She wanted their opinions, because they’d just watched what happened if one of them decided to make a choice like that in isolation, and it wasn’t good.

She wanted to know what they thought, wanted to be as smart about it as she could be.

If you’d asked her, though, even the moment before the question left her lips, whether Laudna needed to be there for that conversation, she would have said no.

Because she knew Laudna’s answer. She saw Laudna’s face furrowing in reaction to her offering her soul on the Crimson Abyss, heard Laudna’s violent threats of protection on her behalf, felt the cold of her form of dread spread and snarling over her as they fought. She knew Laudna’s answer, and it was, “No.”

This was a given, because she loved Imogen more than she loved anything, and because even if Imogen wasn’t trying to be unnecessarily self-sacrificial, there was no denying that giving in could be dangerous.

Except it hadn’t been no. It hadn’t been no, and then, when she’d come back to herself, come back to the cold, exhausting world after feeling so warm, so whole in the heart of Ruidus, and told them just a sliver of it, it still hadn’t been no.

It had been, “If it’s what you want.” It had been, “I don’t want to hold you back.”

And Imogen knows that Laudna loves her. She knows, because Laudna shows her, has shown her, every day.

But the deep and sharpening doubt inside of her says confidently that the love they have for each other isn’t the same.

Imogen wants Laudna. She wants her in every way. There is no future for her, hasn’t been for a long time, that doesn’t have Laudna at its center.

There is nothing she wants more than a cottage with a horse or two and garden beds for Laudna, a porch with a little table where she can start her day with the sunrise while Laudna sleeps and they can end their days with the sunset together, a kitchen like Zhudanna’s, with a stove that works and favorite mugs and a window that looks out at the forest. A home that is warm and easy and theirs.

There is nothing she wants more than to be there, with Laudna. To kiss her good morning and good night and anytime in between. To love her for as long as she’s alive.

And yes, Imogen knows that Laudna loves her.

Long before she kissed her in that marketplace in Jrusar, Imogen knew that Laudna loved her in a way that nobody else ever had. A love so deep and steadfast and self-sacrificial that it made Imogen scared to express the nature of her own feelings because she was afraid Laudna would force herself into something she didn’t want just to make Imogen happy.

Without the circlet, she’d been able to hear the flow of Laudna’s thoughts, often, and understandably, preoccupied with the immediate dangers of their lives after joining the Hells. It felt selfish, in light of that, to ask for more, to put one more thing on her.

And she’d been afraid to say anything without certainty, without some kind of hint from Laudna that she wasn’t going to hurt Laudna and herself and everything they’d built together.

She’d gotten close, before the Solstice. The future they were imagining, the roles they played for each other, Laudna’s own words about Imogen and what she wanted—it closed the gap a little. Made it easier for Imogen to think that maybe, one day, she’d know they were in the same place. That it would be safe to tell Laudna that her love had at some point spilled over its neatly drawn box and had only kept spilling, running over the lines between friendship and devotion and desire until it was all one big pool.

The circlet might’ve made it harder. After all, it was the opposite of confirmation. But the split, her time in Uthodurn, it only made Imogen’s need, selfish as it was, stronger, and when she didn’t have the discouragement of what she thought was knowledge, didn’t have access enough to know that her own want, so fierce sometimes she could hardly think of anything else, was unmatched, she couldn’t keep telling herself the same story about waiting. Fear lost to love (to greed, to desire, to impulse) and suddenly she was kissing Laudna next to the bread stall.

And Laudna was kissing her back. And Laudna was touching her and telling her, softly and with the purpled blush that made Imogen warm and light with affection, that she loved her.

Imogen believed her. She had no reason to doubt her.

Except, of course, for the circlet. Except for the niggling, shameful, persistent voice that reminded her that she could be sure, if she just took off the circlet. That she could be sure, if she let herself explore. That it would save both of them pain if she took even just a minute to be certain that they were on the same page, that Laudna wasn’t just doing her another thing to try to make Imogen happy.

She’d never pry. But without the circlet, she could maybe just stumble into the truth. Fall on it the way she fell onto so many thoughts in the world.

It’s the ugliest part of her. The part of her that believed for most of her life that she knew people because she knew their thoughts, that she didn’t need to listen or to watch who someone was in the world because she could see the real them, the true them.

She knows better now. She knows that people can, and do, fight against their impulses and desires and the darkest voices in their minds. That people work to be more, and better, than their base thoughts.

The problem is, though, that sometimes they don’t. Sometimes people let their impulses lead them and they keep their mouths closed and their hands busy and suddenly you’re watching your friend explode into a million pieces, putting themself and everybody else you love at risk.

She would’ve known, if she’d taken off the circlet. She would’ve seen the plans and heard the reasons and she could’ve done something.

And yeah, it’s about trust. Of course it is. But it’s also about reality, and the reality is that people find it hard to talk about things, especially hard things, and with the Hells, that has the potential to be catastrophic. Has been catastrophic.

It’s easy, to let that logic lead her. She needs to take it off. For protection. For the people she loves.

But if she’s honest with herself, if she fights to be honest with herself if no one else, there are other, more selfish reasons why she sometimes wants the circlet gone.

The biggest one is lying right beside her, humming softly to herself as she works through “the difficult bit. Do you think green or orange, dearest, for the tail?” A question asked before Delilah’s appearance, Laudna’s eyes excited as she held out the options and Imogen kissing her in favor of an answer.

Imogen loves Laudna far too much to leave the worst parts of herself an opening, so the circlet had gone back on as soon as it had been just the two of them. Temptation removed. Laudna had watched but asked no questions and Imogen had offered no explanation and now she’s stuck here in this too-hot bed with her own rambling and pathetic thoughts, lonelier than she has been in a long, long time and looking for a reason not to run as fast as she can back toward the warmth and comfort of that place in her dreams.

Part of her understands. She’d sat, broken-hearted and trembling, on a floor in godsforsaken Whitestone and told Laudna that she loved her and that it was her choice, whether to come back. It was her decision, and Imogen would never ever try to take that from her, even as every part of her wanted to beg and plead and crack open in supplication.

Imogen had refused to be yet another person who denied Laudna a choice. If loving her had meant letting her go, then she would have done it, no matter the cost to herself.

So she understands, a little. If Laudna thinks that what she wants is to leave, to…join with? Return to? Whatever, with Ruidus, and she thinks she’s the reason Imogen is denying herself, then sure, Imogen can understand some of it.

But Imogen’s hopes for the future aren’t mysterious. Even before their kiss, she was clear with Laudna that what she wanted was her. She’d said it over and over again. She’d offered those dreams willingly, in defiance of every part of herself that told her it was foolish and dangerous and pitiful, that reminded her that building a future with someone else was a surefire way to end up like her daddy, lonely and bitter.

Her love won out, and, in the biggest gift of Imogen’s life, Laudna understood. Laudna wanted the same things.

Except maybe she didn’t.

She kicks her second foot out from under the covers, less concerned with the noise, and Laudna stops her motion for a moment, reaches a hand out to touch Imogen’s shoulder.

“Imogen?”

It isn’t really a choice, in the end. Laudna has called her, so she will answer.

“Hmm?”

“Are you…”

The bed shifts, sounds of Laudna putting away her things and moving until her body is against Imogen’s, the hand on her shoulder drifting down to rest on her waist. The cool press of her is such a familiar relief that Imogen almost cries.

“Are you alright?”

Yes. No. Of course not. She feels weak as the water gathers in the corner of her eyes and she bites back her instinct to snap. Anger is first, almost always, and tonight is no exception.

Love surges quickly and she lets it win, feels it temper in the form of an exhalation and the moment she needs to settle herself. Laudna’s trying. Imogen wants her to know, and this is the only way she can.

The metal of the circlet presses into her temple as she gives her body what it wants and shifts back, closer, holds Laudna’s arm to her with her own.

“Do you…do you really not…”

She clears her throat, embarrassed at the sadness and exhaustion that fill the gap left by her receding anger. She’s so tired, and she hates that they’re having this conversation. That they have to have it. That she can’t say what she wants. What she needs.

The question about Ruidus wasn’t a test. This one wouldn’t be either, but it also won’t get her what she needs.

She tries again. Starts with what she knows.

“I…I want you to want me here. With you.” Laudna’s grip around her tightens but she doesn’t say anything, and Imogen takes a second. She sighs out, forces tension from her shoulders and the pride from her throat, open and open and open for Laudna. Trust and honesty and communication. Gods, it’s fucking awful. She presses forward anyway. “It hurt me. B-badly, I think. When you seemed so ready to let me go to Ruidus.”

Nails, now, present but not painful through the fabric of her nightshirt and against her belly, and Laudna’s body tense against her back, and still she’s quiet. Imogen laces their fingers and brings their joined hands underneath her shirt, pressing Laudna’s palm to her skin and shivering as she gathers her words.

“I was tellin’ the truth, earlier. It felt good, bein’ there. But Laudna, I…” She squeezes at her hand and then lets go, pulls and pushes and turns until they’re face to face and she can put her palm against Laudna’s cheek, see the worry in her dark eyes. “I don’t know how else to make you understand that I want you. That I want my future to be you.”

Laudna’s mouth opens and closes and Imogen presses a thumb to her bottom lip and kisses her forehead.

“Sometimes I think I understand the way you feel about me. But the last few days especially, I…” She stumbles again, because they’ve already talked about that night, and she doesn’t want to do it again, although she will if she has to. “I just…” She closes her eyes for a moment and reaches past the sadness and into the fire, lets the slow and steady and bright flame of love and determination and want move her forward. “It doesn’t matter how Ruidus feels. Alright? What’s the moon to me if you’re not there?” She kisses her, hard and quick, and holds her eyes again. “It’s not home. It can’t be. Not without you.”

Laudna swallows and licks her lip and says, slowly, “I want you to have all the things I didn’t get to have.” The pad of her thumb runs underneath Imogen’s eye, turning until the nail is tracing her cheek and down her jawline, over her chin until it comes to rest in the center of her throat. She stares at it as she whispers, voice raspy with the strain of a rope long rotted, “Most of all, I want you to have choice.”

Imogen covers the hand with her own and brings it down, cradling it against her chest.

“I know. I know you do. And I do have choice.” She kisses her again, longer and slower. “I’m choosing you. If you’ll let me.”

She watches the emotions play themselves out on Laudna’s face, expressive eyes widening and crinkling, the corners of her mouth twitching with all the words she doesn’t say, preternaturally sharp teeth tearing at the skin of her lip.

“I can never quite believe that.”

Her lips taste of ichor even more than usual, the texture catching on Imogen’s tongue as she soothes the newly broken skin.

“I know. I know you can’t. But it’s true.” She bites her own lip and asks a question she hopes she knows the answer to. “Is it alright? That I choose you? Would you…would you choose me, too?”

Dark eyes soften and soften, a pair to the arm holding her close.

“Imogen. I chose you a long time ago. I’m so sorry, darling, that I’ve made you doubt that.” She runs her fingers through Imogen’s hair, lets them catch at the back of her head. “It’s beyond my understanding how lucky I am that you would choose me, too.”

It would be easy, to let it go. And maybe she could. Maybe they understand each other, this time. But they’re here, and she wants it to be the last time they have to be (at least for a while, gods help her) so she pulls on the last reserves of her emotional energy to say, “Can you…can you believe me? Please? Or…or maybe we can have a signal, for when you can’t? Because Laudna, I…it’s hard for me to understand that you want me, too. And when you…I can’t always convince myself it’s true, when it feels like you’re tellin’ me to choose somethin’ else.”

Imogen watches as Laudna’s eyes move almost absently over her shoulder before coming back, resolved, as the hand in her hair tightens. “Yes. I’m going to try to remember. This is…thank you, dearest. For telling me. I’m going to think about this more. We can…we should talk about it, again.”

Her displeasure at the thought must register on her face because suddenly Laudna is laughing and the hand in her hair has let go to come pat at her cheek as Laudna tuts. “It’s dreadful, isn’t it?”

Imogen groans and buries her head in the crook of Laudna’s neck. Fingers return to her hair as she nods her agreement. She feels a tug on the circlet.

“Thank you for this, as well.”

Suddenly she’s pulling back, because this is important, because Laudna should know that…

”Laudna, I promise I’d never…”

She’s being tucked back into Laudna’s body before she can finish, lips against her temple before words are whispered into her ear. “I know, my love. I know. But you could, and it means something that you don’t. So thank you.”

She relaxes into the hold, noses into the space behind Laudna’s jaw and breathes for a minute before she kisses the skin there. And again.

Maybe it shouldn’t be as easy as it is for her mind to wander away from Ruidus and their mission and the conversation they’d just had. But maybe they deserve it. Maybe this is what it means, to choose each other even at the end of the world—that joy and desire get their time between exhaustion and fear.

So she doesn’t fight the impulse. “We should sleep,” she says, as she bites gently at Laudna’s neck, moves down to lick her collarbone.

Through a very lovely gasp, Laudna asks, “Forgotten the chasm already, darling?”

Imogen grins. “We should.” Her hands press at Laudna’s hips until she’s below her, bracketed by Imogen’s knees. “But I have another idea.”

Laudna laughs. “Can you be quick?”

Imogen pulls off her nightshirt and feels incredibly smug at Laudna’s wide eyes, the way her mouth is still half-open from her laughter, frozen there.

“Chasm answer? Or would you rather I…”

It’s her turn to gasp, Laudna’s mouth against her and her hands braced against the bare skin of Imogen’s back, nails dragging in that way that makes Imogen whimper shamelessly.

“Hush, now. We’ve done quite enough talking, don’t you think?”

It’s breathed into the skin of her shoulder, and Imogen can only nod, pulling Laudna closer and letting herself remember that she can have this, forever, if she chooses.

[mehoymalloy]

Hello and Welcome!

Name's Malloy! Find me on AO3, where one might say I like to write fanfic about villainous older women. You can also find me on Twitter (which I use rarely) and Bluesky (which I use very rarely). Below is an overview of most everything I've written, with links and content ratings.

Critical Role

Imogen Temult/Otohan Thull—welcome aboard my rowboat!

○ The Main Fic — Let Me Lay Waste to Thee (M) ○ Let Me's Spin-Off (and mostly Smut) Series — Won’t You Lay Hands on Me (G–E) ○ Canon-adjacent one-shots — A Dance With Danger (M) and These Marks (They're Marvelous) (T) ○ A shared series with @lavendertheys exploring Imotohan's somft side — you'll never know unless we go (G–T) ○ And for those not yet brave enough to delve into the ship tag but wondering 'wtf do folks see in these two?' — shiver as you cry (mercy) (T) and Don't Think, Don't Blink (M), some good old fashioned, tension-filled Imogen & Otohan (sans blatant shipping)

Imogen Temult/Dancer (E)

Liliana Temult/Otohan Thull — the Moon Moms AU (G–E), an ongoing series of family-centric one-shots (and like, one smut fic) in which Liliana and Otohan share a somewhat tempestuous history and raise Imogen together

Stray Gods

Grace/Athena (T and E)

Grace/Persephone (T and E)

Through Eyes of Grace (T) — multiship ficlets

The Horizon Series

Aloy/Tilda van der Meer (T–E) — notably, Prometheus Bound (M)

Silga & Untalla (M)

Regalla/Nasadi (T)

~

Here on Tumblr, I like to post sneak peeks of what I'm working on (published works are tagged #mehoymalloy, while sneak peeks, snippets, and the like are tagged #wip stuff).

The current big (and unpublished) WIP is the Judicator AU (#judicator au), which explores the question of 'what if Imogen was raised in academia and Otohan was a judicator?' It's the creative baby of @inomakani's steller wordbuilding and my writing, and we are stoked to share!

Lastly, feel free to drop me an ask anytime! Yell at me about Otohan Thull, shoot me a random question about my fics, toss me a writing prompt (tho no promises <3) or song recs for my character/ship playlists; I appreciate it all!

Thanks for stopping by!

[worshippin]

i feel bad to even say this but it has been nagging at me so.

one of the reasons why the "main character" statements have been made about imogen is bc of the exact thing she did in ep107: completely hijacking fearne's moment. i mean, woof.

i know they're friends playing a game, i know laura probably didn't mean it/was playing into imogen's panicked headspace (she apologized in the moment) and i usually love laura's choices in any campaign, but man.. it's very frustrating. it's not the first time and it's very disheartening. it made me so uncomfortable and really angry on fearne's behalf, especially when it's clear that ashley isn't a fast-paced player and her choices take time -- not only when she acts but as she awaits the results. whenever something is happening that is imogen-centric everyone keeps quiet or say encouraging words but ultimately let her decide, but when it's fearne that is center stage everyone keeps pulling this kind of shit and not letting her have her choices breathe and unravel, letting her control how she wants her narrative to play out.

matt is a great DM and it's very obvious he makes sure to pull ashley in and give her opportunities for fearne to shine, and sometimes his gentle steering pays off greatly so that she allows herself to make any choice, no matter how bold, but in the end he does have to account for everyone's input as well-- which is to say, it can't only be his responsibility to uplift her and as of late it sometimes feels like it is? and idk it's not... great. and look, all things considered this is a show, so it's very frustating to watch.

like, when imogen went home to her dad fearne was nothing but supportive and made sure to ask how imogen was feeling and what was the course of action they were to take and she basically knighted herself as imogen's best friend, protector and follower. imogen had her big familial moment (and lbr she keeps having them). and now it's fearne turn to deal with her daddy issues and imogen can't wait ten fucking seconds for fearne's decision about wether to ally themselves with her father or not? fearne was already conflicted. she didn't feel guilty about the prospect of killing zathuda, but she was hesitating for a reason. she was interested in what he was telling her and what other information she could extract from him. and that's what matters. and that's why it was frustrating to have that taken away so quickly. it felt dismissive of not only fearne's story but of ashley's play. iirc travis was expecting and seemed excited for her to do something big - maybe cast a spell on gloamglut (i was on the edge of my seat thinking she was gonna tame that dragon or polymorph him!). ashton and braius were worried about the dragon and the temple crumbling on top of them; orym was also worried about the dragon and being diplomatic. but imogen popped off before giving fearne a chance. and y'know, sure, idk, maybe i am reading too much into it! maybe my love for fearne is making me see things a bit too harshly. but it doesn't feel like that. it feels like (another) opportunity wasted.

now i do hope this gets addressed next ep, in some way shape or form. one could argue this was just imogen panicking and trying to prevent them from getting separated again, like when ludinus tried to take fearne away. but eh, at this point i doubt that's how she feels (i mean, i sure hope. but wish is a 9th level spell and i don't have access to those yet). she just wanted to kill zathuda.

TL;DR the fact that she attacked before zathuda answered fearne completely derailed everything and shifted the focus from fearne. and yeah, sure, imogen is not the main character. but sometimes it feels like she wants to be, to control everything, fearne's feelings and choices be damned. i don't think anyone in the cast is careless or purposefully dismissive. i don't think it came from a place of malice, of course not. maybe it's just what imogen would do: unknowingly interrupting every moment. it happened. and it keeps happening. but fearne deserves better.

[fyeah-anya-corazon]

Concept art of Isabela Merced as Anya Corazón in Madame Web, by Imogene Chayes.

So I wondered why they made that poster green, but looking at the concept art, it is supposed to be green????

Compare it with Julia's costume, which it's clearly black, compared to Anya's costume.

Btw, I saw Madame Web last wednesday, so expect a Anya centric review one of these days.

[jadequarze]

I sincerely hope to see more laudna-centric fic because girl is not looking too good. Just think of the potential!! Girl is almost having a breakdown and can only do what she does best, acting~~ (Also because I really want more Laudna-centric fic without too much spotlight on Imogen, there I said it) I'll say the same goes with Orym and Ashton.

Seriously though, these three being the most unstable ones, mentally rn, I'm having fun. Really funny putting these three side by side with the other half, and Team Wildemount being the most (relatively speaking) normal. It's really fucking funny. Because let's be real, Chetney is the most stable one, I guess Fearne too, maybe but honestly I feel like she's not stable too.