#like a few tendays old recent

[esterigermaine]

You learn about the damage to durge's brain and cranium from an easy to miss NPC in the underdark that examines them. Specifically that the cranium has suffered severe trauma and that it is a miracle that their brain functions at all.

Could you imagine the reactions you'd get if other characters discovered this damage sooner in the story?

[forgotten-realm5]

Worship

Gortash Week Day 02 Prompt✨

(image made by @aristenfromwarsaw)

Warnings & summary: Decided to write some good ole smut for Gortash Week cos you can never have too much! I'm way too horny for the old man. MDNI, 18+, pre-tadpole, named Durge (Stefni), face sitting, receiving (f & m), 69, Gortash's advances have been rejected time and time again until he is practically begging to worship Stefni ;) TW slight blood play

Words: 2.8K

Notes: Im fairly new to this fandom and it does not disappoint, lots of love to @sankttealeaf for running this event <3

“So now that our business has been dealt with for the night, care to stay for a drink?” Gortash asks hopefully, eyes locking with Stefni who is sits opposite him at the dining table.

This has become their new routine. The regular once a tenday meetings, turned into daily meetings, which has led to meeting for dinner every night to discuss their most recent plans. Over the last month, it has developed into Gortash propositioning the Bhaalspawn at the end of every meeting to no results. Her rejection of him started as genuine, worried about how her father would react, but it soon became entertaining; a game to see how far she could push him, irritate and tease him.

“I don’t think so Enver, are you not getting tired of my repeated rejections?” Stefni laughs, moving to grab her coat off the chair and start to leave.

“I would stop if you genuinely told me too, and I don’t remember you ever saying so” Gortash teases as he walks over to Stefni who is now buttoning up her coat. Gortash leans towards her and lowers his voice “I think you like it”.

Stefni rolls her eyes at his response and takes a step back. “Just because we’ve kissed a few times doesn’t mean I want to sleep with you” she replies sharply but with a hint of a smile as she does enjoy this.

Gortash steps forwards, bringing their bodies just inches apart, his hands grabbing her wrists with surprisingly gentleness to stop her leaving.

“Then tell me outright that you are not attracted to me, and I will happily put this matter to rest”, he states matter-of-factly, his eyes darting to her lips. Stefni moves her hands out of his grasp and turns away.

“Why does it matter? I told you we’re not sleeping together and that’s that!” Stefni exclaims heading towards the exit. Gortash follows, and steps in front of her, blocking the exit.

“It matters because I want to hear you say it”, Gortash demands his voice deepening. Stefni darts her eyes briefly to his exposed chest, admiring the dark curls of hair and strong muscles. Gortash slightly tilts his head and smirks as he notices where her eyes linger.

“I’m leaving Enver, move out of my way” Stefni sighs reaching for the door handle, but Gortash is quicker, covering it with his hand.

“Not until you say it!” Gortash teases, his body now covering the door. Stefni sighs at his behaviour, although she is somewhat amused.

“Fine! Of course I’m attracted to you, but we can’t do this I’ve ----“ Gortash cuts her off abruptly by capturing her lips in a hungry kiss. He moves her around so she is pressed against the door and deepens the kiss, both their tongues fighting for dominance. He pushes her coat off and cups her clothed breasts with his large hands. She releases a quiet moan as he starts to squeeze and tease her nipple through the material of her shirt. Stefni leans into the touch, starting to feel herself give in.

“I really need to leave”, she pulls away slightly, out of breath from his actions. At her words Gortash holds onto her tighter for a moment and then releases her, frowning.

“Stop this, I know you want me as much as I want you!” Gortash groans.

“Why are you holding back?”, he demands, lips slightly swollen and eyes dark with arousal.

“We shouldn’t do this; our gods are rivals! You really think they will be happy with their chosen fucking?” Stefni replies, not fully convinced of her own statement.

“They don’t care what we do, as long as we get results” Gortash answers his tone becoming slightly irritated.

“This is about you and me, I really don’t care what they think” he growls starting to get annoyed.

Stefni pauses for a moment, taking in his statement.

“What a blasphemous thing to say, Chosen of Bane” Stefni smirks at him, her voice softening, teasing him. She notices that his frown has morphed to hopefulness, half a smile flashes across his features.

“My dearest assassin, don’t you know how good we would be together?” Gortash purrs confidently as he steps towards her, grabbing her hand with both of his. His expression suddenly shifts, his eyes darken as he roughly pulls her arm, guiding it down his body to cup his growing firmness. Stefni lets out a gasp at his bold movement, her mouth opening slightly in shock.

“See how much I want you dear, we’ve hardly even touched and I’m already achingly hard”.

Stefni blushes at his words unable to respond straight away. Gortash takes the opportunity to emphasise his point and forces her to squeeze himself with his hand still covering hers. Gortash watches her for a reaction. Stefni can barely contain a small moan that threatens to abrupt from her lips at the feel of him. She looks up at him, her blown pupils betraying just how turned on she’s become. Gortash notices her reaction and pulls her into a rough, pleading kiss. Stefni notices his desperation and grins against his lips, enjoying it. He suddenly pulls away from her, staring intensely into her eyes.

“Please don’t leave this time” Gortash almost begs, “let me worship you like the god you are” his voice needy and aroused.

Stefni pauses and then laughs in response, caught off guard by words she never thought he would utter. Gortash’s face drops slightly at her reaction, he seems genuinely hurt. As she watches him she realises that she may never know with Gortash if his words are genuine or a manipulation, however, tonight she believes he’s been pushed far enough.

“Well then, how can I deny such prayer of devotion?”, Stefni grins at him hungrily, Gortash’s expression morphes into excitement, his eyes roam her body in anticipation. Stefni takes a second to truly look at him, taking in just how attractive he is. She bites her bottom lip in response, having no idea how she’s managed to wait this long to have him. Gortash moves towards her but then unexpectedly bends down to pick her. He chucks her over his shoulder and walks towards to bed.

“Enver! What are you doing?!” Stefni cries out in protest at the undignified position. Gortash just laughs in response, throwing her onto the bed. She lands on her back sprawled out, while Gortash towers over her still standing at the edge of the bed.

“It seems I’ve already made you cry out and I haven’t even begun” Gortash’s voice deepens. “What a noisy little thing you must be” he eyes her in a lustful gaze.

“And so far you’re all talk, let’s see if that silver tongue is as good as you think” Stefni challenges, enjoying teasing him.

Gortash chuckles at her response and starts to unlace her boots, dropping them audibly to the floor.

“Oh it is, and I plan to savour you” he drawls, his hands trailing up each leg at a teasingly slow pace coming to rest at her inner thighs. “After all a good thorough worship takes time” he whispers, squeezing her thighs roughly.

Stefni feels her arousal burn between her legs at how close his hands are to her pussy. Gortash smirks, seeing her mouth open slightly and the dark lustful way her eyes watch him. Gortash moves his hands to either side of her head, and climbs on top. Stefni wraps her arms around him and crashes their mouths together. His lips are soft and full against her own, both tongues sliding against each other. She bites down on his bottom lip wanting to taste him, causing Gortash to inhale sharply at the sudden pain. The bite draws blood, Stefni moves back holding his chin between her fingers, and flicks her tongue out to lick the blood off his lip in one clean swipe. She is pleasantly surprised when she hears Gortash moan in response, and move forward to deepen the kiss. He seems to be enjoying tasting his own blood in her mouth, which sends a jolt of arousal down her body.

Gortash then trails his lips to the side of her neck, kissing and sucking at her flesh hard enough to leave a bruise, Stefni whimpers in response. She can feel herself becoming increasingly wet at his touch. Gortash moves down her body and starts to take off her shirt at a hurried pace. He pushes off the fabric and rips off her undergarment, throwing them off to the side. Gortash sits up, straddling her hips and pauses for a second taking in her exposed chest and hard nipples.

“Beautiful” he murmurs while taking off his own shirt and adding it to the mess on the floor his eyes never leaving hers. Stefni reddens at the comment, eyes traveling to his newly bare chest; taking in his broad shoulders and strong muscular arms, she can’t help but think the same.

Gortash begins to trail kisses across her chest, licking and sucking at her nipples while his hands knead the opposite breast at a hungry pace. Stefni’s breath quickens and she whimpers at the devotion he’s showing her body. She feels the pressure building between her legs and tries to move her hips to grind against Gortash’s body, needing to find release. He quickly realises what she is doing and forces her to stay still by grabbing her hips forcefully.

“Not so fast” Gortash teases, she can feel him grinning against her stomach as he moves further down her body.

Stefni whines at the lack of contact. Gortash sits back on his knees and reaches for her pants and starts to undo them at an agonisingly slow pace, his expression shows he is enjoying every minute of the tease. He finally pulls her pants off, undergarment following as he throws it to the floor.

“You’re going to be the death of me” Gortash mutters, voice deep as lustful eyes stare at her now naked form lying under him.

 Stefni tries to cross her legs feeling a little too exposed under his gaze, but he grabs her legs in response, opening them up and eyes her aching pussy, already glistening. She moans at his touch waiting for his next move.

Gortash positions himself between her legs, lying on his stomach and lowers his mouth to her thigh. Stefni whimpers as Gortash licks a long stripe up her thigh crease. Her body jerks at the sensitivity of the spot, causing her to cry out. Gortash chuckles and continues to tease her, squeezing the flesh of her thigh, peppering it with kisses while his fingers slightly brush over her clit every now and then causing her to whine. After what felt like years, Gortash finally stops his teasing and inserts a finger slowly into her pussy. The room fills with wet, slapping sounds as his thick fingers begin to move inside of her. Stefni moans at the sound and how good he feels, hitting just the right spots. Gortash’s breathing increases as he watches how responsive she is to his touch.

“Look how wet you are for me, what a good girl” Gortash purrs while removing his finger from her pussy and raising it to his mouth, licking her juices off himself. Stefni whimpers at the display, her core burning at his words.

“So tasty” Gortash murmurs while lowering his head towards her pussy finally giving her what she wants. Gortash begins to feast, he circles her clit with long licks, tongue dipping inside teasingly. The sight of him between her legs is even more arousing than she thought. Feeling Stefni’s stare, Gortash looks up, locking eyes. She feels another jolt of arousal as she watches her your own juices coat his lips while his tongue flicks across her clit.

“Fuck Enver,” Stefni whines, back arching off the bed.

“Gods you sound so good moaning my name” Gortash replies in a ragged voice, sitting up slightly his eyes glazed with need. “I want you to come on my face” he orders, his tone hungry as he gets up off his stomach and moves to lie next to you in the bed.

Stefni looks at him confused for a second, brain foggy with arousal, but a new shiver of excitement travels through her body when she realises his meaning. She adjusts her position, crawling on top of Gortash while he guides her sit on his face, his hands surprisingly gentle. He begins again, the new angle bringing her such overwhelming pleasure she has to grab onto the bed frame for support. Stefni grinds against his face, meeting every movement of his tongue increasing her pleasure. Gortash hums in approval, his touch becoming rougher as he fondles her bottom, squeezing the flesh causing Stefni to cry out in bliss from the pleasure of his ravishing mixed with the pain from his firm grip. She starts to imagine giving Gortash the same treatment; how throbbingly hard he must be at this very moment.

“Wait!” Stefni shouts suddenly. Gortash stops, his expression changing into one of concern as she looks down at him. “I need to touch you” she whines, her eyes glazed with arousal.

Gortash laughs, newfound desire spreading across his face.

“I have an idea”, he replies his breath hitching in anticipation. “Turn around but stay sitting on my face” he orders, eyes darkening.

Stefni does as instructed while Gortash grabs her hips and pulls her back towards his mouth. From the new position on her stomach, back arched towards his face, she is able to reach down and start to undo his pants. He is visibly straining against the material, the sizable bludge threatening to burst out the seams. Stefni frantically releases his cock from the confines of his pants, it springs free, glistening and throbbing, and so much thicker than she imagined. She starts to pump him, Gortash hisses in response. Stefni feels his breathing hitch against her pussy, increasing her pleasure knowing she is the one making him fall apart. She licks her lips in preparation and envelopes him in one swift movement, no time for teasing as both parties are nearing their peaks. Gortash moans as both her hands and tongue work him in unison at an increasing pace.

“That’s a good girl” Gortash gasps, sounding close to coming undone. Stefni feels a rush of heat through her body at his words, squeezing him harder, and increasing the pace.

Her pussy buzzes with pleasure as Gortash matches her pace with his tongue, his deep moans increasing in number, the sound vibrating against her dripping centre bringing her to the point of ecstasy; her pussy twitches about to peak. Gortash suddenly brings his hand up and proceeds to give her arse a hard smack. Stefni cries in pleasurable pain, finally pushing her over the edge. She sees stars climaxing harder than she ever has before.

“Enver!” She whimpers sitting up slightly to grind back against his face. Stefni continues to ride out her high, body writhing while she leans forward to again capture his neglected cock in her mouth. She continues to suck him feverishly, her moans now gurgled from his achingly thick member. Gortash reacts to her choked sounds, his balls tightening at her touch as he reaches his climax, thrusting deeper into her willing mouth.

“Stefni, fuck!” Gortash moans in a breathy voice, his hot seed coating the back of her throat. She swallows him down with an audible gulp causing Gortash to mumble something incoherent as he presses a kiss into her pussy. Stefni twitches at the feeling, nearing overstimulation as she releases his softening cock from her mouth.

She rolls off him lying back on the bed, mind foggy, her body weak and still tingling from the comedown. She stares up at the ceiling trying to wrap her head around everything that just happened, coming to realise this was probably the most erotic experience of her life; and he hasn’t even been inside her yet. Stefni smiles entertained at the thought. Gortash moves to lie next to her, propping himself up on his side giving her a cheeky smile, his hand ghosting over her stomach, admiring her.

“What did I tell you, I said we’d be good together” Gortash teases while he pokes the side of her stomach in a playful way, grinning at her.

“Alright I’ll give you that, but you don’t have to be so smug about it!” Stefni laughs, rolling her eyes at him. Gortash chuckles at her response.

“Ready for round two my dearest?” he asks with a sly grin, reaching for her hand and planting a kiss on the back of it, his thumb now gently tracing slow circles. Stefni glances down his body and notices he is already starting to harden again. She returns his grin, viewing him now in a different light and realising that she’s in for a long night.

[owlseeyoulaterpal]

Like Real People Do, Chapter 1

Gale Dekarios x Named! Tav

Synopsis: Seraphina has spent the last 2 years trying to wield her wild magic as life keeps trying to knock her down. After being infected on the nautiloid, she's been presented with her biggest problem and greatest adventure so far. Through the trials of trying to save herself and the city she calls home, she makes new friends, falls in love, and begins to finally understand what it means to trust in luck and her lady Tymora. Already posted this to ao3 and I'm re-learning Tumblr after years away, so it's time to put this here! Notes: It's my first time publishing my writing on the internet in almost a decade, but the BG3 brainrot is real and has demanded it.

Learn more about my Tav, Seraphina.

Includes dialogue directly from BG3. ______________________________________________________________ Chapter 1: Friendly Competition

The gentle hum of the river. The quiet crackling of the nearby fire. The subtle rustling of the leaves as the wind gently blew.

Seraphina leaned into the ambiance around her in camp as she kneeled in the sand on the riverbank and did her nightly prayer to Tymora, her Lady Luck pendant clutched tightly between her hands. Her faith in Tymora had, admittedly, started to waver in the last few years, but the latest state-of-affairs that Seraphina had been thrust into truly made her feel as if the entire foundation that she had been raised on was crumbling.

Just three tendays ago, Seraphina had set out from her parents’ home in Baldur’s Gate for yet another contract with plenty of blessings and well wishes from her family — in fact, an overabundance of them since the last time she left home, she ended up in Avernus. A tenday ago, she had stopped in the city of Yartar for supplies when the nautiloid appeared above the city and began abducting people off of the streets. Now, every plan she had for her life had seemingly evaporated with the death sentence of a mind flayer tadpole in her skull. Her magic and her goddess couldn’t save her, or perhaps Tymora refused to intervene.

The tiefling wanted more than anything to turn tail and run back to the warmth of her family while she still had time left. But that wasn’t what a Hellwhisper was supposed to do. None of her siblings had ever abandoned one of their adventures, no matter how perilous it became.

But none of them had ever encountered a mind flayer or been infected with a tadpole, Seraphina thought bitterly.

Seraphina wasn’t quite sure what to make of the situation she had found herself in, much less of the people who had, for better or worse, become her traveling companions: the gith, the fellow tiefling who had fought on the frontlines of the Blood War, the mysterious cleric, the righteous warlock, the flirtatious pale elf that had recently revealed he was actually a vampire, and the gods damned egoistical wizard of all people.

Seraphina had encountered her fair share of wizards on her adventures and wasn’t a huge fan of them. They all thought they were better than Seraphina, a natural-born sorcerer. Gale honestly didn’t seem too different as he carefully and pointedly distinguished himself from Seraphina when it came to conversations about magic around camp. She had to fully bite her tongue to keep from snapping at him when he made a remark about her wild magic after fighting the goblins at the gate of the Emerald Grove, when mid-battle a wild magic surge enlarged everyone around Seraphina.

They have no idea who I used to be, Seraphina thought as she closed her eyes for longer, clasped her hands tighter, and prayed harder. My Lady Tymora, this trial has to be over now, surely? Have I not shown my perseverance and dedication in the face of the most bizarre odds and chances? Is this wild magic truly the best way to serve you, even now with a tadpole in my head?

Selfishly, a new reason she wanted her old magic back was to prove herself to Gale. Unfortunately, he had taken up a lot of her headspace since their first meeting.

“Hello! I’m Gale of Waterdeep,” The newly appeared man shook Seraphina’s hand as she looked, befuddled, from him to the portal in the rock that she had just pulled him from.

“Apologies, I’m usually better at this,” Gale scratched the back of his neck sheepishly.

“At introductions?” Seraphina joked, brushing dirt from her robes that had appeared after she and Gale fell to the ground.

“At magic,” He smiled. She felt her heart skip a beat.  

“Well, I’m Seraphina…of Baldur’s Gate. Pleasure to meet you, Gale of Waterdeep,” She awkwardly replied. If she was telling the truth, she felt every usually charismatic bone in her body turn to mush as she took in the tall, handsome man standing in front of her. And she could feel the very essence of magic flowing around him? What a catch.

“I hope I’m not interrupting anything,” came a voice from behind Seraphina. She whipped her head around and saw Gale approaching with two quarterstaffs in hand.

“I was just finishing up,” she smiled.

“Praying for Tymora to send an overdue stroke of good luck our way, I hope,” Gale grinned.

“Fortune favors the bold, Gale. Lady Luck will help us find this Halsin and return him to his Grove, curing our tadpoles along the way. She’s never failed me before,” Seraphina replied as she rose to her feet and walked over to him, putting her Tymoran necklace back around her neck.

“Have you followed Tymora your whole life?” Gale asked.

“Yes. As my sisters and brothers did before me, as did my parents, grandparents, and their parents before them. We were all raised in the same temple to service Our Smiling Lady,” Seraphina said excitedly. “But I imagine you’re not here to listen to me babble on about my goddess. Is there something I can help you with?”

“I could listen to you talk for hours, Seraphina, but yes, there was something,” Gale replied, blissfully unaware that he was making Seraphina blush furiously with such a simple statement. “With your natural gift of magic and less of a talent for a blade, I was hoping that you might be in the mood to help me with a small task,” Gale grinned.

“And what would that be?”

“Would you be amenable to a little friendly sparring to cap off our night?”

Seraphina laughed. “I would be, but I’ll have you know my weapon of preference is a glaive.” She thought sadly of her favorite glaive that had slipped from her holster as she sprinted to try and escape the tentacles of the nautiloid. It had been a gift from someone she would rather forget, so maybe it wasn’t too much of a loss.

Gale turned and led Seraphina closer to an empty patch of land near the campfire.

“I will have to keep my eyes peeled for a glaive then, my dear sorcerer,” Gale continued. Seraphina felt her face grow hot and she tried to ignore it as he handed her one of the quarterstaffs.

Seraphina braced herself firmly on her feet, the quarterstaff diagonal to her body, and carefully lowered herself into a defensive stance. “Give me all you’ve got,” she curved her hands, beckoning him.

Gale started with a swing directly at Seraphina’s legs, which Seraphina smoothly dodged, dragging her feet along the dirt in a simple arch. She immediately retraced that arch and, with a thwack, hit Gale on the back before spinning and resuming her defensive stance a few feet behind him.

“I said ‘give me all you’ve got,’ wizard,” Seraphina teased. Gale winced as he stood and turned to face her. “I take it you don’t have too much combat experience?”

Gale chuckled. “Wizards have towers for a reason,” he replied, carefully dodging a direct answer as well as a swing from Seraphina. “I assume this isn’t your first perilous adventure?”

“Far from it. I’ve used magic and a blade or two to fight pirates,”

Gale swung and Seraphina blocked with her quarterstaff, immediately pushing back and swinging at his ankles. He jumped over it.

“Hags,” Seraphina curved her body in a crescent shape to avoid his next attack.

Seraphina swung upwards, knocking Gale’s staff out of his hands, and placing the butt of the staff against his chest. “And I was fighting for my life in Avernus not too long before the nautiloid,” Seraphina finished.

She was crouching down and looking up at him. They were both breathing heavily, having already been exhausted from today’s events of defeating the Harpies at the Grove. Gale looked down at her and Seraphina’s breath caught in her throat as she took in his features, illuminated by the campfire. The gray hairs that blended in almost seamlessly with his long, thick brown hair. The orange of the fire made his brown eyes look like they were blazing.

With Gale’s slightly lifted eyebrows and intense gaze, she could detect a swirl of emotions in his eyes. Admiration. A little fear?

“You like to live dangerously,” Gale said breathlessly.

“High risk, high reward,” Seraphina laughed.

She felt a singular bead of sweat drip down her neck and chest, disappearing behind the laces of her nightshirt, and she watched as Gale’s eyes followed it. Seraphina suddenly felt like her entire body was itching as she shifted. Gale’s eyes snapped up to meet hers and he instantly flushed , taking a step back and ending the moment that truthfully only lasted mere seconds. She turned, picked up his staff, and thrust it into his hands.

“Again. I want you to knock me down or disarm me before we finish,” She smirked.

It took 30 minutes and several tries, but as Seraphina’s eyelids grew heavier, finally, Gale did it. With a firm sweep to the back of her calves, she tumbled to the dirt and, as she fell, Gale knocked the staff from her hands. He mimicked her earlier movements, pressing the end of his staff against her chest.

“Mragreshem,” She playfully cursed at him as he chuckled.

“Mission accomplished,” Gale proudly smirked. Seraphina nodded, panting. He reached out a hand to help her up. She took it and as he helped her up, she swayed backward.

Gale’s hand pressed against her lower back to steady her, and she leaned forward, Seraphina’s hands landing on his chest. With how close he was, she inhaled his intoxicating scent of parchment, books, and sandalwood. Her eyes caught his and he smiled at her when, suddenly, the markings on his chest, neck, and face began to glow a dull purple.

Just as quickly as he caught her, he stepped away, still smiling, but he looked like he was in pain, his eyes squinting as if he was holding back a wince. The glowing ceased. Seraphina’s eyes widened as she realized there was something magical in Gale’s chest.

“Gale, are you alright?” Seraphina stepped forward, a hand outstretched and Gale subtly leaned away.  

“Perfectly fine. I believe I have kept both of us from sleep quite long enough. Thank you for helping me get a little bit sharper in my staff handling,” He smiled.

“You’re welcome. Good night, Gale,” She returned his smile. Gale nodded curtly and Seraphina could’ve sworn he nearly ran into his tent. She was no stranger to rendering people speechless, but Gale seemed positively terrified of her.

She stood there for a moment, processing before she turned to head to her own tent.

What if he’s not usually attracted to tieflings? Does he act nice with me and the other tieflings at the Emerald Grove just to turn around and call us foulbloods behind our back? Seraphina thought.

As she was about to enter her tent, she noticed Astarion out of the corner of her eye. He waved her over and Seraphina crossed the camp to stand before him.

“I thought the wizard might keep you occupied all night. You know, I’ve been thinking about you.” Astarion grinned. “And that delicious moment we shared the other night.” Seraphina felt her stomach flip. She had butterflies around Astarion, and she couldn’t quite tell if it was exclusively because of his flirtatious way of speaking, or the fact that he reminded her of someone she shouldn’t still allow to be occupying her thoughts.

“The moment you bit me?” She asked.

Astarion nodded. “The very same. I’ve had this condition for two centuries, but truth be told?” He broke their eye contact and fiddled with his fingers. He took a deep breath. “You were my first.”

“What an esteemed honor. I hope my blood was satisfying,” She smiled.

“You were delectable. And now I just can’t help but wonder how the others taste.”

Seraphina dramatically gasped and clutched at her heart. “You’re looking at other necks? I’m hurt,” She pouted.

Astarion, for how prickly he was at first, was truly quite silly beneath it all. It only endeared Seraphina more.

“Don’t worry, there’s enough of me to go around. I’m a man of tremendous appetites,” Astarion smoothly replied. The way that he looked at her from under his lashes made her feel like lightning was coursing just underneath her skin. As she held his gaze, Astarion’s eyes began to shift from their beautiful crimson to the bright blue ones that haunted her dreams. She blinked a few times to push the image away.

“In the spirit of theoretical questions - if you had to take a bite from one of our companions, who would it be?” Astarion mused.

 “Ah, I love pondering hypotheticals with you in the dead of night,” Seraphina laughed, recalling when he asked how she would like to be killed. “Gale, no question.”

“A refined palate, but such an underwhelming answer coming from you, darling,”

“And what makes you say that?”

“I took you for someone who likes to take risks, live dangerously.”

“Would Lae’zel have been a more acceptable answer? Or you?”

Astarion smirked at her. “Darling, don’t expose all your lustful desires at once. Let’s try to leave room for a little suspense,” he winked.

Seraphina grinned wickedly. She hadn’t had fun like this in so long.

“Silly me. The buildup is the best part,” she whispered flirtatiously.

“If you think the buildup is the best, wait until you experience the conclusion I have in mind,” Astarion quipped. “But it’s late. I’d better go find something I can sink my teeth into. Sweet dreams,” Astarion brushed the back of his hand down Seraphina’s arm as he turned and headed into the woods.

“Good hunting!” She called out after him.

Sleep came easy. She knew that she couldn’t allow herself to develop feelings for anyone or get attached, not with the tadpole threatening all of their lives.

But wasn’t that all the more reason to have a little fun?

[swindlefingrs]

The Astral Plane is beautiful. Saga tells Gale so. She thanks him for the experience, for sharing this time with her as they float in the translucent sea together. He slips his learned, delicate hands into hers, calloused and broad, and squeezes. They tell each other that they are enough, as they are.

She loses his gaze to the shifting colors of the Astral Plane and makes a promise to herself.

The next morning Saga packs a small tote bag. Bread, cheese, cider. The rest of lunch she can find along the way. She knows Gale doesn't move fast or well over rough ground, so she picks a trail flat enough for her purpose.

Gale only pitches well-mannered fits twice, but she tells him to be patient. It'll be worth it.

It is.

The astonished look on his face as they crest this trail makes her feel less guilty about the stitch in his side that he digs his fist into.

The rushing waterfall is thunderous from their cliff-side vantage point. Cold spray glitters in the air, catching the suns rays and breaking them into a thousand colors.

"This is beautiful," Gale says between wheezes.

Saga takes his hand and leads him a few feet further up the trail to a perfect spot to overlook the valley. She sets out a simple meal of what she brought and what she gathered on the way: salmon berries, miner's lettuce, violets, honeycomb.

She drizzles the honey and violets over the pot of soft cheese. They dip torn pieces of bread into it. Salty. Sweet. Herbaceous.

"I had imagined that wooing a ranger would come with it's own particular set of challenges, but if your goal was to get me alone, there are much easier ways of doing that rathet than asking me to scale a mountain," Gale teases as he pops a berry into his mouth. He squints as the tartness hits his tongue, and relaxes as the sweetness blooms after.

Saga sucks her teeth, brushing off his chiding. Instead she scoots closer to him, draping one arm around his waist and pointing out to the river below with her other hand. She revels in the feeling of him leaning against her. His breath on her cheek.

From where they sit she points out the stories that she can see written in the damp earth, broken twigs, dead grass, moss, and climbing vines.

“Elk cross there every other tenday."

Gale recites the binomial nomenclature for elk, Saga corrects him.

“Red elk, not Marsh Elk. Those are further south."

Gale corrects himself and recites the binomial for red elk.

“A hunter has taught her daughter how to hunt those elk. Just as her mother taught her. There's their blind.”

Saga points to a cluster of rushes next to an old oak tree.

“The scat from the herd fertilizes the water and those berry bushes.”

Eel grass languidly sways in the river's current. Glinting silver fish dart between the thick, green blades of the eel grass.

“These... berries?” Gale hesitates with a handful of yellow and orange salmon berries.

“Those berries.” She snatches one from his palm and bites down until it bursts tart and sweet in her mouth.

She nods southerly, “Look at the entrance to the cave. The bear sow had her tenth cub this spring. She brought down an elk recently. See the bones?”

“These leaves?” Saga plucks a handful of spade-shaped leaves from the bush nearby. She rolls them between her calloused fingers and breathes in their scent, before placing them under Gale’s nose. It smells like mossy pepper and golden melon. Interesting.

She cups the leaves in her palm, “Water,” she commands in a tone that is sweet for her.

With just a flick of his wrist, the leaves float in a pool of cool, clear water. She claps her hands together, rubbing them vigorously before revealing that her palms covered in milky suds.

“Soap.”

“Ah! For washing up! How fascinating,” Gale drags his fingers through the suds, rubbing them between his fingertips, testing the viscosity.

Saga takes a deep breath. Words aren't as easy for her as they are for Gale, “The Astral Plane is wonderful. You showed me that. Just don’t... don't forget about this plane, yeah? It’s just as magical. In its way.”

“So I'm learning," he chirps. “Turns out? Some of my favorite people are here. Somehow you keep finding new ways of teaching me that.”

Gale's smile is bright, earnest. It cauterizes a rotten part of her urges.

“With all that being said, can you promise me something?” he sidles up to her.

She scowls. Promises are heavy things.

“Can you promise me that you'll bring me on another one of your highly educational field trips of the famed Material Plane? I mean the view, the ecology lesson, the meal? The company?” He softens his voice to a whisper shared between the two of them, “I can't wait to see more of it.”

Saga smirks. She tips his pretty head back with only a finger under his chin. His kisses are berry-sweet, honey-sticky, and plentiful.

"A promise easily kept."

[tavyliasin]

10 First lines challenge

Rules: Share the first line of your last ten published works or as many as you are able to and see if there are any patterns!

Tagged by the ever wonderful @redroomroaving

I'll tag in...ahh this is hard I always forget people's usernames so I'm just searching the @'s here... @sweetmage @thylyre @laserlope @ineadhyn @hydropyro and anyone else who would like to - also if you would like to be tagged in for future writing tag games please let me know directly too and I'll make a proper list for a change! Anyway I'm going to take mine only from published works, not WIPs, and will put them all below the cut. I doubt the lines will be spicy, but the fics almost certainly will be~

Piercing storm-grey eyes regarded you quietly, assessing your distress in mere moments. From: Abdirak - Toothache Comfort (Collection of short "x Reader" pieces)

For a rare change of pace, it seemed like the sun was shining on the streets of Baldur’s Gate. From: ATG 16 - Bonded? Thrice (Astarion/Halsin/Tav threeway chapter of the longfic)

By the time they got back to camp, Gale was struggling not to double over. From: Weaving the Blood Moon (Bloodweave entry in my Red Moons of Faerun menstruation fic series)

Sleep did not come easily to Haarlep. From: The Nightmare, The Dream, and The Spaces Between (A chapter in the Raphael/Haarlep prequel longfic series, The Scent Of Cinnamon)

Several tendays passed by in a blur. From: The Dress, The Duck, and The Cambion's Patience (Another chapter of that longfic)

Lord Enver Gortash hissed a long sigh of frustration from between clenched teeth, leaning back on the edge of his desk the moment the last of the day’s guests left. From: Bloodlust and Bhaalists (The DurgeTash entry into the Red Moons of Faerun series)

Durge. That’s what she called him. From: Two Heads Are Better Than None (A Durge/Tav one shot, written for a prompt request)

Raphael walked down the corridors of the House of Hope, inspecting all the recent renovations. From: The House Of Hooooooooohno (A cursed little one shot which pairs Raphael with the House of Hope itself...?!)

“I don’t know about this,” Gale protested, even as he kept pace with the men either side of him, the three walking with arms linked at the elbow like old comrades. From: Between a Blade and a Sharp Place (A Gale/Astarion/Wyll threeway one shot)

The moon hung precisely half full in the sky as Abdirak smiled - Selune may not have been his goddess but like clockwork her light always heralded this particular devotion to the Maiden. From: Hymns of the Red Moon (The first in the Red Moon series, in which Abdirak spends a night of worship alone)

Analysis

This is a tough one. Ideally I would've like to take the first paragraph as a few of those are exceptionally short, especially compared to my averagely very long sentence.

The Longfic Chapters (ATG, Scent of Cinnamon) are lines that have an air of continuation to them, illustrating the change of time or mood within the character or setting with a short opener. The following lines in all 3 cases are far longer - it's like giving just a quick bite first then reeling in a much longer line. It's also not doing a lot of scene setting or action, as I tend to write chapters as scenarios so they have a building pace to them. Red Moon Series each open on a clear depiction of the focus character and how they're experiencing the moment. Abdirak is seeing the signs and finding the beauty in them as the torment of his body begins, whereas both Gale and Gortash are steeped in their frustration and agony from the beginning, desperate to end the day and just not have to deal with things any more. The other one shots almost all start immediately with a name, opening on our POV character and identifying them quickly, following with either a simple action, thought, or dialogue. The character comfort short assumes you know exactly who owns those eyes and aims to pull you in to the moment without the name, to set the scene swiftly for a much shorter piece. Overall I think it's hard to really narrow down any techniques I use for openers - I vary things depending on the piece, but only very rarely do I open on dialogue or dynamic action. Whilst I love those things as tropes and as a great way to start a story, I tend to prefer to walk through the door rather than taking a running start - which is likely partially why all my works end up running longer than I expected because my natural instinct is a building pace. I enjoy taking the time to build the tension, slowly pull on that elastic until you think it can't possibly stretch any further then- SNAP let it all go as the payoff reaches a sprinting pace, preferably with that time at the end to let things cool back down rather than sprinting into a dead end wall. I'm quite tempted to do this again with last lines but not today, far too tired for that! Again if you want to tag in and do this one, use me as your tag in! Or let me know and I can actively tag you in to this one or the next~

[gloomstalkertav]

Summary: In which competition to compose the best version of recent events in Baldur’s Gate is fierce, but Alfira is fiercer (i.e. ready and willing to exploit ex-Hellrider Commander Zevlor’s well-known weakness for bards).

Part 1 of 10

Warnings: None

Word Count: ~1K

View story masterpost | Read on Ao3

“I’m still not sure I can be much help to you,” says Zevlor, the reserve in his voice audible even over the Elfsong’s end-of-the-tenday crowd, though he accepts the proffered mug of ale, regardless. “I played only a very minor role in most of the adventure, after all. Surely, one of the others,” — here, he glances past the booth’s privacy curtains, as if hoping to catch sight of one of the city’s saviours lurking in a corner, or, more likely, courting a crowd of admirers at the bar — “could supply you more details? The sort worthy of a bard’s song, at any rate.”

“It’s not just a song,” Alfira corrects indignantly, plunking her own mug on the table then dropping with similar decorum onto the bench opposite. “It’s an epic! A proper lay lyrique. Or it will be when I finish it, anyway. And I’ve already spoken to everyone else I could. I mean… everyone left to speak to.”

A sober cloud seems to sweep through their booth, briefly dampening the cheerful tavern sounds and dulling the flames of bardic passion dancing in Alfira's ochre eyes. It makes her look older, Zevlor thinks, and for a moment he, too, feels the weight of everything — everyone — he has lost settle back across his shoulders. He rolls them surreptitiously and reaches for his drink. The sudden movement breaks the spell. Alfira clears her throat and ducks down below the table, returning with a sheaf of what Zevlor recognises as composition parchment — the evenly spaced lines crammed with music notes, the margins with equally indecipherable words — and a battered ink-and-quill set.

“Anyway, I’ve already interviewed everyone else I can,” she repeats briskly, flipping over a few pages to reveal more lines of tiny, hectic writing. “I know all about the mindflayer tadpoles, and the netherbrain, and the chosen of the Dead Three. It’s quite the story, isn’t it? I wouldn’t have believed it could all be real if I hadn’t lived through some of it myself. It has everything! Action, adventure, mystery, tragedy…”

The young bard rattles off the genres with all the fond reverence of a parent reciting their children’s names. The old soldier’s eyes glaze as he reaches for his tankard.

“But — I am missing one very important angle. Romance.”

Zevlor chokes on his drink. Alfira slides her precious parchments back along the table — a safer distance away from where the other tiefling clumsily deposits his tankard — and waits for him to recover.

“And you think,” he asks as soon as his throat can push out the words, “I am the person to help you with that?”

Alfira’s supercilious expression is an answer in itself.

“You can’t possibly think it was a secret. The whole camp knew. It was our favorite bit of gossip before the Shadow-Cursed lands.”

This information settles uncomfortably in Zevlor’s stomach beside the sour ale.

“Look, I don’t need any graphic details,” she adds with a blush, not quite meeting the older man’s eyes, “but the romance is an important part of the story. Without it, the rest just falls flat. A true epic needs pathos, passion.”

Zevlor laughs: a short, hoarse bark only a few notes shy of bitter.

“You’ll be disappointed, I’m afraid. If there was anything resembling romance, it was certainly not the kind bards spin into tales. We were far too busy with the business of surviving to think of such things at the time. Or,” he adds at Alfira’s raised eyebrow, “to act on those thoughts, at least.”

Again, shades of regret and half-healed hurts seem to creep out from the shadows cast by the tapers bracketed to the tavern’s panelled walls. Zevlor’s fingers twitch convulsively. With deliberate care, he lifts his tankard to his lips again — a shield against the past and Alfira’s probing gaze, alike — and deflects.

“I suppose in hindsight, and compared to all that came after, the journey from Elturel no longer seems like such a trial. But I would have expected you to remember better. You were there. It was hell.” His fingers spasm again and he tightens his grip on the smooth, cool pewter. “The whole road to Baldur’s Gate was just one hell after another. Like we hadn’t escaped Avernus after all, but fallen through it, to some more deadly layer of the Hells. Like we were falling a little more each day.”

He flashes the young ex-Elturian a dark look over the tankard’s rim: the sort that would have cowed any lower-ranking officer. But, apparently, not a bard.

“Oh, that is brilliant! Can I write that down?” Alfira uncorks the inkwell and swills her quillpen through it before Zevlor, disarmed by her enthusiasm, can decide how to reply. Sorting through the composition parchments for a blank page, she adds, “Tav did say you had a way with words.”

It’s an obvious, calculated flattery. Zevlor knows it. But he cannot stop the effect it has on him anymore than he can rewrite time.

“Tav said that?” He says her name the way clerics pronounce the names of their gods, and it works a similar magic: unknotting his shoulders and smoothing the creases at the corners of his eyes and the centre of his brow. His hands relax around the tankard. “When?”

“At Last Light,” Alfira replies in distraction, quillpen scratching across parchment in a frantic line. “She said a lot of nice things about you then. And later. Trying to repair your reputation, I think. You might look at this as your chance to return the favour.” She glances up and, at Zevlor’s look of wary confusion, sheaths her quill in the ink and explains: “I mean, there are plenty of rumours about her making the rounds, now. More than one bawdy tavern song, too. Help me with my epic, and, together, we can set the record straight!”

But this argument finds no purchase in the long-time Commander.

“Rumours are an occupational hazard of notoriety,” he says grimly, and returns to his drink.

“Maybe, but is that how you want history to remember Tav?”

That stops the tankard halfway to Zevlor’s lips. Alfira hurries on.

“Songs and stories - they’re how we remember heroes, yes. But they’re more than that. They're also how we honour the people we love!” There’s an urgent, lilting cadence in the bard's voice now, and the little bells along her collar jingle in accompaniment as she leans across the table, as if to press her plea into Zevlor’s suddenly slack hands. “Tav wasn’t just another hero. She was our friend! She didn’t just save the world, she saved us. And I think after all she did, she deserves better than a shanty at the Low Light or some fantasy of Volo’s. She deserves for history to remember her as the person she really was. That’s the picture I want to paint of her. But I need you to help me get it right.”

The tavern’s other chatting, laughing patrons fill the sudden silence as Alfira stops to gulp down air: her impassioned speech has left her breathless. Zevlor, too, is surprised to find his heart-rate increased. And his resolution shaken. This is a more poignant plea, and a more persuasive argument, than the ex-Hellrider has come prepared to fight.

“You’re … you’re right,” he concedes at last. “That is what Tav deserves. And,” he adds more to himself, “I think… what she would want.”

“Does that mean you’ll do it, then? You’ll help me?”

Alfira’s tail twitches behind her in anticipation of the story she can smell now, like an oncoming rain. Zevlor stares into his tankard, considering contents and courses of action with similar solemnity, then lifts it and pulls from it deeply, as if the weak alcohol will lend him the necessary strength. Perhaps it does. Or perhaps it’s his memories of Tav — too bold and bright to ever be wholly extinguished by time or tragedy — that warm his limbs and loosen his tongue.

“What exactly would you like to know?”

[shadowmaat]

Mischief and Misinformation, part 2

(Part 1)

"Knight Kenobi!"

Obi-Wan turned to see a grinning Kit Fisto bearing down on him. His fellow Knight was a few years ahead of him in classes, and there were whispers he might be on track for the Council someday.

"Kit, I've been a Knight for two years, now," he smiled. "Throwing my title at me is getting a little old."

Kit laughed. "Says you!" He clapped a hand on Obi-Wan's shoulder. "Do you have time for a spar? Or do your Knightly duties call you away from your resounding defeat?"

"You wish, Fisto!" Chuckling, he glanced at his chrono. Anakin would be in classes for another two hours, which should leave him plenty of time.

"I think I have enough time to show an old man the dangers of hubris!"

"Old man!" Kit clutched his chest, bare beneath his outer robe. "I think you meant handsome! Or clever. Or-"

"Save that energy for the salle, Kit." Obi-Wan winked. "You're going to need it."

-

After working out the rules and going through their warmup stretches, they launched into the spar without too much preamble.

Kit's style was flashy, which made for a good distraction to the power behind the showmanship. He also had a more fluid sense of movement, which was something Obi-Wan found common among the aquatic and amphibious species.

They traded good-natured barbs as well as saber strikes, but then Kit seemed to shift gears.

"I wanted to say how sorry I was about what happened to you on Melidaan," he said, leaping over him to attempt a slash at his back.

Obi-Wan blocked it, frowning. "What?"

Had he been offworld recently? A few smaller mission, but nothing dangerous, not with Ani to consider. The name did ring a vague bell, though. He tried a leg sweep, which Kit avoided by flipping up to the wall and launching himself in another direction.

"I know Master Jinn was a highly-respectable Master, and his loss still ripples through the Temple-"

Kit reversed direction, scored a tap against Obi-Wan's arm, and got a tap of his own for his effort.

'-but leaving you alone in a war zone for a year is unconscionable!"

"What?" Obi-Wan repeated, blocking another swing. "What war zone? Wait- Melidaan..." Memory started to bubble forth, along with an uneasy sense of déjà vu.

"Have you been in so many wars you can't remember?"

Kit's tone should have been teasing, but there was a degree of worry mixed in as well.

"No, I remember." He hissed as Kit got in another strike on his leg. "But Melidaan... Qui-Gon didn't abandon me there, certainly not for a year. We were there maybe a tenday, and Qui-Gon remained in charge of the mission until it was safe for us to leave."

Between storms and bombing, there hadn't been a way off the planet. Qui-Gon's attempts at mediation had failed. Obi-Wan had done what he could for the victims of both sides- including a group of children- but in the end, and with Master Tahl's condition worsening, they'd taken the first opportunity to leave and dump the problem back in the Senate's lap.

"I'm relieved to hear that."

Kit made a move Obi-Wan couldn't quite track and scored a final hit to his shoulder.

"Solah." Disengaging his blade he rubbed his shoulder. "Where did you read about the Melidaan mission? This isn't the first time someone's come to me with a spacer tale version of my own life."

It was Kit's turn to frown. "The mission archives. I heard about-"

Obi-Wan's comm went off. It was Master Bear, Ani's ropework instructor.

"Ani threw up all over the nets and has been taken to the healer," the gruff voice of the Harchian Master said. "You'd best see to him."

The comm clicked off and Obi-Wan swore under his breath. The cafeteria had been serving custard yesterday and he'd bet his lightsaber that Ani's vomit was primarily blue.

Kit shook his head, rattling the bands on his ahwey. "This is why I'm never taking on a padawan," he said. "Go see to Ani. We can finish catching up later."

"Yes," Obi-Wan said, already striding for the exit. "I'd like to know what else the mission archives have to say about me."

As the doors closed he could hear Kit saying, "You aren't the only one."

[faereun]

'i've been around long enough to know that good things never last." / @illithide , astarion && genesis

now, genesis has never claimed herself to be an optimist  —  that being said, she's always at least   tried   to look on the bright side of things. alas, one can only peer  through  the  dark   begging for light for so long until they become disillusioned. one can only have so much faith before they are betrayed by their beliefs, ideals razed by   THE  CRUEL  REALITY   of the universe and its many villains. astarion's words hit the druid like a particularly nasty   [ ice  knife , ] heart dropping to her stomach. the vampire spawn certainly isn't wrong  —  he knows suffering better than the majority of them. knows suffering best , even. she fiddles with the side of her belt anxiously, fingers darting in and out through the loops of her alchemy pouch. 

the druid thinks back to the very beginning of her tale, to her father leaving her in that   creaking  old  house   , never to return. she thinks of the grove that had eventually taken her in, only to   [ cast  her  out ]   when she had proven too much a liability. she remembers her arrival in baldur's gate, finally finding work under the alchemist at danthelon's dancing axe, just to be whisked away a few tendays later   —  dropped into a mindflayer ship, with   a  parasite  squirming   behind her eye. finally, she lands on her   MOST  RECENT  RECOLLECTION   of disappointment: praying to her mother for salvation, the demigoddess's most desperate pleas ultimately going unanswered.

she looks up to meet the rogue's searching gaze, her eyes apologetic and the set of her mouth sorrowful.   'i only wish that i could prove you wrong, here and now. that i were more the positive type  —  like karlach, maybe. but i think i may near be just as cynical as you,'   the wood elf laughs drily. for a moment, she just watches astarion, noting how their eyes seem duller than usual, their skin somehow even more pallid. it makes the marrow of her bones hurt. she aches to reach out and hold him close, tightly to the thud thud thud of her heart against her ribcage.

mustering up what little courage she has, [ her bravery sapped ] from the toiling of the day, genesis brings her hand to rest atop astarion's. she gives them a   SHAKY  ,  WEARY  SMILE   , and squeezes their palm against hers.   'but, for what it's worth? to me, at least, this is a good thing. and i'm here. and i don't plan on going anywhere any time soon, worm or no,'   she murmurs, glancing away once more.

 'i … have not often been privy to good things. but i am nothing if not fiercely dedicated to my wellbeing, and my happiness. and it would seem that you have become a part of that, in some ways. so. all that is to say … i will try and make this last, until i take my last breath . ' and she means it, truly. so long as astarion will have her, genesis will remain steadfast at his side — whether that's as a trusted confidante and friend, or more.

[crispyjenkins]

Thot obiwan... just him being a thot and happy (it’s what he deserves) pls no obitine lol

(went a poly route with this cause i wasn't sure how to write thot!obi without making myself uncomfortable, so instead have poly obi and his seven partners! it’s like scott pilgrim except obi’s still dating them all. a mix of triads and Vs here! because i’m soft for big polycules

couldn’t get to more detail in such a short fill, but all ships are tagged if there’s any confusion! (ノ*´◡`) i will absolutely be returning to poly!Obi in the future.)  

Rex promptly, and calmly, chokes on his first sip of tea.

  Cody sighs, because he isn't exactly clear on the details either. "Yes, all of them. "

  "Is that... Is that... allowed?"

  "High General Ti is also on the council, it must be." The last twenty five hours since rescuing his general and the rest of Ghost Company from Ventress’ latest plot have been rather confusing for Cody, from Obi-Wan’s debrief to the holocall with the council, to Obi-Wan’s four other holocalls that Cody isn't entirely sure he was meant to see. He supposes he should feel grateful that Senator Organa had recently returned to Alderaan, or it could have been more. 

  Rex's eyes go distant as he does the math, a couple of brothers ducking around them where they've stopped in the middle of the hall. "That's... five people, Cody."

  "Yes, Rex, I can count." He grabs Rex's elbow to start steering him towards the hangar again, where they’re supposed to be greeting some new Shinies in less than five minutes. 

  "But what about Ventress? And isn't General Fisto—"

  "With Bly and General Secura? Yes. As for Ventress, as far as I can tell, the General... is simply like that with everyone he fights." It certainly calls into question quite a few "interactions" Cody has witnessed in his two years at Obi-Wan’s side, anyways. Fett's left sheb, does he have to worry about Ohnaka?

  For all that Rex had been CC track just by being smart, he doesn't seem any more sure of the situation than Cody is. "Fett's left sheb," he agrees, bewilderedly tossing his flimsi cup of tea into a waste receptacle without actually having drunk any. "Bly never said anything."

  Cody grunts and thumbs the edge of the helmet in his hands. "He isn't involved with General Kenobi."

  "Cody, brother, that doesn't make sense." He punctuates the notion with a wild swing of his hand, narrowly missing a tech clone, who takes one look at the two of them and decides he isn't going to try and go toe-to-toe with two war heroes. "Where did you hear this? If it was Fives, you should know by now–”

  “The General told me himself.” Sort of, anyways — Obi-Wan is rarely blind to his surroundings, and he had not dismissed Cody after the debrief with the council, so he must have meant for him to see. Why he had been meant to see is still up for debate, especially when Cody had waited all of four hours before telling Rex; no secrets among brothers, or what have you.

  “I suppose what the generals do in their spare time is their business,” Rex mutters. “And it’s not as if the Jedi are anything the longnecks said they were, anyways. But Kote...”

  He could do without the pitying look Rex gives him. “As you said: it’s their business. It wasn’t, and isn’t, any of mine what the General does off the field.”

  “If you say so, brother.” He pats Cody’s shoulder, far gentler than the situation perhaps warrants. “What a way to find out, though; I don’t know what I’d do if I knew Skywalker was romancing around with half the council.”

  Cody sort of wishes Waxer hadn’t tossed out the rotgut Wooley’s had cooked up the last time they were planetside. “I won’t tell you about Senator Amidala and Senator Mothma, then,” he sighs, just to see Rex turn as white as Shiny armour.

-

  Senator Organa breaks away from the little party that had greeted The Negotiator in the Temple hangar and approaches Cody with a smile perhaps even kinder than his general’s. 

  “Welcome back to Coruscant, Commander,” he says pleasantly, folding his arms behind his back and settling next to Cody to observe General Ti fuss over Obi-Wan’s injuries.

  “Thank you, sir.”

  “I think I can speak for everyone,” Organa nods to Obi-Wan’s entourage, “when I say we are indebted to you yet again.”

  Cody blinks at him, thankful he can hide his incredulity inside his bucket. “Sir?”

  Turning his smile back to Cody, Organa puts a hand on his shoulder not unlike a brother would. “None of our positions allow us to watch his back, and certainly not as well as you do. I’m sure you can understand our worry.”

  “I suppose so, sir,” Cody says carefully, not convinced that Organa isn’t trying to catch him up in a lie. “If I may, sir,” Organa waves for him to continue, “I’m not entirely sure I know what we’re talking about.”

  “Hm, perhaps that’s fair,” Organa chuckles. “I apologise for having to speak so mysteriously, but one can never be too careful. I merely meant to thank you, and to encourage you to talk to him; for all that the Jedi are not hierarchical, he worries about his position above you. And Obi-Wan is no blushing Alqull, but he would not impose himself on you.”

  “... Sir.”

  “Yes, yes, more mystery. Just talk to him.” Organa leaves him with one last smile and a pat on the shoulder, and Cody wonders if Waxer had spiked his caf that morning. 

-

  The 212th had lost enough brothers in their last entanglement with Ventress that they return to Kamino immediately after Coruscant, General Ti all too happy to join them aboard The Negotiator; the brothers are delighted to learn she prefers to stand against their general’s back, lekku and arms absolutely dwarfing him, and Obi-Wan lets her. 

  They keep separate quarters, though Cody isn’t sure how much of it is for keeping up appearances. 

  As high strung as he is after his conversation with Senator Organa, Cody is relieved when they finally dock in Tipoca City and he can hand babysitting the 212th over to Waxer. He loves his men, truly, but being cooped up with them for a tenday in hyperspace is far from his favourite pastime.

  When Cody joins Obi-Wan for their trek to the training levels, Obi-Wan takes one look at his harried expression and laughs — Cody would like to believe it’s because he knows what Cody’s thinking, rather than any sort of Jedi-mind-reading-nonsense.

  Taun We meets them on the way, prattling about the “improvements” they’ve made since the last batch, and Cody pays attention because he has to, but the general’s little smile aimed in Cody’s direction does nothing to help him concentrate.

  Alpha-17 greets them as soon as Taun We opens the door to one of the training rooms, and Cody finds he’d actually missed the old hardass; it isn’t every brother that can call High General Yoda a toad to his face and get away with it, just by virtue of being Alpha-17.

  And then Alpha sees Obi-Wan and actually smiles, and Cody updates his mental counter to six. He had forgotten how much time Alpha had spent with the 212th before Cody was assigned, forgotten that it was Alpha with Obi-Wan when Ventress first kidnapped him; perhaps the holodramas are right, that shared trauma is a simple step away from romance.

  Kriff, he could have gone his whole life not picturing Alpha trying to romance absolutely anyone.

-

  “You haven’t asked,” Obi-Wan observes, hands folded under his chin across the desk from Cody. The teapot between them steams gently, filling Obi-Wan’s quarters with a haze of shiso and ginger that settles Cody’s nerves rather than stokes them.

  “Sir?”

  “Come now, Cody: we’ve worked together far too long for that.”

  And Cody snorts a laugh, even as he turns back to the datapad in his hands. “I did not think it my business, sir.”

  “Hm, and your conversation with Bail?”

  Cody glances up. “Are you laughing at me, sir?”

  The soft smile from Kamino is back on his general’s lips, making Cody all too aware of his helmet on the other side of the room. “Perhaps a little, Commander – your play for stoicism is as amusing as always.

  “I don’t know what you refer to, General, I did not lie: I have not asked because it is not my business, and if there was more to discuss, I knew you would bring it up again.” With an inhaled sigh, Cody sets his datapad back on the desk and faces Obi-Wan properly, because he isn’t a cadet, and he isn’t what-are-emotions-what-is-responsibility Skywalker. “Clearly you have more to discuss.”

  “Bah, you make it sound like a chore, Kote.”

  He raises a brow. “When I was assigned to the 212th, General Vos warned me of your politician-speak, sir. Any conversation with you is a chore.”

  Obi-Wan startles out a laugh, eyes crinkling at the corners as if just to remind him that there are lines on his face from more than just war. “Captain Rex tells me you get that snark from Alpha, but I must say I think it is a family trait.” Smiling behind his fingers, Obi-Wan tilts his head as if Cody were an especially endearing puzzle. “I’m afraid I don’t quite know how to navigate this conversation, my friend: I don’t believe I was the instigator of any in the past.”

  “More politician-speak,” Cody chides without heat, but knows what he means anyways. “And you thought I would instigate, if you left it long enough?”

  “Well, I hope I’ve created an environment where you and your brothers may speak your minds–”

  “General,” Cody interrupts boldly, and Obi-Wan just keeps smiling at him, “I have it on good authority that none of my brothers have been the one to broach this subject first.”

  “Mhm,” he chuckles, “Yes, I did hear about Commander Bly and Kit, and about Commander Choke with the 202nd.” Poor Shiny, Cody thinks, fresh out of ARC training when she met her general for the first time; the other battalions hadn’t stopped laughing about it for months.

  “Sir, the freedom the Jedi have given us undermined nearly everything the longnecks brought us up to believe; if you are unsure of what to say, I’m hardly going to be more prepared.”

  “Hm, perhaps we ought to be blunt with each other, then? Avoid the politician-speak entirely?”

  “Yes, perhaps that would be better, sir.”

  “Then, Kote, I would very much like to kiss you.”

  “Only if you’ve brushed your teeth since you kissed Alpha.”

  Obi-Wan throws his head back and laughs.

[yamayuandadu]

Japanese epidemic deities

The relatively recent social media phenomenon centered around amabie, and to a smaller degree around other uncanny figures associated with epidemics like the hakutaku, Zhong Kui and Tsuno Daishi, offers an interesting opportunity to look deeper into the world of disease-related folklore – the beings who bring such plagues, these who protect from it, and most curiously deities and spirits which fulfilled both these roles at once. Under the cut, you will find an explanation of the term “ekijin”, the history of epidemic deities, and short profiles of a few of the most significant ones.

A particularly significant term when it comes to historical Japanese disease-related beliefs is ekijin (疫神), or epidemic god. It refers to a peculiar class of deities which usually existed on the crossroads between Shinto and Buddhism, particularly significant between the Heian and Edo periods. Simply put, an ekijin is a dual purpose god who both protects the faithful for pestilence, and smites the wicked, or these who simply lack sufficient devotion, with painful punishments. Ōshima Tatehiko identified a number of traits common for ekijin: being depicted as a traveling deity, taking the form of an old man or a child (though more outlandish demonic forms are also known), and a dual function as deity of both illness and good fortune or longevity. Other researchers suggested different traits as hallmarks of an epidemic deity: Sujung Kim considers them to be an association with bulls and foreign origin, in addition to the aforementioned duality. However, individual entities which can be classified as ekijin often embodied either the protective or punishing aspect much more heavily than the other; the balance between them also varied through time. Also, it's debatable if every disease-related religious or folkloric figure is an ekijin. The yokai turned social media darling amabie, for example, arguably shouldn't be considered one of them.

It's difficult to pinpoint when did this concept first develop – archaeological research indicates that, for example, Gozu Tenno was already known in Japan during Nagaoka's brief role as a capital (784 to 794). Some scholars, like Michael Como, suggest that the concept of a wrathful disease deity emerged at the same time as a consolidation of the imperial court's power, and to a degree might've represented a fear of instability caused by local deities, which had to be placated with appropriate rites – otherwise not even the emperor would have been safe from their attacks. It's also worth noting that disease demons either reformed by Buddhist or Taoist heroes or answering to afterlife deities and either subduing other demons or administering punishments to mortals on their behalf were already a staple of Chinese folklore of the Tang era, which indicates the later ekijin might've been a synthesis of many separate traditions, both local and imported. The concept of ekijin was further popularized by Konjaku Monogatarishū (今昔物語集 - Anthology of Tales from the Past) – most of the stories contained in this anthology which describe dealing with diseases blame them on vengeful spirits, curses, and, of course, epidemic deities. Some of the most famous epidemic-related deities, most of whom can be considered ekijin, include:

Matara-jin (摩多羅神) – a mainstay of this blog, a god of removing obstacles turned god of fate turned god of noh turned god of rulership turned subject of heated academic debates. According to Tendai tradition, he appeared in front of Tendai's founder Ennin and informed him that if he can remove the obstacles to rebirth in Pure Land if the correct rites are performed,  Matara-jin's ekijin function is tied to this role – as demons were seen as agents of disease, deities meant to repel the spiritual dangers, obstacles on the path to enlightenment, were also capable of repelling the much more corporeal ones. Simultaneously, the most effective means of repelling such calamities were simply their placated past causes – and many protective deities were presented as such. Matara-jin was venerated as an ekijin first and foremost through ox festivals (ushimatsuri), as depicted above. Matara-jin can be considered largely analogous to other similar deities, such as Shinra Myojin, which ties him directly with the next two figures which will be described here. It's also worth pointing out that Matara-jin likely developed from a number of elements originally associated with the Chinese afterlife deity Taizan Fukun, who according to some Tang and Song dynasty sources presided over disease deities, who in many Chinese folkloric accounts formed a part of the afterlife bureaucracy.

Gozu Tenno (牛頭天王) – a syncretic deity whose origin is at least in part shrouded in mystery, as stated above seemingly known in Japan since the 8th century. Korea has been often proposed as his point of origin, even though the myths pertaining to this figure tend to describe him as an Indian deity (often as a protector of the ancient Jetavana monastery in present day Uttar Pradesh) – he was however usually depicted in Chinese garb. Gozu Tenno's function as an epidemic deity likely developed from the association between him and sandalwood, prized in Buddhist text for its religious and medicinal usage. He was viewed as the Buddhist counterpart of Susano-o – however, he was simultaneously himself seen as a manifestation of Yakushi Nyorai, the “medicine Buddha”. This is one of the most prominent examples of ekijin existing on the crossroads between Japan's two most significant religions, as I stated earlier. This complex nature was the undoing of Gozu Tenno's worship – during the Meiji religious reforms, he was singled out as a deity unfit to remain worshiped due to evading easy classification, and most of his shrines were abolished or changed into ones dedicated exclusively to Susano-o alone.

Susano-o (スサノオ) – while today remembered mostly due to his classic mythological role in the tales contained in the Kojiki and Nihon Shoki, at least from the Kamakura period onward he was significant as part of a network of disease deities encompassing, among others, Shinra Myojin and Gozu Tenno; the latter was paired with Susano-o under the honji suijaku system of beliefs. Kyoto's famous Gion shrine, today dedicated to Susano-o, though formerly associated more with his Buddhist counterpart Gozu Tenno, also has a small subsidiary shrine called the Ekijin Shrine ( 疫神社), associated with Susano-o's role as an epidemic god. According to a myth associated with it, Susano-o informed a local inhabitant, Somin Shorai, how to save himself from disease to thank him for offering him shelter while he was traveling in the guide of a poor mortal; as Somin learned later, these who refused to help the disguised deity died from the epidemic he could protect himself from thanks to this advice (similar tales about Gozu Tenno existed as well). Curiously, the Gakuenji temple associated Susano-o with Matara-jin rather than Gozu Tenno. In art of the late Edo and early Meiji period Susano-o was sometimes portrayed as a sovereign ruling over various disease spirits and preventing them from harming humans, as seen on the images included here.

Tsuno Daishi (角大師) – a bizarre deified form of the celebrated Tendai monk Ryogen. Tsuno Daishi's dual nature as both a demonic entity ruling over legions of malevolent creatures and a reliable protector from outbreaks of disease was the result of a complex process which combined condemnation of Tendai and Shingon establishment by detractors within these Buddhist schools themselves and new Buddhist movements with a philosophy according to which even demonic entities could be used as means for salvation. Later legends claimed that Tsuno Daishi was a form Ryogen took to expel demons of disease from his own body, and artwork depicting him was produced and circulated commonly as a ward against disease. Curiously, while his appearance is sometimes assumed to be derived from the fearsome wisdom kings such as Fudo Myo-o, he's viewed as a manifestation of Kannon, and many ofuda depicting him reference this in some capacity up to this day.

Shoki (鍾馗) – the Japanese adaptation of the ever popular Chinese folk hero, Zhong Kui. According to the most famous version of the legend, he was a skilled physician who wanted to serve in the imperial palace, but despite his talents was denied the possibility to do so due to his ugly appearance, which lead him to committing suicide out of despair. He purportedly later showed himself to emperor Xuanzong in a dream, where he protected him from disease-causing demons, which granted him the position of a supernatural defender from disease and demonic incursions. According to some versions, the afterlife kings presiding over reincarnation appointed him to the position of a ruler and queller of supernatural entities because while he died in a way considered sinful, his talents were viewed as too valuable to waste. In Japan, he became popular in the Edo period, though earlier depictions do exist, like the one from the Extermination of Evil (辟邪絵) scroll from the late Heian period, seen above.

Hakutaku (白澤) – another guest from China. Known there under the name bai ze, this creature purportedly informed the Yellow Emperor that there are exactly 11520 kinds of supernatural creatures in the world, and explained how to subdue or placate each of them. The manual created in the wake of this event was considered, among other things, a medical treatise. In Japan, the hakutaku became a popular good luck charm in the early Edo period, and was said to ward off misfortune, dangers one could encounter while traveling, bad dreams and disease (especially cholera). While some online sources classify hakutaku as a yokai (in the rigid sense applying this term only to boogeymen, rather than anything strange or fortean like Shigeru Mizuki wanted) viewing it as a fortune or epidemic god seems to make more sense, and it's referred to as a deity for example by some art scholars. With time,  hakutaku was largely conflated with or replaced by the baku, leading Lafcadio Hearn to viewing these two creatures as one and the same; the statue of a hakutaku protecting a certain temple is known as “king baku” for similar reasons today.

Daruma ( 達磨) - rather curiously, in the Edo period the honored Zen patriarch  joined the ranks of ekijin – as noted by Bernard Faure, he specifically became a hōsōgami (疱瘡神), or smallpox god. This was likely entirely due to the fact he was depicted wearing red robes, as red was said to be a color which either repelled disease spirits or favored by them to such a degree that they would spare these dressed in red. Further reading:

Michael Como, Horses, Dragons, and Disease in Nara Japan

Bernard Faure, From Bodhidharma to Daruma: The Hidden Life of a Zen Patriarch

Richard Von Glahn, Sinister Way: The Divine and the Demonic In Chinese Religious Culture

Bettina Gramlich-Oka, The Body Economic: Japan's Cholera Epidemic of 1858 in Popular Discourse

Donald Harper, 'Hakutaku hi kai zu' (White Marsh Diagram to Repel Ominous Prodigies)

Sujung Kim, Transcending Locality, Creating Identity: Shinra Myojin, a Korean Deity in Japan

Christoph Kleine, Buddhist Monks as Healers in Early and Medieval Japan

Neil McMullin, On Placating the Gods and Pacifying the Populace: The Case of the Gion "Goryō" Cult

Haruko Wakabayashi, From Conqueror of Evil to Devil King: Ryogen and Notions of Ma in Medieval Japanese Buddhism

[muteashes]

Bacara. I admit, I have no idea how to write a letter, but I find I am willing to try, just to have a few more words with you. I was told a letter should include the dailies and the how are yous. So, we have recently completed a recent campaign on some desert in the middle of no-where. Fighting in low-g is still just as fun as ever. We almost lost a shiney as he shot up toward atmo, but our Jedi-Commander pulled him back down.

There was this monument and it was old. Tall and strangely weathered in the low atmosphere - though maybe there was a atmosphere here before and it died as the planet had died. General Skywalker said the monument was meant to direct a soul higher. It had these carved little marks around the base of it. I don’t know what they were for, but it made me think of you somehow.

I have been doing that a lot lately. At the oddest time, I will see something completely unrelated and I will be reminded of how you take your coffee, or of that little tattoo on your hip. These lasting impressions I have of you, and I wonder what you have of me. Have I left a mark yet? — Rex *

Bacara’s alert pinged while he over saw the withdrawal on a combat zone that was still hot. As the last of Nova shred across airspace, Bacara leaned against the LAAT’s seat rest and pulled up the delayed messages. And there were the words directed at him from across a galaxy. Something in his heart, he hadn’t even noticed was off, had settled. Bacara had reread the letter immediately after, then another dozen times that day.

A week had past before he had staked out the corner of the command office and tried to write back.

On the third week of our deployment-

Bacara stopped. His hand hovering over the datapad. This already sounded like a sit-rep. Bacara deleted the one line he had written.

This past week I have been given the opportunity-

Now it just sounded curt. Bacara slashed it off the screen. The datapad gave a happy little beep. Bacara dropped his head into his palm. This was harder then Rex had made it seem. How should he even start? He found himself grasping at words that failed to come out.

“How do you write a non-regulation letter?” Bacara asked the room when he had managed to sit back up. The room, in that case, was Jet as he lounged on the couch, feet on the arm rest while he flipped through reports. Jet had lowered the datapad from where it nearly covered his face, and had eyed him over it cautiously.

“Is this a trick question?” Jet dropped the report he had been reading. “Did Neyo set you up to this?”

“No.” He debated it for a moment, eying Jet who seemed to realize he had given something away. How could Neyo be involved in this? Bacara watched the other commander. Jet did a good job at hiding it, but something about him said panicky. Embarrassing then; for Jet, and Bacara by proxy. “I don’t want to know,” He decided out loud. Jet looked relieved.

Jet dropped his feet off the couch, leaning forward with his elbows on his knees.

“What sort of letter?”

Bacara thought again of the the Rex’s note, “Someone wanted to keep in touch with me.” He traced the bottom frame of the datapad, strangely not willing to look up. He felt exposed, like a part of him was laid bare.

Jet huffed, when Bacara dragged his head back up Jet was smiling warmly. He was always able to depend on Jet, Bacara was reminded then.

It took a little digging, but Jet had samples. A pile of datapads scattered around the officer’s desk. For the most part, Bacara suspected them to be romance novels. Maybe this was a hint, of some sort, that Jet knew. Or maybe this is what Jet read in his off time. Bacara poked at one with the stylus one of the third shift officers had left behind. Highly suspect, but serviceable.

I received your letter, Bacara started. Hopefully this will successfully reroute to you on our next databurst.

It felt awkward, as though he was talking to the screen. This is Rex, he reminded himself. Staring at the form, he could recall when Rex had smiled at him back at Coruscant on the rare turnover Nova had in the core.

He had been in a mash up of dress pants, but a civilian top that Bacara had snagged at curiously to feel the strange fabric. The lights of ads overhead made his skin glow a soft orange gold, and Rex leaned forward and had smiled that smile that was slowly driving Bacara mad weeks later. “I think I like you, Commander,” Rex had said into the space between them.

There has been an infinite number of times these past few weeks where I have found myself thinking of you as well.

Later Jet had dragged him to the mess, insisting eating time was not working time. He needed a break, force take him.

At the long table, across from him sat Neyo looking pleased with himself as Jet stared at him balefully. Bacara safely chose to ignore them.

Neyo was halfway through telling them about his assignment for the last tenday; what sounded like a quiet escort mission, but he set it up to play as a heavy action reconnaissance adventure. At some point a squirrel had somehow become a deep cover espionage agent.

One of the mess-hall main doors opened to excited shouts. Bacara turned around in time to watch as trooper Bugs slid into the hall on his back. He was excited, laughing as he tried to scramble up but fell down. His joy did not stop as his foot slid out from under him a second time. He was covered in a shiny slime that did not appear to be helping.

Later, as Bacara watched the troopers that had filled the corridor with grease to make it into a slippery slide do another lap in full kit, he felt for a moment that he could just turn his head and Rex would be there. As if Bacara could just look over and Rex would tilt his head and say a joke about grease and energy. Except he wasn’t there and like a punch to the sternum, Bacara was left reeling.

He understood what Rex said about how so many things reminded him of Bacara. He felt the same way everyday.

I miss you, Bacara wrote, and everyday I miss you more.

[flightrules]

Throwing this into the void to get it out of my head. I was NOT going to write a sequel to Which Kind Do You Want to Be? But the story had other ideas.

Part I was Din/female reader. We’re now in Din’s POV. Until our paths cross, they said, before she walked away. He’s realizing now, he shouldn’t have let her go.

(Tags on this one for a four-letter word, grown-up concepts under the cut. Please be old enough to be reading this.)

.

He doesn’t know her name.

Why did I never ask her name?

But the answer is simple. Because she did not ask for his.

She didn’t ask for anything.

She held the child on her lap and told the names of animals. Worried about the child’s safety. Let him win at games.

She listened to Din talk. Put up with his silence. Touched him with kindness. And also fucked him into the floor of the Razor Crest.

He figures he owes her.

It’s not in him to admit that he misses her. He didn’t even know her for a tenday. Missing her wouldn’t make sense.

He’d really like to talk to her again.

Beyond the claristeel of the cockpit windows, space stretches away into blackness. The windows are flat, squared-off, utilitarian. He’s still getting used to the modern controls.

He wonders if she’s still carrying that rifle. If she’s settled down somewhere. Is she even still alive?

What he knows: She was gentle. What he knows: She was alone.

There are ways to find people. It’s what he does.

It’s how he crossed paths with the child. It’s why he doesn’t have the child now. Not that he found the Jedi, exactly, but he was a big part of the finding.

This would be easier with a tracking fob.

He tells Karga: A village wiped out by the Empire.

“Which one?” Karga asks.

“The people were kind,” Din says.

Karga is courteous enough not to laugh.

He’s on the way to his next job, or the next one, or the next one. He leans forward, flips a switch on the nav system. Studies maps.

Known space has borders.

It may as well be endless.

Cara says, “What else do you know?”

“Not much. There were no other survivors.”

Cara rubs her thumb across the marshal’s badge she wears. “No idea,” she says. “There were so many towns like that. We couldn’t think about the ones we couldn’t save.”

He’s found what’s left of his tribe. Not his, really, but the covert he threw his fate in with.The people who took him in, the last time he’d tired of running.

The people who welcomed him back, now, even though his own actions were why they were so few.

He doesn’t spend much time there. He brings them credits, and he leaves, and he returns with more. And then he leaves again.

When the Armorer asked him, he told her that his quest was done. She waited for him to say more. When he didn’t, she let him go.

Fett says, “There must be something.”

She said something about fields. About firebugs and twilight. Playing tag.

“Agriculture,” Fett says. “Could mean the Lahara sector. Moff Motana was in charge there. She had a reputation for being ruthless. If you’re looking for places that aren’t there anymore.”

Agricultural settlements, small towns. The Lahara sector has two hundred and forty-five worlds. The maps show what’s there. But how to tell what’s gone?

Twin suns are mid-day high, and he’s glad for the adjustable shading in his visor.

“Yeah,” Peli says, one hand shielding her eyes from the brightness. “I might be able to locate an old nav system.” She shoos him into a patch of shade, where an awning juts out from a wall. “It’s gonna cost you. Those things are antiques. Even if you could find one yourself? It’d probably be burnt out. Cracked through.”

She turns as if to head into her office, then stops. Din’s new ship is parked in the landing bay. It’s a single-pilot gunship, a recent-generation Incom, dangerous, practical, and ordinary. And built in the past few years.

“What do you want one for, anyway?”

“What’s your price?” Din says.

“No,” says Peli. “You’re not getting off that easy.”

“Fine,” he says, and turns to go. Mos Eisley must have a junkyard. He should have started there instead.

She squints at him. “You’re looking for something on a pre-Empire map.”

“Yes.”

“Oh, now you’ve gotta tell me. Is it treasure?”

“No,” Din says. Yes.

In the end, it turns out there’s an ancient nav computer right there among the circuits and parts that are piled at the back of Peli’s shop. The price she names is ridiculous. The bargain she offers is half off, in exchange for knowing why the hell he wants it.

Looking for someone leads to Who? ends up with Peli demanding how he could possibly not have known her name.

And that ends with her charging him extra for stupidity, but then personally supervising the installation of the thing and making sure it works. They look together at twin holomaps. New and pre-Imperial landscapes turn slowly side by side. In some places, the patterns of towns and villages and landing fields match up. In others, gaps reveal what’s changed.

“Two hundred and forty-five worlds?”

“If it’s the right system.”

“You’re crazy,” Peli says. “Does she know you’re crazy?”

“Probably,” Din says.

“Well. I hope you find her.”

There is always work. The New Republic is kinder in many ways, but there is still a prison system, and there is still such a thing as bail. And there are side jobs, too, outside of Guild rules, often bloodier but higher pay, as long as he keeps his mouth shut.

He’s good at keeping his mouth shut.

Most of his credits still go to the covert. To feed foundlings. Buy weapons. Buy time, until their strength is such that they can move freely in the world again.

There is some shame in what he doesn’t bring them. In the credits he holds back for food and fuel and time of his own between jobs. But there is shame already, in what else he hasn’t told them. In three days on a lost ship with a woman who knows his face. Knows his secrets.

Isn’t even family.

He marks the maps with each visit to places-that-were. Walks among shards that used to be people’s homes. There is ash on his boots. In the silent fields, green is just starting to poke up through charred ground.

He asks at the places that still are.

It’s not that he thinks she’ll be there. It’s just that he hopes they’ll know her name.

Word gets around: A Mandalorian on the hunt. Some people close their doors. Others trade information for money.

No one recalls a village with one sole survivor.

Sometimes, though, they’ll send for someone who might.

There’s a year’s more grey in his hair, a year more of the Armorer’s silence while he tithes his credits and waits to be dismissed.

He’s in a place where it’s early summer. Firebugs glimmer in twilight, a year’s more green has crept back into those charred fields, and she shows up at the farmhouse where he’s stopped to ask the way.

The rifle is gone, but there’s a blaster in her hand.

“Who are you looking for?”

He has been wanting, all this time, to talk to her again.

And now, suddenly, he remembers: No promises. She asked if they could trust each other, and she put a condition on it. Trust ended when the Crest’s landing gear settled onto the ground of Pavotha. Or at least, when she stepped off onto cracked duracrete, and he just– let her go.

“I’m not here on business,” he says. He wonders if she can hear that his voice is shaking.

The blaster lowers, slowly, and slides into a holster at her hip.

“It’s all right,” she says to the woman who summoned her. “It’s all right. I know him.”

She moves as though she belongs here, reassuring the older woman, walking her to a doorway, ushering her into another room. She comes back and faces him, a careful meter or two away.

He should say something to her.

He hasn’t thought that far.

“What do you want?” she says.

[albasdragons]

WHIMPERS IN THE NIGHT

She re-read the paragraph for what felt like the thousandth time in an attempt to find some hidden meaning in the way the words were put together. The texts were old, and she'd been studying them for hours with no sleep, or --days, was it? Maybe two, definitely not more than three days. Her wedding day was in just a few tendays, and she wanted to have this done with ample time, but that wasn't going to happen if she didn't have a first draft, and that couldn't happen if she didn't learn how to properly write any of the lines, and why was it so absolutely impossible?

Alba slammed shut the book of love poems and threw it atop the pile of similar books, a small mountain next to the wooden table where she had set up "camp" to complete this study marathon. Looking around at the messy table, the empty plate from a day or two ago, which was probably the last time she had a full meal, pieces of parchment she'd written on then crumpled up, a discarded headband, she started to feel like a slob. She reached for her cup of lavender tea to find it empty. With a heavy sigh and a groan, she dropped her head in defeat for just a moment.

She had to do this right. She raised her head, picked up her empty cup, and stood up to make her way to the kitchen.

"OW!!"

She didn't realize she had been slouching in her seat, and now her back and neck were in terrible pain. She rubbed her neck as she walked --slowly at first-- to the small kitchenette in her suite. It was dark, as it was likely past midnight, so she tried not to make much noise so as not to wake her roommate, the quaggoth Derendil, who was more like a canine best friend, really. She hadn't seen the creature in hours now, she imagined he was fast asleep in the other room.

Just as she stepped into the kitchen, the room seemed to get darker. Darker than dark, she couldn't see anything at all. She knew the place well enough, so she walked to where she kept the nearest candle, but only took two steps before bumping into something large.

"Derendil?"

She couldn't see, and she couldn't hear her friend's response. Suddenly the darkness was gone and she looked up to see a large muscular humanoid creature, around nine feet in height. His obsidian skin shone smooth in the moonlight that peaked through the small kitchenette window. His handsome facial features, seductive and evil, twisted into a wicked smile, and his eyes flickered a green light. He raised his six-fingered hands and cupped her face in them, and Alba stood frozen, unable to move, unable to scream, completely stuck in place. She tried to look away, but her eyes only widened in terror and she wasn't even able to blink. Her eyes began to water and she didn't know if she was crying of sheer terror or if her eyes were just tearing up from not blinking.

It was pointless to try to escape. This was Graz'zt, the Dark Prince, demon lord of the Abyss, and she would not be able to outrun him, even if she did manage to break from his thrall. He would get inside her head again, whisper things, manipulate her to do his bidding. Destroy her in the process, or convince her to destroy herself.

"Where are your friends?" he asked, or said, mockingly, to remind her that she was completely alone. This is it, this is how she would die. Trapped. Alone. Helpless.

•

Derendil thought he heard something in the middle of the night and sat up from his soft cozy bed, more like a large circular mattress that had been specifically commissioned for him. His eyes blinking sleepily. He yawned and rubbed the sleep from his eyes, and then he heard it again, more distinctly. A whimpering sound. It was coming from just outside the room. The quaggoth immediately stood up and hurried out of the room, accidentally knocking over a plastic vase in the process, but there was no time to worry about that. He rushed out of his bedroom into the living room to find his friend seated in her chair, just as she had been when he left her to go to sleep. She was slumped over now, her head resting on the table, and she was trembling. Derendil thought maybe she was cold, then heard her whimpering again, and knew that she was having a bad dream, again. This one is really bad, he thought. It had been a while since the quaggoth had been woken by his friend making odd noises in her sleep. It didn't happen often, but it was really bad when it did. One time she woke herself up screaming. At first, he had tried to offer some comfort, but he soon found that patting her on the head or shaking her awake only made things worse. Derendil had spent many nights curled up at the foot of her bed, or just outside her bedroom door, just to keep her company, thinking maybe that would help too, but it didn't seem to make a difference.

This time, however, was different. He recently had a conversation with his soon to be second best friend, Alba's fiancé. Zelraun Roaringhorn had wanted to get to know the quaggoth a little bit better, develop a rapport, earn his trust, because soon the quaggoth was going to be living under the same roof. In much the same way that he communicated with his best friend, Derendil had managed to have a satisfying conversation with the half elf. There was a lot of food involved. Zelraun knew what Derendil liked to eat. He really grew to like him. The half elf had also seemed worried when Derendil let it slip that sometimes Alba woke up screaming. He had given Derendil something to help Alba during those rough nights. Derendil returned to his room and retrieved from a small nightstand a tiny head garment, a nightcap that he was told would give his friend pleasant dreams.

He returned to put the garment on her head as gently as he could. Within a few minutes it seemed, the nightcap worked. His friend stopped whimpering, and instead seemed to be in a deeper sleep. Derendil curled up on the floor beside the large pile of books she had collected recently, and fell asleep again.

[peckhampeculiar]

All hands on decks

TENDAI CHAGWEDA ACHIEVED HER DREAM OF BECOMING A DJ – AND NOW SHE’S ALL ABOUT HELPING OTHERS DO THE SAME. 

The inspiring Peckham resident explains why she’s passionate about working with those who might struggle to access the DJ world otherwise

WORDS: EMMA FINAMORE PHOTO: LIMA CHARLIE

Many people consider their career mission over once they reach their dream job. But Tendai Chagweda isn’t like most people. The Peckham-born and raised DJ achieved her goal – being able to play music to other people for a living – and has now turned her hand to helping others achieve their own DJ dreams too.

Her Inspiring DJs school offers a wide range of workshops and classes, to help teach an even wider range of people all sorts of skills related to DJing. Through sessions at Mountview theatre academy and Peckham Levels, as well as classes in and around south London and up in Dalston, Tendai teaches everything from the basics on the decks, to how to operate as a professional DJ. Her students range from six to 50 years old.

It seems apt that Tendai is helping people achieve their musical ambitions in Peckham, having lived here her whole life – on Sumner Road – and beginning her DJ career in south London in 2007, playing sets at places like The Cube in Camberwell, and clubs in Streatham and London Bridge, spinning her beloved South African house music under her moniker, Petite DJ.

Now she’s DJed at places like the Shard, but it was here in Peckham that her love for music began.

“I was always raving; Lazerdrome in Peckham was my first experience of that,” she recalls, of the now-closed nightclub at the top of Rye Lane. Lazerdrome was open from 1988 to 2005, playing host to drum ’n’ bass, house, garage and jungle parties, as well as regular club night Innersense and DJ sets from the likes of Kemistry & Storm – who were huge in the ’90s UK drum ’n’ bass scene.

“I used to grab the mic, basically. Me and my girls who all grew up in Peckham were the ‘Dancehall Massive’,” Tendai laughs, remembering a chant she and her friends would shout. “We’d get the mic from the famous DJs.”

When a good friend who was also from Peckham offered to teach her to man the decks herself – rather than wait for someone to do it for her – Tendai was unsure at first.

“I wanted to be front of stage. Back then it was all about the person on the mic,” she says. “I wanted to be out there.”

She eventually changed her mind though and took some DJ courses, and although she gained the technical abilities required, she says she felt completely on her own as soon as the classes were over, with no guidance on how to use her new skills: “They took my money and then said, ‘Bye’. There was no aftercare whatsoever.”

Even though Tendai went on to establish herself as a DJ for clubs and events, specialising in South African house and even being interviewed on BBC World News about the rise of African house music in London, she never forgot that feeling of being left to fend for herself.

That’s what drove her to establish Inspiring DJs in 2016, bringing on board another impressive teacher – the award-winning DJ Smasherelly, who specialises in scratch and drop classes and is the tour DJ for big names like Stefflon Don and Estelle.

The school held its first classes at the PemPeople shop on Peckham High Street in November 2017 – “Nicholas [Okwulu] was the first person to believe in me,” Tendai smiles – and one of the first enquiries that came through was from the mother of an autistic child.

“He was an absolute pleasure,” says Tendai. “These people are excluded from society, but they have super powers! I refuse to call them ‘disabilities’. I’ve been attracting loads of people with super powers ever since.”

As well as a range of ages, Inspiring DJs is opening up the DJ world to those who might struggle to access it otherwise: people with ADHD, autism and dyslexia, as well as those from pupil referral units and foster care. What many teachers might see as hurdles in their pupils, Tendai embraces as strengths.

“For them, they love the encouragement and they love the autonomy,” she says of students with autism or ADHD. “Once I’ve taught them the basics, I just let them get creative without direction, but with lots of encouragement and motivation. It’s not difficult though because they genuinely have a super power, they get it [DJing] in a completely different way and style to other people. When I try to explain things to people without those super powers, they often overthink it, bring in too much logic.

“For some of the mums it’s a breath of fresh air seeing their children use their creativity in a way that is encouraged. It’s beautiful when you gain the trust of the mums. If they leave to go do their own thing, I record classes so they can see what we’ve done – it’s great when you see the parent looking back on what their child has achieved, and they’re like, ‘That’s my child!’

“I remember one mum [during a class delivered to foster care providers] just came up and hugged me – I guess she’d never seen her child in that capacity, being so enthusiastic.”

Working with young people from pupil referral units has been equally as revelatory. “They said they’ve never seen the kids so engaged ever,” says Tendai. “One of the kids kept on stopping us to ask when we were going to be doing it in schools. To hear they’d never been that engaged before, that touched my soul.”

Tendai describes how quickly pupils can pick up DJ skills. “One of the children, I call him my little David Rodigan [a reference to the iconic reggae and dancehall DJ] – within half an hour he was mixing, he’d never touched decks before,” she says. She also talks about how DJing is becoming more popular within schools: it’s starting to be taken seriously as a career choice.

This is where the other side of Inspiring DJs comes in: offering the “soft skills” required to build a business as a working DJ. Tendai offers coaching sessions for over-16s at offices she has in Vauxhall’s impressive Tintagel House, helping them plan for the future. “I find out what their dreams are, and teach them to dream big,” she says. “I basically do life-coaching with them, asking them, ‘Who are your dream promoters?’ and ‘What’s your idea of a dream salary?’”

Tendai tells how one of her students has gone on to work with some of his dream people in different capacities – proof that her holistic approach to DJ training really works.

Arguably, her success as a teacher is also down to the fact that she loves music. When talking about South African house, that passion really shines through: “A dream set for me would be sort of ancestral house – a lot of drums and chanting. A lot of the time the music we’re listening to, we don’t have a clue what they’re saying, but the beat and the rhythm is so entrancing. It’s hard to explain, but it’s when people just become one. No one knows what they’re saying but everyone feels it.”

This passion and emotion comes through in her selections and mixes: a fan got in touch with Tendai just a few days before we meet, enthusing about a mix CD she’d given them years earlier.

It’s an enthusiasm Tendai wants to pass on to everyone: as well as one-to-one classes, Inspiring DJs offers group sessions (for example parent and child, groups of friends) as well as fun sessions for birthdays and team away-days for local businesses.

Brimming with ideas, she talks about recent Netflix series The Umbrella Academy, and how she’s creating a DJ version of this in south London, acting as a platform to help her students get bookings. Southwark Council has already booked Inspiring DJs to play at an event, and instead of Petite DJ, it’ll be her young protégés taking to the decks.

She says real-life jobs like this will help them become better DJs, completing their training in the real world: “They’ll become more engaged, knowing what to play and how to keep their audience engaged.”

All this activity hasn’t gone unnoticed. Last year Tendai was nominated for Female Personality of the Year at the Zimbabwe Achievers Awards, a celebration of talent, art, business, expression and achievement in the Zimbabwean community (Tendai’s roots are in Zimbabwe), and she was even invited to Downing Street to talk to the prime minister’s business adviser about her work in local communities.

“The bread of that conversation was all about university,” she remembers of the Downing Street meeting. “But I said, ‘Sorry I’ve just got to interject here, I’m from the inner city, I personally haven’t gone to uni.’

“It’s about getting them to understand that not everyone wants to go to uni and not everyone can afford to go to uni, but they’ve still got the ability to do whatever they want.”

Tendai is living proof of this. She has achieved her DJ dream without a degree, and also teaches social media at London South Bank University.

“I don’t have a degree or any experience in universities, but I can still do it,” she says, reflecting the can-do, sky’s-the-limit ethos of Inspiring DJs. To all aspiring DJs out there, she says: “Come on down, we’ll show you the way.”

[voidcrow]

This Is a Lot to Take In

(( Note: Recent stories posted here been the byproduct of me and my Baldur's Gate co-op buddy planning to continue our in-character Baldur's Gate roleplay across every campaign in the Neverwinter and Icewind Dale games as well... and as the same characters. This is just here to warn readers in advance that these Forgotten Realms fics are going to play hard and fast with the setting's canon from here on out, in service to our narrative. Calm down; it's only an AU. ))

De'Arnise Keep. 1369 DR.

"Laciel! Where have the months gone?"

Nalia had just emerged into the great hall, greeted by the sight of drunken revelry and a banner reading "WELCOME HOME" across one of the walls. Even amid the celebrating guards and nobles, though, she was quick to spot the auburn-haired elf and go to sit across from her, barely noticing either the infant in her arms or the large, green-skinned man sitting next to her.

"Lady De'Arnise," said Laciel in greeting, "You're late to the party. How unbecoming of a host~." She had an impish grin on her face.

"My apologies." Nalia was deadpan, knowing full well the Bhaalspawn was just trying to get under her skin and seeing fit not to, as they say, feed the troll. "I trust the Majordomo has already shown you and Eifelia to the room I provided?"

"He has." Laciel nodded. "It'll do just nicely for us."

"Later, he'll also show you where to find the stockpile room we cleared out to store all your and Eifelia's adventuring spoils. Although..."

Laciel tilted her head.

"Occasionally we've been hearing a voice coming from in there," Nalia stated, "Yet anyone that has gone to check can't find the person."

"Ah." Laciel smiled. "That's Lilarcor. You remember that talking sword Minsc was using? He's moved on to a better weapon since, and he opted to leave Larry with me. If the sword gets too noisy, just wrap him in some more cloth and stuff him in a chest."

"Won't he suffoc--?" Nalia stopped herself as she caught on to what she was saying. "Forget I asked that."

"Yeah, It would probably take the heat of a forge to actually kill Larry, so..."

Nalia's eyes wandered at last to the child Laciel held, who had turned their head to look across the table at her. "You have a baby." Nalia blinked. "A green baby. With purple hair...?"

"Half-orc," explained Laciel, who now looked down to smile at the child. "She's about, say, eighteen months old? And her name's Kagra. Isn't she a doll~? Eifelia and I adopted her after we got hitched."

"Y-you two are married now?" Caught wrong-footed, Nalia cleared her throat. "Congra--!"

"Speaking of half-orcs, meet Shaaghun," said Laciel, gesturing to the grown half-orc man seated beside her... much to Nalia's further bafflement.

"No relation to Kagra," Shaaghun half-mumbled.

Laciel continued: "Eifelia and I ran into this fellow one day and I thought to myself, wouldn't he make a nice bodyguard?"

"And that's all you've been up to?" Nalia asked, still looking confused. "Partaking of domestic bliss and meeting a new hireling?" She let a pause go by, her face softening. "...Honestly, that's a relief."

"Why? What'd I miss?" asked Laciel.

Nalia leaned forward and took a hushed tone. "News of the war that wiped out the children of Bhaal, and your part in it, have already reached the ends of Faerun. I've heard frightening rumors."

At last, the smile left Laciel's lips. "Such as?"

"The general public doesn't know your name and face, but they have a title for you-- the Killer Queen. They talk of you as being the Bhaalspawn who saw all of her brothers and sisters slain so that her father's essence would collect at the Throne of Bhaal. They say that you went to claim it. That you've become a god yourself. That you might come to walk the mortal world again, as Bhaal once did."

Laciel avoided eye contact with Nalia. "Okay, most of that is untrue. From a certain point of view. The really bad parts are definitely untrue."

"Whatever actually happened, Laciel, you'll need to be careful what you say about yourself out there. If anyone puts two and two together and realizes you're this 'Killer Queen'..." Nalia shook her head. "You'll have a target on your back everywhere you go."

"Hm... Duly noted." Laciel then put on a smile once more. "Enough of that grim subject; I've a favor to ask. Would you humor me?"

"Hmph. You're lucky I owe you so much. Let's hear it."

"Eifelia and I are departing for Neverwinter on some business in a few tendays' time. We'd love it if your family looked after Kagra while we're gone."

"Ah. Is that all?"

"It's..." Laciel started to look glumly down at her half-orc adoptee. "I'd hate to feel like I'm abandoning her; I've told myself I've got to be a good parent. But given what we've heard about what's happening in Neverwinter--"

"I've heard talk of the plague... and all the chaos it's bringing." The redhead nodded. "I can see why you don't want your daughter anywhere near the place." She smiled. "Of course we'll take her in when you go."

"Truly?"

"Of course."

Smiling again, Laciel looked over at her bodyguard. "Looks like you're holding down the fort here after all, Shaggy."

"Ah, shit," sighed Shaaghun.

Nalia's brow lowered. "Hold on. What?"

"He's under my orders to keep Kagra safe," Laciel explained, "So he'll be staying in the keep too."

Nalia started to scowl outright. "I will not feed two of your mouths. Certainly not if one of them's a mercenary thug--"

"Then don't feed them out of your pocket, silly!" Laciel chuckled. "By all means, fund Kagra's needs and forward Shaggy his weekly pay from mine and Eifelia's coffer; the two of us made a killing this past year. All he needs from you is the use of a bed in Captain Cernick's barracks."

Silence hung over the table. The frustration gradually faded from Nalia's face until, at last, the Lady sighed. "We are in agreement. But I want you to know that you're the most irritating negotiator I've ever met."

Laci snickered.

[ericfruits]

Zimbabwe’s new president, Emmerson Mnangagwa, may not be able to fix the economy

UNTIL recently Priscilla Magaya was an administrator in a printing firm in Harare, Zimbabwe’s sunny capital. Today she spends her days on the side of a street, clutching a thick bundle of different banknotes. A few weeks ago, after two years of not paying her wages, her employer went bust. Ms Magaya turned to money trading, swapping real American dollars for Zimbabwe’s confusing profusion of local paper. For $100 in actual greenbacks, buyers get $120 in bright green “bond notes”—a Zimbabwean currency introduced in 2016 that is meant to be pegged to the dollar—or $140 in mobile money, which is also meant to be on a par with real dollars. Her earnings are “not something that I can survive on”, she says, but she has no other option.

Two years ago money in Zimbabwe was simple: everyone used the American dollar, introduced in 2009 after hyperinflation destroyed the Zimbabwean version. Since then, however, banks have run out of real dollars because the cash-strapped and unscrupulous government grabs them in exchange for all-but-worthless IOUs. Zimbabwe is becoming the world’s first cashless economy, but not in a good way. ATMs are empty. Banks allow customers to withdraw just $20 a day, not in real dollars but in local bond notes. Long queues form each morning. Most people rely on electronic bank transfers or mobile money to pay their bills, usually at a hefty premium.

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All this loopiness was originally the fault of Zimbabwe’s former president, Robert Mugabe, who was ousted in a coup last year after 37 years in power. Can his successor, Emmerson Mnangagwa, restore sanity? It will not be easy. The fiscal deficit was a daunting 11% of GDP in 2017. Unpaid doctors and teachers are striking. Businesses are folding like useless banknotes. Elections are due by August. The ruling party is itching to splurge cash on pre-ballot handouts and, perhaps, voter intimidation.

Mr Mnangagwa has spent the past few months jetting around the world, usually wearing a Zimbabwean-flag scarf over his suit, trying to raise money. So often does he say “Zimbabwe is open for business” that it has become a meme. Though he claims to have secured some $11bn of promises of foreign direct investment, many doubt that it will amount to much. Since the coup “things have actually got worse,” says Tendai Biti, an opposition activist and former finance minister who served in the government of national unity after disputed elections in 2009. Prices have gone up as real dollars have become even more scarce.

Zimbabwe used to rely on farming (especially tobacco) for foreign exchange. Mr Mugabe wrecked the country’s largest export industry by grabbing land from white farmers and handing it to cronies who often knew little about farming. As agricultural output collapsed and jobs disappeared, the economy nosedived. Monthly inflation hit 80,000,000,000%, by one estimate. Worthless $100trn notes from that time are now used as bookmarks.

Since 2009 the economy has recovered somewhat. Farming has grown again, partly thanks to the leasing of farms back to their previous owners, and partly thanks to the replacement of the old currency by the dollar. But Zimbabwe still cannot feed itself. Despite bumper rains, more than 1m people may not have had enough to eat earlier this year, according to USAID, America’s aid agency. And the cash crunch hits rural areas particularly hard. “I am getting nothing out of farming,” says a 43-year-old tobacco farmer who gives his name as Cloud. He must travel almost 50km from his home to buy anything with the electronic money in which he is paid.

Mr Mnangagwa’s best hope is that after he wins the elections he can persuade international lenders, such as the IMF, to renew Zimbabwe’s lines of credit, which were cut under Mr Mugabe. Foreign investors could also bring in more hard currency: Zimbabwe has plenty of gold and platinum, much of which isn’t being exploited.

But much more will have to change before Zimbabwe can really be called open for business. Under Mr Mugabe, legions of ruling-party loyalists were hired as civil servants and endless irksome rules were written so they could demand bribes not to enforce them. As formal businesses have shut or gone underground, tax collection has plummeted. Zimbabweans have moved from offices and factories into informal jobs such as hustling. Roads have crumbled and many of the best-educated workers have emigrated. Ms Magaya tentatively predicts that things will get better. But she worries that “it will take as long to fix the country as it took to destroy it.” In the meantime, she is hoping perhaps to move to South Africa.

This article appeared in the Middle East and Africa section of the print edition under the headline "In a while, Crocodile"

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