#lollygagging with lumi

[illumiera]

dragonborn tire slower and heal faster than most, but being still mortal in body if not in soul, it can be hard for them to recognise when they need to stop and rest. elentari's so stubborn about going to bed and waking up at a reasonable time because she knows that the draconic part of her would just keep on going until she physically couldn't, which is when you might find her just curled up somewhere totally unexpected after a particularly tough battle or quest. picturing her coming back from sovngarde after nine days and nine nights that passed like mere hours for her, then exhaustedly dozing in a hidden little alcove of high hrothgar or something...

[illumiera]

the boop (edgar allan poe)

once upon an october dreary, while i pondered, weak and weary, over many a quaint and curious tag of forgotten blorbo lore— while i nodded, nearly napping, suddenly there came a tapping, as of some one gently rapping, rapping at my tumblr door. "'tis some mutual," i muttered, "booping at my tumblr door— only this and nothing more."

[illumiera]

just like having a pet is a constant cycle of asking "what have you got in your mouth now?", modding skyrim is a constant cycle of asking "what are you crashing for now?"

[illumiera]

we have barred the gates (snoozed tumblr live) but cannot hold them for long (seven days). the ground shakes... drums, drums in the deep. we cannot get out (turn it off altogether).

[illumiera]

in the tumbler. straight up “booping them”. and by “them”, haha, well. let’s justr say. my mutuals

[illumiera]

time to draw miraak and ellie in some ridiculously romantic pose. for my health

[illumiera]

i'm thinking about angry elentari.

angry elentari, whose rage is less like the flames she wields and more cold fire, cold fury, quiet and precise.

angry elentari, who softly smiled as she burned the dark brotherhood sanctuary to the ground and offered no prayers for its dead.

angry elentari, who saw the scars on miraak's back and thought with cold certainty, "tell me who did this to you, and if he still lives, i—i will haunt his dreams. i will tell him of his future, of the precise manner of his death, and i swear to you, i will drive him mad with it."

angry elentari, who stood before daemathir, duke of daenia, and rejected him even when he kept pushing her and pushing her to marry him. who snapped, once, and set him alight and stood there as he burned and told him the future date he'd die with the words, "i curse you with knowledge, o daemathir the deathless, deathless no more." who died for it, and rose again for love—and perhaps a little for revenge, too.

i'm just thinking about her, a healer and a flower-grower but a dragon through and through. 💗

[illumiera]

i have a backlog of fics from assorted friends and mutuals to read, and when i eventually get around to them: beware. i'm one of Those (a commenter, a kudoser, a reblogger, a lover, a cheerleader, a—)

[illumiera]

I mentioned in my last reblog that as she escaped Hermaeus Mora with a dying Miraak in tow, Elentari burned a hole in Apocrypha—this supernova-like burst of bright silver light that scarred the Summit beyond repair as if a star had ripped right through it.

the Summit, and the Summit alone, becomes a strange place after that. in my 'verse, Apocrypha's corruption only begins to take hold once a person starts to lose hope of returning, which is why Miraak has held out for so long and has only fairly recently begun to see ink staining his skin, blackening his eyes, and sharpening his fingernails into claws. all seekers (once mortals, corrupted over the course of decades or centuries) who enter find themselves cleansed. they remember who they are; they regain their hope of escaping, and perhaps they even manage it, no matter how many years have passed since they left the world.

Mora hates it, but he'll never be able to return it to how it once was, only hide it and bury it like a best-kept secret...

[illumiera]

i realised a little while ago that miraak (6'7) when kneeling is the same height as elentari (4'11) is when standing, and suffice to say, i haven't been the same since. i try to go about my business and there he is, kneeling before her like a knight swearing fealty. there they are, forehead to forehead. disGUSTING—

[illumiera]

i don't know about you but i've never gotten the urge to play the sims when i'm in a good place. skyrim, on the other hand—

[illumiera]

i like to have microsoft word read aloud my fic chapters to me as i'm editing just so i can hear them in a voice that isn't my own. and in my latest chapter, i used my miraak's birth name (mímir) quite a bit. but my text-to-speech pronounces it like "mimi". so this was my authentic editing chapter eight of i fear no fate experience: "i would call you ✨🌼💐mimi💐🌼✨," elentari replies in a hushed voice...

[illumiera]

one of the vibes i really want to convey with elentari is "gothic romance novel heroine". i need you to be picturing her inside or in front of a castle or perhaps a haunted house, long hair pale in the moonlight, wearing a billowing white nightgown, and ideally holding a candelabra

[illumiera]

today, I'm possessed with the Sudden Urge to ramble about my Miraak's Dibella worship.

I think the Moth would have been an important deity to the Atmorans—Queen of Heaven, goddess of beauty, art, music, pleasure, romantic love, and in my headcanon, language, prophecy to some extent, rebirth, and all that is lovely in creation. to them, and to many modern worshippers in Tamriel, she is the one who painted the sunsets, the one who made the afterlives beautiful, restful places, and the one who brings the land to life in spring.

imagine you're a young boy named Mimir, and wherever you go, you're surrounded by song. you were born in spring, when the land begins to thaw—Dibella's time, when the leanness of winter begins to ease. imagine you face death one day, falling into a frozen river, and you vaguely remember being saved by someone so lovely, it could only have been Dibella herself, or so you think. you wake up warm and dry at the outskirts of your village, and you live another day.

imagine you're a young man without a name. well, the cult stripped 'Mimir' away from you and address you only as yuvonhadrozaal sen (golden-braided one) or dovaar (dragonkind-servant or dragonkind-slave), and it'll be a few years yet before you're given a mask and named Miraak. you wear a veil that covers your face, and to show anybody that face would be to sentence the two of you to death.

so what do you do? not far from Bromjunaar, there's a hidden grove where Dibella's worshippers go to play and sing and pray and dance. you steal a lute, sneak out of the temple, and for a few hours by moonlight, you get to hear the sound of your own voice singing of things that aren't the might of the dragons. your fingers are quick to remember the songs your mother once taught you on her own lute. when dawn is close, you bury your stolen lute and sneak back, knowing that for a few brief hours, you were free.

when you're named Miraak, there's no time for singing. you belong to the dragons now, whole and entire, and can worship no other—but you're a rebel at heart, so you continue to braid your hair and have the belt of your robes fashioned into the shape of a moth.

a woman with the wings of a dragon saves you from death and visits you in your dreams. she looks a lot like the statue you've carved of Dibella, the one you keep in the breast pocket of your robes at all times, but the woman you call Kundruniik, light-bringer, is an ardent follower of Mara, the Wolf-Mother. nonetheless, in your dreams, the two of you sit beneath the heavens hung with a thousand stars, in a meadow that looks to be in eternal spring, and you wonder if your goddess had a hand in any of it.

four thousand years later, it's another spring. you die, because Hermaeus Mora wouldn't have allowed your story to end any other way—but the Last Dragonborn, Kundruniik, your light-bringer, Elentari, has different plans. it's spring, and you return to life just as Dibella is returning Nirn to life. the heavens you get to stand beneath are the realest thing you've seen in four ages of the world.

in short, I think Dibella means a lot to Miraak. more than Kyne, even. no wonder I call him Mothraak...

[illumiera]

very important elentari information in this post

her ears wiggle a little when she's happy, twitch when she's focusing, and go very, very pink when she blushes or is otherwise flustered. that's all. you're welcome

[illumiera]

it's i fear no fate (for you are my fate)'s third anniversary in january; i wonder if i can drum up enough Art Energy to finally draw the fic cover i've been wanting to make for a while as a little anniversary gift to myself... 👀