#love the storm herald barb

[hummingbird-hooligan]

My beefy tief storm herald barbarian got challenged to a duel by another player, a gnome bladesinger wiz/fighter combo, and my boy absolutely WRECKED... Lil guy rocks up like "let's FIGHT" and my mans says "I mean... If you're sure??? I'm not gonna like... hold back... But...let's fucking go!" and did 36 damage in a turn and then a similar amount next turn... Yo rlly said "if you insist!"

he's so himbo I love him he accidentally stole a magic sword and absorbed it into his thigh and now it makes him really powerful but he then immediately passes out... and yet he's attracted a super powerful eladrin (another player character) and we're doing this slow flirt thing that's SO much fun... god I love dungeons and dragons and cool folks who aren't afraid to have fun with it

[roserysttrpggarden]

Hi there~! So If you haven't heard, Wotc has put out another unearthed arcana for One DND, 5.5, whatever its being called. In it came two new subclasses. The Brawler Fighter and The Path of The World Tree Barbarian, both of which I am not a fan of, but the world tree barbarian struck a nerve for me in particular cause it feels like WOTC has no idea what the subclass is supposed to be. So lets go over it

Vitality of the Roots is all the world tree barbarian gets at 3rd-level, it reads:

When you activate your Rage, you regain a number of Hit Points equal to your Barbarian level. At the start of each of your turns while your Rage is active, you can choose another creature within 10 feet of yourself to gain Temporary Hit Points. To determine the number of Temporary Hit Points, roll a number of d6s equal to your Rage Damage bonus, and add them together. If any of these Temporary Hit Points remain when your Rage ends, they vanish.

Okay cool, this is going to be a support barbarian, that isn't really a thing outside of maybe storm herald, cool feature right? Well let's get into the next feature, Branches of the Tree:

While your Rage is active, whenever a creature you can see ends its turn within 20 feet of you, you can use your Reaction to summon spectral branches of the World Tree around it. The target must succeed on a Strength saving throw (DC equal to 8 + your Proficiency Bonus + your Strength modifier) or be teleported to an unoccupied space you can see within 5 feet of yourself or in the nearest unoccupied space you can see. The space the target teleports to must be on a surface or liquid that can support it; otherwise, the target doesn’t teleport.

Now we're a controller style barbarian? The features alright but idk, it feels weird going from healing to control, lets check the next ability, Battering Roots:

Tendrils of the World Tree extend from your melee weapons. While you wield any melee weapon, your reach with that weapon increases by 10 feet, and when you hit with it, you can activate the Push or Topple property even if you’re using another Mastery property with that weapon

In case you forgot, the push property allows you to well, push enemies, and topple allows you to knock people prone, it's alright-if not particularly synergistic with the previous feature, but maybe they can bring it back with the capstone. Travel through the Tree:

As an action, you touch a Huge or larger tree or a Teleportation Circle to create a link through the World Tree to a Teleportation Circle somewhere else on the same world or on another plane of existence. When you do so, you can specify a target destination in general terms, such as the City of Brass on the Elemental Plane of Fire, and you and up to five willing creatures within 30 feet of you appear at the Teleportation Circle closest to that destination. If a Teleportation Circle is too small to hold all the creatures you transported, they appear in the unoccupied spaces closest to the circle.

Once you use this feature, you can’t use it again until you finish a Long Rest. If you’ve run out of uses of this feature, you can expend five uses of your Rage, choosing to activate this feature

instead of Rage.

Yeah, the capstone is basically a ribbon feature. I guess it'd be really good if you're playing in a multiversal campaign but otherwise, this feels really bad as a capstone. Like you go through the effort of getting your barbarian up to 14th-level (Btw, most campaigns at most go to 10-11th level, even WOTC's own adventures do this) just to use teleportation circle. Overall, while I love the idea of a controller barbarian (Especially since most barb subclasses focus on enhancing existing barbarian things, mainly tanking and striking) but the world tree barbarian just feels like a weird mess. So I decided to make my own version.

My version of the world tree barbarian is now focused around creating rifts in reality, which act as alternative positions the barbarian can attack from, say you have a band of goblins that are 30 feet away from you, but your rift is right next to them, you can choose to attack from the rifts position rather than your own, I choose to keep the pushing and pulling via Branches of the planes, the original capstone I converted into a 10th-level ribbon. And the capstone allows you to have two portals active at once, along with swapping places with existing rifts. Admitively i'm feeling a bit lukewarm on the subclass atm, but let me know if I did a good job, or if I made the worst subclass of all time.

That's about all I got for today, I might do more subclass reworks in the future so keep an eye out for that, for now I wish you farewell from the garden. Stay cool and make some homebrew.

[bastart13]

I’ve had a lot of fun recently coming with with female mercenary characters for TF2. I really liked where the concept art was going with making them all individual characters rather than simply “if the characters were women”

The design style is fantastic for distinct simplicity so I tried limiting myself to basic colours and shapes to make these

and I’m pretty confident they pass the silhouette test!

Character names/bios under the cut!

Heavy

Name: Marie Jarrett

Age: Mid 30s-40s

Height: 6’5

Nationality: American (Hawai’i)

Bio: Raised in Hawai’i, growing up she developed more and more drastic measures to fend off the tourists swarming her home. Land mines, electric gates, guard dogs, none could stop them for long until she picked up her trusty minigun to send her message. But even still, she hears the click of cameras in the night.

Eventually, she left her home to explore the world. Enthralled with the image of seeing different wonders across different countries, she’s always disappointed. She’s travelled every continent and still finds nothing that lives up to her expectations. No place, no person. She’s outgoing and open to new experiences, only she usually hates them.

Mercenary life is a great opportunity to earn money, see sights, meet new people and kill them after they don’t meet your expectations. She hates New Mexico and takes every opportunity to destroy the buildings and insult her employer’s tastes. She finds some people she tolerates within the mercenaries as she hasn’t yet visited where they live. However much she hides it, she has a deep, instinctual fear of the Engineer.

  Soldier

Name: Linda Smith

Age: Early 40s

Height: 5’10

Nationality: Canadian

Bio: Canada’s perfect woman… or so she claims. The star of war propaganda posters and clearly decided for the role because of her great tactical assets. She’s there to motivate people into the fight. To spread the glory of Canada and inspire her allies. She believes she has higher orders than anyone else she’s working for (ignoring the fact she hasn’t heard from them for a good few years) and is determined to follow them to the letter. She may have lost the letter but she remembers it good enough.

She represents the ideals of Canada: polite, friendly, apologetic, and pacifistic. None of these are contradicted by how she throws around rockets. That’s not what Canada means. She’s superior to everyone around her and graciously educates them on how to improve through example. She loves her French and British allies and will kindly tell the Americans how to be better.

She’s motivating and actually fairly competent, it’s just that competency might be misdirected. She’s damn good at rocket jumping, shooting her shotgun, and supporting her team, it’s just that you really need to get it in her head when she’s meant to be doing it.

Scout

Name: Patricia “Pat” Herald

Age: 50s-60s

Height: 5’4

Nationality: English

Bio: In her years, Patricia has learnt fear… and she’s learnt to laugh in its face. She wakes up at the crack of dawn, ready to leave at the drop of a hat, boots polished and laced the night before. Her years have taught her that with a gun and Jeremy by her side, she can survive!

The postal route of Appleby-in-Westmorland.

She’s been chased by geese, dogs, cows, elderly ladies, and when her postal route had her delivering post during the war, she developed a taste for blood. Nothing will stop her from delivering her post on time. Every day before 6am, every postbox will have their letters and parcels. One chucked across barbed wire, another house jumped over a river, another house miles into the country with dogs on her heels, she WILL get there and she’ll get there FAST.

But after a couple of decades, she needs a change of scenery, and the Gravels wars are just the holiday she’s needed. With her trusty black and white cat by her side (ignoring the yowling and scratches) she reckons it’ll be great time to enjoy herself.

Quotes: “Oh, hello, Human Jeremy.”

“Bloody fucking Ethel! Building her house out in the country… surrounded by bloody hills and rivers!”

Pyro

Name: Nikephoros Papadopoulos

Age: Late 20s

Height: 5’11

Nationality: Greek

Bio: Survival of the fittest. Nature gives and nature taketh away. If you’re not prepared for that, well, Pyro is more than happy to teach you the lesson. They embody the old values of the Greek gods: f*ck or fire. She indulges her every whim and unfortunately for the people around her it often involves arson.

One year for the Olympic games, she was given the noble title of torchbearer. On complete coincidence, the Olympics shifted to primarily water sports. Underwater sprints became the hot new trend!

She’s merry and chatty, never missing the opportunity to talk to other people about herself and her world view. She can’t wait to spread her gospel to help other people improve themselves (though she always gets a laugh out of those who go out screaming in the flames). She can’t help it if she has a sadistic side.

Engineer

Name: Mikawo Kojima

Age: Early 20s

Height: 5’0

Nationality: Japanese

Bio: Japan’s early-rising industrial revolutions in technology are best exemplified in Mikawo, a young upstart determined to rise to the top, learning everything she can and building the best of the best. Unfortunately, she’s never been the most creative but when you happen upon other people’s blueprints and happen to construct them first, what does it matter who came up with the “concept”?

At first, she appears to be every bit the quiet and demure young woman people expect, only when silk hides steel, that steel is a massive automatic sentry gun. She’s motivated by a distinct contempt for the people who get in her way. Especially those who try to be better than her. She enjoys the flexibility of English, especially the cusses, and she has no reservations about swearing up a storm, even if she still refuses to give a straight rejection, preferring instead to give a small “I’ll think about it.”

Quotes: “This GUN is fair use on your head!”

Demo

Name: Qingzhao Zeng

Age: Late 40s

Height: 5’3

Nationality: Chinese

Bio: The Zeng family has a long-standing family trade in demolitions and explosives, traced down the line all the way to the Song dynasty. Luckily, Qingzhao has sisters so, you know, it’s not all that important. She doesn’t even have to stop smoking and drinking. She hasn’t blown herself up (that much) so clearly, it’s working. Precision is for other people to worry about. She’s apathetic to a T, having seen everything. Measurements come from the heart. A pinch of gunpowder there, a splash of paint there.

Her family has a deep-seated rivalry with the DeGroots. Long ago in ancient China, a Zeng matriarch woke up in a cold sweat, a message from the stars to let them know of their Scottish rivals. Due to being a continent away from each other, the families have actually met each other only a handful of times, but the hatred needs to be kept up because, what if?

Turns out, Qingzhao has met Tavish even before finding employment under the Mann brothers. One drunken night, the two of them had a short, whirlwind friendship, sharing secrets and declaring each other to be their best friends. Luckily for them, they both forgot the night, merrily hating each other as tradition dictates. However, headaches and flashes of this terrible night haunt them both. Could they really get over centuries of hate and become friends?

Absolutely not.

Sniper

Name: Ansa Aaltonen

Age: 27

Height: 6’2

Nationality: Finnish

Bio: Snow. Sugar. Cocaine.  Her life is run by many white powders. Ansa is a professional sniper, with a sharp eye and a steady hand… when she isn’t also high as a kite, lost in the snowy wilderness of Finland and screeching to the sky. When you’re up in the dark and cold, you need something to give you a little pep in your step. It just so happens Ansa liked having a bit more pep than most.

She’s there for a THRILL. There’s nothing better to get your heart pumping at 200 beats per second than a good headshot, embracing the chill, and a hit of sugar. She no longer feels the cold or heat or even pain, shrugging it off until she collapses. It just makes her feel alive. She’s efficient, fast, and determined to get her kicks.

She has an unusual taste, living off fermented fish and tree bark. To most people around the Finnish wilderness, she’s nothing more than an urban legend, but she’s very real and she’s looking for some excitement, happily found in employment in the Gravel wars.

Spy

Name: Yvonne Pleshette [Real name N/A]

Age: 30s

Height: 5’8

Nationality: American (California)

Bio: The silver screen calls to his woman and she’s happy to answer. She trains herself to act in every possible role she can, having a wide range of accents, body languages, and backstories. To truly test herself, she gave up her identity long ago. Lately she’s been going by the name “Yvonne.”

The world of Hollywood is cutthroat and full of backstabbers so she learnt to cut throats and stab backs. While some people tell her the terms are metaphorical, nothing else has given her more roles. Living the mercenary life is simply gathering research for her roles (and earning some much-needed money in the process).

She presents herself as a classic film star, despite being a minor name at best, mostly because she’s always changing it. She has high standards but a cheapskate personality. She’s a bit of a bitch, happily criticising others, especially if they’re working with her. What can she say? She’s a diva.

[Slutshames other spy]

Quotes: “Ugh, actors these days, they know nothing about getting into character. They still have names.”

“’AHHHHH—’ Wait, no. Once more from the top. Scream in agony.”

Medic

Name: Susan Monks

Age: 30-40s

Height: 5’7

Nationality: American (New Jersey)

Bio: The American Healthcare system. Is there a more glorious sight? The exploitation of pain. The money. The debt. The fear it strikes into the entire population it’s designed to help. To Susan, there’s nothing better. She squeezes every last drop from the people she helps, working on a purely transactional lifestyle. She’ll never help someone unless she has all of their insurance information and the payment secure in her bank, and god forbid she ever accept help. It’s not like she can afford her own prices.

She’s very self-aware of her own corruption and proud of it, though she refuses to be exploited in the same way, suspicious of anything “free” but also doing her best not to pay for anything.

That said, she doesn’t much care for how good a job she does. In her eyes, asking for surgery is one thing. Asking for successful surgery is another. She has a variety of skills in both cosmetic and military medicine. She just wishes the license board would stop sending her “malpractice” letters. Ugh, stick to your own business. “Disappearing” all their messengers is becoming a pain.

Quotes: “Why get someone else to do something for you when you can scrounge a way to do it yourself?”

[sulky-valkyrie]

“ i must be hurt pretty bad if you’re being this nice to me. “ for my boy Dorian and a character of your choice?? Bonus for awkward friendships, I love those!

I hope you enjoy, because I feel like this is one of the most awkward friendships Dorian could have - sorry for tweaking the dialogue prompt a bit!

for @dadrunkwriting

~~~~~

“Dorian, my dear, you don’t look well at all.”

He looked up.  “I - Vivienne, I can certainly say this is unexpected.”  The room swam a little bit as he put aside whatever dreck he’d been apparently staring at blankly.  “To what do I owe the pleasure?”

“Your health.”

He glanced around as he stood.  “Isn’t that normally said as a toast here?  Where’s the wine?”

The enchanter gave him a thin worried smile.  “Your relationship with The Iron Bull -”

“Kaffas, it’s none of your business!” he snapped.

“Darling, I’m not here about that, but if you wish to trade barbs, I will happily discuss all the times you’ve made it everyone’s business.”  She sniffed disdainfully.  “Everyone can hear you in the Herald’s Rest, and do you really think people wouldn’t talk about curtains with hand-shaped scorch marks?”  She pointed at the chair behind him.  “Now sit down before you fall over.”

Her tone was not one to be denied.  He sat down.  Maker, why was he so tired?  “I - what’s this about then?”

“You know what happened on the Storm coast.  With the dreadnought.”

Dorian rolled his eyes.  “Fasta vass, I was there.  What sort of question is that?”

“And you heard about the assassination attempt this morning?”

“Yes, he told me over lunch.  He’s already been taking the antidote and several others, so what’s the problem?”

Vivienne stepped close and put a hand to his forehead.  “But were you?”

“Why would I -” a wave of nausea and realization hit him like a dracolisk.  “Are you saying that, that I’ve been poisoned?”

Vivienne crouched in front of him.  “I’m saying that you’ve not been yourself the last two hours.  And yes, it was a poisoned blade, but it wet his vitaar on his chest, did it not?”

Dorian frowned.  “I wasn’t really paying attention to the vitaar.  More focusing on the ‘my lo - the man I’ve been sleeping with was just attacked’ bit.”  He shook his head.  “I think it upset me more than him.”

“Vitaar has nasty side effects for humans, you know.”  Vivienne shook her head.  “You ought to be more circumspect with where and how you touch him.”

He coughed.  “I thought that wasn’t your business.” 

“It’s not, I’m merely offering some friendly unsolicited advice.  On behalf of a very large man who would be devastated if he hurt you, however unintentionally.”

That wasn’t encouraging at all.  “So these side effects.”  He swallowed nervously.  “Are they in the realm of ‘Going to die’ or just ‘going to hallucinate and talk to a berry bush for a few hours’?”

She pursed her lips together in faint amusement.  “Probably the first one.   But I’m a very accomplished alchemist, so if there’s a way to make this right, I’ll find it.  Do you want to talk to a berry bush for a few hours?  I could probably manage that too.”

“Wouldn’t it be easier for you if I died?”  He tried to laugh.  Yes, that’s always a surefire way to get help.  Act like nothing matters.

“It would be petty and foolish to let my feelings for you impact the Inquisition.”  She stood back up and held a hand out.  “Or The Iron Bull.” 

He took her hand and let her help him up.  “I must look pretty bad if you’re being this nice to me.”  Oh yes, something definitely felt off.

“Nonsense, you look as dashing as ever.”

“I imagine you say that to all the Tevinter mages you meet.”  He leaned against her. “How do you know so much about poison anyway?”

“I’ve played the Game a very long time, Dorian.  Poison is its own Orlesian sport.”  She patted his cheek.  “The more exotic the death, the more interesting the scandal.”

That was . . . not something Dorian had considered.  “Perhaps Orlais and the Imperium aren’t as different as they seem.”

“Perhaps not.”

[dungeondaddyjackathan]

Hey all! I'm back on Tumblr with a fresh new account and I'm looking for a few rp partners! Specifically, I'm looking for people that wanna throw their (canonically) single Dungeons & Dragons ocs out into the romance department. If you apply, here are the requirements:

This is probs gonna be long term, so expect to rp for a while. Responses must be at least a paragraph (4-6 good length sentences)!

This is specifically going to be set in the world of Faerun, so be sure you have a D&D character familiar with the world!

All rp will take place over Discord, so if you apply, please have a discord account.

PLEASE BE 18+. My rp's tend to lean towards NSFW content, so if you apply and are cool with adult scenes, please be of legal age.

I have 3 characters up for grabs rn!

(Darla Rockman)

Age: 26

Race: Triton

Class: Bard {Glamour}

Personality: Strong willed, stubborn, sultry, seductive, Mama Bear™

Alignment: Chaotic Neutral

Description: A lounge singer and co-bar owner with a short temper, sharp teeth, and a voice that could charm or kill.

(Donny Rockman)

Age: 26

Race: Triton

Class: Bard {Lore}

Personality: Relaxed, bubbly, fun, thoughtful, cool and collected

Alignment: Chaotic Good

Description: A lounge singer and co-bar owner that really loves the simple things: making himself happy, and seeing others have a good time.

(Jett Black)

Age: 23

Race: Genasi {Fire}

Class: Barbarian {Storm Herald}

Personality: Sharp tongued, sassy, brave, hardened, Kill or Be Killed™

Alignment: Chaotic Evil

Description: A troubled young woman with with a barbed-wire bat that seems to go looking for trouble on her own. Short in size with an even shorter fuse.

Message me here on Tumblr if you're interested, or if you would like more information on characters I have available!!

LETS GET IT

[raeynbowboi]

The Character Forge: How to Play as Damien Lavey in DnD 5e

Today I’m making a build for everybody’s favorite spicy red baby from Monster Prom, Damien Lavey. So showcase how bold and fun you are over a bowl of knives amid the romantic glow of arson, as we conspire to dance with the devil on prom night.

The Prince of Hell

First things first, we need to be a Tiefling. Asmodeus is the standard cut of Tiefling and gets +2 CHA and +1 INT and the ability to cast Hellish Rebuke and Darkness once per long rest without using a spell slot. However, another option for subrace is Zariel Tiefling, which get +2 CHA and +1 STR and the ability to cast Searing Smite and Branding Smite. Choose whichever you feel is better for your build.

For Alignment, this guy is a psychopath, but then, most of the characters in Monster Prom are horrifyingly and endearingly amoral. We’ll call him Chaotic Neutral because just as much as he’s wiling to break the law to help you, he’ll also do it just to amuse himself. Or just for the fun of breaking the law.

For background, Damien is the Prince of Hell, and his fathers conquered Hell together. So, while it’s tempting to label him a Criminal, he’s a Noble.

Skills and Abilities

Damien appears to be completely immune to fire, and while he starts fires with matches and gasoline, there’s also an instance where he throws fire at people from the top of a stolen food pile among other times, so he has some limited use of fire magic. There is an instance where he jumps out of a pizza oven, which even the Narrator is uncertain whether Damien can teleport through fire, or if he was just waiting there in the oven for your character to show up. He has also drank straight fire, and has a literal furnace in his stomach that causes him to eat a lot of food very quickly.

Damien seems to be magically resistant to mortal wounds. While competing with Polly over whose flasks contains better stuff, Damien has a flask of radioactive absinthe, and he finds a fist fight to be a turn on which suggests that he must be supernaturally durable.

The Class Rebel

Barbarian Damien is an angry guy with a love for violence and Polly states that his talent is hitting things. As a Barbarian, Damien would become an embodiment of rage and savage warfare, but at the penalty of losing access to his spell options while raging.     Desert Storm Herald: When you rage, you create a 10 foot aura that wreathes you in flames. Creatures within your aura take Fire damage, you gain Fire resistance, ignite flammable objects with your bare hands, grant your allies Fire resistance while within your aura, and retaliate against anyone who dares hit you with a searing Fire counterattack.     Zealot: Your rage is fueled by a vow of unholy piety to wage war for your dark lord. This subclass lets you imbue your weapon attacks with added Necrotic damage, be revived from death without costing the necromancer material components, reroll a failed roll while raging, fill allies with unholy fury to give them advantage, and straight up refusing to die.

Paladin Whenever you encounter Damien at the auditorium, his designated costume appears to be some sort of black knight. Damien loves warfare and fighting, even claiming that his actual battle attire is really just 700 knives held together with barbed wire. Paladins are usually beacons of moral purity, there are some dark variants of this wholesome class.     Conquest: Conquest Paladins are focused on crushing opposition to their tyrannical rule. Considering you cheer Damien up about being the heir to Hell by reminding him he can wage war as king, this could work nicely for him. You become so terrifying that it actually hurts those who are afraid of you, punish those foolish enough to hit you, and become an avatar of combat.     Oathbreaker: While Damien has never made an oath to break, Oathbreaker Paladins create an aura of hatred that empowers fiends and undead, resist bludgeoning, slashing, and piercing damage from nonmagical weapons, and become such an embodiment of rage and fear that being near you causes mental trauma on your enemies.

Sorcerer Most fire spells are only listed as being in the Sorcerer and Wizard spell lists, and Damien obviously has strong fire associations.     Pyromancy: Your bloodline has strong associations with fire. You gain resistance and later, immunity to fire damage, and your fire spells deal added damage.

Warlock Most of the time when a character fits Warlock, the lack of spells is usually a major hang-up, but luckily, Damien’s use of magic is extremely limited to being able to throw fire. Also, in an adorable side pic by the crew, Damien is seen playing DnD with Zoe, Liam, Oz, and Slayer, and he seems to be dressed like a spellcaster, which to me looks more like a Warlock than anything else.     Fiend: An alternative option to Sorcerer’s selection of fire spells, and as the Prince of Hell, of course his powers come from infernal sources.     Hexblade: Hexblade Warlocks get the ability to swing with CHA instead of STR for weapon damage, as well as letting him bind the souls of his victims into being his slaves. While Damien doesn’t have a specific special sword, he does like knives and swords, so he likely has one that matters enough to him to bother forging a bond with it.

For this build, an Oathbreaker Paladin is very useful, as it lets you add your CHA mod to your melee weapon attack, making Hexblade irrelevant because this boost also increases the power of other fiends, letting you raise and then empower an army of the damned. So, by coupling this with a Fiend Warlock, your melee weapon attacks can deal your normal sword damage, with both your STR mod AND your CHA mod to make you an extremely deadly infernal warrior while still giving you access to fire magic and demonic powers.

Stats and Proficiencies

All of your casting options cast with Charisma, and having a high CHA stat also makes you better at lying and scaring people, so it’s a good stat for Damien to have a lot of. Strength is the other stat you’ll want maxed out so that your Oathbreaker subclass can make you an avatar of pain and carnage. After that, a high Constitution is important so that you can shrug off a stab wound or pierce your nipple with a handgun instead of a piercing gun without dying like a noob. You’ll want a decent Dexterity, but it’s not super necessary for the build. Wisdom and Intelligence will get dumped though. Damien’s not even close to top of the class, and it’s pretty easy to fool and coerce him to believe something, so he’s not exactly wise either. Then again, his strength is punching things, and that’s what his build is focused on doing.

Name: Damien Lavey Race: Zariel Tiefling Background: Noble Alignment: Chaotic Neutral Class: Oathbreaker Paladin (8)             Fiend Warlock (12) Base Stats: Strength: 20 (+5) Dexterity: 12 (+1) Constitution: 16 (+3) Intelligence: 8 (-1) Wisdom: 8 (-1) Charisma: 20 (+5) Saving Throws: Strength: +10 Dexterity: +6 Constitution: +8 Intelligence: +4 Wisdom: +10 Charisma: +16 Combat Stats: HP: 172 AC: 16 Speed: 30 Initiative: +1 Number of Attacks: 2 Hit Dice: 8d10, 12d8 Proficiency Bonus: +6 Passive Perception: 9 Dark Vision: 120 feet Proficiencies:    Athletics   History   Intimidation   Persuasion Skills: Acrobatics: +1                  Medicine: -1 Animal Handling: -1         Nature: -1 Arcana: -1                        Perception: -1 Athletics: +11                   Performance: +5 Deception: +5                  Persuasion: +11 History: +5                       Religion: -1 Insight: -1                         Sleight of Hand: +1 Intimidation: +11               Stealth: +1 Investigation: -1                Survival: -1

Damage Resistances     Fire Condition Immunities     Disease

Equipment:     Chainmail: It’s not 700 knives held together with barbed wire, but it’s interlocking bits of metal, so close enough.     Longsword: It’s just a prop, but Damien uses one in the play. Deal 1d6+13 Slashing Damage +5 Necrotic Damage on a melee weapon attack.

Paladin Feature: Fighting Style    Dueling: One-handed weapon attacks deal +2 damage.

Warlock Feature: Pact Bond     Pact of the Blade: You forge a bond with a weapon, and gain the ability to summon and dismiss it at will. The weapon counts as magical.

Warlock Feature: Eldritch Invocations     Agonizing Blast: Eldritch Blast deals +5 damage on hit.     Devil’s Sight: 120 feet of normal and magical darkvision     Fiendish Vigor: Cast False Life on self at will. Gain 1d4+4 temp hit points.     Relentless Hex: Teleport within 5 feet of a cursed target as a bonus action.     Superior Pact Weapon: Your pact weapon deals an added +2 damage.     Lifedrinker: When you hit with your pact weapon, deal +5 Necrotic damage.

Warlock Feature: Mystic Arcanum     Investiture of Flame

Spell Slots 1st (4) 2nd (3) 5th (3)

Damien’s Spellbook

Cantrips                      2nd Level     Booming Blade           Branding Smite     Create Bonfire            Crown of Madness     Eldritch Blast              Darkness     Sacred Flame             Scorching Ray     Thaumaturgy           3rd Level     Toll the Dead               Fireball     True Strike                  Summon Lesser Demons 1st Level                      4th Level     Burning Hands            Elemental Bane     Command                   Shadow of Moil     Compelled Duel          Summon Greater Demon     Hellish Rebuke         5th Level     Hex                              Flame Strike     Searing Smite              Hallow     Wrathful Smite             Infernal Calling                                         Negative Energy Flood

Actions:

Divine Sense Detect Celestial, Fiend, or Undead. Detect Holy or Unholy energy. Lay on Hands Pool of 40 HP to distribute or 5 points to cure poison or disease.

Features:

Aura of Hate You, Fiends, and Undead within 10 ft add +5 to weapon damage Aura of Protection You and allies within 10 ft. get +5 on saving throws Channel Divinity: Control Undead An undead within 30 feet of you must pass a WIS throw or obey you for 24 hours. Channel Divinity: Dreadful Aspect Choose any creature in 30 feet to become afraid of you for 1 minute on a failed WIS throw. Channel Divinity: Harness Divine Power Use Channel Divinity to restore a used 1st Level spell slot. Dark One’s Blessing Gain 17 Temp HP upon reducing a creature to 0 HP. Dark One’s Own Luck Once per rest, add 1d10 to a skill check. Divine Smite Sacrifice a spell slot, deal (x+1)d8 radiant damage, +1d8 on fiends and undead. Dueling Fighting Style Add +2 to one-handed melee weapon attack damage Fiendish Resilience When you finish a rest, choose damage to resist. Mystic Arcanum Cast Investiture of Flame once per long rest without spell slots Position of Privilege You belong in high society, lowborn bend over backwards to make you comfortable, and you can get an audience with other nobles.

With this build, Damien is an avatar of carnage, dealing anywhere from 20-25 damage with every melee weapon attack and getting two attacks per turn for 40+ damage, he’s absolutely phenomenal at slaughtering his enemies. Quite fitting for this adorkable pyromaniac. How do you feel I did with this build? Would you build Damien differently? Which player character do you like to chase the Spicy Red Baby with? I’m partial to Brian x Damien. And do you have a character you’d like to see me build? I take requests. And as always, thanks for joining me in the Character Forge, where heroes are made.

[duskandstarlight]

Embers and Light (Chapter Five / Nessian)

Let me know if you’d like to be added to the tag list! :)

Ao3

Chapter Five Cassian

Cassian had put a shivering Nesta to bed, piling blankets upon blankets on top of her to warm her up. Her skin had been so pale it had taken on a blueish hue, and he had watched her as she slipped in and out of consciousness for the next hour, unable to leave. She had murmured when she fell under that final time; an incomprehensible string of words falling from her lips that were only silenced when he clasped her hand, as if his warmth soothed whatever images haunted her. He didn’t let go, after that.

Nesta had been lucid enough to tell him what he suspected after the incident; as she begged no, no, no when he started to pile the logs onto the hearth — she was scared of fire. And if her full-blown flashbacks in the camp were anything to go by, Nesta was suffering from an extreme case of suppressed battle fatigue. It was no wonder that she had hidden herself from her sisters… from them all. Her power rose to her fear and if he hadn’t flung up a shield… Well, he didn’t want to contemplate the bodies that he may have had to place on the pyre.

Battle fatigue — or organorum as it was called in Illyrian — was an unfortunate side effect of war that plagued fae and human alike. It was less of a problem for Illyrian’s, where the fighting instinct was so strong that warriors flung themselves back into battle with a stubbornness that defied usual fae, but that didn’t mean it wasn't a problem.

Even a year later, Cassian’s nightmares were proof enough that he himself was still reeling from the war, so there was no excuse for his failure to contemplate the full extent of Nesta’s suffering. Cassian had sat in the armchair by her bed, watching Nesta’s too-still body under the heaps of blankets as he spiralled further and further into a pit of self-loathing at the failure of he, his friends and his family for letting it all get this far.

Although Nesta was skilled at hiding her monsters, they should have pushed — they should have done more — to understand the root of her icy coldness. Nesta had spent a lifetime honing her skill at masking her emotions and protecting herself at all costs, that none of them had even stopped to think that her behaviour may have been to protect them rather than simply push them away.

But today that impenetrable wall had come down, and in its wake that wild power of hers had risen to the surface. Cassian had felt her unleashed terror before he’d even heard her whimper, and then before he’d had time to dissect what was happening, that ice from within her had exploded with such force he’d had to test his own power as he threw up a shield to protect the females, the children…

Cassian had known about the bathtub. Feyre had mentioned it to him prior to Nesta’s arrival in Illyria, and he had installed the spout above the bath because of it, but he had never contemplated the gravity of the other battles she might be facing.

After the war with Hybern, he had been so angry at her for sending him away and so broken himself as he informed family after family that their loved ones wouldn’t be coming home, that emotion had clouded logic. He’d been too distracted by Nesta’s destructive behaviour to look that bit deeper — to see past the excessive drinking and the sleazy males she used to warm her bed.

Because Cassian had felt everything in that moment when she’d lain over his broken body, as if there were a bridge between their souls. It had been overwhelming — the pain, the anguish, the heartbreak she felt — he could hardly bare the unfiltered rawness of it. And in that moment he understood why Nesta was the way she was, because that mask of indifference was the only thing protecting her from the harshness of the world.

By the time his leg and wings were mended, that bridge felt constricted. Rather than fluid it was stiff and muffled, as if he were wading under water. He had seen enough to know it was still there. Snippets of her life as her walls failed, like today, when all he could feel was pure terror at her magic as it swirled around her, readying itself to strike.

He had heard every one of his bones snap and his agonised screams. He had seen her father’s dead eyes as his body crumpled to the floor, and Elain’s blood-coated hands as she pulled Truth-Teller out of the King of Hybern’s neck…

But even though Nesta had pushed him cruelly away, he still wanted her. Cassian had never been so angry at someone in his entire life — had never thought anyone more barbed and merciless when they wished to be — yet there was also a part of him that understood her. She was fire and ice with the sharp and assessing intelligence of a warrior. He had witnessed first-hand as Nesta read a room in seconds and used it to her advantage with that silver tongue of hers.

In all honesty, he had never ever, been more magnetised by someone in his five hundred years of living, and he knew that nobody else would ever come close.

So Cassian had waited until Nesta’s breathing became even before he had left the house. He was desperate for fresh air, to get lost in the monotonous rhythm of feet on mud so he could play their conversations over and over in his mind. He looped them on repeat and when he really started to look, they began to make sense. Because Nesta couldn’t voice her demons like others could. No, instead she had left him clues. He just hadn’t been clever enough to see it and to ask for an explanation why.

Stop following me. Stop trying to haul me into your happy little circle. Stop doing all of it.

I told you to stay away. You know nothing about me.

I don’t like fires. You’ll soon change your mind living here. I won’t.

It was all so obvious now. When Cassian cast his mind back to Solstice, Nesta had left the town house after he had added more wood to the fire. She had even deliberately chosen the armchair furthest away form the hearth, even though he knew it wasn’t her favourite spot. At the time, Cassian had thought it because she didn’t want to sit with all of them, but now… Had she left because the sound had become too much? To think he had berated her for not talking to him, when she had probably spent the entire evening trying to ignore the crackling fire and hold herself together.

Dragging a hand over his face, Cassian cast a look around. He had already found the closest messenger and sent word to Rhys, letting him know that he needed to speak with his brother face-to-face. He had also visited the spot of the incident, checking in on the females and children to make sure they weren’t hurt. He had been certain his protective shield had contained the explosion but he had wanted to double check. Now, he found himself in the craftsman centre of the camp. In front of him stood the small wooden building of Emerie’s clothing shop, the glass of the large lead windows shining brilliantly in the sun.

Emerie was standing with her back straight and her chin held high — a perfect rendition of Nesta’s I Will Slay My Enemies pose — as he entered the shop, the bell above the door heralding his arrival. Her sharp eyes flickered in recognition as he closed the door behind him, but she only dropped her chin in acknowledgement. The action was defiant yet subservient and so unusual for an Illyrian female that respect flared within him.

“Emerie,” Cassian said, trying to instil some warmth into his greeting, even if the thought of Nesta small and vulnerable back home was still making his blood run cold.

“Lord Cassian,” she replied, her voice low and modulated. “What can I help you with?”

Fingering the thick woollen scarves that hung on some hooks driven into the wall, Cassian swept an assessing eye around the shop. It was a force of habit from years of training, and a quick glance told him everything he needed to know: it was impeccably tidy and despite a few empty hangers, it looked as if she was still fighting the same losing battle when it came to customers.

“I see you have gotten more popular,” he lied, for lack of something better to say.

Emerie’s dark eyes bore into his. “The clothing shop across the street ran out of coats because of the snow storms. Some had no choice but to buy here.”

The corner of Cassian’s mouth tugged upwards at Emerie’s blunt honesty and the image she had conjured. Cassian would have paid good money to see those proud Illyrian’s faced with the dilemma of buying from a female or facing an early death from the bitter cold.

“That must have been quite the picture,” he said after a moment.

“Yes,” Emerie said slowly with a frown. “Can I help you with something?”

“I need blankets and some of these scarves,” Cassian told her, gesturing to the rack in front of him.

His words prompted Emerie into movement and she floated over to the shelf piled high with an assortment of thick, knitted blankets. “How many?”

“Twelve of each,” Cassian instructed, as he strolled over to a rack of soft earmuffs. His fingers immediately found purchase in the dappled grey fur of a headband. It was surprisingly perfect; it was wide enough to sit snugly over pointed ears, and whilst it was more fashionable than something Illyrian’s usually wore, it was ideal for muffling noise.

Plucking it off the rack, Cassian placed it on the counter. “And this, too.”

Emerie’s eyebrows rose but she didn’t say a word as she began to ring the items up on the till.

Leaning against the counter, Cassian watched her work. When he noticed how her posture straightened uncomfortably at his attention, he tapped a large finger against the pine and cast a look around in an attempt to make her more at ease.

“I don’t suppose you can you order in some books for me, can you?” he asked suddenly, an idea blooming within him.

Despite the unexpected question, Emerie didn’t miss a beat. Unfortunately for her, it meant her well formed responses fell to the wayside. “For Lady Nesta?”

The subsequent, awkward pause had Cassian’s lips twitching again in amusement.

Wings rustling uncomfortably, Emerie dared a look at him. It was a look that Cassian knew no other Illyrian female in this camp would have risked and for that, he admired her.

Her tan cheeks were stained with the faintest red and her eyes were apologetic, as she murmured in explanation, “It’s the talk of the camp…”

“Naturally,” Cassian said, with a wave of his hand. Illyrian’s always were nosy bastards. “Nesta is a keen reader and is in need of some more books.”

Emerie started to neatly fold the different colour fabrics. Her cheeks had faded to a dusky pink. “What genre?”

“Romance usually, but she reads anything and everything. I’d stay clear of horror and war.”

Emerie should definitely steer clear or war, but Cassian didn’t want to stress the importance of it. He had a feeling that Emerie didn’t need telling twice, anyway. She was as sharp as a well-honed blade, from what he had gleaned of her.

“I can look into it,” Emerie said finally, as she finished carefully placing his purchases into bags. “I won’t be able to get any in until next week.”

Cassian nodded to indicate he understood. “A small selection will do.”

Handing her the money, he took the packaged bags. “I’ll see you next week. Send word when the books have arrived. In fact,” he put a gold coin down pointedly on the counter. “For delivery. You know where I live?”

Emerie jerked her chin upwards, her dark hair swaying at the movement.

“Until then,” Cassian said with a bow of his head.

He shot straight into the skies as soon as he was outside, forgoing the steep walk to the widow’s camp halfway up the craggy mountain. The snow was far thicker than in the mountain pass and the ice was treacherous at points. It had only been in irritation that he had suggested walking up it this morning. Nesta’s venomous comment about his inability to read had struck a deep insecurity he’d never been able to shake. So he had fought back in his own way, knowing deep in his gut that she wouldn’t take the easy way out, because he had an inkling Nesta was a stickler for self-punishment.

That childish behaviour had only gotten him what he deserved: females and children nearly dead, and Nesta passed out, her skin so wan that he felt sick to his stomach.

Cassian was well in the air when he felt the familiar claw raking down the ring of fire protecting his mind. He let the fire part and his flames licked at the forthcoming darkness in greeting. It was not the sort of pitch black that was full of haunting promises, but the soothing calm that came with the midnight sky.

His brother’s voice sounded in his head only a second later. I can be late afternoon or does it need to be sooner?

Late afternoon is fine.

A pause followed. Cassian rarely called Rhys to Illyria. It was only when he truly needed the power of a High Lord did he relent and ask Rhys to winnow in, so he wasn’t surprised by the next question.

Need I be worried?

Cassian couldn’t hold back the tightness in his voice, as he said silently, We had an incident this morning.

I don’t doubt that by ‘we’ you mean yourself and the eldest Archeron sister?

Something like that, Cassian replied vaguely. He didn’t want to get into it now — not like this.

Show me?

It was a request not a command and one that Cassian didn’t hesitate to refuse. He shook his head — an instinctual habit even though Rhys couldn’t see him. I’d rather not.

His brother’s reply was delayed but understanding. I’ll winnow into the camp in a few hours. I’m in a meeting with Amren and I like my balls where they are.

Good. That left Cassian with plenty of time to check on Mas and fly them back to the house.

Making sure his brother could detect the amusement in his voice, Cassian said, I didn’t know you had any balls.

A dark chuckle as smooth as silk sounded in his head. Meet you at the top of the mountain?

An immediate understanding that Cassian wanted privacy without having to ask. Sometimes having known somebody for centuries had its perks.

See you there.

Snow crunched beneath Cassian’s heavy boots as he landed at the edge of the widow’s camp. Cassian had set himself down at the crest of the sloping path, which led up the mountain in a steady ascent to the widow’s base. Ahead of him, in the middle of the camp, Cassian could make out the towering mass of grey stone, which hunched over to create what he had always sombrely thought looked like a jagged tombstone: an omen of death waiting to claim the outcast females of the Windhaven camp.

When it came to the deep-rooted sexism in Illyrian culture, Cassian was hard done by for choosing the greatest atrocity. Yet one of the worst by far was their treatment of widows. Just a brief stock of his surroundings told Cassian everything he had expected — their numbers had grown exponentially since the war, a direct result of the Illyrian males who had not made it back.

The conditions down in the mountain pass might be harsh, but the exposure to the elements halfway up the mountain were nothing less than brutal. It was a heinous way-of-life to be relegated to the widow’s camp, but for many husbandless females, they had no choice. There was nowhere else for them to go.

Every day at the crack of dawn when Cassian left the house, he saw the lines of females as they trudged down the perilous, convoluted path to the heart of the Windhaven camp. There, they would work themselves to the bone, just to afford the clothes on their back and to buy enough food to survive.

Despite the laws that Rhys had put into motion, widow’s found it hard to find their place amongst Illyrian society. Once a husband died, the financial strain of a childless widow was often seen as too much on the surviving family, and if their childbearing years were behind them, there was often only one place for them to go. It was rarely — if ever — out of choice to live up the mountain. It meant a hard and difficult existence at the bottom of the social ladder with no opportunity to climb.

Swallowing thickly, Cassian took in the rusting steel drums of fire and the huddled figures desperate for any sense of warmth. Females looked up in alarm as he passed, recoiling in fear of the male — of the General — who had travelled all the way up the mountain to their exiled spot.

Nodding at the weathered faces, Cassian headed towards the East side of the camp. He was unsurprised when all of the females quickly looked away from him and trained their eyes dutifully to the floor. Some of them were too preoccupied with tugging their worn clothing tighter around themselves to ward off the bitter chill, than to look at him at all. The action made Cassian wish he’d brought more blankets, but he knew if they had an inkling that he was bringing them clothing, they would never accept it. Instead, he’d been giving Mas supplies for years, leaving it to her — a respected elder amongst the widow community — to distribute the clothing to those who needed it the most.

Cassian drew up beside Mas’s tent just as she was stepping out. Her tent was less battered than the others — he had brought her a new one a few years prior as a Solstice gift — and whilst she had tutted at him, he knew it brought her comfort and protection from the elements.

She looked alarmed when she saw him, those dark eyes widening exponentially. It was incredibly rare for him to set foot in the camp. In fact, he could count on two hands how many times he had visited. It wasn’t because he didn’t care but because of the reaction he got . Many of the females here had been abused by males at some point in their lives and so a male in the camp was a threat to their safety. And even though Cassian meant no harm, he could sense how tense the females were because of his presence.

“General Cassian… I am late?” Mas asked, even though they both knew she wasn��t expected for a few hours yet.

“Are you — ” he started. But then he stilled, because what he saw had red, hot anger washing over him. The temperature of it was so intense it felt like waves of heat rolling across a desert plain and Mas flinched, as if she too could feel it despite the icy bite to the air. Cassian suspected the ferocity of it still had something to do with the female back at the house. He wasn't sure he'd ever get Nesta's broken expression out of his head as she begged him to stay away.

“Who did this to you?” Cassian demanded, because around Mas’ wrist was a thick bandage, and in her gait… she was limping.

He stepped quickly towards her. Out of the corner of his eye, he saw females scuttle into tents, his voice clearly too male and full of rage.

It took the restraint of a warrior to dampen his fire.

He lowered his voice. “Tell me what happened.”

Reaching up, Mas patted his cheek tenderly with her palm. She smiled sadly at him. He knew his concern caught her off guard, even after all these years. Cassian suspected it stemmed from never having anyone that truly cared for her well-being. Her poor wings were testament to that.

“Hush, sinta,” she soothed, with a last pat to his face. “I slipped over in the snow yesterday. I was climbing the mountain in the storm and sprained my wrist. Come, you are scaring the females.”

She gestured for him to follow inside the tent and he relented, if only to save the females from hiding away.

“Will you now listen to me and move into the outhouse?” he muttered irritably, as he ducked through the canvas flap. “Then you wouldn’t have to walk up the mountain at all.”

Mas made a tsk sound between her teeth. “And what of the other widow’s, sinta? The orphans? I can’t up and leave them, you know this.”

Grumbling at the truth of her words, Cassian attempted to straighten up. His head just barely missed a lantern hanging from the primary wooden beam that ran across the roof of the tent as it swayed in a gust of wind. He ducked again, before finding a space where he had no fear of being clobbered in the temple, and stood tall.

Mas’s tent was large in comparison to the other females. Although Mas technically had a tent to herself, she usually offered a spare bed to one of the new recruits until they could get themselves on their own two feet.

Today was no different. In the corner, on a makeshift camp bed was a little girl who could be no older than five. She was curled up on the very corner of the thin mattress, her dark eyes watching him warily. Her little wings rustled as he took another step inside the tent, unsettled by his movement, and his heart squeezed with sadness as he watched her too-thin body shrink into itself as she tried to make herself even smaller.

Cassian took a last look at that dirty, haunted face — the face that should be innocent but was already marred by cruel reality of the world — before he worked a kind smile onto his own. “And who is this?”

“We had some orphans join us last night,” Mas explained, with an air that told him that the amount of female orphans joining the camp was far too frequent, too. “This little one is staying with me for the time being.”

Cassian bit back a grimace as he looked back at the scared youngling. Sadly, circumstances like hers was also a recurring addition to the widow’s camp. Unlike male orphans and bastards, whose use would be found in the sparring rings when they came of age, young girls who had lost their families were often taken in by the widow’s. It meant more mouths to feed and more bodies to clothe, but Mas and the other elders who had already lived unforgiving lives, took female younglings under their wings despite the financial difficulties. Unfortunately, many of the orphans had no option but to start working from a young age, often finding jobs in the kitchens or doing laundry, where they were often required to stamp and wring cloth for long durations of time until their feet and fingers blistered from the friction.

“Don’t bother to find her a job,” Cassian said immediately. “Bring her along with you every day. I’ll pay her a salary.”

Mas’ expression softened and she bowed her head gratefully. “You are too kind, General Cassian.”

Cassian nodded tightly. “It’s the least I can do. Bring her with you later so she can have a hot bath and a good meal. You know the clothing store that used to be owned by Proteus? It’s owned by his daughter Emerie now. Drop by there and pick up some clothing for her on the way. Not the store opposite.” He pressed some coins into her hand. “Whilst you’re at it, get a salve for that wrist. If it’s still sore tomorrow, i’ll call the healer. ”

He nodded to the camp bed. “Does this little one have a name?”

Mas sent him a sad smile, glancing at the small figure in the corner. “She’s not spoken yet.”

Cassian nodded in understanding. He knew what it was like to have your life uprooted and be cast out on your own from a young age. Those memories would never leave him, no matter how many wars he fought or how many Siphons he had.

“Let me know if she needs anything else. Do you want me to fly you both down?”

Mas shook her head. “I need to check on the other girls before I leave.”

“Fine,” he replied, his thoughts already running away with him as he tried to figure out how he could help the other orphans, too. Finding them new homes would be tricky — if not near impossible — but he would try…

“General Cassian,” Mas called after him as he went to leave. “You never said why you were here.”

Cassian held up the bags of supplies in his hands.

“I was just dropping off some warm clothing for the females,” he lied, not wanting to mention Nesta’s foresight. “Will you distribute these to the most needy?”

“Of course,” Mas said obediently, but her look was shrewd and piercing. He had already seen her gaze flit to his forehead, where the large gash was still healing. He wasn’t in the mood to tell her what had happened and he knew she wouldn’t push. No doubt she’d learn about it as soon as she reached the mountain pass, anyway.

It was going to be the talk of the camp — if it wasn’t already.

Setting the bags down by a small chest of drawers to his right, Cassian started to head towards the tent entrance, before hesitating. Now was as good a time as any to speak to Mas about Nesta — about what he’d discovered this morning.

Mas was already looking at him expectantly.

“Nesta is feeling unwell today and has taken to her bed,” he started slowly. “I’ve discovered she doesn’t like fire. The log burner in the living room is fine to use as long as the door is closed, but you mustn’t light a fire in her room.”

Mas’s eyes widened as she followed him out of the tent.

“Yes, General Cassian,” she said obediently. “Of course.”

“Good,” he replied and stretched his wings out wide. “I’ll see you in a few hours, then.”

TAGSS @superspiritfestival​

[magicklee]

Types of Dragons

🌬Air Dragons🌬

These great dragons are ruled by the Sairys. Their Elemental colour is pure yellow, light blue, silver, white, and gray. Where they inhabit is often warm and moist. Air dragons often have a very peaceful nature and they like to share what they know, in fact, they feel that all knowledge is worth having. As their name suggests, they control the winds and can manipulate air with amazing dexterity. They can even remove all air from an area, creating a vacuum that is next to impossible to fill. These dragons are often long and slender, some have gauzy wings, and their scales often have a feather-like quality and may have actual feathers around their heads, necks, and paws. They govern the Eastern Quarter of the Circle and you can apply Eastern associations to these dragons. Positive associations of these dragons are new beginnings, Spring, breath, optimism, joy, intelligence, mental quickness, and renewal. Negative associations of air dragons are frivolity, stagnation, bragging, and forgetfulness. The magick that these dragons control is often used to control weather, as one would expect. They are also useful in spells that blow away the old and are excellent in protection rituals, as well as magick that works for mental flexibility and openness to new ideas. Teachers and students both will find a wealth of information with these dragons as they can teach us how to better impart our wisdom, as well as sharpening our minds so that we can learn better. Other forms of dragons that fall under this category are Lightning Dragons, Storm Dragons, Wind Dragons, and Weather Dragons.

🔥Fire Dragons🔥

The ruler of these dragons is Fafnir. Their Elemental colour is pure red, amber, red-orange, and all shades of flame. They tend to live in warm and dry areas. These dragons have a fiery disposition, but can be very gentle and understanding. It is also true that they can be unpredictable and difficult to work with until they get to know you. Once you gain a fire dragon’s loyalty, they are unwavering and powerful friends. Their bodies are often thick and heavy with a long snake-like neck and tail. They often have wicked-looking horns on their heads and their mere presence can make a room warmer. Fire dragons are fierce protectors and are often heralded by their loud roar. They govern the Southern Quarter of the Circle and Southern correspondences can be applied to fire dragons. Positive associations for fire dragons are Summer, the sun, blood, any kind of helpful fire, enthusiasm, activity, change, passion, courage, daring, will power, and leadership. Negative associations for these dragons are hate, jealousy, fear, anger, war, ego, conflicts, and irritability. The magick of fire dragons is often used for personal purification on any level, for energy or courage, and for the stamina needed to pursue your dreams and finish important projects. You can also use their potent magick to help remove barriers, but once they are set on a course, they are very difficult to halt and will go through or over anything  or anyone to achieve their goal. If you don’t have a good working relationship with these dragons and you employ them, they can turn your spell into something destructive that will “burn” through all obstacles and leave ruin in their place. Other forms of fire dragons are Steam Dragons, Heat Dragons, Lava Dragons, and Desert Dragons.

🌊Water Dragons🌊

Water dragons are ruled by Naelyon. Their Elemental colour is pure blue, dark blue, blue green, and turquoise. They live in cold and moist areas. Water dragons have a very soothing influence and are drawn by strong emotions, but will not contact anyone who lets their emotions constantly run away with them. A room may feel a few degrees cooler when water dragons visit or you may notice an increase in the humidity. These dragons are long and serpentine, and rarely have legs or wings. Their scales will have a silvery or shimmery hue to them and they tend to have a feathery fringe around their mouths. Many times they appear looking like Oriental dragons and their eyes may have a glowing quality to them. Water dragons govern the Western Quarter of the Circle and Western associations may be applied to these dragons. Positive associations are calm water, compassion, peacefulness, forgiveness, love, intuition, calmness, peace of mind, and fluidity. Negative associations for these dragons are floods, storms, laziness, indifference, instability, lack of emotional control, insecurity, and overwhelming grief. The magick of these dragons is generally used for dealing with emotions, either calming them or stirring them up. You can also use their energy to help with movement or to help keep things fluid and open. You can call on these great dragons to help open up your psychic centers and lend their aid to your divination skills. Water dragons are also useful for calmness in all situations and on all levels, when you have to deal with anything that will tax your emotions, you should ask water dragons to lend their aid. Other types of water dragons are Ice Dragons, Mist Dragons, and Rain Dragons.

🌿Earth Dragons🌿

These dragons are ruled by Grael. Their Elemental colour is pure green, every shade of brown, and black. Their homes are in cold and dry places. Earth dragons are very quiet beings, they will observe from a distance until they are ready to approach you. Once you have befriended an earth dragon, they are very straight forward and will be blunt and honest with you, but are very loving and nurturing. They tend to have a ridge of sharp scales down their necks and back, their body scales are often very reminiscent of armor. Of all the dragons, these are the ones that like treasure and in order to build a strong relationship, you should keep a jar or dish full of coins. The earth dragon’s bodies tend to be very heavy and most of them have 4 legs, when they have wings, their wingspan is enormous. Earth dragons govern the Northern Quarter of the Circle and Northern associations may be applied to them. Positive associations for earth dragons are respect, endurance, strength, responsibility, stability, prosperity, thoroughness, and having a purpose in life. Negative associations are rigidity, unwillingness to change, stubbornness, and lack of consciousness, vacillation, and weakness. Earth dragon magick is good for building long lasting foundations, for helping to complete long-range goals, and for invoking stability into your life. You can also call on them for physical and mental endurance, as well as the strength to accept responsibility. If you are planning to do a spell for enduring prosperity and success, earth dragons are excellent for this, but they expect you to work towards your goals and not demand that they deliver it to you. Other kinds of earth dragons are Stone Dragons, Nature Dragons, Mountain Dragons, and Forest Dragons.

🌌Chaos Dragons🌌

These dragons don’t have a ruler. Their colour is pure black. Their homes are in Elemental Chaos. These dragons are always dark colours that blend into blackness, often it will look like they have stars caught in their scales. Their bodies are heavy and huge; in fact, they tend to be the largest of all dragons. They have wide, wedge-shaped heads and their long tails are barbed or spiked. Chaos dragons have huge wings that often blend into the night sky and may be hard to make out; they are masters of camouflage in spite of their large bulk and are rarely seen if they don’t wish it. These dragons are not evil or malicious, they work with us and their magick is often incomprehensible to us and they go beyond our limited view of happenings. Because of this, their acts may seem cruel, but they are working for our greater good. These dragons are pure representations of chaos and we are to call on them when we realize that not every problem or situation can be resolved with order and reasoning. When working with these dragons, they will go straight to the source of your problem or question and force you to confront it. This can be rather uncomfortable for us as we will need to deal with hidden aspects of ourselves that we may not be ready to face, so be sure that you are prepared to accept the consequences of invoking a chaos dragon. Chaos dragons do not act as Guardians nor Guides. Chaos dragon magick is mainly concerned with the recreation of lives, relationships, and careers. You can employ them to help break through barriers, with changing luck, and in bringing about vast changes. You can work with them to explore past lives and their magick is particularly powerful aids in divination. Their magick is also used to confine anything that will hinder you in forward growth and movement, if you invoke this aspect of them, be prepared to have everything that is holding you back leave your life, whether you want it gone or not. This is the type of dragon that we work with when we talk about “riding the dragon;” eventually during this ritual, we will have to confront our worst enemy - ourselves. Chaos dragons can also be heralds warning of catastrophe. To ignore what they have to say may bring about destruction in our lives.

--------------------------------

Source - https://witchesofthecraft.com/category/dragon-magick

[rjzimmerman]

The story can make you feel good, because the writer tells us about the best of humanity. It can also make you feel awful, because we are collectively heading in this direction, and we are not ready for this.

Excerpt from this story from Elle:

As Australian bushfires decimate the country—so far killing 24 people and more than a billion animals—photographers continue to risk their lives in the name of environmental journalism. You've seen their heart-wrenching shots circulating on social media: badly burned koalas; anxious wallabies; fiery skies; high-jumping flames; and devastated Aussies left homeless. The apocalyptic imagery was described by a Sydney Morning Herald writer as “distinctly eerie," like a scene from the movie Blade Runner 2049 “come to life.” But without a serious global response to climate change, this is the future humanity is writing for itself. We spoke with five photojournalists battling flames and ash and fire tornados on the ground to get the perfect shot—and alert the world to the ongoing crisis Down Under.

Michaela Skovranova, National Geographic

“I believe this image resonated because it's full of selfless love. The way that Barb held Baz and the way she looks after his wounds, you can feel that Baz trusts her and feels comfortable in this foreign environment. For me, this is the beautiful side of humanity and a wonderful showcase of how Australians have come together to help each other and the environment. It was a very emotional moment for me after seeing the absolute devastation caused by the fires in the Northern NSW late last year.”

Kate Geraghty, Sydney Morning Herald Staff Photographer

“To me it summed up the momentary relief of surviving this fire as the town came under threat again several days later. It also shows the typical Australian country community where everyone knows everyone and they look out for each other. It was a fleeting moment taken on the way to a property on the outskirts of town by a couple who lost their home. We have seen these scenes play out all over our country in the past two months as communities brace for more to come."

Tracey Nearmy, Freelance Visual Journalist

“This image was captured in the devastated town of Cobargo, where the New Year's Eve fire was described by a local as a "fire tornado." When I pulled up a driveway, donkeys, horses, and cows rushed over to the fence to me, momentarily distracted. I can tell they seem anxious and after the fire storm they've been through, I don't blame them. It grew so dark in the smoke haze, that I used my car lights to help light them as I spoke to them gently and photographed their wide eyes in the gloom."

Jessica Hromas, The Guardian Picture Editor

"I found this wallaby by the side of the road in burnt out country just outside of the small town of Kangaroo Valley, NSW. The devastation to animals and their habitat is just heartbreaking. I had a box in the car, so I filled it with water and left it there for the wallaby. Hopefully, it helped if only for day. I want people to wake up to the effects of climate change. These fire are unprecedented. I hear firefighters and scientist say it over and over again, here. Yes, bushfire have always been part of the countries environment—but never like this. This is climate change, period. This is what it looks like."

Cassie Trotter, Getty's Director of Editorial, Asia Pacific

“One of the most recognizable and photogenic landmarks in Australia is the Sydney Opera House. People know the iconic white sails and there is no shortage of pictures of it standing clean against a blue sky and surrounded by beautiful blue water in a city known for its temperate weather, fresh air and picturesque harbor. But for several days, the sails could hardly be seen, shrouded in smoke and hazardous air, highlighting the scale and size of the fires burning dozens of kilometers away. It’s important to capture images like these, ones people can relate to around the world if only to help illustrate the scope and scale of disasters like Australia is experiencing.”

Lisa Maree Williams, Freelance Photographer

[born-of-dusk]

Komorebi or: Those Who Love Shadows

Characters: Vanitas, Arika (OC)

Summary: The New Replica Program aims to give some of the former Seekers of Darkness a new lease on life, a chance to atone and be their own selves separate from their fate bound by the late Master Xehanort. Vanitas has a hard time adjusting to life without a purpose, and it’s up to one tough cat lady from another world to show him the way.

Word count: ~2,800

A/N: this is literally my first fanfic ever and this happened because i really wanted this edgy boy to have a mom. you are getting redeemed damnit.

Vanitas was brooding around a shady tree in the outer gardens when a distant commotion caught his attention. Normally, he could tune out idle chatter and background noise easily but the voices he heard were just a little too familiar. He spared a passing glance from behind a flower hedge and recognized the taller guy with blue hair from their time as the Seekers of Darkness. He and the one with red hair were blathering about some nonsense with Xion and three other kids he didn’t recognize. Whatever. They looked like they were just standing around waiting for something or someone. Vanitas turned his attention back to the flickering specks of filtered sunlight that danced along his armored legs in time with the fluttering leaves above, just killing time until he had to go meet a certain strange lady. 

Arika had taken it upon herself to try and “help” him and the other former Seekers for some reason when they were given second (third?) chances at life in the form of the New Replica Program. ‘I sympathize with all who feel lost, who have been toyed with by fate, who struggle with themselves,’ she said. Whatever, lady, you can do what you want as long as I still get free food and a room to myself. Since the moment of his “birth” the boy had only known one truth: he was created to clash with his other half, forge the χ-blade, and bring about a second Keyblade War. This was his one and only purpose and failing to accomplish this goal would not be tolerated. The old coot, Xehanort, saw to establishing that quickly as well as frequently. And this whole new existence without a clear goal to chase and being around people who didn’t see him as a means to an end was...he didn’t like to think too hard about it. 

After a few minutes he got up to stretch before heading out when he heard the gaggle of friends perk up at their final missing member arriving with his arms full of that blue ice cream everyone seemed to like. It was…Ventus? Ventus was here in Radiant Garden right now? No, that wasn’t right. Same face, same sort of getup, but that wasn’t his brother there apologizing and laughing like a huge loser. It was the other one, that Roxas kid. Just seeing him was enough to sour his mood, but seeing him with his massive group of friends? That was enough to spawn an Unversed or two somewhere in the worlds in an instant. He tried to shrug it off, then he wanted to mock them or slap that stupid ice cream out of Ven-- Roxas’s hands and onto the ground. Anything to dampen that happy atmosphere, but he didn’t. Instead he tried to divert his negative thoughts elsewhere but that stupid smiling face was already burned into his mind. And then those awful thoughts went towards that slippery slope he always seemed to come back to: 

Ventus doesn’t need me. Master Xehanort isn’t around anymore so now there’s no use for me, no purpose to exist. Darkness is all I am and all I’ll ever be. A being of pure darkness in a world of light. What am I even doing here?

That caused a dull blooming pain in the back of his head that surely must’ve heralded another Unversed somewhere, and not a scrawny Flood or Scrapper either. He didn’t raise a hand to soothe the ache and instead let it run its course. That would be a sign of weakness, after all. Right about now he was supposed to be training with his…master? Caretaker? Whatever that lady was to him he still wasn’t sure. She’d offered to spar with him once or twice then to train him from the ground up in a more cohesive style. Something about sound bodies yielding sounds minds or some such drivel. This week she was supposed to help him practice parrying attacks with his keyblade after stressing the importance of defensive maneuvers in addition to the devastating offensive ones that he was more inclined towards. He scoffed at the idea at first but relented after seeing her dispel a mob of Heartless with her fancy footwork and fluid parries into slashes into a wave-clearing focused energy surge. She made it look easy so he figured he may as well add it to his repertoire, even if it did look kinda girly. Maybe it’d help him get his mind off of those troublesome thoughts.

But the rotten start had already tainted the rest of his day. First, Arika had scolded him for being late and made him do 20 laps around the training grounds as punishment. Then she had him do the usual warmup routine of muscle stretches, more laps, and a few sets of the 32-step sword form routine she pieced together for him. Of course he couldn’t blitz through it either; no, he had to do it painfully slow over and over until he did it perfectly. Once he got to the actual sparring it was all downhill. His mind was all over the place bouncing back and forth between thinking about what Ventus was up to, trying to time his parries just right, minding his stances, seething about Roxas having to exist in his general area and look just like his “brother.” His footwork was off, his distraction earned him a few well timed parries strong enough to send his training sword flying, his own attempts just slightly mistimed or lacking finesse which resulted in static blocks. All the while Arika tried to bark out advice and corrections but none of it got through that flurry of doubts and self-criticisms that was storming inside him.

“Stance steady! Stay light on your feet until the blade falls. Meet it at an angle, partial flat. Elbows in!”

Every word she uttered only irritated him further and fueled the ire burning inside. Get it together, Vanitas! Just parry a single hit already! How’d you get so weak and useless?! In his frustration he ended up reverting to his original brash and wild style unlike the more focused one he had drilled into him over weeks of grueling practice. Without even realizing it, he’d given up on the lesson entirely and just gave it his all to land a single massive hit and be done with this charade. 

Arika’s eyes widened when wisps of darkness started emanating off of him and she switched gears entirely when he charged her at full speed. Lacking enough time between blocking his blows to attempt to talk him down, she threw herself into the fight in hopes he’d soon tire himself out. Despite his raw enraged power being on par with hers, Arika’s years of experience and coolheaded approach let her deflect every sword slash and thrust Vanitas threw at her, either artfully sidestepping a blow or returning the force of it in full. At last in his rage and desperation, Vanitas resorted to his iconic overhead strike after leaving behind an afterimage. He warped into the air behind Arika, empowered his weapon with all of his dark magic, and swung down with all his might.

“Too slow!”

But the blade never met its target. Arika disappeared in a blur of violet just short of the blast and delivered a stunning barehanded strike to Vanitas’s solar plexus that sent him flying. The next thing he knew Vanitas was on the ground with the wind knocked out of him, his teacher dispelling her weapon in his peripheral vision. After catching her breath, she glanced down at her student and offered him a hand. This single gesture flooded the boy with anxiety and fear when he realized what he’d done, what he had tried to do. Wait, no! Damn it, I really messed up this time. It took everything he had not to create any more Unversed right then and make things worse for himself but that nagging voice in the back of his mind kept needling him with barbs of doubt. He knew what she was going to say but he just knew there was something more she was hiding. She only did this if…

“That’s quite enough for today. Come, let’s wind down.” It was calm and even like always but he could’ve sworn he heard some bite in the first half this time.

She’s giving up. She thinks you’re weak. No, she knows.

Ven was off in his nice little homeworld with his nice little group of friends that somehow hadn’t fallen apart in the decade they were scattered to the winds. He had friends, connections…a family. Ven didn’t need him, Xehanort didn’t, and now neither did Arika. After all that garbage about “caring” and “sympathy” she was throwing him away. Of course, he was darkness and nothing more. There’s no way she would forgive what he did. And worst of all he failed miserably, he was utterly useless. The air around him grew colder and his whole body felt numb before he reacted the only way he knew how. 

“Just stop it,” he muttered. She raised an eyebrow but stood unmoved.

“Stop what?”

“Just say what you mean and give up already! I know what you’re thinking so just say it,” he shouted, snubbing his master’s aid and slowly rising to his own two feet. The dark wisps had grown to envelop the boy almost entirely in a chilly shroud; he stared down at the inky haze that pooled around his feet and balled his fists at his sides. He let himself get lost in his pounding headache but fought to bite back the prickling tears welling in his eyes. No, anything but that. He was weak enough already.

“Give up on trying to ‘help’ me, it pisses me off! Keep your pity and let me sink back into darkness where I belong! And don’t pretend you still care after I tried to kill you because I won’t believe you! So just quit this whole act and stop trying to save me from-”

Vanitas hadn’t noticed Arika close the distance during his fuming outburst until she had stepped into his view. He shifted his ireful gaze from her feet to her face and was met with something truly bizarre. He was expecting a hateful sneer or cold sharp eyes. But instead he saw a look of concern, maybe even...sorrow? What? Suddenly he found himself wrapped up in a warm hug that caused the smoky dark aura that enveloped him to slowly but surely wane. Not having a clue how to react, Vanitas just stood there still and utterly dumbfounded.

“It’s alright, Vani. I’m not giving up on you, we’re just taking a break for the day. We can try again when you’re feeling better. I should have noticed something was troubling you earlier and for that, I am so sorry,” she said in a soft quivering voice. These strange words spoken in a kind yet sad voice made no sense to the boy. He’d failed, he’d tried to seriously hurt his master. She could’ve died. And she was apologizing to him? And she’d called him some cutesy nickname that didn’t irritate him as much as it should’ve. He balled his fists again, overwhelmed and baffled.

“W-what the hell are you talking about?! How could you have known-,” he snapped his head to face her and happened to notice that the dark aura around him was almost entirely gone. In fact, he felt significantly less frustrated and angry too all of a sudden. Like a massive weight was lifted off his chest and he could breathe again. But Vanitas realized the cost of that relief quickly, that darkness does not simply disappear. 

Arika’s smile was pained and her brow furrowed; he shifted his gaze to her false right arm made of her psionic magic. Normally a brilliant shade of violet, it had been dyed black by inky veins that snaked up the forearm and ended at her shoulder where magic met flesh. She winced as tiny errant barbs of the dark substance calcified and broke through the skin of her shoulder, he could practically feel it himself and winced in return. Arika gave Vanitas, now looking concerned himself, a dismissive gesture as the inky lines crawled up her false arm and out of her skin in short bursts only to fall to the ground and shatter or dissipate into vapor outright.

“Sorry, I shouldn’t have taken your pain without asking either. Don’t worry about me, I’ve gotten the hang of tempering it through experience. It’s something my people can do,” she trailed off. Her smile fell and her eyes softened as she looked at him with an expression the boy could not describe, but it almost looked like she was feeling the same way he did just moments ago. Was this what she meant by sympathy? “You are very strong for having shouldered this pain in your heart for so long. How it must have ached...if you would let me I would help lighten the load any way I can. No one should have to suffer alone.”

Vanitas was at a loss for words; his head was a little clearer but he still felt awful about everything that had just transpired. And now he was baffled by whatever this magic trick was. Just what are you, lady? Someone who didn’t think he was weak, apparently. She even called him strong and was willing to hurt herself for his sake? But in a helping kind of way. There were plenty of questions to be asked, it’s not like he was super happy all of a sudden. He still wasn’t sure what he was feeling now in his fledgling heart (other than “not bad”), he didn’t know whether more punishment was in store for him after his stunt (probably not), he didn’t know how to feel about having his emotions—though negative—siphoned away even if it made him feel better. And while he started to admit to himself that he did want her help, he wasn’t sure what he wanted her to do. But there was one nagging question he had to know the answer to right now.

“Why do you care so much about me? Even though I’m…”

“Even though you’re darkness?” she chuckled. He looked away, almost afraid to hear her answer. “Because my heart can love darkness, of course. And darkness can learn to love back.”

He couldn’t help but chuckle dryly at that answer. Now you’re just making stuff up. “That’s impossible, lady. Darkness isn’t capable of that kind of mushy junk, it’s all just hate and pain.” But then what am I feeling?

Now it was her turn to rebuke him. “Oh, but it’s true. I’m living proof of it, as is my friend Cora and countless others who came before us. We all descend from the one born from the union between pure Light and pure Dark eons ago on my world. We all have light and darkness in our hearts in varying sizes, it’s what makes us all children of twilight. When the Dark fell in love with the Light...” she trailed off serenely. The last of the barbs painlessly fell away to the winds to return to the world and the hearts of living beings. Arika placed her hand to her shoulder and began to heal her wounds shut while Vanitas scratched his head at these outlandish notions placed before him. Light and darkness joining together? And they made some kid instead of a χ-blade? 

“But how? How could darkness fall in love with light at all?”

Arika regarded his question sagely for a moment before pulling the boy into another hug which he received less awkwardly. She placed her good hand on his messy hair and gave it a ruffle, “because the Light ceased fighting with the Dark long enough to listen to him, to understand his pain, and from there a bond was formed.”

Vanitas had neither a sarcastic quip nor follow-up question at the ready, he simply hummed and reluctantly rested his head on his master’s shoulder. He hoped she didn’t notice when he leaned ever so slightly into her hand as she patted his head. Clumsily, he brought his arms up to return the hug but only barely making contact back. This was still weird and new and he didn’t want to make this totally new feeling in his chest disappear just yet. It was something heavy and light, comforting and terrifying, yet entirely warm. Is this…a connection? He tightened his grip to brace himself against the prickling of tears but gave into the urge to let them fall where they may, it was relieving somehow. Arika stroked his hair and started to hum a song from a far-off world, letting her tears shed in kind. Their tears of joy were warm like the embrace they shared in solace, like the feeling in their hearts at this very moment, like the sunshine that greeted the shadows through the trees.

[broadwaytheanimatedseries]

THE BARB IM MAKING FOR YOUR CAMPAIGN IS CALLED MAGNOLIA AND SHES A STORM HERALD THATS THE DRUID VARIANT OF BARB ITS SO FUCKING COOL

I'm love her so much already

[kurtty-drabbles]

Lovesick au (part 4)

@djinmer4 @dannybagpipesarecalling @discordsworld @look-ma-no-hands336 @sailorstar9

N/A: I like this idea of the X-men going to face slendy who is related to Lovecraft Kurt...who, in turn, will destroy him if he so much looks at Zaorva...and Zaorva can destroy him even if she does not know what she is.

The missing of Professor X was tugged under the rugger as Jean explains the man falls in love with a local woman in the Port City, Dagon, while Scott and the others don´t believe in Jean´s words, they have a new student. Jean made a barbed commentary about Kitty, cults and Rogue that Ororo chooses to ignore.

“Hello, Miss Pryde, my name is Ororo Monroe” the Egyptian woman greet Kitty with a kind smile, mentally remembering how Rogue was a child from a cult too. The X-men saw many cults along the years, Storm offers to show the school to Kitty as they talk. “What´s your power?”

Kitty Pryde halts for a moment and looks at Ororo, her powers are a bit hard for her to understand, however, if she can summarize in one word “I can phase through anything”  as Storm explain how the school works and how she´s safe, her eyes travel to the third window on the right and asked to Ororo “who is that?”

“That is Nightcrawler, the new headmaster of the school” Ororo replied and Kitty frown at the man and walks next to Ororo. Exist something really familiar in the name.

_______________________________________________________________________________________

Rogue assemble a team to investigate a situation in a school, located in Oregon, Kitty Pryde is here by the Nightcrawler´s decision(Kitty remember gazing at the man and mentioned quietly she did encounter with him before, Nightcrawler seemed taken back by Kitty embracing herself) and the young woman will see how the X-men do the business.

(She recalls Nightcrawler´s eyes and is conflicted in asking about his eyes and stay away, yet, she is not happy for did stay away. This is very complex and Kitty can´t help by like)

“Sugah” Rogue speaks gaining Kitty´s attention “does your cult talk about what happens with the mutants?” Kitty shakes her head, is all a little bubble there and she hates. Rogue gave soft smiles and explain “I was a child cult too, the cult has a narrow view if you have a question I can answer on the best of my abilities?”

“How did you leave the cult? what´s happened to the mutants and why we have this power?” Kitty asked a bit desperate, there´s a rule in Dagon...don´t make questions, Kitty. Rogue seems to understand.

“It was the X-men who saved me, well, it is a more complex story, in fact, it was one of her  heralds who saved me and take me to the X-men” Rogue then speaks again “her name is Venus, she said here is where I supposed to be as my blood mother and father were punished”

“For what?”

“They ...try to sacrifice me, the anti-mutant mood was a peak, now, things are better, nut 10 years ago...it was hell, it was thanks to the X-men that save mutant-kind”

“And Nightcrawler? How is he?” Kitty asked bashful and Rogue shares nice laughter amused.

“He´s single if is that what you are trying to fish” Kitty is bemused by the word fish and is pouting at the implication, even if she´s blushing.

“No, I just want to know if he´s” Kitty stops and remember their first meeting he´s a person that´s not a person, the same as Dagon(except he isn´t) and Kitty heard lots of talk about the creature, none are good(yet, the sensation of fear never invade her, just a nostalgia) “work with the X-me for how long...he´s seems to young”

“Oh, yeah, Nightcrawler is one of best professors and now headmasters”

__________________________________________________________________________________________

The abandoned school received calls that students are missing, at first, people thought it was a prank, then a kidnapper, now, the police does not know what to think. The chief police is a mutant and called the X-men.

“Is odd, last week Susan vanish and all it was left was those random notes that make no sense” Rogue gives the notes to the other members, Bobby is trying to impress Kitty, who is ignoring, there´s something familiar in the notes. She closes her eyes and can remember amused laughter (not her parents, not the fish people and not Dagon or herself) give space to a tiny smile, there´s something here that is familiar, yet, she knows she has no idea what the notes are saying or who Susan is.

Rogue is giving orders, sure this is a psych type of mutant, Kitty disagrees. “No, I think is something else, something more chaotic”

Her words are proven to be true later as Bobby gesture they lost communication with the few policemen who are helping them. “They´re behind me, I swear, and then the static beings and...they´re gone”

___________________________________________________________________________________

Chaos is the right word as even Rogue can testify something is stalking them, she is calling for help, but, the creature is blocking the signal. Kitty is looking at the notes, some of the symbols don´t make sense, some do.

“Guys, I think this thing, is hunting us” kitty states the obvious “because someone was dumb enough to summon it”

“And how we get this thing away from us?” Bobby asks.

“We have to kill the creature” Kitty replied and Rogue and Bobby now can see their mission changes.

__________________________________________________________________________________________

Slenderman is the creature name, slenderman has a mission, yet, the mission is not being easy. Humans with strong power are a hard target. Slenderman thought, the best outcome would be scary them, killing the tiny human would be the best solution.

The idea of killing the tiny human was proved to be what his master does not appreciate and the X-men heard a demonic scream of pain alerting where Slenderman is.

Arriving on the spot, the creature was screaming in pain, his long arms try to touch Rogue, yet, Kitty, by pure instinct, shoot a crystal blue ray on the creature that causes even more pain, eventually, Slenderman was swollen by the earth.

Rogue and Bobby are trying to understand what the hell just happened, when Kitty, walks to the place where the creature used to be and asked: “can you tell me where the bodies of the other victims are?”

Rogue and Bobby are only looking as something non-human points to North and Kitty nods. The creature didn´t pay any mind to Rogue or Bobby as Kitty was asking about the Slenderman. Funny enough, while Rogue and Bobby can see what this monster is, they can´t understand him.

“Guys, the victims are still alive, in a cabin on the north, it won´t have any Slenderman” Kitty explained as the entity leaves. The victims are safe and sound(terrified and speaking about chaos and order)

__________________________________________________________________________________________

“It was you back then?” Kitty asked phasing through his office. Nightcrawler smiles showing his teeth and he can pretend to be human more than Dagon.

“Yes, the creature was a loose cannon, and I wanted to ended his life sooner” Nightcrawler respond and Kitty frown and didn´t enter in the room, not completely. Nightcrawler´s smile dies.

“Do you plan on hurt me?”

“Is that what Dagon told you?” Kitty is now taken back by the sadness in his voice.

“Yes, he told me your mission in life is to hurt me”

“And do you believe it?”

Kitty would like to say yes, but, at the same time….

“I don´t believe Dagon´s word. My parents sold their soul to keep me safe and I don´t want to be the idiot who jumps into the lion´s mouth” and adds “I´m always in the dark about everything and I hate it, now, answer me, do you want to hurt me?”

“Never, Katzchen, never. Do you want to stay here?”

“I don´t know, maybe, Dagon…”

“Ignore Dagon, do you want to be free?”

“Yes”

[al-dente-icecream]

did session 0 of a new campaign today and im playing a tief storm herald barb and i realised just now that what ive done is just make a harrow gideon lyctor and made them trans masc . he has the shitty short haircut that i imagine harrow has . he has a big fuckin sword strapped to his back . he was sacrificed in a misguided attempt at salvation but its cool he got better and hes mad at the people who caused it . this is a gideon/harrow the ninth . i love him so much

[canaliculi]

Bloodborne / Night Vale fusion, because reasons.

The radio station was a surprisingly squat building, hunched low to the ground in comparison to the imposing, acerbic, latticework tower that stretched and stretched and stretched darkly into the skies above. Tall enough that its piercing tip was lost in the round, bloated stomachs of storm clouds. The station’s doors were flanked by dangling lanterns which spilled out pale yellow light that, Carlos felt, should have made the entrance warm and inviting. But the light barely seemed able to pierce the thick veil of shadows looming around the station’s entrance. Coupled with the eerily dark windows (in which Carlos kept catching flickers of movement), it made what could nearly be considered a foreboding sight. Add to that the strange speaker who must even now be somewhere within, and Carlos almost felt trepidation as he treaded up the short flight of stairs to the door. A scholar is unflinching; that is the- uh, sixth or seventh thing a scholar is. Still, Carlos couldn’t help but to notice old stains upon the sun-bleached stones, splotches and splatters of a red-brown rush seeped haphazardly into the stairs and liberally across the entranceway. There was a brief moment where he delayed before the door, ringing his hands. He turned back to examine the streets. They were as murky and straight and abandoned as they had been on his way over. The other businesses in this area appeared to have already closed for the evening. Halogen lamps lined the street in decidedly exacting intervals, though they guttered sporadically. Carlos had the urge to knock before he entered, which was dumb. He cleared his throat and straightened his cloak and did not think about it being considered perfect and beautiful. If he swept a hand through his hair first before entering, Carlos felt that such an action could be forgiven. The vague menace of the radio station did not end at its exterior. The foyer of the building was wide and well lit, though none of the shadows flicking upon the walls seemed to quite match up with the figures they were cast from. Also, the vaulted ceilings, engraved with twisting and softly glowing designs and sigils, appeared to arch up higher than the building height should allow. Carlos frowned. He back-stepped across the threshold, trying to compare. He stepped forward again. A throbbing migraine settled like a falling rock into the space directly behind his right eye. “Yes, that is what tends to happen when one observes a spatial anomaly too closely,” a soft voice said. “If you close your eyes very tightly, it should pass. Thinking of an object with well-defined physical limitations helps. You could, for example, think of a book. A thick book, with a density of roughly 75 chapters. A book that is eight inches wide and 13 inches tall. It is cumbersome to hold, and in a stack or a row of its fellows, it sticks out.” Carlos pressed his hand against his eye, teeth grinding against the pain. He wanted to snap at this stranger, beg her to stop talking, or to turn off the lights, or to just rip his eye out already, but his mouth and tongue and gullet refused to help him form the words. And as she spoke, slow and methodical and exhaustive, he found himself imagining the book. “It is definitely a color, perhaps burgundy or deep burgundy, though if you hold it closely to a flame, or take it outdoors during the daytime, it appears to become more red. There are curious, golden designs sunken into the cover. These designs line each side of the front, and wrap around the spine of the book, and continue unbroken onto the back cover. Centered on the front cover is lettering, taken from a Latin alphabet. Each letter is in its majuscule form, but the beginning letter of each word is slightly larger than the ones that follow it. These letters, arranged in this precise configuration, read Hunting for Helen: A Helen Hunt Biography. Of course, this is assuming previous knowledge of-” “I’m all right now, I think,” Carlos interrupted. As the young woman had spoken, the pain had dulled and faded, though it was unclear whether this could be attributed to the time allowed to pass by or the excruciating detail with which she had described the book. Either way, she seemed pleased. “Uh, thank you?” “I am happy I could help,” she said. It sounded like she meant it, deeply. “My name is Dana. I am a citizen of Night Vale, as well as an intern here at the Night Vale Community Radio Station.” “Oh! You work here. Of course, that makes sense.” “Does it?” “Yes. Yes it does.” The conversation thus far was… Carlos didn’t have words for it. “Uh, my name is-” “You’re Carlos the Scholar.” “Yes? Yes. I- were you at the town meeting, then?” “Of course not. Cecil was there.” There was a small, wry smile twisting up her lips, as though she had just said something obvious. “It would be a great waste of sentient resources to have two journalists at the same event. Could you even imagine? Having two accounts of the same event?” “I-” Thankfully, Dana cut him off, because Carlos was not sure what he had been planning on saying. “Say, for example, a great boring sandworm chewed its way up through the floorboards of the primary school house-” “-is that something that could potentially happen-” “-and there amongst wreckage it sat, fat and writhing, its twelve front mouths gnashing, its plump, segmented body undulating and its barbed tail - darker than the rest of its pearlescent pink body by at least three shades – flailing about and smashing into bleachers and exercise equipment and people alike-” “-this isn’t a real creature-” “-and what if there were two reporters at this event? What if one were to say gnashing but the other disagreed and said grinding? What if one were to say writhing, while the other said thrashing? What if one had said plump, segmented body and the other had said voluptuous, loathsome body!” “Plump and voluptuous might be synonymous, but they don’t carry the same connotations,” Carlos felt obligated to state, and was rewarded with Dana perking, a tightening leap of every individual muscle, vindication coursing through her body like an electric current. “That is the exact thing that I mean! Two accounts of the same event, from two different perspectives would only muddy the narrative!” She shook her head, slow as though through molasses, slumped so as to imply an unwavering depression. Carlos cleared his throat. Yet another quiet descended between them. He tried to remember how the conversation had reached this point. “So, uh, in that case, that is to say, if you were not a redundant presence at the town meeting, then-” “How did I know you were you?” “Uh, yeah.” “He has a square jaw, and teeth like a military cemetery,” she said, the statement sounding even more ludicrous in her quiet, dreamy voice. Dana nodded, as though this made perfect sense. “With such an accurate description, anyone would recognize you.” “…Right.” Carlos sighed, tugging his collar minutely out of place and then tugging it straight again. “Although, there is the possibility that you are not who I think you are. There is the possibility that you are not who you think you are. You could, say, be a double of Carlos the Scholar. We had some trouble with that a while back.” “Double trouble,” Carlos repeated in a tone carefully stripped of all emotional context aside from a dryness that rivaled the outside climate. “You know what? I don’t think I want to know.” “That is so prudent of you, Carlos the Scholar.” He cleared his throat again. “Anyway, I- uh, I had some questions.” “Absolutely,” Dana said, nodding again. As if that were an appropriate response. “Yes, well- It’s concerning the harbor and waterfront.” “The Night Vale Harbor and Waterfront Recreation Area?” “Yeah, that. I had-” “You know, the official municipal position is that the Night Vale Harbor and Waterfront Recreation Area does not, and never did, exist.” “Uh, I’m aware.” “Great!” “But it… does exist, right?” “Hmmm, I wonder.” There was a pause, as Carlos tried to decide if Dana was going to expand or if she considered that to be answer enough. Apparently, she was finished. “Okay. Well, there was this news report? It came out a few- a few months ago now, I believe, and I just wanted to ask about uh, about that.” “Asking questions is what Scholars do,” Dana confirmed. “Would you happen to know anything about-” “Oh! No, I wouldn’t know anything about something that happened a few months ago.” She and Carlos paused again. “Well, to be precise, I would know something about what happened months ago, but no more than the general populace at that time. You see, I didn’t begin my internship here until a couple of months ago.” That made some sort of sense, Carlos supposed. He nodded anyway. Dana smiled. It felt like progress. It was, potentially, progress. “Is there anyone here that was around then? Another intern maybe? Or one of your reporters?” Dana had laughed when he said intern, which seemed strange. She had a nice laugh though, light and chiming like dangling charms caught in a summer breeze. The kind of breeze that heralded the coming of a storm. “You want to talk to Cecil,” she stated. It was a statement, firm and immutable, but Carlos wasn’t sure he agreed. He had tried very deliberately to not picture the man behind the radio voice. The voice that Carlos had begun to feel he knew intimately throughout his months of study. And he could feel his palms beginning to sweat at the prospect of coming face to face with a man who had fallen in love with him. Instantly. “He usually knows what is going on around Night Vale. Also, if you heard this news report on the radio, it is likely that Cecil was the one who reported it.” “Uh, yes, it was him,” Carlos said. He felt like the conversation was well out of his control. “But, I’m not sure-” “Great! The show is almost over,” Dana said, abruptly turning. “The recording booth is just this way, Carlos the Scholar; I bet Cecil would love to answer your questions.” “Just Carlos, thanks,” he mumbled. There didn’t seem to be anything to do but follow in the gentle swell of her wake. Their footsteps thudded, gentle and earthen, on the richly lacquered wood panels of the halls. The entranceway had been tiled with some sort of stone, a deep grey-speckled black that was shot through with spidery threads of a bright, pulsating red. The overall impression had been similar to red lightning arcing across a night sky. The feeling of skipping across galaxies. The idea that his footsteps clattered and echoed out into the void, to ring around stars and bounce between planets until the sound of his existence was returned to him once more, rendered strange and unknown by time and vast distances. As they ventured out of the foyer, it was replaced by a burnished, burnt looking wood that glistened as if freshly waxed and polished. Mostly, the walls they passed were bare, though there were a few concentrated areas where signs featuring local venues, artists, and general goings-on were posted. And as the yawning ceilings in the entrance had reached unfeasible heights, so too did the hallways stretch onwards, well beyond the point the building should have ended. They walked past intersection after intersection, taking turns seemingly at random and winding deeper into the building. After about the fourteenth turn, Carlos’ head began to ache again. “Stop doing that,” Dana said mildly. Carlos startled out of his thoughts, the mental map he’d been trying to formulate lost. He couldn’t shake the suspicion that they had been going in circles. “Would you like me to describe another book for you? I was in the library recently, so, I saw a few.” “No no, that’s all right,” Carlos replied a little too quickly. He took care not to ask why she sounded so prideful concerning her knowledge on the appearance of books. “I-I’ll just, uh, stop.” “Let me know if you change your mind. Or, as is more likely, let me know if your thoughts become drawn once more to the intricate mysteries of civic architecture.” “Sure,” Carlos said, mostly for lack of anything better to say. Dana gave a quiet laugh that echoed for too long into the halls around them. His pulse throbbed warningly at his temples. The corridor terminated abruptly at a set of doors. Dana pushed them open, and they swung without sound on well-greased hinges, revealing a wide room. The majority of the room was dominated by a massive paper-strewn table, upon which candles were burning down to their nubs, spilling outwards in dense waxy puddles and dripping down the sides of their ornate blackened candelabrums. Bright burning lamps jutted outwards from the side walls. On the far side, directly across from the entrance, much of the solid mortar architecture was replaced instead with thick glass. The window-wall conglomerate looked in on two separate rooms, split evenly down the middle. One half was filled with a darkness that Carlos unthinkingly labeled as impenetrable. If he watched it for any extended period of time, he could swear to see silhouettes within it. He could swear to see the implication of movement, like the slow-wafting curls of a portentous fog. His own dim reflection in the glass seemed warped, somehow, and he found himself stepping forwards, reaching out with one hand- “This is Cecil,” Dana said. She had grabbed onto his outstretched forearm and pulled him over to the lit side of the window. “You can wave, if you like.” Carlos was still fixated on the darker half of the room, and thus he did as she bade without thought. “Of course, he cannot see us, so it is likely he won’t notice.” His hand slumped down to his side. “One-way glass, is it?” How curious. “Oh, is that what that is?” And how much curiouser. There was a dull pain at the base of his skull that had nothing to do with impossible designs. Dana turned to him and smiled again, her dark cheeks dimpling appealingly. “Cecil should be wrapping up just now.” Shaking his head, as if the physical action could alleviate any of the intense mental and emotional anguish he was laboring beneath, Carlos purposefully thrust his thoughts to the side. With a small huffing breath, sucked in harshly through his nose, he resigned himself to coming back and properly studying this radio station at some unnamed and ill-defined point in the future. He busied himself in the present with studying its host instead – Cecil. No sound could be heard from their vantage point, but as he observed he could see Cecil’s lips moving, expressive and mobile around whatever words he was murmuring. Preparedness being one of the numerous things a scholar is, Carlos had tried to study up on the various instrumentations utilized in the field of radio, though to his despair (and interest) he found that he did not recognize much of the equipment the young (?) man was perched before. Cecil sat on a stool, facing a microphone and a large desk that looked like the guts of some great mechanism had been spilled across it, complete with exposed gear teeth and dangling wires, lights that blinked on and off and on in unreliable patterns, as though they were expressing some coded message. His eyes were downcast, and his posture sloped forwards and downwards, and to Carlos it looked like his entire being was pulled towards the device, as if Cecil were pouring the essence of himself out alongside his words. In the strange, wan lighting of the studio room, the reported looked ghostly muted and washed out, even clothed as he was in vibrantly clashing garb. Carlos found himself invested in the continuous morphing of Cecil’s mouth, the elegant line of his throat and the shadows upon it which shifted and vibrated. The even expanse of his lungs, his breathing measured and weighted, and above all purposeful, broken from the monotonous in-out-in-out rhythm of everyday life and instead cultivated to serve his craft. Something about that struck Carlos – the deliberate distortion of so vital and base a function as breath, the reconfiguration of an autonomous reflex to become instead a conscious instrument, tightly regulated and repurposed to suit Cecil’s needs. It was- It was- Uh, well, Carlos liked it. No, he admired it. No, wait, he appreciated it. There was one final series of motion – lips drawing inward and then spreading again, corners curving sharply upwards in a smile – and then Cecil was motionless. Well, his mouth was, which was definitely not a part of his body Carlos had become inordinately fixated upon. The rest of Cecil was moving in long, clean lines, slender fingers flicking small switches, the knobs of his wrists becoming prominent as he turned various dials. He arched his back even, shoulders rolling as if to relieve stress or strain. The twin points of his shoulder blades pressed obscenely through the thin shift of his shirt before sinking back to smooth flatness. “The broadcast is over,” Dana said, punctuation to a sentence they couldn’t hear and shattering a silence which had subsumed them. Her fingers, cautious and weightless as a butterfly, alighted on his shoulder. Carlos felt his muscles twitch violently regardless of her care. “If you would like to enter the sound booth now – you know, to talk to Cecil - you should use this door.” She motioned to a door directly to their right. “Oh, yes, thank you, Dana.” They shared another pause. “Really, you’ve been a huge help.” “You don’t need to thank me, Carlos! I’m only glad I could be of some assistance to you and your work,” Dana replied. “Cecil seems to think this Scholarly Research of yours is of the utmost import.” Carlos nodded. For any number of reasons (including the fact that he wanted the conversation to end and also that Dana said Scholarly Research as though she had no idea what the two words would be doing in conjunction with one another), this felt like the only appropriate response left to him. He took a brief, stabilizing breath as he reached for the polished brass handle of the door, sneaking another glance at the radio host. It was with only mild shock that Carlos, upon opening said door, found himself staring at the inside of the sound booth, watching Cecil continue to fiddle with whatever he was fiddling with on the mechanisms before him. Self-preservation was quite low on the list of things a Scholar was, so Carlos looked to his left, where he could see Cecil through the glass of the wall, in profile and continuing to fiddle. And then looked before him, where he could also see Cecil, though from behind this time, continuing to fiddle. He blinked. He studied the bump of Cecil’s vertebra prominens, where the wide collar of his shirt dipped down to reveal it. He blinked again. Looked to the left where he could watch the curved bow of Cecil’s body from the side, could see his brow furrowed in concentration. Looked forward. Looked aside. Looked forward. It wasn’t a headache this time, no, it was something thrashing in his skull, frantic behind the wet push of his eyes, strung between his temples like a rope bridge in a violent storm and thrumming to the wild pulse of an uncaring universe. Everything was white noise, the pitched, toneless chittering of cicadas climbing higher and louder, a roaring drone, a deafening rustle of chiton and clattering legs and fluttering, veined wings that resembled stained glass windows when they flashed against the blinding, blanketing burn consuming his mind. A flame that struck itself alive in the folds of his grey matter and from there went screaming down every waxy nerve fiber, skipped to flow like poisoned, brambled water through his veins. His muscles went lax, or they tightened, or they trembled. His limbs became numb and indistinct and fuzzy. Sound and sight kept pitching upwards, becoming a resounding din, a blinding (smiling) light searing him from the tinder of his insides and moving outward from there. His teeth buzzed in his gums. He opened his eyes – or his eyes were already open – and saw nothing. No, saw nothing’s brilliant, devouring opposite. Tears spilled down his cheeks, and where they trailed his skin blistered and fissured and spread. He was lost, utterly, completely. He was senseless. Or senseful? This wasn’t the stripping away of who he was, it was the adding upon. Stimulus after stimulus, pooling inside him, a pressure growing and growing, a dam he hadn’t known existed groaning, creaking in duress and he knew, he knew there was no way to stop it, no coming back from this teetering brink. The fall only jutted upwards, cut into the sky like a radio tower with him suspended on its point and what could he do? What could he do but tip forwards, into the awaiting drag of gravity, cutting a silhouette into the rain-soaked sky- And then, he was thinking of a rock. Just large enough to fit inside his palm. Smooth, worn with age. Timeless. Tousled for untold eons by tumultuous waters. Once part of the earth. Once part of a mountain. Once part of a monolith. Once part of a greater. Victim to the steady erosion of rain upon a grassland. The trickling flow of a stream as it bubbled over its surface. Time first measured in minutes, then hours. Then months. Then epochs. Until it was plucked from its cool resting place. Until it was held up to the light. Why don’t you hold it up now. Oh, but it isn’t a stone after all, is it? It was a gemstone, polished with such care and reverence that it felt flat, and edgeless. But it wasn’t, Carlos could see now. Its surface glittered, a thousand – no, a hundred thousand – no, a thousand thousand level edges cutting its oval shape. Drawing in, reflecting and refracting light that was not hungry and covetous, but simply was. He turned it in his fingers, watching how its angles flashed and shown, a prismatic kaleidoscope interrupted by sparks of pure, unsullied white. A voice. He could hear a voice. “You hold it delicately between your fingertips.” Rich, dark, dripping with intent. Soaked in oil, wrapped in honey, in molasses, in everything that seeped. “Carefully, preciously, as if you could break what time could not.” And close. Quiet and hushed. Murmuring, not whispering – no harsh edges, no hissing consonants. “It shimmers against the pale of your palm, glimmers beyond the stark, dark outline of your thumb.” He could hear a voice. He could feel hands on his shoulders, long fingers crooked around the peaks, thumbs rubbing small circles near his collar – one clockwise and one counterclockwise, both pushing in towards his midline. “The light dances and leaps with each turn, each twist, winking in and out of existence.” Carlos was sitting on something cold, and hard. The ground. His back was against a wall. His limbs were arranged artlessly, limp and drooping, his fingers loosely curled. “You think it might like you. That is, you would think that, if you thought that gemstones could like something.” A pause. “Which, being a Scholar, you probably don’t.” He couldn’t help it. Carlos giggled. Gods above and writhing below, he giggled. Shame nipped like beasts at his heels, but relief was more overwhelming, flooding over him in a vast tide. “Oh?” One syllable, hardly more than a rush of breath, save for the lilting of it upwards at its end. Save for the multitude of meanings it seemed to carry, and Carlos felt unqualified to name what even the least of them might be. “Carlos? Can you hear me?”

[cosmere-drabbles]

allergies

if there is not enough mindless, plotless fluff in the world then i will write it myself

Word count: 1618

Relationship: Shakadolin

[AO3]

A hacking cough to his left woke Adolin far before he would have liked. It was still mostly dark; the light outside was barely a dusky glow. None of them had to be awake for some time today. On his other side, Shallan grumbled and pulled a pillow over her head. “Did someone track dust in here again?”

Adolin made a vague attempt to kick in her direction. “That happened once, and I didn't.”

“Why's Kaladin coughing, then?”

“It’s nothing.” Kaladin sounded very stuffed up, quite contrary to Shallan’s claim of dust-caused coughing. “Go back to sleep, I’m fine.”

“You don’t sound fine.” Adolin propped himself up, concerned, and placed the back of his hand on Kaladin’s forehead. “And you feel hot.”

“Or maybe you’re just cold.” Kaladin sneezed. “Besides, you’re always saying I’m hot. I fulfill and exceed expectations.”

“Kaladin, it feels like you have a fever.”

“I feel fine. Who has the medical experience here, you or me?”

“I didn’t know Radiants could get sick. With Stormlight and everything…” Adolin glanced at Shallan--or, rather, the pile of blankets and pillows that Shallan was buried beneath--uneasily. Perhaps this was serious.

“I’m not sick,” Kaladin insisted, just before sneezing again. “I’m just… I’m allergic to lighteyes.”

“Strange that this should crop up now,” Shallan said dryly, as Adolin simultaneously deadpanned, “So you’re allergic to yourself sometimes?”

“Storms take both of you.”

“He probably knows exactly what it is,” Adolin told Shallan’s blanket lump, resigned. “The man can diagnose most people fairly accurately based off of what he can see and hear. Feeling symptoms probably makes it even easier.”

“I can hear you,” Kaladin grumbled.

“Perhaps he's in denial,” Shallan said flatly, still muffled by the blankets.

“I'm not in denial. I'm fine.”

“He hasn’t had Stormlight in a bit, so he could’ve caught it in between periods of using it, when his immune system wouldn’t have been bolstered,” Shallan continued, voice colored with a tinge of curiosity under the annoyance. “Or perhaps Surgebinders getting sick has a purpose. Build up immunity to spren that create illness, in case there are spren that can affect even Radiants. It’ll make him stronger and less susceptible to those diseases later.”

Kaladin narrowed his eyes. “Have you been reading medical books?”

Shallan ignored him. “Maybe Stormlight will help, but maybe we should only do that if it gets serious.”

“It’s not going to get serious, because I’m fine. Why are you talking about me like I'm not here?”

“Kaladin, darling, any evidence linked to your well-being points to the contrary being true, and if you're not going to acknowledge it, we will.” Shallan yawned, turning over to squint in his direction.

“It’s fine. I'm fine. In fact, I need to start getting ready for training.” Kaladin shifted, evidently trying to get up.

“No, no, no, no, you don’t.” Adolin scrambled to sit up fully and pushed Kaladin down. “No, you need to rest.”

“Do not. I have things to do.” Kaladin pushed against him, scowling.

“Yes, you do, and those things include getting rest right now. It’s still really early. Shallan, help me out.”

Shallan blearily reached across Adolin and held one of Kaladin’s arms, which did effectively nothing to help Adolin hold down the rest of him. Kaladin wasn’t fighting much, but it was difficult to keep him down while next to him, so Adolin eventually just shoved Shallan’s arm aside and sat on Kaladin’s abdomen, holding his shoulders down. Kaladin grunted in protest and tried to knee him in the back, so Shallan lethargically moved to drape herself across his legs.

“We can ask Syl when she gets back if she thinks you need to heal up. But until then, you should stay here.”

“No, I shouldn’t.”

“Kaladin, love,” Adolin coaxed, “Stormlight of my life--”

“Almighty, whatever you're about to say, you can say it without the gushy nicknames,” Kaladin groaned, rolling his eyes as he continued to try to wiggle out from under Adolin. Shallan snickered.

“What, you don’t like gushy nicknames?”

Kaladin went limp for a moment. “Oh, Stormfather. What have I done?”

“I have no idea what you’re talking about, you Ryshadium of a man,” Shallan said, tone innocent. “I would think you would have more faith in us to come up with suitable compliments, you picture of Heraldic Radiance, you rare and stunning chasmfiend gemheart. You ferocious and beautiful skyeel. You stubborn, elegant Shardblade.”

Kaladin snorted, quite obviously smothering a laugh. “You're ridiculous.”

“You're ridiculous, refusing to realize you need rest,” Shallan countered.

“I don't. I am rested and I am fine, and there is nothing you can do to convince me otherwise.”

“Nothing, you say?” Shallan’s tone became dangerously sweet, and Adolin felt the need to brace himself for whatever was coming. Kaladin set his jaw.

“Nothing.”

“Nothing, he says. Hm. You know,” she said, in mock thoughtfulness, “you breathtaking, spontaneous collection of rockbuds, we never did officially establish whether or not you’re ticklish anywhere.”

Kaladin froze, just for a second. “I’m not.”

The second was enough. Adolin turned around just in time to see Shallan grin maliciously and reach for Kaladin’s feet. Kaladin yelped, probably the most undignified noise Adolin had ever heard him make, and tried to kick her. She just laughed and pinned his legs down, tickling the bottom of his foot relentlessly. Adolin nearly fell off of him in the resulting explosion of laughter, but he couldn't help a smile--Kaladin laughing was rare, and Kaladin laughing beyond an amused huff was about as common as shalebark growing purple. Which was a shame. Kaladin had a lovely laugh, despite what he claimed; while it was often hoarse, it was spontaneous and infectious and real. But Kaladin’s uncontrollable laughter quickly deteriorated into a wheezing cough, and Shallan let up, concern evident on her face.

“Okay! Okay, maybe I do need to get some rest,” he finally admitted, once the coughing stopped. Shallan nodded and flopped back down. Adolin hummed in satisfaction, and Kaladin opened his eyes a slit.

“It’s not because of the compliments.”

“Mhm.”

“Or because of the tickling.”

“Okay.”

“Or your efforts to keep me immobilized.”

“All right.” Adolin heaved himself off and snuggled next to Kaladin again, ignoring how hot his skin felt.

“You two lightweights are nothing, compared to a bridge,” Kaladin continued, automatically pulling Adolin closer and worming an arm under his shoulders.

“Undoubtedly.”

“I could fling you both across the room if I wanted to.”

“I’m aware.”

“Without Stormlight.”

Adolin laughed. “I know you could, love.”

“I, for one, doubt it,” Shallan interjected, still lying across Kaladin’s legs. “The momentum and force that would be required isn’t quite possible with what you could pull off lying down and weighted.”

Kaladin rolled his eyes and gave Adolin a long-suffering look. Adolin snorted. “Shallan, I’m losing feeling in my legs.”

“Better to be down here than up there. You’ll get us sick too.”

“Shalllaaaaaaaannnnn,” Adolin whined. “We need to keep Kaladin warm for as long as we can before we have to go.”

Shallan grumbled. “He has a fever. He's plenty warm.”

“I can keep you warm, then,” Kaladin said. “Plenty of heat to go around. Because I'm so hot.”

She didn't move for another moment, still resisting. Adolin wiggled his feet underneath her, and she slapped at them.

“Fine. But you two need to move over so I don't fall off the bed.”

Both obliged, and she dragged herself to Kaladin’s other side, burrowing around until she was comfortable. Kaladin grunted and adjusted for her presence. He sighed contentedly once she was settled, nuzzling into her hair.

Adolin watched the faint light track across the ceiling, pressed against Kaladin’s side, listening to his heartbeat and breathing. It was moments like these that he really treasured; even though Kaladin was sick, they were all together, alive and away from the expectations they had to conform to in public. This… this was peaceful and calm. Once again, Adolin found himself making a mental note to have someone help him burn a glyph of gratitude for the two wonderful, amazing people here with him. He shifted a bit to drape an arm across Kaladin’s torso, found Shallan’s freehand, and threaded their fingers together. How had he gotten so lucky? To end up with Kaladin and Shallan, two powerful, beautiful, incredible Radiants with razor sharp wits and unique, lovely personalities and attributes… his love for them threatened to overwhelm him sometimes.

Surely they felt similarly. Perhaps they too were contemplating such things as they stared at the light, slowly drifting across the ceiling. Perhaps they too marveled at how the beauty of the world seemed to increase when people were with those they loved. Perhaps they too wondered at the intricate nature of the cosmere, how it aligned to bring them together.

“If we get sick, it’s your fault,” Shallan muttered into Kaladin’s side, interrupting Adolin’s thoughts.

Adolin closed his eyes briefly, an exasperated sigh threatening to escape him. Despite it, a reluctant smile tugged at the corners of his mouth.

“No, ’s your fault.” Kaladin’s voice slurred slightly, already half asleep. “For not letting me Stormlight so I can get better faster.”

“I didn’t realize Stormlight was a verb.” Despite the barbed nature of the comment, Shallan’s tone was soft and quiet.

“S’not.” He sounded like he was fighting to stay awake, just to keep arguing with Shallan. Adolin rolled his eyes, allowing the fond smile to grow on his face. “Didn’t… use it like that.”

“Shallan, leave him alone. Let him sleep.”

“Fine.” She kissed Kaladin’s jaw. “If I must.”

Kaladin smiled sleepily, eyes closed. “I love you.”

“Love you too.”

“I love you too. Now get some storming sleep.”

[shannaraisles]

Her Beacon And Her Shield - Chapter 9

 My Lady Trevelyan,

 I must thank you for your foresight in providing me with those letters for Madame Vivienne and Grand Enchanter Fiona. As you predicted, no sooner had the mages arrived than they fell to wrangling over which of them was in command of all mages now recruited by the Inquisition. The Grand Enchanter was, I believe, relieved by your instruction to defer to Solas in your absence; Madame Vivienne is reluctant, but informs me that your invitation to leave if she cannot cooperate peacefully is respectfully declined. Your methods are direct, but I confess myself relieved that you took steps to prevent magical war on our doorstep.

 The Iron Bull and his Chargers have been paid their requested advance. I believe Commander Cullen has set them to the task of training the newer recruits in the absence of further instructions. And, if I may be so bold, he misses you.

 With respect and hope, Josephine Montilyet

Herald,

The presence of a Ben-Hassrath agent has alarmed some of my own agents. His first report has already been submitted, and does not compromise our operations. Should this continue, he is welcome to stay.

I am removing Scout Harding to the Fallow Mire to investigate the disappearance of another scouting party. I will keep you informed.

- Leliana

 Cullen,

 It's raining. You remember how much I hate rain, don't you? Even Varric is complaining. Apparently moldy dwarf is not a smell I will enjoy. Not only that, but the constant motion of the sea is making me seasick on dry land. This is a wretched place, and I cannot stand the sight of it. I think I can be forgiven my awful mood, however.

 I failed them, Cullen. Harding's missing scouts were slaughtered long before we located them. They were just left where they fell. Their bodies hadn't even been looted. Cassandra has arranged for their bodies to be collected, and I believe Leliana is informing their families. The ones responsible call themselves the Blades of Hessarian, and that is where things grow complicated. I was furious, and I may have made an error in judgment. I challenged their leader, and no sooner was he dead on the ground than they swore their loyalty to me, personally. How can I possibly command the company that slaughtered our own people? They seem repentant, that they regret what they were ordered to do, and almost pleased that their former leader is dead, and yet I can't risk them anywhere near the Inquisition. I need your advice.

 Speaking of trouble, how are the templars and mages settling in? I understand Solas has been accepted as the mage-commander. Has that helped, or have I made your life horrendously difficult with my meddling?

 To end on a lighter note, I found some prophet's laurel today. That potion for your headaches should be ready by the time I get back. Do try to remember to sleep.

 - Ame

Amelia,

Try not to look at individual waves and swells. The sea taken as a whole can be quite calming.

Your stomach should recover with your mood; your physical state has always reflected your emotional state. You have failed no one. Our people know the risks, and still they volunteer, because they believe in our cause. Though the loss of them is grievous, it is no one's fault but the man who ordered their deaths, and you have already avenged them. The Blades of Hessarian are a known mercenary organization, and your actions have restored their honor. I agree that keeping them clear of the Inquisition is the wiser course. Have them stabilize and monitor the Storm Coast in your name - that should keep them occupied, and allow us to turn our attention to the rest of Thedas. The last thing we need is for our soldiers to begin fighting among themselves as well.

The mage-templar war made a spirited attempt to start itself up again over a missing gauntlet. The templar in question decided to forego a formal complaint and took it upon himself to try and force the mage he accused to submit to a search. By the time Solas and I reached them, several others had joined, and they were on the verge of open battle. Solas can talk fast when he needs to, can't he? You were invoked a few times before the original dispute came to light - the accused mage had, in fact, taken the gauntlet to have one of the Tranquil fix a faulty enchantment embedded within it. We reiterated the need for communication in all things, and Ser Barris has taken to randomly inspecting the templars under his command to make certain they are fully aware of the whereabouts of their kit and belongings. No one was at fault and everyone was forced to apologize, but we are all sleeping more lightly these days. The sooner their training for the assault on the Breach begins, the sooner they will start to notice their similarities over their differences.

The headaches are not as common, nor as bad, as you insist on believing. I have been meaning to ask, however ... why have you put the altus in charge of my lyrium doses? the man delights in annoying me. The Iron Bull seems the only person who can discomfort him.

Be safe out there, Ame. And leave the dragon alone.

- Cullen

 Cullen,

 How did you know about the dragon? Let me guess - Leliana can actually talk to those ravens she's got shadowing my every move. Don't you trust me?

 I've done as you suggested with the Blades. They keep going on about it being right and proper that they're taking orders from the Herald of Andraste, so I doubt we'll have any problems with them. Cumbersome as the title is, it does seem to get results.

 It doesn't surprise me to hear that the smallest upset can set off the mage-templar conflict again, but if the threat of my ire is actually having a positive effect, maybe you should let some of them know you're my husband. You may find them more inclined to listen to you over Solas in such a case. As good as he is, I do not fully trust Solas. I do, however, trust you implicitly.

 Dorian is in charge of your lyrium because I trust him with your life, and that should tell you how trustworthy he is. He teases because he likes you, and you always rise to the bait. He likes to play, that's all. Try giving as good as you get sometime. it can be quite a lot of fun.

 Thank you for sending the cloak, by the way. I may not be the most stylish holy symbol in the world, but at least I'm dry now. We're heading straight to the Fallow Mire, rather than coming to Haven. Harding has some dark suspicions about that missing squad, and I am not losing anyone else if I can possibly help it.

 Be well,

 - Ame

To my believed cousin, the Herald of Andraste, Lady-mage Amelia Trevelyan of Ostwick,

That is a mouthful, isn't it? It's only going to get longer when you finally get around to tacking your husband's name on the end there. And speaking of your commander, what an utter delight that man is. Hidden beneath that devilishly handsome exterior, I have uncovered a sense of humor nearly the equal to my own. And the barbs he can throw! I tell you, my dear, if he were not so clearly smitten with you, I might well have seduced him already. I am, of course, too enamored of you myself to give it more than idle thought. Have you planned your seduction yet? I am only too happy to offer guidance.

Haven without you is, I fear, gloriously tedious. Your stalwart Mother Giselle makes no bones about her distrust of the terrifying Tevinter mage, and several of her darling sister clerics follow suit slavishly. I did hear tell of some disaster with her laundry after one particularly public and strident exchange. Something to do with all her smalls mysteriously turning bright red and bleeding into everything white she owns. I believe your Red Jenny may be defending my honor, such as it is. I feel so loved.

I shall not go on further. I feel sure you have better things to do than read my fulsome prose. Do be a dear and come back in one piece.

Your esteemed cousin, Altus Dorian Pavus of Qarinus

 For the attention of the war room,

 It's raining all over this miserable bog. There are ambulatory corpses protecting the water for some reason. Our people are being held by an Avvar braggart who thinks his gods are better than ours. Will write soon.

 - Herald

Amelia, (scrawled underneath - Dearest, darlingest, Heraldest coochie-woo)

Fire is your ally with the undead. The smell, however, is unpleasant at best. Take care with the Avvar. They are a physically strong people, fierce and implacable in combat. My advice is to allow Cassandra and Blackwall to engage this braggart while you hold back. no mage armor is strong enough to withstand a blow from their heavy weapons. I would rather not lose you to your own zeal for justice. (in the margin - a picture of a stick figure holding a staff being squashed by another stick figure wielding a hammer)

Preparations for the assault on the Breach are finally underway. The necessity of understanding one another in order to work together appears to be overcoming blind prejudice in both ranks. There have been fewer scuffles, and while they still distrust one another, both mages and templars have accepted Inquisition authority. However, I suspect it is you to whom they are loyal. They speak of you with reverent respect at all times. (Well, duh. It's the glow, innit?)

Despite my reservations, I must thank you for the potion you concocted. It has all but banished my headaches. If only a cure for sleepless nights was so easy to come by. (You still not knocking boots? Aren't you s'posed to be married to your Cully-Wully?)

Be safe, Ame. You are missed. (in the margin - a crude drawing of marital relations with some features wildly exaggerated, captioned with - Smoochicuddlekins, touch my lovely hair and make me purr)

- Cullen

 Cullen,

 You really need to read these over before sending them. Sera enjoys your letters almost as much as I do.

 To cut a long story short, our people are alive and on their way home. The Avvar had a hard time capturing them, which seems to be why they kept them as hostages. The customs of respect in a warrior culture baffle me. Their leader was fearsome, but young, and no match for Cassandra and Blackwall. One of his people, Sky Watcher, has agreed to join the Inquisition - with luck, that should keep the Avvar from picking any more fights with us.

 I'm staying a while longer in this Maker-forsaken bog to hunt down an insane apostate. He seems to be responsible for the demons, and perhaps the undead, as well. I will be careful, I promise. I miss you too much to risk not coming home.

 - Ame

Herald - preparations are complete. Return to Haven. It is time.