#order of the blackened denarians

[anotherramblingfangirl]

[ladywiththecoldeyes]

Coin! Harry Dresden

Hey, I want a taste You're a black heart devil and I can't explain Why I wait for your face You're a hotel lover on the back end deal of this race Every night she seems to change her name Doesn't matter who you really are The back room where we sip champagne I can never seem to get enough

I ignite So hold on 'Cause we're about to light it up It's on tonight So hold on 'Cause we're about to about to light it up

@charity-able @hbc-dresden

[narastories]

FFWF: For 'Nic as Thomas' godfather' fic, can we have a sneak peak? :)

Of course! You know what, I'm going to give you a chunky sneak peek because I'm almost done with the first chapter, but I don't like posting WIPs as I go so it will probably take a good while until the whole thing gets posted to AO3. Besides, it was your idea and you deserve it ^^ Thank you xx

[set around Blood Rites AU, eventual Harry/Thomas endgame but this snippet is just Thomas & Nicodemus talking. It's also probably full of typos and will get edited later…]

“Starvation is not a good look on you, son.”

It was after midnight and Thomas had been working out alone, in silence for more than an hour. He did not jump from where he was lying on the bench press when he heard the words. Only because it got ingrained in him from a young age that if you acted like prey you got eaten. So he just calmly pushed the weights toward the ceiling again.

“Don’t call me that,” he growled, sparing a glance at the man standing in the doorway. That sentence was a little too similar to what his actual father would have said.

Nicodemus walked down the few steps leading into the basement gym and smiled. There was no warmth in the expression. He always liked to point out that it said something about a person what they allowed themselves to be called. Thomas thought there were easier ways to get to know someone, like for example, asking them what you wanted to know. Unfortunately, things were never that easy with the leader of the Order of the Blackened Denarius.

“Are you not my godson, Thomas?” Nicodemus asked with quiet amusement. He had a deep blue housecoat on, with his usual black trousers and dress shoes at the bottom. Thomas didn’t know if he actually came here for the gym, if so, the outfit was definitely strange. But it was his house, after all, so Thomas was in no position to judge.

With another push, Thomas put the weights back into their place and sat up on the bench. He was too busy keeping his Hunger in check to entertain his godfather’s rhetorical questions.

He had just saved Harry’s bony ass from the monster of the week again – ghouls, ew – and it took out more of him than he expected. Harry wasn’t some princess that needed saving, of course. He was a powerful wizard of the White Council. But the dolt also tended to get himself in more trouble than he was comfortable handling and Thomas couldn’t just sit on the side and watch his brother suffer the consequences of his reckless actions.

“I’ll be fine,” he muttered. Working out kept his body busy and his mind focused on something. As long as he didn’t injure himself it didn’t make him any more Hungry.

“Once you have fed properly, yes,” Nicodemus replied firmly.

Thomas made a face and dabbed at his neck and naked chest with a towel just to do something with his hands. Ever since he almost killed Justine, he was struggling with the thought of feeding. He knew starving himself to death wouldn’t serve anyone, and that it could even backfire on him if he lost control. But he didn’t think he could let himself take more than a sip of life energy at a time from another ever again.

It further complicated things that he officially became persona non grata in the White Court. He had been staying at one of his godfather’s places as a result and his general state didn’t go unnoticed. His current living arrangement wasn’t something Thomas sought out. He didn’t have a lot of contact with Nicodemus under normal circumstances. Maybe his mother had thought making some kind of deal with the Denarian was a good idea, but Nicodemus was a particularly sharp two-edged sword if Thomas had ever seen one.

(He was also very good with swords, which Thomas had to begrudgingly admit was a sight to behold when applied in action.)

Sometimes Thomas hadn’t heard from him for years and that meant things were going well. However, the Denarian had a sixth sense for showing up when things started to go south. It had probably something to do with his creepy fallen angel shadow spying on everyone.

With nowhere else to go, Thomas had accepted his hospitality. He started to regret it. How was he supposed to know that Nicodemus Archleone of all people had a mother hen’s instinct of feeding the few people he was or wanted to get close to? Which in Thomas’s case was a disaster waiting to happen given his dietary requirements.

“I just need some rest,” he lied.

Nicodemus picked up a dumbbell from a shelf and idly tossed it in the air a few times.

“Is that why you are here and pushing yourself?”

[unseelieaccords]

Would you like to buy a sliver Denarian?

eBay sent me one of their promomtional email.

http://www.ebay.com/rpp/collectibles-events/Ancient-Coin-Sale

I thought I saw Nicodemus’s and Lasciel’s coins. Scared the crap out of me.

Submitted by Scott

Thankfully I don’t have a castual $300 sitting round to buy potentially possessed currency.

[anotherramblingfangirl]

You know, there’s a lot of talk to be made about the fact that age wise Lord Raith and Nicodemus Archleone are contemporaries - about the implications there, at what point their paths first crossed and where were they in their lives when it did, in what manner has it since even if indirectly. 

Whether mutual gain, competing, neutral etc...for example they both knew Margaret, Nicodemus even knew of Thomas which bar the Raiths no-one else seems to have known about. Which implies contact even after she left Lord Raith and went into hiding and/or for some reason Nicodemus was using Anduriel to spy on them. 

It’s interesting to think of!

Although my brain has also merged the really fun concept of this post with that speculation - and the combined implications has made thinking of both things together even more chaotic (and great for it with these two). 

[anotherramblingfangirl]

The first engagement gift to arrive in the Deirdre/Thomas arranged marriage AU when the news leaks, is just a box of these: 

[anotherramblingfangirl]

Polonius Lartessa:

[anotherramblingfangirl]

You know, there's an interesting additional horror to explore for Dresden in any scenario where he does later take up Lasciel's coin.

Because he did end up forming a bond with Lash towards the end. Encouraged her to become her own person, seeing and pointing out her individuality. Grieved her after she sacrificed herself, even as he had to keep that to himself, because who would understand that?

Enter accepting Lasciel in. Someone who looks exactly like a person that came to matter to Dresden before he lost her terribly. Sounds exactly like her too. Emulates how she behaved and I can guarantee as part of an attempt to manipulate, Lasciel would essentially try present herself as the same individual he formed that bond with in the end - and make use of the memories gleamed from his head of their time together. Then there's the pregnancy too.

And I see all of this ending up making him furious.

Because imagine what torture something like that must be, especially for someone who reacts as strongly as Dresden does for those he cares about?

Lash but not. Never Lash, but what sounds/looks/acts/claims her memories and will insist they are the same, denying the individuality of who died after she truly realised her own for the very first time.

"She doesn't deserve you."

[anotherramblingfangirl]

I remember reading a headcanon somewhere, which stated Nicodemus once offered Margaret Le Fay the coin of Lasciel  - and I do think I consider it to be very likely canon.

It makes too much sense for what we know of Margaret, what sort of individual Lasciel goes with - and how Nicodemus operates, for him to have not at least offered at some point in knowing her.

I wonder if she would have considered it though, or if it would have been a swift no.

[anotherramblingfangirl]

In combination with the headcanon/theories about the relationship between Lord Raith and Nicodemus Archleone throughout the years...I have to wonder about Tessa and the White Court.

Namely, in her earlier days when everything was fresh and she hadn’t yet become entirely as she would - I could see her having feelings of enmity towards them. Especially House Raith. 

Polonius Lartessa was canonically sold off by her father for profit to become a child sex slave (“sacred prostitution”).  It was so terrible that Nicodemus - who groomed the then still young teenaged girl  - is said to have “rescued” her from it. 

When she was not that long away from that (don’t think she would care by now), while Nicodemus may be willing to deal with their king, I cannot see Tessa feeling anything but hatred and bad memories brought back to the surface by the sex vampires with their sexually enslaved thralls.

[anotherramblingfangirl]

Saluriel:

[anotherramblingfangirl]

“Nicodemus Archleone knows that his estranged wife has lost most of her people during the event of the aquarium. However, even with Anduriel at his disposal, in the time that has since passed he knows less about what what she has been able to regain and now possesses in pocket. An absence of information there that he is not the sort to like.

As such, he devises a scheme to put in motion to find out. Give a coin to someone entirely disposable, allow it to pass in the wind that he is up to some scheme and see who with and how Tessa responds. There is no cost, or risk or sacrifice for him in this. Whatever the outcome, he gains valuable information, the Church retrieved coin will get a punishment of sorts for the events which resulted in its seizure - and then inevitably return to Nicodemus' hand for a properly selected host shortly after.

But this story is not about him - rather it is about that disposable "meat" who gets obliviously slated to die.”

Note: Patricia Ruiz-Borges is a character from the “Paranet Papers” book, but you don’t have to have read that to understand this. Hope you enjoy reading!

[anotherramblingfangirl]

Summary: 

“Tessa has had many people set her worth for her. How much the temple paid for her, when her father sold her. How much was paid by those who came there to use her.

But not one of those silver coins has ever been placed in her own hand.

So the teenager has a different way to set her own worth - and take something for herself.” Warning: Nothing explicit is shown, but Tessa’s past as child sex slave is the central factor here and things from that heavily referenced.

[anotherramblingfangirl]

Deirdre Archleone is back in my mind again, so I’ve decided to unbury/repost the link to a denarian fic of mine from a couple years ago on here, in case anyone else may be interested?

Dear Child - “A child makes her way through Rome, with a task given to her that she intends to complete.”

[anotherramblingfangirl]

Polonius Lartessa:

[anotherramblingfangirl]

Villainous and female friendship (or as close as they can have to one), I do think Tessa and Rosanna are interesting to think about. Even the wiki states that “they both seem genuinely close”. 

Vitriolic Tessa who churns through the hosts of her side as basically meat for the Fallen, with a second in command that is still “Rosanna”. One who Sanya overheard Tessa literally angrily venting/complaining about a loss to - rushing there of all places and showing what is absolutely weakness to who is a subordinate - trusts to operate relatively autonomously and thanks her for her work. 

Rosanna on her end doesn’t betray this either. She who has nightmares about what she has done (and Sanya implies is disturbed by her actions beyond what she fakes/puts on an act for), remains resolute in her loyalty as second. Referring to Tessa as “my lady” and performing whatever is asked of her, amongst people known for back-stabbing. 

I wonder about those two. 

I do have a theory that Rosanna didn’t actually originate from Tessa’s side. Strong will enough to keep in control of herself despite an implied long time as a denarian - as well as a skill set that tailors specifically to a role? (Charisma essentially - recruitment, manipulation, corruption, seduction...) 

I think Nicodemus originally recruited her for his team, as she more matches what he usually seeks and likes than Tessa’s disposable fleshbags. Albeit clearly something/s happened following that for her to end up so strongly on the other one.