#sad crow

[magpieincarnate]

"I HAVE BEEN AGAIN- went in Danse Macabre TWICE this time. And i am FUELED with inspiration."

~ Maike

[moonscandle]

Sometimes Kaz can’t help himself but feel a little jealous about how easy the other crows can touch each other without even flinching and how they can express the love they feel for one another without effort.

He just wishes to be able to do it too some day and not feel how his trauma torments his every living moment.

Kaz just wants a moment of peace.

[dreaminginthedeepsouth]

I’ve been seeing this photograph posted a million times — it makes me feel melancholic. It’s a starling on a roof, under the falling rain.  it’s from Carina Sirbu’s portfolio. And it’s a great shot.

* * * *

“People once believed that when someone dies, a crow carries their soul to the land of the dead. But sometimes, something so bad happens that a terrible sadness is carried with it and the soul can't rest. Then sometimes, just sometimes, the crow can bring that soul back to put the wrong things right.” -James O'Barr

[proffbon]

Thanks for the reassurance?

[ratbastarddotfuck]

if you're a white person taking pleasure in the idea that Trump voters of colour are experiencing racist violence from white trumpers because "they got what's coming to them" I don't think you're anti-racist at all, I think you were just waiting for an acceptable target, and you're also fucking weird.

Bad Person Deserves Punishment For Their Sins give me a fucking break and get yourself out of the fucking catholic church. you're all prison abolitionists until you see someone you don't like.

[jayb1rb]

I love Six of Crows so much because the way that the whole story ties together in such a neat little bow is so sweet to me. Its things like this:

A man who pats his wallet to make sure it's there is signaling to every thief where his wallet is. He pats it to make sure it's there.

Kaz glances over to Inej on Vellegeluk when he knows he shouldn't have. He knew it was a dangerous situation, but he couldn't help but look.

He looked to make sure she was there.

[vaguely-concerned]

thinking about not only the specific people lucanis pulls in to represent the 'locks' in his psyche, but the storytelling that happens in the structure/order of them. the underlying ideas are presented something like:

the lucanis who went into the ossuary never came back out again; he died down there (the boy caterina raised is gone forever) -> you're putting yourself in danger doing this (by being close to me), you should leave because I can't bear it if you get hurt because of me -> it doesn't matter even if we do try this, it won't work anyway (again because of me) ('you know what he's like, you can open the door but he won't walk through it' :'( oofie doofie) -> what if the real secret is that there was never anything but the monster in here from the beginning. you should leave, there was never anything here worth saving in the first place. (implicitly: what if I deserved what happened, all along.)

it runs pretty cleanly from outward-oriented attachment anxiety ('caterina won't even want me back like this, she won't recognize me (the same way I no longer recognize myself)) and gradually deeper inwards until we reach self-image and self worth. or you know, the harrowing basic lack of it lol.

"careful -- they'll know we're not right," spite says in one of their first scenes... but clearly, some very deep part of lucanis has feared or suspected for much longer than that that there's something inherently not right at the core of him, way before any demon entered the picture. and the voice he gives those lines to is the person who should know him better than anyone in the world, who he has loved more than anyone in the world -- and who deliberately chose to hurt him so horrifically anyway. 'It's better if I'm just a monster and deserved what happened than it is to allow for the idea that the brother I love doesn't really exist and maybe never did'. it's better if he's fundamentally flawed in some way that needed fixing to help him survive, and that's why caterina chose to hurt him again and again -- out of love. (this one I think he might have a very sad wakeup call on one day if he ever ends up with the responsibility and care of a child of his own in some way and realizes just how alien the idea of ever intentionally hurting them for any reason is to him. oh buddy. also interesting that he keeps caterina as the outermost lock -- there IS a distance he keeps there that he hasn't with illario. he doesn't resent her 'anymore' he says, but he also keeps her carefully further away from his deepest self.)

as far as I could tell the only note in the mind prison that's fully hidden and needs to be uncovered is the sad painful helpless stupid little truth that even after all this, even knowing what happened... he still loves his brother. is there anything illario could ever do that would make lucanis completely stop loving him, do you think? sometimes the trouble with unconditional love is that it is, well. unconditional, even when some terms and conditions probably would have been in order haha.

that's the pattern you see there again and again; he would rather destroy and abandon and imprison himself at every turn than let go of love, even when it's just scraps, even when there's only ever enough of it to hurt him. it's only when rook shows up and as it were takes his hand and walks along with him that he can entertain the idea of changing the story of what walking out the door might mean in the end.

[tiiracotta]

He did not want you to see that 🥺 It made him sad

[trialsofthedas]

SPOILERS FOR VEILGUARD —>

For those of you who have played and/or watched the scene that takes place after the dragon attack if you are a crow!rook who chose to save minrathous, you know this little line Viago throws at you?

“Because you always think of something. You always do. Except this time.”

Once again, I’m asking you guys to think about Lucanis having to tell Viago that rook is missing post-tearstone island. Because they don’t know where Rook is. They don’t even know if Rook is alive. All they know is they killed one of the gods, they did it, but the smoke cleared and solas is free but Rook is gone. and it’s WEEKS according to that Bellara romance scene.

Viago refuses to believe Rook is gone. Not Rook. Not the stubborn little idiot who had more lives than the feral street cats of treviso they so loved to pet. Not the little crow who spent years following Viago around with one hand always fisted in his cape until it was beat out of them to not show that kind of weakness. Not the little scrap of a being that succeeded for always being quick, but fell for their mouth that ran that much quicker. Not Rook, who he sent away to learn patience, to get them out of the hot seat and away from the other houses who wanted their head. Rook, who fought and won against gods and dragons and the blight. Not a crow who always completes their contract. Not Rook who was supposed to come home.

Not Rook. So Viago refuses to believe it. The first few days he clings so hard to the mantra. “Rook always thinks of something.” And they will come back and laugh and laugh and laugh at how worried Viago was and Viago will sigh and ring their neck and slip poison into their food to make sure they’ve been keeping up with their daily antivenoms— and Rook will be there.

But those days turn into a week, and then into two, and Viago hasn’t received any update from this so called ‘veilguard’ and all of the sudden “Rook always thinks of something.” is crumbling because what if this is the exception? this is the “except this time.” Because it is always until it’s not. and there is no time to truly mourn is there? there is still one god left to slay and very little time left to do it.

And Viago will fight. The loss of his… the loss to House de Riva is felt, but Viago is a professional. His wings are not clipped. ( his feathers are broken, hard shafts digging in and pulling blood from oozing cuts. they need clipped, groomed, removed. but his wings still work. they just hurt. ) He will finish this contract, in their name if nothing else.

But Viago let himself forget. “Rook always thinks of something.” And he let himself doubt and underestimate when he swore he would never be caught by those things again. but maybe this once, it’s okay. it’s okay because Rook stands in front of him, alive. Broken, but alive.

because a Crow always completes their contract, and a Rook will always come home to bother Viago.

Until they don’t

[xplore-the-unknwn]

"Am I not Merciful?" - Joaquin Phoenix as Commodus (Gladiator, 2000)

Pt. 1, Pt. 2

[opens-up-4-nobody]

Suspirium - Thom York

[squuote]

all anya, nothing else. smiles

[lilyimmsim]

the crows would have absolutely loved monopoly

[theoldgaylion]

It makes me so sad that some people don't get Lucanis' ways to show affection. I mean... This man has been raised and taught to be an assassin, to show zero emotions towards his contracts and enemies. And Caterina isn't the warmest parent figure out there, right? So Lucanis has been neglected physical contact and words of appreciation (platonic and romantic) for most of his life, that shit carves a hole within you that it's hard to fill, even with the right person. Because I think Caterina only praised him when he did a good job. Plus he being demisexual doesn't help in that area. His only ways to express his feelings are acts of service and promises, and that's what he does with Rook, he pours all his devotion in their relationship even if he struggles with the romantic sphere and PDA.... Also, add being held hostage for a year and having to deal with a demon that you couldn't control before idk yesterday? He makes me so emotional...

[thesummerstorms]

Rook de Riva: *grabbing the companions by the back of their collars and dragging them back out of the Diamond towards the Eluvian* Nope. No. I have been home less than twenty four hours; I am not dealing with this again.

[evellynssocbrainrot]

Kaz never cried once, has anyone else noticed this? And he went through living hell as he was beaten bloody, tortured, didn't rest or sleep for days, was haunted by his past over and over again, suffered panic attacks, had to say goodbye to Inej, watched other people get close to her and it hurt because he couldn't, was in immense emotional and physical pain, book-wise and show-wise, but he never cried once.