#sarai balitang

[where-our-stories-start]

[malkaleh]

I think it was @emilykaldwen who did an OC DNA (of characters that the OC has vibes of) and I got late night thoughts for the Boleyn-Tudor-Cromwell kids and:

Tommy

Book (and book is key): Faramir, Elrond and a dash of Aragorn.

There is a little bit of Nikolai Lantsov (mostly the ‘boy with the golden spirit full of light and hope’ quote)

Idril Celebrindal + Book!Arwen

George

Kaz Brekker

Miryem from Spinning Silver

Doran Martell (my impression from reading fic with him in it but)

The rest of Nikolai Lantsov, mostly the scheming.

Irina from Spinning Silver

George Cooper

William (Liam)

Jesper Fahey

Margaret (Meg)

Alanna The Lionness

Arya Stark (impression from reading fic with her in it)

Sarai Balitang

Owen

Zoya

Wylan

Also Kaz Brekker

Nealan of Queenscove (HOLY SHIT THE VIBES. Except 1000% more murder)

Edmund

Thor (MCU) but very specifically Thor from a friends AU verse version of Thor.

If Mattias Helver wasn’t bought up where he was but just got to be loving and Giant and Thoughtful.

Raoul of Goldenlake

Pippa

Cinderella

Elia Martell (again fic reading impression but)

Sara Crewe

Me But Better Basically

Also a touch of Dovasari Balitang and Princess Kalasin.

[love-scenario-rp]

WANTED: older sister for charmed member dove balitang

29+, meng jia/open, female, sarai balitang from tricksters queen preferred

a former member of cm group babygirlz, she blew the whistle on her leader’s blackmail scheme which resulted in babygirlz’ disbandment

cm promised her a solo career, but she got tired of waiting and eloped with a medical student in 2018

has finally returned to korea for a new chapter with her family and possibly even her entertainment career

[goodgrammaritan]

"She's half in love with him," Dove said, her eyes on the man who rode between her sister and stepmother. "They'd do more than talk if the duchess left them alone."

"Only half in love?" To Aly it seemed as if Sarai was head over heels.

"She can't forget his money problems," Dove commented. "I'm not helping. Whenever she starts to gush I mention his debts."

Trickster's Choice by Tamora Pierce

Dove, ever helpful and practical.

[youareiron-andyouarestrong]

@shewhoisneondaisies look it’s Sarai and Dove

[lichensys]

These girls are always my favs for warmup sketches

[pirates-swoop]

Drew some Tortall characters last night. Alanna, Trickster’s Choice time Thayet at a party or something Theyet again but more casual Sarai during Trickster’s Queen

[incorrect-tortall-quotes]

I’m not doing anything else for men today.

Sarai Balitang

[unculturedmamoswine]

Tortall Daemon AU: Dove and Sarai

I got a request from @meallaaoi (whom I can't tag for some reason) to do Dovasary Balitang for my daemon AU, so here she is! Now featuring bonus Saraiyu content!

Dove’s daemon is a Korat, a domestic cat breed native to Thailand in real life, and the Copper Isles in-universe. Unlike many breeds of Asia, the Korat hasn’t changed its appearance much over the centuries and therefore is likely to look the way actual cats of the Copper Isles would look. Contrast with, say, the Siamese, which has changed a lot due to Western breeding (or Eastern breeding, as it would be in the Tortall verse, since the white colonizers come from the Eastern Lands.)

Dove’s daemon would be the traditional solid blue color, with a round face and green eyes. I like this because, although I can’t find canon evidence of it, I always pictured little Dove with a cute round face. (Seriously, did I make this up? I swore it was canon, but it’s not on the wiki.) It was important to me that I choose an animal that related back to Dove’s status as a Raka noblewoman, and since Dove is described as cat-like in canon, it seemed appropriate.

Cats in general are seen as a very respectable daemon shape for noblewomen in Eastern society in my AU. (Again, a reminder that ‘Eastern’ in the Tortall universe means places like Tortall and Galla.) Cats are seen as clever, clean, proper, intelligent, domestic, and if they represent a fancy breed, they can be seen as ‘status’ daemons. Dove is quite politic, but she’s also subversive enough to participate in a coup intended to overthrow the rulers of her nation, so having a cat daemon, which would be outwardly normal for a noblewoman, but having that cat be a patriotic symbol of the Isles, fits her well.

As Dove lives in, and has been forced to navigate, an extremely tricky political situation, her daemon didn’t waste time, settling at the age of twelve, just after Aly is purchased by the Balitangs. The usual celebration of a noble’s settling would be foregone by her family, since they would be quickly scrambling to escape to their banishment in Tanair at the time. Seeing Dove’s calm reaction to this, and her lack of a spoiled tantrum, and the way Sarai angrily advocates that Dove deserves a way to mark the occasion, would be one of Aly’s first impressions of the sisters.

Speaking of Sarai, her daemon is a jaguar, to carry through the idea of Sarai as the flashier, more dangerous sister. The jaguar daemon is dramatic and beautiful, and reflects Sarai’s more combat-oriented personality. She’s dangerous, just like the Jaguar Goddess who is the goddess of war on the Isles. Her daemon is also more eye-catching than her sister’s, since Sarai is paid a lot of attention by others and also genuinely enjoys much of this attention.

She’s also painted, in canon, as being quite similar to Alanna: she’s passionate and fierce and not good at holding her tongue. She’s an action hero in a world that doesn’t want her to be one, which is why she is so unsuitable for the throne, much like how Alanna would not have made a good queen for Jon, so giving them both big cat daemons is an intentional parallel. Unlike Dove, Sarai’s demon is not domestic, nor domesticable.

[randomthingsthatilike1]

I think a lot about how Sarai eloped to the Copper Isles with her new husband, the Imperial Healer, and how that would bring her into direct contact with the Empress Kalasin--a healer, the former princess of Tortall, and childhood friend of Alianne of Pirate's Swoop.

like. Aly told stories of both the royal family and her own to the Balitangs that an average commoner would ever know about and even palace staff and all of a sudden this girl from the copper isles knows all of this info????

So Kalisan asks how she heard about all of this and Sarai mentions her sisters maid, Aly

Like

Thayet didn't raise a fool. A girl named Aly who has been missing for months and lbr she prob would have known about Aly being missing but maybe not that she had been found.

and Kalisan who grew up with Aly, would have put the pieces together that for some reason Aly is masquerading as a maid to do something and it is very obvious Sarai knows nothing about this like

Imagine Kalasin's awkwardness how do u explain this to someone

Imagine when it all comes out and if Aly ever came to visit and Aly is like Kali!!!!!!!! I've missed you!

Sarai: hey what the fuck

[ijustwanttoreblogthings]

Daughter of the Lioness: Dovasary Balitang

"You told me curiosity was healthy,” she said. “Is that confined only to books and nature? Sarai would just have told me anyway. I’d have made her.”

[where-our-stories-start]

In a Time of Fear, the One Who I Promised will come to the raka, bearing glory in her train and justice in her hand. She will restore the god to his proper temple and his children to her right hand. She will be twice royal, wise and beloved, a living emblem of truth to her people. She will be attended by the wise one, the cunning one, the strong one, the warrior, and the crows. She will give a home to all, and the Kudarung will fly in her honor.

[kingedmundsroyalmurder]

While I was at my mom’s house over the weekend my brother and I had a series of long, rambly conversations about Tortall, and one of the things I came away with is that I really want a series rewrite of Trickster that writes out Aly and tells the entire story from Dove’s perspective. The first book could focus on Dove moving to Tenair and negotiating her relationships with Winna and Mequin and Sarai but also having her eyes opened a bit to the realities of her country. Because she was just a kid when they moved, really, albeit an extremely perceptive kid, and I don’t know quite how much social consciousness she’d developed yet. But on Tenair it’s hard to avoid. On Tenair there is no barrier between her family and the locals, not really, and Dove’s the kid of person who listens. So Dove hears about how the local Raka live. She sees the tensions between the Raka and the Luarin in the villages and on the estate. And she sees how they all watch Sarai, silently, constantly, expectantly.

She watches, and she listens, and she talks it over with her father -- not all of it, not the stuff about Sarai, but the racial politics. And he looks at her and sighs, because she’s twelve and he loves her and she shouldn’t have to think about these things, but he talks with her about it, because she’s half Raka and will inherit this world his ancestors built and deserves to know about it. And Mequen’s a moderate, a believer, someone who puts all of his faith in his friends and truly, genuinely believes that the current system can be fixed. He knows more than he lets on about the prophecy and about his family -- he and Sarguani talked about it once, just once, in hushed voices, when they found out that her first child would be a daughter -- but he desperately wants to believe -- needs to believe -- that there is a peaceful way.

But then Bronau attacks, and Mequen is killed by a man he considered nearly a brother, and Dove realizes that they cannot count on the system to protect them. She already knows that the crown actively despises the Raka; now she realizes that the crown cares only slightly more for the Luarin, for the nobility, for its own blood relations. She goes to find Ulasim the very next day.

The second book can stay basically the same. The Balitang family goes back to Rajmuat. Dove, a member of the Raka conspiracy in her own right by now, a young lady rather than a child, takes on a more active role against Ulasim’s wishes. She has the blood as much as her sister, and she will not be part of any regime that doesn’t talk to the people. Ulasim, who sees in her the same fire as he sees in Sarai, as he saw in Sarugani, backs down.

And so things escalate. Navigating the regent’s court, from Dove’s perspective, would be heartbreaking and fascinating and infuriating. Gone is the detached observational tone we get from Aly. Instead we watch as Dove swallows the insults and the condescension. We watch as Dove’s little brother befriends the young king, as Dove herself makes conversation with Taybur and slowly, unwillingly, comes to the heartwrenching realization that both boys are in terrible danger and that there is only so much she can do to protect them. Her influence only goes so far, and she knows enough of the rebellion, of its scope and its stakes, to know how much she would be asking of them if she asked for mercy. 

Sarai, proud, headstrong, passionate, chafing desperately under the expectations placed upon her by everyone, takes her life into her own hands and flees. Dove reads her farewell letter and sees in the eyes of every Raka in that room that, in their minds, all is ruined. She lifts her head and sticks out her chin and, the moment they return to Rajmuat, reminds them that Sarai was not Sarugani’s only daughter. They argue -- she is too young, she is too serious, she does not know what a burden she will be taking up -- but she stands her ground and, in the end, whether because they believe in her or because they have run out of options, the leaders of the rebellion accept her as their future queen.

The regents -- guided by Kyprioth, who cares nothing for individual lives, who plays a game of chess on a cosmic scale and sees his chosen as pawns and barely notices anyone else -- give the order to create a storm. The king’s ship is dashed to pieces by the waves. Dove watches Winna, watches Taybur, watches the Raka leaders, and does not know how to feel. She goes to the rebellion’s leaders later, after she has put Winna to bed, and looks at them, her face still wet with tears, her gown a mess from the long wait in the storm, and says that she will not start her reign with the blood of children. She cannot -- will not -- ask for a bloodless revolution. Her people have gone through too much and the Luarin hold their power too jealously. But this, the murder of children for no crime other than the blood flowing through their veins, cannot be a precedent, cannot be a roadmap for things to come. Someone says something about the God, and Dove glances up towards the ceiling and says, to both the Raka and to Kyprioth, that if the God has a problem with that he can deal with her directly.

(He does. He comes to see her that night, in all his glory, comes to meet the girl who will free him from his shackles. He takes her on a tour of the Isles, soars across emerald jungles and sparkling seas, and tells her that soon it will all be hers. She shakes her head and says that, no, soon it will be theirs, and he looks at her like he’s never seen her before before sweeping her up into a hug.)

Dove dances through the minefield that is the royal court, learns from Ulasim how to rule and from the regents how not to, studies history and economy and geography, talks to shopkeepers and sailors and beggars. She watches as the crown soldiers trample the poor, notes how they mow down Raka and Luarin alike, and weaves this into her conversations. With growing rapidity, Rajmuat comes to a boiling point.

And then it happens. The riot spreads and becomes open revolt. Dove flies a kudarung over the city and when she lands the rebellion leaders welcome her as their Queen. She watches, safely in the skies, watches as her people fight and bleed, ostensibly for her but truly for themselves, for their own freedom and dignity, for their children and grandchildren. Even as she lands before the Grey Palace, before Taybur opens its doors and offers it to her without a fight, Dove swears that she will not let her people down.

[contre-qui]

Book 1 of 2019: Trickster's Queen

Welcome to books of 2019!! I liked the series so much last year that I decided to start a new one this year! To start the year off, we have:

Trickster's Queen by Tamora Pierce

This was the sequel to Trickster's Choice (you can find that book review here) and closes out the duet. Trickster's Queen follows Aly once again as the tensions in the Copper Isles come to a head. Amidst all the chaos, Aly realizes she will soon have to make a choice as to what to do once one of the Balitang sisters sits on the throne. Will she go home? Or will she stay with them? And which sister will it be? Charming Sarai or clever Dove? With tensions rising and plots to set a rival house in power, Aly has to balance more than ever before to keep everyone safe and ensure the prohecy comes to pass.

This was a very satisfying sequel. I wasn't sure until the very end what choice Aly would make, so that surprise was nice. The duet felt complete and not dragged out past what was necessary, which was also nice. I appreciate an author who knows when to stop. If you're looking for an easy fantasy action with a romantic subplot, you've got the right author.

Trigger warnings for fighting, character death, injury, and mentions of sex.

My final opinion: A very nice way to start off Books of 2019!

[goodgrammaritan]

No wonder Sarai falls for Zaimid. He doesn't compete with her other suitors, he gets in good with her grandfather and great aunt, he beats her at horse racing (imagine that!), and then he heals commoners after a riot. She had no chance.

[dorotheian]

Numair is Dr. Strange of course. I see Daine as more of a Spidergirl, perhaps. She transforms, sure, but she's controlled, unlike Hulk. And she's easy to underestimate and a friend of nearly everyone. Could also merge her with Hawkeye or Green Arrow's traits? Ozorne - Thanos. Or evil Deadpool.

Alanna is....Captain America? (Little turned big; ready to throwdown with anybody; stuff is personal; trained soldier; chief defender and critic of Tortall.) But, like, she and Thom maybe also have a Maximoff twin thing going on. Duke Roger may or may not be Vision.

George is probably level with Coulson as head of SHIELD (no powers of his own but cleverness, luck, planning, and fiercely loyal allies). Which makes Myles Nick Fury. I could see Rosto as a Luke Cage type. Beka as Batman makes sense.

The Balitang girls (Dove and Sarai) might work with the Black Panther mythos. Aly herself....Jessica Jones maybe, or Black Widow. Or Negasonic Teenage Warhead.

Because I don’t learn, here’s some more tortall shitposting:

If the world of superheroes and tortallans merged somehow, not like a crossover but like if our fav characters were living out the plot lines of various Marvel/DC character (but tortall based world, let’s assume magic fills the plot holes):

Which superheroes would our tortallans characters be, and why?

I’ll go first:

I think Jon is clearly an Iron Man type. Lotta angst and parental baggage? Check. Playboy reputation? Check. Strong leader but flawed by stubbornness and pride? Check. Married someone way too cool for him? Check.

Ok, now your turn, what other tortall/superhero mashups would work?