#she does have a panic attack when the fire looking flowers that eat magic come out

[the-girl-with-too-many-ideas]

(Spoilers for Lostbelt 6 and Twst Masquerade event)

Ok, but the Masquerade event would be ptsd-hell for castoria.

Castoria would be reminded too much of the Bells of Pilgrimage. She flinches when the Bell of Solace rings and is always on the verge of a panic attack as its magic washes over her. The only thing stopping her from a breakdown is the fact that it doesn't ring for her.

The first time she sees the Bell of Solace, she can't help but think, 'Did someone else have to carry their friend's body and use it to make it?'

Then, when the magic eating flowers come out, and it looks like the city is on fire, she has flashbacks of Fae Britain burning as Barghest marches through draining all energy on her way.

Overall, Castoria does not have a good time.

[ladyofasoiaf]

Jon ‘One Eye’ & Sansa Stark

In this meta I will try to point out the clues of Jon’s death- warging into his direwolf- coming back to life process. 

Our main hint is going to be : ONE EYE motifs... 

And interestingly this hint is always close to Sansa... 

[Most of these clues etc have been already examined by many people but I will try to put them all in order to show the pattern..]

A GAME OF THRONES:

Waymar Royce

Waymar Royce appearence and story are very similar with Jon’s. 

They look similar:

Ser Waymar Royce was the youngest son of an ancient house with too many heirs. He was a handsome youth of eighteen, grey-eyed and graceful and slender as a knife.

[AGOT; Prologue]

Jon’s eyes were a grey so dark they seemed almost black, but there was little they did not see. He was of an age with Robb, but they did not look alike. Jon was slender where Robb was muscular, dark where Robb was fair, graceful and quick where his half brother was strong and fast.  

[AGOT; Bran I]

They are both young men of Night’s Watch but they were not very welcomed by their other black brothers:

His cloak was his crowning glory; sable, thick and black and soft as sin. “Bet he killed them all himself, he did,” Gared told the barracks over wine, “twisted their little heads off, our mighty warrior.” They had all shared the laugh. It is hard to take orders from a man you laughed at in your cups, Will reflected as he sat shivering atop his garron. Gared must have felt the same.

[AGOT; Prologue]

“Yes, life,” Noye said. “A long life or a short one, it’s up to you, Snow. The road you’re walking, one of your brothers will slit your throat for you one night.” “They’re not my brothers,” Jon snapped. “They hate me because I’m better than they are.” “No. They hate you because you act like you’re better than they are. They look at you and see a castle-bred bastard who thinks he’s a lordling.” The armorer leaned close. “You’re no lordling. Remember that. You’re a Snow, not a Stark. You’re a bastard and a bully.”

[AGOT; Jon III]

Others are a very important part of Jon’s arc and story and Waymar meets with them in Prologue:

Ser Waymar met him bravely. “Dance with me then.” He lifted his sword high over his head, defiant. His hands trembled from the weight of it, or perhaps from the cold. Yet in that moment, Will thought, he was a boy no longer, but a man of the Night’s Watch.

[AGOT; Prologue]

This phrase also reminds us Jon:

It is more than impatience, Jon realized. They are afraid. Warriors, spearwives, raiders, they are frightened of those woods, of shadows moving through the trees. They want to put the Wall between them before the night descends. 

A snowflake danced upon the air. Then another. Dance with me, Jon Snow, he thought. You’ll dance with me anon.

[ADWD; Jon XII]

In Prologue, Waymar gets killed by Others:

Royce’s body lay facedown in the snow, one arm out-flung. The thick sable cloak had been slashed in a dozen places. Lying dead like that, you saw how young he was. A boy.

[AGOT; Prologue]

And Jon dies in ADWD:

Jon fell to his knees. He found the dagger’s hilt and wrenched it free. In the cold night air the wound was smoking. “Ghost,” he whispered. Pain washed over him. Stick them with the pointy end. When the third dagger took him between the shoulder blades, he gave a grunt and fell face-first into the snow. He never felt the fourth knife. Only the cold …

[ADWD; Jon XIII]

But Waymar comes back to life as a wight with ‘ONE EYE’:

Will rose. Ser Waymar Royce stood over him. His fine clothes were a tatter, his face a ruin. A shard from his sword transfixed the blind white pupil of his left eye. The right eye was open. The pupil burned blue. It saw.

[AGOT; Prologue]

So: A young man of Night’s Watch who looks like Jon dies and comes back to life with ONE EYE. 

Let’s continue with the second book...

A CLASH OF KINGS:

Orell

Orell is Wildling who is also a skinchanger. His animal is an EAGLE. 

Jon kills Orell in ACOK; Jon VI:

Jon nodded toward the one by the fire. It felt queer, picking a man to kill. 

[...]

Jon’s man leapt to his feet, thrusting at his face with a burning brand. He could feel the heat of the flames as he flinched back. Out of the corner of his eye, he saw the sleeper stirring, and knew he must finish his man quick. When the brand swung again, he bulled into it, swinging the bastard sword with both hands. The Valyrian steel sheared through leather, fur, wool, and flesh, but when the wildling fell he twisted, ripping the sword from Jon’s grasp. 

[...]

“You ought to burn them you killed,” said Ygritte.

[ACOK; Jon VI]

But due to the magic of skinchanging, a portion of Orell’s consciousness remained in the eagle, which developed a fierce hatred for Jon.

And in ACOK; Jon VII he dreams of an eagle attacking him and people talk about vargs and skinchangers:

Then a sudden gust of cold made his fur stand up, and the air thrilled to the sound of wings. As he lifted his eyes to the ice-white mountain heights above, a shadow plummeted out of the sky. A shrill scream split the air. He glimpsed blue-grey pinions spread wide, shutting out the sun… “Ghost!” Jon shouted, sitting up. He could still feel the talons, the pain. “Ghost, to me!” Ebben appeared, grabbed him, shook him. “Quiet! You mean to bring the wildlings down on us? What’s wrong with you, boy?” “A dream,” said Jon feebly. “I was Ghost, I was on the edge of the mountain looking down on a frozen river, and something attacked me. A bird… an eagle, I think…”

[...]

“Skinchanger?” said Ebben grimly, looking at the Halfhand. Does he mean the eagle? Jon wondered. Or me? Skinchangers and wargs belonged in Old Nan’s stories, not in the world he had lived in all his life. Yet here, in this strange bleak wilderness of rock and ice, it was not hard to believe.

[ACOK; Jon VII]

So: There is a skinchanger who dies because of Jon but a part of him keeps living in his animal: eagle. 

The interesting thing is that between these two Jon chapters (Orell and eagle dream) comes a very important Sansa chapter which has many parallels with Jon VI chapter...

An example of parallels:

[…] ‘All I ask is a flower,’ Bael answered, ‘the fairest flower that blooms in the gardens o’ Winterfell.”

“Now as it happened the winter roses had only then come into bloom, and no flower is so rare nor precious…  

[ACOK; Jon VI]

Sansa lowered her head. “The blood frightened me.”

“The blood is the seal of your womanhood. Lady Catelyn might have prepared you. You’ve had your first flowering, no more.”

Sansa had never felt less flowery. “My lady mother told me, but I… I thought it would be different.”  

[ACOK; Sansa IV]

For more, please check: Jonsa Book Hints: B5 

In this chapter Sansa says she wants to be loved and Cersei warns her that “love kills too...” Next chapter is Jon with his eagle dreams and warging abilities:

A half smile flickered across the queen’s face. “[…]Robert wanted to be loved. My brother Tyrion has the same disease. Do you want to be loved, Sansa?”

“Everyone wants to be loved.”

“I see flowering hasn’t made you any brighter,” said Cersei. “Sansa, permit me to share a bit of womanly wisdom with you on this very special day. Love is poison. A sweet poison, yes, but it will kill you all the same.”  

[ACOK; Sansa IV]

Let’s move on to third book...

A STORM OF SWORDS:

Orell and Wargs

In ASOS; Jon I, we learn the name of the Wildling that Jon has killed in ACOK; Jon VI:

“He slew Qhorin Halfhand,” said Longspear Ryk. “Him and that wolf o’ his.”

“And did for Orell too,” said Rattleshirt.

“The lad’s a warg, or close enough,” put in Ragwyle, the big spearwife. “His wolf took a piece o’ Halfhand’s leg.”

[...]

“What’s this?” he said. “A crow?”

“The black bastard what gutted Orell,” said Rattleshirt, “and a bloody warg as well.”

“You were to kill them all.”

“This one come over,” explained Ygritte. “He slew Qhorin Halfhand with his own hand.”

[ASOS; Jon I]

This Jon chapter comes after ASOS; Sansa I. 

And these chapters have many parallels such as:

Sansa knelt at the feet of her future queen. “You do me great honor, Your Grace.” “Won’t you call me Margaery? Please, rise. Loras, help the Lady Sansa to her feet. Might I call you Sansa?”  

[ASOS; Sansa I]  

“I would be pleased to eat, Your Grace. And thank you.”

“Your Grace?” The king smiled. “That’s not a style one often hears from the lips of the free folk. I’m Mance to most, The Mance to some. Will you take a horn of mead?”  

[ASOS; Jon I]

For more, please check: Jonsa Book Hints: C1

We also learn about Sansa’s new betrothed: Willas Tyrell.. 

Willas has a bad leg and so does Jon, in ASOS:

“Willas has a bad leg but a good heart,” said Margaery. “He used to read to me when I was a little girl, and draw me pictures of the stars. You will love him as much as we do, Sansa.”

[ASOS; Sansa I]

If the mare had gone down, he would have been doomed. “A lucky thing my leg got in the way,” he muttered.

He rested for a while to let the horse graze. She did not wander far. That was good. Hobbled with a bad leg, he could never have caught her.

[ASOS; Jon V]

Let’s keep reading...

In ASOS; Jon II chapter Jon’s eagle dream from ACOK comes true and Orell’s eagle attacks Jon’s eye:

He could still hear wings, though the eagle was not in sight. Half his world was black. “My eye,” he said in sudden panic, raising a hand to his face.

“It’s only blood, Jon Snow. He missed the eye, just ripped your skin up some.”

[…]

Can a bird hate? Jon had slain the wilding Orell, but some part of the man remained within the eagle. The golden eyes looked out on him with cold malevolence.

[…]

I will need to get this tended, he thought, but not just now. Let the King-beyond-the-Wall see what his eagle did to me.

[…]

The look Mance gave Jon was grim and cold. “What happened to your face?”

Ygritte said, “Orell tried to take his eye out.”

“It was him I asked. Has he lost his tongue? Perhaps he should, to spare us further lies.”

Styr the Magnar drew a long knife. “The boy might see more clear with one eye, instead of two.”

“Would you like to keep your eye, Jon?” asked the King-beyond-the-Wall. “If so, tell me how many they were. And try and speak the truth this time, Bastard of Winterfell.”

Jon’s throat was dry. “My lord… what…”

[ASOS; Jon II]

Jon almosts loses his ‘one eye’ and becomes Jon ‘One Eye’ Snow because of this attack..

After this eagle attack Jon chapter comes ASOS; Sansa II 

And these chapters have many parallels such as:

Jon wheeled and followed Tormund back toward the head of the column, his new cloak hanging heavy from his shoulders. It was made of unwashed sheepskins, worn fleece side in, as the wildlings suggested.

[…]  

“I wear the cloak you gave me, Your Grace.”  

[ASOS; Jon II]

A new gown?” she said, as wary as she was astonished.

“More lovely than any you have worn, my lady,” the old woman promised. She measured Sansa’s hips with a length of knotted string. “All silk and Myrish lace, with satin linings. You will be very beautiful. The queen herself has commanded it.”

“Which queen?” Margaery was not yet Joff’s queen, but she had been Renly’s. Or did she mean the Queen of Thorns? Or…“The Queen Regent, to be sure.”  

[ASOS; Sansa II]

For more, please check: Jonsa Book Hints: C2

And after the chapter of an eagle attacks Jon’s eye we learn in next chapter that Sansa’s betrothed Willas Tyrell flies EAGLES:

“Willas has the best birds in the Seven Kingdoms,” Margaery said when the two of them were briefly alone. “He flies an eagle sometimes. You will see, Sansa.” 

[ASOS; Sansa II]

Why is Almost One Eye Jon and Sansa Stark being near to each other important?

Because the first Sansa Stark in Stark family tree was married with her half-uncle Jonnel ‘One Eye’ Stark:

So another Sansa being close to another Stark family member who almost had lost his one eye sounds interesting. 

Well, Jon didn’t lose his eye but his face got scarred:

He had almost forgotten about his face. “A skinchanger tried to rip out my eye.”

Noye frowned. “Scarred or smooth, it’s a face I thought I’d seen the last of. We heard you’d gone over to Mance Rayder.”

[ASOS; Jon VI]

Who else has a scarred face? Sansa’s husband- Tyrion Lannister:

“I like your scar.” She traced it with her finger. “It makes you look very fierce and strong.”

He laughed. “Very ugly, you mean.”

“M’lord will never be ugly in my eyes.” She kissed the scab that covered the ragged stub of his nose.

[ASOS; Tyrion II]

Varamyr 

What happens to this eagle later?

Skinchanger, Varamyr Sixskins, takes control of Orell’s eagle. Varamyr uses the eagle to scout Castle Black and spots Stannis Baratheon’s arrival at the Wall.

The eagle bursts into flames during the attack on Castle Black with Melisandre claiming she was responsible. 

The skinchanger was grey-faced, round-shouldered, and bald, a mouse of a man with a wolfling’s eyes. “Once a horse is broken to the saddle, any man can mount him,” he said in a soft voice. “Once a beast’s been joined to a man, any skinchanger can slip inside and ride him. Orell was withering inside his feathers, so I took the eagle for my own. But the joining works both ways, warg. Orell lives inside me now, whispering how much he hates you. And I can soar above the Wall, and see with eagle eyes.”

[...]

“Banners,” he heard Varamyr murmur, “I see golden banners, oh . . .” A mammoth lumbered by, trumpeting, a half-dozen bowmen in the wooden tower on its back. “The king . . . no . . .”

Then the skinchanger threw back his head and screamed.The sound was shocking, ear-piercing, thick with agony. Varamyr fell, writhing, and the ’cat was screaming too.... and high, high in the eastern sky, against the wall of cloud, Jon saw the eagle burning. For a heartbeat it flamed brighter than a star, wreathed in red and gold and orange, its wings beating wildly at the air as if it could fly from the pain. Higher it flew, and higher, and higher still.

[ASOS; Jon X]

Melisandre burns the eagle. Who else got burned in the books? 

Jon Snow in AGOT:

He had burned himself more badly than he knew throwing the flaming drapes, and his right hand was swathed in silk halfway to the elbow. At the time he’d felt nothing; the agony had come after.

[AGOT; Jon VIII]

And Jon burns himself in AGOT; Jon VII:

Jon tried to shout, but his voice was gone. Staggering to his feet, he kicked the arm away and snatched the lamp from the Old Bear’s fingers. The flame flickered and almost died. “Burn!” the raven cawed. “Burn, burn, burn!”

Spinning, Jon saw the drapes he’d ripped from the window. He flung the lamp into the puddled cloth with both hands. Metal crunched, glass shattered, oil spewed, and the hangings went up in a great whoosh of flame. The heat of it on his face was sweeter than any kiss Jon had ever known. “Ghost!” he shouted.

The direwolf wrenched free and came to him as the wight struggled to rise, dark snakes spilling from the great wound in its belly. Jon plunged his hand into the flames, grabbed a fistful of the burning drapes, and whipped them at the dead man. Let it burn, he prayed as the cloth smothered the corpse, gods, please, please, let it burn.

[AGOT; Jon VII]

This Jon chapter comes after AGOT; Sansa IV:

And these two chapters have many parallels such as:

So she went to the queen instead, and poured out her heart, and Cersei had listened and thanked her sweetly … only then Ser Arys had escorted her to the high room in Maegor’s Holdfast and posted guards, and a few hours later, the fighting had begun outside.

[AGOT; Sansa IV]

They took his knife and his sword and told him he was not to leave his cell until the high officers met to decide what was to be done with him. And then they placed a guard outside his door to make certain he obeyed. His friends were not allowed to see him, but the Old Bear did relent and permit him Ghost, so he was not utterly alone.

[AGOT; Jon VII]

*

Yet somehow it seemed colder with Jeyne gone, even after she’d built a fire. She pulled a chair close to the hearth, took down one of her favorite books, and lost herself in the stories of Florian and Jonquil, of Lady Shella and the Rainbow Knight, of valiant Prince Aemon and his doomed love for his brother’s queen.

[AGOT; Sansa IV]

Yet he was trembling, violently. When had it gotten so cold?

[…]


Metal crunched, glass shattered, oil spewed, and the hangings went up in a great whoosh of flame. The heat of it on his face was sweeter than any kiss Jon had ever known. “Ghost!” he shouted.

[AGOT; Jon VII]

For more, please check: Jonsa Book Hints: A10

What happens to skinchanger Orell and warg Varamyr after the eagle burst into flames?

The incident greatly affects Varamyr and supposedly kills the remnants of Orell inside the eagle. 

After the defeat of the wildlings at the battle beneath the Wall, Varamyr has lost all his possessions in his madness from experiencing the eagle’s death; he has also lost control of his snow bear and shadowcat, but his wolves remain.

[Orell dying completely and Varamyr gets mad also reminds me another resurrected character Beric Dondarrion who also has ONE EYE and him dying for good to bring Catelyn Stark back to life... And like Varamyr, Lady Stoneheart loses her mind too... ]

Let’s move on to fourth book...

A FEAST FOR CROWS:

Jon is not even in this book? 

But Sansa is and we learn few things about her crushes:

Waymar Royce:

She had fallen wildly in love with Ser Waymar, she remembered dimly, but that was a lifetime ago, when she was a stupid little girl.

[AFFC; Alayne I]

Grrm reminds us Waymar Royce aka the biggest foreshadowing for Jon in AFFC book via Sansa’s chapter... 

Loras Tyrell:

Loras was another crush of Sansa and we learn that he got burned really bad in AFFC. 

Like the eagle and Jon. 

“Tell me,” said Margaery. “I command it.” Command it? Cersei paused a moment, then decided she would let that pass. “The defenders fell back to an inner keep once the curtain wall was taken. Loras led the attack there as well. He was doused with boiling oil.” Lady Alla turned white as chalk, and ran from the room. “The maesters are doing all they can, Lord Waters assures me, but I fear your brother is too badly burned.”

[AFFC; Cersei VIII]

More about Loras // Jon, please check: Jonsa Book Hints: A8

Let’s keep reading the fifth book...

A DANCE WITH DRAGONS:

In ADWD; Prologue Varamyr encounters with Others (just like AGOT; Prologue) and Varamyr’s body dies, but his mind lives on in his wolf One Eye. 

And Varamyr also thinks about Jon and his direwolf.. 

So we have dead warg who kept living in his animal: A WOLF whose name is ONE EYE. 

Varamyr could feel the snowflakes melting on his brow. This is not so bad as burning. Let me sleep and never wake, let me begin my second life. His wolves were close now. He could feel them. He would leave this feeble flesh behind, become one with them, hunting the night and howling at the moon. The warg would become a true wolf. Which, though?

[...]

“They say you forget,” Haggon had told him, a few weeks before his own death. “When the man’s flesh dies, his spirit lives on inside the beast, but every day his memory fades, and the beast becomes a little less a warg, a little more a wolf, until nothing of the man is left and only the beast remains.”

Varamyr knew the truth of that. When he claimed the eagle that had been Orell’s, he could feel the other skinchanger raging at his presence. Orell had been slain by the turncloak crow Jon Snow, and his hate for his killer had been so strong that Varamyr found himself hating the beastling boy as well. He had known what Snow was the moment he saw that great white direwolf stalking silent at his side. One skinchanger can always sense another. Mance should have let me take the direwolf. There would be a second life worthy of a king. He could have done it, he did not doubt. The gift was strong in Snow, but the youth was untaught, still fighting his nature when he should have gloried in it.

[...]

A sleeping direwolf raised his head to snarl at empty air. Before their hearts could beat again he had passed on, searching for his own, for One Eye, Sly, and Stalker, for his pack. His wolves would save him, he told himself. That was his last thought as a man. True death came suddenly; he felt a shock of cold, as if he had been plunged into the icy waters of a frozen lake. Then he found himself rushing over moonlit snows with his packmates close behind him. Half the world was dark. One Eye, he knew. He bayed, and Sly and Stalker gave echo. When they reached the crest the wolves paused. 

[...]

The things below moved, but did not live. One by one, they raised their heads toward the three wolves on the hill. The last to look was the thing that had been Thistle. She wore wool and fur and leather, and over that she wore a coat of hoarfrost that crackled when she moved and glistened in the moonlight. Pale pink icicles hung from her fingertips, ten long knives of frozen blood. And in the pits where her eyes had been, a pale blue light was flickering, lending her coarse features an eerie beauty they had never known in life. She sees me.

[ADWD; Prologue]

Jon dies in his last ADWD chapter and his last word was his direwolf’s name: GHOST... 

Jon fell to his knees. He found the dagger’s hilt and wrenched it free. In the cold night air the wound was smoking. “Ghost,” he whispered. Pain washed over him. Stick them with the pointy end. When the third dagger took him between the shoulder blades, he gave a grunt and fell face-first into the snow. He never felt the fourth knife. Only the cold …

[ADWD; Jon XIII]

So we have a full circle: 

It started with Agot; Prologue 

and ended with ADWD; Jon XIII

Let’s not forget that Jon’s death was foreshadowed in ASOS; Sansa VI chapter. 

Lord Petyr dismissed him with a wave, and returned to the pomegranate again as Oswell shuffled down the steps. “Tell me, Alayne—which is more dangerous, the dagger brandished by an enemy, or the hidden one pressed to your back by someone you never even see?”  

“The hidden dagger.”  

“There’s a clever girl.” He smiled, his thin lips bright red from the pomegranate seeds.  

[ASOS; Sansa VI]

Next chapter was Jon:

Fore more about Jon’s death and Sansa; please check: 

Jonsa Book Hints: C12 & E7 

“Do not be so certain.” The ruby at Melisandre’s throat gleamed red. “It is not the foes who curse you to your face that you must fear, but those who smile when you are looking and sharpen their knives when you turn your back. You would do well to keep your wolf close beside you. Ice, I see, and daggers in the dark. Blood frozen red and hard, and naked steel. It was very cold.”

“It is always cold on the Wall.”

“You think so?”

“I know so, my lady.”

“Then you know nothing, Jon Snow,” she whispered.  

[ADWD; Jon I]

In conclusion:

Jon’s death, him warging into his direwolf during his death and him coming back to life arc has been foreshadowed since AGOT; Prologue and its most obvious hints were given in ADWD; Prologue by echoing AGOT; Prologue. 

The ‘ONE EYE’ motif seems like a key hint for his resurrection. 

And Sansa is always close to this motif or she has some connections with this motif via other characters or her chapters. 

A Sansa Stark being close to another ‘ONE EYE’ Stark is interesting because of the historical couple: Jonnel ‘One Eye’ & Sansa Stark in Stark family tree.. 

Even the hints of Jon’s death can be found in Sansa chapters. 

All of these tell us that Sansa will be important in Jon’s past resurrection story. 

Thanks for reading. 

Some sources:

Waymar // Jon 

Disfigurements 

Jonnel / Sansa

Jon’s fate and losing an eye

[tradeway2]

Session 1 10 Jul 2021

We start a little later than usual today as our illustrious DM has been working hard to provide a game from scratch for us this week!

We were asked to provide him with a name, race, sub-race, and a class if we wanted to. We were not asked to draw up character sheets or determine stats and so on, and it’s been driving us (all now at least somewhat seasoned D&D players) up the wall. Matthew hops on to the chat after Joe drops the link to the game, to ask us not to open our character sheets if we sign in early. Duncan tells us he has emphasised this casual torture by having not even read the rules for his class; he likes to live on the edge.

When we sign in, we are greeted with this calming landing page (we know it's calming, because Matthew tells us it is):

Ah. Well that’s alright then.

We are told this campaign could last ten minutes or the rest of our lives; Matthew is hoping for somewhere in the middle. We have some technical issues - as is to be expected. Roll20 is a steep learning curve. One might even call it a wall.

We’re told that this entire fiasco is based off a spoof tv show that Matthew saw late at night once and thought it would be fun to base a one-shot on. Then it got out of hand, and now has the potential to become a full campaign. Here's hoping! Without further ado, we dive in…

Cora (Ishara) stands beside a crossroads. There is a sundial at its centre; she sees the shadow pass over its face. An elven merchant passes, cart laden with water jugs. She waves, but her face is a picture of fury. The sundial's shadow disappears - it is midday. Another elven merchant passes, this one with a cart of food. She also waves, but she is in floods of tears. The sundial shows that dusk is approaching. A third elven merchant passes, with a cart full of empty glass jars. She laughs hysterically as she passes by, waving as she goes.

Night falls and the moon rises. A fourth merchant approaches, but this one does not wave. Her face is blank as she walks toward Cora - she drops a bunch of snapdragons at Cora's feet and continues walking. Cora picks the flowers up and admires them; half the bunch withers and dies, and the other half grows to twice its size. She drops them to the ground; as the new roots touch it, the earth collapses beneath her -

She awakens, to see Leslie:

He tells her he doesn’t know who she is, but she shouldn’t be sleeping here.

We all awake now, in what appears to be the ruins of a battlefield.

We are all zombies.

Huh.

We see each other as friends; in fact the word 'zombie' in Friend means 'friend'. We know this, because as it turns out, we all speak Friend.

But not Common. Hmm.

Leslie tells us his name and asks why we’re sleeping here?

We roll History checks to see if we remember anything; that will be hard for Marcus who has -3 INT.

Pilfer remembers his name, and something about a boat, and nothing else. No idea where he is or why, or who his new friends are. Ren knows that this is definitely his lute. He takes it. Will he remember how to play it?

Hilda remembers nothing about how she got here, but she remembers fighting in a war. A big one. It was important; significant to her. Marcus remembers little more than Ren. That’s definitely his rucksack, though. Milo knows something is missing but he can’t figure out what. Cora remembers her dream. There was a risk that she wouldn’t. She’s told it didn’t feel like her dream, even though she was dreaming it.

We heard voice from behind a wall saying, “Friends? Friends!” Leslie rolls his eyes.

Cora goes to the wall to see if she can lend aid to the owner of the voice. It is coming from very close to Hilda. Should she do something about it? Where are we?

Hilda rolls a nat 20 for her Perception check. (Fun new house rule: if we are using a skill or tool and roll a nat20, we gain Proficiency - ooo!)

It is carnage around us. A huge fight has happened here. Imagine the biggest battle from the LotR movies - what we see laid out before us makes that look like a boundary dispute between neighbours.

Does Ren feel peckish when he looks at the bodies? It looks like food, but food has this habit of moving around; once it stops doing that, it’s bad food. We are all aware of this; what we're looking at is No Longer Food.

There are old fires and signs of burns on the ground. Amongst all this we hear the bewildered, friendly voice again asking for help. It’s coming from the remains of a building that has been destroyed by fire or magic or something of that ilk.

Hilda goes to investigate, and Pilfer goes to look as well. It turns out Matthew meant to put us on a different map, but we have been looking at the crossroads this whole time. Whoops! We switch to the map. Technical issues, please stand by…

(Matthew, direct quote: “JOE! Make it better, help!”

Joe helps, and makes it better. We continue… )

Ren has a go at tuning his lute. He makes a Performance check. an 8! We are all suitably distracted.

The voice calls again. “Friends?”

Where is this voice, and whose is it?

Leslie introduces himself again, rather pointedly probably, and we all introduce ourselves this time. Leslie seems particularly enamoured by Milo. The voice asks us what are we going to call him?

Pilfer suggests Bingo; Bingo likes that so that’s his name now. Pilfer asks how long he’s been here? He heard us get up and before that it was dark, but before that it was quite bright. Before that it was dark, and before that it was bright. Before that there was a lot of angry people, and there was a lot of food, and now the food’s all gone. He tried to leave, but he couldn’t.

Pilfer - formerly a drow elf - is dismayed to discover that it is daytime. He panics until he finds his parasol.

Ren gets a nat20 - he now has proficiency in Investigation! (There is a limit to the number of these bonuses we can receive, we are warned.) He and Marcus and Hilda all see Bingo's problem. Pilfer, however, has got lost in Bingo’s eyes again. He’s a good looking fella.

“Would that we had met before the rot set in!”

Milo gets distracted when some food shouts at him from over the bridge - it then pegs it away. Milo wants to follow, but we are all Slow (-10feet). The food disappears into the trees. He is disappointed, and hungry. He sits on a bit of broken bridge and sulks; Leslie joins him. He offers to help him look for some more food.

Bingo is pinned in place with a spear through his sternum - he’s upright, and the spear is piercing him from above. Can we pull it out? Or him out? Marcus has a go at pulling him by the hands - and manages to get Bingo off the spear with a 19 STR check. Bingo is very pleased. Ren asks if he wants the spear back; Bingo says it’s not his. Ren takes it instead, and adds it to his inventory. He has two now.

Bingo says he’s going to find the horde.

Us, politely confused: "The what?"

The horde! It’s the best! We should totally join him.

Leslie pats Milo on the back and tells him not to be disheartened. We’ll find some food. We suspend our disbelief while Matthew puts some food on the map that we didn’t notice sneaking up on us…

Ren rolls another nat20, getting proficiency with Perception. Thanks to Milo’s alertness, the food doesn’t get the drop on him either. Pilfer’s stomach rumbles, and we roll initiative. (Marcus gets five XP for helping Bingo off the spear!)

Noticing that we appear to have noticed them, the food closest to us appears to be carrying a stick. Uh oh… Food uses tools, this is the thing we learn first. The first food seems reluctant to move towards us, so it holds an action.

Cora is up first. She shambles 20 feet, and uses her action to dash twenty more feet and gets right up to some food and zombie-groans in its ear.

Milo remembers different food, food that you have to sneak up on, so he has a go at that. He rolls a Bad stealth check, and uses all fifteen of his feet, loudly announcing what he is doing to Leslie as he goes.

A food bonks Cora on the head with a stick for 15 to hit, which does, for 2 bludgeoning damage. Another food advances towards us - he’s wobbling his arm and pointing to the food that bonked Cora on the head.

Marcus shamble-dashes toward Cora, upsetting the food that she’s in melee with. Another food tries to hit him, but misses. Marcus consoles it.

Pilfer moves forward. Can he throw a dagger? Yes he can. He hucks his knife at a food. 21 to hit! Right in the shanks. 3 piercing damage! He did not get the food in the shanks; he got it in the neck.

He feels a weird urge to snack. All the other foods look very unnerved at this development. The food isn’t quite dead, but clutching its neck with blood pouring through its fingers and making an agonized squealing noise.

Pilfer: “... Is he okay?”

Hilda waddles up to another food, the one that lurched forward at us. She gives it a smash with her greatclub for 13 to hit.

Matthew kicks himself out of the game. We won!

Moving on…

Hilda’s attack hits, for 9 bludgeoning damage. She destroys the food. Can she still eat it? As a bonus action she eats some of the food, before it spoils. (Matthew moves the token to get it out of the way. Hilda, aggrieved: “I was eating that!”)

Ren’s turn. He swings the lute around, remembering that a lute is a useful thing to have; he can’t remember what to do with it so he swings it back out of the way and gets his spear instead. He stabs at the food in front of him. He spears it successfully and goes to town before it spoils. “Yum yum.” He says grace, which sounds like a beautiful prayer to us, and like hideous gurgling to the food.

Another food rushes at Hilda, seeing the thing she just done. It natty 20s her, but the damage is only 4.

Cora swings her mace at the food in front of her, to get to the juicy filling. 11 to hit, which does, and 3 bludgeoning damage. She’s tenderised it good; that’ll melt in the mouth, that will. Fall right off the bone.

Milo has heard all this going on; he goes back up and throws a javelin at the food attacking Hilda. He crit-fails. Whoops! He gears up and swings, and throws the javelin in completely the wrong direction. He looks at Leslie, who shrugs.

"I'd have thrown that over there, if I were you."

Leslie moves up, and old Bingo’s gonna get in the game as well. (Matthew forgot to roll initiative for them on the first round. He puts them in the turn order; better odds for us, yeah!)

Cora’s food tries to hit her again, but misses. There must be delicious sauce in its eyes.

Marcus batters the food in front of him with a slam attack, not realising there’s a quarterstaff on his back that he could use. He hits and kills the food, and goes to town. It turns out that that was Pilfer’s food; he retrieves his dagger and stops for a little nibble. A fistful of the insidey-bits is a great snack-on-the-go. He has enough movement to flank another food, so he does that, and makes a slam attack against it. He has prepared another meal!

Hilda’s turn, and the meals around her are in full swing; she uses both her action and her bonus action to snack on two different foods.

(Ed, OOC: “Is it bad that this game is making me hungry?”)

Ren too decides to feast on the 'horrible visceral tapas' that surrounds him. (We are adjusting swiftly to our new circumstance.)

Cora has another go at the pudding with a slam attack, hits the wrong button, finds the right one, and hits that for 13 damage which makes contact. 8 bludgeoning! She has prepared the heck out of that meal by swinging at the head and taking it clean off.

We are out of initiative! Pilfer waves a bit of meat at Bingo and invites him to join us. Milo seasons his own meal with the spices in his bag and even washes his hands, remembering that that’s important to do before eating. Pilfer empties his waterskin and fills it with blood. If he shakes it every now and again it’ll be fine.

It turns out that our meal doesn’t seem appetising for very long, and we quickly realise that our food has spoiled.

We roll Perception checks, at Disadvantage because we’re eating. Leslie doesn’t seem interested in the food.

Pilfer asks him what’s up, why isn’t he chowing down with the rest of us? He’s eating his own meal, he hints. Ren would love to Investigate Leslie. There seem to be bits of plant coming out of wounds or open sores on his body; he catches Ren looking and explains that although he’s a Friend, he eats it a bit differently. Over a period of time. We aren’t really talking to the person-suit, we’re talking to the plant inside the body. He uses the food to get around a bit more easily. And he can eat it even though it’s gone grey. The word he uses is 'compost'.

But, he assures us, we are all Friends here.

Fair dos. So, to the horde then?

Bingo looks really excited at this. Do we know where the horde is, he asks us?

"... We don’t even know what the horde is."

If we want to know who and what we are, Leslie might know someone who knows someone…?

There is a gnawing in the back of our heads (not worms); maybe we might want to know more about ourselves than just our names. (Which - it's odd that we even know our names. That's certainly more than Bingo knew.) Hilda thinks we might not want to know; we might upset ourselves.

We can follow Bingo to the horde. Or we could go with Leslie and take Bingo with us, and do horde stuff later? We’re full now, and all the food has gone bad, so we may as well follow Leslie. We get 15 XP for eating all that food.

We walk through the battlefield and the heaps of spoiled food. Occasionally we hear shouting in the distance:

Random friend: “Friend? Friend!”

Bingo, shouting back: “I’m called Bingo!”

New Bingo: “Oh, wow! Can I be called Bingo?”

Bingo Prime: “Sure!”

(Ed returns from the kitchen with snacks, very confused to arrive back in the middle of this.)

We shuffle along with Leslie. There are a lot of Bingos about, after a while. It starts to get dark. Ren remembers he has a tail. Leslie turns to us and says he once inhabited a food with a tail. It wasn’t a grippy one, but it was quite furry. He doesn’t know what you’d call it, but it was quite entertaining to see the looks on the other foods' faces.

Leslie doesn’t like to travel overnight, so we sit down in a little sitting around circle. His eyes aren’t good in the dark. Do we feel tired…? We don’t need to sleep, but that doesn’t mean that we can’t. Every so often we hear the little Bingo exchange in the distance. (We’re going to regret this.)

We roll INT checks at Disadvantage - Marcus rolls a 16. Maybe it’s a faded memory, but he is pretty certain he remembers going to sleep in a similar situation, and one person stayed awake. He suggests to the others that one of us should stay awake; most of them don't seem to follow his train of thought. He remains awake and so does Milo; Ren paces in circles until he gets bored.

Those of the group that try to sleep, give it a go. They don’t dream exactly. Those that stay awake still get the benefits of a long rest. Yay!

(We break for tea and cigarettes and whatnot.)

Bingo lies down, seeing some of us do that, and asks what we’re doing. Those of us that stay awake roll Perception checks.

While Matthew’s computer reboots, he tells Cora about her dream.

She stands in a familiar room; the bookshelves around her are laden with ancient texts. She notices that there is no door. She starts to feel anxious. Music sounds, from a hearth that wasn't there a moment ago. There is a music box open on the stone floor. She kneels down and closes the lid, and finds herself standing in a field. Her anxiety fades to contentment as she stands in the short, but lush, green grass. About a hundred feet away, a large black stag with eyes of fire begins to charge her. She begins to float, and the stag passes harmlessly beneath her. She flies over the treetops. Behind her she sees a triangle of ravens flying in her wake. She lands, surrounded by friends and safe, and the ravens continue on.

Marcus and Milo stayed awake; Marcus was distracted, wondering what the twinkly in the sky lights do and if anyone will ever walk on the surface of one, that kind of thing. Milo sees figures that appear to be advancing towards us. Uh oh!

Is it friends or food? Milo thinks it’s almost definitely food. It did not introduce itself as Bingo. Milo alerts us all that our delivery has arrived, and we roll initiative.

Cora goes first. She nobbles one with her mace and a nat 20 for 7 bludgeoning damage. She sees some sauce come out.

Marcus Slams another one; he makes a dent in it. (He still hasn’t realised he has a quarterstaff.)

A guard attacks Hilda with a spear. Hilda, sounding mildly inconvenienced: “Nooo!” 13 hits. Things are getting a little more real. She takes 6 piercing damage and is quite poorly.

Milo wants to know if this food is human sized; it is. He shambles into one and does a slam at it, and has a go at chomping off a couple of crunchy fingers. 18 hits. Milo, extremely pleased: “Delicious!” 8 chomping damage, and he comes away with some delicious bits of food. If this guy was planning on using his spear two handed, he may have to re-think his strategy.

Leslie’s turn. He makes it quite a way out to his chosen food, but his attack misses. The food next to Cora has a go at clobbering her with a 9 - which misses.

Pilfer’s turn, and he zips down toward another food to whale on it. He rolls a dirty 20 and slams him good, also doing max damage.

Hilda's turn! 15 with her club just misses, and she’s very annoyed about it. As a bonus action she wants to still try and have a chomp, but nothing happens.

The food fighting with Marcus fails to hit him, as does the one with Leslie. Milo’s food natty 20s him for 13 damage, and he’s down. Oh no! He rolls a good CON save and pops back with 1 HP.

Another food attacks Bingo and another attacks Pilfer but misses. Ren shambles across to help our good friend Bingo by poking the food with his spear, hitting for 4.

Bingo does a slam on the food as well, but misses. Marcus misses his attack; he is marinading it in its sauce, he says. Squeezing it like a mango to check for ripeness.

Cora rolls an 18 with her mace, and 3 bludgeoning. The food looks nearly ready. She falls upon it and has a chew. (Matthew: “Gross. I like it.”)

15 hits Marcus for 7 spikin’ in the tummy. No worries; he's got four more spikin' in the tummy left. Milo’s next slam hits, doing 6 points of munching damage, eating it to the point of perfection. It runs around screaming with a little halfling zombi- friend, attached to it first; Milo sets about feasting when it lies down and stops moving.

Leslie does an attack, and prepares another meal as Matthew plays D&D by himself. Pilfer has another attack - a 15 just misses. “Curse you!”

Hilda has another go with her great club for a 17, and 10 bludgeoning damage. Her food went from raw to almost perfect in one hit. It’s still moving about a bit, but in a much more ‘ready to be food’ fashion.

Ren’s food swings at him and misses. Ren, put out: “The food's just playing with me. It's supposed to be the other way around, right?”

Pilfer’s food fumbles at him and hits, and he’s none too pleased about it. He takes two HP damage when his food pokes him. “How dare it! I’m getting pre-eating indigestion, somehow.”

Ren does another poke with his spear. “Stop moving around! It makes it harder to bite you!” Six misses, unfortunately.

Hilda’s food attacks her for 14, which hits for 5 damage and she’s down. She rolls a CON save, but fails. She is at 0HP. She will be rolling undeath saves, oh no!

Bingo slams his food and misses. Marcus prepares his food with a crunch, and begins chomping.

Cora would like to kneecap her food so it can’t escape. The kneecaps are one of the best bits. 7 damage to the food (not Marcus!) and begins to chomp as well.

Milo’s meal is going down a treat, but he notices that Hilda appears to be lying down even though her food is standing up. Is her food trying to eat her? He’s not having this; Friends are not Food! He slings his javelin at Hilda’s food. The javelin hits, and he gives it a good dressing down. “Rude!”

We don’t understand it, but the remaining food is very distressed. If we could understand the food, we'd hear it saying, “Oh my God, they’re using tools!”

Leslie dashes at full pelt, but doesn’t get far. He looks puffed out; or he would if there was breath in his body.

Pilfer slams his food for a nat20. “YES! YES! What’s that mean, do I roll damage twice? Yes! YES! Look at all that damage. Yes! I bludgeon him to the floor, I eat him.”

Hilda rolls an undeath save: a 17, yay!

The last guard takes his turn. Looking around him he realises he’s in trouble, so he legs it. Wait - Ren is still struggling with a live one, and the guard isn’t going to abandon his mate. He runs up to Ren and gives him a bit of a poke - 12 just hits him. He takes 4 points of being stabbed. However -

It is now his turn. The food that he’s stabbed looks closer to edible than the newly arrived food. He stirs his spear around in it for 23, and 6 piercing damage. His food is well prepped and looking delicious.

Bingo hasn’t had much luck prying open the last one, so he has a go at Ren’s new arrival but misses. It’s been a long day.

While Marcus is shovelling stuff into his mouth, he notices that Hilda is down. Upon seeing her, his rotting brain supplies “…food?” But he remembers that’s not right. He shuffles over and pokes her with a Medicine check of 9; he can’t figure out why she’s lying down. Yelling “Get up!” doesn’t seem to do anything.

Cora shambles over to the two of them with a handful of brain pudding, and attempts to feed it to Hilda. She rolls a Medicine check - another 9. On the plus side, it’s not like she can choke her to death.

Milo has just eaten a whole hand, so he comes over for a poke at Hilda as well. He snaps off a finger from his food and tries to poke it into her mouth. It works! He’s very pleased. This feels familiar to him.

Leslie pats still-unconscious Hilda on the head. In broad Gloucestershire accent: “There there.”

Pilfer proceeds to his second course. A dirty 20 for 6 bludgeoning, hitting it so hard on the top of the head that its neck disappears into its chest. The guard returns in kind - 9 to hit, which misses.

the guard looks worried as he looks around. “… Fuck.” We, of course, do not understand him.

Ren gets confused and tries to stab his food with his lute, but misses. Bingo misses again. It’s a wonder he’s survived this long.

Marcus natty 20s the last food, for 11 HP. "That's as many hit points as I have on a good day!"

DM: "That's as many hit points as he started with."

While we wait for Hilda to wake up, we can search for loot! Or lute! Who knows!

We leave it there, and Matthew will tell us what treasures we find on our respective food. Pilfer makes a prawn cocktail with gizzards.

[bittybattybunny]

I need more fluff before angst steals the show!!! Of all the food Hattie's shared with him, what is Snatcher's favorite? Do Snatcher and Hattie ever swim together? Has Hattie cried in front of Snatcher (and how did he respond)? Does Hattie enlist Snatcher's help to build the BIGGEST, most impressive sandcastles? Thank you for all the wonderful content for this AU, I'm LOVING IT

Oh don’t worry! It actually takes a bit before we even hit the angst in the au! I just like teasing about it because I’m living for the reactions. The fic is actually like 70% fluff with 25% angst and 5% suffering. There’s just some BIG angst moments that will hit. So don’t worry much when i’m being a lil gremlin with the angst! I just like writing it. (gods if you want angst you should hear what I’ve done to my oc Kai. Poor girl doesn't catch a break)

I just find a bit of angst makes the fluff sweeter.

also im gonna be wordy so---

okay in order!!!

Snatcher’s favorite so far has been the spicy chips she brought him! He loves spicy foods that burn his mouth to hell and back because he’s never got to experience that in the ocean eating raw kill, nor as a prince because they worried for his health (his guard would sneak him snacks sometimes; and even taught him to cook) when he becomes human; she introduces him to hot sauce and he never goes back. Poor Eclipse hates spicy food and he keeps cooking it and its suffering. He adores spicy hot Doritos and flaming hot Cheetos.

Yes all the time! Hattie loves swimming with him as he will let her rest on him when she gets tired. he also takes her to places most people cant get to because the sharks and such prevent entry! He scares sharks away just by swimming near them so he’s the best safety! He helps her find lots of cool seashells and such and even cleans them out if they have something living in it still! He even eventually helps her mother get used to the water so all three of them go swimming! (well, Hattie will swim with Snatcher, Eclipse kinda just, hangs onto him afraid of sinking.)

She has! A few times. Actually I was just writing a scene with her crying with him but that relates to a big angst so I won’t share that.

But she’s cried from falling on the dock, he freaked out and had to check her over. He did his best to wipe her tears however he was covered in salt water and made it worse. She wound up laughing in the end from his frantic attempts to comfort. She’s also cried when she was lonely as her mother had to stay at the doctor’s longer than normal and he wrapped around her until she fell asleep. When he’s able to be human again, she’s cried during thunderstorms, and he lets her curl up with him. This isn’t for a number of chapters still obvs since it’s human snatcher but have some dadtcher:

   “I already did!” She beamed, running over in game to show him. Her mother’s blue and grey house was surrounded by black roses. “I put black ones for now. But I really want to get blue roses someday.” She grinned ear to ear, gasping and dropping her controller as the lights went out with lightning. She crawled into the poor man’s lap pulling the blanket close.

    “It’s just a storm.” He said but, he kept his voice low and wrapped his arms around her pulling her close, “It will pass. You’re mom will come home, we’ll all go for a swim or something.” 

    “Can i just. Stay here for a little bit?” She whimpered as she clung to his shirt. She buried her head under his chin, tears on her eyes, “Please, snatcher?”

    He sighed, “Well, Clearly I’m not throwing you outside.” He got up, holding her, “God, how does your mother swing you around without breaking a sweat all the time?” He groaned. Carrying her to the kitchen, “Does Eclipse keep candles around?”

    Hattie shook her head from in the blanket, holding fast, “Mom doesn’t like fire.”

    He stared at her, “She doesn’t like fire. She hates water. Does your mother like anything other than you and raw meat?” He sighed, “Then is there some.. Other power lights? Something without the main lights?” 

    “I think we have flashlights in the closet.” She recalled, “But mom keeps them with her work gear mostly.”

    Giving a curt nod, he made way to the closet setting her down so he could rummage. Ropes. Climbing Gear. Shovels. Was that tnt? He stopped and turned to the blanket claude girl squinting, “Kid I didn’t ask because it’s never been on my head. What. DOES your mother do exactly?”

    She clung to him as thunder snapped and shook her head, “Mom’s a dog trainer!” She beamed through her tears, “She helps train service dogs and police dogs!” She grinned.

    He held up the, what he assumed was an explosive casing, “You don’t need a bomb for a dog. I don’t think?” He paused, he wasn’t even sure. He never trained a dog. They didn’t even really do that when he was a human. Well hunting dogs. But that was a family thing.

    “It could be stuff from when she and Grampa DJ go out.” She thought on it, she had the blanket half over Snatcher as he felt through the closet, “They go off on adventures and come back all dirty, but I like when they do, because mom won’t have to work for a long time and I can hang out with her! Sometimes she brings me cool stuff.” 

    “That so?” they must be doing something dangerous, feeling in the dark he looked to the child, “So what’s a flashlight look like?”

    “It’s the little thing I keep on my shoulder when I’m diving.” She stated.

    “Got it.” He felt around finding it and handing it to her, “Okay do the magic.”

    Taking the flashlight she clicked it on right into his eyes, illuminating the gold colors. He hissed, revealing his fangs and covered his face with his hands, “KID!” He growled.

    “Sorry!” she aimed it away and used a hand to hold his shirt, “Can we go back to the couch…”

    Rubbing his poor eyes, he got up holding her hand. Walking past the dead tv, he grabbed her switch from the dock, and picked up her discarded controller.He set them on the side table before grabbing her and falling back on the couch with her on his lap.

“I’m playing now.” He stated, putting the controllers on the main console. He set off on the island, to mainly fix Hattie’s flower power.

She rested against his chest, holding the light so it was aimed at the ceiling bouncing it off the white walls, “I worked hard.” The rain pittered outside as her voice trailed off. Soon enough as he kept one arm around her, the other focused on the game, she fell asleep. He sighed and pulled the blanket over her more. he gave her head a light kiss as he held her close. Thunder rolling outside.

It’s more like she builds the biggest impressive sand castles on him. he’ll just be napping on the beach and she’ll start piling sand on his chest and then he’s stuck there because he doesn’t want to ruin her hard work!

Ahhh thank you!!!! I’m really enjoying creating the content!!!! It’s been a while since i actually had this much fun just. doing this kinda thing. I don’t think I’ve really been this excited and worked up since gods i think when i first create Bells and Whistles (it used to be a fancomic for Summer wars, but I wound up pulling it away and it’s all it’s own standalone. I’m planning to tackle that after I finish Little Contractor and The Moon Guardian and the Lost Prince)

Like seriously this had been keeping me sane while I try not to panic at work everyday. Gotta love being super prone to panic attacks...

But it’s been a blast, plus I’m able to do something I love that I’m not super confident in! (I’m pretty shy about my writing; but everyone's been so nice and it’s uplifting and makes me want to write more)

Also it’s like really good for me art wise. I’ve gotten way better at posing and hands and such with all the sketches I do (plus the comic I’m doing for Eclipse and Snatcher) it’s so much fun!!!

Also i love reading comments and tags.

Yes im reading every tag you guys add. all of them.

Sorry i got a little wordy--! :’3c

[lettersandinkstains]

To Go Somewhere

Credit to @one-lonely-whumperfly for their prompt!

warning: mentions of attempted assault, drugs, angst, suicide. anything heavy will be under a read more!

It had been a normal night, at least, she had thought so. There wasn’t anything big planned, and her favorite little person was off gallavating around the country with her little speeches about a better future and bringing a false sense of hope to a people who have lost it so long ago. They were no longer afraid of the monsters that lurk in the shadows, no longer afraid of the magic that holds them over.

Yes, the little heroine was a pest and she had put her through so much, but one night off won’t hurt. She needs a break, and she doesn’t want to quite break the other quite yet. Besides, she’s so far behind on one of her other projects, that just focusing on destroying that girls spirit would push her back even longer.

So, she gets to work on her project--just a simple blanket because she likes to do things with her hands and even villains have hobbies. Deeply focused on her work, she doesn’t notice as her servants bustle and move about. Each thread is brighter than the other, knotting more and more.

The only thing that draws her out of her hyperfocus is a loud knock on the door. Her hearing has always been quite good--she’s not a human, after all. With a bit of curiosity (and annoyance), the witch stands up and moves with a swiftness in her steps as she goes down what seems to be so many stairs.

Upon her appearance, the maid that had answered the door shoots her a desperate look before stepping aside.

The red hair is no mistake, though it used to shine so brightly is now dulled and askew, and her skin pale. She’s leaning against the door, and can barely lift her head. She can make out a few bruises, and what looks to be a cut on her shoulder.

“And what do you need?” It would truly be an easy strike, now. Yet, she plays fair, and just killing the little heroine in this state, would not be fair.

It seems to take all the power in the other, who usually stands with her back straight, the needless pride of a human, to lift her head. Her eyes are glossy, pupils large. She opens her mouth to speak, but only air comes out.

All pretenses drop as she steps closer to the hero. “What happened?” Gently, she wraps her arms around the other woman, pulling her in and close. Briefly, those big, beautiful green eyes close, and then, re-open.

“I-I didn’t know where else to go,” She rasps out.

How stupid. “What about those people you call your friends?”

She doesn’t get an answer.

Once upon a time, the witch-queen had a heart. She used to help those who were in need, but one day, she learned that humans were selfish. They only took and took, needlessly slaughtered and harmed each other in any way they could.

When her powers got weaker and weaker, they left her. They only feared her the moment she turned on them, claimed the world as her own. Perhaps her ways were cruel, but humans are merely children to her.

Once upon a time, the witch-queen had been in love.

The heroine sleeps fitfully through the night. There are moments where she wakens in a panic, the cry that rings out in the otherwise silent room. The witch-queen remains by her side through every second, remaining there until she calms and sleeps.

The heroine, in her ever breaking pride, does not speak during the day. She barely eats and drinks, insisting on isolation. The witch-queen does not press, does not put pressure on her because there’s no point in doing so. She will speak when she’s ready--if anything, she still has a heart, but it’s only deserved for those who have worked for it.

“It wasn’t fair to you,” She says as she sits in the chair next to the bed, one night, staring at heroine whose face is scrunched up, caught up in a nightmare. What monsters have gotten into her head now that were not there before? “You’re trying to save them. And they betray you.”

It’s an echo of a familiar story. The endings might end up different, but it’s still the same song.

“So, what happened?” The witch-queen ventures to ask one day, as the heroine eats at her soup, her appetite slowly returning. “Who thought it was okay to hurt their savior?”

The heroine places the spoon back into the bowl, gently. Her head hangs low now, hair curtaining her face.

“They’re all monsters.” The witch-queen continues. “You fight for them, and they do this to you.”

“A bad apple doesn’t make a bad harvest,” The heroine finally answers, voice raspy.

“It is a sign of a bad harvet,” The witch-queen answers.

“It is a sign of nothing.”

“So you say.” But she doesn’t want to fight with the sweet heroine, who no longer has a fire in her eyes, who no longer stands proudly. She doesn’t want to kill something so broken, so prideless. There’s no fun in that.

“So I know.”

Another week passes, and the heroine is brave enough to move about by herself. She’s still quiet, she still doesn’t stand straight up, her hair is still dull. She’s still quiet. Unbeknownest to her, the witch-queen watches from a disance, follows her around. Perhaps it’s curiosity, perhaps it’s pity.

“I’m surprised you haven’t done anything yet.” The heroine says, one day, out of the blue. “I’m free range.” There’s a drip of irony in her voice, her nose scrunching up at speaking those words. “I’m available to kill.”

“I don’t attack anything helpless.”

“You’ve killed thousands.”

“I’ve purged the world of poison.”

“They were all innocent.”

“You do not know their sins.”

“You killed children, they are the least sinless of us all.”

The witch-queen stares at the heroine, who now has that same look as she did when they first met. Fierce stare, deep frown, that spark is returning somewhere. It leaves just as quickly as it came. She is overstepping her bounds, grasping onto courage that was taken away from her. It is a familiar story, surely, she’s looking into the past.

“They would have been poisoned from the ideologies of their parents.” Is all she says, though she does not disagree. She gestures to the food on the table, it is much for two. Plentiful. “Eat, there’s still food here. Do not let it spoil.”

“Do you hate all humans?” The heroine ventures to ask one day--(how long has she been here now?)--as they sit in the witch-queens library. The books are bountiful, she is never left bored.

“The sinful deserve to be die,” The witch-queen answers.

“How do you deem that?”

“Should the one who harmed you get off free?”

The heroine thinks about it for a moment. “Everyone deserves a chance,” she tries, though, the witch-queen knows what she’s thinking, because she’s had the same thoughts. She wonders if the difference will be that the heroine will continue to fight until her last dying breath for the sake of the humans.

“They will turn their backs on you when they learn of what happened.”

“You don’t know that.” The heroine argues. “They’re not all like that!”

“Where are your friends? The ones you’ve traveled with.” The question she never gets an answer to. The question the heroine will avoid, casting her eyes down, the light disappearing once again. “They’ve turned their backs on you, didn’t they?”

“No.” The heroine answers a little too sharply. “You’re wrong.”

“Then where are they?”

As the heroine recovers, her steps more brave than the last, her argumentative personality returning, the witch-queen gets closer and closer to finishing her blanket. Breaks away from her was much needed, the way she still defends the humans is almost enviable and laughable. She hears rumors through her servants, her spies who are most loyal to her cause.

“They think you’re dead.” The witch-queen says one day as the heroine gets ready for bed. Her injuries have long since healed, the life returned to her. But the spark is still just a spark. The heroine does not answer to that. “Some think you gave up.”

“Like you did?”

A smile plays at her lips. “I never gave up.”

The heroine casts her a glance, eyes sharper than before. They have argued over and over about what she had done to the heroine’s people, the anger towards just a few small groups flaring into more. She does not know the whole story, she does not need to know the whole story.

Their ending needs to be different.

“You still haven’t killed me,” The heroine says as she climbs into bed, the covers wrapping around her body. “Why?”

“It is still an unfair fight.” The witch-queen says.

“I can fight back now.”

“But will you?”

“I didn’t go to them,” The heroine says one day, as they stroll through the pastures of the witch-queens garden. She is meticulous of how it looks, for she believes the world can be beautiful. “Because I was scared.”

The witch-queen stops in her tracks for a moment, turning to study a bush of flowers, brightly colored of pinks and yellows. “Now, why would that be?” She asks, without casting a glance at her.

She can’t ignore the chill she feels at those words. It’s as though the dead was confessing to her. The same story, but there’s so much more to it.

“I’m supposed to always be strong.” The heroine’s voice cracks. “I’m supposed to lead, and that happens--!”

“And they’re selfish to always think you must be strong.” The witch-queen answers, plainly. How stupid can this girl be? How brainwashed is she? “You’re allowed to be weak.”

The heroine goes silent, her eyes wide and mouth agape. She has never once heard those words.

“What happened wasn’t your fault.” The words come out harsher and harsher. How cruel were they, to raise the heroine to believe these things? How stupid. How awful. Now, she’s staring right at the heroine, whose lower lip is quivering and her eyes glossing over. “It will neve once be your fault.”

“But I could have. I could have just.” The heroine stutters out, voice cracking. It’s been weeks, over a month, the witch-queen doesn’t know, and now, now she’s breaking in a different way.

Her ending has to be different.

“No,” The witch-queen says, her voice softening. She steps closer to the heroine, her arms out and wrapping around her. “No, you could have done anything, it would not have been your fault.” The words tumble out before she can stop them--perhaps that’s a good thing. The air is feeling lighter.

It’s as though something shatters inside the heroine, as sobs wrack her body. She can only go up from where she is.

“I can’t stay here much longer, can I?” The heroine is quiet as she asks that, one morning. The witch-queen had gotten used to her presence, that she just now expects to find her anywhere in her large, secluded home.

“No. You have an evil queen to overthrow.”

The heroine is silent.

“An adventure to go on, a people to save.”

“Yeah,” The heroine agrees. She’s relunctant to agree with the witch-queen. “The reign has to end.”

“Good girl.”

The heroine throws a piece of bread at her.

“I kind of don’t want to,” The heroine admits the night before she has to leave. She felt good enough to return to the world. “I like it here.”

“Mm,” The witch-queen answers as she turns a page in her book. “You have to though. No use in hiding.”

Her ending will be different.

“How can I overthrow you when I know you’re actually nice?”

“You’ll forget, don’t worry.”

“I don’t want to.”

The witch-queen closes her black leatherbound book and lightly hits the heroine on the head, a little smile on her lips. “I’m glad you feel that way, but you’ve no choice.”

“I’ve never had a choice.”

“No.” The witch-queen agrees. “But that is okay, you can still make choices of what happens after.”

“What should I do if I see...?”

“That’s not something you have to worry about,” The witch-queen says, softly. The heroine doesn’t venture to ask why, just accepting her answer and staring at the pages before her. The book is uninteresting to her, and the witch-queen doesn’t blame her. The fairy tale of the princess being rescued by a prince is quite the bad story to her as well, it’s always repetitive.

The heroine is not some damsel, she knows this to be true. There is as fire that burns inside of her, rapidly growing. The hunger to help people, that same hunger she, too, once felt.

She envies the heroine for her never dying optimism towards the humans.

“This is goodbye.” The heroine says, the sky is just barely pink and orange. The air is crisp, a sign that fall has now come. “I guess.”

“Yes,” The witch-queen agrees. As the heroine turns to leave, she reaches out, her fingers brushing against the inside of her wrist. She turns to face her. “I’m glad you turned out okay this time.” She says, softly.

Once upon a time, the witch-queen had been in love.

Once upon a time, she had lost her lover, a beautiful hero who set out to the save the world with her trailing behind.

Once upon a time, she found the body of her lover hanging from the rafters of their room in some inn while they stayed at some village. It was the same old story, the same old words written on a page. A song sung by too many, and she did not make it through this, expected to remain strong as the people she was supposed to help betrayed her.

Once upon a time, the witch-queen promised revenge. The story would be re-written.

“I will be back.” The heroine promises. As she leaves, so does the ghost of her lover.

“I will be waiting.”

[standuphippy]

2018 Favorite Shows

This year I continued my effort to catch a few bands that I’ve liked for years but never got around to seeing and it was very rewarding. These shows included Saint Etienne, Protomartyr, Agnes Obel, The Love Language,  Erasure, Johnny Marr, The The, and The Dickies.

Not everyone comes to Los Angeles on a regular basis so I was thrilled to finally catch Young Galaxy, Dawn Landes, Retirement Party, Samantha Crain, and Sidney Gish.

It’s also worth mentioning that I saw a lot of great openers this year: bands I checked out because they happened to be on the bill and they turned out to be great. Weaves, Thin Lips, Petal, And the Kids, Jess Cornelius, Ed Harcourt (never miss the opening act at an Afghan Whigs show!), and awakebutstillinbed all belong in this category. But the following list is of the shows that were really special to me, in no particular order after The Jesus Lizard.

The Jesus Lizard, Sept. 29, Crystal Ballroom, Portland OR “Happy Birthday, Sabina.” Seeing The Jesus Lizard has always been an incredible experience but the reunion shows they’ve played over the past year were excellent even by their standards. The crowds came with high expectations: you could feel the excitement in the air before the band set foot on stage. (I’ve never had so many strangers strike up a conversation the way they do at TJL shows.) I’ve loved this band from the moment I heard them (thanks, Dad). I saw them play many times when I was in college. They were a standard by which I measured any other rock band. I’ve seen a lot of live music in the 25 years since I first saw them. They are still the standard. They never disappoint. It’s hard for me to articulate my feelings without hyperbole because it’s hard for me to believe that I’ve found a band that’s so consistently rewarding. In Portland, there was a profound synchronicity between the audience and the band. They delivered an epic set that included both “One Evening” and “Lady Shoes,” while the audience did the Dudley dance for half the duration of its namesake song, then staged a clap-a-long during “Fly on the Wall.” They keep getting better and no one else comes close. 

Fever Ray, May 25, Hollywood Palladium, Los Angeles, CA One of the great debts I’ll always owe Pitchfork is that they introduced me to The Knife. Not only the band's music, but in 2006 they clued me in to the band’s 4-show U.S. tour with a front page exclaiming “THE KNIFE IS COMING”.  On that tour, and the first Fever Ray tour three years later, Karin Dreijer hid in the shadows, obscured by darkness and makeup. The Knife had changed their approach by the time they hit the road in 2014, and it was a wild technicolor spectacle for people who wanted more aerobics in their dance party. There were so many performers onstage that it wasn’t always clear who was singing. Dreijer was never more out in front than on this Fever Ray tour, supporting the excellent 2017 release, Plunge. Flanked by backup performers, she seemed jubilant throughout the entire performance. Remarkably, all of the tracks from Fever Ray’s subdued 2009 debut fit neatly next to the new material. The version of the band that was onstage made everything in the catalog uniquely their own. Unfortunately, it wasn’t meant to last. Dreijer cancelled the second half of the tour citing “general anxiety and panic attacks.”  It’s a shame because this Fever Ray show was her best yet. Few artists reinvent their art the way Dreijer does. hopefully she’ll be ready to hit the road again in the future.

Let’s Eat Grandma, Sept. 4, Moroccan Lounge, Los Angeles, CA Every once in a while there’s a show where everyone knows something truly remarkable is happening. The audience is ecstatic and the band shares these glances where you know it’s special for them too. This was one of those shows.  Let’s Eat Grandma released one of the best records of the year and delivered a performance to match.

The Dickies, Sept. 8, Whisky A Go Go, Los Angeles, CA I finally saw them after 30 years of fandom and they lived up to my high hopes. They played most of their greatest hits circa 1989′s “Great Dictations”. No “Killer Klowns from Outer Space” or “If Stuart Could Talk,” but a great set nonetheless. Their cover of “Paranoid” is a steamroller live and was definitely a highlight until the woman next to me was knocked down by an errant mosher and one of her pinwheeling arms hit me right in the balls.

I saw them again a few days ago on a bill with Mac Sabbath, PPL MVR, and Captured! By Robots and they played “If Stuart Could Talk”. I guess if you’re on bill with that many high-concept acts it’s time to break out the arms-length penis puppet.

Poster Children, Sept. 18, Hotel Café, Los Angeles, CA Poster Children should be huge. Their first three records, Flower Plower, Daisychain Reaction, and Tool of the Man, are classics, and their latest, Grand Bargain!, was one of my favorite records of the year. Their Los Angeles tour stop was at Hotel Café, a small club known for lighter fare. Upon seeing the tables in front of the stage, Rose asked, “You guys know what kind of music we play, right?” The set was a mix of classics and cuts from Grand Bargain! and I lost my mind when they played “Dangerous Life” in the encore set.

Samantha Crain, Dec. 13, The Echo, Los Angeles, CA An artist I’ve waited a (relatively) long time to see and she was worth the wait. I loved last year’s “You Had Me at Goodbye” and it turns out she has a deep and excellent catalog as well. The Echo wasn’t crowded and there was no one else in my line of sight so it felt very intimate. My only complaint was that she was opening for another act; I would have loved a set that was twice as long.

Basia Bulat, Feb. 23, Bootleg Bar, Los Angeles, CA I’ve loved her music for 10 years and I’ve tried to see every show she’s played in Los Angeles. It’s a quest that’s included venues such as Old Style Guitar Shop, It’s a School Night at Bardot, and even a Bob Odenkirk comedy revue at Largo. I’ve seen her at Hotel Cafe, The Echo, and The Bootleg (3 times). I’m trying to show you what my commitment level is so you can fully understand how embarrassing the following story is to me: The show last February was a gig that she performed while she was in town recording her new album. She effortlessly translated her work for a solo performance where she alternated between guitar and piano. As always, she sounded amazing. The piano was pushed up against the stage, so when she played it, she was only a few feet away from where I was standing. She asked if anyone had heard her most recent record, “Good Advice.” We had. The audience seemed very enthusiastic: before the show I overheard people recounting other shows of hers that they’d attended, one couple had opened for her many years ago, etc. “Well, sing along!” she enthused. “Good Advice” has a bridge where there is a back and forth vocal. The lines are repeated and slightly offset, so that if one person was singing, she’d have to clip the outgoing line to get to the next one, and there are about six of these call and response couplets in that part of the song. I knew this is the part of the song she was talking about. When she got there, I was feeling pretty confident that we were all gonna nail this and it was going to be a fucking magical communion between us, her longtime fans. She hit the first one, and sang “Any sense I had at all is gone,” and I, anticipating being part of a chorus, sang the echo line. Over the course of the five seconds it took to recite the line, I realized that I was the only one singing and everyone was listening. I could feel people turning towards me. Basia Bulat was saying, “Yes, yes, yes!” and smiling as she played. I was shaken and missed the next cue. Now the pressure was on and there was no way I was going to be able to rejoin and not mess up, so I stayed silent. I stood next to her in shame, knowing that every line I didn’t jump in on made the situation increasingly awkward. Basia Bulat shrugged and did the rest of the lines herself.

I humiliated myself in front of an artist that I’ve long admired, but it was still one of my favorite shows of the year, because she’s brilliant. The reason I go to every show I can is that she always seems like she’s about to have some greater degree of success. If there are any casual observers in the audience when she starts, there are only fans when she walks off the stage. I still believe that it’s only a matter of time before she’s playing in a theater or a place with a greater separation between the artist and the crowd, so I'm going to continue to catch all the shows that I can. I’ll just try to do a better job of reading the room.  

The Breeders, April 7, Observatory, Santa Ana, CA The last time I saw The Breeders they sucked but they put out such a great album (All Nerve is easily one of the year’s best) that I had to see this show. I’m glad I went because they was amazing. They have so many great songs that a live set is an embarrassment of riches. They even played “Gigantic.” There was a woman standing next to me for the duration of the show and we chatted while The Breeders were setting up. Once they started playing, she would turn to me and say something I couldn’t hear and I would smile and nod and she would issue this crazy laugh. So The Breeders were great but after every song I looked into this mass that was all eyes and teeth and hair in blue light. She looked like Sheryl Lee in Fire Walk With Me and it was terrifying.

Kyle Craft, March 4, Moroccan Lounge, Los Angeles, CA

I have bad luck seeing Kyle Craft in that he’s played here fairly frequently and it rarely works out that I can attend. I’ve seen him twice, once a few years ago when he was on tour for his debut album Dolls of Highland and then this year when he was supporting his follow up, Full Circle Nightmare. Both shows were excellent. He’s got a great band and they’ll give you a full on rock show. Craft is  one of those artists that you should see when you can, not only because he’s a great performer, but because his muse moves quickly. His first release was a double album; he played it almost in it’s entirety the first time I saw him. When he came back for this show, he played one song from it.

Lydia Loveless, June 10, Casbah, San Diego, CA Lydia Loveless, June 11, Troubadour, Los Angeles, CA

My daughter had a dance recital on the 10th and when it was over I dropped her and my wife off and tried to break the land speed record to get to San Diego in time to see Lydia Loveless. I arrived just as she started her first song. Forty minutes later, I jumped in the car and drove back to Los Angeles, as I had to work early the next day. It was worth it because although Lydia Loveless has recorded many exceptional cover songs, I’ve never heard her play one live, and at this show she performed her cover of Justin Bieber’s “Sorry.” These shows were solo acoustic performances, and she was opening for Justin Townes Earle. She doesn’t play on the West Coast very often, so I always try to catch whatever I can. I love her records and she’s fantastic live. These shows were excellent but shows with her band are unbelievable.

Belly, August 9, Teragram Ballroom, Los Angeles, CA

I had written Belly off as a live band, I was disappointed with a show that I’d seen two years previous. I liked their new album, Dove, and since I had the night off I figured I should check this show out. I’m glad that I did because it was the best Belly show I’ve ever seen (twice in 1993 and once in 2016).

Loma, April 8, Bootleg Bar, Los Angeles, CA

Silence is respect in Los Angeles, and Loma got a lot of it. Jonathan Meiburg (Shearwater) Emily Cross and Dan Duszynski (both of Cross Record) crafted this delicate record and as captivating as it is, I feel as though I didn’t truly appreciate it until I saw this show. Who knows if the three of them will ever make another record together. See what you can when you can.

[itsbenedict]

No Driver’s License: Session 5

[adventure log- from the beginning]

[session 4]

Last time on No Driver’s License: wiiiiitch fiiiiiiiiiight, which the players won handily. They went to where Nishi-chan said the safehouse was at, found the witch Ｌａｍｐｌｉｇｈｔ Ｊｏａｎ rampaging, and put her down pretty handily, claiming a weird grief seed that Nishi-chan warned them not to use. Then a scary evil MG showed up and tried to get them to give it to her, and they managed to escape down a hatch to the safehouse right before her giant magic death shark ate them.

(pictured: @drazelic‘s drawing of @eternalfarnham‘s character, Kazama Ibara, who beat the everloving shit out of Joan while getting the everloving shit beat out of her in return.)

So what happens now that they’re in the safe(?)house?

Well, first off, the door to the safehouse led to a vertical shaft- and it was too dark for any of them to see the ladder, so they all tumbled down and landed in a big heap they had to extricate themselves from, to Sakura’s drastic abashment.

So, in the pitch blackness, Seina is the first to try and solve the problem like a reasonable person. She takes out her cell phone that she has, and uses its flashlight. Now they can see! And the only exit to the small room they find themselves in (besides the ladder back up, to where the overpowered shark summoner is waiting) is a dark tunnel that stretches on a long ways.

On their way through the tunnel, Nishi-chan gives them sharkgirl’s name- Yamauchi Yoshe. The name sounds sort of familiar to Sakura, but she doesn’t roll well enough to remember it exactly. So she turns to Google, which also fails, and her school website, which doesn’t have a public register of students. Finally, she tries Facebook- and finds Yoshe’s profile. It’s hidden, but she also finds that a few of her Facebook friends (who are mostly classmates she’s barely if at all spoken to and aren’t actual friends) are friends with Yoshe, making it pretty likely she attends her school. 

Yukari wisely advises not to immediately investigate Yoshe using an online tool that’s connected to her civilian identity, so she drops it there and the team proceeds into the darkness.

At the end of the tunnel, they find the world’s most suspicious object ever: a vase of daffodils on a small desk. There’s also a left turn that leads deeper into the safehouse, but clearly this vase of flowers needs to be investigated in detail.

They thoroughly inspect the incredibly suspicious vase of flowers, and find that it hides exactly zero secrets whatsoever. It’s just flowers. It must be a trap, but they continue on regardless.

At the next bend in the tunnel, they find the second heinous trap on the wall: a motivational poster!!!

They could handle some flowers, but this diabolical obstacle was going FUCKING DOWN

The party is somewhat split on this.

Eventually, the deadly foe is utterly vanquished thanks to Makoto’s heroism.

They finally reach an actual room, with a lightswitch, and turn it on. They find... just, kind of a nice apartment! A clean kitchen, a sofa, more flowers, and a desk covered in half-finished homework. Someone clearly lives here, and- OH FUCK THERE’S MORE MOTIVATIONAL POSTERS, SHIT, IT’S TIME TO TAKE ACTION

Eventually, after Yukari’s outburst quells the rampage of indiscriminate poster destruction, (and after Ibara raids the fridge to address the fact that she hasn’t eaten in like days,) Nishi-chan tries to get people back on track. During the confrontation with Yoshe, she claimed she could bring the magical girl who’d become Lamplight Joan back to life- and is eager to get around to it.

People aren’t exactly eager to trust Nishi-chan, what with how she apparently kinda sort of tried to kill them earlier. A whole lot of questions ensue, including:

“Is Olivia going to be okay? Can she go home?”: Nishi-chan says that Yoshe can only sense people by tracking where their telepathy comes from, and that- since nobody replied to Yoshe back when they were in the apartment- Yoshe probably doesn’t know exactly which apartment they were in at the time, which means Olivia is probably safe. 

“How long are we trapped here?”: Until Yoshe gets bored and decides to go cry to- and then Nishi-chan cuts herself off, not mentioning who exactly Yoshe reports to. Yukari guesses that she has an Incubator on her side.

“What’s up with Incubators? Don’t you take sides against each other, for some reason?”: Nishi-chan unconvincingly lies, saying that, oh yeah, there must be a third incubator on Yoshe’s side, because she and Tama-chan have nothing to do with her at all, HA HA HA WHAT A CRAZY IDEA

They start rolling Seek the Truth to get more info out of Nishi-chan, but they flub their rolls and she clams up, and tries to redirect the conversation back to them handing over Joan’s Grief Seed.

Yukari tries to use her Prophecy power again to find out if this is a bad idea- she looks at the future “if they trust Nishi-chan”, rather than anything more specific. What she gets is... a mess.

While Yukari is trying to make sense of this data, Sakura decides she’s tired of beating around the bush and distrusting people, and tries to covertly slip the Grief Seed to Nishi-chan. Ibara, though, notices what she’s doing, and snatches it away before she can finish. There’s a brief fight that ends in Ibara getting a tick of Trauma on her “disdain for victims” track.

Yukari eventually interprets the data as “trusting Nishi-chan will cause the girl to come back, but we’ll probably get in a fight with her, which could go badly.”

She turns out to be completely correct about this- Nishi-chan eats the seed, and spits out a soul gem. They notice- using uncharacteristically lucky Real rolls- that the gem looks a little weird.

Reiko, apparently, does not like home invaders very much. She doesn’t understand how they all got there, and they’re in her house and it’s her house and how dare they be in her house! It’s supposed to be safe, no one is supposed to be able to bother her there, they CAN’T be here!

She transforms, brandishing her magical weapon- a baseball bat full of nails.

She’s in full-on aggressive panic mode, and everyone scrambles to try to calm her down- trying to fill her in on the situation, explaining that she’d witched out, and so on- but it all goes in one ear and out the other, because she is too busy being ANGRY. Seina tries to use her empathy magic to alter Reiko’s emotions, but unfortunately the magic empathy locks on the wrong emotion- fear of the ghost shark outside. Reiko remains highly agitated.

Yukari tries to be blunt about it, explaining that Reiko became a witch and they were the ones who saved her. This... does not make her less agitated, and has the unfortunate side-effect of alarming the rest of the party- Yukari had tried to dance around the “becoming a witch” part of the exposition earlier. General panic increases.

Sakura, then, decides to defuse the situation in the most direct way she can think of.

Awwww! What a heartfelt gesture! Clearly this means she should roll 2d6+Heart to see if it succeeds, right?

Congratulations, Sakura! You’ve passed your skill check... on resisting Reiko’s passive ability!

Thera, though, requests a retcon- Sakura does not recoil before the fire manages to do any damage. She’s still got candy armor left over from the Lamplight Joan fight! She decides to tank the hit.

Reiko, ultimately, is completely flabbergasted by this gesture, and is a little too confused to start attacking. She shoves Sakura away- and demands that Ibara, who rolled a success on Help Someone Out, start helping her out by giving her information.

Ibara answers several questions, and rats out Nishi-chan as the one who told them that the safehouse was there and helped them get inside. She also tells her about Yoshe, who will definitely kill them if they leave. Reiko is not quite heartless enough to send them to their certain deaths, and being able to blame Nishi-chan helps take the heat off. It’s starting to look like this conflict is defused.

(Because there was no way in any hell that I was going to forget about that.)

So she gets pissed, but Sakura decides to roll Change the World to repair the posters before things can get too nasty. She rolls... a crit 15, which means it succeeds but has noticeable side-effects. One poster ends up with the wave turned to syrup, and her face watermarking the sky.

Reiko, thankfully, doesn’t notice these slight modifications just yet. She does get a little snippy about the stolen food, though. Ibara offers to buy her more groceries- and when the question of money is raised, Makoto holds up the  351025 yen left over from buying a phone for Tama-chan. Reiko’s jaw drops, and she decides that maybe it would be a good thing to have these very rich people feeling indebted to her.

As the team tries to walk away, Reiko grabs Nishi-chan, who does not get forgiveness for bringing strangers into her perfectly secure home. She begins incinerating her.

Most of the team doesn’t give a shit about this. Nishi-chan can respawn, and she’s kind of a dick, and kind of deserves it. Only Sakura remembers the practical problem with letting Nishi-chan temporarily die- without Tama-chan, Nishi-chan is their only relay for the use of telepathy. And without telepathy, Makoto is mute- and Sakura is Bigtime Ultra Gay for Makoto, and doesn’t want to be unable to talk to her.

At Sakura’s protesting, Reiko extinguishes Nishi-chan and flings her at Sakura. Sakura flubs her roll to catch her, and Nishi-chan bounces off her face and flops to the floor. Nishi-chan falls unconscious, and telepathy is temporarily disabled.

Makoto calls out, trying to make her teammates hear her- but no one hears her. 

Luckily for the group, the hiding effect of the safehouse interferes with Yoshe’s telepathy-related tracking abilities. Her ability lets her pick up Makoto’s undirected mental cries (where other MGs would hear nothing without an Incubator as a go-between), but she can’t tell where she is.

Sakura tries to help Makoto communicate by texting with her cell phone, but she flubs her roll and ends up giving information overload, leading Makoto to panic. Sakura takes Trauma on “Isolation from Peers”, and Makoto takes Trauma on “lacks basic knowledge most people would have”.

They eventually reach Reiko’s “big empty room”, and set themselves to the task of finding a way to sleep comfortably on the hard floor. Seina uses Sorcery to produce piles of petals to sleep on- flowerbeds, so to speak. ( :V ). A middling roll means there aren’t enough for all of them to get a bed to themselves- there’s going to be an odd girl out. Ibara volunteers to keep a lookout while the others sleep, and Makoto volunteers to sleep on the floor (because that’s nothing new to her, poor thing.) Ultimately, though, the soluton of “Makoto and Sakura share a bed” is decided upon.

And the session wraps there, with the party finally getting some rest!

Now that a session has ended on something other than a cliffhanger, the players are free to use the channel to play out some scenes of downtime between sessions. Thera and Koho have a scene planned with Sakura and Makoto, and there might be other conversations that happen that night. I’ll be putting those up as Omakes in between session logs. And then, next week... we’ll see what’s waiting for the team when they wake up.

[pleuvoiirs]

happy extremely belated birthday to you, @casual-boys-end , love you heaps x

to everyone else, i’m finally delivering on my promise for the hogwarts au. happy reading!

i don’t love you as if you were a rose of salt, topaz,    or arrow of carnations that propagate fire:    i love you as one loves certain obscure things,    secretly, between the shadow and the soul. 

i love you as the plant that doesn’t bloom but carries    the light of those flowers, hidden, within itself,    and thanks to your love the tight aroma that arose    from the earth lives dimly in my body. 

i love you without knowing how, or when, or from where,    i love you directly without problems or pride:  i love you like this because i don’t know any other way to love,  except in this form in which i am not nor are you,    so close that your hand upon my chest is mine,    so close that your eyes close with my dreams.

-          one hundred love sonnets: xvii, pablo neruda

you’re all my heart ever talks about

♥

two left feet, one beautiful smile (she’s sweet like marmalade and tastes like ooh la la) – sally, thundamentals

One week before the Yule Ball, Reynie Muldoon is beginning to panic about his lack of a date. He’s sitting glumly at the Slytherin table when Martina Crowe slides onto the bench beside him and starts piling her plate with cinnamon buns.

“Muldoon,” she says curtly.

Reynie rolls his eyes at her.

“Martina, I’ve known you for five years, you really don’t need to keep addressing me by my last name.”

She flicks her hair over her shoulder and raises one manicured eyebrow. “Actually, I have a reputation to maintain. I can’t be seen fraternising with any friend of Kate Wetherall.”

Her lips quirk up into a smirk.

“Speaking of which, who are you taking to the Yule Ball?”

Reynie narrows his eyes. “What are you plotting?”

Martina cackles. “Absolutely nothing. And if I was, it wouldn’t be any of your business,” she pauses to inspect her fingernails. “So, who’s the lucky person, if there is one at all? I must say I’m curious because it’s getting very close to the ball and I know that there are several very good-looking Beauxbatons students that are still dateless. I’m sure I’d manage to con one of them into going with you.”

Reynie flushes and looks down at his hands, trying to think of some excuse to give Martina – the queen of setting people up on terrible dates. If Martina picks a date for him, it could end up even worse than last year’s Valentine’s Day at Madam Pudifoot’s, where he spilled a whole cup of tea on Peter Costa and spent the next two months trying to make it up to him (Peter was not the forgiving sort).

Martina is staring at him like a bird of prey surveying its next meal.

Grasping at straws, he says:

“Actually, I’m already going with someone. Kate.”

And immediately regrets it. He cringes.

Martina’s face lights up with glee (or something more malicious) and she claps her hands together.

“That is the most excellent news I’ve heard all day. I must go and discuss this with her,” she calls over her shoulder, already walking away. “See you around, Mr Wetherall.”

Reynie leaves his toast on the table in his haste to find Kate before Martina does.

…

Kate is in the library. She’s reading a book about domesticated dragons and taking notes for her Care of Magical Creatures class when Reynie skids to a halt in front of her, all flushed cheeks and toast crumbs on the front of his robes.

“Kate, have you seen Martina today?” he tries to ask casually.

Kate may not be as good at reading emotions as Reynie is, but she’s known him long enough to be able to tell when he’s upset.

“No. What’s she done now?”

Reynie sits down next to her and takes a very deep breath.

“I may have accidentally told her that we were going to the Yule Ball together, and she’s looking for you so you can chat about me and the date that I definitely did not ask you on,” he says, but it all comes out a little bit jumbled in his nervous haste to explain.

Kate looks at him with an expression of disbelief on her face and he winces. A few beats of pained silence, and then, surprisingly, she breathes a sigh of relief.

“Is that all? I thought you were going to tell me you were about to die or something. Way to give a girl a heart attack,” she says, punching his arm a little too hard.

Reynie looks up at her, frowning. “You’re not mad? I can just tell Martina that you changed your mind and we’re not going together anymore if you’d like me to?”

Kate seems to consider this for a minute, and Reynie bites his lip, preparing for the crippling embarrassment of rejection from one of his best friends.

But she just laughs and claps a hand on his shoulder. “No way! Martina will make fun of you for the rest of your life and then she’ll try to humiliate you further by asking Peter Costa or some French girl for you,” she beams at him. “So we’re going on this fake date. There’s no one else I’d rather go with, anyway.”

Reynie grins up at her brightly, and strangely, Kate’s heart skips a beat.

…

Reynie cannot believe that he brought this upon himself.

Everything was going to be fine – he would just tell Martina that he and Kate weren’t going together anymore and her reaction would hopefully involve as little public humiliation as possible.

This is much worse than anything that Martina could have schemed up – Reynie gets to go to the Yule Ball with Kate and she’ll probably wear something jaw-droppingly beautiful and they’ll have to slow dance together and then Martina will watch them leave with glee, expecting a goodnight kiss or something of the sort.

And he has to do all of this while pretending he’s not hopelessly in love with one of his best friends in the whole world.

…

Surprisingly, Martina doesn’t question Kate too much. She simply asks: “So when did he ask you?” and rests her elbows on the table to look attentively across at Kate.

“Oh, I asked him,” Kate replies, unfazed.

They’re ‘studying’ in the library for the Charms test on Tuesday morning – Hufflepuff and Slytherin share the class and although Kate excels at the subject, Martina can’t remember wand movements to save her life and needs all the help she can get.

“It was last weekend when we went to Hogsmeade,” Kate continues. “We went to the Three Broomsticks and he was giving me some tips for Transfiguration, which you know I’m rubbish at, and I thought it would be nice if we went together, so I asked, and here we are.”

Martina seems happy with this answer. “That’s sweet. I thought I was going to have to ask you for him, which would have been a little bit pathetic.”

Kate rolls her eyes, exasperated.

“Come on, Tina, he’s not that bad.”

Martina looks at her, positively gleeful. “Oh, dear Kate, you are so clueless when it comes to matters of the heart. Reynie was never going to make the first move because he’s scared of being rejected and values your friendship too much, and on top of that, he’s so polite he doesn’t want to make you uncomfortable in any way.”

Kate wrinkles her nose.

“How do you know all this?” she asks accusingly, frowning.

Martina flicks her glossy black hair over one shoulder and winks.

“You two are the biggest will-they-or-won’t-they of our year. I pay attention,” she declares, sliding her textbooks and parchment back into her bag. “And Constance tells me things sometimes.”

…

On Monday, Professors Curtain and Kazembe shuffle the Slytherin and Ravenclaw fifth-years into the Great Hall to give them dancing lessons. Constance and Reynie joke their way through a waltz, Martina dances with a Ravenclaw boy who keeps sweating and looking nervously at her like she’s going to eat him (but she’s too busy glancing at Isabel across the room to notice), and Professor Curtain deducts thirty points from Ravenclaw and hands out two detentions.

Professor Kazembe demonstrates at the centre of the room with Charlie Peters (Professor Curtain refuses to dance, so stands with his arms crossed and a thundercloud-scowl on his face), and Constance hexes a group of boys leering at her.

“Martina told me you’re going to the ball with Kate,” Constance says plainly. “But I weaselled some information out of our good friend George Washington, and he says that you’re just going as friends.”

Reynie makes a noise of distress and drags his hand down his face. “You cannot tell Martina anything. I’ll never hear the end of it.”

Constance mimes zipping her lips shut and waves him off.

“Don’t worry about it. Your secret’s safe with me, Romeo,” she says with her signature know-it-all smirk. “And your other Kate-related secret, too.”

Reynie blanches, eyes widening. “How do you know about that? I haven’t told anyone except Sticky!”

Constance huffs out a dry laugh and puts her hands on her hips. “Well, I had my suspicions. You just confirmed them for me, so thank you.”

Reynie bites his lip and looks behind her at Professor Curtain, who is reprimanding Isabel for snickering at a scathing comment Martina just directed towards her dancing skills.

“I didn’t mean to, you know,” he says softly, looking down at the floor.

Constance glances at him, and for a moment, so short that if Reynie had blinked he would have missed it, her expression is soft, too, the smallest of smiles on her face. Then it’s back to the Constance she puts on every morning before getting out of bed, raised eyebrows and a devilish grin.

“It’s not so bad, you know. You could be dying,” she declares, putting her arms back on his shoulders so they can continue their dance.

Reynie is not convinced.

…

It’s Sunday afternoon and Reynie is sitting in the library with his Advanced Potions homework when Kate and Will stride in, laughing. The librarian, a rather stern woman by the name of Jillson, who Reynie secretly believes should not be trusted around books, shushes them and they snigger at her behind gloved hands.

Will abandons Kate to sit in the corner with his Herbology report, and Kate saunters over to Reynie’s table in the corner. She slides into the seat across from him with a thunk. They stare at each other for a couple of seconds, and then Kate huffs and grabs Reynie’s parchment out of his hands.

“’An Introduction to Wolfsbane’,” she reads. Kate drops the sheet from in front of her nose to look at him disdainfully. “How terribly interesting.”

Reynie rolls his eyes and looks over at her, all raised brow and eyes crinkling at the sides as she smirks. He sighs to himself, resigned to eternal torment.  

“What do you suggest we do instead, then?” he says, and smirks right back at her.

Kate’s smile is full of trouble as she leans back in her chair.

“I suggest we throw Martina off the trail by finding her a date.”

…

That night, Kate and Reynie watch from behind a corner as Isabel stops Martina in front of the Slytherin common room. In one swift movement, she drops dramatically down on one knee in one of the most cliché but sort of elegant ball proposals Reynie has ever seen.

Martina puts a hand to her mouth, her usually cool exterior fading for a moment as she nods. Kate and Reynie glance at each other in the gloom of the hallway, and then back to the scene unfolding in front of them, where Martina and Isabel are hugging each other tightly. The former’s eyes are closed, the smallest of smiles gracing her features.

Kate looks over at Reynie, beaming with bright eyes, her hair falling around her face, and he feels something in his stomach twist.

They hold each other’s gaze for just a second too long, and then Kate offers him a whispered ‘Goodnight, Reynie’, with a hand that lingers on his shoulder. She disappears around the corner, leaving Reynie standing there in the lamplight, feeling happy and sad and nervous all at once.

…

It rains again on Wednesday afternoon, so all Quidditch practice is cancelled, resulting in a lot of unhappy students traipsing around the school with sour expressions on their faces. Avoiding the gloom inside, Reynie spends his afternoon sitting under the eaves in the main courtyard playing a game of wizard chess against Sticky. Constance watches them, mostly disinterested, still chewing the bubble gum she’s had in her mouth for about an hour. Will and Isabel sit ten metres away from them, engaged in a conversation that involves hushed tones and a lot of hand gestures.

The light would normally be nice at this time of the afternoon – casting glowing golden rays on the old oak right in the middle of the courtyard, little brown sparrows singing in the branches, students milling around on the grass, soaking up the sun. Instead, the ground is sodden and devoid of life. The slow patter of rain on the roof above them is rhythmic, the air is filled with the smell of growing green things, and Reynie is in his element.

“Checkmate,” Sticky says, struggling to keep a grin off his face. Reynie sighs and scoops his pieces back up.

The relative silence is broken when a pair of Durmstrang students still in their red tunics and black scarves stride over to the three of them, boots tapping loudly on the cement.

One of them, the boy, who is tall and has wide green eyes, has his hands clasped in front of him in what seems like an almost nervous gesture. He pushes his fringe out of his eyes and clears his throat, and Sticky and Constance finally look up from where they’ve been squabbling over who’s going to take the chess set back to the library.

“Um, hello,” the boy says, his voice softer than most of the students from Durmstrang.

“Hi,” the three of them reply together.

Reynie and Sticky glance at each other quickly out of the corner of their eyes and then look back at the boy, trying to look as friendly as possible. Will and Isabel are staring now, too.

“I’m Eustace, and I was talking to that girl from your school – Kath, is it?” he asks.

“Kate,” Reynie says a little too quickly, and Constance smirks at him.

“Yes – Kate!” he turns to Sticky, now, biting his lower lip. “She told me that you didn’t have a date to the Ball, George.”

Sticky bristles, waiting for some sort of insult, but it never comes.

“I was wondering if you wanted to go with me,” Eustace asks, rubbing the back of his neck.

Sticky looks up at him, slightly bug-eyed, then glances back and forth between Constance and Reynie like he can’t quite believe what he’s hearing.

Will chooses this moment to stand up, dropping his soda bottle on the ground with a clang that shocks everyone. He stands there for a moment, opening and closing his mouth a bit like a goldfish, and Reynie looks between and Sticky, finally realising what’s going on. He bites his lip to contain the smile that’s trying to work its way onto his face. Sticky looks over at Will painfully, and then back to Eustace, who looks incredibly hopeful.

“I’ll have to let you know,” Sticky says quietly, and looks up at Eustace with a sympathetic expression on his face. “But thank you for the offer, I’m flattered.”

Will sighs noisily in relief, then frowns when everyone turns to look at him. Eustace seems to understand, and nods at Sticky, smiling as kindly as possible as he walks away with his friend.

Later, when Reynie is sitting across from Sticky at dinner, Reynie winks at him and gives him a knowing smirk.

“Shut up!” Sticky says, burying his face in his hands and blushing bright red.

“George Washington! I never expected to hear such profanities come from your mouth!” Constance shrieks and some mashed potato flies off her fork and onto the table next to Kate’s plate. Kate flicks it at Reynie, who laughs and retaliates by flinging some peas off his spoon at her, and soon the four of them are engaged in a mini food fight that has them sent out of the room and tasked with cleaning up after dinner.

They’re lined up on one of the benches outside the Great Hall, Constance engaged in a thumb war with Kate that she’s going to lose in about two seconds, Sticky trying to wipe gravy off his tie while telling Reynie about the newest theory about life on other planets, when Reynie decides that it wouldn’t be so bad if the four of them just stayed best friends forever, nothing more.

…

Friday night finds Kate Wetherall standing across from Reynie Muldoon in the Hufflepuff common room, her arms draped across his shoulders as they twirl slowly around on the carpet. Ella Fitzgerald and Louis Armstrong’s voices float tinnily out of Milligan’s record player, perched precariously on top of a stack of textbooks. Reynie had winced when he saw it.

The soft orange light from the fireplace casts long shadows on the carpet. It’s almost uncomfortably warm despite the thick winter chill settling in outside. Their coats lie discarded on the worn armchairs in the corner, and Kate is down to her yellow Quidditch shirt and a pair of grey striped pyjama pants. Reynie’s eyelids are starting to droop – they’ve been like this for about an hour, shuffling their way through a standard ballroom waltz, his hands at her waist and hers on his shoulders.

Reynie brings his hand up to his mouth to stifle a yawn, and Kate gives him the smile she’s come to realise she’s reserved especially for him.

“Come on, it’s probably time for bed,” she whispers, too close to his ear.

“Yeah. Yeah, okay,” he says, and rubs his eyes before moving over to grab his coat.

Kate walks him over to the door, one hand on his elbow, and they stop to look at each other. Reynie’s face looks a bit pink, but Kate puts it down to the heat of the fire.

“Well, thanks for practising with me,” she says, quietly. “I really needed it.”

Reynie smiles cheekily at her. “It was no trouble.”

Kate looks down at her feet in embarrassment, then reminds herself that Kate Wetherall doesn’t get embarrassed. When she looks back up, Reynie’s smiling at her with his head tilted slightly to the side, and he looks so happy and soft in the firelight that, against all better judgement that tells her this is not what best friends do, she leans in closer.

Kate’s lips graze his cheek lightly, and she can feel his heart beating where she slides her hand up to the back of his neck. Reynie’s breath hitches, and then he moves his hand to find hers, clutching tightly. If she just moved a little to the right –

A seventh year and his girlfriend burst through the door behind Reynie’s back, giggling and dripping rain onto the carpet.

Kate and Reynie pull away from each other in embarrassment. She squeezes his hand for a second before he leaves, and he looks at her like she’s the sun and moon and stars, face flushed so that his freckles stand out more than normal. Her hand burns where they were just touching.

“Goodnight, Kate,” he whispers, and waves shyly at her before slipping out the door.

…

It’s six o’clock on Saturday evening and Reynie is waiting anxiously at the bottom of the main staircase in his navy-blue dress robes, wringing his hands. Martina slinks past him in her dark green velvet dress, hand in hand with Isabel, both sipping butterbeers and rosy-cheeked in the glow of the tiny lanterns floating just out of arm’s reach.

Sticky, who eventually turned down Eustace because he just didn’t know him that well, or, as Constance put it, was “too hung up on his Hufflepuff sweetheart” to even think about going with someone else, is standing beside Reynie in classic black. He tries to look casual when said Hufflepuff sweetheart walks past looking dashing with his blond hair pushed back, but fails epically. Reynie grimaces and silently prays that they’ll sort their issues out before the end of the evening.

He’s just about to go and get the two of them something to drink when Sticky nudges him and nods upwards.

Kate descends the stairs, and Reynie can feel his heart thudding in his throat. Time doesn’t slow down or stop or anything like that (because secretly, Reynie thinks Kate is jaw-droppingly beautiful even without the red ballgown she’s wearing or with her hair loose from its ponytail), but Reynie does smile brighter than he can remember doing in a while, and takes Kate’s hand to lead her down the final three steps. They stop in front of each other, grinning, hands clasped together tightly. Kate leans down to kiss his cheek. Martina yells “get it, Muldoon” somewhere.

The Triwizard Champions (including Will’s older brother Sam – a Gryffindor) and their dates have their dance to the soft ballroom music the band is playing. Then, Kate extends a hand to Reynie to ask:

“May I have this dance?” with a twinkle in her eye.

Reynie lets Kate lead him to the middle of the dance floor, and then places his hands on her waist. Hers come up around his neck, and they stand there, still for a while, communicating without saying any words. The band starts playing a Muggle song, Frank Sinatra this time, and Kate and Reynie start to step into the dance they’ve practiced so many times – backwards, sideways, forwards. Reynie has to reach up to twirl Kate as the song finishes, and she laughs, bell-like against the chatter of the Great Hall.

The lights floating above their heads glow prettily and cast a golden glow across everyone’s faces as Kate and Reynie exit the ballroom floor to watch Constance dance with Rhonda, both sisters with genuine smiles stretched across their faces.

Martina and Isabel are kissing in the corner of the room under a branch of mistletoe that Martina probably placed there herself, and Reynie realises that Sticky and Will are dancing together in the middle of the ballroom floor, giggling at a private joke with matching shy smiles.

Reynie takes Kate’s hand.

…

Out in the garden, the air is still. Kate and Reynie are laughing about Sticky and Will finally getting it together when they realise they’re still holding hands. Reynie looks down at them clasped together and stops laughing, but then he smiles up at Kate, who’s biting her lip and trying not to grin.

“Good thing you’re so scared of Martina and public humiliation, huh?” Kate says, and she leans in, just as she had a couple of nights ago in the common room.

Their noses bump together. Kate pulls back for a second, laughing, to look at the stars in Reynie’s eyes, and the way his face looks in the moonlight. Then, she leans in and kisses him. Just like that.

The crickets are chirping in the background, they can hear the soft bass from the music inside, and Reynie slides his arms around Kate’s shoulders (she’s still slightly taller). This time, it does feel like the world slows down a bit as she winds a hand through his hair and smiles against his lips.

Kate tastes like butterbeer and the thrill of soaring through the air on a broom. Her heartbeat is steady against Reynie’s chest, and when they break apart to breathe, her face is flushed, eyes crinkling at the sides in her ‘for Reynie’ smile.

Reynie tastes like honey and the way it feels to sit by the fire on a cold afternoon. He’s blushing, but not with embarrassment. Happiness, maybe. Kate brushes her thumbs across his hot cheeks and kisses him again, slowly, sweetly. She moves her lips to his jaw, and his breath hitches slightly, heart rate speeding up.

Kate would be quite content to stay there forever under the honeysuckle, Reynie’s hands on her waist, the cool winter breeze on her face, but eventually Constance saunters out and coughs, eyebrows raised.

“Well, it’s about time,” she says, grinning at the two of them. “I hate to interrupt, but the band’s about to play David Bowie and I thought you might want to be there for that.”

Kate and Reynie glance at each other, still holding hands. They follow Constance inside to the warmth of the ballroom, faces flushed from the cold, hair a mess.

“Do you think we should tell Martina the truth?” Kate leans down to whisper.

“Nah,” Reynie says, a smile in his voice.

Outside, the first snow of the season begins to fall.

thank you so much for reading + supporting my work, it really means a lot to me. there’s also a playlist that goes with this fic that you can find here, and it’s appropriately sappy and cute

[rizzizzsins-blog]

From the Ashes, Ch. 2

Wanna read this on Archive? Click here.

 The rustling of hospital sheets and a splitting headache woke Asher up. He’d never even gotten a drink and it still felt like he had a hangover.

 “Morning, princess.” Was that the red eyed skeleton from the night before? Had he wasted his evening watching over him?

 Oh. Right. They’d probably taken him out of his binder.

 “Er, prince. But, yeah, morning.”

 “Oh… alright, princey.”

 Close enough.

 “What are you doing here? I mean, I appreciate you taking me to the hospital, but he didn’t hit me      that     hard, did he?”

 “Yeah, ‘bout that. Might wanna feel your noggin. It’s not a pretty picture.”

 The living sap that made up his face had solidified and cracked. It was a way that his body protected itself from hard hits.

 Bastard had really done a number on him. Was he going to be able to go into work like this?

 “Did the doctors say it was a concussion?”

 “No, but---”

 “Cool. I have a shift tonight,” Asher grunted, starting to get up. Gravity magic yanked him back into bed.

 “Woah, easy there, your Highness. They didn’t say you were fit to work either, so just stay your ass put before you break something else.”

 “Fiiiiine. Well, I’m awake. You can go now. I’m not dead and you aren’t liable,” Asher sighed.

 “Why the fuck would I leave ya like this? It’s kinda my fault that you got hit.”

 “How is it your fault?” Asher snickered. “I shouldn’t have run my mouth towards a ball of fire twice my size. Not that I have any regrets.”

 “I, uh, shoulda stopped you. Or him. I coulda done something,” The skeleton scratches his head.

 “You didn’t have to. You’ve done more than enough for me, getting me to the hospital.”

 Cinn was about to answer when Asher heard shouting from down the hall.

 “Yeah, I’m his significant other! I have pictures of us! Who the hell did you let in that room with him?! You people are fucking incompetent!”

 Theo threw the door open, giving Asher a heart murmur.

 “What are you doing here.” Theo asked coldly.

 “I’m… busy? Recovering from a head injury?” Asher replied, already tired of hearing his partner’s voice.

 “Yeah. I can see that. What I don’t see is…. I don’t know, let me think. How you got yourself hurt. Where the hell you were last night. Who that motherfucker right there is,” Theo pointed at the skeleton.

 “Look, just stop raising your voice. You’re making a scene.”

 “Oh, I’m making a scene? Just like you did at that filthy bar last night?”

 “So you do know what happened,” Asher responded.

 “You were on the fucking news. ‘Dryad Injured By Fire Elemental Punch In Possible Interspecies Hate Crime.’ Guess who’s the only fucking dryad in this city?”

 Asher’s head felt like it was going to burst.

 “Please, Theo, just stop. I talked shit. I got hit. If this is a private hospital, you don’t have to foot the bill. So just go. I’ll be home tonight if I can.”

 “Pfft, no you won’t. You’ll be at work. Or maybe at the bad part of town getting into barfights, because that’s apparently who you are now.”

 “Hey,” the skeleton tried to interject.

 “I don’t know why you’re trying to act out. Are you looking for attention or something? You ever considered that I could use a glance over once in a while?”

 “Hey! That’s fuckin’ enough!” The skeleton stood up. He seemed offended, as if Theo had been talking to him.

 “You stay out of this! You fucking impersonated me and took      my    partner to some random hospital. Who knows what you two did on the way.”

 Asher couldn’t believe what he was hearing. “  I was unconscious!  Stop shouting and just go to class! I’ll be back later!”

 “I expect you home by 10 pm for dinner. Now that I have to put a curfew on you just to prevent you from getting killed,” Theo threw that in, before slamming the door as he left.

 “... You’re dating that fuckboy?”

 Asher knew what kind of talk was coming, and he didn’t want to hear it.

 “Just go. Whatever you’re gonna say, I’ve already heard it, so go. Before the hospital staff kick you out for lying.”

 “Look…. Name’s Cinn. I’m leavin’ my number on this napkin. Text me by 10, please… not to sound like that bastard. I just wanna make sure you’re okay.”

 Asher turned away in his bed, curling up. “..... Thanks.”

 There’s three gentle knocks on the door.

 “This is your doctor. May I come in?”

 “Sure,” Asher manages, trying not to cry.

 A goat monster with a gentle, but slightly detached voice came in with a cup of chamomile tea.

 “Good morning. My name is Dr. Gabriel Dreemurr, pronounced Gah-Bree-El. How do you do today, Mr. John Doe?” She chuckled a little at her joke, then set a cup of tea down for Asher to have. No doctor had ever brought him tea. It was nice.

 He took a careful sip of the chamomile. It was delicious, and he typically hated chamomile.

 “Ms. Samara Frax,” Asher winced. “Please call me Asher, though.”

 “Your legal name is already on the paperwork. I will call you what makes you most comfortable, and I will ensure that others do so in my presence. Does that help?” She asked, sounding genuinely concerned for him. It helped him relax a little.

 “Yeah… thank you, Dr. Dreemurr.”

 “Now then, it seems that you were hit rather hard on the head at a barfight. May I have a look at the injury?

 Asher pushed his long, mossy hair aside to reveal the injury. He still hadn’t looked at it, only felt it.

 “Oh, my. Will you be pressing charges? I’m sorry, but under Monarchic Monster Law, I’m required to ask, and this is a monster hospital.”

 Asher shook his head. “No point. It already happened, and I kind of deserved it.”

 “Now, now, violence is almost never called for, especially if you were speaking the truth. I have been briefly acquainted with Mr. Sparkby Embers, and let me say, the dislike is mutual.”

 Asher chuckled at that. Gabriel did the standard tests- ask him math problems, take his blood pressure, listen to his soul, before letting him know that everything checked out.

 "I would strongly suggest that you at least spend the day here before returning to work tonight. I overheard you and the flame arguing over it."

 Fantastic. How many people had heard that, the whole hospital?

 "Will do."

 "Well then, it was nice to meet you, Mr. Frax. Please don't get caught up in another 'interspecies hate crime'. The human news have enough fuel for idiocy out there."

 "Got it," Asher replied, before reclining a bit. Gabriel hadn't taken back her mug. He presumed she would come and get it later. In the meantime, he reached for his computer and opened his email. Great. An email from the professor already.

     Dear Asher,  

     I noticed that on the get to know you assignment, you were a bit reticent to offer any information on yourself.  

     I hope that my lines of questioning have not made you uncomfortable, and would be happy to discuss anything you'd like to get off your chest in private.  

     I look forward to seeing you a bit more comfortable in the class. I read your contributions in the Creative Writing magazine, and I think you're capable of great things!  

     Cordially,  

     Dr. Clementine Gaster (Dr. Clemm)  

 Well… that was less bad than Asher had expected it to be. Still, something didn’t seem quite right. Asher had learned from experience that STEM professors, in general, tended to be less understanding of his situation. So if Clemm wasn’t an interdimensional physicist, what professor was he thinking of? He’d remember eventually.

     “Dr. Clemm,  

     I’ll do my best to be more responsive from now on.  

     Asher”  

 He couldn’t think of anything else to say, so he sent it as it was.

 He rang for more pain meds. After the nurse administered them, he used a vine to open the blinds. The lazy afternoon sun replenished his spirits a bit, and he felt comfortable enough to take another nap. He really had fallen behind on his sleep schedule.

 Around dinnertime, there’s yet another knock on the door. Asher didn’t even have time to say “Come in” before the door was opened.

 “.... What are you doing here?! Don’t get closer!” Asher hissed. It was his attacker. To hit him for insulting him was one thing, but to show up at his hospital room?

 “Hey, hey, hands off the panic button. I’ve heard enough sirens for today,” the bartender sighed. “Look, if I had come here to kill you, would I have brought flowers and food?”

 Oh. He had brought flowers. And food.

 ��.... I guess not…” Asher paused, before pulling his finger away from the call button.

 “So, how’d Sparkby react to you punching a client half your size? Do you still have a job?” Asher asked. Asher didn’t know why he cared, but he did.

 “I’m Sparkby,” the elemental answered.

 “You’re shitting me.”

 “Nope. I’m the owner. So yeah, I got to keep my job, just barely. Almost lost my goddamn license.”

 “I’m glad you didn’t. I kind of deserved it for what I said. I shouldn’t have judged you like that,” Asher chuckled, rubbing his head.

 “Cinn and his bro chewed me out for quite a while after you were checked in. So…”

 Sparkby took a deep breath, steadying himself.

 “Look, I’m not good at apologies, but I’m a damn good cook, and hospital food blows, so I made you supper. Don’t worry, it’s not poisoned or some shit. I’m not that kind of a bastard.”

 Sparkby set the flowers by Asher’s windowsill, then stopped.

 “Ah, shit, I brought you dead plants. That’s not considered offensive or anything, is it?”

 Asher shook his head. “I appreciate them.”

 “Right. If you ever wanna come back to my bar, I won’t bash your skull in, and your first drink’s on the house.”

 He was about to head out when Asher noticed he still had a styrofoam container in one hand. Was Sparkby going to eat alone?

 “Wait! Umm ... if you’re not busy, you can sit down for a bit. We could both eat.”

 “Huh?” The flame looked down, confused. “Well… if you need someone around, I guess.”

 He closed the door and sat in a chair nearby. Asher opened his food. Chicken parmigiana. It smelled heavenly.

 “Jesus, this is beautiful. You really didn’t have to.”

 Sparkby shakes his head, a hint of blue on his cheeks. “‘S nothing. And I did have to. Or Cinn and Edge would’ve had my head.”

 Asher took his first bite. It was perfection. Better than anything he’d made. And certainly better than cold takeout from Theo. He hadn't meant to moan, but it was so goooood.

 Thankfully, both he and Sparkby silently agreed to pretend that it hadn't happened at all. Sparkby cleared his throat.

 "So, Cinn has an older brother?"

 "Younger. Nickname's Edge. Real uptight bastard, but he's gotten a lot better. oNow he’s just a fuckin’ busybody when he’s not working Captain’s Shift.”

 “Wait. Cinn’s little brother is the Captain of the Interroyal Guard? Some brother.”

 “Yeah. Rides my ass every time I don’t card in his presence, but otherwise a good guy. He almost blasted me when he found out I punched a mouthy little sapling.”

 Asher chuckled. “Interspecies hate crime, huh?”

 “The shit humans come up with to slander monsters. You’d think we wouldn’t be newsworthy by now,” Sparkby scoffed.

 “Especially since we’ve lived along them the entire time,” Asher grinned.

 “Oh, you’re a glen kid? How was it?”

 Asher wanted to answer, but there was a pit in his stomach whenever someone asked him that.

 “... Don’t worry. I don’t like dwelling on the past either. Well, how was the food? Orgasmic?”

 Asher almost spit out his iced coffee. “You piece of shit! I thought you were gonna let that slide!”

 “Oh, you’d love for me to let it slide, wouldn’t ya?~”

 The door swung open, almost hitting Sparkby. Thankfully the guy could DODGE.

 “What the fuck is this?” Theo growled, glaring daggers at the larger fire elemental.

 “A friend.” Well, Asher wasn’t sure if he considered Sparkby a friend yet, but it would hopefully shut Theo up.

 “You don’t have friends. Is this the guy who hit you? Why the fuck did you let him in? You just opening the door for anyone except your significant other now?”

 “Theo, you didn’t even knock.”

 “Why should I have to knock? I have the right to be here.      He    should be in prison.”

 “Well, I’m not pressing charges, so let it go, Theo.”

 “Let it go?” He guffawed. “Let it go?! This bastard is getting more forgiveness out of you in five minutes than I have in 5 years.”

 The potent scent of frankincense hit Asher’s nose.

 Sparkby was smoking with rage, but the wicked smile on his face was what was worrying Asher the most.

 “Ohhhh…. I remember you. I see why you’re trying to get rid of me. How could I forget you, you little piss stain of a monster?”

 “I’ve never met you in my life. And I don’t want you in      our     life, so get out before I tell the Guard you attacked him again.” Theo’s voice wavered on the last word.

 “You’re playing a dangerous game, little matchstick. Truth’s gonna come out one way or another; I won’t even have to be the one to do it.”

 “Get out. Before I call. The cops,” Theo demanded. Sparkby just shrugged.

 “No worries. I was on my way out anyways, and so are you.”

 He saunters out, cocksure as when Asher had first seen him behind the counter.

 What had he just witnessed?

 “Do you know---”

 “No. I brought takeout, but clearly that’s not good enough for you anymore. I’m going home.”

 “Theo---”

 “Be back at 10.”

 … There was no point in thinking about it. Whatever had just happened, Theo would keep him in the dark forever if he could. Asher hugged his pillows tightly, trying not to sob.

 Maybe it was better like that.

[daniella-the-travella]

Machu Achoo

Now for the post you have all been waiting for... my trip to Machu Picchu!!

Let’s start where I ended off in my last post. After returning from Ica, I was very worn out and started coughing. I ate some dinner and went right to bed. The next morning, I felt awful. My head was hurting and my throat was scratchy. I saw white spots in the back of my throat and knew I was done for. Camille, another girl in my house, had the same symptoms the previous week, so I knew I had her virus. She got better eventually, so I knew I would make it. I got up and found out that Morgan and Camille were both sick as well!! Morgan had the same thing I had, and Camille got traveler’s sickness. Traveler’s sickness is common when you venture to new places with different bacteria in the water. The water in Peru is not safe for us United Statesians (technically we are all Americans here). The cure for traveler’s sickness is an antibiotic that was very easy to find. Together, all three of us skipped school and had a sick day. We shared vitamin C and compared the amount of fluids we drank. I think I won with 4 liters.

Sick day party! It only lasted about 5 min before we were all tired and went back to our rooms.

All of the lovely beverages I drank to try to flush out the sickness.

The next day, Tuesday, was pretty much the same deal. All three of us stayed home sick, mostly sleeping. How exciting, right!?

I enjoyed walking around the house with my comforter. You could say I found it... comforting. It was the perfect length, so it didn’t drag along on the floor.

Wednesday. This day was miserable for me. Camille and Morgan were feeling better, thank goodness, but I certainly was not. We woke up around 4:30am to get ready! At this point, I was actually feeling good! I thought there was a chance that I was better! We were picked up by our private bus and taken to the airport. I was cracking jokes most of the way there; it was a great time! We even came up with the idea that there is a group of people called the night runners. There were a lot of people running on the streets, and we decided it was because they were part of a club. Now that I think about it, we were very tired, and it isn’t that funny anymore.

At the airport, we checked in our bags and went through security. It was strange to me that I was allowed to have fruit and a full water bottle through security without getting yelled at because it was a domestic flight. Then, Morgan and I napped until the plane was ready for us. I waited to board the plane until the boarding line was only 5 people long, so I didn’t have to stand for a long time. I had a fever and my headache was back. I tried to sleep on the plane. When we landed in Cusco, I wanted to cry. I had a fever, headache, sore throat, and then suddenly I could feel the altitude. At 11,150 ft, there is a lot less oxygen in the air. When I was breathing, it felt like my lungs were shivering. When I took bigger breaths, it went away. Upon entering the airport, there was a basket of free coca leaves. We were told not to take them because they could be unsanitary, but only after I was already sucking on a couple. Oops. Coca comes in the form of leaves that can be held in your cheek, or it is made into tea, caramels, chocolate, and, yes, after processing, cocaine(however, cocaine is a very concentrated form of coca, and it would require a LOT of coca leaves to actually “get high”). The purpose of the coca is to help with altitude sickness and to improve digestion. Digestion is much slower at high altitudes. The coca works as a stimulant and gives you energy to power through. Once we all had our bags, we SLOWLY went to a little store to get “mate de coca” (coca tea). Keyword: slowly. Take it easy when you jump from pretty much sea level to the middle of the mountains. I don’t actually enjoy drinking tea very much, so when one of the girls in my group dropped hers, I gave her my cup of tea. Don’t worry! I did not spread my sicky icky germs. The tea was so hot, three people had burnt their tongues, so I hadn’t taken a sip yet.

My first coca leaf. I did not like the taste very much. My tummy also got upset any time I had any form of coca.

The next goal was to get to a lower elevation. We got on a bus, and drove down. We made a couple stops along the way. The first was to visit alpacas and llamas! There was a little museum, and then we got to feed and pet the animals. We could also watch people weave using alpaca wool. I perked up enough to walk around a little because one simply does not sit on the bus when there are alpacas to pet. The second stop was to try cuy. Cuy is guinea pig. I was a little hesitant at first, but then I ended up really liking the skin. I got tired of eating the actual meat because there were so many little bones to eat around. The drive through the sacred valley was gorgeous! The reason why it is called the sacred valley is because the soil is very fertile. There were many terraces and fields of crops as we drove by.

My new llama friends.

It’s hard to eat a guinea pig when there is an adorable painting of one playing a... some sort of string instrument... right next to the table.

This is a plate of potatoes and cuy. The lowest piece in the picture is the head, mouth open. You can see its teeth poking out. Its leg is right next to the head.

Danny (the guy in the picture) took a selfie with me eating my first bites. He is the main academic coordinator dude that helps organize the trips. He also constantly asked how I was feeling during the trip. Thank you for looking out for me, Danny!

Look how pretty the Sacred Valley was!!!

Finally, we made it to the hotel in Ollantaytambo. I ventured out to get water and then slept. I started getting scared that I wouldn’t be able to go up to Machu Picchu.

Thursday morning, everyone went on a tour of an Incan grainery except me. I stayed back to sleep. I still felt iffy. My throat was less sore, but I was coughing a bunch. Around 11 am, we got on the magical train that took us up to Machu Picchu town. I felt horrible the whole way, but could not get myself to close my eyes for a nap because the scenery was beautiful! I was riding in a backwards seat. To my right, there was a winding little river that sparkled in the sun, and to my left, there were snow covered mountains in the distance. At a certain elevation, the few plants and grass, turned to lush vegetation. This is because we entered the cloud forest. There were orchids and other colorful flowers and bushes and vines and trees... The cloud forest eventually leads to the Amazon. At the end of the train ride, we pulled into the station, got off the train and marched up a hill to the hotel. Some of the people in my group stopped to take breaks as we went up the hill, because elevation, but for the first time, I felt great! The more time we spent in Machu Picchu town, the better I felt! After missing lunch, we were hungry, so Morgan, Camille, and I went to a little restaurant. As we walked through the streets, people, mostly men, were shouting cat calls and trying to get us to go to their restaurant. There were many to choose from, but the fancy table clothes and outdoor seating drew us in to this particular one. I ordered chicha morada and a fruit pancake. Both were delicious. Chicha morada is purple corn drink, and I say it tastes like mellowed down purple grape juice. I love it!

Machu Picchu Town

My yummy pancake with papaya, strawberries, and pineapples.

Then I took a short nap before checking out the hot springs. The hot springs were really cool (or should I say hot). There were a bunch of baths filled with water of different temperatures from the river (the same one along the train tracks). The first one we tried had no people in it, and we quickly found out why. It was freezing cold. Then we tried another. This one was a strange lukewarm temperature. It was really uncomfortable, so we quickly left this one as well. We finally went to the crowded big pool. This pool was the warmest and felt really nice. There was a gravel bottom, which we did not expect because the other ones had tile bottoms, and we met some interesting people from around the world. It also smelled like pee, but oh well, I guess. There was a list of benefits of bathing on the wall right next to the list of alcoholic beverages you could order while enjoying your soak. Some of the benefits were releasing toxins, relieving stress, and helping with altitude sickness. Turns out, it also gets rid of your nasty virus that has been bugging you all week! I felt great afterwards! I was also very hungry.

This is the pretty little river/spring.

This is what the bathes looked like.

This was one of the carvings in the wall along the path to the hot springs.

Some of our friends told us about a yummy pizza place right next to our hotel, so we decided to try it. When we got there, they asked us which country we are from. We told them we came from Canada because why not. While we waited for our pizza, we sang along to the music and played a little jenga. The jenga blocks were signed by people all over the world. We decided to write on a jenga piece of our own. The wood-fire pizza was amazing! Nothing like the greasy pathetic crap they have in the US. At the end, they started playing live music. When we went back to our hotel, I could hear it from my room the rest of the night.

Here is our Canadian flag with our own Jenga block. We wrote “No hay drama” because our professor, Carlos, always says it. Directly translated, it means “there is no drama,” but he says it sort of like “no biggie.”

To be continued because Tumblr is having a panic attack from all this writing!

[mediocrewritingsofacrazycanadian]

Sylla Itrasium

Full Name: Sylla Nemita Xalenor Anvira Galatea Iridian Itrasium (Sil-ah Nem-eat-a Zall-e-nore Gala-taya Itr-as-e-yum)

Nick name(s): Sylla, My Lady, Princess Sylla, Goddesses Revenge 

Age: 20

Race: Demigod/ Sprite 

Height: 5′2″

Eye Color: Sparkling pink

Hair: Pale green, shoulder length, curly (like big perfect curls. Like a mix between Claudia in Interview With The Vampire and Shirley Temple) 

Abilities/Powers: Healing magic (somewhat limited: She can heal say a gash in your abdomen but she can’t put your arm back on if it’s cut off. She can fix a broken bone but not if it’s pulverized into dust.), expert in healing herbs and medicine, mild levitation (can’t fly but she can hover a couple feet off the ground and glide around like that)

Weapons:Throwing weapons (knives, daggers, throwing stars, hand axes, forks, if she can throw it she’ll probably use it), her own hand-to-hand skills

Job: Healer/Herbalist/Apothecary 

Personality: She’s a giggly and kinda goofy person, really hyper most of the time, kinda flighty and often forgets things, loves to fight, loves money and jewels and basically anything shiny, she is a truly terrifying force when in battle and is rarely defeated (having a goddess of war and battle for a mother will do that to ya), is insanely fun to party with and always brings the fun, fully embraces her femininity and will fight anyone who suggests that you can’t be feminine and a badass (will kick your ass wearing a frilly dress and pink armor), loves to dance (she dances places way more often then walks), is really easily annoyed by those she dislikes or considers to be fake or liars or just general boring douchebags, hates being treated like she is a delicate breakable flower made of glass or something (”I may have been born in satin and pearls motherfucker but I have no qualms going out in blood and armor, or better yet taking you out in blood and armor if you don’t back the fuck off.” for instance is something she yelled at a guy in  bar who said something like “What’s a pretty thing like you doing in a dangerous place like this sweet heart? Come here, I’ll protect you.” before grabbing her around the waist, she also pulled a knife on him while she threatened him.), gets really lonely sometimes and misses her family and home even though she ran away and hated most of her life there, loves and hates her mom at the same time for many reasons (ditto for her father), if she cares about you she’ll do anything to protect you and keep you safe and happy, when she’s sad it’s awful and all-consuming and often it means she’ll just lay on her floor and cry alone for a while, loves to make people smile, obsessively polishes her bladed weapons until they shine because she says they look better that way, fidgets a lot (like constantly), eats so much food for such a tiny person (”Food is my one true love and nobody will ever keep us apart.”), really doesn’t care about religion in any way (”I’m half goddess guys...I’ve met gods and goddesses...honestly they’re just like normal people but somehow more annoying and petty. At this point I can never see gods as almighty badasses...not after the stupidity I’ve seen.”) but will respect yours as long as you don’t try to force it on her. 

Physical Description: Small with chubby little legs and big hips and a round face with a cute nose but not chubby tummy or arms, freckles everywhere, super long dark lashes and eyes that shine and twinkle and just make you happy to look into them (unless she’s mad at you or in battle in which case her eyes look like they’re full of fire and death and looking into them will strike fear into your heart), full lips usually painted pink and smiling, bouncy curly hair that she wears in two pony tails (or one high pony) when she needs to get things done or when she’s working or fighting but leaves down whenever she’s just chilling out or having fun (Her bedhead is the stuff of legends it’s so wild and crazy and she hates brushing through it so she usually gets another crew member to do it for her) and she usually has ribbons twisted and twined with the curls (pretty sure she keeps them in with some kind of magic), likes flowy frilly and feminine clothes in pastel colors usually (really likes pastel blue and purple a lot) and is also fond of short skirts and pants with pretty embroidery (especially of flowers or stars) all over them, wears a lot of capes and coats that flare out or sway and swirl when she moves,  has a whole flower garden in bright colors tattooed on her right arm (it’s an entire sleeve from shoulder blade to hand, it ends in big pale blue Gerber daisy in bloom on her palm. It’s full of weird and beautiful flowers and leaves and vines and it’s enchanted so certain flowers only open at certain times. The night-blooming flowers which are usually silver and gold and white are enchanted to glow faintly. There’s bees and lady bugs and one little butterfly that move and fly around the flowers.), has her armor all enchanted to be pretty colors (Nix is exhausted with weaving color magic into all her armor but she likes it when Sylla smiles and laughs and gets all joyful about it so she keeps doing it for her), always wears at least a thigh sheath with 4-6 throwing knives on her person (yes even when she sleeps), some of her weapons are even enchanted to be pretty colors (again Nix does it because it makes Sylla happy), paints her toenails and fingernails sparkly gold and silver most of the time, has scars on her thighs (she used to self-harm but she’s four years clean thanks to the help and support and love of the crew), dainty hands and feet, likes lace-up boots with little heels, likes corsets a lot, wear so much jewelry everywhere (fingers, toes, wrists, ankles, neck, ears, nose, lip, tongue, navel) and it’s a mix of silver and gold and gems and changes all the time (healing magic means she can pierce and heal over and over again and leave no scars)

Backstory: 

Sylla was born to King Aymon Arakian Itrasium of Silkhill and the goddess Mytia (Sprite Goddess of War, Wealth, Royalty, Healing, and Battle. She’s a force to be reckoned with and has very few children, god or demigod, due to her very high standards and dislike of my most people/gods. The children she does have are usually fierce warriors with excellent healing abilities, both in the medicinal/herbal/practical knowledge kind of way and the magical kind of way. Her children are also fond of shiny objects like gems or precious metals due to her being a goddess of wealth. Though she is a goddess of royalty her children are not always royal and she bears no favoritism to royals over non-royals in those she chooses as consorts or in general really. Her children are also born with sparkling eyes in strange colors which mirror her ever-changing gem-toned eyes.) How in the hell the King managed to seduce her nobody knows, he won’t speak of it and obviously nobody is asking the war goddess how the king got her into bed out of fear of her killing them. The King has quite a few children, about 13 in fact and Sylla was the eldest of them all and the only one to be born from a goddess, her siblings (four sets of twins, one set of triplets, and one single birth) were all born to the current Queen Vasica Klaimin-Itrasium of Puresummit whom the King married when Sylla was 4. Queen Vasica was not overly fond of Sylla, mainly because she wanted a child born of her to be the first in line for the throne, but unfortunately for her it’s a really bad idea to be rude or abusive to the child of a notoriously temperamental war goddess so the Queen was forced to be at least polite to Sylla or face the wrath of a pissed off Mytia. The Queen’s children on the other hand were not so smart nor so fearful and had no problem fucking with Sylla and making every day hell for her because they decided that they hated her for some unknown reason (it’s speculated that the Queen encouraged her children to torment Sylla in hopes of driving her mad or some other such problem but nobody can prove it). Though Sylla was a strong and resilient person and fought back often it’s rather hard to win against so many people attacking you at once, especially when every time she stood up for herself or fought back when they physically attacked her they would run and tell their parents that she had started it and so Sylla would be punished and reprimanded constantly. Her father didn’t believe her when she told him what her half-sibling were doing to her because honestly Sylla was pretty sure he hated her in a way because she reminded him of the fact that her mother ignored him and never visited with him after Sylla was born, and the fact that Mytia still visited Sylla didn’t help either. Of course Mytia was unable to help her daughter because she was bound by the rules set in place by the entire sprite god pantheon saying that a god cannot directly help their demigod children with their lives, they can provide advice or lessons or even gifts to help them along the way but they cannot directly influence their lives. So Mytia taught Sylla to fight, to use her healing magic, she taught her how to use herbs and the like to heal, she taught her how to be resilient, she taught her battle strategy and ways to sway almost every fight in her favor, she reminded her daughter that strength comes in many forms and that nobody was fit to judge her worth based on how she looked or who she was born to, and she bestowed many weapons upon Sylla and taught her how to use each one in the hopes of helping her daughter to be strong and happy. Even with her mothers support though Sylla fell into a dark depression and eventually began hurting herself and having panic attacks and not sleeping because her horrid siblings had even attacked her in her sleep on occasion. Sylla loved her father for the man he’d been before he’d met Vasica when he’d been supportive and affectionate, and she loved her mother for trying to help her when nobody else would, but she also hated them both for not being there for her as much as they should have been and for not protecting her as parents are supposed to. Sylla, though hated by her half-siblings and stepmother, was loved by her people and was hailed as the perfect Princess in many ways. Sylla was an expert in all thing etiquette and refined by the time she was 10, she was the perfect example of a highborn lady and she hated every second of it, she hated being trotted around like a prize pony for everyone to gawk at and judge as if she meant nothing beyond how pretty she looked in a dress, it’s not that she hated the fancy dresses and such (she actually quite liked frilly dresses), it was that she hated being judged solely on her appearance and not on her intelligence and strenght. So in her free time Sylla trained in fighting and she trained with her healing magic and she read and researched and trained with her medicine making and she enjoyed any time she could spend alone in blessed silence without anyone bothering her. For years Sylla dreamed of escaping her life and running off to anywhere else and being anybody else, and then that dream turned into a plan and finally that plan became a reality. At 16 she escaped the palace with a bag full of gold and jewels and a change of clothes and her weapons and armor from her mother and headed for the docks where she bartered passage on a foreign vessel to anywhere but Silkhill. Unfortunately the vessel was attacked by the pirates of the Dragon Song and Sylla was taken aboard their vessel because when they saw how much wealth she was holding the figured they could hold her for ransom. While sitting tied to a chair in the captains quarters Sylla was asked who she was and why she had so much damn treasure with her and why her armor and weapons were so exquisite and Sylla defiantly told them that she was the crown princess of Silkhill and of all Sprites...and after that she begged them to not return her to her father, she ended up having a panic attack in Glory’s office at the idea of going back to her home and after she explained why she ran Glory couldn’t just send this abused young girl back to where she was treated so deplorably, and in fact she offered her a position on her crew and voila! Sylla joined the crew of the Dragon Song, became a pirate, began to learn to love herself and to trust others, picked up the name Goddesses Revenge after people learned that she was a demigod, and with the help and support of her newfound family found the strength to fight against the urge to hurt herself (and she knows when the urge flares up that she can always go to one of her friends and they’ll support her and help her through it), and eventually she found that she was a bubbly and happy person once she was free to be herself. Mytia still visits her sometimes and gives her new weapons and sometimes interesting jewelry or armor.