#there are actually studies that say it's likely she was originally a goddess that got demoted into a demon

[sennik]

here are a few things about my take on baba jaga, taking from a bunch of folklore stories, myths and some historical research:

baba jaga is a name given to her later in life and it's not exactly a flattering name either, in literal translation meaning evil witch, nightmare, serpent, calamity, fear, fury or shudder. jaga was given to her first after she started getting demonized, and baba was affixed later, when she started being associated with an old hag. her real names have been long since lost to time and abandoned, but the name she calls herself usually is jagna.

she was born as one of three sisters into a matriarchal tribe that resided close by to a large wilderness. she and her sisters were beautiful and talented, born with great powers and raised following practices of old, living in peace with nature. as they grew older, they became priestesses of their people. her role in particular became a matriarch, as she's been known to be clever and spirited, with immense power that resided over nature and spirits. she had many responsibilities, some of which included handling important rites, such as initiating youth into adulthood and funerary rites.

time passed and their powers grew. the sisters never died, but withdrew somewhat from active roles to allow other generations to take over, but they never left. their roles instead were elevated into something higher - not unlike gods. they were revered as elders and lived in harmony with mortals for some time. jagna herself was most prominent of the three and worshipped as a goddess. she withdrew into the wilderness, where she lived in a house that could disappear at will, and would often appear to aid lost travelers. she commanded the animals and nature within, could fly and was often sought after by the people, both respected for her wisdom and powers, and feared for her blunt personality.

eventually times have changed, and so have the people. it didn't start with jagna, but her sister - her sister who grew tired of her immortality and ended up giving up on it after she fell in love with a human. despite her sisters' concerns, the two got married and had a child. the joy, however, didn't last. her lover grew jealous of her prominence and seeking to make a deal with another tribe, ended up betraying her for power. she and her son started gradually being feared and were eventually drowned in an uprising.

death wasn't the end of it - her fury turned into resentment and her soul emerged again, hungry for revenge. she terrorized the guilty party, and once that was done, it didn't seem like she wanted to stop at only those that were guilty. soon, she became wildly known and feared, considered a calamity. people came begging to the sisters for help, and though jagna saw justice in revenge, neither of them wanted to leave their sister to this fate.

so, they went to take care of her - yet despite their power and love, there came a moment where they stood between a moral choice: having to choose between sacrificing their sister and the world they knew. before jagna could react, her other sister chose to sacrifice herself to preserve their people and at least a part of their sister's spirit. all that was left of the two of them were shards of their souls, which jagna collected and put into the immortal bodies of familiars - sometimes manifesting as a raven and a cat, sometimes as a snake and an owl; but their consciousness could never fully come out again.

jagna despaired, feeling resentful and bitter. still, she returned to her post, but that didn't last long either. people's memories were short, after all - instead of gratitude, they quickly turned to blame. soon, jagna's name was slandered, dragged through the mud and eventually they came searching for retribution right to her door. jagna, still feeling the pain of losing her sisters, snapped and unleashed her power to punish those people who all blamed; and she would carry on with it, if it wasn't for a raven that flew to her arm and perched on it, staring into her eyes. though she withdrew, damage was done - she fell from a strong, but helpful goddess to one that needed to be feared. so, she withdrew deeper into the wilderness to live in a house that stood tall on chicken's feet, sometimes disguises as an old woman, and people started avoiding her too - though she still kept some shreds of respect.

times changed, but stories only grew. at first the damage wasn't so great, but when a new faith came, having a powerful woman as a figure became uncomfortable for these people. and so, a goddess became a demon, so a beautiful woman of great wisdom that would sometimes disguise herself as an old woman became a hag. she became baba jaga. people would tell their children of an old, ugly wicked witch that haunted the woods to scare them from going there alone. jagna minded her own business, but it was impossible to avoid these stories: a children eating demon, a scarecrow, a nigthmare that would kidnap you if she saw you. since she was made into a boogeyman, she truly became it - sometimes appearing in this form to scare on purpose, sometimes flying in a mortar and cackling. she was sometimes helpful, sometimes malignant, sometimes selflessly giving aid, and sometimes asking for impossible tasks.

these days, she mostly keeps to herself and barely appears at all. if she does, it's impossible to tell who she is, as her true appearance is unknown to most.

[azrielbrainrot]

I Laugh Like Me Again... She Laughs Like You - Part 2

Pairing: Azriel x Reader

Description: You're back home right when Azriel was starting to lose all hope, but is the person standing in front of him the same who disappeared all those years ago?

Warnings: Angst, mentions of blood, injury

Word Count: 6670

Notes: The original plan wasn't to write more of this story but I had a few ideas of where to take this and decided to turn it into a mini series, don't think it will be longer than 3-4 chapters. Also I don't know if the HoW has cells in the books but it does here and they're normal, not dungeon-y like, and the story is set after acosf but Amren never got turned into fae because I like her better like this. A lot of people liked the first part so I really hope this one doesn't disappoint. I hope you enjoy!

Part 1 ○ Part 3

Azriel was at the townhouse before he even fully realized what was happening. Didn't even give anyone an explanation, simply letting his shadows take him, barely hearing the questioning cries of his name. He didn't need to hear anything else aside from your name to know that's where he should be, his body moved before he even had time to formulate the thought.

Your sweet scent invaded his brain before he even arrived at the house. He'd be able to recognize it anywhere, he'd longed for it for so long after all. Every day when he opened his eyes, he hoped he would wake up to your scent floating around this house as it once did, as it did right now. He's not one to go into anything blindly, to run head first and only think about the consequences later, but this felt like his last chance. The loneliness that had settled deep in his soul had been replaced with hope with one word.

His shadows move to different corners of the room as soon as he's dropped off, leaving him uncharacteristically naked, unguarded. Even the shadows that would form naturally from the faint glow of the moon seemed to move off his face. They wanted him to enjoy this moment in full, this was his and only his.

In truth he barely noticed them leave, too preoccupied with the figure in front of him. He wouldn't have believed it if he wasn't witnessing it with his own eyes. How many times had he been haunted by this exact vision in his dreams? There you were standing in the sitting room, shining like a goddess under the moonlight filtering through the windows. You hadn't changed since the last time he saw you, only had gotten even more mesmerizing if anything.

Your hair was a bit shorter than you usually wore it, the tight pants a contrast to the usual short skirts you preferred. Then there was a scar running across your neck, even with the distance and darkness in the room he could tell it ran from ear to ear. It was a painful reminder of what you've been through, of the night he couldn't protect you. But it meant this was real. You were actually standing in front of him. This was something he had dreamed of many times, almost every night since you've been gone.

He calls your name and it feels amazing. Just the sound of your name leaving his lips, not in mourning or wistfulness but as a greeting, is enough to bring a face splitting grin to his face. Gods, he missed saying your name without almost feeling suffocated by the weight that formed in his chest.

You startle at the sound, seemingly not expecting company at the house. He has no time to study the strange expression on your face though, he needs to touch you first, to feel your skin against his, your warmth against his body, your heart beating behind your ribcage. He needs to make sure this is real and not some cruel dream or hallucination his mind thought up to torment him. He needs you to be really back.

As soon as your eyes meet his form, he clears the distance between you in two hurried steps, but, before he can hug you, he feels your hand reach out to him. He doesn't even have time to realize you're reaching towards his thigh, to Truth Teller. He doesn't know if it was confusion holding him back, the strangeness of the whole act or if he's simply willing to take anything as long as it comes from you, but he makes no movement to stop you from grabbing his knife, allowing you to pierce it through his stomach, never so much as looking away from your beautiful face or even flinching at the blade.

He can feel every inch of the dagger inside him, can feel the blood quickly seeping through his shirt. Still, the pain in his gut can't hold a candle to the relief and joy running through his veins. You're real. The knife went through, so you have to be real. He can clearly hear your heartbeat now as well, it sounds strong aside from how fast it's going.

Azriel reaches a hand out to you again, slower as not to startle you. He can't help the fluttering of his own heart as you finally let him make contact with the softness of your skin. You haven't moved your hands from the knife, your wide eyes staring at your now blood covered hands. He caresses your cheek lovingly and tilts your face up so he can meet your eyes at last.

He can tell something is wrong, as if it hadn't been glaringly obvious by his favorite knife currently stuck in his stomach. Your eyes seem unfocused, a bit panicked, maybe even angry. But he can't bring himself to care in this moment.

He doesn't know if this is your revenge for letting you die, for not finding you, or even if this is what you had wanted out of him from the start, maybe your whole relationship had been a lie. It doesn't matter. He'll gladly die at your hands if that's the fate you chose for him. At least he'd spend his last moments with you, a privilege he didn't think he would have the pleasure of experiencing.

His heart threatens to stop altogether when your eyes meet, it feels like time stopped around him. “You're home, my love,” he breathes out, letting out a soft disbelieving chuckle, “You're finally home.” He raises his other hand to your face, caressing both your cheeks with his scarred thumbs, he almost forgot how soft your skin felt against his rough hands. He's been clutching at faint memories for decades.

His smile falters when his thumb moves down, stroking down your jaw to the column of your throat, where a scar runs across your neck. He watches his thumb following the clean line, his scars had always been awful reminders of what was done to him, it ate at him even five centuries later, but seeing yours hurt even more. You should have never known this kind of pain.

“What?” Your voice was barely a whisper, confusion and fear holding it hostage. He looks back up into your eyes, seeing the same emotions swim in your gaze even more heightened. He didn't like that, you would never have any reason to be scared of him. He goes to tell you as much when he feels power surging into the room.

“Azriel?” Cassian's voice cuts through the moment and he has to close his eyes to keep himself calm. He wanted more time with you, wanted to talk to you before they got here, before they saw the blood but had gotten too distracted. His mind wasn't working properly, his thoughts were all over the place, he wanted nothing more than to hug you but was too aware of how strangely you were acting. He couldn't keep you and his family in check, not with every instinct inside him screaming to just pick you up and winnow you to the other side of the world.

He calls his shadows to him, a desperate attempt at hiding his injury. He knows it's in vain when he feels Rhys let go of the damper on his power, letting the suffocating night fill up the room. You look positively terrified now, he can even smell it mixing in your sweet scent. Letting go of your face, an act that takes more effort than he could imagine, he turns around slowly, trying to be mindful of keeping you covered, protected from his family.

Your hands don't stop holding onto the dagger, as he moves away from you, the force of it is enough to pull it out of his stomach and let the blood run free with no resistance. The pain was getting worse, it didn't look like you hit any vital organs but his healing wasn't fast enough to keep it at bay on its own.

Feyre is the first to move towards him when she sees the blood, but he simply holds up a hand, effectively stopping her in her tracks. Trying to keep a leveled head was proving to be a near impossible task as he saw the anger in everyone's faces, it was directed at you. He holds onto his abdomen, the pain was making itself known.

Seeing Azriel stop his mate from approaching, Rhys walks closer to the shadowsinger himself. His face was a mix of regret and fury as he spoke up. “What happened here, Azriel?” If his mind was in the right place he would have noticed the restraint his brother was showing at seeing him bleeding out in his house, restraint only present because of his own feelings towards you. Unfortunately, Azriel's instincts were winning against logic.

He hears you finally drop Truth Teller behind him, your body must have started listening to you when Rhysand got too close, recognizing him as a threat. He makes the mistake of looking back at the knife, not hearing the snarl that curls his brother's lips in time. Rhys winnows behind him in that moment and you had gotten too close to the window for him to reach you.

“Don't touch her,” he warns Rhys viciously. He doesn't want to think what he was capable of if anyone hurt you again, even if it was his own brother.

He sees you fall to the floor before he registers what happened. His heart almost leaps out of his throat, letting out an anguished cry of your name as he runs to you, pushing his brother out of the way and holding you up from the ground. Searching for a pulse frantically, he finds you were only unconscious. A breath of relief escapes him as he pushes your hair out of your face, it almost brings tears to his eyes. You will be fine. Rhys had only entered your mind to keep you asleep and stop you from escaping. You will wake up. You will not leave him again.

He hugs you closer to him, too focused on making sure you were alright and keeping his breathing leveled to hear what they were saying behind him. He felt as helpless as when he was still a child being subjected to his father's cruelty. It takes him a while before he finally calms himself down enough to hear the argument behind him.

“Let's talk to him first,” Cassian says, the emotion clear in his voice.

“He put up a shield around them,” Rhys was sounding less like a High Lord by the word, “He's not in his right mind.” A shield? He checks the air around them to find that his brother was right, there was a shield around them both, even his shadows had moved to cover them, separating them from the world.

“Neither are any of you,” Nesta's voice cuts through everyone, finally silencing them.

“We already called for Madja,” Feyre uses the silence that settled to speak, “We can get him treated and hold her somewhere until she wakes up.”

“No,” he drops you gently on the ground, letting his shadows cover you, protect you, before turning to face his family.

Feyre hesitates before continuing, seeing something on his face that makes her choose a different approach. He never mentioned being married to her but your name had been brought up before, he knew Rhys had filled her in on what happened, still she couldn't understand what he was feeling. Even he couldn't.

“The cells under the House of Wind are safe. It's just for-”

“You will not put my wife in a cell,” the words came out clipped, slipping through clenched teeth, the shadowsinger was barely holding on to a sense of restraint against his High Lady.

“She stabbed you,” Rhys yells, looking down at the wound in his brother's torso, thankfully already starting to heal, “it doesn't matter that she used to be your wife.” The growl Azriel lets out at his brother is nothing short of vicious, a feral and lethal thing rising straight from the center of his being.

“She is still my wife,” Azriel says behind a snarl, “And you will not hurt her.” Even if it was in the clean cells of the House of Wind, he could never bear to see you caged. He was ready to go to any lengths necessary to make sure of that. If helping you escape the Night Court was what it took he knew of a few ways not to get caught.

He could see Rhys' shoulders tense up, his own face morphing to match Azriel's fury. He didn't know if his mental shields were down or if his intentions were just uncharacteristically clear on his face but he was sure that his brother knew what Azriel - his spymaster - was thinking.

“She can stay in one of the rooms up in the House,” Cassian offers quickly, trying to settle the rising tension between his brothers, “She can't winnow out because of the wards and we can watch her until she wakes up.” Deep down he knows they don't want to hurt you either, that they're only worried but it's difficult to pay attention to the voice of reason within him during this whole situation. His greatest wish had just been answered. So why does everything seem to be falling apart with it?

Mor winnows in with Madja before he can give them a response which is a good thing because anything he could come up with would probably only put you and him in a more precarious situation. There were too many emotions warring inside him, the same going around almost everyone in the room if only more intense. The healer's presence seems to dissipate most of the tension automatically as Rhys even turns to look out the window and allows his mate to hold onto his hand, probably telling him soothing words in his mind.

Madja moves to Azriel with no hesitation, only stopping briefly when she senses the shield. She merely gives him a look before he drops it so she can reach him. He knows she wouldn't hurt you, knows he needs the wound in his stomach taken care of so he can focus on you, think about what to do when you wake up.

“You need to sit down so I can treat you,” she tells him while inspecting the wound.

“I will not leave her.”

“You can trust her with us, Az,” Mor tries to reassure him, but with the way the last minutes have played out he wasn't trusting you with them, or anyone else for that matter. He'd just gotten you back, no way is he letting you out of his sight for a second, he could bleed out for all he cares.

Suddenly, he sees Nesta walk to the table and grab a chair through his peripheral. She appears to be mumbling something to herself but he can't quite hear her to understand. She walks to him and drops the chair in her hands on his right, before giving him a narrow eyed look and returning to her mate's side.

He's not sure how much she knows of the situation. The three sisters probably all know by now that he used to be married but none of them has mentioned you to him, warned by whoever told them of the consequences of doing it.

He sits on the chair and lets Madja work on him. The wound wasn't too bad, even if he didn't have access to a healer it would close in a short time. You stabbed it cleanly through, just like he'd taught you. If he hadn't been the practice dummy he might praise you for it. By the Mother, he thinks he still might. He wonders if you'll grace him with a bright smile and flushed cheeks for it like you used to.

Azriel looks over to your sleeping form under the moonlight. He's calming down enough that he's starting to feel the uncertainty bubbling inside him. Truth Teller still laid on the floor beside you, covered in his blood just as your hands were.

“Is she…” What did he want to ask? Is it really her? How did she survive? There was so much blood on the ground that night. He didn't need to be a healer to know it was too much for someone to survive with no immediate help and an absurd amount of luck. “Is it really her?” He whispered the question, not bearing to look away from you as he does.

“You know that better than me,” the healer answers calmly. He can sense some emotion in her voice. You had asked her to make tonics to help him sleep and relax many times, to teach you basic healing and how to put on bandages to help him when he was too stubborn and not gravely injured enough to go see the healer. She probably missed you as well. “She's healthy.”

He feels a rush of relief at the words. You're healthy. The confirmation allows him to relax further. Finally looking away from you to see part of his family still watching the scene before them. He knows they too were thinking about the blood, the sleepless nights they spent searching for any sign of you. His eyes meet Rhys' briefly, knowing they'll need to talk about what happened.

He closes his eyes and leans his head back, letting out a soft sigh. You're back. He never thought he'd see you again but you're right here next to him. You're not a dream or a hallucination. You're healthy. The thought almost brings a smile to his lips despite the situation. Anything else can be dealt with now that you're by his side again.

“Are you sure you don't need to rest, Az?” He looks up from the familiar ring, still twisting it around his finger. It felt right putting it back on, he was almost giddy at the sight of the silver in his finger, but it also left him with immense guilt eating at him for taking it off in the first place. He studies Nesta's face for a second, giving up on trying to decipher what she was thinking in favor of looking back at you.

When everyone calmed down enough and Azriel was treated, it had been decided that you couldn't be left alone even in the room, they needed someone to keep an eye on you. It had also been quickly added that Azriel wasn't enough, his brother had seen right through him, he knew Azriel wouldn't try to stop you from killing him or trying to escape if you put your mind to it.

Cassian and Mor refused to stand watch unless it was truly necessary. He knows they wouldn't want to be put in a position where they had to stop you, knew they would not only feel guilty for hurting you but also wouldn't forgive themselves for hurting Azriel.

Even Rhysand, used to the weight and impartiality of the High Lord's title, looked hesitant in keeping him company, he had already forcefully invaded your mind to take your consciousness away, something he had vowed never to do to his friend. He could definitely stop you both from any of the worse case scenarios but at a cost he couldn't bear to pay.

That had left him with the two trained Archeron sisters and Amren. They set shifts to make sure Azriel was never left alone with you, he thinks they might not even trust him not to take you away from the room himself and help you escape. He can't really be sure himself if he wouldn't do exactly that if you asked. He'd follow you to the end of the world and beyond just to hear you call his name one more time.

“The wound is healed,” he whispers, keenly aware of your sleeping form, a habit that came to him naturally after seeing you. You always liked to sleep in and waking you up before your time was close to a death sentence.

“That's not what I meant.” Nesta walks closer to the chair beside your bed, the one he hasn't gotten up from since tucking you into the bed carefully. She placed a hand on his shoulder and studied you for a moment, something she's been doing since her shift started. “She stabbed you,” she says in an usually hesitant tone coming from her, “Are you sure it's her?”

“I would sooner forget my own name than mistake my wife for someone else,” the words came out clipped even with him trying to hold back his anger. It wasn't her fault for being suspicious, Nesta never got the chance to meet you, barely even heard about Azriel's marriage. She just wants to protect him, protect her friend.

“Why would she hurt you then?”

“Maybe it's my punishment,” the words leave him before he can think them through. It doesn't matter anyway, they all saw the state he was in at the townhouse. No point hiding now.

“Punishment?” She took a step back from the chair to be able to face him, her perplexed face coming into view. “You didn't do anything wrong.” The notion was almost laughable. Azriel had done plenty wrong in his life.

“I didn't find her,” he whispers, facing away from his friend in favor of watching you, “She's been out there for almost a century, on her own,” he clenched his fists at the thought, “and I didn't find her.”

“I know you looked for her as best as you could. I know you all did.” And what good did his best do?

“You don't understand, Nesta,” he says as he looks down at the ring once again, closing his eyes briefly at the burn he felt in his head. He didn't want to talk about this anymore, didn't want to explain his feelings to any of them.

“I do,” she starts, “If something happened-”

“If,” he cringes at how he raised his voice, immediately looking over to your sleeping form to make sure he didn't disturb you, and then added more quietly, with the same conviction in his tone, “If something happened to Cassian you would understand. But it hasn't and so you don't.”

Nesta lets out a defeated sigh, moving back to her original seat by the window, patting his shoulder comfortingly on her way. His eyes are focused on you once more and he has no intention of letting them stray until you wake up, and long after you do.

⋆｡°✩°｡⋆

You wake up slowly, your mind aware of your near consciousness before your body can follow. It feels like you've never been this deeply asleep, even the dreams that usually haunt you were quiet. Perhaps that's why it takes you so long to remember your current situation, it could also be the strangeness of it. You keep your eyes closed as your body and mind slowly come to.

You didn't expect to be lying on a bed, an unbelievably soft bed at that, after being caught stealing from the High Lord's home and then stabbing someone from his so-called Inner Circle. You're not sure when you lost consciousness but, in the split second the High Lord stood in front of you, you were more than certain you wouldn't be able to escape death again.

The sun is high in the sky, meaning you failed your mission, not only because you had been caught but also for not getting to the meeting point on time. Whether at the hands of your captors or your employers you were already as good as dead. The thought has heat burning behind your eyelids and your throat threatening to close up.

You don't even know what happened. This whole mission had seemed above your expertise from the start. You had never been sent on a mission to Prythian and the fact that you were sent to steal from a High Lord's home, the strongest in history at that, had sowed doubts inside you from the moment you heard about your mission from your handler. That and the sinking feeling in your gut as you listened to their descriptions of the city and people working for the High Lord. Every cell on your body was trying to reject this idea.

Deciding to trust your gut, you even brought up your doubts to your superiors, going as far as asking why you were being sent to retrieve some book when there are other fae more experienced in working there. There wasn't even any time to study the place or come up with escape routes. You had never been sent into any mission like this. Your worries had been quickly dismissed. They seemed completely convinced you wouldn't be caught, that you were the only member capable of this job.

Sneaking into the city had been simple enough, there seemed to be some celebration happening since so many fae were drinking and dancing around bars and even on the street. Your uneasiness only got worse as you walked through the streets. Something was wrong, every single one of your instincts was screaming at you, but you couldn't figure out why.

You walked to an alley close to the High Lord's house and surveyed the perimeter, making sure your intel was correct and the house was truly empty. After postponing the inevitable long enough, you took a deep breath and winnowed straight into the house, and, just like your handler told you, there were no wards or shields stopping you from entering. You thought this was peculiar for a High Lord but many powerful fae think themselves invincible to the point of arrogance and at the sacrifice of their own safety.

As you walked quietly through the hallway, your feet seemed to have a mind of their own, carrying you into a big room with sofas and a fireplace instead of the office you were supposed to be already searching through. You had the same feeling of deja vu as when you were walking through the illuminated streets before, something about the portraits on the walls and the peculiar chairs had your heart sputtering in your chest. It was an intricate design but you could swear you'd never seen anything like them before.

You moved closer to the window, far enough that no one could see you through it, and looked down at the city once more. Taking in the lights, the colorful houses and the fae cheerfully walking around the streets despite the late hour. There is no place like this in Montesere, not even close, so you don't understand how you could be confusing it, you really feel like you've been here before. Everything down to the names of the stores and smells wafting through the air look strangely familiar.

As you got lost in your thoughts, you had completely forgot about your mission. Letting your guard down, enough so that you didn't hear or feel anyone's presence in the same room until you heard them call out someone's name. The sound had goosebumps traveling through your entire body, your breath getting stuck in your throat. What scared you the most wasn't even the fact that you had just been caught but that voice, that name, almost brought tears to your eyes.

You stood frozen for a moment before turning around slowly and your entire body went still at what you saw. The male in front of you was the same one that haunted your dreams ever since you could remember, you would recognize that figure, those wings, those eyes anywhere.

You almost doubted you were awake at all but when he moved closer to you, standing in front of you before you could even blink, your body moved to protect yourself on instinct, to do as you had been taught at the guild. Your movements were a lot slower than usual, almost like something inside you was trying to stop you from hurting him but you had still managed to grab the long knife strapped to his thigh and stab it through his stomach in one clean movement.

The knife went in smoothly and he simply took it without trying to stop you or even letting out a sound. You've taken countless times before, killing was part of your life, of your job, but watching his blood run and coat your hands had made you feel incredibly guilty. You couldn't move, couldn't even let go of the knife.

When his hand reached to touch your face - a movement you didn't even register until his rough skin came in contact with your cheek - your wild eyes had met his and, suddenly, it felt like the world was spinning. The bright hazel was so familiar you could cry. He'd been starring in your dreams for so long but you'd never seen him quite this close. As you slowly let your mind catch up to you, you noticed he was smiling.

“You're home, my love,” he whispered softly. Your heart had felt like it was going to beat out of your chest at that point. You were missing something, a piece of information that felt like it was swimming right on the edge of your brain, but you couldn't quite reach it. His hands had both moved to cup your face by the time you found your voice.

“What?” What is going on? Who are you? Why do I feel like I know you? Why is your touch so familiar? My love? Your brain was filled with questions but you couldn't even find it in you to ask them. Couldn't look away from his eyes, the former joy seen in them giving way to something else.

“Azriel?” Both of you had tensed at the voice behind him. It seems he didn't hear anyone else arrive either, too caught up in each other and whatever mysterious tension was tying you together.

Your hands had tightened around the dagger on instinct, you could feel the power rippling through the room. You should have ran away while it was only him, he had let you stab him so maybe he would let you run away as well. But, as night incarnate filled the room, you knew every chance you had at an escape was lost.

The rest of the events were a blur, one moment you were watching more and more people winnow into the room, sending your heart further into disarray, and the next the High Lord himself stood in front of you with fury and what looked like disappointment etching his features, and then everything went dark.

As your memories from the night before fade, you become more aware of your surroundings. You could hear two separate breaths close to you, could smell two distinct scents, you suppose it was lucky enough that they had let you sleep on a bed, it's only natural they'd have someone keeping watch.

If they'd been watching you this whole time they would have to know you were awake by now, so you open your eyes slowly, blinking a few times to adjust to the brightness in the room. You study the intricate gold designs on the dark navy ceiling. Why did even the ceiling seem familiar? It feels like you are losing your mind.

Your head turns to the nightstand, where a cup of water sat over a flower shaped lace coaster. You almost gulped at the sight of it, your throat was so dry you weren't sure you could speak, but you were in a stranger's house, one you had tried to rob the night before, there had to be a catch somewhere and you didn't want to end at the cruel hands of poison.

Two pairs of eyes burned into you, and since you're not going to drink anyway, you decide that there's no delaying this confrontation any more. You turn to look at them, not surprised at finding the winged male sitting close to your bed, but he was accompanied by someone else, something else.

You sit up in bed slowly, not wanting to appear as a threat and startle them into thinking you had intentions of escaping or attacking you. You really didn't know why they hadn't just dumped you in a dark dungeon - you heard about their less than kind reputation before coming here - but you wanted to keep in their good graces if you could help it. They're probably keeping you to know more about who sent you, shame you can't tell them anything, maybe they'd even let you go if you could.

When you sit up against the headboard, your eyes meet the male's immediately, as if you were called to do it. Some of the same emotions you had seen last night were still shining in his eyes, but today there was so much more, so much so that you couldn't even begin to pick them apart even with the difference of a calm mind.

Your captors don't move so you take the moment to study the male before you. He always showed up covered in shadows in your dreams, you had barely caught glimpses of his face in the almost century of seeing him. Which was a real shame if you dared to admit it. He has an exceptionally beautiful face, the sun filtering through the window was giving his tan skin an ethereal glow, his eyes shine brightly, allowing you to make up the different tones of green and brown within them. His hair was stark black, curling slightly at the ends.

You had noticed the large wings that stood at his back the first time you'd seen him. You've never met any species of fae with wings but his were definitely peculiar. You always thought they were black but, with the brightness in the room and his shadows away, you can see they lean more to a crimson and gray-ish color. Trailing down to his torso, you notice that there doesn't seem to be any blood or sign of injury. He had already gotten healed then. For some reason, your heart calms at that and you try telling yourself it's because it might lessen the trouble you got in.

A shadow moves across him to reach up into his ear, almost like it was whispering something to him. You knew the Night Court's Spymaster was a shadowsinger, the only of its kind, but you didn't know what his shadows could do, what they could see and tell him. The hair on the back of your neck raises as his eyes watch you intently while listening to his shadow's words. They had to be talking about you. Could they read through your thoughts?

“Leave us alone, Amren.” Your eyes finally stray from the male when you hear her name, finally taking in the short creature behind him, and you almost regret it when her bright silver eyes meet yours. She was nothing short of terrifying, you think even the older assassins in the guild would feel unnerved under her gaze. You weren't even sure what she actually was but it had to be something other, something ancient and powerful. She seems displeased at the look you give her, though you doubt she's unacquainted with seeing fear on people's faces, or bothered by it.

Amren narrows her eyes slightly before looking at the male. She studies him with an intensity that could make most fae run for their lives, makes you consider it, but the male doesn't seem to care, his eyes never leaving yours. “I hope you know what you're doing, boy.” She walks out of the room with no hesitation, leaving you alone with the male that walks your dreams once again.

You stare into each other's eyes for what feels like an eternity. Neither of you seem to find the right words. You know why you're having trouble finding them. Between getting caught stealing in his house and the turmoil going on inside you, you're surprised you've been managing to keep your composure at all. But you can't understand why he'd be in the same position as you. Could he also be haunted by dreams of you the same way you were of him?

Leaning forward in his chair, he says the same name you heard last night, the one who made your heart tighten painfully in your chest. You had been too confused and scared last night to even consider it but now you can clearly see he's using it to call you. He seems to think that's your name.

“That's not my name,” you manage through your dry throat, the words coming out so rough and low that you're sure he wouldn't have heard you if it weren't for the quiet in the room. Your answer seems to hurt him, his face drops, the sunlight that was shining through his skin seems to vanish, and you see his wings tighten behind him. Your own body seems to respond to it. You want to make him feel better but you don't know how or why.

He nods almost imperceptibly, as if accepting a fact he was unwilling to, and rises up from the chair, tensing slightly when you press yourself further into the headboard. He seems to try to ignore it as he moves to the nightstand, picking up the glass and handing it to you.

You eye the glass sitting in his brutally scarred hands, momentarily wondering what could have done such a thing if he healed up from a stab wound in mere hours. He senses your hesitation but simply holds it closer to you. You look up to meet his eyes again.

“It's not poisoned,” he offers, “I promise.” You're not entirely sure why but you trust him, or maybe you were just in desperate need of water, reaching up to take the glass from him and almost drinking it in one go. He seems at least pleased enough with this, moving back to sit in his chair. As you observe his movements, you almost miss the way the glass refills on its own. You blink at it, deciding it's not worth considering, and take another slow sip.

Since he doesn't start asking you questions, apparently content enough with watching you drink, and you start to get unusually shy under his intense gaze, you start asking them yourself, seeing this as your chance to know the male of your dreams.

“What's your name?” You play with the glass as you ask, trying to appear nonchalant despite your perilous situation and the tension between you.

“Azriel,” his deep voice cuts through the silence. You repeat it, goosebumps spreading over your body at the act. Nothing is making sense anymore but his name feels right on your tongue.

You say it one more time, letting it linger in your mind. There is something inside you trying to claw its way out at the sound. You can feel it now, can feel how wrong it feels, how wrong you feel. There was a growing pressure inside your head. You let go of the glass and watch it vanish into thin air before it has the chance to make contact with the covers.

The sensation that you've forgotten something really important is back. You look up at the male one more time, seeing he has moved closer to you and noting the worry in his gaze. He wasn't supposed to be worried about you, he's a stranger and you had just stabbed him a few hours ago. So why does it feel right for him to care? Tears line your eyelids, your hands shaking slightly at the strange feelings building inside you.

“I don't know you,” you whisper, more to yourself than him, “I feel like I should.”

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[hyun3hk3y]

Symbolism in "Portrait of Lady Edelgard Von Hresvelg"

This is something that I’ve usually never really felt comfortable doing. If you ever wonder why some artists are a bit more reluctant to actually *talk* about the “meaning” of their work, its because it strikes the same tenor as having to explain why a joke is funny.  If I have to actually lay it out for the viewer why certain decisions were made in the execution of a work of art, the magic of the whole experience may be lost.  Moreover, many artists avoid making definitive statements on their work because they do not wish to deprive viewers the opportunity to derive their own unique explanation. 

While I chiefly view myself as a fine artist, most of my artistic training was as an illustrator.  As an artist, this can lead to an interesting dichotomy when it comes to creating paintings.  During my studies, I was told that the job of an illustrator is to solve pictorial problems for people often by making pictures that tell a story or convey an idea.  Fine art’s definition, in contrast, tends to be more nebulous.  But I digress, on to the painting…

A number of people on reddit and Tumblr have remarked on the candle with the snuffed-out flame.  No interpretations on it have been offered, the mere presence of a candle with a smoldering wick is a strong enough implication.  However, this is one instance where I drew inspiration from art history so I believe it is worth elaborating on.  The animus for the candle originates in the Arnolfini Portrait by Jan Van Eyck.  Below is an image of the painting with the pertinent candle circled.

Art history scholars have a number of different readings about the candle’s presence, but the one I was taught in Art History is that the lit candle indicates the presence of the holy ghost or the watchful eye of God.  Three Houses draws from a number of religions for its world building, in the case of The Church of Serios, the developers took the majority of their cues from The Catholic Church.  If a lit candle would suggest Edelgard’s faith in the Goddess, then an extinguished one must imply Edelgard’s *loss* of faith. 

In addition to the extinguished candle, I would also like to direct viewers to the reflection of the candle in the polished wood table surface. In the reflection the candle is still burning very brightly, almost down to the base of the candelabra.

The purpose of this image is to recall a saying from old Taoism Philosophy in China: “The candle that burns twice as bright burns half as long.”  Those who are familiar with Edelgard’s back story in Three Houses will find its relevance obvious.  I doubt I am the only one to make the allusion.

This brings me to the next major piece of symbolism I employed in the painting, the dagger and the drapery on the table.  The dagger’s significance should go without saying, but its application as a device will become more apparent after I explain the table cloth.  To put it succinctly, the majority of the dark shadow shapes made by the tablecloth are arranged to evoke the shape of the crest of flames.  Below is another visual to help illuminate this detail. 

The immediate implication here is the detail of Edelgard possessing the crest of flames.  As for why I decided to depict it in a more concealed way…When I first got the idea for this painting, the whole concept was that if a person saw this painting in a gallery, they would be looking at an actual artifact from Fodlan, one that created by an artist who actually lived there.  This is why the second row of the inscription reads “In the Imperial Year” on the left side and “1179” on the right.  This means the painting would have been completed just before Edelgard starts attending Gareg Mach, and long before the greater public would know she has the crest of flames.  How the artist came to know this would remain a mystery.  I like to imagine it as a detail that Fodlan’s historians would debate over for years after the game’s narrative.

There is also a second message that I have intended with the dagger’s placement cutting (heh) across the crest…Gripping the dagger over the crest of flames is a statement about what the path is that Edelgard will take, especially when the crest is examined as representing the Goddess Sothis.  In fact, there are two (technically three) lines of dialogue from Three Houses I had in mind for this symbolism.

That about sums it up!  I may do a couple more posts in the future where I show how the painting evolved from thumbnails, to studies to the finished image if theres interest in that sort of thing.

[genericpuff]

more proof of Rachel responding to criticism (but it deserves its own post)

Shoutout to @loreolympusminoredits over on Instagram because they were the one that we saw pointing this out, but Rachel and her team went and edited a panel in the newest free episode right as it became free.

Original:

Edit:

So, a few things about this.

FIRST OF ALL, it's clear beyond a shadow of a doubt now that Rachel is seeing the criticism being made about the S2/3 art and its degradation. A lot of those criticisms include how overly-sexualized Persephone is (because Rachel will take any and all opportunity to draw her mamajama's as the central focal point of the shot even when it doesn't make sense) and how little floral there is compared to S1 despite her being the Goddess of Spring.

THAT BEING SAID, SECOND OF ALL, this edit still feels so incredibly low effort. It doesn't tell me that Rachel genuinely wants to do better, it tells me that she's doing this because Webtoons finally told her to shape up and do it or because the criticism finally got to her head but instead of going "hmm, maybe the points people are making are genuine?" she's going "FINE. IF YOU GUYS ARE GONNA BE DICKS ABOUT IT, I'LL REMOVE HER BOOB LINE. HAPPY NOW????" (no, because the art still looks cheap and rushed, it's still missing color along the left side of her dress/arm ffs, changing little things like her cleavage and adding some white blobs into her hair isn't getting to the spirit of these criticisms - and that's that the whole vibe of the art is gone, there's no personality or oomf that it had back in S1).

THIRD OF ALL, SHE DIDN'T EVEN EDIT OUT THE ORIGINAL PANEL LMAO YOU CAN LITERALLY COMPARE THE OLD VERSION AND THE NEW VERSION RIGHT ON THE COMIC, BECAUSE THE PANEL SHOWED UP AT THE END OF 227 AND IS SHOWN AGAIN IN THE BEGINNING OF 228. BUT SHE ONLY EDITED THE 228 ONE LMAOOO SO NOW IT'S JUST INCONSISTENT 🤣 it's like Rachel thinks she's "winning" for doing the bare minimum but she's creating even more little art inconsistencies and problems. It gives me the impression she only changed the panel because it was about to become free to read and she wants the non-fast-passers to be eluded into thinking she's making 'more effort' when that 'effort' is literally just like, white blobs and the eraser tool and one redrawn line LMAO

Anyways, all that's to say, Rachel we can see you editing your panels and your efforts to do so are so bare minimum it hurts. You don't need to go back and edit old panels, you need to work on the stuff that's coming out, and that's gonna take a lot more work than just throwing in some blob flowers and erasing Persephone's boobs. You haven't addressed the oversaturated colors that make the characters look like they've been dipped in grease paint, the void backgrounds that make that oversaturation look even WORSE, the lack of watercolor texturing, lack of glow, anatomical problems, overuse of lineart, character model inconsistencies between panels, lack of shape language, and lack of overall visual appeal that's definitely being lost due to an over-reliance on assistants to pull the weight of drawing the comic and lack of proper direction/training to get everyone on the same page.

Go back and read your own comic for once, Rachel. Do some studies on what used to be good about your art. Get your assistants on the same wavelength. Make an actual effort. Because there are currently SHITLOADS of salty unpaid Internet randos online drawing circles around you and understanding your techniques better than you do these days.

And as one of those salty unpaid Internet randos, here you go:

[lumenflowered]

Pelipper mail! A nightmare that isn't yours. For its original dreamer, it was always painfully reoccurring, especially in her youth.

Your duty, your burden, feels too big for your own body. You are nine years old again, with the weight of the world lying right on top of your shoulders, again, without even the decency to wait till you grow a little older, a little stronger, so that maybe everything won't seem so bad through a grown-up's eyes.

"Hello, Princess Zelda!"

You snap out of your daze and look up at the voice's owner— a boy of nobility, accompanied by five or six of his peers. The duke's boy. You know his name is Imos, and he is eleven years old.

"Lovely weather today, isn't it?" Imos says loftily. "But it might rain."

Your face does not shift, and you level a blank gaze with him. "And?"

"Perhaps you ought to return to your study and… what was it? Awaken that sacred power that's going to save us all from certain doom?" The other boys and girls hide shrill giggles behind their hands. You don't mean to curl your fist (it is very unbecoming, after all), but then your nails dig into your palms anyway.

"Look at her," the baron's son shouts with glee. "She couldn't tell a cucco apart from a heron if she tried."

That embarrassing memory floods your mind and your face goes a bit pink.

The count's daughter waves him down. "Oh, spare her! She fails at everything, even the bare minimum!"

"Did you hear she was caught sneaking into the library by her father?"

"Did you hear she got sick from her last fountain trip 'cause the Goddess thinks she's so stupid?"

"Did you hear that his Majesty confiscated all her books because she couldn't stop reading them?"

"Eugh, what kind of princess likes to read so much?"

"Only lunatics with thick-wired spectacles do that!"

"Did you hear that in the past three years, she's done nothing at all?"

"Yeah, except become a booky freak!"

On and on the children go and erupt into high-pitched laughter, and rage and shame constricts around your throat— the kind of tightness that makes you want to explode into a million little pieces and somehow still scream at the same time. The kind that makes you want to disappear and not come back.

Tears prick at your burning eyes and you are just about to think, you are not going to cry in front of—

"Hey, your Highness," Imos says in a mocking tone, and he walks up to you, but his smile falls into a serious frown. "It's been however long and you don't exactly have forever to save all our asses. So you need to toughen up. Otherwise…" He shrugs, stepping back to rejoin his friends. "We'll see you on the other side of hell."

You feel your heart twist as they whoop and jeer. "Aww, look! Is the little princess gonna cryyyy?" the captain's son taunts. "Does the little princess want her muuum?"

The other children actually stop and gasp, and he clamps his mouth shut with a slightly guilty look. Before they all burst out laughing, again. Endless nightmare. Blurry, leering faces you cannot discern. Endless, endless laughter.

"Are you going to cry for your mum, Zelda?"

"Put a little doggy treat that says 'Queen of Hyrule' on a stick so Zelda will jump after it like a pet!"

"Mother won't save you now, princess!"

"And your daddy thinks you're a failure!"

You can't stop the tears. You can't stop. And then you're curled on the ground gasping for air like a dying fish and crying for your father who would never come for a failure like you and you just want someone to hear you and to just hold you and it won't stop it won't stop it won't

"I just want my mother," you wail, and their laughter sounds like screaming. "I just…"

and pain will never fucking stop, least of all for you

That i s...

...Children do always know how to be the cruelest. Those of nobility especially; they had many examples to learn from, after all. I suppose that does not vary as much as I thought (or perhaps hoped) it did between worlds.

Zelda, if you happen to be reading this, I am sorry you had to deal with anything approaching... this.

(Urbosa or Link, if you happen to be reading this, would you mind giving Zelda a hug for me?)

[thedangerstranger]

Pelipper mail! A nightmare that isn't yours. For its original dreamer, it was always painfully reoccurring, especially in her youth.

Your duty, your burden, feels too big for your own body. You are nine years old again, with the weight of the world lying right on top of your shoulders, again, without even the decency to wait till you grow a little older, a little stronger, so that maybe everything won't seem so bad through a grown-up's eyes.

"Hello, Princess Zelda!"

You snap out of your daze and look up at the voice's owner— a boy of nobility, accompanied by five or six of his peers. The duke's boy. You know his name is Imos, and he is eleven years old.

"Lovely weather today, isn't it?" Imos says loftily. "But it might rain."

Your face does not shift, and you level a blank gaze with him. "And?"

"Perhaps you ought to return to your study and… what was it? Awaken that sacred power that's going to save us all from certain doom?" The other boys and girls hide shrill giggles behind their hands. You don't mean to curl your fist (it is very unbecoming, after all), but then your nails dig into your palms anyway.

"Look at her," the baron's son shouts with glee. "She couldn't tell a cucco apart from a heron if she tried."

That embarrassing memory floods your mind and your face goes a bit pink.

The count's daughter waves him down. "Oh, spare her! She fails at everything, even the bare minimum!"

"Did you hear she was caught sneaking into the library by her father?"

"Did you hear she got sick from her last fountain trip 'cause the Goddess thinks she's so stupid?"

"Did you hear that his Majesty confiscated all her books because she couldn't stop reading them?"

"Eugh, what kind of princess likes to read so much?"

"Only lunatics with thick-wired spectacles do that!"

"Did you hear that in the past three years, she's done nothing at all?"

"Yeah, except become a booky freak!"

On and on the children go and erupt into high-pitched laughter, and rage and shame constricts around your throat— the kind of tightness that makes you want to explode into a million little pieces and somehow still scream at the same time. The kind that makes you want to disappear and not come back.

Tears prick at your burning eyes and you are just about to think, you are not going to cry in front of—

"Hey, your Highness," Imos says in a mocking tone, and he walks up to you, but his smile falls into a serious frown. "It's been however long and you don't exactly have forever to save all our asses. So you need to toughen up. Otherwise…" He shrugs, stepping back to rejoin his friends. "We'll see you on the other side of hell."

You feel your heart twist as they whoop and jeer. "Aww, look! Is the little princess gonna cryyyy?" the captain's son taunts. "Does the little princess want her muuum?"

The other children actually stop and gasp, and he clamps his mouth shut with a slightly guilty look. Before they all burst out laughing, again. Endless nightmare. Blurry, leering faces you cannot discern. Endless, endless laughter.

"Are you going to cry for your mum, Zelda?"

"Put a little doggy treat that says 'Queen of Hyrule' on a stick so Zelda will jump after it like a pet!"

"Mother won't save you now, princess!"

"And your daddy thinks you're a failure!"

You can't stop the tears. You can't stop. And then you're curled on the ground gasping for air like a dying fish and crying for your father who would never come for a failure like you and you just want someone to hear you and to just hold you and it won't stop it won't stop it won't

"I just want my mother," you wail, and their laughter sounds like screaming. "I just…"

and pain will never fucking stop, least of all for you

...Oh.

That felt... uncomfortably familiar. I suppose... I was never bullied quite like that, but... the feelings remain, all the same.

I guess if I'm to try and find any silver lining... it must be nice, to want your parent.

[franstastic-ideas]

Mei, I am definitely looking at the Nimbasa Ferris Wheel event with the X-transceiver like I’m on The Office. Starry-eyed has an extra layer of cuteness knowing she wears space-buns. Nagisa could be a reference to something other than the water relation, but again, the kind of softness that matches.

The little gremlin! I like the fact spirit can have a double meaning as a “sprite” not so much in modern english, but more in word origin. And I see it mostly attributed to children. Nox is def related to night, the moon, ghost-type, honestly the mythology writes itself. You literally have an owl archer. And something in my brain ticks it as a good choice you went with Nox over Nyx or any other feminine-esque name despite also referring to a goddess for some reason, intentional?

Akari, The Skyfallen Luminary, and the one I could suspect to be your favorite bc it’s all kinds of pretty and fun. Honestly gorgeous all around. It’s not easy coming up with three word titles that captures everything you want in a way that feels alive or cool, but you’ve done it for sure. And Seraphina? I’m giggling even more I don’t need to google that to know the religious symbolism here, and with fire. Oh, PLA and Volo. You’ve started a whole thing here aesthetically. I’m bouncing off the walls from it tho, the research that goes into this is my jam, bread and butter.

Juliana (The Straight A's Scholar) GIRL PLS I’m bout to cry, I am not gonna get anxious over a Pokegirl y’all don’t KNOW what real college is like for hard science majors in your cozy Pokémon World (just got out of an exam) but FINE go be a scholar like in the old days. PHDs ain’t no walk in the park either irl. But alas, yeah, that’s Paldea for you, I GUESS I have to say congratulations. She’s a good girl, and bonus points for the culturally fitting nicknames.

This is not something I know how to express, but I read each name like it’s a title card of a movie flashing across the screen with a dramatic and lit up sequence with all the girls and little made-up animations and whatever else I picture that goes along with the backgrounds of the names and I go “hm yeah” *nods* that be them. So kudos all around!

Mei seems to be under the impression that she's in a shoujo rather than an adventure game. She sets off from Aspertia City with the hope that her journey will be filled with romance, that she will finally find her true love, her prince...

As much of a sentimentalist as she is though, do keep in mind that Mei still defeats Ghetsis at his worst.

I consistently refer to Mizuki as a 'horrid little creature', even though she's actually one of the taller girls. She moved to Alola from Kanto and originates from Lavender Town, so she has a camaraderie with Ghost-types.

You know that girl who asks Red or Leaf if they believe in ghosts and if told 'No', she replies, "That white hand on your shoulder... I'm just imagining it." That's Mizuki.

Akari's title is indeed one I hold in high favor, because of the multiple meanings behind it. Skyfallen of course pertains to her falling from the space-time rift, and a luminary is someone who inspires or influences others, referencing how Akari brings about change in Hisui.

But luminary can also mean 'angel'. When you pair that definition with her status as The Skyfallen, it paints the image of a guardian angel descending upon the region. Which is certainly what Volo sees her as.

Juliana, she's essentially the perfect student. She shows up to class on time, she loves every second of it, and she's entirely devoted to her studies. So much so, the grand majority of her Pokémon's names begin with the letter 'A'.

She has to do the intellectual heavy lifting between her and Arven. Juliana would be more than happy to tutor him, though.

[de-pointe-du-lioncourt]

Some background for my Tav and his parents

If you even care

Pictures first

Tavish

Talice

Rian

His mother’s name is Talice. She’s a (mostly) full blooded drow, descended from Lolth sworn drow from Menzoberranzan on her father’s side while her mother came from a largely T'lindhet drow family and one of The First (the half-elf priestesses of Loviatar who ruled Dambrath.)

For most of her life growing up, Talice spent her time in either Dambrath or Menzoberranzan due to her parents having ancestral homes in both places. I was thinking her father’s house was maybe close friends and allies with the Do’Urden House (before the Drizzt fiasco) and consequently the house is not ranked very highly as of the present. Because of that, and the fact that Talice and her mother were technically not full drow, their time spent in Menzoberranzan wasn’t the most welcoming and eventually they decided to live full time in Dambrath.

Luckily, in Dambrath, Talice’s mother held high social status from being a Child of the First and having strong drow features, so growing up there was much more favorable.

Talice was very scholarly by nature and her time in Menzoberranzan as a youth bore some resentment towards the fact that she wasn’t a full blooded drow, so she took it upon herself to learn as much about her father’s House and relating Houses as possible in order to feel more connected with her full drow side. She ended up learning of the Do’Urdens and was quite enthralled by Drizzt. She halted her studies of becoming a Priestess of Loviatar and focused on a life of adventuring, combining her two passions to become a Cleric of Pain.

She devoted a lot of time to traveling with a group of other worshippers of Loviatar whose main goal was to spread the teachings of their Goddess. During one of these outings, the group was to travel through an area that didn’t take very kindly to the attempted religious conversion so as a precaution, more hired muscle joined the group.

This is when she met Rian, Tav’s father. I haven’t thought as much about him as I have Talice. He’s a fairly ordinary human, not originally from Dambrath. He grew up in Baldur’s Gate and as a teenager, he stumbled across the regrowing cult of Bhaal in the sewer ruins.

The cultists planned to sacrifice him to Bhaal but as he was in the throes of death, he made a pact: in order to live, he promised Bhaal his firstborn child. A new Bhaalspawn to replace the ones killed during the events of the original Baldur’s Gate games. Very Rumplestiltskin-esque, I’m aware. Rian becomes a Fiend Warlock in service of Bhaal, becoming a mercenary, hunting and killing not only for a living but also as an act of faith. He figures it’s better than murdering just anyone as he at least has reason from his employers to target these people.

Eventually he makes it to Dambrath, possibly because he heard of the need for muscle for the group Talice is a part of, or possibly because he already had a target in the area. I’m unsure of the reason as of right now. He likes it there and the contract he signs with Talice’s group means he’ll be there for a while. Maybe this is where he can finally settle down, he thinks, to give Bhaal his promised child.

He didn’t think he would actually fall in love. He planned on breaking free from his pact and running after the true nature of his child was revealed. He didn’t think he would become so passionate about Dambrath, Loviatar, and more specifically, Talice, who was near nobility due to her heritage, even if she didn’t act like it. Here is when he would take up an Oath of the Crown, vowing to protect Talice and the party and kill those who got in the way of their mission.

Despite all of this, I don’t think I would say Talice or Rian are completely evil, despite both of them serving quite evil Gods and committing evil acts in their names. I think I would say they were just. Eccentric. And devout. Or in Rian’s case, bound to it.

And then there’s Tavish, a half drow wild magic sorcerer, powers granted from not only his Fey ancestry from being a half elf but also the fact that he has Bhaal’s blood. His childhood is pretty good I’d think. His murderous tendencies don’t really show up for a long time. Rian wonders if Bhaal has made more Bhaalspawn in the time it took for him to settle down and just kind of forgot about their deal. Or maybe all the murder he did in service of him was enough to fulfill their pact. Talice teaches Tavish the history of her father’s family, even about the Do’Urden house and Drizzt, who they might be very distantly related to. He grows up following Loviatar just like his mother just not to the same extent as wanting to spread her teachings throughout more of Fae’run. He wants to explore and adventure the way his parents did, he wants to visit Baldur’s Gate where his father grew up even though he doesn’t talk about his time there much. He goes off into the world and then. He can’t remember much after that. Until he wakes up on the Nautiloid, with a tadpole in his head.

[pen-paper-ink]

Alright Im going to go OFF because this is what I studied in school:

Galatea is a play where two pre-teen girls are disguised as boys to prevent them from being sacrificed to Poseidon. They meet. They go “oh I think you are like me”. They vanish for a FULL ACT and then return and announce they are in love and getting married. Everyone is horrified and they summon Aphrodite, the end all be all of love, to explain why this is wrong. Instead! Instead. Aphrodite shows up and says “I like it well.” This matter for several reasons. First, it is the culmination of the play’s entire theme where same gender love is the higher form of love (the play author is super into parallel structure and the language mirrors this as well). Second, this line Aphrodite says is a HALF LINE. In a play where everything is mirrored language and half lines are practically nonexistent this matters. In the flow of a performance this means Aphrodite would say “I like it well” and pause. The audience is left to sit with this idea that the goddess of love thinks these two girls in love is totally fine. This gives this statement so much weight and emphasis! And the end of the play is everyone leaving to go to church because Aphrodite’s solution is that when they cross the threshold, one will become a man to ensure SOCIETY accepts them. Not to make it proper, but to make them safe.

Sir Gawain and the Green Knight. The one they made the movie based on and did Gawain a disservice by removing his very blatant bisexual dilemma. The third section of this epic poem is all about the bargain between the Lord of the castle and Gawain. They each agree to give the other whatever they ‘win’ over the course of three days. Gawain stays at the castle while the Lord goes out hunting. This is already huge because gender at this time was kind of more about what you did. So Gawain here is taking the feminine actions while the Lord is taking the male ones. And Gawain could not care less! His only dilemma is that the Lord’s wife is very interested in Gawain and tries to get more and more from him. Gawain does not ending up sleeping with her, primarily because that would require then sleeping with the Lord AND taking the “feminine” position (yes I know bottoming is not feminine but we are talking medieval definitions of gender and sexuality here so go with me). Gawain is not opposed to sleeping with the Lord’s wife nor is he actually opposed to sleeping with the Lord, just with what role he would be expected to assume. In today’s terms: Gawain is a top and does not care for bottoming and he thinks the Lord is hot but the Lord is also a top and therefore they are incompatible. This is an extreme simplification and honestly the queer depths of the original are exquisite so I really recommend reading it.

Most things Shakespeare wrote and at least mildly queer. Twelfth Night has so much gender and sexuality panic as each character falls in love in ways they aren’t supposed to and PANICS. Its is every meme about Gay Panic in one play. Read it! Viola is dressed as a man and pretty comfortable doing so. Except Olivia falls for Viola as a man. And Viola is in love with her boss. Who is starting to feel uncomfortable as he tries to explain how he feels about Viola-as-a-man as totally normal bro feelings. No homo except for its ALL the homo and he is in denial (until he really isnt). Like its kind of implied at the end of the play that Orsino likes Viola as either gender and would be very VERY down to seduce Viola as a man or woman.

Roaring Girl is one of a bazillion plays written about the real life figure Moll Cutpurse. Moll was a highway robber and ran brothels frequented by enough people in power that she always got out of prison whenever she was arrested. Moll is fascinating because she was beloved by the populace in a sort of Robin Hood way where they are doing illegal things but are of and for the people. Moll never wore only feminine clothes. She went around in women’s tops and men’s breeches or in fully masculine clothing (and purportedly was excellent at fooling people, which is why she is a common supporting character in comedies). Moll did not have the language we have today to talk about herself, so she is never classified as officially trans or genderfluid but rather queer (this is to respect her, not to erase identity. We use the language these people had to talk about them to ensure we do not place our own ideas of who or what they are onto them.)

I could go on and on and on. There is so much incredibly subversive, queer literature in the past that people just don’t talk about. It takes more work and background knowledge to interact with some of these texts but that does not make them less queer. And outside of just queer identity, there are tons of plays and poems and epics featuring strong and dynamic female characters who do not bow to men’s power and are allowed to be seen as the hero for doing so (The Duchess of Malfi is my FAV of these but I would need another long text post to do her justice).

tiktokers who say classic lit is bad because its not relatable 1. thats not the fucking point 2. you've clearly never read twelfth night as a trans bisexual

[beananacake]

Dear Diary

A Savior one-shot

Ikaris x fem!guardian angel!reader

Summary: Ikaris has felt a him for millennia and he's never questioned it, until he found the source.

One-shot Summary: While you expected some of your past to come back and haunt you, you just didn't realize that it was not only a one-time thing.

Word Count: 2.2k words

Warnings: I don't know how these occupations work so I'm so sorry if I make mistakes of archaeologists and anthropologists and historians, attempt at trying to read cuneiform and construct sentences in Sumerian style, the word 'ass', angel being a pest, written really quickly so it might not even make sense, fLUFF!

A/N: Hey, everyone! I miss writing about Ikaris and Angel so here you guys go! This was a concept I talked about with @mentallyscreamingsincebirth and it was too good to ignore so, on a whim, I just wrote it. It ends abruptly and awkwardly so I'm really sorry about that. As uzhe, not betad. Reviews, comments, suggestions, requests (and reblogs) are super welcome! Enjoy Dear Diary!

Catch Ikaris and Angel's origin story here! (SAVIOR)

Main Masterlist

There were advantages to being alive for over seven-thousand years. You got to live throughout civilizations, saw them rise and fall. Saw the dawn of the invention of a lot of things—thank you, Phastos—and be one of the first to see it all happen. Live out the history and have every right to call out people who say the wrong things about them. And because you had lived such a long life, you had your pick of whichever occupation you want—other than being Ikaris’s guardian angel, of course.

Sersi worked as a history professor. Makkari considered the museum curator job since she liked collecting things. Phastos worked in an engineering laboratory. Ikaris, an archaeologist, and you became an anthropologist.

You were fine with your job. You liked it, actually. You loved history and people and people all throughout history (except for the nasty ones, of course). Plus, your extensive life gave you an edge over your colleagues since most of the events you were studying had happened to you personally. Case in point: The Weeping Goddess. You were The Weeping Goddess (before your wings got sliced off during the Emergence) and all the records of that account, you had taken and personally annotated. Of course, you added a few pizzazz to jazz things up but you stayed true to what had happened.

And while you expected some of your past to come back and haunt you in your line of work, you just didn’t know that that was not the only time it would happen.

Because when Sersi sent a photo on your family group chat, you did not expect it would be one of your pieces of history. Or at least, something that was made by you.

Your phone pinged and you reached over Ikaris’s bare chest, to his side table, to grab your phone. Your husband was still sound asleep and you placed a gentle kiss on his chest as you took your mobile device.

“Angel, what are you doing?” he asked, voice still raspy from sleep. He tightened his arms around you.

“Just grabbing my phone, my love.” You brought your phone to you and checked the notification.

“It’s too early for you to be on your phone,” he complained, turning on his side and taking you with him.

You chuckled as you let yourself go along with him. “Sersi sent a photo on the family chat. I just want to see if it’s a baby announcement.”

He nuzzled your neck, breathing against your skin. You shivered. “Us Eternals can’t have babies, Y/N.”

“I know but doesn’t hurt to hope, right?” You kissed his head and opened the notification. “And besides, it could be their wedding invite.”

But it wasn’t. What it was was a photo of a stone slab with etchings from a dead language. Dead to the world, anyway. But to you, a seven-thousand-year-old guardian angel, it was as recent as yesterday.

Beneath the photo was your tagged name and the message: Is this you?

You enlarged the photo and read the stone slab after finding the right orientation, gasping when you decoded the message. Then, you laughed. You made a mental note to tell Sersi to turn it 180 degrees so it would be readable.

“Angel,” Ikaris said again. He planted his chin on your shoulder to have a look at you. He rubbed his nose against yours. “What’s so funny?”

You looked at your bed partner and kissed his nose. “You are.”

“Me?”

You nodded, grinning.

“What’s so funny about me?”

You closed your phone and returned it to your nightstand. You wrapped your arms around Ikaris once more and sighed contentedly.

“I love you,” you murmured.

“Hmm.” He laid his lips against yours, kissing you, as he pulled your naked body closer to his bare form.

But you still couldn’t shake off the image and you giggled when you felt him pressing against you. Your husband took offense in this and he pulled back, watching you with a frown.

“You weren’t laughing last night when we did more than just kiss,” he complained.

“I’m sorry. I promise it’s not you.” You said then retracted your statement. “Well, it is you but not you now.”

He raised a brow and even when you had spent the whole of your life looking at—at, after. Po-tay-to, po-tah-to—him, he could still take your breath away.

“Y/N, I love you, I really do, but even you should know it’s too early for your sense of humor.”

You faked offense at that. “Excuse me, you told me you loved my humor. You said as much on our wedding.”

He only gave you a flat look. You chuckled and pecked him on the lips.

“Fine. Go have a look at your phone if you want to know what made me laugh.” You said, pulling from him.

He did as he was told, taking his phone to open the family chat. You snuggled closer to him, wrapped an arm around his waist and rested your cheek against his arm as you read the message with him.

“Is this… Sumerian?” he asked after he turned his phone this way and that until he found the perfect angle for the slab.

“Technically, the writing style is cuneiform but the language is Sumerian.” You told him, pointing at the etchings.

“Okay. I don’t see what’s funny here.” He said.

You rolled your eyes even though he couldn’t see it. “I thought you knew how to read texts. How far back does your vocabulary go?”

“Far enough.”

“Greek?”

“Yes.”

You snorted. “And you call yourself a verified archaeologist, Dr. Ike Harris.” You teased, using his human name that wasn’t far off his real one.

He chuckled at you. “It’s a front. And I only did it in case someone excavated something Phastos made that would be too modern for that time.”

You kissed his arm. “Of course you did and I love you for that, but your vocabulary needs work. I need to teach you Sumerian.”

You plucked the phone from his hands and sat up. You heard him groan.

“What? Now?” he grumbled.

“Yes, now.”

“It’s still too early, Y/N.”

You pouted prettily at him and gave him a look you knew he wouldn’t resist. “Do you want to laugh with me or not?”

“You said the writing is about me. Why would I laugh at myself?”

It was your turn to grumble. “Fine. It’s on you when we go to Sersi’s and we share an inside joke about you.” You turned back from him and plopped down in bed.

His arms snaked on your waist and pulled you flush against his chest. “Am I going to regret decoding the slab?”

“Yes.”

He sighed. You felt his lips against the patch of skin that once connected you to your wings.

“But at least you’ll learn a new language. You can add it to your resume. I know there are some people who would die just to learn a dead language.” You said with a grin, holding the hands on your waist.

“There’s that sense of humor again,” he chuckled. “Okay. Let’s go learn Sumerian.”

You spent the better part of the morning in your home library, pulling out all of the books you wrote about the Sumerians and the Akkadians and anything about Mesopotamia. Ikaris was a still grumbly while he studied but the chocolate chip pancakes you made for him lifted his mood. You never realized how difficult a student your husband was until you started to teach him about cuneiforms. He was impatient and he complained a lot, especially when he couldn’t immediately read and write perfectly.

Always a perfectionist, this stubborn Eternal. It was a thing of wonder you still loved him, even if he was a pain in your ass.

Your phone pinged again after a few hours. It was well into the day now. You and Ikaris had no jobs scheduled for that day so it was just perfectly okay to waste it learning a dead language.

You pressed on the notification, seeing that Sprite had chatted in the family group chat.

Sprite: HAHAHAHAHA

Sprite: Please tell me he’s read this

Sprite: @Y/N Send a video of his reaction!

You chuckled, replying in the affirmative. You weren’t selfish. Ikaris was more open around you and you shared that teensy-tiny side of him to everyone. Much to his chagrin, of course.

“Are you ready?” you asked, watching him.

He was still hunched on a paper where you had written in cuneiform. “No.”

“You don’t have to be perfect at it.” You took the pencil from his hand. “Because if you are, you wouldn’t take me to your excavations anymore.”

You said out loud the simple sentence you wrote. “Ikaris is my husband,” you said as you pointed at the symbols on the paper. You put emphasis on his name and wrote a new sentence for him to decode.

“Ikaris… is… an ass…?” He read slowly then looked at you sharply with a mockingly offended frown.

You laughed. You bent down and kissed him. “Am I wrong, though?”

He only smiled. You taught him more words, especially ones that were on the stone slab. When he looked like he could read through it without difficulty, you drew up the photo on his phone. On yours, you put it on video to capture the look on his face.

“What’s the video for, Angel?” he asked.

“Oh, you know,” you said with a dismissive wave of your hand. “Records. As an archaeologist, you should know how important it is to do record-keeping. At least, that’s what we anthropologists do.”

He rolled his eyes at you. “Yes, Dr. Y/N Harris, anthropologist extraordinaire.”

You grinned at the mention of your name. “Now, go. Read through it. It’s just about two sentences.”

“Two really long sentences,” he grumbled again. “Today… I saw Ikaris… fly… into a… tree… because he was… looking… and—No, that’s an at… at… Sersi.” He frowned at the sentence and reread it, with more conviction this time. “Today, I saw Ikaris fly into a tree because he was looking at Sersi—Angel—”

All the while he was reading, you were laughing behind the camera. Ikaris read it so seriously the first time that you doubted he even realized what he had just said out loud.

“I did not—”

“Read the next,” you said between guffaws.

He huffed and resumed position, squinting at his phone as he read slowly and out loud again. “It… was funny… to see… What’s this? Is this supposed to be ‘big man?’… Big man… Poke Ikaris… with a… stick… to get… him… down—What?”

You laughed louder at his embarrassed expression. Your belly started to ache at how much you cackled.

“Read it straight, my love,” you urged.

“No.”

“Please?”

“Y/N.”

“If you’re not going to read it, I’m just going to say it out loud.”

He made a face and turned to his phone again. He cleared his throat. “Let me just explain—”

“No. Read it.” You grinned.

Ikaris sighed and nodded. “It was funny to see ‘big man’ poke Ikaris with a stick to get him down—Okay, in my defense—”

“My love, everyone else who’s seen you get stuck in a tree has been dead for over seven thousand years. You don’t need to explain yourself.” You said once you got your composure back, then broke down again. “You got stuck on a tree!”

“Angel—”

You laughed harder at the exasperated look on his face. God, how you loved being the pain in his ass now.

“Did you write this?” he asked once you stopped laughing.

You had just sent the video and the chat had been blowing up with comments and reactions of it.

“Yes,” you said with a sly grin. “My handwriting is still the same. See?” You pointed at his name on both the paper and the photo.

“How many people know?” he asked as he looked.

You turned to your phone, at the notifications that were piling up by the second. “Sprite does. So do Kingo and Druig and Gil—everyone, I think.”

He groaned.

“Don’t worry. No one reads Sumerian anymore. It’s just us.” You assured him with an impish smile. And anthropologists and archaeologist and possibly historians, you refused to add.

“Us and the people who have the same job as us,” he said as he pulled you closer. “What’s that one word I can’t read? Big man? Giant man?”

You howled in laughter again, remembering that day vividly. “It was Gilgamesh. He had to poke you with a stick to dislodge you from the branches!”

“He did not—”

You kissed him deeply. When you pulled back, you grinned widely at the adoring expression he had on his face. It was the same expression he wore when he flew into a tree because he was watching Sersi. And now, he had the same look on his face while looking at you and it had been Sersi who sent you a slab of that time.

Not entirely a full-circle moment but it was as close as having one for you.

“Ikaris, my love, I’m your guardian angel. Deny it all you want; I still know what I saw. Proof is in the pudding, or at least, in my six-thousand-year-old diary entry. Let's just hope no one else digs up the rest of that slab.”

He just groaned.

[bluesdesk]

ZELDA HEADCANONS

Sun:

-- considers "Zelda" and "Hylia" as 2 different identities. When she has to act as Hylia (to give a serious order, to do some magic...), she moves her fringe to her left side. Also when Sky makes her angry in a discussion she is like: "remember I can be Hylia!" and  not "remember I'm Hylia"

-- she wears shorts under her dresses, she would be pretty uncomfortable without them.

-- She has a very strong personality, like a girlboss, and she's as chaotic as Tetra

-- She's Hylia, and so she must handle magic pretty well. Also Sky didn't have problems, if not more frequent nightmares and lightning scars and fear of thunderstorms... But "fear of thunderstorms" doesn't even count! However, she noticed her hair became lighter near the tips, and wavier.

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

Dot:

-- the girly princess? No way! She grew up with Four, she's a smith too, she loves adventures and festivities. The fucsia jacket is a hoodie (she covers the hood with her cloack), she wears leggings and seakers nunder the dress, that's actually a high waisted long skirt she can remove

-- her hair is kinda orangey! Also it's pretty long

-- she's a relative of Four! In the italian version of Minish Cap she refers to Link's grandpa as "uncle Smith". This might mean Smith is her uncle, grand-uncle or greta-granduncle? Dot's mom might be Smith's younger sister for example.

-- She had a pretty simple life before MC and FS.  Dot had learnt some magic because of the whole "descendant of a goddess" thing. Not much, and she preferred to not use it. So, when she got petrified by Vaati's magic, she got the signs of it. Her hands and feet are as small as when she was 12 (MC), and her hair got way straighter than before. And when Vaati kidnapped her, she got some eye markings, like tattoos, on her arms.

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

Lullaby:

-- genderfluid! But their father doesn't really support them and when they feel like a boy they just become Sheik and go in the woods or at Lon Lon!

-- They have a tanned skin and dark blonde hair

--They do want to be a mom though. Dusk is their daughter!

-- They can handle magic well, but Lullaby turned into Sheik for the first time when they were really young, and this had an impact on them. Their blue eyes became red with the Sheik mask (yeah I headcanon it as a mask!), and the repetitive use of it made their eye color turn from blue to violet even when they're "Zelda". They also got a sheikah eye symbol on their left eye, which they cover with their hair.

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

Dusk:

-- She grew up with her grandpa (Lullaby's father)

-- She has Lullaby's skin color! Also she's thin and tall

-- She  didn't attend a royal/exclusive school but went at Twi's same one so they were friends as kids. She also studied swords and archery!

-- She simply didn't recognize Twi as a wolf, she thought he had become a spirit, because she didn't know he had the triforce too!

-- When Ganondorf turned her into his puppet, her skin became pale, and she had those black scars/signs and her eyes turned yellow. Her light power kinda healed this, but she now has light brown eyes, that turn blue when she's really happy and yellow when she's angry. Her skin color changed back to normal but her lips are always more violet than normal and she still has those black scars.

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

Artemis:

-- Dusk's great-great-granddaughter! She has a similiar face, but her colors are different. Also she has chubbier legs.

--When the war started, she took the master sword and trained with it, until Impa told her she had to leave it for the next hero

-- She's been training with magic for a long time, since she can really use it perfectly, and she masters different kinds of magic. Every scar/sign she got is from the enemies' weapons, and not magic

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

Flora:

-- She refused the whole princess/goddess thing, she just refers to herself as a scholar, researcher and adventure.

-- she loves Sheikah clothing!  She has stealth lessons with Paya

-- she tries to imitate Wild's cooking in secret, but she refuses to admit it because of the "powerful hero/ useless princess" thing

--She has also been training a lot with magic, and when she sealed herself and Calamity Ganon, her powers were awake. But being sealed for 100 years, with constant light powers on, and Calamity Ganon surely did something. The constant light made her photosensitive, and her hands are burnt, not as badly as Wild's face of course, but you can recognize they are. The usage of a newly awakened magic, for so long time and with that intensity made her unable to use magic for the next years after she came back, and if she'll ever get her magic back, it'll be only few.

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

Tetra:

-- She grew up knowing her name wad Tetra. She didn't know it was just a nickname, so for her "Zelda" is a nickname she doesn't even like. In the italian version of WW/PH, her name is Dazel. She prefers Dazel over Zelda when she has to do royal stuff.

-- even as Zelda her skin is dark and her hair is all curly

-- Wind's grandma loves her and already adopted her in her mind XD but she keeps telling her she needs warmer clothes and she also gives her lots of Wind's clothes that became too small for him

-- she has blonde freckles on her dark skin, Aryll says she's a starry night

-- chubby!!

-- She had never heard of magic before her first adventure, so you might imagine she must have taken it really badly. She has a messed up sleping schedule and she falls asleep in the strangest ways, positions, and times. One second she's arguing with you, the next moment she's asleep, even if she's on her feet, this thing can get dangerous for her so she always brings someone (mostly Wind) with her. She has scratches everywhere from her petrification too, and being petrified surely didn't help with her previous situation.

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

Fable:

-- she loves to wear pink and sky blue together! Pink is her favorite color and sky blue represents the goddess. She's a fan of jewels too!

-- Don't touch her hair, she'd get mad!

--Legend's step sister and somehow twin! She and Legend have different mothers and the same father (the father became a king after the marriage with Fable's mom, the queen). Oddly enough, they were born the same day of the same year.

-- She knows how to use a sword but she mostly uses magic and she can kick pretty well!

-- She can use magic almost perfectly, like Artemis! However, being in a painting gave her some lighter/"discolored" spots on her skin, pretty much like vitiligo. Just few spots, as she could handle that magic well too.

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

Aurora:

-- a child. She's like 10/12. A pretty smart kid!

-- redhead, tanned skin, curly hair and lots of freckles!

-- autistic, her stims are most likely jumping and moving her arms! She loves springs and water in general, she could spend her entire days with fairies in a spring! Pretty enthusiastic about literally anything too!

-- she sees Hyrule as an older brother

-- She had negative memories about her brother, and giving the adjective "brother" to Hyrule is  like turning the page, seeing that adjective with a new meaning

--The poor kid often thinks her dreams are reality. She has problems in distinguishing vivid dreams from reality as she had been asleep for too much. On the other hand, she barely sleeps.

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

BONUS:

Phantom/Angel (Spirit Tracks!):

As the great granddaughter of Tetra, Phantom and Link should be related (One of Spirit and one of Phantom's parents must be cousins) Unless Spirit isn't the great grandson of Tetra and Wind... but maybe the great grandson of Aryll instead! This would explain why Spirit is in contact with the pirate crew but not royal, and since their first common relative is so distant (Wind and Aryll's parents) they wouldn't be considered as related and the fact they didn't know each other before would have more sense

-- She took her personality from Tetra AND Wind: her will to help and be a hero too, still being a bit sassy, and a little rebel (escaping from the castle). She's like, a perfect mix of their personalities.

-- As for her design, she has wavy hair, a slightly tanned skin (she's not dark skinned, unlike Tetra), she loves earrings and she has a lot of them!

-- She wasn't used to magic, she knew that but not too much, so being a phantom and leaving her body because of said magic had an impact on her. Her eyes were originally dark blue like Tetra, but they're now pink to purple and yellow! Her skin got lighter after ST, and so she wears makeup to seem less pale. Her eyes get irritated easily (red eyes when possessed) and she spaces out a lot, sometimes she has dissociative events

[annab-nana]

Stay With Me - Colby Brock

When tagging along with the boys on a trip to London, you experience some crazy things when you’re alone in your room at the Langham Hotel.

@traphousedaily’s favorite snc series project with: @lonely-xplr, @sarcasmhadachild, @taradummy @reddesertcolbs, @reinad-snc, @cartiercolby, @colbylover99, @sunflowerwhoever, @xplrtrash, @goddess-of-time-and-magic, @xolbyz

A/N: This is my longest fic I have ever written, so if you like the longer fics, let me know! Also, this probably isn’t the best edited because I tried to get it out in a hurry so sorry about that haha

Warnings: some curse words; mentions of suicide, murder, and suffocation

Word Count: 4.6k+

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

“We’re going to England, brothas!” Sam shouted which was followed by excited squeals and scream from you, Jake, and Corey as Colby clapped beside you all. When you went to the party at Kian and Jc’s, you were not expecting your best friends to come up and surprise with such news. You giggled as you watched Corey prance around, saying “Oh my God” repeatedly, and Jake spew absolute nonsense of connecting Queen Elizabeth to Bloody Mary.

“Pack ya bags. We’re going to London, baby!” Sam spoke enthusiastically before covering the camera lens that Colby was holding with his hand. And from there, your crazy adventure with the boys began and you hand no idea what you were in for or how badly it would end.

...

After your suitcase was packed and you had your backpack on, you were ready to go to London. You were so excited to see a new place and considering you have never left the country, this was a whole new experience for you. After a ride in an uber and a plane, the five of you arrived in the capital of the United Kingdom.

“Are you guys gonna be safe driving on the opposite side of the road?” Jake questioned as we walked through the parking lot of cars.

“Oh,” Sam and Colby say together, though Colby’s ended with a ‘my God’.

“I didn’t even think about that,” Colby added as he walked backwards, facing the camera towards us.

“Look at the steering wheel, brotha!” Jake pointed to the steering wheel of a black car in front of you all and the wheel was in fact on the opposite side.

“Oh no! How are we gonna do this?” Colby questioned as we all looked at the car, thinking the same thing as the boy with reddened locks.

“I don’t know my right from my left,” Sam spoke in a horrid British accent that you could not help but laugh at.

“Alright, you’re gonna drive,” Colby told his counterpart as you playfully rolled your eyes.

“Okay,” the blond sighed in defeat.

“This isn’t looking good,” you spoke to the camera that Colby held as you two watched Sam try to pull out of the parking spot. He already nudged Jake with the car and then tried to turn right when you can only go left. After a bunch more tomfoolery from the group, you all finally moved your stuff into the car and got in as well.

“Alright boys so-” Colby started to explain what we were doing but was cut off by Corey clearing his throat.

“And girl,” he scolded as he nodded his head in the direction of you.

“No, Corey. Y/n is one of the boys,” Jake butted in.

“I don’t know if that’s a compliment or an insult,” you chuckled before turning your attention back to Colby so he could continue his explanation.

“Anyway, this is what we’re doing. We’re going to the Langham Hotel which is known as the most haunted hotel in the UK.”

“And also top ten in the whole world,” Sam added.

“Wait, are we going there or staying there?” Jake asked beside you. Your eyes followed from his to Colby’s to see his answer.

“Staying there.” Your eyes widened slightly as you looked at the two boys beside you. Corey giggled nervously and made jokes to hide his fear and you and Jake just laugh in disbelief.

“In our last series, The Origin, we talked to those guys like a demonologist and he says we’re a lot better at paranormal investigations than normal and he thinks we have a gift. So, this whole trip is trying to prove that our group is the best ghost hunters on YouTube and because of that, we are meeting with two paranormal experts who’ve been studying the paranormal and demonology for years and we’re doing an interview here in an hour,” Sam explained.

Jake appeared to be really excited to the right of you and on your left, Corey stayed quiet, which led you to believe he was kind of scared and trying to hide it. You felt a mix of both the emotions of the boys next to you. You were excited for the adventure like Jake was, but also a little scared like Corey since y’all were going to one of the most haunted hotels in the world.

...

“Hey, there it is,” Colby announced to you three in the back and the camera that he had pointed at the building before you guys.

“The Langham!” Sam shouted as he kept his eyes locked on the road, still trying to get used to driving on the other side of it. You all pulled up the hotel, got your bags, and headed inside in no time.

“So, we have a reservation under Golbach,” Colby started as he spoke to the man at the front desk.

“We put in a request. We don’t know if it was able to be fulfilled, but we’re trying to do room 333,” Sam asked the man in the grey suit, a maroon tie and handkerchief to compliment it. You and Corey shared a look after Sam mentioned the number 333, both knowing it did not sound good.

“Absolutely. You have been allocated in that room,” the front man told y’all and Colby turned to you three with an excited grin which you returned. The man at the front desk noticed your group’s excitement and smiled along with you.

“We heard online that room 333 was like haunted or something like that?” Sam mentioned, hoping to get some information from the clerk.

“Is this why you have the camera?” He grinned as he processed the transaction.

“A little bit, yeah,” Sam chuckled.

“There is the legend, yes,” he told you all as he focused on his work.

“Have you heard anything about that?” the blond pressed again.

“We can’t tell guests,” the clerk starts with a smile, but the grin soon drops as he nods his head. Something about the way he did that made you feel a bit uneasy.

“Do you believe in it personally?” Sam questioned as you all listened intently to what the man had to say.

“No. In one year that I’ve been here, I didn’t have any complaints and so on, but you can tell me. Just stay there with the camera, yeah?” he laughed as you all joined in, trying to relieve the awkward and weird tension.

...

“My name’s Sam. This is Colby, Y/n, Jake, and Corey. We’re filming for our channel, but these guys are always into it and woah.” Sam turned the camera to the large creak you all just heard coming from above him and Rosie, the lady you had just met who is a member of the ghost club. John, a guy from the council for the Society for Psychical Research, sat next to her. You sat on the couch nearest to him between Colby and Jake and Corey sat on the chair next to Sam across for you.

“We just rented out room 333. We haven’t even told them why that’s a significant number, but do you guys know much about room 333 here in the Langham Hotel?” Sam asked, filming the response from Rosie.

“Well, the story goes that a Victorian doctor spent the night in room 333 with his bride. It was his wedding night. Who knows the circumstances, but the story goes, he actually murdered his bride in room 333.” She pauses as y’all take in the information she had just given before she continues.

“So, fast forward now to 1973 and the journalist James Alexander Gordon was staying room 333 where he’s waking in the middle of the night and he said he saw a fluorescent ball of lights that slowly formed into the figure of a man, but there was something strange about this man. He was dressed in a full evening suit, very smart, but the bottom half, his legs, were actually missing. Now the journalist actually tried to speak with the figure, but the figure didn’t speak to him. He just walked towards with his arms open wide.”

“A famous cricketer, he was staying at the room and in the middle of the night, he was woken by the sound of taps turning on. He went into the bathroom. Water was gushing out through the tap.”

“Woah,” all of you say collectively as you think back on what happened to the boys previously. You didn’t go with them on that trip, but you heard the story several times and watched the video too. Sam fills in the woman in on the experience briefly before she can continue with her story.

“Anyway, he turned off the taps, went back to the bed, what he could hear was still the sound of running water, gushing out even though the taps were turned off.”

John nods along before speaking about a theory that ghosts are like a tape recording of traumatic experiences that just play over and over again. He explains that you can’t really interact with it because it’s always going on a loop. The theory piques the interest of the group to say the least.

...

After finishing the interview and exploring a bit of the beautiful town you were in, you all gathered around the camera as Sam gave some background on the hotel. He tells you all about a German prince who jumped from the building out the window and how the doctor from earlier killed his wife and himself afterwards, both stories happening in room 333.

Soon the camera is turned off and you all pile in the elevator to head to the third floor. The whole hotel has an unsettling vibe, especially with some weird and creepy paintings that are hung all around. There is a big one of a boy with creepy eyes right when y’all get off the elevator.

“Which way is room 333?” Corey asks a worker when y’all get to a hallway and do not know which way to turn.

“Oh… uh… room 333… it’s that way,” he speaks, dragging out each word and shuffling away in a weird fashion. You and Corey share a wide-eyed look before going to catch up with the rest of the group.

“This is the most haunted room in the most haunted hotel,” Colby tells the camera as he films Sam who is about to unlock the dreaded door. The key does not work on the first try or the second which scares you all, but thankfully, the third time’s a charm.

Sam pushes the door open to reveal the supposed haunted room. A bed sat in the center of it, a closet to the left and a desk to the right. Huge grey curtains covered the window and another door was next to it, which you assumed to be the bathroom.

“It smells like old people,” Jake mentioned. “You know what that means? That means its haunted, bitch.” You and Colby giggled at the beanie boy as Sam and Corey were off in the other corner of the room. Colby mentions how tiny the room is as Corey says how that one of us could be standing where someone got murdered.

“Oh, we got three rooms. There is no way we can all share this bed,” Colby mentioned.

“Where are the other rooms at?” Corey asked as he stuffed his hands into his new hoodie that he got earlier when we were going around the city.

“Just down the hall,” Colby told him.

“Oh, so still on the most haunted floor,” Corey rolls his eyes and nods, accepting the fact that something bad might happen tonight.

...

You all left room 333 and headed to 324 where Corey and Jake would be staying to check the room out. Your room was next door, 323, and looked remarkably similar to 324. After exploring the rooms, y’all take on the hotel in its entirety, passing more creepy paintings and experiencing a door closing behind you without anyone around it, several vortexes, handprints on mirrors, immediate temperature changes, strange noises, and so on. The thing that freaked you out the most was Sam getting random headaches as you explored.

Back in room 333, you guys sat on the bed and Sam explained all the new ghost hunting gadgets they got, from the EMF reader to the dowsing rods. Sam says that with the dowsing rods, you can find basically anything you want.

“Anything?” Colby questions as he picks up the rods.

“Alright, where’s my girlfriend?” he asks and both rods point to you almost immediately. A blush scatters on your cheeks as you laugh it off.

“See guys, even the rods think you two should get together,” Jake tells the camera. Colby ignores the awkwardness between you two as he asks Corey how to effectively use the rods.

Y’all decide to begin the investigation, starting with the EMF reader. Corey brings it close to the hangers that made a noise and it moves up one green light. It lights up to orange in a few places on the right side of the bathroom which freaks you all out and y’all decide to set the EMF reader up in the bathroom since it got the most activity. You all put together that the bathroom is the only spot in the room that has a vortex and that it is exponentially hotter than the bedroom.

While Sam and Colby messed around in the bathroom, you, Corey, and Jake stayed in the bedroom to see if anything would happen in there while the cameras weren’t running in there at the moment.

“If there’s anything in here, can you please make the bed shake?” Jake asked into the air above him, trying to get whatever was out there to make the bed shake like they did earlier. At the moment, he was laying on the left side and you were on the right. Corey was next to you in the desk chair. You guys waited a moment for any responses and then you got one.

“We’re here,” you heard the raspy low whisper come from the closet.

“Please tell you heard that too,” you begged as you sat up, pulling your knees to your chest to comfort yourself. Corey nodded profusely in the dim lighting as Jake audibly answered ‘yes’. Corey dashed to the bathroom door to tell the other two.

“Hey, you good?” Colby asked you quietly as the other boys discussed what happened. Your eyes left the trio before meeting the blue ones that gave you such peace. He had placed a comforting hand on your back, his thumb rubbing it to soothe your nerves.

“Yeah, just freaked out. This place has been giving me an uneasy feeling all day, but I’m good.” You smiled up at him and he gave you a grin right back, one big enough for those adorable little dimples to pop out.

“Bro, if you guys lay on the bed, you will feel something with you,” Jake told Sam and Colby. You stood off the bed, allowing Colby access to lay on it. He handed you the camera, which you handed to Corey because you were not the best them and your hands were slightly shaky.

“When I was laying with him, we could feel it shaking,” you told the duo as they sprawled out on the mattress.

“You should turn off the light,” Jake told Corey and he did. It was just you five in the room alone with the darkness and all who inhabit it.

“Do you guys feel the bed shaking at all?” Corey asked, his voice right next to you.

“Maybe, barely,” Colby’s voice sounded in front of you.

“If the German prince or the doctor that killed his wife is in here, please shake the bed,” Sam asked nicely of the spirits that are presumed to be in the room with you guys. After a moment of silence, a stunned ‘woah’ fell from Sam’s lips.

“What?” Corey questioned as you heard him fiddling with the camera. “What? Bro, I can’t find the light.” Sam grabbed the green light grid thing and turned it on to provide you all with some sort of light.

“I felt it go back and forth,” Sam told us all as he kept his eyes on Colby to see if he felt anything too.

“You felt it? I don’t know if I’m feeling anything,” Colby sounded a little disappointed like he wanted to feel what you, Jake, and Sam had felt.

“It literally rocked bro,” Jake told the camera and you nodded your head in agreement. You all hung out in the bedroom, trying to figure out the green light grid and how else you all wanted to go about the investigation when Corey got a text from his little brother, Cambrey.

“Are you okay?” you asked Corey as he stared wide-eyed at his phone screen. The other boys turned to look at Corey to see why you asked him such a question when y’all were just chilling at the moment.

“Uhh yeah, Cam just texted me this: Hey so I just saw your new video and at the end of it when you were talking about in the part where y’all kept saying save me and you were wondering like what you should do, I just wanted to let you know I went to a psychic lady and she told me that I have powers to send ghosts to the other side lol. All I have to say is you are free to go to the other side and it helps them go through. I know this sounds really stupid but ever since I talked to her, I’ve been seeing giant black figures in my room every night and when I sleep, it feels like someone’s watching me.”

“What the fuck?” Sam comments as you all share looks between you guys.

“Wanna know what’s even freakier? Cam is fourteen right now and I was fourteen when I first saw the shadowman.” ‘Woah’s fall from the group around him as we take in the information and process what we’ve been told because it seems so surreal. You all talk about how to deal with this. Corey feels guilty and responsible for Cambrey possibly seeing the shadowman. You try to comfort him, but the heavy feeling that he is dealing with is something that you can’t help that much.

“Maybe it might be good if we call it a night,” Sam suggests to the group as you nod your head. Things are a bit tense right now and maybe just getting settled into our own rooms and stopping the investigation for now could ease it some.

“Let’s set our alarms for three or something like that, but I think it’s good to take a break for a minute and like relax and we’ll come back to this in a minute.” And that is exactly what you guys did.

“Are you gonna be good by yourself, y/n?” Colby asked before you left their room with Jake and Corey.

“Yeah, I should be but I might call you so that if I hear something, you might hear it too and so I don’t go crazy,” you chuckled as he smiled at you, the grin making butterflies flutter around in your belly. He nodded before you turned around and went to your room.

A sense of relief flooded your body when you walked into the room. You were still very creeped out by the hotel and the fact that you were on the most haunted floor of the most haunted hotel in the most haunted country in the world. You were happy you were no longer in the most haunted room, but the things that were happening in there freaked you out.

You went to your suitcase and flipped through your clothes until you found something to sleep in. You had packed mainly warmer clothes for sleepwear, but since room 333 was so hot and you were still burning up from it, you grabbed the one pair of shorts you brought and a tank top. You grabbed a hair tie from your backpack and went to the mirror, throwing your hair into a ponytail. After you brushed your teeth and got your charger out, you settled into bed and shot Colby a text.

Y/n: can I call you?

Colby: of course

“Hello?” you asked as soon as you hear the ringing stop.

“Hey, are you okay?” His voice sounds so concerned and it makes you smile.

“Yes, Colby. I’m fine. Can you stay on the phone with me until I get tired?”

“Yeah, sure.”

It didn’t last long until you were about to conk out, so the two of you said your goodbyes and you placed your phone down on the bedside table. Just as you were about to fall asleep, you swore you felt the bed shake. You do not know why you said what you were about to, but you did.

“If there is anything there, can you make the bed shake again please?” A moment or two of silence passes before it does it again. The bed wobbles lightly beneath you.

“Okay so there’s something here,” you whisper to yourself. You try your best to shrug it off and go to sleep. You almost slip into a blissful sleep before you hear a whisper similar to the one from before.

“You’re not alone, y/n.” You immediately grabbed your phone to text Colby. You knew he would probably be in a deep sleep by now, but it was worth a shot.

Y/n: the bed shook in here

Y/n: and I asked it to do it again and it did

Y/n: then it whispered youre not alone y/n

After not seeing the bubble with three dots pop up, you decide to let your phone record audio while you sleep just to catch anything that might happen and set an alarm from three in the morning. Finally, you get to sleep.

You woke up with a jolt, a sweat on your forehead and the bed moving slightly beneath you.

“You’re not alone”

“We’re here”

“Come with us”

The whispers filled your head as you watched an outline of a guy appears in the hallway near your door.

“Colby,” you call out as you sit up and rub your eyes.

“Sam? Jake? Corey?” you continue but not a peep comes from the man as he inches towards your bed.

“Seriously guys. Cut it out,” you chuckle, but he keeps coming closer and closer until he is right beside you. You reach a hand out to try to touch him, but your hand falls through his misty form.

“Whoever you are, please leave. You aren’t welcome here,” you demand, but your voice falters at the end. You hear a loud maniacal laugh vibrate throughout your small room as the figure crawls on top of you.

His presence is suffocating enough, but when a hand comes up to your throat and clamps down, it becomes difficult to breath. You fear for your life as you try to pry the hands from your neck, but just like his body, you can’t grab onto them. Your fingers slip through his and there is nothing you can do about it. Tears seep out your eyes and black spots cloud your vision before all you can see is black.

“Y/n! Open the door! Y/n!” you hear the worried shouts of your friends. You look around and reach for the lamp to turn it on. Looking around, you see that you are safe. It was nothing but a bad dream. You hand flies to your throat and when you feel that there isn’t a misty hand closing in on it, a sigh of relief leaves your lips.

You sling the covers off your body and run to the door. When you open it, you are met with the concerned expressions and worried eyes of the four boys you loved most. Your tear-filled eyes meet the specific blues ones before you step forward and wrap your arms around his waist, hiding your face in his chest.

“Are you okay, y/n?” Sam asks as he places a hand on your shoulder. You flinch at his touch unintentionally before muttering a ‘sorry’.

“You were screaming,” Jake added as he met your eyes.

“Really?” you asked, but based on how scratchy your voice sounded, you could tell it was true. “What happened?”

“Sam and I went to Corey and Jake’s room because Corey called us, but we heard you screaming and rushed over here. What happened to you?” Colby asked calmly above your head.

“Did you get my texts from earlier?” Colby nodded at your question. “I had a nightmare and the same whispers I heard earlier, I heard in my dream. And then this figure came up to me and try to choke me to death. I saw black and then woke up to you guys banging on my door,” you finished as the tears came back and you went back to hiding in Colby’s chest. His hand rubbed up and down your back comfortingly as he looked around at the other guys, unsure of what to do.

“I don’t want to be alone anymore,” you muttered into his chest.

“You can come stay in our room,” you heard Corey offer.

“Or ours,” Sam suggested.

“Can you stay with me?” you asked the blue-eyed boy as you looked up at him.

“Yes. Sam, can I have the camera? I’ll start looking through the footage and you can go to sleep since you couldn’t earlier.” Sam handed him the camera that he had hanging by him side before the other three left to go back to their rooms.

“Was I really screaming?” You asked Colby as soon as you sat on the bed.

“Like you were being killed,” he told you. You grabbed your phone and began to listen to audio recording you started earlier. It is mainly quiet for the most part, just your soft breaths and sounds of you moving in your sleep. Then, you hear the whispers again.

“Listen to this!” you shout as you hand the phone to Colby. His eyes widen at the sound.

“That’s what I’ve been hearing.”

“That’s insane,” He told you as he handed the phone back to you. You get all the way to the end and do not hear any screams.

“There’s no screaming on this.”

“When did it end?” You check and the time that stares back at you freaks you out even more.

“3:33 a.m.”

“Here. Let’s put this away because you have been through a lot tonight and just chill out,” Colby suggested as he placed your phone down and pulled you closer to him. You settled yourself into his side and placed your head on his chest. He had one arm around you while the other laid on his stomach.

“I’m sorry we put you through this,” he muttered as he fiddled with the bottom of his shirt.

“No, it’s okay. I have had a lot of fun this trip and I don’t want it to end early because I had a bad dream. That’s all it was,” you tried to see the bright side of it all.

“That makes me feel better because I really do love you, y/n, and I’d hate to see you not come on another trip with us or stop hanging out with us because of this.”

“I love you too, Colby, and it’s gonna take a whole lot more than a bad dream to get rid of me,” you both chuckled as a comfortable silence fell over the both of you. You fell asleep in the safety of his arms and right there, you did not have another bad dream that night.

[thedumbguywithaheart43]

A spark of hope

chapter 5 story 1

1.Sparks walked with spike to his home. The big ass castle in town. Say what you will about royalty they knew how to do the place up. Still it was far deeper in town then sparks wanted to go.

2. But after everything they had went through to get him his first kill Sparks assumed it would be fitting to at least accompany his little protege. Even if Spike was now about his height."you know your family is going to freak when you come home twice your original height."

3. Spike started laughing."well it was totally worth it. Although I'm sure I'm going to get a lot of studying done on me. Twilight's going to take every chance to record every little change of me right when I get inside."Sparks Patted him on the shoulder."Hey no matter what though they're your family I'm sure they'll be thrilled to see the changes. All part of growing up right."

4. Spike just gave a simple nod. "Thanks for walking me home it was nice to have someone to talk to about all this."Sparks just smiled as he turned away."Anytime kiddo."Spike then reached for the doorknob only for the door to swing open suddenly and six Mares to immediately surround him.

5. Six very pissed off Mares. Actually make that five pissed off mares and Fluttershy who looked like she just wanted to go home."SPIKE! Why the bucking hell have you been sneaking to the everfree!"Spikes eyes widened. They knew. This also got Sparks attention as he stopped in his tracks to look behind him.

7."Fluttershy told me she saw you hunting! You were eating meat! Why the hell were you eating meat!"Spike wanted to answer but he was too paralyzed by The many eyes around him.

8. The girls themselves on the other hand were very uncomfortable. They all came out to speak to spike but right now this felt like more of a conversation between him and his guardian. Right now they were just there to watch. Maybe that's what Twilight wanted.

9. Sparks also watched only he was resisting the urge to jump in. Twilight then begin her rant once more after a short breather."do you have any idea what ponies would think if they saw that! What if someone else found out about this! For all we knew there could have been an angry mod coming to take you away! And I've been worrying every single night!"

10. Spike was now taking a step back lowering himself below twilight's eye line looking straight up at her as he did."I swear spike you gave me a heart attack! Do you have any idea how worried I was I thought you could be in danger an turns out you could have been!"Twilight herself look like she was on the verge of tears but her anger persisted as she walked towards spike."Im so angry spike I'm very disappo..."Twilight never finished her sentence.

11. Her view was now blocked from spike. Because Sparks quicker than anyone had registered got right in between the two and he was pissed. He also abandon his hood letting the garment fall to the ground behind him.

12. Before everyone stood a jet black Pegasus stallion. Just a little shorter than Big Mac. He had a bone white short mane with a few strands poking out. And a tail to match. His wings were also slightly larger than the average Pegasus. Solid black with white tips. They were also bound with what seemed to be large bands making it impossible for him to fly.

13. Still that didn't stop him from putting himself between the angry princess and the Dragon. And at a speed that even rainbow Dash would be impressed with if she wasn't absolutely stunned by the display that was happening.

14."Don't you fuckin dare talk to spike like that!"Twilight was lost for words as the stallion glared at her."I don't give a shit if you're the princess of Equestria or the fucking goddess of the world itself! You wanna be pissed that spike was following his nature you can deal. With. Me."

15. At this point rainbow Dash had moved with applejack to either side of Twilight. Not yet ready to barge in but they're to protect their friend."How dare you talk to me that way I'm looking out for his best interest!" She snarled back. But despite her words she felt an instant sense of dread as if the back of his eyes were turning into small storms.

16."you're not looking out for his best interest you're looking out for the best interest of ponies! I have no doubt in my mind that you truly love your dragon but you don't seem to understand anything about his biology what you were doing to him could have killed him in the future!"everyone took a sharp gasp even Spike.

17."wha-what?"Once again Twilight without a loss for words."A gem only diet is incredibly dangerous for a dragon to do long-term! You don't know how many countless dragons I saw in the dragonlands who only ever ate gems die at the hands of a larger predator because their bodies hadn't grown the strength necessary to defend themselves. Without a larger frame and harder scales there's no doubt in my mind that if Spike were to ever go out of pony care he would be killed!"

18. Twilight now took her own step back."Spike is 17 years old! And I could only tell that because the fact that he has a wings and guess why that is."Twilight could barely get the words out."H-he wasn't eating m-meat."she now felt herself pressed up against the door as her friend stood around sparks. Ready to pounce.

19. Sparks then notice the terror in her eyes. He wanted to protect spike to defend him but. He didn't come there to make pretty mares cry. And admittedly this one was a princess as well.

20. Additionally he also noticed the dark clouds forming around them and a heavy wind starting to blow. He took a deep breath and spoke."look I-im sorry. I've got a bit of an issue with my temper I just couldn't stand by and hear you say those things to someone you care about. Your a pony who took in a dragon that's more than I can say for a lot of folks."

22. He could now also see the mares around him but he showed little concern. He then took several steps back giving the mare a chance to breathe."I uh wow um I'm not wearing my cloak uuuh."There was a slight blush on his face as he realized everyone was staring at him. Although luckily everyone seem to have taken a deep breath when he backed away.

23. Twilight then started to stand up again taking more deep breaths as she stared at stallion in front of her and her fear quickly turned to curiosity."How do you know so much about dragons?"Sparks seemed almost surprised when she asked."oh uh I spent about the last 6 years or so living in and around the dragon lands I got to witness the lives of many dragons."

24. He was given a few looks of what the fuck by the mares all though he could hardly blame them."look I truly don't mean to intrude on the way you're teaching him but I don't think anyone else around here or anywhere for that matter knows more about dragons. So I did what I thought was right and taught him what I could and I would like to keep teaching but I cannot blame you if you forbid him from speaking with me again."Twilight stood up examining the stallion.

25. She noticed things about him things she wasn't sure if anyone else could. He had an ungodly amount of bags under his eyes as if he hasn't slept in weeks. He had a light scars barely visible through his fur all around his face and hooves. Most probably would never see them as they blended nearly perfectly with his black coat. Most importantly she noticed the eyes.

26. They were eyes that showed nothing but caring. Whoever the stranger was had taken a liking to spike an the way spike was currently hiding behind him. she knew what she had to do. Twilight spoke "could you please come inside I would like to talk some for spikes sake."

[kintatsujo]

LoZ AU- The Courage of Running Away Part FOURTEEN

You’ll see why this one took a while in just a second, I did that thing where I drew a whole ass scene again

Content warning for fantasy religions based loosely on Christian schisms

#AU August

#LoZ AU: The Courage of Running Away

So while Link is getting acclimated to Castle life and getting hugs from Marla and Tonbo (and also getting unofficially adopted by the royal family) Astramorus flies back to the Sky Temple with his loftwing. 

And he has a lot of time to think while he’s doing it; I don’t know how fast a loftwing flies but even so it would have taken some hours on Hera’s back and you don’t have anything to do up there but think about why you got blasted through a wall by a god-queen.  So he gets back and he’s feeling pretty fucking subdued when he hands Hera off to the Sky Temple commune’s gardener/bird caretaker, Maurice.

[Image description:  Astramorus, looking tired and still missing his hat, his hair a mess, is standing opposite a short and round mustached man with bushy eyebrows dressed in the same priestly robes, except that this man has his sleeves shortened to his elbows and is wearing thick gloves.  This man is holding Hera the loftwing by a lead, while she makes a particularly vacant happy face.  “NAYRU’S EYES, man, WHAT HAPPENED?”  Astramorus gives a very small smile, and after a pause, answers, “TURBULENCE.”  The man harrumphs skeptically, then says, “Well, LORD SERENUMBRA from the LORULEAN ORTHODOXY showed up three days ago and he’s been giving me ADVICE ON MY TOMATOES, so turbulence or OTHERWISE I’d appreciate you DISTRACTING HIM before I commit some WEEDING.”  Astramorus smiles.  “Ah,” he says in understanding.  “Yes, thank you for your PATIENCE, Maurice.”  End ID.] 

A note on Maurice, originally I was going to make him look like Gaepora OR Rauru and then Ice suggested basing him on Maurice-Belle’s-Dad and I liked that, so I blended the ideas a bit.  

I think I’ve mentioned that Lorule and Hyrule have different takes on the Hylia religion, haven’t I?

Basically since this Lorule is just the country south of Hyrule instead of a dark-mirror-universe world, Invid suggested that part of the idea might be that Lorule insists that Hyrule is wrong about which country the Golden Goddesses left the world from, and that the Triforce belongs there instead.  I kind of played with that a little further, and so now part of the thing is that their royal line is actually also descended from Hylia directly, except that at some point a sister broke off from (one or the other of) the royal family, founding the Hilda line versus the Zelda line.

And real quick here’s the Hilda of this story, which I promise is relevant:

[Image Description: Sketches of a tall, black haired woman with pale skin and blue eyes and extremely long pointed ears, dressed in a cape and dress of purple, dark blue, red and gold.  She wears a blue and green belt trimmed with gold and black gloves, and a diadem featuring a red gemstone and golden spread wings.  There is an inverted Triforce symbol on her sash.  She is also wearing black lipstick and red blush and eyeshadow.  A sketch to the side shows her making a decidedly less dignified expression with the note “All the finery and rouge is a desperate attempt to fool you into thinking Hilda is in her twenties but she’s only actually seventeen, same as Link.”  Another sketch shows her next to an old man with round glasses and priestly robes different to the Hyrulean priests, who only comes up to her chest.  She has her hands on her hips and is ranting at him.  A note reads, “Hilda TOL.”  End ID.]

Anyway the thing is that currently, the two churches are relatively peaceable with one another, they have joint gatherings to quibble about tradition and who should be allowed to have what sacred treasures and who has to bring the roast boar next time, and that is how a very young novice Astramorus ended up as friends with the man he would eventually match in equivalent rank, Lord Serenumbra.  Who gets a nice picture equivalent piece to Astra’s introduction because of symmetry: 

[Image Description: The same short priest from the picture with Hilda.  He has white loosely curly hair, circular gold glasses, a hat similar to Astramorus’s but in red, a dark red robe over a black underdress, both trimmed in gold, and is wearing a heavy golden neck piece with an inverted Triforce and golden wings framing a blue disc.  To the side are various comic panels; in the first, he has taken an extremely young Astramorus’s hand and is saying, “Let me be the first to CONGRATULATE you, my friend!”  In the second, he’s spread his arms wide while approaching Astramorus and Catena, Link’s mother.  “Let me be the first to CONGRATULATE YOU, my friends!” he’s saying, and Catena laughs, giving Astramorus a rough side hug that lifts him off his feet despite her only coming to his chest, while Astramorus gives her a gooey smile.  “TOO LATE,” she says, “I told my mum first,” and laughs.  In the last panel, Astramorus has collapsed limp into a chair at a dining room table, his hair in his eyes, his face wet with tears, propping his head on one arm as Serenumbra pats his shoulder from behind the chair.  “Let me be the first to say,” Serenumbra says, “How DEEPLY SORRY I am, my friend.”  End ID.]

This is awful but that’s currently my favorite picture of Astramorus.  

Serenumbra’s design is based on the priest and philosopher from ALttP and Link Between Worlds; the philosopher’s robes were red so I sorta priestified them.  The blue disc in the center of his neck piece represents the Moon Pearl from ALttP, which was actually red in the game but blue in some of the promotional materiel, and the blue was a nicer contrast.  The Moon Pearl was mostly important because it let Link run around in his human form in the Dark World but I always liked it because it was sort of weird and mysterious.  In Four Swords Adventures there’s actually a LOT of moon pearls and they let you make portals between the worlds.  There isn’t going to be a lot of world hopping in this AU, I just thought it was interesting context. 

Anyway here’s two old friends having a conversation, image description and a little more commentary plus some bonus poking at Astramorus at the end:

[Image Descriptions: Astramorus is entering a room with a rounded door and a coat rack on the wall.  “Seren?” he calls.  “ASTRAMORUS, are you QUITE all right?” Serenumbra answers.  He is sitting at a round table in the center of the room; there are two dining chairs, one of which he is sitting in, and opposite of him is a comfortable looking rocking chair.  “I came because I heard about your SON, have you still not found him?”  Astramorus, looking deeply pained, straightens some of his hair with one hand.  “I found him,” he says.  He settles into the rocking chair with a long creak.  Serenumbra is clearly shocked by his demeanor.  “Astra,” he says, concern clear in his face, “What HAPPENED?”  Astramorus stares at the ceiling while looking like death warmed over.  There is a panel fading from light to dark to indicate the passage of time, then we see that Serenumbra has a hand to his mouth in thought.  “So the queen refuses to see the DANGER here,” he says.  Astramorus has folded his hands together.  “She’s right about my SON, though,” he answers.  Serenumbra is quick to defend Astramorus to himself: “Well- he’s such a SOFT BOY, you wanted him PREPARED,” he begins, but Astramorus stops him.  “I pushed him too hard, too SOON, and with too little CARE.”  Astramorus lifts his hands and grins painfully, continuing, “WHAT was I DOING, trying to teach him how to FIGHT when all I knew was an ADULT’S routine?”  He puts a hand to his chin, still smiling.  “I must be the STUPIDEST MAN ALIVE.”  “Astra,” Serenumbra begins again, and Astramorus interrupts again.  “My wife used to tell me I WORRIED too much, did I ever mention that?”  He asks.  His face turns solemn.  “It was even one of the LAST THINGS she said to me,” he says.  We get a glimpse of young Astramorus and Catena together backlit by the sun; she’s wearing a blue version of the classical Link costume with a sword strapped to her back and plate armor on her shoulders, he’s wearing his priestly robes and hat.  She’s reached up to grab his face, grinning, while he’s put his hands on hers.  “And then she died,” Astramorus says.  He sits up, animate once more.  “What else could I DO but worry?!” he demands.  “You’ve studied the legends, same as I-” he subsides again- “That mark on Link’s hand may as well be a DEATH SENTENCE.”  He puts a hand on his face.  “And I’ve so THOROUGHLY FAILED him that now I’ve put the Royal Family in danger TOO.”  Serenumbra puts a hand to his chin, thoughtfully.  “WELL, you never KNOW,” he says, “Princess HILDA is more of an age with Link, maybe the Triforce of Wisdom will arise in the LORULEAN line this time.”  Astramorus laughs.  “That doesn’t change the SITUATION, Seren,” quietly adding “But also KEEP DREAMING.”  He then puts his hand to his mouth.  “How do I even BEGIN to atone?” Astramorus asks.  “Ahh, old friend,” Serenumbra answers, soothingly.  “If only Catena were still WITH us, she’d know how to ease the boy’s burden.  Why-she’d face down GANON HIMSELF if it came to that!”  Astramorus makes an intense face, as if he’s been suddenly burdened.  Serenumbra stands and puts a hand on his shoulder.  “Get some REST, dear friend, you still look TERRIBLE,” he says with a smile.  Astramorus is wringing his hands, staring forward.  End ID.]

DUMBASS BRAINCELLS ENGAGED.

I didn’t expect “Got pegged by his wife so hard that the mere invocation of her name knocked him back to his senses after over eleven years of fucking shitty behavior towards their son” to be on the bingo card for this character when I started this project either, but this is Draft 0.5 so anything can happen XD

Astramorus is so layered now what the fuck!  

[Image Description: Serenumbra, face full of concern, asks, “Astra, what HAPPENED?”  Astramorus stares at the ceiling like death warmed over.  Behind him are the words “HELLO DARKNESS MY OLD FRIEND.”  End ID.]

[Image Description: Serenumbra, face full of concern, asks, “Astra, what HAPPENED?”  Astramorus stares at the ceiling like death warmed over.  Behind him are the words “WELL FIRST OF ALL I FUCKING DIED.”  End ID.]

[Image Description: Serenumbra, face full of concern, asks, “Astra, what HAPPENED?”  Astramorus stares at the ceiling like death warmed over.  Behind him are the words “...my wife made this chair.”  End ID.]

Catena got into carving as a hobby during long trips but she started making furniture while dealing with nesting urges while pregnant, so imagine this little tank of a woman assembling a rocking chair for her tol noodle husband while ranting about her weird cravings.  

[dangarretjournal]

Visions Often Come in Dreams

Hello! This is Dr. Maxwell Miracle again. Unfortunately, Gale Porter is under the weather today, so I've elected to do today's transcript for her. Happy reading!

If you are still able to read this... then I have failed. I tried my best to destroy this document, washing away the ink with a glass of water on my desk, but it clearly hasn't worked... I hope I don't need to plead for your attention. You've already read my confession to being the original Scarab... if you truly care about me and the world you live in, you will burn this book right now.

Now, I will write what I am required, hoping that the words I write here won't bring on the end of days.

In my dream, I was in a harsh void of sharp angles and blinding darkness. In the midst of this, encased in a web of angles, was Fantomah, large, a black gown flowing seamlessly into the background. Her skin was blue and thin, barely covering the thick and rigid bones underneath. Her hair was yellow and fading, seemingly trapped in the angles like wheat caught in the inner workings of an immense clock. 

Her voice was raspy. “Greetings, subject.” Despite me being able to see her, I got the distinct impression that her voice originated from somewhere behind me. 

I tried to move, but my limbs were caught in the grinding, endlessly shifting angles that surrounded us. So, this is what it was like to be in the space beyond space. I couldn’t respond, my mind felt numb being here. As time went on and neither of us spoke, I noticed a whining noise reverberating through the space, through my body, making me feel entirely numb. 

Her gargantuan head leaned closer to me. “Nothing to say? I’ve filled your mind for years on end. I’ve taken people away from your world… and now you’re in mine, and you’re just silent?” she sneered. 

“What are you?” I murmured, trying my best to move my numb face. 

Fantomah cackled, “What am I? I thought you understood me!”

“Do I?” I asked. “First I thought you weren’t real… but I changed my mind a while ago. Then I used to think you weren’t a Goddess, but how can that be true? How can someone with your immense powers be anything other than a deity?” 

I thought I saw a bit of mirth in her empty eyes. “You were right though. I’m not a deity… and I’m not exactly real either.” 

That statement made me rather confused… how could she not be real? What about the Robin’s Nest Plague, the Haunting of Robespierre, the Robin’s Nest Plague, whatever the Hell Maxwell did, those were all variably linked to Fantomah…

She cackled again at my confusion, “Need help? I'll walk you through it all... you'd like that, wouldn't you? To learn the real origins of Fantomah."

I did as she said without even thinking really. As I closed my eyes, an image formed before them. A garden, wide, open, endless, filled with various animals and wildlife. In the midst of this was a solitary man, as bare as the day he was born.

Fantomah continued to speak, “What you see here… isn’t accurate to reality either. But, if I’m not real, then I should be able to filter my reality through a lens you understand. You knew of Christianity... let's call this reality Eden then. An endless garden… and yet, Adam was sick of it. Every animal had its pair... and Adam just had himself.” 

At this point, what I thought was the sun moved closer and closer to Adam… it wasn’t actually a sun at all, but a giant flaming eyeball. The eyeball studied Adam, its iris expanding. Fantomah went on, “The Father of Man noticed his sadness and examined him... what Adam wanted wasn't someone made from the same clay as him. He wanted something made from the Father.” Suddenly, a flame like the ones encircling the eye (the Father I suppose)  rose from the ground, becoming a neat pillar roughly the same height as Adam. As the flames receded back into the ground, they left behind the shape of a bare woman, dazed and confused. “And there I was. Forged from an aspect of the Father, in a shape resembling man.”

Despite my eyes being open already, they opened again, and I was back in the angled void. I was still numb, so I only managed to ask a two-word question, “You’re Eve?”.

Fantomah shook her head, “Not Eve, no... I'd say I was closer to Lilith in this scenario. Not exactly, but close enough. I was born into the world with immense power... but I was shackled to Adam, and Adam was more... narrow than I was. I could see into infinity, he could see 30 feet in front of him. Every time I tried to elevate him to my level, he made it clear that he'd rather be above me, above the Father... When he looked at me, he didn't see the Father, he saw the one who'd give him children.” she snarled slightly, which then turned into a wretched smile. “So... I set the order right. He was my subject, and he should act like it.”

An image formed in front of me again. Eden was dark, and Adam was prone on the grass. Meanwhile, Lilith crouched over him. Fantomah’s giant form loomed over it all, her gruesome smile revealing jagged teeth. Lillith laid a hand delicately on his side, tracing a finger up to his blank stomach… no belly button. With one sudden and viscous movement, she plunged her finger into his stomach, causing dark blood to spill on the field. Adam awoke screaming in immense agony. Lilith’s face was stone cold as her hand plunged in deeper and deeper… and then retracted. Lilith walked away from Adam, who was still in pain. 

Fantomah’s ghastly head resumed her explanation, “Don't look so horrified. All I did was touch one of his ribs! I even rewarded him for the pain of it all... after a few days, a fully formed woman sprouted from that rib. Eve, I suppose." Her smile went away, leaving a neutral expression, "Unfortunately, the Father didn't like my solution to things, and he cast me out of Eden."

The lingering spectre of Adam faded away. In its place was Earth: clean, free of humans… it was admittedly rather beautiful to see, especially as it moved closer to us.

Fantomah looked at Earth wistfully, “This was the best possible outcome. Much like Lucifer before me, my transgressions gifted me a world of my own. This was my domain to do whatever I pleased… and I built so much too. I formed your land, I created your plants, I filled this place with beasts and creatures I’d seen in Eden. It was all so perfect…” she paused, and her snarl came back with a vengeance, “And then you showed up again.”. The Earth vanished, and all that was left was the angular darkness and the ghastly visage of Fantomah. “Adam and Eve transgressed against the Father, so he banished them to my realm… but he didn’t want me harming them, so he banished me to here… the Primordial. The remains of what there was before the Father created existence as we know it. There is no existence here... anything that dwells here is not real. And because I'm not real, Adam's imagined version of me became my reality... he got what he wanted in the end; my subjugation. He got to decide that I was in the wrong, I was an abomination, I was... wicked. Of course, since he remembered me, I did have some influence over the realm that was once mine, but it was weak... I was not a God, ruling the land as I pleased, I was a ghost, haunting it. By then, they stopped calling me Lilith... they preferred Fantomah."

I was used to the numbness by now and could speak more comfortably… unfortunately, now that I had been told all this, there was one thing I could ask. “Why are you telling me this?”

She moved closer and closer to me, her blue face enveloping my range of vision. “People like you are the Gods of me. You control how other people think of me. Tell the people I caused a plague, and suddenly... that's real. Tell the people I curse colonisers, then I do. Tell the people I'm real, then there I will be. In your world. Free to reclaim my home from the children of Adam."

Fantomah is real... I'm incapable of saying anything else. She's real. She's real. She's real. She's real. I'm sorry, but she's real... and if you've read this, and you believe every word, then you've doomed us all. She's real, and she's here.

I'm sorry, Daniel... I wish I could say I was the Dr. Maxwell Grant that you knew, but I've never been sure... and I suppose now is the confirmation that I'm not. In the Primordial, where I had been trapped for years, she rebuilt me atom by atom... I was made in her image and, despite my best attempts, I was made to fulfil her wishes.

Believe me, my dear Daniel, I didn't want this. If I had a will of my own, I would've let your granddaughter burn the journal, but, as it stands, Fantomah has free reign over my soul and your granddaughter is still passed out. I was just lucky that I didn't need to fulfil her wishes for so long; oh how my heart leapt when I got that message from the CIA saying how I needed to remove all mentions of Fantomah, or when they made sure that my books from the 70's were long out of print... but their eyes just didn't look here for some reason. Maybe they too have been compromised.

LONG LIVE FANTOMAH

[mika-13]

So, with the help of the wonderful @wandering-horizon, I came up with a Legend of Zelda / Linked Universe AU where every Link is a Zelda species that isn’t Hylian So here’s what I came up with and how it influenced their respective stories

Sky - Rito

When Skyloft was raised above the clouds by Hylia, the Rito were already there

The Rito helped the Hylians get accustomed to life above the clouds and the two species quickly came to rely upon each other

Link is born a Rito and grows up on Skyloft, where things are pretty similar to the original story, he is best friends with Zelda and studies at the academy to become a knight

When Zelda disappears beneath the clouds, he draws the goddess sword and follows her

Things continue on quite the same way as in the game, just with Link wielding the sword with both his "hands" and foot claws, because him flying around and cutting down enemies at the same time is just really neat

He also pecks out one of Ghirahim's eyes at one point because he can

Four - Minish

I've had this headcanon, that the Hero of Men, the one before Four who made the picori blade, was actually a Minish who came through the Minish door (which transformed him into a Hylian for the time) to protect Hyrule

So yeah, basically that

Link is Ezlo's grandson who is also an apprentice with Melari and when Vaati goes rogue he helps his grandfather in defeating him

I imagine him being really confused by being so tall at first and that he still retains some Minish like traits

Time - Kokiri

Link is an actual Kokiri in this, with Navi as his fairy

His life in the Kokiri forrest is pretty peaceful, though Mido still bullies him, because he's best friends with Saria and Mido is jealous, until the Deku Tree calls for him

The Kokiri Emerald allows him to leave the forrest unharmed and so he goes to help Zelda

The rest of the story is pretty much the same, except that he doesn't age when he goes into the future, because he really is an immortal forrest child this time around

Let's just say that Ganondorf is pretty angry about being beaten by a 9 year old

At the start of Majora's Mask when Skullkid steals the ocarina and Epona, he also imprisons Navi in a bottle

Tatl is kind of shocked about that and that plus the fact that she can sense his Kokiri nature result in her trusting and liking Link much sooner

Link manages to free Navi when he gets back his ocarina and from then on it's another adventure, this time not just with his mom but also with his newly acquired older sister Tatl

Twi - Twili

His story is quite different from the one in the game

With him growing up in a completely different world and such

In the beginning he lived a relatively simple life, getting by by doing odd jobs for other people

When Zant staged his coup and started turning helpless Twili into Shadow beasts, Link tried his best to help people escape in time

Zant really didn't like this and sent the beasts after him

Not wanting to fight his people, he ran, stumbling onto the portal to Hyrule

Eventually, Zant caught up to him and tossed him out into the light in the hopes of killing him

Instead of dying, Link is saved by the triforce, which transforms him into a wolf which let's him survive in the world of light

He knows he needs to defeat Zant before the usurper can destroy both Hyrule and the Twilight realm and so he sets out to free Hyrule from the Twilight

The light spirits give him their protection and with the master sword he gains the ability to keep his Twili form even in the light

Of course he also travels with Midna, though he meets her later in the story

Also he obviously knows who Midna is, since the name and the vast amount of magic she possesses is kind of a giveaway

Legend - Zora

He's a sea Zora, so he's different from the rather mean ones in his Hyrule, since their tribes lost contact a long long time ago and he looks more like an ocarina of time Zora

A pink one

He washes up at the beach one day when he's still a tiny little kid and a Hylian man (his uncle in the game) takes him in and raises him

He has to deal with a lot of crap from people because he's Zora and most Zora in his Hyrule just really like spitting fire balls at people

It's also why people don't believe him when he goes out to help Zelda and say he's kidnapped her instead

As for Kohilint, the storm hits him when he's out looking for his family and Marin is also a Zora

He ends up being afraid of storms at sea after that whole debacle and just kind of avoids the ocean after it

Hyrule - Fairy

What can I say, he's the original fairy boy after all

He's not just a regular fairy though, but a very young great fairy, young enough that his usual form isn't that different from a regular fairy

However, he possesses a lot more magic and even has the ability to grow to Hylian size for a time, enabling him to wield sword and shield and fight the various monsters and Ganon

One of the reasons he travels so much is the fear of being bound to a single place once he's grown up, being a great fairy and all and he wants to see all much of the world as possible before that

Wind - Korok

He lives in the forest on outset island and is best friends with Aryll

Once Tetra shows up and Aryll gets kidnapped, he decides he needs to go out and save her

So he asks Aryll's grandma for the sword and shield (grandma is kind of surprised since it's the first time she's ever seen a Korok and she wasn't quite sure Aryll didn't just have an imaginary friend) and sneaks onto Tetra's ship

She discovers him, being able to see him even when he doesn't want to be seen, triforce of wisdom and such, but she's so impressed by him being able to sneak onto her ship that she lets him stay

He has fun with the crew, flying over Nico's obstacle course with Korok magics, and infiltrates the forbidden fortress

From there on it's much like in the original stories though everyone is really surprised and shocked that a usually peaceful forest fairy can wield a sword with such devastation

Needles to say, Ganondorf is even more surprised when he's stabbed in the face this time around

Wars - Gerudo

He's Gerudo, he's trans and he's here to end Ganon's whole career

He isn't a Hylian soldier in this but a Gerudo warrior and the first part of the war takes part without him

Which also means that it isn't going too well for the Hylian forces and Ganon revives way faster

The Gerudo haven't dealt much with the rest of Hyrule for many decades, but they take the return of Ganon in the form of a Gerudo as a personal insult and immediately join the war, turning the tide, especially with War's proving himself to be an unrivaled warrior as well as the hero

Wild - Sheikah

With all the Sheikah tech in his game it only makes sense

Before the calamity, he was Zelda's personal bodyguard, the way Sheikah often are for the royal family

Him and Zelda got along pretty well, having known each other for a long time, but they sort of drift apart once he draws the master sword, as Zelda envies him for his easy his destiny came to him, and he kind of struggles with the burden of the whole world, as his life was kind of all laid out for him before the master sword

Once the calamity strikes everything goes pretty much the same way, but his interactive with the yiga clan are way more intense this time around, because he's a Sheikah as well as the hero

So yeah, there you have it, my personal Zelda AU

I hope you like it