#v. life is sly and unscrupulous. in service to itself it will commit any offense. ( grishaverse | second army )

[carelessgraces]

but i’m also thinking about grishaverse astoria and thinking a lot about the degree of isolation she can experience upon reaching ravka? she’s fjerdan, through and through — she’ll joke mostly about the climate being different, or about the differences in accent and language, but she’s fjerdan. 

     and i think it would impact her in really interesting ways — for instance, astoria is, at her core, proud and bold and demanding, and that’s not something fjerdan women are allowed to be very often. but, growing up without a father, she and her mother are ostracized to some degree; veronika is unmarried, her child is a bastard, and astoria’s not likely to end up married either. she wears the braid and the unremarkable clothes, and she chafes under this, because she’s only ever known a woman as a breadwinner and a protector and a caretaker, and it clashes pretty strongly with the ideals she’s meant to hold regarding gender. so there’s a lot of internal conflict there, and it’s one of the first things she wants to abandon when she reaches ravka: she takes her hair out of the braid and refuses to braid it again, preferring instead to twist it in a knot if she’s training or she’s on the volkvolny. the kefta covers a fair amount, if she’s in the second army, but she prefers hers form-fitting, and she’s thrilled by the bold colors and how they look against her hair. wherever she ends up, she’s very quick to start up a series of short little romances, and it’s not the first time she has sex but it’s the first time she’s able to be a little louder while having sex, and it’s just this immensely freeing experience for her, when she realizes that reaching ravka means that she can abandon a lot of the shame she’s carried, about her power, about her body, about her gender, about her history. 

     on the flip side — it makes her reckless. not being permitted to do anything potentially risky in good fjerdan company means that astoria ends up something of a daredevil in ravka. she’s not physically strong, even if she has a fair amount of power, and her power is pretty raw and undisciplined. she doesn’t know how to style her hair to wear it down, and i imagine she and genya spend some time together at first so she can learn. the first time she has a good night’s sleep because she’s been doing something physical, whether labor or training, she nearly weeps with joy, but she also has a hard time moving the next day. she forgets too often that her body has limits, and she has a strong tendency to way overdo things. 

     and funny enough, she’s desperately homesick. she’s a fairly devout believer, and it’s hard being so separate from her faith. nobody talks about djel, and everyone looks at her a little strangely if she does. she does start sort of patching together a hybrid system, folding the ravkan saints in, and the number of grisha saints gives her pause. she’s especially comforted by the number of fjerdan saints, and sees them as carrying out djel’s will. she keeps icons in her bedroom, if she’s at the little palace — sënje ulla, sankta vasilka, sankt mattheus, sankt demyan, with sankta marya at the center. she sleeps with her window open when it’s cold. she daydreams about going back to fjerda someday, even though she knows she never could, and it hurts, to know that this place that was her home for twenty years is unreachable to her now, and always will be. she has a hard time explaining why it hurts so badly, because fjerda is not safe for her and fjerda is full of people who would love to see her dead and fjerda, as she reminds herself very often, is awash in grisha blood. but it’s still her fjerda, her beautiful fjerda, and she’s always going to hope she can be buried in the fjerdan earth when she dies, even if it’s only just past the border.

[carelessgraces]

i’ve talked a lot abt astoria on the volkvolny, but i do want to talk about astoria if she makes it to ulensk instead and is saved by the darkling —

just like with nikolai: she develops a very intense and unshakeable loyalty based on the fact that he saved her life. unlike with nikolai, here she has an ideology she can get behind: protect grisha at any cost. 

and there are a few points where i default to the show rather than the books, but definitely in this case: the books portray the darkling as motivated exclusively by power, whereas the show portrays the darkling as motivated by a very specific anger. the show really gives us a darkling who’s been hunted and who knows what it means to be threatened with death for your power, and to be more powerful than the people threatening you but to be expected to bow your head anyway.

so astoria can relate to that !! she can relate a lot !! her power is raw and undisciplined but it’s there, and it’s significant; and she’s being chased out of the country and hunted down by bands of men trying to murder her first chance they get. i imagine that drüsje who pose a significant threat to drüskelle are more of a dead-or-alive situation, and astoria is all undisciplined power and rage. 

the first thing she does when she reaches the little palace is take a bath that’s so hot she’s surprised she doesn’t burn herself. she keeps the water warm until she’s finished. she refuses to tie her hair up except for training with botkin or baghra, and then, she ties it up in a knot. the first time she sees her kefta, she cries — she then asks if it can be taken in to fit her more closely. 

as far as she’s concerned, the darkling could come forward with a volcra in a hat and bloomers to offer up as the next king and she’d back it. 

she trains primarily as a tidemaker, but on the darkling’s request she works one-on-one with a heartrender or two, to work on her affinity for water in the blood. 

once she’s been properly trained, she requests to be stationed at the fjerdan border.

she has a little bit of a hard time swallowing some of what the darkling does, because it is cruel and it is vicious, but she does her best anyway. once he’s on the throne, she’s kind of thrilled. she’s not one of his favorites, and so she’s not with him constantly, so she is a true believer in the cause, and that does make her a danger in the aftermath. she would, in fact, support the idea of canonizing the darkling. zoya doesn’t trust her, understandably, and so i imagine she’s either kept very close until she’s determined to not be a threat, or she’s sent to ulensk to wander the border, which she’s pleased to do anyway. 

things i want for astoria, post-war, regardless of her alliance:

astoria in her kefta and loose hair seeing whoever reported her to the drüskelle and the intense anger and satisfaction that would follow; bonus points if she has to save them for whatever reason

astoria in some sort of diplomatic capacity, working to end the tensions between fjerda and ravka. 

astoria getting her mother out !!

and a few notes on my default approaches to canon:

book canon for anything post-S&B, with some adjustments.

show ages — mal & alina in their early twenties, zoya & genya & nikolai in their mid-late twenties, the crows in their early-mid twenties. astoria’s about 20 when she flees, and 23-4 when siege and storm starts. 

if i’m writing with someone who’d prefer book ages, then i’ll bump her down by about three years, so she’s 17 when she flees and 20-21 when siege and storm starts, but i’d prefer show ages. 

i’ll probably be ? adjusting fjerda / expanding on it for my own purposes after i finish the books, so you can expect lots of crying over fjerda sooner than later.

show characterization for the darkling & mal 

show plot, in terms of the timeline and the crows trying to kidnap alina. 

book characterization for genya, and her relationship with the darkling ( tho in general if i’m referring to genya, i’m referring to my own — over at @dekoranevich — for ease. genya and astoria do not spend much time together, but genya does teach her how to style her hair when leaving it down ).

[carelessgraces]

as promised ( threatened? ), the massive grishaverse info post —

HISTORY

PRE-SERIES. Witch, they called her, drüsje, but the woman paid them no mind; she smiled and bared her teeth when someone stared too long, laughed loudly and with abandon, and for all the men who whispered that she was a demon made flesh, there was one willing to test that theory — newly married, visiting his wife’s family from the Wandering Isle. For weeks they remained together, the world outside forgotten in favor of one another’s insatiable hunger, until his wife called for the drüskelle, certain that her husband had been bewitched. There was no magic; he had simply fallen in love. But Veronika knew better than to test her luck, and so she left Elling. By the time she returned to Djerholm, she knew she wasn’t traveling alone.

     The child was born Asta Viktoria Grim, and she inherited her Kaelish father’s copper hair and her drüsje mother’s power. The water around her would sing to her, and even as a child, Asta found that it would do as she asked — until Veronika took her little hands one day and kissed her palms and made her promise never to tell a soul what she could do. The neighbors already looked at them strangely: Veronika had never married, and passed her own name to her daughter. She worked, maintaining the little household on her own. When the windows needed fixing, or the door creaked on its hinges, Veronika fixed it herself. The daughter, whose illegitimacy would certainly haunt her, was unlikely to grow up much different. There was no need for them to look further. There was no need for little Asta to give them anything else to look at. 

     For nineteen years, mother and daughter were at peace in Djerholm, despite the way the neighbors looked at them, but Asta — who had inherited her father’s temper and pride along with his hair, and who had been encouraged by her mother’s independence — wanted more. In her loneliness and naivety, she confided in a friend, who she believed would keep her secret. ( She knew it was a risk, but friends trusted one another, didn’t they? He would know she would never harm him, wouldn’t he? ) She told him she could hear Djel’s voice in the water as it danced on her fingertips. She told him she thought that perhaps drüsje could do something marvelous, and begged him to understand.

     He told the drüskelle where to find her, all but brought them to her door. In an attempt to save herself — and her mother — she lashed out, strong but undisciplined. It was easy to find the water in the witch-hunter’s blood. It was easy to make that water boil. 

     She begged Veronika to come with her, but it would be easier to hunt two witches than one. Veronika promised to lie, to tell the drüskelle who would come looking for their brothers that she hadn’t known of her daughter’s powers, and Asta packed enough to get her through a few days and she fled. A few miles out of Djerholm, another drüskelle caught up to her, and she killed him, too, stole the coins from his pockets and the cloak from his shoulders and left his body for the wolves. 

     The third found her at the border, with orders to take her in alive or dead. ( And still, she survived. )

VOLKVOLNY

She wept when she set foot on Ravkan soil, and she traded the drüskelle’s cloak and coins for clean clothes and food, and when the merchant asked her name she told him it was Astoria. Asta Viktoria Grim had died in the Fjerdan snow. The coins bought her passage to Os Kervo, where she hoped to find a way onto a ship. Not forever, of course, but just long enough that the drüskelle might believe that she was dead, and give up the search.

     For weeks as she traveled she thought she was safe — but they found her in Os Kervo, anticipating her next steps, and she offered herself up to the mercy of the first captain she could find at the port. He called himself Sturmhond, and the ship the Volkvolny, and he wouldn’t turn away a Tidemaker, even one being chased by drüskelle. ( She watched from the ship’s bow as they departed, and made sure the drüskelle saw one last look at the red of her hair. It didn’t matter if they thought she was dead; she was free. ) 

     Her loyalty to the captain who saved her was unwavering, and expanded into a loyalty to the crew, to the ship, to their goals; she worked harder than she knew she was capable of working, wore each scar and callous with pride. ( When she learned pieces of the truth about the captain, she kept his secret — after all, he had kept hers, and they were all entitled to a few secrets. )

     And when the captain called for volunteers to do the impossible — save the Sun Summoner, betray the Darkling, and return to Ravka — she was among the first to put forth her name.

PRE-SERIES TO SHADOW AND BONE. Astoria is an active and devoted member of the Volkvolny’s crew, deeply loyal to Sturmhond and ecstatic to be free from the drüskelle. Slowly but surely, she learns to trust the rest of the crew — with her freedom, with her safety — and tells them of her history. While on the ship, she learns to read in Ravkan, and learns conversational Kerch, but the majority of her focus and energy go into learning from the other Tidemakers on the ship. ( Her unexpected skill in boiling blood is not forgotten, or ignored. )

SIEGE AND STORM. When Sturmhond calls for volunteers in a venture that could mean death, Astoria jumps at the opportunity, emboldened to take risks and determined to repay the kindness showed to her. She aids in the battle against the Darkling, and when Sturmhond comes ashore to reveal himself as Nikolai Lantsov, Astoria remains in Ravka, offering her support. She remains as a member of Nikolai’s guard, though she acts more often as a spy, moving quietly throughout the palace whenever she can to report back to him. When the Darkling strikes, Astoria remains with Nikolai and the few escaping Grisha, including the other rogues from the Volkvolny, retreating to the Spinning Wheel. 

RUIN AND RISING. After months in the Fjerdan mountains, unsure if the Sun Summoner is alive or dead, Astoria is elated to learn of Alina’s survival. She volunteers to join Tamar on the Bittern as they search for the firebird, and it’s only this that saves her when the Darkling strikes again. After the final battle, Astoria remains in the Ravkan court, taking advantage of the opportunity to formally learn about politics in the hopes of someday acting as a member of an ambassadorial team. 

* Note: While this verse is built around a specific set of circumstances and assumed relationships, most notably with the crew of the Volkvolny, I am more than happy to discuss, adjust, and compromise on most things in this verse when writing with canon characters, and will not assume any relationship we haven’t discussed. Built with either my own Nikolai and serendpitous’ Alina in mind, or clpdwings’ Nikolai, these are the versions of the characters I’m referencing in any character development posts.

SECOND ARMY

A miscalculation prevented Asta from crossing the border near Arkesk and instead sent her further east. Despite her exhaustion she managed the impossible — she survived. Chased into Ulensk, she managed to avoid detection only briefly before she was found by the drüskelle hunting her.

     Fear of a Fjerdan invasion — and whispers of a terrorized Grisha girl trying to keep herself alive — prompted the soldiers stationed at Ulensk to send word to the Little Palace. The Darkling and his modest force found her covered in blood and dirt, dead drüskelle behind her and more to come, and protected her. When asked her name she said Astoria — and when told she would be brought to safety in the Little Palace, her power encouraged and sharpened, she was overjoyed. 

     She wept when she saw her kefta. ( She would never be powerless again. ) 

     Training amongst other Tidemakers to hone her skill with water, and taught by senior Heartrenders to better hear and manipulate the water in the blood, Astoria’s power — raw, but significant — grew, became deadlier. As one of the many the Darkling had saved she was loyal without question or condition; as a woman who had been hunted, who would never be hunted again, she was quickly identified as a true believer in the Darkling’s cause. 

     Even the arrival of the Sun Summoner — a saint, a gift, a promise of something better — didn’t sway her loyalty to the Darkling, to his mission, to the Grisha. 

PRE-SERIES TO SHADOW AND BONE. Astoria’s power, straddling the line between Etherealki and Corporalki, becomes more focused with time and training. As she spends more time in the Little Palace and learns more of Ravkan politics, she becomes more critical of the Lantsov king and his attitude towards Grisha — and becomes easy to identify as a potential believer in the Darkling’s cause. One of many recruited to the effort, she firmly supports the moves made to dethrone the King, and to subdue the Lantsov forces. When the Darkling expands the Fold into Novokribirsk, she swallows any discomfort she feels at the news — how many Grisha died screaming because they were so desperately feared? how many would be saved with this show of power? — and after his return she joined him in his search for the Sun Summoner. 

SIEGE AND STORM. One of the Tidemakers brought aboard the commissioned ship, Astoria witnesses the creation of a second amplifier firsthand, and only becomes more certain in her belief in the Darkling’s goals. She remains on the ship, searching for Sturmhond and his crew, and when they fail to locate Sturmhond and Alina Starkov, she helps navigate Fjerda to launch an attack on the Grand Palace from the North. ( Her memory is sharp, and she remembers the way to Ulensk through the ice and the snow. ) After the Lantsov line is driven out, she remains in the service of the Darkling, slowly becoming one of his favored guards for her ruthlessness and her quick action. 

RUIN AND RISING. Astoria’s knowledge of Fjerda proves useful again. Present for the attack on the Spinning Wheel, she is one of many to witness Baghra’s death, and the Sun Summoner’s escape. She joins the march on Keramzin, determined to protect the children brought there and to bring them home to safety, and when the Darkling returns to the Fold to meet Alina there, she remains with the children as their guardian. After the battle, she remains at the Little Palace, watched closely by Zoya and the rest of the Grisha Triumverate, until it’s clear that her dedication to the Grisha as a whole will win out over any political alliances. Once she’s determined to not pose a threat, she volunteers to join excursions outside Ravka to find Grisha on the run and bring them to safety.

* Note: While this verse is built around a specific set of circumstances and assumed relationships, most notably with the Darkling as a leader, I am more than happy to discuss, adjust, and compromise on most things in this verse when writing with canon characters, and will not assume any relationship we haven’t discussed. Built with my own Darkling and Zoya in mind, and unless otherwise specified, these are the versions of the character I’m referencing in any character development posts.

KETTERDAM

She crosses the border in Arkesk and buys passage to Kerch, desperate to get as far from Fjerda as she can with her limited resources. When she reaches Ketterdam she uses the last of her money to pay for three weeks’ lodging, and she settles in to observe, determined to learn the lay of the land and determine the safest place she could be, and after weeks of deliberation ( and quiet, careful watching ) Astoria approaches Per Haskell of the Dregs. 

     The Fifth Harbor is promising. So, too, is its savior. Astoria offers an indenture of her own design — something guaranteed to keep her in Per Haskell’s employ for at least the next decade — and her services as a grisha. As a Tidemaker, she can help bring shipments to safety, though Per Haskell is more interested in her ability to manipulate water in the body to boil blood. He agrees, with the promise that if she is of no use to him, she won’t be given access to his protection any longer. 

     Astoria gets to work — starting with the Black Tips. A months-long affair with Elzinger leads to information: places where they think the Dregs’ control of their territory is vulnerable, plans to intercept shipments, even calculated attacks. ( Men talk. She listens. She finds that wide eyes and a thicker accent tend to help make her seem less threatening. ) 

     After eight months, nearly a million kruge saved, and a parley that nearly ends with Elzinger killing her in his fury at her betrayal, Astoria secures her future, with Per Haskell and the Dregs as her salvation.

PRE SERIES. Proving her worth to the Dregs is difficult, but she manages — the affair with Elzinger gives her an in, and she refuses to waste it. Her role as Per Haskell’s spy morphs somewhat as she becomes known in Ketterdam for her allegiances and for her willingness to kill to protect herself and her newfound family. ( Betraying Per Haskell in a parley becomes far more dangerous when he arrives with his witch in tow. ) She works rarely with the Crows, though she keeps a careful eye on Kaz’s bold moves, and whenever he’s in need of a grisha’s service she’s among the first to volunteer.

SIX OF CROWS. When Per Haskell learns of Kaz’s plans for the Ice Court, he recommends Astoria to join the team. As a Tidemaker she can help secure safe passage to Fjerda; as a Fjerdan refugee she can help navigate the climate and the landscape, as well as the language; as a woman willing to kill, she’s a help in a tight spot. Kaz ( reluctantly ) agrees, intending to make use of Astoria’s skills and her willingness to strike a blow against the Fjerdan state in retribution for what’s been done to her.

CROOKED KINGDOM. Under construction as I read!

* Note: While this verse is built around a specific set of circumstances and assumed relationships, most notably with the Dregs, I am more than happy to discuss, adjust, and compromise on most things in this verse when writing with canon characters, and will not assume any relationship we haven’t discussed. Built with clpdwings’ Kaz and Matthias in mind, these are the versions of the characters I’m referencing in any character development posts.

GENERAL CANON NOTES

I follow a combination of book and show canon. I’m happy to compromise on most elements, but as a general note, this is my default:

Show ages. Alina and Mal are in their early twenties; Genya, Zoya, and presumably Nikolai, are in their mid-late twenties; the Crows are in their early-mid twenties. Overall, I think this makes more sense than everyone being teenagers. 

Show characterization. I tend to assume show characterization for the Darkling — I think he’s more dimensional and more compelling in the show, and also a much more frightening villain. I will absolutely defer to any Darkling I write with, but this is my assumption when writing with other characters. 

The exception to this is in the Darkling’s interactions with Genya; since I use my own Darkling and Genya as default, unless writing with either of these characters, I default to the characterization in S&B and ���The Tailor,” in which the Darkling intended for Genya to be a spy but was more than willing to protect her when he learned of the King’s abuse.

Show and book plot. I like the blending of the kidnapping plot with S&B’s plot in the book, as well as the added political elements ( West Ravka seeking independence & General Zlatan ). I’ll default to book plots, as influenced by the show, for anything past S&B. 

I’m still in the process of reading the series — I’m starting Crooked Kingdom for the first time — and so SOC / CK verses will be developed as I read, and Astoria’s post-R&R verses may change as I read KOS / ROW. Please feel free to let me know if I’ve made any mistakes with later plot !!

VERSE WISHLIST

Some dynamics and plots I’d love to explore — 

Astoria and Fjerdans. Especially Astoria’s friendship with the boy who betrayed her to the drüskelle, meeting again when Astoria is in the Second Army. The two of them navigating the aftermath of such a significant betrayal, particularly if one of them is saving the other / if they have to rely on one another. This person being the only one who calls her Asta and her equal parts homesickness and anger at hearing it.

Astoria and the crew of the Volkvolny. Sturmhond, absolutely, but everyone else on the Volkvolny, as Astoria starts to figure out who she is and what she’s capable of when she’s no longer bound by shame and grief surrounding her power and her history. 

Astoria returning to Fjerda. As an ambassador, to save her mother, whatever, I just want Astoria going home and dealing with the fact that it’ll only ever be temporary.

Astoria in the Little Palace, training. Training with Tidemakers, training with Heartrenders, becoming a True Believer, all of it. 

IMPORTANT NOTES ON THE VERSE

Gen. notes, Astoria in the Second Army

Gen. notes, Astoria on the Volkvolny

Gen. notes, Astoria in Ketterdam

Astoria and Fjerda

Astoria and her mother ( feat. Astoria and Fjerdan concepts of womanhood / her Ravkan alliances as rejections of Fjerda & Astoria’s family )

Astoria and monstrosity

[carelessgraces]

the only thing more dangerous for astoria than not having any cause, any goal, any specific ambition driving her besides her own self-satisfaction and wants, is to HAVE a cause — the darkling would give her that. freedom for all grisha is noble enough that she could easily lose herself in it. and for her that's the sort of ideal that can justify just about anything — short of what happens to the children at keramzin, she struggles a lot with that and that could easily make her defect — which means that it's very easy to push astoria to become her most ruthless. she'll kill without flinching, she'll die for the cause, but more than that she'll have no problem living with whatever she does in the sake of something greater. it's what makes her dangerous as inquisitor in her DA verses, without the public image to worry about — and that public image is the one thing that keeps her in line.

[carelessgraces]

also these lines:

“Sleep is a luxury at Hellgate. It’s a danger. But when I slept, I dreamed of you.”

     Her head snapped up. 

     “That’s right,” he said. “Every time I closed my eyes.”

     “What happened in the dreams?” she asked, eager for an answer, but fearing it, too.

     “Horrible things. The worst kinds of torture. You drowned me slowly. You burned my heart from my chest. You blinded me.”

     “I was a monster.”

     “A monster, a maiden, a sylph of the ice. You kissed me, whispered stories in my ear. You sang to me and held me as I slept. Your laugh chased me into waking.”

my darlings i am thinking about astoria & monstrosity always but i’m thinking a lot about it now: astoria does not have formal training in her grishaverse until she’s in her twenties. by that point, she’s a little bit set in her ways, of course, but more than that she’s got a handful of things she can do very well, and a lot of things that simply do not occur to her. she doesn’t know the theory, she doesn’t know the right way of doing things, but she knows a few things very very well: 

     she can find the water in anything like it’s calling to her, and this includes blood; she can raise or lower the temperature of water until it’s boiling or until it’s ice; she can slow or speed up the movement of water; she can move the water around her, whether wicking it out of fabric or urging it to help a ship along its way. it never occurs to her to use ice as a weapon, but she learns quickly how to boil someone alive in their own blood, because it’s necessary for her survival to be able to do something deadly and irreversible. she learns how to form blood clots and slow or direct bleeding, because it’s necessary for her survival to stop a wound’s bleeding. 

     and she is comfortable taking a life. it comes down to her or the men hunting her, and she chooses herself every time; after she crosses the border, wherever she goes she’s near death fairly often, and near battles. and this is difficult for her, not because she struggles with killing, but because she doesn’t: fjerdan society and religion believe that the grisha are monsters, that the grisha are inhuman, and it’s something she’s internalized. and what if she’s proving them right? what if, with every life she takes, with every action designed to protect herself at any cost, she becomes exactly the monster that the drüskelle believe she is? 

     and it haunts her, for a long time. she’s perfectly fine after killing the drüskelle hunting her, but when she’s in a ravkan chapel praying for someone to hear her and help her, she wonders if she has any right to think of herself as a person when she’s been so comfortable with another person’s blood on her hands and staining under her fingernails. and this guilt continues until she reaches a point where she can become comfortable being the monster that the drüskelle fear. she’s at ease with being a witch if it means that she can eliminate the people who would have been happy to slaughter her. she’s even happy to think that there are people who fear her, now, because it means she’ll never be powerless again. the more she’s accused of monstrosity, the more it thrills her, and she comes to wear her monstrosity like a badge of honor: she is someone’s nightmare, and after having so many of her own, she can’t bring herself to be sorry anymore. her monstrosity becomes a part of her. 

[carelessgraces]

not 2 obsess over grishastoria again but i’m gonna obsess over grishastoria again: when i say that astoria is fjerdan i really mean that astoria is fjerdan. and when i emphasize that astoria growing up without a father in the picture was a source of a lot of sorrow, it’s not because i think she needs a father to make her interesting. and i swear it’s all connected but: 

     asta grows up without a father, through no fault of her father’s or hers. her father doesn’t know she exists at all, and he could very well be in the wandering isle; likewise, he could be right around the corner in djerholm. she has no way of ever knowing. she carries her father in her face more than her mother: his jaw, his nose, his smile, his hair. she carries her father in her personality as well: his temper, his pride, his strength. and a lot of this is because that’s how veronika raises her: veronika is the sole financial provider, the protector, entirely independent. asta does not need a father to be safe. she is very aware that she can function, and even thrive, as a woman on her own, and that while the people around her might not be thrilled about it, that doesn’t mean she can’t be happy, or successful, or fulfilled. 

     coming to ravka means leaving a lot behind. she keeps her mother’s surname, but she blends the names her mother chose for her — asta viktoria into astoria. she leaves behind a lot of the physical markers that indicate she’s a fjerdan woman, like the clothing and the hairstyle, and she embraces the potential of her new life very quickly and very intensely. but she also leaves behind the chance that she could find her father — she can’t reach her mother to ask questions. she has a first name and little else. she doesn’t know what country he’s in. and she’s been told over and over again that the lack of a father ( and, later, the lack of a husband ), by choice rather than circumstance, is a significant emptiness in a woman’s life. 

     so when she reaches ravka she inadvertently ends up allied to one of two very powerful men — either sturmhond or the darkling — and i think it would be very easy for this to be ‘astoria seeks out a father figure to replace the father figure that was gone from her life,’ but it’s not !! it’s not !! it’s astoria seeking out a man to whom she has no ties — familial, marital — and whose existence and actions are a threat to the fjerdan status quo. sturmhond ( and nikolai ) represent a political and economic threat to fjerda; both operate for ravka’s benefit, often at fjerda’s detriment, and both require an alliance to a different nation. the darkling is, in many ways, a grisha king: he’s everything fjerda would fear, a political entity who’s empowered by his being grisha. both are an inversion of what an appropriate male head of household or family or state would be. both are a direct rejection of fjerda. both are a destruction of the fjerdan father, the fjerdan husband. and she wouldn’t be so drawn to that if she wasn’t so deeply fjerdan, and if she didn’t see fjerda’s violence against grisha as such a gaping wound in a country she deeply loves. 

     and as a result, one of her constant drives is to prove her worth, her skill, her value — to prove to the anti-fjerda that all the things that made her weaker or lesser in fjerdan society ( her power, her gender, her history ) make her invaluable in ravka. 

[carelessgraces]

@mrzost​ ( plotted starter )

She has dreamt of this before; the dreams usually end with her dead. 

     Drüskelle, the people of Ulensk whisper; Astoria is sure they’re not an uncommon sight, considering the proximity to the Fjerdan border, but these drüskelle are on a hunt, and she is their target. She had hoped to cross the border closer to Djerholm, to reach Arkesk without fuss and without having to account for the Unsea, but there had been too many of them to pass by unseen. 

     But they know where she is, now. They know where she sleeps, and the people of Ulensk have taken note of the broad-shouldered men peering at every red-haired girl they can find. They say that word has been sent to the capital, for fear of some sort of invasion; they cannot imagine another reason for so many witch-hunters, and certainly not a single grisha girl with a penchant for boiling blood.

     And they’ve spotted her, this time, and this is usually where the dream ends, with a knife between her shoulder blades or blood on her lips. She wonders if they’d bring her back for a trial, or if they’ll kill her here and now and be done with it. 

     So Astoria runs, runs, like her life depends on it because it does. It rained last night and she loses her balance in a patch of mud; one of them is on her, the point of a knife aimed at her shoulder, and she thrusts her hands out and she closes her eyes and she finds the water in his blood as though it’s singing to her — 

     — there’s blood on her clothes when she pushes the body off of her and picks herself up and runs again, and that’s how she finds him, climbing down from a horse, surrounded by others dressed in bright, bloody red. He’s tall, she notices vaguely, tall and full of sharp angles, wearing a long coat of all black, and she runs between the men in red and reaches up with her bloodied, filthy hands for him and grabs desperately at his arm. 

     “Help me,” she says, and her Ravkan is fine but her accent is certainly audible, “drüskelle. There are more of them, I can’t — ” She won’t die begging, but if it’s what it takes for her to live... Astoria tightens her grip on his arm, hopes he’s among the Ravkans who will understand that she is grisha, not a witch, not disposable. “ — please. They’re coming — ”

[carelessgraces]

@corpsewitchery​ | ALISA SOKOLOVA ( plotted starter )

She is practiced in the fine art of braiding one’s hair in a way that makes it look remotely attractive. It’s one of the many skills learned in her adolescence — her mother had worn the braid of an unmarried woman with a sort of spiteful glee, and so Astoria had learned a thousand ways to do it. She’s falling out of practice here; when her hair must be worn up she knots it, pins it, anything to avoid the braid she’s worn her whole life. Even so, she manages a passable, even pretty, one, though she has to keep stopping to turn Alisa’s head in the appropriate direction.

     “If you keep trying to look at me while I talk, it’s going to be crooked, and I’m going to have to start again,” Astoria scolds, tone far more severe than her expression, and she resumes braiding. She never quite knows what to make of Alisa — she adores her, unquestionably, would happily trade just about anyone she’s ever met for Alisa’s happiness. But there’s something about her that always leaves Astoria just a little uneasy; her enthusiasm for their general is almost concerning. 

     ( Not that Astoria is not enthusiastic as well; how rare, how beautiful, to have a leader whose only goal is the protection of their people. She cares little for Ravka and less for some abstract loyalty to a country that saved her, but to the man who saved her, she is wholeheartedly devoted. But even Astoria never quite knows when Alisa might go too far; there are believers, and then there’s this, and it worries Astoria, even frightens her at times. ) 

     When she finishes, she tugs lightly at the braid before hooking her chin over Alisa’s shoulder, and she clicks her teeth in her friend’s ear with as much gusto as she can manage. “I had an idea,” she says cheerfully, “about blood. I know I can’t freeze it, but I want to see what I can manage, and no one’s letting me test it out. I know there’s some to practice with in the classrooms, and I know the classrooms are closed right now, but I want to break in. Are you busy tonight?”

[carelessgraces]

@corpsewitchery​ | THEO KOTOV ( plotted starter )

She feels... healthier. Her appetite has increased. Her hair doesn’t break so often. Her eyes shine brighter, more the color of honey now than the sickly yellow she’d seen in the mirror hanging over her mother’s vanity in the little house in Djerholm. She doesn’t bruise so easily. And the blue of her kefta is the perfect compliment to her skin, her hair, her eyes, and she has always known she was lovely but she has never known that her loveliness came from something other than the illusion of fragility.

     You’re getting vain, Alisa teased not long ago, watching Astoria marvel at the shine of her hair in the mirror, and Astoria had simply flicked water from the washbasin in her direction and grinned when she let out a shriek of laughter. But it’s true; she is getting vain and the vanity is a gift, a reminder that she is alive, that she thrives, that none of this would have been possible if not for the long hand around her shoulder that drew her close and shielded her from the monsters that followed her. 

     So why, for all her newfound confidence and vanity, does she struggle so much with this? She can flirt and tease the other Tidemakers when they train, thinks nothing of adjusting the sway of her hips to encourage being watched — so why does she sit here in the Fabrikator workshop with Theo, bent over some notes she couldn’t begin to decipher if she tried, trying and failing miserably to string five words together without sounding like an absolute fool?

     She’s frustrated enough to be emboldened, and so she lets out a sign and she looks to Theo and she speaks without thinking, certain that if she thinks, she’ll stop herself from saying anything at all. 

     “Is it intentional that you only speak to me when I’m with Alisa,” she asks, propping her chin up in her hand and resting her elbow on the table, “and if it is, would you recommend I simply stop coming by here and bothering you? At this rate I think I could strip myself naked and you wouldn’t spare it a second glance. It’s terrible for a girl’s developing self-esteem.” 

[carelessgraces]

tag drop part six. 

[carelessgraces]

verse tag drop (3/4)

[carelessgraces]

@serendpitous & @shesacred said:   grishaverse au!   ( yelling about aus | accepting )

so i have two versions of this — astoria’s a fjerdan tidemaker who flees to ravka after killing two drüskelle, and either she ends up in arkesk when she’s found by sturmhond, or she ends up in ulensk where she’s found by the darkling. so this already affords me the really cool opportunity to look at how a character evolves when she’s presented with two vastly different sides of the same situation, given the same initial circumstances. so here are some notes that are just generally accurate across the two:

     one. we know, from what the darkling says about genya, that the corporealki / materialki / etherealki lines aren’t always clearly drawn, and that there’s genuine overlap across the board. it comes down to training — what one is trained in, who trains them, etc — and the choices made there. all of this to say: if astoria were brought to the little palace as a child she probably could have chosen between heartrender & tidemaker. there’s a lot of water in the human body; she’s self-taught, and taught by her mother ( a heartrender ), but she does have a talent for manipulating water, and so she focuses on water wherever it is, including in the body. she mainly trains as a tidemaker when the opportunity for formal training arises, unless the darkling, for instance, insists she train as a heartrender. 

     two. astoria’s mother is fjerdan; her father is, by origin, kaelish. astoria doesn’t know where her father is and hasn’t ever met him, but she’s been assured that she is in many ways his spitting image: while she has her mother’s brown eyes, she has her father’s red hair and curls, and she has a similar face shape — same jaw, same nose, same smile. she wants desperately to meet him someday, and i like to imagine that if she survives the events of ruin & rising, she tries to locate him.

     three. astoria doesn’t do too much stealing while she’s on the run. not because she’s opposed to it — she’s really not — but because it’s fairly easy for her to charm people into wanting to help her? she’s a genius when it comes to giving a good show of being terrified and delicate, and she finds that a lot of people are willing to try and help her if she asks. she kills more than a couple of the people coming after her, though, and she never hesitates to loot their shit and keep it for herself, so she can pay for things sometimes. 

     four. in a surprising bout of sentimentality she refuses to change her hair. she’ll hide it, or put some mud in it to try and cover the color, but she will not even consider any more permanent change. she loves her hair; it’s her father’s hair, and her mother loved it, and she desperately misses her mother and wants her to come to ravka too, though she knows that’s not particularly likely, and it’s the one link to her family she refuses to sever. she’ll change her name ( she goes by asta or storya, or even a completely different name, to hide ) or hide her accent, but her hair stays untouched. 

     five. if she had a lot of options, she’d still always choose ravka. in the eventual verse where she flees to ketterdam instead, she’s still trying to find a way to get to ravka safely. it’s about power: she does not want to live in hiding and being vulnerable all the time. even when she’s on the volkvolney, the hope is always that she’ll be able to settle in ravka. she does not ever want to be powerless again.

[carelessgraces]

it just clicked that it's about loyalty to ravka, under nikolai's leadership, or loyalty to the grisha, under the darkling's. each evolves out of a loyalty to the man responsible for saving her life and becomes a dedication to the thing they love most and the thing they want most to protect and the only thing that changes this is what happens at keramzin. will update after i finish r&r but Damn.

the only thing more dangerous for astoria than not having any cause, any goal, any specific ambition driving her besides her own self-satisfaction and wants, is to HAVE a cause — the darkling would give her that. freedom for all grisha is noble enough that she could easily lose herself in it. and for her that's the sort of ideal that can justify just about anything — short of what happens to the children at keramzin, she struggles a lot with that and that could easily make her defect — which means that it's very easy to push astoria to become her most ruthless. she'll kill without flinching, she'll die for the cause, but more than that she'll have no problem living with whatever she does in the sake of something greater. it's what makes her dangerous as inquisitor in her DA verses, without the public image to worry about — and that public image is the one thing that keeps her in line.