#veilguard spoilers tw

[mercysought]

APPROVAL: Shianni looking at the darkspawn horde coming for Denerim a second time and the fires on the horizon and everything looking like it will end and joking not joking maybe now is the time to get married, Maxima

approval + (prompt) // not accepting // @skyheld

   "You would want that?"

The thought stuns Maxima into silence; a feat in itself. Memorable, even, if perhaps the times they were living in weren't perhaps the most interesting that had happened since she had discovered that ancient elves both existed and some of them were really angry. Some of them even more specifically at her or people like her. Looking at Shianni, though Maxima would not admit it, it did bring some level of relief that the Elvhen Gods of Old seemed just as angry at her and those like her.

It was a terribly selfish thought, but truthful nonetheless.

The thought of marriage had always been one she had sworn off, though perhaps not for the same reasons as Shianni might think, not he same ones that a marriage to her would be a problem. To be a Magister was to make sure that one wielded her power and position; one of House Aurum also meant that any alliance she were to make would mean that their influence would grow tenfold. Maxima, however, had not refused to do so out of some petty reason to hold onto all influence she had amassed (though it certainly was part of it); but it had to do with expectations.

The expectation that she would marry a man, and that she would have children so that whatever magical aspects would be passed to the next generation, strengthening those bonds. The thought made her sick.

That she would bring children to this world when she knew what it did to folks that were born like her; to marry someone under the assumption that she was fully human, for there was no real alternative. To tell the truth was to sign her death. That any children would have to bear the same shame and fear that she had her whole life - that they should, rightfully, blame her.

It was not a punishment she would wish on anyone.

Looking at Shianni, she takes in the nervous smile, the half joking tone and the underlying hope that she would be taken seriously. This would not be an issue, not with her. Just a few moments before she had been feeling overwhelmed at the force of darkspawn just beyond and now she stood overwhelmed before one single woman.

Shianni would hate Tevinter. She would hate the politics. She would hate the people Maxima surrounded herself around with, whoever was left after this was all over - if any of them survived it. Maxima feels a chill in her body. She could not marry a woman under Tevinter law, not as it stood. She could certainly not marry an elven woman. But they were not in Tevinter - moreover, Maxima wondered more and more - despite how terribly fatalistic it sounded that she might not survive it. And now, looking at the darkspawn, the fear that Shianni might not either makes her heart tremble.

The thought that Shianni would still want to marry her, despite knowing all of her flaws. The cracked edges under the fantasy - and that she would leave Ferelden despite loving it or, at least, accept being so far from it far more frequently (for she knew that Maxima would not leave Minrathous or Tevinter) - it was more than anyone had ever given her. More than anyone had ever offered. A love truer than she really deserved, but a love that she was selfish enough to accept.

And, if they did survive it, Maxima would likely be amongst the few that could make that a reality. If there was even any Tevinter to speak of, by the end of this.

Sniffling, Maxima turns back to the darkspawn but not really seeing them, pushing her hair over her shoulder, her hands move into her pockets as she shifts the weight on her feet.

   "I do not want to get married in the middle of a battlefield." she says flatly, she sees Shianni's head snap to her and her brows arch. Grabbing a cigarette from her pocket, she lights it with a flicker of a wrist, pointing at the sky and then at the horde just beyond "In the rain?! In the cold?! With Darkspawn for guests?! In these robes?!"

Shaking her head, she waves her hand in a mirroring motion. If that were to be the case, then perhaps indeed it would be better to be dead. "I need to plan it, have a dress that will literally be impressed into legend by how amazing it is. And flowers."

A sea of flowers from ceiling to floor.

It would be an event for the ages, for the history books because they would have no other choice but to take it and write for what it was. The thought gave her pause, it made her feel fear like she had never done before. Not for her; her own shame and her own flesh and blood need not be in those history books but to expose so much of what could make her bleed frightened her more than she was willing to admit.

   "We will discuss it, once this is over." the smoke fills the air around her head and she pushes past it to approach Shianni. One hand holding hers. Her hand, filled with golden rings, lifts to rest against her cheek. Every fiber of her being told her this was a terrible idea, that this would literally spell out the end for her, for her family in Tevinter.

Taking a deep breath, Maxima leans down, taking her lips, hands holding her waist closer to her. The world was ending and they could be dead tomorrow at their enemies' hands. Her head spins and while she does not know if this is the right thing to do, it feels... it feels like they deserve this softness.

Maxima leans back, enough to break the kiss but not enough to fully separate them. Her forehead against Shianni's, she holds her at the centre of her back "This is not the end."

maxima aurum approves

[sun-marie]

Something that makes me. insane about Lydia/Lucanis is that, deep down, I think they both have a part of themselves that desperately needs someone to look out for them, and they feel they can be there for the other person when they weren't there for themselves 🥲

[knightwayne]

Yes, I have entered lichdom! And I am not an abomination or a demon or a disconsolate spirit. I have become something more.

Bonus:

[aesfocus]

Varric and Bianca

[merciawintersageposting]

just throwing a theory out there about lucanis’ basement room:

have you ever been in a place where you can feel the eyes at your back? calculating, assessing, observing- the back of your neck prickling with a thousand heated daggers. you are never able to get comfortable- comfort is a blade turned inward. lucanis has lived with that feeling since he was a child.

at a certain point the claustrophobia of a locked room becomes the only sense of safety he has ever had. the bed is not so comfortable that he would lose his vigilance to oversleep. here his back is always to the wall. here he is never denied food. his things are safe. he has a key to a door that locks. here he can breathe.

and so a root cellar becomes a crow’s nest.

[mercysought]

She cannot stop herself from snorting, that was Varric's gift in all things it seemed. Thin fingers hold onto the bandages a bit tighter as she approached the bed "Of course. You should see the line to visit!"

The Inquisitor was sure that there would be a line, if they had announced it. Varric was that sort of person. As she approached further, however, the smile faded - she was no nurse, no specialist in healing magic but she knew enough. It hurt, hurt to know that if others were to visit that they might feel the same as she did: Varric didn't wear frailty well; it fit him like a suit too small to hold such a larger than life person.

Slowly, she turns around the bunk, her hand undoing the buckle that kept her prosthetic hand. She wouldn't need it, not to do the job of inspecting the woods and changing bandages. It would have made her life easier, but she was not in a rush. Not in that moment.

With a justle, the prosthetic comes loose. Asharen drops it in the larger pockets of her robes. Slowly, she pulls the edges of the embroidered sleeves up to her arm, carefully pinning it before dropping the bandages on the edge of the bed with a sigh.

   "We have a makeshift plan, but Varric—" inhaling, Asharen pushes the red hair off her face, over her shoulder. Her back straightens with a crack at the shoulders. Unsure how to say it, she just opens her mouth "I found Blight in the fade."

She pauses - worry now allowed to fully sink her eyebrows. Her hand moves to her forehead, massaging the budding headache that never quite left her these days.

   "Just... out in the open. In the Crossroads, spilling out of some of the eluvians." and that, that she had never seen. Not in any significant way though she was more than happy to admit she knew very little about the Blight and the ways it spread.

Still, Valyssa didn't seem to be familiar with it either. And that was concerning. As well as a blight that seemingly had no archdemon leading but a corrupted elvhen mage who thought herself a God.

The list of horrors seemed unending. Whatever this meant it was terrible. The ease at which blight could travel coupled with the ease of navigation in the fade, the alteration of spirits within - it could have multiple levels of devastation that she could hardly dream of. Beyond the damage that it was sure to cause in the waking world - so to speak.

   "I showed it to Warden-Commander Mahariel, we're working on it, but..." shaking her head, she turns once more to the bandages, placing them carefully separately from other ointments she would likely use "Orzammar has seen a large spike in darkspawn activity. There is also blight in the Brecelian forest." finally finishing setting up, she breathes "Things are about to get much worse."

But they had a plan, and that had to count for something even if, at times, it might feel hopeless. Them both, above all else, didn't have the luxury of bowing out. Nor would they have accept it, had it been offered. She finally allows herself to smile when her light eyes find Varric's, the wrinkles at her eyes reflecting the warmth in them.

Grabbing her staff again, she approaches the head of his bunk, she sits on the edge. With a nod she points towards the wound at his neck and chest, covered in bloody banadages "May I have a look?"

@mercysought sent a meme: [ patch ] sender carefully patches one of receiver's wounds from asharen to varric, listen a small break before the storm while varric is recovering (not quite early veilguard game given circumstances BUT)

       “ So you're here to fuss over me too, huh? ” Word had assumedly gotten out about what had happened at the ritual site. Difficult for it not to, Varric supposed, seeing as it had resulted in two elven gods breaking free from their prison, ready to wreak untold chaos across the entire continent. He might have regretted taking Rook along to confront Solas, but he maintained that the alternative — ripping down the Veil entirely — would have been much, much worse. From what he'd heard, Chuckles had been contained, too, which at least wiped his piece off of the board for now. The elven god of lies and trickery would find a way out of his prison, the laws of storytelling dictated that a trickster always would, but Varric had faith that Rook could gain an advantage or two before then.

       He shifted on the bunk in the infirmary, sitting up a little straighter as Asharen approached with a fresh set of bandages. He wanted to turn down her offer of help ( he had a feeling that the wound inflicted by that dagger went deeper than any medicine could fix ) but, in the face of the concern writ plainly across her features, he didn't have the heart to resist.

       “ How're things outside of the Fade's answer to Skyhold? ” Varric tried to keep his tone light, but a noticeable edge remained. It was more frustrating that he'd admit to be stuck here at the Lighthouse, away from all the action, bereft of his beloved weapon. Letter writing could only get him so far — and it would take time for replies to be delivered back here. “ I've heard from Rook and company that there's a Blight, but — how far south has it spread? ”

[bardistraee]

DRAGON AGE: THE VEILGUARD (2024) | lucanis dellamorte [4/∞]

[whereismywarden]

Let's try this your way.

[assanstrike]

LUCANIS DELLAMORTE

˚₊‧꒰ა ͏͏͏͏͏͏ ໒꒱ ‧₊˚

[aceghostsarchive]

Emmrich: But you've been through so much these past days. You must need rest.

Rook: Emmrich?

[mercysought]

slams my hands on the table

ok quick thing because I need to finish something and dash. Mythal and Elgar'nan always worked because they were so deeply passionate and they truly did pull each other on / forward in ways that no one else could have. Challenging each other and changing each other. While Spirits like Solas might see that as mangling of the spirit, changing its original aspect, twisting its nature, Mythal and Elgar'nan were very clearly two spirits whose goal (to me) was deeply connected to it.

Change was the purpose, was the goal, not an accident byproduct. This is also why I think that the experiements with the Blight was, mostly, well perceived by a lot of them until they (Solas, later Mythal and the others who "outlawed it") saw the adverse affects on themselves.

Their romantic entanglement was one, just like anything else related to spirits, of deep passion. And that meant deep disagreements too which fed on itself.

I headcanon Mythal dying at the hands of Elgar'nan (though, technically, it was a coup) but that didn't mean that he didn't love her in this deep twisted way. The Mythal that he eventually killed, I think, is not the one that he fell in love with, it would have been a dulled out version. A tempered version. A version that he blamed Solas for constantly pulling her towards being.

He would burn the world for her. He did burn the world for her because ultimately the woman that promised him she would be his doom is the version of the woman that he loved.

[mercysought]

His face looked wrong. The way that Hakkon wore Ameridan made her feel uncomfortable, and she guessed that was part of the reason why he did it. It was Ameridan's voice, his face, yes. But that mean spirited quirk of the lips was enough to put her off the entire situation.

The concept of possession was not one that she was unfamiliar with. She had read some notes about some cases of possession that worked more like a parasite and host instead of a full, immediate take over. There was Cole, of course, whose existence wasn't so much possession of a living host but of remembering a living host too closely in hopes they could keep living through them. Morrigan herself was in a specific situation that was harder to place, not quite this either but being able to pull from knowledge and feelings that were not truly her own.

If Asharen truly wanted to stretch, she supposed her own situation with the Well of Sorrows could be seen akin to those two situations, however, she would truly need to be stretching to reach such a conclusion.

She is still watching him in silence as he apologises, her brow quirking lightly.

   "You are trying to flatter me." she hums, giving him a clipped smile, holding her brass hand over her flesh one, feeling the coldness of the metal against it. Which was saying something however, he would not be the first God trying to court her ego and she had had enough to those, elvhen, Avvari or otherwise for a lifetime "I am wiser than to fight a dragon one on one, or head-on, for that matter."

She pauses, her brows knitting together for a moment as she studies his face. When she had received the letter from Rook she had feared the worst and now? The fact of more, and more loss was going to continue being a constant in Asharen's life, she knew this, but it didn't mean she wished to see it come to fruition any swifter than necessary. That she saw him walking, that she knew he was in there? And yet to talk to Hakkon, the same dragon that they had slain so many years ago, how long until the tables turned and he would pull the rug from under them? Ameridan and her both.

   "How?..." she starts but her words disappear as she attempts to place her thoughts into line. She takes a good look at him again, lips strained into a line. She could only wonder, for now, given what she knew of Ameridan how much of a difficult thing this had been. If it had been a choice at all "How does it work? Between you and Ameridan."

@mercysought petitioned a very benevolent and humble god

"I thought our meeting overdue, Asharen Frost-thaw."

Cold and callous Hakkon watches the Fade-scarred lady who healed the sky, heart hammering with emotions not his own. Ameridan's spirit is strong even when he slips into the background of their being, listening but not leading; what he feels Hakkon feels, a faraway fire in the depths of them. The heart that isn't his beats with the fear that she will be unforgiving. The hands wants to close around the prayer that she will understand. The head wants to bow while it waits for judgement. The mouth wants to say, again: I am sorry I had to do this. I am sorry you must see me this way.

Yet Ameridan remains silent, as promised, down in the depths of them. Asharen must know who it is she is working with now --- both of them. It is Hakkon who watches the woman who once killed him through pale, piercing eyes, and Hakkon who lifts the head instead of bowing it, mouth set in an insolent quirk.

"I must, at least, apologize." (He feels Ameridan stir in surprise at this, but if he hopes Hakkon would beg forgiveness for his actions, he will be disappointed.) "In my dragon's-pride, ages bound, I did not consider you a worthy foe. I should have challenged you to duel."

A duel? You were a dragon, Ameridan says in his mind. Do not use my mouth to speak nonsense.

[knightwayne]

I have loved the stars too fondly to be fearful of the night

– Sarah Williams

[aesfocus]

[reagan-the-saunders]

"The Veil is a wound inflicted upon this world. It must be healed."

[thedissonantverses]

Once again on why you’re all wrong about Veilguard, let’s talk about the red lyrium and the blight and why it’s shown as two different things in Veilguard and what it represents and why this isn’t a retcon or bad writing. Because I saw people genuinely confused about the red lyrium in Harding’s quest. I’m actually not trying to be a dick here I genuinely want to clarify this for people and not just because Harding is my wife and I’m obsessed with her quest line and what it means for dwarves. It also illustrates what I love about Veilguard. Spoilers under the cut. Also trigger warning for talk about processing trauma.

This is going to sound facetious but first things first, Origins established lyrium is blue and you shouldn’t touch it unless you’re a dwarf because it’s basically raw magic.

Then DA2 established that red lyrium is really bad. It’s like the One Ring as far as what it does to your brain Prolonged exposure will turn you into a monster.

In Inquisition we learn that red lyrium is blighted. The blight can only affect living creatures. This means lyrium is alive. We also know that red lyrium is very, very angry.

In Veilguard we learned the blight is actually a living entity all on its own, a combination of magic and existential horror and the living embodiment of the mind of hatred born from the pain of an entire sapient race being exploited. (Like holy shit I can’t emphasize enough how cool I think this is as a concept).

But what we are supposed to infer during Harding’s quest is that lyrium turns red when a Titan is in pain or angry. The reason the blighted lyrium is red as well is because it is literally infused with the Titan’s nightmares. We essentially learn not all red lyrium is blighted but all blighted lyrium is red. This is just expanding the concept and isn’t a retcon. This through line was being set up since at least DA2 if not origins.

Side tangent, I’ve mentioned I worked in the medical field and a pet peeve of mine is people saying blood is blue before it’s oxygenated which isn’t true your blood is always red. But I love how the Titan blood is blue but when it’s exposed to pain it turns red. Not really relevant I just think it’s neat.

Anyways, so when Harding touches the dagger I believe she opened a two-way connection to the Titan, which is why she gets her stone magic. But I believe she also received the pain and rage that the Titan was harboring for literal centuries. By opening that connection, the Titan turned Harding into its avatar in much the way Valta was.

Harding’s shade is red for the same reason the lyrium is, she was forced to cast out the hatred for the sake of her own survival. It’s literal pain and anger. She’s a reflection of toxic positivity as a character. She’s always cheerful for survival even when she has every right to her emotions. What Solas and Mythal did to her and her people, both personally and across the eons, is truly awful. This why Harding waffles on Solas before she embraces the shade, but why she fully lays into him during the final mission if she gets the chance. (If you haven’t heard that banter it’s so good. I’m so proud of her.)

It’s not until Harding embraces her negative emotions that she and the shade and the Titan can rest easy. However you make that choice, Harding has to acknowledge those emotions and cleave to them. Something a lot of trauma survivors struggle with. You have to face them and process them or your body will hang onto that hatred and pain until it kills you. Harding’s journey is at its heart, about uniting who you were with who you are so you can move forward. Healing means reckoning with all of the parts of you, the good and the bad.