#ettvard needle
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gortash interfering with press freedom.jpg
Noteworthy to me:
it took at least a TENDAY to print all the Gort posters around the city
he hired a Banite as an official aide (obviously) (Ulova's the Black Gauntlet up in his office)
Ettvard is reeking of Banite too (I see you, "yours faithfully")
he didn't even send this protest
a Gortash signing his name just "G" is an angry Gortash (see the "inappropriate tone" Ketheric letter)
#bg3#enver gortash#ettvard needle#man I should work on that ettvard needle fic in my wip pile#also that typo in ettvard's letter: messy typist journalist very real actually
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Claws Out - with Tara and Astarion!
Note from Ettvard Needle - The Sword Coast’s finest agony aunts unite in our new column, ready to give YOUR dilemmas the delicate consideration they’re due. Submit your questions via pigeon or sending stone to our offices in Baldur’s Gate, but be prepared: our correspondents don’t sheath their claws!
(author’s note: this was inspired by a conversation with @littlemisscactus! Some mild sauciness follows)
Q Dear Aunties,
The wizard in my camp claims his chest will explode if I kiss him. How much flirting can I safely get away with?
Tara Our employer has a strict policy of confidentiality, but you would do well to consider yourself warned. Certain wizards have VERY protective family members, and if they should find out who sent this - well, my editor informs me I should say no more. I leave you in my colleague’s capable hands.
Astarion - Sit on his lap and find out, darling!
Q Dear Aunties,
Since I was cursed to look like a devil, I’ve been feeling a little down about my horns. Worse, I can’t say it - because my crush is a smoking hot tiefling! (Literally). How can I make peace with this and move on?
Astarion Easy as pie, darling. Whenever you’re feeling down, remember things could always be worse - you could have been turned into a gnome!
Tara Ignore my colleague’s flippancy. Though I may be a tressym, and thus blessed with the perfect form by nature - even I sometimes look in the mirror and feel unease at my greying feathers. We must all remember that change is in our natures, and is a sign of our continued existence in this glorious world.
Q Dear Aunties,
Ever since reading ‘The Salty Mermaid,’ I find my thoughts drifting to the… scalier… types. However, my boyfriend flat-out refuses put on a tail for me! Should I just break up and try my luck with the waveservants instead?
Tara Good grief. I didn't know we were in the business of bedroom advice. However, I must caution you that the servants of Umberlee are a serious bunch. Chasing tails is an activity for dogs, not thinking creatures, and you should remember that attached to every mermaid scale is a real person, not some cheap fantasy.
Astarion For once, my colleague and I find ourselves in total agreeement. If you absolutely must hump something with a tail, may I recommend the figurehead of the Blushing Mermaid? She’s amenable to all comers, or so I’ve heard.
Editors Note: and that’s all we’ve got for this week! If you have opinions, or complaints about the advice given, please send them directly to our office fireplace. Every letter helps keep our scribes’ fingers a little warmer!
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Also my new favourite thing to do is go around the city and decide who is a Banite.
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Ooops
Err... I mean... Who could have done such a thing!?
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Trouble
Small piece of durgetash drivel i wrote while a lil tipsy and feeling some kind of way about the Baldur's Mouth Gazette mission. Will upload to AO3 when i get better signal.
Gortash x f!Durge oc - AO3
Fluff, playing chicken with each other, manipulation, small threats. Pls enjoy 🥺
"Miss... Miss! You can't go–" That was all the guard got out before he found a dagger against his throat, silencing him to a whimper.
Gortash could, of course, hear this exchange going on outside of his office. He was debating how far he was going to let her go, to see how badly she wanted in. This was enough for now, he decided; he'd spare the poor guard. Flaming Fists weren't as replaceable with Orin prowling the streets.
"Let her in," he said, a hint of bemusement in his voice. After a moment, the door swung open violently. Maevris strolled leisurely to his desk, a measured smile on her face. Without the bloodstains and the shaking guard, one could almost mistake her for a person paying a pleasant social visit.
"Ah, my most efficient assassin! A pleasure. To what do I owe–" She dropped a stack of papers on his desk wordlessly, smiling at him with her blade still at her side.
A test print of the Baldur's Mouth Gazette lay on his desk, along with a letter in his hand. Not signed, of course, but recognizable to anyone who would care to notice. Warning! Dangerous Band of Adventurers Bring Absolutist Chaos to Our City! The paper cried out, with an unmistakably portrait of Mae and her band of misfits.
"I'm beginning to question the integrity of this alliance," she said coolly. "I wonder how this article could impact our... joint endeavor."
Gortash glanced over the newspaper and letter. "Tsk. Someone's been snooping. I didn't think the printing press was open to the public," he said with a half cocked smile.
"I'm remarkably tenacious," she said, "especially when threatened by men with feathered hats bigger than their sense. But, I suppose he's more useful to your plans than I am, if you're so ready to throw me to the wolves."
Her words dripped sweetly like honey, coating the malicious undertones as she twisted her dagger between her fingers. A subconscious habit that survived Orin's attack. He found the familiarity comforting, for a moment. "An insurance policy, my dear," he said, looking up at her, "until you were more certain where your allegiances lay."
"What an interesting way to win over my allegiance, then," she said as she perched herself on the corner of his desk.
Slander her name publicly, invent a reason for the Steel Watch to detain her. She would resist, of course, but they would be ordered to bring her in with non-lethal methods. Once she was declawed and separated from her traveling companions, Mae would certainly be much easier to talk to. She could be reasoned with, surely, without those do-gooders clinging to her. It wasn't a bad plan, if Ettvard had been more cautious.
"You know, you would have one advantage in this partnership, if you weren't so keen to throw it away," she said, looking down at him.
"Oh?" He said back with a lazy smile. He had missed their little sparring matches. "And what is that, dearest?"
"I don't have an opinion on you yet, one way or the other," she said, twirling her knife on its tip against the wooden desktop. "We might work well together, or we might not. I'm decidedly undecided, I suppose. But you do things like this, and it... tips the needle in the wrong direction." She lifted her blade up and brought it back down swiftly, stabbing the tip into the grain of the desk, all while keeping her face completely calm and measured.
He couldn't help but grin fully back up at her. A lovely display. "A thousand apologies, then," he said as he stood up and walked around the desk. "However, I do think I have at least one more advantage."
"And what's that?" She asked, feigning disinterest as she pulled her dagger from the desk and sheathed it at her side.
He came up behind her, barely a whisper away from her back. "I remember you better than you remember yourself," he whispered just above the skin of her neck before planting slow, delicate kisses trailing down the space just behind her ear.
She melted into the touch in spite of herself as an arm came to rest on her waist. Just as quickly as it came, the moment was over, as Gortash withdrew his touch and walked to a bookshelf. That momentary lapse of self control was all it took; the split second, involuntary movement of her body to his, and they both know where the balance of power was shifting in this battle. The smirk he had when he turned to face her, leaning against a shelf so cockily, said that he knew exactly what he was doing.
Two could play at that game. She hopped off of the desk corner and strolled over to him, stopping almost flush against his chest with her arms behind her back. Tilting her face up to his, with the most saccharine smile she could muster, she said, "so what is it that you want, then? Am I a partner, or a plaything?"
He grinned back down at her, eyes hooded, as he put a hand under her chin and brought her face inches from his. "I suppose that's up to you, dear," he said.
Mae stood on her tip toes and leaned in to whisper in his ear, hands on his shoulder for balance. "And how would I go about convincing you I'm more useful as your equal?" She purred.
He chuckled, and she felt it rumble through his chest under her hands. He put one arm lazily around her middle and leaned in to press a small kiss to the side of her head. "Not with such an obvious show of manipulation, pet." He teased before releasing his hold on her waist and walking back to his desk.
"As opposed to your very subtle manipulation?" She quipped back, disappointed but evidently not deterred. "You say you want to work together. Rule together. You string together all these pretty words to my face. I can't help but wonder if it's to distract me from the dagger you're planning to plunge into my back."
"Aren't daggers more your thing, Mae?" He replied as he sat at his desk again. She was already halfway across the room now.
"Give me one thing to trust. Anything. That's all I'm asking," she said as she approached his desk. "One reason to believe you're sincere."
He looked at her for a moment, amusement and admiration dancing across his face as she sat back on his desk, this time right in front of his seat. "Alright," he said, "give me your hand."
She looked at him quizzically as he reached towards her right arm, but acquiesced all the same. He took it in both hands and turned it over, holding her forearm with one hand while tracing a scar across her wrist with the other. "I was there when you got this scar. It was in Mephistopheles' vault. You were trying to disarm a trap, and it triggered on you instead," he said, looking her deeply in the eyes. "I was the one who cleaned and bandaged it for you out." He took her arm and pressed his lips to the scar, not looking away from her eyes, silently relishing in the fact that she didn't pull away from the contact.
"Anyone could make up a story about a scar," she said quietly, still looking down at him.
Her words said she wasn't convinced, but he knew her tells and mannerisms. He had her right where he wanted, if he could keep going. "I know you prefer to sleep on your left side," he said, curling an arm around her waist. "You preferred to sleep facing me. So you could listen to my heart beat under my chest, you said."
"That doesn't..." He could hear her breath hitch just the slightest bit. "That didn't stop you from betraying me last time though, did it?" She asked quietly. It wasn't a challenge; her eyes were wide and sincere. Almost hurt. That small, veiled vulnerability. Only ever reserved for him, even still.
He stood to meet her gaze, wrapping one arm around her middle fully and cupping her face with the other as he brought it to his. "It didn't stop me from losing you," he said, his breath ghosting over her lips, "a fate I'm very keen to avoid you facing again."
"Unless it's at your hand, apparently," she replied, leaning into the embrace all the same. Just as touchstarved as always, it seemed. Just as eager as he felt.
"My hands can be much more gentle, love," he said, leaning against her forehead, "if you'd let them."
She kept her eyes locked on his, barely a hair's breadth from his face, searching his demeanor. She gave him a small smirk, and his own heart was the one doing little flips this time. "We'll see," she said playfully, before extricating herself from his grip in one fluid movement and walking towards the door. "Do tell your other friends to play nicer, in the mean time," she called over her shoulder as she left.
He smiled after her, long after she had left the room. She might not remember him, no. But that was certainly still his same Mae.
#gortash x durge#dark urge x gortash#lord gortash#enver gortash#gortash x dark urge#lord enver gortash#bg3 gortash#durgetash#bg3 durge#durge#dark urge#fanfic#bg3#maevris
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Writing Patterns Tag Game
I was tagged by @sinelaborenihilsr2 - thank you!
Rules: list the first line(s) of your last 10 posted fics and see if there's a pattern!
(I've skipped past two NSFW fics with spicy first lines.)
Dance of the Damned:
For her entire life Adrien has cared for her.
A Boy with a Sweet Smile and Silver Blue Eyes:
Mother is pregnant with her fourth child.
Afraid to Love, Afraid to Lose:
Flames lick Karlach’s red flesh and the heat radiating off her is enough to burn Petra’s own skin, and she’s a good metre away from her love.
Quiet Afternoons:
“Pet, I’m cold,” Astarion whines, sliding closer to her and wrapping his arms around her waist, resting his head on her shoulder and looking at her, doe-eyed.
Delicate Morning Flowers and House Wine:
Her name was Coralie Trevelyan, and a bit of discreet asking around told Dorian that she was an enchanter at Ostwick Circle Tower, and one of the representatives sent to the Conclave.
The First Anniversary:
It’s been a year since the gold-plated puppy broke Iris’ heart with his promise that he would tear the world asunder, and for nearly a year now she’s lived with Dorian as his roommate in Tevinter.
Long Way Home:
“Dad? I’ve done the math.”
Yes, You Can Exercise Like a Vampire: A Baldur's Mouth Gazette Feature:
“Good news, Colin!” Ettvard Needle says in the tone that usually precedes the opposite.
Lost Souls Like Us:
Karlach has decided she’s going to be happy after her breakdown following Gortash’s death.
New Beginnings:
Don’t become his.
What do I notice? I tend to start my works with a simple statement that establishes the setting or tone of the work, and/or the POV character of the first chapter. Occasionally, I'll start with an attention-grabbing first line that doesn't really seem captivating outside context.
No-pressure tagging @thetrashbagswasteland, @outpost51, and @sparatus.
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I love Scottish accents so much I love Scottish people absolute fuckin delights
This post brought to you by me, fresh off of going into the Baldur's Mouth building and having a chat with Ettvard Needle, unable to stop thinking about how he says the word "murderer"
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Vox populi, vox dei
The voice of the people is the voice of God.
I just noticed Ettvard Needle says this to Tav/Durge. And the irony is just... beautiful. Love it.
Not only is Ettvard not printing the voice of the people anymore, he's printing the voice of a god instead. To tell the people what to think, so the voice of the god of tyranny becomes the voice of the people.
This has to be the worst and best possible interpretation of vox populi vox dei. 💜
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Holly Fowes knows!! Ettvard immediately fired her for it, of course:
But her original letter isn't just in the newsroom, where they obviously didn't publish it—she posted a copy on the bulletin board outside the Flaming Fist barracks, too.
(And maybe elsewhere? This post inspired by me noticing it out in public for the first time.) (And I'm a little worried for her safety given...Gortash...but I think this is the only mention of her in the game.)
#holly fowes my new favourite incredibly minor npc#am I eventually just going to post every baldur's mouth note? maybe!#this is part of my beat you might say#bg3#ettvard needle#enver gortash
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I was looking for a different note, but you know what, I need to make fun of Ettvard for the way he addresses and signs this note to himself
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For the WIP game, tell me about "To Set and to Spike" 😁
thank you!! (answering questions about my WIPs here)
"To Stet and to Spike" is probably a title that won't make it to the actual piece—they're journalism terms (stet meaning to reject an edit and allow something to stand, and to spike a story is to kill it and not run it), and probably a bit insider baseball. But it amuses me, so: working title!
This one's about Ettvard Needle, the editor of the Baldur's Mouth Gazette, getting drawn in by Gortash to become a Banite. It's set well before the game and is so self-indulgent (via its cast of OCs and a point of view character who might as well be one) but I'm having so much fun picking away at it.
There's some durgetash lurking around the edges, too. (Gortash's first request to manipulate the press is to cover up a string of Bhaalist murders when a journalist gets too close.)
I have a journalism background; turns out writing what you know is really fun actually! Here's a bit I've never shared before:
Gods, he’s at it again.
Otran Rolfe comes from one of those old-blood families, the kind with generations of distant relations in the game—practically born with a notebook in his hand and relentless questions in his heart, but with dark-rimmed eyes and the loose, affected clothes of someone trying to pretend not to care. A failure, in coin and prestige and his family’s opinion. One who fancies himself on the oddities beat, the kind of sensations that sell broadsheets but have Ettvard swatting away asinine ideas at each editorial meeting. Strange creatures, cults, conspiracies: that sort of thing.
He’s even drawn in Thomasin, apparently, the fascination clear on her usually stoic face. “But Bhaal hasn’t been worshipped since Sarevok.”
“Actually,” Otran says, ever pleased to make a correction, “Sarevok didn’t worship Bhaal. Not according to the accounts of his half-sibling, at least. He wanted to replace him.”
But she pushes back. Good girl. “Right, the half-sibling who turned into a monster and murdered half the Wide. Incredibly reliable source.”
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Let's throw out a little WIP Wednesday before I start work, too! This is from the journalism project, aka Ettvard Needle becomes a Banite.
I'm having way too much fun creating journalist OCs to populate the Baldur's Mouth, and figuring out the voice (puns and cliches intentional—when you spend so much of your life brainstorming headlines that becomes automatic, you can't escape).
(Turns out writing what you know is really fun, actually.)
Ettvard knows the value of a name well-chosen. He’d seen it as a child, back when he had more than half a memory of what his family was called in the generations before they moved to Baldur’s Gate. Needle—he’s heard plenty of petty jabs over the years, are you serious? A tailor named Needle?, but everyone was talking about his father’s business then, weren’t they. Of course, it helped that he was good, that he knew what the common people want, a skill and a sharp eye that had the family resting in a level of wealth uncommon for the shops on the Lower City’s foggy streets.
He’d considered picking something else as a man, when he began the business that made him, but it fits his new life of ink and investigations, too. It’s what he threads when he crafts a sentence, balancing fact with the fanciful phrasing that catches a reader’s eye and keeps them coming back to buy more. It’s what he does in an interview, wielding pointed questions to find the truth bit by bit. It’s what he is to the patriars and political powers of the city, a sharp threat that could deflate their years of carefully curated artifice.
He knows, too, the power of a title boldly claimed. Editor. Publisher. Founder. The voice of the citizenry of Baldur’s Gate, with the ability to change their thought with a well-placed editorial, or cut something from the conversation entirely with his silence.
He should have known, when he first met Lord Enver Gortash, that there was so much more lurking behind the name.
#I don't even know how to tag this#ettvard needle#enver gortash#I guess?#should I follow the ettvard needle tag I can't imagine anyone is looking at the ettvard needle tag jslkfdf#bg3#my writing#wip wednedsay
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Okay well I don't have my own screenshot so I won't post it but THE NEW EPILOGUE HAS A GIFT FOR ME AND ME SPECIFICALLY in that there's a note that gives us a sample of Ettvard Needle's writing voice
(I just started writing a fic from his point of view)
HIS COLUMN IS CALLED NEEDLING WITH ETTVARD
(I think you only get it if you go all the way to the brain with Gortash? My file where I did that hasn't played through the final fight yet so I can't check myself before I redo it, and that is not in the cards today, but)
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3, 4, and 5 for the fic asks?
(from these asks!)
3) How you feel about your current WIP
Like I've been lost in the weeds of it for far too long, and I'm really displeased at it for growing extra chapters, but also I've been rewriting the opening sections recently and loving what's there, so optimistic I'll like the end result!
4) A story idea you haven’t written yet
I've written...130 words apparently with my vision for an opening, so I think this one counts: there's a piece I really want to write about Valas and Shadowheart during the game. I have other bits and pieces about them in the WIP file, but I'm trying this one in her voice instead of his and I think the vision's working better.
Constructing a sense of self through the smallest fragments of memory, clinging to concepts of faith, feeling the cracks in both grow too wide to ignore—framed around the night he tries to murder her.
5) First sentence of the fifth paragraph of an unpublished WIP
Oh, since you're asking, here's what's fifth from the top of the unstructured chaos of the Ettvard document!
He bought the thin, three-story building with his parents' coin, sure, gathered over generations as the Lower City's favourite tailors—but the Baldur's Mouth Gazette, the city's first publication to be the voice of the people, based far from the prim streets of the patriars' perch, was something he built entirely on his own.
#thank you!!#asks#talking about my writing#my writing#valas devir#ettvard needle#(love using the ettvard tag as if there's literally anyone else in the fandom who might ever look at it)#(maybe if I do it enough it will let me search my own blog for it at least)
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Also I planned this and shared with some folks and others might find this interesting!
In my little canon world Gortash has many lovers, and I compiled a little list of his favourites!
Everybody listed here happened multiple times over a time period, so people like Haarlep which was a very set period and one off seductions like Liria (the name I gave to the elf whose head can be found in the workshop in Moonrise) don't count here.
Neither technically does Manva Warhelm, though she sits on top for always being on his mind sue me.
Putting under the cut because Enver Gortash is a bad, bad, bad man.
Bane. I mean this goes without saying. Visits from his God are always eventful.
Musahn Mensahn (Human) a Calishite importer of people who docks every few months. One of the few people Enver is actually fond of, Musahn is a shrewd, cultured man who spins a good yarn and is an attentive, gentle presence in his life. Afternoons with him are like a little holiday.
Del Dawnstar (Dwarf) A young employee at Mistress Yare’s flophouse in The Wide, Enver has been seeing them since they were a teenager starting out. Their position fluctuates; on the one hand they will do anything he asks of them as long as their price is met and he has been able to shape them to his tastes, but on the other hand, sometimes he likes a bit more of a fight (features in Let Me Adorn You)
Hester Ashenheart (Dwarf) A servant in Gortash’s household. He knows Hester does not like him, but that is part of the appeal on both sides. She has found herself in his bed on a number of occasions, often when he has received a less than pleasing letter - and she bears the brunt of the worst of his temper (Features in The Portrait)
Franc Peartree (Human, deceased) Franc and Enver have been working together for around a decade and have been lovers for almost all of that time. Franc has been a close supporter of Enver’s rise across business, politics, and religion, and their affair has always been one of a mutual understanding of his place.
Kruugar (Half-Orc, deceased) Kru is a mercenary who has worked for Enver across jobs. This one is pretty much just physical, and Kru has a prosthetic that Gortash fitted himself as a prototype (having also cut off his arm)
Kerrie Lovelace (Half-Elf) Gortash traded Kerrie and her brother Ellyan from Calimshan, and let her be bought by Karlach Cliffgate in what he saw as a very funny and misplaced moment of chivalry. She went on to become Ulder Ravengard’s mistress, which then sparked his interest; he blackmails her for her company when he feels he wants that particular feeling of power, and she cries all the way through, which is exactly what he is looking for (features in The Portrait and Ammunition)
Ivo Thorngrove (Halfling) A very shrewd moneylender, Ivo has been working with Enver for decades. They had a much more physical relationship when both men were younger, which has petered out into something more familial for the most part, though Ivo can sometimes be persuaded…
Helsik (Dwarf) A completely transactional, only occasional relationship when he wants something. He admires her business sense.
Wisteria Jannath (Human, deceased) Another transactional relationship, Enver nonetheless enjoys her sharp wit and warmth, and her understanding of what their relationship is.
Ettvard Needle (Human) Editor of Baldur’s Mouth. Enver met Ettvard when working on improvements to the efficiency of print and they formed a close working relationship which became closer when he joined the Banite church.
Ffion Goldgrind (Dwarf, deceased) Another working relationship, he sees Ffion when he needs a heavy reset.
Fariza Linnaker (Human) Technically his wife. Fariza was kidnapped and held as collateral for ransom to attempt to get Lady Ruth to hand over some of the family’s gold. She did not play ball, a move that Gortash deeply admired, and instead suggested that he keep her if he really wants the investment of the Linnakers. She has gone from locked up in a safehouse, visited only by Manva who “trained” her in what to expect should she live, to being locked up in his estate. He loathes her weakness.
Avery Sonshal (Human) Avery is a recent addition, an ambitious young man who is a Banite “friend of Gortash.” Enver doesn’t think much of him, but he takes a cock well and is eager to please, so is also easy to subjugate.
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