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butterflydm · 1 month

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more WoT s3 spec - what we know vs what we're guessing at

I've been poking at what we know about s3 vs what we can reasonably guess, so I wanted to break that down a bit.

So there are a few things we know just about the structure of how the show has worked so far: we know they shoot in blocks of two episodes each and that each of those blocks is going to have the same director for both episodes. Because of this info, we can make some guesses at where specific episodes may land. We also have some casting info (wotseries.com being a great resource here).

They tend to have a major reveal in the fourth episode - Nynaeve being incredibly powerful in the One Power in 1x04; Selene being Lanfear in 2x04.

What we know for certain:

Rhuidean & the Waste will appear (Rand & Egwene's storyline).

Tanchico will appear (Nynaeve & Elayne's storyline).

The Two Rivers will appear (Perrin's storyline).

Rand and Perrin will each get focus episodes akin to Nynaeve having "What Might Be" and Egwene having "Eyes Without Pity" in s2.

We have four episode titles: "To Race The Shadow"; "A Glimpse of Crimson"; "Goldeneyes"; and "He Who Comes With The Dawn".

Sea Folk are confirmed for S3.

Potential leaks include:

Mat, Min, and Thom all being part of Nynaeve & Elayne's storyline in Tanchico. Big change for Mat & Min, but matches canon for Thom. And since show-onlys have only seen Thom with Mat and Rand, it would make sense to use Mat to re-introduce us to him.

Reports of the actresses reported to be playing Morgase and Elaida seen at a castle which is almost certainly in Caemlyn (Andoran banners spotted), most likely for the first or second episode due to the timing.

An actress playing Maigran (one of the Aiel from the Rhuidean glass columns sequence) is listed under the director who is being used for eps 3 and 4.

An actress has been cast to play an older version of Latra and I really like @wheeloftimeofficial's idea that we'll see her as the ancient Aes Sedai who establishes Rhuidean in the glass column memories, especially since the younger actress also has s3 listed on her CV.

We have (unofficially) confirmed castings for Faile & Galad.

Hints we've gotten from interviews & bts info:

In an interview filmed before the actors' strike, Daniel mentions Lan having some really good relationship scenes with Nynaeve, so we know that there's interaction between those characters before their plotlines separate, implying that we will not begin with everyone already all off on their separate journeys, like they were in 2x01.

Also from Daniel, it's implied that there are training scenes between Lan and Rand (could happen at any point, since Lan is likely to be in Rand's storyline the entire season).

From what Josha has said, the show will be pivoting to a more familial relationship between Egwene and Rand next season (which matches the book timing).

Rafe made a point of mentioning that Elayne healing Rand was to flag to the audience that this was a relationship to pay attention to (which implies we'll get at least some movement on that relationship in s3).

Josha also says that there is "way more togetherness" for Two Rivers' characters in s3 than in s2.

In an unrelated interview on screenrant, Rima Te Waita (Sheriam) mentioned that she will not be in s3 but, if s4 is greenlit, she will be in s4.

Josha and Ayoola posted some cute instas of each other after finishing up the South Africa shooting stint near Cape Town, which might be a hint towards our potential AviRand interactions (could also just be the actors being cute!).

Guesses based on book & show knowledge:

It seems likely to me that Gawyn & Galad will be introduced in the same episode as Morgase and Elaida, which I am tentatively going to guess will be episode 2.

I think that Verin, Alanna & their Warders are going to be getting out of Cairhien as quickly as possible. And that they are pretty conveniently set up to head to their TSR storyline.

I am pretty torn about when the coup will happen! I feel like it happening this season feels pretty much a lock because there really isn't any more "White Tower storyline" until the coup happens, and they do already have the set made. But it could either happen pretty early on or fairly late in the season. Maybe episode five? That lets us meet Elaida in episode 2, gives her and possibly Gawyn & Galad time to get to the White Tower, maybe we get some scenes of her politicking in the WT in episode 4, with the trigger being pulled in episode 5 or 6. But another possibility is that the coup happens right away, while all those Sisters are still in Cairhien and we see Liandrin take the lead on something like stilling Siuan and Leane, which would put the White Tower in chaos before Elaida even arrives. There are at least two Black Ajah Sisters in Cairhien, after all, and Liandrin likes to act extra-judicially, and she might want to try to make sure that Siuan is taken care of before anyone has a chance to out her (Liandrin) as Black Ajah. But there is also a chance that it might happen in the finale, so that we can parallel Moiraine & Siuan's 'downfalls'. So really this one is a wildcard for me. It isn't really directly tied to any other specific events in TSR, so it can happen whenever.

We will get the glass columns in episode 3 or 4. In the books, it happened as soon as Rand landed in the Waste, basically, but the show could potentially do Cold Rocks Hold first, depending on how Rand is getting to the Waste. I used to lean towards it happening in ep3, but after learning the leak about Mat being in Tanchico, it made me wonder about ep4, maybe, as that could potentially lead to Mat going through the doorways (just speculation with zero leaks or spoilers to back it up but I like it a lot lol) from Tanchico to Rhuidean either at the end of ep4 or the start of ep5, leaving Nynaeve & Elayne's storyline and going to Rand & Egwene's.

I do keep thinking about Josha saying that the Two Rivers' kids would have "way more togetherness" than in s3, which seems difficult if they all separate by or after ep2 and then don't reunite the entire season. I guess technically it would be true because they don't reunite in s2 until the final moments of 2x08 but feels somewhat underwhelming to mention, lol.

I do still suspect that we're getting Lanfear & Moiraine with the doorway at the end of the season.

So, a tentative outline. Now we leave behind the more solid leaks and knowledge and enter into the wild speculations. Please check out @markantonys' recent post too, she's got some fun speculations!

3x01: To Race the Shadow

"Way more togetherness" between the Two Rivers group than in s2, so says Josha. This is also where we have to be getting the Lan & Nynaeve romantic scenes that Daniel keeps hyping up, lol.

Moiraine and Rand are going to be arguing about his next plans.

Something will happen that makes them realize that Something Is Up in Tanchico -- this might be a first Dream from Egwene that leads them in the direction of the museum? Which also leads to her talking to Amys, which is why she decides to go with Rand instead of going with Nynaeve & Elayne. The big question for me is if they are going to Tanchico because of Liandrin or if they go for other reasons and then run into Liandrin also being there to get the same thing that they're getting.

Now Mat may go into a doorway here as speculated by @markantonys (the room of curiosities) but for this specific outline, I'm going to say that he doesn't, and instead he chooses to go with Elayne & Nynaeve because he's running away from Rand (after the Stabbening). This pulls in something that Mat tries to do a lot in the books but gives him a new motivation that fits his show character.

I think Lanfear is going to warn Rand about the rest of the Forsaken being free but potentially also send Liandrin to Tanchico to try to get the, uh, plot token for her potential use in the future (a girl needs a back-up plan).

Lanfear talking to Rand might be another thing that Rand and Moiraine argue about.

Rand and Egwene are going to have their official 'break-up' and then we'll see their more platonic relationship develop over the course of the season. I also feel like we have to have at least a scene or two with Rand and Elayne to establish them feeling Some Kind of Way about each other, to build on that moment from 2x08.

3x02: A Glimpse of Crimson

Good episode title for a Red Ajah & Andor episode!

I'm going to guess that Rand & co are going to be stopping in Caemlyn (my feelings are similar to @markantonys about us potentially getting a garden introduction between Egwene & Gawyn here, and then having Rand & Egwene meet Elaida & Morgase (and Galad?). Elaida will have her Foretelling about Rand and freak herself out.

Our group hears the rumors about the Two Rivers, and Perrin decides to go investigate. The question is how is Rand going to get to the Waste from Caemlyn? I don't feel like they would introduce Portal Stones as a one-off if they haven't done it before, so I think there's a chance that Loial might go with Rand instead of Perrin, as Perrin doesn't need to go through the Ways to get to the Two Rivers (of course, then they would need to change how the battle resolves in 3x07).

(alternatively: there's always the Lanfear express, I guess, lol)

This could also be when Elayne, Nynaeve, & Mat arrive in Tanchico, and their introduction to the city is our B plot. I don't think they would throw all the plots at them at once and I feel like just introducing Thom first would be a good start for the first episodes in Tanchico.

3x03: Unknown

Rand & co arrive in the Waste, but I'm going to send them to Cold Rocks Hold for now, instead of straight to Rhuidean. This gives Rand and Aviendha time to bond, Rand and Moiraine time to fight, Rand and Lan time to train together, and gives the audience a chance to get to know the Aiel culture in a bit more of a relaxed setting. Then we get an attack by Shadowspawn and Rand gets the reminder that the other Forsaken have been let free and don't share Ishamael and Lanfear's feelings about him.

Another plot will be in Tanchico, involving Nynaeve, Elayne, and Mat investigating, running into Min and/or Egeanin or Tuon taking Egeanin's role. This may be where we get our early encounters with Moghedien (she Compels one or more of our characters to spill the beans to her about their plans) and potentially where she reveals herself to Liandrin & co as one of the Chosen and takes control of their group after playing servant for part of the episode.

We also have Perrin & co arriving in the Two Rivers and getting the lay of the land. This could be a fairly emotional episode for Perrin, due to memories of Laila's death. Maybe when Perrin says goodbye to Laila (putting his ring on her grave/memorial?) and potentially our first sighting of Faile.

3x04: Unknown

Rand goes to Rhuidean and into the glass columns. This is the main plot of the episode and Rand's focus episode of the season.

We get the history of the Aiel here, and learn about Rand's ancestors.

Subplot: Aviendha is told that she is destined to be a Wise One (maybe she accidentally channeled during the fight at Cold Rocks Hold?) and deals with idea that she has to leave behind being a Maiden.

Our Tanchico B-plot leads to Mat entering through the twisted doorway in the museum, For Reasons, and getting his prophecies. Maybe this same plotline leads to Elayne and Nynaeve finding dream ter'angreal, and to Tuon/Egeanin realizing that Elayne and Nynaeve are channelers, and potentially learns that all sul'dam are, and then leaves our main plotline at this time.

3x05: Unknown

When Rand leaves the glass columns, he finds Mat hanging on the tree outside, and saves his life (we've gotten a few different pieces of foreshadowing about Mat being hanged, so I feel like it will happen at some point). Mat says he was just in Tanchico.

We catch up with Perrin in the Two Rivers, with him learning to move past his grief as he gets to know Faile.

Because we've already done Cold Rocks Hold, this means that Rand & co can go straight to Alcair Dal at this point.

Aviendha and Rand bond over their lives being dictated by being able to use the One Power and not having any choices about their future.

On the way to Alcair Dal, we meet the traders, who are hiding Lanfear and Asmodean in their ranks, and Lanfear sees that Rand is getting closer to Aviendha and Does Not Approve.

Nynaeve and Elayne worry about where Mat has disappeared to and experiment with the dream ter'angreal that they recently discovered in the museum (might only be one: the twisted stone ring, so that channeling isn't needed for it), and run into Birgitte in the dream. She gives them a warning but they realize that this is the same place that Egwene was talking about in 3x01 and are excited that they might be able to communicate with her.

3x06: Unknown

Another journey into TAR for Nynaeve (maybe a successful contact with Egwene?), and she encounters Birgitte again, but Moghedien too, and this leads to Birgitte getting ripped out of TAR and bonded by Elayne to save her life.

Moiraine tells Rand that he needs to go to Tear, to fulfill more of the prophecies, but Rand is resistant.

The Two Rivers ramps up for the battle.

This would also be a good spot for the coup, imo.

3x07: Goldeneyes

The Battle of the Two Rivers. Potentially Perrin's focus episode as well, as he comes into his own as a leader. I think that it would be good to push any confirmed Perrin/Faile romance forward into the future, so they will still just have some vibes for now.

We get some pieces moving into place for the other storylines: Rand arrives at Alcair Dal; Nynaeve and Elayne make plans to return to the museum.

3x08: He Who Comes With The Dawn

Desperate to get through to Rand and worrying that he is focusing on the Aiel instead of being the Dragon Reborn, Moiraine went back to Rhuidean to try to use the doorway, as when Mat talked about his experiences there, she recognized what he was talking about and wants answers of her own.

Rand announces himself at Alcair Dal, drawing the attention of Lanfear, who makes her pitch to him that We Could Rule Together, worrying that she's losing her hold over him after seeing him getting closer to Aviendha. She tells him about Asmodean and about him potentially teaching Rand so that he can reach his potential.

Inside the doorway, Moiraine gets answers that she doesn't like about Rand and Lanfear (sort of merging her going into the doorway in Tear with her going into the silver rings).

On the Tanchico side of things, we have our big Tanchico encounter between Nynaeve and Moghedien, which results in Nynaeve breaking her block. Nynaeve and Elayne escape Tanchico on a Sea Folk ship, heading towards Tear, potentially bringing Min & Thom along with them.

After talking with Lanfear, Rand is let out of his 'bubble' at Alcair Dal as Couladin declares that HE is the Car'a'carn and he will prove it by leading the Aiel to conquer the wetlands (setting up s4 to be a combo of TFoH/LoC, with a hint of TDR with the destination being Tear instead of Cairhien). Rand realizes that the fake dragons on Couladin's arms were put there by Asmodean and goes after him -- Asmodean Skims back to Rhuidean and he and Rand battle, and Lanfear arrives, puts the block on Asmodean and offers him up as a teacher to Rand. Moiraine takes advantage of Lanfear's focus on Rand to yeet both of them into the doorway while channeling, based on the knowledge that she learned inside, melting the doorway. We see in the Tanchico storyline that the other doorway melts at the same time, leaving them no exit.

And I agree with @markantonys that possibly the most effective stinger would be the reveal that Tuon is the DotNM, but if there is no Tuon in this season, we could have it be a Forsaken (Sammael) setting up shop in Tear, to set the scene for the upcoming season.

It is a lot more cliffhanger-y than our previous season finales and I'm sure that my thoughts on it will change as we get closer and learn more spoilers, but that is my wild speculation for this specific week!

#wot #wheel of time #wot on prime #wot book spoilers #the fires of heaven #wot speculation #wot s3 speculation

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republicansaredomesticterrorists · 7 days

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They must be sensing a Trump defeat because they’re suddenly turning against the “chaos caucus”.

🤡

#moscow marjorie #marjorie traitor greene #maga morons #traitor #Trump sycophant #republican assholes #chaos caucus #Republican clown show #never trump #resist

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the-90s-music-colosseum · 7 months

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Round 2 Group C Match 2

ATTENTION VOTERS WE ARE TRYING TO ACHIEVE A TIE ON THIS POLL. MARGIN OF 0.2% OR SMALLER WILL MEAN JONNY AND MIKE MOVE ON TO THE NEXT ROUND TOGETHER.

expand for propaganda ↓ (major wall of text warning + videos. very.)

Jonny Greenwood:

"Every art girl's (and boy's) wet dream"

"He wrote the tourist. That's all you need."

"Repeat from my Thom propaganda but he was a part of it so anyways. I had a dream once where I met him and Thom on the street and asked them to sign my Pablo Honey CD, so Thom pushed me into open traffic and I got hit by a car and died and Jonny laughed his ass off. 10/10, my last sight before death was his beautiful face laughing."

"I could probably snap him like a twig but I want to marry him and have 3 children with him before I do that"

"Choose Life. Choose a job. Choose 1/5 of Radiohead. Choose 1/5 of In Rainbows. Choose the man who wrote weird fishes, both Greenwood sisters ,the man in South Park, his telecaster and the stickers on it. Choose the bug Jacqueline Kennedy, his love for literature and poetry, and his lovely lisp. Choose his sublime score for Phantom Thread and his husband Paul Thomas Anderson. Choose the weird amount of straight men who thirst over him in the YouTube comment section. Choose his jawbone. Choose the most pretentious, unpretentious member of the band. Choose his silky hair and his (probably) Dove shampoo. Choose his great knowledge of music theory and how he often disregards it. Choose Astroboy's biggest fanboy (minus maybe Thom. Choose a very hot Alex James who eloped with a fish. Choose Jonny Greenwood. Choose your future. Choose life… Involuntary Trainspotting reference but please vote Jonny over Wario. Oh, and( even though Jonny lives in Italy at the moment), I live in Oxford and if I meet him, I'll tell him that he won."

"He keeps chickens guys, CHICKENS"

"I'm a straight guy but no joke Jonny is hot tbh maybe it's cuz he looks like a chick but like damnnnn"

"He's so gorgeous....kinda like an ant 😍😍😍😍"

Mike Patton:

"Mike didn't consistently wear BDSM masks matched with boiler suits and lick Trevor Dunn on stage just to lose this bracket. Also, if you don't think he's hot in every which way, you clearly haven't seen this: https://youtu.be/gjEbHBafvm0 or this: https://youtu.be/i9_hCjcFNO0 or this: https://youtu.be/Kfq7wHJu21c"

youtube

"Mike Patton collaborated with basically everyone who's anyone in music, and he speaks Italian too. He's great in a live show. And Mr. Bungle is unmatched and unparalleled, full stop."

"HEE HEE HOO HOO HA HA FUNNY WHITE MAN SCREAMS IN MY EAR AND BUSTS IT DOWN SEXUAL STYLE"

"I'm a lesbian but I find him insanely attractive which I think says a lot"

"whenever mike arches his back and screams a part of my soul leaves my body and is shattered by the soundwaves."

"all you need to do to love mike is watch this: https://youtu.be/0gq_Jn41iMM&t=1375 the fact that he blurts that out and then super casually goes into the song leaves me crying with rage and hormones every time I see it"

youtube

#most attractive 90s musician #poll #polls #90s music #tournament #jonny greenwood #radiohead #mike patton #mr bungle #faith no more

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rosewaterandivy · 4 months

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Award season starts tomorrow and I can’t help but think of actor Steve and rockstar girlfriend attending all these award shows. And the public isn’t aware of their engagement until they hit the red carpet at the golden globes and anytime a reporter asks about the ring they both act coy 🥹

You are so right for that baby!

Regardless of the awards show, the prep remains the same: Steve doing fuck-all until the last possible minute, while you get poked and prodded within an inch of your life for the majority of the day before getting quite literally sewn into a gown for the rest of the evening. And he feels for you, really he does because it’s not fair that you’ll be raked over the coals for the slightest perceived misstep— choice of designer, amount of jewelry, hairstyle, makeup, etc.— while he can just show up in a Thom Browne suit and call it a day.

As much as he’d like to whisk you away, back to the cosy mountain chalet and honeymoon engagement haze (he very much misses the days of you running around an oversized cashmere sweater, illuminated by the lights of the Christmas tree— even better were the times when you were wearing the engagement ring only), awards season beckons. And you take it all in stride, god does he love you for that.

Vickie had absconded with you not long after breakfast and Steve hasn’t seen or heard from you in hours at this point. It’s torture and he finds it’s something he’d rather not take part in again. Robin is doing what she can to keep him occupied, going over upcoming projects and reminding him of his schedule while he idly sips from his drink. He half-heartedly keeps up with a texting conversation with Eddie, speculating on the ridiculous red carpet interview questions and whether or not you’ll be wearing something that will make Steve weak in the knees.

The answer is always yes, and Ed’s got odds in favor a brief exit during the awards ceremony that will have Steve returning slightly flushed with a dazed look in his eye.

“Rally the troops,” your voice startles him from the entryway. “Harrington, let’s get this show on the road!”

Robin shoots him a knowing smirk and follows him into the foyer. Vickie stands behind you, her hands full with her clutch and yours, free hand carrying the excess black fabric of your gown.

And holy shit, Steve is in for a rough evening.

Hasn’t even gotten to the venue yet and he’s already slipping. Robin claps a hand on his shoulder with a wicked grin, “Deep breaths Steve, keep ‘em coming.”

He doesn’t know where to look first— your tits pressed against the black fabric, looking as if they could spill from the corset any second now, the high slit of the skirt showing an expanse of your thigh bracketed by a black garter and stocking drawing the eye down to an impressive heel that makes your legs look positively delectable, or the prominent gleam of the sparkler on your ring finger affixed over the black sheer opera gloves on your arms.

Steve wants to fall on his knees to grovel and beg you to skip the ceremony and let him worship you for hours instead.

The man is simply not going to make it.

When his eyes finally make their way back to yours, he raises a solitary brow as you wiggle your fingers in the gloves. “Yeah?” He asks with a nod to the ring on your left hand.

You smile so sweet and he swears he’s falling in love again.

Christ Harrington, get a fucking grip.

“Yeah,” you say, soft and low, extending your hand to fall into his. “Always.”

The Golden Globes was always fun.

Drinks and carousing, an atmosphere of humor and frivolity. Plus, Eddie always managed to sneak his way to Steve’s table with his screenwriter girlfriend in tow. He’d have you snickering and laughing more than the host could ever hope to, making it a boon for the camera operators to zip by for a shot of your table. Steve, ever the professional, had honed a poker face over years of these events. You, however, had decidedly not and, as a result, various memeable moments had occurred thanks to yours truly.

Eddie had one as your contact photo, as a matter of fact.

Before you can relax and settle in for the show, the red carpet had to be walked. In years past, Steve had braved it alone and done the perfunctory interviews, graciously dodging any inquiries about your relationship per the PR team’s advice. And you had done the same for the AMAs and Grammy’s. It was a good system and it worked a treat, occupying the media outlets with soundbites and quotes while one of you walked in after last call and bypassed the entire circus.

But this year…

“Steve! Cherry!”

A cacophony of voices calling your names as you step onto the red carpet and stand for photo call. As you exited the car, Vickie all but threw the black clutch at you, waving her left hand all the while. Now, the supple leather was safely in your grasp, effectively blocking your left hand from prying eyes. Steve’s arm winds around your back, settling his large hand at the small of your back.

His thumb moves in soothing circles against the fabric, pulling you close as the flashbulbs fire. “You look down right evil tonight,” he murmurs, voice pitched low, breath fanning against the sensitive skin of your neck. “Anything to say for yourself?”

You smother a laugh and look back over your shoulder, spotting Eddie. “I plead the fifth.”

As you wave him over, Eddie wolf-whistles loud enough to wake the dead. He cackles and drags his girlfriend over by the hand. “Damn girl, can I call you sometime?”

Rolling your eyes, you tug him into the photo. “Edward, you know I cannot be held responsible for the varied ways in which Steve will kill you.”

His girlfriend huffs a laugh, “That makes two of us then.”

A few photos are taken of the four of you before the handlers single out Steve. He parts from you reluctantly, dropping a kiss on your brow before he leaves. “You’re paying for that later, y’know.”

“Sure, honey,” you brush him off with a smile, “We’ll see if you can walk the talk once I’m through with you.”

He nearly stumbles at that, earning another laugh from Eddie.

“Steve!” The reporter crows into the mic, waving him over, “So good to see you, thanks for stopping by.”

“You as well, and thanks for having me.”

Steve hates this part. Well, truthfully he loathes most of his charade, but he’s not about to bite the hand that feeds him. Give a little, get a little, or so his publicist says. She prattles on about something or other— his nomination or upcoming projects, he’s not really sure— and turns back to him.

“Congratulations on your nominations tonight, but are additional congratulations called for? Maybe for you and certain Grammy award winning artist?”

“Oh thank you very much,” he effuses with a smile. “You mean Eddie over there?” He glances over his shoulder, finding the long-haired man easily. “I mean we’ve been buddies for a while—“

The reporter laughs, “Not exactly, but it is nice to see him here supporting you.”

Steve refrains from rolling his eyes, “He’s supporting Liz Finch. She’s nominated for best original screenplay, but I’m sure you already know that.”

You slowly turn, catching the last part of Steve’s clipped response, eyes narrowing. ‘Be. Nice.’ you mouth at him, knowing he should’ve eaten something before you left the house.

“Of course, my apologies.” The reporter has enough sense to look abashed, “I just meant that it’s nice to see the four of you together, supporting one another.”

He hums in assent, eyes trailing you as you chat with a few friends making the rounds. Their eyes generally fall to your left hand, still hidden behind the clutch you’re carrying, curious as you exchange pleasantries.

Steve does his level best with the remaining interviews, but they always try and cajole a confirmation from him either about his relationship with you or a potential engagement. Little do they know that behind that little black bag, nestled just underneath your engagement ring, sits a wedding band.

To his mind, it really doesn’t matter if he comes home with a Golden Globe tonight because he’s already won something better than another statuette or accolade: a rockstar wife.

#steve harrington x reader #steve harrington x you #modern actor!steve #fic: hmlahr #awards season blurbs #cee’s got mail!

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jsuh · 1 year

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“The biggest name to elicit mania on the internet from Thom Browne's show was without a doubt Johnny Suh, the NCT 127 rapper and k-pop superstar who was attending his first major New York Fashion Week event. His front row debut is a big coup for Browne, as Fashion Week and k-pop have increasingly become intertwined in recent months. The majority of the brand's YouTube livestream comments were from users anticipating Suh's arrival. [...] This wasn't Suh's first big New York fashion outing. Last year, the musician attended the Met Gala for the first time as a guest of Instagram and alongside designer Peter Do, who made his outfit for the big night. Andrew Bolton, who curates the Met's Costume Institute, is also Thom Browne's partner.” @papermagazine

#johnny #nct 127 #nctinc #nct #johnny suh #idolsincedits #ultkpopnetwork #mgroupsedit #kpopco #john #useranusia #useroro #lucieblr #baekwin #aleksbestie #namjoonlisa #mine #edits

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imdoingaokay · 1 year

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R!Companions If The Inquisitor Dies

(A/N) I like angst. Sowwy.

I’m a Cullen girlie so I started thinking of what he would be like if his Inky died and… I made this.

Also, I want to say that, without The Inquisitor, I genuinely don’t think The Inquisition would last that long. And I don’t think it’s because The Inquisition would lack leadership or anything, I think it would lack the draw or the figurehead that would garner the support needed to maintain it. So it’s kind of implied that the Inquisition disbands.

It is also implied that this all takes place a while after Corypheus is defeated… Except for Solas’ part (hehehehe)

TW: Death, descriptions of death, burning and burying (idk maybe you’re claustrophobic), and more sadness.

Major Spoilers

Sorry again, love you pookie bear

Blackwall/Thom Rainer: Blackwall watches The Inquisitor fall, he tried to shield them, but it all happened too fast, far too fast for him to realize what was happening. He’s rushing over to his friend as fast as possible as if that’ll prevent them from dying, but once he sees how limp The Inquisitor is, even he knows that his friend is dead.

His only comfort is that their death was quick and hopefully, painless. He’ll throw himself into the drink for a little while. Just for the period of time right before and after The Inquisitor’s funeral. Afterward, he stays with The Inquisition for some time. He does what he can, making the adjustment.

He leaves much later, whether to the custody of the Grey Wardens or himself, but he never forgets his friend, never forgets what they did for him.

Romanced, he’s rushing over to his lover, scooping them up in his arms while he pulls them away. He begs them to open their eyes and pleads with the Maker to not take them away… not yet. But when the battle is over, and the rest of the party sees Rainer and The Inquisitor, it’s obvious that their friend and his lover his gone.

He drinks for a bit longer than he would if he was just a friend, and is less able to help around Skyhold. With what little he is doing, he feels like a coward, but he simply can’t will himself to get up and help.

Eventually, he’ll leave like he would before, but as he watches them burn or bury his lover’s body, he realizes that a part of him will be locked away in his lover. He’ll still be him, but he’ll be unable to show the same love and devotion to anyone else.

Cassandra: Cassandra is immediately slicing the bastard who killed her friend, and with a quick swipe of her blade, the offender is gone. She still turns to her friend and attempts to wake them, but after feeling for their pulse, even she realizes that her friend is dead. She solemnly waits for the rest of the group to gather around and help her transport her friend's body back to Skyhold, as is most likely the one sending the letter to Leliana of the Inquisitor’s death. Initially, she thinks of taking the role of Inquisitor, only to immediately reject the idea. However, she continues to work tirelessly to help the rest of The Inquisition deal with the death of their leader, but it’s hard. She also tries to help the lover of The Inquisitor, but even though she tries, she can’t seem to find the right words to comfort them. She’s struggling too, The Inquisitor was her friend as well.

Romanced, she’s immediately dragging her lover away, crying out for them, but even she has to accept that she has lost another lover.

She does everything she would if the pair wasn’t together, but she officially swears off love. No one else can measure up to Regalyan or her Inquisitor. And with her focus now on the Seekers and The Inquisition, Cassandra finds herself unable to focus on things like love.

Cole: He knows immediately that The Inquisitor is gone. It doesn’t help, of course. All he does is shout for his friend, but once the battle dies down, Cole watches the rest of the group gather around the motionless Inquisitor. Cole whispers that their friend is dead, which potentially leads to some angry words being thrown at him, depending on who is present.

He stays around Skyhold, mostly helping those who grieve The Inquisitor. He spends most of his time with The Inquisitor’s love interest if they had one. He finds his efforts fruitful, as some of those he attempts to help accept it far easier than some. But the ones that don’t accept his help, Cole knows they need it the most. So he sends others to help instead, people willing to talk to them, and comfort them. Part of him feels The Inquisitor’s spirit from far away, and he hopes they aren’t too upset with his antics.

He’s just trying to help, after all. Kind of like The Inquisitor.

Cullen Rutherford: He hears about it right after Leliana, a letter attached to a bird flies through the hole in his roof and down the ladder right to his desk. He absentmindedly opens the letter, where he reads frantic, scrawled words that culminate in some of the most dreadful words he’d ever read.

“The Inquisitor is dead.”

He rushes over to Leliana, who is already speaking to Josephine, and all three retreat to the War Room where they begin to discuss what the next steps are. Cullen does his best to put on a brave face, he does what he can to provide some sense of stability, but he’d be a liar if he wasn’t struggling himself. The Inquisitor seemed so… invincible, so strong, how were they able to survive so much and then just… die? It didn’t make any sense.

The most Cullen is able to do is send a prayer to Andraste, asking her to give The Inquisitor a safe journey to The Golden City, they deserved that much.

Eventually, Cullen will head home, to his siblings in South Reach, where they will accept him with open arms. Cullen continues to live on, spending time with his family, teaching his nephew chess, and sending letters to his friends in The Inquisition. He sets up a clinic for former templars and even gets a Mabari down the line.

But most importantly, he keeps on living.

Romanced, he was just thinking about them. He was sitting at his desk, musing over some paperwork while his mind drifted to a few days ago. He was laying in bed with his lover, while they clung to his chest, asking for reasons not to leave on this trip. He had laughed, petting their hair gently as he said “You have to go, my love.”

He watched them sigh and get up, their hand still lingering on his arm, “I love you” they had whispered.

“I love you t-”

“Cullen.” He heard, Leliana standing in front of his desk. He smiled for a moment, about to greet her, but her furrowed eyebrows and deepened frown told her there was nothing to smile about. Her next words were careful and gentle, but still, they got their point across. “I’m afraid that The Inquisitor perished in the ensuing battle.” She said, watching Cullen’s face morph into something unexplainable. He furrowed his own brown and opened his mouth as if he was about to ask what kind of joke this was, but as he saw the painfully sympathetic look on Leliana’s face, he knew.

He moved so suddenly his chair fell backward, he could barely look at the desk where he and his lover had-

“We need to discuss… the next steps…” Cullen shook his head, his breathing becoming rapid, all he could hear was his own heartbeat, that and the singing of…

“Perhaps we should-” Leliana began, only to watch Cullen pass by her. But with every step he took, he felt his legs slowly become heavier and heavier until he all but collapsed on the bridge that connected the battlements to the rotunda. Leliana quickly followed after him, attempting to comfort him. His head hurts, and he can’t seem to stop hearing the agonizing sound of the lyrium, calling out to him.

Somehow he gets into his bed, unable to work for the rest of the day. When his lover’s body comes back from wherever they were sent, he’s in a bit of a better place. Maker, it crushes him if he sees that they were still holding onto his coin. He prays that they won’t go too far, that they’ll wait for him on the other side, and that somehow, they’ll be there when he dies. He begs them not to go too far, that he’ll be with them soon, that he loves them, and he’ll never forget them.

It takes more time, but eventually, he finds himself back in South Reach, where he opens a clinic for templars and lives his life. But even then, he waits for the day when he dies, the day he can finally see his lover again.

Until then, he’ll keep living.

Dorian Pavus: Shoots the bastard as soon as he sees his friend fall. Dorian surrounds The Inquisitor with a shield and tries to feel for a pulse. But their body is still and limp, Dorian knows what has happened.

He attends the funeral, out of respect, and out of a sense of loyalty. But he can’t bear to watch the body be buried or burned, Maker he can’t watch. He’ll leave, deciding to focus his energy on Tevinter rather than The Inquisition, which is something he planned, but he had wished he would have more time before he had to return. He misses his friend every day and hopes that whatever afterlife they’re in, if they are in one, hopefully, they’ll save him a seat and a glass of wine for when he eventually kicks the bucket.

Romanced, he cries out, rushing over to his lover. He’s in denial as he tries to heal his Amatus, begging them to open their eyes. He pleads with the Maker, begging them to take him instead. He gets angry right after, angrily shouting at them “Why didn’t you get away? Why didn’t you run to me?” He has to be pulled off, has to be taken away from his lover’s body, as he begins to sob into his lover’s armor. It’s painful to watch, but nothing more painful than what Dorian feels.

As his lover’s funeral draw near, he throws himself into wine. And intends to drink himself to death, but then he gets sent a letter from another Magister, Maevaris.

He tells himself that he’ll keep living, at least, for The Inquisitor’s sake. But he’ll never love again, because he’s too busy, and because no other man will ever be the same as his Inquisitor.

Iron Bull: He shouts for his friend immediately, destroying the poor sod who killed The Inquisitor before they can desecrate the body further. Bull has seen many, many dead bodies, but he never imagined one day seeing The Inquisitor. Of course, he’s imagined the necessary steps of subduing The Inquisitor if they ever tried to betray him out of nowhere, but he would never imagine them like this.

He attends the funeral of The Inquisitor and tries to figure out what the next step is for him, for The Chargers.

He’ll leave eventually, as his place was by The Inquisitor, but with them gone, there’s no need for him or his crew. He goes out drinking with The Chargers before they leave Skyhold, and he invites the rest of the inner circle, encouraging them to tell stories of The Inquisitor’s antics. It turns into a more pleasant night than anyone expected. When he leaves, he hopes that he left the rest of his friends with more positive memories than sad ones.

Romanced, all he can get out is a weak “kadan?”

He doesn’t cry, not yet, not here. He waits until he’s back in Skyhold, where he sits in the tavern, unable to stop thinking about the way his lover fell, the way their hair looked, their mouth, their eyes… Maker, their eyes. All of a sudden, he feels a hand on his shoulder and looks up, seeing Krem. It’s a simple “You okay, boss?” But that’s all it takes for Bull to let lose a torrent of tears. He clings so tightly to the dragon tooth necklace his lover gave him that he thinks he might break it. Krem and the rest of The Chargers comfort their leader the best they can, but everyone realizes that there isn’t much that can be done, as the love Bull held for his Inquisitor was far deeper than he ever described up until that moment. But The Chargers will be there for him. It’s Krem that makes the comment that The Inquisitor isn’t really gone, as the dragon tooth still is with Bull,

“Which means something, doesn’t it Boss?”

Bull can’t help but agree, Krem’s right. The Inquisitor hasn’t left him, and he hasn’t left them either. Even when he leaves Skyhold with the rest of The Chargers, he hasn’t left them. They’re always together.

Josephine Montilyet: Josephine has the heavy task of informing the general public and the nobles of the Inquisitor’s death. Her friend’s death hurt, but she was relieved that her amount of work seemed to distract her from the heavy amount of pain she felt. She’ll leave eventually, but not without saying goodbye to her friend during their funeral. She ends up back in Antiva, working to see that her family’s business is upheld, especially after all the work her friend had put into helping her restore her family’s fortune. Platonically, she takes The Inquisitor’s death the best out of everyone but it also helps that she wasn’t present for her friend's death in the first place.

Romanced, she was not expecting it. She was minding her own business, scribbling down a letter for some high-ranking noble in Ferelden. Then all of a sudden, Leliana walks in, solemn and quiet. Leliana allows Josephine to send her a letter before Leliana asks Josephine to take a walk with her. After all, Leliana thinks her friend deserves some privacy before she hears the news. So Leliana ushers an oblivious Josephine into the War Room, where Cullen was already waiting.

Everyone could hear Josephine’s anguished cries from any corner of Skyhold. Josephine clings to Leliana, unable to support her weight as her mind tries to picture her lover in various different positions. Her mind immediately goes to what she will say to the nobility, to the chantry, but Leliana hushes her diplomat, claiming that she’ll take care of it. Josephine doesn’t want her to, but she can’t seem to get out any words in between her sobs.

She moves back to Antiva fairly soon, once all is taken care of. She begins to focus more so on her family and their trading business, potentially using this as an excuse to avoid any marriage proposals given by other nobles.

Leliana: Aside from those in the direct party, Leliana is the first to find out. She’s the one to tell Josephine, Cullen, and the many soldiers and spies under her. She prefers to be the person who tells The Inquisitor’s lover if they don’t already know, and she watches them crumble or slowly slink away, unable to truly cope with the news.

She spends time praying, asking why The Maker would take someone like The Inquisitor away when the world still needed them.

If Hardened, she realizes she will get no answer, and furiously draws away from The Maker, deciding to spend less time praying and more time doing, as The Maker has yet to hear her pleas so far.

Softened, she’s more kind to herself, she believes that The Maker must’ve taken The Inquisitor back because it was just their time, that it had to be, some good reason… that’s why Leliana has lost someone yet again… That has to be it.

Sera: Watching Inky crumple has her tearing her attention away from whatever they’re fighting. She calls out for help, and attempts to wake her friend, but to no avail. As the battle dies down, she watches as the rest of her friends gather around her. Sera’s confused, after all, The Inquisitor isn’t supposed to die. Not yet. They’ve survived so much! Haven, nobles, that dragon… how… how do they just… die?

She cries at camp, after hiding from everyone else. She feels ashamed of her tears, it takes the sight of someone like Blackwall or Varric to cry for her to feel less bad about her tears. And even then, she still hides them away.

She doesn’t stay in Skyhold for long, unable to attend her friend’s funeral. She believes it’s stupid to hold a funeral for someone when there’s work to be done, so she leaves. She gets back to work as a Red Jenny and never looks back.

Romanced, she cries out. She shakes them, kisses their face, anything to get them to wake. For one moment, she wishes she had magic to heal the wounds her lover had. It’ll take at least two people to drag her away from her Inky, and even then, she’s kicking and screaming. She’s reminded of her dreams where she watches her lover die, she’s reminded of her Inky kissing her cheek and saying in such a stupid voice “I’m not going anywhere”

That stupid liar! That stupid, perfect liar! Why would they lie to her? Why would they say they would never leave when there they were, gone?

She stays for the funeral before leaving, she thinks her lover deserves that much. But even then, she’s only there to say goodbye, which she doesn’t even say. It’s more of a “see you soon” if anything. She carries the memory of her lover with her, which is good enough for her.

Solas: Solas watches his friend stumble, Corypheus was recently killed, the orb destroyed, and his friend… who weakly falls to the ground. He’s torn between leaving and staying. On one hand, if he leaves, he’ll avoid the tormented look of agony The Inquisitor’s friends and lovers will hold. But they might also think that he was the one who killed them. But Solas can’t bring himself to leave, so he goes to his friend’s side. They’re gone by the time he catches them, and Solas quietly wishes that The Inquisitor didn’t have to die. He watches his friend’s inner circle climb the stairs and listens to the heartbreak that follows. While his friend’s body is carried away, Solas slips away and disappears, in hopes nobody will care or notice he’s gone. He continues his quest to tear down the veil, and with seemingly nobody to stop him, he seems to be well on his way.

Romanced, he rushes immediately to his lover’s side, but the moment he reaches them, his Inquisitor is gone. It isn’t relieving, watching his ex-lover die, the one person he expected to keep him tethered to the idea that this world may still deserve a chance. He leaves once the body is carried away, and continues his journey, but he is so much sadder. Because, at least if his vhenan was still alive, he could see them in his dreams. Now, all that he sees is their body, as if the spirits of the fade are taunting him with his failures. He hopes, in a way, that he’ll come across his lover’s spirit somewhere, so he can apologize, so can confess everything. But with the vastness of the fade, with the low probability of it all, Solas comes to the conclusion that perhaps he doesn’t deserve such closure, he just wished he could give that to his vhenan instead.

Varric Tethras: He doesn’t realize they're dead at first, focusing more on the hordes of enemies he’s dealing with. He shouts out that The Inquisitor is down, but that’s about it. Eventually, when the last of their enemies are taken down, Varric gets a chance to realize what the fuss is all about. When he hears the suffering cries of friends or potentially a lover, Varric realizes what happened. He hangs his head and lets out a quiet “shit” before turning away, unable to look.

He sticks around Skyhold, helping the Inquisition the best he can before he sees he’s overstayed his welcome, which is when he returns to Kirkwall. Every once in a while, he gets reminded of The Inquisitor’s death, and how… maybe if he had noticed faster, they would still be around.

Romanced, he notices much faster. Previously, he had made a joke that he was actually unable to take his eyes off of his lover, so watching them crumple in the middle of the battle really caught his attention. After a few bolts from Bianca, he rushes over to attempt to revive his lover. Once it registers that his invincible Inquisitor is dead, he’s struck with a terrible feeling of helplessness. He holds them tightly and gives a quick prayer to Andraste or the Creators, someone who could potentially save them. But as his friends gather around him, even Varric has to come to grips with reality.

He’s more introspective in the coming days, staying close to his lover’s body as if he’s waiting for them to spring up and claim some elaborate prank. But as their body burns or is covered by layers of dirt, he accepts that it’s over.

He’ll never really get over the person that helped him move on from Bianca, the person that made him feel like he was the best version of himself. And he’s okay with that. So he just does what’s needed. As with the friendship route, he’ll stick around for a little while, and then return to Kirkwall. But every day that passes, until death finally takes him, he’ll wish for the comfort of his lover, his Inquisitor, once more.

Vivienne: She watches The Inquisitor fall, and quickly rushes over to them. A ward here, a healing spell there, she attempts to revive her colleague, but when she checks for a pulse and feels nothing, she sees that her efforts were for nothing.

Vivienne is a great help to Skyhold and whoever The Inquisitor’s lover is, even Sera finds Vivienne around to kindly help her through her grief. Vivienne also helps The Inquisition during its more vulnerable stage of healing after The Inquisitor’s death. Once she believed her work was done, she’d eventually return to the fancy courts of Orlais, but not without being prepared to defend the late Inquisitor if anyone dare disgrace their name.

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giuliadesu · 1 year

Text

you were 22 when you wore his name between your collarbones.

... & THEN?

two more years had passed. the red string kept sitting snugly in front of your apple watch (another gift from atsumu on a previous birthday), not fading nor giving signs of wear. you took the habit of fidgeting with it whenever you felt stressed or when you were lost deep in focus. sometimes you’d bring the bracelet to your lips and give it a little kiss, as if he could feel it despite the distance — this would usually happen when you were watching msby matches or when you knew the setter had an exam.

it came a little bit as a shock when you realised that you loved him. and not in the way two friends love and care for eachother, but in the “i’d take the first plane to you and drop my life here if only you so much asked” kinda way. yet, it made so much sense: the fluttering in your chest whenever you spoke with him; how you cherished every text message, every silly little picture, every gift — despite telling him you didn’t want to be spoiled and that he didn’t have to waste (spend, atsumu would correct) money on you. he made you feel safe, accepted, loved in a way that felt magical. you’d never experienced such affection directed at you, so thinking and knowing someone would go out of their way just to be with you and spend time together was unreal.

at some point, you felt confident enough to reveal to him the full extent of the bad blood in between your family and you. starting from how they never supported any of the things you were interested in or you applied yourself to, going as far as making fun of it in front of friends and acquaintances alike. finally, when the acceptance letter from the university reached your inbox, it felt as if breaking free from heavy chains that constantly and painfully held you down. you moved, got a part-time job to support yourself and be completely independent from your family; despite that, they paid the university fees simply because you lied when telling them what was the major of your choice. that greatly helped in saving money and actually build your freedom.

when atsumu heard of all that, he became furious. he took it upon himself to never let you feel alone, unwanted or unsupported. you were his first thought in the morning and the last one before he went to bed; your pretty face was constantly on his mind.

he quickly realised he was deeply, madly in love with you. there was no other possible explanation for the warmth he felt when he was with you — albeit virtually. the setter decided to show you every aspect of his life and personality. you were the first person he would call right after a match; showing you his famous pr smile when they won, or the dark shade of his eyes when they lost. your voice always managed to soothe him and bring him back from the post-loss frustration that made him see red.

considering how important you were to him, atsumu was determined to keep you in his life for the longest.

ŌSAKA, 10:00

atsumu had been thinking for a long time if the object in front of him was something appropriate to gift you. his profession as a pro athlete allowed him not to worry about the price of many things, so it was safe to assume the problem didn’t lay in the actual cost of it. there was a black, open box sitting on his bed; inside, his jersey and shirt sat neatly folded, and on thom of them a small velvet box, black as well. the real treasure was guarded in the smaller box: an only-platinum necklace consisting of the kanji making his surname (宮), completely studded in small diamonds. the chain was almost invisible, and he knew the length would have been perfect for it to rest precisely in the soft spot between your collarbones.

glancing at the clock on the wall, he realised he had to cut his contemplations short: the express and private courier he hired to deliver the present would arrive by his apartment soon. sighing, atsumu closed the box and sealed it properly so it wouldn’t break (and to shield it from prying eyes). after the courier assured him the package would have top priority and be delivered within ten hours, the setter decided to make use of his day off and go to onigiri miya.

“i need you to teach me how to make a very specific kind of ramen.”

“you do realize i make onigiri, yes?”

“oh for fuck’s sake, osamu! we both know you are capable of preparing way more than onigiri!”

two hours later, a steaming cup of ramen sat on the wooden counter of the shop. it had a creamy color, being made with coconut milk as a base for the soup; the udon swam contently together with fried tofu, shiitake mushrooms, spinach, lotus roots, an egg and scallion.

osamu leaned on the countertop, white rag hanging from his shoulder. he had never seen his twin so focused on something that wasn’t volleyball. he was certainly impressed.

“is it for her?”

“... yeah. she once told me it was her favorite dish. man, i sound like an idiot, learning to make what she loves the most when i don’t even know if i’ll ever see her.”

osamu was about to reply, when he felt his phone vibrate in the backpocket of his trousers. fishing out the device, he read the message.

“hey ‘samu, can you teach me how to make fatty tuna?”

YOUR LOCATION, 12:00

it was a surprisingly chill day. you went for a walk at a park near your house, got a new plant for your apartment, and finally managed to get a present for atsumu’s graduation. while you couldn’t be there in person the msby family (plus suna and osamu) made sure you were there: they kept a constant facetime call, so you could witness the setter getting his degree — and you could also see the look of pure happiness in his eyse when he noticed that somehow you managed to be part of such an important day.

when you reached your doorstep, you noticed a medium size box waiting for you. a smile made its way over your face: it had happened enough times to know that neatly placed and packaged boxes with a small japanese stamp meant atsumu had sent you something.

bringing the box inside, you went over to your bedroom, resting the present gently on the fluffy blanket you kept over the duvet and grabbing your macbook. you quickly shot the pierced guy a message, asking if he was available for a facetime and an unboxing.

“hey cutie! i get you received a little something?”

a pair of silver snakebites appeared on the screen, together with a happy smile and two dimples.

“you wouldn’t happen to know why there was this waiting for me, don’t you?”

you smiled back at him, taking in the fact that he just got out of the shower — a msby towel was around his neck and wet blond hair framing his features.

“me? i don’t know what you’re talking about.” the wink atsumu sent you made a swarm of butterflies take flight in the pit of your stomach. was it really that effortless for him?

you spent the few minutes it took you to open the heavily sealed box chatting a bit and keeping atsumu company as he finished his dinner.

when the lid came off, you weren’t expecting to see another small package. setting it aside (as the setter instructed you), your fingers came in contact with soft, black fabric; pulling it out, you realised it was his jersey and his uniform. the fresh smell of clean sheets was mixed with something more musky and cold, similar to mint.

“you can’t imagine how much i had to beg in order to have a new set! i had to pretend i lost part of my uniform.”

your eyes darted to the screen in bewilderment. this was his uniform. with his smell.

“atsumu, i don’t even know what to say… is it really okay for me to have this? you don’t have to get in trouble for me.”

chocolate eyes softened immediately, the smirk replaced by a sweet smile, and a little blush spreading to his ears.

“i remember you told me that sometimes you hate the fact that you can’t hug me, so i thought this would be a cool alternative, albeit not being the same thing.”

atsumu swore his heart stopped beating when he saw you hug the clothes tightly to your chest and bury your face in the fabric. maybe for your next call he could hope to see you wearing them (and that’s exactly what you did).

“now you can open the smaller box, bubs.”

the nickname made you giggle like a child. you kept the clothes on your thighs while reaching for the black velvety box. your mind brought you back to when he gifted you the red string that still adorned both of your wrists.

“atsumu, i swear to the kami i’m going to kill you. how much did this cost?!”

“do you like it?”

“of course i do! but that’s not the point-”

“it is; if you like it then the cost doesn’t matter.”

the kanji shone brightly, a stark contrast to its dark hiding place.

“wait. it’s the kanji for your surname.”

to say you were confused was an understatement. in japan one’s surname was an incredibly important part of their identity; you couldn’t wrap your head around why he was giving it to you. your lovesick brain made the obvious connection that you would take his surname, like a married couple. you hoped your room was dark enough to prevent the bright red to show on the screen.

“i want you to be part of my family. if your own family isn’t capable of understanding the beautiful, smart and perfect person you are… well, that’s on them. mom loves you, ‘samu treats you like a little sister, you are already a part of this family.”

warm tears started streaming down your reddened cheeks. a few drops fell on the necklace, making it shine even brighter. you took a deep breath. you weren’t ready to confess, but there were still things you wanted him to know.

“miya… it means shrine or constellation. you are my safe place, atsumu; the brightest star in any sky, the sun that warms me up on the coldest days.”

atsumu noticed how you didn’t mention his mother or his twin (despite knowing how deeply you cared for them). he watched you with a proud and love-filled gaze as you brought the necklace up to fasten it around your neck. the setter mentally high-fived himself when the pendant sat exactly where he wanted it to.

and then he decided he could be even bolder. bringing his left wrist into view, his lips went to rest on the small string.

“i will always be your safe place. you are not alone anymore — i won’t let you go that easily, cutie.”

a smirk appeared on your face, between the tears, as you mimicked his actions.

“i wouldn't even dream of it.”

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honorable mentions

@arquitecturadelanada | @cup-of-fluff | @kyopmi | @melancholicautumnfever | @ohtokki

taglist

@alienvarmint | @cloud-lyy | @mommyourcall420 | @opalloveworld | @voidshoutsback

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read-alert · 1 month

Text

Another crosspost from my Instagram! This time for the Trans Day of Visibility!

Full titles under the cut

Poetry

Bluff by Danez Smith

Even This Page is White by Vivek Shraya

[Insert Boy] by Danez Smith

Maiden, Mother, Crone: Fantastical Trans Femmes ed by Gwen Benaway

Giving Birth to Yourself: Poems for Combat by Kai Cheng Thom

Falling Back in Love with Being Human: Letters to Lost Souls by Kai Cheng Thom

Fantasy

Lead Me Astray by Sondi Warner

She Who Became the Sun by Shelley Parker-Chan

Out of the Blue by Jason June

Celestial Monsters by Aiden Thomas

Historical

Self-Made Boys: A Great Gatsby Remix by AM McLemore

Most Ardently: A Pride and Prejudice Remix by Gabe Cole Novoa

The Companion by EE Ottoman

The Spirit Bares Its Teeth by Andrew Joseph White

Horror

Manhunt by Gretchen Felker-Martin

Hell Followed With Us by Andrew Joseph White

Romance

I Think of You Often by Sienna Eggler

Their Troublesome Crush by Xan West

Drag Me Up by RM Virtues

Nonfiction

Whipping Girl: A Transsexual Woman on Sexism and the Scapegoating of Femininity by Julia Serano

Self Organizing Men: Conscious Masculinities in Time and Space by Eli Clare and Jay Sennet

A History of My Brief Body by Billy-Ray Belcourt

Miss Major Speaks: The Life and Times of a Black Trans Revolution by Miss Major Griffin-Gracy and Toshio Meronek

Indigiqueerness: A Conversation About Storytelling by Joshua Whitehead and Angie Abdou

The Appendix by Liam Konemann

Captive Gender: Trans Embodiment and the Prison Industrial Complex by Nat Smith, Eric A Stanley, and CeCe McDonald

Making Love With the Land by Joshua Whitehead

Graphic novels

Cheer Up: Love and Pompoms by Crystal Frasier

Across a Field of Starlight by Blue Delliquanti

Lumberjanes: Up All Night by ND Stevenson, Grace Ellis, and Shannon Watters

Trans authors but (to my knowledge) no trans characters

Sorrowland by Rivers Solomon

All the Dead Things by Bear Lee

Bitter by Akwaeke Emezi

Miscellaneous

The Many Half-Lived Lives of Sam Sylvester by Maya MacGregor

Catnip by Vyria Durav

#queer books #trans books #queer reads #trans reads #queer lit #trans lit #bookblr

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thatsdemko · 1 year

Text

ice and spice - t.bordeleau

masterlist

requested: y

pairing: thomas bordeleau x fem!reader

warnings: nsfw + mentions of oral +not intended for minors!

a/n: this has absolutely zero correlation to my last thomas imagine! I tried to leave out major engrossing details! I also somewhat did not follow the prompt given to me… that’s on me y’all! I don’t really like how this ends and this truly challenged my writing because I’m typically not into smut. my apologies are given if this is not in perfect detail.

《 the following content is not intended for minors. 》

the tweet lit up on your phone that afternoon when you saw Thomas’ name in the congratulatory AHL all star post from the San Jose barracuda’s. without even a thought in your mind you immediately texted Thomas, my place 8pm ;). the adrenaline hit through your body and you immediately started getting ready.

there was no doubt in your mind Thomas would be early. he was always one to take an appetizer before the main meal, which meant the finale had to be much more filling and you had to impress your boyfriend—although all it took was for you to moan his name and dig your nails into his hair and he was pretty much already coming.

thomas entered your apartment early to see candles lit, the blinds drawn, and you eagerly waiting for him sitting on the kitchen table. he’d been impatiently waiting all day for this.

“you hungry?” you smirked crossing your legs at the sight of him taking off his sweatshirt and his shirt lifted up revealing his skin. you couldn’t believe how horny you were already for him.

he came over to you and your legs naturally fell apart and wrapped around his waist locking him in. you felt his hands grab ahold of your ass pulling you closer to him trying to break the space.

“so I made a cake for you, and maybe we could eat it tonight?” you giggled, feeling his cold hands slip down the back of your sweatpants, you could feel his finger tips rubbing circles around your skin. you smirked at his subtle surprise reaction to find you had nothing on underneath.

“there’s a piece of cake I’m dying much more to eat right now.” he growled, eagerly his hands came out from behind and pushed you on to the table causing you to hit your back hard on the wooden table.

you gripped both the sides of the table waiting for Thomas to pull down your pants. you were practically already wet with the amount of agonizing time it was taking him.

“I don’t have all day, thom.” you scoffed, when you suddenly felt his hand grab your thighs pulling you closer to the edge of the table where he was already kneeling. his fingers carefully pulled at the seam of your sweatpants and you could feel his warm lips against your thigh. sighing in relief, you grabbed a chunk of his hair playing with it, you felt his tongue move across your thigh making himself comfortable going in to find what he was looking for. he heard you gasp and felt you tug on his hair.

you let out a small moan feeling his fingers inside of you, he was practically toying you right now and you didn’t like it. you just wanted him to go full force and fuck you raw. but this was a night to celebrate thomas, so you had to put your wants and desires aside for him.

“you wanna move this to the bedroom?” he asked, standing up now he carefully picked you up from the table, your legs still wrapped around his waist having never let go.

thomas was gentle this time setting you down on the bed, he removed his clothes leaving you breathless at the sight of him, “fuck me like no tomorrow, pretty girl. I deserve it.” he lay there waiting for you. and you did exactly what was asked.

you moved yourself on top of him, your fingertips just grazing his cock and he let out a small moan. he was itching for just more, he was beyond hard, he felt like he was going to break at any moment.

“you’re gonna kill me with the teasing, aren’t you?” he groaned shifting uncomfortably underneath your small frame that straddled his torso. when he adjusted himself you could feel the bulging of his cock growing underneath you. you were pretty sure he was close.

“you always wanna play fast never slow.” his hands gripped your hips, guiding you to ride him and you followed. hearing the soft whimpers grow louder as you moves with ease allowing him to enter you, watching his eyes close and his head tilt backwards.

“feel good?” you asked, he could barely handle himself, his nails were digging into your the skin at your hips. moving your body down on him your lips touch the tip of his cock and you could feel all the muscles in his body stiffen underneath you. he’s never felt your lips down there and it was a surprise to him when the contact came.

before you could go anywhere your mouth was met with cum. if you could smile you would because you knew he couldn’t take it any longer. the minute your fingertips touched his cock you were sure it was only a matter of time.

he let out a sigh of relief opening his eyes to see you taking every last drop of him, and he could finally relax, “now I want a taste of that cake.”

you chuckled getting on all fours, “anything for you, all star.”

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butterflydm · 10 months

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wot reread: a memory of light (chapter 38-epilogue)

spoilers for a memory of light!

Well, the rest of the chapters have fewer pages in total than chapter 37 did, so this is going to be my last full reread post, though I do have a couple of follow-ups planned.

My timing ended up being pretty good, even though my original intention was just to reread books 1-3 in anticipation of the second season of the show. And now I’ve still got over a month to get good and excited about everything the show will be bringing to the table.

1. We go back to Rand, still deep in his conversation with TDO. The chapter “the Last Battle” really revolved around the battle between the forces outside Shayol Ghul, because it ended when the commander of the other army finally was killed (though there are still a ton of his forces to take care of, the head of the snake was cut off and so was the person who fancied himself Demandred’s replacement).

2. The ‘let go’ that Rand is hearing in his mind is in his father’s voice, and the meaning expands here -- let them sacrifice. it is their choice to make. And then Egwene’s voice -- am I not allowed to be a hero too?

Because this is something that Rand has been resisting over the course of the books -- basically ever since he accepted that he will be the sacrifice, he’s struggled with knowing that he’s not the only one, with knowing that other people are sometimes even sacrificing just to get him here, to this place. And, I imagine, with his tentative plans to maybe even survive this ‘sacrifice’, that’s going to make him feel even more guilty about other people giving up their lives in this fight.

3. He talks in dialogue with Egwene’s voice in his head (given that he’s existing around and between reality, it might really be Egwene’s voice too). He is not in charge of protecting her. He decided to take that charge on himself, back in EotW, but it was never his to claim. Let us die for what we believe, and do not try to steal that from us.

4. And so Rand takes himself through his list again, backwards, this time, releasing his feelings of shame for failing to save them, releasing his need to protect them. Letting go of the mountain that has been crushing him for the majority of the series.

He hadn’t realized how large it had become, how much he had let himself carry.

...

Ilyena was last. We are reborn, Rand thought, so we can do better the next time.

So do better.

5. And now Rand, as he stands surrounded by all time and nothing at the same time, comes to understand that the Darkness was never a being, never an entity of its own. It is the between of everything. It can only win if no one is willing to keep fighting against it.

6. Mat gets the news of Lan’s reported death. As he did with Egwene and with Elayne, he swallows the grief and doesn’t let it show to anyone else, instead using the news to spur the army onward to attack the now-stunned foe.

7. Rand tells TDO that he can’t win, and TDO argues that it has Rand in its grasp right now, and Rand says that that’s missing the point, because it was never just about his victory. The people he lists:

Morgase (?) - a woman, torn and beaten down, cast from her throne and made a puppet

Thom - a man who remembered stories and took fool boys under his wing

Moiraine - a woman who hunted truth before others could

Perrin (?) - a man whose family was taken from him, but who stood tall

Nynaeve - a woman who refused to believe she could not Heal those who had been harmed

Mat - a hero who insisted with every breath that he was not a hero

Egwene - a woman who would not bend her back while she was beaten and who stone with the Light for all who watched

Rand realizes -- “it was never about beating me. It was about breaking me.”

8. Okay, I have to say. I have to! But this is... this is literally also how the Seanchan work. This is their philosophy of life -- to take people and break them to the Seanchan’s purpose. As I’ve said before, there really is no way around the fact that the Seanchan are going to be the Great Evil of the Fourth Age. There are just too many Shadow-Seanchan parallels! Maybe Mat and Min can slow the train slightly but I don’t think they can actually put the breaks on it.

9. But back to now -- Rand and TDO watch the battlefield, where Mat is fighting -- Tam at his side, then Karede and his suicide-slave troops, then Loial and the Ogier. “Outnumbered three to one”. Mat is shouting in the Old Tongue: For the Light! For honor! For glory! For life itself!

I will take a moment to be glad that, despite the first half of this book trying so hard to align Mat with the slavers for whatever fucking reason, he’s not fighting for the slavers in this battle. That he actually did become the General of the Forces of the Light, not primarily the General of the Slavers. Looking back, it really does feel like the change was signaled when Mat first took off his Seanchan clothes and put back on his Two Rivers coat*. That seems to have been a visual cue about his change in characterization -- how he started pushing back more against Tuon, forcing her into more compromises, and standing more aligned with the Forces of Light rather than pandering to the slavers all the time. idk, maybe forcing Mat over to Ebou Dar at the start of the book was Sanderson’s way of trying to finally create a synthesis between the horrible Mat of CoT & KoD and the non-horrible Mat of the earlier books, and he felt like he actually had to take Seanchan!Mat to his worst conclusion before bringing him out again? It still really sucks that the Mat and Rand reunion happened during our low point of Mat’s characterization, though.

(* which appears to have been triggered by the ‘not pleasant’ conversation that Mat and Tuon had after Tuon berates him for not telling her that Egwene was briefly enslaved by the Seanchan. After that (off-screen) conversation, Mat starts being much more combative re: the Seanchan -- after that conversation is when he has his bitter/sarcastic thought that he’s not done much to convince Tuon to stop using damane and when he suggests to Min that she mislead Tuon about her viewings to try to soften her stance on Aes Sedai; so I think we can safely give Egwene credit for the turnaround in Mat’s characterization -- I wish that that conversation between Mat and Tuon hadn’t happened off-screen! like so many important emotional moments!, but it seems like perhaps that was a watershed moment for Mat)

Rand and TDO watch, and TDO taunts Rand “the son of battles. I will take him [Mat!]. I will take them all, adversary. As I took the king of nothing [this is Lan, I assume]”.

10. Mat thinks about how he knows he can win this battle, despite the horrible odds. He just needs “a favorable toss of the dice”.

And, not too far away, with the Trollocs outside his hiding place, Olver gives up on the idea of trying to get the Horn to Mat, and lifts the Horn of Valere to his lips.

11. First Mat, and then everyone else, hears Rand’s voice -- he calls out Shai’tan as wrong, telling everyone that Lan isn’t dead. And just after he says that, Mat hears the familiar golden and clear note of the Horn of Valere.

...wow, the Seanchan feel so superfluous to requirements right now. They didn’t show up until after the final combat was engaged, after Rand had his final necessary epiphany, after the Horn was blown (they have still not shown up, technically).

I’m going to take a moment to daydream about a world where Tuon’s nature as marath’damane was revealed and accepted, so she really did flee with the Seanchan (so that she can try to recover from this blow to her powerbase) and the Seanchan never returned to the Last Battle. This would be a much easier way to de-tangle Mat from the Seanchan than whatever he’s gonna need to actually do post-canon.

12. The Heroes of the Horn return and our first sight of them is Birgitte coming to save Elayne from Mellar, with a shining silver arrow. 😍

Birgitte standing over her own corpse kinda cracks me up. Good for her! It’s also probably the first time she’s felt like herself in books and books.

“That was the bloody Horn of Valere!” Mat announces to his troops. “We can still win this night!” Inside, he marvels over how the Horn was sounded without him, showing that one of the things that he’d believed that he was permanently tied to isn’t tied to him after all.

Well, if that knot can be untied, Mat, maybe another one can be as well.

13. Between losing Demandred and the appearance of the Heroes of the Horn, the Shadow are now the ones who are on the defensive, with some Trollocs breaking and trying to run away.

The mist of the Heroes forms near Mat and he feels a moment of worry, wondering if maybe someone on the side of the Shadow summoned them. Hawkwing rides up to Mat, and tells him, “Do take better care of what has been allotted you. Almost, I worried we would not be summoned for this fight.”

I know, right? The lack of urgency in the Mat-in-Ebou-Dar half of the book about actually getting him to Merrilor to blow the Horn was really frustrating to me too!

When Mat confirms that this mean they’re fighting for the Light, Hawkwing tells him, “We would never fight for the Shadow.” The rumors about the Horn are wrong -- I feel like we learned this back in TGH as well but, you know, Mat was dying at the time, so I don’t blame him for not remembering.

Yeah, here’s the line: “We have come to the Horn, but we must follow the banner. And the Dragon.” So it was Rand, Perrin, and Mat who learned that. But, like I said, I don’t blame Mat for not remembering.

14. Hawkwing and Amaresu both scold Mat for not showing Rand enough appreciation for saving his life. Honestly, so fair and legit for Mat to finally be on the other end of a scolding like that. “I have seen you murmur that you fear his madness but all the while you forget that every breath you breathe - every step you take - comes at his forbearance. Your life is a gift from the Dragon Reborn, Gambler. Twice over.”

Mat feels so scolded. As he deserves.

He’s told that they can fight here because they have Rand’s banner and because Rand is... technically sort-of kind-of leading them... from a distance.

Amazingly, Mat takes a moment out of this encounter to marvel at how pretty one of the heroes is and then Remind Himself again that he’s married. He really does have to keep Reminding Himself. One of these days, he’s not going to remember to Remind Himself until after he’s already slept with someone else. It’s been more subtle in this book than in ToM, but Mat is still constantly checking out Every Other Lady around him.

15. Olver gets dug out of his hole by Trollocs but Noal, now one of the Heroes, arrives to save him. I don’t care about Noal, and Jordan definitely didn’t do enough to build up their relationship in CoT & KoD, but I still got a little misty at the tiny orphan child feeling grateful that one of the people who ‘abandoned’ him has finally come back.

16. haha, this next chapter is called ‘wolfbrother’ so I guess that Perrin is finally gonna wake up. But first, we have Elayne!

She’s able to wriggle lose enough to make the medallion copy shift away from her skin and fall to the ground, and now she can embrace saidar again. Elayne apologizes to Birgitte but Birgitte laughs it off, “Why do you mourn, Elayne? I have it all back! My memory has returned. It is wonderful! I don’t know how you stood me these last few weeks. I moped worse than a child who’d just broken her favorite toy.” Ah, yeah, that confirms that Birgitte’s spiral into bitterness was not meant to be a reflection of Elayne but on the dark place that Birgitte was in, with her loss of memories, I think. But it’s a shame that it feels like parts of the fandom just took Birgitte’s unrelated bitterness as a reason to slam on Elayne more. My girl gets so much undeserved hate.

And Elayne and Birgitte will ride back into the battle together. Not as Aes Sedai and Warder, but as friends. 😍 😍 😍 😍

17. Aviendha! I’ve missed you! Her timeline isn’t advancing as quickly as it has been for those further away from Shayol Ghul, so not as much as happened here in the valley. She can feel the channeling inside the Pit of Doom - “a quiet pulse”. Oh! The wolfbrother of the chapter’s title is actually Elyas, who Aviendha runs across now. The Darkhound Wild Hunt is happening, and hundreds of wolves have come to fight back against them.

Aviendha is about to go fetch channelers to help bring down the Darkhounds, when she spies Graendal a bit higher on the slope, with some Turned channelers, and Aiel guards under compulsion. Aviendha alerts her companions (Amys & Cadsuane) and then begins the fight against Graendal.

18. Elayne has a sword again. Where is she getting these swords? I’m just gonna assume it’s made out of Air or something. More useful than the sword, Elayne creates a banner with the Power, the red lion of Andor, lighting up the night.

19. [Mat] remembered, within those memories that were not his, leading forces far grander. Armies that were not fragmented, half-trained, wounded and exhausted. But Light help him, he had never been so proud.

...

This was the moment he had been seeking. It was the card upon which to bet everything he had. Ten to one odds, still, but the Sharan army, the Trollocs and the Fades had no head. No general to guide them.

...

Elayne’s death had been a lie. Her troops had been in disarray - they had lost more than a third of their soldiers - but just as they were about to be routed by the Trollocs, she rode into their midst and rallied them.

20. Catching up with Moggy! Hi, Moghedien. I bet your Last Battle is going pretty shitty. She kicks Demandred’s abandoned corpse. Oh, his devoted Shendla just left his body there to rot? Yikes. For Moghedien, she discovers that now that so many of the Chosen have been killed off, TDO is ready to let her have a taste of that sweet sweet True Power.

She disguises herself as Demandred and heads to the Sharan forces. I have to admit, given how open Min has been about her Talents, it’s kinda astonishing that Moghedien doesn’t know about her viewings. Min will tell anyone who stands still for five seconds, plus Tuon announced her as a Doomseer and has been plumping her up for the past whatever-number of chapters.

Moghedien starts to gear up for her role as Fake Demandred...

...and then she gets a blast of cannon/dragon-fire in her face from the Band’s part of Mat’s plan.

21. Instead of the Band leaving their caves to fight; channelers are opening them up brief windows to shoot through. Aludra is placed up on a high location with a spy-glass, giving orders to the channelers for the next locations for the booms. Honestly very clever.

22. As Aviendha fights in the valley, plants grow to cover her passage.

They had come right when she had needed them to hide her approach. Happenstance? She chose to believe otherwise. She could feel [Rand], in the back of her mind. He fought, a true warrior. His battle lent her strength, and she tried to return the same.

Determination. Honor. Glory. Fight on, shade of my heart. Fight on.

😍 😍 😍 😍 😍 😍 😍 😍

23. Aviendha kills a Compelled attacker, only realizing it’s Rhuarc after she has struck the fatal blow. She kills him moments before he would have killed her, and only her shoulder gets injured.

She does her best to convince herself that she only killed a shell. That Rhuarc was already dead.

There is a burst of determination from Rand (Strength, Aviendha) and her fatigue leaves her, and she refocuses on the fight.

24. Aviendha studies Graendal and decides on her approach -- she creates a spear made out of fire and light, and some other weaves in reserve -- and charges for Graendal. See, this makes a lot more sense that Elayne randomly having a sword, because this is a weapon and Aviendha knows and has trained in most of her life. I think that Sanderson Just Likes Swords tbh.

I really love the description here because of how it brings back Aviendha’s Maiden roots as she launches her attack on Graendal. The ground explodes underneath her (her legs get pretty destroyed, it sounds like), but she’s leaping up already aimed like a spear herself, and she sinks the spear into Graendal’s side just as Graendal is using the True Power to Travel... and because they’re touching, she goes along with Graendal when she Travels.

25. Mat rides with the Heroes of the Horn. He gets them to confirm that he isn’t one of them. He can see Elayne from where he is.

Mat saw Elayne’s banner glowing above them in the sky, crafted of the One Power, and caught a glimpse of someone who looked like her riding among the soldiers, hair glowing as if lit from behind her. She seemed a bloody Hero of the Horn herself.

26. And then the great battle is over, at least here on the battlefield.

He would have to thank Tuon for returning. He did not go looking for her, though. He had a feeling she would expect him to perform his princely duties, whatever they might be.

Hmm.

27. He does feel that tugging. Rand needs him. He tries to convince himself that this was his part, out here, and whatever is going on where Rand is... that’s Rand’s business. The dice are still tumbling in his head. This part here manages to capture Mat’s double-think in a way that I didn’t feel like came across in the actual chapter when we had the Rand & Mat reunion.

After trying to talk himself out of it, Mat ends up saying that he’s a fool because “I need to go to Rand.”

As a parting note, he asks Hawkwing to go have a conversation with “their Empress” (Tuon), and hmm, interesting. Okay, I need to break this down a bit.

So, one of the things that gave Tuon the big jollies back in the negotiation chapter with Rand was Mat referring to the Seanchan forces as “our forces”, which she basically interpreted as “haha you’re mine now, no take-backs”. And here, he does not call the Seanchan empress “my” Empress. He says she’s “their” Empress. The Empress of the Seanchan, who he is not currently identifying with, it would seem. So. That’s interesting.

We don’t get to see the conversation between Hawkwing and Tuon, of course, but what would Mat assume about what Hawkwing would tell Tuon? Why would Mat send Hawkwing to talk to her? The Heroes of the Horn follow Rand, pretty explicitly. They literally just recently scolded Mat for not appreciating Rand enough. They are aware of current events in the world and of the Seanchan Empire.

Which is to say... of course, Mat is assuming that Hawkwing will try to set Tuon straight on how to be an Empress without abusing millions of people under her power. Hawkwing told him that they would never fight for the Shadow. I think it’s reasonable for Mat to assume that he would disapprove of slavery. And Hawkwing’s hatred of Aes Sedai in his lifetime was canonically influenced by Ishamael, if I recall correctly, so the idea that Ishamael’s corruption is still influencing him in his Horn-form just seems like kinda silly to me. So. That’s my stance on that. Mat has clearly stated in recent chapters that he disapproves of the damane system, in particular, and that he wants to influence Tuon to soften her stance on Aes Sedai. So we know what Mat’s motivations are in sending Hawkwing off to talk to her. And it kinda fits Mat’s pattern of trying to use other people to influence Tuon to be less awful.

28. Rand has thought about Mat often, here in the battle with TDO. He thinks of him again -- Beneath them, on the battlefield, the Trollocs had fallen, beaten by a young gambler from the Two Rivers.

29. Oh, hey, Perrin just woke up. Page 853. He went to sleep on page 670. Nice long nap. Missed... a lot of stuff.

He learns that the battle at Merrilor has been won, but the battle at Thakan’dar, outside of Shayol Ghul, rages on. He gets his exhaustion washed away by one of the Aes Sedai and goes physically back into TAR (where he left Gaul to guard the cave where Rand fights).

30. In the waking world, Thom is the one guarding that cave entrance and he ponders the various ways that the ending of the world can be turned into a song, once this is all over.

31. Mat goes to Grady and tells him that he needs to be taken to Shayol Ghul. He’s brought Rand’s banner with him. Hanging out with Grady are Olver and Noal. The dice are still tumbling in Mat’s head. As far as I can tell, they haven’t stopped since Elayne asked him if he knew what he was doing.

Mat, on thinking about Noal/Jain becoming a Hero of the Horn:

Well, you wouldn’t find Mat trading places with him. Noal might enjoy it, but Mat wouldn’t dance at another man’s command. Not for immortality itself, no he wouldn’t.

Another data point that I’m placing into the pile.

Grady says that Traveling is wonky in that direction. Can’t be done.

Mat won’t accept that as an answer, and he gets Grady to take him (and Olver) as close as they can get -- a Seanchan scouting camp, a day away.

32. lol, we get a tiny glimpse into Fain the mist god-demon here. This just feels so anti-climatic, to still have Fain around at a time like this. Anyway, he’s basically a walking Shadar Logoth at this point. Fain kinda suffers from the same issues as Slayer, in that it feels like he’s a villain that the story grew past and yet he hung around anyway.

33. Gaul has been standing alone against Slayer all this time in TAR, fighting against him and protecting Rand, on his own, while Perrin was taking his restorative nap. But now Perrin is back to help. On the plus side, because of the time dilation stuff, only two hours has passed for Gaul in here.

34. Since he couldn’t take a gateway to Shayol Ghul, Mat is going by dragon to’raken. And, yes, Mat takes time out of his terror at being up so high to notice how pretty the morat’to’raken is, even as he thinks that anyone willing to do this must be “completely insane”. Olver, who is riding with them, is having a great time, though.

From up high, Mat sees a mist covering the valley below and gets a tingling that tells him... it’s about Fain and the dagger.

35. Then their to’raken gets hit by arrows, killing the rider or knocking her out. Mat undoes his straps and climbs over to take the to’raken’s reins. So he’s... he’s riding the closest thing that this world has to a dragon. Subtext, fun for the whole family.

He does his best to give them a gentle landing. It is not terribly gentle.

36. In the aftermath of the crash, Mat thinks that kidnapping Tuon (aka marrying her) is the worst decision that he’s ever made. Hmm. And this is after she ‘returned’ to the battlefield per their plan.

“That,” [Mat] finally groaned, “is the worst bloody idea I’ve ever had.” He hesitated. “Maybe the second worst.” He had decided to kidnap Tuon, after all.

And he doesn’t undercut that thought with any kind of caveat. He just lets it stand as he moves on to the next thing. Another interesting data point.

37. Mat literally panics when he realizes that Rand’s banner has gone missing during their dragon to’raken flight. Why does it seem like Sanderson is so much better at writing Cauthor-related scenes when Mat and Rand are separated from each other?

Olver points out that the swirling clouds above them are forming Rand’s sign, and then he blows the Horn again, for good measure.

38. Rand breaks out of his frozen battle with TDO and re-enters his own body. “From his watching of the Pattern, he knew that although only minutes had passed here since he’d entered, in the valley outside this cavern, days had passed, and farther out into the world, it had been much longer.”

He points Callandor at Moridin, and Moridin promptly throws a knife at Alanna.

Broke back to consciousness by Nynaeve’s herbs, Alanna pulls herself together long enough to release the bond she forced on Rand before she dies.

...I kinda feel the need to point out that Moiraine has done nothing but be a battery for Rand since she entered the cave with him.

I also feel bad for Alanna, who really disappeared from the story once Min was bonded to Rand and could take over as Cadsuane’s Rand mood-ring, and now is only here so that she can die. I have extremely large beef against Alanna for forcibly bonding Rand but it feels like the story really should have used that beat even more than it did, rather than it disappearing after WH.

39. Perrin kills Slayer. Finally. And then he pulls back out of TAR and is “on the rocks in the valley of Thakan’dar”, near where the Aiel are gathered.

40. Mat leaves Olver with the Heroes and meets up with Perrin at the mouth of the cave. So, yes, Mat and Perrin get another reunion. Why does Perrin! Get all the reunions! This is what I was talking about when I said how annoyed I was that Mat thinking about Rand tugging on him wouldn’t end up with any good payoff. All we get is yet another Mat and Perrin reunion.

That Rand is literally inside that cave and yet the three ta’veren do not reunite here is honestly somewhat infuriating for me. Genuinely those two things: the Emond’s Five reunite and the ta’veren three reunite should have been at the TOP of Sanderson’s priority list! There is a lot that I have enjoyed about AMoL but there are just way too many important emotional moments that were either skipped or didn’t happen at all but should have happened.

And, fuck, letting Mat and Rand have a scene that doesn’t take place during Mat’s weird Ebou Dar adventure. That would have been nice! Once Mat decides that he’s not going to be a lapdog for the Seanchan/Tuon anymore, his storyline and his PoV get so much better and so much more enjoyable and I am just... eternal bitterness that our only Mat & Rand reunion was plopped into our most lapdoggy-Mat era.

Mat came here specifically to protect Rand and then he never sees him! That is just fucking awful. They deserved a better reunion. What was the point of having the Heroes scold Mat if we didn’t actually get to see Mat and Rand interact again after it? This is kinda a place where the epilogue is mostly at fault -- Mat just strolling off to plan a fireworks show for Tuon post-Last Battle conflicts pretty hard with him spending time with his dying best friend, tonally-speaking -- but that really just makes it all the more frustrating that the only Cauthor reunion took place when Mat was in his worst Seanchan-era.

41. Aviendha attacks Graendal with an exploding gateway; and Mat kills Fain/Mordeth/etc.

And Perrin almost takes off to go searching for Faile but manages to resist the urge: If Rand died, then he would lose Faile. And everything else.

Yes. I have tried to yell this at the fictional characters so many times: if the world dies, then so does your sweetheart! It’s nice that Perrin finally listened.

42. And for his final trick, Moridin grabs Callandor, and Moiraine and Nynaeve spring their trap, using the flaw in Callandor to take control of the ‘circle’ that Moridin has accidentally formed with them. With Moridin having pulled the True Power, Rand is now able to enter the link, and Moiraine and Nynaeve can feed him all three sets of Power: saidar, saidin, and the True Power. Light explodes from him, and from Shayol Ghul, as Rand uses the True Power to protect himself as he reaches through the Bore and grabs onto the Dark One.

43. We get a quick beat of people reacting to the light:

Elayne is on the battlefield of Merrilor, as they search for the living among the dead. She feels the “swelling of power in Rand” and her attention focuses on him.

Thom shields his eyes as the light bursts from the entrance to the Pit of Doom.

Min appears to have managed to get away from the Seanchan for now, changing linens for the wounded, perhaps also on the Field of Merrilor.

Aviendha is drawn back from the darkness of near-death by the light and the warmth of Rand inside her, and realizes that her explosion twisted the compulsion weave so that Graendal compelled herself to worship Aviendha. Awkward!

Logain sees the light and knows that it’s what was meant by the message that Egwene sent, and he breaks the seals on the Dark One’s prison.

44. In TAR, Perrin runs across Lanfear. Together, they walk into Shayol Ghul, and we learn that she apparently compelled Perrin a little while ago? He’s able to pull out of it by reminding himself of his duty and of Faile, and he snaps her neck, killing her.

*squints at the scene*

Yeah, I mean. That’s certainly still what looks like happened? Sorry, Sanderson, I’m not seeing your hints here about Lanfear tricking Perrin and surviving.

45. Rand holds the Dark One in his hand. Or the representation of his hand. And, once again, when Rand tells TDO how pitiful he is, all I see are echoes of the Seanchan:

You would have enslaved me as you would have enslaved the others. You cannot give oblivion. Rest is not yours. Only torment.

Rand can feel himself dying, his life blood slipping away. Realizing that the world that he’d seen without the Dark One would have been the truth, he knows that he cannot kill it. So he thrusts TDO back into his prison, braids saidar and saidin together to reforge a new shield onto the Bore.

With this new form of the Power, Rand pulled together the rent that had been made here long ago by foolish men.

He understood, finally, that the Dark One was not the enemy.

It never had been.

(because it only reflected the evil that people were already capable of)

46. The black hole inside the cave expands, as Moiraine and Nynaeve run for the safety of the cave entrance.

47. And now we are at the epilogue.

Much like I did with The Last Battle chapter, I’ll take the epilogue in sections by character. Rand & co will go last, this time.

Perrin

The spirits of the dead wolves fade back into the dream. Perrin voluntarily worries about Rand? Wow, that feels kinda out of character for Perrin, who has always been way better at pushing away thoughts of Rand than Mat has been, but I guess let’s go with it. It seems to exist to tell us that Perrin no longer sees color swirls and no longer feels any tugging towards anything. “Those seemed like very bad signs.”

“Have you sent for the three?”

What a weird way to ask “do Rand’s girlfriends know that he’s dying?”

I’m going to take a minute and count up the PoV & page counts everyone gets in the epilogue.

Rand: 3 PoVs (4 pages total)

Mat: 2 PoVs (1 1/5 pages)

Perrin: 3 PoVs (6 1/5 pages)

Loial: 1 PoV (3 pages)

Moghedien: 1 PoV (1 page)

Nynaeve: 1 PoV (2 pages)

Birgitte: 1 PoV (1 page)

Tam: 1 PoV (1 page)

Min: 1 PoV (1/2 page)

Cadsuane: 1 PoV (1 page)

That’s a lot of Perrin, comparatively-speaking.

Anyway, Perrin finds Faile, happy ending, etc.

...oh, I just looked it up and Sanderson answered some questions about the epilogue (tor[dot]com/2013/01/23/brandon-sandersons-wheel-of-time-answers-from-torchat/)! He added Perrin’s and Loial’s scene(s). Ha! I knew that Loial was a Sanderson addition because he uses “Matrim” instead of Mat (that is, imo, by far the easiest ‘tell’ of a Sanderson scene -- someone using ‘Matrim’ when they normally wouldn’t). And the Perrin scenes make sense too because it really builds off of and finishes the narrative thread that was at play earlier in the book for Perrin, which was presumably all written by Sanderson.

Mat

Mat strolls away from the aftermath of having killed Padan Fain, calling the dagger “a gamble I don’t want to touch”. The dice stop rolling in Mat’s head after he decides not to pick up the dagger. Hmm. Mat avoiding becoming the new Fain for the Fourth Age?

After that, we skip to his scene with Tuon. And there are only those two scenes with Mat in the epilogue -- killing Fain and finding out that he’s been baby-trapped into the Seanchan Empire. Though Perrin confirms in his own PoV scenes that he no longer gets the swirls or the tugging, we don’t get the same kind of confirmation in Mat’s (very short) scenes.

I will say that there is more subtlety in Mat’s ending here than I had remembered -- I was extremely unhappy about his ending but this marriage is pretty troubled already in the text, and so it’s not really the book that tries to pretend this is a happy “babies ever after” ending for Mat; I feel like that’s maybe more of a vibe that I got from fans at the time, rather than from the text. There are a lot of “male power fantasy” fans who just really like that Mat ends up married to an Empress and commanding vast armies, I think, at least from what I’ve seen around the internet (and especially back when the series was originally published).

And Mat specifically forces a grin at the news that Fortuona is pregnant, so he’s not genuinely happy about it (and we got things in recent chapters like Mat thinking that kidnapping Tuon was the worst idea he’d ever had).

But, honestly, I do still hate that it happens. I hate it up one side and down the other. It sucks as an ending for Mat so much. Miserable marriage, awful wife, horrible shackles tying him to a terrible fascist empire built on slavery.

That being said... just Tuon’s rule is incredibly fragile, this marriage is also incredibly fragile (which is probably why Jordan slapped a baby in there to begin with -- otherwise, given his general misery level in many of the Seanchan-related scenes, it’s difficult to see how Mat could bring himself to stick with Tuon for long enough to do whatever plot-related things Jordan was imagining would have happened in the outriggers -- the baby is a trap for Mat, not from Tuon but from Jordan).

There are still so many things about the Seanchan that could end up being deal-breakers for Mat if he finds out about them!

(ex. Bodewhin Cauthon is never mentioned in the books after Knife of Dreams, so it is entirely possible that she is among the new damane who were taken by the Seanchan in recent days, and Mat might end up seeing his sister with a collar around her neck post-canon. How would he react to that? And to Tuon’s unwillingness to let her go?)

In addition to Mat potentially seeing people he knows and cares about in collars, we also have the possibility of him learning just how brutal Tuon’s attack against the White Tower was (there isn’t any indication that he knows about the attack at all yet); or Talmanes telling him about Verin’s letter and Mat realizing how damaging his fear of Aes Sedai has been for the world; or further in the future there’s Mat’s potential reaction to the lethal political wrangling that Imperial heirs are meant to get up to (he was disturbed enough that Galgan liking him only means that subpar assassins will be sent against him -- when he realizes that Tuon might well encourage their own kids to kill each other to win her favor, it’s very hard to see him brushing that off). Plus he’s regained his sense of disgust over the damane system. So there are a lot of powderkegs waiting to be blown sky-high for Mat, post-canon.

idk, Mat’s storyline is maybe the one where I most have to untangle whether I dislike it more because I feel like it was executed poorly or if I dislike it because it sets up a situation that will never get resolution. And how connected are those things?

A big frustration that I’ve had with how Jordan and then Sanderson handled Mat’s storyline over the course of the last few books of the series was how many shortcuts were taken with his character and how artificial forcing him into the Seanchans’ arms has felt to me.

a. Mat getting trapped in Ebou Dar and then all the characters involved taking a vow of silence when it came to telling Rand about it. Mat getting trapped in Ebou Dar is plot nonsense: relatively forgivable. But having multiple characters being given the opportunity to change that situation and just... not bothering to do it is... that’s a characterization issue. It severely impacted my feelings about Nynaeve for Jordan to turn her into the kind of person who just doesn’t bother to tell Rand that his best friend was left behind in that kind of perilous situation. Plot manipulations... that’s just how the plot works. But over and over, characters got broken or bent for the purpose of jamming Mat into the Seanchan storyline.

b. Setalle Anan is a minor character, so I get why people don’t care about her, but she’s a character who pretty much completely reverses her characterization between WH & CoT (in WH, she is anti-slavery and finds Mat charming and trustworthy; in CoT & KoD, she protects and waits on Tuon while treating Mat like the dangerous one, including betraying Mat’s secrets to Tuon -- and her betrayals are never acknowledged by the text in any way; she just keeps on being treated as if she’s a friendly supporting character) and, from what I could see, it’s just so obviously done in order to protect Tuon from ever having even a sliver of character growth rather than it making sense for Setalle Anan’s character.

c. We keep tiptoeing up to the brink of Actually Having A Plot Happen with the Seanchan and then backing away at the last minute without really having a good reason to do it. Incredibly frustrating. This was one of my main annoyances with CoT & KoD. And in AMoL, both Rand and Egwene inexplicably back down when they have Tuon on the ropes and off-balance.

d. Mat’s teleportation to Ebou Dar in-between Towers of Midnight and A Memory of Light. I’ve talked about this one a lot but yeah. It’s just... really bad? I do suspect that Sanderson couldn’t figure out any way to actually make it believable that Mat would go to the Seanchan and that’s why he had it all happen off-the-page. But the careless damage that it does to Mat’s characterization is just horrific. Mat gets ripped out of the action of the first third of the book, and doesn’t get to the Last Battle itself until the book is more than half over. Once Mat is actually engaging in the Last Battle, his characterization steadies a lot but especially those first four chapters with Mat, it feels like we’re only working with half of his characterization and the other half has vanished somewhere in-between ToM & AMoL.

(and if Mat hadn’t been cut-and-pasted from the Tower of Ghenjei over to Ebou Dar, then we would have had a full reunion at Merrilor. So I’m annoyed/bitter about that too)

I could keep going but... let’s keep it at four issues for right now so that we’re not here all day, lol.

All of those issues are problems that I had with the execution of the storyline.

I am not inherently opposed to depressing endings for characters that I love but... it has to be done well. It has to make sense. And Mat’s ending just... required cutting away too many parts of him (and other characters) for it to make sense to me.

But though it is not always handled well (to put it mildly), Mat’s storyline with Tuon (and Tylin before her) is an example of the ‘typical gender roles are swapped’ done in a way that is more down to the very core of his storyline than a lot of other storylines, which are more on the surface.

He’s much less politically powerful than his spouse and needs to use guile, intrigue, and manipulation to get his way and try to persuade her to a gentler and kinder path than her warlike nature naturally aligns towards.

He undergoes something of a gender-swapped version of “The Taming of the Shrew” storyline, in which a fiercely independent person gets coerced/’tamed’ into being a properly submissive spouse (or, depending on your interpretation, into pretending to be one) -- many of the tricks that Tuon and Tylin use are similar to what Petruchio does to Katherine in the play. Mat gets publicly humiliated and starved by Tylin into submitting to her (which is what Petruchio does to Katherine during/after their wedding), and isolated away from his past connections during his time with Tuon, where he constantly has to act to try to figure out how to appease her without provoking her temper (Petruchio compares taming Katherine to falcon-taming, but Tuon would probably compare it to horse-training or damane-breaking), and Petruchio changes her name from ‘Katherine’ to ‘Kate’, which fits pretty well with Tuon’s insistence on never once calling Mat ‘Mat’.

Plus Mat getting his name changed to indicate that he now ‘belongs’ to Tuon’s people fits into this general category -- and historically, in the culture that Jordan belonged to, that’s normally a role given to women, to be given a new name that shows that they are now of their husband’s people and not their father’s; it’s usually their last name but, in the not too-distant past (and maybe currently in some places as well, idk), at least in the USA, women were often referred to as Mrs. “husband’s first name” “husband’s last name” with none of their own name making it into the address.

But a lot of the issues that I have with how this was written is that it felt like Mat was behaving like his hand was forced even when it wasn’t. Which is definitely a writing issue -- it’s a similar issue to the one that I have with the Rand & Min romance, for example, where Min desperately chases after something even though she doesn’t really want it at the start. Prophecy gets used as a way to skip actually writing important character or relationship beats, instead of prophecy being one of many tools in the writer’s kit.

So, yeah, it really is the execution of the storyline that is the biggest problem for me with Mat & Tuon, and the way it feels like he is pulled away from his other attachments whether or not that makes any narrative or character sense.

I really hope that the show does better with them, and with Mat in his endgame (should we get there, etc.).

I will say that I do think that Sanderson handled the romance better than Jordan did; the main problem was that it was already fundamentally broken by how the relationship was written in CoT & KoD, imo (the KoD collaring chapter in particular made me despise them as a pairing and my feelings never recovered from that moment). But in Sanderson’s books, we actually see the effects of Tuon compromising with Mat during various points of the Last Battle (though we see don’t actually see their private discussions and/or arguments that lead to those compromises), and there’s always a throughline showing how miserable the Seanchan lifestyle is for Mat, and those are two things that were majorly missing from CoT & KoD for me, but that make sense as the only way to make the romance even half-believable for Mat’s pre-established characterization from WH and earlier.

The three big issues that I have with Sanderson’s Mat are: the terrible first chapter of TGS (with the gross sexism); the terrible first chapter of AMoL (now featuring inexplicable teleportation); and the deep deep disservice done to Mat and Rand’s friendship (Rand got a personal goodbye with EVERYONE important to him EXCEPT Mat! And Mat got a personal reunion with everyone important to him, except Rand! All they got was the negotiation scene that was ultimately all about Fortuona and the Seanchan treaty, with Mat and Rand’s friendship being the set dressing around the scene).

But the relationship with Tuon honestly... makes a lot more sense in this book than it did in CoT & KoD (once we work past the brain-breaking logistics of the first chapter or so). There are TONS of hints that Mat has uncomfortable vibes going on underneath his casual exterior, plus Tuon actually does make some attempts at compromising with him, and if the well hadn’t been poisoned by how much I despised CoT/KoD-era Mat & Tuon then... I might have had a chance at enjoying AMoL-era Mat & Tuon for the toxic trainwreck that it is.

But, like all the characters & relationships in AMoL, we skip some pretty big moments in the Mat & Tuon relationship -- we see the effects of them compromising but we never actually see them coming to that compromise in private, which I feel like we needed after how unyielding and frankly how annoying Jordan made Tuon about everything.

We do end up with a Mat & a ‘Fortuona’ who remain at cross-purposes -- Mat continues to think of and refer to her as ‘Tuon’ while Fortuona has kinda reversed from thinking of him as a ‘buffoon’ to instead believing that he has the same kind of practical motivations behind his choices that she does, which is also not accurate. But Sanderson did add in some actual give-and-take to their relationship, which Jordan never seemed willing to do, so the AMoL-era Mat & Tuon is a lot more genuinely engaging for me, even if I do still think that they are one of the most obviously doomed fictional marriages that I have ever seen.

Final Mat-related question for the moment: the Seanchan Empire is based on authoritarian governments throughout history, so does how the Seanchan Empire operates mimic the behavior of a cult?

The popular model for cults is the BITE model, which was developed by a man who was deprogrammed from the Moon cult in 1976 (Steve Hassan). It’s an acronym:

Behavior, Information, Thought, and Emotion control. BITE.

Do the Seanchan seek to control people’s behavior? (yes) Do they seek to control the flow of information that the people under them learn? (yes) Do they seek to have their members reject critical thought and only apply to the group-think? (yes) Do they manipulate the emotions of their followers, usually instilling fear or paranoia about outsiders? (yes)

We know from earlier books that the Seanchan culture =/= the Seanchan Empire. There are constant civil wars and uprisings in their native land. This is explicitly why they are such good soldiers, because they are always fighting each other. Yet they present themselves as a monolith when they come to the Westlands, bragging about how they’re here to bring ‘order’ to a lawless continent. What they say about themselves does not match the truth of what else we know about them.

How does the Seanchan Empire exercise its control over its people? Everything I included here is something I think we’ve see the Empire do, but I did bold ones that are particularly blatant in the text.

Behavior control: Control types of clothing and hairstyles; permission required for major decisions; rewards and punishments used to modify behaviors both positive and negative; discourage individualism; encourage group-think; impose rigid rules and regulations; punish disobedience by beating, torture, burning, cutting, rape, or tattooing/branding; threaten harm to family and friends; encourage and engage in corporal punishment; instill dependency and obedience; kidnapping; beating; torture; murder

Information control: Distort information to make it more acceptable; systematically lie to the cult members; minimize or discourage access to non-cult sources of information; ensure that information is not freely accessible; control information at different levels and missions within group; allow only leadership to decide who needs to know what and when; encourage spying on other members; impose a buddy system to monitor and control member; report deviant thoughts, feelings, and actions to leadership; ensure that individual behavior is monitored by group; extensive use of cult-generated propaganda

Thought control: require members to internalize the group’s doctrine as truth; adopting the group’s ‘map of reality’ as reality; instill black and white thinking; organize people into us vs them; change person’s name and identity; use of loaded language and cliches which constrict knowledge; encourage only ‘good and proper’ thoughts; thought-stopping techniques to shut down reality testing: denial, rationalization, justification, wishful thinking; rejection of rational analysis, critical thinking, constructive criticism; forbid critical questions about leader, doctrine, or policy; labeling alternative belief systems as illegitimate, evil, or not useful

Emotion control: teach emotion-stopping techniques to block feelings of homesickness, anger, doubt; make the person feel that problems are always their own fault, never the leader’s or the group’s fault; promote feelings of guilt or unworthiness; instill fear, such as fear of: thinking independently, the outside world, leaving or being shunned by the group; ritualistic and sometimes public confessions of sins; phobia indoctrination: inculcating irrational fears about leaving the group or questioning the leader’s authority, no happiness or fulfillment possible outside of group; shunning of those who leave; being told there is never a legitimate reason to leave.

“Destructive mind control can be determined when the overall effect of these four components promotes dependency and obedience to some leader or cause; it is not necessary for every single item on the list to be present.“ (in this case, that would be to the Empress, ~may she live forever~)

(all taken from freedomofmind(dot)com -- not linking because sometimes outside links make tumblr act weird about posts)

On the page, we witness the slow process of Leilwin née Egeanin pulling away and deprogramming from the Seanchan Empire, and then in this book, it feels like Mat has begun that process as well. And it feels like they started the same way -- because of a massive overreach by Tuon, the leader of the cult/Empire. Leilwin née Egeanin gets humiliated and punished by Tuon for no reason; just because Tuon felt like being a brat that day, and that moment of humiliation -- the re-naming and the forcing of the jewelry on her in a way that treated her like a slave -- was really what made Leilwin née Egeanin start to pull away from the other Seanchan and go into the path that eventually led to her being, however briefly, Egwene’s Warder.

For Mat, it really seems like whatever happened in that ‘not pleasant’ discussion that he and Tuon had after she berated him for, essentially, prioritizing Egwene’s privacy over Tuon’s desire to get information from him... that discussion (that we didn’t get to see) really seemed to lead to the more combative Mat who refused to back down and roll over for her. Mat still feels a level of protectiveness and affection for Tuon through the rest of the book but he stops letting her push him around and he starts acting like he cares about doing something about the slavery system in the Seanchan Empire again, which was a part of him that we lost at the start of CoT and I have hated so much that we lost in his character. But it slowly grows back over the course of the second half of AMoL.

Again, my big regret here is that the Mat & Rand reunion happened before Mat started his spine regrowth program. Even though Mat does start to push back on Tuon more here, he still never finished several of his character arcs that were set up over the course of the entire series: namely his own mistrust of Aes Sedai and his fear of Rand as a channeler. Both of those fears were things that he was actively working in the text and that he abruptly backtracked on when Tuon was introduced into his life (because being chill with channelers and being chill with people who enslave channelers is contradictory and so Jordan decided... to go with being chill with slavers). So those are two flapping loose ends for his character at the end of this series that never got to fully be addressed because the ‘romance’ was prioritized over Mat’s characterization.

Loial

Loial is looking for people to help him with accounts for his book and “Perrin ignored me and Mat cannot be found”.

Mat just completely disappearing from the Westlands side of things to go set up a fireworks show for Tuon (and asking Aludra to be the one to set it up, which just seems kinda mean, considering that the Seanchan pretty much completely eliminated the Illuminators) is just... frustrating. Apparently Mat visited the battlefield here “smiling and healthy” but then vanished. So, in theory, there’s an empty place here where Mat might have visited Rand and talked to Elayne & co one last time, since Rand is in the main healing tent on this battlefield.

Loial also notes how odd it is that Elayne and Min don’t seem to feel any urge to go in to hold Rand’s hand while he’s dying (Aviendha is getting her legs looked at). I know, Loial! They’re the worst fake-grievers who ever lived, I swear. If the whole point is to trick people into thinking Rand is dead, then it might be a good idea to... actually try to trick people?

Moghedien

In which Tuon’s people are already breaking the terms of the treaty by snatching up channelers from the battlefield at Merrilor. No hundred years of peace, Rand. I’m sorry.

Rand (& all those who say ‘goodbye’ to him, or who don’t)

Rand leaves the mountain, slipping on his own blood and carrying a body. Shayol Ghul is trying to close before he can leave and he only barely makes it out in time before the cave snaps shut behind him.

Moiraine tells Rand that he did well, and Nynaeve tries desperately to keep him alive, but eventually, and without ever waking back up, ‘Rand’ dies.

Elayne, Aviendha, and Min do the absolute worst job of playing grieving widows ever. Like, if Rand had actually died, I could understand this better. Because they might really be in shock. But they know he’s alive! And their whole job is to convince people that they absolutely believe that he’s dead! Just... pinch your arm until you start crying! This is literally the most suspicious way that they could have gone about things -- Nynaeve is already extremely suspicious of how they’re acting. Seriously, she’s gonna wiggle the truth out of them pretty much five seconds post-epilogue.

Birgitte comes to say goodbye to Elayne because she’s about to be reborn... and to mention that she’s tossed away the Horn of Valere. Sure hope that Elayne doesn’t regret that in ten years when they’re at war with the Seanchan!

Tam hopes that now his son can get some rest. My hope is that Rand will, you know, go and talk to his dad after he’s had a chance to recover from the stress and trauma of the Last Battle. Also, Tam... you’re gonna have grandkids. No thoughts on that, I see. Still no thoughts on that.

The funeral scene frustrates me to pieces.

Honestly, the most frustrating thing about the funeral scene is how easy it would have been to casually mention that Mat and Perrin were there? Like, that’s ONE SENTENCE. Just... the erasure of those years of friendship, because heterosexual marriage, in Jordan’s fictional world, meant that close male-male friendships just stopped existing. It’s depressing. That CADSUANE is considered to have more right to be at Rand’s funeral than his childhood friends who were also vital parts of the Last Battle. It’s insulting. And apparently Tam organized it? But he couldn’t be bothered to invite his kid’s best friends. Definitely a place where Sanderson should have done some editing of the original epilogue. One sentence is all that was needed.

*sigh*

I do think that Sanderson did try to set up why Mat wouldn’t have gone -- we have seen Mat, in several of his recent PoV scenes, swallowing his grief over losing people he loves and not letting it appear to affect him openly, even as it rocked him deeply, so Rand’s death would be another of those gut-punches that he would do his best to pretend didn’t happen. But, fuck... it just sucks that the friendship between Mat and Rand is such a sublimated thing in this last book, when Rand and Mat both got to much more openly deal with pretty much every other important relationship that they had (though I will note that Rand and Sulin never got a reunion either! Rude!).

Perrin didn’t get anything like that kind of subtextual explanation, but Perrin actually did visit Rand’s healing tent while he was dying, so at least he got that much. *shrugs*

Min thinking here about how the assembled people expect a ‘show’ of grief -- yes, they have all found it exceedingly odd that none of you appear to be grieving the man you said that you loved.

Rand wakes up in his new body, washed clean of the wounds that he’d taken over the course of the series. No more missing hand; no more agonizing pain in his side.

I have to admit “she left me some money” feels like a pretty anti-climatic way for Alivia to “help Rand die”? She wasn’t really involved in his “death” at all -- it was really Moiraine and Nynaeve who were the ones who ‘helped’ him die. I mean, any one of Min, Elayne, or Aviendha could have left him some money, since they all know he’s alive. I wonder if Jordan was originally thinking that Alivia would be the one joining Rand & Nynaeve for the cave journey, and it was Sanderson who decided that Moiraine would be more appropriate? Nothing distinctively Moiraine happens in that cave, not the way that Nynaeve was needed to be there to heal Alanna without using the Power. Like, this poor woman was harassed by Min for a handful of books because of that prophecy and all she did was leave Rand some money! Min better find her and apologize to her! (I already know that she won’t)

Haha, so confession: my brain edited out that new!Rand had lost saidin. My brain was just like “nope, of course he can still channel”. Personally, I’m not a huge fan of Rand not being a channeler at the end of the story, so that part I’m not thrilled about. He does have his newfound ability to use the threads of reality to basically channel anyway, though. Or at least I assume that’s what the pipe scene is about.

And then his thought, too, about ‘which’ of the women will follow him - yeah, you’re right that thinking that means you’ve gotten a swollen head! They all have responsibilities! Though since Rand leaves so abruptly here, there’s a lot that he doesn’t know, and the two things that most affect this specific question are: the extent of Aviendha’s injuries and the extent of Min’s involvement with the Seanchan. Literally zero of them is in a position to go chasing after Rand, even if they wanted to! Rand is the one who has no obligations and can easily visit them if he wants (well, maybe not ‘easily’ if Min does end up in the Empire).

But I can still remember, wow, what a relief it was that he was alive at the end, and free and unbound. The rest can be... adjusted by post-canon theories.

In terms of ‘things that aren’t covered but that we can probably assume’:

It does look like Elayne ended up with all three of the medallion copies -- the one Mellar used on her, the one that was on Birgitte’s body, and the third was with Lan and she probably reclaimed it (there’s nothing to indicate that Mat spoke with Lan and got it back), so the slaver empress never gets that medallion that Mat wanted to give her back in ToM. Tragic.

Despite Elayne and Tam speaking frequently over the course of AMoL, they somehow never speak about the whole grandkids issue. I feel like we can assume that this happens at some point, post-epilogue? Elayne and Aviendha both seem like they would go back to Caemlyn to rebuild. And Tam doesn’t really have a reason to go back to the Two Rivers at this point, so I can see him ending in Caemlyn too because: grandkids.

Technically, Min has slipped the Seanchan net at this point and could just not go back if she wants, so she can either go back to the Seanchan or she could go to Caemlyn with Elayne & Aviendha, but if she does stay away from the Seanchan, Tuon is going to try to get her back. Unless she was super-turned off by Min actually standing up to her in front of all the Blood and hastily makes Selucia her Truthspeaker again. That’s another possibility.

Ah, since we were told earlier that Melaine was about ready to give birth and Birgitte tells Elayne that she’s about to be reborn: Melaine might be her mom. I feel like Birgitte being reborn as Aiel sounds kinda fun.

I feel like Rand would not actually enjoy traveling all on his own after a while, given what we know about him, so he would probably end up visiting Caemlyn. And given how suspicious Nynaeve already is in the epilogue, I’m going to guess that she knows the truth by the time Rand goes to Caemlyn.

If Mat decides to leave the Seanchan behind at any point, he will probably also go to Caemlyn, and Mat and Rand can finally have a good reunion.

All in all, there are things about the ending that don’t thrill me but there are also things I really like. And having an ending at all helps in terms of sparking the imagination for fanfiction or meta or... an Amazon Prime television series. I don’t think we would have ever gotten the series if the books had stayed unfinished.

The epilogue checklist (and my theories about how it affected AMoL)

So, while reading AMoL, it felt like Sanderson took a couple of shortcuts in order to bruteforce the characters into reaching their epilogue endpoints, because there simply wasn’t enough time for it to happen naturally. This is my list of things that I believe got shortchanged due to “writing to the epilogue”:

Fortuona is pregnant in the epilogue: at the start of AMoL, Mat gets teleported to Ebou Dar without any kind of narrative or logistical explanation (contradicting his PoV chapter in the ending of ToM, where he was planning to return to Caemlyn, which would have thrust him directly into the main stories at play in the prologue & early chapters). I feel like part of it is that Sanderson really wanted to get that bun in the oven as quickly as possible.

“they expected something from the three of them; a show of some kind” : There’s just a wide acknowledgement in the epilogue that literally everyone knows that Rand has three girlfriends, so everyone just already knows in AMoL that Rand is in a relationship with three women now. No need for anyone to have emotional reactions to it, please! (not even Rand’s literal dad!) This one also ends up being weird because it seems to change from moment-to-moment whether or not the whole army knows that Rand has three girlfriends (if everyone knows already, why is Rand playing spy games with Elayne?).

Min is Fortuona’s pregnancy test: Min instantly respects ~Fortuona~ as an empress even while thinking that she doesn’t normally respect nobility. Bizarre, considering Min’s own history with the Seanchan from Falme.

Mat kills Fain: we got two super-quick glimpses of Fain earlier in the book to set up this moment but Mat had so much other stuff to do that Sanderson couldn’t really do more than say: yeah, Fain exists and he’s bad, lol.

Minor elements I think were affect by the epilogue:

Rand is still pondering over the idea of choosing between Elayne, Aviendha, or Min: we get Rand’s going “am I allowed to love three women? idk sounds fake” when he and Aviendha sleep together in chapter 4, which just was kinda silly. I think the epilogue is also the genesis of the vibe where Rand appears to consider “having sex with Min for months” to not be any kind of “choice” when it comes to the three women, but having a romantic interlude with Aviendha or Elayne would signal a choice -- because the epilogue acts like the situation between Rand and each of the three women is roughly equal, so “months of sex with Min” appears to hold the same emotional weight to Rand as “pining from afar with two nights of intense passion” does when he thinks of either Elayne or Aviendha.

Mat has no thoughts about any of the Westlands characters: I think that this is more of a subconscious effect -- as he focused more on the final book, I think Sanderson focused on the relationships highlighted in the all-important epilogue... and the only person that Mat cares about in the epilogue is himself *cough* I mean, Fortuona, of course, lol. In both TGS and in ToM, Mat’s deep affection for various Westlands characters was constantly on display, as shown in his own ‘loves lying to himself’ way. This gets curtailed in AMoL, especially in the early Ebou Dar chapters.

I think I’m going to let myself might let myself marinate over the various books before I post a final list of my personal ranking of the books.

One thing that I’ve really noticed is that, more than any other character, the quality of Mat’s storyline has a huge impact on my overall enjoyment of the book. In CoT & KoD, Elayne and Egwene (both of whom I love), got pretty good stories. But Mat’s story was so bad that it made it difficult for me to enjoy the good parts. But maybe some time just letting myself think about the series as a whole will balance out my thoughts. Does that make Mat my favorite character or just my most impactful character? idk. I feel like Elayne or Rand would more consistently hit the top of my favorites.

Overall top five characters throughout the entire series:

1. Elayne

2. Rand

3. Egwene

4. Mat (might be higher if not for CoT & KoD)

5. Nynaeve (might be higher if she didn’t basically disappear after she married Lan)

Then, moving on to the next favs, I think there’s more uncertainty there for me:

6. Verin, probably, but it could be Moiraine. Let’s say they tie.

7. Aviendha and Siuan can both go here. Both generally very good and interesting characters.

8. You know, I had a real turnaround with Gawyn in this reread of the books; I’m gonna put him here. He can share this spot with Leilwin née Egeanin.

9. Loial, probably. Needed more PoV; that would have been nice. I’ll put Faile here with him.

10. For more minor characters, I gotta give a shout-out to Narishma (favorite Asha’man), Sulin, Pevara during her Black Ajah Hunter phase, Olver is really good in his sections here in AMoL, Asmodean for being my favorite fail-Forsaken and Moghedien for sticking it out until the very end, Elaida honestly very fun PoV as far as villains go, Teslyn and Joline for being troopers and enduring Mat Cauthon at his very worst, my girl Berelain who always deserved better, the ‘Finn in general always lots of fun, Aludra and Juilin who always kept their integrity intact.

#wot #wheel of time #wot reread #wot book spoilers #wot spoilers #wot amol spoilers #wot a memory of light spoilers #mat cauthon #rand al'thor #elayne trakand #so it really feels like the 'main characters' of the actual last battle #were rand mat egwene and elayne #with everyone else being more of a secondary character #who helped the one of those main four storylines #posting this today because ao3 is being slightly iffy right now #so i'm going to post the next chapter of voice on thursday #and just give ao3 some time to work out whatever the connection issues are

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