#oathkeeper writes things
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Moon Above And Stars Beside Her
Me, rising from the dead after a hundred years to post fic? It's more likely than you think! These specific characters were laser-targeted and lovingly crafted to activate every single one of my neurons and I am immensely grateful for them. Please enjoy the result of me endlessly rotating them in my mind ever since I met them.
Be warned that this fic is pretty much made up entirely of spoilers for Act 2 of the game.
Fandom: Baldur's Gate 3
Characters: Dame Aylin/Isobel Thorm, Ketheric Thorm, Balthazar, Withers, and a smidge of Selûne herself
Length: ~11000 words
Rating: M, for canon-typical violence and sexual content
Hurt/comfort, dealing with trauma, an overabundance of righteous anger, a smidge of Came Back Wrong, and some pretty complicated and peculiar parent/child issues.
Summary:
What of the gnawing in thine holy gut, the rage clawing up thine throat? A great weight, inclined to tip the scales once more. Which way shalt thou cast it?
When you had nothing else, caged in darkness, you learned to cultivate your anger like the finest of crops. And yet there seems to be so little for you to reap.
The Nightsong is no more and Dame Aylin is returned to her most holy duties. Isobel Thorm is free of her grave. How they handle their past, present, and future is, perhaps, up to them.
Also on AO3.
—
Moon Above And Stars Beside Her
"And what of thee, god-child, moon-graced, silver-blood?"
It is the Scribe who addresses you one entirely unremarkable evening, looking up from his scroll to arrest your gaze with his deathless one. They introduced him, a camp guest most unexpected, by some nonsense name you cannot even call to mind. But you would know him anywhere. And so you stop in your path, as you are bid, and listen.
"A tipping of the scales most severe: thine mother freshly spared mourning her daughter, her dark sister's triumph snatched away at the very last moment."
"You have guided these adventurers well, Scribe," you incline your head in respect and a small measure of thanks.
"I do not guide," the grave-wind voice is raised just enough to convey something resembling annoyance at a minor inaccuracy he simply must correct. "I offer what services I am bound to, nothing more."
You arch an eyebrow at him. "And yet you wish to speak to me, who did not ask any service of you."
"Yes," he responds, and leaves it at that for a few moments that feel like an eternity. A timescale he is used to, one would imagine.
"Dame Aylin. Thou art a curious creature, I admit - immortal, yet appearing in my records many times over. Moreover, thine fate stands indelibly entwined with one whose name has been freshly struck from the archives in a manner most uncommon and highly questionable."
A tension floods you as you realise he talks of Isobel, and your hands tighten into fists at your sides.
"What of her, pray tell?" It comes out more curt than you intended, perhaps, but the words are spoken before you can properly settle on them.
"She lives, and shall do so for the time that is given to her, as it is to most. And still," he nods, unnervingly calm, all taut paper-thin skin, a being of unlife if you've ever seen one, "thou wouldst cleave thine malefactors in twain and rejoice in their screams. Thou, who burnest so deeply to reflect back upon them every spear-strike, every lash, every cut, every shattered, twisted bone and sinew, every drop of blessed blood they dared spill."
You breathe in a leaden breath, knit together as you are, the divine birthright of your Mother lacing your scars with shining gold, proclaiming that the testament of your newly ended immeasurable suffering is something to be proudly displayed. You know the marks on your face glisten in the firelight much like the woven gold that decorates his skull, his sunken cheeks, as he looks upon you half-expectantly.
"I would, and I do," you can but confirm through grit teeth.
"What of thine anger? What of the gnawing in thine holy gut, the rage clawing up thine throat? A great weight, inclined to tip the scales once more. Which way shalt thou cast it?"
"I would destroy them. I would scorch the very traces of them from the world. Some, I already have - as you are doubtlessly aware, Scribe. Much like they tried, and failed, to destroy me."
"Or did they?" There is the infuriating calmness again, and a question meant for no answer, or perhaps merely a word of caution aimed at you.
His withered countenance is as utterly illegible as a weather-worn tombstone, but if this was meant to stir hated doubt in you, it does. For you have grown well aware it is not just the bright, righteous blaze of justified anger that fuels you now, but something relentless that stings and cuts you as it wants out, out, out. This is not the way of Protection, of Devotion, of measured Justice. This is not the duty you were once sworn to, the sacred oath that has resounded in the marrow of your very bones since the first breath you ever drew upon this land. No, it is something new, and yet Vengeance has served you just as well - better, perhaps - in this brief time you've been free.
"For all their infernal efforts, I have pieced myself together over and over and over again. It is my nature to do so, not a choice to be made, nor a conscious effort. Their betrayal and their sins against me are but a chapter in my tale, nothing more. My task is not done, and for as long as it is so, Dame Aylin will not stop, will not falter. You know this as well as I."
The calm of the tomb refuses to be disturbed in any way, least of all by your tirade. "And yet, along the way, a piece of thee was lost and replaced with another, ill-fitting. Many stand to win from this, as many stand to lose."
You frown as you scrounge around for a reply, and find yourself lacking one. He looks not at you, but into and through you, and it is uniquely discomfiting.
The Scribe raises his hand in dismissal, and offers solemn parting words. "A godling thou art, but no god. It is in thine nature, too, to wonder, and question, and change in response. As it is in mine to observe, and take note, and stand witness to the weaving of fate. Forget not: thou art not near as tide- and cycle-bound as thine divine moon-mother."
-
You are given little time to contemplate the Scribe's weighty, ominous statements. Yet another comes seeking, coveting, poaching. Craven-clever mouth full of honeyed praise for your "gift" and only ever wanting to take, take, take, all for himself.
How dare, how dare he, how dare they how DARE--
A thousand echoes of deaths upon deaths swarm and you take the vainglorious fool, lift him bodily up and--
He breaks upon your knee like a dry kindling scrap and your breaths come loud and half-choked and heaving. What was once a vile wizard is now nothing and for a moment, the briefest, most fleeting of moments, neither are you.
Until the world rushes back in, exhausting in its sheer weight. There is no glorious, triumphant rush of battle-roused blood singing through you. Vengeance didn't taste sweet. It didn't taste like much of anything.
When you had nothing else, caged in darkness, you learned to cultivate your anger like the finest of crops. And yet there seems to be so little for you to reap.
As the sounds of the city far, far below slowly fill the enchanted tower, competing with crackling magic and bubbling potions and a complete absence of words spoken by any of your present companions and allies, all you can pinpoint whirling within you is a rising despondency.
One more, and then another, and another after that, extending before you all in a line, down the endless, endless years that await you, immortal and eternal. Magus or sorcerer or ruffian or necromancer or halfwit charlatan, it won't matter much, will it? Because they will try.
Do you dare ever again let your guard down for even a few precious moments of respite, when another villain with designs on your person could be lurking, scheming just around the corner?
Worse yet, far more chilling - what if they, conniving, decide to aim their ambitions at a different target, at your soft underbelly, and come for Isobel in turn?
When you draw yourself out of the crowding thoughts and return to camp at long last, subdued, tired, painfully aware you are far removed from your usual mighty bearing, hours have flown by and the sun has already set. Isobel is there, and for a moment that is all you know. She is there, and whole, and alive, and it is all you can do not to drop to your knees once more and offer prayer upon prayer of gratitude.
She looks at you, eyes brimming with a potent mix of concern and questions, then rushes towards you and wordlessly takes you by the gauntleted hand to the small sanctuary you've carved out for yourselves in the midst of your newfound allies: a simple tent, a soft, warm rug, a comfortable enough cot. A small washbasin Isobel keeps filled with conjured, moonlight-laced freshwater.
"It was a glorious victory, my love, worry not," you rush to reassure, though even you can tell your heart is not in it. "Yet another villain slain, his devilish designs denied - as has become the habit of our merry retinue. The battle has tired my mind somewhat, that is all."
You can see the doubt writ plainly on her face, but it is no lie you tell her (never, never could you bring yourself to lie to her). It is more that… you do not know the reason yourself, or, rather, that it feels too manifold to ever encompass in simple words.
"I wish you would give yourself time, Aylin, let yourself rest," Isobel says, soft, endlessly caring, achingly perceptive, and only slightly disapproving. She starts taking your armour off piece by piece as you sit on the small campaign stool you appropriated recently, then dampens a washcloth to wipe the traces of recent battle from your face. "Please. You endured more than a hundred years of horrors I can scarcely imagine."
You grit your teeth at the mention and try, foolishly, to hide from her the tension that runs through you at the mere evocation of the thought. She palms your cheek and tilts your face to look up at her - her, standing above you and yet barely exceeding your height, though you remain seated - and oh, how you adore the sight!
Isobel frowns as she notices a scrape on your temple, slightly singed in a near-miss from one of the mage's commanded elementals. It is nothing, you want to insist, no need to fuss over it, but you know how to recognise a battle lost before it has even begun. "In Her radiance, you are made whole," she murmurs, and you feel the familiar tingling and slight warmth of the gash knitting itself closed.
Her incantations are perfect and as subtly melodious as ever. There is healing even before her spells take hold simply by the fact she is here. It is Isobel's touch that has ever been a balm when you returned from a skirmish, feathers ruffled, just as it is now when you feel burning echoes of abuse tear through you at some unintended motion or runaway thought.
Satisfied for the moment, she dips the cloth in water again, and runs it gently over you, in a cycle as regular and comforting as that of the Moon itself: brow, nose, cheek, jaw, neck, then brow again, and again. For a little while the gentle, refreshing, cleansing caress is the only thing that exists in your world, and you let go of the death-grip you only half-consciously had on her other hand.
"I confess… I hate to see you throwing yourself back into the fray like this. I understand why, and that it is necessary, but…" she trails away and pauses for a heavy moment, cloth in hand. She resumes, more determined, now scrubbing at a stubborn mark on your chin. "I wish it didn't have to be so soon. Duty or not, you shouldn't have to. You should be allowed to recover in your own time, to heal in peace, until you are ready."
You cannot help but bristle at that. "You would deem me unfit for my purpose? My duty and my self are so entwined, it is not possible to have one without the other - would you call into question a sword's place in battle?"
"Listen to yourself," Isobel snaps, harsher than you can ever remember hearing her, stopping her ministrations and standing tall to face you down, cheeks reddened. "Can't you hear what you sound like? Like a misguided Sharran, making yourself out to be nothing but a tool to be used and used and used until you are useful no more!"
You gape at her, useless, wordless. "Isobel…"
"Yes, you are the resplendent Sword of the Moonmaiden, performing great deeds in Her name… but you're so, so much more than that, and I treasure all that you are." The words are so impassioned and so openly honest you are struck silent in pure awe. Isobel, clutching a dripping, bloodied washcloth in the middle of a patched-up tent, might as well be a queen making proclamations before her devoted court assembled in a lofty palace. And oh, devoted you are, endlessly, endlessly. This can never change.
"My Aylin, my angel. You always have been, and always will be, and if it takes me years to remind you of all of these things I know you once knew, I promise I will." Her palm is back on your face, a gentle caress that soothes many wounds long invisible, never healed.
She speaks her promise as solemn as any vow you have ever made, and you bow your head to kiss her hand.
"There is no need for recklessness, after all," Isobel smiles, the slightest wry twist to it, as she tips your chin back up, leaning down to press a kiss to your forehead and murmur against your freshly washed skin. "The Moonmaiden's shield is mine to wield. You know its strength, the blows it can take. Let it be a sanctuary for you as well. Give me - give yourself a chance. Slowly, step by step - there is time."
You have time, she is correct, even if you've never managed to have a very good grasp of it. All the time in the world, and then some.
Isobel does not.
You've already lost her once, had her ripped from your arms by whims of fate, or rather something far more sinister. There is no way to know, but you suspect, oh, you do. Your Mother's dark twin schemes ever on, and Moonrise, beacon that it was, surely seemed to her a provocation, Ketheric Thorm a crown jewel to be poached, and Isobel, your Isobel, a mere means to an end.
Isobel, brought back, a miracle paid for so very dearly. It would be foolish to count on another.
You stand up and reach over and almost crush her to your chest in an embrace - one she returns not a moment after completing her surprised exclamation. You hold her and hold her and allow yourself to lose track of time again.
-
Moonlit, timeless, subdued in her glory, you listen to Isobel recite the Words as she pours fresh milk into the small silver ritual bowl before her.
"Our Lady of Silver, whose light falls upon us all, hear me."
Her reverent voice is barely above a whisper but carries impeccably, harmonising with the gentle bells and chimes surrounding the private little altar.
"Sheltered by Your radiance, guided by Your hand, I come not to entreat, but to reaffirm."
Motes of moonlight buoyant around her dance in the rhythm of the prayer you've heard and repeated so often it feels like breathing itself. It would feel stranger not to join in, so you do, if only in your mind.
-
Ever-changing, ever-returning, as the silver Moon waxes and wanes, so too does life.
-
You lurch back into awareness in a place you have never seen before, but that you recognise without a shred of doubt. The utter absence in the dark dome of the sky above you, the storms that swirl and rage all around, the assault on your ever-heightened divine senses - the reek of the Shadowfell feels like it has sunk its claws into your lungs already. You shudder, then startle, scrambling to stand when you realise your armour is gone, your sword nowhere to be found.
Your feet are bare on the cold, cruel rock; your mind reeling, disoriented. Half-blinded by the glowing runes that encircle you, your tunic still stained with the fresh blood of your latest, very recent death, you come face to face with the two men you made the mistake of believing and turning your back on mere moments ago, in what must have been a different pocket of the dark realm.
And so, the last time you see him for what is to be more than a hundred years, Ketheric Thorm locks gazes with you and wordlessly draws a dagger. Then he cuts his palm, deep and deliberate and unflinching, and your own muscle and sinew feel the slice.
The hideous grin of savoured success on his pet necromancer's face upon witnessing your startled, pained reaction chills you to the bone. It is then, perhaps, that you begin to grasp the scope and shape of what they have in store for you.
You try to rush at them, charge and claw them into submission with your bare, bloodied hands if needs be, but the boundaries of the sickly-bright rune-inscribed circle flare up, the cage tightens around you, phantom hands grasp and wrench and restrain and keep you in place, your foes and would-be tormentors only just out of reach.
"What are you doing, you dog ?" You roar at Ketheric, your insides twisting at the sight of the dark disc newly burnished on his armour, Sharran symbols adorning his brow, his chest. "Oathbreaker! How dare you conspire against Dame Aylin, against Selûne herself! How dare you so betray Isobel--"
A heavy gauntlet smashes into your jaw as soon as the beloved, yearned-for name leaves your lips, and Ketheric's voice rises above the ringing in your ears.
"You do not get to speak her name, thief. I am the one betrayed, abandoned. By your witch of a mother who hoarded my misguided service for far too long."
Ketheric steps back and calms, somewhat - or merely restrains his rage into something crueller and colder, while you recover enough to speak.
"Shar will not help you, Ketheric Thorm. Oblivion does not heal, does not mend - and oblivion is all she offers. But what she will ask of you in return will damn you forever."
He waves a claw-armoured hand in mock-dismissal of your warnings.
"Do what you will with her, Balthazar, as long as it doesn't impede my Lady's plans. Break her, if you can. Let her rage and pace and fume and rot, if not. But I want her to know," he steps closer again, so close, almost close enough to touch, if not for those accursed hands holding you back, "when our Dark Lady's acolytes come calling, when her wretched silver-stained blood fuels the creation of an army the likes of which the world has yet to see - I want her to know and never forget: it was on my orders."
You calm your breathing enough to answer, the burning rage within you forging your words into steel - the only steel you can aim at him, for the moment. But the tides will turn, as they inevitably do. "The Moon shows many faces. Our Lady of Silver is ever-changing. You should be careful, traitor, lest the Hunter's Moon marks you as Her prey."
Ketheric scoffs, unimpressed. "Let her try! Let her come, let her send all her legions after me, when she would not lift one holy finger to help me when I needed it most, for all my decades of faith and devotion. No, you will see," the quiet conviction in him is chilling to behold, in all its sheer wrongness. "This place, this bond, will sustain me, and it will take everything from you, piece by piece, until you whine and cry and beg your moonwitch mother for salvation. And when you are met with the same merciless silence as I was, perhaps I will consider it payment enough for the precious hours of my daughter's presence you dared steal from me, interloper."
You cannot reach him to wrap your hands around his worthless, treacherous throat and wring. But the trap, the cage, is imperfect, and you spit silver-flecked blood at his face easily.
He flicks his cheek clean, all dismissal, then motions to his foul, death-reeking companion to come forward. "Start with her wings. She has no need for those anymore."
"I would be delighted, General," comes the sickening, rot-sweet voice of Balthazar from somewhere behind you, along with the deceptively gentle sound of him tinkering with his ghastly tools and implements. "How very appropriate, how symbolic, to start by clipping our little bird's wings."
You roar your rage at Ketheric's back until he is out of sight and your throat is raw and bloody and capable of nothing but a hoarse whisper. You strain and pull and beat your wings in great gusts with all the desperate force you can muster; you burn, entire, with a scorching radiance unlike any you've manifested before. But the newforged bonds persist, and drag you down, down, down, merciless, until you see and breathe nothing but dust, the magic of one of the caging runes stinging against your cheek as the sounds of what can only be termed butchery fill the stale air.
It is the perhaps unfortunate attribute of your particular strain of immortality that you are obliged to feel every wound, every hurt, every blow that seeks to lay you low. That you rise to fight again only after you have been truly felled. That your memory is one made to suit your long life - blade-sharp, exact, and infallible.
You lie there afterwards for a long, long, quiet while; unmoving, though the spectral hands loosened their grip and vanished along with Balthazar, a minute, or an hour, or a day, or a year ago. There is too much pain still, you think almost idly, feeling quite far removed from your own self. Too much for any of it to have been a killing blow.
It is the first time in your storied existence you dare to think of death as a possible mercy and wonder if you might ever welcome it.
-
Let all on whom Selûne's light falls be welcome if they desire.
-
You do not see Ketheric after that, except in gory fantasies produced by your mind's eye. But you do get to know, intimately, each and every battle he deigns to fight personally, each scrape and cut and bruise and jab, arrow and spear and sword - all unseen, but far from unfelt.
Then comes the steady stream of misguided Sharrans, would-be Dark Justiciars.
You try to speak to them, at first. Reach out. Try to make them see their terrible error while retribution might still be within their grasp.
You fail, each and every time. And each and every time you pay for that failure with a death. Some of them are more decisive about it, quick, almost merciful. Some stretch it out, savour it. Some can't bear to meet your eyes.
But all of them, in the end, do it. And you choke back to life over and over and over again, knit together anew, as the murmurings mount.
Descend to her. Look upon her. Listen to her.
Kill her.
You remember the first time you died: out on a quest taking you through a steep mountain pass, falling into an ambush, peppered by poison-tipped crossbow bolts. You remember also the slight fear, the uncertainty of what exactly would happen to you - the fact of your Moon-blessed immortality until then only a suggestion, a curiosity somewhere in the back of your mind.
You remember the gradual change into certainty over several misadventures and the ensuing determination - you were indestructible! Indomitable, as befits the Sword of the Moonmaiden, put upon this earth to enact Her will. Who would dare stand before you, resplendent, eternal, uncowable?
And you remember the long, slow slide into being utterly used to it, down in these seemingly bottomless shadows, stuck on another Sharran spear, listening to your own blood drip drip drip as the darkness grew even heavier, laced with increasingly triumphant whispers.
-
As we turn to the Moon, we trust She will be our true guide.
-
Exhaustion overwhelms even the most righteous of furies, and you fall into a fitful sleep now and then. You dream of Isobel, soft, warm, brilliant, alive, and it makes the cruelty of awakening all the worse.
Balthazar comes, sometimes, your most frequent and most despised visitor by far. He delights in letting you know how much time has passed - impossible to tell, in the umbral pocket of your prison. Regales you with tales of Sharran tyranny being visited upon the land and the people you were sent to watch over and protect and guide, your one mission and the purpose written into the very blood flowing through your veins. And yet you did nothing but fail. Precious Isobel, dead; Ketheric, lost, determined to tear down with him the world entire.
Balthazar rejoices in the disgust you cannot help but bear openly upon your face as he expounds on his experiments, hands unbound by any trace or suggestion of morality and propriety and with Selûnite victims in abundance. He crows endlessly over his successes, his sick triumphs - but oh, none as impressive as you!
He does much worse, later, and you learn you do not need a tongue to curse him.
You know nothing can come of it but even more pain and sick retribution, yet you goad the corpse-rotted bastard every chance you get. The necrotic embodiment of every foul undead creature you would have wreathed your sword in radiance for, if only it were at hand. Whom you would have longed to smite until nothing but ash remained.
There is nothing else here. Empty shadows, as befits the Lady of Loss. A void without and within, yours to fill with gnawing, searing, holy wrath. Nothing left to sustain you but the thought of a long-distant but inevitable escape and vengeance.
One day.
"I keep a tally just for you, Balthazar." You pace the infuriatingly familiar bounds of your cage, precise in your steps in order not to trigger the wretched closing in, the grasping--
He looks up from the stitching he is doing, morbid handiwork on some poor Moon-devoted stonemason he wanted you to see. "Aylin! I did not know you cared so."
"Why, yes," you bare your teeth at him in mockery of a smile. "When your little spell inevitably fails and this game of yours runs its course, I will come find you first. I will tear you apart, limb from mismatched limb, into your grave-robbed constituent parts. And then I will mince them further, until there is one rotting morsel of you for each and every hurt you have ever visited on me."
"You will find," you prowl closer, just out of reach of the necrotic claws, "I have an excellent memory."
Infuriatingly, the corpse only smiles, laughs in your face.
"I was expecting just a touch more creativity, but then I suppose that has never been much of a strong point for you moon-followers."
You scowl and swallow back a growl and want only to provoke him further, itch to make him react, to make a mistake.
"So very boring and predictable. Painfully straightforward. Laughably easy to trick."
He waves a hand and conjures a muddy image of the lost Selûnite child you were made to chase down here what feels like a lifetime ago, the perfect bait they contrived just for you.
"You were nothing, Aylin. A meat-headed little errand girl for your useless mother. I, well, I have made you into a treasure."
Balthazar's smile splits the corpse-bloat of his face. The stench makes you want to gag, makes you yearn for the duller senses of one not trained from birth to be a paladin.
"As thanks, let me leave you with a thought you will doubtlessly appreciate. Do you know, I wonder, how very little it would take for you to be freed? What little effort I had to invest to ensure your captivity? One friendly touch would break the confinement spell, a mere moment of kindness. Nothing more."
He steps forward, waving your clawed shackles into existence. Then he moves as if to pat your head or caress your face - but instead pulls at your hair, whipping your head back, and sneers.
"How lucky for both of us you will never find such a thing here. There is not the slimmest hope of reprieve, not for you."
And for a hundred years, he is right.
-
The Moonmaiden will never allow us to bear a burden we cannot carry.
-
The burning flare of indignant rage sours somewhere deep in your belly along the way. You are not of Ilmater's stock, made for the rack, proud to endure all pain, indignities, and abuse, for oh, good things would come to those who waited! With idle waiting you were long done. There was no glory to be found in suffering. No, you were made to be a beacon soaring through the sky, driving away shadows and fear and doubt, illuminating with the stark, silver light of your Mother's truth all the myriad lies your foes so loved to wield.
What have they done to you? When it might be easier to ask what haven't they, over the months, years, decades, uncountable. Tongue, eyes, wings, heart. Yours to lose, all of it, when it was never theirs to take. And then, darker still - what use it all, when your heart's love had gone already? Isobel, most cherished of all, taken so suddenly and cruelly - you always knew you were going to be painfully parted, for your nature made that an inevitability. But not so soon. Not cut so short so abruptly, when she had so much still to give, and do, and be. When you were supposed to watch her grow old and say goodbye slowly and gradually with every precious day.
You try to fill the hours between deaths with something kinder: memories of her gentle smile, her soft touch, her grace and her wit and her light. But all you can picture here among the accursed shadows is the beautiful, heartrending serenity of her laid on her bier, awaiting her final rites.
Your own words to Ketheric resound in your mind. "Dear Isobel," you whispered, reverently, words you now know fell on deaf ears, "in my Mother's care at the Gates of the Moon, no doubt, with noble Melodia by her side. One day you shall be reunited on the silver shores. One day, my mission will be deemed complete, and I will be released from my duty… and I shall be permitted to join you." A tentative, tender smile to the bereaved father, and a hand on his shoulder. Trying to meet the man's grief with your own and perhaps thus relieve both your burdens.
In a kinder world, you could have mourned your mutual loss together. But it wasn't to be. Instead - this. Instead, you, here, caged, tormented, made to carry more than just the hurts visited upon Ketheric's flesh and bone. Though in your mind it seems it has all done little to soothe his own pain, instead merely doubling it and vomiting it back into the world.
Your contemplation is cut short by a sudden agony. This in itself is nothing new - Ah, you think, Ketheric has run afoul of a Harper's blade or a druid's claws again. You know enough from Balthazar's boasting to distract yourself with dreamed-up possibilities, a comfort as meagre and thin as the rags that clothe you. As if you could will his own hurts back onto him.
No, the pain is nothing new. But there is something different about it this time - it feels like it has no end, it does not ebb, and you take such a very, very long time to die. And when you awaken again, the crushing in your chest continues, then stops so abruptly you feel like you can breathe for the first time in years. This was clearly no normal battlefield injury and it makes your entire being burn with hope that, for all the unusual suffering it is foisting upon you, it means that something shifted --
That perhaps, somehow, miraculously, even with leeching off of you, fat and silverblood-gorged, Ketheric failed. Was defeated.
That perhaps your torment is reaching its end, and soon enough some enterprising hero, a fellow Selûnite perhaps, will find themselves guided into your prison to help you pry the bars wide open--
And then, a roar. A quake of the very foundation of your unseen cell so strong it knocks you down, and a surge of darkness and fury greater than anything you've ever seen. An entire storm of shadows, howling, screaming with a thousand enraged voices, ever-wretched Shar's above all, rushing up and up and up and blasting through the black dome that stood for the sky in this abyss.
You dare not think of what this could mean: the Shadowfell pouring out its umbral essence over the world so suddenly and violently.
It is a moment, perhaps, of ultimate weakness - for a precious few seconds you had the nerve to think it might finally be over, but instead… this.
"Hear me, Mother," you rasp out against the ground stained over and over with your own blood, unable even to lift your head and address the words up high, where they belong. "Hark, Moonmaiden Selûne, Your blade is dulled, stolen. Your will delayed, undone. Your daughter… begs for Your aid…"
"I need… I pray… a boon. Bless me with Your help, so that Your bright sword can once again be lifted as an instrument against the darkness. At Your service, as I ever must be, I incur this debt gladly. Let us answer this invasion with all our might."
There is no response to your prayers. Not a glimpse of your Mother's ever-changing face. Not a single droplet of silver moonlight penetrates these shadows, and no other voice reaches your ears.
The thought rises, unbidden: is this what Ketheric meant?
There is no shadowy shroud of Shar that a moonbeam of Selûne cannot pierce. You have staked your entire being on this belief, a thousand times over. And yet not a mote of light reaches you in all your years of captivity, and you, curse you, you wonder. The swirling shadows whisper and tickle your mind and your very soul and you despise this intrusion but--
If she can, and yet she does not - does that mean she does not want to? Does not care to?
Among the wild shadowy storms and the gusting winds and lashing lightning, the silence is deafening. When you repeat your prayer, a year later, then a decade, there is still no answer.
An incredible loneliness stretches before you, a nothingness so profound and so very, very long you think you might even miss Balthazar's rancid presence.
And then, a sudden crushing in your chest again, and an agony exploding behind your eyes. Mercifully brief, as far as these things have gone before, but igniting such unspeakable anguish in you that you bellow and pound your fists against the ground until they are raw and bloody. For you know this can only mean one thing: the cycle is starting anew after all this time, and what you took for Ketheric's defeat had somehow only been a temporary setback.
-
As Your starglow soothes and bolsters, so we promise to aid our fellow faithful, and guide those whose path is not yet clear.
-
You've flown over these lands countless times, but now, as you rush forward to your long-promised reckoning, you might as well be flying over one of the hells. The ruin and desolation drains away even the heady rush of newfound freedom, the sheer relief of feeling the wind on your wings once again.
It is hard to reconcile the shadow-swollen horrors below you with the magnificence of Moonrise Towers as you once knew them, striking pillars of faith without question. Reithwin itself and the land entire have changed, twisted, in the end but a mirror to the devotion of their ruling family.
There is nothing here of what you remember, nothing left of the simple, blessed life you got but a taste of, not even an echo to be found of all that you once came to treasure alongside your beloved. Fields and orchards you helped work; vineyards you helped bless; fine, silver-wrought fountains you helped make ever-pure, all in your role as your Mother's emissary.
Ketheric Thorm, now False twice over, in whose throne room you stood in audience, promising your fealty and your aid, as recognition for his family's long list of deeds in Selûne's name.
And Isobel, his daughter, still fairly young for one of half-elven descent, but an accomplished cleric in her own right. Her mother's daughter through and through.
The first in Reithwin to stop being star-struck when faced with you, made of far sterner stuff than she might have at first seemed, and insisting on meeting you as an equal. Wise, caring, and skilled. And achingly beautiful, with a soft face and rosy cheeks meant to be bathed in the gentlest of moonlight.
It was odd, but meant to be - clearly part of some plan you happened not to be privy to, but had no desire to question.
-
All love alive under Her light shall know Her blessing.
-
Isobel, living and breathing before you, is a miracle if you've ever seen one.
Isobel, still hurt, bruised from what you are told was a kidnapping attempt ordered by her own father - you bristle, and bite it down.
"It is nothing," she insists when you belabour the point, and you want to chastise her for never thinking of herself enough, even after a century, always putting her own wellbeing last, knitting everyone else's wounds closed and leaving no salve for her own.
Instead, you take her face between your palms, trace her cheeks with tentative fingers and carefully, carefully tap into the healing magic you've ignored for a hundred years. The face of the Moonmaiden is ever-shifting - the fierce, warlike guise of martial prowess is but one of many in Her exalted repertoire, and so, too, in yours.
Then, in the privacy of the spacious upstairs room granted to Isobel as the haven's pivotal goddess-touched protector, the very embodiment of the Last Light, you do the same for the rest of her.
Her body is warm, though she complains of a coldness she cannot be rid of.
You fall before her, on your knees as if in supplication, as has always felt like the most natural thing in the world. Face buried in the softness of her bare stomach, a dam in you breaks, and you weep for the joy, the relief beyond all hope, of her real and breathing and whole before you.
She leans down to press a kiss to the top of your head, like a benediction, hands running through your hair and cradling you ever so softly until you regain yourself.
"My darling, my angel. I can hardly believe you are here."
In this, she speaks for the both of you, and spurns you to action.
"Then let me banish all doubt," you murmur, trailing kisses all the while, reverent hands on soft thighs. "I would taste of you, my love, if you allow it."
There is a fleeting moment of hesitation that was never there before as her hands and lips still. But then her shiver becomes one of anticipation as she murmurs into your ear. "I welcome it."
It is yours, then, as ever, to do as you are bid.
You wish to touch every inch of her, impress upon her again and again in a thousand kisses the affection and adoration welling within you inexhaustible. You crave to recommit to memory what you once studied and learned like the most fastidious of students. You need in a way you never have before. And she obliges - no, answers, just as eager and driven by your age-long separation, though her experience of it has been so wildly, incomprehensibly different.
The sounds you draw from her (familiar, dearly missed) are like a balm, a private song you were certain you would never hear again.
You hold her as close as is possible, and she returns the favour. Her caress is familiar, warm, healing in ways few things could ever be. After the hundred years of emptiness interspersed with biting, death-inviting pain and foul, crushing hands holding you in place, after unspeakable things visited upon your body, your person, a gentle, loving, careful touch is a treasure unmatched. The sharpness of the contrast makes your throat tighten.
"Isobel," you breathe into her shoulder, neck, and can think of nothing holier to say than her name.
She holds you entire in her gentle hands, heart and soul and body, and whispers fervent vows to never let you go, never allow you to feel hurt and harm again.
Isobel is slight compared to you, small and soft, for your strengths have ever lain in different areas. Treasured and safe in the circle of her arms, in the sanctuary of her embrace, finally, finally, you find rest.
-
You are back in your circle-cage, face down, limbs leaden.
The bloated corpse-face of Balthazar leers over you and you launch upwards, swipe at him, near-desperate to drive him away before he continues his wretched work. Aching to make him pay for every insult he has dared commit upon your blessed flesh.
Only to find yourself gasping, gulping down cool night air, seated on the bed in the pleasantly twilit room on the upper floor of the Last Light Inn.
You focus for a moment and effortlessly as ever manifest your wings and take stock of yourself. You know you have not escaped unscathed, unchanged, but your strong limbs are still there, as if nothing had ever happened. Shoulders wide and sturdy, downy feathers, wings. Every sleek vane and fine bit of plumage in their place, pearly white-silver and perfect.
Yet any human rosiness that used to reside there is long gone out of your skin, grey like marble, criss-crossed with precious gold. If you look down, there is a severe, pronounced crack lying right above your heart. It makes sense, of course, if you think on it, though you so desperately prefer - try - not to.
And the dream - nightmare - insists on sinking vestigial claws into you, leaving you with a burning, torn sensation between your shoulder blades.
Isobel stirs beside you, and you curse for having woken her from such hard-won and rarely granted serenity. She sits up, sleep-cottoned, and traces gentle fingers down the tensed, trembling part of your back, though you have said nothing. But Isobel, wise, insightful Isobel, always seems to know at least part of what ails you.
"One of the Flaming Fists encamped here... a traitor. Marcus," she speaks somewhat haltingly, cautiously. "We were all struck by his betrayal, but I... when I saw him, when he came for me, when he was sent for me..."
Her eyes meet yours, almost reluctantly.
"He had wings. Hideously warped, blackened, rotten things, but..."
A question is raised, a mirror of one you've asked yourself, during long hours-turned-days of morbid contemplation in your prison.
"Balthazar. He got them from that wretch Balthazar."
"And he got them--" Isobel cuts herself off, fully awake and alert and wincing at the confirmation of her fears.
You swallow, throat parched and burning as if the screams from then still scrape against it. Harvesting, he called it.
"He got them from me."
It is simply not something to be thought about. The bile of wrath rises, crawls up your throat instead, and you spit out words almost in a growl.
"He has been dispatched, I trust? The traitor?"
Isobel understands.
"He has, of course," she rushes to reassure. "Jaheira and the Harpers made quick work of him and the horrible creatures he called to his aid."
You hum, move to sit back against the headboard, then change your mind as soon as it touches your skin. "It seems I have much to thank High Harper Jaheira."
Your hand is still tightened into a fist in the coverlet, and Isobel reaches over, pries it open, to hold it ever so gently between both of her palms.
"We both do. We'll see them all come morning, exchange tales over breakfast. Outside, perhaps, in the sun, at long last." Her smile is as bright as this promised dawn, but there is a note of silver-filigree steel behind it. "We can thank her then. Make sure she knows she can count on us through whatever is to come."
She reaches over to cradle your chin, tugging you down, and kisses you softly. "Let us get some more rest, my love."
The both of you slip back under the moth-eaten but soft covers and she burrows insistently into your side, under one wing. You lie - and, blessedly, sleep - on your stomach, Isobel's arm thrown over your lower back in that perfect balance she is mastering of being reassuring while not calling too much to mind.
-
When we are beset with shadows, You mend our hearts with the silver thread of Your radiant loom.
-
You let Isobel braid your hair, one idle evening in camp. You can sense she is just as starved for simple contact as you are - her hands seem restless, even more so than usual, and flit over your back, shoulders, arms... so you let her occupy them, as she perches in your lap and peppers you with kisses, and speaks not a single word.
There is no mirror at hand to see her handiwork when she is done, but she looks pleased with herself, and with you, and you feel like this should be... enough.
But another memory stirs and inches through, of the times you knelt, crouched, sat in that glowing circle that your world had seemed shrunken to, and, for want of anything to do with your hands (now past punching, past clawing for the freedom that was out of their reach) you set to braiding your hair, as if preparing to don a helmet and march off to glorious combat. It was something to do, and pretend.
You undo the braids as soon as Isobel falls asleep.
-
The city, that meeting point of fates, draws ever nearer.
Isobel's cough comes and goes. Nothing as bad as the fits that sometimes awoke her while you were still in the cursed lands, but it persists, frustratingly.
"Isobel, I--" you barely get to begin to voice your concern before she brushes you away.
"Please, it's nothing. Don't worry about me, dearest."
"I find I cannot," you state simply, as it is a very simple truth.
"I- I don't want to burden you. You've enough on your plate as it is." She gives a small smile so forced you almost feel insulted. "It'll pass, I'm sure."
"Burden…? Isobel," a mess of words past her cherished name stick in your mouth, awkward, nigh indignant, and you take a moment to calm and order them. Simple and earnest is what you settle for, in the end. "Isobel, my love… You are first in my thoughts, always, you know this. I would gladly bear all your burdens if I but could, if you were to allow it - each and every one."
She frowns, shakes her head, and you hate that you seem to have somehow displeased her. "That's just it, isn't it? I don't want you to. I don't need you to. You've born more than anyone's fair share."
"Ah, but Dame Aylin is hardly anyone, is she?"
You aim your most winning, blinding white grin at her, but fail to induce the reaction you were once used to getting on a whim. No blush or giggle hidden behind a dainty palm at your deliberately overtuned charm being pointed at her, no smirk and tease in return.
No, Isobel is subdued, troubled, and, most vexing of all, everything you say seems to only serve to make it worse.
There is something new behind her eyes, too, those beautiful, wise eyes that won your heart entire the first time you met them. A darkness, you would dare call it, a shadow not unlike the curse once fallen upon the land. A question, a yearning for some understanding that never seems to come, a futile grasp for something in an emptiness that was not there before.
"Please, my love," you say with the utmost tenderness, reserved for Isobel alone, "do not hide your heart from me. You know I cherish it as if it were mine own."
"I haven't felt… myself," she haltingly begins in answer to your plea, as you step forward and encircle her, first in the embrace of your arms, then in the shelter of your wings. A treasured sanctuary saved for the two of you alone.
"I cannot… the death, it clings, I..."
She buries her face in your chest as she struggles to pick out words one by one, plucking them out like painful thorns. You let her rest tucked under your chin, restrain yourself to quietly running one gentle, slow hand through her hair.
"I am afraid," she settles on, finally, almost a whisper, hiding still, refusing to look at you. "I am afraid there is no fixing this wrongness I feel day after day, that's been… in me, over me, ever since I awoke. That something has been taken from me, and now there is no way to remove this vile mark that's been left on me instead, whatever it is. Not even by the grace of the Moonmaiden."
She shivers, and you tighten your hold on her, even as the sentence after that tears into your very heart, sharper and more jagged than any Sharran knife.
"I am afraid, most of all, that no matter how much I pray or plead, that whatever I do to try and prove myself worthy, I… cannot be. Ever again. I will never be worthy of Her light again. Or of yours."
"No," it comes out far rougher, angrier than you ever intended, ever wanted to aim anywhere near precious, beloved Isobel - not at her, never at her. But she is wrong, because it is an impossibility, unthinkable, ridiculous to even suggest. Her, treasured, cherished, held high above all in your regard, and lofty in your Mother's.
"Please, Isobel," you move a half-step back, if only to make it possible to cup her face, tilt her chin up and look at her. "Do not ever, ever think such a thing again. You could never be unworthy, not you. Not you."
The hitch is back in her laboured breath as she moves to protest, the haunted look shadowing her eyes. "How? How can you be so sure?"
And that is the question, isn't it? Your love for Isobel and faith in her intertwined, utterly certain and utterly relentless. Like the rage that sustained you through a century of torment, settled heavy and deep in your bones. You don't know any other way to feel, to be.
"I will prove it to you, I will drive away any shadow of any doubt. Her light, through me. For you alone, Isobel."
She acquiesces, at least, to being led over to the bed and sitting down. You lower the shoulders of her tunic. Place a gentle, reverent kiss on the revealed skin, trying to press in with it all the love and devotion you desperately need her to be aware of.
You lay a hand on her bare back, palm flat and flush with warm skin. The rush of joy and slight disbelief that she is once again yours to touch is still fresh, and yet the familiarity of every freckle, shift of shoulder blade, and light shiver of gooseflesh is ancient and deep and right. From the outside it is the same, perfect, unchanged Isobel. But you believe her unquestioningly when she says something is wrong.
A mere moment of focus has a silvery glow bathing the room, unwinding from underneath your fingertips and sinking into Isobel's back. She breathes in deeply, breathes out, then in again, shifting under your touch, until she seems to find at least some relief.
"Thank you, that's…" she murmurs, barely above a breath.
There is a dawning, deeply saddening comprehension rising in you - Isobel, insisting on pouring all her heart and soul into taking care of you, healing and protecting and doting on so devotedly, driven not just by your love most mutual, but also by fear. By a desperate need to prove herself worthy of Selûne's grace again, prove her return to life was not a horrifying mistake. Chasing redemption where none was ever needed, not for her, clinging to the thought like a lifeline.
"Whenever, whatever you need of me, however many times." You allow your fervour to seep into your voice as you feel your eyes burn, and continue trailing moonlight-dipped fingers down her back. "If you but say the word, I will provide what relief I can, I swear it, until you are free of any shadows haunting you, or until there is no light left in me - whichever deigns to come first."
Isobel smiles wryly, turning to steal a glance at you over her shoulder, a tiredness in her that she has only ever shown you alone. "I promised I would take care of you. And yet here you are, taking care of me. After… after everything."
She knows enough not to specify. Even this brief almost-mention is enough to make a darkness creep at the edge of your thoughts, but you swallow it back hastily, and focus only on the treasured countenance before you, on brushing stray silver locks behind her ear with your free hand.
"A fair and just exchange, I would think, if you are amenable."
Isobel hums something that is neither agreement nor disagreement, then turns to face you fully, sombre in the circle of your arms.
"I always thought that when the time came, I would be ready," she begins, slowly, as if every word was a trial. "Foolish and naive of me, probably. But I thought I knew what to expect, what I would have awaiting me, after a life of service. The City of Judgement, as awaits us all, and then, hopefully, and - I pray - deservedly, an audience in Argentil after being Claimed."
She stops, swallows, looks at you so pleadingly you cannot help but pull her back into your embrace.
"But instead…" you hold her tighter as she shudders, "...nothing. Darkness. A void."
Nothing. Like the black hole of your prison. And it seems fitting, for a moment, that fate has decided to match you in this, too.
"It is I who failed you. When it truly mattered, when it was of most consequence, I wasn't there. And you… you were lost to me. To us."
A small frown furrows her brow as she grasps around for something, anything. "I don't remember."
"Perhaps… perhaps that is for the best," you exhale, half-sick of dredging up shadows you would prefer remain buried. "My own memory is prodigious, and yet how I wish I could forget much of the past century."
But Isobel looks at you longingly, searchingly, and you oblige, at least for a little bit, calling to mind what should have been the darkest days of your long life. "For all our efforts, we were never able to capture your attackers - the cowards struck so suddenly, fled so swiftly. You were laid in state, for a while. The entirety of Reithwin mourned - the Silverbrow Priestess conducted the funeral services most beautifully. The very Moon, full to bursting, cried over it. And your father…"
Your throat seizes up. Her father, your tormentor. A wretched man you feel the two of you have to speak of, some day. The man who gave the world Isobel twice over, but selfishly, impossibly, wanted to keep her all to himself both times.
Her countenance grows steely and determined in a way you have yet to get used to. "My father was lost to me far before he died at your hand. I mourn the man I remember, not the monster you killed. A loving, kind, generous man, who should never have been capable of such horrors as Ketheric brought down upon my home, upon you. And yet... if I was all that was keeping him from such a fall, I cannot help but think--"
Isobel's voice cracks and you wonder when, in your absence-captivity, he stopped being Papa and became Ketheric. Your anger towards him tastes bitterer still.
And you think of Isobel, fleeing her own grave and the twisted visage of what was once her beloved father. Dragging her own burial shroud across a land of shadow and horror, full of echoes of a life half-remembered.
Isobel, alone, convinced of your demise, mourning you as you endlessly mourned her, both of you unknowing.
Isobel, left to desperately and single-handedly guard the only meagre surviving pocket of her childhood home, doomed and destroyed by her father's violent, misaimed grief over her own death. A pillar of light in an all-encompassing darkness and one final, crucial defence against it, without even a fair promise of hope or future to sustain her.
It sounds, at first, like a noble task you would think worthy of a cleric of Isobel's most excellent calibre. But you can't help but think it a test of devotion far too harsh, and entirely superfluous. Such incredible weight to place on any one person's shoulders. And for what?
Needed and necessary she once called herself and her efforts when you asked, insisting on dismissing it all in a way you perhaps understand entirely too well.
Perhaps, together... you, hollowed, and her, overflowing. And, in turn, her aching for something that is missing and you fit to burst with wrath and vengeance and violence. Perhaps there is hope yet, and healing to be found for both.
Together. Only ever together.
-
We trust in Your radiance, Moonmaiden, even when it is out of our sight.
-
The battle you were waiting for is over - won, by most reckonings, but not without great cost. What is left of the city now needs care and careful restoration. There are still stray cultist enclaves to root out, remnants of the illithid army, as well as mere opportunists who always show their vile selves in such circumstances. As part of an array of unexpected, colourful allies, you make short work of them all, whenever any come to light.
But rebuilding takes precedence, as does healing, and Isobel has taken point among Selûne's devoted in a way that is nothing short of awe-inspiring. The situation seems altogether more suited to her talents rather than yours at the moment, so you follow her readily, without question, and provide whatever aid you can.
It is a cycle as old as time, after all, as reliable as the phases of the Moon. Building, destruction, rebuilding - the world will always need both of you.
But tonight is the night of a full Moon, and Isobel has gone to conduct the requisite rituals with the rest of the Selûnite encampment that has been so welcoming to you. Isobel, death-touched but untainted, no matter what she may fear, will excel in whatever role they set out for her, of this you are certain.
You, on the other hand, have begged off, your own communion awaiting you elsewhere.
Your path leads you away from the outskirts of the city and up into the hills, your back turned on the Chionthar. Through remnants of farms and hunting lodges, up and up to cliff and brush and down again to sparse woodland, your steps are guided, as is your birthright.
It is becoming easier to hear Her voice once again. She does not always speak in words, but Her presence She makes felt.
And so you stop in a clearing, before a pond, crystal clear and fed by a jolly, clamouring stream. It is quiet, otherwise. Peaceful.
You dismiss your armour, letting it dissipate into motes of moonlight. You remember with a touch of warmth and immense fondness how sweetly Isobel would pout whenever she did not get to take it off you piece by piece.
The air is crisp and the water, once you touch it, is almost icy. The moonlight on your skin cleanses and soothes, combining with the chilly water into a refreshing blessing. It is the sensations of the world that you so dearly missed during your captivity, that you now allow to rush over you, all at once.
It is the first time in over a hundred years you stand and behold the full silver face of your Mother, the trail of Her Tears beside Her, and wonder, idly, if She shed any for you.
Please, you beg as you step into the pool, without shame, without words. A kinder fate for Isobel, this time.
A kinder fate for the land she still calls home.
A kinder fate for me.
The cool silver water seeps into every crevice of your being and washes away with it some ichor of darkness you didn't even know still clung to you. You lie back and let yourself float, the rush of water in your ears drowning out even the small nighttime noises of the clearing and surrounding woods. In the soft waves you hear your Mother's voice, and She sounds kind, inviting, forgiving.
Why, you want to ask, why would you allow…
There is new dampness on your cheeks, and you realise haltingly that it is tears. "Hello, Mother."
The light of the Moon is caring and compassionate, and bathes you in love. It is the only embrace She has ever been able to give you, here. It is almost enough to forget a century of sorrow and the cries that went unheard.
No more, She says.
Rest, the murmur continues, soft and sad - a familiar melancholy, though not one you would expect during a Moon so full and bright. Earned, a hundred times over. My Sword, tempered to perfection. My Daughter, put through trials undeserved. Lost to me for so long. You are welcome here. Safe. I would have you know peace once more.
"Not… not yet. There are still too many, I cannot--" You sit up, rivulets of water running down your face, following the crevices of your scars. It is unlike you to struggle so with your words. You proclaim and vow, you do not stammer and hesitate.
What would you have for yourself, then, daughter mine?
"I would seek and extinguish the tyrants, the oppressors," your hands tighten into determined fists as you channel and reflect all that has been done to you, aglow with silver, wings unfurled. "Those who would bind, capture, enslave, who would subjugate and rule another for their own gain - let them sleep with one eye open. Let them know: Dame Aylin sees their deeds and offers no mercy."
Your cause is righteous, and I bless it as my own. But a burden should be shared. And you are not the only champion at my call.
It is true, of course, and you grasp the intent, but you cannot help but bristle. You may not be the only one, but surely you are the most--
--fearsome? Reliable? Accomplished?
Doubt creeps in, that most rare and hated of sensations. There is a shift, then, into a plea for you to understand, from a mother to her child.
A broken sword can accomplish little. And even the finest steel has a breaking point. Do not too eagerly seek your own.
You sink back into the pool, water up to your chin, as if bowing in acceptance.
If you crave a task, I task you: offer aid in healing and rebuilding, and thus rebuild yourself. Worry not - I will call upon you when the time comes. But for now, shore up the bulwark within you.
A smile, a tender grace.
And let each and all know yours is a blessed union.
The last fading words leave you puzzled for a few moonlit moments. And then Isobel is next to you, bare and glowing and embracing you, holding you to herself as if she will never let go.
"Isobel," you start, a host of questions forming on your tongue, but she places a finger over your lips.
"Guided back to you, as you were to me. As I promise I will be, for as long as I can."
A shiver runs through you at the undercurrent of steel and sheer devotion in her sweet voice.
"Then I vow I will never let myself be torn from your side again. And any who seek to part us will meet a swift end by my hand."
You spoke such promises to each other once already, what feels like a lifetime ago, even though it should by rights have been nothing compared to your eternal years. It is a heavy lesson to have learned so well in breaking them, though - that no tomorrow can ever be guaranteed. Not even for you.
Not near as tide- and cycle-bound, the Scribe had said, and you wonder at the recalled words. No endless rise and fall for you, then, perhaps. No waxing and waning. No rote repetition of tragic history in this world changed and strange, but instead something altogether new, hewn by the two of you.
Isobel takes your face between both her hands and kisses you, putting a swift end to your reverie.
In response, you pick her up out of the water, twirl her around, splash the both of you back down happily. Your smile turns into a grin, then a laugh, open and simple, and her giggle is crystal-bright and utterly free of the grasp of the grave. You feel lighter than the feathers you leave behind like a snowy trail.
You hold her and kiss her again and again and again and allow yourself to lose track of time.
#baldur's gate 3#dame aylin#isobel thorm#aylin x isobel#bg3#fanfiction#bg3 spoilers#oathkeeper writes things#my fic#i love them and wish them all the succor in the world#cross-posted on ao3 if you prefer to read there#poor unprepared me starting the game salty that they didn't let me play my aasimar paladin staple
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Do you think having such a personalized and detailed headcanon makes it harder to enjoy fic about the show/game that's written by others?
I mean sure, probably.
But unfortunately things I adore, for people named Doc who are me, fall into one of two buckets:
The character work and plot in this show are incredible, I find myself turning it around in my mind like a rotisserie chicken. I constantly discover new things about the show/book/game or the characters in it. I do not read fic about this, because why would I? Every answer I search for is in the text. I want to talk about this with someone, but about what is THERE, not what could be there. Ex: The Haunting of Hill House, Picnic at Hanging Rock, Piranesi, Bioshock:Infinite, Watership Down, Yellowjackets, among others.
The concepts of this could be amazing but are handled so fucking badly so consistently, in a shocking contrast to how INCONSISTENT the character work is, that all I want to do is steal it and make it better. All i want to do is turn it into something that doesn't suck ass when you look at it too hard. So I am going to take it SO seriously, and I am going to develop the rich inner lives for these characters that they lack, with intense backstories and families and motivation for how they got to be the person we know, or know sometimes, in certain episodes or shorts. Ex: Sailor Moon and Overwatch are the biggies here obviously, this is actually not an emotion I feel very often. I don't have intense backstories and extra-textual feelings and ideas about most of the stuff I read and watch, these two are just my Spiders Georg.
So! The odds on me being into something in the correct way to make me want to Seek Treasure Elsewhere but also I have a chill enough attitude about how the characters are that Any Dream Will Do is almost nil. I do not in ANY way mean this in a shady way, but I mostly read published adult fiction for entertainment and not fanfic. I am very picky about my fanfic. So, "plus these two new red and blue girls into Starbucks" often won't work for me, because the reasons to have Haruka and Michiru meet in a coffee shop are completely different from any of the reasons Fareeha and Angela might meet in a coffee shop, and so many of those types are archtypical plug and play stuff. Honestly, I have skated the idea of making a cheat sheet of fanon archetypes of various characters and buying a typewriter to sell 100-200 word 'quick fic' at cons with my sister. That's how common it is to use these archetypes. This is not a criticism! At all!
But, to take the two couples above, I have read so much BORING SHIT about both HM and FA that I could throw up. Lesbian couples have a lot of very milquetoast writing about them, and a lot of meet-cute which isn't really my bag.
But there are authors I love! @oathkeeper-of-tarth was and is one of the best harumichi writers out there and we don't even have all the same headcanons. The rare occasions @verbforverb decides to grace me with "Jewish Mercy I don't Have To Write" I pop a can of bubbly in the tub. And on both fields of battle @keyofjetwolf has stuff I've had bookmarked for years, and there are some things even within Rei's backstory and history that we disagree on.
Actually, to that point what I like is good writing. You can write me into believing nearly anything. There are things I believe about Amelie when I'm reading @lemon-embalmer's stuff that when I go back to my own world, aren't true, but when I'm in her world who the fuck cares, I'm having a great time. EVEN MORE to the point, I read @moonlight-frittata's stupid sun and moon lesbian League of Legends shit and I would rather shoot myslef than know ANYTHING about the game, but unfortunately she has a beautiful turn of phrase and plot flow to her work that I just....read anyway, because it is good. Fucking @tallangrycockatiel had me like 25 pages or so into a story before I was like, "OH SHIT, IS THIS SLASH??? WAIT I DON'T WANT TO READ ABOUT BOYS' LOVE!! NO!!" *hits next page* And I still could not care less about that podcast and would never listen to it, and if I did I would be massively disappointed because to my mind, her John and Arthur are the actual article, and whatever the fuck is going on in the source material can eat my dick.
So, yes, I DO think that having a very particular point of view is going to mean I back out of a story where like, "Lena stepped out of her Chelsea flat, custom leather high heels clicking against the step" sometimes, or, you know, "Haruka put down her copy of War and Peace, each meticulous note codified by a color-coded tab. Blue was for historical references to research, green for character analysis, yellow for themes, blah blah blah*" But I am actually shockingly open minded in what I will read, often to the point that I'm reading stuff from SHIT I DO NOT LIKE OR CARE ABOUT, because the quality of the writing is excellent. So, also no.
*I met someone who read books like this and I suddenly realized what the literary equivalent of 'knowing someone is a serial killer' was.
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I like your jaime opinions but you have such bnf takes on jb and marriage that kind of baffles me
bnf takes 😭😭? cmon man. im just not that interested in that. like i am just not crazy about the marriage/children endgame aspect, simply out of preference. do not care for that kind of clean happy ending for any of my faves, i think it would emotionally resonate with me less. i also internalized what george had said about what romances he likes to write and read and the “we’ll always have paris” example he used. i do like some kind of tragedy or bittersweetness in romantic stories too. and the love was and would still always be there and all that. i do want some kind of departure, some key choice and sacrifice perhaps. i see the possibility of jaime dying too, which could achieve the same, but not executed the way it was in the show. i do not at all deny the possibility of interpreting the set up for what u guys r saying either, i think you can find foreshadowing for it (certainly has more of a basis than a majority of what ppl skew as marriage foreshadowing for other ships), i just dont feel crazy about it as a “happily ever after” scenario, dont think it would fit:
like i see this. i even thought that stage direction (if it was that and not a directorial choice that was not in the script) in the lion and the rose could be alluding to a union. the one where loras and jaime discuss the cersei-loras marriage and the dialogue ends with “you will never marry [cersei]” “neither will you” and then brienne enters the frame while the camera is on jaime. followed up by the cersei brienne convo. grrm wrote it after all. this is the technique he kept using with olenna regarding joffrey’s murder as well.
i am just fine with if all this just indicates future romance between them, and is being used to emphasize their desire for each other that they both repress in different ways (oathkeeper itself can be read as an engagement metaphor: “He will bring a rose for you,” her father promised her, but a rose was no good, a rose could not keep her safe. It was a sword she wanted.”, “Ser Galladon was a champion of such valor that the Maiden herself lost her heart to him. She gave him an enchanted sword as a token of her love.”) i do not think it would be made lesser if the relationship does not necessarily operate within the boundaries of westerosi society. i dont care if the marriage is a symbolic one rather than a literal one (like a knighting.) i do not think that would take away from the romantic relationship. we will see. i know jaime deals with failure when it comes to fatherhood but i am still pretty lukewarm when it comes to that kind of ending for him. i would prefer that remaining a tragedy. could that change? idk.
brienne too is a complex character. her relationship with her desires is complicated. part of her does crave marriage and a child etc. again, it is not as simple as her not at all desiring any aspect of the role she is assigned due to her gender. it is a role that society made for her, but also did not allow her to fit due to how she looks. so that is already very loaded and highlights the contradictory nature of this strict binary. but she also is a knight. she likes it. there is a reason she is a little relieved as well. she has agency to be what she wants to be. she is operating outside of society’s moulds in her own way. is there a way to make these things compromise? maybe.
if you want an “anti-bnf” 😭 opinion from me i do absolutely want their relationship to be consummated, and i disagree with the ppl who want it to be/read it as just a courtly love/chivalric romance type deal in that sense. sexual themes permeate the dynamic, and i wouldn’t like it if george, who does not shy away from dealing with sexuality, didn’t deal with this one relationship, ESPECIALLY because Brienne is an unattractive woman. would unironically rub me the wrong way if she ended up being the one ‘major’ female character, with a key romance, who is also an adult, to not have that. do not want her to be desexualized in this context. i am also tired of the relationship being “purified” in this sense in a lot of general discussion bc i think it often ventures into backwards territory. i would not be really happy with them only getting sex metaphors (which there are plenty of already) + i do believe it would actually mean a lot for both of their characters too.
#getting bnf takes allegations in the ask box is it fucking over everyone#ask#i think i would prefer something that is between tragic and bittersweet but not as doomer as the show
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Thinking of the parallels between Jaime/Brienne and Jon/Arya and the contrasts between Jaime/Cersei and Jon/Arya.
We start with the swords. I spy similarities in the writing where Jon gifts Arya a sword and Jaime does the same for Brienne.
First, it’s a gift.
“I have something for you to take with you, and it has to be packed very carefully.” Her face lit up. “A present?”
“You could call it that. Close the door.” - Jon, AGoT
“I have a gift for you.” He reached down under the Lord Commander’s chair and brought it out, wrapped in folds of crimson velvet. - Jaime, ASoS
Then there’s the unveiling.
By then Jon had pulled off the rags he’d wrapped it in. He held it out to her. Arya’s eyes went wide. Dark eyes, like his. “A sword,” she said in a small, hushed breath. The scabbard was soft grey leather, supple as sin. Jon drew out the blade slowly, so she could see the deep blue sheen of the steel. - Jon, AGoT
Brienne approached as if the bundle was like to bite her, reached out a huge freckled hand, and flipped back a fold of cloth. Rubies glimmered in the light. She picked the treasure up gingerly, curled her fingers around the leather grip, and slowly slid the sword free of its scabbard. Blood and black the ripples shone. A finger of reflected light ran red along the edge. “Is this Valyrian steel? I have never seen such colors.” - Jaime, ASoS
And then there’s the naming, where both Jon and Jaime name the sword, for Arya’s ‘love’ of sewing and Brienne finding Catelyn’s girls for the oaths promised.
“I almost forgot,” he told her. “All the best swords have names.”
“Like Ice,” she said. She looked at the blade in her hand. “Does this have a name? Oh, tell me.” “Can’t you guess?” Jon teased. “Your very favorite thing.” Arya seemed puzzled at first. Then it came to her. She was that quick. They said it together: “Needle!” - Jon, AGoT
Before she could think to refuse, he went on. “A sword so fine must bear a name. It would please me if you would call this one Oathkeeper. ” - Jaime, ASoS
This then leads to the first instance of Jon/Arya (and Jaime/Brienne) being written as foils to Jaime/Cersei with Cersei’s anger at the difference between how she and Jaime were treated growing up as children.
"Yet even so, when Jaime was given his first sword, there was none for me. 'What do I get?' I remember asking. We were so much alike, I could never understand why they treated us so differently. Jaime learned to fight with sword and lance and mace, while I was taught to smile and sing and please. He was heir to Casterly Rock, while I was to be sold to some stranger like a horse, to be ridden whenever my new owner liked, beaten whenever he liked, and cast aside in time for a younger filly. Jaime's lot was to be glory and power, while mine was birth and moonblood." - Cersei, AFfC
And while Arya’s parents did treat her differently to her brothers, she did end up getting a sword because Jon Snow gifted her with one. Jon Snow who recognizes what it is that Arya is actually interested in, what it is that Arya wants, who understands the unfairness of the patriarchy where Arya is concerned and proceeds to try and fix in some small manner.
And yet for as much as Jaime claims to love Cersei, giving up Casterly Rock and becoming a Kingsguard to be with her, he does not seem to either understand this side of her or acknowledge it any way. Given the constant reminders that Jaime and Cersei are very close to each other from birth, does Jaime even know of Cersei’s resentment and try to address it? Have conversations with her about it? Given what we know of pre - one hand Jaime and his initial interactions with Brienne, I doubt it. In fact Jaime is surprised at Brienne’s prowess and strength given that she’s a woman.
She is stronger than I am.The realization chilled him. Robert had been stronger than him, to be sure. The White Bull Gerold Hightower as well, in his heyday, and Ser Arthur Dayne. Amongst the living, Greatjon Umber was stronger, Strongboar of Crakehall most likely, both Cleganes for a certainty. The Mountain’s strength was like nothing human. It did not matter. With speed and skill, Jaime could beat them all. But this was a woman. A huge cow of a woman, to be sure, but even so … by rights, she should be the one wearing down. - Jaime, ASoS
And while Cersei resented that Jaime got Casterly Rock and the swords, there is understanding and empathy on both sides where Jon Snow and Arya Stark are concerned.
“Why aren’t you down in the yard?” Arya asked him. He gave her a half smile. “Bastards are not allowed to damage young princes,” he said. “Any bruises they take in the practice yard must come from trueborn swords.” “Oh.” Arya felt abashed. She should have realized. For the second time today, Arya reflected that life was not fair. - Arya, AGoT
Jaime only gets to this place of seeing Brienne as an equal in ASoS, after interacting with her, starting to respect her skill and accepting her as a fellow warrior and trusting in her to keep his oaths to Catelyn.
He swayed with the motion of his horse, wishing for a sword. Two swords would be even better. One for the wench and one for me. We’d die, but we’d take half of them down to hell with us. - Jaime, ASoS
With Jaime’s gradual change in feelings towards Cersei and Brienne, we get that final contrast between Jaime/Cersei and Jon/Arya - possibly also where Jaime/Cersei ends once and for all and where romantic Jon/Arya may start with a resurrected Jon reuniting with an older Arya. Yes, this is about the letters.
“Does my lord wish to answer?”
I love you. I love you. I love you. Come at once.
“No,” he said. “Put this in the fire.” - Jaime, AFfC
“What do you mean to do, crow?”
I want my bride back … I want my bride back … I want my bride back …
“I think we had best change the plan,” Jon Snow said. - Jon, ADwD
Keep in mind that by laws and oaths sworn, as a sworn brother of the Kingsguard, Jaime can and most probably should defend the queen in a trial by combat and still Jaime refuses to help. Meanwhile, Jon Snow is prohibited by laws and sworn oaths to step in and help Arya and yet he decides to endanger the neutrality of the NW by going to war with Ramsay Bolton.
Jaime is as done with Cersei as Cersei was done with Jaime when he returned without a hand. Meanwhile Jon Snow is just getting started, breaking his sacrosanct NW oaths and rallying an army of Wildlings to go attack the Warden of the North for Arya.
And following through on here, I think there will be a very different reaction from Arya to a scarred Jon Snow - and yes, depending on how Jon is resurrected he may have a lot of scars or never healing injuries like Ladystoneheart and Beric Dondarrion - compared to Cersei’s revulsion at Jaime’s stump. Their bond and love for each other goes deeper than the lust and infatuation based on beauty and looks between Jaime and Cersei.
So yes, I think Braime makes for some nice parallels with Jonrya, while Jaime/Cersei work as foils to Jon/Arya.
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Thinking about Brienne and idealism and despair, I feel like George has sown some seeds in the last couple glimpses we get of her that hint at a crisis of faith she'll have in twow. There's this deep-set sense of futility, of helplessness, in Brienne's last chapter, one that extends beyond the fact that she's a prisoner.
"He turned back at the river, m'lady. He's gone back to his forge, to Willow and the little ones, to keep them safe."
No one can keep them safe. She began to cough again. "Ah, let her choke. Save us a rope." One of the shadow men shoved the girl aside. He was clad in rusted rings and a studded belt. At his hip hung longsword and dirk. A yellow greatcloak was plastered to his shoulders, sodden and filthy. From his shoulders rose a steel dog's head, its teeth bared in a snarl.
"No," Brienne moaned. "No, you're dead, I killed you."
Those kids at the inn that Brienne was willing to die to protect, the kids that she was literally eaten to protect, well now, in her mind, no one can keep them safe. Of course, Brienne feeling like the odds are against her is not something that will make her fold on its own. "No chance and no choice" after all, but here, you can feel her wondering, is there ever really a chance? And as if to confirm this, the monster haunting the Riverlands, the same one that Brienne killed at to crossroads to protect the children, is seemingly back again and right in front of her.
And then, the last time we see actually see Brienne, her appearance startles Jaime.
Jaime scrambled to his feet. "My lady. I had not thought to see you again so soon." Gods be good, she looks ten years older than when I saw her last. And what's happened to her face? "That bandage … you've been wounded …"
Obviously, her injuries and the fever she suffered are likely contributing to the fact that she seems to have aged ten years, but if we take this more metaphorically, what else is associated with youth? Resilience, innocence, idealism. In Winds we may see a Brienne who has lost some of these things. Being confronted with the rotting husk of your liege lady who commands you to do something you deem unjust lest she kill you and and an innocent child will do that I guess. Jaime says "You've been wounded," when he sees her, and he's right, and not just physically. Brienne's in a lose-lose situation, where any decision she makes requires her to compromise her own morality, a part of the too many vows dilemma that led Jaime to lose his faith in the institution of knighthood that Brienne still holds sacred. I think there are some dark places she could go internally, and the fact that she's going to get slammed with the fact that Tarth has been invaded and has possibly fallen is certainly not going to help. How far things will go, and what morally grey actions Brienne may take I don't know. In my mind there's a certain something to Brienne killing Catelyn, with Oathkeeper no less, but considering all the foreshadowing that Arya will meet her mother again before her final death, I don't know that that will be the case. What this faltering idealism will look like in Brienne's story I'm not sure, I just know that I am ready for George to tear my heart out in twow (one of these days).
"There are a lot of dark chapters right now in the book that I'm writing. You know, it is called The Winds of Winter, and I've been telling you for 20 years that winter was coming. And winter's the time when things die, and you know, cold, and ice, and darkness fills the world, so this is not going to be the happy feel-good book that people may be hoping for, and some of the characters are in very dark places." - GRRM x
#brienne of tarth#valyrianscrolls#asoiaf#also don't think Brienne's arc will end on this kind of note just that we'll see her wrestling with this in twow#*
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ruminating on iolanthe today...
here's a big chunk of a RP @desnas and I were writing with iolanthe and one of the NPCs from faye's campaign, an aasimar paladin named aurum. we'll be restarting that campaign soon so the canonicity of this event is questionable but the dynamic of grouchy twilight cleric with trauma surrounding the paladin's religion ends up falling a little for him anyway because of his friendly boy swag still holds up 😌
iolanthe's POV was written by me, and aurum's POV was written by faye!
It is, perhaps, a touch of ill-fated impulse that leads Iolanthe plates-in-hand to once more darken Aurum's door.
She takes pause before she knocks. A moment and then several go by as Vigil hugs the side of her neck in silent comfort.
Why did he ask her, out of all of them? (Pity, maybe. Desperation. Convenience.)
Why him, then? Why say yes? (Well, she hadn't. Not really, not yet.)
Does it matter? Will it hurt? Is it fair?
To those points, she hasn't a good answer.
Iolanthe takes a breath. And tucks whatever questions, feelings, thoughts she has away into their neat little boxes on their dusty little shelves. The day weighs heavy on her shoulders, and while the prospect of sharing a night with a paladin – an oathkeeper, of all things, should speak only to her contempt and disgust...
It doesn't.
Curious. Strange.
She uses the tip of her boot to rap on the door.
There's some shuffling. Some nervous prancing. And then the door swings open, and there stands Aurum. Trying very hard not to look as relieved as he feels, she thinks. His face is still dusky, silhouette aglow with light all his own.
"Hello." She tilts her head, a half-smile flittering across her face. She slips inside once he invites her to and carefully sets down the bottle of cider and then their dinners on the low table in front of the couch.
With a twitch of her fingers, she dismisses Vigil from her eternal perch upon her shoulder. The world falls into darkness, and Iolanthe takes a seat.
"I thought you might be hungry," she says softly. "Unless you already ate. I suppose that would make the gesture a bit awkward."
~
The sweet aroma of well-seasoned and cooked meat wafts in through the front door, and Aurum feels the sting of hunger-- a great hunger. He in fact did not know how hungry he was up until this moment. A wide, grateful smile blooms on his face and he settles next to her, feeling slightly more at ease without the owl's gaze locked in on him.
Not that he didn't find it endearing, but-- well, a private moment might be nice, just between the two of them. "I... heavens, thank you. I am rather hungry, yes, though I'd truly appreciate the gesture regardless." He looks Iolanthe over, his stare lingering a little longer than it would otherwise, before cupping his hands under the warm plate.
"And a steak, no less? Please let me pay you in kind for this. You've a baby to take care of."
~
At Aurum’s words, her easy smile falls away.
Chivalry. Now there’s something both old as fate and newer than a babe’s first breath all at once. Had it always felt like this? So… stilted? Or is that just her? Ill at ease and out of practice from decades spent in matrimonial bliss?
Lady save her. She hasn’t done this in… Well. She’d rather not put a number to the years it’s been, lest she feel well and truly old.
Delicately, Iolanthe clears her throat. Neat little boxes. Dusty little shelves. She picks up her silverware and begins to eat.
“Think nothing of it. But if you must give me money, it would make me feel better if we at least pretend it’s a tithe.”
~
“A tithe? A commendable cleric you make.” He hums in amusement, taking his own eating utensils in hand before he takes a bite. Delicious, for a reclusive tavern in a small corner of Kethelan. Not quite how he’d ask it to be done, but he still doesn’t carry any complaints.
“Very well, then. Five silver as a tithe to… the Mortadias and their willful followers.” And he sets it out in front of her, on the small coffee table in front of them before forking up some of the vegetables.
Between bites, a thought occurs to him, and after some contemplation, he decides to speak it aloud. “I know your relationship with my… my faith is not at a good standing. But I thank you for giving me your trust today. With Wyll— and after that, too.”
He glances at Iolanthe sideways, brows screwed upwards with a pair of silver puppy dog eyes. Another bite, another swallow. “Your company is most welcome.”
~
Iolanthe makes quick work of her meal, legs pulled up onto the couch and folded under her as she cuts into her steak. The clink of the silver on the table makes her lips twitch. She ignores it, for now, chewing slowly and swallowing as Aurum speaks.
"Commendable," she echoes. The word bleeds across her tongue, ashen in taste. "I fear you've misjudged me. I don't serve a higher calling for the praise. I serve because I must. Because I am nothing and have nothing without it. And besides," she tilts her head in his direction, "the tithe was just a joke."
The amusement must show in her eyes. The spark of mischief. The teasing.
"I don't often hear that, even so," she continues. "Praise, that is. Or that my company is welcome." A pause. Another bite. "I've found you don't make many friends serving the Lord and Lady of Bones. It can be... lonely, at times, I admit."
~
“All part of the natural cycle.” Aurum hums in admiration, filling in the gaps of silence between each bite. Before long, his food is gone, that cider is half empty, and his belly is full.
“Emaroth’s religious restrictions and distaste for those that aren’t under the Silver Sun have put a great chokehold on the land. It’s ironic, but… I pray in a few years time, things will be more welcoming here. For people like you, and others.”
He sighs, standing to place his plate atop the end table by the door, lest he forget to take it out later on. Turning back, he places his hands on his hips, giving Iolanthe a once over.
“I’ve read those under the Lady of Bones are often midwives. Is this true?” The paladin sounds curious, intrigued, all the while taking her finished plate and stacking it onto his.
~
Iolanthe considers his words awhile, taking a mite longer to clear her plate than he. She sips at the cider filling her glass in thought.
“The Church’s intolerance of differing faiths plays a heavy hand,” she ventures, “but even if it didn’t, I don’t foresee the gods of death ever becoming… popular.”
He doesn’t sit again after he takes her dirty dishes to stack them atop his own. The distance yawns a valley between them.
Is this all he wants, then? Just to talk?
Iolanthe turns her head to the side, considering. It wouldn’t be so bad. Even if she’s just as unpracticed at this as she is at… everything else.
“…It is,” she says at length. She pulls her legs up onto the couch and tucks them underneath her, clasping her hands atop her thigh. “Midwives, morticians, gravediggers, healers… Sometimes soldiers. Inquisitors. Monster hunters. Those on a holy mission to root out necromancers and the undead.”
After a pause, she turns to gaze vaguely in Aurum’s direction.
“Sit with me, Oathkeeper. The formalities have their charms, but you do me a disservice standing clear across the room. I won’t bite you. I’ve already had my fill.”
#what if you were a paladin of the same religion that was responsible for my spouse's death#and you challenged my hatred and grief#and also we were so sun and moon coded. what then.#auuugghhh I miss playing her!! I miss the milf!!!#🌿.txt#my writing#and my partner's :)
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A post looking over Kairi's actions in KH1/KH2/KH3, because curiously (and frustratingly) enough she only seems limited to approximately 10 major action set-pieces per game.
Races with Sora and Riku.
Referees a race between Sora and Riku.
Makes the Oathkeeper charm.
Goes to the Secret Place to safeguard the world's heart but is attacked by darkness.
Sends Sora a flashback of her and her grandmother from within his heart.
Saves Sora from having his head caved in by Ansem from within his heart.
Tries and fails to save Sora but still refuses to believe that he's gone, then runs away with Donald and Goofy at Riku's urging.
Recognizes Sora as a Heartless, protects him from other Heartless at great personal risk, and restores his human form to him.
Gives Sora the Oathkeeper charm and has him promise to return it to her.
Goes to the Secret Place and draws herself giving a Paopu Fruit to Sora.
Prior to Destiny Islands' destruction, Kairi as well as Riku are both, apart from their major character development scenes at sunset, simply doing things that reflect their friendship with Sora and their easygoing tropical life. There isn't anything major until the big storm strikes and they are both lost to Sora. After this, Kairi is a passive character by plot necessity, being unable to do anything because she's inside Sora's heart and for the longest time isn't even aware that she is. The moment she gets an inkling about it following the events at Neverland, she does something from within Sora's heart, and once it's outright confirmed by Ansem she immediately puts that knowledge to use and saves Sora from him. After this is her main actions everyone remembers her for - saving Sora after he becomes a Heartless and then giving him the Oathkeeper charm we see a lot more of in the following two games. While she absolutely could have stood to do more after regaining her body, she is at least given the focus in the ending FMV and (epilogue aside) does the last action seen in the whole game.
As I said here, I really like this mostly-passive-by-design role for Kairi in the first game, since as a potentially standalone title with heavy basis in fairy tales, mythology and of course Disney movies, this kind of mysterious magical damsel role is a perfect fit, plus it had a nifty twist put on it and was accompanied by an actual human and relatable character arc for her. Some may find it disappointing, but I feel for this specific entry in the series, it is perfectly justified. The only fuck-up was putting the scene where she gives Sora the Oathkeeper in Traverse Town instead of Hollow Bastion, which is then nonsensically said to be "way too dangerous" for Kairi and she'd "get in Sora's way" if she did...a fitting description for if she followed him into End of the World, not Hollow Bastion where the other Princesses of Heart are managing to get by just fine. Fix that one glaring error and Kairi in KH1 would be perfect.
Writes a letter to Sora and sends it out to sea to reach him.
Resists Axel's manipulation and runs into a dark corridor to Twilight Town with Pluto.
Befriends Hayner, Pence and Olette.
Gets away from Axel when he kidnaps her (off-screen).
Escapes her prison cell alongside Namine and is willing to fight Saix alongside her.
Stops Riku from leaving and has him be honest about his current condition.
Fights a chamber load of Heartless alongside Riku to save Sora, forcing Xigbar's hand.
Stops Riku from leaving AGAIN and reunites him with Sora.
Takes as many small actions as possible as a member of the party.*
Merges with Namine, thus saving her from fading into darkness.
* Stops Mickey from getting himself killed, points out the appearance of a Heartless swarm and the door to Kingdom Hearts, gets back through the door alongside Mickey (off-screen).
I again link to a prior post I made, where I brought up the reasons many people found Kairi in KH2 to be a disappointment. And while those reasons are and always will be valid (and always rectified in the KH2 manga; please check it out, people!), when I look at Kairi's actions in KH2 as a whole I can't help but feel that it's a major overreaction. People get caught up in either the various execution flubs that affect more characters than just Kairi or let their personal expectations for her get in the way of actually looking at and appreciating what's actually there, because what's there is a strong young woman learning to come into her own and fighting tooth and nail for every scrap of agency the villains keep trying to deny her, all while forging new bonds with others and being responsible for restoring the old bond of the Sora/Riku/Kairi trio. Her first action undertaken boomeranging back at the very end to save Sora and Riku from dying in the Realm of Darkness and bringing them home to a happy ending is just beautiful, the ultimate reward for Kairi taking it upon herself to be proactive.
Writes a letter to Sora but doesn't send it to him.
Gives herself a makeover.
Shares a Paopu Fruit with Sora.
Fights Heartless, Nobodies and Unversed alongside Lea (off-screen).
Guides Sora in corporeal form as he uses the Power of Waking to save everyone.
Kills some Heartless during the Heartless Rain event.
Fights Xion and Saix alongside Lea and Sora, but loses and is kidnapped then killed.
Re:Mind - Fights Xemnas, doing well until he saps her energy with a nil technique.
Re:Mind - Fights Master Xehanort alongside Sora then takes part in destroying him.
Re:Mind - Does everything alongside Sora in the ending FMV.
I've bitched about this a lot, but I want to specifically call to attention just how incongruous Kairi's actions added in the Re:Mind DLC are with her actions in the base game. The first two actions she takes in KH3 are utterly useless, with the actual point of her in those scenes being for Lea's sake and for the sake of pushing bad retcons. Sharing a Paopu with Sora comes out of nowhere both in the context of the game and the series up to that point and it affects nothing. We then get her fighting either entirely off-screen, shown killing a single raining Shadow Heartless, or pathetically short-lived and ending in miserable failure, with her actual major plot-affecting role being spiritual in nature and, again, out of fucking nowhere. Whatever one's issues with her in KH2, Kairi was not being built up for a combat role in that game - she was only being built up for a more proactive one in KH1, and while that role could have been executed better (like it is in the manga) she still fulfilled it. In KH3, she was very specifically being built up for a combat role, and she didn't fulfill that role in favor of a sudden, unsatisfying bait-and-switch where she's just as passive as she was in KH1, if not more so.
So that's why it's jarring when in Re:Mind, she's suddenly having no problem against Xion despite struggling in the base game, fiercely fighting Xemnas to the point of shattering his energy sabers and forcing him to drain her stamina in order to save himself, and then not only fighting and helping kill Master Xehanort but being the most OP playable character in the process which is at stark odds with her useless party member AI. Then she's inserted into literally every part of the happy ending montage she was originally almost entirely absent from until the last minute. It is such an obvious ham-fisted case of damage control after fan backlash that it only satisfies you in the moment, then you begin asking how and why the game even had to get it so wrong in the first place. And the dissonance only gets worse with the following Limitcut Episode + Melody of Memory, where suddenly it's like Re:Mind never happened as Kairi's once again a weakling who needs more training because adventuring's "way too dangerous" for her, with her main story contribution being passive and spiritual!
Character-wise, for Kairi it's KH1 > KH2 > KH3.
Action-wise, however, it's KH2 > KH1 > KH3.
#Disney#Square Enix#Kingdom Hearts#Kingdom Hearts II#Kingdom Hearts III#Kairi#Opinion#Analysis#Comparison#Bad Writing#Character Derailment#They Wasted a Perfectly Good Character#Kairi Deserved Better#Anti-Kingdom Hearts#Anti-Square Enix#Anti-Nomura#Anti-Tetsuya Nomura
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☾ * ── 𝐘𝐎𝐔𝐑 𝐌𝐔𝐒𝐄'𝐒 𝐈𝐍𝐕𝐄𝐍𝐓𝐎𝐑𝐘 .
rules: list the things your muse carries in their pockets or bags in their everyday life. (optional: explain their significance.) repost, don’t reblog.
➤ Tagged by : @shimmerbeasts
➤ Tagging: @ofwaterandfire (Viktor), @decidentia (vi), @realmyths (Vi), @angelicaaster, @knightfeared (Jayce / Grayson), @knightinsourarmor (Mel or Vi), @vulpesse, @goldenfists, @couturiere, @ambrosius-goldenlion, @lashhers, @knifvd (Soraka / Luxanna), @hemomania, @heredis-sanguinis and anyone else who wants to <3
── Caitlyn's most noticeable and known item that is typically always on her person is her rifle, gifted to her by Grayson when she was hitting her teenage years. The Rifle is specialized and one of a kind, able to fold in half for easier carry as well as extending the rifle barrel forward. Caitlyn named the rifle Oathkeeper, as a promise to Grayson that she would always use the rifle to protect people. In later years, Caitlyn gets the rifle a few upgrades, including having Hextech invested in the weapon to allow for greater distance and power behind her shots, but also it allows her to use concussive shots as well as electric bullets for paralyzing takedowns. At the front is a grenade launcher, which allows her to fight electric nets or smoke bombs. She has Jinx to thank for her adaptive process as she learned she could not depend solely on bullets alone but needed to become more unpredictable with her weaponry.
── Her Pistol had been a gift from her parents, sketched with foxes upon it as their connection to Ionia and its roots. Foxes have many meanings but to the Kiramman they are spirits of the dead, keepers of life, and know to bring good omens to those who respect them. Caitlyn didn't wear her pistol all the time until the events in the undercity and her charged struggle with Jinx. Now, she always has her pistol on her hip and she is never without it. While she may or may not have her rifle on her, her pistol is ALWAYS on her side. Unfortunately, she has learned that Piltover is not as safe as it claims to be, so she refuses to ever leave her house without her pistol, which she has called Fox Song.
── Caitlyn's two blades were crafted by Jayce as a favor. She wanted a pair of weapons that were not enforcer-issued and would be slightly smaller and easier to carry. They fit into her boots, with a sheath that fits on the inside of the boot rather than the outside (she can interchange the sheath to any boot wear she wears or on a belt). These two blades are called Frostbite and Moon's Edge. The iron and steel are imported from Frejlord, known to have the strongest metal ore around. Caitlyn learned hand-to-hand combat from being at the Enforcer's Academy, so while she is far more skilled with her rifle and pistol, she can handle hand-to-hand combat and knows how to use her knives in case she needs to in a means to protect herself. These are always on her person as well, she never leaves the house without them.
── Caitlyn got her spinner rings when she was eighteen, as it helps with her stims and anxiety whenever they pop up. She typically wears them on her left or right thumb or pointer finger (she has several in her room, due to different sizes and environments) but she never fails to have one on her hand. They allow her fingers a distraction to twist and spin the center component that allows her to focus better and keeps her hands busy.
── Caitlyn has a ton of journals! In her room, there is a small dresser that is specifically for her journals. She started to write in them when she was twelve, finding it helped ease her mind to have everything on paper (think of it like a box, and her box was overflowing due to having an eidetic memory and being unable to "forget" details). She always has spare ones on hand, so that if one gets full she just grabs a new one. Each journal is leather bound and has a pen with it. She will never go without a journal, because while she has an eidetic memory, she finds it a lot easier to organize her thoughts and memories into a journal to see them visually (though she can visually map out everything in her head as well).
── Caitlyn's fluorite necklace was given to her by Jayce on her twelve birthday. Jayce and Caitlyn both have a love for rocks and gemstones, so when he found one of purple and blue, he immediately thought of Caitlyn and got it placed on a silver chain and gifted to her. She often wears the necklace daily and only takes it off if she is going to a fancy occasion (and the necklace doesn't fit the outfit she is wearing) or if she needs to remove it. Most of the time, though, she always has it around her neck. She likes to twist it between her fingers, another object she use to deal with her fidgety hands.
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WIP excerpt
I’m now 4,000 words deep into what I’m telling myself is just gonna be a little post-LSH oneshot. It’s centered around a few scenes of Jaime & Brienne sparring, and silly me, I know nothing about sword fighting, and yet here I am trying to write this thing lmao. Anyway, here’s a mostly finished quarter of it:
Yield - (probably) rated T, book canon, post-LSH
“I’ll never get better if you don’t actually try,” he sighs, tapping aside her halfhearted strike with his blade.
She steps outside of his reach. “Perhaps I am not the best person for this task.”
“Nonsense. Where is the wench who nearly drowned me in a brook?” He gestures to his eyebrow with the golden hand. “Where is the wench who gave me this scar?”
She casts her eyes to the dirt rather than meet his gaze.
“Tell me,” Jaime says, circling slowly now, eyes drifting lower, “does your skin bear the memory of my sword as well?” He makes it sound as lewd as possible, hoping to rile her, before lunging forward. He aims the tip of his practice sword for her upper thigh, remembering the blood he made blossom there, oddly thrilled by the thought that he may have left a permanent mark on her skin all those moons ago.
And finally, finally, he’s sparked some life into her. Her faces flushes with indignation as she wrenches herself into furious action, easily parrying his strike before it can make contact with her leg. She continues to drive him back, slashing with impressive ferocity. He attempts his own attack but she quickly smacks the back of his knuckles with the flat of her blade, sending his sword clattering to the ground.
“Yield,” he laughs, shaking out the pain in his hand, utterly delighted. “I yield.”
She draws back, exasperated. “I do not understand you!”
“You seem to have understood well enough. You see, Lady Brienne, when an opponent says ‘yield’—”
“Why are you not angry with me?” She asks, cutting him off as she pushes sweat-dampened hair from her face, exposing the still-healing knot of flesh on her cheek. He feels murderous every time he sees it, reminded of the cruelties she has endured.
“I was, for a moment or two.” He crouches to retrieve his sword, looking up at her from the dirt. “Do you wish me to be angry with you? Curse you, bind your hands and keep you prisoner? Should I have left you to die of your wounds? Shall I call you traitor? Oathbreaker?” He narrows his eyes as he returns to his full height. “But you swore no oaths to me, my lady.”
“I would deserve no less.” She pulls her lips in and furrows her brow and looks completely, utterly at sea. “I truly don’t understand why you do not.”
“Neither do I,” he shrugs, striving for flippancy, and desperately ignoring the way the invisible coil seems to tighten around him again at the look in her eyes. “There, are you satisfied? You do not understand why I don’t hate you, and I do not understand why I forgive you. Fools, the both of us, yet mayhaps we can agree to put it behind us? I admit, I find the way you always expect the worst of me rather tedious and predictable.”
Brienne considers him for a long moment. “Alright,” she says, and she sounds reluctant but a bemused smile threatens her lips, and there is a set to her shoulders that tells him they will not need to discuss it again.
She trudges alongside him as they walk back to camp, though her silence is now more companionable than sullen. She does not speak again until they reach her tent.
“You’re not a lost cause,” she ventures, so quietly he’s not even sure she spoke at first. “The skill is still all there in your mind, it will just take time to reestablish it in your other hand. Lighter steel would do you well in the meantime, while you build strength.”
She begins to unfasten her sword belt and in an instant he understands what she means to do. He feels a rush of annoyance that she would even think it. The lion on Oathkeeper’s pommel seems to grimace up at him, pityingly, when she tries to press the sword into his hand.
“It was meant to be yours,” Brienne says. “Take it.”
Jaime crosses his arms against her. “You’re a highborn lady, surely your wicked septa taught you that it’s impolite to return a gift? I gave you that sword. It pleases me to think of you wielding it,” he snarls.
Something unreadable flickers across her face and she parts her lips as if to speak, but no sound comes out. He suddenly feels as if he said much more than he meant to. Those absurdly expressive eyes of hers are staring at him, and he thinks he could not look away even if he wanted to.
“I will strive to be worthy of it,” she says, finally.
He wants to tell her she need not strive; she is already worthy. That until he met her, he had long thought honor a cruel fantasy. That there is no one worthier in all of Westeros—she may think herself just a maid, yet he is certain there is no truer knight living.
He wants to tell her this, but he does not.
And he does not stop her when she tears her eyes from his, nor does he catch her arm when she brushes past him to duck into her tent. He puts it out of his mind as he makes his way back to his own pavilion, pretending he does not feel the thread trying to pull him back.
#i'm sure this concept has been written before but i can't help myself#the red tent scene but make it book canon#a cookie to anyone who picks up on the (probably not subtle) bit of wordplay i snuck in#my fic#wip#jaime x brienne#fic#fanfic#asoiaf#wip excerpt
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This is just my anon opinion, but I think Jaime's 'redemption' is more a thing of perspective shift. Gallant 'man who looks like a king' Prince Charming -> GRRM takes that and makes him a man who pushes a kid out of a tower etc. -> to a man whose greatest deed is the thing is known as his blackest deed, when the truly evil things are not known of or only rumours. So, not completely black and white, someone capable of doing the right thing in an extreme situation (and mind you he was quite young when it happened). I'm much softer on Jaime for that act than perhaps others in the fandom; it's probably one of my favourite things in the series.
It's a powerful thing, what GRRM does with the perspective reveal and the reveal of his character to Brienne, but I generally think of redemption arcs as transformative. Jaime does not transform; he doesn't even revert (which is a more common and bad type of redemption). He is revealed.
That, to me, is the distinction. He is revealed, in order to facillitate Brienne carrying on the ideals and the true beauty of someone trying to do the right thing in a complicated world.
As someone who categorically loves redemption arcs, and am probably a lot softer on villains than most Jonsas, Jaime does not fit the bill for me. There are certain structural demands he's not fulfilling at all - and it would be totally possible to write redemption for Jaime - but GRRM has not. (In part, this is a constraint of the ensemble cast). It's symbolically carried on by Brienne, though, someone denied knighthood by the circumstances of her sex.
Though to be honest, I'm not sure I really agree with GRRM's atittude towards redemption (and there's a lot of corruption in his series). I still think, according to his own standards of redemption, Jaime is not it. I think Jaime wants to be better, but his version of better is... complicated.
I really like Rouka's take that he'll redeem Rhaegar by being loyal to his 'wife' (Cersei).
Sorry if this is a lot to put in your inbox, I keep telling myself I'm not really in the Jonsa fandom and yet I can't help myself.
"to a man whose greatest deed is the thing is known as his blackest deed, when the truly evil things are not known of or only rumours."
^^^^^^^^^
This is one of the reasons why I find Jaime so interesting. He has done some genuinely terrible things, but the best thing he ever did, save an entire city of people from being blown up, is his defining worst moment in the eyes of the world.
"That, to me, is the distinction. He is revealed, in order to facillitate Brienne carrying on the ideals and the true beauty of someone trying to do the right thing in a complicated world."
This is what I was trying to convey, that Jaime's reveal to Brienne is more about Brienne's development as a character, than Jaime's. Jaime already knew his backstory- it's been driving him the whole time, and continues to shape his actions. It's the reveal for Brienne that makes her sit back and think about what it truly means to be a "knight." And I think it's extremely purposeful, that Jaime passes Oathkeeper and his mission to Brienne, who is going to go through hell and high water to accomplish it. No chance, no choice. I think it's very telling that the most "chivalrous" characters, the "true knights," are the people denied that status by their society but still carry it out regardless. Brienne is the biggest example of this, but I think there's a case for Sam and other characters.
And Jaime does want to be better, and in AFFC, he even thinks he's doing that. It's just that what he thinks of as "better" is still defined by the legacy of Tywin and everything that's happened to Jaime prior. It reminds me of Tyrion when he says he'll do "justice" in ACOK, and it ends up being a mixed bag. Jaime is not prepared to completely breakdown his idea of "better" and rebuild it. (arguably, Brienne is currently doing this in her own story, redefining what it means to do right and who are most likely to this.)
I also think that Jaime and Cersei are so intertwined, that any character development by one has to reckon with the other. I know a lot of people think "put in on the fire" is Jaime's big hopeful moment, and the sign of his redemption arc, but it's interesting to me, because it basically proves that despite all his promises, Jaime has never protected Cersei. Cersei and Jaime are an absolutely toxic relationship built on narcissism and weird childhood issues, but something I've picked up on this reread, is the contrast between Jaime and Loras, specifically in regards to their sisters. Loras loves Margaery, and would do anything to protect her, to the point that everyone realizes that one day Joffrey would do something and Loras would kill him. Jaime saw Cersei being abused by Robert for years, and never really did anything. And then, when Cersei's life is on the line, Jaime decides not to come. And it's not so much that he's realized that Cersei is a terrible person, but that he's been ruminating for the entire book on the idea that Cersei sleeps around. Which, ah, okay. Maybe I'm wrong, and this is meant to be Jaime breaking free of Cersei, but Jaime is just as awful and weird back to her, and he never thinks on that, and it seems like he's going to go back to her. The twins are very fucked, but Jaime is on a high note at the moment, while Cersei is uh, well, not doing too hot. I've noticed that one doing better almost always happens when the other is having horrible things happen to them. C'est la vie.
I don't want to come across like I'm defending Cersei's side of the relationship, just wanted to note that Jaime is just as shitty back, and that's often ignored when talking about whether or not Jaime is being "redeemed." I do like the additional Rhaegar idea, that Jaime will go back for Cersei, especially considering that Cersei had/has a thing about Rhaegar, despite that fact that she could have easily been Elia's position (not I think the Dornish would have done the same thing to Cersei, just that Rhaegar would have ditched her for someone else if she didn't fit into his perfect plans.)
Also, I love long anons! No worries about that at all! I know that this a "Jonsa" account, but I talk about plenty of other stuff! and this corner of the fandom also has a lot of interesting other ideas not directly related to the ship. That's one of the reasons I enjoy it so much here, that there's a lot of really solid analysis that makes me see the books through new lenses. 🥰
#My opinions on the Lannisters is constantly evolving#my evil little blorbos#Branwen answers#jaime#cersei
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Worldbuilding Wednesday- Cridhe-dàime
Note: I thought I’d expand on the concept of cridhe-dàime because it’s such a fundamental part of the relationship between Meredith and Elowyn that it was probably a good idea to explain more fully what it means and its importance in dwarven cultural norms. Under a readmore because it's quite long.
tags: @druidx, @odysseywritings, @homesteadchronicles, @mariahwritesstuff, @asher-orion-writes
Cridhe-dàime, or ‘heart-kin’ in common, is a kind of deeply respectful, platonic relationship characterised by a closeness not seen in more ordinary friendships. Dwarves, despite their tough outer demeanour, are actually quite passionate about their relationships, their friendships included. Since dwarves have a culture that is steeped in tradition and notions of honour and kinship, it is perhaps not surprising that this passion bleeds over to friendships with other peoples.
While all dwarves will basically adopt their travelling companions into their families if they spend more than a few weeks together, few will choose to name anyone as their cridhe-dàime due to its associations with the cultural roots of oathkeeping, loyalty and honour found in dwarven society. This can be confusing to outsiders as dwarves are often very quick to name others as blood and/or battle brothers and sisters, which are based on the same cultural norms. It does not help that cridhe-dàime is often mis-translated to ‘soulmate’, a word which has so many romantic connotations attached to it, that it completely misses the point of the concept to begin with. Nor is cridhe-dàime to be confused with the kind of love one has for one’s family, chosen or otherwise.
So what is cridhe-dàime if it is none of the above things? The closest real-life parallel I think I can equate it to is the idea of the Queer-Platonic-Relationship, or QPR; the definition of which is as follows:
Queerplatonic relationships (QPR) and queerplatonic partnerships (QPP) are committed intimate relationships which are not romantic in nature. They may differ from usual close friendships by having more explicit commitment, validation, status, structure, and norms, similar to a conventional romantic relationship.
However, in-universe, while other cultures have similar concepts for this kind of relationship, none are so deeply tied to their cultural heritage or taken nearly as seriously. This is probably why publicly naming someone as such, aside from other dwarves, is still so rare.
In dwarven culture, naming someone as cridhe-dàime in front of others is taken as seriously as telling them that you’re engaged or married. That this relationship, despite its platonic nature, is significant enough to one both parties that, even if they’re unspoken, there are oaths and vows of loyalty involved. While there are no official ceremonies involved in naming someone cridhe-dàime, there is very often a religious element to doing so. This is mainly because dwarven culture is so steeped in tradition deriving from their faith in either Moradin or Kherillim (usually both for the dwarves of Fangthane) that oaths and vows taken even by individuals are done in their Names. The only bureaucracy involved in this kind of relationship is if the dwarf, or dwarves, in question want to officially add their cridhe-dàime to their family or clan. This is relatively common when the relationship is between two dwarves, it is almost unheard of for those of other races or cultures to be added to a family or clan in this way. The most common way this is done is by asking the cridhe-dàime to become a child’s Faddri (which translates roughly to ‘Gods’ Parent’ in common), though it is by no means the only way.
For the most part, the cridhe-dàime relationship is generally a private one between the individuals involved, and quite often one-sided should one of them be of any culture that is not dwarven. This is usually because it’s hard enough to explain what the word even means, never mind its significance to someone who isn’t from that culture. For those that publicly declare such a relationship, it is a thing to be celebrated and cherished, especially if the cridhe-dàime is from another race/heritage because dwarves keep enough to themselves as it is.
Ending note: Please feel free to send me any questions if you want further expansion on the concept, because I could go on for hours about it, but this post covers the basics at least. Do feel free to use the concept in your own work too; expand on it or mess around with it to fit into the setting(s) you prefer. We need more of this kind of thing in fantasy fiction. The relationship between Elowyn and Meredith is a very special one to me and many, many thanks go to @druidx for her encouragement and for playing and writing Elowyn in a way that allowed the relationship between our characters to flourish as it has post-campaign.
#worldbuilding wednesday#aquadestinyswriting#titan fighting fantasy#worldbuilding#elowyn o'toreguarde#meredith gruksdottir#qpr#queer platonic love
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Fic Prompt #2
Anonymous asked:
For the prompts if you are still taking them: Aylin x Isobel + watching the sunrise.
I have to say I am way too slow and rusty and annoyingly nitpicky with these ficlets. But that's why we are here! And I have about 10 more to go, so thanks to everyone who sent some prompts in.
Fandom: Baldur’s Gate 3
Characters: Dame Aylin/Isobel Thorm
Length: ~1900 words
No warnings, just some post-reunion comfort and fluff.
---
The first night on the road out of what was once her home, then her shadow-laced purgatory, and now little more than a mosaic of ancient battlefields and assorted tragedies ready to be reclaimed by nature, Isobel Thorm does not manage much sleep.
It is not the tension of her little alliance's precarious position, paired with the strenuous demands of her twilit vigil - not anymore. But the unease is relentless, set deep in her bones and in her gut. It seems to care little for her accumulated exhaustion, for the unlikely joy of their victory, or for the utterly unexpected wonder of having her angel returned to her.
After another restless hour slowly crawls by, even the delight of listening to the familiar sounds of Aylin in a deep, much needed sleep - slow, steady breaths, the occasional unintelligible murmur and soft snore, the rustling of her tossing and turning and stubbornly entangling herself in more and more blankets - fades into frustration.
So Isobel carefully slips out from under a warm, heavy arm and extracts her legs from a mess of kicked-at covers, only just managing not to trip. She retrieves her rumpled robes with some effort, fishing them out of a hastily discarded pile in the dark of the graciously donated tent, and throws them over herself before stepping out.
The rest of the camp is quiet, as even their fully elven compatriots are still engrossed in their nightly meditations. The fire has died down to embers. It is a warm summer night, but Isobel still suppresses a shiver.
It takes but a few steps to find a crumbling, moss-covered stone pillar to lean against. With the feeling of something taking at least part of the weight that seems to have descended upon her, Isobel stands watching the Moon and Her Tears, basking in the familiar light. But it is not as comforting as it should be, as she wants it to be. It hews far too close to that balcony at the inn, perhaps, and to all the twilit days and nights spent gazing upwards, in desperation-tinged prayers to keep the shadows at bay.
All too soon the face of her goddess completes its descent, sinks into branches and out of sight. Taking its place is the grey of pre-dawn, slowly staining the sky just above the treeline crowning the little hollow they have made camp in.
"Isobel?"
The voice is sleep-rough and tinged with concern. Judging by the way Aylin is still pulling on a very wrinkled tunic, she has wasted no time at all between awakening alone and launching into a search. The sight makes Isobel feel a slight twinge of guilt.
Isobel steps out from behind her rather disappointing shelter, only to be immediately caught with an arm around her waist and pressed against a broad shoulder in a comforting, comfortable gesture that needed no thought at all.
"Did I wake you, my love?" She says quietly, arms tight around Aylin in turn, looking up at her. "I'm sorry, my sneaking skills are not quite up to par--"
"No," Aylin cuts the apology off, shaking her head, dismissing clinging remnants of sleep, and, judging by the shadows lurking around her eyes, something darker, too. "You have done nothing of the sort. Do not worry."
Isobel pointedly does not release her gaze, does not allow for the easy dismissal. Aylin sighs and looks away, restlessly surveying the campfire remnants, the darkened trees, the ground at their feet - clearly displeased to find nothing worthy of her focus. Not breaking their embrace, Isobel reaches up to rub slow, gentle circles against Aylin's stomach, and gives her time.
"It is simply… difficult to sleep without you near." The confession feels like Aylin is drawing out word after heavy, resisting word, and each one tastes bitterer than the last. "The silence, and the stillness. It is…" her lips curl in distaste, "vexing."
Isobel lets the understatement slide. Feeling another rush of guilt that she knows very well is misplaced, she chooses to attempt lightening the mood instead.
"I suppose neither of us have much luck with sleep tonight. Well, perhaps we can look on the bright side - it means we are both awake for the sunrise."
The moment the idea dawns on Aylin is easy to pinpoint, as simple relish lights up her entire being - doubly so when she summons her wings with the smallest yet most eager of movements, shaking out glistening white feathers in anticipation.
"Would my beloved care for a better vantage point?" Aylin's smirk as she extends a gallant hand is a long-lost delight, and the beaming grin when Isobel takes it without a moment of hesitation feels like a warm, curative balm applied directly to her heart.
They have flown together before, of course. Stolen nights, being whisked off of her balcony and returned by morning - Isobel used to be quite well-practised at this. An arm below her knees, and another around her back and chest, while she winds her own arms around Aylin's neck and peppers kisses down her jaw, or combs fingers through her hair. All of it familiar, comforting, safe. All of it things she thought she would never get to experience again.
Her trust in Aylin is absolute, of course. But Isobel still finds herself tightening her hold and burying her face between Aylin's shoulder and neck for the first few moments, as those magnificent wings spread and make a few tentative, testing flutters.
She feels the whoosh and the sudden drop in her stomach, and the takeoff is, perhaps, a bit jerkier than she remembers. But it feels like all the clinging shadows fall off of them both, left far, far below, as gripping and as greedy as they are - for they cannot possibly keep up with the mighty beats of her beloved's wings.
Higher and higher and higher Aylin takes them as Isobel finally dares to truly look; higher even than the very top of Moonrise Towers, Ketheric's great grasp towards the heavens, had ever reached.
Finally, Aylin stops her ascent, ostensibly to let them enjoy the view that stretches out below and all around them. And it is spectacular, truly, there can be no doubt - but there is another sight Isobel wishes to take in and bask in first.
Her darling is of gleaming countenance, glorious and radiant, the first traces of sun glistening on her golden scars only serving to highlight the handsome, cherished lines of her face. But it is the charming tilt of her head, the softness in her eyes and the proud curl of her lip, the way her thumb rubs soothing circles into Isobel's shoulder while holding her aloft, that Isobel loves the most. She presses closer against the warm, solid chest, where that noble, bruised heart beats that Isobel vows to protect, to cradle in her hands with utmost gentleness and care, for as long as she is able.
"Truly wondrous to behold." The smirk on Aylin's face has faded into something softer, and her voice is unusually quiet in its awe, tinged with wistfulness. "To be welcomed home like this, as if I were one of Lathander's own."
There is an undercurrent of dissatisfaction, of something that might be bitterness there that Isobel notes and stores away for later. But she cannot deny the thought is appropriate - a blessing from the Morninglord himself, for a new beginning.
A dawn of their own, set alight the moment their eyes met across that throne room, the same way they had over a hundred years ago. When the Moonmaiden's newly arrived knightly emissary looked up after swearing fealty to the lord of the land, and when Isobel, dutiful at her father's right-hand side, knew her life was to be irrevocably changed by this woman's presence in it.
Then her mind rushes forward and catches on the word home. Aylin's favoured mode of expression is poetic and colourful, yes, but her embellishments and verbal flourishes are never meaningless or thoughtlessly done. She has come home, to Isobel, whose own home is lost to her in ways she has yet to fully take in. Where home might end up being for either, or both of them - that is something they will have to discover. But the task feels so much simpler now that they can do it together.
It feels a tad absurd to Isobel to feel so safe, when so much evil is still at large, and when there is so little between her and a certainly deadly drop. But held in arms she knows will never let her go is the safest she has felt in a long, long while.
The both of them stay quiet for a while after that, and indulge in the magnificence and unlikely miracle of it all. It is the first sunrise either has seen in a century, after all, and they get to witness it together.
And as the tendrils of gold unfurl over the land beneath them, driving away wisps of early morning mist from the winding banks of the Chionthar, rising above the impressive span of the Wood of Sharp Teeth, and rolling, roiling, spilling over to where the shadows once reigned - there it is, Aylin's dream, clung to for a century: dawn undoing a nightmare.
The sun climbs higher and higher, and Aylin gets tired. It is subtle, the strain: a slight downturn of the corner of her lip, pulling down the golden line that runs to join it; her brows furrowing, almost as if to squint at the bright light; the slightest tightening of arms and tremble of tension in her shoulders. Staying aloft in place like this is certainly taxing at the best of times. Gliding, yes - Aylin has told her of impressive distances travelled with ease by catching the air currents just so. But she has not flown in a hundred years.
Isobel doesn't know many of the details of the past century yet, and is not quite sure she ever will. But she knows Aylin's pride is not something that needs more wounding.
"My angel, perhaps it is time to return? It's… a bit chilly up here." Her words and the accompanying shiver are not altogether false. More importantly, the excuse works as intended, and after one last sweep to take in the view, Aylin shifts to take them back down without a word.
The landing, too, needs just a bit more practice. It is touching and heartbreaking at the same time, the way Aylin is obviously relearning tenderness and gentleness in all she does. Still, Isobel stays happily ensconced in her beloved's arms even when both of her feet are back on solid ground, any trace of the troubling, haunting restlessness that plagued her night long forgotten.
"Thank you," she beams up at Aylin, brings a hand up to caress her cheek, and feels her heart clench at the way Aylin leans into the touch immediately. "I've missed this." I've missed you. But it catches in her throat, for she has had so little time to miss anything at all, and Aylin has had nothing but.
"You need never miss it again," Aylin is solemn and ardent in that particular way of hers, when every simple word sounds like a sacred vow. Isobel chooses not to reply. Instead, she stands on tiptoes and pulls Aylin into a kiss, warm and sunlit.
The camp slowly comes alive behind them, the mounting sounds of a soon-to-be-busy morning drifting over. Isobel takes Aylin's hand and briefly raises it to her lips, then leads them both to face the day.
#dame aylin#isobel thorm#aylin x isobel#baldur's gate 3#fanfiction#bg3#my fic#oathkeeper writes things#fic prompts 2024#consider this an apology for the last one perhaps
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@tallangrycockatiel tagged me in an ask game!
RULES: post the names of all the files in your WIP folder, regardless of how non-descriptive or ridiculous. Let people send you an ask with the title that most intrigues them, and then post a little snippet or tell them something about it! and then tag as many people as you have WIPs.
Stolen from @tallangrycockatiel:
I will be limiting tagging to people whom I know, who I know write fic, and who did not tag me in this. (while I am doing shabbat stuff, I could remember)This is not as many people as I have WIPs. (<---I have more WIPs than people I invited to my fucking LARGE wedding, this will not be all my WIPs, just the ones i think have decent titles or are likely to be finished or whatever moves me)
Organized by fandom, and then in likely to be finished order:
Overwatch:
Trick or Treat
The Sweater We Buried You In (Is Hanging In My Closet)
Lena/Fareeha at Oyster House (Nov year before)
3 Lions on a Shirt
Emily should get to say fuck
hana needs to ask brigitte to marry her but the only people to give her advice are lena and fareeha
Sailor Moon:
Trompe-l'oeil
Bottomless Mimosas
Toreador
Harumichi first date after MA
Both:
Minako/Lena/Fareeha p2
Rei and Fareeha organize something
OCs
Shay tries to talk to Seth about feelings
Petunia Rogers, Girl Barbarian
Lesbian Pirate thing
tagging: @oathkeeper-of-tarth, @moonlight-frittata, @lemon-embalmer
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do you believe jc’s endgame is to die together?
i think i have communicated much of this already, but let’s just say i am more open to the possibility than most jb/jaime ppl, but i am not at all as certain of it happening as most ppl in general fandom seem to be, and i am also not a huge fan of it personally. here is my perspective:
yeah, it is explicitly integrated into their belief system. it faded from jaime’s, as he did abandon her, and already often contradicted it through moments of being ready to recklessly die, or his passive suicidal ideation, but it was always present as a key aspect of their ‘destined lovers’ delusion. the thing with me though is that i dont really think this is how george tends to do foreshadowing? he does love to be unpredictable. and i have seen this argument many times before by other people who doubt this being their trajectory. not to mention the whole idea seems to get deliberately deconstructed over time.
jaime comes to the realization that she was the stranger (and we know he is cersei’s stranger, but she does not think he means death). he starts treating the relationship very differently (george says they are “effectively estranged”), and their fate is no longer entwined in his head. them saying they will die together is telegraphing that is very in your face. i mean the text is telling us what would happen explicitly. is that supposed to be deliberate and meant to be a tragic irony? i can see it working from that perspective maybe. but i think this aspect would still be effective without the double death necessarily, even though i can see how the wording may be deliberate here, i just have certain thematic gripes with it. we know these two are not supposed to be reliable narrators when they say this. their relationship is a twisted attempt at self-love. again, i get that there is a subversion happening with cersei being killed by him for one, but is the belief system supposed to end up “endorsed” by the text from the pov of jaime’s character, even if it is tragically ironic? what i am saying is that ig i would be more certain of it happening if cersei did not keep repeating it explicitly atp while jaime is completely contradicting it simultaneously. if they are supposed to doom each other, what is really the point of that divergence? of the deconstruction of such a narrative in jaime’s head? why not send jaime back and have him not make those kind of key choices? jaime’s arc is supposed to be about choices (“whatever he chose…”), and defining his own fate and identity (like you do not even have to believe it is about exploring redemption to get this out of the text), so i really still cannot help but dislike the idea that this is set in stone despite everything that he keeps doing and the choices that he keeps on making. like there is an essentialist aspect to this belief system that i would prefer to be subverted honestly from the perspective of his character. i want all of these choices to have some kind of result (the letter, oathkeeper, the pit, rejecting her because of certain ultimatums even before the cheating reveal, abandoning the pursuit of the brotherhood for the vow to cat in adwd). + the hand that held her foot could have very well been the one that got chopped, so there is symbolism there. he is not tied to her. and that hand loss and “change” is constantly emphasized when it comes to JC. and i really do not want jaime to die before having some kind of confrontation with bran tbh. and i have talked about the widow’s wail thing before. if jaime is gonna wield it (which i think there is a set up for), then he would have to come out of KL alive with it. the weirwood dream also has them separate. her torch being the ‘only light in the world’ is replaced by brienne’s sword’s fire being the only one still burning in his darkness when the ghosts rush in.
this is another argument that i have seen before, and see validity in. george does write that belief system as something that has an element of ‘sociopathy.’ like of course it isn’t meant to be ‘romantic’. and jaime is also growing out of it. his relationship with a lot of characters now, brienne included, is a testament. i do not at all mind if jaime dies down the line, i just really would prefer it if there is some form of triumph over the self when it comes to his ending. i also atm cannot imagine how it would go, and what would cause jaime’s death, and how they would “leave the world together” logistically with the valonqar prophecy existing. so while i think george might be capable of executing it in a way that i could like, and i see that tragic irony working out, i still am not crazy about it as a concept atm for all the reasons above. we will see.
#ask#jaime lannister#valyrianscrolls#i genuinely think my biggest gripe is that it would cut things short with him in a way that i wouldnt like#and could be very counterintuitive with the agency theme#however i do see the irony in that wording being jaime making sure to bring her down with him lmaoo#like i see that implication in the wording#but i can also see ‘he would not go without me’ referring to jaime leaving her#as he literally does in that book#🤷#theres also the whole ‘dont leave me’ ‘dont tell me to leave’#and she does leave him in the dream#so it could be about him going on without her
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2, 4, and 9 for the fanfic asks?
2. What fanfic do you wish you got more response on?
I'm gonna have to go with (Nothing Is) Whole; not that it's been ignored or anything—it's honestly been pretty well received—but I have to pick something. I've put a lot of work into both this fic and the much larger AU it belongs to over the last four years and it's definitely the favorite child, so I'm always going to want to share it with more people
and yeah, when all there is so far is a single introductory chapter posted just shy of a year and a half ago, it's understandably not gaining much new attention, but also consider: I love that AU so much
4. Do you prefer writing multi-chapter or oneshot fanfictions?
in general, I prefer writing multichapters. I like to write scenes and even lines out of order for my multichapters, and I really enjoy the whole planning process for my larger AUs
but it also depends on what works best for any particular story. if I have a fic idea and it works best as a oneshot, trying to write it as a multichapter regardless is not going to go well for me
9. What’s your favorite line(s) or scene(s) that you have written?
okay, look. I'll be honest, the entire 2000 word Memory's Skyscraper scene in the first chapter of Not Your Sacrifice is my favorite thing I've written. there's a lot of different things I love about it and I'm not about to quote the whole scene to talk about all of them
but that's a short and boring answer, so I'll talk about one of them!
there are two parts of that scene that involve Xion summoning a keyblade; one with Oblivion, and then another one later on with Oathkeeper. taken individually each one is some of the best writing I've ever done, and I'm really proud of having written them
but they're also intentionally very structurally similar to each other and are meant to mirror each other in a few ways. I'm really happy with how well it turned out
I'll throw the two excerpts under the cut because they about double the length of this answer and it's long enough already (plus, y'know, the fic link is right there anyway)
the Oblivion part:
There was a flash as Xion summoned their keyblade, and moments later one of the heartless exploded into darkness as the black blade cut an arc through them.
Oh. That was new.
Xion looked down at their keyblade, taking in its unfamiliar new form. Instead of the silver coloring they were used to, this one was mostly black, though some silver remained in the handle and at the tip of the keyblade. Two bat wings served as the guard, with a purple gem inlaid where they met at the base of the blade. A chain ran the full length of the blade, which ended with ornate teeth more detailed than the ones on their Kingdom Key.
Somehow, they knew this keyblade was called Oblivion.
A fitting name for a keyblade wielded by someone who wasn’t supposed to still exist.
the Oathkeeper part:
A flash of light accompanied Xion's last few words as they readied Oblivion, and when it faded, Xion held another keyblade in their hand.
In their left hand.
It wasn’t Xion’s keyblade. That was still in their right hand and once again pointed at Riku. In several ways it was the complement of Xion’s keyblade. While Oblivion had a pair of bat wings, the wings that made up this keyblade’s handguard were feathered. While Oblivion was primarily black, this one was mostly colored a silvery white. And while Oblivion had a single blade, the blade of this new keyblade was split into two.
The name Oathkeeper came to their mind, but Xion barely registered it over the realization that this was Roxas’s keyblade.
It was all they had left of him; a reflection of who he was, one last echo of his—
They let out a pained scream, both keyblades falling to the ground and dematerializing, as the realization from earlier that day finally caught up with them.
Roxas had a heart.
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i am once again grumpy that. roxas and ventus ended up being separate people. like, i get why it is the way it is. “i am me, nobody else” blah blah. people liked roxas way too much as an independent character for him to be “overwritten” with ventus. i also get that roxas’s story was written before ventus’s. this is just me being an editor and pointing to pieces of a story that has been presented to me and suggesting ways they could be swapped around to improve cohesion and the overall message. this is what i fucking do.
okay so. what would an explanation for roxas-as-ventus look like? pretty simple, really. for kingdom hearts, anyway. sora stabs himself, yeeting out kairi’s heart, his own, a “copy” of himself in the usual form of a nobody, AND ventus’s heart. ventus and the copy wake up in the same body, ventus with amnesia (again) and only able to draw upon the vague memories that would have allowed sora’s nobody to form a consciousness, if it weren’t for ventus’s already formed presence to take command.
and then we have xion. designed to draw out the memories of sora within “roxas” and make them her own. which she does. and as a result, in this situation, xion would be the closest approximation of sora’s “proper” nobody. why is she a girl? uhhhh she’s trans, duh. we fucking been knew. why does she look like kairi to the few people who actually believe in her as a person enough to see her preferred form? that’s the female face most present in sora’s memory.
i want to stress that this alone would change effectively fuck all about kh2 or days. i mean, i personally would let xion unwillingly win that final battle and take roxas’s place as sora’s nobody- and i did literally write that specific AU concept out as a full fic- but really, no changes are necessary until kh3, and even then, not many. hell, the “i am me, nobody else” exchange could still happen, given as ventus-as-roxas would 1. still be entirely correct and 2. already have sora’s memories back at that point.
so what does this accomplish? well, let’s see. in kh appearance is tied strongly to identity, and it’s pretty fucking weird for these two characters to be identical and it to pass with only minor comment. you’d have ventus-as-roxas’s arc mean one thing, and xion’s mean another, whereas now xion’s arc is basically roxas’s again but bass boosted and with a trans flag palette. honestly, just give that set of themes to xion, she does it way better. it’d dramatically increase the ties between the various trios, giving them more reasons to interact and care about each other. ventus would have someone to interact with on his level, who knew him as himself rather than as aqua and terra’s wayward little brother.
the only thing we’d lose in this exchange would be… rule of cool dual-wielding roxas ex machina in kh3. which. is not a great loss. just give ventus oathkeeper the moment he remembers being roxas and have xion get oblivion the moment she remembers herself, and call it a fucking day.
again, i get why this is not what happened, but i maintain that it would notably improve the story had it happened. point is if kh ever gets remade somehow put me on the writing team please i got this shit on lock
#okay this time i’m doing it lowkey on purpose#talking about a fic of mine#but indirectly#and i DID genuinely have the random urge to talk about this#it’d just work so much better dammit#kingdom hearts
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