linney, she/they/he, adult (pls no minors), grad student so assume i'm suffering but having a good time
dragon age. origins, awakening, & da2 primarily. always asking hey where's zevran. what's he doing. early modern vibes and by vibes i do mean vibes. what if i apply a bunch of otherwise usually fun but not esp practical info into helping a faux-medieval/renaissance setting make a little more sense to me specifically. ask me abt my playlists if u enjoy the shawm. ask me abt shakespeare/early modern english theatre if u want a new friend.
i am shy but friendly. house-trained!
ao3 here
fic tag here
will eventually compile some info abt ocs but for now:
my main girl is cat cousland, a walking anxiety disorder who is having a bad time. an autism diagnosis would not save her but it would make her brother go ohhhhhhhh wow.
my hawke is an andersmancer but more importantly, bethany is there (: ask me abt fenbelathany.
if you're here bc of my leandra posts. idk welcome and i'm sorry ig.
the thing is i knowwwww ppl would be boring abt del bc she resents the hell out of carver and does not forgive him over the course of the game. 'but that's not MY fault' is on all the posts talking abt this. 'actually it's aveline's for not letting him join the guard!!!!'
as for del, she is a hawke sibling companion that doesn't leave in act 1, but she will leave after leandra is murdered regardless of approval. similarly to isabela, she's back by act 3. obv you cannot romance her as hawke, but if you don't romance anders, they get together in a vague way. he still doesn't tell her abt the chantry explosion.
if bethany is taken to the circle, you will never get higher than 50% approval, but she'll still be available for quests. she frequently undermines you in conversations and bringing her along will sometimes guarantee combat
if carver joins the templars, she becomes an npc in anders' clinic with a limited number of barks if you try to talk to her (but she can be a companion for either dlc)
she will show up before the chantry explosion regardless of whether or not she's in the party
if you side w the templars or execute anders, you will have to kill her, and before you succeed, she will give you a permanent scar across your face that ends up being the hawke blood swipe
varric's nickname for her is 'hammer' and he describes her as hotheaded, stubborn, and not v bright in dai
her 'questioning beliefs' quests are all abt malcolm and finding pieces of evidence that indicate he was not an uncomplicated hero and then handling those revelations rly badly. you have to be careful not to play legacy w her as companion before act 3, otherwise she will leave and not return until the final battle. if you complete legacy without her, there will be a cutscene where she asks you what you learned, and the only dialogue options you have are lies.
i've talked myself into this. cat joining the wardens against her brother's wishes bc she wants to reassert agency over her life and body and ends up in a decade-long will they-won't they w an orlesian warden-commander..............................navigating the cousland family warden history while having incredibly ill-advised sex w an orlesian when her parents famously fought against the orlesian occupation of ferelden.....................i am now for real on tumblr saying I COULD MAKE THIS WORK
i think you can come across cat in the Torture Dungeons in rescue the queen, and it's both a miracle that she's alive and also the implications are bad, and eamon just straight up tells you that you can't tactically unite the cousland-theirin families bc cat is no longer a virgin and would be better off being sent to an abbey. if you try to do it anyway, you have to pass a somewhat difficult coercion check to get alistair on board, and even then, when you announce it at the landsmeet, anora intervenes and says if that's the game, then she's going to marry alistair, and you incur a MASSIVE approval drop from alistair, worse than if you just told him to marry anora from the jump.
she gets a little epilogue slide that says she helps fergus rebuild highever and becomes an accomplished diplomat. no mention of her in da2 but fergus will make a neutral mention of her in his war table quest in dai.
you CAN flirt w cat in origins but the only thing that rly distinguishes just upping her approval from being on the romance route is that her little combat barks when your character goes down get markedly more panicked. it's sort of not worth it bc the game is essentially over by then.
actually, lmao, if you flirt w cat, it prompts alistair to tell you that wardens are infertile, but if you try to ask cat to sleep w you, every time you pick that dialogue option (it is repeatable and can be spammed for +1 approval), your dog interrupts.
maybe there is an amusing additional dialogue option at the end game party where you can choose that option one last time, and you get more than three words into it!!!! but then fergus interrupts.
HOWEVER, if u flirted w cat during origins, and if you either didn't romance anyone else or broke it off w your love interest, you CAN romance her in awakening. she and oghren will both be there at the start and will both take the joining. nobody ever actually romances her bc nathaniel disapproves catastrophically unless you time it exactly right, but it makes it impossible for you to be more than lukewarm w him without having a guide pulled up. the guide is a single tumblr post from 2010 from a deactivated account.
i think, tho, no matter what, you have to recruit cat to the wardens in awakening, and no matter what, fergus shows up spitting mad to ream both you and her out. in a perfect world, he interrupts esmerelle's conspiracy and helps you fight the crows and once it's over, he says WELL I'M STILL NOT HAPPY but lets it go.
the lore discrepancy between her going back to highever and becoming a diplomat vs being in the wardens is unresolved. there's a blade you can pick up in datv w a codex entry that inexplicably seems to reference her, but it doesn't use her name.
During this quest, if playing as a Human Noble and confronting Rendon Howe, Howe will taunt the Warden that they've lost. Choosing either of the options:
1. [Intimidate] I know your game. No shadows, no lies. Just you and me.
2. [Persuade] You lie, Howe. To yourself most of all. I am a Grey Warden!
and then succeeding in either intimidating or persuading Howe will net (+6) approval
this is morrigan's approval btw. you get a similar (if not the same? unsure) amount of approval from zevran if you succeed the intimidation/persuasion check. do you get why i want to fucking lose it every day of my life.
tagged for wip wednesday by @atiya-nagrano (it's now wip saturday, whoops)!
Here's some stuff about jowan and morrigan and negotiating the dark ritual!! I've got to work on this more, I want to get to Lily so badly.
I'm so behind on the TL that I'm not tagging anybody, but if you wanna share, please tag me!!! I'm always interested!
“I—you want this to be a secret?” He’s—it’s not like he’s unaccustomed to holding secrets, but none of his secrets have ever bore out well for him. Secrecy has been his worst enemy for quite some time. Everything always spills out at the most inopportune moment anyway.
“You think Alistair or Wynne would be comfortable with blood magic? Old magic? Even in the name of saving their own hides? They are rigidly dogmatic, surely you comprehend that much.” she asks, sharply.
“No, but Vellia…”
Morrigan shudders and draws close to him, her fingernails digging into his shoulders as she grabs him, with wild strength. “She mustn’t know, Jowan. It would place her in grave danger, one that she must not face, not as she is. I trust only you in this matter. Do you underst—”
“Okay, okay!” he agrees, hastily, feeling his cheeks flush at her proximity, the sharp, earthy smell of elfroot and deathroot, the ways he can see the chapped skin on her lips unhidden by her usual dark lipstain, “So. What…what does the ritual entail, anyway? Other than sex…and blood…”
Morrigan looks at him for a long moment, as if judging his trustworthiness. Whatever she sees in his eyes seems to reassure her, and her grasp on him loosens, thankfully. She brushes herself off slightly, and turns to the fire, to regain her composure. There’s a long beat, in which Jowan’s stomach grumbles, embarrassingly. He shovels a slice of cheese and bread into his mouth with a swiftness he hadn’t been capable of since he was fifteen and constantly ravenous, and almost chokes as the bread hits the back of his throat. He chokes quietly at least, not managing to spit all his food out, as he bends over in two, in agony, eyes watering. He feels his cheeks burn now, with hot, piercing embarrassment. Morrigan doesn’t seem to have noticed, thankfully, pensive as she is, gazing into the fire.
“What I propose is this,” she says, her voice smooth, as Jowan attempts to quietly open his mouth and drink from his waterflask without making even more of a mess of himself, “Lay with me tonight, fresh as you are from the Joining ritual. From our own joining, a child will be conceived,” And Jowan feels a weird twist in his chest as she explains that. But he’d thought—he’d banished such possibilities from his head when Vellia had explained the downsides of Wardenhood. The infertility—he’d accepted it. Fatherhood had never been something mages could aspire to anyway. But now—what, Morrigan thinks it could be achieved through blood magic?
“The child will bear the Taint, and when the archdemon is slain, its essence will seek the child like a beacon. At this early stage, the child can absorb the essence and not perish. The archdemon is still destroyed, and yet, no Grey Warden must die in the process.” She finishes, with the flourish of her hands, as she finally turns to face him.
Jowan places down his waterflask, and frowns as he thinks over this. He’s never been—the senior enchanters always criticized his inability to think ahead, to think of the consequences. He’s been trying more lately. It’s somehow easier, surrounded by people like Vellia and Leliana, whose vision stretches far into the future. “The baby absorbs the archdemon and the Taint? Wouldn’t it become a darkspawn?”
“No. Just as you do not become a darkspawn when you become a Grey Warden. It will be…something different. It will be born with the soul of an old God.” And her eyes glint at this, terribly triumphant at the mere thought, and for a moment, Jowan finds himself swept along in that current of thought.
“An Old God’s soul…” Jowan says, wondrously, popping a grape into his mouth, “But could a human body even take that sort of power? The magisters were driven mad by the mere whispers of the Old Gods, they say…” The soul of an old God in the body of a human…what would that even mean? Would the child have the magical strength of an Old God? Would it…remember the past, the old ancient past? What things it might be able to tell them if it could remember the days before Andraste, before even the Imperium! But, could that even be possible? Could an old dragon even truly be compatible with a human baby?
“I did not think you were so shallow as to believe the Old Gods were as evil as your Chantry doctrine says. The Old Gods were powerful. Nothing more, nothing less. Power itself, does not drive one to madness. Besides, the child will merely hold the essence of that powerful, ancient soul. Flemeth did not think a mere fraction of their power would leave the child vulnerable to the forces that once corrupted the Old Gods. Neither do I.”
Jowan nods, thoughtfully. It made sense. The Grey Wardens would be killing the archdemon, after all. Death was death—something had to be lost in death, even if the archdemon could jump through the bodies of the darkspawn freely. Moreover, the archdemon was a corrupted, withered version of the Old Gods anyway. It was already weakened and shattered. It made sense that only a fraction of the Old God could be kept. He sighs, in disappointment, and at her quizzical look, tells her his musings.
She smiles back at him, strangely earnest. “I knew you would understand,” she says, and her voice is almost gentle, a timbre he had heard only once from her before, as they had knelt next to Vellia’s form in the Deep Roads, weak and pale from Jowan pulling all of the lyrium from her veins, and she had told Vellia that she would live yet, despite the pain and the shame. “Some things are worth preserving in this world. It is why I am so insistent on this path forward.”
Jowan feels a lump in his throat, and he turns away, sharply, so he does not have to stare at her beautiful, piercing, amber eyes. He thinks he would have jumped at the chance to do this earlier. If she’d asked him in Soldiers’ Peak, if she’d asked him in Orzammar, hell, if she’d asked him that one night after they had descended from the Temple of Sacred Ashes, he would have agreed in a heartbeat. Jowan had functioning eyes and the libido of a normal young man. Morrigan was stunningly attractive, and he was one of three people she would even tolerate, something he took a deep, furtive pride in. If she had asked him to sleep with her, even without the pretense of this ritual, he would have stumbled over himself to do it, to be of use to her in some way, to repay her for her offhanded kindnesses. He might have convinced himself that he loved her, and he would have done anything for her.
He would have clung to the thought of living on, back then too. Of there being some clever, serendipitous way to get everything he desired. But he knows now. Somebody always gets hurt. There are no conundrums that can be solved by clever schemes and ancient magic rituals. There is always a cost, always a price. Lily and Vellia had paid the price for Jowan’s escape from the Tower. The people of Redcliffe had paid the price for Jowan’s attempt to poison the Arl. Somewhere in Denerim, a woman cries over her lost baby, paying the price for a political scheme to keep the peace of Ferelden. Somebody always suffers.
He had been blind to that suffering until the Temple of Sacred Ashes had opened his eyes to it.
“I can’t.” he says, simply, “It’s not—it sounds beautiful. Truly. But I can’t. I’ve got to see it through.”
“See what through?” she demands, her voice cracking.
“I’ve got to do it. I’m supposed to die killing the archdemon. I do it and I’ll be—forgiven. I’ll be cleansed of my sins.” He tells her, simply, summoning his resolve, shoving away that tiny, cowardly part of him that’s screaming at the void of death, “I’ll—I told you earlier today. I’ve always figured it out too late, but I get it now. I understand. It’s my purpose. I’m supposed to die here.”
Morrigan growls, low and frustrated, and she grips him again, tightly, by the shoulders. “I heard you uttering that moronic nonsense before—but I had imagined you were simply attempting to spare their lives, out of love. I’m telling you—nobody has to die!”
“And I’m telling you that I do.” Jowan replies, jutting out his jaw, in determination, “It’s—for what other purpose has the Maker spared me until now?”
“There is no Maker!” she cries, sharply and shrilly, “I thought we were—in agreement about that.” Briefly, she looks almost injured, before it is replaced with sneering discontent, “We both know that those who invoke the Maker at every turn do so because they are snivelling cowards who cannot face the real world as it is. Don’t tell me after years of sensibility, you’ve decided to succumb to their blithering nonsense now?”
fleshing out my warden's backstory... Lefei has scars from his ice/shock powers kind of a mix between frost patterns and scars from a lightning strike! more about it under cut (and baby Lefei sketch)
Lefei doesn't remember his childhood at all, all his earlier memories are already in the circle. but! I will tell you that he was taken to the circle because he was very proficient in ice and lightning magic, so much it was uncontrollable by him alone and it had done damage to his body already
his first few weeks in the circle were with the high enchanters, specifically with the spirit healers, and the first spirit healer to actually make progress with treating him and making it safer for him to do magic was Wynne! so they met before the game plot :]
the high enchanters were able to make it so that his magic didn't hurt him, but the scars remained, as an adult Lefei always hid his scars because it felt like a reminder of his destructive nature, something that almost made the circle turn him tranquil (but Wynne was the mage to make the decision against it! she saw potential in Lefei and was very happy when he passed his harrowing)
this overall is something that maybe if Lefei was a companion, it would be the thing he reveals to the player if he trusts them, so in my canon it is something he reveals to his companion as the plot develops
first Morrigan sees the scars when Lefei and Alistair are getting healed at Flemeth's hut, because before that he was very careful not to show more skin than he needed to, ofcourse he didn't tell her much at first and only confided in her about his past when they became closer
next was Alistair, and he was the first person Lefei really confided in, their relationship is very close, being the last two grey wardens, but still Lefei explained his past in parts, sharing little by little as the two became good friends
the most important one is Zevran, Lefei only showed his scars during their first night together but he didn't explain them, Zevran thought it's too personal to get into and only pestered Lefei about it after a couple of nights, again, Lefei revealed his past in parts, but Zevran was the second person (after Alistair) who Lefei let touch his bare skin
I'll tell more at a later time but this is what I wanted to share so far :] thank you to whoever read this far!
when I was drawing young Lefei I was like shiiiiit this is like frozen isn't it😭😭
I have a thing I wanna sketch out and post with a bit of writing next :3
if I have any problems with the lore pls don't tell me yet, I only played origins and awakening at the time of this post!!
i think tbh where boy faltered is that it forgot sander is a sex worker, or if it didn't, it was much, much too subtle abt it. sander is a little bit silly and a little bit vain and wildly too reliant on his ability to talk his way in and out of situations, but maybe idk, his discomfort around the concept of taking someone's virginity might be that he just has a fundamentally different understanding of sex rather than joan being an Exception. like obv she's an exception and it's v sweet, but idk.
also yes penelope rich is hot and charismatic, but i wanted a lot more inner turmoil about what it would mean to give up the only good pathway, or what seems like the only good pathway, towards supporting a family without having to be a sex worker anymore.
i don't mind the YA vibes, i think silly sex scenes are exactly that, and who cares if joan is london's favorite princess etc. sander's selfishness sits side-by-side w how little he's been able to be selfish for himself, and that's more interesting than him being reformed.
that said, i think joan's ingenuity at the end was just. slightly too much in the sense that she's just awfully in control, which undermines the tension. and the emotional implications of what was happening were maybe less compelling bc sander gets shortchanged a little bit having no choice but to be a prop in a play. a swoon was good, but i think him not seeing joan's signal and not comprehending at all what the larger plan was but joan knowing him well enough that she can count on his reaction and him having exactly the kind of honest reaction she was counting on would have sold me.
historical novel used the term 'blind spot.' OED says it wasn't rly in use until the 19th century. this is the first time in almost 12 hours of this audiobook that i've gone hey that doesn't sound right. that's incredible. i love that this main character is out-mary suing francis bacon.
it didn't stick the landing for me but tbh i'm so tickled that there's a YA novel that is playing around with those things that i will forgive this book for the terrible sin of not being exactly what i would write
like the thing is you're gonna get away w a lot if you include scenes like this:
'what's this about?' heminges demanded as he entered the steaming tiring house full of half-dressed men. to his left, augie phillips (shirt, stockings breeches) grasped sander cooke (linen shift) by the neck; to his right, dick burbage (linen shirt and nothing else) glowered like an angry gcd. will shakespeare, between them with arms placidly outstretched, was the only one fully clothed and breathing calmly.
'the brat lunged at me,' burbage said.
'he insulted joan,' sander snapped, wriggling his shoulders against phillips's grip.
'it wasn't an insult, sweetheart, it was a question,' burbage said.
'it was a question asked in a particular tone,' shakespeare amended, to heminges. 'sander objected to the tone.'
'sander objected to everything,' sander clarified angrily.
historical novel used the term 'blind spot.' OED says it wasn't rly in use until the 19th century. this is the first time in almost 12 hours of this audiobook that i've gone hey that doesn't sound right. that's incredible. i love that this main character is out-mary suing francis bacon.
it didn't stick the landing for me but tbh i'm so tickled that there's a YA novel that is playing around with those things that i will forgive this book for the terrible sin of not being exactly what i would write
no big deal or anything (huge deal, vibrating out of my skeleton) but i got a 75 on the essay i cared most abt and my marker was the coolest professor in the program and the other essay that's been graded did prompt another marker to fuss at me for smth that i don't feel bad abt (if the ppl who invented xyz concept can't define what it is, i'm not gonna try!!! and also yes i should be marked down for that) BUT he called my writing 'beguiling' (:
wait.............WAIT...........................hal fang henry v...........................hero much ado abt nothing.....................................THAISHA THAISA PERICLES?
