Adding on to the proud twenty year long tradition of super fucked up Dark Brotherhood oc centric fics. You know it's good when the 20 year age gap is only the fourth or fifth most fucked up thing about the ship dynamic.
Joanelle is so ridiculously fun to write, she's such a bitch and everyone just has to deal with it because she's the only one deranged enough to run into the Deadlands bare foot in prison rags AND come back out with a bag of daedra carcasses. That she fully intends to turn into Daedric armor, reachfolk style.
She's reachfolk, but lives her life in a full time Breton cosplay to avoid the association (and the racism that comes with) but she fails, because despite the way she hasn't been in Skyrim, let alone the Reach, in 16 years, her accent is a dead giveaway.
She's a witch hunter, but everyone she mentions it to gets confused. Because to reachfolk, a witch hunter is not a hunter of witches, but a Witch That Hunts.
She was in the imperial city dungeon because she got caught manufacturing and distributing dangerously potent skooma laced with void salts. From the Arcane University, where she'd been working at the time. Her shitty turbo-skooma killed like seven people before she was caught.
She is transgender, and she kills people with lightning for misgendering her. It's okay, she has enough gold to pay the bounty, so she can do this as many times as is necessary.
When she first met the emperor, she was shackled completely. Muzzle and everything. The guards did NOT want to risk Joanelle breaking out with magic.
She has personal beef with the Dark Brotherhood, as five people have called out contracts on her, and five perfectly good assassins have been wasted. The acting Listener had to put out an official order that boiled down to "No more contracts on this lady". Which was super disappointing to Gogron, he'd been waiting for his turn to take a crack at killing Edwene.
Three canon divergent facts about my HoK Joanelle, re: the shivering isles.
One: Sheogorath knew exactly who she was before she showed up. She was the latest mortal to receive the Wabbajack, after all. He just pretended not to because he'd noticed that Joanelle is an insane egoist who thrives on being the most impressive person in any room. Playing stupid was an excellent way to rile her up, make her more eager to prove herself as the valiant, infallible hero she believes herself to be. It works, though. Joanelle goes on a whole "Don't you know who I am?!" rant at the God of Madness. Haskill's in on this ribbing, btw.
Two: Joanelle technically did not have to kill the Gatekeeper. She could have just walked on in, as she'd already been blessed by the mad god. She killed the Gatekeeper anyway, because she heard that it was indestructible and took that as a challenge.
Three: After everything is said and done, Joanelle's name is still wiped from history, specifically in response to her starting violent riots across Cyrodiil and killing a Count and Countess. Later, like, around Skyrim-time later, Joanelle has become the TES equivalent to like, Bloody Mary. Nobody mentions her by name because they think that'll attract her spirit's attention. Bored children try to summon her at sleepovers. (Which is pretty wild, but Joanelle IS a safer summon than your average Dremora. She's far less likely to kill you for fun, she just wants a break from her job in the Isles)
hiii i got a little insane over haskills characterization in the other elder scrolls games / material. teehee
rambling abt these ^ quotes under the cut (long). also im not that serious abt any of this tbh im just glad haskill appeared in any other elder scrolls material at all LOL
OKAY. okay. about these quotes. idk why other TES media does this, but in these quotes from elder scrolls legends + the interview with haskill it seems like the writers are pushing to give the impression that haskill slightly resents or is even indifferent to his position / the isles / sheogorath ?? (unless haskill is being a little bit more flippant or hyperbolic than usual...?) which is characterization that is NOT what i got from playing oblivion at all skdskdjfn
like... when i played oblivion i thought it was very clear that haskill prefers to be in the isles, serving sheogorath, more than anywhere else. (<- i think this is actually the reason he's technically "mad" even tho he seems sane outwardly. if you enjoy being among madmen it probably means you're mad yourself ykwim). i think haskill does like the isles, his ass is just reserved abt it, like he is about everything... yknow just like jeeves, whose character he's been compared to lmao:)
i think unfortunately some writers take his annoyance with the player and his slight second thoughts about sheogorath's plan in oblivion, and mistakenly assume that he's just annoyed at his whole position. haskill does have his moments of exasperation, but the thing is it's usually only exasperation and it never verges into anger or bitterness or resentment like the top quotes seem to indicate. for example, haskill says this abt his idea of you mantling sheo / the clowns debacle:
^ This quote is a good reference point for haskill's view on sheo bc its pretty much the most critical-of-sheogorath quote from oblivion i can recall, and it tells us a lot of things. in this quote he expresses some exasperation about the clown idea (because he's a prissy bitch who doesn't want to get his outfit dirty /affectionate) and shows some apprehension about one of his lord's ideas (because it involves you, and haskill doesnt like you). but these 2 points he has beef with aren't really reflective of sheo himself but of other issues - ie he doesn't directly question sheogorath. and IN THE END Haskill defers to sheo's judgement because haskill trusts him and values sheo's ideas. in all of his oblivion dialogue, this is the most critical toward sheogorath he gets, and he never outright insults or shows resentment toward him or the isles like in the above quotes bc his loyalty to sheogorath eclipses it
on the contrary (and i dont know why the writers for non-oblivion elder scrolls content dont seem to see this??), theres so much evidence that haskill actually does, you know,,, enjoy being in the isles. here are just some snippets i can think of:
"the isles are hardly a place for anyone, really" <- i BEG to differ, Haskill likes it here, he likes listening to prisoners being tortured in xedillian, he likes wearing his ridiculous frilly high collar outfit emblematic of the fashions of the isles, he doesn't care about morality and it suits him just fine that it doesn't matter here!! (the end quote might be him being a little facetious about relmyna but to be honest i wouldn't be surprised if he thought decency and morality WERE provincial notions because he certainly has no problem killing people lmao). and again, to enjoy doing these things / being around madmen probably says something abt haskill being mad himself. lol
not to mention he likes a bit of joking around. which i imagine sheo does a whole lot. when YOU rib him a little he says this:
his derision in the first bit i think indicates, "i cant believe you would joke around at a time like this," and the upturning of the "very good" i think indicates, "it was a good joke / maybe they could mantle sheo after all". he's not all dour - he appreciates a good joke, especially from (someone who's about to become) his Lord!!
and going a little deeper into haskill actually liking the isles... haskill clearly holds what sheogorath and the isles represent (chaos, free will, individuality) very highly. a good example of this is when you ask him about dyus, and he gives this snarky reply:
^ he says this with such VITRIOL its so funny :p and the amount of disdain in this line indicates (to me) a real conviction in his belief in the free will, chaos etc that sheogorath represents.
this is why i dont think this quote makes sense. "i cant remember why i put up with [sheogorath]" <- haskill wouldnt say this bc he understands fully why he puts up w sheogorath, and his own convictions in sheo that lead him to keep doing it, and even if this quote is him being hyperbolic, i dont think he'd joke about his faith in sheogorath like that because, yk, one of his characteristics is that he's extremely loyal, and moreover he never said anything to this effect in oblivion sdkjskdjs
him having a strong belief in what sheogorath / the isles represent is also evidenced by the language haskill uses when talking about sheo. whenever haskill mentions him, there is an element of poetry and respect to his words that shows that haskill thinks about him highly at the very least:
^ haskill constantly stresses sheogorath's intrinsic unknowableness and power and unique wisdom in a way that feels very respectful. saying "to attempt to fathom [sheogorath's will] is a foolish endeavor" shows that he knows there are unexplainable aspects to sheogorath that he takes note of, respects, and knowingly keeps his distance from... he gets sheogorath and reveres him (at least more than most others or the HoK). in these quotes especially, it feels a bit like hes trying to illustrate how impressive sheogorath is to the HoK, hyping up his boyfriend if you would. who said that.
and combined with this respect is (i believe!!!!) a deep care. he is invested in the isles and sheo and wants to help them out of more than just duty. he gets fearful and even loses his composure at some points in the story when sheo/the isles are threatened which i think indicates that he deeply cares for them both!!:
i think this is a care that, combined with the respect he has for sheo, makes it really unlikely for him to get more than exasperated with his behavior and verge into resentfulness. i dont think anyone truly understands sheogorath, not even haskill, but haskill respects sheo as a god, and also gets him in a more familiar/personal way i think - like the way that a cat owner loves their cat but gets exasperated with it when it gets its head stuck in a tissue box. he doesn't angry or anything because he understands that it's the cat's nature to get stuck in the tissue box / sheo's nature to be wild and unpredictable and messy. (the difference being that sheogorath is an all-powerful god cat..... do u see my vision???)
anyway this got crazy long JHDSHFSD... to finish i wanted to look at this extra bit of characterization i found that was wild to me:
^ like. i truly dont get where they got THIS characterization LMAO sheo constantly calls haskill faithful and smart and knowledgeable in oblivion, he practically begs you to summon haskill for help, hyping up his boyfriend so to speak, they care for each other your honor so of COURSE sheo trusts haskill to do his job. what are the legends writers doing in there!!
do you think that a certain genre of queer person is so obsessively weird about pride flag discourse becuase their flags fill the gaping hole in their personality where a hogwarts house used to be
