Finian's Ghost @finiansghost - Tumblr Blog

Twenty years ago Lena was someone else. She put that life behind her, while the old gang dropped like flies and muttered about curses. Now the stranger at the centre of it all comes walking out from under the hills and back into her life.

(part 1 of 4)

finiansghost

Part II. Lena and Fian meet again, in more sober context.

finiansghost

Part III: the fox. Third meeting, and this time it's actually deliberate.

finiansghost

Part IV: the green chapel. Confessions and conclusions.

#at the third fall grace #original fic #original writing

tboymordred

Journey to Avalon

alt ver under the cut

inkstaindusk

knight/lord ships are like. what if i would die for you. what if i wanted you to live for me. what if i wanted to touch you but could only be satisfied with being near you. what if i could touch you but only through the safety of our gloves. what if i couldn’t stop thinking about you right next to me. what if i bloodied my hands for you and never looked back at the wreckage. what then

inkstaindusk

what if i wasn’t allowed to love you. what if i loved you anyway. what if you knew and i knew but we wouldn’t dare to take that step. what if we made meaningful eye contact as i knelt at your feet and devoted my whole being to you. what if i whispered your name for only you to hear

inkstaindusk

“my lord” is actually something that can be so personal

inkstaindusk

what if i said “my lord” but i actually meant “my love”

#yeah that's like quite a lot of the vibe here

myteaplace

by Keith Perelli

#The Marshwood

thisworld1

by Japanese photographer みつ®︎ / Mitsuhide Mori @mikkun_m

#the marshwood

deer-knight

they/them

through the coldest days and the longest nights, we keep on fighting.

[image description: four photos of op standing outside in a snowy forest. op is a slim 20s white person with very long wavy brown hair worn loose, with two braids tied back from either side. they wear layers of grey and brown wool with a shirt of mail, spaulders, and a wide leather belt with tassets. they wear a white fur mantle and a black leather gorget, mostly covered by a dark brown scarf. in the first photo they are in the middle of unsheathing an arming sword from their hip, which they hold in the three subsequent photos. end image description.]

finiansghost

@purple-hel remind me to come back and talk more about arms & armour in context of Summerchild etc. at a later point when I have chewed through my research, I have a gut feeling that Ceriog gear in general (and swords in particular) are based on an earlier pattern than OP's, but I've not got any actual references to back that up with... :D

(Also OP has excellent costuming and quite possibly some supernatural ability to keep their hair out of their mail-shirt - mine has a similar texture from the look of it, and was always terrible for getting caught in the bloody rings.)

#to arms

So I know I said I was going to do Summerchild out-takes with the bingo card, but you see, there was a dailyprompt prompt 'Paper thin masquerade', and the top-left bingo was the nine/fire combination, which they describe as 'Nine of Bows - Respect' and which I would normally read as the yearning for things to make sense or to happen in their proper season.

So instead, here's Rob Nyren, realising the Guenefyn stranger in the room isn't somebody's honey-trap pawn, she's the raparee he's been strategising against for a decade or so.

Ten short-years in Caer Guen notwithstanding, Carycoll is Rob Nyren's home ground, not hers, and that lends him certain advantages. The fact that he hasn't slept well in weeks is probably a disadvantage, but at least it's one he's used to working with.

First and foremost, he has his sister, who is as reliable an intelligencer here as Generyn is in Caer Guen. Different methods, he profoundly hopes. But Rhosyn has met the woman calling herself Hazel, and relayed her impressions: astute, politically-aware, occasionally blankly wrong-footed by the reality of the Ceriog in their own country. Might be some House's disposable daughter, might be bait in a trap, almost certainly not what she seems.

So he's forewarned, and forearmed with a letter which he knows is a trap, and which he means to use to set a less-lethal trap in his turn. He's confident in his ability to guide his king's hand; sometimes it's been harder not to; he's watching her.

He watches her see the same trap he sees, and hold her tongue. Watches her glance at the map like one who knows the land beneath. Baits her into confirming his warning, to see what words she chooses. Doesn't have to look directly at her to watch from the corner of his eye as he plays his hand. Names himself as the Free named him, and waits.

He's not expecting the Maid of the Hills to throw her cards on the table quite that clearly. Or perhaps it's only clear to him. He knows the mind behind that plan, that baits and manipulates and manouvres the opponent exactly where she wants them -

- and he's been wondering about Oisin's sudden recklessness. If his erstwhile partner is here, not whispering strategy in his ear, then a great deal of things suddenly make a great deal of sense.

She's sharp, she's bitter, she's an open book when she speaks of peace, and she always deserved more credit than the Free would give her. He can work with that.

#writing #origfic #maid of the hills #as usual he could do with three square meals and a good night's sleep #maybe he is being just a *little* bit lancelot here

From https://dailyprompt.dreamwidth.org/ prompt 'back to the new normal' - a little bit of ordinary life on Carycoll. Mill-wheel as an unintended metaphor for turning seasons. The morning after Iestyn dies, Agnes the brewer goes out with a boat-hook to break the ice on the mill-pond, only to find the water is clear even to the dead-reed margins. Still a bitter bite in the air.

The work will not wait. Not for the death of a king, not for hope, not for mercy to send that whispered tomorrow, and not for the two or three branches of the levy sleeping in the old tithe-barn they use as a malt and grain store.

Agnes saw twelve ordinary winters come to spring before this last; eighty-seven short-years or seventeen long. She and her beloved craft-sister have walked fearless among the monsters of a Frost-king's winter; to trifle with a brewer is to drink sour ale the rest of your days. Levied farmers and craftsmen, armed though they may be, give her no pause.

A handful of them are already awake when she comes with her barrow, and the rest have had sense not to sleep beneath the hoist. The most trouble she has is that these brawny young men are shamed to sit idle while a woman their grandmothers' age moves malt-sacks singlehanded; she compromises by letting one of them work the winch and another wheel the barrow back to the mill.

The sky's bright, and the air is still; the mill-race is clear, the sluice opens freely, the mill grinds slow, and perhaps now there is time for hope after all.

#writing #origfic #summerchild