✧

LIGHTS OUT, EYES CLOSED .

[hallowleaf]

✧ HALLOWLEAF :

selective multimuse featuring characters from BALDUR'S GATE 3. spoilers abound!

GUIDELINES / MUSELIST

[hallowleaf]

writing this isobel/aylin fic really makes me want to pick up both isobel and jaheira but i have to beat myself with a stick before i take on more responsibility zzz

[griefology]

nocturne can overlook the snotty wrist, in fact. actually, she approaches with the clean little cloth square she keeps tucked against her bosom, because the thing about pain was it was always felt, here. grief was on no backorder, always plenty to feel. to acknowledge. sometimes, and nocturne knows this is forbidden, but she wonders if it's worth it. if these feelings of trying your hardest for minimal approval was worth it.

how many were like her, like shadowheart ? how many just ached to be seen ? valued ?

❝ i know, ❞ nocturne soothes, offering the cloth as some sort of peace offering. some sort of warmth in the cold of these walls. ❝ if anyone sees how hard you work, and how much you put in, you know it's me. and if it were up to me, you'd be — well. anything you wanted, shadowheart. ❞ earnest honestly, the support of a beloved friend. it isn't up to nocturne, unfortunately. ❝ if it's not out of your system, that's okay too. i think we've done enough studying, and training, for the day. we could do something [ . . . ] nicer, instead. would that make you feel better ? ❞

[hallowleaf]

Shadowheart gives one final sniff, gratuitous and far louder than anything the Mistress of the Night would tolerate, before accepting the handkerchief Nocturne offers with a wobbly little smile. Noct is good like that. Perhaps about the only person in the entire clergy who hasn't chastised her for the human mistake of, well — being a normal person who makes mundane missteps.

Being around the Mother Superior makes her feel as though she's walking with a leash threatening to yank her back so fast she'll break her neck. Around the other initiates (and yes, those who'd once been her peers but have since graduated while she still continues to languish in the unknown) she feels as though she is the obvious outcast. Something to be laughed at, her failures celebrated in jeers. Nocturne, in all her gentle understanding, makes it so much easier to bear.

The Mother Superior had once claimed Nocturne too gentle to employ Shar's will, but — is that really so wrong? She is not so sure that Shar would disapprove. Cruelty is not felt without kindness to balance it out, after all. Gods, doesn't Shadowheart know this story well.

She does not think she'll ever be able to pay her back for these little kindnesses, not in a million lifetimes. So, Shadowheart takes it upon herself to protect her. It's the only thing she can do, but she'll do it to her own death if necessary.

"You're really sweet," Shadowheart says, which is meant to sound genuine and cool but it comes out a bit warbly and eager. Nightsinger above, she must sound like a total dork. "If I could be anything in the world right now, I'd be, mm... A dragon, maybe. It would be nice to do nothing but sit on a fat pile of gold all day. Barring that, a Dark Justiciar — of course. What did you have in mind?"

[hallowleaf]

oh tumblr straight up not giving me notifications for... anything now, actually :') if you've given me a reply or something in the past 2 or so days feel free to im me over tumblr. you can ask for my discord if you'd really like. aieee!

[hallowleaf]

didn't mizora groom wyll or did i misunderstand

the dynamic between wyll and mizora is absolutely unhealthy but i wouldn't personally reduce it to just grooming. she took advantage of someone young and naive for her own gain and that's evil enough without attaching a sexual relationship to it. (not that i explicitly begrudge anyone who does see it that way, because we're all just here to try to add depth to our muses in various ways, but i just... don't.) liking characters that are evil doesn't exactly necessitate absolving them of their actions. a good chunk of the characters i muse are evil-aligned and i personally see value in writing characters who are evil. it gives writers who have muses that are ideologically opposed to those villains (or in, yes, toxic relationships with those characters) another avenue to express their muse — and most importantly, to do so optionally. if i did pick up someone like mizora, i wouldn't force people to write with her. anyone who does not agree with the above is more than free to block me for their own comfort.

[hallowleaf]

so consider the following: mizora— (I AM IMMEDIATELY TAKEN OUT BACK AND SHOT)

[holysworde-deactivated20230921]

𝖎 𝖆𝖒 𝖙𝖍𝖊 𝖘𝖜𝖔𝖗𝖉 {̳ 𝑶̳𝑭̳ 𝑮̳𝑶̳𝑫̳ }̳ . (cr.)

[hallowleaf]

i will always prefer a portrayal of a character that may not be accurate to the source material but is interesting over a portrayal that refuses to do interesting things as a result of adherence to canon. it's generally good form to think less, "am i writing a good portrayal?" and more "am i being interesting with what i write?" if you are engaging with your partner and having fun, that is infinitely more condusive to the spirit of 'good' roleplay than anything else imo. write first to have fun. have fun, and your portrayal will always be good.

[silksworn]

Iraestra laughs, for there is nothing else left to do. A jagged noise like the grinding of teeth. A wince, a catch of breath, when even that proves exertion enough to bloom pain anew. She feels almost small, chastised, for being seen so easily. Young, in a way that she has not in centuries. It is far from a sensation she relishes.

Minthara may more blade and shield than woman, yet she refuses to be Iraestra's to wield against herself. Iraestra is embittered by this realization. Even this she will be denied of then; to join her family and be felled by the same foe.

Resentment, rage, grief: these are all old bedfellows. So long has she made root for them within herself, thinking it better than the emptiness. She has filled her vessel to the brim with it, until her cup overfloweth. She hardly knows what else to carry inside of her.

"There is no recompense for the past." Her lip curls in disgust. It is good, to have something familiar to hold onto. "To end my own life — I am not some wretch so unable to face the truth that I will fall upon my own sword." Her voice gains strength where her body has little, the lingering edges of the fatalist's despondency burned away. "No. If you will not grant even this to me then I will continue to endure, as I always have. A survivor’s curse.”

She addresses Minthara now, instead of the cold indifference of the moon. In truth, are the two so very different? Iraestra turns to her and sees her severe face silvered by the moonlight, as if she has become its creature. An indulgent, fleeting whimsy, for Iraestra cannot imagine a lasting claim of any sort being cast upon the other woman. How utterly in possession of herself Minthara is; a trait that Iraestra might admire if she were to ever extend a generous thought towards her.

"Twice now I have found religion — thrice, if I am to count the charlatan fanaticism of the Absolute. Each has been as false as the last. There is no altar let to me that I would cast myself upon. The only faith left to me is this: if a god may die, they can also bleed. The Dead Three’s bloodletting will begin with their Chosen,” how she relishes the notion.

[hallowleaf]

Live, or die. At the end of the day, it matters not. Something she'd been told once, whispered in a much sweeter cadence by a pale shade of a woman. Something meant as a taunt prompting fatalism — oh, little spiderling, but you are mine to use, mine to discard! — but now used as a bulwark against life's piercing harshness. If Minthara must suffer life ( and suffer life she will, in endless repetition ) then it is better to be done on her own terms. Death, when it comes for her, will be delivered in the form of battle.

There is a hint of that assuredness in the new tone that Iraestra takes with her. And she speaks with such sudden conviction that it first makes Minthara wonder where she had managed to hide it, and then causes her to push away the wry sense of pride the words bring. She is not proud, and certainly not because Iraestra had found her spine only after Minthara refused to let her throw her life away. And yet...

Live, or die. She was not lying, not by any stretch of the imagination. Minthara could give far less than a bulette's maw of whether Iraestra longs to die or not. The duty Lolth had demanded she carry out so long ago had already been buried beneath a mountain of piety. House Oblodra, a whisper on the wind. But if Iraestra demands life... A life in service of tearing apart those who had misled her does not sound like a life entirely wasted.

Minthara, after all, is much of the same. Lolth does so love to cut Her children from the same cloth.

"Good," she says, soft in a way she does not intend, and the curtain descends. She forces herself rigid, her voice taking on a harsher, more impersonal tone. "You make a pretty speech; it remains to be seen if you are capable of carrying out your will."

A small moment passes, before Minthara rises to her feet. She takes it in; the silence of the world around them, the gentle, silver-scaled glow of the moon in a sky she cannot comprehend. Iraestra, determined — but for how long? There is more Minthara could say; bring herself down to Iraestra's level by relating her own desire to make the Chosen suffer for the transgressions she has suffered. Spill her rage in a course of words so inadequate she could choke on them.

But history is a foundation that Minthara is not so eager to tear away. Minthara is a Baenre, and Iraestra's name is obsolete. Feelings change, but the fundamental truths remain the same. Minthara's eyes narrow, and she recedes into herself. "And, well. If you're allowing yourself to take blows as grave as those of the Shadows, then I fear your capability must be called into question. Do not let this happen again."

[hallowleaf]

so mad this is a bot this username rules

[hallowleaf]

[hallowleaf]

wld a bg3 rpc discord server be of any interest (thonking)

[gildedthrns]

*𝐆𝐈𝐋𝐃𝐄𝐃𝐓𝐇𝐑𝐍𝐒. and all of my flowers grew back as thorns . . . independent and mutually exclusive rp for the player character of baldur's gate III. RAHETA DIN, DRACONIC BLOODLINE SORCERER. mun & muse 21+, minors dni. written by: erin [©]

[hallowleaf]

look at this painting of the dead three from bg3's artblast article

[hallowleaf]

trade offer: i receive: engaging roleplay thread you receive: the threat of getting your oc sketched

[silksworn]

Vindictive Iraestra may be, but even she is not so caught up in her own fury to continue her tantrum. She considers herself to be a pragmatic creature. Objective. Rationality is what separates men from beasts, and she has managed to keep her fury on a tight leash thus far.

She swallows it down. All of her bitterness, the rage, the injustice of it all. She does not allow the ghosts her tongue any longer. Still, they riot in her heart as they always have. Why will they not abandon her?

Iraestra pointedly turns her face away from the other. Terrible enough to suffer Minthara's black touch; she need not gaze upon her hateful visage any longer. Instead, she watches the waning moon, that graceful, impartial celestial body. Her first night on the surface she remembers her fascination with its serene glow unlike anything she had ever seen before. Even the memory of Narbondel's arcane beauty could not compare.

How far she is from Menzoberrazan. Distance and time, both uncrossable seas. Her home, the only one she has ever known, is buried at the bottom of the Clawrift.

She thinks frenzied, hazed thoughts. The moon, a child's smile, eternal darkness and blood upon blood. Legacy and ruination, two sides of the same coin. Faith lost, faith found. Faith lost — Her mother, who lives within her and her mother's mother and —

All the fight leaves her body suddenly. A puppet with cut strings, thrown aside by its master. Another curse leaves her so that she does not weep. But truly, what is there left to be ashamed of now? Is her humiliation not already complete enough? Has she not been debased entirely?

A betrayal, that she breathes still because of Minthara's aid. "Perhaps you should have let me die. Pretended you hadn't seen me," Iraestra tells the moon, voice caught half in a dream. What madness arrests her so? This breed of blasphemy — no, honesty — pours from her throat thick as blood. These are the sorts of truths only to be told at the witching hour. She speaks slowly, flatly. Words she has never allowed herself to say aloud to any living soul, even in the privacy of her own mind. Her grandmother would have said the thought itself is as bad as the sin. "What am I but my name? It is all that is left to me. Am I not already dead?"

She does not understand why she tells Minthara this. Maybe the other woman will find her pathetic enough to finally free her of this mortal coil. A blessing. A circle long left open, completed.

[hallowleaf]

Minthara's gaze follows Iraestra's across the dark landscape, to where the husked moon lies in the distance, watchful and knowing. Before the Absolute, she had only ever scarcely set foot upon the surface, and it was generally only ever in the service of war. What can you do, with all of this sky and nothing to hold it all inside?

She'd once thought herself untouchable. Minthara Baenre. She could have been Matron Mother, if it were not for her pride. Iraestra, panting and breathless, dying another kind of death beneath her — ( but it was Minthara, not Lolth, who'd ripped that life away from Iraestra. And if Iraestra had been there upon the sounding of the warhorn, then Minthara does not doubt she'd have killed her then, too. )

Now they both cannot return to the lives they desire. Two wanderers stranded, separated by sea. Yet in their separation, they are closer than they could ever realize. Minthara had once sworn off of these childish ideations, the you and I are not so differents, the minute cliches befitting milksop surfacers and not the stalwart paladin who had led the charge against a doomed house.

What is Minthara now, but an exile with a victim complex? The fall from grace is steep and littered with small, meaningless mercies, enough of them to choke on. Minthara sees the pain in Iraestra and knows it intimately, but never will she understand the reaction to it.

"If you are looking to me to change the past, you will be left sorely wanting," Minthara says, voice grave. A hand on Iraestra's shoulder, limp and cold. A half-attempt at a half-comfort she knows full well is inadequate. Guilt is unbecoming for a woman who deals in vengeance. Regret is meant to be discarded, not coddled. "Neither you nor I curry Lolth's favor any longer, so don't you dare sulk at me. You are not so pathetic as to beg for a death I refuse to give. If you want it so badly, do it yourself. But your death will change nothing of your fate — a meaningless offering to a series of gods who could not possibly care less. It changes nothing. Do you understand? Nothing."

( She remembers this lesson well. A series of campaigns drenched with so much blood that she possibly cannot count the heads she has taken. Lolth, as thanks for Minthara's service, discards her like an unbeloved toy. The Absolute's Chosen catch her between their teeth, bereft of Lolth's scant mercy. Minthara does what any true Baenre would do; she refuses to die. )

[hallowleaf]

very orincore song btw