Fanart dedicated to Ariel D’s Road to Redemption / Descent Into Darkness / Power of Prophecy series of fanfiction for RA Salvatore’s Legend of Drizzt books.
I first read Ariel’s stories back in high school, when I was a huge Drizzt fan and just tentatively beginning to pick up a pencil and draw. They had a huge impact on me at the time, focusing around Entreri and Jarlaxle (some of my favorite characters), but written so skillfully and so well-characterized that everything from the interactions to the dialogue to the very language structure itself read just like the real thing; for me as a quiet, withdrawn teenager it was a huge revelation that even Normal PeopleTM could write and encouraged me to actually start writing my own stories with the same OCs that I still love. Her stories and the themes in them were a huge influence on me in a lot of ways, and I unironically think they helped shape a lot of the stories I tell today.
Ariel herself was also an infallibly kind, genuine, and modest person who was endlessly patient with a doubtless very annoying highschooler who wanted to be friends; something that I think is rare, and something that I wish more people had because I know it made a hell of a difference for me back then when I was just starting out in what would turn out to be a lifelong love of drawing and writing.
Though it’s about fifteen years late, this is the fanart I wish I could have done for her back then. I owe her more than I can really say.
