📚 do you ever read similar works while writing, or do you intentionally not read them?
🔥 what’s something that’s currently going really well?
Thanks for the ask, friend! 💚
📚 do you ever read similar works while writing, or do you intentionally not read them?
For the most part, if I am in the THICK of actually putting words to page (not editing/on a second draft etc.) I try to avoid similar works in order to not parrot them. I don't want a particular turn of phrase to get stuck in my head and then all of a sudden I can't remember where I saw it and am writing it down and then next thing you know, someone's mad at me. I understand especially in fandom, especially deep in the ships and all their favorite tropes, there's only so much runway before we all start crashing into each other, especially if in-game dialog is being used. At the same time, I want to make sure I'm telling my version of the story. Once I'm in the editing phase it's much easier to read with an active WIP because I'm generally not adding a ton at that point.
There is one exception to this rule sometimes though, and it's smut. (the why, and 2nd question below the cut)
It's not that I don't think I'm not good at writing it. It's that sometimes I get too deep in the weeds. I read a lot of very terrible purple prose-stuffed bodice rippers in my youth, and let me tell you, some of that stuff stuck. Sometimes I hit a point where I've realized I've taken post-nut revelations or something a bit too far, so I'll go pull up some smut from favorite works/pieces that are not my own, just for the reminder like, hey, this just says "he came" and you loved it, knock it off. Not every single fuck needs to be life-altering, y'know? It's a good level-set.
🔥 what’s something that’s currently going really well?
So I actually don't have a WIP on the front burner currently by design! I just went through two event weeks only a week apart, and I just want to take a break and do some reading and recharge my brain instead of jumping immediately back in and burning myself out. I suppose that not getting burned out by all of that in and of itself is something that's going well!
But thanks to my Lucanis Week piece, I feel more inside his head/characterization than I ever have, and I think I was pretty good at it to start. This might sound crazy (and perhaps runs opposite to what I explained above 😂), but to prepare for writing that series I wrote down The Wigmaker Job in its entirety, and it gave me so much insight into his speech/thought/action patterns. Less is definitely more with this dude except in certain circumstances, and it's such a delightful challenge to stay true to that! I'm enjoying it so much.
Also, I am definitely more of a one-shot writer, and though Water, Water, Everywhere was by no means an epic, it is a cohesive multi-chapter fic that I spent a ton of time weaving imagery, themes, and metaphor throughout, and honestly? I think it's the best thing I've ever written. I'm immensely proud of it. So it's a little bit of a past-tense gone well there, since it's complete, but I just get giddy every time I look at it!
8. Are they a quick thinker or do they need time to sort through their thoughts?
I think Maribel prides herself on falling somewhere in the middle, knowing when and where each is valuable. She grew up in the rougher Soprati part of Minrathous, so she has the ability to think on her feet from a childhood spent playing on sometimes unkind streets. But she went on to attend the Minrathous Circle, and became an enchantment breaker as her career before everything was turned upside down (ultimately putting her on the path to the Shadow Dragons/Nessus/Varric/VG). So she knows the benefit of slowing down and thinking things through, lest something blow up in your face.
During her time as leader of the Veilguard, I think she relies on the latter more, particularly because she's so unused to leadership. I don't see the events of the game as unfolding particularly fast, so she uses the time to think out the options and plan appropriately. Even if said plans often go to shit and she does end up having to think on her feet in the moment *cough*lets-be-bait-at-Weisshaupt*cough*
Interpersonally, especially with Lucanis, she runs on pure instinct.
22. Does your character trust people right off the bat or does it take them some time to warm up to someone?
I'd describe her as cautiously optimistic when meeting new people. She's been with the Shadow Dragons for eight years (basically the entire time they've existed!), and they pulled her out of a really dark place, thanks to people she learned she could rely on. It definitely changed her mindset, and she assumes the best rather than the worst.
If you cross her though, she won't stab you in the back. She'll stab you in the front with a smile.
Spicier one below the cut!
25. Do they have any weird bedroom habits? Any unusual kinks?
I'll be getting into the reason why in my upcoming Shadow Dragon Week pieces, but Maribel worked in a brothel for a few months, so she's kind of seen/done it all (as I alluded to in my OC Kink List post for her a while back). No habits emerged from that, but she is excellent at bondage, both the physical act of restraining someone and the emotional navigation throughout. It's tragic, almost, that she ends up with Lucanis, because that's a no-go for him (at least at first, maybe he warms to it after quite some time).
I also think once she realizes how terrible his pull out game is, her breeding kink activates like a sleeper agent and it's part of the reason why they end up having six children 🤣
Fic authors self rec! When you get this, reply with your favorite five fics that you've written, then pass on to at least five other writers. Let’s spread the self-love 💗
Thank you for my very first ask @vixenofcadmea, and one I'm so excited to blab about!
So I've done lots of different tag games about most of my posted fic (all Rookanis at this point), but never from the angle of favorites! I had to sit and think about this for a little, and while I do love everything I've posted thus far, there are definitely some standouts! These are in order of publishing, I can narrow down to five, but I don't know that I can rank them more than this! More below the cut, for length!
Means of Control
T, 5386 Words, 1/1 chapters
This was written kind of as a companion piece to Pleased to Meet You (my piece where Lucanis almost dies of horror at the girl dinners the Veilguard was eating prior to his arrival), and while I love that one for the group banter, this was written as an excuse to have fun, playful banter between solely Lucanis and Rook in the early days when he's still quite tortured. I think the vehicle of playing cards was one of my more clever devices, and the thought of Lucanis having to pose as a fortune teller for a previous contract remains one of my favorite things to space out thinking about!
Reciprocity
M, 11754 words, 2/2 chapters
I wrote this because the previous fics I posted to Ao3 all used the Lucanis Dellamorte Needs A Hug tag, and it tickled me so much each time, I just had to write him actually getting one. The natural point in time for this in my mind was after a Shadow Dragon Rook saves Treviso instead of Minrathous. Rook would need a hug after that, I think, and Maribel certainly did. I think the hug itself was one of my best uses of cause-and-effect in my writing thus far, because neither of them was prepared for it. The second chapter is Lucanis S P I R A L I N G about it, and I greatly enjoyed sticking him in the blender about it. It's an important piece of Maribel & Lucanis's history, but it worked quite well as a two-shot. It remains the highest number of subscriptions I've gotten, because people really wanted to know what happened to ol' boy after getting his hug!
Baby, It's Not That Cold Outside
E, 8843 words, 1/1 chapters
The byproduct of holiday prep madness, this originated as a silly little idea: what if Lucanis never celebrated the holidays because he was too busy completing contract after contract because it's a ripe time for it? I did not anticipate it becoming nearly 9k words of smut. Genuinely the most fun I think I've had writing anything, because the concept was just so off-the-wall. There's tiny twinges of angst. There's fluff so sweet it'll rot your teeth like holiday cookies. I loved it so much it spawned a follow-up, Baby It's Too Damn Hot Outside, it's summer companion. I kind of am playing around with the idea of spring and fall ones now too, because I am insane and I guess weather-related smut is my niche, or something.
Before, After, Before Again
E, 29050 words, 4/5 chapters
My longest fic by a long shot, I chose this one in particular for the middle 3 chapters, aka After, which was supposed to be one chapter, but it ballooned up to nearly 25k words alone so I split it up. This entire piece is a look at the endgame of VG, filling in some blanks (three weeks w/o Rook, I'm mostly looking at you), adding a little extra flavor to some in-game things. The exploration of grief that I covered in After is brutal, to the point my Oura ring kept asking why I was stressed while I was writing. But I personally think the first chapter of After (chapter 2 overall) is quite possibly the best thing I've ever written. It hurts so good. I'm so proud of it. Out of everything I've posted, it's the one I wish I had gotten a few more comments on because I want to be insane about it every minute of every day, and where better than in the comments!
Waiting for Something to Bite
M, 3525 words, 1/1 chapters
Yet another weird concept: fishing but make it sexy. Okay, it's more than that, I promise. But I grew up on the east coast frolicking in the Atlantic and watching surf fishers on the shore. I so wanted to play with the idea of Lucanis trying to reclaim something his father taught him, and surf fishing didn't seem too far outside the realm of possibility. So I wrote this nauseatingly cute scene for Rookanis Week where he tries to teach Rook (the infamous non-swimmer) how to catch a fish on the beach. I think it was mostly an excuse to write a cute beach day too, but I really loved the end result. It was nice to write them just having a (mostly) nice time after all the previous stuff in which I stuffed him in the blender. I just love the visuals of this one so much.
So much fun to revisit these, thanks again for the ask!
Since Lucanis has the reflexes of an assassin, he has the ability to pin her thumb before she can even think about moving hers. But because he is an absolute mush for her, he throws the game every. single. time. Though he doesn't make it easy, just so he can hold her hand a few minutes longer.
She knows he's throwing it, though, and it drives her crazy because she can be competitive.
For him, that's a feature, not a bug. 😈
The rest of the questions below the cut for the sake of everyone's dashes!
7. How did they act with one another during the crushing stage?
There are so many facets to early-days Rookanis that I just adore leaning into for them.
They have a very easy repartee that they fall into quite naturally, and even in the beginning Lucanis is happy to play along with Maribel's tendency to tease and banter. I think it reminds him of what his back and forth with Illario used to be, before they started drifting apart, and that's something he always enjoyed. That she gives him an outlet for that from the very beginning is what draws them together more than anything else.
But we all know Lucanis has Feelings™️ he doesn't realize he has to start and suppresses once the pieces do fall into place. He is cautious. He doesn't want to endanger her because Spite is still such a huge unknown at this point. He is stubborn and determined to try to keep her safe by distancing, but yet is still drawn to her like a moth to flame. So much one step forward, two steps back. It's delicious.
Maribel however, starts crushing basically the moment she first lays eyes on him, and just... is not deterred by his reluctance. She realizes he his dealing with a literal sea of emotion though, and does not want to send him running for the hills. So she's just herself around him, and with the patience of a saint, lets him come to her. She wants to be his safe space to land. That said, she does have a talent for seeing right through his many masks though, worming her way beneath them, and sometimes calling him out for it!
If you want to read more about what I envision for their early-days stuff, this, this, and this are the peak examples of it.
10. What is an incredibly heartwarming moment between the two?
I'm really fond of them flirting through real estate transactions about 10 years into their relationship.
11. What do you love about them?
I think more than anything else, it's their care and support for one another. They are two people in need of softness, and they get that and then some from each other, and it's just beautiful.
12. What is their ship name and why?
Does Rookanis count? 😅
Uhh, let's see. Fair warning I am bad at naming things (Maribel got her name from the in-game randomizer 🤣)
Marcanis? Marilu? Lucabel?
I think of the three I like the last the best? No real why here beyond how it rolls off the tongue, and that it's the most balanced of each of their names when combined.
13. How would the pair do in an escape room? What kind of room would they choose and would they get out?
Was the Ossuary not one giant escape room? 🙈
I think they'd do quite well in one. I'd argue that being a successful member of both the Crows and the Shadow Dragons requires a lot of quick thinking and observational prowess. They certainly ran into many obstacles to overcome and puzzles to solve over the course of Veilguard. I think they would choose a scavenger hunt type room, because they hit a lot of those same points, and they would definitely escape!
28. How do they divide up the chores? Who does what?
Maribel cannot cook to save her life, so Lucanis handles that, which is good because he's good at cooking and he likes to cook. She, in turn, is happy to clean up after him, because it's something she can do without setting the kitchen on fire.
As for the rest of the household chores... after Veilguard, Lucanis remains as First Talon, and Maribel takes an offered seat in the Magisterium. Both Villa Dellamorte and the townhome in Minrathous that comes with the seat (yay basement Eluvians) are maintained by a full staff. They are busy, and even though the staff is baked in, they don't want to spend their precious time together doing chores!
I do think Lucanis pays close attention to feeding the fires in winter though, often before the staff can get to it. He knows how easily Maribel gets cold!
34. If they get married, what would their wedding be like? (Location, food, guests, wedding outfits, etc)
I'm actually still sorting a lot of this out! They definitely do get married, but I am not sure where it would be or what all it could entail. Definitely not a Chantry. I think they would want to do it quietly, with only a handful of people, maybe just the Veilguard. Maybe at the Lighthouse? They are influential enough in their respective cities that I don't know that they'd want to broadcast it with a huge event in the public eye.
I think about finding the right balance a lot! Luckily I have a lot of other stuff to write before I get there!
40. What symbols do you associate with your OTP and why?
The Serpent-Entwined Dagger card in a deck of Wicked Grace cards. Daggers are synonymous with the Crows. Serpents (or at least serpentine dragons) are all over Shadow Dragon items. It stands out from the rest of the cards ([suite] of [virtue], ex. Knight of Temerity). When I ready about it, I just went, oh, yeah. That's them.
Alexandrite can shift red to blue (though it's rare), and those colors I associate with Maribel and Lucanis, respectively. Red/blue shift stones can even bleed purple, which covers Spite too.
The ocean has a lot of meaning to both of them (I wrote about this extensively for Lucanis Week), but Maribel has eyes the color of the Nocen Sea, she was born near it, she can't swim but fell in love with a man that loves being in the water despite being trapped beneath it for a year. There's just a lot of hidden depths (sorry) there to dig in for them.
Hope this answers your questions! Thanks for asking! 💚💚💚
You are the absolute sweetest and such a bright spot in this little community. You’re quick to befriend and think that’s so special. I always get excited to see when you’ve commented on something because I know it’s going to be so lovely and funny.
Oh sweet angel, I'm kissing the top of your head a hundred times, thank you!!! I'm just here to have a good time and be silly and encouraging, you all make it so easy!
