#border country

[illustratus]

Sweethearts and Wives by Samuel Edmund Waller

[brightclothesforwinter]

Who has two thumbs (neither of which has a splinter in any more) and -on being reminded by @lissomelace's A Matter of Need that I, too, had once written a character being retrieved from a kink club, after an experience which was somewhat more than they bargained for, by an unexpected cousin and their partner -

- subsequently realised that when I said I'd 'written' that, I meant I'd got bits of drafts 5-18(!) years old and it was on my 'rewrite this to work where it now fits structurally' list on a very back-burnered project (turns out when one arc hinges on an intense and unavoidably explicit kink scene and the other is mostly about peace talks, they maybe don't fit in the same story even if they do involve a lot of the the same characters in the same time period, who knew?) -

- fell down a research rabbit-hole or three (most old pub buildings have two front doors, how have I never noticed this?) got far too invested in finding out the exact timeline for various docklands redevelopments given this is an AU anyway and not real London -

- anyway I accidentally about 2k of the beginning of Kerry's quest to pick a fight with everything in her way - especially if it's bigger than her, which it usually is - but most of all her father (even if she has to go to faerie to do it). (Somebody should have told her her crime-lord great-uncles already had the shit kicked out of him before she was born, she might have calmed down a little. Wait. That would make more sense if I actually said that her father is Fian from at the third fall, Grace.)

London Calling intro, feat. parkour before parkour was a Thing, marginally more 90s crime than actual crime, a probably unnecessary density of Cúchulainn references and, uh, dubiously consensual aftercare, somehow.

[landwriter]

Border Country | Dream/Hob | 6K | Mature | Complete Tags: Touch-Starved Dream, Metaphorical Squire Hob, Mutual Pining, Self-Denial, Unresolved Sexual Tension, Post-1889 Meeting, Tenderness, Clothing as Armour and Ritual, First Time, touching that is, the inherent body horror of emotional repression, and the ecstatic terror of succumbing to your desires

There are two things that Dream does only once a century. The first is meeting with Robert Gadling, immortal. The second is getting dressed by hand.

He begins early in the day, visiting the dreams of tailors and lords, choosing from among them fine garments that suit the new fashions of the century and befit his station. He has two preferences of his own: black, because it is dignified and he thinks it looks well on him; and high necklines, because it is his armour, and he would not move through the Waking with his throat exposed. It readies him, arraying himself thus, piece by piece, as though riding into battle. Although there have been times in the past, contending with so many ornate clasps and fastenings, that he understood why knights had squires.

[Read on AO3]

[darlingghoul]

My partner and I went for an Autumnal walk in Holywell Dene. Didn't see the well, but did see a few accidental waterfalls, some dramatic trees and a load of hawthorn

[howieabel]

There’s only one real politics, and that’s politics on a weekly wage. All the rest, well. We can all talk.

Raymond Williams, Border Country

[no-lyrix]

Underworld & Ø [Phase] - Border Country (#DRIFT Ep.4 Pt.6)

[mings]

We’re off on a grand tour

Somewhat unexpectedly, we sold our house. How, you might ask, do you sell your home by accident? Although we placed it on the market, we really didn't expect to sell.... yet. It has a part-finished extension that I've been building forever, and while I'm continuing the work we assumed that we may get viewings but no offers. Just shows how wrong you can be. The second couple to view came in with an offer on the asking price. Oh dear. Now what?

So, today we head down to Cornwall to see my elderly aunt, then up to Wales where we'll view some properties tomorrow before driving up to Carlisle. On Tuesday we view homes in Scotland, the land where my heart lies.

I can barely contain my excitement. It's twenty years since I last set foot north of the border. It feels like coming home.

[landwriter]

🌹

Dream is returned from the Waking, his mantle of night draped once more across his shoulders. Still, he lingers for a moment. Reflects.

He avoids the impulse to run his hands over every spot Hob has touched. Even in the Dreaming now, his skin feels a Waking thing, a woken thing. It is an ill portent that he cannot find it within himself to regret.

Half-clothed in a robe, he still feels less exposed than he did with the line of his throat beneath Hob’s lips. He feels less. He should not need to remind himself that is good. He touches his fingers to the spot Hob kissed on his throat, and shuts his eyes. As he does so, he carefully reaches out to Hob’s dreams and wraps himself in the golden warmth of them. One last touch, unbeknownst, while his friend sleeps.

Once a century, he will meet with Robert Gadling, immortal. Once a century, he will dress by hand, and be undressed by another’s. Once a century, he will allow himself this small thing.

He thinks about stories of courtship and ruin, and how both can be done slowly enough, sometimes, to escape almost all notice.

---

thank you anon! here is an excerpt from Border Country verse, part of a coda that i cut out but will almost certainly recycle into the sequel(s) for it. one of which will DEFINITELY be my take on the comicbook Wine Toast but with hob dressing dream for battle and both of them being very normal buddies about it :)))))