#delicatefade wip

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If you’re tagged, make a new post and share 1-2 (a few) sentences from your most recent unposted WIP(s) with zero context – Let your followers guess!

Thanks for the tags @dreadfutures @rosella-writes @theluckywizard

The “I love you’s” came easily now. Having said it once was like bursting a dam. And like with a dam burst where the torrent of the water brought with it other things too — fish and twigs, tadpoles, silt and pebbles of light — so it was with their love, a gushing, wet-whispered flood of adoration and promises. “I love your skin.” “You’re so beautiful.” “I never want to stop.” “You and me, babe. Forever.”

Tagging the DAFF list: @warpedlegacy | @rakshadow | @rosella-writes | @effelants | @bluewren | @breninarthur | @ar-lath-ma-cully | @ir0n-angel | @inquisimer | @crackinglamb | @theluckywizard | @nirikeehan | @oxygenforthewicked | @exalted-dawn-drabbles | @melisusthewee | @blarrghe | @agentkatie | @delicatefade | @leggywillow | @about2dance | @plisuu

and @mrslyncx @oliversrarebooks @flaggermuser @anderstrevelyan @moonlightheretic @hekaerges @curioushappenstance @jarakrisafis

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(WIP Wed/Whenever) kissy kissy Dalish elves

What if I actually posted on tumblr instead of just reblogging art? I've been writing a Dragon Age fanfic with no canon characters because I am a clown. It's a love story told in three four stories between my OC Eilan Lavellan and @bluewren's OC Lex Lavellan. They are twenty years old. Here is a fluffy little love snippet. (for any familiar with my main Eilan/Solas story, this is an AU for Eilan.)

Context: Lex and Eilan have been dating in secret for 8 months. Eilan insisted on keeping it secret because she didn't want to be the center of gossip. Lex didn't care if everyone knew but went along with Eilan's secretive nature. Their cover was just blown and everyone at Clan Lavellan now knows. CW: sex implied, nudity word count: 653

Eilan was surprised by how much she enjoyed having her secret exposed. That everyone knew she and Lex belonged to each other made her feel proud, even smug. Surely she had the envy of every other young woman — who better a catch than Lex? And who would have expected him to fall for Eilan, who was pretty enough but a bit odd, a loner who lived too far in her own head and practiced strange hobbies like elven calligraphy and writing. Being recognized as a couple had its practical benefits as well. They no longer had to invent ruses to explain their absences. They could disappear together, hand in hand, in plain view of their clan. Though Lex and Eilan had never named what had grown between them, in the eyes of the others they were clearly now a committed couple. Eilan was inclined to adopt their view.

To disappear together was as far as she dared express herself in public. When they were at camp Eilan preferred not to kiss or touch unnecessarily. Lex, she suspected, would have preferred to flaunt their relationship. He had sat close to her by the fire and rested his hand on her knee. The following day he swam out to where she bathed in the shallow sea just to hold her, the two of them weightless in the water. She reciprocated with a quick kiss, a small touch or a shy embrace, enough to make sure he never felt rejected, but invariably she would cut short his sweet affections, whispering to him that someone could see. He did not seem to mind. Or if he did, he never said. It helped that they often found time to be alone together. They each had daily duties, everyone in the clan did, but Eilan had found a way to pawn off some her chores onto a much younger cousin by baiting the girl with unfair bets. “I bet that when I drop this quill it will fall upwind,” Eilan said, knowing full well she could tip the quill with a sleight of hand. “Bet you can’t blow out all these candles in a single breath,” she said after having coated two wicks in essence of wyvern’s breath so that they would burn more stubbornly. The girl was only twelve, an apprentice healer of an agreeable and shy nature. By the fourth bet Eilan suspected that the girl had caught on, but was so thoroughly enjoying Eilan’s attention that she was willing to spend the day de-stemming spindleweed in Eilan’s stead. On those days Eilan would meet Lex in the forest where it was his duty to tend to wild gardens, thought admittedly when Eilan was there he tended to little but her. “Hold on. One second. I should check on the peppers,” Lex said as he disentangled himself from Eilan and stood up from the ground. They had just made love on a patch of summer squash. Fat bright leaves clung to Eilan’s bare back as she sat up to watch Lex move, his nude body gorgeous in the dappled sunlight. He pulled free a pepper from a nearby plant and screwed up his nose at it. It was a runty thing, curled in on itself like an angry cashew, bright red and gnarled. Lex raised a bewildered brow. “…the fuck?” Eilan repressed a laugh, her whole body shaking, tears in her eyes, lips twitching as she covered her mouth. “Oh yea?” Lex grinned, trying not to laugh. “You think it’s funny?” He tossed the sad pepper behind him and dove towards her, nipping at her neck as he guided her back into the cushy leaves. She shrieked with delight. “It’s all your fault,” he teased. “You’re the… what’s that word again? The title of your play? The Saboteur.” Eilan gasped. “You remembered the title of my play!” Lex wagged his brows cockily as if to say ‘duh.’

Tagging: @monocytogenes, @crackinglamb, @about2dance, @nirikeehan, @theluckywizard, @oxygenforthewicked @melisusthewee @rosella-writes and anyone else who might want to share their WIPs!

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New experiment. What if I actually started treating this like a writing blog?

No context tiny snippet from a scene I worked on in my WIP. Sharing because "weenie"

As tempted as Eilan was to suggest they forgo the festival, she could not bring herself to be a weenie. As a child she had been a weenie and ostracized for it — and rightly so, in retrospect. She liked being a loner just fine except in those moments when she did not. As an adolescent that solitary streak morphed into an appealing mystique, perhaps with some sex appeal, and she had an easier time finding her place among their peers and even attracting the secret affections of two of the shyer boys. Meanwhile, Lex went from an agreeable and well-liked child to a teenage hunk that was popular with the girls. Even now, over a year into their romance, Eilan felt lucky that he had chosen her, did not quite know why he had, and was reluctant to do anything that may break the spell.

A WEENIE

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WIP Wednesday - Lex comes home

Excerpt from my kissy kissy elves draft. Dragon age setting, but it’s all OCs. My OC is Eilan Lavellan and @bluewren’s OC is Lex Lavellan.

Lex and Eilan are twenty years old. Lex has been off on a solo adventure for seven months. Eilan has received three letters from him in that time. (Forwarding letters to a nomadic clan is very hard.)

wc: 585

Five weeks after Lex’s third letter Clan Lavellan was camped outside Kirkwall. It was here one year ago in a clearing in the woods not a half mile out from camp that Lex had first learned of Eilan’s secret playwriting. Eilan had been so nervous to tell him, so scared he would find her strange. She still remembered the tender way he looked at her, and how touched he had been to be let him into her secret. Though they had kissed hundreds of times before and hundreds of times since, that kiss stuck out in her memory for it was the first time something like love had wormed its way into her reluctant heart. Remembering that moment made Eilan ache with longing. She could not focus on that day’s magic tutoring. Today’s lesson: augury. She knelt on a pillow in her grandmother’s, the Keeper’s, tent. Incense burned in a corner. It smelled of jasmine and rose. Eilan stared blankly at a silver plate filled with colorless oil. She recited an incantation as she poured a darker oil from a small vial, drop by drop, and watched the oils swirl. The patterns were supposed to mean something, but all Eilan could see was Lex.

Outside the tent a young man whooped jubilantly. A woman cried out as an excited murmur swept through the camp. Eilan cocked her ear towards the exultations. Her heart raced against hope. Finally she heard Evelyn cry out, “Lex!” Eilan gasped and looked towards the tent’s exit. Her grandmother smiled knowingly. “Go.” Eilan leapt her feet and sprinted out of the tent. She followed the stream of clanmates, her eyes peeled as she searched for him. There he was, in a bear hug with his sisters, one arm around Evelyn and the other around Tali. The siblings swayed from side to side as they embraced. When they parted Evelyn inspected her brother for any signs of ailments, malnourishment, injuries, and general neglect. Lex let himself be fussed over as he ruffled Tali’s hair and said something to make her laugh. Cylen called out “Letha!”, the hip abbreviation of ‘lethallin’, the elven honorific for a friend. The men embraced, patting each other on the back. Elves lined up to greet Lex one by one. Those who belonged to the generation of parents who saw all teens and 20-somethings as their communal brood made sure to impart little observations with their greetings — “You got a tan!” “Survived the wilds, eh? Good lad.” “Look at you! Feeling all grown up?” Lex spotted Eilan at the back of the line and looked arrested as if by a vision. He worked his way through the crowd of well-wishers and greeters with polite impatience, often stealing glances at her. She was overcome, hands clasped over her nose and mouth, eyes wet with happiness. At last he reached her, his hands sliding along her waist as he pulled her close. He buried his face in her hair. They held each other tightly. She smoothed a hand over his back. He cradled her head close. They kissed several times. “I missed you,” they both said at the same time, in the same way. They laughed at the synchronicism. He wiped a tear from her cheek with his thumb. They kissed again. A sparse wisp of hair clung to his chin. “This is new,” she said as she rubbed it. “Yea,” he said. He couldn’t stop smiling. He cupped her face and looked at her like she hung the moon.

tagging for WIP Wednesday @warpedlegacywrites @exalted-dawn-drabbles @nirikeehan @monocytogenes @theluckywizard @crackinglamb @rosella-writes @dreadfutures @anneapocalypse @bluewren @liza011 @rakshadow @megasaurusssss @hekaerges@moonlightheretic@flaggermuser

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for the wip game: love and fake potions!

I wanna see the fake potions

Ahh! Yes, it is exactly what it sounds like. Lex and Eilan wind up making fake potions to sell in a human village. How did they end up there? Here's an excerpt. wc: 519

“We’ll make fake potions real quick.” “Fake potions?” Lex grinned, proud of himself. “Yea, I came up with this in Nevarra. Making real potions takes too long. But with a little magic you can take any old plant and make it look like something else or smell like something else, then mash it up with a little water or whatever, bam, it looks like elf root serum or whatever you want it to look like.”

He was so clever. Eilan kneeled down and impulsively kiss his cheek. “You’re handsome.” “Oh yea? Is doing crimes sexy?” His smile was a touch bashful — was that a hint of color on his cheeks? “Anything you do is sexy.” “Hey, that’s my line.” He looked utterly disarmed, even goofy, as he soaked in her approval. He leaned in for a chaste kiss, one that would not do, not now after Eilan had witnessed his competence in the human village and been aroused by it. She deepened the kiss, her lust quickening in a way that made him chuckle. He smiled against her cheek as he cooled her passions. “Okay, okay, I’ll do more crimes,” he teased. Eilan mimicked Lex’s male swagger as she said, “Looking so good, you’re already a crime.” He laughed. “You haven’t even done one crime yet and you’re already a badass. Come on, little miss smooth talker, we have potions to make.” With the enthusiasm of children at play, they took up their new enterprise as potion scammers, thinking no further ahead than what could be bought tomorrow with the money made today. As they brewed their useless elixirs, Lex told her about the delicious treats, curious trinkets and glittering accessories that he had seen at a Nevarran festival. He rattled off the prices and Eilan adjusted her inventive concoctions accordingly. The combination of his skill with plants, her knowledge of botanical medicine, and her talent for fiction yielded clever results. In the past Lex had brewed imitations of real potions, but Eilan had never been so limited by reality. She took his knife and sliced off three short strands of her hair. She held up to the sun a bottle that contained an orange-colored jelly and dropped the hair atop the goop. Her brows knit in concentration as she recited in her mind the same telekinesis spell that she had used to the day before. This time, however, her targets were too small and slipped free of her arcane grip. “What are you doing?” Lex asked. “Shh, shh.” To sharpen her focus she repeated the incantation aloud. Her free hand worked in strange, jerky patterns as she pinched and twisted the invisible fabric of the fade, that ambient magic felt only by mages. Millimeter by millimeter the strands of hair moved deeper into the bottle. “Wow,” said Lex. She kept at it for eight long minutes, slowly working the strands into place until finally they stood vertically, suspended in the orange gel like a centerpiece. “Perfect.” “You’re unreal, babe. What is that supposed to be?” “A tonic for balding.” Lex snickered. He knew there was no such thing.

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Varric/Bianca head canon history

Having this as my first post is misleading, because I am mostly a solavellan, but I've been writing a lot of Varric POV lately for my WIP, so here we are. Context: We're in post-Veil Kirkwall and everything bad that could happen, has happened. Bianca was exploring a ruined thaig when the Veil fell and Varric has not heard from her since. He has asked Bethany to, uh, use magic (*waves hands vaguely*) to try and find Bianca. Bethany needs an object that means something to Bianca. Excerpt from WIP:

Varric hesitated, then pulled a ring off his little finger, working it past his swollen knuckle. For twenty-five years Varric had worn the ring more often than Bianca, though he had bought it for her in a rash romantic gesture. They were young, in love, and had nearly started a clan war. The Merchant’s Guild had prohibited them from seeing each other, a sentence that only made their trysts all the more exciting. After a year of meeting in secret, he had had enough.

He bought the ring from an Orlesian in High Town and planned to ask Bianca to elope and runaway to Tantervale where he knew a guy who knew a guy who could set them up nice and cushy. She needed that, being from money; Varric too, if he were being honest with himself. But that night when they met she had news of her own. Her parents had arranged for her to marry Bogdan Vasca, thereby ushering an alliance between two powerful merchant houses. Varric proposed anyway. Bianca replied, “Ask me again next time,” and he did. He asked her to marry him every time they met in secret over the next twenty-five years, and she would always respond the same way, “Ask me again next time.

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wip wednesday - The Veil Falls over Tevinter

I got tagged by @nirikeehan on Jan 11th. Still counts, right? I'm working on a post-Veil fic, a sequel to my published post-Trespasser solavellan fic. A couple of you don't want spoilers of the sequel (looking at gabs and narra) so I am putting it under the "read more!" wc: 535 Tagging @mindfogger | @inquisimer | @anneapocalypse | @brainworm-terrarium | @demarogue | @ir0n-angel | @kirkwallsokayesthero | @melisusthewee | @queenaeducan-writes | @roguelioness

In the Tevinter capital of Minrathous, Magister Dorian Pavus sat on the roof of his estate with his boyfriend Lukas and his closest friend and political ally, Magister Maevaris Tilani. They sat on a woven blanket and shared a bottle of Antivan wine. Their attention was turned up towards the eerie beauty of the dying sky. The deep purple of the Tevinter night had blanched to a bone white, and that color was now being replaced with a green so pale Dorian could not say whether or not his eyes were playing tricks. Dorian’s moneyed neighbors had also gathered on their roofs to watch the Veil draw its final curtain. They lifted their glasses to each other in rare and buoyant camaraderie, borne both of wartime nationalism and the need to maintain morale in the midst of this millennium’s greatest calamity. Magister Irian Amladaris called over to Dorian across the alley between their estates and shouted, “Is that the best the Dread Fucker’s got?” Dorian grinned thinly and lifted a glass to acknowledge Amladaris, who just last month had tried to censure Dorian in the Magisterium. Hours ago, graduates from the Circle of Magi had lined the city wall and erected a massive, magenta shield over the city. The Siccari, Tevinter’s mage spies, had gotten a lucky and timely break. The city’s readiness was proof of the Imperium’s power and the shield assuaged the fears of its people, for now. The lower castes congregated in the main square outside The Needle, the tall, thin building that served as Archon Radonis’ residence. The Archon’s voice boomed throughout the public square and to every corner of the city. …No nation is better prepared to face this threat than our Imperium. The continent knows no better mages than ours. Throughout our long history, Tevinter has persevered against impossible odds. We do not know what lies ahead, but we know what has always been unchanging: Our glory is divine. We rejoice in the Maker’s gift of magic and in turn he smiles on us. The Imperium has never been stronger… Had the Imperium never been stronger? He and Maevaris had founded the Lucerni caucus in the senate to answer that very question. He met Maevaris’ eye and saw his skepticism reflected in her stare. Decades of complacency, corruption, and lethargy had made Tevinter’s institutions weaker than they ought to be. But all the same Dorian wanted to believe in the greatest of his country, in its ability to come together to do incredible and inspiring things, and to survive the villainy of a wicked elven god. He wondered what Solas was doing at that very moment, and if Eilan was with him. He wondered if she had fought until the bitter end, or had she, as Dorian feared, joined Solas willingly. He bristled at the latter, could not believe it. He imagined Eilan alone somewhere, unable to stop Solas, regretting her poor decisions and impotence. His lip curled as he blamed her for her role in The Fall, but his anger was tempered with pity. Had she made better decisions, would it have made any difference in the end? Did she worry about Dorian as Dorian worried about her?

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For #talktometuesday I'm v curious to hear more about corrupt Eilan is that in a world where she follows Solas and helps him bring the Veil down or something else? I love hearing about Inquisitors who turn to the dark side 😈

Aha! The turn to the dark side is full of thrashing and self delusion. Quick world state catch up. It's close to canon-ish. Solas broke up with Eilan and left to pursue his goal of tearing down the Veil to restore the world to its rightful order. Eilan stayed on as Inquisitor. The Inquisition is now a direct military and ops vehicle of the Chantry lead by Leliana with Cassandra as her hand. The Inquisition's main target is Solas. tl;dr: If you're wondering what radicalizes her.... nothing? She never agrees with Solas philosophically about the Veil or why it needs to come down. But she is so singularly focused on staying in a relationship with him, so self-absorbed in her love, that she makes a series of small, compromised decisions. Each decision feels, in that moment, absolutely human and excusable. But ultimately those decisions culminate in her corruption because they make her his accomplice. And once the deed is done, she engages in a series of mental gymnastics to live with herself and with him and her transformation from a do-gooder to a villain is complete. The slightly longer explanation below: 👇

Eilan corruption arc. The story starts six months after Trespasser. Eilan and Solas were a couple and very much in love. She is convinced that if she could just find him and reason with him, he can be persuaded from his destructive path. She dreams about him, finds him that way (dream magic!) He's actually thrilled by this turn of events. For him, it represents the possibility that she might change her mind and join him. He also wants this to end with his lover Eilan at his side. What a dream! They both ignore the elephant in the room for a while, just enjoy being together and pretend they aren't at odds. But as he gets closer to his goal, she starts getting desperate and leaks some of his secrets to Dorian so that power players of Thedas can perhaps oppose Solas a little longer. But she never actually gives up any critical information that would help Solas' enemies stop Solas once and for all. That would be a step too far. Her heart isn't there. Dorian, and others, doubt Eilan's loyalties. She had said she is Team Modern Thedas, but her actions speak otherwise. Dorian in particular feels betrayed by her. 😟 Meanwhile she's arguing with Solas all the time, their relationship is frayed very badly, she acts out, but he will not be dissuaded. He is convinced she will prefer life as an elf without the Veil and their lives will be better. He is also hoping that removing the Veil will make all elves immortal again. Fingers crossed, vhenan!!! You and me forever!!! Finally, when Solas does take down the Veil, Eilan against all odds shows the fuck up and does have a way to stop his ritual. Bruh, it won't even kill or wound him. It is like, the perfect Solavellan gotcha: stop the ritual without hurting Solas? Wow, the dream. SHE STILL BACKS OFF!!!!! She's too in love to disappoint and hurt him (emotionally) this way, and will absolutely choose him over the world (as her friends had accurately accused!!!) Sure, she gives herself a little mental band-aid about it, she reasons her decision not to stop Solas from *checks notes* destroying civilization as millions of people know it is about, uh, "having faith in him." Nah, dawg, it's toxic, obsessive love. That story is completed and published. Comes in at just under 30k. Read it here -> https://archiveofourown.org/works/38774526/chapters/96954213 I am working on the sequel which covers the first 3 years after the Veil falls. The draft is currently at 65k words. In that fic, the consequences of the apocalypse are dire!! A little worse than Solas expected. You know. For consistency. Eilan, at first, is not coping well and says ugly things to Solas. But in order to cope, she has to compartmentalize. Also, she's essentially in the most privileged position in all of Thedas at that point, and shielded from most horrors.

Meanwhile we see Solas start to have doubts about his choices re: the Veil (both putting it up and taking it down). His self-doubts start to eat at him and it is Eilan who builds up his confidence again. She's a playwright and writes literal propaganda to retell history where Solas is the singular greatest Byronic hero of all time. She tells him that what he did was right and good. Does she actually believe that? Doesn't matter! And not really? Look, they need to live. Here's what she does start to believe: Some people just matter more to world history, you know? 😉 And her turn to villainy is complete without ever, even once, having a god damn point. She just wants her love. I might write a part 3 where we see Eilan at her happiest. She and Solas are married, have kids, and the ugly past feels distant. In that story they learn that actions have consequences and the misdeeds of the past catch up to them both.