Why do the virtues look so different from their actual virtue designs in Elder Fairie's retelling of the story?
The BORING but somewhat realistic explanation: devsis simply didn't completely have their designs down during that time, and needed placeholders
The FUN explanation (to me): Elder fairie did not know what the virtues looked like.
Elder Faerie has always been an unreliable narrator, from this story he's giving being almost completely false, to him purposefully withholding information.(coughcoughwhitelilywitchesbanquet)
Burning spice and eternal sugars depiction deviates greatly from their actual design, in fact, eternal sugar and burning spice look much closer to their current designs than they do to their virtue designs.
I've created two explanations for this alone,
He only had reference for what they currently look like, and had little idea of what they looked like in the past.
These are how they looked earlier into their original creation.
However, the only two that look exactly like their virtue designs are mystic flour and silent salt. It makes sense that he would know what silent salt looks like by heart, but the others? It's difficult to say whether or not he'd really know them or what they look like.
Of course, these could still be passed off as them not completely having the designs down, and simply needing placeholders.
BUT, something really interesting that I believe to be the elephant in the room, is the fact that shadow milk is so obviously not Fount in this retelling of the story.
Simply misremembering details is one thing, but it is a blaring fact that this design is specifically Azure Storyteller, a design barely even slightly close to what fount actually looked like. The staff even lacks the souljam Fount would have had, the soul jam does not have the pupil like it should (similarly to the souljam depicted in the story.), and they have the exact same pose.
This is extremely interesting, because devsis has gone out of their way to say that it's impossible to know what he truly looks like, because he constantly changes forms.
With Azure storyteller being one of them.
This is also significant because the azure storyteller in the image seems to have a milkcrown, so there's a possibility that it was a version of azure storyteller instead of azure storyteller we have now.
But this may also mean that, with the idea that even before shadow milk he had various forms, no one truly even knew who the Fount really was. He could have concealed his true identity completely, from everyone, and no one would have known unless they visited his domain personally, and not even salt seemed to do that. And I find that fact REEAALLy interesting.
I’m working on so many projects, but I’m hoping to get as many done as possible before I go back to Uni. I enjoy this a lot (if you can’t tell) so fingers crossed! ENJOY!
Reader x Male Monster
These Violent Desires
For most of your life into your late teens, you always thought you had a follower. A follower or someone who watched over you like a guardian angel. Maybe it would’ve been seen as a bit odd or creepy to some, but to you, you thought not much of it; as if you had someone to protect you.
Your mother had told you otherwise. Many times, she had tried protecting you from the world, an overprotective mother, who too, grew up in a sheltered life trapped from the outside.
You see, all things lurked and hid in the darkest of places, coming out into the light as something or someone you could trust. A stranger who could manipulate you into thinking of them as nothing but harmful, until you find it too late and you’re whisked away from a life you once knew.
You had found it odd, and it applied mainly to humans that many would’ve been given the lesson of never talking to strangers. But this applied to other species too.
The fondest memories you had since you were a child were when you would go to visit your grandmother, in a secluded part of the north-east part of your small town.
The mansion was large, with ten bedrooms, a flower-shaped rose-window in the top of the attic that you remember going up into to do tea parties. Each room was homely yet held possibly years of history.
The walls were old and decrepit: decades of some neglect could be seen from the amount of many trinkets and items your grandma Delores had collected, but it was homely, and always smelled like pine.
There was a simplicity to her large home, a rustic feel that you often didn’t get when at home, and something that always called for you to return more and more.
Your mother like her own mother grew up in a household that was filled with more paranoia than freedom. All for certain beliefs and unknown truths that your family held for years. You had been unfortunate to witness yourself many times before.
Collecting your shoes to head to the back door to the garden, your grandma there either sewing or washing the dishes would stop all to come to you. It would follow with her putting charms in your pocket and an iron bracelet around your wrist before telling you time and time after again one simple rule:
’Do not go over the line.’
It was a simple rule that you couldn’t forget, yet something so normalised with the number of times you had gone to play in the garden. The line was something simple: as if it had been drawn in salt with small mushrooms growing on the exact spot, it took up half of the garden, reaching just under the branches of the trees.
You never misbehaved when it came to that rule (simply that you were too scared what would happen and how your mother and grandma would react), so you stuck to playing far away from it, ignoring it as best as you could as you got on with your play.
But still, in the back of your mind, you thought you were being watched through the bushes like there was a peeping neighbour watching in on you, but when you looked, you saw nothing.
The swaying of the trees danced through the wind, a call and whisper that danced through the air, and then you would be called in for lunch before you got too curious.
It continued and continued until you grew old of your dolls and small play, and you got older and found little time spent at your grandmas. She soon passed away when you were in your late teens, and that distant memory of playing there was something that plagued your mind; as if calling for you.
After a few years of cleaning out the old house, your mother told you that they were going to knock the entire building down, rebuild over it, and at that moment so rushed, you had told her your words of disagreeing, going as far to say that it would upset and disappoint your grandma.
’If you and I are not going to look after it, who will?’ your mother shared her disapproval with you that evening of the news.
Your answer back to her made her close her mouth in surprise. ‘Who said I wasn’t?’
After a lot of convincing, you persuaded your mother for you to keep the house and to maintain it for as long as possible. You had a simple part-time job, but you were certain that you could just keep the house at its bare minimal in tidiness.
You had returned to your grandma’s home when you were in your early 20s, returning to a place of both nostalgia and sentimental memories. There almost felt like a place of déjà vu.
You had parked your car and exited, walking alone and quietly to the front of the door, the leaves blowing past your shoes as you opened it with the key given. The door opened eerily and slowly, a hallway of utter darkness greeted you.
You stepped inside, involuntarily wiping the dirt from your shoes out of habit when there was no doormat, going to turn the light on. No luck. Damn, a reminder to buy new lightbulbs. You thought, shutting the door and walking further in and peering through the empty rooms.
For years of being cleared out, there was still that recurring smell of pine that faintly wafted through the air, but it made you think that it was possibly due to a window being open. It seemed true when you saw the large cobwebs in the corners of the dark rooms.
It was an odd feeling returning, a feeling of forlorn fell over you like a curtain. You were sure that there was some despair that was making you feel this way: the feeling that all would go through when it came to those to remember those lost.
You stepped through every room, even the rooms upstairs, memories flooding your mind as you silently walked along like a forgotten ghost. The smell of the earth, the laughter shared in these rooms. The flower-shaped rose window in the attic. All from a childhood long lost. You reminisced.
You walked yourself to the kitchen, looking out on the overgrown garden; a wilderness that awaited you. With the key in hand, you knew there would be little waiting for you, say perhaps some forgotten gardening tools or a neglected bike with its safety wheels left on.
You twisted the key in and soon found yourself entering into a void you thought you could recall. It was as the barrier between the mortal realm had been brought down; creating a euphoric and unearthly feeling in the air, twisting it to just feel oddly strange if you hadn’t noticed deeply.
You stepped out, the trees warped into creatures and shadows you didn’t know nor recognise, encasing you in as you looked around. Even the birds sang a tune much more unknown; as if all reality had melted into the wonderland you were standing in now.
The line that was in the middle of the garden, was still there, with more mushrooms and flowers that had grown so that it had now been a line made from flowers.
There soon suddenly came a found of sweetness that filled the air, a sound of music that fills your ears to not exactly know where it was coming from.
It was all so peaceful you felt, walking closer to the line, a concerned voice of Grandma Delores warning you. ‘Don’t go over the line, remember? They certainly will not be as kind to you as you are to them.’
You never wanted to question what she meant by them, for most of the things your mother fed you as your grandmother being half-mad had been supplanted into your head since young. You, however, had your question answered when a dip in the trees and bushes brought your attention, and when you squinted your eyes from afar, you could just about see the figure standing not so hidden in view.
Your heart dropped a few metres down as if you had jumped from a cliff, a rush of adrenaline came to you as you were questioning whether what you were seeing was true or false.
The figure grew bigger into your view as whoever it was, stepped out further into the clearing. You would’ve begun shouting for them to get out of the garden for trespassing; perhaps even one of the young boys trying to get his ball back by crawling under a broken fence?
But this was no neighbour nor boy, no, what stood a few metres by the trees was that of a young man, tall and willowy, you would’ve believed if you had blinked, he would’ve disappeared - for his sudden appearance was something that surprised you.
He was ethereal and celestial; a man who even looked and stood there in a way that didn’t look like someone from your world. He had hair straight and long, black as a coal pit, but made his skin look paler and porcelain than your childhood dolls. He was dressed in garbs that were rich in deep autumnal colours, and what contrasted the clothes of his rich-looking clothes were his eyes.
His eyes are full of aeons of wisdom, the colour of nothing you had ever seen from others; the colour of alexandrite. His face was sharp and lean; with high cheekbones and a heavenly look.
Albeit there was a strange man in your grandma’s garden, you couldn’t deny he was very handsome; an attractiveness that you didn’t see from other men.
You stared at him quizzically, unknown exactly what to say. “Hello?” You called, your voice floating gently through the air with a force more suit for divine reality.
He stared with his majestic eyes, a mysterious smile appearing on his face. “I’m glad to see you again.”
“I’m sorry sir?” You called to the stranger. “How did you find a way into my garden?”
The dark-haired male stepped out close, his long flowy dark cloak making him look as if he was levitating without having to walk, gliding closer with steps you wished he would’ve stopped in taking.
He chuckled melodically, a sound similar to wind chimes; so soft and deep that it rumbled through you and shot right through your soul. “You don’t know my dear? Hmm, that is a shame. I would’ve thought a smart little thing like you would’ve known not to speak to people like me.”
The man was soon standing just opposite you, the line keeping him from crossing it to come over, as he stood a few metres back from it, looking at you with those enchanting haunting purple eyes.
“People like you?” You questioned hesitantly, looking him up and down. You had been told countless times by your mother and paranoid grandma over not talking to strangers when you were young, but this was now when you were an adult, and you had never met this man before.
You stared at him, trying to see what was really peculiar with him, and why he was giving you such odd vibes; none that would raise flags as of yet. The more you stared, the more you thought that you could perhaps even look right into the being of himself. You couldn’t even get that with him.
The man smiled to you, keeping an oddly calm composure. “When this house was built, many had come to see it truly for itself, to see the new souls living just on the outskirts of the woods here.” He gestured with a pale hand behind him. “It was only when more, shall we say… unexpected guests started coming over more and more often to this lovely home. That was when the first owner built this ring, the line that had kept whatever out there from coming in.”
You squinted at his words, trying to take them in. “You know of this garden?”
“Why yes, each individual habitant knows of every little soul who comes living there, even I.” The stranger spoke, a harsh frown fell over his face quickly as an immediate thought floated to his mind.
“When news came over what had happened to Delores, the owner’s sweet little girl, why, every creature big and small mourned for her loss."
Your hands grew clammy in that brief moment he had said that, and a wave of the need to faint washed over you, trying to keep yourself upright. “How do you know my grandmother?” Your words were slow and cautious, downright afraid of what would come out next from the man in front of you.
The elegant man took another step just outside the line keeping him from entering, and you only just took note of the high pointy ears that were protruding out from the side of his head. The cogs inside your head were only just beginning to turn.
“Why, when little Delores had started growing more curious of the outside world and she stepped out, every creature was interested in her, and it had been her father who had come up with the genius plan of creating this line, drawing the bad things away and to keep her safe. It had been done so for as long as the winds continued to blow and the sun continued to shine. And still, this line had helped ones like you from crossing over into the threshold of this land.”
You had been thinking back to the English lit lessons from high school, to what all had been told about during plays and stories of what you believed weren’t true. It couldn’t be– it just couldn’t. Grandma was mad, but never… never did she say anything to me about the land of the fey living just outside of her home.
You took a cautionary step back, now making sure to not take your eyes off of the man you believed could only be a fey. “You… you know me?” You tried to pick the right words to say to him, hearing of how you had to be smart around one of his kind.
He kept his fixed expression on you, tempting in ways as if he was trying to drown you in the alexandrite of his gaze. “I’ve seen you since you were a youngling, always too curious for your own good. It was always something that brought me coming back to you.”
You unintentionally gulped. “You wanted to see me? Even when I didn’t know who you were, or what you were?”
“Precisely.” The man smiled broadly. “And yet, this from a sly mistake your grandmother made, and this fairy line would be brandished as a punishment for all that came wandering back.”
“You clearly know more than I? What happened to her?”
“Let’s just say…. a fey unlike I wasn’t as kind to her as I to you.”
That could explain why grandma Delores was filled with such paranoia. In your short lifetime, you had never told that your grandma had been possibly attacked from a young age; not even mom had told you anything about it and you knew how protective she was of you too.
All because she had potentially stepped out of line. You had been sheltered all your life from answers, and you were unsure whether to believe the fey right in front of you. You did know faes could tell the truth - the amount to it you were uncertain of, or whether they could twist some of it.
You brought your gaze to the dark-haired fae once again. “A so-called fae who has known me for all my life, yet I do not know you.” You bit your own lip momentarily, uncertain whether to pursue. “Is there a name I can call you?”
His eyes twinkled in contrast to the little sunlight coming in through the trees, a soft glow coming to his skin that couldn’t have been coming from the sun.
“You may call me Erolith. And you, my dear?”
You gave him your nickname given to you since your younger days.
Erolith bowed his head in respect. “I shall be seeing more of you I assume my delight? Until then.” And with a swish of his heavy cape, the fey in front of you had slunk back into the woods, disappearing quickly before you could even think twice.
Curious, cautious, wary… words you couldn’t describe how to feel that day when you thought you had been lied to or been fed the untold truth. All because your grandmother had thrown caution to the wind that she had made you stick to being showered with overwhelming amounts of protection.
You hadn’t told your mother that day of going to the house, telling her you had been there and out in a matter of seconds - a lie you knew she wouldn’t think much too.
You returned during the weeks of the cooler season, sometimes there for hours on end to just bring in things to clean out the rooms and to leave as soon as possible.
You had found yourself in the darkness of the attic, sitting cross-legged against the wall as you read beneath the flower-shaped rose window. It brought an immense amount of memories to you to remember, but you enjoyed staying here in the quietness of the house, away from the world.
You read books and reread them over and over again, this time trying to familiarise yourself with some classic plays and novels during your late teens. This time, you had Romeo and Juliet in your hands.
These violent delights have violent ends. At first, it seemed vague to you during high school, but now, seemed to make a lot of sense.
You closed the part you had been on, gazing forth from the window as you stared on into your garden, certain you would see the fey again.
Erolith hadn’t returned in the few times you had come back, not at first, but you were sure he was watching from a distance. You weren’t bothered by it by much, sticking to sorting out the house, and soon it could be someone else’s problem.
You sighed, rubbing your eyes from lack of sleepless nights when your eyes focused on the certain silhouette of a figure emerging from the foliage.
You had dropped your book quickly, heading down to the garden to see him.
He was found standing right in front of the fairy line, closer to it than the first time he had come forth to you, standing there in the opening as if not bothered if another would see him there.
“Erolith…” his name was odd on your tongue, a name you found was still delightful and sweet of sound to taste. “I didn’t think you’d come back.”
He had turned to you with a gaze so familiar with eyes of calmness. “You didn’t think I would come back to see you, my dear?”
Damn him and his beautiful looks. You thought, walking to him but not standing as close to him. “You wanted to come back here?” You asked.
“Careful now my dear, you mean to say wished.” His tone darkened for a moment, your heart thumping in your chest, ready to implode.
You reiterated. “You wished to come back here? Why?”
“Because of you.” Erolith coolly responded, taking note of how far off you were conversing with him. “You stand so far off as if waiting to run off the moment something seems off.” invited the fey, “come closer to me. I won’t bite as you think I will.”
You wavered. “I’m fine here, thank— I appreciate it though.”
Erolith obliged, and the two of you just spoke about anything that he would answer that wasn’t cryptic. When he isn’t telling you things that sound like riddles, you grow mildly frustrated; thinking about exactly everything he said and the meanings behind every word.
“My grandmother once told me there is always something to be afraid of, that the world is awaiting things bad for me that hide with smiling faces.” You begun, eyeing the fae with a quick sharp look.
Erolith chuckled an airy laugh, mirthless. “Well, she is not wrong there.” And when you looked to him to clarify, did he continue. “All the worst things come to snatch those innocent enough. The sweet naïve child, the blushing maid. They’re all for taking when it comes to most faes?”
“And what about you? Do you follow those rules?” Your words twisted to add him into the mix, your eyes staring him down. He didn’t look in shock nor surprise by your words. And either he was trying to tell the truth or was struggling to lie, he was a good actor.
“I’m not like most faes my dear.”
You didn’t know whether to believe him, but there was something that you could find beneath his words that were hiding. Something hidden that was begging for you to trust him. In your mind, it seemed weird, but you couldn’t deny maybe you could perhaps fight fire with fire and go with your mind than your heart.
“I trust you then.”
His broke into a broad signature smile, spread over his pale face with relief. “I’m glad.”
The next few days you brought things from home to set up camp to a sleepover for a few nights, maybe thinking that not having to drive over constantly would save you gas. It was more in a case to familiarise yourself with the old house; trying your best to not seem scared when you sleep in a dusty sleeping bag in the living room, staring up at the ceiling the entire night.
The days you didn’t sit in the attic, but in the garden, reading or humming softly or even napping, but all just to wait for your friend. When he did arrive, it surprised you into thinking he must’ve sensed you there, but deciding not to question it.
At first, you sat far as possible away from him, watching from a safe distance and continued your conversations with him. It was only when on one day that you sat a few metres from the fairy line, picking growing flowers to create links from scratch.
Erolith didn’t say anything to that, copying you and sitting in the grass, continuing to speak with you as you exchanged small daisies to each other with some effort.
On the fifth day of doing so, you had decided to question where he stood when it came to deciding to keep coming back to you or to even holding conversations with a mortal like you.
“Sometimes I think you just come back here because you’re bored.” You spoke up, not meeting your eyes as you continued fixing the daisy chain in your fingers, “I suppose I can admit I was nervous around you.”
“You were?” Intrigued was the only word you could think of that made you think of Erolith. “And what would you say now? Still horrified at the sight of me?”
You met his gaze that split second, and immediately wished you could look away. He was already staring straight back at you, waiting, with a look you didn’t want to decipher. You gulped, your words dry in your throat.
“No– no I wouldn’t say so anymore.”
Abruptly he was stood before you, standing just inches away from the line as he stared down upon you. “Test this theory out then my dear. Come please– over to me.”
Your mind raced but your body was already programming yourself to slowly and steadily stand to your feet, neglecting the flower chain as you stepped over it.
Inching and inching closer, you thought back to your grandmother and what she would think. Mainly stupid and perhaps gullible in believing him. But from what you could tell of Erolith, he was funny, smart, and intellect, but she would’ve said it was his way of drawing you in closer.
Like drawing a moth to a flame. You breathed, soon standing just before him. He was a few inches taller than you, you only reaching his collarbones, and having to peer up into his beautiful eyes. The fairy line was touching your feet, begging you not to overdo it.
Erolith smiled shyly, reaching a hand for you. “Please, I want to touch you.”
These violent delights have violent ends. You reached for him, and tentatively, you put your hand into his. Warm and soft you didn’t expect that from him, but you were more than expecting the fae to have really smooth skin compared to yours.
Erolith hummed in approval. “That’s it– just like that.” He softly spoke, like talking to a wounded animal with no indications of harming it. You felt flushed under his gaze, blushing as you didn’t break eye contact. “That wasn’t so bad, was it?”
You shook your head as you pulled away, quicker than you could expect. Withdrawing brought a coolness to come back to your skin as if you had been brought back into your own world and body.
You stared at him with awe and wonder, thinking to yourself as to what you had done. “I wonder how Dolores would’ve reacted had she of seen you now.” Grinned the fae. “She wouldn’t have been most pleased.”
You shook your head, thinking that for a split moment, you could hear the familiar song and mirthless chimes coming from the distance, shaking your head to dismiss your head with such thoughts.
This continued and continued, days and days on end as you got closer and closer to Erolith, the barrier-breaking between the two of you. Slowly and with what you thought could be trusted, he broke your walls and allowed you to be more open to him, asking more questions and being open to answering ones he had for you, touching him and even going as far as to read with him.
You grew more appreciative of him, his time he spent with you as you the nagging feeling in the back of your head grew less and less; telling you it was better to have a friend around than none at all.
You were sat reading silently to yourself, leaning into his back as he sat facing away from you on the grass. Back to back, you held the book with one hand, your hand reaching over to his side over the line to hold his, feeling his warm fingers trace and squeeze and hold you back with much attention and adoration you had ever felt in your life.
“I will have to go soon, my dear. The evening is nigh and you still haven’t eaten. We wouldn’t want to ruin your evening, would we?” Erolith had brought your attention back to reality, as you shut your book with a quiet sigh.
“I’m not hungry.” You said, turning your head back to him as he grinned. “And besides, I can spend more time with you.”
“Wouldn’t you want to share the company with another instead of I?” Erolith suggested softly. “Have you no worrying mother, nor troubled friends that would need to get in contact with you?”
You thought to your mother, whom you had fallen out of talking with over an argument. She had believed you were spending too much time at the house and away from home; as if the house was corrupting you like grandma Delores had been.
As for friends, you fell out of conversion with old ones from high school. You didn’t need them, you had Erolith now… but did he want to be friends with you still?”
“I— they don’t matter right now. Don’t you want to spend time with me?” You pouted, looking downcast as you stood to your feet.
You weren’t expecting two warm hands to come around your face, pulling your attention to flicker up to meet his soft and genuine eyes. “I enjoy every day with you, my dear. More so than anyone I’ve known compared to a beat of every millennium.”
You paused in a beat, before speaking what anyone sane would’ve called your mad for thinking. You shut your eyes as you went to wrap your arms around the fae’s waist, effectively stepping over the fairy line that was keeping you safe for twenty-three years of your life.
Erolith gasped softly into your touch as you felt him hug you back for what you wanted in forever, slowly coming to terms as to what you had just done.
“The line… you stepped over the line.” His voice a mere state of shock.
You were standing in fae territory now, and now your life was in the hands of the fae you had come to enjoy spending time with. Erolith grabbed at your shoulders, pulling you back to your senses as you stared dazed at him.
You managed to get “get back over” from him as you felt him trying to push you back over to your side, but you tried your best planting your feet firmly into the dirt. “I don’t want to.”
Erolith huffed, surprised as you were with your statement. “Faes less kind than me will come when they sense you on our side. They will be here in a matter of seconds, claiming you for themselves and making you become their personal slave.”
You breathed, planting your fingers spread over his chest, leaning up to him. “If there is one person I would want to be claimed by, it would be by you.” You caught him off guard for sure.
“Please, my life is a living hell, I find little love nor freedom here.”
“And you won’t over here if you don’t go back. Please, I beg of you, I will not take you as a slave and I never wanted to.” He said your name, adamant and serious in making sure you were safe. That was all you needed to know in believing that the fae did care for you.
You smiled sadly, still trying to get him to agree. “I don’t care. I like you Erolith, I will admit that. I enjoy spending time with you, whether you like me or not.” You may of seen insane in anyone’s eyes, but not to him. He knew of your pain, your silent suffering you had to face for all your life.
Erolith embraced you carefully, sweetly as if you were made of glass than human flesh. He was treating you like a delicate jewel, making sure to keep you from breaking. “I wouldn’t keep you as a slave, that was never my intention. You have my word. If you go with this, there’s no certainty you will be able to pass the threshold back into your world.”
The swaying of trees brought your attention past his shoulders, but he pulled his head to block the view behind him. In front of you, Erolith’s eyes were completely blown wide with wanton and adoration.
You smiled, saying two words that brought him to believe his words and set out to make you happy. Two words that made him see that you were completely trusting him and confident in what you wanted.
“I know.”
It was enough to make him sweep you off your feet and press his lips to yours feverishly, and you felt yourself float above the clouds, higher than any God or kingdom could keep you from falling or staying still.
You wrapped your arms around his neck as you sighed blissfully into him, your bodies flush to each other.
The book you had been reading had been neglected in the empty garden, forgotten for aeons as the wind blew gently through the trees. For seasons would come but the sun would continue to rise.
The page left on the final page as it fluttered shut on the final words:
MY KINGDOM GROWS WELCOME TO THE LAND OF THE FAE. I AM THE RULER OF THE FAE AND I SHALL PROTECT EACH AND EVERY ONE OF YOU. MY MUTUALS ARE MEMBERS OF THE FAE COUNSIL.
