#kauriart

[not-poignant]

Not sure if this has been asked. But I remember you saying that FFS Arden could easily thrash FFS Gwyn pretty easily. In an UTB like-universe would you see Arden as a Peak Alpha as well so they could still have that same dynamic, or something else?

(I think my brain is in a thousand directions with those two right now. Loving the anticipation of their conflict in Constellations and still stuck with my Fae canon vision of Gwyn as this ultimate-warrior-of-unmatched-awesomeness-but-with-FEELINGS.)

I actually don't see Arden as a peak alpha at all, tbh. I see him as a beta who is also a dominant, and I don't really see a ton about him or his lifestyle changing!

I think part of that is that I don't think I could preserve his easygoing, friendly and compassionate personality in quite the same way if he was a peak alpha, or even an alpha, and that to me is such a vital, chosen part of who he is.

But I don't think the dynamics parallel anyway! Like, FFS Gwyn doesn't want to mount his cousin, and FFS Gary doesn't want to fuck Efnisien, so like... I don't really see UtB Gwyn and UtB Arden as having any kind of similar relationship either.

In fact I don't actually think Arden is in this universe at all. Like, I can kind of imagine a version of him existing in it, but I'm not writing the story as though he exists in it! To me Arden is just not in the Underline universe, in the same way that Eran as a viable partner isn't really in the Smoke in Autumn stories and Gwyn isn't present in Strange Sights.

Sometimes to make certain pairings work I have to 'you don't exist' to another character, lmao.

But yeah in Underline the Black I'm really not looking to preserve most of the dynamics that exist re: Efnisien and the people around him! I think part of that is that I'm several years on from thinking about Gwyn as much as I used to? So outside of The Nascent Diplomat and Constellations, Gwyn is not in my thoughts quite in the way he used to be (that's the break that I needed all along, tbh, so I didn't end up developing a strained connection to him as a character).

I think it's really amazing that other people enjoy and love thinking about him! Like, that's both humbling, and also like, I'm just glad on Gwyn's behalf in a weird way that his energy is still being really loved and looked after. But I've been trying hard to make room for new characters and new dynamics for a few years now, which means that I am really not seeking to replicate a lot of dynamics anymore, because I've written like 2.5 million words of those dynamics, and need a bit of a break!

(I love Arden, I just really didn't want to put him in a dystopia, which was like a weird personal choice of like 'no Arden deserves to not be here, especially if he's not going to get someone he loves out of it' dsalfkjasd)

[kauriart]

2017-2019 Writing Review

Tagged by @elveny​ and @kittimau​ <3

Am gonna do this a little differently, because I was too upset with my writing in both 2017 & 2018 to talk about where I ended up at the end of the year, and frankly 2019 isn’t that different, but I want to be kinder to myself and let myself celebrate what I HAVE written, instead of always focusing on what I didn’t.

Total A03 word count

188,821 with just a TON of writing that I haven’t published yet.

Any finished stories?

The Captain (Cullen x Isabela) is a very porny fic featuring one of my all-time fave rare-pairs. I managed to post the final 2 chapters after realizing that this wasn’t a stand-alone one-shot like I’d first planned, and am overall pretty floored with how it ended up.

What’s your own favorite story of the year?

Sunshine in the Dark (Alistair x Bethany) which has been a really lovely story to dig into, but also a challenge because A.) teeny tiny fucking ship and B.) I’d never written much from either character C.) the chapters are much longer than I usually write D.) no one is fucking yet so as a smut writer I don’t know what to do with myself.

Do you have any writing goals for the new year?

I want to get focused on how I attack writing. I want to actively write 3 stories simultaneously: Letters from Orlais, another multi chapter fic, and a one-shot; and focus on posting vs writing. I actually did manage to get through a chunk of my story queue in the last couple of years, but here’s what’s left of things that aren’t WIPs on AO3:

Cullen x f!Trevelyan (Dog Park AU) |  Warden x Morrigan x Alistair | Bull x Dorian | m!Lavellan x Bull  | Cullen x Carver | Tabris x Zevran x Isabela | Anders x m!Hawke x Fenris

Did you take any writing risks this year?

My mini-nsfw headcanons series was a big departure for me. They’re written in second person, which is literally no one’s favorite voice to read, and they’re tiny little character studies that take me forever to do. They’ve been pretty successful on tumblr –– which I’m super grateful for –– but they’r still not very satisfying to me compared to posting a full fic, and overall I felt like they derailed my focus.

Most popular story of the year?

Cullen: Intimacy (NSFW Cullen x f!Trev) It’s my most popular one-shot ever. A look at Cullen’s relationship with an explicitly plus-sized Trevelyan. It was rather intimidating to write, but that make its reception that much more rewarding. And my eternal thanks to @stregatadallostregatto​ for her encouragement of that fic.

Story of mine most under-appreciated by the universe, in my opinion:

Cullen: Through the Ages It’s my first, and only, non-romance / gen fic, so it has a much lower readership than some of my other stuff, but similar reception in terms of comments. But I can only track easily on AO3, and my audience is muuuuuch smaller there than on tumblr so “under appreciated” is a little hard to track.

Story with the single sexiest moment:

Checkmate (Cullen x Dorian) Because I am a fan of awkward, passionate blow-jobs and it turns out this pair delivers.

“Holy crap, that’s wrong, even for you!” story:

Merill’s mini-nsfw headcanon. My dudes, there is fisting, and I did not intend for there to be fisting. But then I wrote:

Merrill’s hands are small, and graceful, and covered with scars so thin and fine in places, that they can only be felt when you drag them across your lips.

And then I went goddamn this is going to be about fisting, isn’t it? And lo, it was.

Story that was the most fun to write:

The Knight Lieutenant (Cullen & Meredith) I spent so much time pondering Meredith, and her impact on Cullen’s life, and his relationship to her, and how deep and complex Cullen’s ties to the order were, that I got to just wallow in the meta and headcanons which is pretty fun.

Hardest story to write:

Good Boy, Good Bye (Alistair x f!Cousland) Inspired by the death of my doggo - so it’s SAAAAAAAD, because it’s basically just Alistair’s reaction to Barkspawn’s death.

Biggest disappointment:

Happy Endings (m!Hawke x Orsino) I had to rush to finish the fic as part of an exchange I was doing and was pretty brutally disappointed with what I had posted. I did a pretty major edit that next week, and ended up being satisfied with the final product –– despite the lack of porn, alas –– but the initial failure still stuck with me.

Biggest surprise:

Cole (NSFW headcanon) because I kinda shocked myself by wanting to make Cole smut my #2 entry into my mini NSFW headcanon series, because it’s Cole and who the hell writes Cole smut?!

[fandom-age]

text overlaid atop the dragon age logo that reads "I can’t say (or divulge) how many times I have read @kauriart ‘Letters from Orlais’ but I cannot wait for more! Hello Mr. Rutherford….😏"

[gaymingbinosaur]

💬

He stood there entranced at the movement of her mouth. The way her smile seems to light up her whole face, the way she bit her lip when she was focusing on trying to remember a small detail of a picture. He wondered if they were as soft as they looked. He noticed her vibrant smile disappear breaking whatever spell her lips casted.

for this ask

[freethemages]

10 for Salty Asks!

Ooh thank you Kauri! That’s a tough one! XD

10. Most disliked arc. Why?

This is a really tough one, actually!

Idk if this is my most disliked of all, but I thought of it so here we go:

Orsino’s character arc pisses me off big time. Given the trajectory he had the whole time, his end just doesn’t make sense at all. It is so utterly ooc for him to flip like that, you know? It’s absurd. Totally, utterly absurd.

That man would not do anything to prove Meredith right no matter what. He wouldn’t endanger his charges like that. It goes against everything he’s said in game.

And I get that desperation does intense things, but I just don’t think that he was capable of that.

Like they really went ahead and fucked with a character just so they could have an extra (unnecessary) boss fight. Smh

Anyways, thanks so much! ❤️ xD

Anybody feel free to ask more of these questions, they’re fun!

[free-smarcher]

An Archive of Our Own, a project of the Organization for Transformative Works

Chapters: 5/5 Fandom: Dragon Age II, Dragon Age (Video Games), Dragon Age - All Media Types Rating: Explicit Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply Relationships: Alistair/Bethany Hawke Characters: Alistair (Dragon Age), Bethany Hawke Additional Tags: Warden Bethany Hawke, Grey Warden Alistair (Dragon Age), Slow Burn, I mean... ish., like slow burn for me, Fluff, aftermath of the joining, mild sex pollen, Hand Kink, Mutual Pining, Nightmares, Skinny Dipping, Public Nudity, Vaginal Fingering, Semi-Public Sex, Grey Warden Joining, warden headcanons galore, Vaginal Sex, Smut, quick someone high-five Bethany, Porn with Feelings, Canon-Typical Violence, Oral Sex, Falling In Love Summary:

“What’s your name?”

“Bethany Hawke,” she says, and sticks out her hand like an idiot, the way her mother always taught her –– palm down like a lady, not a secret apostate, or an up-jumped refugee, or whatever she is now.

He takes her hand, thumb brushing across her knuckles the way a well-brought up man’s lips might. “Alistair. Welcome to the Ferelden Wardens.”

***

What if The Joining made you not only super hungry... but super horny too?

***

Okay, this is my second fic rec in a single weekend - today, even! I was way, way late to reading this but I read it yesterday morning (@kauriart I owe you comments on two chapters still, sorry!) and it just left me warm and grinning and overflowing with affection. First of all, Kauri knows for smut, but best of all, she also knows for incredibly vivid, believable, so-real-you-could-touch-it love and affection. In this story she takes two of the biggest sweethearts in the DA franchise and commits 110% to writing a believable, enjoyable character-exploration-via-sex-pollen story for a super-wholesome rarepair (who are cursed to spend their lives fighting an unstoppable ill and to die half-monstrous in the dark, or whatever). The Warden lore and headcanons in this are great, and the original characters are deeply enjoyable, too. And Bethany! The way her magic, her relationship to her magic, and to desire, and to repression, and to her people (whoever they are) - it's all so SO good. 

This was genuinely a ray of good cheer on a sorta somber Saturday and I can't recommend it enough. 

[simonjadis]

Salty Asks #10?

Most disliked arc? Why? 

(refers to this post [X])

For Dragon Age, this is so tough for me. A lot of people don’t like Lost In Dreams but, as a mage player, I love that sequence.

I literally thought about this off and on for HOURS before coming up with an answer: Awakening

I don’t dislike the DLC or the new lore. The Architect of Beauty is an interesting character on a number of levels. Having my own castle and sitting in judgment was SO fun there. And it really helped to flesh out headcanons of what the HoF did.

I really like the companions. Like many people, I’m h*rny for Nathaniel Howe. This is where we meet Anders. Speaking as someone who lost a sister shortly before Origins was released, Velanna is an interesting, sympathetic character. Sigrun is precious. Justice was such a cool companion. Oghren ... was also there.

But the actual quests and main story? They freak me the h*ck out. The Wending Wood by itself is a little creepy. There’s a Deep Roads portion and that’s not the worst part, because of THE BLACKMARSH. I do not wish to go there!!! Ever!!!

(Golems of Amgarrak is worse but I’m not counting that)

[yay-smut]

Snow day up north- so I thought I’d try @kauriart portrait tutorial. I don’t have Photoshop, so this is a 4x6” canvas; medium and small square and round tip brushes; acrylic (just mixes of red/blue/yellow/black/white); and about an hour. I haven’t painted a portrait in 15 years- so her tutorial is LEGIT.