"Heard what happened in Nessus. Didn't think you had it in you, baby bird."
It's as close to praise as Reva ever gets. Esha hates the squirming soft part of her that preens at it; the rest prickles. Reva's hand rests warm and firm on her hip, her body steady as it ever was. Esha swallows and tries to match it. "If you'd stayed," she mutters, "you'd have known first hand."
🪶 - Davrin death fix-it fic
He scrapes the mess off the hard surfaces and over towards the soft ones, the pits and lumps that snake around the edges of Weisshaupt. Sometimes they grow over the gouges in the walls, other times they just seem to make them more obvious.
At least, when Davrin looks at them they do. He tries not to do that too often. Makes his head hurt.
🍲 - Lucanis + food
But Neve is less familiar with Hightown, and so it is Rook who leads them through quiet streets of stone as pale as buttermilk. Up they follow her to the parts of the city where breezes stir enough to break through the thick humidity, and a mixture of curious, scornful and worried glances follow the three of them.
"Helps that I'm with two humans," she says, not bothering to keep her voice low. "They probably figure I'm your servant."
"Not our slave?"
"Nah. Wearing too many clothes for that, plus they know you wouldn't stand for it," Rook adds, when Neve's face falls. "C'mon, this way."
🖋️ - Bullvelyan soulmark AU (specifically, soulmate AU with a soulmark that's the last thing ur soulmate is supposed to say to you)
Is he going to die? Perhaps. At least Josephine’s already made sure his affairs are in order. Lucien itches at his forearm; the motion allows a trickle of the Storm Coast's constant rain to sneak in between the sleeve of his cloak and the robes underneath. He imagines it tracing the words on his skin.
How quickly might Bull kill him? Lucien's hoping he wouldn't leave it to Gatt. It seems terribly uncouth, after all they've been through together. But the words burn, as if to remind him.
tumblr user flowers i HAVE to thank you for the best mod of my fucking life [always bad ending]. it's a true gift and DEEPLY appreciated. absolute lifesaver.
(the mod in question)
YAY! I've always thought of it as one of the more useful mods I made, getting to the bad ending on its own is kind of hell. Glad there are people who actually need it!
Thank you for taking the time to say thanks, that means a lot to me <3
ship kiss meme thing, number 12 'in grief' for any ship HIT ME WITH THE BITTERSWEET ANGST, AMY
u said bittersweet so i had to mix in some of the sweet also, here u go!
prompt from this post
"Festis bei umo canavorum," he'd said, that first morning they woke up together. His face had been golden as he'd looked down on her, his eyes bright as the sun as Neve squinted up at him.
"Wake me up this early again," she told him, "and I might be." To which Brom had laughed, and kissed her brow, and pulled the blankets higher up around her.
"Sorry. Go back to sleep."
-
Strange. She hasn't thought about that morning in so long. It's been hard to imagine any part of Brom that wasn't the last. Every drop of blood that escaped him had bled a little more of that vibrancy out with it, until he was left pale and waxy and cold.
That's the face that's haunted her these last few years. The one whose brow she kissed just before the rest of the Templars arrived, far past the point where there was anyone left to save.
-
And now the memory again. The way the sunlight slanted through the window grate. Brom never left the blinds closed when he slept - said he liked to rise with the morning sun. Neve had grumbled and turned her face into the pillow, and secretly thought it suited him.
There's no sunlight in the meditation room. The strange blue of the aquarium is a constant. It washes over her skin and turns it to something cooler, almost stonelike. Somehow, though, it seems to suit Alec. She can almost picture him in the Nocen Sea, the clear waters off Ventus. The way they'd hold him for a moment, the way the light might play off his face.
"Mph," he says, in a low, sleep-roughened voice. "Neve?"
He looks at her the way Brom had. Like she's the one who took the sun and set it in the sky, just for him. Neve opens her mouth to say something, but it feels like she used up all her words last night.
So instead, with grief and guilt and pure relief singing through her veins, she presses a kiss to his forehead, and hopes it speaks for her.
character asks: 3, 4, AND 5 for Eshaaaaa [and also for Lucien if you feel up for it]
ohhhhh ty ty!!
(prompts from this list)
3. What was the first thing you decided on, the character's name, appearance, personality or their role in the story?
Appearance and personality first for Esha! She was originally gonna be a Fenhawke fankid, so I knew I had to get the DA2 elf nose and big eyes. I also tried giving her canon Garrett's square jaw, and Fenris' darker skin (I'd just finished reading FoxNonny's 'Heart Says Go', so Desi Fenris was v much on my mind!) Basically I wanted a Tevene elf with a snarky sense of humour and a massive chip on her shoulder - and even after her backstory shifted to have Charon Mercar as her dad, she kept all of that.
Lucien's name and rough facial appearance came from having rewatched the original Death Note live action film last year. It was as terrible as I remembered, but Tatsuya Fujiwara's face is excellent (though I think Lucien came out closer to Takumi Saito in the end). Originally he was going to be a lot more calculating and morally grey - using Andrastianism as more of a propaganda cudgel - but I ended up having a lot more fun playing his devoutness straight, as it were.
(Currently mulling over a world where the person who drinks from the Well is the one who ends up hosting Mythal in Veilguard, rather than just Morrigan. I just think it would be extremely funny - for me - to have Lucien "yes I really am the chosen avatar of Andraste" Trevelyan wake up one morning to find he's playing host to the elven All-Mother.)
4. And reverse, which one of the four things did you struggle with the most?
Esha's full personality took a while to come through properly! I initially stuck to the line of 'looks like Fenris, mostly acts like Hawke except with a chip on his shoulder' for that first playthrough, but it felt weirdly superficial. The second run, I tried out a lot of the more direct/angry lines, and they felt much more suited to her. It was also kind of fun getting to play her as slowly warming up to her teammates over time, and shifting to more helpful/upbeat stuff with people she'd grown to love rather than that being the default.
Lucien...honestly slotted into place so easily lmao. Like once I'd got that core of genuine belief in the Maker and his duty of like - noblesse oblige, I guess? The rest pretty much fell into place.
5. How did you choose their name and why? Was it simply based on vibes or is there any specific meaning behind the name? Are the reasons behind their name different in- and out of universe?
Okay, so in-universe Lucien's name comes from an adventure novel he read as a kid - he read a lot of them, including one that I sort of imagine as an equivalent to the Chronicles of Narnia (Lucien in this book series being like... Prince Caspian maybe). When he started thinking of what he might want to be called as a man, the older herbalist mentoring him (a trans woman herself) brought up the book series he'd mentioned, and it stuck.
(Fun fact: the reason he went exploring at the Temple of Sacred Ashes was because he was being a huge nerd and wanted to follow the path taken by the Hero of Ferelden and her party through the Temple. He'd made notes on all the little markers he might find along the way and everything. Then he heard someone calling for help, and... yeah. In a roundabout way, the Tale of the Warden saved his life.)
Esha was complete random chance IRL - I literally just used the name randomiser in Veilguard until I saw one I liked. In-universe, Charon Mercar brought a baby home to his wife, who naturally asked what it was called. Charon felt wildly guilty over the death of the baby's clan and wanted something to vaguely honour her elven heritage, but crucially didn't know any elves.
White people tattoo-style shenanigans ensued, with the result that Esha has a name that effectively means 'they' or 'person' in elvehn. It's... yeah. She feels very alienated from her culture of origin, and that doesn't help - but by the time she's old enough to try connecting with it, it is her name, y'know?
(This headcanon brought to you by Project Elvehn - I know, boo hiss - having 'Ma'esha' as a term of endearment that they translated as 'my person'. It's Reva's nickname for her, or was when they were still together.)
In the Mercar siblings 'verse, it's probably either holding Alec for the first time or climbing an orange tree with him somewhere in Ventus, giggling uncontrollably all the while. Or the first time she used force magic to very gently toss him into a nearby lake. She was absolutely terrified for a solid moment that she might've just fucked up and drowned him, but then he popped up from the water, laughing like a mad thing and demanding that she do it again.
Outside of that verse, pre-canon, it's probably curling up in Charon's lap while he read to her. Slowly, yes - he wasn't taught his letters until he was being lined up for promotion to a command role - but his rough voice and rough hands carefully following the letters and sounding them out was and is a deep comfort.
Post-canon - nothing beats the morning after the battle of Minrathous, waking up in Lace's arms and realising we did it. We fucking won. And then getting to kiss her girlfriend silly, ofc!
When you get this, put 5 songs you actually listen to, then publish. send this ask to 10 of your followers (positivity is cool)! 😎
yay, what a fun meme! here's five songs I've been jamming to lately:
hm. "holy roller" by the format
FIRST NEW SONG BY THE FORMAT IN YEARS YIPPEEE. I literally cannot believe we're getting a new the format album in just a few short days. nostalgia to the max.
5. "she used to be mine" by sara bareilles and rufus wainwright
I have a general sad millennial girl fondness for both sara bareilles and rufus wainwright, so I lost my mind when they released one of the most beautiful covers of this song for pbs. I've listened to it an absurd number of times. (note: the recent sara bareilles and brandi carlile duet is also very worth checking out, since they also covered this song together).
4. "used to it" by noshows
I had a really hard time choosing between noshows eps because I've become instantly obsessed with every new single he drops. WHERE'S THE FULL ALBUM?
3. "firelight" by young the giant, ft. cassandra coleman
another live male/female duet that I've had on repeat recently. young the giant makes me feel like I'm 18 years old again.
2. "the yips" by petey USA
the bass line in this song makes me want to crash my car. fun fact: I had no idea this was the tiktok guy until just now when I looked the song up on youtube. neat! enjoy a funky jam with sad lyrics!
"spin" by bad bad hats and the front bottoms
I love the front bottoms. this has been my emo car anthem recently. please picture me belting out "hey baby, I've been meaning to tell you / I don't wanna die / before you" as I drive down i5 (again).
HAPPY BIRTHDAY FLOWERS it's a little one but my fav bellara moment is when she, with COMPLETELY earnest curiosity, asks qunari!rook why they can't breathe fire. she's so real. also love how easy it is to build a rapport with her if you joke around a little.
Teehee thank you <3
I LOVE that moment so much, too. I think it really shows just how much she Wants To Know Things!! All the things. Every single one of them.
