#matan

[rafaelmartinez67]

“Hay heridas que no te matan, pero te enseñan a vivir como si merecieras el dolor. Y entonces confundes resistencia con costumbre, y terminas llamando fortaleza a no saber irte de lo que te rompe.”

-Francisco J. Zárate

[leregirenga]

¿Cuántas veces no nos hemos visto en esa situación? Esa, la de pasar por un gran decepción, la de que nos rompan el corazón y sentir que el alma también está hecha cachitos.

No pasa solo una vez, de hecho, a lo largo de nuestra vida lo padecemos varias veces ya que un corazón quebrado se puede dar por cualquier tipo de desilusión, no necesariamente tiene que ser porque perdemos a la pareja. También nos destroza que algún familiar o amigo nos haga pasar por esa situación.

Y en verdad nos queremos morir al estar viviendo semejante dolor, pero no pasa así, lo que nos mantiene de pie es la esperanza, la fe en que llegarán mejores cosas y que ya habrá quien nos valore con sinceridad y no nos apuñale por la espalda.

Leregi Renga

[freyadragonlord]

Biani: so, are you the big spoon or the little spoon?

Udir: I'm the Knife!!

Matan: he's the little spoon

[not-poignant]

What is Tradewinds?

Tradewinds was an original Fae Tales novel set in the canonical universe, that has been shelved due to me not being able to find Aboriginal Australian sensitivity readers who were happy to read gay male/male sex scenes.

It was based on a separate cast and set in Australia and Malaysia, with their series being part of the 'MerchantVerse.' Basically how merchants trade, who they trade with, and the stronger Seelie and Unseelie divide among fae.

The story features Matan, a Malay Seelie peacock pheasant shifter and master merchant specialising in selling batik, needing to find a cure for an Unseelie curse placed on his cousin. To go on the journey necessary to get information, he pretends to be Unseelie, and joins an Unseelie merchant caravan of birds of prey (almost all raptor shifters are Unseelie). There, he meets Udir, a Romansh bearded vulture/lammergeier shifter who is frequently down on his luck, and has worked as an assassin in the past.

Udir finds out Matan is actually Seelie, and then blackmails him into sex, thinking that he's being clever, only to not realise that Matan's very clever too.

And then it was basically about Matan and Udir falling in love, Matan going on an Eran-like journey of learning to understand that the difference between Seelie and Unseelie isn't as black and white as he thought, and finding the cure for his cousin, and learning about trading in Australia with his Unseelie merchant friends, while dealing with a pretty awful villain in the meantime.

It's very found family.

I really like the story, and I think with a little reworking, the novel would be super strong. However there's literally only one white main character, and everyone else is either Maori or Aboriginal Australian or Malay etc. so while I was able to get some of the sensitivity reading done, some of it I couldn't get done (and I lost money in the process, because one person said they would sensitivity read for me, asked for a $150 deposit about 7 years ago, and then took it and never talked to me again, which was frankly very demoralising and depressing, because like, as a disabled, chronically ill person with cancer, I kind of needed that money too, lmao).

So...the book is pretty much permanently shelved. I did share some chapters on Patreon under a redundant tier (which would now be the $10+ tier, but I need to edit those posts to reflect that). And everyone who's ever read it thinks I should publish it. I just...don't feel comfortable with that given I'm writing Indigenous side characters.

Sula did a really lovely sketch of Matan though:

[freemanblue]

Siempre habrá gente envidiosa, mal intencionada, chismosa. No hagas caso, ignóralos, déjalos porque entre ellos solo se matan.

[loshabitantes013]

[shiro-and-kuro]

El color de tu iris... y esas pupilas... esas pupilas tan dilatadas que tenes... y, cada vez que estoy serca de vos... me matan.

Shiro-and-kuro

[chavela-pero-no-vargas]

Morirme contigo si te matan...

Y matarme contigo si te mueres