#meribel

[meribels]

Nyamine has something to show you!! :3

[aneverydaything]

Day 2777, 20 January 2026

The always busy link between the Courchevel Valley and Meribel Valley. Plus there is inevitably an idiot who tries to take you out.

[moncoeurestatoimonamour]

ᙏᥱ́ɾɩᑲᥱꙆ ᙏottᥲɾᥱt

𝗟𝗮𝗰 𝗱𝗲 𝗧𝘂𝗲𝗱𝗮

Parc national de la Vanoise - France

©️LM®️

[kylebonallo]

by Kyle Bonallo (ig: @kylebonallo)

[mrs-trophy-wife]

[bobcorrigan]

A little world-building from Meribel

Violet sloshed through melting snow to the coffee place on the corner of Astor and Brooklawn. She took in the room as she waited in line, inspecting every table, every face, looking for the best table, one that would give her privacy and a view of the door. It was an old habit she missed. But opening orders from the Captain required a certain amount of care, especially if another Guard was paying attention.

The table she wanted had a middle-aged hipster reading the Racing News at it. One look up at her – six feet four of muscle in a long ivory Irish sweater – and he scuttled away. She made a point to say thank you, but he was long gone by then.

Inside the Captain's black order envelope was a blank sheet of flimsy, off-white tissue paper. Violet tore it up and sprinkled the pieces into her coffee mug, transforming it into a dark, viscous sludge. Faint whispers rose from the cup, as usual. But then that single voice became three, each one slightly out of phase, and a teardrop of pure silver appeared on the surface of the coffee.

Oh shit.

Under a sky of painted stars the tears of the Goddess will appear

Let none who live consume their light lest a brother’s sword unsheathed draw near.

She pushed the coffee cup away and leaned the back in her chair until the top of her head rested against the frosted window. The Captain had never not once sent someone else's message in his envelope. It would have taken an order, and there was only one person alive who could give the Captain of the Guards an order.

And that sure as shit wasn't the Morrigan.

Unpacking the message wasn't hard. Tears of the Goddess was a reference to the Tears of Danu. The problem was it wasn't real. The children's story of a potion that would allow one of the Eldest to travel from anywhere in creation to Danu’s throne was just that – a children's story, and a ridiculous one at that. Why would the Morrigan bother to get the King to assign the Guards to investigate one of her garbage prophecies? 

Violet sat forward and poked the now-solidified coffee with her index finger. But what if the Tears of Danu wasn't fake? What if someone had figured out how to craft it? That must be what the final line meant. A brother's sword unsheathed would be the King's dead brother Finvarra, who he'd killed to take the throne.

The King was worried Finvarra's daughter Meribel would consume the Tears of Danu.

It didn't take much for the possibilities to spiral out from there. Everyone knew Meribel had spent centuries looking for a way out of exile and a weapon powerful enough to kill the man who murdered her father. With both of thise in hand she could unify all of the exiles trapped here. She could raise an army.

Violet managed a smile. Raising an army is what a thoughtful rebel leader would do, so of course Meribel would do no such thing. It was much more likely the Princess Meribel would use the Tears to pop back Inside, murder Lugh, and then dance over his body out of spite. Once a pirate, always a pirate.

Losing power was what Lugh feared most, so being the clever court creature that she has always been, that's what the Morrigan prophecised.

It was all starting to make sense. Everyone knew the Morrigan liked to get Lugh worked up, no one more than the Captain. He agreed to assign Violet to the case because he knew Violet would work it correctly, even though they both knew the Tears of Danu was a myth and that Meribel was the same useless piece of shit she'd always been.

All it would take was going through the motions, and the case would close itself.

So how did the Captain get the King to agree to the extravagant reward? Violet never expected to get a case worthy of cancelling out her own sad debt, but here it was, and even that was par for the course with the Captain: he only offered extravagant rewards when a task merited it. If the King wanted the Captain's best, the Captain would exact appropriate payment in exchange. It was exactly the sort of cleverness Violet had come to expect from the Captain over their centuries of service together.

She left the coffee shop feeling better about life than she had in ages.

[fanofi]

Meribel

Les 3 Vallées

~ Alecse

[septembergold]

Meribel, France