#rue house

[aghostnotaguardian-archive]

I don’t normally play the “Make a Doll” games, but when I saw this on PiCrew and I saw the style...I caved. 

Have some OCs! 

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Working on a redesign.

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MY VERY FIRST CHARACTER MODEL!

It's not perfect and the wireframe could be better, but I'm still proud of how the model came out, and my computer modeling class really liked them, too! If I have time, I may do some modeling for a few other characters from RUE House!

This is Ilanel, an Unseelie fae sorcerer who's talented at magic, luring their enemies into a false sense of security, and riling Brunnie up (Ilanel: well, she's fun to play with~)

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Guess who has two thumbs and gets to use her characters from RUE House for her rotoscoping project which means actual animation for RUE House for the first time ever????

:DDDD

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Cupcake: So, are there any other Mirror Dwellers around aside from Brunnie?

Radcliffe: LOL Of course not, child! XD XD XD XD

Araceli: They were dealt away with a long time ago! LOLOLOLOLOLOLOL

Every Mythos Over the Age of 600: Yep, they're ALL dead and they're NEVAH COMING BACK! XD XD XD Never ever! 8D8D8D8D 8D 8D 8D 8D 8DDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDD

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Brunnie, could you tell us more about the leader of rue house?

     A long moment was spent with lip-chewing and drumming fingers before Brunnie answered. 

     “The first thing that pops into my head about the Leader - Kalare - is that she was the person who helped me when a lot of other people didn’t want to. She knew exactly who I was and what I’ve done, but that didn’t stop her.  

     “Somehow, she got it through to my head that what I had become was not something to be ashamed or afraid of, that what I choose to do with myself is what made the difference. Whenever I hit a downturn during my rehabilitation - and believe me, there was no shortage of that - she had this saying that partly goes, ‘Wounds ache, bleed, even tear open again as they stitch themselves into scars, but that doesn’t mean the flesh they mar is weak.’ I can’t say she was completely successful, but I’d be in a much worse place if it weren’t for her and Araceli. 

     “But - that doesn’t mean I would say she’s a nice person, not completely. She’s wise, undoubtedly, and I think her heart’s in the right place at the end of the day, but you can’t manage and protect a boarding house full of disowned and displaced humans and mythos without some pretty shrewd ways of thinking. She’s more of a leader than a therapist, and I was a lot more valuable to her as a house guard than a corpse.

     “The Leader always acts in the best interests of those RUE House shelters. Kalare does that - in every sense of those words.” 

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{Throwskissingatthedash}

Spoils of War

RUE House. 2040. Post-War Era.

    “You never gave me a straight answer about why you got involved,” Brunnie said after taking a sip.  The spiced drink trailed a pleasant burn down her throat while the lake caressed the bottoms of her bare feet.

    “Waging a war was more preferable than weathering it.”  Ilagan’s tone carried a dismissive mildness which hinted that her decision wasn’t a particularly difficult one to make.  “That aside...I’m not completely certain of the reason myself.  I was more than experienced at dispelling skirmishes between the fae; perhaps I wanted to quell the Great War just to see if I could.  Does that count as morbid curiosity?”

    Brunnie looked away to turn the words over in her thoughts and lean back to admire the sunset.  Those dying, fiery rays streaked pink and gold through the clouds and across the lake’s glassy surface and illuminated the sky in a darker, richer blue.  If she craned her neck up just a bit, she could spot the first stars of the evening.

    She thinned her lips and took another drink before answering.  “It wouldn’t be the worst reason I’ve heard.”

    “It’s easy to see why you fought.”

    “You talked me into it, so I really hope it is.”

    “I hardly ‘talked you into it,’” Ilagan rolled her eyes in mock indignation at Brunnie’s smirk.  “What I did was merely hold the door open.  If you’re looking to blame who stepped through the threshold, we can find you a mirror.”

    Brunnie made a snorting laugh and tilted her glass of whiskey in consideration.  “Got me there.”

    Silence floated between them as they savored the whiskey, the lake, and each other’s company.  Laughter in the distance drew Brunnie to look over her shoulder.  More people had flocked to the back porch as the day eased into the soothing hum of the evening; from the edge of the pier, Araceli, Romilde, and Cupcake could be seen with the newcomer Zrimat, along with residents both new and old.  Many had come desperate for refuge from the War, and many stayed when it finally ended.  Brunnie drank in the scene lit by the pale golden light streaming out of every window which no two were alike.

    “I would have gone to war either way,” she said to Ilagan, “even if you hadn’t attacked Prague.  I wanted nothing to do with it.  I wanted to stay and protect my home...but I think a part of me knew even then it wouldn’t last.  It just happened sooner when you came.”

    The silence was filled with the leaves swaying in the breeze and the waves lapping under their feet.

    “Is it something you regret?” Ilagan asked.

    Brunnie rested a look on the snifter in her lap.  The amber-hued liquid twirled between the glass and the ice cubes, and her shoulders sunk under a faded sigh.  “It’s selfish, but when I feel like I might - when I feel like I could be tempted - I take a look around.  I look at what I’ve robbed so many of having...and I don’t.”  She lifted her head.  “I don’t regret following you out that door.”

    “...Ever the unrepentant.”  Ilagan’s dark eyes glimmered and her lips turned up in a teasing, fond smirk, but Brunnie’s eyes fell on her left collarbone.  Just beneath it sat a circle-shaped patch of white, pearly skin. Just one of many.

    “I don’t regret how it ended, either,” Brunnie said, glancing away not quickly enough to miss Ilagan’s smirk falling.  “I wish some things had gone different, but we made it back here -”  

    “Because you brought us back here.”  Ilagan's tone was quiet but insistent, and Brunnie couldn’t help the smile it placed on her lips.

    “But we’re alive, and we’re here now.”  She met Ilagan’s eyes then; met eyes deep as night and framed by red wavy curls and freckles many and scattered over her skin like stars.  “I can’t ask for more than this.”  

    Some unseen veil lifted from her eyes, and they were all at once gentle and content even before she donned a soft smile.  Brunnie admired her companion’s visage until she turned away, taking a long sip of her drink until her glass was near empty.

    “I can appreciate that sentiment,” Ilagan said before staring at the horizon, now a myriad of pink, violet, and indigo, “and if I am honest myself, I think I could really be happy here.”

    A beat passed before Brunnie gaze her with a questioning look, her brows pinched.  “‘Here?’” Her tone invited hopeful elaboration.  “What about your plan?”

   “I’ve given it thought.  I’ve suffered my losses from the war; losses that were worse than what I had foreseen.  There was more than a moment during my recovery when I didn’t know what to do with myself, and I thought it would take wandering the world’s miles to find what might be left for me.” Ilagan studied Brunnie’s face frankly, before she reached out to comb back some hair that had fallen against her cheek, thick and dark and decorated with a few silvery strands.  Her fingertips traced her scars as if they were delicate patterns in a tapestry.  “I think I see new possibilities here.”

    “...There’s not a lot to do with an old boarding house.”  The light in Brunnie eyes became too keen to be dismissed.  Ilagan didn’t pull her hand away but instead perched it neatly against her neck.

    “Who says there isn’t? We could run this place, make it better than what Kalare’s already created.  If that doesn’t appeal to us, we could try our hand at dispelling the warlord tribes like we did last summer.  We could even settle for a normal life here.  Imagine how that would spite everyone who wanted us dead!” She laughed at it like it was a private joke, her thumb burning a trail along Brunnie’s jaw.  “We can do whatever we want, Brunnie. Haven’t we shown that there’s nothing we can’t accomplish together?”

    “Ilagan, why're you saying all this?” There was a slight, desperate furrow to her eyebrows. In the dusk’s weak light, her brown eyes seemed brighter as they searched black eyes.  

     The redhead shifted closer. “I think you already know.”

     No golden-red sparks were ignited by that dry brush of soft lips, but a stillness that stained the sky and glazed the lake rippled through Brunnie. Every doubting and anxious thought was lulled away, and she answered, traced, studied, felt, committed that fond, warm touch to memory with her lips until her breathing shook and her heart drummed a quiet, echoing beat. While gentle lips caressed and seared hers in return, a freckled hand sought her scarred one in her lap and wove their fingers together into an intimate knot.

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Headcanon

     In the post-war era, Brunnie cares for Maelstrom, a large, blue roan warhorse whose original owner was killed during the war. Rumor around RUE House is that Maelstrom is able to understand English; it’s been observed that when the words, “dumb,” “stupid,” and “donkey” are uttered while she’s in earshot, bad things happen.