Apparently a lot of people get dialogue punctuation wrong despite having an otherwise solid grasp of grammar, possibly because they’re used to writing essays rather than prose. I don’t wanna be the asshole who complains about writing errors and then doesn’t offer to help, so here are the basics summarized as simply as I could manage on my phone (“dialogue tag” just refers to phrases like “he said,” “she whispered,” “they asked”):
“For most dialogue, use a comma after the sentence and don’t capitalize the next word after the quotation mark,” she said.
“But what if you’re using a question mark rather than a period?” they asked.
“When using a dialogue tag, you never capitalize the word after the quotation mark unless it’s a proper noun!” she snapped.
“When breaking up a single sentence with a dialogue tag,” she said, “use commas.”
“This is a single sentence,” she said. “Now, this is a second stand-alone sentence, so there’s no comma after ‘she said.’”
“There’s no dialogue tag after this sentence, so end it with a period rather than a comma.” She frowned, suddenly concerned that the entire post was as unasked for as it was sanctimonious.
*me starting a new playthrough with my elven Inky, suddenly fully aware again as soon as this motherfucker shows up that she will end up in the fade over a decade later*
New to the EmmRook ship and I'm already breaking my heart.
----
Spoiler Alert.
Post-Veilguard, Rook passes away in battle before they can deliver vital information to one of the factions. Then imagine Emmrich having to use corpse whispering on Rook. Heartbeat in his throat, there are so many things he wants to ask and tell Rook, but they don’t have much time.
In the end, Emmrich does what he has to do. During the last moments, he holds Rook’s cold hand in his. In a quiet rasp, Rook tells him that they hope to meet and be able to love Emmrich again in another life. Or, if Emmrich is a Lich, Rook says that they’ll come back for him. When they do, whether as a person or as a spirit, Emmrich will know, because they’ll love him just the same
Chapter 11 of again we light our fires is now up! In which Emmrich and Rook are so, so cute (and Emmrich is stupidly sexy)
***
Emmrich paused the kiss, and breathed in slowly, his eyes half-lidded. He pushed his weight off her, knees bracketing her body, so that he was no longer pinning her to the arm of the couch.
“Lie down,” he told her, his voice deep.
Rook narrowly held back a whimper, scrambling to do as he’d asked before she’d fully processed what he’d said. Flat on her back, she looked up at him, breath heaving unevenly.
Something shifted in his eyes as he looked down at her; Rook’s stomach flipped. Emmrich made an approving sound deep in his chest, stroking lightly up her body. He settled back down on her. Rook bit her lip, hard, against making a sound. The feeling of his weight on her belly, between her legs, had her grabbing his shirt in a white-knuckled grip. His cock pressed against her thigh, just hard enough for her to feel it clearly. She jittered, using every ounce of her self-control not to grind on him.
Emmrich’s hands lingered on her breasts, his thumb sweeping over her, and Rook arched up into his touch with a little cry.
“I know how little someone wants to do anything after a rut. You don’t have to push yourself,” Rook said, breathlessly.
He only repeated the motion, and Rook whimpered.
“It’s fine. I can wait,” Rook said, her voice thin with desire.
Emmrich lowered his head, tongue circling her nipple through her blouse. The wet heat of his mouth might as well have been pressed directly between her legs; the shock of it went down Rook’s spine like electricity. Rook cried out, hips jerking helplessly.
“I missed your body beyond reckoning,” Emmrich said, in the low voice of confession. “Your impossibly soft skin, your generous hips, your pleasing little sounds, your sweet cunt…”
His breath fanned over her, warm in a way that made Rook bite her tongue against begging.
“I’d very much like to pleasure you, if that would be amenable,” Emmrich said.
“Please,” Rook said, with embarrassing quickness.
Emmrich hesitated.
“Although you must understand, I won’t be able to fully—I was, erm, not as diligent as I should have been with lubrication. I’m still a bit too oversensitive to be touched,” Emmrich said, embarrassed.
Rook made a noise at the back of her throat. With Emmrich settled over her, his generous mouth leaving her desperate from the smallest, teasing touches, her mind was only too willing to conjure images of him during his rut: fist frantically pumping his gorgeous cock, his many bracelets jangling in time with rapid rhythm, face twisted with pleasure, hips jerking as he chased completion…
“You thought of me?” Rook asked hopefully.
Emmrich’s face darkened with intensity. He blinked, licked his lips, and visibly tried to restrain himself.
“I must admit, my dear, that I thought of nothing else,” Emmrich said lightly.
The words bypassed Rook’s brain entirely. Rook growled, fierce and possessive.
Emmrich’s mouth went slack with arousal, his eyes darkening. The self-consciousness vanished from his expression.
“I lived with my nose buried in the scarf you left,” Emmrich said, making unblinking eye contact. His voice was low and rough, the barest edge of a growl. “Dreaming of you in every way I had denied myself for so long. Pliant under my hands, begging and writhing, desperate with want. All the minute details I had tried to forget came back to me— the shade of your lips when you’d been roughly kissed. The exact tilt of your hips when you lost your mind with pleasure. The shiver that went through you when I kissed under your jaw. The way you tightened around me at the very first hint of my knot, desperate to be locked.”
Rook’s breath caught. She watched him, transfixed.
Emmrich reached for her blouse. Every expectation Rook had said that he’d rip the fabric apart, letting the buttons pop and seams tear.
Instead, Emmrich slid one button open. He kissed the revealed skin tenderly, his mouth lingering, mapping every newly exposed bit of her.
“My fevered rememberings and imaginings are nothing compared to the reality of you,” Emmrich murmured into her skin. “To be permitted to bring you pleasure, to listen to your breath hitch and feel your muscles quiver with your want…”
Another button was lovingly released from its hole. The tip of his tongue traced the exposed skin of her breast, slowly exploring the border where her skin darkened. Rook shivered, burying her hands in his hair.
“To know that you are here not out of base urgency, as your heat, but for your own desire—driven not by desperation, but by simple pleasure…”
An Archive of Our Own, a project of the Organization for Transformative Works
~“Strength isn’t never breaking. Strength is letting yourself shatter and trusting you won’t disappear in the pieces."~
Sometimes the weight of the world becomes too much to carry alone. Emmrich reminds Rook that she doesn’t have to.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Word count: 4.460 / One-shot
Relevant tags: Fluff, True Love, Sweet Emmrich Volkarin, Healthy Relationships
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
I broke down on my first day of the inpatient therapy program, so I did what every sane person would do: Write a fanfic that has Rook breaking down and Emmrich comforting her.
Yes, it’s been a long weekend. No, I don’t want to talk about it. 😌
(praying my therapist doesn’t ask too many questions tomorrow and this qualifies as a 'skill')
