That wasn't my point.
I simply thought you meant something else to begin with.
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Verd’s Ramblings [One Shots, Mostly Worm/X]
- Thread starter Verdthandi
- Start date
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I simply thought you meant something else to begin with.
Chiaroscuro (MCotAC omake (Hamefura/Bloodborne))
- Location
- SoCal, USA
This is an omake for Writer2814's "Maria Campbell of the Astral Clocktower" over on SB. MCotAC is one of the best fanfics for either Bloodborne or Hamefura/Bakarina.
Chiaroscuro
~~~
It was a fever that brought King Artorias down, in the end. Maria rushed to his side, but was too late; no other Light Mages could summon the necessary balance of light and shadow to purge the Abyssal taint.
Their factions aligned behind each Prince as they finalized the plan for succession, and Lady Maria kept the peace in memory of her liege.
~~~
Sarah sprinted through the halls, her Dark Familiar lashing out at Katarina's harem. Rolling earth, rushing water, roaring flames, and ravaging winds - it made no difference. The Dark Familiar would parry, riposte, and shield as fast as they could cast. Sophia's gehrmans were no different, bullets ricocheting down the corridor, putting fresh holes in paintings from dynasties and kingdoms past.
Sarah finally reached her goal and threw open the double doors, only to see a wall of fog. She turned to her pursuers with a manic grin and pushed her way through.
As the roiling fog concealed ever more of her retreating figure, Prince Alan held everyone back. "We will only get in the way."
~~~
The throne had been removed from the throne room. In its stead, a stone sarcophagus lay on a strangely crystalline titanite pedestal. The lid was ajar, with King Artorias lying in state within.
Maria, the Lady once more, perched on a high-backed chair just before the throne dais. Her left knee crossed over her right; her titanite Rakuyo lay across both legs, with her hands gently clasped over the sheath. The brim of her tricorne hat was pulled low.
Maria, the Child, almost tittered at the deja vu as Sarah approached.
"A corpse," the Lady said, "should be left well alone."
The Knight stood, and drew Rakuyo from its sheath. "Oh, I know very well how the secrets beckon so sweetly."
She paced forward as Sarah's Dark Familiar started molding itself into a new Beastly shape. "The King's Dark Soul to unlock the Abyss - as you struggle to find your worth in our waking world, it must seem a dream with the answers just now coming within reach, but that way lies naught but madness. Only a honest death will cure you now."
The Mage ran her hand along the flat of her sword, the crystalline blade turning a deep black as it gained a shining white corona.
"Liberate you, from your wild curiosity."
The Wending Weaves of the Wheel (WOT books)
- Location
- SoCal, USA
The Wending Weaves of the Wheel (WOT books)
"I'm a woman," Alys reminded herself, staring into her own mirrored eyes in the glassy pond. "I'm learning the healing arts, I bleed monthly, and I've been betrothed to Jac since we were swaddled."
She blinked, and saw himself in a tailored black coat and pants on a field. His sharp jaw and cheekbones turned with her as she saw himself from new angles.
The image fit.
The image hurt.
She smashed his hand into the image and sobbed.
~~~
It was lucky, she was later told, lucky that the plague skipped her even as it killed everyone else in her village. Jac was dead. Her mother was dead. Her father was dead. Her sister, a welcomed surprise, was dead before her first turn of the year.
It's luck, she thought, as a hart walked onto the path a scant five paces ahead, and luck that herfather's arrow pierced its heart.
~~~
The neighboring village had been touched much more lightly. One of the Aes Sedai - the stories were real - had been riding through at just the right time, and had seen the signs. The only deaths had been the wise woman, her apprentices, and the dozen patients under their care, as the woman's ageless, expressionless face watched her warder bar the door after throwing a torch into the healer's lodge.
The stories were real.
The same ageless, expressionless face had declared each and every other villager as free of plague, with merely the lightest brush of her hand against their forehead.
Alys walked past her at the cattle gate - this village had cattle! - exhausted, pulling Farmer Itam's cart with half of the hart still uneaten, still unspoiled. A raised eyebrow and a light brush against her arm, and the ageless woman in blue was on her way, leaving merely goosebumps behind.
"I'm Alys, healer's apprentice from two days west. My village is gone."
The village grieved even as it welcomed her. One of the matrons even gave her a blanket and some hay to sleep on in the barn.
~~~
The years passed and the Wheel continued to turn. Patients lived when there was no hope - and the women worried that she was driving herself into an early grave as she fought through fevers and chills. She took to wearing pants instead of skirts, "the leathers are better protection from the thorns of my herbs," and binding the breasts "that aren't good for aught but getting in the way of healing." Some of the gossips were scandalized, but everyone's family had someone that she had saved, and after a few years even the gossips didn't let peddler's nonsense distract them from who was caught leaving who's house in the dead of night.
But she couldn't remember their names. She barely remembered her own, Alys, and even then only because people would always use it to her.
Her apprentice in the blue dress was doing better than the apprentice in the green dress today. Actually, the person in the green dress was useless. "Don't come back tomorrow."
~~~
The girl in the red dress knew enough that she must have listened well to her mother, and she also looked familiar enough that Alys must have seen her around the village square a few times. Alys could work with this.
~~~
A tall man had ridden his horse through the village today, bought hay with a few silvers from a bulging purse, and casually rested his right hand on his sheathed sword. This would feed the gossips for weeks.
Something about him, though… something about the way he spoke to the headman raised Alys's hackles from across the square.
Alys turned back to today's patients as he rode off, the feeling of menace slowly fading away.
~~~
This was the second time Alys had seen ageless faces, this time in red. Five of them, all on horseback, four asking questions about the man from a few days before, asking if any of the men had seen anything. The last was doing something with her hands before crying an unknown word, "say din", as they all turned and galloped through as the cattle gate slammed itself open.
Another break from the monotony, some goosebumps, and now back to the idiot farmer who let a cow step on his leg.
~~~
The red apprentice was useless and would have to go. Alys had asked for an emetic, like the beady roots of the white flowered plants by the pathway, not needles of evergreen. Needles of evergreen were only good for cough, and this child had eaten spoiled meat.
~~~
She had a new apprentice today, in a purple dress. This one was a young woman, perhaps of age to have children, with her hair already pulled back properly. And she was pretty well trained, just needed some polishing. Maybe she was apprenticed to another village's healer?
It seems like she would fit right in, Alys thought, after all she and the longtime green apprentice are chatting with their heads close together like they're old friends.
~~~
The gossips had started talking about Alys again, whenever she wasn't looking, but she could hear their whispers at all hours. How she was "losing it" and "outstaying her welcome" and "do you know how expensive the dye is to keep poor Tanya employed" - who the fuck is Tanya?
And how she was destined to destroy this village, just like her last one.
"Well," Alys said, "if you insist."
The last patient healed, Alys grabbed the torch off the wall and headed to the village square.
~~~
It was luck, Alys thought, that the buildings caught so easily, and that the fire just seemed to jump from house to house, man to man, woman to woman.
Luck, the story of Alys's life.
The fire brought a smile to Alys's face as he turned east towards the Dragonmount beyond the horizon and lightning crashed down. The heat within him grew hotter and hotter as the fires joined into a sweltering inferno. He laughed and laughed until he knew no more.
~~~
The four red women picked their way through the scorched field. "A man did this", one said, "I detect residue from Saidin."
"We checked all of the men a few years ago; it must have been someone who moved in. And none of the women had the Spark, even their healer."
"This, sisters, is why we must succeed in our mission. We cannot allow the wheel to weave another Breaking."
It's been a very long time since I've written anything. I recently went down a bit of a rabbit hole with the Wheel of Time, and while it's really difficult to get past the portrayal of women in general, the Saidar/Saidin duality has a lot of interesting potential. Something that's been bouncing around my head is what it might be like to be a trans person in a world that has such a binary magic system.
While a woman AMAB who submits to Saidar would probably be able to detected reasonably easily (assuming that the Aes Sedai ever go to their demesne), fit fairly well into a lot of white tower politicking, and would be able to get along reasonably well in any Ajah but Green or Red, I feel like that's not a story I would be able to do justice to and keep it interesting.
That said, there are a couple very interesting stories that can be written about a man AFAB seizing Saidin, depending on where we are in the timeline…
In case you aren't familiar with Wheel of Time, there's the One Power, split into Saidin (which exclusively men channel) and Saidar (which exclusively women channel). Three thousand years ago, the ultimate evil was sealed away by a group of 100 male channelers, and the backlash drove every one of them, and every male channeler until a major story event, irrevocably insane. As a general rule, insane plus powerful plus magic user is really bad for everyone in the vicinity.
I also want to really emphasize something that I tried to show in the text - Alys channels Saidin, with the usual consequences, because he is a man (who happens to be AFAB), and nobody in the setting can reliably detect that he is a channeler because that's how the Saidin/Saidar duality works - Saidar channelers can only detect Saidin through specific intention, though passively detect people capable of channeling Saidar, while Saidin channelers detect both Saidar and Saidin when channeled - and nobody even thinks to look at someone who isn't super obviously masculine presenting because it's a medieval world with poor education standards by Robert Jordan's time, let alone our own.
Please tell me if I missed the mark.
While a woman AMAB who submits to Saidar would probably be able to detected reasonably easily (assuming that the Aes Sedai ever go to their demesne), fit fairly well into a lot of white tower politicking, and would be able to get along reasonably well in any Ajah but Green or Red, I feel like that's not a story I would be able to do justice to and keep it interesting.
That said, there are a couple very interesting stories that can be written about a man AFAB seizing Saidin, depending on where we are in the timeline…
In case you aren't familiar with Wheel of Time, there's the One Power, split into Saidin (which exclusively men channel) and Saidar (which exclusively women channel). Three thousand years ago, the ultimate evil was sealed away by a group of 100 male channelers, and the backlash drove every one of them, and every male channeler until a major story event, irrevocably insane. As a general rule, insane plus powerful plus magic user is really bad for everyone in the vicinity.
I also want to really emphasize something that I tried to show in the text - Alys channels Saidin, with the usual consequences, because he is a man (who happens to be AFAB), and nobody in the setting can reliably detect that he is a channeler because that's how the Saidin/Saidar duality works - Saidar channelers can only detect Saidin through specific intention, though passively detect people capable of channeling Saidar, while Saidin channelers detect both Saidar and Saidin when channeled - and nobody even thinks to look at someone who isn't super obviously masculine presenting because it's a medieval world with poor education standards by Robert Jordan's time, let alone our own.
Please tell me if I missed the mark.
"I'm a woman," Alys reminded herself, staring into her own mirrored eyes in the glassy pond. "I'm learning the healing arts, I bleed monthly, and I've been betrothed to Jac since we were swaddled."
She blinked, and saw himself in a tailored black coat and pants on a field. His sharp jaw and cheekbones turned with her as she saw himself from new angles.
The image fit.
The image hurt.
She smashed his hand into the image and sobbed.
~~~
It was lucky, she was later told, lucky that the plague skipped her even as it killed everyone else in her village. Jac was dead. Her mother was dead. Her father was dead. Her sister, a welcomed surprise, was dead before her first turn of the year.
It's luck, she thought, as a hart walked onto the path a scant five paces ahead, and luck that her
~~~
The neighboring village had been touched much more lightly. One of the Aes Sedai - the stories were real - had been riding through at just the right time, and had seen the signs. The only deaths had been the wise woman, her apprentices, and the dozen patients under their care, as the woman's ageless, expressionless face watched her warder bar the door after throwing a torch into the healer's lodge.
The stories were real.
The same ageless, expressionless face had declared each and every other villager as free of plague, with merely the lightest brush of her hand against their forehead.
Alys walked past her at the cattle gate - this village had cattle! - exhausted, pulling Farmer Itam's cart with half of the hart still uneaten, still unspoiled. A raised eyebrow and a light brush against her arm, and the ageless woman in blue was on her way, leaving merely goosebumps behind.
"I'm Alys, healer's apprentice from two days west. My village is gone."
The village grieved even as it welcomed her. One of the matrons even gave her a blanket and some hay to sleep on in the barn.
~~~
The years passed and the Wheel continued to turn. Patients lived when there was no hope - and the women worried that she was driving herself into an early grave as she fought through fevers and chills. She took to wearing pants instead of skirts, "the leathers are better protection from the thorns of my herbs," and binding the breasts "that aren't good for aught but getting in the way of healing." Some of the gossips were scandalized, but everyone's family had someone that she had saved, and after a few years even the gossips didn't let peddler's nonsense distract them from who was caught leaving who's house in the dead of night.
But she couldn't remember their names. She barely remembered her own, Alys, and even then only because people would always use it to her.
Her apprentice in the blue dress was doing better than the apprentice in the green dress today. Actually, the person in the green dress was useless. "Don't come back tomorrow."
~~~
The girl in the red dress knew enough that she must have listened well to her mother, and she also looked familiar enough that Alys must have seen her around the village square a few times. Alys could work with this.
~~~
A tall man had ridden his horse through the village today, bought hay with a few silvers from a bulging purse, and casually rested his right hand on his sheathed sword. This would feed the gossips for weeks.
Something about him, though… something about the way he spoke to the headman raised Alys's hackles from across the square.
Alys turned back to today's patients as he rode off, the feeling of menace slowly fading away.
~~~
This was the second time Alys had seen ageless faces, this time in red. Five of them, all on horseback, four asking questions about the man from a few days before, asking if any of the men had seen anything. The last was doing something with her hands before crying an unknown word, "say din", as they all turned and galloped through as the cattle gate slammed itself open.
Another break from the monotony, some goosebumps, and now back to the idiot farmer who let a cow step on his leg.
~~~
The red apprentice was useless and would have to go. Alys had asked for an emetic, like the beady roots of the white flowered plants by the pathway, not needles of evergreen. Needles of evergreen were only good for cough, and this child had eaten spoiled meat.
~~~
She had a new apprentice today, in a purple dress. This one was a young woman, perhaps of age to have children, with her hair already pulled back properly. And she was pretty well trained, just needed some polishing. Maybe she was apprenticed to another village's healer?
It seems like she would fit right in, Alys thought, after all she and the longtime green apprentice are chatting with their heads close together like they're old friends.
~~~
The gossips had started talking about Alys again, whenever she wasn't looking, but she could hear their whispers at all hours. How she was "losing it" and "outstaying her welcome" and "do you know how expensive the dye is to keep poor Tanya employed" - who the fuck is Tanya?
And how she was destined to destroy this village, just like her last one.
"Well," Alys said, "if you insist."
The last patient healed, Alys grabbed the torch off the wall and headed to the village square.
~~~
It was luck, Alys thought, that the buildings caught so easily, and that the fire just seemed to jump from house to house, man to man, woman to woman.
Luck, the story of Alys's life.
The fire brought a smile to Alys's face as he turned east towards the Dragonmount beyond the horizon and lightning crashed down. The heat within him grew hotter and hotter as the fires joined into a sweltering inferno. He laughed and laughed until he knew no more.
~~~
The four red women picked their way through the scorched field. "A man did this", one said, "I detect residue from Saidin."
"We checked all of the men a few years ago; it must have been someone who moved in. And none of the women had the Spark, even their healer."
"This, sisters, is why we must succeed in our mission. We cannot allow the wheel to weave another Breaking."
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