The Morning After

The bed is warm and there’s sunlight trying to creep under the curtains as I slowly wake up. It feels weird, I know I haven’t been asleep, but also I have been.

The person in the bed next to me stirs slightly, snuggling closer, still using my shoulder as a pillow.

“You know you’re an idiot, right?”

The corner of my mouth twitches up in response to her sleepy voice.

“I know.”

My hand comes up, round her back, lazily caressing up and down her bare arm. I haven’t opened my eyes yet, as the memories of a life that I’ve lived, and haven’t lived, start to well up. Some are still the same, I remember mother leaving just after Imogen was born, and my blossoming seems relatively similar, the scar on my back twitching slightly as I examine the memory. But more things are different. Dad’s death, the legal battles for custody, the city of queens, the wands, but to name a few.

But most of all, there’s a women. Standing by me. Taking my hand. The first kiss, the first night together, the first argument. So many firsts. Except we know we’ve been here before, in so many lifetimes.

Four years together in this one. Four years of memories that sit weirdly new and old in my head. Except now I can feel her skin beneath my fingers. Feel her breath passing over my chest. Hear the faint sound of her heartbeat as she lies in my arm.

The end of my nose gets flicked and I open one eye to look down at her. Her green eyes are slightly mischievous as the finger trails down over my face, playing with my lips. I kiss the tips of her fingers and earn a smile.

“Still an idiot.”

I chuckle and squeeze her slightly, “I wasn’t ready to give up on you.”

“Softy.”

My mouth twitches again, and I roll us over, her long brown hair scattering across the sheets as she ends up slightly pinned beneath me.

“You complaining?” I ask, a bare inch away from her face.

She reaches up, linking her hands round the back of my neck, fiddling with my short hair as she gives me a contemplative look.

“No.”

And then we kiss. A proper kiss, not one from a life that happen in retrospective. A long, tender one, fuelled by the desire of lifetimes past, closing the gap that our former lives had driven between us.

Even I run out of breath eventually, and pull back, brushing my nose against hers.

Which is naturally when I hear the thumping footsteps of my sibling, and a pounding on the door.

“Pancakes! Pancakes! Pancakes!”

Ah yes. It is that day of the week.

She chuckles, and shoves me away, ripping the covers off and rolling herself up in them. I make a noise of protest and she just smiles at me, only the very corners of her mouth betraying smugness.

“I want breakfast in bed.”

“Oh do you now.”

“Mhm. Mush.”

Her foot creeps out, pushing me off the bed some more. I grab the foot, and kiss it, before making my way to the door.

“The things I do…” I mutter under my breath as I greet an excited Immy and she sprints off to the kitchen.

“Hey, Aegis?”

I turn back to her.

“What’s my name?”

No matter how hard I tried, I never could remember. In the old life that was.

“Anastasia.”

The smile is quite smug now, as she settles back down into the bed. I can’t help but smile to myself as I make my way down to the kitchen, lift Immy onto the counter, and start to make breakfast with her. I’ve only been in this life for minutes, and it’s already far better than the last.

I guess it’s okay to be selfish once in a while. Especially if you get to re-write your own life.

 

Where It All Began

My eyes are still narrowed as I look out across the border, into the land which we’re about to call our own. It’s quite bright, and sunny, and hot. I’m not entirely sure how I feel about the weather yet, I’m more used to cold and sunny. And yes, that does make sense when you live up a mountain.

“Hey.”

I turn my gaze from the vast expanse of scrubland to the person who’s just come up to me. It’s Francesca, a noble I’ve been speaking to on and off since I joined up with the wands a little while back now. I like her, we get on well.

“Hey yourself.”

“Nervous?”

“Not so much nervous. More, like, that energy of anticipation, can’t wait to actually get going, possibly slightly too hyper about this whole thing.”

Francesca grins at me. I don’t think it’s indulgent, okay, maybe a little. But on the other hand, I think she gets what I’m saying.

We kick around for a bit more, as people in the massive group triple and quadruple check the stuff we’re bringing with us. No wheeled vehicles to help, they’d be useless in the sandy environment we’re going into, so everything’s being carried. Not like we mind, we are wands after all.

Heh. Feels good to say that.

The entire column turns to look at our Queen as she steps out, looking out into the distance, then she makes a single gesture, and we start moving.

It’s not fast, it can’t be with this many people, but it is a sustained pace. We’re all pretty hardy, invested in working for it, and we knew that this was going to be a bit of a slog. And it’s still scrubland, so it’s not hard going as of yet.

Evening comes, and we spend another hour walking in the cooler air before the halt is called and we can group up and pitch tents. Francesca asked me if I wanted to share, and that’s cool by me. I know a few people around the court now, but I’m as friendly with Francesca as I am with anyone. Probably more so now since we spent the entire day walking together and chatting. Turns out, we joined for much the same reasons: that pride of doing something with your own two hands and skills, not really wanting, no needing, recognition for it, but just taking a sense of pride in having done it. I mean, sure, I’m very capable of showing off, but I don’t really take to it like the Swords do. I have Fuoco, but that’s more just useful for keeping warm up in the freezing conditions of the mountains. Heh, I even admitted to her that a small reason for coming along was the potential for new places to climb. She just seems to be really on board with the court, and to be fair, being part of something new like this is pretty exciting.

Also she’s a damn decent cook. Way better than me, especially considering the small fires we’re having to use. I leave her to it, and get some nice food out of it. Score.

The next day I wake up early, I signed up to the scout group. So I pack up everything that isn’t the roll Francesca’s still sleeping in, and the tent itself, giving her an easier time of it when she does wake up and they break camp, and go join the other people in the early morning air.

Honestly, it’s quite boring. Just scrubland for miles and miles around. Not even any creatures around. I mean, that’s good from a threat point of view, but means we’ve got quite a way to go before we find home. That’s okay, I thought it would take a while. We just have to trust our Queen.

I get back to the column just before midday, make my report, and then amble off to find Francesca somewhere in the column. From there it’s much the same as it was yesterday, and I feel like it’s going to be much the same for most of the trip.

Day three and we’re on stretcher duty. Some of the people who came with us, not nobles, but you need far more than nobles to make a city, have already reached their limit. That’s fine, we all have a limit, and as long as you kept going as long as you could, then the rest of us are here to help you get there when you can’t by yourself.

The women on the stretcher is a cobbler by trade. She’s coming along mostly because she’s heard that there are giant lizards out in this land, and she wants to try her hand with the leather that comes off them, since it’s apparently nightmarish to work with. Sounds like a fun challenge.

Francesca’s in front, throwing back the occasional comment. I’m at the rear, smiling and chatting. It’s easy and comfortable.

Which is probably why the women on the stretcher says “It’s so nice to see two young people starting their lives together in a new place. This is all about new beginnings you know.”

Wait, what?

Francesca almost trips up, jolting the stretcher a little bit. I’m not all that much better, I know I’ve gone bright red and I’m choking on air slightly. We stabilize the stretcher, and then I can’t look at either of them anymore as my cheeks continue to burn bright red.

The women apologises, and frankly, won’t stop apologising for assuming, and then keeps going on and on about new beginnings, and seems to be subtly hinting that we would make a good couple.

I still can’t really look ahead of me. My neck’s going to have such a crick in it by the time we stop tonight.

I’m frankly relieved when we do stop for the night. We pitch the tent, both not quite looking at each other, both being awkward, and frankly, it’s terrible. I’m surprised we can get the tent up with how we’re acting.

I mumble something out, and scurry off to get water for dinner, but find a quiet spot so I can take a breather.

Its fine, I tell myself. It’s all fine. It’s just an older women, with some opinions. We don’t need to be this awkward. Just breathe and start acting like a normal person again. You’re friends. You can shrug this off and laugh about it.

I get the water, and managed to fool myself into thinking it’s all okay, and that I’m cool and collected, until I duck through the tent opening and actually look at her again, then my stomach’s gone.

Although, there is a delicious smell coming from that pot already.

“Water, hang on, is that?”

Francesca looks down at the bottles I’ve just spotted. One’s wine, and the other looks like it’s filled with coffee granules.

“Yeah. I know everything was done on weight, but it’s just the one. And creature comforts are so nice after all.”

“You sure you want to share?”

“With you, yes.”

And there goes my stomach again. Dammit.

It’s good. Like, better than normal. I’m forcing myself to just be cool. Just, enjoy it for what it is. Don’t get weird. Pretend your stomach isn’t churning or flipping out every time you look over at her. The wine does help with the relaxing, I’ll admit. By the time we get to coffee, I’m pretty chill.

Or, at least, I can pretend to be.

I’m not sure what Francesca’s doing, or feeling. She’s harder to read than I am. But she seems fine. Yeah, let’s go with fine.

“So, I’m just going to ask this, straight up.”

Uh, what?

“Do you think I’m attractive?”

Shit. Thinking. Words. Thoughts. Need to do those.

“Well, yeah. I mean…”

I have more words that are going to get garbled out, possible involving the word ‘obviously’, but I don’t get the chance as suddenly Francesca’s there, on top of me, kind of pinning me to the floor. Kissing me.

You know what?

I’m totally fine with this.

At some point we lose the clothes. Or more accurately, Francesca starts pulling them off, looks at me, and I respond by pulling hers off. I am so fine with this. More than fine. It’s amazing.

We end up lying next to each other, sort of cuddling, a blanket warding off most of the chill of the night. Not that we really need it after working up all that body heat.

I’m mostly just looking at her face. Her eyes are currently closed, and there’s a little smile on her face. It’s kind of amazing to see. I’ve not really had a relationship before, but this feels…right.

Her eyes open, “What are you looking at?”

“You.”

The smile gets a bit wider, and I can see her emotions a little bit clearer through it. There’s delight and pleasure, but also, relief?

“What are you thinking?”

She looks at me, “Mostly that I’m really glad you like me back.”

There’s something in there I pick up on, “Were you interested in me before today?”

She flicks her eyes away briefly, a tiny bit of colour coming into her cheeks, “Sort of. I thought you were cute when I met you. Spending this much time with you, yeah, I was interested. Had no idea if you were back though.”

“Well I hope you have a satisfactory answer now.”

She smiles, and slips an arm around my back, her fingers splaying out over the bare skin.

“What do you want out of this?”

I blink a couple of times, “That’s a bit deep, don’t you think?”

“Not really? I mean, this happened, and don’t get me wrong, it was fantastic. But, what about tomorrow?”

I discard my first, slightly flippant answer, and think about it for a few seconds. It seems like something she’s a bit, not worried…concerned about.

“I like you. I like what just happened. I would very much like it to happen again in the future, with you. I’m pretty sure that’s considered dating, so, I’d like to date you.”

She looks, kind of like she’s holding her breath, but I can hear her breathing, “You sure? It might not work out”

“Yeah I’m sure. And that’s kind of the point of dating. You do it for as long as it does work out, and if it doesn’t, that’s a problem for future us. Present me very much wants to date present you.”

She smiles, and tugs me in just a little bit further, her fingers pressing in on my back as they squeeze tight. Yup, I’m very happy to be right here.

The next couple of days almost seem to blur past, until time slows down again. I’m in the tent, starting dinner this time. Really, it’s not going to be as good as Francesca makes it, but I can at least make something edible.

I look up as she comes in the tent and greet her with a smile, which soon gains a frown.

“What’s up?”

She looks at me, and then sits down heavily next to me.

“It’s just…nonsense.”

“Tell me.”

Her face pulls to the side. I’ve not seen worry on her face before, she’s usually quite confidant and assured.

“I can’t help but think that there’s nothing out here but sand. And rocks. It’s been days since we left the Diamonds kingdom, and there’s nothing out here.”

I leave the spoon in the pot and turn all of my attention to her.

“We wouldn’t have started this journey if there wasn’t a destination out there for us.”

“I know, but…where? Do we have any idea where we are actually going?”

“She (Wands) knows it’s out there. We have to trust her, trust that she wouldn’t lead us into a situation where there is nothing but death at the end.”

“I know, I know. But, all the court is here. And even all the people who follow the court. If we don’t find anything, we’re all gone. The entire court, swallowed up before it could really get going.”

I crawl round a few inches until I’m behind her, and I can slip my arms around her shoulder from behind.

“You trust me, right?”

“Yes.”

“And you trust the Queen?”

“I do. It’s just…”

“Well then, have a little faith that this will work out. And when you can’t, come to me. Trust in me to at least be able to make you feel a little better. I believe that we will find a home out here, no matter how long that takes. If you can’t believe that for yourself, then believe in me.”

Francesca closes her eyes, and one hand closes over mine, squeezing it.

“Is there anything I can do to make you feel better?”

She opens one eye and looks at me, a tiny predatory glint in there. Excellent.

“Well…”

Time seems to fast forward again, until the distance starts to come into focus again, and we can see a looming rock in the distance. It’s day sixteen, and the laugh of the Queen that echoes out over the column lifts my spirits as she points at the rocks.

“There. That’s home.”

We’re not there yet, and I hear a lot of mumbling and talking as we complete the last length of distance over to the massive rock face. Really? That’s it? Where’s the water? How can we survive out here with no water?

I trust the Queen. She knows what she’s doing. And home is in sight now, I can feel my spirits starting to soar. I reach out and take Francesca’s hand. She’s got that tiny little frown that she doesn’t seem to realise she wears, just pinching her brow together. But it does disappear as I smile at her.

See? It’ll all work out, as long as we work for it.

The rock just juts straight up out of the sandy earth, almost completely sheer on this face. Almost. I’m looking up at it, trying to plot a route up if I was going to climb it. I can’t help it, it’s what I love.

The Queen strides forward, her inner circle of princesses following her as she walks up and down the face, examining it. Eventually she picks a spot, and talks to the princesses. That’s when the work starts. Menders, Troubadours, and anyone else with Shape charms surge forward, following the orders of the princesses as they start digging a huge channel, which then opens out into what can only be described as a reservoir.

I can’t help with that, and instead my attention wanders back to the sheer cliff face that the Queen is standing at the bottom of, looking at it and judging how I would climb it. Not whether I could climb it, definitely how.

It’s only a few hours for them to finish the work, benefit of magic really, but by this point even Francesca has given up and is sitting next to me, leaning against the pack I’m sitting on and my leg.

There’s a signal to the Queen, and she unslings her massive sword from her back and turns to the wall. I nudge Francesca so she can look at this as well, as the Queen carefully chooses a spot, and then stabs the sword down into the rock.

Yeah, her sword wins against rock. Because of course it does.

At first nothing really seems to happen, she pulls the sword out of the wall, and there’s just a massively jagged hole. It seems like the entire court is holding their breath as suddenly there’s a spray.

Dust? No, water.

Abruptly, it starts pouring out, bursting through that crack into the channel which has been packed down and lined to retain the precious liquid. A massive cheer goes up, and I can’t help but join in, laughing and whistling along with the rest of the people.

Francesca reaches out and takes me hand, giving it a squeeze as she smiles at me, a proper broad smile that I can’t help but return.

We’re home.

 

The starts above us glimmer in the night sky. There’s a warm breeze, ruffling our clothes as we sit here, the city splayed out below us.

It’s been twenty years since that day, and we’ve really made ourselves a home here. It’s still a long way from finished, people are talking about crop cycles and dirt and things I sort of understand now after working on this place for so long, but still, we’ve come a long way. The tent city is now almost entirely replaced with rock buildings, and the tunnels extend quite deep into the cliff, although we’re constantly looking for new places to expand into. I’m pretty sure I’ve found some natural caves higher up, it’s just working out how to join them into the existing network and make them useful to us.

The night life of the city below is actually quite active, and there’s a bit of a party due to finding the underground lake with fish in it, but there’s no place I’d rather be than up here with Francesca, looking down at it all, legs dangling over the edge of the cliff, side by side with her.

She leans against my shoulder, “Say it again.”

“Hm?”

“That thing you say. Say it to me again.”

“Now what could that possibly be?”

A smile’s playing around my lips as she thumps me, both us very aware that I’m teasing.

“What I always want you to say. Tell me again.”

I clasp her hand, intertwining our fingers together as I bring it up to my lips and kiss it.

“Take my hand, and I swear I’ll love you ‘til the stars go out and beyond.”

She hums and settles back against my shoulder again, and smile firmly placed on her face. I place my cheek on top of her head, feeling it press into me as I look down, seeing her and the city we’ve helped build.

You and me. Forever and always, my love.

Breakfast Idyll

Alatoria almost felt like she was spying. She wasn’t really, and even if she was, it wasn’t like Melora would mind. And she take a simple joy in just watching her partner, especially when the morning light was coming through the curtains in such a nice way. They were currently eating breakfast, although Melora was somewhat engrossed in her data crystal. It was primarily her diary, Alatoria thought, but in the six years they had been partners, she’d never let her look. It wasn’t a big thing, Melora always told her if there was anything important, but she did wonder what went on in her lover’s head.

Melora reached out for her fork, absently stabbing a piece of food and bringing it up to her mouth. For a second her eyes flicked over to the other side of the table, and caught Alatoria looking at her.

“What’s on your mind?”

She smiled to herself a little, of course she’d caught her.

“Just admiring you.”

Melora lifted both eyes up to look over at her, before smiling, and then going back to her tablet, leaving Alatoria to her admiration.

The slow breakfast eventually came to an end, someone coming in to tidy the remains away as the two of them linked arms and slowly walked through the castle to the throne room where Alatoria needed to attend court.

Entering into the large and ornately decorated room, she leaned over and kissed Melora on the cheek, before her lover slipped her arm out of hers and went to find a space where she felt comfortable. She wasn’t really fond of courtly interactions, and tended to be elsewhere when Alatoria attended. Just one of her idiosyncrasies.

Alatoria moved across the court, stopping and talking to a few fellow Flowers, exchanging pleasantries, recent news, thoughts about the upcoming fair, the sort of polite interactions that characterised the court of Hearts.

“Tori.”

The gentle call came over the court, and Alatoria immediately excused herself from her current conversation to present herself to her Queen. She knelt, before being bade to rise, a few words were exchanged, and then she could move over to the side where the Rose Groom was standing.

He had a data crystal in his hands that he was scrolling through, but gave her a smile as she approached and saluted him.

“Good morning Tori, I hope it finds you well.”

“It does, and yourself?”

“Most agreeable. Now, we’ve got you down to patrol out to Dallarn and the surrounding areas, have you done that one before?”

“I know the route.”

“Excellent,” he flicked over the surface of the tablet and a rota came up, “We’ve not scheduled anyone else with you, as usual.”

Alatoria looked over her should, and as expected, Melora was waiting there, near the edge of the room, looking over at the two of them. As she was courtless, she couldn’t be placed on the schedule with her, even though everyone knew that despite her name appearing by itself, she was never alone in performing her duties.

Alatoria did occasionally wonder why she didn’t join a court, but all Melora ever said when asked was ‘I used to, but don’t anymore’. Alatoria wasn’t quite sure what she meant by that, given that there didn’t seem to be enough time for her to have tried joining a court in this lifetime. Melora has always been countless since she’d known her, and that was quite a few years now. But, again, another idiosyncrasy, it didn’t change her she felt about her.

“Thank you.”

“Our pleasure,” The Rose Groom flicked his eyes over to her lover as well, and then back to her with a smile.

“Anything else I need to know?”

“There’s nothing listed. We’ve not had any reports of trouble out that way for a while, so I expect it should all be routine.”

“By your leave then.”

He nodded to her, and she left with another bow, before walking over and joining Melora.

“Where are we going this time?”

“Dallarn,” she said, before taking her hand, and leaning over to kiss her, “thank you.”

“For what.”

“Many things,” Alatoria couldn’t help but be happy that she had a women like Melora at her side, in work and life.

Melora gave her a bemused little smile as the two of them returned to their rooms and then the kitchens to pack a small amount of rations for the trip, before going down to the stables and saddling horses up. It wasn’t even midmorning by the time that they were underway, gentle trotting out the gates of the outer wall. Alatoria looked up, not catching her eyes to shield them from the bright sun in time, and her vision blossomed out into bright spots.

 

The Battle of Alhambra

Finally the gates swung open, and the armies could start moving out from the city. It was easy to see the Queens at the front, Wands and Swords, not quite next to each other. Of course the swords wanted to charge ahead, it was clear to see in the way they restrained themselves, matching the pace of the wands, who were marching forward in a determined sort of way.

Alex rolled her shoulder, her broadsword still strapped to her back. No reason to draw it until the fighting was about to start, and it was much more out of the way there than if she carried it, given how many people were packed into this army.

Her hand just brushed the back of the women walking next to her, and their eyes briefly flicked towards each other, meeting for a bare second, before returning forward. Even though they were going into a fight that they expected to be bigger than anything they had faced before, Alex wasn’t too worried. She was at her side, just like she always was, and that was enough to quell most of the unsettlement she felt.

Of course it wasn’t just the two armies out here, all of the remaining Queendoms had gathered. Cups, Hearts, Diamonds, Pentacle, Spades and Clubs were all around too, although somewhat scattered. Clubs were mostly at the back, along with a good number of Pentacles, setting up field hospitals. Fighters from the other courts were interpreted with the two main armies, as well as a rear guard manning the walls of Alhambra. They didn’t have many catapults, but archers could get quite a range from up there.

Out of the corner of her eye she spotted a mixed group of people, skirting along one of the edges of the field. Probably a skirmishing group, but it caught her eye as she recognised a fellow courtier – they’d only joined last night. Alex hadn’t been watching the circle particularly, more interesting in spending the evening with friends and lovers, and kicking her rival from the swords into the dirt once more, but she did know that a princess of hearts had apparently had a change of heart and come to join them. What a time to join, but, if they felt that wands was the right place for them, then Alex welcomed them.

The Queens had stopped, not too far away from them now, and the armies were starting to form up in a long line, stretching across the field for the better part of a mile. Alex took up her position at the front, her lover by her side. Unslinging her sword from her back, she felt the familiar grip in her hands as she watched the rolling mass of darkness stop a distance away, and then fall away from the centre as a women, a queen even, stepped out from the dark.

Alex frowned, as she felt a warm touch on her hand. She looked over at her love, and took the hand off her sword, interlacing their fingers together and squeezing slightly. She was still concerned about the Queen that seemed to be opposing them. She could see her own Queen’s face, and it looked thunderous. They weren’t quite close enough to hear what was being said, but from the way people were reacting, and the slightly smug smile of the opposing Queen, it wasn’t too hard to guess.

Reluctantly, she let her lover’s fingers go, gripping her sword again as her lover swung her spear round into a ready position as well. This was the worst part, as the moments stretched out a little more, the tension in the line growing. Looking over at the wall of darkness, Alex could see that it was less of a single wall, and more of heaving mass of shadowy creatures, all piling on top of one another, forming and disappearing, a constant writhing mass. Her hands tightened on her sword, the leather of the hilt creaking slightly as she did so.

A single tutting noise spread out across, overlaying any other noise despite it not being a loud sound. And the opposing Queen turned away, walking back into that wall of darkness. As soon as she disappeared, the wall broke, creatures bursting out of it, charging straight at the armies. Alex brought her sword up in a great arc, cleaving through the first hellhound that had come charging towards them, kicking it’s head away as it started to disintegrate, the body fading away in the grass. But Alex didn’t have time to think about it, as more creatures were already besetting them.

The battle seemed to pass by in flashes. Hard slogs through dozens of creatures punctuated by quick stops to catch the breath, before diving back in again. Falling back again for a quick breath, she swiped her hand across her face, wiping away the blood. A passing healer laid a hand on her shoulder, stripping off the most recent wounds. She gave them a nod of thanks, before looking around for her lover. A flash of the spear drew her attention, and she saw that her lover was currently engaged with one of the larger monsters, almost troll like in appearance. Her lover was quick, just keeping ahead of the troll’s heavy blows, but it was not going well for her. Charging in, Alex used a passing dog as a stepping stone, jumping off that onto the back of the troll, plunging her sword straight through its neck, the momentum of the leap taking her forward. Keeping a grip on the sword, she sheared it through half the neck, landing next to her lover as she twisted the spear round, hitting it so the last part of skin still holding the head on ripped, and the creature slumped over, ebbing away into nothingness as the two of them plunged back into the fighting.

It was exhausting, mentally and physically. All the bodies of the darkspawn, as they had come to be called, were ebbing away, leaving only the bodies of fellow nobles on the floor. Even though they were killing these things, the evidence in front of their eyes made it hard to believe, especially when there was no end to them. Once again she was wiping the blood from her face, stilling for a moment between the fights as she looked around, taking stock of the field.

There were so many dead, and her Queen was growing, dark clouds gathering overhead, different from the darkness which still loomed like a wall over all of them. Alex had to turn and slay a few more darkspawn before something else caught her attention. Over all of the field, the corpses were shimmering, pale spectres rising up from them, and drifting towards the city. She blinked in confusion, before she spotted the Queen of Cups, leaving the field, heading back to the city. Alex felt anger and bile rising up in her throat as the ghosts and cups left them, but that was nothing compared to the fury that she felt course through her next, as a shattering scream broke through the air.

Alex turned her head just in time to see her Queen, now gigantic in size, sprout a pair of glowing wings, electricity crackling from them and her sword, which she raised up into the thunderous sky. A bolt of purple lightning crashed down, striking the blade, and the blast that it created swept over the battlefield, hurling everything backwards, noble and darkspawn.

Things broke, she could feel that much as she landed in the mud. She noticed the mud was warm on her neck, that was odd. Oh, of course, it was blood that was soaking through the earth right now, not rain. Her sword was still in her hand, although she wasn’t gripping it anymore. It was hard to really concentrate, part of her knew that she was dying. She was tougher than most, but even if she hadn’t been fighting for hours, that explosion from her Queen would have been hard to shrug off. And there was that scream, that terrible, awful scream, still ringing in her ears, singing of loss and anger and vengeance.

A movement in the corner of her eye. She turned her head, and could see her lover, getting up onto her hands and knees, coming over to her. That was good, Alex would hate to see them die, although she guessed that was unfair, considering that they would have to watch her die instead.

There were tears in her eyes as she leaned over, mouthing words at her, but Alex couldn’t hear anything apart from the scream. And there was this tugging sensation, not quite a physical one, but the storm, crackling with purple lightning, surrounding the massive figure of her Queen, was pulling at her. The sword she still loosely held was starting to crackle as well, tiny purple sparks running up and down its length.

Her lover looked terrified. Alex felt so bad, she tried to bring her hand up to touch her face. It’s fine, she wanted to say. If this is where it ends, then that’s okay. She thought back to last night – she hadn’t slept for half the night, staying awake, watching her lover as she had slumbered in her arms, just so peaceful and right. I spent my final time here with you, she tried to speak. I got to spend my life with you. I love you, and it’s alright.

Her lover looked up, and Alex could turn her head slightly to see the Queen from earlier, someone she now recognised as the Queen of Many Courts. She was looking down at the pair of them, a sad sort of smile on her face. A couple more tears splashed down, and Alex could see their mouths moving, and a sense of dread starting in her stomach.

No, don’t. Whatever you’re thinking, don’t. Please, don’t do anything stupid. She reached up with her hand, managing to touch her face. Her lover caught the hand, her grip betraying her panic as she looked down at Alex again, and then back up to the Queen.

It’s not worth it. Whatever price you’re paying, it’s too much, I’m not worth it, please…don’t.

She knew she wasn’t speaking, but she was praying that the words might find her, even as something pulled on her soul, and she screwed up her eyes in pain.

When she opened them again, the Queen was there, leaning over her, one finger extended out. Alex flicked her eyes back to her lover, wide and panicked, looking at their tear-stained face.

What did you do?

Then the Queen touched her, and it all went black.

Princess 2017

My usual apologies for the lack of posting. This time it was a combination of coursework being due in on the 16th (got both pieces in before they were due, score me) and as soon as I had handed them in, I came down with that rather nasty cold/plague that’s been doing the rounds. Two weeks later and I’m still coughing and sniffling, and I do wish my lungs would start working properly sometimes soon.

However, it has been a busy year so far. Mostly coursework and gaming, with extra gaming since the coursework got handed in (I’ve been playing a lot more video games since then, there was this kind of cool indie one called Stories: Paths of Destiny, and I’ve started Skyrim for the first time ever rather than just watching other people play). Including a Princess crossover game where the two groups actually got to meet up and tackle a really big problem that was kind of threatening to literally rain monsters down on our cities. We tackled it, although it wasn’t easy – I play a front line fighter who has such good defences they are near impossible to badly hurt, and I nearly ended up bleeding out. Although the giant monster did eat me a little bit.

I really love this tabletop game (and there’s another session tonight, hooray!), and a lot of stuff has happened since we started playing. I’ve gotten a much better handle on my character, they’ve gone through a court change, and a name change associate with that, and they are currently exploring their own gender identity, transitioning from female to non-binary as I explore them and how they actually act and feel about that area. It’s something that I might have mentioned before, but I see a lot of parallels to writing, because it is telling a story, and telling it over such an extended period of time actually helps to build in these character arcs as I get to build on them with each game rather that it just happening all at once. That, and I love this character so much, it’s really nice to just sit down and play them and have all the terrible things that our GM loves to throw at us happen – the biggest external plot they’ve got going on right now is that someone from a past life (probably past lives, they seem to have encountered each other quite a lot) has shown up again and is being a bit weird around Aegis, who isn’t exactly sure she can trust anything they say given which court they are in. It’s beautiful drama.

And because I love it so much, I’ve started writing fan fiction about it. I call it fan fiction, but since it’s my character in a game I play in, I’m not sure that’s an entirely accurate term, but you know what I mean. So, here’s a little extract of that.

***

 “Come on,” Aegis held their hand out to Keres, looking down at the other princess as they detransformed, their shirt corners settling down over slightly worn out jeans.

Keres sniffed as she looked up, a slightly confused look on her face as she gazed at the hand that was still extended out to her. Aegis wiggled their fingers, obviously expecting the hand to be taken. There were a few more moments of hesitation, as if Keres couldn’t quite believe that it was suddenly this simple, after so much resistance, but then she reached out, and Aegis pulled her to her feet.

Keeping the hand in their own, Aegis started walking down the street.

“Where are we going?”

“Back to my place. Just a small diversion first.”

There was a tiny frown still on her face as they walked through the city, eventually coming up to a school just as the bell rang out. Soon after floods of kids poured out of the doors, joining the various parents who were waiting outside for them.

“Luca!” The last ‘a’ was elongated as a short person with a long flying ponytail came blasting out of the door and leapt at Aegis.

Aegis easily caught her in their arms and lifted them up in a big hug, “Hey small one. Good day?”

“We got to play with keyboards in music class! Who’s that?”

“That?” Aegis followed the glance to look over at Keres, “That’s one of my friends whose coming to dinner tonight.”

Imogen looked at Aegis and blinked, “You never have friends over.”

“First time for everything.”

“Can we still have fish fingers?”

Aegis looked back over their shoulder again, “You like fish fingers?”

Keres opened her mouth and then shrugged, “Sure.”

“Yay!” Imogen wriggled out of Aegis’ arms and dropped to the floor, immediately going over and inserting her hand into Keres’ as she struck up conversation about her day.

Aegis came the other side of her and took the other hand, walking out of the school with an easy smile on their face as they listened, occasionally commenting, on the small one’s school day.

The flat was on the third floor of the block, as Aegis took out a key and unlocked the front door.

“Who’s home?”

“Me,” A slightly apathetic voice came from the sofa, and Aegis walked over and smiled.

“You go to sleep now and you’ll never get any rest tonight.”

“But I’m exhausted! My P.E. teacher effing sucks.”

“Language.”

“I didn’t swear!”

“Effing is hardly enough of a diversion from the word you were going to say. Come on, up. You’ll need to share the sofa tonight.”

Jake rolled up and over, his uniform rumpled from where he had collapsed on the sofa, and blinked in surprised as he spotted the other person in the flat.

“Whatever,” he grumbled, but shuffling over to free up some space on the sofa.

“Have you got homework?”

“No.”

“The only person who gets punished by your incomplete homework is you.”

He grumbled again, then pulled his bag towards him and flipped out a book onto the table, pen in hand as he slumped over and started scrawling.

Time passed them by, food was cooked and then demolished, even if there was a tiny incident with peas. Soon enough the evening had gone, without a call from Aegis’ fellow princesses for once, and they came out of the bedroom which they had just ushered their siblings into, closing the door quietly.

Keres looked at them, like she was expecting them to say something, but they didn’t as they walked over and sat down on the floor, leaning back on the sofa before dragging a pad towards them and flipping to a new page of paper.

There was a few minutes of scratching, before Keres broke the silence.

“So what was this?”

“Hm? It was dinner. Admittedly simple, I’m not the best cook in the world.”

“No, I mean. You’ve never given any indication that you trust me, and suddenly, you’re letting me into your home? Letting me meet your siblings? I mean, I guess you had some, but you’ve never given anything away about them, and suddenly here I am.”

Aegis continued to write as they looked down at the paper, “You needed it.”

“What makes you think that?”

Their lips twitched up into that trademark not-quite-a-smile, “The collapsing and sobbing wasn’t enough?”

“I was not sob- wait,” she looked at the back of their head, the short blond hairs still in disarray, “You remember, don’t you?”

There was a pause from them this time, “More than I’ve been letting on. Not as much as you claim to. But some things, like how you could sometimes lose your grip.”

“On what?”

Aegis finally turned their head to look at her, “Reality. Tonight was supposed to help ground you. Remind you that’s it’s not all princess business and there is a world here. Sometimes I think you forget that.”

Keres reached out, stretching her fingers out to gently touch Aegis’ cheek.

“Do you trust me?”

Aegis looked at her, those grey eyes boring into her, “I hope I can.”

She sighed, and let herself fall over on the sofa, hand trailing around to the back of Aegis’ head, playing with the short hairs at the nape of their neck.

“I’ll take it.”

She could almost hear the lips twitch up again.

August Life

First of all, apologies for a couple of weeks absence. Empire as always was fun, but draining and there was so much politics going on this time that I was busy the entire weekend despite planning on having a more relaxed weekend, but that’s always how it goes.

Since then, I’ve hit an energy low, culminating in being ill and off work yesterday. It was one of those things where you have low level background illness, but you have a full weekend of stuff lined up, so you just ignore the illness, and then as soon as you stop it catches up to you and slams into you.

On the other hand, I have been doing a lot of cool things, so I’ll just catch you up with some of them.

Photo Credit – Charlotte Moss

Empire

So, only a three day event but that just meant everything was packed into a shorter time frame:

• Started the weekend with a combat linear for my mages. Got to beat up an ice giant, and we rocked it!
• Got invited to a banquet in the summer realm (which was really tasty roast)
• Found out there what the linear had allowed an Eternal to do and caused drama – whoops!
• Culminated in one of the Eternals getting super mad (that part wasn’t me) and flipped her food across the entire table!
• Record length conclave sessions
• Didn’t die during battle
• Attempted to join mage coven and was prevented by yet more drama
• A meteor is crashing into the Empire and one of my nation persuaded conclave to vote to crash it on our territory, striaght onto the Vallorn – TERRIBLE IDEA
• Spent a good day running around undoing that decisions
• Got that decision undone and it is now crashing somewhere much more sensible

So yeah, that was an interesting weekend. Bring on event 4. See above for a really cool photo taken by the brilliant Charlotte Moss of me striding through the forest. As far as I remember this was at the start of the battle on Saturday and the guy that you can just see under the tree tripped and hurt his ankle so I was making sure he was okay before going back to join in the battle.

Adara

Long Weekend

So I had a five day weekend the next weekend. I was supposed to be going somewhere, but due to drama and funding issues, cancelled those plans and had a lovely five day weekend just relaxing at home. Boyfriend was also off, which was nice, although his cats were a nightmare, bless their little derp faces.

Mostly what happened then was a lot of roleplaying. Monday was Princess, and Princess continues to be great. The GM is encouraging me to write a lot of fan fiction about it and my character, and I am happy to supply him with that. I have my special snowflake thing and a friend who’s visiting for the entire month came in and played a DPC (directed player character, somewhere between an NPC and PC) to help us with plot. It was fun!

Friday we then started up D&D again!!! The last time we played that was in January sometime, and we had the break because we hit level 11 and changed tiers. Admittedly we filled the gap with a Star Wars game, which was fun, but I had missed D&D so! Playing my hot-headed Ardent, making the bad decisions, getting talked down and round into the sensible thing and then running off straight into the terrible mist of death was so much fun. That, and our paragon path powers are amazing!

NAMA August Graders

Last Weekend

So, Saturday during the day I clean the flat because people will be coming round and I’ve been putting it off for weeks and weeks. That was exhausting, but did mean that I didn’t have to stress about it when I went to my party in the evening. We saw Suicide Squad – enjoyable but messy is my official verdict – and then went for Nandos which is always fun in a large group. then back to mine for board games.

Sunday had to get up early so that I could go and grade for my next Taekwondo belt. As you can see from the photo above, I passed – First Class Pass! Although I was so nervous (and this is the ill as well) that I didn’t sleep the night before and my instructor said that she could tell I was practically terrified because when I did my Kata (set routine of moves) I was so wooden. Admittedly, I was, because brain weasels kept telling me I was failing. Silly brain weasels, I did fine. I now have an orange belt.

Straight after that I went to IoD to roleplay my changeling and werewolf. I was so tired I gave the last game of the day, Mage, a skip. And since I was grading I turned up late to the first game. But that was fine, that character’s a bitch so I can be exhausted in character and just avoid responsibility and doing things. Werewolf was the issue as the STs once again find new and interesting ways to cause my character feelings and yank her chain around. She went from confused to lamenting to lust to terror to rage to determined to full on lethal damage and hurt to extraordinarily upset and convinced that she’s got to break up with her boyfriend. Seriously. All in one game. I love the STs. And hate them. Mostly love though.

Birthday Dragon

This Week

Of course because I was putting off my ill when I did all that, waking up on Monday was fun and after calling in ill I spent most of the day sleeping. Sleeping is great. Eating not so much. Back in work today but my boss has said if I feel particularly bad I can probably go home. Hooray for summer holidays and college being so quiet it could be called dead.

Tomorrow I do have the day off though because it’s my birthday! Hoping that if I take it really easy today then I can enjoy myself tomorrow, but actually I don’t have to leave the flat and I have some presents to open and I can have a super chill day, which’ll be nice. The legion pre-patch is live and awesome and I suspect that my partner is upgrading my computer with a couple of new bits as my present so I’ll probably play that. Might also see if I can get the N64 working and blast from the past with Pokemon Snap. Maybe some sushi. It’ll be chill and great.

I also have some fun things lined up for this weekend, so as long as this illness starts going away, I should be having a pretty good week overall 🙂

Tabletop Explosion

So, I’ve gone from one tabletop game to four. And this is a delightful state to be in.

The existing one: Dungeons and Dragons. Ever classic, one of my very good friends who happens to be a fantastic GM is running a game for me, my partner, his partner and a friend. Four players, one massive campaign spanning levels 1 to 30. We just reached level 11, so we are officially upgrading from heroic to paragon tier.

Adara – D&D

Unfortunately for our character, we’re playing Cyran’s in Eberron, and the Day of Mourning has literally just occurred. That’s where we left off, with our character standing in a fort twenty miles from the border, looking back at the country as this weird, bright mist overruns the entire country. It’s going to be all of the feelings when we pick up from our break.

In that I’m playing an Ardent, which is a psionic leader class. That with a dash of cleric. I’m the parties healer, although I think I’ve been downed more than everyone else, but I am also the second defender. Sort of. Our team is a bit weird, with two hybrids, me, and a multiclassed striker. But we work really well together, and it is all of the fun.

The interim one: Star Wars. So, we hit the paragon tier, and to give the GM a little bit of time to plan out the next ten levels, we’re taking a bit of a break. From that game anyway, we like gaming too much to give it all up, so we’re keeping the same group, swapping GMs, and our friend is going to run us a short star wars campaign.

We’re still statting these people up, but we’re going to be a small crew of smugglers, and he’s letting me play a droid! I’m going to be an astromech, and you can bet that I’m downloading a sound board for all the beeps and whistles to use during the game. So we’re be taking a couple of months out to play that instead of D&D before going back to it and all the feelings.

The revival one: World of Darkness Mortals/Hunters. So, different group this time. However, this is sort of leading on from a game that I played in about four years ago? It was an innocents game, which is the same setting and rules, except you’re playing children. The GM moved away, but now he’s back, and he wanted to run a game, so me and another player that also used to be in the kiddy game decided to play our children as grown up characters.

It’s proving fun, and our characters are basically inseparable, and we had to visit the school the children went to and all the bad stuff happen and it turns out the demon from that has broken out so everything is terrible forever. My character is a lying good for nothing thief, and her partner is a completely antisocial know-a-lot. It’s a fantastic partnership. And I look forward to slowly killing all the other players as we abandon them to horrific fates.

The new one: Princess the Hopeful. So, this one had it’s character creation session last night, and I am really excited for it. Been building backstory today. One of the players from my DnD group decided he wants to run more stuff, so invited a bunch of us, and some others, to play a game. What he wasn’t expecting was everyone to pounce on it and say yes, so he’s had to split the groups. But instead of having two separate games, we’re just in mirror universes, and there’s going to be potential for crossover, which is going to be so cool.

Lana/Skye – Princess

I’m going to be playing a fighter, known in the setting as a Champion, and I’m going for a very classical knight/paladin feel, so armour, sword and shield, protecting those you love characters. In her normal life she’s a big sister/stand in mum, and I am very much looking forward to playing her since I think this game is going to be great, and the GM is loving the backstory so far, because there are a lot of things in there for him to mess with, and messing with the characters is always so much fun.

So those are all my games. The tabletop ones anyway. I’m love playing games, just for the playing of the games themselves, but also because it means that I think a lot about characters, which helps with writing, but also because it’s cooperative, and I always find it interesting to see how different people react to the same situation, and building a story together is great.

It’s been a very game intensive weekend. I barely had time for writing!

Dungeons and Dragon Dice Shaming

So, for the first time in a while, I played Dungeons and Dragons last night. I word my dragon earrings and everything. It was the first game of what is hopefully going to be a long campaign, starting right from level 2 (level 1 was deemed too boring to start at) and going all the way up to 30.

It was good, although my roleplaying is going to take a little while to get right. I’m playing her too high class at the moment. I need her to be snarky, vivacious, not suited at all for the military, but basically a good person who does like helping people beneath it all. I never play the easy characters.

She’s an ardent though, so I’m having real fun with the whole stick my spear in this guy, then shield/heal/protect my allies. It’s really fun. Although I have forgotten some rules, and having the sheet in black and white meant that I was using an encounter power as an at-will for most of the fight – whoops!

But the main part was once again, my dice kept rolling really low for me. I know that there has been a  trend of dice shaming, where people post pictures of their dice with notes about what they have done to them. I prefer a more direct route with my dice. If they failed me, they are banished to the bottomless pool of aqua.

*Note: Bottomless pool of aqua may or may not actually be bottomless.

G – Dragon Games

Yes, this is where Dungeons and Dragons is going to come into it, as part of the games sections! I’ll showcase some of the dragon themed games, or games that include dragons in this post, hopefully it will be shorter than my other posts since this is more of a go out and try these yourself adventure.

Dungeons and Dragons: One of the more famous example of gamer and geek culture. Players (usually 6) and their Dungeon Master (DM) sit around a table with character sheets in front of them and undertake challenges in a fantasy world and roll dice to see if their character can accomplish these things. Pretty simple. Well, I think it is, but then I’m glossing over pretty much everything. In this world, you have a group of adventurers who go around killing big bad monsters and saving the day, and as the title suggests, some of these monsters are dragons. Not all, and very occasionally the dragons are nice to the adventuring party, or at least don’t kill them on sight, but sometimes they do just attack and gather treasure. There are of course other monsters, since only killing dragons gets very boring (and makes me upset) but dragon are some of the big bads in these worlds. It is of course, up to the DM, since he creates to monsters that the player have to fight. But Dragons are popular enough in this game to merit their own book. Two in fact, one for Chromatic Dragons, and one for Metallic Dragons. Unsurprisingly, I own both.

 

 

Dragons in Video Games: Dragons of course appear in quite a few videos games. Good examples include: Dragon Age (there is a dragon on the cover of both games, a lovely one in red); Skyrim, the most recent Elder Scrolls Games, as well as older Elder Scrolls games; Spyro, that lovely little purple dragon who I remember very fondly in bad graphic; World of Warcraft (yes, the MMO) contains a whole council of dragons, most of whom are on the side of good, but the black dragon have a bad reputation, and deservedly so; I have been reliably informed that Monster Hunter contains some really badass and hard to beat dragon as well, referred to as the Fatalis; And Bahamut in the Final Fantasy series has made several appearances throughout the game, usually in order to prove you have the right to summon him, by defeating him.

There are of course, lots of other game which include dragons, both as a main character, a companion, or as monsters, but there’s a selection of the most famous ones, if you have not played any of them (I myself have only played some, but I like it when the dragons are the good guys and I don’t have to kill them).

 

Dragons in Card and Board Games: I’ve already mentioned one dragon board game, which takes in place in the dragonology series and I find incredibly fun. Dungeons and Dragons also has a couple of board games out, of which dragons do feature (not exclusively though, I think Liches are a more frequent big bad boss at the end, but I don’t own all of them.) Talisman, a fairly popular board game which has more than one edition, has a dragon expansion. Dragonquest is a game that originally came out in the 1980’s, but has gotten a redesign by Fantasy Flight Games with a more modern look and feel, but the same original gameplay (I might have to look into buying this one, I did not know it had been remade). As for card games, there’s Seven Dragons, which plays like dominos in which you have to match the dragon’s colours to gain dominion over territories. Three-Dragon Ante is again a Dungeons and Dragon product, but plays really well and is very enjoyable to while away a couple of hours. Magic the Gathering also has its shares of dragons as monsters and planeswalkers (I did indeed build a dragon deck, and regret nothing). But of course, there are many more games out there, including one I kickstartered, which I await eagerly.

Day 20 — A hobby of yours

Well this one is easy, roleplaying. It takes up most of my social time, I have to say, and generally keeps me sane.

What I am in at the moment. Couple of tabletop games, Rogue Trader, Second Sight and Mirrors. I’m also thinking of running my own tabletop game, and seeing how I like GMing and STing.

Live games, there is Shades of Norwich Requiem, Mage, Sabbat, IoD Mage, IoD Changeling at the moment. No more prospects thank god because I would need to find some more time to play them. Although they are nice and spaced out.

LARP is on Sunday’s, still going, still plodding along.

I like roleplaying, it allows me to be things that I’m usually not, and there is so much possibility, and we sometimes have some emotional things going on, like a scene we just did yesterday for Changeling, which is going to be a good thing to think how to roleplay through and how my character would react to everything that happened. It’s going to make the game on Sunday great 😀