how to d sappear completely

“You can’t just leave the guar leather,” the Ashlander had insisted. “It’s wasteful and disrespectful!”

I'm sorry, I know this is a dramatic and pivotal point in the narrative, but we've triggered a made-up animal husbandry rant, because guar are serious business. A herd-based tribe like the Ahemmusa will structure all their movements around the good of the herd: moving across the best grazing lands for most of the year, then heading somewhere warm and safe for the critically important breeding season. There, you hatch your clutches of eggs, and decide which are worth raising, and which are khett: runts, too weak to survive. And you hope that you have enough viable young, because those guar are key to the tribe's survival. As they grow, you'll assign them purposes: strong ones to keep with the herd for breeding next year, and for cheese and cargo in the meantime, maybe even riding, if they have good legs and temperament. The rest are raised for meat and hides, and are slaughtered one by one, throughout the year. Upon hatching, guar imprint on their herders, and will follow them anywhere with no need to rope them (though others might!), and will stand quietly even as the herder cuts their throats. Guar leather is a core material, used for everything from yurts and banners, to bags, clothing and armour. If asked, most Ashlanders will happily tell you the history of the guarskins they are wearing, who they came from, and whether or not they were a good guar.

As outcasts, Mashti and Julan didn't have a herd, but as a teenager, Julan was once given a khett to raise, when he begged it from Sen, who was about to kill it. He called it Pelagius, and managed to keep it alive for over a year, despite it being a blind runt with brain damage and constant seizures. There wasn't much leather from it, but Julan did get a pair of guarskin pants out of Pelly, which he now regrets - should've made a bag, or a quiver! He's grown out of the pants, and can't wear them now without threatening to break them apart entirely, but he still has them in a chest, at his mother's. Guar are family.

Anyway. Wild guar are not necessarily free guar (I assume they're hard to tame, if you don't rear them yourself), but a dead wild guar is still free guar leather! And Julan's current pair of guarskin pants were shredded by clannfear, and despite his attempts at repair, are not in fantastic shape.

the succession of carefully skinned animal corpses guided him back along the grey foyadas until he was once again before the arched gate to Red Mountain.

This is so stupid. How many skinned guar would you need, in order to leave a trail? Are we sure Julan doesn't collapse on Red Mountain due to the sheer weight of the couple dozen guarskins in his inventory?

“Oh, it’s you!” The cheery Buoyant Armiger waved to him from her guard post. “Didn’t expect to see you back here. You just missed your Ashlander friend, though.”

This nameless Buoyant Armiger appeared briefly earlier, to heckle Julan. She's here to be an anti-Sister Llathyno, and really confuse Iriel about the Temple view on homosexuality.

She laughed. “Oh, ignore those musty old priests. I’m a Buoyant Armiger! Knight of Vehk! We’re all gay for Lord Vivec, it’s practically the entire point! Haven’t you read Sermon Twenty-Four?”

Sermon 24:

But before he could even get within sword-span of the monster, a trio of lower houses had trapped Horde Mountain in a net of doubtful doctrine. When they saw their lord, the Velothi cheered. 'We are happy to serve you and win!' they said. Vivec smiled at those brave souls around him and summoned celebration demons to cleave unto the victors. There was a great display of love and duty around the netted monster, and Vivec was at the center with a headdress made of mating bones. He laughed and told mystical jokes and made the heads of the three houses marry and become a new order. 'You shall forever be now my Buoyant Armigers,' he said. Then Vivec pierced Horde Mountain with Muatra and made of it all a big bag of bones. At the touch of his right hand the net became right scripture and he threw it all northeasterly. The contents spread out like sugar-glows and Vivec and the Buoyant Armigers ran under it laughing.

Buoyant Armigers are an elite troop of warriors, exclusively dedicated to Vivec, modelling themselves on his warrior-poet image. The quote above implies the origin of the order, mythically at least, was a post-battle orgy around a captured monster.

Earlier, the strange combination of Vivec's poetic homoerotica and the Temple clergy's overt homophobia caused Iriel to deride them as hypocrites, but could something else be going on, here? What if, when Vivec claims that spear biting is a forbidden ritual, he isn't saying "do as I say, not as I do", he's telling you it's a privilege, and if you want it, you gotta git gud?

Many acts are forbidden to the Dunmer people at large, because their wholesale adoption would disrupt the regular order of society. Lies, for example, or murder and betrayal. But these can also be holy acts. The "good Daedra" Boethiah rules over treason, deceit and betrayal. Murder is sacred, under the holy auspices of Mephala, but only for the licensed Morag Tong assassin. For Dunmer, these actions are not anathema in and of themselves, in fact they may sometimes be necessary. But they must be kept in their place.

What if homosexual acts were viewed similarly? Subversive behaviour that goes against the social majority view is permissible for gods: they know what they're doing. Vivec can put his spear (or Molag Bal's) wherever he wants. As companions of Vivec, the Buoyant Armigers' role contains echoes of his holy nature, but that's ok, because it's a strictly boundaried and defined state, kept secret by oaths and initiation ritual. The Buoyant Armigers were formed in an explosion of divine love and duty. To love one another, and to love Vivec, regardless of gender, is part of that duty. Entry into that state is to level up physically, spiritually and sexually. They've earned it. They're allowed to suck cock, they've got the sexual equivalent of diplomatic immunity. They're not an unqualified gutterfag like you, Iriel, they're trained professionals.

Iriel will later refer dismissively to this theological framework as "the Temple make you join the army to be gay".

“To be honest, it’s a lot more symbolic these days than it used to be. He doesn’t go among us in person any more, ever since… well.

It's a close-kept secret that the Tribunal have lost access to the Heart of Lorkhan, the source of their continued divinity. But out of everyone on Vvardenfell, the most likely to know would be the Armigers, the mortals most intimate with Vivec, some of whom might have accompanied him in his forays onto Red Mountain, both successful and not.

“Since you’re a woman, wouldn’t you be straight for Vivec?”

The Armigers are male dominated, but female Armigers certainly exist. If I'd made the Armiger a man, Iriel would have thought he understood the situation, but I want to make sure he realises it's more complicated than that.

“Ah! That’s where you’d be wrong! Lord Vivec is the union of male and female, the magic hermaphrodite, the martial axiom, the sex-death of language and unique in all the middle world! Mephala was his Anticipation! He is all genders and none, and I promise you… whoever or whatever you are, when you’re with Vivec, it’s always completely gay. Both ways. All possible ways. Many impossible ways, too.” She grinned wildly, and swung her spear back and forth. “Completely. Gay.” Ire backed away slowly, feeling for the gate switch behind him.

Obviously I am failing to resist the temptation to get Silly with this, purely because it's fun to discombobulate Iriel. He doesn't know how to handle someone trying to out-gay him, especially not a woman, and especially not in this paradoxical, nonsensical way. 

Iriel hasn't paid attention to Vivec's gender, since he was only cherry-picking bits of the Lessons for (ahem) specific things, and Vehk uses male pronouns, there. Ire wasn't reading closely or thoroughly enough to register much nuance. He'll raise an eyebrow, later, though, when Viatrix says of her meeting with Vivec, "She was beautiful".

Behind the Armiger's deliberate silliness, I think it's less that close encounters with Vivec are "always completely gay", and more that Vivec's gender presentation shifts to mirror yours, in an idealised sort of way. Whether that's an erotic experience depends on a lot of things, not least where you fall on the "would you fuck your clone?" spectrum*.

(* The LOTR version was the first version of the meme that came up in the tumblr search, but if anyone has a TES one, feel free to submit. Yes, I know which answer would be given by each major HTDC character. Iriel is obvious, and gets no points for identification.)

Moving on. Iriel runs up the mountain, immediately gets into trouble and needs to be rescued.

He screamed, and it clung to him, pinning his arms and dragging him to his knees. Wailing and gurgling, it stared up at him beseechingly, eyes crusted and desperate.

Iriel's seen someone like this already -  the body of Danar Uvelas, in Vivec. So he's aware this isn't a beast or Daedra, just a person who caught the wrong disease. While corprus victims can be violent, in moments of blind, confused frenzy, what if sometimes they're lumbering towards you in sheer desperation, seeking help?

“I thought you might… need… help.” Ire said weakly.

Julan looked distracted and sounded exasperated. “You can’t help me with this,” he said. “Look at you, you’re not even wearing armour, and that stalker was right on top of you. You’re going to catch corprus if you stay out here.”

Iriel's looking less like a rescuer and more like a liability every moment. Except that Iriel is right, because without him there, Julan will end up dead. Julan may be able to swing a sword at things, but he doesn't have the temperament to handle a solo mission into such dangerous territory. That's not a criticism - I don't think many people would. Later, Ire's become even more defenceless, having lost most of his magic, but he's still the only thing keeping Julan together, because heroism is about more than physical strength.

I was full of shit, and I’m sorry. You do realise I ran all the way from Ald'ruhn, don’t you?”

This is an excellent and heartfelt apology, probably the most honourable thing Ire's done for chapters and chapters. Shame it has such an unappreciative audience.

Raising his shield to ward off the worst of the ash, Julan steered Iriel into a slightly more sheltered area of the mountain. Once there, he stared in confusion. “But… why?”

Julan's not used to apologies, especially not genuine ones. Ans the one time he gets one, it's when he no longer has any use for it, and has no idea what he's supposed to do with it. He's done playing at friendship, now, he's busy.

“Because I’m worried about you!” Ire said vehemently. “I’m scared you’re going to get yourself killed!”

Given Ire's behaviour lately, it's understandable if this sounds fake to Julan. And true, this isn't pure altruism on Iriel's part, a lot of it's terror of being saddled with another mountain of guilt. But Ire's also realised that Julan's kindness was genuine, that they had moments of real connection, in the brief moments that Ire's neuroses weren't eating him alive, and Ire's been a colossal shitbag to him. Whether or not Julan really needs help, Ire can't stand the thought of leaving things on such a sour note, knowing he threw a friendship away for no good reason.

Julan resheathed his sword with diffident precision. “Look, that’s all very touching, but there’s no need. I’m ready for this, now.”

Thing is, Julan's had a day or so alone, now, during which he's had time to really entrench himself in mission-mode. Mission-mode is necessary, because otherwise the paralysing fear takes over, and that's no use. So: mission-mode. Mission-mode involves shutting down all emotion and logic, and replacing it with two things, held in constant tension: delusions of grandeur and suicidal ideation. 

The delusions are the hero fantasies his mother raised him on, that he pretends to himself that he believes. These are the surface thoughts he allows himself, the phrases he repeats until they feel as true as he can get them.

The wanting to die comes from the part of him that knows it's a lie, that he's not a great hero, but doesn't care. It doesn't matter that he won't succeed, because he has no future anyway, and dying for his people feels like the most productive thing he has left. He can't let these thoughts surface, so he batters them down with the heroism, but it's all still there, bubbling under. He keeps it there, because it's a useful weapon against the paralysing fear. If his survival instinct starts gaining the upper hand, he can remind it that he doesn't deserve to live.

What this adds up to is the most godawful martyr complex you've ever seen in your life. And now he's got it all unpacked and set up, the last thing he needs is Iriel, coming in and messing everything up.

“Then… I’m going to Dagoth Ur’s citadel.” Ire blinked. “You’re what? Why?” “To hunt him down, and kill him.”

I mean, when you put it like that, it sounds stupid. Stop making him explain his total lack of a real plan out loud! This is why he doesn't like talking about it!“No!” Julan shouted, “You don’t need to get anything straight, because you don’t know the first thing about it!”

NO EXPLANATIONS NO PLANS ONLY MISSION. stop talking stop talking no rationality can be allowed to penetrate MISSION MODE

Julan threw up an ash-covered gauntlet. “What are you going to do? You’re a scholar. The most danger you’re used to is papercuts! This is serious, Iriel.”

Stop trying to get in on the serious business of martyrdom, Ire, you're ruining it! Now Julan has to distract himself trying to protect you, or else you'll die first and beat him to the martyrdom, and he doesn't wanna share!

Julan might have argued further, but his eyes were elsewhere, head making sharp, sudden moves. He winced. “Fine. Whatever. I need to… get this done.

He was doing this before, back at Ghostgate. Is there something physical about being on Red Mountain, or is just that his mission is focused here, so the stress is magnified?

Next chapter, up the mountain proper. I wanted to call a whole bunch of chapters after colours, but in the end I only managed red and green.

The sky was an open wound, pouring down red torrents of ash. Iriel’s boots were full of it, and he could barely see.

Most of this is unchanged from the mod, because even though it was a nightmare to script, and breaks the moment someone installs a terrain-change mod (or for no reason at all - this is Morrowind), I still think it's a fun trick to force the player into such an extreme situation. Ask them to do something obviously stupid for the sake of this guy they hardly know! Red Mountain is genuinely horrific and disorienting to navigate. It's the end-game zone, your character is probably wildly underleveled for the enemies here, and could easily end up dead. You also have no control over Julan and no idea how far he's going to push this crazy thing he's apparently determined to do. 

Julan was pulling ahead again, and Ire was about to shout to him, when Julan turned first, irritation on his face. “Look, I can’t hear what you’re saying when you whisper like that!”

...and then he starts hearing voices.

“Daedra are resistant to most metals,” Iriel shouted. “but this one has elemental resistance too! We need an enchanted weapon, or a spell it’s weak to!” Julan, frantically parrying claws with his shield, didn’t seem to hear him.

I know this whole business with the Hunger is stupid as hell, but LISTEN: I had to. Because this is what happened in my game! Usually, I try to write a story, not a gameplay record. I try to ignore the silly realities of Video Game Logic and focus on what works best for the narrative. But this was so ridiculous, I had to include it.

Remember that steel longsword Julan had, last chapter? I'd equipped that on him to replace that shitty chitin shortsword he starts with, with the fleabite of a fire spell. What I had forgotten is that it doesn't matter how much more damage a steel weapon does, it's going to do zero damage against creatures that are resistant to unenchanted weapons. It's fine, I thought, he has destruction spells too.

Guess what's the one creature in the entire game that's 100% resistant to normal weapons, AND 100% resistant to fire, frost, shock and poison? Guess what we immediately ran into on Red Mountain?

And I realised: Julan's not in follow mode, right now. I have no way to stop him from attacking this Hunger, despite the fact he can't damage it. He won't follow me if I teleport, and I can't change his equipment. He's just going to keep fighting it until it kills him. Which is honestly an extremely appropriate Julan situation for him to perish in, but I was hoping this story might be longer.

Ire had no spells or weapons that could damage the Hunger either, only paralysis, which was just prolonging the inevitable. Sure, I could have console-killed the Hunger, but I didn't want to play Iriel's game like that. I was trying, in my pedantic little way, to keep it real.

It was actually even more convoluted, ingame. I at least allowed story-Ire the mercy of finding a filled soulgem at the Shrine of Pride, since that's the standard offering for that shrine, so it's plausible. Actually, I only had an empty gem, so I had to enter the mine, find a pickaxe, soultrap some random nix-hound I found in there, and successfully enchant the fucking pickaxe! Which was thankfully the easy part, since Ire's skill wasn't terrible, and you can only put, like, one enchantment point into a goddamn pickaxe. But then I had to get back to Julan and save him from his endless battle, before he ran out of health!

Oh, and then manage to kill the damn Daedra, with a weapon Ire had no skill in, that only did a couple of points of damage per strike, while exhausted and wearing no armour. Which took forever, plus a million health potions, so be glad I streamlined that part, in the fic.

Long story short, we were all so traumatised by the experience, that I had to include it in the story, regardless of whether that was a good idea.

Julan doubled over in pain, oblivious to Iriel. “Nnnngh! No! I am NOT… Get OUT!! Aaaggh! Stop it, you s'wit!!” He raised his head, stared blankly into the storm, then suddenly howled and clawed at his ears so hard his nails left marks in the skin. “No!! That’s NOT true! That’s not why I’m… unngh… I am Indoril Nerevar reborn, and you will not… Aagh!”

Two kinds of reader reactions to this line, A:

cottoncandy_dreams: "OH SHIIIIIT!!! I thought Julan might be thinking he was the Nerevarine but aaaaaaaa"

and B:

HopeStoryteller: "...is this something I'd know about if I played Morrowind?"

I want to thank every reader in the B category for their perseverance, honestly. I can't imagine trying to read this fic without knowledge of the Morrowind main quest.

I also want to thank the readers in the A category, because yesss, you get it. One of my aims with the Julan mod was to make the main quest feel fresh again, add some new spice and conflict. The point of Morrowind is that your character is (well, possibly, it's Complicated) the reincarnation of someone called Indoril Nerevar. So the veteran player, hearing this line, is meant to be going, "wait, what? he thinks he's ME?"

Iriel, of course, is in the B category.

He screamed, convulsed, and then, as Ire watched helplessly, his eyes rolled back and he fell unconscious into the ash.

Aaaand, that's it, we're out. Julan can take a turn being the character to pass out at the end of the chapter. As I said, I prefer to leave the source of the voices in Julan's head ambiguous - or whether there even was a source, beyond his own hyper-pressurised brain. I will note, though, that Julan's reaction implies the voices were mocking and insulting him. Which... if we're trying to use that to decide between his own subconscious, Dagoth Ur and Julan's deadbeat dad? Doesn't really narrow it down, does it?

“Sweet Alma, lad, do stop all this fussing.” Ulmiso Maloren, the Ghostgate healer, rinsed her sponge in searing water, and brought it once more across Iriel’s naked back. “I can’t heal it until I’ve cleaned all this ash out of it, can I? You’d end up with blight under the skin, and a nasty infection.

Back at Ghostgate, and Ire's voicing his low tolerance for physical pain. I will cut him some slack, given he's just been through hell, where he was extremely brave and resourceful, and is now entitled to fall apart a bit.

I assume that healing with Restoration is based on speeding up the natural regenerative processes of the body, convincing it to heal faster. So your basic healing spell isn't going to remove debris from a wound or reset a displaced bone; you better do that before you try to heal the flesh, or you're making trouble for yourself. Throw in a few Cure Blight spells, as the equivalent of antibiotics.

Pain relieving spells would be a separate thing - possibly an Illusion spell, since it's about removing the perception of pain? A local anaesthetic done with some combination of Calm spells and carefully targeted Paralyse spells on the nerves?

Anyway, I'm sure Ulmiso could cast one on Iriel if she wanted to, but doesn't, for the same reason they don't give you a full anaesthetic to clean a wound in real life: it's a waste of time and resources, this is a minor treatment, you are honestly being a huge baby.

“It’ll probably scar, you know,” she tutted. “Serves you right for leaving it so long untreated.

labskeever had some really cool thoughts about magical healing and scarring:

"one of my made-up bits of TES lore is that wounds healed by magic are almost guaranteed to scar, and usually in far worse ways than if they healed on their own. it creates consequences for waving one’s hand to get rid of an injury. sure, you could fix it now, but it will be ugly and pain you forever, whereas with bedrest and mild potions you have a chance of full recovery."

I really like this, and kinda wish I'd done it this way around in HTDC. Julan later talks about Ashlander scarification techniques, which involve letting something heal slowly to ensure scarring, so magic isn't allowed. Which could easily be changed to: magic is used in order to ensure scarring. But then you'd probably have to make it extra painful through other means, because stringing out the suffering is part of the point - these are Dunmer we're talking about.

“I’ve examined him, and there’s nothing physically wrong with him. He keeps babbling nonsense, but I think he’s just exhausted.

Now, why might Julan be exhausted, Ire? Maybe his behaviour on the mountain was less about his dad or the devil, and was all down to sleep deprivation-induced psychosis. It's all making sense, now - irritability, mania, hallucinations - all symptoms of lack of sleep!

Iriel scurried barefoot across the stone floor, and crouched down by his friend’s bed.

His friend! Despite everything - because of everything! - Iriel's clear on that, now. Before, he couldn't handle the fact that Julan had seen him at his worst, full of rage and irrationality, lashing out blindly, failing at everything he attempts. But now he's seen Julan in more or less the same position. They're no longer teacher and student, or patient and babysitter. They're just a pair of fuck-ups, trying to keep each other sane, and Iriel can work with that - that sounds like friendship to him, and he's right.

“Shhh, don’t move,” said Iriel. “Let me try a spell.” He gently placed his hands on Julan’s temples, and tried to focus his limited healing abilities through his fingertips. “Does that help?” “Aah… yeah, a bit.

See, he's feeling so amicable, he's even managing some minor healing! That, or Julan's just trying to be polite about whether it's working.

I called HTDC a story about visibility, but it's also a story about healing. Iriel is bad at it, and he needs to get better at it, because magic is a metaphor for how you believe you can affect the world. So. Listen to the professionals, Ire! Clean the ash out, first! Of, like, Julan's brain or whatever we're doing, here, metaphorically or otherwise.

But it was just like my dreams, except… the voices were different. Clearer. I could hear what they were saying.” Not at all sure he was going to like the answer, Ire asked, “What were they saying?” Julan didn’t seem to like the answer either, breaking eye contact and muttering: “Oh… I don’t know. Not much. It’s not important.

Lots of ash in the brain, for sure. He doesn't really hint at what this is about until much, much later:

Want to know a secret? I used to wonder if Dagoth Ur was right, if maybe the Nerevarine was supposed to join him, not defeat him. Return the tools that were entrusted to him by Nerevar, and then stolen from him by the Tribunal. I mean, that makes sense, right? In a Bal Molagmer sort of way.” His tone was light, but an increased tension beneath Ire’s fingers betrayed the shame of the admission. “That’s not why I thought it, though,” he added, his voice dulling. “I was angry, bitter. I thought any change for Morrowind would be better than living under the Empire’s thumb, beneath the mockery of false gods.

I wasn't deliberately trying to echo anything about young men being targeted by toxic right-wing nationalist grifters, but it's hard not to see the parallels now, innit? Plenty of Dunmer joined the Sixth House, there was clearly something that appealed to a certain type of person, beyond the all-you-can-eat tumours buffet. Julan doesn't want to be that type of person, and doesn't think that's the sort of hero he wants to be, but part of him kinda gets it.

What matters is, I failed again at my mission. I’m still not ready. Maybe I’ll never be ready.” He sighed like a falling tree. “Ai… I guess I should go back home and herd guar. Seems it’s all I’m fit for.”

I totally stole "Ai..." from Symmachus in The Real Barenziah. Or, wait, since he's read it, did Julan steal it for himself? Whichever one of us stole it, it just sounds like a good grim, brooding Dunmer thing to say.

"Sighed like a falling tree" is a godawful simile, though, I am slapping past-me on the wrist. Have you ever heard a tree fall? All screeching and cracking! Squirrels everywhere!

Iriel chewed his lip, struggling to think of something encouraging. “Herding guar actually sounds rather difficult,” he said at last.“I imagine it requires a lot of observation skills, patience, and… um… animal husbandry, and…” He felt Julan’s glare before even seeing it.

Iriel may not be beating the autism allegations, here, but I have to defend him - he's right! Guar-herding is a rewarding life that requires skill, perception and empathy! Julan assumes he's being insulted, and that Iriel's "well, actually" implies he's not even good enough to herd guar, but Iriel means the opposite: that being "fit for" herding guar isn't an insult.

But Julan doesn't want to herd guar, he wants to be a hero and save his people, or he wants to be a righteous martyr. And he also knows that "his people" wouldn't let him touch their precious guar with a bargepole, so even his attempt at self-deprecation is an unattainable fantasy.

Julan's always chasing the wrong dreams - he'd make a fantastic guar herd. He'd love it.

I mean, I’ve been very impressed by your physical, um…” don’t say anything weird, Ire “…prowess, by which I mean…” keep your eyes up, that’s right “…your skills. With weapons. As in, you know, using them. On people.” ok, good, I think we got through that.

The running joke in this scene of Iriel wrestling with his terror of being Predatory Gay, and completely failing to act normal as a result. He's determined to level up his Male Friendship, and that means pretending he can't tell other men have bodies, however implausible this seems. The correct response, of course, would be to roll his eyes and tell Julan to "pull the fucking sheet up" at the beginning of the conversation, but Ire needs more skillpoints for that. (At even higher level, he can attempt the move Sottilde demonstrated for him earlier, of telling him off for being unfairly naked in plain sight when he doesn't swing that way!)

“Uhh… Thanks.” Julan looked slightly nonplussed, but attempted a smile anyway.

In an earlier commentary, I said: "as far as Julan is aware, people treating you badly is just how relationships are. He does not have what you would call a regular baseline for comparison”.

In response to that, sinilakki asked: "How does kindness feel like to Julan when this is the starting point? Does it feel fake (like the notion of Iriel having friends)? Inherently suspicious?"

This is hard to answer, because it encompasses a whole range of behaviours and reactions, like... it depends. Julan is suspicious of people he doesn't know well, as they often subject him to mockery and scorn. Flattering words from strangers may be assumed sarcastic until proven otherwise, but provided he thinks you're legit? He does have social skills, far more than Iriel. He can take a compliment, give and receive basic courtesy, chat up  random farmers in the tavern about their guar until they buy him drinks.

With those he cares about, he has a high tolerance for mistreatment in that he'll excuse, justify and forgive it easily, but he'll still notice it, and probably complain. Perhaps what I should have said was: Julan is used to a high degree of emotional volatility in his relationships.  In his experience, anger, frustration and confusion is the price you pay for being close to people, but he's also aware of the benefits.

Notwithstanding any of this, it's understandable that Julan is having trouble parsing Iriel's stilted compliments delivered while staring fixedly at a point two feet above Julan's left ear.

“But if you’re not in an immediate hurry, I could still do with help exploring another Dwemer ruin. I was reading about one that’s in the middle of the Molag Amur ashlands. There are some interesting things in Edwinna’s notes that I want to act on before she does.”

Julan leapt at the proposed distraction.

expended-sleeper replied to my commentary on ch31:

""If you don't intervene, Julan will get himself killed." This part kinda blew my mind. Of course you save him from the Clannfears, but it somehow never occurred to me that you also save him by agreeing to let him tag along with you. Kinda recontextualizes the whole relationship between Ire/Julan or Player/Julan -- you're not just doing this guy a favor, you're putting yourself between him and his certain death long enough to give him time to find a context where he isn't doomed to go on a one-man suicide mission to kill the devil."

It takes SO little to get Julan to avoid his mission, any excuse at all will do. And it takes SO little to get him to become best friends/fall in love with you, any tiny amount of affection will do. Because on an unconscious level, he's so desperate to find a new emotional context for himself, a role, a relationship, a bearable way of existing in the world that isn't the single one he thinks he has.

Iriel could always sense this edge of desperation in Julan's friendship. He was always wary of committing to it, and has tried to escape it multiple times. It's less about Julan and more about him and his ability to live up to it. He knew it was bound to get messy, and he was absolutely right. People are messy. Iriel has at least realised that this particular messy person is his friend, and if he can't commit to that - to understand what that means, and act on it - he doesn't have a hope of learning to live with himself.

Playlist pick: I'm Sorry by Voltaire. Iriel does a lot of apologising. Sometimes it's just the panicked, automatic reflex of his childhood, but these days he has plenty of real things to apologise for, too.