love like a burning city in the breast

Hi it's me, creampuff gobbler again, contributing to my pile of shart-art :)

if it's going to make sense, then i think we'd need to see each memory increasing shadowheart's frustration and longing to know more. these scraps are tantalising and unsatisfying--her parents will know the whole truth.

but that would then imo require the resolution being that her parents actually knew her for a very brief period of her life when she was very young. they don't have some inherent, profoundly truthful knowledge of her because of their shared blood (and i am desperate to meet the writer who feels like THEIR PARENTS understand them more profoundly than anyone else they've met in life since). they've seen more of her acting like a sharran than acting like her "true" self (as of age 8). the life they'd built for her was one she was on the brink of beginning to outgrow. they don't have the answers either.

✨ first light, astarion and the star of bethlehem - a flower that represents hope and forgiveness, purity and new beginnings.

Ship Tournament, Round 1 — Match 5 / 30

Astarion/Lae'zel

"They’re both coming out of systems that taught them affection was weakness and obedience was survival. Cazador and Vlaakith are obviously different flavours of awful, but Astarion and Lae’zel both have this thing where freedom is something they want desperately while also having no idea who they are without the rules that shaped them. I think they’d recognise each other’s damage in the least gentle way possible."

"she would call him out and he would complain but also secretly appreciate that she doesn’t pity him. like lae’zel is blunt as a hammer, but she isn’t fake. if she respects him, he KNOWS it’s real because this woman is physically incapable of flattering someone just to be nice. and astarion would be good for her too imo?? he’s selfish and messy and dramatic, yes, but he’s also someone who understands being lied to by the thing/person you were supposed to obey. he gets the humiliation of having your life stolen and being expected to thank your master for it. i think post-vlaakith lae’zel and post-cazador astarion could have some really raw, uncomfortable conversations where neither of them says the nice thing but somehow it helps more."

vs. Lae'zel/Wyll

"Lae’zel has the Vlaakith propaganda, the creche, the glorious destiny she was promised if she obeyed hard enough. Wyll has the Blade persona, the noble hero story, the pact he made when he was young and desperate and trying to save people. They’re very different people, but both of them know what it’s like to have your identity wrapped around duty until you barely know what you personally want. I’d love them post-game especially, when Lae’zel is learning what freedom means and Wyll is trying to live as more than the role everyone projects onto him. They’d argue constantly, but I think there’d be so much respect there. Wyll admires courage. Lae’zel respects action over empty words. They would both see the real thing in each other."