"I don't know. Fly casual."

Black Emporium is a rare pair exchange that encompasses everything Dragon Age – provided they have less than 300* completed works on Ao3. Whether you’ve been a fan since the beginning or got in to it via Veilguard– whether you write snappy dialogue or draw detailed scenery – we want YOU to participate!

*Except for Rook; see our post about how we're handling that!

2026 Schedule

All deadlines are as of 9 AM US Pacific / 12 PM US Eastern / 4 PM UTC+0.

Nominations: June 30 - July 7

Signups: July 8 - July 18

Assignments Go Out: When mods are done matching (probably sometime on July 19th)

Works Due: August 30

Works Revealed: September 6

Authors Revealed: September 13

Links

AO3:

AO3 Nominations Tagset

2026 Subcollection

Parent Collection (all past years)

Resources:

Participation Walkthrough Guide

FAQ

Fun Spreadsheets & Other Useful Tools:

Searchable Nominations Spreadsheet

Request Database

Treatless List -- Coming Soon!

Official Links:

Tumblr: @black-emporium-exchange

Dreamwidth Mirror: black-emporium

Discord invite

This has been happening all month with little to no international media attention. Here are a few organizations you can check out for resources or to support:

ActionAid India

SEEDS India

GlobalGiving

The administration is trying to rewrite policy to outlaw use of grant funding for anything they consider "woke" and to put political appointees directly in charge of approving grants. This is very bad. Grants fund a lot of research and nonprofit work, and this is aimed at making it almost impossible for research that doesn't support the current administration's ideology to happen in this country.

In more detail, it changes a bunch of wording from suggestion to requirement; bans using grant funds for international collaborations with any countries that the administration considers suspect; and blanket prohibits anyone who has previously done work interpreted as "undermining public safety," "inconsistent with religious liberty," or "discredited" from receiving grants. It also bans all grant funding for projects affiliated with DEI "policies, principles, or practices," "gender ideology," and "transition".

These guidelines are known as the "Uniform Guidance." The Uniform Guidance previously outlined the principles that grant distribution should follow, but it allowed grant-awarding agencies like the NSF broad oversight to set their own policies, which typically involved boards of subject-matter experts who reviewed grant applications and decided which projects got money. This was a flawed system, but replacing subject-matter experts with political appointees and banning a ton of research subjects is not the move. The administration has been meddling with grants since Trump was elected, but this rewrite would change flexible guidance to inflexible regulations and codify previously scattered, ad-hoc grant cancellations and politically-motivated review practices into law.

Historically, the Uniform Guidelines have been applied primarily to research grants. The wording, however, is designed so it can apply to any government grant, including grants for nonprofits. Which means that grants for everything - food banks, medical clinics, really everything - could be subject to formal review by political appointees and cancelled for mentioning anything to do with gender or race, or for being associated with any person or organization with a history of work related to gender or race.

It's hard to say exactly how bad this would be if it goes into effect, but the range is somewhere between "functional ban on all research directly related to race and gender for the rest of this administration" and "functional ban on all research and nonprofit activity that isn't right-wing approved for the foreseeable future".

short form writers look at people writing 100k+ fics as though this is some sort of talent given as part of a fae bargain, that the commitment required shows some sort of ungodly mental fortitude.

It's time!

The goal of this survey is to collect data on the demographics of and choices made by the Tumblr-based Dragon Age fandom. Everything is 100% anonymous, and all questions on the form are skippable - just keep in mind that the more questions you answer, the more accurate and thorough the data will be!

The form is split into the following sections:

Voter demographics and series-wide preferences - this asks things like your age range, gender, favourite game in the series, and which mainline and side-content installments you've played

Choices specific to and your preferences within Dragon Age: Origins

Choices specific to and your preferences within Draon Age II

Choices specific to and your preferences within Dragon Age: Inquisition

Choices specific to and your preferences within Dragon Age: The Veilguard

And a very optional bonus section where you're invited to share your more specific opinion on each individual main game and companion, along with a place to share any feedback on the blog and suggestions for future tournaments!

This form will remain open for a month - submissions will be accepted until July 7th, and results will be shared shortly after.

MORRI-PAN

leliana

BI-STAIR THEY-RIN

zevran arainai

WLWYNNE

STEN OF THE BEAR-ESAAD

ARO-GHREN

shale

LO-GAY-IN MAC TIR

Fandom: Dragon Age: The Veilguard Pairing: Lucanis Dellamorte/Rook Rating: M Summary: Flashback to when Rori entered his emo phase

The first time Rori was mistaken for a servant, he didn’t even realize it was happening. He was thirteen, and it was a day exactly like hundreds before it. It was normal for him to accompany his mother on her weekly trip to the markets for everything the household needed. And to help carry some of her purchases. If he carried the majority of them now, that could be blamed on youthful exuberance. The regular teenage desire to be seen as strong and competent. That it freed up his mother’s arms so she could better examine the items at merchant stalls and not ask for his input was merely a side effect. And when his arms began to grow tired, it was much easier to convince her to wrap up and head home.

They were supposed to be on their way home that day, except his mother was distracted by a perfumery on the edge of the market. The whole building reeked of flowers and incense. So strong Rori could smell it from the street, and he nearly gagged when they stepped inside. So when the shop’s proprietor gave him a narrow, sideways glance and said, “Your boy can wait outside,” he was more than happy for the excuse to leave and take up a seat on a stone bench across the street.

It was around that same time Rori began to notice other boys in a way he hadn’t before. Like how the butcher’s son had a single dimple on his left cheek that appeared when he smiled in greeting. His seat offered a decent view of that market stall, and while it was the wrong angle to watch that dimple appear, it was the perfect one to watch the older boy’s arms flex under rolled-up sleeves as he went about the more physically demanding parts of the job. Rori knew he wasn’t supposed to be looking at other boys like this. He should be watching the girl at the baker’s stall when she fixed her hair, or something. But he thought there would be plenty of time for that in the future. Besides, he was just looking.

His mother emerged from the perfumery soon enough. Its stench clung to her clothes but was faint enough now to be pleasant as they resumed their walk back home unbothered.

Knight Enchanter of the Imperial Court (2025)