saw a question on twitter about “whats your favourite herb in wow--or whats your characters favourite?” & was reminded of an old piece of work i did that revolves around this (& that helped cement the eponymous tradition of “starlight” as the lovey dovey name between my paladin & @234ams crystalsmith)
so im bringing it back because im pretty sure i never posted it anywhere other than sharing it originally with mr am once (& so i can shamelessly link it as my response)
written from the pov of mr ams character as a gift
(img src from wowhead)
--
a flower particularly a rose is considered objectively pleasant. this facts been told to him many times by others.
the flower he presents today he gives without flourish or preamble but with his pulse trembling inside him. the long stem is ridged in tiny thorns all down its length but lacks bite. he made sure of this. trimmed each point with care: though less with forethought and more through learned experience. his own hands, large and heavy and just as worn as the ones that take the rose from him, are crisscrossed with the toothsome marks of previous failures.
hed been thoughtless in plucking the early attempts out of the earth. treated the flowers with the force applied to stubborn weeds or like the daily tasks that his easy strength carried him through without pause. the results were thorns snaring his clumsy efforts with their brambles and fistfuls of dust scattering from disintegrating petals. the stardust sifted through his fingers and clotted with his blood and left him with nothing of use for his purposes.
the recipient of his gift stares silently at the buds soft translucent petals. he stares at them. at their hand and their thin fingers and the thinner scars gained from years of practise and the battlefield alike. stares longest at the ginger way they curl the tips against the sides of the trimmed stem.
"starlight."
"yes?"
pale blue eyes full of stars, too, tilt until they look at him. not at the rose any longer. just at him. he tries to keep their stare but lasts barely seconds before averting his eyes. they cant tell with his goggles to hide behind--or perhaps they can. hes tucked his chin slightly. his jaw tendrils coil all at angles beneath to squirm restlessly.
he looks back at the rose. through the rose. fixates on the sheen of their pale bare skin seen through a shimmering filter of dusty blue petals. there are words to say. he wants to say them. to cough them out at last. they stick in his throat. gum up his mouth and hide behind the backs of his teeth. he shares none of the thoughts he means to: not about the view before him, or of the other draenei who waits so patiently. all of it is out of reach.
"the roses name," he continues. says facts aloud instead of the truth. watches guarded behind the opaque lenses of his goggles while the roughened fingertips of their other hand slides so ghostly from stem to bud.
"yes?"
"also starlight."
"ah."
the sound is a breathy huff of surprise; their already airy voice is clearer to his ears and he catches the change of tone as faint as it is because their mouth isnt muffled by fabric like it so often is in public.
the rose is briefly forgotten. his attention wanders from it distracted and drifting from bandaged jaw and cheek to scarred lips. his goggles still reveal nothing of the directions his gaze ever takes on their own but hes being a little brave and lifted his chin from his chest. the cant of his head betrays him well enough.
"this one," they start to say, then pull their mask down entirely from their jaw so that it rests around their equally-bandaged throat, "has heard... many things... said of him before."
they offer their hand. when he takes it they draw his own rose-bitten ones to them to press their disfigured mouth on. he can feel exposed teeth from the ruined side through the layers of gauze. they prickle far more gently than where thorns did earlier.
they mumble into his hands between gentle albeit imprecise kisses: "it is... entirely a... novel experience, this being... compared to, ah, the... glory of, of a flower."
as their tone turns aside of impersonal and becomes decidedly less so, they move their face against his cupped palms to smile up at him. the damage theyve suffered prevents much but the subtle kind of joy in the way they squint up at him is a muted look he loves. when their lower lids raise it turns soft and happy with faint lines of crows feet at the edges.
"withal: i think--"
the tint of rose-blue that stains the tip of their good ear and flushes as a dark bloom on their unmarked cheek are rarer than the flower he spent so much time on. and more than merely objectively pleasant to him.
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I love fan fiction. I love how different everyone is, how their writing styles are unique, how they interpret characters so differently yet leave the the distinguishing features.
Glass Sandcastles by 234am
I love how his Vincent is hurt and suffering from PTSD, how the others act around him.
The Nightmare Begins by TheCalamity for Crimbly
Another really good story, a Vincent who is struggling with rage before the transformation.
"im the best!" red bird awks his loudest. his black hand and metal hand talk with him for all hes shouty shouty.
"im king!"
{what-of} look-out asks, giving his most done-face. his hands shift from palms wobbled out to in with pointers and thumbs linked like chains.
"of me! of all the things!"
the bony goat knight, dead and pale as red bird is live and red, huffs a silent snort.
red bird gives teeth, part laugh and all pride.
"am so. king. and gonna eat all the chips i found!"
look-outs shiny shiny eyes full of blue wrong-fire narrow to thin streamers and his palms spread to crackle with the purple death. just a little of it.
just enough. the open crinkly bag of chips red bird found in the big glorious bins of free food has been thiefed! taken! ripped from him for showing off mid spin.
he gawks at look-out while his skirt settles and stills around knobby scabby red knees. his hands are still held up, pinchy pinch as if holding something tight.
"betrayed!" yaru shouts, forgetting to use his hands at all, and look-out just gives an ugly hoarse laugh before deliberately turning his face away. if he cant see he cant know red birds words, and now its the most one sided game of keeps-away as red bird pops from one pocket of the world around look-out to the other, trying to reach, trying to get look-out to look.
being deaf and tall and immune to red birds portal tricks just isnt fair.
{dont-eat garbage} look-out tells him later, but before theres a hand to his head careful careful and another hand out to give a sweet from acorns tray.
- illustrated by my good buddy corpse: commissions info
- prompt inspired by this art: “im going to eat chips out of the garbage!”
- the long-suffering “look-out”/grave belongs to mr @234am
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so mr am (@/234am) has been hosting a lil dnd campaign for a few of us!
its been SO much fun, and mr am has consistently gone above and beyond in providing amazing enfishment for our small little group to gnaw upon within our virtual enclosure
i thought, both as a thank you to him, and coz sort sort sort i like to arbitrarily sort its fun, that i would release little scraps of our adventures here as i go through and document/preserve our ongoing shenaneries
the campaign itself is homebrew and ffxiv-themed; the party meets up weekly on d/iscord and consists of four players (myself, my wife*, @/blatantlyqueer, and @/meredactyl), and four main characters (mordant, fhloe, e-yuk-pen, and sohna) that are (mostly) au versions of themselves (fhloe is the exception and was crafted specifically for this)
the campaign itself is ongoing and currently still in Act I--
which thus far has solely centred around being stuck in The Torment Nexus aka Palace of the Dead, where bad and naughty characters get put through the pear wiggler and we collectively get to see what falls back out :)
the whole campaign is basically themed around this:
from what mr am has told us, there is An Lot content planned, so we can likely expect to see our characters go to lvl 20 and potentially further!
basically, this is four absolute walnuts (affectionate) knocking barbies together making four supposed strangers fumble their way through hell, looking for both answers and a way out
while our dm makes this face the whole time: >:)
yoshi-p voice: please look forward to it
*ironically the only veteran dnd player in the group, but one who solely has experience with 3e and earlier; she joined up to have fun and learn 5e together with us
the rest of us either have limited experience or zero
its babys first dnd campaign and has been a wild ride so far for everyone involved and i cant wait for more!!!
