#mortifa

Katja's horse, Mortifa.

Mortifa, inspired by an in-game cosplay I did of my namesake

Drawing

App: Procreate

kind of theory (more like a wild assumption based on very little evidence), but what if Dark Song’s main antagonist is Katja? all I really have to back this up is that the title “Dark Song” makes me wonder if she’s using her violin to magically mess up stuff and that the wolf thingy in the music video shares a very small resemblance to Mortifa:

idk if Katja can like create creatures but I know she can create illusions so maybe that’s what’s going on with the wolf? or perhaps Mortifa has a wolf form, who knows. Nihili is probably a real horse that can turn into a toy horse and I think Khaan almost turned into a demon thing at some points in the book trilogy so. Idk

credit to @phoebified for alerting me to this and making me go do my research!! i mostly related sámi gákti to having square shapes around the neck bc i mostly saw sámi men around the karesuando/kiruna area (where my family is mostly from) and didn't really see these open V shapes much. they may also have been covered with shawls when i wouldve seen them.

besides what ive put in the pic, its also worth noting that sámi culture includes a traditional singing style called joik (has different names in different sámi languages) which is very well known in scandinavia. so the fact that she deals with music may or may not also relate to the image of "mysterious" indigenous music.

"katja is cold and mysterious" (sso website) and ofc an evil villain - not appropriate traits to associate with an oppressed indigenous people in the global far north (icy and cold and scary).

this part is not related to sámi design influence, but it's also interesting that katja is albinism coded (ableist stereotype in villains) which also wasnt something i really thought about until it was pointed out ("fictional girl with white/grey hair" was my initial reading). and i also didnt really pay attention to the fact until just now, that her horse mortifa is blind, which also ties back into both albinism and ableism. blindness, especially white or clouded eyes as mortifa has, as a disability in itself shouldnt be treated as "ooh spooky" or evil. we do have a positive representation blind character in sso in rania, as well as a few positive or neutral characters with glasses, and at the end of the day we do want all kinds of representation - i want to see my own disabilities and traits in both good, bad, and neutral characters - but i do think its notable that the horse with blindness is tied to the albinism coded character and that they're villains.