middaeg | [open] april catch-all

Entry tags:

[open] april catch-all

Who: Daenerys Targaryen + Open Prompts
When: April!
Where: Aefenglom and outside the walls
What: Starting fresh for April. As a note: last month I'm dropping all threads, as I had some IRL stuff prevent me from focusing most of the month on plot due to COVID concerns. If you'd like to hash out what happened with our characters, please PM me! Here's a general list of what happened with Dany and her CR.
Warnings: N/A as of now.

FARMLANDS

[ The farmlands had begun to show promise. Once hollow and dying lands slowly began to heal and one by one, the rows of crops began to push up at the dirt. The smallest of buds, stalks, and vines began to seep from the soil reaching out for any warmth. Daenerys had no say in the success – it is instead the few workers and visitors who assisted. The khaleesi hated remaining idle, so she learned the best she could – leading and guiding others with diligent tasks and getting her own hands messy when she could.

It still wasn't enough to carry things on for herself, however.

a. Visitors – Open
The latest partnership elderly Edre, the owner of the farmlands, agreed upon was supplying two of her best horses to a section of the city guards in Aefenglom. Daenerys spends her morning out in the front of the stable, brushing down the mane and tail of the two horses. She can be heard humming from the distance, a lullaby she can't even recall the words to. Part of her wanted to wish it was her brother who sung it to her when they had nothing else to their name as children, but the thought was untrue. It was a hymn the children in markets would sing – one that was about dragons flying free, but that was all she could recall. Instead of lyrics, the wordless hum carries among such a menial task.

b. Passerby (afternoon) – LIMITED - 0/1 *
However, later that day... anyone traveling the roads leading back to Aefenglom would find quite a sight. A cart, wheel broken and a few bags of wheat and rye tossed off the path. A few yards into the treeline and no sight of its owner... Will you follow into the broken shrubbery and path deeper to hear a pained neigh? ]

*A limited slot! This will be an action-oriented prompt where they find Dany attacked by a Shade. One horse is injured, which will be a tw: animal death if the appropriate prompts are taken, the other is running around. Dany is not capable of fending for herself yet.

CITY BUSINESS

[ Daenerys, despite her problems earlier in the day, arrives for a day in Aefenglom. A foul mood hangs over her head, part shame and part anger. There was still work to be done regardless... so she meets with the people, with her fellow council-members and the city guard to deliver the remaining horse, per agreement.

a. In Parliament – LIMITED - 1/2
The council was something... different. She did not bode well with sharing power, but she's learning. The greater good was to serve the people, to protect their own kind – right? She sits in silence most of the meetings – unusually so. Perhaps it was the disappointment of not pushing forth Asura's idea properly that weighs on her or the events earlier in the day, but she never brings up her discourse. It was in the past, but perhaps her mind still lingered.

It, however, was more accurate to assume Daenerys is critical on herself. Perhaps a Queen isn't needed here, she wonders, but refuses to truly accept the self-pity. All she has known is wanting to go home, go reclaim what was hers ... everything else feels foreign now. So, she is abnormally distant – interjecting only when needed. That does not mean she will ignore anyone when dismissed from the meeting...

b. Market District – Open
The city was as bustling as always, but there was a caution since the Rathmores were seized and executed. Shops closed at sunset, more guards filtered through the market. That pleased her when she first arrived. It was a small change, one that put herself at ease.

Daenerys stops at the wharf first to gather a healthy supply of fish for Drogon, who remained on the farmlands during this venture.

When the smell of lemoncake seeps through the air outside of a bakery, Daenerys will find herself curious. The tartness – it's undeniable and it had been some time since she had anything with lemons. So carefully, she'll eye through the window of one of the bakeries like a child tempted by a second dessert.

Finally, she'll browse through a winery, beckoned by the seller's calls to passerbys to try the latest uncorked bottles. Fortunately, she does not feel compelled to drink – the last time such an occasion happened, she was nearly poisoned... So, Dany awkwardly and insistently declines. ]

MEMORY SHARE

[ Daenerys once dreamed of a giant throne cast of iron swords and of her child's face she can't quite see clearly. She dreamed of a man who would love her unconditionally, but never once could parse his identity. Dreams of lemon trees and red doors often found themselves keeping her tight in her bed until the sun crept upon the horizon.

But, dreams in Aefenglom were not of wonder or omens. They were magic, she knows this to be true, forced upon them without consent or reason. This one is no different... The Looking Glass House was all but wondrous, imposing and still for the curious. Upon arriving, Dany's mirror was clear: dragonscales line the frame and twigs from a lemon tree sprout from the cracks and edges and underneath the edges glows an ember of fire. Anyone who dares go to Dany's mirror...? Oh, they were in for some Fun Times... ]

*Dany's prompts are here to choose from. Please list which memory you'd like to see and I can whip something up!

WILDCARD

[ Dany will be stopping in Aefenglom for business, but will make a special stop at the refugee area in city. She'll be delivering some extra bags of goods from the farm's owner and ensuring they have been treated well. She will also offer jobs to the strong refugees who wish to find coin and housing outside of the city.

Additionally, Dany would not be opposed to watching a meteor shower if she has visitors late at the farmlands!

If you have an idea for another wildcard, please feel free to PM me and we can hash it out! ]

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

( it isn't so much that she intends to go into dany's mirror as she very much does not intend to go into another, and in the slight confusion of the hall of mirrors she is stepping in one direction without looking to the other, and

the first thing she sees is a woman. some inches taller than she is, slender, warm-skinned and dark-haired, dressed in a fashion that wouldn't seem out of place in koschei's court. )

...hello?

( probably not. )

[ The scene unfolded like pages pulled from a book. Line by line, scenes became vivid with details lost to the memory over time. At first, it starts with the most important – a single woman with curls more beautiful than anything Daenerys had ever seen. From the woman, the darkness in the mirror instead becomes vast – spread out across an expanse of rows of stadium seating, of arms raised in the air and the call for blood beginning.

The Fighting Pits of Meereen, a time-honored tradition. A display of true prowess to survive, despite the discomfort from the few surrounding the stranger.

The woman looks uncomfortable, her eyes unable to look forward to the display of men brawling to the death. Defensive, her eyes downwards towards the floor and hand clasped. It was a smaller man – a dwarf, many call him, who shows kindness with a small nudge and reassuring smart-mouthed comment lost to the display.

And if Gwen stares deeper, past conversations and sportsmanship – she sees a familiar silver-gold set of hair weaved into braids that cascade down her back. Gwen's words are like a ghost – or perhaps the visions before her otherworldly. If she steps forward, it is like the world parts for her to immerse herself deeper, as if wanting to be revealed. ]

Edited 2020-04-07 03:54 (UTC)

( no one looks at her.

everything feels at once too-real and not at all; not dreamlike, precisely, but as if maybe she's a dream someone else might have in this place. none of it recognizable, but the atmosphere of it—the way they all hold themselves. the brawls catch her eye, and under different circumstances perhaps they would have held her—it's sort of impressive—but it's when she catches sight of someone she has seen before that she reconsiders.

she doesn't know her well. it would take her a moment to place the name, but it's a distinct look. someone from the city, or more accurately, not from the city. like her.

a dream would be different. this is, she thinks, a memory. )

[ Missandei's fair smile was always hard to ignore. They were rare, even if they were forced. The woman and the shorter man, Tyrion had been making idle conversations to ease the displays of violence. The time honored tradition. They keep their distance from Daenerys, a strand man sitting next to her instead and many guards keeping their Queen safe.

Or so they believe.

The crowd watches the display, booing triumphantly when an old knight from Westeros instead wins the brawl – which would result in a javelin being sent into the crowd, as if centered directly to Gwen.

It goes through her or just misses enough. Behind the woman, one would find a masked man all-but armed and soon... the crowd was full of the very same, hissing in a foreboding tongue foreign from them. ]

Why are you here?

[ The voice seems so far, but when Gwen filters between the panic of a sudden massacre, there is the same silver-gold girl she can't quite place a name to. More draconic, more tired. ]

This... can not be changed.

Fucking Christ—

( is involuntary, and perfectly understandable under the circumstances. having a javelin go (painlessly, confusingly) through her is terrifying, even if it's immediately obvious that it hasn't done anything. blurred, and landed somewhere else. in someone else. her hands flatten against her sternum (there aren't any breasts in the way, really, it's easy) and it takes her a moment to refocus on now-dany as opposed to then-dany.

or to focus at all. 'well, this is a fucking trip' seems like the wrong thing to say. she settles on, )

Great question, love the energy, no idea.

( this is some magic bullshit if she's ever seen it. she straightens, makes herself drop her hands because nothing touched her and she's fine. she's fine. )

I didn't mean to. I don't think I was trying to do anything.

[ It was different. Daenerys could see herself – what she was before coming to Aefenglom through the mirrors. She sees the confusion and fear, she hears the screams around them. And one by one, each row of the coliseum seating was full of masked assassins, hissing and killing anyone running for safety. ]

I don't think anyone means to. This magic has a dubious aura to it. [ It forces itself upon them, warnings or omens – it was something Daenerys hated, truly because she could not understand or control it. The Aef!Daenerys stands before Gwen, pity in her eyes and she winces when the sounds of death around them grow louder.

She hears Missandei's scream, nearly losing her life in the process. One hand reaches out as if she could stop it – but it was Tyrion Lannister who saved her precious handmaiden that day. The resolve of the woman was clear, ashamed it had slipped under her nose even now. Dany faces Gwen, unable to move really. ] It shows us regret, it makes us fear. This is not the first time this world has trapped us within.

( it's not, exactly, that she disputes what daenerys is saying about what they're being shown. this is a clusterfuck and no mistake; if she wonders what about it in particular sings of regret to the woman whose memory it is, she doesn't need to look hard to think probably, there are things about this godawful day that someone might wish to have done differently.

and she's curious about what. what led to it; what came after. but what she says, instead, and not unkindly is— )

How many happy memories have you got?

( which is sort of a fucked up thing to ask somebody, except that there's no mockery in it as she takes a step to watch tyrion. missandei. names she doesn't know, but faces she will not soon forget now. )

People are really fast to ascribe meaning and motive and flavor to magic. ( there's a casual confidence to how she talks about it, now, and while in aefenglom how magical someone looks is not really as much of a clue as to how well they know it now the mirrorbound are so much a thing—

the inhuman paleness of her, opalescent, milk-pearl skin that reflects rainbows wherever the light hits her, the sharpness of her needle-fine teeth. her eyes, star-filled slit-pupils blown wide with the initial fear rimmed with blue-black, huge. the slightly unreal quality to her, and to the wild curl of her hair that looks like wet silk no matter what she does to it. most of this was already her truth. ) Sometimes you read the signs and you miss the forest for the trees. We are in a mirror.

And how many regrets have you got for it to reflect back? I bet mine would show us regret, too.

( maybe this was the worst day of daenerys's life. maybe this is the most terrible thing that ever happened to her, an outlier. but she doesn't wear it like that's the truth. maybe they're seeing regret because they're looking inside a mirror and that's what's there to be reflected. )

A few, but they have not seemed to show here.

[ There are some, far away from this chaos and madness. Where masked men are replaced with the chanting of Dothraki supporters christening the son fresh in her belly to be strong enough to mount the world. Where a gentle morning in the arms of a lover was so simple. Where her dragon children soar so freely above the waves of blue.

Daenerys speaks plainly to the woman, but not to herself. As much as she seems like she has accepted what the past had weaved, it was clear she was deceiving to herself. Her eyes try to connect the words Gwen offers, believe them truthfully, but she's not sure if she can. Not when the arena of masked assailants had surrounded Daenerys and her closests – when the roar of a dragon pierces through the sky in the distance. ] It shouldn't have to show us these, to share with others. Neither yours or mine.

[ She feels frustrated, helpless. ]

We can not control what is show and that causes a deal of discomfort. I'd not wish these sights upon anyone.

You not liking it doesn't make the magic dubious.

( it's not unkind, but it's also a bit fucking blunt for someone she's only just properly met, and in a traumatic memory at that; if daenerys gets the impression that gwen is not a woman naturally given to being gentle with people, then she's observant, because that's what's up. she isn't incapable of trying, but it always sort of looks like this, anyway.

the thing that feels truer to her, not the softer. )

Either someone is actually behind it, manipulating, in which case they're so fucking powerful how we feel about it is a joke next to how helpless we are and we might as well all lay down and call it a day anyway because this is frankly next level shit that the most powerful person-thing I know might not be able to do if she were totally unbound and so-inclined, or it's just—

( she flings her hands out wide, turns in a circle underneath the sound of the dragon's roar. her hands pass through people. )

Magic.

Is it dangerous? Obviously. But so is getting caught in a storm, and if you don't even have hypothermia and you're banging on about how thunder is naughty and disrespectful, you're going to get taken exactly as seriously as that deserves.

( she loops an arm through daenerys', the gesture bold but the hold loose; she expects to be shrugged off. )

Do you want to watch the rest of this, or see if my theory of statistical likelihood holds up?

Edited 2020-04-21 03:18 (UTC)

[ Her words hit hard and she flinches. To her, she feels justified in her distaste of having her dreams stolen and shared. It had been like this for some time – many of her escapes gone, many of her fears shared. Yet, Daenerys does not argue. ]

There were warlocks, capable of magic that could bring someone to their death quickly. Showing them their greatest fears, binding them in ways no mere metals could... [ But, that was not this vision. She doesn't argue with Gwen – there's an acceptance that there is things outside of her control. The magic is as she says it is, and part of her wants to protest it – especially knowing how magic here in this world is as common as a storm – but the hook upon her arm silences her. Her form tense, eyes judgmental only because the casual swoop was... well, not of her kind of interactions.

Congratulations, Gwen, you're one of the few to treat her as a girl and less as a Queen.

The question was tempting, it hung in the air. ] ...I do not. If you believe there is more than reliving memories here, show me what else awaits for us than regret and anger in magic.

( it seems impolitic to say something like you're describing child's play to me or I could do a lot fucking worse than that, and probably to those warlocks if I had time to learn their capabilities, so she says instead, ) I'm not a mere mortal, and I know what I'm talking about when I say the scale of this is bigger than some psycho jerking himself off about how special he is because he can read a fancy book.

( her regard for warlocks is...low. fucking human practitioners and their fucking arrogance.

(no, she doesn't see the irony.) )

But it's the opposite, really. I think reliving memories is exactly all this is. If you remember a lot of regret and anger, then yeah; you walk into a mirror with that, and you're going to have it reflected back to you. We probably won't see anything pretty in my mirror because there's just more ugliness.

If something shows you your own memories...

( her shrug is one-shouldered, not to jostle daenerys too much. )

It's going to show you your memories, and the magic doing it isn't controlling what your life was to remember.

Edited 2020-04-29 03:42 (UTC)

[ The temperament Gwen shows was unlike any she had met. It was not playing politics, not biting down upon a tongue fearful of it being cut out. Women like her – they were rumored only to be the fiercest of warriors that had long since became a rarity. Dany listens when she speaks, commanded by the truth no matter how blunt.

If she flinches, she's fearful of colliding with a truth she was unaware she was hesitant to accept. ]

Then how... [ Her words stammer. ] ...how do we find anything other than the ugliness? Be it yours, mine, your world, my world – this world?

[ She isn't jostled, but instead saddened. The scenes may wash away and the memories may grow less detailed over time – but this had felt like a fresh wound that had been festering.

That she allowed silently to fester. ]

( temperamental is a good way to describe gwen. a few words that historically really aren't include: optimistic, hopeful, idealistic. and if she knew daenerys better, maybe she would follow her first instinct, which is to answer with something along the lines of oh, I'm pretty sure we don't, but considering that she just walked into a relative stranger's traumatic memory and told her that the magic that's forcing her to relive it probably doesn't care that it hurts—

probably doesn't even have the capacity to care about that—

maybe digging her thumbs into the sadness-wound and twisting isn't what she actually wants to do. if they knew each other better, it could just be a bleak joke in a bleak time, but they don't, and she doesn't actually want to be the thing that tips someone else over the edge. so she's quiet, for a while, as the dream blurs and they come to a stop outside of her mirror. molded, stylized backstage curtains, a spill of musical notes and jumbled letters; hard to make out much else about it.

finally, )

My ancestor is a Rhinelord named Aelfraed—he's older than modern human society. He is my great-great-grandfather, and he was in love with this human woman in, like—a couple of hundred years ago. It's been a minute. She was married, and the bloodline they started carried her husband's name, and she stayed in that life until she choked to death on it and she committed suicide.

She'd put a geas on him, on my grandfather. He can never approach his descendants, we have to go to him, it's why I didn't know what I was for a really long time. I didn't know he existed, so I couldn't ask him for help. And he couldn't come to me even if he wanted to. When she killed herself, she did it in his waters. The Rhine is a river, uh—she drowned herself. He carried her body back to their son.

( cool, this is a happy story, where the fuck is the beauty in it, exactly, gwenaëlle— )

He talks about her like she's just in the next room. She died so long ago that he is the only person living who ever met her, and he loves her so much like it was yesterday. He loves all his descendants because we are part of her and he loves us like he's still trying to prove something to her and I think it's kind of. It's a horrible story, you know? Her final act, at her lowest point, could have been the cruelest thing someone ever did to him. He doesn't see that. He just sees that she was alone and she went to a part of him and he loves her. He would do anything for her. He still sees her when she was beautiful when he looks at his children. He lived thousands of years before her and he'll probably live thousands of years after her and she was this one moment in his life and it ended so awfully he could have just—his king thinks she broke him and that he should forget her.

I think that beauty and ugliness aren't mutually exclusive. I think they go hand in hand. But, you know, I'm a poet. That's kind of my thing.

[ There's a divide between them – beyond formalities and bluntness, beyond eras and adaptability. Daenerys bites her tongue when the trauma and anger subsided, when her guilt was ushered away only for a brief moment. It was fortunate that through perhaps will or even fate, there was some other dream that made it easy to blend to. The transition was still always going to catch her off guard, however.

She remains silent, eyes curious like a young girl watching as Gwen retells the story of her ancestors, of the tragedies she had experienced as well. From lords to rivers, from great-great-grandfathers to sorrows of a woman's sadness.

It was as if she was understanding part of the woman, through lore that may not be so clear – instead hidden under the oppression of her own emotions. ]

That didn't sound like a poem, but some... epic. [ A tale that was almost as fantastic as dragons? ] And if this ugliness and beauty was instead part of what shaped your people... shaped you – what does that make you now?

( the question surprises her—it's a long-ingrained habit to communicate in context of the people around her. to deflect from herself, often no longer even intentionally; people who are more interested in hearing about her famous father, or the circle of people to whom he and therefore she are connected. her great-great-grandfather, just grandfather because they are all simply his children, whose story is—

epic, like she says.

and then her, at the end of it, holding it in her hands. some days finding meaning in it, and some days feeling acutely the weight of her grandfather's gaze and the uncertainty of what it is he sees. )

I guess it depends who you ask, ( she settles on, eventually, more rueful than she was expecting. ) Hasibe, who is a long story, didn't want to tell me what I was even though she could tell when we met because she thought I could just have a life where it didn't define me. That human lives are aspirational and I would—be better off just having one. And I get that for her but I just think, uh.

I just think it's bullshit that humans get to have simple lives and be as mediocre as they want and that's fine and if you want to survive just existing as anything else you have to be something extraordinary because of everything you're going to have to live with to protect your family from the parts of humanity that know you exist. Which isn't even—even humans that don't know anyone else will just sort humans into worth more or less. Where I'm from, there is—it's really fucked up. So it has made me.

( she considers. gathers her thoughts. settles on, )

Angry. It's made me angry.

( maybe that isn't the most helpful or illuminating answer, but it feels like the most honest one. )

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

[open] april catch-all

memory-share.

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

i'm sorry for the delay, hon! i was away most of the week!

NO WORRIES BOO <3

no subject

cw: suicide.

no subject

no subject