Being Dead Will Make It Easier To See Her At Least

Everyone in the SP universe calling Ghastly ugly and I’m just here thinking he’s like one of the most handsome people I’ve ever seen. Others include Dexter vex, Saracen Rue and Erskine- because I still refuse to accept ghastly’s death

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Saracen’s Suicide Part 2

This is part two of a (Saracen Rue X Dexter Vex) fic

If you haven’t read part one PLEASE check it out🙏

Saracen had fallen asleep in Dexter’s arms, but he woke up alone. Blankets were draped across his body. He realized Dexter was gone immediately. He sat up quickly, but when he tried to slip off the couch, he stumbled and fell on his ass. The blankets dragged down with him. Dexter heard the noise and rushed in. When he saw Saracen sitting dumbly on the ground, he raised his eyebrows, “What are you doing?”

“I fell,” Saracen responded.

“Yes. I can tell,” Dexter said and turned his back again. “I’m making breakfast,” he added. Saracen sat up to follow him. He hadn’t realized how hungry he was. He barely ate anything yesterday.

“What are you making?” Saracen asked.

“Pancakes,” Dexter responded.

“Blueberry pancakes,” Saracen asked hopefully.

“Fine,” Dexter said. Then his expression turned more serious, “Listen, we should talk about last night.” Saracen shook his head, “Do we have to?”

“Yes,” Dexter frowned, “You need help.”

“I have you.”

“Am I enough?” Dexter asked.

Saracen looked at him incredulously, “Of course you’re enough.”

“You never came to talk to me. Last night, you would have killed yourself if I didn’t walk in.”

“But you did walk in.”

Dexter frowned, “That’s not the point. I'm scared, Sar. I'm scared you’re going to hurt yourself. I’m scared I won’t be there when I need to be.”

Saracen looked away, “I can deal with it myself now. Last night won’t happen again.”

Dexter eyed him suspiciously, “You know I don’t believe that.”

“Can we talk about this later?” Saracen asked. Dexter nodded, “Later today.”

“Thank you,” Saracen pulled a chair out from the table and sat down. Awkward silence followed briefly.

“Did you mean it when you told me when you said you wanted to kiss me?” Saracen questioned.

“I meant it. I’m in love with you,” Dexter grinned. Saracen formed a relieved smile, “Can we just pretend nothing happened last night. Except for what you said. Just for a little bit?”

Dexter walked over. “Just for a little bit,” he repeated. He leaned over to Saracen and kissed him. One hand cupped his cheek, and the other ran through his hair. Dexter kissed Saracen gently. He had to pay attention to the pancakes first, but he told himself, right after pancakes, he was going to give Saracen all of his attention.

He pulled away and rushed to put the pancakes on plates. “Give me the bigger one,” Saracen added. Dexter turned back to him with the plates in his hand. Saracen’s cheek was cupped in his hand, and his finger subconsciously moved in a circular motion.

“Here,” he placed the smaller blueberry pancakes in front of him.

“You think I won’t notice?” he smiled, “Switch.”

“No.”

“No?’ Saracen made a mock-gasp, and reached for the plate of pancakes.

“No! This is mine!” Dexter yanked the plate away, “Back off!”

“This isn’t fair!” Saracen reached farther across the table. Dexter leaned farther back in his chair.

“I made the pancakes, so-” Dexter’s chair tipped back too far, and he fell backwards.

“Dex?” Saracen leaped out of his chair. Instead of asking if Dexter was okay, he laughed. Saracen kneeled to snatch the pancakes, but Dexter pulled him all the way down. “I won’t let you!” Saracen tried to get back up, but Dexter pulled Saracen’s leg across his own and bridged, so that he was on top of Saracen. Saracen started to reach up for control of Dexter’s neck, but Dexter grabbed his wrists and pinned them to the floor. He reached his face down and pressed his lips against Saracen’s.

They never acted like this together. They were never this intimate, but even when they were, it was never out of attraction for one another. Seeing Dexter act this way sent butterflies into Saracen’s stomach. He became aware of how close they were to each other. He was attentive of how much bigger and taller Dexter was. He never minded that before, but now it made him feel helpless. His face became red. Dexter smiled in amusement, and pressed his entire body onto Saracen. Saracen gasped at the pressure, which, mixed with Dexter’s lips against his, made him breathless.

Saracen’s hands were still pinned against the floor, but one of Dexter’s hands now held Saracen’s thigh, pulling it up until Dexter could slide his knees beneath, and enable him to move forward. Saracen wrapped his legs around Dexter. Dexter pulled his hands under Saracen’s shirt, pulling it above Saracen’s chest. Dexter brought his lips down to Saracen’s chest.

“I’ve been waiting to do this forever,” Dexter whispered.

All I want is Supernatural but with Cas in all the episodes, even if he isn’t with the brothers all the time.

“ I wonder where Cas is?” Dean asks

*Camera cuts to Cas petting cats at a pet store*

* Camera cuts to Cas being a cool badass and saving the world*

* Camera cuts to Cas remembering good things of his past*

Lil Nas X pulling queer people from the pits of hell on 00.00 1/1/2009 to set us free

Deleted scene

Will does his presentation ... but we all know that LGBT+ people didn’t exist before 2009

The time I publicly destroyed a bigot in Starbucks

This might sound fake but I assure you, my life is stranger than fiction.

Me, minding my own beeswax: I’ll get a large warm milk please!

Some guy: under his breath Warm milk? Get a life.. they don’t even sell that here

Barista: Actually yeah we do sell warm milk, does that bother you?

Some guy: Rolls eyes imagine actually drinking that

Me: I don’t have to imagine grabs my warm milk and takes a good sassy swig

The guy: Notices my ace pin Oh so you’re an aceggot? So you just don’t get laid? That figures

Me: Yup, I’m a proud “aceggot” and that has nothing to do with my preferences in beverages

Woman behind me: Did you seriously just call that person an aceggot? What kind of world are we living in!?

Me: Yep, I’m used to it though.. That’s what you get for being openly asexual it seems!

The guy: I’m literally a gay man and I won’t let you Jesus freak aces shame me for having gay sx, people like you are hurting my community. I’m gonna go have SX with my boyfriend

Me: Uhhhh buddy you were the one shaming me for buying warm milk and now you’re shoving the image of s*x down a sex repulsed ace’s throat… Not a good look. And yes, I’m a proud Jesus freak!

Woman: I’ve been an out asexual woman since the 80s and let me tell you, mr. Gay, we have done nothing but further acceptance for your community and carry your community on our backs.

Me: You have the nerve to talk down to an asexual elder? Really?

Barista: Throws water on the bigoted guy

Barista: Well… I might lose my job for this but at least I can say it was worth it

Me: picks up my warm milk and pours it on his head

Bigot: I HATE ASEXUALS AND ASEXUALITY. YOU ARE NOT EVEN HUMAN.

Me: loudly and proudly Another warm milk please, on the house! I think I’m owed it

Barista: You know it!

Bigot: storms out crying

to every wlw/sapphic who sees this, and runs an active blog:

please reblog this if aro sapphics can interact with your blog. it's crazy that I have to say this (again), but it's extremely hard finding aro-positive wlw blogs, without coming across something even mildly negative towards aro sapphics.

doing it this way, I have a better idea of where to get my daily dose of sapphic content. thanks for your cooperation 🌻

from your local, tired, aro (aphrodite) lesbian,

-Y.

I love the fan pack!

I was wondering what head canons you have for each of the Raze siblings?

Okay so, firstly these are shared with @thats-so-craven

The Family In General

Skug's maternal family are incredibly wealthy old money aristocrats. His great-grandfather was the younger son of an Anglo-Norman Duke, who came over with the Norman invasion and was given A Lot of land in what is now County Dublin. He and his siblings all grew up on the ancestral family estate. As prominent nobility, it's impossible to avoid mortals, so they - like a lot of wealthy sorcerer families hiding in plain sight - officially use a false name for the entire household. Skug's family uses the surname Sionnach (Fox).

Ónora - 29th April 1360

She's an Elemental with an inactive ambidexterity gene - she has no second discipline herself, but she can pass ambidexterity on to her children.

She's straight.

Deceased.

Ónora Is Not Quinlan:

She's one of four children - she has two brothers, Alacrity & Thane, and one sister, Estrilda. The other three have a different mother; Ónora is the daughter of her father's second wife. Ónora only becomes heiress to her father's lands and wealth when her brothers are killed in the early years of the war.

She's the absolute biggest Daddy's girl. He cannot say no to her.

She grows up with Corrival! Their family estates neighbour each other's, so they're playmates as children and stay close as they grow up. The oldest five children, especially Carver and Skulduggery, remember Corrival visiting often when they were small as a sort of uncle figure, but over the years Abrogate's jealousy drove a wedge between them and eventually he - Abrogate - put a stop to the friendship. He puts a stop to pretty much all her friendships, really.

Unlike Lardo's Quinlan, Ónora is not some swashbuckling adventurer. She's a noblewoman in 14th century Ireland. She's unusually well educated for her day, and she's quite remarkable in that she's a woman in a position of political power, but she's not a warrior, was never taught to fight, and very much behaves as is proper for a lady of her station to behave in that time period.

Her father establishes diplomatic ties between the reclusive sorcerer Communities in rural Ireland and the outcast/misfit mages living in mortal towns like Dublin. Ónora follows him into that line of work, serving as an ambassador of sorts, but as a woman she has to work a lot harder and do a lot more to be taken seriously as a competent politician. She helps write several important and influential treaties, including one which legalises the practice of necromancy in Ireland and negotiates religious freedoms for followers of obscure magical faiths. She meets Tenebrae during this period, basically doing the same job Solomon Wreath does in the 2000s.

She helps fund the initial Sanctuary effort, and she's later asked to serve as an Elder after one of the Council is killed. This is where she meets Abrogate, who's a sort of. Witcher-type at the time - an itinerant monster hunter for hire.

She has. Kind of a tragic life, really. She marries Abrogate during a period where the English are invading and taking land from Irish nobles, and she badly needs a husband because women are allowed to own land in their own right under Irish law but not under the law of the invaders, so she's facing losing her home. She likes him a lot, and thinks she could love him, but they marry far too quickly and she doesn't really know him that well when they become man and wife. At first, they live quite happily together. But when Carver is born, she has a very traumatic birth experience and suffers from pretty crippling PPD, which goes on to be the case in pretty much every pregnancy she has. Once Abrogate realises that having kids doesn't give him meaning in life, and neither does being married, their relationship very quickly goes downhill as he spirals into madness and violence and she spirals into depression and self-medication. She's a neglectful, kind of toxic mother, but she's very much the product of her circumstances and her suffering, which most of her children realise to varying extents.

Carver - 18th May 1573

He's primarily an Elemental. I haven't chosen his secondary discipline yet.

He's straight.

Alive

Childhood:

"Tadhg Sionnach" - Tadhg means "poet" in Irish; he's named after an ancestor of his mother's.

Heavily parentified from a very young age, he feels responsible for his siblings' care, safety, attitude and behaviour. He can be a bit nitpicky and overbearing, but he means well.

He's his mother's Emotional Support Eldest Son, which messes him up good. Their relationship is rife with covert emotional incest - she's not getting her emotional needs met by Abrogate (love, support, protection etc), so she turns to Carver and dumps those expectations on him instead. He's expected to defend her against his increasingly unstable, aggressive father, be there for her no matter how distant and uncaring she gets, never criticise her, and stay Mama's baby boy forever.

Quiet, people-pleasing, mature-for-his-age nerdy bookworm. Huge advocate of not rocking the boat.

500 Year War:

Officer in the Sanctuary's army - he buys a commission not long after his Surge.

Very by-the-book in his approach to military tactics; he's all about honour, fair-play and chivalry. He's born a bit late to be a knight, but he would've made a good one.

Will probably never forgive himself for leaving early-teens Skug to shoulder the brunt of the abuse to save his own skin

Maintains a relationship with his parents out of obligation for a lot longer than he's comfortable with

Corrival has him posted abroad for a lot of the conflict, which gives him space to actually develop a personality

Post-War:

Honorably discharged from the Sanctuary's forces after the war

Currently teaches History at the University of Roarhaven, the first educational establishment specifically for sorcerers. His courses are about magical history specifically, mostly the 500 Year War.

Has calmed down considerably and prefers to live at a slower pace. He's realised the world isn't going to end because he's five minutes late to a lecture.

Still a bookworm. Gets very enthusiastic about his subject. Generally well-liked by his students.

Used to offer correspondence courses for sorcerers before he was approached to teach on-campus.

2020+ has not been fun for him. He's only just figured out how to work the interactive whiteboard they installed like ten years ago. Zoom makes him want to kermit.

Very polite, very proper, a bit old-fashioned. Little old ladies love him.

Alt!Serpine is in his class. Carver hates him.

Skulduggery - 31 December 1578

Elemental/Necromancer

He's inherited a very watered-down form of Abrogate's Compelling Voice ability, which is why he used to be so good at inspiring his soldiers and why China says that you can't help but like him and want to fight alongside him. He has no idea he has this ability - he thinks he's just charismatic.

He's bi.

Alive...ish.

Childhood:

"Ruadhán Sionnach" - "Ruadhán" means "auburn-haired" or "red-haired". Carver named him, and he took it very seriously, so he got a nicer name than most of his siblings. His given name is basically "Little Red Fox".

He's. Arguably more challenging as a kid than he is as an adult. He's a) highkey love-starved and desperate for attention, b) an unmedicated ADHD nightmare child and c) unable to please his parents no matter what he does, so he's the most prone to acting out, breaking rules and just. Doing his own thing.

Designated family scapegoat from birth; Abrogate has doubts about Skug's paternity, and hardcore resents him for it

Like adult Skug, he's sweet at heart. He tolerates a lot of shit from his siblings without complaint, and he's the one who'll take responsibility for something he didn't do so a younger sib doesn't get caned. He lets Confelicity bully him into letting her dress him up for a lot longer than he's happy about.

500 Year War:

By the time he dies, he's a decorated General

Court-martialled so many times for doing stupid reckless shit oh my god. But the stupid reckless shit tends to work out for him and save lives, so he's never dishonorably discharged. Or shot. Much to Guild's dismay.

He's given his commission as a reward for leading the Forlorn Hope at the battle of Black Rock.

Unusually for an officer at this time, Skug enlists as a regular soldier (with Ghastly and Hopeless), and works his way up through the ranks rather than just buying an officer's commission. He leads from the front, doesn't ask his men to do anything he's not willing to do himself, and treats them like equals rather than inferiors. They're fiercely loyal as a result.

Talented, ruthless tactician & strategist.

Adores his wife. Adored by his wife. He does not know what the fuck he did to deserve her but he is so glad he did it.

Confelicity - 27 February 1582

She's a Sensitive primary, I haven't decided her secondary yet.

She's straight

Deceased

Childhood:

"Banbhán Sionnach" - "Banbhán" is a word for a small pig. ~3yo Skug gets to name her, and, as you can probably tell, he's not very happy about his new sister. Confelicity is a colicky, shrieking baby, and he doesn't like the noise, so she's named for the scream of a piglet.

Highkey spoiled, bratty and demanding. She's very much the Little Princess.

Her tantrums are colossal when she doesn't get her own way. The nursery maids are terrified of her, so they just give her whatever she wants.

She's basically Skug's first bully. Carver is quite a bit older, so when it's just the three of them, she'll scream and stomp her foot and throw things unless he lets her dress him up in pretty gowns and put ribbons in his curls, so they can have a ladies' tea together like Mother does in the parlour. Carver will sometimes intervene on his behalf, but the nursemaids expect him to put up with it to stave off a tantrum.

She's? Fiercely intelligent, and especially good with numbers. Managing household finances is part of her education as a lady, and she excels at math.

She's a daddy's girl - right up until she isn't. She's Abrogate's favourite while she's obeying his every order and parroting his commands at her brothers, but that goes right out of the window when she realises that he's intending to marry her off to someone she's never met in the name of personal social advancement. She elopes as a teenager with the first person who proposes to her, and that's the end of that special relationship.

500 Year War:

Adult Confelicity is a socialite and philanthropist with a string of ex-husbands as long as her arm, each of whom has more money, a better title or more land than the one before. Some of them died and some of them she divorced, so she's got kind of a scandalous reputation as a possible black widow.

Frenemies with China after Skug introduces them after China first leaves the cult. They're pretty catty to each other whenever they're not being catty about other people together, but as soon as ganging up on Skug is an option they're the dearest of companions.

She's put that math expertise to use and become incredibly wealthy; she talks her husbands into investing in this project or that company, and it usually pays off for her. She's a money launderer extraordinaire.

She has a few kids, all daughters. She's...not a great mother. Like, she loves her children, in her own way, and she's a lot better to them than her parents were to her, but she's dealt with her upbringing by becoming cold and distant and emotionally closed off, so she's not the most maternal. Her love is mostly in the form of making sure her daughters get all the opportunities she never did, and that they never need anyone for anything.

Controversially refuses to take sides in the war, and is very public about it. She funnels funds into both sides, keeping herself and her family safe by steadfastly remaining neutral. This pretty much napalms her relationships with most of her siblings, who are firmly Team Sanctuary.

This backfires on her badly in the end. She's discovered using her connections, blackmail she's gained from her lovers and money she's embezzled from the projects she funds to run an operation smuggling the families of high-ranking Sanctuary officials out of occupied territory, so nobody else ends up like Skugwife and Skugbab. Ultimately, she's executed by Mevolent's forces, and subsequently given a bravery honour by the Sanctuary.

Francis - 12 June 1584

He's an Elemental primary, secondary undecided.

He's bi but. Very conflicted about it, thanks to Abrogate

Deceased

Childhood:

His given name is a girl's name. I haven't decided which girl's name, but it's like. Painfully feminine. Think like, Annabelle, Evangeline, Rosalind level girly. Confelicity named him, and she very much wanted a sister, so she was super salty when he was born male. She decides that she's having a sister, whether he likes it or not.

He's sweeter, gentler and more sensitive than Skug and Carver, and Abrogate wastes no time in getting on his back about it. Francis doesn't like fencing lessons. Francis cries if he falls off his pony. Francis hides when his parents fight. He hears every variation of "why can't you be a real man", and he's constantly being compared to his brothers in a negative light. This, obviously, is not good for his emotional growth.

500 Year War:

He didn't ever really want to be a soldier? Adult Francis is a rake; his main interests as an adult are gambling, whoring and drinking. But at this point, he has two brothers in the military and he's under a lot of pressure not to let the side down, so he buys a commission because he feels like he has to.

He's? Kind of a mess, honestly. Skug and Corrival are constantly hauling his ass out of the fire - paying off his gambling debts, talking him out of duels, dragging him out of drinking dens when he's so wasted he can't see straight.

He has a complicated relationship with his brothers - he simultaneously aches to be just like them and make them proud and be praised by them, and resents them for setting a standard he doesn't think he'll ever be able to meet. He's always very sorry for his bad behaviour, but he never manages to stop.

Essentially he's a lost kid who doesn't have the skills he needs to deal with his childhood trauma. He's also funny and theatrical and overly generous. He just can't quite get past his destructive coping mechanisms.

He does okay until Skug dies. And then he's left alone with nobody to wrangle him or intimidate people he's on the wrong side of into backing down. He's killed in a duel in the early 1700s.

Petulance - 14 October 1588

She's an Energy Thrower, secondary undecided. She's very much about anger and explosions and fucking shit up, though.

Bi

Deceased - but she lasts longer than most

Childhood:

"Peaches Sionnach" - she's named by baby Francis, and he just? Really loves peaches at the time.

She's Skug's favourite sibling by far, and she idolises him. She's six when he runs away, and she's the only one he leaves a note for.

Very much a 17th century tomboy. She's far too impatient to enjoy needlepoint or taking a turn about the gardens - she always wants to be riding or climbing or running through mud. Her mother absolutely despairs of her, and Confelicity very much sees her as the complete opposite of the sister she always wanted.

She doesn't do anything slowly. She's quick to anger, but quick to forgive. Quick to decide a new hobby is her entire life now, and quick to lose interest in that hobby. Quick to snap when she's in a temper, but quick to apologise once she's calmed down. She's just kind of? A tempest of a person, really.

She runs away from home when she's in her early teens, rides to Dublin alone, and just sort of. Shows up at Skug's barracks announcing that she'll be moving in, he doesn't get a say, she's not going home. She knows he's incapable of saying no to her. They make it work though - like him, she's not afraid to pitch in and get her hands dirty, so she makes herself useful and earns her keep fetching and carrying for the soldiers, helping clean firearms, running messages around.

500 Year War:

She's never officially a soldier, but her magic is combat-based and she's involved in several defensive battles, when Mevolent's forces attack a Sanctuary encampment.

For all that her name is kind of. Edgelordy and gothic, she's actually sort of aggressively positive. Highly practical. She doesn't waste her time with what ifs or could've beens; this is the world she's got, the life she's living, and she'll figure out a way to make the best of it. She's stubborn and bullheaded to a fault, and she is Not going to end up like Francis.

She's a fucking nightmare when Skug meets Wifey. She's that sister who's like, cringily obvious about your crush, smirking and making pointed comments about how maybe you should walk her home, Skulduggery and how you two look perfectly adorable together. She likes Wifey a lot, and she's determined to push them together.

Post-War:

She finally gets married either during or after World War I - technically, sorcerers aren't supposed to get involved in mortal affairs, but she thinks that's bullshit in the case of such massive events, so she signs up as a mechanic with the British Army while all the men are fighting. Her husband is a mortal fighter pilot, and they have a son together.

She's killed in the Blitz of World War II when her son is three, just a year after her husband's plane is shot down in a dogfight.

Uther - 30 November 1595

Disciplines undecided.

He's straight.

Alive.

Childhood:

He's born the year Skug runs away, which is quite a shock to Ónora, and she clings to Uther as a result.

He's in the unfortunate position of being the oldest child still living at home. Carver is stationed abroad, so even letters from him are few and far between. Skug has run away and not spoken to anyone in the family since. Confelicity got married and cut her parents off. Petulance runs away when Uther is fairly young, and Ónora is left with none of her eldest children to serve as her emotional support animal.

Yeah, Uther is the Emotional Support Child v2.0.

His role in the family is the same as Carver's was years ago. Listen to, validate and protect his mother, to his own detriment. Raise his siblings and keep them in line so their behaviour doesn't fray her nerves. Listen to her rants about how badly her older children are treating her. He's all she has, her perfect son, what would she ever do without him?

Like Carver, he takes this duty seriously. Unlike Carver, he likes it. He feels mature and important and loved, and he's incredibly enmeshed with his mother.

To the twins, Apricity and baby Respair, he's sort of. He does love them. He wants them to be happy and safe. But he sees them as his responsibility to raise and discipline, so he tends to be a bit overbearing and controlling and critical. He likes to flex his authority over them.

When Ónora is killed, Uther takes it hardest. He'd already learned to hate his older siblings through years of listening to his mother vent about them abandoning her, but having to go live with Skug really compounds it. He blames Skug for not being there - if the Family Scapegoat had never left home, Abrogate would've had someone to beat up on, and his mother would still be alive. He hates that he's gone from being treated like a miniature adult to being treated like a preteen boy, and that his authority over his siblings is revoked. He hates how Skug grieves, and that Skug doesn't remember their mother with the same adoration that he does, and that this brother who didn't even stay around to meet him as a baby now gets to run his life. They clash hard, and Uther hates Skug from the get-go.

As soon as he's old enough, he leaves home and cuts the rest of the family off. He never meets Skugbab, or any of his other siblings' children.

500 Year War:

I haven't thought too much yet about what he does during the war.

He's a draft-dodger though; there's a phase after Skug and the other generals are killed where the Sanctuary is desperate enough to conscript, and Uther is having none of that. He wants nothing to do with being in the firing line.

Now:

He's a math teacher. In Handbook canon, the kiddie school still exists, but it's not Bargain Bin Hogwarts. It's a regular school, teaching ordinary subjects, with a magical twist. So like, history class includes both mortal and magical history. Basic sigils are offered as an optional language alongside beginner's French, German and Spanish. That kind of thing.

Bayard - 22 August 1597

Honestly I haven't focused much on Bayard yet. His magic is something in the Ergokinesis family - not a traditional Energy Thrower, but something related.

He's straight.

Deceased.

What I Have So Far:

Honestly I haven't focused much on Bayard yet. His magic is something in the Ergokinesis family - not a traditional Energy Thrower, but something related. Maybe a Juggernaut - someone who stores kinetic energy and, rather than throwing it, channels it through an object. In Bayard's case, this would be his beloved warhammer, a two-handed weapon the size of a short adult - even before adding bonus magic damage, if he hits you with that thing, you will feel it.

He's the older twin, and he's very protective of Sophrosyne.

He's? Not easily flustered. Not much really bothers him. He's rarely found a problem he can't solve by hitting it really, really hard.

It's pretty easy to assume Bayard is stupid and honestly, compared to the likes of Sophrosyne and Skug, he'd agree that he is. He's a simple man, he enjoys a simple life, and he's never been one for academics or overthinking things. But he's got A Lot of common sense.

Sophrosyne - 22 August 1597

She's an incredibly powerful multi-branch Sensitive. She doesn't just have very vivid premonitions, she actively has to tune out everyone's thoughts. She hates it.

She's a lesbian.

Deceased.

Life:

She's the younger twin.

Probably the most intellectual sibling. In addition to English and Irish, she speaks Latin, Greek, Spanish and Italian. She styled herself after Sappho, her favourite poet, at the age of...somewhere between 11-13. She plays the harp, the lyre and the harpsichord, creates beautiful embroidery, and writes professionally.

She publishes several books of poetry (under a pseudonym, because she's female in an era when that would affect her readership). A decent chunk of her poetry is somewhat melancholic and tends to focus on like, the fleeting nature of life and dreams and longing. The rest of it is...really, really gay. Meeting China around the time she hits puberty is. Something of a formative experience.

Unfortunately for her, her magic is more of a disability than a gift. She begins having visions from about the age of four, and from that point, she spends the rest of her life in delicate health. The visions she has are vivid, all-consuming and deeply distressing to a gentle soul, and because her magic is so powerful, she's like a dinner bell for malicious entities looking to possess a body, so she has to fight off attempts to take her over. She's often indisposed/bedridden, becomes exhausted easily, frequently faints after a vision and experiences chronic pain left over from previous psychic battles.

When she's feeling well, she likes to get involved with a local charity hospital for mortal peasants.

This is ultimately her downfall. When Mevolent weaponises liquefactive necrosis, mortals start presenting at the hospital with unexplainable plague symptoms. And like, this is only a few hundred years after the Black Death. Sorcerers of Sophrosyne's generation would absolutely have been told stories by their parents, who lived through it. She knows what plague can do to mortals. As a sorcerer, she's supposed to be immune to mortal illnesses, so she volunteers to take care of the infected patients to protect the doctors. But it's not a mortal illness, and when she contracts it, there's still no cure. She dies young.

Apricity - 27 March 1599

She's an Arborkinetic - her magic is all about plants. She talks to her plants, she makes them grow, she can use them defensively if she has to, and she has a few plant-based adaptive abilities.

She also inherited a subconscious ability from Abrogate - hers is...what you might call luck. While she believes life is good and things will work out for the best, they tend to do so - she gently nudges the world in the direction she wants it to go, without even realising she's doing it. But that can backfire.

She's straight.

Deceased.

Childhood:

"Dolly Sionnach" - technically the twins both get to name her, but they're 1, and they also refuse to compromise, so Uther (3) takes over. She's named after a toy baby doll, because that's what he thinks she looks like.

She's basically Wifey's mini-me. She's about seven when she's orphaned and taken to live with Skug, and a few years older when Skug marries Wifey. Once she's got that stability, she thrives. Wifey is very maternal and very much wants to be a mother figure to these poor traumatised children, and Apricity is a child who badly wants a loving mother.

She's a bit eccentric, as a child. Wifey has a lovingly-tended garden, and Apricity will sit out there for hours talking to the rose bushes. She's highly imaginative and prefers playing alone to playing with other children.

Wifey instills a deep love of crafty pursuits in her. They cook together, bake together, repurpose old gowns together, make quilts together, all that sort of thing.

500 Year War:

She has zero interest in ever getting involved in the war in any capacity. Like, absolutely nothing about Apricity is combat-worthy at all, she's a super gentle soul.

She marries, and dedicates herself to growing and selling flowers. She gets lucky; the tulip boom happens while she's still a young adult, and it makes her a very wealthy woman.

She really wants children, but she has a hard time conceiving any. Like most of her siblings, she got the same magical ambidexterity gene combination as Skug, which affects fertility. It's upsetting for her, of course, but she mostly stays upbeat about it - she's young, and she has a very, very long life to become a mother.

But then Wifey and Skugbab are killed, and the brother who raised her is butchered for sport and burned on a spike. She loses a huge chunk of her family in one go, and she sinks into a deep depression which. Pretty much brings her entire life down around her ears. She's not happy-go-lucky anymore. She's not optimistic and she doesn't feel like everything will work out for the best. So. Her luck basically turns on her. Because she thinks everything is going to go to shit, that's the way she nudges the world, and then when bad things happen, they just make her feel worse.

She dies in childbirth in the 1700s.

Respair - 3 July 1602

He's an Elemental.

He inherited a watered-down form of invulnerability from Abrogate. It's a bit harder to injure him, he heals injuries faster, and he can tolerate more pain than most people. He believes this is his second discipline, some form of Vitakinesis - "We're all a bit magically ambidextrous in this family." This is really useful as a soldier. It's less useful in...other situations.

He's heteroflexible.

Alive. Technically.

Childhood:

"Báb Sionnach" - "Báb" means baby. His given name is literally "baby". He's named by three-year-old Apricity, and she is VERY!!! EXCITED!!! ABOUT THE NEW BABY!!!

He barely remembers his real parents. He knows that Skug is biologically his brother, and Wifey his sister-in-law, but they're the only parental figures he's ever known.

Because he was so young when his mother was killed, and he wasn't raised with her dysfunction and Abrogate's abuse, Respair escapes pretty much all the psychological trauma inflicted on his older siblings. He's a healthy, happy, normal kid.

He always aspires to be like Skug, from a very young age. He's an athletic, sporty boy, so he enjoys learning to fight and fence and playing soldiers with the neighbourhood boys.

He grows up into a very good-natured, cheerful, gentlemanly young man. He tends to take things on the chin and just sort of. Make it up as he goes along. He's a lot like Carver personality-wise, but he's more independent and less anxious, a lot more secure in himself.

500 Year War:

He signs up with the Sanctuary as soon as Skug lets him. It's not exactly what he expected - he doesn't get put in Skug's unit, and he's not immediately amazing at all things military - but he does enjoy it and he's generally a promising young soldier.

When Skug and Wifey are captured, the Sanctuary hesitates in its official response, so the people who love them - Carver if he's in the country, Ghastly, Hopeless, Bayard, Respair - mount an unofficial rescue mission. They don't know that Wifey and Skugbab are already dead.

They make it all the way into Serpine's castle, but they trip an alarm sigil and they're forced to flee without Skug. As they're trying to make their escape, Respair falls behind trying to get an opportunity for a killing shot against Serpine, and he's captured.

Serpine is busy with Skug, the object of his obsession, and he doesn't know who Respair is or that they're related. He's just a random young soldier. So he's thrown into the dungeon for now.

Officially, he's Missing Presumed Dead, and Carver never forgives himself for getting their baby brother killed.

Now:

Pretty much everyone thinks Respair is dead - including Serpine, who - when he remembered Respair existed after Skug was burned - found his cell empty, and was told that in the meantime, the boy had died of his injuries and the body had been disposed of.

He's not.

Valkyrie has even seen him. She just didn't realise at the time.

"They were in a warehouse of some sort...Dead people, in various stages of dissection, hung from the walls on hooks and large iron nails. They looked at her as she passed, but made no sound." - Valkyrie, Mortal Coil

"No one will know you never left. I can hide you among the corpses here. You'll never be found. I'll tell the Dullahan, and I'll even tell the banshee if she comes to investigate, that I waved goodbye and watched you leave. Who knows what could have happened to you after that?" - Nye, Mortal Coil

me trying to convince myself that two straight white men in their 30s are going to write the best (slowburn) queer love story ever made