Kitchen And Craft Wix Corner (Exciteable Bird, Enter At Own Risk)

*paps him* oh noooo

 

hallr - wolf

 

Spoiler: literal disney princess ryol rutherford gets to meet an ambiguously mystical black dog

The rain storm outside rages as much as Ryol’s heart races when he finds himself face to mud-splattered face with several feral dogs. The weather had ambushed him, weeks out from any bigger settlement and only luck had brought him close enough to this abandoned farm at all. He had just been in the process of checking over his pack to make sure his books were all alright when a low hoarse growl had made him back up until his back hit the wall behind him and he realized he was already surrounded.

And he was tired. He was far too tired to fight with dogs, the fact that he hated hurting animals aside. He swallowed loudly, eyes glancing from one pack member to the next in quick succession, trying to figure out which of them was going to attack first, before a gruff bark, of such volume it seemed to make the entire barn shake, pulled his attention to the shadows.

She was easily almost twice the size of these other dogs, missing an eye and half an ear, limping slightly and still the almost black hound of clear Mabari heritage commanded such authority she would not have looked out of place besides King Calenhad himself. Her remaining eye gave Ryol a long hard look, noticed his fingers twitching and sniffed the frost on the air around him and she simply sneezed before coming closer to sniff his pack.

Ryol had the distinct feeling that he was suffered here at least partially for the food he carried, but he didn’t care. He was simply too relieved. And besides, he was Fereldan. Being so accepted by a Mabari was… an honor, even if she was a feral, worn out beast. Part of him wanted to try to befriend her, liked the storybook idea of being followed around by a pack of feral dogs loyal to him, but it would almost sully the wild nobility she clearly had. This hound was independent and self sufficient. She clearly should be free. They were alike in this way. Still, maybe he could at least befriend her a little.

“Well… I suppose I shall make a fire and share my food then, no? Perhaps I will have a bone or two for you to nibble on so you will leave mine alone, my grim lady?”

She barked softly, settling down magnanimously as if to agree he should serve her, even as the other feral dogs still circled him cautiously.

(I'm gonna work on the others bit by bit sorry this is taking so long)

 

important pokemon post:
grass types (and bonsly) like sleeping in lightly padded plantpots.

 

the ordeal of having to decide if i trust a website enough to buy plants there..... F

 

rowan and larch.... could be mine tho......... and then I'd really have an excuse to start making that concrete replica of the fenharel statues and maybe also the mythal statue...................

 

oh yeah btw i have a shirt/general merch print storefront now

 

What if.... What if I stole cuttings from the fig tree... haha just joking.... unless......

 

I bought the rowan and larch btw, larch is potted up and seems delighted to be here and exist, rowan needs some babying before i pot it up still but it's cute as hell and i'm super excited
i also really should not get more bonsais. I'm already running out of space. God.

 

-kicks over a chair the sit on the back of it with my back propped against the seat-
I need to nail down some worldbuilding component for a thing, anyone wanna ask me questions about the verse Aulus is from?

 

(Also anyone want to see my bonsais)

 

I dunno enough about Aulus to ask about them(?) I’m afraid, but :eyes emoji: at the bonsais!!

 

this is a group pic of about half the family from like a few days ago

and the current new styling of my willow.
I have to kind of shuffle bc my phone camera is too good for kintsugi's software lol

 

Also my sorbus aucuparia has tons of foliage! it really had amazing backbudding i'm so happy

 

aulus was in/adjacent to the military right? i'm on no sleep brain but i remember that
is there any specific group they're at war against? slash where did aulus fuck off to when he chose to become farm man

 

Aaaaah, gorgeous!!! :D

 

OKAY SO
the verse centers around a thinly veiled allegory for the roman empire but like with elves and magic and vampires and unicorns and shit. The empire recently-ish split in half bc the undead-semi-immortal emperor fucked up part of the prolonging ritual bc he got sloppy and his heart exploded in a magic super heart attack, which obviously caused trouble because the emperor hadn't officially declared an heir. Because he meant to rule in perpetuity, forever.
So on the one hand there's the Tsarity, the, shall we say, more liberal, more ethical half of the empire that splintered off and is mostly meaning to shore up their defenses through trading pacts and vasal-agreements that are peacefully negotiated, with the usual adjacent nonsense of hostage/ward exchanges and political marriages but little military aggression against their neighboring smaller countries (with a few notable exceptions that were mostly diplomatic oopsies) and a cold-simmering front to the other half of the empire. Life's good there, slavery is frowned upon and being phased out if not fully illegal and vasal states and conquered territories can freely request citizenship. The tsarity is lead by a charismatic aristocrat who is very popular with the people, a patron of the arts and supporter of education and the sciences. Swell dude though he has a bad habit of inviting himself to other people's estate with only just enough warning which can cause trouble. His first wife is a noted learned woman with a love for gossip.

On the other hand you have the Faustian Empire, which is where Aulus and Servius served. They're lead by the late emperor's son who went turbo-evil because he flipped his shit at suddenly being presented with a fracturing empire, rebelling provinces, political strife, several people trying to turn him into a political puppet and also yknow, being raised in the full knowledge he would never be anyone important unless he murdered his father himself and now suddenly having a massive fucking crisis of self-conception because he just got handed an opportunity to ascend? without murdering his dad? did he accidentally murder his father? Did someone do him a favor? Was this divine intervention? Is he indebted to the gods now or some benefactor? He doesn't want to be indebted, he will prove himself and reconquer the rebelling provinces! By chopping off the heads of people who're trying to question him! That will show them! (It doesn't work very well).
Slavery in Faust is legal, and practiced very casually, though slaves can be freed or buy themselves out. They have a huge military and are completely obsessed with attacking and conquering even the most useless barren hills at the ass end of nowhere to "show strength". That's the military Aulus and Servius served in and both were born into, One of Sindri's wives was also born there, and she and another were enslaved in Faust before getting to Sindri. Sindri's husband Felici was a court mage in Faust as well. (Sindri's jarldom is a vassal of the Tsarity which is why Faust can't get them back easily). Most Faustian nobles get commanding posts in the military, and 90% of the court is made up of just People From The Higher Echelons Of The Military. Like pretty much everything in the place is focused on projecting martial strength. This means Faustian mage education is generally focused on military application and sorted and categorized through that lense.

Aulus and Servius moved to the countryside in the central Tsarity territories, as far from an open front as possible basically! This isn't unusual given both Aulus' status as born Freedman and their husband Patroclus' status as a run-away former slave, as the Tsarity does not formally distinguish legally between freeborn citizens and those who were slaves or were born to slaves.

 

Oh also probably important to note:
- unicorns are real in this verse, and they do have the 'only peaceful and kind to virgins' behavior pattern, but every single one has its own definition of virginity, though herds will synchronize this to some degree. This means there's actual in universe wildlife sanctuaries for specific behavior patterns and their keepers get real fucking mad if someone were to release a unicorn with a 'NO HANDHOLDING NO IMPURE THOUGHTS, ONE HUNDRED THOUSAND YEARS OF MURDER-TORTURE BECAUSE YOU THOUGHT OF DICK ONCE' rule into a 'backdoor is fine ;)' herd (this is because i think it is immeasurably hilarious)
- elves in this verse are biologically crepiscular predators and should eat mostly meat with only some plant matter, Aulus has horrifying eating habits
- Vampire-Descended people tend to either not have magic at all (most common) or have incredibly violently unstable magic because blood magic is Kind Of Frowned Upon and that's the safest thing they can do, albeit still not particularly safely, though their cultural roots to this school of magic have mostly been lost to a degree due to how long ago the last pureblooded vampire was introduced into any of the bloodlines. The ones that are mages tend to show the most pseudo-vampiric traits. This mostly gets them read as elfblooded though because real vampires have been like. thought to be extinct for ages. Every so often the ruling aristocratic lines will throw a child that is a genetic throwback to properly identifiably vampire blooded. This scion will be treated as a divinely gifted Promised Ruler and take the spot of actual Duke for as long as they live which is generally like 2 or 3 normal human generations, but they're not nearly immortal.

 

sorted and moved my bonsai stuff, bc it's raining so i can't repot. i wanna repot....

 

someone ask me shit about the fantasy romans bls i need to sus out some worldbuilding details still