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

Hmmmm

musings about my PCs in DA and their various faiths and religious afilliations under the cut

Spoiler

I said several times already that Meraud is almost startingly devout I believe. Not quite the way the Orlesian chantry would like, she's too much of a doglord for that, and she has spent too much time in alamarri ruins for it. Her particular brand of belief and practice is more in line with the Blades of Hessarian (to which she has contact and whom she considers shieldbrothers) and avvar ancestor/hero worship of Andraste specifically, but she very much still sees herself as in essence chantric, if in a different way. She does believe herself to be a Chosen of the Maker's Bride in some ways. She doesn't begrudge anyone else their religion though, nor does she think the Chantry is the only way there is, but she does have a bad human-influenced view of the Creators as essentially just aspects of the Maker and Andraste? It doesn't really make sense.

Hallr does heed the Stone and he does seek guidance from the Paragons but it lacks a religious or community building aspect to him? It's pure pragmatism, simply a reality of his life. He thinks the chantry is rather silly. The Avvar and Chasind at least make sense.

Idris is not really religious and he actively dislikes the Chantry but it is very much a quiet sort of defiance against the structure. He doesn't have anything against people's beliefs, he just... can't bring himself to seek guidance from a figure he is told would rather see him dead. He does think the Tevene Chantry is possibly a bit more sufferable, but that's mostly Anders' rose tinted view of things.

Sylvia never felt like andrasteanism 'fit' her so to speak and has by now casually taken up the dalish customs regarding the evanuris from Merrill, though she is quick to point out it's not really her place and she's not an authority. It's just that Falon'din and Dirthamen are far more comfort to her than the Maker ever was. She's still a blaspheming little shit though.

Atish'an clung to the Evanuris with all her might when she was picked up by Clan Lavellan, greedily soaking up what she could of an elvhen culture she was physically seperated from in early childhood. not particularly surprisingly she violently rejected any form of Andrasteanism and antagonized the Chantry at every turn.
She... didn't take the reveals of Trespasser well. It felt a lot like yet another aspect of her past turning out to be a lie all along. She's slowly readjusting and reevaluating, slowly arising at the conclusion that the Evanuris may not have been gods, but they're no different from Andraste in that way. Warriors, teachers, leaders, worshipped for their accomplishments. So she has rededicated herself (to Fen'Harel) and is aiming to strip away the distortions and lies twisted by Tevinter and the gaps ripped into history by time and war. It's definitely not a worshipful dynamic anymore though.

Saar-Raas has wholesale converted to Andrasteanism and is carefully and slowly easing into the role of being a 'chosen one' and religious leader, though this makes him anxious still. He does however derive a ton more comfort from the idea of a creator being out there who may turn his face upon them once more, and the Maker's Bride blessing and advocating for the people of Thedas. He's not... fanatical or stupid but it's very obvious that he looks to religion as an ordering principle for his life and that he is parched for an alternative to the Qun and the Qun adjacent practices of the Valo-Kas. He prays often, if quietly.

Brejan never set out to be a Saint, but damn is she doing well being one? She keeps faith with both the Evanuris and Andraste and essentially works as a Laysister nowadays, leading sermon if asked to and taking confessions, soothing frayed and fraught tempers and leading her flock. She is quite liberal and doesn't attempt to convince people either way, but there's enough of a palpable aura of faith in guiding forces watching over her and her people that a lot of people are drawn to her naturally, looking for guidance. She mostly uses her influence and position to quietly advocate for the Dalish though, and be a tempering, calm counterpoint to the misinformation and fear. She still takes her role as future Keeper very seriously and as such was always going to be the one holding on, the one to keep the practice alive, the one to be the spiritual leader. Now she merely adds Andraste to the Evanuris, as a friend and ally of the People. She is very headstrong about resisting the influence of the Chantry As Institution, despite her close friendship with many leading officials of it.

Asaaranda uses religious rituals and customs as structuring principles to deal with her anxiety and has never really navelgazed about whether she actually believes or not. The faith she keeps to is the remnants of the Qun as kept by her parents and her kith, so it's not really like anyone can tell her what bits she has to keep to and which she doesn't.

Àedàn quite possibly has never sincerely prayed in his entire life before the Conclave and he's a tad appalled at the urge to pick it up now, but he's also not particularly picky. As far as he is concerned he's just a particularly attractive smuggler, he'll happily blaspheme about any religious entity, and then turn around and pray for help from whcihever god is willing to listen.
He does believe bone deep that dwarves are children of the Stone though, and his stonesense is pretty impressive for a surfacer. Paragons don't really have a dimension of ancestor worship for him, but he does like to study their accomplishments just as historical figures.

 

added to the above:
Atish'an flat out refused to be referred to as the Herald of Andraste. When pressed on the matter, after a bit with the library of Skyhold she publically proclaimed that if Andraste saved her it was only as a reaffirmation of her bond with Shartan, heavily implied Andraste was the lesser partner of Shartan's slave rebellion and finally ending on an insinuation that Andraste clearly kept more than one lover and Shartan was her 'most favored' disciple, wink wink nudge nudge.
Josie probably almost passed out from stress running damage control on that.

 

Am I thirsty enough for Ser Aaron/Vaea content and Calix Qintara Gets Told He Is A Good Boy fanfic to hunt on AO3 on my own without anyone to hold my hand? Good question

 

Like I'm sorry but

Spoiler: DA:Deception

If they didn't mean to heavily imply that Ser Aaron and Vaea fuck they shouldn't have had the mentor/mentee pair deliberately positioned as the dysfunctional funhouse mirror of their dynamic, Olivia and Calix, fuck.

 

my humanities training: feral memes should be viewed in a tradition of savagery/civilization dichotomies and the narrative function of misrule and disobedience as a fetishized transient state of things to prop up the status quo--
goblin brain: digging in mud good

 

Local man flirts with everyone, confuses ex-templar into almost losing ability to speak Trade

 

fun little characterbuilding detail:
Àedàn used to be slightly exasperated but amused by people referring to his eyecolor as 'as bright as lichen or moss'.
Now that everyone calls his eyes 'rift-green' or 'fade-colored' he desperately wishes someone would go back to describing his eyes as tasty not-plont.

 

Àedàn: I once crushed a man's skull between my thighs for talking shit about my boss :)
Josephine: Master Cadash......... Is that really--
Dorian: Nuh-uh-uh!!! Let the man finish, Ambassador!
Varric, already drafting up a classic Bad Boy Needs Loving To Stop With Murder Tale: Gotta agree with Sparkler on that one, this kind of stuff sells, Ruffles.

 

He didn't actually crush a man's skull between his thighs but he did once legitemately rip someone's throat out with his (mainly) ornamental silverplated canine caps. It was self defense but he likes to frame it like he did it for no other reason than 1) he was mildly pissed off 2) his maul was across the room and 3) he wanted to see if he could
He hasn't had to do it since. The rumor is out there now. The threat alone makes people flinch away when he grins too broadly, when it comes to Carta dealings.
Àedàn very much enjoyed being an enforcer.

 

Aight, presentation went well, i got misgendered once despite actually prefacing the whole thing with an introduction that included my pronouns, I didn't get snarked at for despising person first language and I was thanked for my insight on disability in education matters as well as my reasoned critique on the text.

 

Also I'm p sure Leliana's song is now up there with Witch Hunt, Legacy and Descent for favorite DLC? It's just so unapologetically stupid fun. Like hell yeah! Actiony heist movie!!!
Golems of Amgarrack is also amazing but i'm a huge wuss about horror and also terminally stupid when it comes to puzzles so like I enjoy it greatly in theory and atmosphere and lore but I super do not like playing it.

 

also like I should note a huge component of why I adore Leliana's Song is the soundtrack? Like surprising absolutely no one there, lmao. But yeah those are some fucking amazing pieces.

 

i'm just gonna be very very basic and do the most obvious thing

'tis a Ryol song

Hands getting cold
Losing feeling is getting old
Was I made from a broken mold?
Hurt, I can't shake
We've made every mistake
Only you know the way that I break

 

one day I'll get back to writing that 'Ryol and Brejan are stuck lost in the Mire together shortly after Ryol arrived to Skyhold, He Has Never Actually Seen Undead Up Close and now is caught between fascination and horror while his new Mom looks on with mild concern' fic

in other news

Spoiler: sexual tension with a dead man

Spoiler: he's so fucking pretty

Spoiler: print this on a propaganda poster to immediately increase your faction's popularity by 200%

Spoiler: soft sad murder husbands

 

oh also this is a Marisela/Josephine song



Judy grew up stepping right beside her
Loved her from the cover of the crowds
Judy’s heart was beating right beside her
Even with the music loud and

Judy’s never minded all the waiting
Judy never thought to watch the clock
Judy knew that loving’s in the patience
When the red side of the moon is what we’ve got

 

whelp it rained entirely too much last night and my seedlings got like washed out of their little thingies so i guess i'll get my shades and seperate them out and put them in pots today wish me luck

 

Luck!

 

apart from the fact that i literally cannot tell which are peppers and which are tomatoes rn i think i rescued a decent number of them
i'm never gonna use this seedling nursery thing again tho, seperating something out of compacted coconut shavings is such a pain

 

also i apparently did it wrong by using relatively small pots as an intermediary to gage whihc of these are actually capable of surviving when there was Indefinable Organic Something in the bigger pots so like fuck me I guess.

 

idk it kind of was stupid but I can't find my gloves rn and I didn't feel like washing five pots and fighting things like that and I wanted to do something by myself for once.
still need to spread coffee grounds in the planting hole for the pear and put the monks cress around it and put the pear in the ground