The State Of The Nine-Fingers Keene Tag On AO3 | Additional Notes & Thoughts

Behold! The most beautiful Drow on Toril: Minthara Baenre!

I’d like to feed you chocolates, then watch you run around in a forest.

Nevermind that you’re naked.

“Someone will remember us

I say

even in another time”

- Fragment 147, Sappho

Fragments by Sappho mock book cover 💘💐🕊️

I’ve been continuing to play with cover concepts, and am very excited to share this one for a prospective collection of Sappho’s poem fragments. 💘

I’d come up with the idea earlier, to reuse my illustration of Flora from Stabiae, but this week I stumbled across this very cool font named Big Caesar that looks just like ancient handwriting. I’ve tweaked it a little bit to fit the composition, but overall kept the original look.

my best tip for anyone trying to get back into reading is to remember that you can read books to avoid other responsibilities in ur life and it can become a vice if you play your cards right

I will absolutely yell at anyone about Jaheira/Nine-Fingers and/or Karlach/Minthara! (Or other BG1, 2, and 3-related things!!)

Messaging people for the first time is so hard. What am I supposed to say? Like, "You seem really odd and your blog intrigues me. Do you want to have philosophical conversations or perhaps talk about fictional characters?" What! Whatever. I will just follow you back and stare at your blog with my big beautiful brown eyes.

The Athenaeum was my go-to as a teen! Highly recommend for Xena fics and femshalsh!

Most people tend to agree that Ao3 is the go-to fanfiction site nowadays, but some of you really need to remember that older fandoms (and fandoms up through the early 2010's even) have a LOT of content on places like FF.net, Livejournal, Wordpress, etc. Some people even still post there and elsewhere exclusively. Like, you're truly missing out in those cases if you think Ao3 is the end all and be all of fandom content. I was still actively using LJ communities to find and share fics until around 2020.

I've even been reading for an old fandom of mine on FF.net this past week. Y'all don't even know. There are literally FAR more fics there than can be found on Ao3 simply because of when this fandom began.

Ao3 is easier to use and superior in almost every way, but too many people think that all "quality" fic or all fic in general is on Ao3 without considering what was available beforehand. Too many people think all fanfiction on fanfiction.net is bad just because it's on fanfiction.net. They don't even think about the older blogging sites.

I'm just saying. Y'all are missing out by not being open to navigating the fandom archives and spaces that dominated before Ao3 got here.

I never knew I was into MILFs until I met Jaheira

lae’zel and minthara have extremely biteable ears

reblog if you agree

Pipe Smoke

It was the pipe smoke that roused her from a deep slumber. After the rush of soft hands and velvet lips, gentle gasps and shaking hips. After words said at least five years overdue, perhaps even longer. It was after the simple rustling of leaves had turned into a tempest of sweat and flame and arching release. It was the pipe smoke that roused her.

The night had been slow and sweet; reverent even. Holy. Both of them taking turns being cleric and goddess, intent on heavenly worship of the other. It was the type of delicate lovemaking she had gotten used to once upon a time, and not something she thought she’d ever feel again. Warmth and life crept back into her tired bones, stirring them to shiver and hum, stirring her chest to rise and fall, breaths coming in rapid successive gasps twice, no, thrice, in one night.

It had felt like home.

And maybe that’s why she said it, mumbled it under her still ragged breath whilst halfway dreaming. “Smoke in the study, Khalid.”

The smell of an old long leaf, a tobacco antique even to her, lingered, then lazily mellowed into nothingness. Her breathing settled back into an even rhythm when no new smoke flooded her dreams. Suddenly, she was being gently pulled by a strong, yet wiry arm. She twisted her body against warm, pink flesh, her cheek finding a new place to rest atop a soft, broad shoulder. The smell and feel was so similar and so, so safe. She curled into it, smiling. A soft sigh escaped her lips in response to a whispered comment she couldn’t quite hear.

— —

That experience was… different. Not at all what she was used to. Her line of work didn’t leave room for softness, kindness, gentle touches, or fluttering kisses in the aftermath of a storm. She was used to the feeling of her dark-haired kingpin’s sharp dagger trailing down her spine after a victorious coup, or a quick nightcap with a golden-haired lady after a stressful day of negotiations - her court wasn’t there just for fucking protection, after all.

And she was used to being in control.

Every order obeyed, every enemy quaking in fear of her vicious wrath, every kingpin and guild member falling neatly in line lest they meet an undesirable fate either at her own hand or upon her command. She wasn’t used to subservience. Or giving into temptation. Or whispering sweet lover’s words in the heat of passion - she wasn’t sure she was used to passion. But she was used to being the one calling the shots.

So when her - lover? Ally? Frenemy? Mumbled about smoking in the study, she scoffed. An eyebrow raised slowly at being called the name of a dead husband. Either she’d done a good job, or the old crone was finally losing her fucking mind. She scoffed, yet she found herself sitting down her tinderbox, letting the tobacco she had just lit die out, then working her fingers to empty out the bowl even though she was in her own fucking office.

She thought about a quip. A wry comment lay on the tip of her tongue and she opened her mouth to say it. Then she shut it. Instead of flinging a well crafted and very witty insult, she rose from her chair, shed the oversized tunic she had thrown on, and slid back into her bed. Her strong arm pulled the other woman on top of her, waking her just enough so she could twist to rest her head upon her new pillow’s broad shoulder.

“You’re lucky you’re only half a Harper, grandmother,” she whispered into a mess of gray hair.

The only response she received was in the form of a soft sigh.

she's allowed to stab me as long as she also licks the wounds