21_days | 21 Days of Valdemar!

Entry tags:

21 Days of Valdemar!

Welcome to 21 Days of Valdemar!

Put on your party hats - it’s time for the Dead Vanyel Memorial Party! Vanyel is OFFICIALLY the Woobiest of the Woobies, and we celebrate in his honour!

WE'RE DONE.

No More Fills posted here! Post to AO3 or FF.Net and post the link here!

Discussion Post | Mod Call Post | Resources Post

Schedule

Day 1 -Aug. 9 - Prompts! You will have seven days to put as many prompts as you'd like on this post. And if you start writing them early, well that's just good planning!

Day 8 - Aug. 16 - Prompting ends, posting begins! You have 14 days to write, draw, and potentially diorama as many prompts as you can.

Day 19 - Aug. 27 - This is the cut-off day for prompters to reply to any questions about their prompt. Unanswered questions are considered enthusiastic agreement.

Day 21 - Aug. 29 - Last day of posting! All fills must be posted by 11:59 PM North American Mountain Time.
Day 22 - Aug. 30 - Party time! You now have the option of going unanon and reposting everything you've done to AO3 under our fancy AO3 Collection. Or unanoning in whatever manner you please.

(Click on the dates for countdowns; the fest is following MDT/Mountain Time)

Rules

For the purposes of this fest, the prompts themselves are warnings. If you have issues with this policy, we recommend either not participating or using Dreamwidth blocker.

Joining the 21_days community is optional for prompters, fillers, and all interested parties; we have some extra content for comm members, but this prompt/fill post, the discussion post, and the mod call post are open for everyone.

MOST IMPORTANT RULE: Posting unanon will be deleted. This doesn't mean you aren't welcome here! And if you'd like the content of your comment PMed to you, contact the MOD CALL post.

For Prompters and Readers

Subject lines should include the series, characters and/or pairing you want. Feel free to be as descriptive as you'd like. Warnings aren't required, but they also aren't banned.
You don't have to write or draw. It's anon, there's no IP-tracking, and we aren't going to stalk you.
Do not comment on other people's prompts to try and change pairings or characters. Post your own version with the characters you want instead.
If you fail to respond to a 'is this okay?' kind of question about any of your prompts by the 19th day, it'll be taken as an enthusiastic yes, no matter what the question is.
There are no subject bans. You may prompt anything you want.
If you don't want to answer any questions, you can say so, and that will work as blanket permission for anything people might want to do with your prompt.
Prompts for non-Valdemar Mercedes Lackey series are allowed.

For Artists and Writers

No claiming prompts, please, as multiple fills are welcome!
Minimum wordcount per fill is 100 words.
All content is allowed and all warnings are optional, but if you want to write or draw extreme kinks** for a prompt that doesn’t specifically request them, you have ask the prompter first.
If the artist requests it, the mods will repost art fills as an embedded picture in a reply to their comment. NSFW art will be labelled as such in the subject line by re-posting mods. Art involving underaged characters in porn situations will not be re-posted as an embed.
RPF of underage people is not allowed. We're not even sure if it's possible for Valdemar fic, but whatever. It's not allowed.

** "extreme kinks" for the purposes of this exchange include but are not necessarily limited to: extreme underage, major character death, scat/watersports/emetophilia, extreme gore, and bestiality. Please use reasonable discretion, and ask a mod if you have any questions!

For Everyone

This is a Choose Not to Warn fest. At no point will any comment be deleted for failure to warn of its content in the subject lines. They will be deleted for rampaging dickery and failure to follow the rules.

Unanon comments will be deleted.

Attempts at policing other people's fun will be deleted.

Prompts posted after the end of the 7th day will be deleted.

Links to off-meme posts posted prior to end of the 21st day will be deleted.

Concerns are to be directed to the MOD CALL post. If posted here, they will be deleted.

Fills that have spectacularly failed to fulfill the prompt/been posted to the wrong spot will be screened. You can request a copy of your work at the MOD CALL post.

The rules may change without warning in response to unforeseen circumstances, like us thinking of better ones.

Discussion Post | Mod Call Post | Resources Post

Threaded | Top-Level Comments Only

A!A here! I'm glad you're liking it so far. I'm hoping both the desolation and the cuteness are going to successfully climb way further up before the end lol.

A!A here! I'm so glad you like it. The prompt's mention of brainwashing had made me think "Gosh, though, Vanyel at this age is already inclined to do that to himself, even without help!" so I had to run with The Ice.

Author, this is brilliant! I like your not-actually-sociopathic (but still damaged by the feud) Tylendel very much. Vanyel is exactly as he should be, frozen nearly to the bone after years of monastic life, but just beginning to become a little bit self-aware. I can't wait to see how they finally connect.

Thank you for actually thinking about Nyara's self-determination. This is lovely.

OP:

Oh, well done! You've got the connection between Lavan and Kalira, and you've written a story in which their actual body types... are part of the story, but don't matter so much. It's a convincing take on what a lifebond between a human and a sentient horse could look like, and it's just creepy enough to work for poor messed-up Lavan and Kalira.

Oh, clever! I like the canon changes you're making here, and I can see how they'll work. Stef getting the kyree involved in the final battle, and Yfandes realizing the message can be sent much earlier, are both really important pivot points. But even before that, the first pivot you've written is Vanyel admitting to Stef that he expects to die, giving Stefen the chance to plan alternatives. Well done, A!A.

Thank you so much!! I'm really glad you're enjoying it and I'm working hard on cleaning up the next part as we speak. Poor Vanyel has really gone much further than he ever had to go in Pawn but I like to think there's a core of Vanyel-ness that can't ever be fully extinguished.

About Tylendel I'm sorry to drop a tl;dr but I've done so so so much reading to try to figure out his charater from the story hints (since alas Lackey never did a lot to fully actualize him instead of dropping moments sob) and I'm really excited to talk about what I'm drawing on, especially since when I started to make notes I found him the opposite of sociopathic-- messed up though, dear god! I don't mean to dump too much rambling on you and it isn't meant as any kind of counter it's just so exciting to me to talk about these weird little details I've been finding and how they fit together haha.

Because when you start to put his timeline together he's actually paralleled to Vanyel -- I mean literally in that Price is a complete parallel where Vanyel steps into Lendel's role (gets cold and heartless and scares Stefen constantly with his seeking revenge for Savil's death), but in Price Vanyel an actually balanced relationship and an actually evil villain to face but. At 12 Lendel's gifts wake up and they include thought-sensing and empathy (as strong a gift as vanyel has, anyway), and at the same time as THAT he's discovered to be shaych and he spends two years with his family hating him and thinking he's cursed and wanting to outcast him while going through the same thing Vanyel does at the end of Pawn - with gifts uncontrolled he'd both be picking up on thoughts and feelings and projecting his own. DURING this time (since he and Staven together discover his mother's body and as soon as Gala shows up Tylendel leaves for Haven) first his father dies, then his mother takes poison. So he develops a total dependence on Staven as his only support and hides the depth of his mindlink out of fear anyone will take it from him. Has huge anger issues from these years, that nobody actually treats other than encouraging Savil to later numb him to them after they notice them. 14 he heads back to Haven, finally shielded, is taught to shield himself, makes friends, starts to connect to others. We know he had exactly one relationship before Vanyel, Nevis, who as soon as they slept together Nevis immediately calls seduction and treats it like an abuse so that must have been pretty fucked up. Nothing else for one year until Vanyel and then as soon as the two get together he gets super excited to just share everything with Vanyel -- the next day he drags Vanyel out to meet Gala and tells him his entire awful backstory but instead of noticing that Lendel is trying to communicate and be on an equal level with him poor messed up Van is just, "Cool! He's telling me things!" lmfao. Meanwhile LENDEL thinks he got through, has no idea that Vanyel is dependant on him (and what does he have to compare to? His relationship with Staven? Yikes)...) and both are approaching it as totally different things. So fucked up. Lendel as a person is just a big teenage nerd who gets excited about linguistics and never stops eating (he's got food in every scene and Savil makes fun of him for getting crumbs and grease on the cushions) with some stuff in his history that's really fucking him up, but Vanyel sees him as a cool mature herald who's so smart and clever because Lendel tried to be a support to him and didn't notice when Lendel tried to switch that over into being people together and Lendel didn't notice that he never made his own issues clear. Then shit goes to hell and Staven loses it and nobody realizes it and I kept wailing while I read like, "Mlackey! YOU PUT ALL THESE DETAILS IN! Why didn't you make this clearer? More solid?! Give us more time in his POV! I know you needed to kill him off for Stefen reincarnation endgame, but make us care!" Ugh I hated him on my first reads and I'm just both in love with and so mad at this book at all times.

/breathes SORRY ABOUT THAT!!1 Anyway so I took all that and I was thinking how like. ok. they have some really basic but not great anger management, so let's assume that goes forward and helps a little. It's two years later, so two years more recovered from his trauma than he is in Pawn, and we do see that time has obviously helped him already even in Pawn. Staven dies because Lendel and Vanyel try to trick Evan Leshara and fail but since Vanyel isn't there, the stalemated settlement is still stalemated and Lendel has been forced to learn to stand down on it. So taking all that unresolved past and his current role how will he fit into this? Is my goal with Lendel's side of things.

sdfj I'm really sorry for rambling I just get excited lmfao.

Thank you! Honestly these things have been bothering me for years. I actually have another Vanyel-lives headcanon that involves the Companions NOT enabling his self destruction, and Tantras (or somebody, but Tran's my favorite) thumpi g Van on the head and yelling "It's a trap you idiot!" (because obviously if Leareth wanted him dead, he would have killed him long distance, instead he saved Savil for last, killed her in the most gruesome, obvious way he could, thereby ensuring Vanyel would go insane with grief and head north to take him on personally, so that Leareth could then seduce him to the dark side/steal his power/make him his sex slave/whatever.) so instead they send a couple of Heralds with mindspeech, fetching and farsight to scope out the situation, and they figure out a way to stop Leareth, because I said so and my babies deserve a happily ever after, dammit ;_____;

Basically, all my Van/Stef fic assumes this ^

A!A

"Convincing" is possibly the highest possible phrase for this sort of story, haha. Thank you! And thank you for the prompt -- it was definitely something new for me, but I'd just reread Brightly Burning and I ended up having a lot of fun writing this :)

This is getting better and better, nonny! I still love all the echoes with canon, especially the part where he simultaneously learns about gay people and realizes he's gay. (Oh, my sweet summer child....)

Looking forward to part 3 :D

OP

Oh wow, Lendel would have to bring up Bards... Van's reaction is so heartbreaking ;__; Much woob. I liked the part where Lendel recognised that he could have been in the same position - that passage was a touching character moment. ahahaha MAYBE THE CELIBACY indeed

I also love that you brought in the idea that Heralds are sinful and licentious! It had slipped my mind that that was a thing, but wow, it's so relevant here. I wonder if Van believes that and if it's affecting his behaviour at all. Lendel is tempting him away from his vows & his stable, empty little monastery world, into a life of chaos and sin, lol.

basically I love how you're developing the ship, via avoidance and introspection and increasing tension (where do people vanish to???) Thanks so much for this fill!

(OP here - I am super happy with the way you are playing this, so feel free to ignore my expounding: when I mentioned 'brainwashing' I thought that could include adopting cult-like beliefs/behaviours, loss of selfhood, rewriting of his own history eg. declaring he'd come here of his own volition to learn the One True Way, etc. I am really loving the ice and the desolation, and the deliberate attempts to close out everything from his old life - music, family. Now I'm wondering if he's seen Gala yet and if he misses riding...)

I'm not the anon you replied to, but I just want to say you have given me a whole new perspective on Tylendel and Vanyel/Tylendel. I have a looooot of headcanon about Stefen and Vanyel/Stefen, and while I enjoy schmoopy V/T, V/S has always been my flagship.

But I thoroughly subscribe to your headcanon now and I am enjoying the hell out of this.

Tylendel picked over his words as he finished up a letter to Jeanni. She was still buying time, and he could hardly blame her for doing so. It was a lot of pressure, and the settlement had been in stasis for long enough that she didn't need to rush into anything. He summarized his thoughts and the relevant issues as clearly as he could so that she'd have it for a reference, then stated the time in which a decision should be made—no more than one year, now, and that only if she felt like she needed that long to make a decisive statement. Personally, he felt that if she wanted to delay even half that long, it meant she shouldn't do it, but he couldn't say that despite the desire to. Instead, he just urged her to seek opinions from those around her and those who would want the best for her, and left her with contact info—letters to the collegium or the palace would reach him if addressed to Tylendel Frelennye, though it may need to wait until he were back from any mission; in the meantime, it would be best to send information care of his old friend and teacher Savil.

He was just signing the missive when Vanyel entered the room in a rush, shutting the door and locking it behind him, staring at Tylendel like his gray eyes were about to fall out of his shaven head.

Tylendel opened his mouth to ask what was wrong when Vanyel's feelings hit him. That strange wall was shattered. It reminded him of magic gone wrong, like Vanyel had made some kind of false shield that had rebounded on him finally, leaving him raw and burned inside. His distress made the air so thick that Tylendel thought there was a haze in it. It was almost impossible to pick out individual notes, especially with his own senses dulled as soon as he tried to focus, but there was rage in there, fear, guilt, and (strangely) some kind of deep hunger.

"This is a trap," Vanyel hissed at him, accusatory and hurt. "This is a trap! You're here to trap me."

"What—?" Tylendel stared at him, confused by his words and shocked by the intensity.

"Savil. You mentioned a Savil before. I have an aunt Savil. My father's sister." He was almost raving, chest heaving with his deep breaths, with the effort of keeping his voice low so nobody else would hear him through the thin walls. "Lord Withen talked to my aunt and had you sent here to tempt me. Father Brevec's in my father's pocket; that's why I'm here, that's why he could send his goddamn—the goddamn son of—what's my family name?!"

Tylendel opened his mouth and closed it. Vanyel was staring at him in utter panic now, and Tylendel couldn't even begin to know where to start with the sudden rant and the hysterical implications of conspiracy. Alarmed, trying to pick his words carefully, he said, "Savil's ... family name is Ashkevron...?"

"Yes... yes. Yes! I'm Vanyel Ashkevron!" Vanyel seemed almost about to start crying, tears welling up in his eyes, but instead he grew angry again, like he didn't know how to cry. Or, worse, didn't dare to. "And my father had me locked away here and you were sent to tempt me! To see if I'd sleep with you! And if it sounds like I did, if there's any sign, he'll tell my father... he'll tell my father and he'll never, ever approve of me..."

It was a jumbled, incoherent mess, and Tylendel raised both hands. "Hang on," he said. "Who was sent to tempt who?"

"You were! Because I'm—because my father knows, thinks I'm—" Vanyel shut up abruptly, trembling, clearly afraid—maybe for good reason—that someone was listening. His voice dropped to a whisper. "If I'm not reformed, Father won't call me home to be heir. If I'm not obedient. Manly. He'll never approve of me."

:Gala. Didn't Savil have a nephew who went missing?:

:Not missing. It's as the boy's saying.: Gala's usually-teasing voice had dropped all pretense at humor. :It was a few years ago, but don't you remember the letter? Savil cursing and insisting she was going to kill her brother?:

He did, now Gala mentioned the details. It hadn't been his business, and not the first time that Savil had grousingly threatened her brother, so he hadn't paid it too much mind. Vaguely, he recalled that Savil's brother had queried if he could have sent his son to be 'toughened up' by Savil, but had changed his mind when he'd heard about her training Tylendel. That there was no way she could help him become a man. Even secondhand, it had hurt a little.

:And she...said that he decided to send his son to a monastery instead. That's right. She couldn't intervene because he was sixteen and Withen was his guardian, so legally Withen's decisions had to stick. But that was years ago: Tylendel blinked.

Gala sent him some encouragement, wordless, and he steeled himself a little.

"How old are you?" Tylendel asked.

Vanyel stared at him, trembling. His voice came out in a whisper. "Eighteen."

Eighteen. Just a year younger than him. He thought of his father's old threats to cast him out and felt the worst sort of sympathy curl in him. "Then you don't need to stay here. You're legally an adult now. You can leave. You don't need your father's permission—"

"Not permission," Vanyel whispered. "Approval. I don't have anything else. I don't want anything else, not anymore. I can't play music. I don't have anywhere to go. Without the Ashkevron name I have no money either. No way to make it. If Father approves of me I'll at least have that. I hate it here. I hate it there. But I hate it everywhere, so at least I'd have that."

Gods. The boy seemed almost broken. This gambit to make a good obedient son out of Vanyel had done horrible damage to him, Tylendel thought. Faced with nothing, he'd become this cold, sharp-edged thing, barely a person, cutting down every possible emotional attachment to the people around him and showing obsequience for the approval of those above him.

"Alright," Tylendel said. He spoke calmly and quietly, like trying to calm a spooked horse, one hand toward him with an open palm. Vanyel was in a panic and the only way to get through to him would be to make the truth too clear to deny. "I wasn't sent here by Savil to trap you. Believe me, I didn't want an arrow to the leg either. That injury was real enough. You saw it, right? I didn't do that to myself."

"That's..." Vanyel hesitated.

"I know you won't believe me when I say that Savil would never do such a thing," Tylendel said evenly. "I know her, but you don't. However, she wouldn't. I'm not disagreeing that you might have people trapping or testing you, but Savil wasn't a part of it, and I wasn't either. If you're right and it is a trap? It's just that I showed up; my reputation as someone shay'a'chern preceded me, and the Father decided to test you like that."

Although the foreign word was obviously going over Vanyel's head, the meaning in context was clear enough. "That's too convenient," Vanyel said, almost silent. "Do you expect me to believe that?"

"I'm a Herald," Tylendel said. "I would never, ever, ever take advantage of someone. I want you to believe that. Surely you know enough about Heralds to know that I'd never let myself be used to harm an innocent. Savil, too, is a famous Herald. Our job, our calling is to protect people who need to be protected. To help the helpless." He tried to project his earnestness, meeting Vanyel's eyes and not looking away, and could tell that trying to explain how abhorrent that would be to a Herald meant nothing to Vanyel. He tried taking another tack. "Besides, I do prefer men. I don't have anything against people like me. Obviously! Why would I want to trap anyone else into getting found out? Why would I want anyone to be punished for that?"

Vanyel's eyes widened; Tylendel saw that line of reasoning sink home with a dawning understanding and pain. For a moment, he thought he had him.

And then Vanyel's shoulders slumped completely. On the one hand, the fight had gone out of him. On the other hand, the feeling that was welling from him—equal parts despair and that hunger again—had become nearly overwhelming.

"It doesn't matter," Vanyel breathed. "It doesn't matter whether you meant to be involved or not. I don't care... I need Father's approval. I have nothing else in life except the Father's approval."

It was chilling. Tylendel realized impulsively that Vanyel was making no distinction between Father Brevec or his own father any more. That, in some way, it had become a strange, enormous mass of simply needing to be obedient to authority.

He was broken. Completely.

"If you'll excuse me," Vanyel whispered. Behind himself, he unlatched the door again. "I need to sleep in the library tonight. You leave tomorrow, and then everything will be normal again, and they'll know I didn't give in."

Before Tylendel could protest again, he was gone.

***

So cold.

Vanyel hadn't brought a blanket with him to the library. Hadn't thought about anything except getting out of that room. He found a nook in the library and curled up as tightly as he could, holding his own knees, dropping his head to them and trying to contain what little warmth he had left in his body. Slowly, almost against his will, one of his hands rose to rub against the minuscule spikes of hair on his scalp, sharp and abrasive against his palm, not how it should be. He remembered how proud he'd been of his hair, long and elegant. His mother's ladies would play with it, twist it into different styles. He wondered how it would feel to have someone else do it instead, someone he wanted to play with it.

It doesn't matter, he tried to tell himself, bitter, but he couldn't quite bring himself back the place where he felt that way. It was missing, that spot where being miserable almost made him secure, where he could just stop thinking and feeling and exist moment to moment in a thick shroud of his own hatred.

Breathing was hard. Toward the end, talking to that Herald, he'd been afraid of being overheard, but also had simply been unable to get words out with any strength. His throat had closed like it was going to choke him. Everything inside him had felt sharp, like he was going to cut himself open on his own feelings.

And he'd wanted. That was the worst possible scenario, wanting things again. He'd wanted Tylendel to promise that he hadn't tried to trap him. He'd wanted Tylendel to reach out to him. When the Herald had done both those things, he'd wanted assurance that it would be okay. That everything would be fine now. That he could have something other than this life of constant vigilance and misery.

That wasn't something he could have.

When he was here, he had nothing to do except what he was told. He had nothing to do but wait for his performances of obedience to make him acceptable. He didn't have to want anything, and he didn't have to get hurt. It wasn't like before, in Forst Reach, where he constantly wanted to be acknowledged, wanted people to know he was smart, capable, had his own way of doing things, talented. Where he wanted to have his own personality and talents mean something, rather than just be something for them to scorn him for. He'd desperately wanted to be a Bard. To fight his own way. To learn the things that interested him. For who he was to be more than simply his father's son.

And now he knew: nothing he could have done would have helped that.

Because what he was good at, what he liked, was what made him so abhorrent to his family. To everyone except his sister—what was her name? He couldn't remember. But to his mother, it made him a pet. To his father, it made him fey. It didn't matter that he'd never even realized that was possible, that his treatment had started long before he were capable of wanting another man. It didn't matter that he'd never once taken action to sin with boys, as the other novices had put it.

All that mattered was that he wasn't what his father wanted.

He wanted to cry, but couldn't. He wanted to scream, but couldn't. He wanted—

Those beautiful brown eyes, staring at him with genuine, true concern. A hand outstretched towards him; meant to be appeal, but looking too much like an invitation. A face Vanyel had finally been able to find beautiful, after so many years of looking at the wrong faces and not being able to feel anything at all.

All the time that he'd been irritated about sharing space with Herald Tylendel, had that irritation, that awareness been as much desire as it had been fear? Without knowing a thing, without being able to put a word to it, had he wanted the Herald—for his looks, his body, that firm thigh under his hand when he'd bound his injury? Or, worse, for his freedom, his ability to make choices that even the queen would listen to, to ride wherever he wanted and be accepted for who he was and how he was by everyone who met him, regardless of what they felt about him?

But desire was the enemy. Desire was a fearful, wrong thing which would get rid of the ice if he let himself feel it. It wouldn't give him anything; it'd just make him want things he couldn't have, hurting for no good reason.

If I can just endure this I'll get my father's approval. If I can just endure this I'll get my father's approval. If I can just endure this I'll get my father's approval. If I can just endure this I'll get my father's approval. If I can just endure this I'll get my father's approval. If I can just endure this I'll get my father's approval. If I can just endure this I'll get my father's approval.

He repeated it like a prayer, a mantra to keep himself going, to keep himself centered, to the point that words stopped having any meaning. Eventually, it relaxed him. Eventually, he began to drift to sleep, and lose hold of the words, and instead he thought:

Then what?

What's for me there?

Will it mean something?

Will I begin to live again?

I don't even want to.

A!A:

Oho! I don't think I hit all of them, alas, but as I revise the full draft I do see a few of those in here. :> I hope they work for you! I'm really enjoying writing it and I'm so so so glad you're enjoying it so far!

Ahh, thank you so much! I've been spending some time with the parallels (and how Stef is written with 'Lendel's karma and being a counterbalance to the mistakes of 'Lendel's life -- No family at all, bears p. much the same name as Tylendel's twin, has to live through something similar when Vanyel begins acting toward him as 'Lendel had to Vanyel for similar reasons, has to live on after Vanyel's death for the sake of the greater good even though Stef isn't a Herald, because Lendel should have lived for the greater good instead of for personal things...) and I'm just so excited lately about all these messy things in Lendel as a result sob. I'm really really happy I could contribute!

A!A: Thank you so much!! I'm glad that worked for you. Precious Vanyel. He really had no idea...

Poor Vanyel. SUCH woob; and Lendel didn't even know. sadfj I'm really glad you enjoyed that line; I admit I'm having a lot of fun writing Gala, who we never got to see anywhere near enough of.

'Lendel is an evil tempter, luring him into his too-appealing trap...

I'm so glad you're enjoying this! Thank you so much for sticking with me on this, more coming soon!

Good God. This is fantastic!

Your broken!Vanyel is painful and awesome to read. :) I'm in all sorts of love with where this is going.

DA

It's so fucked up that Stef is living in penitence for something he doesn't know he did. I have a real need to dig into that, in fact.

Stef had come to look forward to visiting Vanyel in a way he couldn't define. Exhausting though his efforts were, there was something dreamlike, almost indulgent about singing to the Lost One in his hidden cell. He could sing what he liked; Vanyel didn't mind his tastes. He'd begun from the old songs, things he thought Vanyel would be familiar with from childhood, and had moved on to modern variants, even some of his own songs. Nothing about the ongoing war.

He's changing, Stef thought, as their eyes caught in the low candlelight. More focused. I almost think he's glad to see me. They'd even talked a little last time; questions about Vanyel's childhood passion for music met only with confusion and silence, but simple technicalities - which version of Windrider Unchained he preferred, whether he knew the Kettlesmith variant - were allowed.

There were few greetings between them. Even the eye contact was something of a novelty. "Any requests?" he asked, as always, fumbling his lute from its case. Not his favourite twelve-stringed gittern today, but he had his reasons for that.

Vanyel shook his head - as always - and then hesitated. "I liked the one you sang yesterday about Sunsinger and Shadowdancer."

Stef decided not to tell him that he'd not been there in two days. He'd gathered that Vanyel wasn't best aware of time - and who would be, in this silent hole? Vanyel hardly seemed uncomfortable with his surroundings, but the Work Room made Stef feel stifled by silence on every side; the ceiling was as low as you'd find in a slum tenement, not far over Vanyel's head, and all six faces of the room were formed from thick stone. "You flatter me," he replied instead. "I wrote that one."

Vanyel's eyes widened. "I shouldn't be surprised. It fits your range so perfectly." He frowned, as he was wont to when trying to remember things. "Mine was lower, back then. I remember...after my voice broke, I couldn't sing Herald Nasha's Lament any more."

"That happened to Medren," Stef grinned. "He came up with a variant that works for him - I'll try to remember where it starts -"

"I don't sing," and Vanyel's voice wavered. "It's been years since..." He curled his hands, and Stefen wondered at a pain that drove away thought, drove away song. He always recognised pain - he didn't know whether it was part of his Gift, or due to years of carefully watching Berte for signals, but no one could hide it from him. There was enough of it in the world that he'd long ago grown hard to it; if he'd paid heed to every little ache and scrape, there'd be none of him left. There's a reason I concealed this Gift for years, and only let it show once I was sure I'd be well repaid for it. Without the prospect of reward, not even Breda's headaches had particularly concerned him.

But he couldn't think of leaving Vanyel in pain.

I'm spending too much time around Heralds. Either that, or Shavri's guilt is getting to me. Stefen played the opening notes of the song Vanyel had requested - the one he was more often been told was too gloomy for good company - and let his Gift flow through the music. It is helping him. I see more and more of him every time I come in here. It's getting easier to reach his pain. And hells, if I can give him even a moment of peace and enjoyment - doesn't he deserve that, after so many lost years? That's not pity, exactly. I spent plenty of years struggling and suffering too. That's when music first came to matter so much to me.

As the songs went by, he saw the tension drain out of Vanyel's posture. I feel like I'm tuning him, every time. Turning a peg, listening out until he reaches the right key - the place where he and the music understand each other. That first time, he fought me the whole way, but now...he's yearning to escape from pain.

At the end of the song, Stef set his fingers against the catgut lute-strings to still them. Enough of me indulging myself. It's about time he indulged me instead. "I had an idea," he said, and he set his lute on the table between them. "When did you last play?"

Vanyel was silent so long that Stef wasn't sure he'd understood the question. "I...my memory's not good. I tried. When I came home. It hurt," and he flinched.

Stef surpressed a shiver at the odd sense of loss in Vanyel's voice. He tapped the lute's belly gently. "You said you used to love music." You still do, he added to himself. "I won't let it hurt you - I'll sing while you play. We can take it slowly. I brought a few music books," and he gestured to the case he'd set on the floor.

"I'm not sure I remember," said Vanyel slowly.

"Try her. Your fingers do." I'm sure you can do this. I'm quite sure.

Vanyel glanced at his hands as if they'd done him some wrong. He took the lute with some hesitance, but his fingers immediately found the right grip. He plucked a note - then a scale, which Stefen followed with his voice, an octave below.

No pain. I promised. I'm well acquainted with this prison, and I'm handing you its key.

Stef reached into his case, and pulled out a student book he'd pilfered from the library. "Want to warm up on the Midsummer March?"

"I haven't played that since I was a child," he replied, but his hands shaped the first note unerringly, with barely a glance at the book in Stefen's hands. Every beginner learned it. Muscle memory, Stef thought. Your hands and your ears remember, even if you don't consciously know it.

He sang slowly as Vanyel's long fingers made their hesitant way through the song. As Stef held the last note, Vanyel flicked at the strings in frustration. "Feels like starting from nothing," he muttered in frustration.

"Beats not starting," Stef told him. "You love music." That, he wouldn't let Vanyel deny any more, but his curiosity about the puzzle was eating him alive. "Whyever did you let it go?"

"I...didn't care any more. It doesn't matter. Nothing else matters," and Stefen sensed the pain shift inside of him. The tension returning.

"Nothing else except what?" he asked.

"Krebain," Vanyel breathed. "There is only him."

"Krebain?" Stef inquired.

A look of wild longing crossed Vanyel's face, and Stefen felt that instinct turn inside him. The word - the name - pulling him from the escape Stef had crafted as if it were a trap noose. He sensed pain wrack through Vanyel, and his lips curled as if he craved it. Stef seized his lute and sang the first line that came into his empty head. "Nothing can I hold of you but thought -"

Vanyel's eyes brightened, and he held his head in his hands. Stefen blinked, feeling dizzy as if he were drunk. Sparks seemed to circle Vanyel's hands, his hair. Everything was so bright and warm. Stef stared even as he sang, mesmerised by the smoke that clouded his eyes. Was this how magic felt, close at hand?

No, he noted, his vision fading. The mattress is on fire.

He tried to scream but the air was thick as a marsh. The lack of air. He dropped to his knees, and grabbed Vanyel's sleeve with both hands. "Get down here," he choked, and tried to pull him toward the door. Vanyel stumbled into him. They'd never touched before. It seared him, like the firelight burning patterns against his eyes - panic, yearning. Horror. Stef fell on his back on the ground as Vanyel scrambled away from him.

He choked, and somehow had the wits to grab his lute as he slid himself over the floor, gasping breaths of air an inch from the stone. He hammered at the foot of the door, tried to lever himself up to grasp the handle, but his arms were damp twigs and his lungs were leaden weights. Light bloomed in his eyes, and as it faded, he felt his hands turn numb.

Stefen rubbed his eyes, and his knuckles came away black with smoke. He felt like there was a lump of coal stuck in his windpipe. He tried to stretch. Someone had piled a heavy blanket over him. Several heavy blankets. He wriggled, pins and needles afflicting his limbs. "Don't, Bard," Savil cautioned. "I assure you, you need more rest."

"Where's Vanyel?" he asked.

"In my bedroom. I built him some shielding that ought to last the next few hours."

He rubbed his eyes and tried to look at her. She sat on a low table beside the settee that Stefen was stretched out on. The sleeves of her Whites were dotted with black-edged holes, and her frown was drawn in sharp, deep lines. His lute, Stef was relieved to see was beside her. Two of the strings were missing but if he was lucky, the rest of it might still be hale."Shielding?" he queried, and thought of what he'd read of mages. "That's why you shut him up in the Work Room?"

"He's not 'shut up'," she replied sharply. "He comes and goes as he likes. But yes, he spends his time there because the permanent shields on the Work Room are a great help in keeping him and the rest of us from harm. It's usually the safest place he could be when he loses control of his Gifts," and her face sagged with exhaustion. "Last time he tried sleeping somewhere else, he had a nightmare that woke every Gifted person in Haven."

"I remember that," Stefen breathed. He and Medren had both woken up wild and screaming, and had only the next morning learned that every other Gifted Bardic apprentice had done the same - and so had the Heraldic trainees. "That was Vanyel?"

"Yes, and he doesn't want that to happen again." Savil sighed. "He's very sorry he hurt you."

"He didn't hurt me," snapped Stefen. "He'd never hurt me." She gaped at him in disbelief, and he wondered how he could be so certain. Logic presented itself easily enough. "He's a powerful mage - if he tried to hurt me, I should think he'd do a lot better than that."

Savil shook her head darkly. "I knew we were only putting him through this again," and her eyes shone as if tears of exhaustion were lurking behind her lashes. "We tried to free him from the pain after Yfandes first brought him home. I was sure his control was improving, and then one day it snapped back. I told you not to hope, and you still thought a few songs would cure all his ills? His mind is a trap, Bard."

"Whatever do you mean?" he asked in confusion. "What's wrong with his mind? What happened to him?"

"Stefen," and she trembled as she spoke. "As best as I know, Vanyel was kept as a slave for fifteen years. His mind was controlled and he was tortured, both physically and with magecraft. I removed the - the magical chain that his captor had used to control him," and her voice broke over the memory. "Van was conditioned to believe he didn't own his own mind, his own body. I thought we could heal him, until we realised his captor had planted a trap inside his deepest magical shields. We can't reach there - the trap is fed by Van's own power, and he's very, very powerful. He's completely impervious to magic, Healing or Mindhealing, to Mindspeech, even to Empathy. Even his own Companion can't communicate with him except when they touch. I let you try this damnfoolery because the Bardic Gift is the only thing he's not shielded against. And now I regret that," she thundered.

Stefen fought the urge to hide under his blankets. He'd had no idea how far beyond his depth he'd been trying to reach. He couldn't even imagine - the Lost One kept chained - by the hand, by the ankle? Around his neck? Every image was crushing, discarded in horror. He'd always thought of the Lost One as, well, lost, wandering through twisted forests, or in a maze of canyons cutting deep below wasteland. Not chained in some dark place and tortured as the years passed by.

"There's nothing I can do but keep him stable," Savil continued. "I've come to accept that. My one hope was that eventually he'd regain the control he needed to break the cycle, because I can't do that for him. We tried to bolster his magical abilities - I couldn't link to him through the shield, but I did try to build a connection to the Palace node. He was hurting - he always said he hurt - and the more power I tried to give him, the more it hurt," and she curled her eyes closed. "It's - like seeing a knife twisting deep in his reserves. It uses his own magic to secrete a kind of energy he can't handle. His torturer left it there to cause Vanyel pain whenever he wasn't nearby - so he wouldn't be capable of using his own power to seek a way out of captivity. So he'd always be a slave no matter how far away his torturer had gone. Now it hurts him even to try to use his Gifts - he can't unmake the trap and let us inside."

But I was so close, Stef thought, as he watched her sink into despair. I was so near to handing him control, and then he focused on - "Krebain," he murmured.

Savil looked at him sharply. "How do you know that name?"

"He told me," Stef breathed. "He tried to let me inside the trap."

She was right. I shouldn't have imagined my ditties could cure Vanyel. Only Vanyel can cure Vanyel.

He looked up, and held her eyes. "He's trying to heal himself."

OP

ohhhh my god. Van's thought process all through this is so. well. done. All that paranoia and self-hate and self-denial because he's so afraid he is of wanting Lendel, or anything except what he's been used to. The way he's lost parts of his life. He's so beaten down, how is Lendel going to get through to him? I can't wait to see all of this resolved.

There was enough of it in the world that he'd long ago grown hard to it; if he'd paid heed to every little ache and scrape, there'd be none of him left. Stef :( I love his pov here, how he just accepts the shitty things that happened to him, but doesn't accept them happening to Vanyel.

And poor Vanyel. You just keep escalating the torment, but the fact he even wants to try to get better instead of wallowing in his misery is just. My god this is perfect and I need to lie down.

A!A you are my favourite writer of woobie misery right now and I love you to bits. Vanyel's angst is so delicious, I can't even tell you in real words. I love every second of it, so much, how he's just trapped in his own mind and hates himself so much, too much to consider any possibility but the grimmest of them all. Poor poor poor Vanyel, and poor confused Tylendel. My money now is on him heading home and Savil sending a rescue team once she hears from him what's happened to Van.

In short - keep it coming, A!A, you are doing the Gods' work.

Ahhhh this part is brilliant! Your Stef voice & POV is really solid and enjoyable. The idea that starting to teach Van to play again is what triggered things to go haywire, but also start to indicate that things are trying to change, was really compelling. I'm really looking forward to more!

Threaded | Top-Level Comments Only

Page 12 of 22

21 Days of Valdemar!

Re: FILL: Tylendel/Vanyel - Orders - 1/?

Re: FILL: Tylendel/Vanyel - Orders - 1/?

Re: FILL: Tylendel/Vanyel - Orders - 2/?

Re: FILL: Nyara post-Mage Winds gen - "Stable"

Re: FILL: "Beloved" - Lavan/Kalira, mind-linked masturbation

Re: Fill, 3/? Vanyel, gen, Magic's Price Fix-It

Re: FILL: Tylendel/Vanyel - Orders - 2/?

Re: Fill, 3/? Vanyel, gen, Magic's Price Fix-It

Re: FILL: "Beloved" - Lavan/Kalira, mind-linked masturbation

Re: FILL: Tylendel/Vanyel - Orders - 2/?

Re: FILL: Tylendel/Vanyel - Orders - 2/?

Re: FILL: Tylendel/Vanyel - Orders - 1/?

Re: FILL: Tylendel/Vanyel - Orders - 2/?

FILL: Tylendel/Vanyel - Orders - 3/?

Re: FILL: Tylendel/Vanyel - Orders - 1/?

Re: FILL: Tylendel/Vanyel - Orders - 2/?

Re: FILL: Tylendel/Vanyel - Orders - 2/?

Re: FILL: Tylendel/Vanyel - Orders - 2/?

Re: FILL: Tylendel/Vanyel - Orders - 3/?

Re: FILL: Tylendel/Vanyel - Orders - 2/?

4/?

Re: FILL: Tylendel/Vanyel - Orders - 3/?

Re: 4/?

Re: FILL: Tylendel/Vanyel - Orders - 3/?

Re: 4/?