Thank you for writing for me! My requests this year are two fairytales I'm curious about and a book series I love, so I’m very much looking forward to seeing what you do with them.

The contents of this letter are:


There's a lot here (this gets longer every year!), so take or leave whatever you like, DNWs aside. Optional details are optional! If you too are an inveterate over-researcher, however, I also have four previous yuletide letters, I’m the magpie said on Ao3, and my fic reading account is hollowmen.

OPT-INS:

• Treats are very welcome!


• Interactive fiction is too; I don’t know how suitable these fandoms are for it (the fairytales, possibly?), but if something strikes you, please have at. I prefer choice-based to parser options, generally.


• Crossovers and fusions with other folk-or-fairytales are also welcome for the fairytale fandoms.

---

1. YES, I'd like these things!

1. in relationships: Mutual pining! Trust issues. Careful or guarded people learning how to let someone in. Quiet, steady devotion and constancy have my heart, as do people being gentle and patient with each other. Deep friendships. Friends to lovers. Hand-holding. Complex relationships that aren't easily set to rights, that need honesty, negotiation, forgiveness and time to heal. Protectiveness. Yearning. Romantic relationships between equals who respect each other's competence.


2. in sexual tension: Sharp hunger and longing. Drawn-out teasing. Suspense. Touch of all kinds, careful or uncertain or reverent or rough or confident and sure. Intense awareness of the other person, of their nearness; being super affected by them. Major top/bottom or D/s dynamics, especially the unbearably soft kind. Making out. First kisses. Softness and vulnerability. Being held. Being held down (or still, or up against walls). Shifting, uncertain power dynamics, where nobody is entirely sure who has the upper hand, or it could change any second. Surrender. Loaded conversations. Skin hunger.


3. in characters: Confident, competent, dangerous people. Clever, twisty-minded schemers. Manipulative liars who are always guarded, always pretending, until they feel safe enough to open up. Actually intelligent protagonists who figure things out quickly and come to logical conclusions. Soft bois.


4. as plot or narrative: Secret identity hijinks and reveals! Quiet emotional realisations. Intrigue, twisty schemes, betrayal and lying to survive. Living with grief as it mellows. Comfort, recovery, trust and healing from trauma. AUs, crackfic taken seriously, tropes (and I mean AUs and tropes: time loops, fix-its, forced marriages, modern settings, soulmates, Hogwarts, uni fic, marriages of convenience, fake dating, amnesia, canon divergence—love 'em).


5. in writing: Subtext and a lot of space for the reader to infer, rather than being told. Worldbuilding! Clever narrative structures. Second and third person POVs (I don't actually mind first person, but I am also afflicted by the standard fanfic flinch related to it. Always happy to be convinced otherwise, though).

(back to top)

---

2. NOPE (DNWs)

1. bad endings, unhappy endings. Endings where things aren't fully resolved but are still hopeful are fine.


2. inescapable suffering. Mindbreak. Cruelty for the sake of cruelty, humiliation without restoration or repair, unresolved misery without eventual hope or help (I avoid the whump tag for a reason). I am, however, comfortable with any level of grief and the difficulties of recovery, fine with difficult relationships if there's escape or at least the hope of change, and also fine with some trauma shit if it's matched by comfort, soothing or support (if it's particularly harrowing, I'd also prefer a warning).


3. other general nopes: porn without plot. Infidelity. Non-con. Rape as wallpaper or villain backstory. Being in the head/narrative POV of a predatory character who harms others with no regrets, empathy or compassion.


4. This isn't a DNW, but it is a warning: I'm not the easiest person to write lengthy, explicitly detailed sex for. I always prefer feelings and sexual tension to no-holds-barred rawing, and prefer sex teased at or sparingly used for character, atmosphere and relational development, so a play-by-play of highly detailed fucking is going to be pretty hit-or-miss for me (in a puzzled greysexual rather than a nope kind of way). This isn't a DNW at all, though, and if it makes you happy to write it or you feel your fic needs it, please do! This is more just a heads-up that if you feature the fic equivalent of zoomed-in genital shots of people banging, I'll probably steer politely away from mentioning them in my comments.

(back to top)

---

A. The She-Bear

This fairytale. Oh man, this fairytale. It's the most absurd, delightful nonsense that also happens to be a story about finding safety and trust in the aftermath of betrayal.

1. What is it?

This is a variant of the Princess In Disguise From Her Incestuous Father fairytale, except instead of running away and disguising herself in catskins, rabbitskins, donkeyskins, a cap o'rushes or a moss coat, she turns into a bear. A full-on terrifying bear. Who then does housework and roasts a chicken.

It also contains the most ridiculous, melodramatic prince in the history of princes, who (a) is first terrified nigh to death of the bear, and then (b) takes it home as a pet, and then (c) pines so much when he discovers she's a person that he falls ill and takes to his bed until his mother begs him to tell her what he wants (he wants the bear to do housework). He also utters sentences like "O candle of love, who art enclosed within this hairy lanthorn! Wherefore all this trifling?"

God I love this fairytale.

2. What do I love about it?

The utter absurdity, particularly emphasised by Giambattista Basile's writing ("may I have my head cut off like a mackerel!"). The ridiculous prince. His patient but dubious mother. The fact that the princess turns into a proper bear—none of this Fucking Around With A Weird Coat nonsense, she's an eight foot tall fuck-off grizzly bear with claws. And the part where this story is, at heart, about how someone gets to a point where she feels safe enough to allow herself to be seen and known in the aftermath of trauma and betrayal.

3. Or in more detail:

a. Preziosa gets to become an actual fuck-off bear. This feels so different to other Princess In Disguise fairytales because she becomes something so inherently powerful and dangerous, so inhuman, that she's safe from both discovery and harm in a way the other variants can't be. Nobody can make a big fuck-off bear do anything if it doesn't want to do it.

What this means, though, is that all Preziosa’s actions—escaping, following the prince home, participating in his housework schemes, going home with him again, becoming human at the end? They're choices. She’s in control of who gets access to her vulnerability, her real self. She gets to choose what she wants to do and when she wants to do it, and unlike her original environment, she gets to take her time making her decision, and she gets to say no (see: however long the prince spends begging and languishing away, to absolutely no avail). It’s the Consent And Boundaries equivalent of a power fantasy, and I am 100% Here for it.



b. The Prince of Running-Water (This Guy) in all his dramatically wailing, loudly emotional glory. Look, princes in these variants are often cardboard ciphers that Do Things For Plot Reasons, and I never quite get a sense of them as actual people with feelings. This guy? This guy is all feelings, all the time. He's a flailing emotional mess. I love it. No heroic alpha male In Charge Of This Situation for him; no bear-kicking, either (unlike the prince in the other variant that involves a bear).

Instead This Guy is going around being (understandably) terrified of bears but also taking one home with him when he realises he can pat it, pitching bratty dramatic fits and pining himself sick when the person he saw (briefly! from a distance!) refuses to re-emerge, staggering off his sickbed to go retrieve his bear from the woods, coming up with weird housework-related schemes to justify the bear being in his room, and having heartfelt conversations with his mum. And also with the bear. Just—this guy. Melodramatic Swooning Feelings Boi. Talks a lot, begs a delightful amount; is surprisingly polite for being so spoilt. He’s so absurdly human.

c. The prince's "I'm Supportive, But I'm Also Quite Concerned" mother. I actually love that we get a cameo from the queen, partly because I think she’s awesome, but also because it gives us a glimpse of the environment that shaped the prince (c.f. Preziosa's home life). I kind of see the queen as the Main Monarch; she's the prince's working mum and comes across as matter-of-fact and practical, and very patient with—if dubious about—her son's shenanigans (she's probably had to deal with an unholy amount over the years). I love that their interactions not only show us their secure-attachment relationship but also tell us why the prince is a bit of a brat (probably one who's used to Women Making The Decisions, though). I also think she serves as a kind of parental foil to Preziosa's relationship with her father, in direct contrast to the way that his non-interactions with Preziosa suggest he doesn't care about her wants, or see her as a person with agency at all.

4. Prompts and questions:

a. Princess In Disguise fairytales are inherently stories about trauma and their aftermath, even at their most lighthearted, whether or not the incest takes place. They tell the story of a person who is relationally betrayed, and who—in a different environment, with different people, as a different person—eventually reaches a point where she allows herself to be seen and known again, instead of hiding everything that identifies her as human, let alone her actual identity. I’m curious about how she gets there! What allows her to feel safe enough to drop some extremely effective defenses? What allows her to trust this new suitor with who she is, after the disaster of the previous suitor?

b. YMMV, but I highly doubt that the piece of wood slipping out of Preziosa's mouth at the end—while she's kissing the prince, while the queen is there to witness it—is an accident ("I know not how it was", narrates Basile, wink wink, etc). Why is she choosing now? She was clearly unconvinced or afraid enough to remain a bear, earlier, despite all the woe and wailing; when did she decide debearing was the right move? (Come to that, was the first time the prince saw her in human form an accident, or deliberate?)

c. If being a bear keeps her safe from both discovery and harm, is she afraid of being human? Or does she miss it? How often does she drop her disguise, during canon? (Eating would presumably be hard with a piece of wood in your mouth.) Trust and safety also take a while to learn; post-canon, does she bear up whenever she feels scared or defensive?

d. What the hell kind of a plan is I Would Like my Pet Bear To Make My Bed, Please? What's the prince trying to do? Why won't he explain himself, even to his mother? Is he trying to protect Preziosa's secret or keep her safe (from the servants? From the neighbouring king? From spies in the court?), or is he being possessive so nobody else will try to win her, or is magic illegal in their kingdom? Or is he doubting whether what he saw was real?

e. Have I been Very Subtly suggesting this whole time that the prince is a bit of a whiny bottom? Yes. Absolutely. Please go there. (Also happy for alternative interpretations, however!)

f.I'm not personally a huge fan of love at first sight narratives. Sure, princes are prone to taking exactly one look at a beautiful woman from a distance before falling in love, but I Would Like More Substance, Please. If you don't genuinely know someone, flaws and fears and joys and annoyances and all, do you really love them or just your idea of them? Also, frankly, given that Preziosa hid in the first place because of marital decisions her father made based on her beauty, the prince making a similar snap judgement based off seeing her beauty once seems... like a pretty shit echo.

5. Specific preferences for this fandom:

a. AUs, tropes, what-ifs, crackfic taken seriously and all settings are perfectly fine! Ditto interpretations. Wanna write a post-canon character study, a retelling of the whole thing, or really lean into the absurdity or trauma recovery or romance? What about soulmates? Modern AUs? Time travel? Arranged marriage AUs? Do it! Feel free to use whatever names and descriptions you want, too; the princess doesn't have to be blonde or Preziosa or a princess, and the kingdoms don't have to sound like mythical hardware store aisles. Or even be kingdoms. Hell, make them hardware store aisles instead, if you like. Folktales are infinitely adaptable like that; that's the joy of them.

b. Preziosa's agency can certainly be read in more complicated ways, since the prince does—unintentionally or otherwise—basically hold himself hostage to get her to de-bear. I am Not A Fan of that kind of manipulation, especially when it's deliberate. This isn't a DNW, however, because I'm happy for it to be addressed or depicted—or completely ignored!—whichever, as long as it's not framed as a positive relational move.

c. DNWs: please no bestiality, canonical bear-kissing aside. I'm also uninterested in being shown any incest. Mentions and general vibes are okay, given canon, and I’m perfectly fine with any discussion or depiction of traumatic emotional after-effects, but I don’t want to see it happening (yes, I know incest doesn’t actually happen in the She-Bear, but given that fairytales are infinitely variable, best to be clear which variations I’m not okay with).

(back to top)

---

B. The Six Swans

1. What is it?

At its simplest, the Six Swans is a fairytale where six brothers are turned into swans by their wicked stepmother, and their sister voluntarily undergoes years of muteness and some very painful fibre arts to get them back. During those years, though, a king decides he'll take her home and marry her because she's beautiful, she gives birth three times, and her mother-in-law takes away her babies and accuses her of eating them. She then barely manages to transform her brothers back just as she's about to be burned at the stake, which leaves her youngest brother stuck with a swan's wing instead of a left arm. (She does get her voice and her children back at the end, though.)

Sources: Grimms | Lang | Andersen | Other Related

2. What's interesting about it?

Two things stick with me the most: the sister's fierce determination to remain voiceless and therefore unable to save herself in the face of all provocations, and the way the youngest brother gets left as neither fish nor fowl, even after the happy ending. Both characters are intriguing, which is why I didn't choose one to request! I'm happy to read about either or both.

I'm also happy to read more difficult or uncomfortable interpretations of this fairytale as well as kinder, gentler ones. As with the best folklore, there are a lot of weird, hard and unsettling elements here that can be taken in any direction, dark and dubious or warm and hopeful or some mix of both (this is one of my favourite things about fairytales). See the fandom-specific preferences for the edges of this.

3. Talk to me about the sister:

Look, I am extremely curious about her internal life during the events of this fairytale. We almost never hear what she's thinking or feeling; she's locked herself down very tightly, right up until it's safe for her to speak again, but there’s clearly a lot going on for her. I have questions.

About the voluntary muteness:

a. is that a ban on communicating or just on speaking (which are two quite different things)? I’m particularly fascinated by the interpretation where it’s no communication allowed (which the fairytale seems to suggest, given that she can’t defend herself against her mother-in-law). As Terri Windling points out, it reflects real-world choices to protect others in abusive situations, which is a really interesting space to explore—but I’m not against options where she figures out ways around it, too (interpretive dance? Charades? Why is writing not an option? If she does communicate in other ways, though, do people hear her?).

b. What kind of person does she have to be to stay silent, despite knowing that speaking could save her (from being burned to death, from being accused of eating her children, possibly even from being married at all)? To me, it smacks of an iron fucking will, a fierce single-minded determination that keeps her choosing, again and again, to keep herself voiceless–but I’d also be curious about other interpretations! What keeps her going? How much of a struggle is it? Does she barely avoid speaking every time someone asks her to pass the salt? Does she imagine conversations or arguments with her absent brothers, her husband, the people around her?

About those shirts:

a. Six years and three babies seems like… a long time to make six shirts in, even if we follow Hans Christian Andersen, who apparently Demands Suffering and insists that she picks, spins and weaves six whole shirts out of stinging nettles, barehanded. Why does it take years? Has she fucked up shirts before? Is there a nettle-shirt quality control? Is she even good at weaving? I could see a lot of self-blame and frustration in this–what's it like, knowing that so much depends on your speed at this thing that probably has long wait periods built into it (e.g. retting)?

About her relationships:

a. What does she think about her husband, before and/or after he decides he's going to marry her? Was consent actually involved in that marriage–and if so, how? Does she even like him (when she says "dear husband" at the end, does she mean it)? Does he make an effort to know her despite her silence? Once she can speak again, post-story, what changes in their relationship? I’m a shipper at heart so I’d love a love story to emerge under these complicated circumstances, but I’m also not against a story of captivity, grim determination and relational survival, as long as she ends up happy or hopeful at the end, whether it’s with or without the king.

b. There’s a lot of interaction and affection between the siblings in Andersen’s version, which is pretty neat, but she’s sacrificing a lot of autonomy for her brothers. She might love them, but does she also resent them? Does she see them again during these years of shirtmaking? Would she rather be a swan and fly off with them, if she could? (Does she just have a gaggle of swans following her about the castle?)

c. This fucking poem. It's a very different interpretation of choice and voice and sacrifice; I am simultaneously thrilled and horrified by it (and everything it doesn't say). Want to go in this direction? Have at. (Please do warn for character deaths, though.)

4. Tell me about the brother:

a. Look, half of what makes him such a compelling, maybe-tragic figure is the part where he’s trapped as neither bird nor beast after the happy ending, altered in a way that means he’s never going to quite belong in either world. There’s grief and a loss of identity built directly into that kind of change, and perhaps even a sense of being broken—of being deformed, of being a mistake. It feels to me like it mirrors the process of adjusting to a new disability, especially one that involves losing your old self and life—especially if you loved your old self and life. What would it look like for him to come to terms with it, if ever?

b. He’s been a swan for years. Did he prefer the freedom of it to being human, or did he miss being human—or both at once? How often were he and his brothers human during this? The Grimms and Lang versions have them napping at a robbers’ den and Andersen has a bit where they’re crossing a sea and can only land on a tiny rock overnight; did they often have problems finding places to sleep, or things to eat? What did he and his brothers even do during this time?

c. I’d love a story where he fell in love with someone while a swan, and then has to go find them after his botched transformation (identity shenanigans are my fave!). Are they human? Are they a swan? Are they a stranded selkie, a mermaid, one of the twelve dancing princesses or a swan maiden? Is this Five Ways The Youngest Swan Brother Could Have Fallen In Love, And One Time He Actually Did?

d. Fucking swans, man. They're like geese. Give me obnoxious geese brothers, flapping around their sister and getting in the way, trying to help with the shirtmaking and pecking at the king, hissing at the mother-in-law and trying their best not to make their sister laugh. Geese have been kept as guards before; could they save their niblings from being snatched?

e. Wanna write me a horrible goose crossover? Feel free! Admittedly, a horrible swan-goose who gets trapped as a half-human half-bird seems like a surprising amount of pathos to stick into the untitled goose game framework, but it also seems like it could take that kind of depth.

5. Specific preferences for this fandom:

a. Sources: while on the whole I prefer the sparser events of the similar Grimms and Lang versions rather than the full-blown Hans Christian Andersen Purple Waffle Experience (Fata Morgana???), you can probably tell from the prompts above that I'm happy for you to mix, match, ditch or make up whatever details you'd like from any of the related stories, and I mean any of them. Are there six brothers, or seven, or twelve? Were they actually ducks? Doves? Ravens? Oxen? Goldfish? Spaceships?

b. Dubious directions, clarified: as per my DNWs, I’m not a fan of explicit non-con. I am, however, fine with implied and situational lack of consent, given that it’s an existing facet of the Women In Historical Arranged Marriages territory; I just don’t want to have to see it happening in detail, as it were. I am also not fine with inescapable or unrelieved suffering and trauma, but I can handle grimly determined misery, difficult relationships and some traumatic shit as long as there’s adequate comfort and/or support involved, and as long as it ends either well or hopefully.

c. AUs, tropes, what-ifs, non-canonical and canonical settings are all excellent! What’s a modern AU look like? What about A/B/O? Feel free to crossover or fuse them with any other fairytales, too—the Goose Girl, for instance (a flock of obnoxious princes?). The Little Mermaid could be particularly interesting, too, given both the muteness and the animal-human hybrid situation.

(back to top)

---

C. The Queen's Thief

These. Two. These. Two. I love them so much. I love this fucking series so much.

1. What is it?

It’s a series of six books set in Fantasy Ancient Greece that basically follows Eugenides, the Thief of Eddis—a clever young trickster with his own loyalties and secrets—and how he affects the people and kingdoms around him as he matures (particularly the cold, ruthless and iron-willed Queen of Attolia). There’s a lot of intrigue and scheming and court politics, which are some of my favourite things, and an emotionally complex central romance, which is also one of my favourite things. And it’s fantastic storytelling; Megan Whalen Turner reveals plot secrets and character details by sketching out the edges of events and trusting us to fill in the gaps, which is a narrative approach I love.

Everything after this point is going to be spoilers for up to at least Book 3, so: you’ve been warned. Also, as a heads-up: as of this letter, I still haven’t started Book 5, because I have this thing about savouring a series, so this letter mostly hinges on their relationship prior to that.

2. What do I love about this fandom?

a. Their complicated dynamic. That black hole of what Attolia did to Eugenides runs all the way through their relationship, and it affects them both differently (how can you trust that someone won’t harm you after they have, badly? How do you keep believing that someone can trust you, when you’re faced every day with the harm you’ve done to them?). But what we see of their interactions in KoA also shows us how solidly they believe that the other person loves them, at the same time. It implies that they're open and truthful with each other about the difficulties in their relationship, that they talk (and argue) about it, that they navigate it together. It’s a complex mix of trust and safety and instinctive terror and pain and grief and regret and affection and courage, all at once, and I love the emotional realism of that.

b. Attolia's sharpness—her viciousness, her ruthlessness and iron will, her masking and reserve and guardedness, her possessiveness about what's hers—and how isolated and alone she is, and that she knows it. I also love that there are warm, gentler parts to her that only Eugenides is allowed to see, but that she’s not afraid to be her sharp, hard self with him too, because that is part of who she is, even if she also grieves the way it harms the people who love her (“an exceedingly effective scythe”). I love that she’s loved with it, though, not despite it. She can be hard and difficult—she has had to be, to survive—and Eugenides isn’t afraid of that (not least because he’s sharp-tongued and ruthless in his own way).

c. That Attolia's love for Eugenides comes out sometimes as carefulness and a hesitation that can shade into awkwardness—because she knows she still scares him, and is helpless to know how to fix it. I love that it renders her helpless in this specific way, when she's so coolly in charge the rest of the time? I love it whenever we see her affection for Eugenides. That may be my favourite thing, because our glimpses of Attolia being soft with / for / on Gen are rare in comparison to how much more open Gen is about his feelings (him being Attolis is a declaration, after all). That scene where she comforted Eugenides after his nightmare (while Costis stood by awkwardly and tried not to exist; poor guy)? It gives me life.


d. Eugenides's trickster nature—his own sharpness, his mischief and humour and temper and pride, his cleverness and patience and loyalty; the way he clowns and complains so he won’t worry Attolia about his major wounds (seriously, that scene). There’s also the way his will matches Attolia's: I love that he pisses her off, and that he does it on purpose; he can be a Puckish brat and a smug grinning asshole, but he’s also insightful and brilliant and that confidence is fucking earned. I love how skilled he is, and that he’s a lying liar who lies. I also love how young he is, and that Attolia feels it so strongly, especially in QoA.

e. The way Eugenides loves Attolia—that he's been fascinated with her forever, and that that he loves and wants her even after the brutality of what she did to him. I love that he can read her so well, even when she scares everyone shitless. I love that he turns towards her with this odd mix of sureness and fear—he's instinctively afraid of her for many excellent nightmare-related reasons, but he's also not afraid to push her, both because that’s just how he’s made when it comes to things he’s afraid of, and also because he genuinely believes she loves him. I love that he dances the edge of her patience like he does rooftops, reckless and trusting, with a similar faith that the people involved won't let him drop.

3. Prompts and questions:

a. How did Attolia and Eugenides learn to trust each other, post QoA? MWT tends to reveal relational info by hinting at stuff that has occurred offpage, and a lot of that includes the ordinary and key moments of Attolia and Eugenides’s private relationship. We see very little of that (not least because KoA is narrated largely from an outsider perspective, and Eugenides is very good at sneaking). I’d love to get some of those moments filled in; how does their relationship get from the end of QoA to the point in KoA where Eugenides tucks his face into Attolia’s shoulder on the staircase “like a man seeking respite, like a man reaching home at the end of the day“?

b. Give me Attolia being affectionate with Gen, subtly or openly or both! I love seeing cool, reserved characters letting down their guard and Openly Being Soft, not least because it means they feel relationally safe enough to admit to Having Feelings.

c. Or give me more of Attolia just being affected by Gen—not just anger, but deep fondness or attraction or regret or pain. She spends so much of her time looking like a perfectly composed statue of a queen, for many excellent reasons, but there’s so much going on under it. Like: does she still have nightmares about being the cause of Gen’s suffering, about the hours she spent outside his cell listening to him crying? If she does, does Gen know? I could see it being difficult to bring up; can you really ask the person you hurt, who still has screaming nightmares about you, to comfort you about your nightmares of hurting them?

d. Attolia being affected by Eugenides, Option Smut: look, Gen is a wicked tease in everyday life, and does his best to provoke people because he enjoys getting a reaction; it’s a form of play, for him. My bet is absolutely on him trying that on with Attolia’s cool reserve; does he try to wind her up over the course of the day, as they go about their court business? Does he gradually undo her like he did with her hair in the dance (metaphorically, I assume)? What happens if he succeeds? The Queen’s Thief series is very chaste (as far as I’ve read, anyway); please feel free to not be.

(I will note that their dynamic seems complicated to me, though; it doesn’t read like straightforward femdom here, although that seems to be the most obvious interpretation on the surface. Relationally, it reads like there’s an odd push-pull of power that moves between them, equally as complicated as their emotional dance is—but YMMV!)


e. Those face touches! They both do it now in KoA, but does it mean something different now? Is Gen still affected by Attolia’s touch the way he was in QoA? How does his instinctive fear of her fit with the way he also reacts to her as home and respite?

f. Does Gen ever get properly pissed off by Attolia? The most hostile we’ve ever seen him is on the boat in QoA (was that a bluff? What if Attolia had said no? Did he intend to drown her?) but we rarely see him angry with her the way we see Attolia angry with him. In some ways, I think her anger is more straightforward. They both have tempers, though, and are clearly happy to argue. What does Gen being genuinely angry at Attolia look like?

g. That slap in KoA, where Attolia knocks Gen into the doorpost—I find it interesting and also troubling that Attolia does this, because her own regrets presumably lie around hurting him physically (see: snatching her hand back when he startles, and the way Gen tries to reassure her that her touch is welcome by pulling her back). Attolia turning up to offer Gen comfort post-nightmare doesn’t feel like a complete resolution of that fight to me, because in some ways their relationship has uneasy parallels with domestic violence, even if there are complicating factors such as war and the way Attolia’s rule has required her to be vicious and brutal. Attolia has more power than Gen does in their relationship (that’s their dynamic, at least), and she’s already badly harmed him once when she lashed out in temper; doing it again doesn't seem like something easily dismissed. I’d love to see more of their discussion and resolution around this.

f. I’m not wholly sure why you’d offer a canon couple if you’re not interested in shipfic, but in case you aren’t into this ship: intrigue! Intrigue is great. Gimme court politics and manoeuvring and backstabbing barons (literally?) and Gen being sneaky and underhanded and brilliant and a lying liar who lies, and also steals. Gimme Attolia being a very clever strategic ruler who knows her people and her army inside out, who is feared and respected and nigh-worshipped by her court. Gimme their war councils behind the scenes. Honestly, clever, competent, dangerous people scheming their way through difficult situations is one of my fave things.

Specific preferences for this fandom:

1. I’m mostly interested in extra-canonical moments here, whether that’s during or after books 2 and 3! I am not, however, averse to what-if or trope AUs, as long as they semi-plausibly work in the canon setting and still give me these two and their relationship (e.g. soulmates would be fine; ditto... I have no idea how you’d plot a time loop here, but it’s certainly possible). I’d still prefer no modern settings, however, unless a particularly rabid plot bunny attacks you about it and you cannae resist (I’m normally a Read All The AUs! human, honestly, but I love canon too much in this fandom).

2. Sex is on the table here, so my standard non-DNW warning about me not being the easiest fic recipient for it applies to this fandom: I enjoy reading things like sexual tension, teasing, D/s dynamics, making out, people being super turned on and even the odd brief orgasm, but a zoomed-in play-by-play of highly detailed fucking is going to be pretty hit-or-miss for me (in a puzzled greysexual rather than a nope kind of way). You are, however, welcome to write what makes you happy, as long as you’re aware I will probably avoid commenting on any highly detailed fucking parts!

3. Feel free to weave in other characters if you want, as long as the central narrative is about these two! I love Eddis’s sibling-like relationship with Eugenides, and enjoy both Sophos and the magus, as well as the various cast of characters swirling around Attolia’s court. I will probably have gotten through at least Thick as Thieves by Christmas (no promises on Return of the Thief, though), so feel free to include characters from there too if you want to.

(back to top)

a. Pining. All of it. More pine than a Swedish forest. I particularly love mutual pining in all its varieties (neither party is aware of the other's feelings and it's all hopeless longing; both parties are quietly aware it's mutual but they've never explicitly discussed it or something's in the way; one or both parties are becoming aware that the feelings are mutual and it's all hesitancy and cautious hopefulness and fear and I'm just going to shriek quietly in a corner over here, ignore me). Slow burn, heartbroken and angsty misunderstandings, despair, patient one-sided or mutual yearning; I'm all about the pine, as long as it ends happily (and I would prefer that it end happily, please). Half of my favourite tropes are about the pine. It makes for sturdy furniture and fiction.

b. Devotion and constancy. This gets me in the feels, every time. It can be friendship and having someone's back without question, family being ride-or-die for each other, partners who trust and depend on each other and move together instinctively because they've been doing it so long, communities being supportive and forgiving and protective--whichever configuration of relationship it is, I want it. I particularly love it when people are protective of each other--I've come across a couple different iterations of friends closing ranks and putting themselves bodily in the way to hide someone from an emotionally threatening person, and it has delighted me each time. Good long-term friendships give me enormous joy. Quiet, steady, patient devotion in romantic relationships is *hearteyes* (and also goes excellently with pining. It's probably clear by this point that I'm a friends-to-lovers kind of reader).

c. Romantic relationships between equals. By this, I mean both parties are equally skilled and competent in their own areas, in their own ways, with their own sense of self and abilities and boundaries and rights. I have no objection to people adjusting themselves to fit each other, or learning from each other, but I'm less interested if it's a dynamic where one person semi-worships and looks up to the other from a position of lesser-ness, as in Notice Me, Senpai or student/mentor type relationships (see: the Yuuri/Viktor ship in Yuri on Ice! where Viktor is often the idol-mentor to Yuri's awed student, as opposed to the Otabek/Yuri Plisetsky ship, which I love). While I don't generally enjoy uneven dynamics of worth or value in romance, though, I do enjoy D/s power dynamics (particularly if the woman in a het relationship isn't the sub), given that it can be a deliberate choice in a relationship between equals.

MORE SPECIFIC DETAILS ON NARRATIVE THINGS:

d. Worldbuilding. I love the small details of what makes a universe- the politics, the social constraints, supermarkets, breakfast foods, toilets, strange rituals, janitors, shoes, assumptions, post offices, the lot. I love worldbuilding, but I've definitely also loved fics that were scant on the worldbuilding and Very Strong on the Character-Centred Feels, so, you know. Write what works for you.

e. AUs and crackfic taken seriously. Were they roommates? Excellent! Is this a time travel fix-it? Even better! Is this a Groundhog Day time loop situation? YES PLEASE. I'm all for twisting canon into new and bizarre positions, which should probably be expected from someone who loves fairytale retellings and outlandish Shakespeare or opera reinterpretations (Rosalind in a kimono! Jazz-age Malvolia with nipple tassle propellers! Figaro on... a giant minimalist staircase?). Canon divergence, what-ifs, A/B/O, amnesia, soulmates, high school, people turning into otters when they're stressed--AUs and crackfic taken seriously tend to offer new perspectives on familiar characters and narratives, which is why I love them. They give you glimpses into people you wouldn't have otherwise. I do also enjoy canon settings, however, because sometimes canon can be complicated and interesting enough by itself (Enola Holmes could be this, for instance, not least because the storytelling is so modern that it's already open to interpretation by default).

f. Relational tropes. I particularly enjoy arranged marriages, marriages of convenience, fake dating and soulmates, a.k.a. anything that shoves people together repeatedly and insists that they actually think about their relationship with the other person, forcing them via sheer proximity to ask whether romance is a thing they want or are comfortable with, and what that might look like within these constraints. I do also enjoy having trope boundaries and stereotypes pushed and questioned and invented upon, though (e.g. can you break soulmate bonds with neglect? what are betas for in A/B/O? Is this fic's soulmate identification mechanism based on one's favourite pizza?).

g. Movement, change and resolution in a narrative, even if it's purely emotional or internal, like a change in perception or a relational realisation or character growth. I like both plot-driven fics where Things Happen and meditative character-centric pieces where nothing much happens externally, but either way I prefer that there's movement from one state to another over the course of the fic, and a sense of resolution (in the sense of an answered question or emotional completion, not necessarily in the sense of a fully-stamped Happy Ever After).

h. Comfort, recovery, trust, rest and healing, in all their complexities. I love stories where people who have been through hell are comforted and supported and loved well, where they learn to rest and make friends and slowly recover (with or without setbacks). I love slow quiet domestic glimpses of relationships being grown or mended, of people learning to trust each other and let each other in, whether it's for the first time or after betrayal or long bitterness--and the difficulty of this, because trust isn't easy. I really like reading about people navigating complex and difficult emotions and relationships, but when it comes to heavy angst in fic, my preference is usually around the level of "Avengers: The Civil War never happened, and everyone sat around the Avengers Tower eating delicious food and snuggling and learning how to friendship better and being kind to each other and recovering from their individual massive cases of PTSD, please, give these guys a break, they've been through so much".  

1. This fandom actually lends itself to one of my favourite things ever: clever, manipulative liars who are always guarded, always pretending, finding people or places where they feel safe enough to put down pieces of their armour. It's the 'finding people/places where they feel safe enough to de-armour' that I'm here for.

2. I just want these two to be happy, okay? I want them to trust each other instinctively and have each other's backs, and I particularly want to see the details of how they figure out how to get there while navigating their prior betrayals and old habits of antagonism and fear and mistrust. I want to see them try to learn how to communicate and be vulnerable with each other in healthy ways, given their complicated histories both together and individually--all their survival mechanisms and ingrained strategies for staying safe, none of which are conducive to openness or vulnerability. 

3. 'Comfort, recovery, trust, rest and healing' applies very strongly to this fandom, as does, you know, pining, uncertainty, insecurity and angst. Which can, of course, happen even when both people are aware that the other person has feelings of some sort for them.

4. This is also a great ship for an AU, whether that's canon divergence at a different point earlier in the story, or something more tropey. I am perfectly happy to read some viciousness for this ship, as long as it eventually resolves, although I'd prefer a ratio of trust to mistrust that differs from Holly Black's (more screentime on some level of trust and co-conspiring, less on antagonism. I'm not actually a huge enemies-to-lovers fan, which is a little absurd considering I like this ship, but I enjoy it for the hope and potential of the eventual payoff--the potential of how well they'd work together, of what it might look like if they trusted each other fully. It would be nice to see even more of that than what we're given. Honestly, hatred and endlessly adversarial relationships mostly just tire and stress me out).

• uh, Cardan's tail. Something that indicates how you're feeling is a huge giveaway when hiding your feelings is how you keep yourself safe, even in close relationships. That's gotta be difficult. Talk to me about that tail.

• I love how brutal and take-no-prisoners Jude can be, in her approach to situations, decisions and people. It's a soldier + survivor mindset, and it doesn't turn up often in fic, especially in women.

• I'm definitely not opposed to D/s dynamics here. This is a ship that lends itself to emotionally complicated sex, I think, where both parties are very aware of the historical power dynamics in their relationship, and their ability to really hurt one another--and the times they've done so.

• If you do decide to write sex, I'd really like it if there was some discussion about it, especially about the emotional aspects. Or, like, no discussion whatsoever, and then problems and misunderstandings because of said lack of discussion. If you've been afraid and guarded for most of your life, especially with the person you're having sex with, vulnerability and intimacy are difficult. It takes practice and patience and forgiveness.