Yuletide letter 2020

[elen_nare]

Dear Yuletide Writer,

First, thank you so much for this! Here are general notes, and some ideas for each fandom. I know this looks rather long, I'm just trying to make it as detailed as possible in case that makes it easier for you. I adore each and every one of these fandoms, so getting fic for any of them will make me a very, very happy person!

General stuff:

Ratings-wise, I’m fine with anything. I’m fine with (of age, consensual) sex scenes if that’s where the story’s going - though gen fic is equally awesome! I’m not too fond of highly detailed graphic violence, but if it’s absolutely necessary to your fic, go ahead.

Feel free to look through my journal for inspiration :) You can also find me on AO3 and on Tumblr.

A plotty story, a character piece, an exploration of friendship or romance, an adventure, a quiet moment, a missing scene, a different POV to the canon... Any and all of these are great! Gen, het, slash, femslash, are all fine.

Things I like: friendship, friends helping each other out, humour, banter, nerdiness, science, happy (or happy-ish at least, not overwhelming despair) endings, worldbuilding, sibling love (and family interactions in general), found families...and a great many other things! These were just the first that came to mind.

Do Not Wants: suicide - I’d prefer it if you didn’t kill any major characters (other than canon deaths), but if you absolutely must, please avoid suicide! - , noncon/dubcon, incest, gratuitous violence, underage sex, unrelieved gloom and angst, character/ship bashing, AUs, crossovers.

Fandom specific:

Listed in alphabetical order. Obviously, all optional details are optional! I'm just giving them in case you're interested (or stuck for ideas and wondering why you ever offered to write this fandom :P). For the “ideas” lists, they’re absolutely not intended to be mutually exclusive, nor exhaustive - mix, blend, combine, as you like, or throw them out the window! I include them in my letters because I’ve found them really useful myself :) Spoilers abound I’m afraid, so if there’s something on here you’re interested in reading/watching and haven’t yet, I’d avoid that section. Feel free to include any other characters, nominated or not.

First, a brief “where do I find these things” in case you’d like to check out any of them:

• Chalet School: at 50-odd books, this is a long canon! And may be hard to find as most haven’t been reprinted… The best advice I can give you is to point you in the direction of The Chalet School Bulletin Board, the folks there are very helpful.
• Flower Fairies: all available at the official site for your perusal! I’ve linked the nominated fairies in the fandom section.
• High Rollers Aerois: Another long canon, at 88 and counting 3h episodes. On youtube and twitch as videos, also available as a podcast. I prefer the videos for seeing maps and reactions, but they do a good job of describing things for the podcast as needed too.
• High Rollers Curse of Strahd: Somewhat more manageable at 23 and counting 2h episodes, on youtube and the same twitch and spotify channels.
• Swallows and Amazons: 12 book series, all in print and available as ebooks I believe.

Chalet School series - Hilda Annersley, Nell Wilson

I just love these two women and their relationship. They’re quite different in many ways, but they complement each other perfectly. A few ideas:

• Their first meeting and the start of their friendship, back in Tirol.
• Dealing with unruly schoolgirls (in any stage of the school’s life)! The middles’ absurd pranks are always fun. Alternately, helping a girl in trouble.
• Rebuilding the school after having to flee Austria - how did their exile change them?
• The challenges either or both of them faced when they first took up the Headship of the school.
• A holiday together (perhaps not the ill-fated one in “Gay from China” - or if you like that one, please don’t end with the accident and everyone despairing of Hilda surviving! I wouldn’t mind the accident being in it, but don’t end it there, please).
• Hilda’s recovery - there’s Nell’s visit to her at half-term mentioned in “Mystery”, and she shows up for the play, but really we don’t get much of it! Or her return at the start of "Rosalie"- we don't exactly see much of it from her perspective.
• Learning to work together as co-Heads - how easy or hard was it? Did they clash a lot? What differences did they find, going from Senior Mistress and Head to Co-Heads?
• Retiring - did they stay in Switzerland, go back to England, split time between the two, go somewhere else entirely? Perhaps they travel before settling down, visit Old Girls scattered around the globe... how do the School and St Mildred’s say goodbye to them? Who takes over as Head?
•  

What I love about this fandom: I’ve always liked school stories in general, but since I started reading the Chalet School they’ve become some of my favourites in the genre. I love how much personality the teachers have, rather than being simply authority figures; how we get to hear about old characters; the way the school grows and evolves, but remains true to its ideals; the war books; and so on and so forth.

What I love about these characters: They’re both such strong women, who have been through so much, and only come out stronger. I love Nell’s sarcasm, and her courage, and Hilda’s kindness, and I love the friendship and love between them. I definitely ship them, but I’d be happy with them portrayed as friends, a platonic relationship, a romantic one, anything in between... I don’t need them to be in love - just to love each other :) (Of course, if you do want to ship them, that’s great!)

Flower Fairies - any

I am so delighted to have this fandom in Yuletide again! I’d be happy with any or all of the nominated fairies, and any others you like. For this fandom, I’d prefer G-rated fic only - I’m happy with romance if that’s what you want to write, but keep it… innocent, for lack of a better word? A few ideas:

• Alder fairy: “Seasons come and seasons go” - what does Alder see, through the seasons? From the poems, some of the fairies seem to be more seasonal, to come and go, and others to be there year-round, with Alder being the latter sort.
• Traveller’s Joy fairy: what travellers has she seen throughout the years? The poem talks about human travellers, but perhaps she also sees fairy ones? Or more natural ones, like migrating birds?
• Wayfaring Tree fairy: this is one of my favourite illustrations, and the poem raises so many questions! Where is Fairyland? Is it where the seasonal fairies go when their flowers are out of season? Or do all the fairies come and go as they please?
• Willow fairy: I love the joyfulness of the poem, how light-hearted it is - and what an interesting contrast that makes with the “weeping willow” that’s probably the best known willow variety? (I am no botanist and have no clue if the willow depicted is a weeping one!).
• I can see a couple of obvious combinations here - Traveller’s Joy waving off Wayfaring Tree on her travels, and welcoming her when she returns? Or Willow and Alder skimming over the water and dancing along the riverside? But if you come up with other ones I’d love to see them too!

What I love about this fandom: I had the Flower Fairies treasury as a child, and I could spend hours looking at it! I love the beauty of the illustrations and the poems, the snippets of worldbuilding and historical connections.


High Rollers (Aerois campaign) - Qillek Ad Khollar, Lucius Virion-Elluin Elenasto

I would be delighted to see any or all of the main cast as co-stars, I love them all! This is a tricky one because it’s an ongoing canon (I won’t update the letter so you don’t have to re-check it, you can probably find me yelling on tumblr if there are any huge developments! Or find a friendly Yuletide hippo to go-between), but here are a few ideas:

• Quill has let his family think he’s dead since the lightning strike - did Lucius losing his family make him rethink that decision at all? (Also, I am fascinated by how everyone but Sentry knows this, and - since they found out through Speak With Dead - Quill doesn’t know they know!)
• The whole “Elenasto fiasco” arc was such a pivotal part of Lucius’s character growth, anything set around there could be interesting.
• There’s been a few “big” time skips, in Gusthaven, on the Stormchaser, on the Twinstar Longbow - what did they do in those? But there’s also just the natural gaps of travelling, camping, and so on; I love quiet conversations and missing moments.
• I very much ship Quill and Lucius! (I have /thoughts/ on how they could potentially deal with the “vastly different lifespans” thing… True Polymorph might work, or Clone, or maybe Divine Intervention? Or a well-worded Wish of course.) So anything shippy between the two of them would delight me :)
• The party meeting on the Sparrowblade? How have Quill and Lucius’s opinions of everyone changed over time?
• The Croakatoa/Dragon Turtle encounter, where do I start - Lucius nearly dying, and in such a horrible way, with Quill unable to help because he only has one arm, divine intervention failing, Quill having wanted to sell the sequester scroll before… Lucius trying and failing to stabilize Quill earlier, while they and Aila were falling… Lucius mending the crack in Tiangong that Quill accidentally caused while saving Lucius… it was so much, and there's definitely potential for fic about it!
• As I write this on Oct 18th, they are finally at the Valley of Storms! How does Quill feel about returning there? About that sight of the ruined messenger spire? That scene with tying the cloth to complete the messenger test killed me…
• And Quill has his wing back! It was such a beautiful and moving moment :) We didn’t see Sentry or Lucius’s reactions to it, if you want to look at those?
• Lucius. Talk. To. Your. Friends. About. Your. Trauma. PLEASE. (It really doesn’t help that in the most traumatic moments of a. losing his parents and b. the punctured lung, most-perceptive-party-member Quill was a. dead or dealing with just being resurrected, and b. in the middle of dealing with his own trauma from the Valley…)

What I love about this fandom: So much! I’ve loved seeing them come together, from strangers to willing to die for each other. I love the world of Aerois, the fantasy-sci-fi vibes. I like how well-intentioned they are, and also how utterly terrible they can be at communicating those good intentions at times! I also enjoy having my heart broken by cruel uncaring plastic polyhedrons, apparently. You can find plenty of my ramblings about it over on tumblr, tagged with "High Rollers"! I’m pretty familiar with 5e if you want to have fun with game mechanics, but I’m also totally happy with ignoring them for better narrative.

What I love about these characters: Quill, my darling bird boi, I love (and may identify just a bit with) his worrying and nervousness, how he tries to plan for every eventuality. I also love how he is slowly gaining in confidence, both in his abilities and in his friends. I like his game-breakingly ridiculous perception and how it still never saves them from getting brookstoned ;) And Lucius, I love how very much he loves his friends, how he’ll risk anything for them (even as it utterly terrifies me at times with how very squishy he is). I love how much he’s grown from the sheltered daddy’s boy he was at the start, but also how he still sometimes has that endearing naivete, still loves his shiny hair and fancy clothes.

High Rollers (Curse of Strahd campaign) - any

I would be delighted to see any or all of the main cast (including Shadow and Dogsbody), I love them all! Strahd is a dark campaign of course, so if you’re worried about how that plays with my DNW list - I’m fine with up to Mark’s level of descriptions for violence and battles and such; I know there’s probably going to be a fair bit of gloom and grief, but maybe have some hope or light in there too, even if it’s a small or distant or temporary thing? Like Aerois, this is a tricky one because it’s an ongoing canon (I won’t update the letter so you don’t have to re-check it, you can probably find me yelling on tumblr if there are any huge developments! Or find a friendly Yuletide hippo to go-between), but here are a few ideas:

• Xiiki’s pact - how does she feel about it? About the changes it’s causing in her? About the content - does she want Barovia, does she realize it probably means she’s trapped here? Is she wanting it more as the Mists sink their claws deeper into her? Alternately/also, how do the others feel about it? Is Xiros worried about his sister?
• Xiros’s pact(s) - how does he feel about it? Did he regret it at any point? How aware is he of just how tightly he is bound to Asmodeus after his restoring him to life? Alternately/also, we know Rose, Yesper and Shadow don’t like it, but how does Xiiki feel about it? How worried is she about her brother (or/and herself, as Xiros did promise both their souls)?
• Yesper has lost so much… Madame Eva first - he said he’d never have made the deal Xiros made, but deep down, did he ever consider it? How did he feel after speaking with her soul in Avernus? But also, the Vistani have been cast from Strahd’s favour, the camp near Vallaki destroyed - how does he feel about that?
• Rose, werewolf slayer, monster hunter - she’s in the worst place she can imagine, probably. How is she dealing with Shadow’s loss? With the knowledge that Shadow’s body was taken before she could fulfil her friend’s wish, and has probably been turned into a vampire? How okay is she with Dogsbody, really?
• If you want to write ship-fic, I don’t have any particular OTPs here but can see pretty much any pairing - There’s the Trott-endorsed Yesper and Xiros enemies to lovers / hate sex, of course (if you wanted an excuse to write it, this can be the excuse :P). Rose and Yesper, lost grieving humans trying to find some semblance of joy in Barovia? Xiros and Dogsbody, who is the closest to a friend Xiros has now, after all the times he’s saved Xiiki? Rose and Xiiki - who would be better able than Xiiki to understand Rose’s grief over her brother? Xiiki and Dogsbody, after that conversation they had in Argyn Vostholt? Rose and Dogsbody, with Rose working to overcome her understandable fear, and Dogsbody falling for someone who’d do that for him?

What I love about this fandom: I’m currently playing a couple of Strahd campaigns, and I love the changes Mark has introduced! I love the complicated and fractured team dynamics, how incredibly messy they got so quickly. I’m pretty familiar with 5e if you want to have fun with game mechanics, but I’m also totally happy with ignoring them for better narrative. I’m also fairly familiar with the module other than Ravenloft itself (beyond what we’ve seen in the show, I know Krezk and the abbey, the Amber Temple, Berez…).

What I love about these characters: I love Xiros’s confidence, Xiiki’s longing to bring joy, and both the dragon siblings’ willingness to do anything for each other; Rose’s strength of character and pragmatism; Yesper’s courage and determination to see their destiny through.

Swallows and Amazons - Nancy Blackett, John Walker

It was incredibly hard to choose characters for this fandom, so feel free to bring in any and all others you like as co-stars! A few ideas:

• Childhood adventures at the lake? A missing moment from any of the books would be lovely… Another houseboat battle, like the one Nancy was planning at the end of Pigeon Post? Going up to the mine again to see how it’s progressed? Another trip to Secret Water? The first part of the Sea Bear trip?
• Growing up and leaving schooldays behind - what’s it like, when John is away at sea, Nancy… what does Nancy do? Go to University perhaps, try to become a journalist-cum-travel-writer like Uncle Jim?
• As adults, pre, during, or post war – what do they do, how does the war affect them? John has to be in the Navy, and I can see Nancy in the Wrens - or the SOE if she got a chance? (I headcanon Jim as having done Intelligence work, so that may have been a way in?)
• I admit I ship them like there’s no tomorrow, so anything shippy will make me squee - Growing up and suddenly noticing the other one isn’t a child any more either? Wartime and suddenly realising they could lose each other? Or a less dramatic realisation built of tiny moments?
• If you don't feel like ship-fic, I will be equally delighted with gen-fic, but would rather they weren't paired up with anyone else :)

What I love about this fandom: It’s one of my favourite book series ever. I love the way there’s never a sense of just “playing pretend” – they are (to themselves, at least) pirates or explorers or miners or an arctic expedition or martyrs or picts... I like how everyone works together, and how hard they work – how they all bring something to the team, and how they’re all valued. I like how they can be friends without having to be all the same; how they respect each other, even if they don’t see eye to eye on some things.

What I love about these characters: I love John’s honesty, his steadfastness, his sense of responsibility (and how it can go too far and lead him to pile far too much on his shoulders). I love Nancy’s fierceness, her determination, how quick and insightful she is. I love how they are always, always equals - and competitive with it, absolutely! But how there’s never any sense either in their thoughts or the narration that Nancy being a girl makes the slightest bit of difference between them.

Comments

[bluealoe]

I know it's a ways off, but I'm still on for beta-ing this year, right? :)

[elen_nare]

Yes! You are a life-saver and I don't know what I'd do without you :) This letter took me way longer to write than usual with two of the fandoms I'm requesting being ongoing... Aerois especially, as we're just *finally* beginning a major quest Quill's been putting off for at least a year (since I mentioned it in my last letter!) so pretty much every new episode is new developments for him.

[bluealoe]

It must be super difficult to write/read fanfic in an ongoing canon like that! It's hard enough for a TV show, but when it's updated weekly(ish?) and not scripted in advance...yikes.

Just let me know when you need my services. :)

[elen_nare]

It's pretty tricky, especially with dice randomness being such a big part of it... I can think of several occasions when the DM has gone "I had this as a possibility but given the odds I did not think it would happen, welp" (like when the Aerois party got magically yeeted across space to another planet). And then there's player initiative too, like the dragon siblings in Strahd who have never yet been offered a dangerous deal they didn't take, lol (there is a reason their players have a joint gaming stream called Chaos Twins!). I tend to do more "missing moments" fic, or just accept that it will likely become an AU as canon progresses.

I'll email you once the assignments are out! Should be end of the month-ish :)