Thought For the Day

Note to self: "Seth" + "angst" = instant traffic

You know you're in an obscure corner of the fandom when posting an FE8 'fic makes you more popular.

Fic Update: "Heaven's Blessings Upon Us"

So, anyway, some time back, writerawakened and I were discussing Ephraim from FE8, and WA referred to Ephie as a "Henry V" figure. He was speaking in terms of the Shakespearian history play cycle, in which young Prince Henry screws around during his father's reign and eventually matures to kickass warrior and leader of men (and conqueror of France and all that jazz). Well, cross-referencing history, especially Anglo-French history, around me tends to breed weird things. Like this.

See, to me the interesting thing about Good King Harry isn't the whole Agincourt dealie. His upbringing and his conflicted youth re: his father and King Richard II is interesting. And the mess he left when he died rather suddenly, leaving a literal infant as King of England and heir of France, is real interesting. Because then you get madness and witchcraft and Joan of Arc and Marguerite d'Anjou and the Wars of the Roses and suddenly Edward IV is running the show and things just get more screwed up from there.

[Yo, FE fans-- Henry's grandson Edward of Lancaster is an object lesson in what really happens to little sixteen-year-old exiled princes who show up with a ragtag army to get their throne back. It ain't pretty.]

Anyway, after Henry kicked the bucket, his young widow Catherine (daughter of the French king) started messing around with a handsome Welsh guy in her household. Owen ap Tydder was Clerk of the Wardrobe, or something like that, but he was just Catherine's type and before long they had either three or four little half-French/half-Welsh half-siblings for young King Henry VI. This might have been a bizarro footnote in history if not for that whole Wars of the Roses mess, which ended up putting the grandson of Catherine and Owen on the English throne as Henry VII.

Anyway, without further ado, I present "Heaven's Blessings Upon Us," starring L'Arachel as Queen Catherine, Rennac as "Owen Tudor," Seth as the Duke of Bedford, Amelia as a Very Special Guest, and a very dead Ephraim as Henry V. It was intended as a screwy comedy, but since I was the one writing, you get Seth-angst and politics. Enjoy.