Quiver and Crown // KateLena

Author's Note

Hello loves,

Thank you for coming on this quest with me, weary traveler. It was a long journey, wasn't it? Lengthy but fulfilling, I hope.

This project is so wild to me. I wrote this in exactly three weeks. The longest story I've ever done compressed into less than a month. I wrote at honestly an inhuman pace but when I'm inspired, I'm inspired, I guess.

Every project I take on reveals something new about my own creative process, and I think this one honestly nailed down how important color is to me. I've mentioned before that I write very heavily based on aesthetics rather than premise or concept (if this makes any sense), and color is a huge part of this. When I imagined scenes for this book, I almost imagined colorful blobs interacting, or auras.

Color also heavily, heavily defined my settings, like palettes for a painting. I imagined Aram and the palace as very blue/gray, with stone and water being my main motifs. In the Plains, green definitely dominated, and I wanted the earthy feel of wooden tables and vast meadows. Overall, the kingdom of Galon was represented by cool colors and the coldness of stone. Then, Asgard was very obviously gold/yellow, and I think Yelena feeling very golden to me matched perfectly with her coming into her own in Asgard. Anyway, this is way too much detail but I thought it would be fun to share my process.

Also, in way too much detail and matching with my color theory, Kate and Yelena are very sun/moon to me, and their physical features just play so perfectly into this. I like to think I subverted the trope of sun-symbolized characters being smiley and warm, because Yelena is like the fiery side of the sun. While Kate is more friendly over all, I think the moon is actually a bit friendlier as well. She pulls the rides and watches over the night sky.

Okay, anyway. Writing KateLena for the first time was so, so fun. I'd love to do it again but I really must watch Hawkeye again, I just don't have as much familiarity with them as characters as I'd like to. Wanda and Natasha, for example, I feel like I know them like the back of my hand. Kate and Yelena are just so new. I feel like I captured Kate pretty well (honestly I think I'm more like her than any MCU character), but Yelena I'm not so sure. They're similar in a lot of ways, but Yelena is much more jaded, and it's a difficult balance between her experiences and her sense of humor.

Also, I'll probably be taking a writing break because I've effectively written 3 books since March and I'm a wee bit burnt out and I just started a full time job and summer class. I'll be back when I recharge. In the meantime, drop some ideas.

So, I think that's all I wanted to say. Thank you for reading, and please, please feel free to comment. I put so much time into this just out of love and I hope you got something out of it.

Very special thank you to-
angstydisaster  I know I thanked you before but I will again! Your comments are so funny and I love them. Plus you single handedly convinced me to write this pairing at all.

ConnorJauregui  thank you very very much for your unwavering support and your great ideas. You are very appreciated.