I've been wanting to make this poll for a while, but I was unsure how to formulate it. I hope the options make sense. This love triangle has progressed beyond a simple question of which guy should get the girl.

I have a chapter coming up with Vash, and as I have hinted recently, I think it's time for him to move forward. I won't say "move on" because I'm not saying he won't get Iylaine after all. However, I think it's time for something to happen with him. I simply don't know what yet. So I want to get a sense of what everyone's feelings are before I make up my mind.

Also, would anyone object if I change his hair? The emo look is so 1070's.

And look at what a change in hairstyle did for Ris.

I am Team Malcolm only because I do like Malcolm and not because I think Iylaine deserves him (cause she doesn't). Vash can bother me some times but I know he has some reasons to be like he is. Maybe a new haircut would help him to change I am a 100% for it and I agree with you, it's so 1070's ! Let's come in the eighties !

So which team are you on Lothere?

I didn't even bother to check the votes. No wonder my friends call me Mr. Oblivious

Yes, I'm still there Lothere ! But I hadn't enough time recently working my music (I played on an EP that will be out on Itunes with my friend's band) and building my story (I bought OFB and it is just so great). I know it's off subject but don't worry, I won't be far away from Lothere for a long time. I just have so many things to do by now. I hope everybody is ok in your land and I'll come back very soon !

Oh dear.... *wrings hands in sim worrying style*. I don't know anymore. I just don't know. I love Malcom... I always have. I like him better than Vash. And I always liked him for Baby better than Vash. But I have been rereading a lot lately and I am starting to sort of change my opinion. When I picked Malcom for her, I always thought they would be happy together. But in rereading, I can see that the hints where always there that things weren't going to be good for them. The way Baby reacted to him. So... I voted Team Malcom, because I still like him better and I still wish they could be happy together.

But if they can't then I think I am Team Vash and I do want him to be with Baby. I have come round to the conclusion that they really were made for each other. I don't think Baby can ever be balanced by someone as firey as her, her love for Malcom seems to have been consumed in a giant blaze of passion and all that is left now is dead coals and occasional flickers of warmth. I think Vash would balance her out. Now we understand a lot more about how this elven thing works, it seems that people are generally not happy and fulfilled unless they are with their counterpart. It makes you wonder how Cat and Paul will end up and Osh and Flann. Who knows. But it hasn't worked at all for Baby. And I still love Baby. I know other people dislike her and think she is whiney and horrible. But I feel sorry for her... she has never felt a part of any society, she is unable to be fulfilled despite loving Malcom and she is constantly longing desperately for something more that she can't help and can't even begin to understand. It isn't her fault that she needs Vash.. that is how this thing works.

I think for me the chapter I read recently that kind of cemented this Vash thing was the one where Baby went away with Malcom and when she came back Vash was really ill. He needs her, he just does. And I don't think their need for each other has gone now even though Baby has been released from the bond (obviously Vash's is still there). But it seems Baby's is too. And the chapter where Vash saves Malcom's life for her and he tells Malcom to go back because he can't bear to hear her crying for him anymore. I mean that totally breaks my heart. But oh my lovely Malcom... I really don't want this for him. I think I might have voted the wrong way judging by the conclusion of my comment. Is it possible to be a fence sitter. Can I vote for a happy ending all round *makes hopeful face*. I guess not, since this is Lothere and it isn't exactly a valley built on happy endings.

I guess my past comments are enough to show I'm Team Malcolm, though I also admit it's more for Malcolm's happiness than their happiness as a couple. It's more of a case of "he's been soooo loyal and wonderful to her, he deserves her!" than anything else. The loyalty thing works for Malcolm but it's kind of unfair to Iylaine-- she didn't force him to love her, and it's not her fault if she loves someone else.

If I look at how the story has been going for them, and try to see which is the "canon"/intended couple, it's very much pushing Vash/Iylaine. Not because of the elven bond, which I see as a big negative for them-- it basically forced Vash to accept Iylaine as The One from the very beginning. Who knows if he might have been attracted to someone else if society hadn't boxed his choice down to one girl. And I really dislike the idea that just because "society says so", that means Iylaine must end up with Vash. I guess that's why Paul/Cat is one of my favourite couples.

(It just occurred to me, didn't young Malcolm think it a given that he'll marry Iylaine too, because they were cousins? Granted, he said it as a child so maybe he was just saying it to rile her up, and I don't think human expectation was as strong as in elven society... Malcolm still has the plus point of having seen and continuing to love Iylaine despite every ugly side she's shown.)

But the story itself has been, IMO, very clearly showing Iylaine unsatisfied with Malcolm. I wouldn't say it's because they're both fire (Cat and Paul are fire but they seem rather happy) but because Iylaine just wants more than Malcolm can give her. (The nesting thing is pretty illustrative, IMO. Kinda reminds me of what Sela did...) Ideally, she needs to spend a few years living in elven society with all its own ridiculous problems/rules and then she can decide (if such a clear decision can ever be satisfactorily be made) which world (and man) she likes better. Ideally.

Malcolm/Iylaine has the huge minus point of having come together and not being happy-- whereas Vash/Iylaine still has the bonus of "What if?". It's still a mystery if they'll really live happily ever after (which, this being Lothere, I highly doubt) and that's where the allure lies. If Malcolm and Iylaine continue, they'll... what? Maybe Malcolm will have some adventures around the valley (I got kinda lost when Vash severed Iylaine's bond to him-- if Malcolm leaves the valley, will Vash still be affected? Will Iylaine?) and Iylaine will stay at home and angst over missed opportunities. And maybe Vash will pull a Sebastian on us.

Whereas Vash/Iylaine has so much story potential...

But I also strongly agree that they've been loving idealised versions of each other for ages, which can really crash and burn. I'm sure Vash thinks her stubbornness and temper are endearing, but I wanna see what he thinks of it after several years. And living with him might reduce some of the shiney-eyes she looks at Vash with. Iylaine also tends to do what she likes (as a child, anyway) and I cannot see such spiritedness surviving well in strict elven high society (was trying to remember my example for this, and I finally did: Kiv-- I cannot see Iylaine turning away Kiv no matter which bigshot elf told her to).

Actually, watching it crash and burn or blossom has a lot of potential too.

And I would love to see Malcolm go off on adventures (maybe even the Crusades!) of his own. I didn't realise how much I missed the awesome, crafty, divinely intelligent, quick-witted spy!Malcolm until that post where he deciphers Eirik's letter. That's the Malcolm I wanna see, but everytime it comes to Iylaine he seems to lose all intelligent faculties to his overprotectiveness.

All that said and done, I vote "Team Vash minus Iylaine", which I shall interpret at "Team Vash/Kiv + cave + 2.5 kids".

Well, I like Vash (although I think he should get his head out of the clouds), but like most here, I'm team Malcolm all the way. His character really made me fall inlove with him. He actually reminds me a lot of my husband, all gruff and whatnot, but oh so loving with the woman he loves. I don't really think Lylaine deserves him, but thats for him to descide

Thanks everyone for answering this with so much thoughtfulness. Even though these characters live in my own head, you would be surprised how often someone's comment reveals something I hadn't noticed about them, or makes me look at them in a different way.

I have been especially appreciative of the several people who have pointed out that Malcolm has seen Iylaine at her worst and still loves her, while Vash never has. The little he's seen has probably just seemed cute to him. Of course he does know what fire-elf temper can be since Kiv was his best friend, but still.

I've often thought that Iylaine might not be so keen to be with him if she had spent some time with the elves and found out just what the daily life of an elven princess can be. She used to complain about being cooped up and watched all the time when she was living at Nothelm, but it's nothing to what she would experience, I think, with the headdresses and stiff gowns, and being responsible for taking off the Shalla's slippers and sitting around in her hall waiting to be granted permission to speak, and ... certain quirks and constraints of elven family life that you don't necessarily know about yet.

But it's too late for that, because of her marriage to Malcolm and especially her two kids.

What would have worked was if she had been allowed to go live with the elves at fourteen, say, and live like a princess but not yet sleep with Vash since she wasn't yet of age. And after a few months of that she might have been running back to Malcolm and the men.

Or not -- and if not, then we would have known her feelings for Vash were real.

Either way, Malcolm and Vash and -- most importantly -- Iylaine would know that she had made up her own mind based on her own desires and feelings. That is something she has never been allowed to do. Ever. (I don't even count her marriage with Malcolm since she thought Vash was gone forever and she was dying anyway.) That is why, no matter how petty and bitchy she can be at times, I still love her and feel sorry for her.

And my beginning-of-idea for what is going to happen between those three is that once again someone else is going to make decisions for Iylaine without regard for what she wants and how she feels, and even if it's "the right thing" it's going to be terrible for her. I think if anyone's going to pull a Sebastien one of these days -- or maybe "an Elfleda" if you prefer -- it's Iylaine.

That would certainly solve the problem, of course, but you can get the Vash + Kiv + cave + family dog + 2.5 kids idea out of your head. I have no intention of ruining everything for Paul and Cat. They've been through enough! Somebody has to be allowed to just be happy and have fat babies.

It's a bit frightening how people keep wishing for happy endings and saying "Oh yeah but this is Lothere" where, apparently, no one lives happily ever after.

?

*twiddles thumbs* But the cave would have so much space for the elven chilluns to run around...

Ooh, Iylaine pull an Elfleda? I've seen her as something of a "heroine" of the story this whole time, so I can't imagine her dying... even the route down this will be interesting, though. It's gonna be explosive.

...

You know, you wouldn't have to split UP Paul and Cat. Just have her be open-minded to "try new things". New, flexible things.

Okayokayshuttingupnow.

Not "the thing"? Anna and I need to have a talk on what is "the thing"! Clearly, without a father or an older sister, the poor girl has had no one to talk pervertedly with.

Ahahaha, I haven't read an Iylaine/anyone chapter in ages, and like the proverbial writing on the wall, the quote up above linked to "Iylaine comes as an assassin". It's the one where she climbs into Malcolm's bed the night Lili and Hetty (I think) arrive and starts a-molestin' him ASAP. But it was so illustrative of their entire relationship: Malcolm chasing 3/4s of the way, with Iylaine turning back occasionally to blow a kiss, a smile, only to flutter away again. I'm definitely looking forward to what you have planned for them.

And now I shall hunt down that cave chapter for perusal.

So, it appears I am alone, but that is alright!

A reason for Team Vash: Imagine your family just made you the most scrumptious dinner you ever had. Every bite has your taste glands melting with joy, and each sip of pleasant liquid only complements each morsel. It comes to the dessert course - chocolate cake drizzled with white chocolate (assuming this is your favorite, of course). You have been looking forward to this all evening. Now, this entire time you are enjoying being the guest of honor and eating with your family. However, as soon as you are about to enjoy that last, sweet, enticingly chocolate sliver left on your plate...a servant comes by, takes your plate, and leaves your mouth with an acrid, bitter, taste, wanting more. Your close family and friends try to appease you, try to offer you their various fruit tarts and puddings. Alas, all you want is your cake back. What preserves can make up for that addiction found only in chocolate? Life goes on, and you naturally begrudge the servant, assuming he ate that last sliver. All the dinner functions you go to you look in vain for that familiar chocolate cake, but it is nowhere near your taste glands. At this point, consider these questions: do you want to give up dreams of the cake for other desert? Settle for a tart you know will not appease your craving? Do you not think of the cake ever again (keep in mind, you really, truly, loved this cake)? Do you perhaps fantasize about getting your cake back from the servant in some way? Now imagine the immense joy you would feel if upon returning home from one of these functions you find a round package on your doorstep. As you open it up on your kitchen table, you see in front of your watery eyes that yes, the cake you have long been searching for has arrived! Granted, it is smaller and there are small, yet scrumptious cookies included in the package, but you probably could not be happier. That cake was made for your taste buds to begin with.

Well, it is something to ponder.

Nimue, it appears to me that you are hungry, and also perhaps slightly tipsy. I do not follow your logic; however I am now wishing I had some chocolate in the house.

I think Vash's situation is more like being famished and coming home to a house that smells like a delicious roast turkey dinner, but Mom keeps telling you it's not done yet, it's not done yet... And maybe when she's not in the kitchen you open the oven and steal a nibble but you are soooooo hungry! And there will be mashed potatoes! With gravy! And pumpkin pie! Joy!

And just when you are sitting down to dinner with your bib tied under your chin and a fork and knife in your fists...

The Bumpus dogs break in! and steal the turkey right off the table! right before your teary eyes!

And you have to settle for glazed duck with plum sauce at the local Chinese restaurant, because that's the only place open.

And the duck still has a head on it.

The end.

I was hungry yes, tipsy never.
My logic made sense to me at the time, and in some ways still does. If you think of Iylaine as the much beloved cake...alright, so it is a stretch. I feel like Malcolm can find someone else to make him happy, someone else to love completely. But Vash? That just seems like a harder thing for him to do. On the other hand, now that they are all interlaced through blood, the situation does not become any easier. Someone has to be hurt; though I like Malcolm, I would rather Vash be happy now. Perhaps they can take turns bearing the pain.

Oh dear, yes, let me clarify something that I completely forgot to: Team Vash only ideally, really. I realize that "Vash and Iylaine" could truly only have been completely functional (perhaps) if Iylaine did not choose Malcolm in the first place. But, now that she did, she has children and other factors to consider. In this case it would hurt the children for their mother to leave them, or to take them away from their father. The only way this could be remedied, really, is for Malcolm to mysteriously die and Vash come to love her children and her as a part of his family. Not to worry all you horror-stricken Team Malcom-ers! I do not want anyone to die, at all. Especially because the three-way bond would hurt all of them. So... I probably should not have voted at all. This just has so many layers. I think I will cancel my vote, actually, even though it really makes no difference. At least I have got it straight in my head: Vash ideally, Malcolm I suppose for now because the deed is already done and there are children involved. It is not fair to Vash at all, but Iylaine at least has to live with her decision and Vash has to move on. Malcolm? Just try to be happy with what you wanted in the first place. So sorry for all the confusion!

I can always count on Yicke for a Team Vash vote but I haven't seen her around in a while. I'm so pouty now that Nimue has retracted her vote though. You're allowed to be wishy-washy but you are required to have An Opinion.

I don't know if I dare make Iylaine run off and dump her kids on Malcolm, Seiza. I think that would make me wildly unpopular. I have noticed I have to be careful what I do to babies and kids around here. (Especially when Tiana is around *shhhhh*)

We have had this problem a lot, though. Maud would have gone off with Malcolm if not for Caedwulf and Brit. Iylaine (perhaps) would have gone off with Vash if not for the little turtle. And my big aching sore spot right now is poor Hetty, who can't leave David and Upcoming Baby, no matter what Leofric contrives for the two of them.

Actually, now that I have said that, I realize I can still imagine Iylaine doing it. Maud and Hetty no. Iylaine has occasionally reflected on the unimportance of mothers in the lives of children, such as in "Iylaine learns the crime":

Iylaine had never truly understood the necessity of a mother, but she had sworn that her children would never know what it was to long for their absent father.  This elf had committed the one crime she could not forgive.

Perhaps she was already proactively justifying a future flight, hmm?

I agree, we need to see more of her with Malcolm, though. They might be blissfully happy most of the time.

I also think that Egelric and Gunnilda must occasionally meet at Iylaine's house, and it would surely be revealing if we could just watch them some afternoon. Even if Egelric simply finds an excuse to leave as soon as Gunnilda comes, it would be good to know.

It might be even more pronounced since Iylaine is an elf. Isn't maternal blood passed on in the elven race? She might have a similar connection to her children as she does to Vash and Malcolm, so leaving them would definitely not be an option. The only way that Vash and Iylaine could be together would be if she and Malcolm got their marriaged annulled or if he were conveniently killed. Or they could work out some kinky arrangement...but I don't think they would really go for that.

Ok, here we go! I was talking in the comments to the latest entry about this, and Lothere pointed me here. So, the kids do present an obstacle. I still think there might be opportunities here to give Iylaine and Vash a chance. Let's see - we could do the tried and true affair, except that I'm sure Vash wouldn't settle for that. I like Malcolm a lot, but, (don't kill me), I would be ok with his death if it facilitated exciting plot developments in this area. As of now we rarely see him. And it wouldn't have to be some deus ex machina dying of an unknown heart murmur death either - it could fit. There's baddies around. Or maybe not death but imprisonment by someone. Or something lylaine does by accident since it seems she does not understand the extent of her magic abilities. (But not violent because then Vash and Iylaine would both die too, right?)

Or maybe something happens that requires Vash and Iylaine to team up to save the valley from some impending peril - Iylaine could be a very valuable weapon in a warfare situation! Related to that, I don't see Iylaine choosing suicide if she ever gets to that low of a point. I think she's more likely to turn rogue and possibly homicidal.

Um, so, anyway, I haven't given up the dream. If Vash moves on from Iylaine with someone else, I think we will hardly recognize him. He's said it himself, he doesn't know who he is without her, and his character has always been defined by his love for her.

SIGEFRITH?!? Not Sigefrith! I will seriously cry when he goes.

It's either Gunnie or Ethelmund, it has to be.

If it's Alred, then...NOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO!

I'm pretty sure that it won't be Alred, cause Matilda told him he couldn't die quite yet, he has to be there for his granddaughter. hmmmm. The red haired guy, the father of Brinstan? Wow, I forgot his name! Theobald? idk He's supposed to be sick, AND going on a pilgrimage,to a place where no one ever survives or something like that.
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Smile Don't Frown, Look Up Don't look Down
oh you heart stealer, don't shy away, tell me your name!

Watch it would be some little person who no one likes. Maybe Anna, do everyone a favor. "Death by bees" the headlines would say. Yes, the medieval times headlines in the fictional newspaper. Oh! Or maybe Father Brandt, he's getting up in years, maybe a church accident! ummm.... his robe caching fire? I hope not, I've always liked him...
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Smile Don't Frown, Look Up Don't look Down
oh you heart stealer, don't shy away, tell me your name!

Anna is such a sweetheart she doesen't deserve to die. I nominate Lar, it's time Lady Sela got justice.

There's some good in Anna deep down somewhere. It's been a while since we saw Bertie and his family.

She was still pregnant the last time we saw her. One of the reasons why I like Anna is her resemblance towards Maud I'm afraid.

Hurray for Queen Maud! So, there's still hope for Anna! Good, because that pretty much emliminates my hate list (for now) But Imin is up for grabs at this piont, he's on the border between nasty-perv to okay character.
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Smile Don't Frown, Look Up Don't look Down
oh you heart stealer, don't shy away, tell me your name!

There probably isn't a way for Vash and Iylaine to live happily ever after. I can't imagine Iylaine getting over Malcolm's death easily. With that said, Lydia, I understand your sentiment about wanting Vash and Iylaine together. I'm 100% Team Malcolm, but I had similar feelings about Flann not getting together with Araphel. I remember that chapter when Araphel almost killed Osh, instead of reacting with horror like the rest of the readers, my mind was secretly hoping for Osh's death so Araphel/Flann could have a chance. Evil, evil me!

I've made a few arguments about the merits of Malcolm/Iylaine on the forums, but I've never posted about Araphel/Flann. That's probably because my brain knows logically that it wouldn't work out. Ah well...just like with life, not everything we want always happens, even in Lothere!

OOOOH *shivers* Stay tuned!

So I guess you're not on the Vash + Kraaia wagon? That's OK, I myself am kinda walking alongside...

Yes Vash+Kraaia! We need more love! lol, just do what you want, I'll be happy with whatever happens. Unless Gwynn somehow dies. Then I won't be.
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Her life was more than mine;
like a proud shooting-star, into the night.
She crashed through the air with a rip like a knife.

Do what you want.

But no Vash + Kraaia!

Osh did say that Vash has enough love in him for ten. Kraaia is so in need of love by now that she'll count for several. But I wasn't expecting Osh to latch onto her like that -- maybe she will get some of what she needs from him. On the other hand, a few years from now Osh himself may have a few Cassie-like ideas with respect to his favorite almost-son and his crow-daughter...

Iylaine!

I just want one chapter of Vash and Iylaine. Kissing. So we get to see this passionate chemistry. And so I can go on living. That is all I ask for.

Please! I'm like Vash, here! I don't want to let this die!