BoM/TWS Message Forum

I was about to answer this, declined (because I thought it was thread necromancy, which is a big no-no on other forums), noticed rugal was willing to answer, and decided "why not?"

Without going for the routes I've been involved with (namely, the one with Natalie because it was a Round Robin and the TWS route with Mireya - which, BTW, I feel so sad that rugal didn't even make a mention on it on his most recent reply!), I feel inclined towards Niamh because - I presume - she's a gamer girl and gets him in a way others don't, but also sets limits on whatever relationship they may have whenever he goes too far. I certainly enjoyed that bit.

I haven't really gone through the routes that have Will and Joe tied up, but I prefer Frank's side a bit more. Joe always gets presented as a womanizer even though he calms down as time goes on. Frank, on the other hand, is a lot more sensitive and really cares for Will despite everything - his is a more calming and recomforting relationship, allowing both of them to be vulnerable to each other and therefore bolstering them.

As for the Will/Sydney pairing: it's one motivated by magic, in that she gets hooked by his magical talent and that eventually blossoms into the real deal. I believe people that dislike Sydney find her an absurdly toxic influence, mostly because she is - she drives Will into delving further into the Libra for her own ends - but she ends up as one of the most loyal partners to him. The problem between Will and Sydney is that they haven't developed their investigation on the Libra to a point where they get to the latter spells, the ones that involve stripping and copying imago and anima, but I recall reading from either Seuzz or someone else that Sydney's interest for Will parallels her interest for magic - and the more "magic" Will becomes (particularly if he uncovers more of his "prodigies"), the more she genuinely becomes interested in him. The reason I feel it seems "forced" is because Sydney's relationship is obsessive - the more she shares with a magic user, the more obsessed she becomes with them.

As for the arguably most popular pairing (Will/Chelsea), that one I feel can be forced. Most of the early chapters present Chelsea as domineering and manipulative, using Will for her own ends; it's only when he seems to resist and sets her in her place that she starts to open up. I feel that they're only paired because of the reader, never because of themselves. (But that's just me.)

Finally, regarding the relationship I worked for in TWS (I'm not much of a self-promoter, let alone a shameless one, so it feels weird that I have to point it out), it officially starts with "Home and Back Again"  but the history between them actually starts with "Meet the Harrisons" . I apologize in advance for how it ends, however. I wanted Mireya to be vastly different from all other relationships, not being a teenager romancing/being romanced by another but an adult on a relationship with someone relatively younger (not by much, though), and being pretty self-sufficient and tough but also caring. I'm well aware that it doesn't get as much traffic because it doesn't have a "public" version on-site (only off-site) and thus it gets hit by traffic-wall, and would really benefit from looking at Will's evolution as a Stellae in that branch, but it's definitely a relationship I'd like to see evolve in different ways.