December Q&A — Part One (Patreon)

• Is there anything in their life that the ROs regret?

Hadrian regrets not leaving the Templars sooner. But some nights, when the shadows are deep, and silence lingers like a thorn digging into his side. The kind of nights that have Hadrian lying awake in his cold bed not knowing what tomorrow might bring. Not knowing what the past was all for. Not knowing if the future is worth the trouble.

Those nights when freedom weighs a thousand tons and loneliness chills the walls of his heart, Hadrian regrets leaving the Order. He doesn't want to, but he does.

Alessa has no regrets. None that she would admit aloud. She has done what needed to be done, and it has gotten her where she is. What point is there to linger on the past? 'Twill do nothing but sour her mood and make her hesitate when she cannot afford to waver. To doubt the self is more than foolishness, it is fatal. She cannot afford it.

What is done is done, and Alessa is breathing, so it means that whatever transpired, she came out on top.

This is, of course, what Alessa would tell the world. It is even what she tells herself most of the time. But despite what most believe, Alessa is not made of stone. And there are times, rare, brief, when she sits and looks at the waves rolling in the sea and fixes her blue eyes on the horizon and... Sorrow bobbles up her throat. Regret clings to her heart. Longing makes her bones as chill as the tips of her fingers.

People flash before her eyes, their faces made of wind and water and rainy clouds. Her parents, her, Rafael...

Alessa sneers, gets up and walks so fast that she almost runs. Leaving it behind. She would never voice this aloud, but fate has a way of mocking what one believes to be unchangeable.

Maybe, with time, Romanus will listen to all that lies beneath the ice.

Alain Theer would laugh and tell you that he has many regrets. He regrets waking up so early this morning. He regrets picking the wine from Lord Harold's cast instead of Lady Catherine's because hers was clearly the superior one. He regrets walking to the gardens instead of waiting for a carriage because look, he stepped on something that smells like shit and Alain is sure that it is shit and now he has to go back and change his shoes.

Alain has so many regrets, and he'll tell you about them happily. All of them expect, of course, the ones that swirl in his mind when the nobleman finds himself alone. He doesn't like to be alone, his thoughts are too prying, but alas, sometimes one finds himself without company, and when he isn't drunk, he thinks.

Alain has one big regret: that he never dared to defy his family. But can a character flaw be called a regret? Alain likes to think it cannot. He was born a coward, there's nothing he can do. There's nothing. No regrets. He has no regrets.

In polite company, Ysabella Theer would wave aside your question with a light laugh and a charming hand to her chest. "Oh? What are you talking about, dearest? Here, have another cup of tea."

She would skillfully steer the course of the conversation and before you knew it, you would be discussing the shoes Lady Matilda wore to the ball the previous evening.

In private, however, alone or with the ones she trusts, she can let her walls crumble down and voice the fears that cling to her heart. And make no mistake, there's only one person in the world Ysabella can say she wholeheartedly trusts, and that is the one who came into it at the same time as her. Ysabella confides in Alain, in herself, and no one else.

Ysabella's biggest regret hasn't happened yet. She doesn't know if it will happen, but she has set the wheels in motion for the events that can trigger it. She fears what can be. She regrets what may come to pass.

The Pirate King has lived through in his 30-something years of life what most would not experience within a lifetime. He has been stabbed, thrown overboard, kicked, punched, spitted on, cheated on, robbed, betrayed, lied to, abandoned, and one time, a particularly tough time he'll admit, The Pirate was held down while a bitch with a big smile and ugly teeth cut off his thumb.

But then again, he gave back tenfold. He kicked, he punched, he lied, he threw, he robbed — and robbed well, mind you. He doesn't bother with petty change, he goes after the great treasures, the ones that'll buy him bigger and better ships. He has betrayed and abandoned the ones who needed abandoning. He even did what has never been done to him: he murdered. Several times. With his own hands and sometimes, with only a word.

It's incredible what authority will give you: the ability to kill with a command.

Does he have regrets? He looks at the stump in his hand, at the scars on his arms, and the trail of broken hearts at his feet. And then he lifts his chin and sees his armada, the men under his command, the power to make his own future, to carve his own path.

From a scrawny boy scrubbing floors. No. No regrets. He'll die with a smile on his lips and his axes in hand, and The Pirate will have no regrets.

Neia, the Dawnseeker. Neia, the Inquisitor. Neia, the woman burned at the stake. Does she have regrets? Her mutilated lip twists in a snarl, and ancient anger boils the water out of her veins. Yes, she fucking has regrets. She regrets not realizing what cowards, what spineless vermin her "superiors" truly are. She regrets not seeing how they don't care at all about what God wants. All they care about is keeping their fat behinds safe and comfortable while sin and madness run amok outside their gilded halls.

She regrets not taking her men with her when she could and march down to the golden gates of the Vatican. She regrets not cutting down those silk robes, drenching them in blood, and melting their gold relics into a single pathetic puddle.

But what Neia truly regrets with burning wrath, is relying on who she thought she could rely on. Speaking with who she thought she could speak. Neia, the specter, regrets ever trusting anyone besides the Lord and herself.

Lance Silverthread doesn't like to talk about himself. He's a spy, you see, so it comes with the trade. He's also a bard, and while boasting of his skill and wonderous songs, while recounting tales and flashing his best clothes also comes with the trade, no one is supposed to know the man behind the act.

All bards and minstrels are to remain impenetrable. They are a vessel, a mouth to tell a tale, and a pair of lungs to sing a song, and nothing else.

Lance likes this very much. Both the bard part and the spy part go together hand in hand, and he can stay as blank to the world as he likes. You won't hear him speak of regrets, mostly because you won't hear him speak of anything personal at all. Goals, aspirations, beliefs, and fears. Lance doesn't speak of them, and if he arbors any, he keeps them to himself.

But the moon likes to summon him, and he always heeds its call. And if you follow him outside, you may catch the spy in a mellow mood. You may catch the bard with a melancholic aura. And, if you're lucky, you may witness Lance for who he truly is.

If you ask him then, of regrets, he would smile a smile so small that you couldn't even see his golden tooth. And tell you in a whisper of a voice that what Lance most regrets in life is having no life at all.

Rafael Borja is a man made of regrets. They weigh on him like stones on his shoulders, twist his spine, roll off his arms, and fall at his feet with every ragged step he takes. He can't forget about them, can't leave them behind, can't even pretend they do not bother him because to hell and back, they do.

Rafael carries his regrets in every aspect of his life. They turn him bitter. They turn him jaded. They turn him into a man he never once wanted to become. But amongst the mountain of regrets, one as tall as the black walls of Tarragona, Rafael can tell you without hesitation what's his biggest one. The one that burdens his heart, right at the center, like a rotten seed that darkens and spoils everything around it.

His biggest regret in life, the one Rafael would give up his place in Heaven to rectify, is this: Joining the White Company.

• The church in our world frowned deeply upon homosexuality. If the church in The Golden Rose has similar views on the practice, how has Hadrian come to terms with his attraction to other men?

The Church in the Rose's world doesn't have the same views on homosexuality! This is something that I intentionally changed because, to be perfectly honest, I didn't want to explore this theme within the game. This is a very heavy, profoundly serious subject that still affects a large part of the world's LGBTQ+ people, and if I were to include homophobia, I wanted to include it the right way.

The Rose explores other themes connected with the Church — like the denial of individual and intellectual freedom, the erasure of knowledge that goes against their doctrine, the persecution of anyone who dares to think or speak differently, the fear and control they had over the populace with their threats of Hell. This I want to feature and plan to explore further into the story we go. This is something that I always found fascinating from a historic point of view — how the Catholic Church influenced the region I grew up in.

Europe, especially southern Europe, is massively connected to the Vatican. This is part of my culture and something that shaped the core of my life.

As a woman myself, the Church’s, and general society's treatment of women in History also interests me on a personal level. I can't say I've been a victim of harsh, cold misogyny (I'm fortunate, I know), but I have experienced some discrimination in that regard.

However, while I maintained just a tiny bit of misogyny in the Rose — Will, the bandit, for example, reacts differently if you're a female Romanus. And the Church favors men over women — I still watered it down significantly. Women aren't really oppressed in the Rose. Alessa, Ysabella, Neia, Vallen, and a female Romanus can all do and speak as they wish without having a steel hammer coming down on them. Women can hold positions of power, like captain Cynthia, and their voices are heard when it comes to important decisions.

Even the Pirate has a woman as his second. And he'll kill anyone who dares to say she is less than capable.

What I haven't experienced, what I don't personally know what it feels like, is homophobia. This doesn't mean, of course, that I can't (or I won't) write it. I don't believe art is a gate that can only be spoken about by those who experienced it. I think that's a dangerous slippery slope.

Will I ever write something that explores this? Probably. But the Rose's scope is so large already that I can't put everything in. And I don't necessarily want to. I'm just not interested, right now, in including misogyny or homophobia.

So, the Church differs from "our" church in that regard. Who people choose to spend their time with is their business and theirs alone. The Church is too occupied with other, more urgent matters to try and control that part of the people’s lives.

They are content to control their thoughts instead.

Nobility does tend to marry in the traditional way, but solely because they want biological children. The importance of blood and inheritance is heavy in this world. But same-sex marriages are not unheard of among nobility, they just usually happen with ones who have no hope of holding land and titles.

The Holy Order very rarely accept women within their ranks, and intimate relationships between men are strictly forbidden. But this is not for disdain of homosexuality, it’s one of their rules: “Hold no attachments but for God.”

Neia is a lesbian, and she never once bothered to try and hide it. She still climbed through the ranks with bloodied nails and snarling teeth and carved her place within the highest classes of the Holy Church. All the while having women warming her bed – but none of the women meant anything, mind you. This is the important part; Neia the Dawnseeker held no attachments but to God.

As for Hadrian? He was surprised by his attraction to a male Romanus, not because of some dogma taught by the priests, but because he has never experienced it before. Hadrian wasn't attracted to other men until Romanus — you can say you are his "bisexual awakening". It's a shock in a way, but one that he doesn't shy from. It doesn't feel wrong, it feels... it feels good. It feels right. It feels sacred.

Hadrian is more hesitant with a male Romanus because he has even less experience in that romance than with a woman — which is already very scarce 😄. But he will gain confidence and sureness, and Hadrian so very rarely gets truly angry but if anyone (and I mean anyone) would dare to make a comment about a romanced Romanus, his black sword would be out of the scabbard in the flash of a moment.

• What's one thing the MC does or could do that would make the ROs heart skip a beat?

For Hadrian, it's undoubtedly you listening to him. Truly, sincerely, and honestly listen to what he has to say. Hadrian's voice has been ignored for so long that he has convinced himself that he seldom has anything worth saying. He holds his opinions and tries to uplift his beliefs, but Hadrian always expects a pushback whenever he has something to share.

If it's about something personal, he doesn't expect others to remember. If it's not, he expects at best to be ignored and at worst to be chastised.

But when you hear him. When you try to understand him. He knows he doesn't always have the best way with words, but Lord in Heaven, you're trying to pierce through his awkward phrases and mumbled sentences to get to the core of what he means. And Hadrian's heart skips, it bounces, it jumps to his throat.

Because here you are, gazing at him with rapt attention. And listening.

- - -

"I am here because I want to."

There are no other words that would shake Alessa as deeply as these. Alessa is someone who is sure of what she has to offer. She is capable, she knows. She is efficient, and above all, she can finalize whatever task you ask of her. She has value because she makes it so, and Alessa walks with her chin lifted high and her shoulders straight and knowing her place in the world.

She has value.

But 'tis not an inherent one. Alessa is not a fool, nor is she blind. She can tell that most would rather not spend their time in her company. She cares not. She does not need their approval, nor does she have any wish for it. Alessa needs no company, she only needs herself.

"I want you for who you are."

The words would freeze her to the core. What can make the ice around her heart melt? What can turn it obsolete? You showing her you don't only tolerate her presence, that you don't expect anything from her — be it her skills or her body, or the influence of her authority — but simply... Alessa. She cannot phantom why but she almost does not want to question it.

Her heart skips a beat. It skips several. It makes her falter and flush and behave like a sickened fool. But she cannot help it.

You have touched the soft, hidden part of her soul.

- - -

Alain likes to think of himself as a simple man. He needs little to be happy, it's not hard to please Alain of the Theers. Give him good food and good wine and, above all, company that satisfies the eyes, and Alain will be grinning wide. He doesn't need much, he tells himself, but fate would have him owning much all the same.

He is a noble and a high one at that, and it comes with certain benefits. He didn't choose them, of course. God saw fit to grant them, and who is he to deny God's gifts?

Being desired and coveted is one of them. Alain is used to being chased and longed for and he likes to play the game. He is used to being wanted. He's no stranger to compliments and suggestive looks and invitations masked in sultry praises. He basks in them.

He also knows it seldom has anything to do with who he is. People want what his last name can provide or what his body is capable of delivering, and Alain tells himself he doesn't care.

But, one time, you look at him and smile, and Alain can't name what it is he sees in that smile of yours. It looks... simple and plain but so sickeningly sincere. Your hand sweeps back the curls from his forehead not in lust but in tender care, and when you speak, your voice also holds something he cannot name. It has no mirth, no witticism, no cold sarcasm.

No hidden agendas. "Stay for a while?" you ask of him, not having anything to gain but his presence.

Alain's heart doesn't skip very often. He rarely allows himself to feel, truly feel. But here his heart is, beating like a madman. "I suppose I must," he answers, trying and failing to sound nonchalant.

And then you kiss his cheek, beaming, and he has to look away before you see the embarrassingly bashful smile on his lips.

- - -

It's honestly hard to find the one thing that would make Ysabella's heart leap like a sparrow from her chest. Truth is, she would marvel at so many things. She would marvel at you treating her servants like people instead of objects made to serve. She would marvel at you showing care for the less fortunate, for an animal lying on the road or a child covered in mud.

She would marvel at your smile, at the way your eyes seem to hold in the light, or how you'd lead her in a dance, her hands looped around your arm and your fingers steady on her waist.

Ysabella Theer finds things to marvel at every day of her life, and when it comes to you, she finds them without even trying. It makes her days full and bright, and it gives her light and happiness in an existence most envy but so very few understand. An existence that holds darker shadows and deeper pits than what most can dream of.

Lady Ysabella of the Theers finds a great many things to admire about you. But what makes her falter, and freeze in her spot with weakened knees and wide eyes, and a flutter to her chest?

Ysabella would never admit it, but it's you being physical. She likes to watch you from afar, training with your weapon, sweat rolling down your forehead, and sinking into your hair. She strains her ears to hear your every grunt, your heaving breaths, your growls and groans.

She sees you spinning, the might in your arms flexing, and Ysabella suddenly cannot breathe.

When you pick her up, throwing her over your shoulder, Ysabella squeals partly in shock, but mostly out of the thrill that sparks through her core. Your strength, your brutality, your raw ferocity.

That makes the delicate noblewoman's heart flutter like a butterfly. And God help her if she ever witnesses you fighting another. She's against violence, she's appalled by it. And yet...

Her most frequent daydream is of you dueling someone in her honor.

- - -

The Pirate King does not have his heart skipping any beats. If it does, then that means he has his axes in hand and a torn smile on his lips, and his feet dance to the deadly rhythm of battle. That's the only time the Pirate's heart beats like the war drums of an enemy ship.

Or the heart of the ocean, always pulsing inside his veins.

But one day, late in the afternoon, you come into his cabin unannounced, of course, as only you can do, and walk up to his desk. He doesn't take his eyes off the large map that spreads on top of it, busy studying the layout of the upcoming group of islands.

They're too close to each other. There are bound to be some foul currents.

"Hey," you call him, leaning your hip on the desk.

"Hmm?" The Pirate hums. Maybe he can lead his armada around, but that'll take too much time.

"Would you look at me?"

He does so with a smirk and sees in your face the exasperation that rang in your voice. "Feeling needy today, peach?" he says, leaning over so he can taste your pouty lips. "I'm nearly done. Then I swear I'll give you—"

"This is for you," you interrupt, snapping your head away as you push something heavy into his chest.

"What." He instinctively holds it and looks down to see a black velvet mantle. He slowly unravels it to see sitting at its center a gold-encrusted dirk with jewels on the hilt and engravements in the blade.

"I saw it and thought of you," you say, your voice... hesitant. The Pirate glances at you and sees you biting your lower lip. "I know you have better ones, but—"

"No," he says, voice solemn. He puts the treasure aside to gather you in his arms. "No, I don't."

And he kisses you because he has no other words. The Pirate's heart doesn't skip a beat, but someone thought of him. Something reminded you of him enough that you decided to bring it as a gift.

And that... no one has ever done it before. His heart skips no pathetic beats, but he can feel it, pounding strongly against his ribs. He can sure feel it.

- - -

What can you do to make Neia's heart skip a beat? Some would tell you there's nothing on God's green earth that can do so. Some would say that only the Lord Himself coming down for reckoning would have the former Head Inquisitor in any state of joy.

But then again, most people are fucking idiots.

Neia feels it when you fight together for the first time. Not against each other, although that had her blood pumping too, but together against a common foe.

She swirls, the unmistakable sizzling sound of an incoming blade cutting through the air, but before she has to duck, you block the sword and drive your blade through the fool's chest. "One," you quip at her with a wide grin.

Your canines flash, and a red streak of blood crosses your cheek, and Neia suddenly wants to reach over and wipe it clean.

She has never been one to be left speechless, but for a moment, for just a brief second, she can find no words. Time slows to a crawl, danger and adrenaline far away because all her yellow eyes see is you. She stands there, gazing down at you like an idiot while you wink and skip away.

"Two!" you yell over your shoulder as you clash against the next bandit who dares to attack you. The man is still falling as you launch into motion again, seeking yet another foe. "Try to keep up!"

You're keeping score, Neia realizes.

She laughs then, a rasp akin to a growl, and finally hurls into action. She keeps laughing, her heart waging war against her breastplate until all enemies lie down.

In the end, you win by two.

She'll think of this for months to come.

- - -

Lance Silverthread is a hard man to shake. Whether positively or negatively, he faces most things in his life from a carefully maintained distance. Like an observer watching through a window, so does Lance goes through his daily happenings.

There are downsides to this, of course. His laughter often doesn't reach his eyes, and a friendly face doesn't mean as much. Maybe even the wine he drinks, the food he tastes, the songs he hears, the steps he dances — maybe none of them feel as they should. They're like a leaf blowing in the wind. Beautiful, nimble, but so feeble and so forgettable, and soon, completely gone.

But Lance has long accepted the downsides because the benefits are far too great. It allows him to do what he does best: spy. It allows him to keep a careful, curated, perfectly controlled façade to the world.

You can't control life, you see, but what you can do is control how you react to it. What matters most is not that you die, it's how you face death. And Lance has that perfected. He has an iron fist around himself.

But... Lance is still made of flesh, and he has moments where that glass window breaks and the distance closes, and Lance finds himself feeling everything right against his skin. Moments alone spent staring at the moon, moments with Chouriça, his dog, curled between his legs with her precious heart beating softly against his hand and her wet nose touching the skin of his wrist. Moments...

With you.

Make the window break, make Lance lose control, make him forget, for just a moment, what he should be doing and simply be. Be in the moment, ignore everything else. That will have his heart skipping a beat. It'll skip several.

It'll make him want to avoid you, but he won't. Because, when it comes to you, the bard realizes he doesn't listen to himself.

He simply does. And isn’t that something else?

- - -

Rafael's is quite simple.

Kindness.

Show him kindness, make him feel it like warm honey over his tongue, like a balm to a festering wound, like water after days in the desert, like sight after years spent in complete darkness. Rafael is used to many things. Most of them harsh, cruel things. He knows well the dark side of life: he grew up with it. He believes that's how it always is.

And tries hard to kill the part of himself — the naïve, innocent part that sounds so much like his child-self — that believes there's another side to the world. A kinder side.

Make the rest of Rafael — the adult, broken Rafael — believe it too, and you'll have his loyalty for life.

Show him kindness and patience and understanding despite how difficult, how hard, how jaded the world made him be. Show it to him and nurture him with it, and Rafael's heart doesn't skip any beats.

It soars high in the sky.

• Do you have a background or education in writing?

I don't! I have a bachelor's in Biology and a master's in Marine Biology so... vastly different fields from Creative Writing!

But I always loved to read since I was a kid and wrote my first story — one about a lonely frog 😄 — when I was 8 or 9, I think. I kept writing since, not consistently, sometimes I'd go months or even years without writing, but I always picked up the pen eventually.

The Rose is my first big project. I have a lot I want to improve and do better!

• For the next book are you planning on utilizing MC's personality stats within the narrative?

I am. I already used some of this in the first book — especially when it came to your Sinful/Devout stat in the later game. There were a couple of responses that varied based on whether you were more emotional than stoic, sarcastic over genuine, etc.

However, I didn't use it a lot. To be honest, I always prefer to give a choice whether it be dialogue or thoughts, or simply facial expressions that would indicate what you think at that moment. People are complex, and sometimes, we answer differently to different situations or different people, or hell, maybe we woke up grumpy that day. I think one of the beauties of Interactive Fiction is that you can roleplay pretty much how you like.

I was never a big fan of picking just one personality at the start of the game and then being punished if I dared to be or say something that fell out of that box. So, all in all, I prefer to give a choice over a pre-made response.

But I definitely want to use that kind of thing a little bit more when it comes to what the other characters have come to expect from you. Since you've had Book One to establish your Romanus, I feel like there's been time enough — both in-game and out-of-game, in the player's mind — to shape your Romanus. So, if you have a pretty big Sarcastic stat, then Alessa might doubt and not take you seriously when you start to speak from the heart.

If you've been direct, never hiding what you feel and what you think, then Hadrian might question why you suddenly prefer to be more close-lipped. Are you alright? Is there... is something hurting? Do you, uh. Do you need help?

I want to use those stats that way, but when it comes to dialogue, I'll be honest: I'll probably just keep giving the player choices.

The only stats that will lock are the Sinful/Pious ones. It'll reach a certain point in-game where you won't be able to change your alignment. But you've had the first book and half of the second to get to that.