faderift | (open) for all we know it's just a lie

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(open) for all we know it's just a lie

WHO: Alistair + You
WHAT: Sleep deprivation and a long ride.
WHEN: Both vaguely before and vaguely after today.
WHERE: Skyhold (before today), the road to the Fallow Mire (after after).
NOTES: Vague starterish things because I don't like doing the same thing multiple times! If they're too vague and you want something more specific you can leave me a blank comment or something, it's cool.

I. AN INCOMPLETE LIST OF PLACES ALISTAIR FALLS ASLEEP IN SKYHOLD

1. In the stables with the dogs, usually. He only sleeps for three or four hours at a stretch, lightly and fitfully, but he never wakes up screaming. At worst he wakes up gasping and sweating, with concerned, wet muzzles nudging at his face. More often he times things well enough that he's woken in the still-dark hours of the morning by heavy boots or banging wooden doors, instead, and is already on his feet before anyone can reach him.

2. Draped over a table in the tavern still holding the handle of a tankard. He might look like a drunkard from a distance, but really, it's still three-quarters full.

3. Draped over a table in the kitchens with his arm curled protectively around a bowl of porridge or stew or whatever else the kitchen servants were willing to give him at the given hour.

4. Draped over a table in the dusty, cobwebby cellar library, with his arms folded on top of a book he couldn't force himself to stay awake for for very long even if the fate of the Grey Wardens and/or possibly all of Thedas is hanging in the balance.

5. Standing up and leaning against the back of a horse that doesn't belong to him, brush still in hand, until it steps away to search for something more interesting or edible and he falls right over.

II. AN EVEN LESS COMPLETE LIST OF THINGS HE FINDS ON THE WAY TO THE MIRE

1. Money. That's one good thing about wars and demons: there's more coin on the bodies than when roadside homicides are mostly the work of highway robbers. Alistair is a practiced looter, but a gentle, respectful one, too. If it were possible to close their eyes once they'd gone this stiff, he would.

2. A set of Ferelden figurines, mostly soldiers, half trampled by horses. He doesn't pocket them; he's not a child. But he takes the time to move the ones that aren't broken yet to the side of the road for someone else to find.

3. A temporary Inquisition camp full of travelers headed in the opposite direction. He doesn't consider himself one of them--he's a Warden, he's only visiting--but he hasn't found so much money on corpses that he won't borrow their fire or eat their spare food, if someone offers.

4. A Grey Warden, and not any of the Grey Wardens he was on his way to find. He recognizes the armor at a distance on the road, even in the cloudy half-dark. The sight makes his heart stop in the curious, still, emptied-out way it always does in the seconds before a fight begins. But the moment passes, and he keeps moving forward. Maybe he won't be recognizable, he thinks, now he's traded his griffon-and-blue armor for something simpler from Inquisition stores--

Or maybe it will be someone he's met before. Never mind. He raises a hand instead of his sword. The wave is a little sheepish.

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Oh, bother.

Pel is quickly at Alistair's side, having been seated on a bucket by the halla, spinning quietly, just out of sight. Hearing someone who had previously been breathing and shifting, then a thud, has her dropping everything. First, she confirms that he is breathing, then checks to see if she can wake him by patting his cheek and murmuring his name.

"I'm awake," Alistair says. He thinks he says it very clearly, but it might sound more like mwake, and it's another second and a half before he musters up the will to open his eyes and squint blearily at Pel. "I'm fine." That's clearer. "Ground looked comfortable."

One of his boots is smashed sideways into horse shit, but the boot's seen worse. So has he.

She gives him a bewildered look for a moment, then frowns. "If you're falling down unconscious, you're either sick, hurt, or exhausted. No matter which it is, you need to see a healer. Come on."

"No, no, no," Alistair says. He lifts his head, in part to prove that he can. See? Fine. "I'm just tired. Where's the--"

The horse is far enough away that being kicked in the skull isn't an immediate risk, he confirms with a look, but his head is very heavy and this is all very embarrassing. His boot is not ruined, but at the moment, moving and cleaning it feels like an insurmountable obstacle, as does getting Pel to stop frowning at him, so he shuts his eyes again. Problem solved.

She's looking less frowny and more concerned now. There is never a good reason for someone to stop sleeping.

"Let's get you to those hay stacks over there, at least. Someplace where you can lie comfortably. I'll bring you a blanket once you're there, all right?"

He's quiet for a moment. The moment is long enough to be noticeable as a pause, but not quite long enough to suggest he's actually fallen back asleep, nice as that would be.

"Now you're making me feel ridiculous," he says, emphasis on now--not serious, he's aware he was ridiculous from the moment he got hypnotized brushing a horse and decided resting his head on its back for a moment was reasonable--and tone a poorly-faked resentful. He pushes up to sit, hands braced behind him, and dares to check her face again. Better. "A blanket."

That's scorn, also poorly faked. How northern of her, he might say, if he weren't too tired to follow through.

She reaches out to take his elbow--a purely ceremonial gesture, encouraging him up rather than helping. She's definitely too tiny to help him up.

There's a haystack nearby, and she drapes her cloak over it so he can lie down.

"Come on. I'll sit nearby and spin to make sure nobody bothers you."

He stands up--not quite a full clamber, out of armor, but not with any grace either--and has followed her all the way to the hay before he's awake enough to realize what's happening. He stops and rubs his face with his hand while he says, "I'm more likely to bother them. Or you."

That's the problem. The reason he's more exhausted now than he was on the run, sleeping in snow caves. They can sleep through each other's tossing and turning, and no one worries overmuch about the occasional terrified shout, and concerned stable hands don't appear to shake them awake if it goes on too long. He's been sleeping lightly since he got here. Waking himself up before anyone else feels the need.

"We have bad dreams," he says. "I suppose most people do these days, but--it's a Grey Warden thing. There's nothing to do about it."

Pel doesn't look surprised. Very zen about this, in fact. Bad dreams are familiar territory.

"Mages have bad dreams too," she answers softly. Sympathetically. "Usually dreams about demons trying to possess us. I'd imagine a Warden dreams more about darkspawn than demons, but I guess I wouldn't know. Doesn't matter, maybe. If they're bad enough to keep you awake like this, it doesn't matter. The less you sleep, the worse it'll get."

It's like dealing with Merrick when he's been triggered. Or herself.

"Best thing you can do is make everything around you as safe as possible. So...not here. Too exposed. Come with me, I know a place."

She picks up her cloak, dusts off the hay attached to it, and reaches for Alistair's hand to guide him toward the keep.

Alistair follows easily even when he isn't half-asleep on his feet, so they're already out of the stables before he says, "A demon tried to keep me in the Fade once, but that was--it was a very nice dream," and another two steps before it occurs to him to add, "But this isn't the Fade, it's--I don't think--"

He doesn't think a change of environment will help. His state of mind doesn't matter. The Old Gods don't shape themselves to his subconscious. But he glances down at where Pel's hand has hold of his and is suddenly more interested in sucking his lower lip into mouth and looking off toward the clouds than in divulging any ancient secrets.

"Of course it's not. You're not going to stop the nightmares. You're going to make it so you can go back to sleep when they wake you up. And the safer you feel, the more quickly that will happen."

She doesn't seem to be concerned with the sudden contact, threading her fingers with his like she can lace the two of them together so tightly he can't escape her. Into the keep they go, and from there into the gardens. Up a flight of stairs, then through an unlocked door.

"I don't know how so much of this space goes unclaimed. People don't explore, maybe."

The room is empty and littered with rubble, but there's a window. Someone toted a mattress up here and set it down on the floor with no bedframe, but it doesn't even have bedding on it. It's clearly unslept. But the room is dry and as warm as any place is in Skyhold.

"Come on. Lie down."

"You're bossy," Alistair says, but he isn't serious--or he doesn't mind, in any case, sounding more admiring than put-out and mustering up drowsy smile before he does as he's told and drops himself face-down onto the mattress.

He's still for a couple of seconds. It's been a while since he's been on an actual mattress--Zevran's, for a couple days while he was gone, but other than that it's been weeks. Maybe a month. It's nice. But those seconds pass and he twitches one hand up to press over his exposed ear as if to block out noise, then the back of his neck because that's closer to where the sound feels like it's coming from, and twists his spine to look up at her.

"Would you mind staying to talk to me for a minute?"

He wouldn't ask, except that she'd already offered to stay with him in the stables.

She drapes a blanket and her shawl over him and sits down on the edge of the mattress beside him.

"I wouldn't mind, no. I said I'd make sure nobody disturbs you and I will."

"Thanks." He lies back down, head on his folded arms and turned toward her, even though his eyes are already closed again. He's too tired to muster up strong feelings of any kind, let alone embarrassment, but he does manage a sheepish exhale. "I'm acting like a child."

"No. No." The second "no" is breathed more than spoken, as if sternly banishing some unwanted ghost. "I promise you children are a lot more annoying than this. You're acting like a grown-up dealing with grown-up things that require the help of another grown-up."

A hand smooths over his hair.

"Do you think you can sleep here?"

The touch makes his eyelids flutter on instinct, but he doesn't really open his eyes to look. "I can sleep anywhere," he says. It's been easier in the stables--they smell familiar, and the stomping and huffing of horses is what stood in for lullabies when he was small--but not being alone counts for a lot. Whatever he's said to try to make Zevran stop fussing, people are better than dogs.

"What if I ask you to tell me a story?" he asks. "Still grown up?"

"Still grown up," she confirms. "Stories are far too important to be only for children."

She smooths over his hair again.

"They say Ghilan'nain was one of the People first. She was very beautiful, with snowy white hair and extraordinary grace. She was devoted to the goddess Andruil, master of the Hunt, and Andruil favored her above all others. One day, she came across a hunter who had slain a hawk, an animal beloved by Andruil. She grew angry, and demanded the hunter make an offering to Andruil as recompense. The hunter refused, so Ghilan'nain cursed him.

"He found he could not hunt, and became a laughingstock among the People, for what was a hunter who could not hunt? He swore vengeance then against Ghilan'nain. With soothing words, he lured her into the woods, promising he had learned the error of his ways and needed her guidance in making a proper offering to Andruil. When they were alone, he blinded her and bound her like game. But because he was cursed, he could not kill her. So he left her alone in the woods to die.

"Ghilan'nain prayed to the Creators for their aid, but most of all to Andruil. Andruil took pity and sent hares to chew through her bindings. But because Ghilan'nain was still blind, she could not find her way home. So Andruil turned her into the first halla, a beautiful white deer, and thus Ghilan'nain found her way back to her people. Since then, the halla have always guided the People, and never led us astray."

Even half-asleep, he's a decent audience. He makes a noise in his throat at snowy white hair that, if he had the energy, would have blossomed into commentary on their apparent similarities, even if her hair isn't quite white, but after that he's quiet. His breathing evens out. Her voice doesn't drown out the song, because nothing can, but it threads alongside it and keeps him from getting lost in it.

And it's a good story. Afterwards he's quiet for a time, half of the seconds born of respect for culture and so on, half of them due to being the kind of exhausted that makes vibrating his vocal cords feel like a chore.

His voice is a sticky-sounding rumble, but he manages it. "Why didn't they just fix her eyes?"

A soft laugh. "It's mythology. The whole point is that nothing can be fixed, just...made into something new. Dire action must have dire consequence. Even the gods have limits to their power, even your Maker. Andruil dearly loved Ghilan'nain, but she was the goddess of the hunt, not of fixing peoples' eyes."

"That would be very specific," Alistair agrees, unmoving; the he exhales and adds in a burst of gravity, "Some things can be fixed." Or else they're all in trouble, including him and what's left of his optimism and his lifespan.

He moves closer, sort of. It's less a move than a lean, weight shifting on the mattress without going anywhere, but it angles his ear toward her better.

"Do you have another? Or you could tell me about your day."

She releases a soft breath, settling down more. After a few heartbeats, she tells him the story of Andraste and Shartan and the Long Walk to the Dales. It's a longer story, more detailed, and more of a history than a mythology. She lets herself linger in it, hoping he'll fall asleep before she is done.

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(open) for all we know it's just a lie

I. 5

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