this world of ours is not as it seems

[girlinthebox]

WHO: River and OPEN
WHAT: Spooky little girl wandering around Skyhold.
WHEN: Late Wintermarch.
WHERE: Various locations around Skyhold.
NOTES: n/a

River has good days, and she has bad days. At times it feels like the swing of a pendulum, whose motions she can never truly calculate.

The good days have gotten progressively better. There are points of focus, people to talk to, to connect with. The Fade remains a presence, near-engulfing even when she's awake, but there's an opportunity to see past it, or perhaps more accurately to watch it layer against the people on this side of the Veil. Cole's compassion. Nerva's protectiveness. Zevran's cleverness. She thrives in their contact, stretching out without fear of it harming either Simon or herself, and simply allowed to be. It's a novel concept. She flits about the keep, often barefoot and the edges of her dress a little dirtier than they ought to be, her dark hair streaming behind her.

It's odd to think she has friends, yet it seems so. She feels their overlap and it feels like comfort, like warmth, and she doesn't want to untangle herself just yet.

But there are bad days.

She's more like a feral cat on those days, slinking just out of sight, out of reach. Either the noise has grown too loud inside her own head, or Simon's attempts to negate the worst of it leave her sluggish and more than a little bitter. Stumbling around like a child, slowed and lethargic. Those days she's not much good for anyone, though she tries to find those warm touchstones again. She lingers in the kitchens, in the hall, in the library or tavern, trying in vain to feel the vividness of those familiar voices again, blossoming bright like colors in her mind's eye.

She's little more than a shadow then. Huddled, hair in her face, staring outward blankly and through most passersby.

There are more good days than bad, thankfully. But every time she sinks brings doubt, creeping and gnawing. If she can't prevent herself from slipping, what happens if she falls?

Or is simply it a matter of when?

Comments

Russian Roulette on the mood wheel

[judgemewhole]

The barefoot girl can read minds. was the general consensus of whomever Norrington had questioned about the mage who had been attacked by Cade. Weirdly, he had also heard that Cade had been seen in her company. Even stranger, that Nerva herself had appeared to be as well.

So, was it mind control? Blood magic? Or was it simply something about her that apparently turned two of the most "questionable" Templars into approachable people? What did she see that everyone else had missed?

Norrington had kept himself fairly busy over the last few weeks - but with the troops out on general clean-up of the area, he found himself with hours free. Remembering Cade's accusation, he thought it was time to see about the girl himself.

He wonders if he should be surprised that he finds her on the ramparts. He has a feeling he shouldn't be.

[girlinthebox]

She rocks on her feet, back and forth, rolling up onto the ball before slipping back to her heel, her hands braced against the cold stone. She's watching birds fly from the tower, soaring out towards wherever news needs carrying, disappearing after a time into the mist of the mountain clouds.

She is, as previously noted, barefoot.

Norrington is a rumble of confusion and concern, and more than a little suspicion. It creeps up her spine like an unwelcome touch and she turns, brown eyes flickering over him quickly. But whatever she sees doesn't seem to trouble her.

Her gaze soon returns to the birds, a smile breaking out on her lips as one swoops closely overhead, and she turns to watch its progress over the battlements. A fallen feather tickles at her toes in the meanwhile.

[judgemewhole]

She looks over at him, then away again, as if he is nothing more important than the feather resting on her toes. So while she watched the birds, he instead watched her arms and legs. Looking for recent scars, deep cuts that could have only come from a knife.

Folding his arms behind him, he approached cautiously, noting that, oh joy, she was right near a part of the ramparts where there was a straight drop. No scars on her arms, and on her feet. Typically the two places blood mages liked to cut themselves. Besides that, he couldn't recall a single blood mage who enjoyed watching birds out of sheer joy and not some sort of ...predatory intent.

He came to about five feet away from her, and looked off at the birds himself, and stated dryly, "So they tell me that you can read minds."

[girlinthebox]

"They're not books."

Nonplussed, River bends at the waist to pluck up the feather. It turns delicately in her fingers, gleaming in the light. She carefully smooths the ruffled sections back into one smooth, sleek line.

"Can't just open a person's life to the middle and read. I hear people when they're loud. It's not the same."

Finally she looks back towards Norrington, unafraid. He's not one of the bad ones, either, just very concerned about corruption. He's afraid of the wrong thing, but it'd be foolish to tell him so.

[judgemewhole]

Now that... was a valid point. He folded his arms over his chest, nodding his head slightly. "I cannot argue with that. You can never understand a person if you do not know where they have come from."

Now curiosity flickered across his face, as he tipped his head at her. "So ... if our ... thoughts are loud, you can hear them? Like we are yelling them at you?"

[girlinthebox]

"Like...noisy neighbors. Echoes. There's a wall, but it still comes through. I can't not hear." The feather lowers, though still clutched in her fingertips.

"Wasn't always that way. Things...happened. Split the seams and now things come in, bleeding through. We're trying to fix it, but the pieces don't fit together like they used to."

[judgemewhole]

Well, now she had his full attention. It didn't sound like it was a gift she could control. He ...wasn't entirely sure how she would. He had never heard of a mage's ability like this.

Something in him paled, because to have something like this done to her - ah, Maker. "So they took apart your mind, and you ... and someone else are trying to put it back together again. Was it ... blood magic?"

He isn't entirely sure he understands.

[girlinthebox]

The word brings the memory back to life in a breath, a spell all its own. Blood. She'd taste it on the air, on her skin. That poor elven girl, who'd been kind to her...

She'd gone very still, very quiet with the remembering. She barely shivered when the wind blew down across the battlements, stirring her hair and her dress.

"They...wanted me to go inside. To hurt people. But I didn't want that. And they were wrong, something out of place. They tried and tried, and the others died..."

[judgemewhole]

Maker's Breath. He had no idea what had happened to this girl, but he knew the touch of blood magic when he saw it. Destructive power, worked over an innocent girl and broken her from the inside. His jaw tightened, but he wasn't angry at her, oh no. Just the monsters who had done this.

Others? They had done this to others? Monsters. Horrific monsters. He stands up a little straighter, quieting his voice, "I don't want to hurt you, by making you remember those things. I know it ... I know it was terrible. I would like to help you though, if I can. Help you and the ... person trying to put you back together."

[girlinthebox]

"My brother. Simon. He took me away..."

But she shouldn't talk about that. Better not to bring questions to the matter. Not in front of this one. He'd saved her, and that was enough. She swallows and lifts her gaze to James once more.

"He said it'd be safer here."

[judgemewhole]

Simon. Right. He'd seek that young man out later. For now though, he can see the look in her eyes and -- suddenly he feels like he should share something that he has only shared with one other person here. He puts one hand on the stone, gesturing for her to do the same.

"Do you feel that?" He asked quietly, "The very feel of this place is a beacon from the darkness. It is protecting us, even now. Your brother was very right, River. You are safe here."

[girlinthebox]

"The stone sings. Not just to the dwarves. It sang for all of them when it split apart."

But she smiles, pressing her palm to the stone as he does, nodding. Any templar who can feel that presence and not fear it but instead recognize it for what it is? Can't be as terrible as the rest.

After a moment she turns, extending the sleek black feather towards him between her fingertips, an expectant look on her face.

[judgemewhole]

He looks at her, surprised, but his lips curve into a little smile. That it was a real feeling, and not something he just imagined? It helps his poor hurting faith a little more.

He tilts his head at her, a little confused, but he leans and takes the feather from her fingers.

[girlinthebox]

"It's real. It's a glow in your heart. Doesn't matter where it comes from as long as it helps. Helps you, helps them. The little things matter, too."

A tentative smile flickers across her face before she spies a butterfly, seemingly an escapee from the gardens. She slinks right past James in order to peer more closely at it, though hesitating to reach just yet.

[judgemewhole]

He stares at her for a moment, before he looks at the feather for a long moment. She was right - although he wasn't sure what a feather would mean as a symbol for faith. Still, he tucked it inside of his leather jacket, before turning to watch her as she looked at the butterfly.

One corner of his mouth lifted up, "Delicate little thing, isn't it?"

[girlinthebox]

"Grew in the garden, nestled in the snow. All desolate and white around her, but she survived." River is entranced by the little creature, and when it lands on a nearby stone she ducks down to observe it more closely. The wiggling antennae, the glossy black eyes.

"She's free...as long as she stays here. The cold would kill her."

[judgemewhole]

He looked over at her, then at the butterfly, and he spoke with an honesty he rarely shared with anyone. Still, he had the strangest feeling that River of all people, would understand and not judge.

"Yes the cold would kill anyone out there. She's not the only one who is safe within these walls." He looks down at the courtyard, keeping his voice quiet, "Sometimes I wonder if everything we have fought for is already dead, and all I am trying to do is stay in the cocoon. Refusing to come out into this ... strange new world."

[girlinthebox]

"They have to come out."

River peers up at him now, though not moving from her current position near the butterfly, her knees tucked up under her where she's crouched.

"They die if they don't. And they'll never know what they could have become."

[judgemewhole]

He looks down at her then, the factual meaning and the symbolic one striking a chord in him. He knelt down next to her, his expression serious as it stayed on the butterfly.

"But what do you do, if you spend your entire time defending your right to come out of the cocoon at all? What if other ... kinds of butterflies deny that you can ever change, ever become something else?"

Frustration and a little bit of anger came across his expression then. "Is it worth it, in the end, just to see if you're beautiful or ... a monster?"

[girlinthebox]

"Nobody chooses what they become. You just choose what to do with it."

If that were true, who would decide to be a mage, or an elf? Who would decide to be seen as different, to come out of that cocoon and be more when others would fear or deride them? But he's a human, a man, a templar. He knows little of what that means, and it's good enough that he thinks to ask those questions at all.

Her eyes flicker back to the butterfly, as it departs for the gardens some distance away, over rooftops. For a moment she seems ready to follow, climbing up onto the edge of the battlements and carefully balancing there.

[judgemewhole]

He pressed his lips together, considering it her words. He had a choice now - as did all his people. A choice to move forward, or cling to the old ways. He couldn't ... wouldn't stay behind when there was so many people who were looking at him and Alayre to show a new way.

Even if it meant he was going to have to face the anger of some, on either side of the Templar and Mage fences. So many had fought to move forward with their lives, either outside the Inquisition or as Templars. Could he do no less?

He looked back to her, before he let out a strangled noise, then put his hands up, "River - would you please back away from the edge?"

[girlinthebox]

But she showed no signs of swaying, nor of backing away. The gaps between the stone were easily navigated as she walked, one foot in front of the other, following the drifting insect with curious eyes. If it went too high, it risked being found by the ravens.

A sharp wind had her skirts gusting about her calves, but she remained in place. Somehow.

[judgemewhole]

He watched her, hands going out to grab her back if she fell from the edge, but ... she seemed to stand perfectly still, without wavering at all. Reaching out to the sky, without a nary drop in balance.

He felt his hands fall down to his sides, as he looked at her with open wonder. How did she manage that? Fearless, in every regard? Did she simply have that much faith that she would not?

Allegories, again. But he did move closer to the edge himself.

[girlinthebox]

The birds. There was something in that, something that scratched at the back of her mind. But it was gone again, and then the butterfly was wafting off towards the courtyard, leaving her to watch it drift away from her precarious perch.

"...we can't be afraid of what we become. Can't be afraid of falling, or we will."

Her fingers closed into her palm, pressing against her own chest gently before glancing back towards the templar, hovering so close. Ready in case she did.

"Nerva told me that if I fell, I might hurt someone."

[judgemewhole]

He leaned against the stone, looking down, then up at her again. She was very wise, for a mad little one. Perhaps that was the way of things - how she knew to get by. The world was clearer through the bottom of a distorted glass, when the world was already distorted.

"So we must be brave where we stand, whereever that might be. Even right next to the edge."

He paused, then said simply, "In more ways than one."