We must resist

[arcaneadvisor]

WHO: Morrigan; open
WHAT: Checking in on friends, checking in on the mage and rifter situation and research. Wildcard and shapeshifter lesson discussions available!
WHEN: Post-rift opening in Skyhold onwards, basically a big catch-all
WHERE: All over Skyhold
NOTES:A few so please bear with me:
1) Morrigan is seeking out rifters since what happened to Sina, there’s a starter just for them
2) For the same reasons she’s seeking out members of the mage council
3) If you’re interested in shapeshifter lessons, there’s a handy sticky post here
4) The research Morrigan is doing is based on the Hinterlands expedition here

Library - artifact research;
Since returning from the Hinterlands, she’s devoted more time to the artifact that had returned with them, or rather to the notes that had been made about the surroundings. It makes a change to reading the book on the Veilfire runs and making her own notes from what Pel had directed her to, taking her deeper into history, into Avvar culture and Ferelden legends for a change. Each time Flemeth is mentioned she makes what might be a grimace or might be a smile.

Spread across the table are copious notes taken in the Hinterlands, including sketches of the artifact, as well as a symbol drawn on the floor in the ruin, a few more of the strange statues, the piles of bones.

Another perspective would be welcome, as would a distraction in all honesty.

Gardens;
Instead of the usual peace, Skyhold's garden is a battle.  Not a serious one to most but to the children playing Wardens and Darkspawn it's very much real, shrieking and lunging, hacking and slashing with swords.  One little boy holds Morrigan's attention more than the others; this is a rare moment of peace, when things have been on edge lately.  As it is, she's kneeling, planting the seeds she brought with her, a few she's carried around since she left the Wilds, others brought with her from Orlais and beyond.  Simple, quiet work, no devious plans some might think she has, just a break from researching out in the fresh air. 

And no, contrary to what some might have you believe, not a single one of the seeds will grow into something poisonous.

Seeking rifters;
She's met a rifter or two since she came to Skyhold, and talk of them has been everywhere but hunting them down to talk was never a priority until the rift had opened within the very walls.  Now?  Well she has theories, theories she cannot test herself but looking for them might help, and it's a different sort of magic, something new to draw her attention when not working on whatever scraps of elven lore they've uncovered thus far.

Wherever the rifters might be, she seeks them out eventually, appearing around a corner seemingly from nowhere, perhaps after a particularly intent crow or cat has watched them before disappearing.  The introduction is the same each time, for she only knows one or two in passing.

"Greetings, you may call me Morrigan.  I wonder, might you have the time to talk a while?"

Seeking the mage council;
That they've made a little Circle themselves here is still a notion that disquiets her, something that she keeps an eye on without joining in, unwilling to be held to whatever rules they've made but it wasn't just anyone who opened a rift in Skyhold.  It was a native, a native mage and when she arrived in the first instance it was after an Abomination rampaged.  It hardly helps matters that she's Dalish as well.

There are too many Templars here for her liking as it stands, unsure of what reprisals there might be.  So she waits, quiet and patient, seeking Adelaide LeBlanc in particular simply because they've spoken before but it is opinions she is after, a sense of how things truly lie.  She's lingered before, to watch, to listen, to judge silently and she never could abide things being caged.

wildcard;
[Or feel free to find Morrigan elsewhere!]

Comments

barges in here!!! (also: wildcard)

[fightingale]

Since Zevran was taken, Leliana has not wandered the castle so freely has she had begun to. Any sense of relaxation was nixed, banished, and what small trifles she had allowed herself even before her regular forays out of the tower had begun, she ceases. The Nightingale is present at all hours, it seems, speaking in soft words, reading and writing endless letters, descending over to deal with advisors and necessary situations as they arise. Her time in the Emprise had been brief, compared to many, but it is enough to have sparked a sick guilt in her over her self-indulgences.

She must be here. She must stay here, in Skyhold, to be the most effective eyes and ears that she can be. Her reach and her knives must be ever ready, her ink and poisons to hand.

Leliana lights a candle little shrine in the Rookery, murmurs prayers and wonders, not for the first time, what He wants. It is a question that presses at her more, another weight to drag at her. She moves in silence back to her desk, taking a set and smoothing her hand over a piece of parchment, before taking up a knife that was used to weigh down one side of it. The dagger is sharp, ready. The right tool for the right task, as she so desperately has to be. She lets the tip of the blade press against the gloved pad of her left index finger, slowly spinning the hand with her right hand as she thinks. "If sacrifice is the only way to win the your favour, how much will it take? Justinia gave all she had, and then her life."

Zevran lost what sense of peace he might have come to have and half of his sight. Leliana had lost nowhere near so much, so well as she can see, but she wonders. Must she cut away her compassion? Her mercy? Must she cut away Leliana completely, give her to the Maker, and let only the Nightingale remain? What good had Leliana managed to do, a child with delusions that she had been chosen?

Her lips curl with displeasure, and she takes the dagger and drives it into the wood of her desk, the only target present for her anger.

[arcaneadvisor]

Kieran had wanted to see Zevran. She isn’t in the habit of lying to Kieran but there are things a boy doesn’t need to know; they took Zevran, he was hurt, he’ll get better, he needs peace and quiet to rest. If only it would be enough for her but she hasn’t gone seeking him beyond taking Kieran along, mercifully catching him on a good day. There’s research, much more since the Hinterlands, others who wish to learn how to shapeshift and the current...situation, if she has to put any sort of name to it. That would be enough for anyone.

But some of them are more, have been more.

The scouts still aren’t used to her sweeping her way up the stairs to the rookery judging by the way they scurry out of her path, but she can feel something ugly in the air already. She waits at the top of the stairs, listening, sighing. Part of her expected this though there is so much less of Leliana that she wonders where it’s gone or if she wants to know. A scout moves to say something but a jerk of her head sends them away right as the dagger hits wood.

A few steps and she stands, arms folded, eyebrow arched, inscrutable as ever.

“I thought the Maker had turned his gaze from all of us until the Chant rings out across the whole of Thedas,” she says, and for once she doesn’t sound amused, like there’s a private joke only she understands, just tired. “If that is so, is any sacrifice known?”

What argument she gets in return - if that is what she gets - she can’t say but at least she’ll know who she’s talking to, if it’s Leliana or the Nightingale.

[fightingale]

"Morrigan."

Such is the best greeting she can muster, for now, dragging her gaze from the dagger and the splintered wood at its base to look towards her. The Arcane Advisor, the alarming and sometimes unwelcome hand within the Winter Palace. She remembers the first day they met, when she was a wild, untamed thing, and the poet in her thought she was more like a force of nature than a person. Such an idea still fits, though she is perhaps less akin to a storm, now, controls herself but still will not be controlled. It is admirable, Leliana thinks.

"He is not gone, only... fickle. Demanding ever more of his children, wringing everything we have from us." The tone is harsh and bitter. Her hands remain steepled before her, elbows resting on the desk, and she is trying to gauge what it is that Morrigan wants today, because Morrigan always wanted something. That is the other thing she remembers.

Post-rift, pre-emergency meeting?

[gatheringstorm]

Korrin never intended to be involved in politics at all; really, she just wanted to be left alone with the freedom to do as she wishes. But the Inquisition isn't the Valo-Kas, and she's not immune to whatever decisions are made about mages in general. She'd only intended to ensure that non-Circle mages weren't forced into something not of their choosing, that their rights were respected. As that was interpreted as volunteering herself, Korrin's role as the apostate Councilor was cemented.

Due to leave Skyhold shortly, Korrin lingers below the main hall, waiting for the council to convene. Her vote could be cast by sending crystal, but given the timing, the Vashoth mage might as well linger long enough to speak with the others in person. On the road, this would only distract her anyway. And 'distracted' is a terrible thing to be in Emprise du Lion.

So, she paces, a horned stormcloud of emotions. Left to her own thoughts, that stormcloud will only grow.

[arcaneadvisor]

There are more Qunari - or Tal-Vashoth, whatever they’re calling themselves - here than she’s seen before. Always a few in Orlais, curiousities, but more of them are a delegation from the Qun itself or in a mercenary company, same as those employed by Carta dwarves of all people. Hopefully Kieran has spoken to none of them, their tempers are less easy to predict when someone might say something about their blood.

This isn’t the mage she’s seeking but it can’t hurt to ask others as soon as she can because there are so many Templars here, too many, and this is another unknown, so soon after an attack within the walls itself. If the Templars are clamouring for blood from this - and well they might, Templars do not understand, they never will despite protestations - then she will be gone, she will slip away in the night and back to Orlais.

She will wait, as she has waited before, or the Inquisition will have to manage without all that she can bring.

“A moment, if you will,” she calls, stepping about the corner from where she’s been waiting, watching, “I have a question I wonder if you might answer, regarding the rifters and the attitudes the council bears them.”

[gatheringstorm]

That voice abruptly pulls Korrin out of her own thoughts, and her pacing comes to a halt as she notes the arcane advisor with some surprise. She's seen her around, of course, but their duties haven't often intersected. Naturally, she's curious about one who has traveled with the Hero of Ferelden, but there's enough restraint in her to hold back from pestering when they barely know each other.

So it's a little ironic that it's Morrigan coming to her with a question instead. Once her surprise wears off, she nods politely. "Lady Morrigan. I'll try to answer as best I can, though I'm certain some of those views have changed significantly since the council last convened." You know, before the rift in Skyhold. Her wry smile is brief. "Before the rift, I would have said that they were sources of curiosity. I know many others have been suspicious of them, but we know what demons are and aren't; and we know what it is to be judged. And since they bear the Herald's mark, they're invaluable to the Inquisition."

With a sigh, she begins pacing a new, though it's slower than before. "Now, however, there's as likely to be dread. Those shards are supposed to seal rifts, not open them. That it was one of our own might not matter; all could bear that potential. All of them could be in danger." Her lips thin, eyes dark with concern and grief. It may seem strange for a native to be so invested in the rifters' fates, but she has her reasons.

nearly a month after the rift; in her tent in the garden

[eolasemah]

Sina is still recovering from the rift incident, and likely will be for a while. But at least she's awake and able to speak with people now, and Nari has more opportunity to go out and help with other aspects of the Inquisition.
Bedridden, Sina looks longingly toward the flap of the tent, listening to the hum of activity outside and wishing she could join in with it. Her shard has calmed considerably, though it gives her the same amount of difficulty as usual, which in her state of recovery means she won't be up and about anytime soon.

[arcaneadvisor]

Given that she's spent much of her time in the gardens, either to restock from her own stores, to watch Kieran playing, or simply to sit somewhere with fresh air and less noise, the tent attracts attention. A boy might have crept past before being called away, peering in with a shy smile, almost as if he might ask a question but he never does.

There are other things to be excited about that don't involve pestering the ill.

Morrigan though does find herself drawn to it, striding across before she comes to kneel and flip open the flap, golden eyes bright even in the dark.

"Care for company?" If it had been another rifter she would have been curious anyway, but a mage and a Dalish mage? No one ever said she lost her taste for selfishness entirely. "I had hoped you might feel well enough to talk for a time, I will not stay overlong."

[eolasemah]

Sina is rereading a scroll for the millionth time when she turns her head toward a voice, and she smiles pleasantly at the sight of the woman she's come to recognize from her presence in the garden. "Certainly," she says quietly, and with a poorly-disguised wince of pain, she props herself up to be more upright so she can converse.

wildcard.

[byblow]

This isn't a request for sympathy, but: Alistair looks like shit. He's looked a little like shit for months now, maybe a year, but now not even his attempt at a smirky schoolboy smile can keep him from looking several years older than he is. He abandons it pretty quickly, when he comes to stand next to Morrigan in the Skyhold garden—the smirk, and his attempt to come up with an appropriately insulting greeting. (The habit isn't dead, only taking a nap.) He sighs instead. Not at her. At life.

He can see Kieran on a bench across the way, working diligently on something or other that involves a book. He definitely didn't get that from Alistair.

"You said he's been having bad dreams?"

[arcaneadvisor]

Until now Alistair's has been a face seen in passing, usually before one of them turns in the opposite direction or Morrigan shuffles Kieran to a lesson or to eat. Admirable considering she stays not so many doors from him though that's more because having Zevran as a buffer has worked well.

Or had, she has no idea when his good days will be what his old days were, if that will come back.

That she knows Alistair went, that's reason enough to at least try for something less than her usual self, to keep the claws tucked in as she glances at him before back at Kieran. Her smiling around Alistair is probably rare enough something terrible should be happening before it slides from her face.

"Yes," she admits, and it hurts, it's not a thing she can fix yet she's the cause of it. "Lyrium has given him terrible nightmares before but with what you spoke of..."

She worries. She worries and it shows, that way she clenches her jaw and can't look at either of them, the sigh almost verging on a gasp.

[byblow]

She doesn't look at him, but Alistair looks at her, openly, with surprise and skepticism that quickly bleeds into sympathy. He's changed you, he thinks but doesn't say. Instead he asks, "He doesn't hear a song, does he?"

As far as Alistair understands the process, Kieran shouldn't be tainted--but he doesn't understand it very well, to be fair. He hadn't asked many questions. He'd been twenty and overwhelmed and afraid to die, and Cousland had handled the details, made the bargain. Alistair never thought he would actually see the end result of it, or that the end result would have his nose and not a single visible fang.

post-zevran rescue, pre-returning to emprise du lion | gardens.

[wickedchase]

"Is that him?" is asked, with Fate leaning casually against one of the pillars.

There's not much that Twisted Fate really knows about Morrigan's son, nor has he truly asked. It's her business after all, and Fate respects her enough to have her personal space. It's not a lack of interest, far from it; he wants to know, wants to ask, and it's his natural instinct to be nosy as hell.

But he likes her and leaves her be.

Mostly.

[arcaneadvisor]

"The one with the griffin on his shirt? Yes." That does seem to be where his gaze is drawn, and it would be easy enough to pick out her son. The pale skin, the dark hair, the same jawline.

The nose is all Alistair.

"He has not come to pester you then?" Kieran has more freedom to wander in Skyhold though there are watchful eyes: Zevran, Alistair if he spies, Leliana, his other little mage friends with watchers of their own no doubt. And Morrigan is never far unless she leaves but she's been good at keeping him safe. Still, Twisted Fate would be very interesting to a boy of ten.

[wickedchase]

"Pester? Never." He chuckles. "I doubt that he could. But I didn't want to assume you would approve of my interacting with him. I've been told I'm not always the best influence, as it were."

There is something of a warm look in his eyes as he looks over the boy. Fate glances at Morrigan before he turns away again. "He looks a lot like you," he says, complimenting.

[madame_de_fer]

Vivienne isn't difficult to find. In fact, it would be nearly impossible for anyone to miss that she's set up her own refined parlour in the balcony of the Great Hall. If Morrigan is to seek out the Council members, this particular one should prove beyond easy to locate.

It takes Morrigan's initiative to approach the Iron Lady, however. Vivienne knows that the uncultured barbarian witch is present, but has has no interest in interacting with her. Perhaps not so surprising given that there have been whispers that one usurped the position of the other. As far as the Enchanter is concerned, at least openly, she cannot be bothered with an insignificant apostate when there is so much other work to be done.

At present, she is occupied with pouring over any shreds of research on the Fade and its interaction with magic. Sina's mishap weighs heavily on her and she would quite like to avoid seeing a repeat. Seated with perfect posture at her writing desk, Vivienne is armed with a glass of wine, a stack of books, several sheaves of paper and three inkwells.

[arcaneadvisor]

Of course Morrigan rolled her eyes when she came to Skyhold and saw where Vivienne had installed herself - Morrigan prefers her quiet quarters further from much of the noise, close to Zevran and Alistair, a place to research quietly. But then some do become accustomed to a certain loftiness wherever they go.

Arriving in Skyhold was mostly about settling Kieran because she can't put herself first and hasn't in a long time, and then there were the many Dalish she had time to meet, the research to share, keeping careful track of the eluvian coming from Orlais and stopping during the worst of the winter snows. Usually she has little and less to say to Vivienne but if she wants to have a true idea of the direction the mage council might go, she'll go to Vivienne.

They can say it's a council all the want, but if Vivienne is willingly involved in it then Morrigan is no fool, she knows where much of the power will lie.

It's tempting to simply appear, she could do that if she wished because the trouble with time spent with heroes is that people know she's a shapeshifter but she'd rather save that for listening in on council sessions. Instead she comes up the stairs, halting where she won't be in view from below, old habits still prevailing.

"Vivienne." No point in even pretending then can stand one another, Morrigan doesn't play the Game. "I trust your little Circle will have something to say on the Dalish mage with the shard?"

Gardens

[el_tybs]

It was just one thing after another in Skyhold. First there was the rift opening up leaving Sina bedridden, and then the whole ordeal with the Crows, which had left Zevran in bad shape and Merrick bedridden as well. And now? Sam was taking a break before something else happened, and before he had to head out to Emprise du Lion.

He had figured the garden would have been a good place to relax, but today it seemed that it had become a battlefield. The yelling and the clank of wooden weapons weren't normally associated with relaxing, but at seeing the children enjoying themselves, Sam finds himself smiling. Even so he makes sure to keep himself out of sight as much as possible so that he doesn't end up being pulled into the fight.

Eventually though he spots Morrigan kneeling down by a patch of dirt and curiously moves over to see what she's doing. "Elven historian and gardener," he comments, raising his brows with a tilt of his head at what she's doing.

[arcaneadvisor]

As much as Kieran is usually at his lessons or helping Morrigan with something, after all that's happened to Zevran, she's rather glad that he asked to go off to be with his friends. It's good for him to have children his own age and to do normal childish things. Right now he's still under her gaze and she glances over at Sam before she gets back to work, digging a neat hole with her thumb to drop in another seed that she covers again.

Clapping the dirt from her hands before she reaches for another from one of the glass vials at her side, she looks up, brow arched.

"If you had been to Orlais you would know what they call gardening. But I was raised in the Wilds, if one had little knowledge of the plants there she would not last long."

Gardens

[the_effect_she_has]

A young woman enters the gardens, a saddlebag over one shoulder as she pauses and smiles at all the children. One of them spots her, and lets out an excited squeal, "Katniss!"

The others follow, running over to her, and she puts down her saddlebag so she can get group mauled by all the children, but one. A solemn looking boy - new obviously - and she gives him a quiet nod and a little smile, before putting her attention on the other children.

"I won't interrupt the battle -- but I've got treats... " And she hands them out - sweet honeysticks, and some other fancy Orlesian candies, along with new bone whistles and the like.

She looks at the solemn boy again, as the others part, and gives him another quiet smile. "You can have one too, if you like?" She offers out a small bone whistle -- probably best not to offer candy until she's met this boy's parents. Something about him, though, struck her as familiar.

[arcaneadvisor]

Kieran watches, allowing his playmates to run past him as his gaze goes to Morrigan. Zevran gives presents freely, and Morrigan always returns with something that he’ll find interesting. He’s much the same as she was, shiny things, glittering things, supplies he can make something from and books, she’d privately been afraid he wouldn’t enjoy books but though he sighs before lessons when he’d rather do other things, she so often finds him curled somewhere with a book open in his lap.

Much of the resemblance becomes clear when Morrigan comes to stand beside him: the dark hair, the shape of the eyes and the jaw, something not wholly of this world about either of them. The nose is not her nose though. His is the unfortunate Theirin nose, a nose he might be teased over by friends when he grows older.

For now though he’s at least smiling once she reaches his side, her hand on his shoulder. His name is called by one of his friends before he can decide and after another glance he’s lifting his wooden sword once again as he rushes into the fray, all of them laughing.

“He is not accustomed to receiving things from a stranger,” she explains, “tis not a habit one should gain in such times, when demons fall from the skies.”

/tosses in a rifter!

[dragoon_pride]

Kain has been- what else?- busy training in the practice grounds. He did see a crow lingering about the area, but thought nothing of it as he carried on with his routine, jumping and stabbing at the dummies with his lance. It's after he's finally ready to stop and take a break that Morrigan approaches and gives her greeting.

"Talk? About what?" He hasn't met her before, and can't imagine why she'd want to speak with him... he'll find out soon enough, he supposes.

[arcaneadvisor]

The lance was a weapon rarely used in Thedas, at least not outside of sieges and open battle and Ferelden still had mostly foot soldiers, a preference for shield in one hand with a weapon in the other or a great heavy monstrosity requiring two hands. True, Alistair had his pike but well, that was never put to any great use beyond pointless handling.

“I wished to discuss the shard you bear, and such matters. I am no mage of the Circles,” it should be plain enough in how she’s dressed, how she holds herself, “and I have knowledge they shall never possess. I had hoped to find some answers to perhaps satisfy curiousity, or to help before the mage council bows to the Templars and likely has all of you watched wherever you go.”

Library

[fleurdesel]

As before, there is little to be found in Skyhold's library that could possibly be of use. Nothing on the fade of veil that she does not already know, nothing on rifts, nothing on the summoning of demons that isn't five kinds of fictionalized or banned. If she had her own notes on spirits and fade meditations from the spire- that would be something but this? This is a mess she's run through once already and come to naught.

Adelaide is hunched over a desk, books and scrolls stacked high at her elbow when Morrigan approaches, though she does glance up. "Is there something I might do for you?"

This deep into research she is less the councilor and more herself; though she may need to claw that mask back on.

[arcaneadvisor]

Despite knowing that she could easily arrange a true audience with or submit any questions and concerns to the council on a more formal basis, this suits her far better. She’s more comfortable one on one, and honestly if her and Vivienne have to be in the same room for any length of time then little is going to get done; one of them didn’t come here to play politics.

With a quick glance about to check for any ears that might be listening, or any that didn’t already belong to Leliana, she does offer a smile before she finds a seat to pull over, splitting the stack in half with care so she can see Adelaide better without being in her way.

“Hard at work I see,” she says by way of greeting but whatever passes for friendliness or warmth fades quickly. “I wished to speak with you regarding this newest incident in Skyhold, the one involving the Dalish mage, I cannot imagine it can pass without some official comment from the council at the very least.”