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WHO: Eirlys and YOU
WHAT: Eirlys arrives back in Skyhold
WHEN: End of Drakonis
WHERE: Skyhold's courtyard and throne room
NOTES: No warnings. Prose and brackets both welcome. So yeah, Eirlys is back, I have a CR meme comment for her here!

a) Courtyard
At first glance, it's not obvious that Eirlys has been away. She gets back into the routine of life at Skyhold easily enough, if for no other reason that she excels under the sort of pressure that the healers there - and everyone else, for that matter - are under. She's brought a fresh supply of herbs and poultices, and she's kneeling in the midst of the sick and wounded, attending to them as best she can. On looking closely, however, she's very pale and tired, and she's far thinner than she was when she left Skyhold, after months of scarce food over the winter in the alienage. While she remains the pinnacle of compassion with her patients, she doesn't seem too pleased to be back overall.

b) Throne Room
It takes her a few days to pluck up the courage to make herself heard. She dislikes being the centre of attention, preferring to focus her efforts on the wellbeing of others instead, but she knows that in the long term nothing will change unless she speaks up.

She makes her way over to anyone who looks important - or at least, anyone who looks like they belong to the Inquisition more than she feels she does herself. Clearing her throat, she asks quietly, "Excuse me, but I need to speak to those in charge."

c) Wild card
Choose your own starter, or hit me up at

viridianwings if you'd like me to write another option for you!

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Across the Courtyard, every afternoon, James is going through his correspondence and writing letters to people across Thedas. He is writing reports for Cullen on the progress of the troops, and sketching up plans for blood mage hunts. Usually, he has his head over his parchment and writings, but for whatever reason, he looks up today and see the young elven woman across the way.

His first thought is that she looks tired, as she bends over another soldier, tipping his chin back so he can drink the potion. The second is that -- he's certain he might have seen her before, but not for some time. He frowns, briefly, and continues to watch her for a moment.

Then he puts up his quill, rises to his feet, and makes his way across the courtyard to her. He stops a few feet away, folding his hands back behind his back as he calls out, "My lady, would you like some assistance?"

Eirlys' lips purse into a thin line at such a polite greeting, never sure if it's one that's sincere or intended to mock her, as her status as a lowborn elf is so obvious at first glance. Then she lets her guard drop a little, smiling gratefully at the offer.

"If it won't inconvenience you, Sir. There's plenty of work to be done and precious few hands to help." She shifts her position a little so there's room for him to reach in. "Hold this poultice in place, while I pack it to the poor fellow's leg."

You know, it should say something about the company James has been keeping that a suspicious glance does not send him immediately in the other direction. Instead, he waits, and is rewarded with a grateful smile, which is a surprise in of itself.

"It absolutely does not." He stated, before he knelt beside her, and nodded as he looked over at the soldier, then down at the wound. He tutted softly, "Poor fellow - looks like a magical wound. Venatori?"

He holds the poultice as he should, clearly not someone who is disturbed at the sight of gore.

"It wouldn't surprise me." She reaches across James to get the straps of cloth she's torn in advance to hold the poultice in place. "But he hasn't been in a position to tell us, so far."

She sincerely hoped that would change, that her care would make him take a turn for the better, but she doesn't have too much experience with magical injuries.

"Then I shall put a few prayers in to the Maker, while you bind his wounds." He held the poultice firmly in place, and as good as his word, closed his eyes to pray over the man lying below him. Putting it out into the universe that this man needed to live to see a few more sunrises.

"I'm sure he'll appreciate that." She still believed very strongly in the power of prayer, even if she felt herself beginning to question her own faith more and more with each harsh winter in the alienage that passed. "Balm for the spirit is just as important as that for the body, after all."

He looked up at her at that statement, a quiet smile flashing over his face before he nodded. "I agree completely." He said a quiet prayer, under his breath, before he looked at her curiously, "Do you believe in the Maker, or do you believe in the Creators? I don't want to presume anything."

"I was raised Andrastian, as all the alienage elves are." She makes sure the poultice won't shift, then reaches up to place a lozenge of different herbs under the man's tongue, something to help break his fever. "Nowadays, I confess I'm not certain. Some days I want to believe in both, and others neither. I'm not sure if that's my own will or a test of the Maker."

"Ah-hah ... " James had been learning quite a bit about elves recently - that elves in the Alienage seemed to have the worst treatments, according to Fiona. He gave her a sympathetic look, before he sighed, "I am sorry. I understand your people's suffering must make it difficult to keep faith."

Eirlys nods in agreement with his sentiment, her brow furrowing as she considers both sides to her conundrum. "It is difficult," she admits, "especially when the Chantry treats us with the same oppression as the rest of the shems." Her face flushes and she glances back at him. "I'm sorry, I mean no offence, Ser. At the same time, how wonderful it feels to know there is something out there greater than all of our struggles, a tiny part to which we belong."

He sighed, as he watched her hands do her work. Capable, strong hands, no different than any healer's. Certainly she was elven, but why did that matter? If you could do your job, kept faith and did your best to better the world through the Maker's work, who cared if your ears were pointed or not?

"Some shems are closed minded bigots and idiots." He stated firmly, then sighed, "... and some of us are ... learning. I will not say I am perfect, but I will say that I am trying. It may take longer than that, but the world is changing, madame. As is the Chantry's views on your people, and the public's."

"I hope that the work of the elves with the Inquisition will go a long way toward altering those views." It was the reason she'd come back, after all, to do all she could to elevate her own people.

"I think it will, my lady. The fact that you are all helping so many people has not gone unnoticed." He put a hand to his chest. "Case in point."

Eirlys smiles, not one of the small practised ones she offers her patients, but a genuine one filled with her own relief. "It is good to hear that. Part of the reason I returned was to ask for the Inquisition to help my own people, so I'm glad we've made some sort of positive impact."

James smiled warmly in turn, before he looks back down at the patient before them. "I think we're all looking for that sort of support from the Inquisition - or at least - a way to all get on the right path. I am afraid tarnished honor is not a worthy goal as yours, though."

"Humans and their honour." She shakes her head a little, thinking that when they had ample food and an equal voice and could walk down the street without being harassed, then maybe her people would start to consider the fragile pride of honour, that humans seemed to wear like a badge. Then she softens a little, considering it from all angles, placing a worn and calloused hand on top of his to show what support she could. "It strikes me, Ser, that honour is, in its way, a sort of dignity. Considering it as such, I'd say that our goals are exactly the same, though you have the good fortune to be in a position where you only have to think of restoring your own honour and dignity, rather than that of all your people."

He looks over at her, then down at her hand, a hand that has seen more work in a lifetime than a noble has seen in a single day. His own hand is rough, and callused, but that is from holding a sword, not tending to the sick and the needy.

Then he gives her a slightly lopsided, sad smile. "Ah, my lady, but I do have to restore it for all my brothers and sisters. For every sin they have perpetrated, I must win back that much faith." He too, softens, "But I shall never say that I walk the harder path. You must do all this, and keep your people and your history alive."

Eirlys smiles over at him, a little lopsided but encouraging. "In that case, Ser, I'd say you are most definitely learning. And I hope the Maker guides you to your own goal. I'd say it's a worthy one."

She had a very nice smile, James thought, and he was glad it was pointed at him. "Thank you, my lady. I know yours will be ... a long upward battle, but I hope you find the same."

"With the help of the Inquisition, I just might." But she'll see. For now all she can do is work hard and prove that the elves of the cities were worth helping.

He smiles at her in turn, before he looks down at the fellow still breathing beneath their fingertips. "By the look of things - you are off to an excellent start. You are a fine healer, I must say."

Eirlys finally removes her hand, busying herself by mopping the clammy brow of their patient. "Thank you. I still have much to learn, but I'm glad I can make some sort of difference."

"Hmmm, for someone who still has much to learn, you have quite the skill in it." He looks down at the young man, then back at her. "Have you always wanted to be a healer, or is just a natural affinity that you have?"

"I didn't really have much of a choice." Her lips thin into a barely perceptible line as she thinks back on the day her parents had taken her to Wellow's, dragging her along the street kicking and screaming, certain that she was going to be chopped up and eaten in her childish terror. "One of the most prominent human healers in Gwaren, his daughter was taken to the Circle and he needed a replacement assistant. So he paid my parents to send me to live there and work for him." She realises that her hand has balled into a fist so tight that her nails are digging into her palm, forces herself to relax it. "In hindsight, there's not a better profession I could have learned. I've saved more than a few lives, and the alienage is far better for having someone who knows their way around a pestle and mortar." But still, she wished the circumstances had been different.

He looks over at her, before he looks down again, and then up at her once more. "I am sorry it was a path, not of your own choosing. I ... chose to be a templar, but only because it was the only way I could see avenging my parents and my brother. I do not regret the man I have become, but in the end ... perhaps I would have not chosen to be a Templar. Perhaps I would have just been a soldier, and my burdens lighter."

He took her hand, and gently squeezed it. "The Maker takes us down many winding roads, to find us in the right destination. I believe whatever you have suffered? Has made you strong enough to fight for those who cannot - like this man. Like your people. You seem like the kind of person who will make this path your own, with your own joys and triumphs, despite the less than ideal beginnings."