In the summer, I remember

[rowancrowned]

WHO: Thranduil, Legolas, anyone good with a bow or who enjoys the wine on offer.
WHAT: ROOTY TOOTY POINT N SHOOTY ARCHERY CONTEST
WHEN: 8th of Bloomingtide, midmorning until sunset.
WHERE: Valley
NOTES: log for a friendly wager! 

The eighth of Bloomingtide began as a chilly morning; not quite cold enough to leave frost on the budding flowers and fresh-sprouted plants in the heights of Skyhold, but nearly, nearly.

By the time the sun was been in the sky for a few hours, most of the early-morning chill had burned off, leaving a day that promised to be nearly too-hot for those who would be stuck in full-plate and in direct sunlight. Thranduil wasn’t expecting any to come clanking down to his little fete, but had none the less secured a spot in the shade. Varric had apparently found him while he was still working on organizing—the target launchers are set neatly in line with everything else. Along the clay pigeon launchers were the standard, stock targets, blindfolds—and on a table off to the side was a few bottles of sweet wine beside loaves of brown bread and hard cheeses.

The contest did not pretend to be anything other than what it was; a chance to meet, and mingle, and possibly show off archery skills. The purses wrested next to the wine and cheese and Thranduil himself. He had found a chair to rest in while waiting for the contestants to arrive, dressed plainer than he had so far allowed himself to be seen. On his fingers, four rings glittered—but his confidence in Legolas was so absolute, he doubted he would lose even one before the days was out.

Comments

[gatheringstorm]

"I couldn't agree more." Korrin reaches up to touch her dragon tooth necklace, a rather recent acquisition. "She now wears a matching one, an old custom among some of my kind. You split a dragon tooth and each wears half. Then, no matter how far apart life takes you, you're always together. Maybe I should have waited, but I'm never good at patience. Besides, with the world as fucked up as it is and getting more so, a lot could happen. I'd rather take what I can, while I can."

She falls silent, turning the dragon tooth in her hand for a moment longer as she's lost in thought. "To be honest, it's baffling to me how little race matters to some rifters, and the worlds they come from. In a good way, mind you. Here, it's always been a major issue, what defines a good part of your life. My kind don't have it as badly as the elves, but we're still outsiders, often mistrusted or kept on the fringes because they think we're little better than beasts or that we'll attempt to convert them. Nevermind that many of us have nothing to do with the Qun."

[obi_wanmanshow]

"Congratulations are in order, then."

Obi-Wan tipped his cup in her direction, a drink to health and long life.

"Well, I can't speak for all Rifters, but in my world, you'd be considered very nearly human, in appearance at least," He grinned, because the word for that category was just that, near-human, and likely related by some distant shared ancestry to the ordinary human stock, "I don't pretend that we have no bigotry at all, but with hundreds of races and thousands of different cultures all working under the same government, we don't usually have the kind of... widespread nonsense that I've seen here."

People will always leave communities, when they feel unwelcome, but where Obi-Wan is from, they will leave the very planet, when they do so. And they'll take their credits with them. The end result is that multiplicity prospers and the insular must remain humble by necessity. But Obi-Wan doesn't explain that, he only sips at his wine and watches the assembles archers draw, hold for a breath, and fire, to the general susurration of the crowd.

"I don't blame her, though. If I were in Galadriel's position, I might be much more aggressive than she has been."

[gatheringstorm]

"Thank you." Flashing a smile, Korrin raises her own glass in response, taking a sip afterward. "And 'very nearly human' in appearance? Seriously? I have to wonder what other people exist that I would be considered so similar. Here, we're the opposite."

Mention of Galadriel has Korrin narrowing her eyes, lips forming a thin line. "She was aggressive enough. She dared to threaten Araceli, leaving her very shaken afterward. The way to get my sympathy is not to threaten my beloved." And she won't soon forget it, from her tone. While the Vashoth woman is usually willing to hear people out as long as her own right to freedom is respected, she has no more sympathy to spare in that particular case.