faderift | [OPEN] Heaven bend to take my hand

WHO: Hermione Granger and YOU
WHAT: Hermione's seen some shit and is trying to get over it.
WHEN: Mid-Kingsway through the end of the month.
WHERE: In and around Skyhold.
NOTES: Takes place after this plot, so some threads will likely have mentions of child death and/or signs of depression. Please let me know if you'd like me to avoid any triggery topics.

Library

Though the curly-haired rifter has become a staple in the library over the past six months, Hermione has been relatively scarce there lately. She has no real heart for research anymore, not after the things she'd uncovered in those journals in that cave in Fromage, and there's so much more to Thedas than what can be found in books. She'd learned that the hard way, and now instead of reading and taking notes, she finds her thoughts wandering as they rarely do. For once, she can use a distraction from her failed attempts at studying.

Stables

Avoiding people isn't always as easy as she'd like it to be. But if she can preoccupy herself with animals, Hermione can withstand a bit of small talk. There's usually a kitten or two playing around the stables, and if not, at least helping to feed some of the horses will make her feel productive as well as distracted. And if that doesn't work, there's a certain dracolisk that she'd been slowly learning to get friendly with, assuming it won't sense her dour mood and become agitated.

Battlements

The battlements are actually quite pretty. She'd never really come up here before - if she wasn't in the library then that usually means she wanted to be social, and so the courtyards were where she'd spent more of her time - but now that she's looking for a change of scenery... well, there are worse places to get some quiet with a beautiful view. She's not always alone, since there are always people passing back and forth, but most people don't seem all that keen on hassling the young woman perched in between two turrets, staring out into the mountains. Indeed, unless someone happens to recognize her or just manages to catch her as she wipes at a stray tear, most probably wouldn't even know she's there.

Healing Tents

Returning from Emprise had been difficult, for more reasons than one. Beyond the obvious, Hermione still had a few physical injuries that she'd intended to ask the healers in her group to help with on their way back, but had clearly never gotten around to it due to the extenuating circumstances. Of course, she can't indefinitely deal with waking up with a sharp pain in her back and some of the bruises had begun to look particularly gruesome, so there's nothing wrong with making the occasional visit to the healing tents. If she takes care of one thing at a time and sees a different healer each time, it minimizes the chance of any awkward questions being asked, which is all the better; she's not ready to talk about that dreadful day and is in no rush to change that.

Wildcard!

She probably won't be quite so cheery until later on in the month, but Hermione still needs to eat, drink, bathe, and presumably sleep. She may be a little awkward around those that had gone to Emprise du Lion with her, but she isn't about to actively ignore anyone or send them off. Her nerves might be a bit frayed, but there's still such a thing as etiquette, after all.

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

"This keep is old. Older than most of us know. I've heard various accounts of who might have built it, but the truth is whatever or whoever formed it here has been long been lost to time." She takes a small breath.

"And yet. I've felt a strangeness about this place since I arrived. Not unpleasant, mind, but certainly something. And along these battlements seems to be a presence. As though a thousand people before me have come to stare out at these mountains with the weight of the world on their shoulders."

She cocks her head towards the younger woman, eyebrow lifting. "No? Perhaps it's just me."

Hermione avoids eye contact, something she's gotten to be all too good at doing, really. Taking in Mia's words, she frowns slightly, not liking the idea of every single person who'd ever taken refuge in Skyhold having such troubling thoughts weighing on their minds. But then, given what she's seen of Thedas, it really shouldn't surprise her.

"It's a little harder to bear that weight when it isn't your world," she responds, voice soft. "Thedas doesn't really allow for much of a learning curve, from what I've seen."

"Is it very different in your world?"

If she's noticed Hermione pointedly not looking at her, she doesn't seem offended. Nor does she find reason to dismiss herself. The girl appears to need someone to talk to, even if it's around the issue at hand rather than about it directly.

"I don't imagine you have a hole in the sky to contend with, or some immortal monster trying to conquer all, but I've often thought each of your worlds must have their own troubles to contend with, as much as you may miss them."

"We've dealt with our immortal monster," she returns automatically. "He wasn't so immortal after all."

All things considered, Hermione's experience in the Wizarding World has made it easier to deal with Thedas. She can't imagine growing up as a Muggle and then coming to discover the open existence of magic, dragons, elves, and all manner of other things. But they differ on certain key points, and she can't keep pretending that those points don't have a tremendous impact on her and the semblance of a life she's been making for herself here.

"The things that are different are very different, and very troubling. Especially for someone in my position. How many rifter mages are there, after all?"

"Well. It's good to hear immortality no longer counts for as much as once believed. We may have hope after all," she counters, somewhat dryly.

There's a pause as she adjusts the fur around her shoulders with a gloved hand. The Rifts have indeed known their share of troubles, and a Rifter mage? She can only imagine. Not that she doubts Hermione's ability to handle herself, mind...

"Not very many, as I understand. You are in a very unique position, in a number of respects." One eyebrow lifts. "Are we speaking of something in particular that troubles you?"

Hermione might have ordinarily smiled at that wry remark, but she only frowns down at the warm cake she's still holding in her hands. It's hard to find humor in much of anything these days, and really, that's part of what's been making the previous weeks so hard.

Even so, she finds it hard to answer Mia's question, even if she recognizes that Mia deserves an answer. If not because it wouldn't do to mope about inexplicably, then because, if anyone should be able to understand, it might just be Mia.

"Do you remember when we first met? And we talked about... about possession and-... and the Rite of Annulment?"

To her credit, Mia doesn't flinch away. "I remember," she replies simply, with an air of patience that says Hermione is free to take her time with this. To say as much or as little as she cares to.

She has an ear here to listen, a shoulder if she wishes it. Mia cannot change much inside these walls but she can offer that much.

Hermione takes a deep breath, not really sure that she can go on with it. But Mia isn't rushing her, so as long as she can take this in her own time, she should be all right. Theoretically.

"I... finally saw what happens to someone when they get possessed. I saw it a while ago, I suppose, but we'd been able to help him. This one... he was killed before anyone thought to raise a hand to help. And he'd been a child. A little boy, no older than... seven? Eight?"

While that's certainly what bothers her on a visceral level, there's another layer to it, and she shivers a little before anxiously continuing. "If the Inquisition can do that to someone so young, to someone who'd been ripped away from his family and who'd granted a demon access to his body without being old enough to properly think through the consequences-... if they could kill him the moment he proves he isn't human without trying to contain him or help him despite the fact that they can... what would they do to me? A mage from another world, with magic that most here have never seen. If I get too angry and get taken over by Rage, or too scared and succumb to Fear, or too anything and make a single misstep, how much time would I have before the people that I'd thought had been my friends turn against me for the greater good?"

Her dark eyes remain steady, though sympathetic.

"It is a fear the mages here in Thedas live with every day. For the life of me, I do not know how they bear it. I cannot."

But Hermione is close enough to the issue, even as an outsider, that of course that fear would take route. The idea of a child falling victim to a demon as well is disturbing in its own right. In truth? She has every right to be afraid.

Hermione doesn't know what she'd been expecting to say, but she realizes belatedly that there'd been some small, uncharacteristic part of her that had almost wanted to be coddled and told that she has no reason to fear. She's never needed that sort of treatment, had never wanted that sort of treatment either, but right now anything is better than the idea of strong emotions leading a demon to her doorstep. Gryffindors had never been known to do things by halves, after all; strong emotions were sort of their forte.

"Then there's nothing to be done?" she half-asks, half-states, voice uncomfortably hollow. "The mages in this world, both native and rifter, simply have to accept the fact that at any moment, they could be warped into something horrible and forced to be put down like some rabid animal?"

[OPEN] Heaven bend to take my hand

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