Player Plot: I will call you home

[arlathvhen]

WHO: Beleth, Cyril, Merrick, and Ellana Ashara, Thranduil, Sina Dahlasanor, Metaari, Sam Gareth, Kallian Endris, Alistair and Ruby i think??? whoever wants to go
WHAT: Keeping Up With The Asharas, the reality tv show
WHEN: Backdatedish, around mid-kingsway
WHERE: The Heartlands of Orlais
NOTES: OOC post

Tel'enfenim, da'len Irassal ma ghilas Ma garas mir renan Ara ma'athlan vhenas Ara ma'athlan vhenas	Never fear, little one, Wherever you shall go. Follow my voice-- I will call you home. I will call you home.

Clan Ashara currently resides in a small valley nestled into the mountains, that seems idyllic for a Dalish clan. A stream runs through the valley, descending into a waterfall with the steep cliffs on one side, and sheer mountain walls going straight up on two other sides. The only way in and out is through a gap big enough to lead several aravels through. It's a defensible position, safe from any threats. Except the fade rift that has opened up just a little ways from the gap. The hunters can handle the demons spewing from it well enough, and there are always a couple stationed there to pick off whatever appears. But it's too dangerous to lead the aravels and noncombatants through, and thus, they are forced to wait. To compound the issue, there's a village close to where they're currently staying, and while both sides have kept to themselves, neither are pleased with the current situation. They've helped get a message to the Inquisition in hopes that someone will come take care of the problem, and now both are tensely waiting for something to happen to change the situation, for better or worse. And so the members of Clan Ashara, with their friends in tow, return back to their clan.

Comments

[samahl]

It's probably for the best the idea of sharing a tent with Thranduil wasn't spoken aloud, as it would likely distract Cyril for the remainder of the trip.

Cyril takes the offered cup but when he smells the alcohol he doesn't drink. He hopes that won't be considered offensive for now. He hates the idea of disappointing the elves from their world. "Oh me? I'm about to return to my family. I'm happier than a nug in a sweater."

There's something to his tone that shows that it's fake, perhaps the way he forces it to sound off handed and casual.

[rowancrowned]

He smiles, reaches for the cup and settles it back between his hands, letting it warm his palms and leave his fingers near tingling from the warmth.

"The Orlesians dress their nugs in clothing. I have not yet met a nug who was happier once freed." Gently chiding, because that tone is impossible to miss and he does care, truly. He raises his eyes from the cup to meet Cyril's gaze and hold it, lips softly turned in a smile.

[samahl]

For a moment, Cyril allows himself feel distracted by that smile and the way it plays on Thranduil's face. He's so beautiful that he makes Cyril's chest ache in a way that is both familiar and so strange.

"You're right, I'll have to think of a different analogy," he says. He offers Thranduil a small smile. "Why wouldn't I be fine? I'm about to see my elders again. I was raised by the Clan, you know. Many of us were because our parents died from illness. This is like seeing my parents once more."

[rowancrowned]

He isn't particularly fond of using little stories or parables to make his point, but it seems to be happening more and more often. He's better off embracing it. Thranduil's hands tighten around the cup as he shifts over, makes room for Cyril to come closer. The affection Cyril so obviously feels is sweet, not unwelcome. It's different from mortal lust, which he's used to his advantage. It hasn't been difficult to watch him a little closer, remember what he said on the crystal after what had amounted to a love story, and decide how to handle it.

Gently, and with grace, done so slowly over months that Cyril won't realize until the end that Thranduil's painted himself as utterly lacking all sensuality and suitability as someone to be desired. If only there were more Quendi here, he mourns, both for comfort and for the hope that some of them might find spouses among the elvhen. It would be a neater and tighter bind than his own plans.

Come closer, the newly emptied space and Thranduil's carefully angled body says.

"My son often was late for supper when he thought he might have done something to anger me."

[samahl]

Cyril already feels like every elf from Thranduil's world are untouchable in that way, but it has less to do with anything about them so much as this deep sense of them being so far out of his league that the mere thought is impossible. He had experienced that even when it was just Galadriel with all of her grace, beauty, and power. Though with her there hadn't been the weird ache or the deep sense of longing.

In truth, it has a lot less to do with them so much as everything they represent. Even Cyril knows that, which is why he tries so hard not to say stupid things around them. He doesn't want them to think that he overlooks their personhood in favor of the pedestal it's so easy to put them all on.

Cyril still takes the offer for closeness, because it's such a tender gift that he couldn't dream of turning it down. He settles there carefully and then offers a smile of gentle amusement at how easily that analogy hits the issue.

"I suppose that your wrath must be frightening. Most men who care as deeply as you do would feel that deeply as well."

[rowancrowned]

"He is my son." Is, is, even though Legolas is not here, is far from him, is- must be in Valinor by now, safe and happy. It's easier to speak of, now, without actually acknowledging verbally that Legolas ever was here or the manner by which he had left. He smiles, the barest expression, banishes the sadness from it- it is a glamour, always, he may do with it what he likes. "He never suffered more than perhaps a loss of the chance to go to market with his hunting group."

Of course, Legolas had never done anything worse than breaking a bow during an instance of drink-fueled rowdiness. None of them ever had. They were his elves. They understood what was expected of them. A death in a patrol group was its own punishment. He didn't need to tell them to train harder for the next time the spiders would be upon them. They already knew.

(Tauriel's betrayal still left a sour taste in his mouth.)

"Do you truly believe your clan will be angry with you?" His advice would be poor and useless if these feeling were more than anxiety. And then perhaps he would have cause to feel-- well, not wrath, but annoyance.

[samahl]

"No. Not angry. Disappointed," Cyril responded after a moment. He frowned a bit as he thought about it. He wasn't sure he could really fully explain this without seem ungrateful for all his Clan had done for him.

"That's probably much worse."

[rowancrowned]

"Disappointed? In you?" He sounds a tad incredulous- just a tad, a raised brow, concern. Cyril is- well, he hasn't done anything that would make Thranduil disappointed, but Cyril isn't his son, and he's yet to wholly decode the entirety of Dalish culture.

[samahl]

Despite himself, that expression and tone of voice makes Cyril smile. The thought that he was something the elves from Thranduil's world would be proud of made his chest feel warm and comfortable.

That didn't stop him from having the face the elves in Thedas, though, and the feeling faded quickly as he thought of it. "Yes," he says. "In me."

Then, after a moment, he opens up and begins to explain "You know, what we've lost here. You've been told the stories of Arlathan by now. I'd imagine those sound much more like home to you then what we have today."

He frowns a bit at the thought of it. Of how strange it must be for Thranduil and Galadriel to be in a world with elves who are barely shadows their own people. "We are a broken people, limping towards an uncertain future with only fragments of who we once were. If we ever wish to return to that - if we ever will be able to restore ourselves, that means future generations. That means children."

[rowancrowned]

"Not wholly." They had elements of what ought to be- the long life, the art, the connection to the land. But other pieces disgusted him. His expression stays light, polite, his hands still around the cup. He's moved beyond the problem of how they wed so freely and frequently, but the violence, the cruelty, the kinslaying- that sticks, and makes him think that perhaps what was ought to be released. A better future can be built.

"Which you have no interest in begetting." Ah. This makes it much more simple. He sets the cup down, off to the side, and takes Cyril's hand in his own, warm from the heat of the cup. "And they have this same... attitude towards an elf who might have been injured in some way and is also unable to beget children?"

[samahl]

Cyril raised his brow a bit. "You mean pity?" he asked. "It's not that I have no interest in children, it's that I have no interest in women. Many in the Clan have been accepting of that, as long as I eventually settle down and continue the blood line."

[rowancrowned]

"The same disappointment." No better word for it than the one Cyril himself used, after all. What a wretched world, to need to beget elflings for the need to keep elves as a people alive, rather than simply out of love. A world with death breathing down your neck, no promise of Mandos, no promise of a someday-soon reunion.

"Is this common?" He looks over the rest of the clan now, wondering to himself how many are like Cyril, male or female. "Then they expect you to put yourself out to stud."

Like an animal.

[samahl]

Cyril watches Thranduil carefully, taking in his expression and the way he responds to the whole idea of this. He himself is careful not to have too much emotion on his own face. "Each Clan is different," he explains. "We're too separate from each other to be completely unified in all matters." The thought, briefly, of Twisted Fate and his Clan and how different things had seemed when they went there. "But in general, there is a sense that if you are Dalish and choose not to have children you are failing, in some way, to be true to the bloodline. We are not immortal anymore. We need children if we are to live on."

Then, after a moment. "I haven't had it nearly as hard as our Keeper's son, Sorrel. I've been allowed my reckless dalliances, while he has been held on a tight leash. I'm not even sure his mother realizes he has no romantic interest in women. I don't think she'd care if she knew." But Cyril had realized and had known since they were all very young. It had been everything in him not to fall in love with Sorrel because of that. "He has magic, you see. His blood is more precious."

[rowancrowned]

He has schooled his expression into careful neutrality, if a fairly warm one. It always seems that just when he's managed to discover the depths of this world that another makes itself know. Thranduil's only comfort is that once all is made right, Cyril will think less of this time. He's so young- it will seem less important once eternity rolls out before him.

"Would you wed him if you were free to?" he asks, and then clarifies. "Sorrel."

Perhaps he's being insensitive, but given how both Cyril and Sorrel both prefered males, and had been in such a small clan- their paths must have crossed.

[samahl]

Cyril blinked at the idea. There's a hint in his expression that his path had indeed crossed with Sorrel and there had been a hint of longing there. They had never acted on it. Sorrel was strictly off limits.

Still, the idea of it was intriguing. "I might, if he wanted me that way," he admitted after a moment. The idea seemed so unobtainable that admitting he'd consider it seemed harmless.

[rowancrowned]

Harmless enough. "How do engagements and wedding go, among the Dalish?" Thranduil asked, genuinely curious. It wasn't as if he'd have as neat of a movement to this topic again.

[samahl]

"In general? Usually two of age elves decide to bond. There's a token of affection, sometimes a ring, and then they let the Keeper now. It gets more complicated when it's cross Clans, though, as they need to figure out which Clan the couple will stay with. Other times, it's arranged. For example, a Keeper might arrange a marriage with another Clan to help with relations. We don't really see much of each other though, so you need to be ready to say good bye to your family."

internal screaming about how dalish life sucks

[rowancrowned]

"There is no happy median, is there? No state of life between being trapped in an alienage and roaming the woods?" He's staring off into some middle distance, some point beyond the fire. These are thoughts he really shouldn't be voicing to Cyril. He should keep them to the side with all the other things saved for Galadriel and the Outsider. "Ah, forgive me. My thoughts wander. Tell me of the rings you exchange?"

[samahl]

"It varies," he explains, but his eyes are narrowed a bit when he thinks about what Thranduil has said. "It depends on the Clan, the elf, and what gods they feel most close to. Usually there's some design to the thing to help make it unique. I've never really seen one up close, I'm afraid."

Then, after a moment, "In Tevinter, elves are more often slaves or servants. The Dalish refused to bow to masters and reclaimed the woods as a statement that we will never submit to the humans." He takes a breath and considers his words for a moment. "I'm very proud of that heritage, but at the same time I've always wondered if there wasn't some other way - some better way to live. At times I feel like we're shadows trying to hold onto air."