open; and so we burned

[redinside]

WHO: Samson and assorted guests
WHAT: The red general has been put where he belongs; the rest is up to you.
WHEN: Harvestmere 28-30... ish
WHERE: Skyhold Dungeon
NOTES: Warnings for very strong language and substance addiction. Fight and capture, still in progress, is here.

day one;

On a certain night, deep into the coldest hours before dawn, a wagon under heavy guard enters Skyhold and passes through the yard by torchlight. It stops at a certain door, and armed soldiers drag its cargo roughly through and down two flights of stone stairs. One of the men left behind spits after it. By midday next, the word has begun to spread, and quickly: there's another body in the cells. Whether through gossip or a proper announcement by the returning war party, it won't be long before a name surfaces, and even the humblest of the Inquisition's agents will know they've cut off the Elder One's despicable right hand. Samson, the general of the red templars, the blighted traitor. They got him.

Separated now from his armour, without the heavy Kirkwall steel and thick horns of red lyrium fused to it, without the nauseating glow to lend him a towering presence and the power to break a soldier in half, he is simply a long-legged man folded on a bedroll with his back turned to the bars. He's been quiet and still, lying just where they left him. Most of what he's done amounts to slow bleeding—and even that's since stopped.
Don't get too excited, now. He's only unconscious, not dead.

During these first hours, only those who've come down to the dungeon on official business will be admitted.


days two and three and beyond;

A few days' time will see him livelier, though not by much. He's since been stripped of his filthy clothes, allowed a cursory wash with a rag and bucket, and given something different to wear. It seems a kind of uniform, fitted with straps and buckles and other odd bits of metal tackle—to restrain him, he reckons, should an authority figure deem it necessary for whatever arbitrary reason. Maybe they'll drag him up for a proper trial, though he doubts it. The hood even buckles closed—for what? To conceal his identity? As if anyone can keep gossip contained in a barracks. So he won't know where they're taking him, more likely. Or so he won't see the swings coming to dodge them.

He sighs, often. Rubs his eyes, his face, massages his forehead. Doesn't eat much of what they bring, can't get comfortable enough to feel rested. He's taken to moving around the limited space of his cell to keep the strange ache in his joints at bay, and trying—failing—to sleep through the headaches. There's nothing for it. This is his life, or whatever little is left of it, as far as he knows: suffering in this stone box until he dies in a haze of pain and madness.

The dungeon doesn't have visiting hours, exactly. Anyone without a legitimate reason to be down here might get in a bit of trouble—one of the prisoners might even tattle out of spite. There's always a guard on duty, besides. But when has common sense ever stopped anyone doing anything in Thedas?

Comments

[redinside]

He might take to raving once the withdrawal gets bad enough. Give it a little more time.

"Serving the same master don't make us friends." And their aggressively upper-class bearing is but one of the reasons why. This kid is markedly more chipper about it, at least. "It might be the magister spoke your name and I missed it. When he gets talking, it's hard not to stop payin attention after a while."

Unlikely, but the sentiment is absolutely true. Samson couldn't care any less about restoring the glory of the Imperium and all that Tevinter nationalist garbage—not even when the Elder One himself speaks of it—except that it's supposed to mean the Chantry gets turned on its head, the cycle broken.

[liberalum]

That gets an eyebrow raise, although Dorian is attempting not to be too hasty in making his snap judgments. Suspicious minds might paint Samson's manner as a sort of last resort to distance himself from his actions and allegiances, and perhaps a little of that is going on, who could say -- but Dorian rather doubts that this is the sort of man to put on such a performance in any truly considered way.

"They must have adored you," he remarks, more to himself, but then, to Samson, agreeably; "As far as evil darkspawn overlords go, he doesn't strike me as the friendly type."

His fingertips patter against where he's leaned against the bar, thoughtful. Curious.

"Nor the laconic. That does, then, beg the question: what was in it for you?"

It's spoken with the assumption that he'll get an answer. He is, however, smart enough to imagine that Samson's sense of nihilistic generousity probably only stretches so far. All the same--

[redinside]

"Funny." Samson isn't laughing, but he means it. "You've got a way with words—but I meant Alexius. When the Elder One speaks, you listen." One may quietly endure rather than relish that material which isn't personally relevant, perhaps, but one listens all the same. That magister's patience is not one he would care to test.
Not that it matters now.

"When he came, it seemed as good a chance as any to change the world," he says, while his attention travels from the mage's chin down to his fluttering fingers, and finally drops away to drift elsewhere. "But you wouldn't understand the rest, even if I cared to tell it to you."