faderift | OPEN | Hello...

Entry tags:

OPEN | Hello...

WHO: Alan + OTA
WHAT: Arrival Catchall
WHEN: Backdated, pre-Orlais Stuff
WHERE: Skyhold
NOTES: Minor nudity in one prompt. Wildcards 100% welcome, feel free to HMU if you'd like a starter!

A || ROOKERY

There’s a naked man in the Rookery.

Maybe you needed to send a letter, or perhaps you were checking in with a scout.

Or — well, you’re here now at any rate, and there’s a naked man in the Rookery, ravenously shoveling handfuls of dry corn into his mouth. The birds squabble and hop between his shoulders, cawing with indignation.

He looks up to you slowly, making full and uncomprehending eye contact.

“Hello,” Alan mumbles through a mouth full of kernels. Nailed it.

B || AROUND SKYHOLD

Clothes have been obtained. Thanks to the harried ministrations of the Inquisition’s launderers, it’s a bit mismatched.

Maybe it’s a set from the uniform for the order of your choice — Templars, Wardens, the robes of a Chantry member. Gender doesn't seem to have played a major role in the selection criteria. Maybe that's even your stuff!

"Do you know where we sleep?"

C || WHEREVER FOOD IS EATEN

It's food o'clock, for those thrifty souls eating on the Inquisition's dime. The latest kitchen staff (apparently) seems quite cheerful about it, as he passes you a mug of stew.

“It’s horse,” Alan reassures, as though this is the finest signature of quality. “Grass-fed.”

It’s also a substantial bit spicier than usual. Someone let him help.

D || LIBRARY

It's not uncommon to find strangers here, furtively pouring over Skyhold's small collection. It's a little less usual to see them making their own additions, particularly to the rarer works of certain esteemed, scholarly explorers.

Someone should probably put a stop to that. Or join in.

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

Glancing over upon hearing Alan's voice, Korrin smirks. She's used to abrupt questions and the lack of social niceties from him, so this doesn't faze her in the slightest. "Hello to you, too. And what, you don't want to pick a tree to snooze in? You're looking for an actual bed this time?"

Alan tugs at a scarlet sleeve. The sweater's faded with time, its templar sigil barely visible, two sizes too big and hanging like a wooly bag.

"They're territorial," The birds or the people? Who knows. He smiles, finally, relieved at Korrin's familiarity. He wouldn't want to explain this to a stranger. "And I think —"

He fumbles for the words, and they spill out in a bit of a tumble.

"— I think that's what went wrong, last time. I think I need to try harder."

Korrin nods, not in the habit of coddling people but happy to give credit where it's due. "That you're here at all when you could be hiding out away from all this tells me you're making a good start of it. A lot of people are just claiming a tent and camping out wherever in the valley but if you don't want that, there are the barracks buildings. You'll have to share space and the rooms are pretty small, but it's effective shelter from the elements.

“I’ve wintered in the mountains, I won't turn down a roof,” Alan shakes his head, stuffing his hands beneath his arms. A chill breeze is already beginning to stir in the air; Firstfall will prove its name soon enough. “At least, if I’m to do it as me.”

It sounds claustrophobic, all those bodies and noise, but he’ll manage. If it’s bad enough, he can reassess, and spend the nights in fur as he used to.

“You weren’t hiding out and away,” He points out. Korrin's situation is different from his in half a dozen ways, but courage is courage, regardless of source. “Still, you can’t have been here the whole time.”

It’s a question. What have you been up to, favourite-living-perch?

"If you choose to spend some of it as a wolf, I wouldn't blame you. It can get cold enough where a fur coat like that is definitely a boon, even if you just sleep that way." That would be a strong point in getting Korrin to consider the benefits of shapeshifting, but she still isn't sold on it for herself, fascinating as it is to watch others at work.

"I've been here since we first found it, over a year ago. Not constantly, sure, but it's as close to a home as I'll have without the Valo-Kas around.

Other than kicking the asses of every Venatori and Red Templar I see? I've been learning Knight-Enchanter and Rift Mage stuff. The former really pisses off some of the pro-Circle people, it's great. I'm also living with the loveliest rifter woman in existence, inside and out. She was one of the first to emerge, so she's a veteran to all this, too."

Everyone's about Circles lately — Circles and Apostates, snakes and ladders, the black and white pieces of a game he despises, and doesn't particularly care to understand. But it matters enough to the people out there for them to kill and die over it. Maybe more importantly, it matters to her.

In this, too, he's going to have to try.

"They aren't spirits, then," How it can be, he still isn't sure, but Alan knows enough of Korrin to know that she wouldn't be hunkering down with a desire demon. "Congratulations. There are still Circle people? In numbers?"

The crystal voices had been adamantly against the things. But then, the loudest in a room are not the only ones within it.

"Oh, yeah." Korrin crosses her arms, pacing. She can never seem to stay still for too long. "Circles may not exist anymore, but a lot of the rebel mages needed somewhere to go and the Inquisition took them in. There's even a mage council, for self-governing purposes and to coordinate education efforts. That's for anyone, not just mages who've passed a Harrowing. I joined mostly just to make sure no one was going to pull crap on apostates. But even the council is a voluntary thing; some mages don't recognize it, either because it's too extreme for their tastes or not enough."

"A council," If he sounds a little doubtful, it's just because the last one that he remembers listening to was the one that arranged blood sacrifices. "Can anyone really join it? Not just mages?"

It seems like someone ought to be speaking for the civilians.

"I can't imagine anyone pulling something on you."

"And yet, assholes have tried just because they think my kind dumb muscle." Korrin rolls her eyes at that, then shakes her head at that question. "No, only mages can join and cast votes though anyone can attend. But considering they're working with apostates at all, that's still pretty damn progressive."

People are the only kind of animal that assumes strong has to be stupid, too, that the two cancel each other out somehow. But even the biggest creatures need brains, and the Maker provides.

"I'd like to see it. If it's really alright. I've met so few of them — and everyone talking earlier, they were so," He waves a hand, lost for the right word. "— Could I go with you?"

Korrin nods, hardly about to turn his presence down. This might be good for him, and good for the Council. "Of course. I warn you that it can get pretty heated sometimes, and I'm only partly to blame there. We have a lot of people with a lot of strong opinions, so compromise isn't easy. But we have wine gatherings afterward, to decompress a little."

"If nothing catches fire, it'll be less heated than the country."

But really, she had him at free stuff.

"The —" Rifters, that's what everyone was calling them now. "— Rifters, have any of them been mages?"

He assumes if she's sleeping with one, she'll know.

"...yes and no. Some of them have powers that we could call magic, but practically none of them knew about the Fade until they arrived here. Either they had a rough equivalent or none at all, which is just weird to think about. Their magic can be very different, too, and they have a wide variety between them. As for treatment, it runs the gamut from a lot better than our situation to a lot worse. Hermione, who'd call herself a witch instead of a mage, says that she went to a school to learn magic...but that it was voluntary, and that students could still see their families. No phylacteries, no Harrowings, no Templars to slaughter them. Nice, huh?"

"It sounds like it could be a home."

It sounds like it was home, like home used to be, but deep in his heart Alan knows that learning was never voluntary. Everyone had to do their part.

"If you'd been her, do you think you still would've tried to learn?"

That question is one Korrin has asked herself before, yet she hesitates when Alan asks it aloud. "...maybe? I don't know. I don't regret the magical education I had, it prepared me to be a good mercenary. But the chance to socialize with and learn alongside other mages...it would have been tempting. What about you?"

"I don't regret it either." Mostly. Sometimes. Next question. "Something like that — it could be important. But it isn't the only way to learn. Like your family,"

Like his.

"Like a lot of them, out there. But I don't know. A man on the crystal — Anders — he was talking about schools, too. I don't know that they value the way we learned."

It's more of a problem without another mage in the family, Alan supposes. Still, it doesn't seem like it should be the only option; there are things you can't learn in books.

Korrin's expression hardens at mention of Anders, tensing in a moment. "I'm not interested in what that mass-murdering fuckhead has to say, unless it's his intention to jump off a cliff."

Well. Never let it be said that she holds back on her feelings. "And that's the thing, if it's non-Andrastian and non-human, I have my doubts that other values would be respected. Even if they don't mean to, it'd be easy to assume it's the same way for everyone and go from there."

Alan blinks. It's the information, not the delivery. He trusts Korrin, but — Anders had seemed so helpful. Loud, and not a likely candidate for compromise, but,

"Mass-murdering." A beat. Well. Okay. He turns aside slightly, swipes the bangs from his face. It's a small gesture of agitation, but it's there. "Ah —?"

Forgive him, he's rather lost that train of thought.

"You must've heard about what happened in Kirkwall by now, right? With the Chantry blowing up and killing a lot of people? That's his doing. The Mage-Templar War had a lot of factors behind it, and he was one of them. So, no, I don't trust him or his brand of extremism, either. The Inquisiton's going to pay for sparing him; if not now, then later." Blunt and more blunt. Korrin actually doesn't spell a lot of time ranting about this, just because the subject matter gets her riled up and she'd rather not spend her time constantly ranting like a crazy person.

"Ye...yes." He'd certainly heard about that. He'd heard about that in great detail and invective — and absent of certain identifying names. "Maker."

He doesn't swear, not unless it's bad. He also doesn't usually advocate execution, not unless it's real bad. This situation qualifies for both.

"Why is he alive?"

Alan finally blurts out.

Letting out a sigh, Korrin crosses her arms. "Because the Grey Wardens reclaimed him, and the Inquisition still needs the Wardens or at least they think they do. Not wanting to lose them, the advisors said more or less that the Champion of Kirkwall's original decree of sparing him was still valid. I can only imagine the arguments that took place over that, but in any case, that's the official story. We're stuck with him, until the southern Wardens leave or Coryphues overruns us."

"...oh..."
Cade takes the bowl, but hesitantly, the realization slowly dawning in his eyes. Then he stares at the bowl, not quite certain what to do with it.
"...thanks..."
You're not supposed to eat horses, right? That's a primitive thing, isn't it? This is new and frightening and he doesn't know how to deal with it.

Alan pulls out the chair beside him, settling into place to peer owlishly at Cade. The cook had told him not to mention the meat's source to anyone noble — but on closer inspection, Cade looks anything but.

He tugs up the slipping sleeves of his sweater, massively oversized and dyed with the faint, faded sigil of the Templar order.

"There's also onions, and lard, and ginger. Little red cones I've never seen before. Potatoes," He's reciting from a mental list. "Salt, pepper. Yellow powder."

It's a moment before he remembers, and fishes a spoon from a pocket, offering it out.

"I am almost ran out."

Cade likes eating horses only a little more than he likes being stared at, and he leans away from Alan as though the man's gaze is a poisonous snake. Only then does he realize that Alan is wearing the Templar insignia, and his eyes widen incredulously.

"You're not a Templar," he observes with an air of accusation, nonetheless accepting the spoon.

Normally, he’d agree. No, no I’m not, but I’m warm now.

But with what he’s told Korrin, with the armed men and fortress and drills, he wants to know what gives it away. He needs to be able to, if he’s going to be around people for so long. They’re more attentive than he ever remembered, and Alan knows he's out of his depth with —

— Templars. Denerim didn’t keep a permanent staff of the order, and the fighting in the hills, well, the memory of teeth crunching on bone slips through his mind, chased out again as quickly. That doesn't matter now.

“You think so?” His voice is benign, gentle to the point of placidity. An outside observer might mistake it for condescension. “Alan Fane. I just arrived.”

He leans back, eyeing the stew. He crushed up all the red cones they had, but maybe it wasn’t enough.

"Yes, I think so," Cade persists, his irritation growing, "you're wearing my shirt." Or at least... it was his shirt, before a lot of his livery was reappropriated, but he'd still know it on sight. And he does.
Temporarily, Cade's manners are lost as a flash of anger passes through him. He looks away and clenches his teeth, holding onto his resolve. It doesn't matter, other people need it more.

...but Alan doesn't even look like a Templar. He's skin and bone.

Well, that'd do it.

"They said that no one was using it." A shrug. "They said that they'd — you'd —"

"— Gotten bad sick, like in the head, all loopy as a dog," He's parroting, from the peculiar tone his voice assumes. He's clearly memorized the phrase. "So I figured you'd died and they were being, you know."

Alan makes the sign against evil.

"You can have it back, if you want,"

He's already weaseling the thing up over his head. There's definitely nothing on underneath.

Cade's grumpy expression slowly transforms into one of deep hurt, and he keeps his eyes directed away from Alan, a nervous and embarrassed blush already forming over most of his face.
"No, keep it," he snaps, looking back just in time to see the shirt nearly half-off, and he looks away with a small noise of disgust. He sets down his plate and moves to leave, head low, a retreat if there ever was one.

Alan shuffles the sweater back on, eyes torn between the food and Cade. He's messed this up somehow. He can't pinpoint how, but he has, and he promised the kitchen staff that he wouldn't.

He scoops up the stew, and hurries after.

"Wait — look," He gestures out with the stew. "I'm not, I mean you're obviously not dead. And you don't seem sick. There's no reason for them to give your things away."

There'd be even less reason if he was sick, Alan doesn't want to take with a pox and die just because Skyhold's drafty. But that's probably not the right thing to say either.

Great, being followed! Cade loves that almost as much as he loves being mocked, which on some level he's also certain is what Alan is doing. He tries to walk faster, but is also, as usual, aware that that will never stop somebody who's truly persistent. So when he reaches the door, he turns to regard the man with a look both angry and pleading.
"Leave me alone," he says, in a tone that isn't hostile but might become so if he's pressed.

"Alright," But he offers the stew again, even as he hangs back a step. "Will you take your food, though?"

Alan's totally fine with eating it himself. He's considering it, right this very moment, with the distant awareness that if he ruins this with more people, he can keep eating more than his share. But probably someone would find out, and it definitely wouldn't count as trying harder.

A beat, then inspiration:

"A horse died for this. It shouldn't go to waste."

Cade stares at him like he's a crazy person for several moments, well aware that he himself is a crazy person, then looks despondently down at the offered bowl.

"...I don't want to eat a horse," he says miserably. Horses are nice. He knows a few.

"Oh," Alan just tilts his head to the side, and blinks. He can't think why anyone wouldn't, so — "Why not?"

It's not like it's going to get any less dead.

Alan is pressing him, and Cade hates being pressed. He takes another step back, glancing unhappily between the man and the bowl. "...I just don't," he murmurs, praying that it'll be enough. He's starting to feel his chest tightening and his thoughts beginning to race, which means it's time to bail before something bad happens.

"Well." This is still a foreign concept, one he's trying hard to process. "Is it just the horse that's the problem?"

He steps back, searching for the spoon. His side is turned, momentarily distracted — here's your chance, Cade.

"I guess we could bring something else, they got a raccoon —"

Cade peaces entirely out before Alan can turn around again. He likely will not return until someone forces him to, which may be sooner than any of us think.

Why Pamelia is up here doesn't matter as much as the fact that there is a grown, completely naked man stuffing himself silly with the bird's food, and for a moment Pamelia simply stares.

Then she shakes her head, blinks, and still sees the same thing in front of her.

Well.

With a sigh, she rummages in the bag that stays at her side at all times, eventually procuring a dry scone full of raisins. "Here, before they try to peck your bits off. Also, we need to get you something to wear." A beat. "Alan?"

A raven horks and snaps at his shoulder, sending a little trickle of blood oozing out over the dark ink. Alan waves it off, and blinks.

Oh.

“Yes?” He knows that voice. He knows many voices, but this one is recent. It’s — “Pamala?”

No. Dead. “Pamelia.”

That's the one. Relief washes over his features, and after a moment he tosses the corn aside. The birds scatter after it, and Alan reaches for a little cloth bag — hesitates, hand hovering over a map, eyes lingering on the scone. He can’t seem to decide which to go for first.

Finally, he settles for the map, opting to hold it discreetly in front of his junk. Much better.

“I brought the rock."

She'd meant for him to eat the scone, not cover himself with it, but she supposes that's her fault. Phrasing, and all. At least the map is bigger than a child's handkerchief and she can focus on looking instead of not!looking now.

"I would say you should keep it." A beat. "The sending crystal, I mean. It's yours." Can she make that decision? ...sure. Who is gonna stop her?

No one here, that's for sure. The birds can hold a forum on it if they disagree.

Speaking of which, he's bleeding, and Pamelia reaches forward without thinking, stopping just short of making actual contact. "Hold still." It'll only take a second for the warmth to spread from her fingers to his skin and for the wound to knit itself shut. With that done, she unwinds her heavy scarf, long enough to pose as a blanket, and drapes it over his shoulders.

"Welcome to Skyhold."

Alan glances over his shoulder in brief interest, quickly distracted again by the blanket. He doesn't object, eyes tracking to the scone once more.

"You're a mage," He comments, along the same lines as you've got red hair. "It's older than I expected, to be hidden. I never would've known it was here."

He shakes his head. Alan suspects he knows the Frostbacks better than most besides the Avvar.

"And you're a shapeshifter." Pamelia presses the scone into his hands this time and nods. "It's very well hidden, and I'm told was half a mess when everyone arrived after Haven. Now, at least, it can support the people flocking towards it."

As far as she can tell, anyway.

"I'm just me." He shrugs, assumes that settles it, that they understand each other now. Alan's many things, but he knows better than to try and lump them all together. His grandmother had gotten like that before the end, Elene always said. Began to speak of herself as us, at once the raven, the woman, the flock. "There are so many. It's like a town."

He rips a chunk from the scone, chewing with ferocious intent. He's already talking again, before swallowing.

"Where can everyone be staying? It'll be blizzards soon."

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

OPEN | Hello...

B

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

i am so sorry for the delay on this dude, i got sick and have had no head for log tags

it's fine!

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

C

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

A

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject