semi-closed; i cannot see the path

[redinside]

WHO: Samson, Cullen, Mia, Anders, Thranduil, and more perhaps
WHAT: Even more dungeon visits
WHEN: One backdated, the rest current
WHERE: Skyhold Dungeon
NOTES: Preemptive warning for strong language and substance addiction.

the commander's visit;

How long since they first hauled his sorry carcass down those steps and dumped him in a cell? Hours? Days? No sun or moon to tell by, not down here. In the lingering aftermath of his own foolishness, consciousness has been elusive. Through the murk of his memory he glimpses a brisk voice and gentle hands, faces reduced to indistinct shapes, there and gone again. He slept after that—for how long, who knows—and it's from that same sleep he's just been jerked by a well-aimed boot.

Samson is hoisted up from the bedroll before his wits even have time to congeal into awareness, strangers' hands gripping him rough under the arms. They jostle him till he'll sit on his own. Now awake enough to be aggrieved by it, he shrugs them off abruptly, and thereafter two armed and armoured men leave the cell to join others outside it. Shadows and torchlight beyond, bodies moving or leaning to look, the man at the cell door glaring down at him expectantly. The chains are heavy on his wrists as he drags them toward his lap.

Someone important's coming down. He can tell that much.


a captive audience;

First hours, then days, and now weeks later, Samson is still here. Same clothing, same sweat-stained bedroll, same small space to call his own. Apart from sluggish but persistent beard growth that waxes and wanes from week to week, not much else has changed since the first day—not at a glance—only now there's a pail sitting outside his cell, the long handle of a dipper keeping its wooden lid just slightly ajar; from this he can drink when he likes.

It's just as likely you'll find him sleeping as standing. Occasionally, he'll be seated on the bedroll without any shoes or stockings or gloves, biting or tearing at his nails when they grow long enough to need a trim. His hair might still be wet from the occasional wash achieved by bucket and rag. Sweating or shaking, listening or waiting, he's still here.

Comments

[redinside]

Samson is still considering an answer to the first question when the next comes—he might have laughed if he felt more like laughing—and so leaves it lie for the time being. He shakes his head. "Not personally. It's how they—the ones working with him. Venatori and others. They called him that, or Master. I picked it up quick."

As if he can sense that sneer wanting to emerge, he adds, "Being in the Master's presence is... arresting. You find yourself breathing more carefully. You can't bear to look away. And," he pauses to cough once behind his fist, lips against knuckles, "he's endured for more than a thousand years. Say whatever else you want about him, but a being like that is worthy of some respect."

*pretentious oh my god jxjc

[rowancrowned]

"So he is able to command a room," Thranduil says, shifting, refolding his legs. The floor is cold-- and he spares a thought for Samson. Perhaps he ought to be given a blanket. There is a pause as he waits for Samson to work through his fit, having no tissue to offer him. "And he has endured. That is a very long time for a Man."

But from what he has been told, and from what he understands about Corypheus, what might have once been a Man is certainly not now. Shaped like one, but beyond what it might have once been.

Thranduil does not think of yrch.

this hiatus has been like a tar pit, please excuse

[redinside]

Curiously, Samson can feel himself becoming quickly annoyed by this simplification of the Elder One's being, by the elf's attitude in distilling the ancient magister's essence into that of a mere person, stripping away his divinity. His longing for divinity. Command a room, bah. For a time he is quiet, remembering the way Corypheus sounded during one of their last conversations, face to face—something in his voice like regret, or sorrow. Something kept locked away. Back then he wondered at it, why he was allowed to glimpse even that brief hint of vulnerability, took it and curled his fist around it and kept it close.

Now, the notion of trust—of a trust betrayed—sours his voice with a defensive note. "Corypheus is no man. He's much more than that." He has to be.

[rowancrowned]

"No, not any more," Thranduil admits, readily. Some men do things that turn them into legend, and then that too is swept away until all they are is a story, a myth. Corypheus has proven very stubborn at hanging onto life. Thranduil's pause and meaningful glance at Samson is... almost apologetic.

"But he was, once-- he is man-shaped. I do not suppose he has confided in you just how old he is?"

[redinside]

"Not down to the year, no... it ain't as if he told me his entire life story. I was his follower, not his friend." Whether it's Thranduil's weighty glance that does it, or his own sense of importance butting up against the truth—that he is of no real value to Corypheus except as a tool of war, the very same way the templars are tools of the Chantry—a cooler mood covers him like the shadow of a high cloud. "You want to know his birthday, you can ask him yourself."

[rowancrowned]

Dryly: "I fear my attempt at an introduction and polite conversation would end with me in a great deal of pain."

Certainly not in a pretty little cell with gryphons for roommates and the little pile of food Samson's assembled from admirers. Or the high fashion he's sporting.

He considers, briefly, trying for soothing, but decides against it. It's not his job to try and pull things from Samson. They're just having a nice conversation.

"Though it is an admirable attempt on your part to have me surrender myself to your people."

they definitely did not stare at each other for an entire month between tags

[redinside]

A few minutes earlier, and he might've grinned at that—now he snorts, shows his teeth only by the curl of his lip. Your people. His people. His men and the tattered remains of their honour, their last shreds of humanity reserved only for each other. A brotherhood soaked in blood. The Elder One he could take or leave, in all honesty—but without the rest of them, he's nothing.

"Been a long time since anyone's used that word to describe anything I've done." He figures it was a joke, but still... "Not since I was young."

Samson is not yet fifty. Compared to his master and current company, both, he's still a child. But still.

they could have

[rowancrowned]

"Admirable?" he clarifies, and then goes on. "The Templars are a military force. The structure of command, your hierarchy- it is little wonder you are as successful as you turned out to be."

They were far from a sparse grouping of bandits. The Yrch had no concept of familial loyalty, no respect for structure- and it was a weakness, gladly exploited.

"I needn't like you to recognize your methods as successful. Only a fool would discount an opponent's strengths."