faderift | i'll be your shadow in the dark

The invitation began with hey—you're a mage, and Alistair could not begin to explain why it worked, but here they are.

"I should have told you to bring wax."

This isn't the first thing he's said since they left, but it is the first thing that hasn't been purely logistical or aimed at corralling the two other Wardens, who have now drifted ahead on their horses. They could just as easily have drifted behind, but Alistair likes being able to see they're still pointed in a direction that isn't straight toward Antiva. That leaves him with the Tevinter, who is--probably--more sober than last time. He hasn't fallen off his horse or anything.

"For your ears," he clarifies. "We're noisy sleepers. And noisy in general, I guess, but that's not a Warden thing. Just your bad luck." He's not as bundled as some people, but he does have a cowl protecting his ears, and he doesn't look around it to see if Dorian is even listening. "Or your just desserts for the sins of your countrymen. But did you know the first Wardens were Tevinter? You probably know that."

Save for being in possession of a flagon of wine he's yet to partake in, Dorian is stone cold sober, with cold being an operative word despite the fur-fringed cloak he's wearing. It's not fancy, rather Ferelden in fact -- most of his possession, save for his own personal armour, seems handed down through Inquisition ties, which even includes his staff.

And he rides well, with good form, and isn't in the habit of being unkind to animals, so his presence could so far be considered unobjectionable.

He lists forward in his saddle as Alistair speaks up to better catch his words, eyebrows rising. "Most first things on this continent are," he responds. His voice carries naturally, without particular thought or effort. "We're in greedy possession of an awful lot of history. Of Grey Wardens past and present, however, I can't say I'm well informed."

"I guess if you want to brag about having the first Grey Wardens you also have to brag about having the first Blight, which," Alistair says, and pauses to build up some relish, "has implications."

He does glance over now, leaning his head forward to make sure his smirk and the teasing glint to his eyes is noticeable. He's not actually trying to goad the man into turning his horse around and leaving them mageless.

"Now, now," Dorian says, somehow both reprimanding as well as cheery, "you ought not to underestimate the Magisterium's capacity for cherry picking what it does and does not believe. There's always been darkspawn, wouldn't you know. The magisters of old just happened to be there."

It's talking around a topic. Not that Dorian is attempting to evade alluding to the implications of the Elder One's existence and his claims, so much as it's not his instinct to bring it up in casual conversation, but there is an edge to his tone that sounds borderline-- well, annoyed.

If 'annoyed' is the sort of word you'd attribute to being Very Disappointed in your own nation of origin.

"Mm, that happens to me all the time," Alistair says, with a transparent layer of fake sympathy. It's a joke he's mostly telling only to himself. Duncan just happened to recruit him, Cailan just happened to send him away to light the signal fire at Ostagar.

But, less privately, Grey Wardens often just happen to be where there are about to be a great deal of darkspawn. It's part of why people are always so terribly pleased to see them--though, of course, not nearly so pleased as they are to see a Tevinter mage.

"Maybe you're--" Tevinters, generally. "--where we got the whole selective secrecy thing from. I've been around for a while, and there's still a lot no will tell me." A near-stumble and snort from his horse fills the pause before he adds, fairly, "I do have a big mouth. I wasn't supposed to tell anyone about Templar business, either, and that didn't go well at all."

"I suppose the obvious question, 'what sort of Templar business?', would be cruel exploitation, then."

Dorian settles his gaze on the two figures astride their horses ahead of them, although his attention remains contained to the conversation. He considers his wine, and his horse protests its bit with a mild headshake. He considers Baratheon. Hill. Decides--

"Regardless, the mysteries of the southern Templars may remain as such, as far as I'm concerned. Perhaps we ought to remain on topic instead. Tell me, what compelled you from one secret-keeping shield-bashing demon-slaying fraternity to yet another?" He nods, ahead of them, indicating the Antivans, and lets his tone drop into flat, wry affect; "The company?"

Edited 2015-11-29 12:38 (UTC)

Alistair's laugh is neither flat nor wry. His horse's ears swivel back toward him until he pats her neck reassuringly. "Actually, yes. I didn't have a lot of friends at the abbey. They hated me so much they moved past wanting to get rid of me and into wanting to keep me. Thought I would embarrass the Order." He sounds more nostalgic than offended. "They weren't wrong. But they--" A nod toward the two men ahead of them, as representatives of the Grey Wardens on the whole. "--like me all right. I think. And they're sort of charming, aren't they?"

Rhetorical. Of course they are.

"I'm assuming that's why you've come South," he says. "The company, not those two specifically, since they're not Southerners."

There's a sideways glance and a lifted eyebrow at that guess turned back on him, some private amusement at his own expense he opts not to share with the rest of the class.

"The company, the cuisine, the scenery," Dorian agrees, instead. He allows rhetorical question to stand; the Antivans may be very Antivan, but at least they have senses of humour, which is more than he can say for practically three quarters of the rest of the Inquisition, full of dour southerners who hate him on principle and don't laugh at his hilarious jokes.

But his list isn't done. "A supremacist Tevinter cult run south to cause mischief, one that represents just about everything wrong with my homeland. Oh, and the weather."

"Well now I know you're being sarcastic," Alistair says, like he hadn't cottoned on at cuisine or, arguably, before Dorian spoke at all, ever. He has one of those faces. "But go back to the cult, please, sorry? They don't let us out much."

That isn't true, physically speaking, of course. But Wardens are very focused. Insular. Until the dots looked like they might connect, the Inquisition's troubles seemed very distant--and minor, to people not in the habit of concerning themselves with anything except the Blight.

"The Venatori," Dorian supplies, with a sideways glance at Alistair. "A cult of Tevinters with specific interest in seeing our national majesty restored, or the ancient version thereof that Corypheus recalls. Very patriotic, not a little bit insane."

'Fondly exasperated' might be the affect, but there is a truer, underlying revulsion beneath Dorian's tone. That something such as that could come out of the Imperium, even if it's really existing latent sentiment given physical form. Motivation.

"They travelled south with Magister Alexius, and his son, Felix, the sickly fellow you might have seen hardly ever leave his room, in Skyhold. Together, we attempted to signal to the Inquisition that Alexius and his Venatori were attempting to bring a faction of rebel southern mages under his leadership, or rather, the Elder One's leadership. They'll be the uppity ones in robes and big sticks you've noticed wandering around," because he is a friend to poor, sheltered Grey Wardens. "And thus, here I am."

"Here you are," Alistair agrees, musing and thoughtful. "You know, a good, rebellious Tevinter isn't the strangest thing I've heard of happening, lately, but it is up there. Someone should write it down so we don't forget about it in the rest of this mess. Maybe in a few different places, in case the Chantry tries to burn it."

In case anyone was wondering why Alistair and the Revered Mother and Various Sisters at the abbey didn't get along.

"I did know a bunch of Tevinters threw my uncle out of his castle," he says, skipping the not my real uncle explanation, for brevity's sake. "I didn't know they were more insane than usual. Thank you for cleaning that up. Your friend, too."

"Ha. They won't forget me. Better men have tried."

Jauntily, confidently delivered, equal parts jest and truth. Dorian hasn't exactly been discreet as to his affiliations, or uninvolved from what constitutes (laughably) as politicking amongst the motley crew of leadership. His feet idle in his stirrups with a shift of leather and metal.

"And you are, of course, very welcome. It was a terrible infestation, but that's Tevinter -- we typically prefer to travel in swarms. Now, did you refer to the Arl of Redcliffe as your uncle? What a charmingly small world we live in."

Alistair grins wide, the kind of rim that stands in for laughter when the mood doesn't quite call for it. He can imagine Dorian makes an impression on everyone, even if he doesn't throw things at them from on high as an introduction.

"Not my real uncle," he says, belatedly, with some regret. "My mother was the old Arl's servant, and my father was his and Arl Teagan's brother-in-law. They took me in to protect their sisters' honor or something." Or something. Queen Rowan had been dead for years by the time Alistair was born. But that's the story he was told. "I haven't seen them since the Blight, now--" He is, technically speaking, exiled. "--but they're good men."

They arrive in Haven too late to venture underground, where it will be dark regardless but less dark if they wait for sunrise, maybe, probably, or at least less likely for there to be a total massacre if their meddling rouses a whole swarm of darkspawn to the surface to overrun the sleeping laborers who are still here clearing the wreckage.

So: sleeping in a half-wrecked Chantry. It's warmer than a tent, but it can still only go so well and last so long, with the nightmares. One of the laborers kicks Alistair awake before dawn over some minor whimpering, and while he makes bland, sticky porridge over a fire outside, he briefly but seriously reconsiders his position on letting them all die of corruption. Light sleepers first.

There aren't actually any bowls, but there are metal tankards fished out of the wrecked tavern, only slightly charred. When Scipio and Rafael appear--perhaps also kicked awake, perhaps eager to get started, who knows (ha ha, Alistair knows, they were definitely kicked)--he slops porridge into mugs for both of them without asking if they want any. It's all there is, unless they have something better in their pockets, and he isn't taking them anywhere on empty stomachs.

"Have either of you done this before?"

Edited 2015-11-12 06:52 (UTC)

"Yes," says Scipio, all confidence.

The actual answer: no. But he didn't get himself this far in life by a lack of confidence. Most times if you say something with great force and positivity, it follows that you are both supported and assumed to be competent. And he and Rafa are competent, thank you, in many fields, with many skills. How hard can this be?

--Oh, wait, he realizes, as he takes the tankard from Alistair. Darkspawn. He's talking about putting down darkspawn.

Er.

Well, there's no taking it back now, and nothing else for it but to go on. "Both of us, yes. And we can handle ourselves," which, that bit is true, really; he and Rafael are quick and clever and witty. At least one of those is sure to prove useful in--whatever lies ahead. Although-- "What exactly, er, do you think we can expect to find ahead? Their numbers, I mean. Two? Twenty?"

Maker, let it be two. Although, again--and he grins-- "It is a little exciting, isn't it?"

Perhaps not something a seasoned Grey Warden would say. Or perhaps it is. The porridge looks quite viscous. Scipio tips his mug, watching it slosh gloppily toward that side. It's a very slow slosh. The obsession with porridge is a mystery to him. Why would anyone choose to eat it? Warmth? Maybe?

For most of those words, Alistair has his head tilted back and his tankard to his mouth, waiting patiently for the porridge to reach him. It has the added benefit of hiding his skeptical asymmetrical squint. But he's charmed, too. He lowers the cup and slowly swallows his mouthful of oats and loses the fight against a one-sided almost-smile.

"A little."

To be good at something is to enjoy it, and Grey Wardens are good at it. Even new ones.

"They wouldn't have called us down here for two," he says. "They'd have dropped some rocks on them or something and called it a day."

Scipio deflates only slightly, which puts him at a more normal and manageable level, so the actual difference might be difficult to detect. Rafael can probably guess, but Rafael can also guess when he has a terrible hand during cards and is only bluffing, so perhaps Rafael is nothing to measure by.

(Not so. Rafael is everything to measure by.)

"Upwards of two," he says aloud, as he lets the porridge slide back toward the other side of his tankard. It is a slow but choppy day, in the porridge sea. "Ah, but our numbers are also upwards of two."

A whole three. He sounds positive enough to be nearly convincing, even to those who can count.

"Besides, Rafa and I have gone up against more, as only two." Conveniently, he does not mention that this 'more' included no darkspawn among their ranks. A very small detail. "In a smuggler's cave just south of Rialto Bay we were, backed into a corner. Shoeless, covered in the guts of a pink dolphin, no hope of escape. And yet, we still slipped out, with only one sword each, and were back in Antiva City before the very next sundown."

Be impressed.

At the moment one should probably be measuring by the breadth of Rafael's chest, which puffs out slightly to compensate for his partner's deflation, as if there is a limited quantity of arrogance that must be shared between them (this is not actually the case; they are perfectly capable of both being insufferable at the same time).

"Perhaps they just wished to see the famed Grey Wardens in action before employing the rocks," he suggests, in between letting swigs of porridge slop into his mouth. He has made no secret of his distaste, both for the meal and their means of eating it, but he is generally less precious about his food than Scipio can be. Gloppy sludge for breakfast is a somewhat nostalgic experience. He gulps it down as fast as is possible, head tipped back until the mug is nearly vertical, waiting for it to make its slow gelatinous slide into his gullet as Scipio tells the tale. He swallows to join in.

"One sword each and a dagger." Very important distinction. He pats his boot. "But I have one today, so we will survive. I hope our clothes will fare better, that pink dolphin stained my second-best tunic so badly even Mariella on the Via Fresca could not get it clean again. Pink spots, all over." He gestures at his front, loose fingers and a flick of his wrist away at the end in remembered disgust.

He looks into the mug, shaking it to try to draw the last bits of porridge together into a single lump worth eating. "So. How far do we go to meet them and what is our plan? You charge ahead with your shield and we attack from their flanks?"

"Oh, I like that," Scipio agrees, picking up the thread of suggestions right where Rafael had left off, so swift they nearly share the breath. Alistair has had time to grow used to the patter of Skip and Rafa's banter, but probably not used to it enough that he is able to unseat or interrupt that patter.

"We are good at the flanks. At attacking from flanks," he clarifies, as he does a gesture with his hands, one chop that draws invisible brackets in the air. Flanks. Two. Crunch. Maybe good at flanks in some other sense too, but right now, we are all discussing attacking. "And we do not have shields or armor. We would do better if we were to be snucking up. It is a style that suits us, yes?"

Snucking. He says it with such confidence that it might actually sound a little right, and he charges on to agree with himself:

"Yes, I think we should go with Rafa's plan. It is a very good plan. Less risk of staining, too." Not that their clothes are so fine any longer, but it is the principle. A man must care for what finery he has, even if it is a poor sort of finery. To let it grow poorer would be careless.

Alistair has his mouth full of porridge for most of the time they're talking, unaware of the science of enzymes but aware that the longer he holds it in his mouth the sweeter and less bland-mush-tasting it becomes. But he would not try to interrupt even if he didn't have his mouth full. He's decided to try a tactic where he lets them exhaust themselves--not utterly, not physically, but on the topic at hand--before he bothers getting a word in.

Anyway, they're funny. He looks very obviously like a person who is trying not to smile.

"That is more or less the plan," he says, "but you have to wear at least a little armor, and shoes, and we'll have the mage. At a distance. He's not immune." Neither are they, technically, with the Calling as obnoxious proof. But they're more immune than the Tevinter. "If they have a mage, you need to stay back until we've handled it. Otherwise you can--" He wiggles one hand and his mostly-empty mug in an approximation of what he imagines people who fight with smaller and less clunky armor must feel like. "--flank away."

They come out of the dark less subtly than spiders or deepstalkers, noisily and bearing torches, and not in too great a number. Alistair wouldn't have come down here with two untested thieves and a mage with no immunity if there were too many. Still: a few more than he would have liked.

Midway through the carnage, his sword sick through a hurlock's chest and into the icy tunnel for beneath him, he raises his head to look towards Dorian. "Coming up behind you," he barks. He pulls his sword free and ducks to cut the creature's throat, to be certain, and has time to wipe his face with his arm and adjust his hold on his shield before the ice and stone and wood behind Dorian begin to crumble and crash.

The other way, Scipio and Rafael have a handful of archers distracted and disabled and well in hand. And they aren't civilian(ish) volunteers. Alistair looks back at them to be sure they aren't dead, but he's at Dorian's side as the torchlight and stink of Blight-rot both seep through the falling wall.

"Watch the blood," he warns, probably for the fifth time, and rocks his sword low to the ground to loosen his wrist.

"I'm watching the blood," Dorian sighs. It doesn't take too much restraint not to go ahead and snap something about definitely not wanting to catch the Blight, mostly because he is preoccupied with not catching the Blight.

Stepping side along and out of the way of the spill of filth and ice, Dorian turns his attention towards the figures shambling out of the darkness. They're offputtingly human in affect, intelligence and precision in their movements, in a way he doesn't associate with a demon driven mad by the sensory input of the waking world. Still, they aren't human. Intelligence doesn't connote humanity. You learn that in Tevinter.

With a sharp gesture of his staff, the leap of electricity branches off towards the gloomy passage way ahead, suddenly brightening it as lightning leaps from body to body, making them twitch and jerk like puppets.

Edited (we could also just wrap this one if you promise me other battles) 2016-01-14 23:28 (UTC)

i'll be your shadow in the dark

@ Dorian

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@ Rafael & Scipio

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I'm tagging this and no one can stop me

i'm tagging this and you could've probably stopped me if you wanted but now you're too late

ok but why would we want to stop you

please never stop

@ Dorian again

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