OPEN | coldest comfort, safety glass

[limier]

WHO: Wren, Anders, Gwen, and OTA.
WHAT: Arrivals at Skyhold & Junk.
WHEN: Post-Winter Palace. Catchall.
WHERE: Skyhold.
NOTES: I'll edit if anything comes up!

Starters in comments. If you'd like a specific starter, or to make plans for later in the month, just let me know on plurk or Discord (oeste #8807).  :)

Comments

[eolasemah]

Over the past year, Sina has learned to be very aware of to whom and when she is unwelcome, and perhaps if she weren't so incredibly Done at the moment, this might be a situation that would give her cause to leave. But she doesn't, instead standing and blinking in dull incredulity as Marguerite storms off, her large and tired eyes eventually shifting back to the other woman when she speaks.

"No," Sina says absently, and after a pause, drily, "I hope I didn't disturb yours."

[limier]

"You've saved me from another half hour's argument. I'd sing your praises if it might not draw her back."

A better look at her now, and Maker — Sina looks like shit. Despite herself, she can't keep from a degree of... interest? Worry? What do you call it exactly, when you don't want a strange elven teenager to pass out in the middle of the walkway?

Whatever you call it, you invent an excuse.

"May I ask, are you familiar with these gardens?"

[eolasemah]

Well that's... a little better. Sina's defensiveness melts into a small, self-conscious smile, though she still looks guarded, especially when the woman looks at her like that. But at least The Topic doesn't have to come up.
"...yes," she says, with a small start of surprise at the subject change, "I... live here, actually. And cultivate them myself." Among others, but she spends the majority of her time here, and has taken a particular pride in shaping its growth.

[limier]

"I’d wondered at the tent." The slip of a smile back. She admits: "And at half the plants. I'd expected to recognize more of them."

Not so much a surprise; her experience is limited largely to the species of her childhood, and a few more obvious breeds.

"I had hoped — a small request. But only if you've the time."

She lifts a palm, shakes her head slightly to imply it's no matter. Wren will never be a woman capable of appearing wholly harmless. In moments like these, the best she aims for is non-threatening.

[eolasemah]

Sina smiles, a little bashfully at that. It seems the tent is regarded as strange to others-- and it is to her, if she thinks too hard about it, but she and Nari make do.
Tilting her head at Wren, she nods to prompt her onward. "What is it?"

[limier]

"There's a habit that my mother kept with Arbor Blessing. But my eye for vines has never been sharp. I always mix them with ivy."

Particularly when riding through them at face height. Fucking vines.

"Our gardens were lost many years ago now. But if the Inquisition cultivates any — I know it is difficult to coax, but I should be grateful perhaps to carry on her small tradition."

[eolasemah]

This is the magic topic, the one that will put a light in Sina's eyes no matter her mood. She perks up and nods, starting to grin. "There's a small section of it over by the pots in the corner, the things everyone always uses," she says cheerfully, "I can show you, if you like."

[limier]

"Please." Wren gestures out to the path. "After you."

Her expression's calm, but behind it there's some private relief. Sina looks more her age when she smiles, a young woman and not a wounded thing. All elves have a peculiar proportion about them, by small measures distinctly inhuman. But few of them look quite so much like her parents' fawns.

"I apologize, my manners. I'm called Wren."

A simpler name, a gentler one, than the one she typically favours. A name for those moments she must pretend to still be someone simple and gentle.

[eolasemah]

Sina nods and beckons her forward, moving at a much more sprightly pace through the garden and in the direction of the largest concentration of arbor blessing.
"Siuona," she replies, "of Clan Dahlasanor. Most call me Sina." She looks over her shoulder to smile again-- something about meeting a fellow botany enthusiast brings out the best in her.

Once they arrive at their destination, she lovingly runs her fingers up the leaves of a vine. "Here they are," she says, "do they look right to you? Vines can be tricky."

[limier]

"Well met, Sina."

Her smiles widens in response, though it owns a new, slightly sheepish cast upon their arrival.

"It's been ages since I've seen them in winter." A small admission: She honestly can't say whether these are Arbor Blessing, or something more mundane. She reaches out in turn, to test it against the width of her palm. "But the care is evident."

"And there's always blessing to be found in the kindness offered by strangers."

She steps back, fishes in her pockets (the small benefits of mountain cold: infinite pockets) to withdraw a small lump of white chalk. Wren snaps it in two, offers half out.

[eolasemah]

Pleased by Wren's appraisal, Sina smiles and gives a small nod. She's a bit confused, however, by the half-piece of chalk, though she takes it and looks it over before raising her eyes to the other woman again, quizzical.

[limier]

"At the beginning of the new year, when the fields lay asleep and times grew grim," Wren draws in a breath, considers the little wall. There’s enough untouched room on the stones, she thinks. "My mother would find the vines."

Wren reaches out, to outline an outstretched hand around the end of one tendril.

"And draw a mark, for everyone who we held dear, who we wished blessings upon in the coming year. That we might all hold each other together."

She hopes it sounds passingly plausible. At the beginning of the new year, when times grew grim, her mother mostly slept and cried. But that’s not fine fare for strangers.

[eolasemah]

Sina is quiet as Wren explains, though her smile grows slowly, and she nods in understanding. "I like that," she says, looking back at the chalk, "may I keep this? For when they grow longer?"

[limier]

"Of course," She drops her half into a pocket, steps back to dust her hands. "I hope I shall be at Skyhold to see them bloom."