faderift | [Open: To the homeless, a haven.]

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[Open: To the homeless, a haven.]

WHO: Thingol & Open!
WHAT: He is coming to grips with his new situation and planning for the future.
WHEN: Guardian, 9:43 Dragon
WHERE: Skyhold
NOTES: You can reach me on Plurk @

tiger_eyes or through PM/DM for plotting. I am happy to write starters.

He had thought, initially, that he was dreaming. Death had surely fallen upon him - thus freeing his spirit from his body - but instead of him stepping into the Halls of Mandos, he encountered a vicious demon bent on not only annihilating him but all around him. Thingol wasn't a coward - despite what popular opinion might say of him on Middle Earth - and so he had drawn his blade and fought side by side with a few that showed nothing but bravery in the face of a monstrosity.

The entire experience had felt unreal to him - even as he cut into the beast - however the moment he was wounded, he had begun to realize that he was not dreaming. He was not even dead! His body had traveled with him - thanks to gods or a spell - and, by Eru, he was alive again. The shock had remained with him as he traveled to Skyhold and it lingered as he made himself acquainted with the Inquisition and their actions.

Once he had been a mighty King, proud and ready to face any and all who threatened his kingdom. The Dwarves, the Nauglímir and the Silmaril had broken him of his pride - a positive change some might say - though it left him at a loss as to what to do with his time or where it should be spent best. For now, he walked the full expanse of Skyhold, breathing in the mountain air and letting his spirit and body settle into this new way of life; a life where he was not a king or even a lord. A life where Elves were valued very little.

A small smile touched his lips as he paused, peering out over the lands to the north. The Elves deserved a fine leader; someone or someones who could unite them and give them back their worth. Oh yes, that would be a fine use of his time indeed.

For now, all who approached him would be met with a piercing, calculating stare. If you think this Elf will be dominated or belittled so easily, you have the wrong idea. Aranrúth was loyally sheathed at his hip and Thingol took full advantage of his six foot and eight inches of height.

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He never forgets his etiquette unless he is under severe stress. Or mad. That had happened more than once, though the aforementioned stress had been involved. Thingol cannot foresee those experiences being repeated and his death has...humbled him. The slightest bit.

"Your eyes are sharp." he tips his head back to enjoy the breeze, eyes half-closed, "I believe I come from a point much earlier than them, Lady." which matters little except that he knows almost nothing of them despite being from the same world, "As best as I am able. No one likes to be without a home."

Edited 2017-02-06 05:25 (UTC)

That thought quirks her mouth sideways, not quite a smile but the hint of some slightly sly amusement at the thought of someone who might have known Thranduil when he wasn't ... all that he is now. If they were actually speaking, presently, she'd probably be less shy about it (even ask, perhaps, did he dandle a small elf lord on his unnecessarily large knee? did Thranduil ever fight bath time, does he know?), but -

Well, that's a problem for another day. Or possibly never. He hasn't managed to corner her just yet, and she isn't sure what she'll say if and when he does.

"Thus all the refugees," she says, instead, bone dry. "Are you going to join the Inquisition?"

If she asks, he will tell her of a small Elfling that was prized by Oropher, his father, and who was loved by King Thingol and Queen Melian. All of the children of Doriath were cherished and Thingol was known for catching the little ones when the mood struck him and giving them his full focus. No Elf could truly ignore children of any race, though they might claim otherwise if the race is somehow unsavory.

"The Elves concern me most." first, he should say, "I have not decided. I have not allied myself to another's cause in a long time."

The last time he did so was with Túrin and that had ended in tragedy and the loss of his foster-son. He is hesitant to travel such a road again with mortals.

"I wasn't aware elves had some sort of alternate arrangements made in the event of the world ending," in that same tone; Gwenaëlle has been unsympathetically banging the we're all in this together and who cares about your politics, the sky is literally ripping itself apart drums for some time now, although it must be acknowledged that she's never claimed to have any particular sympathy for the various existing plights of elves.

A dead thing that doesn't know it's dead. It's hard to believe anything else when she exists, breathing proof of how thorough is human conquest.

"If it all coming apart around your--" knife, "--ears is somehow not your problem, though, then by all means, take advantage of Skyhold's sympathy and hospitality without contributing anything, you'll hardly be the only one."

"Would not everyone benefit from the Elves being united to one cause or another?" Thingol has noticed that, despite how poorly his race is treated, there is very little cohesion amongst them. There is very little pride. The world can end - he does not fear such - but what shall be done with the time they have left? Should not what has been broken be mended? Strength could come from it.

"You presume." his voice is suddenly colder, deeper, "The Inquisition is composed of many members. Not all might be good intentioned."

If recent events have taught Gwenaëlle anything - if the past year has taught her anything - it's that aristocratic hauteur and good bone structure will not, in fact, protect her from someone who means to do her harm. The burned claw-marks of the rage demon that so violently derailed the quiet path of her life, visible creeping up her torso from the low edge of her bodice, taught her that; her mother's death on an Orlesian highway and the battle at the Winter Palace. She doesn't set her jaw in the face of his coldness because she imagines herself impervious, just -

She's stubborn as a little mule, that's what it is, digs her heels in regardless of whether it might be smarter not to. There are better ways to argue your case and with a pen and ink she can be remarkably persuasive, but there's not much of softness in her without that distance. That it doesn't have to be an argument doesn't mean she isn't very good at making it one, anyway, even if she might not have bargained for it (although she can't be surprised no one likes being called an ingrate to their face); it is not the first time she's offended, and will not be the last.

"There is one cause. It's 'not letting the fucking world end'. That's what everyone benefits from. No one benefits from anything if the only person left to admire all that wasted effort is Corypheus."

Edited 2017-02-06 12:23 (UTC)

Surprisingly, he has a fondness for stubborn ladies. Melian is one - as was Lúthien, his daughter. In the past, he bowed to them and reconsidered his stance on many matters. However he can be one of the most stubborn of beings on Arda. Elu Thingol - once called Elwë - is one of the first Elves created by Eru. He and his brothers are downright radiant and hard-headed; a trait they passed on generously to their children.

It is perhaps best that Thingol only had a daughter and not a conquering obsessed son.

"So shall we work on that cause separately? That should progress nicely!" his voice is sharp with sarcasm, "The tensions between the races are a waste of time. They cannot be ignored, lady, or they will begin to fester." he pauses before continuing, "All worlds must end. If the time has arrived for this one to see its conclusion, how can any of us stop it? What do you have planned?"

"It isn't time that decided this world is worth less than the ambitions of some ancient Tevinter monster to rip it apart and use it to make himself a God, it was the ancient Tevinter monster," she snaps back, and if he thinks she has purposefully ignored what he says about those tensions: he is correct, because that is a sore subject she can touch on only lightly and if she says the first thing that comes into her mind, she is liable to get hit in the mouth for her trouble. "Is that what you're going to do, if someone threatens your people? Just stand there with your arms out--"

she demonstrates.

"Oh, it must just be time, do whatever you want, fuck me up."

Her jaw sets. "If that's where you'd prefer to stand, go lie down and die somewhere else. Space is in short supply and there are people here who actually give a damn about anything."

"Ancient monsters are not easily exterminated. We need our full might if we are to stand against it." he wonders, truly, how anyone dares debate with this woman. She is so quick to bite and to assume what he might do in any given situation. That trait of her chafes and he presses his lips into a thin line.

"Has no one taught you how a lady should speak?" though that is beside the point, of course. He merely points it out to aggravate her further.

"You leap to conclusions about my intentions; about what I will do and say. You are nothing more than a child to me. I have seen battles; I have seen great beasts that threaten the lives of all on my world. I kept my kingdom and my people safe for centuries by not acting rashly." and Melian's Girdle had helped, "The Elves could unite under a King - or a pair of Kings, even. Then they would face this beast of yours with their full force. Does that really sound like I am laying down before the inevitable?"

Every inch of her is furious - awfully, viciously, a wounded animal coming out of its corner. Just as swiftly and mercilessly as her ire rose it then catches in her throat and his jibe lodges there, too, choking her to momentary silence, an echo of her mothers who did, in fact, teach her better than this; one with strictures and disappointed sighs, one by silent example because she was permitted naught else.

It isn't Thingol that humbles her; he starts babbling on some nonsense like elves are going to do anything useful in the near future and she tunes it out, but -

One elf, in particular, who had no last words, her throat wreckage where the arrow (that she tried to stop, she tried - Mama, please, we're so close, I tried) lodged. Who had been as steady as Gwenaëlle is intemperate, who had spoken quietly with Solas and with Thranduil on her behalf, who would likely have spoken the same with Thingol, later, if she were here. Apologised, explained, smoothed her work-worn hands over the messes that Gwenaëlle has made and done it thanklessly, too, for a daughter who sat ill at ease in her company and now grieves her clumsily and desperately and if they could face this beast where were they when she died.

"The elves aren't going to do any such thing," she says, with a bitterness she can neither hide nor explain, and turns on her heel, the flush shame as much as anger.

(They're dead and she lives and look at what she does--)

Ah and so there is the root of her anger; pain! He knows pain intimately. He knows loss. Amusingly enough - or at least ironically enough - he also knows her hot-headed, stubborn pride. It is a fine defense; a defense that lasted him centuries, but it cannot sustain her as it did him or she will suffer the same end.

He waits for her to find her words, his sharp gaze softening the slightest bit. Her manners are deplorable and if they speak after this, he will teach her, bit by bit, how a lady can present herself without using profanity. She would admire his queen and his daughter, he knows. It is a shame that she has encountered him and not them.

"How can you be so certain? What have you seen?" his voice is quiet, soothing, coaxing her to speak genuinely - from the heart - instead of biting and snarling. He is the inexperienced party in this world and thus, while he can teach her etiquette, she can teach him of history - more importantly, her history.

Edited 2017-02-07 10:24 (UTC)

Gwenaëlle doesn't wish to be soothed, and so she isn't, too difficult, too prideful, too - lonely, mistrustful of hands reached out in kindness, too aware of the precariousness of her own position to trust them. The problem has never been that she lacks the knowledge of how to conduct herself, the problem has always been her ... selective application of the lessons of courtesy, how easily her temper gets the better of her determination to do as she's been told. She means to be what she's told she must, and tries, and - still, here she is, provoked and provoking.

"I've seen enough," she says, more coolly, her jaw set. "And I've yet to see anything that suggests the Inquisition would in any way benefit from yet another stupid factional dispute. You aren't Thedosian. The only people here that are yours are Thranduil and Galadriel and none of you have any right to expect anyone else to fall in line behind you because you toss your hair."

If she can't claim her blood, then these upstart foreigners don't get to waltz in and act as if they're owed something. It doesn't work like that, it cannot work like that, it's a slap in the face of the worst kind and the fact that the Dalish frolicking about Skyhold encourage it only deepens her resentment of the people she is quite happy to blame entirely for her mother's death. It would have been wrong to warn people of that clan, knowing that no Orlesian on the road would be at pains to differentiate between one tattooed knife-ear and another -

For just long enough, though, it might have been satisfying.

"We don't need that. We've just put one stupid civil war to bed and Maker knows it's only a matter of time before it bubbles over again," especially with the concessions that Celene wrote into law for the newly ennobled Briala, concessions Gwenaëlle can't imagine being well-received or properly enforced, that the Empress is like as not to abandon once it's more expedient, once she's reinforced her power and doesn't need some elf's cooperation. "If you want to talk about unity then what we need is unified Thedas. Not elves. Everyone. The only person it helps to stand about squabbling over where to draw which lines in whose sand is Corypheus, because that's just more time we're not spending doing something productive--"

Gwenaëlle's heart is not a soft thing. She hasn't the luxury.

"You are incorrect. Thranduil was once one of my people. Whether or not he chooses to adhere to that loyalty is his choice. Galadriel, however, is another matter. She was never part of Doriath." his nose wrinkles and he continues, voice forcefully calm, "So you would have the Elves stay silent and take the abuse without recompense?" it's clear he doesn't like the idea in the least, "I understand those the most like me. Why should I not start there and then branch out to the other races? Your presumptions are rash and dangerous."

Thingol has aided the other races on Arda and he does not mind doing so again for the good of all. But he will not watch people that are so like his kin pushed undertow without speaking out against it; without attempting to unite them and reminding them of their worth. There is strength in numbers and if those numbers are led by someone with a cool head, it remains a positive movement.

"Define productivity? Do you think diplomacy springs from the ground? It must be built and maintained. If a large percentage of those you wish to unite in your Thedas are unhappy and abused, what is keeping them from revolting?"

Frankly, he couldn't blame the Elves if they did revolt - as useless as that would be in the long run.

The more determinedly Thingol drags the conversation back to the subject of elves, the less sense it makes to continue it. She has no desire to debate the merits of dredging the elvhen corpse for what little value it might have left, and frankly no ability to do so in any sort of measured way. Her opinions, where elves are concerned, are -

complex

- but on the matter of the intersection of these foreigners and Thedas, much less. It isn't that Gwenaëlle is completely unable to see the value of elves committed to a purpose, though even if it were one she could more readily stomach she'd be reluctant to be heard making the admission, but that his purpose, his proposal of elves united beneath him, that is too abhorrent to be dignified.

"You ought to contribute your passion to the Inquisition's cause," she says, curtly, "where it might do some good. I don't claim to decide what good that might be, but it'll all be academic if Corypheus destroys everyone."

If it sounds as if she's giving him a pat reiteration of her previous arguments -

Well, she is, without a hint of shame, and it's all he'll get.

"I shall consider it." his smile is thin and it does not reach his eyes. Her stubbornness must stem from somewhere deep; a wound perhaps that she does not wish to be touched. He has wounds of that same nature - only they were dealt to him by well-meaning (or not) Men. The first Man had captured his daughter's heart and cursed her with mortality; the second had been his foster-son and cursed him with a second tragedy where his children are concerned.

Also, what else is an Elven-King supposed to do but unite his people under him? Thingol has never been a commoner or even a simple noble! Eru created him and his brothers to be leaders.

"Were you born so stubborn? When the other children cried, did you refuse simply so you were different?"

"Yes."

It's a tart answer given without so much as turning a hair, but: a little girl with dark eyes sitting quietly at the bottom of a flight of stairs, holding a plush rabbit and her own knees, waiting patiently in front of a closed door that wouldn't open because no one was behind it.

A solemn little girl that stopped crying because people had stopped answering -

An angry young woman who thought, no, answer me and shouted at the world.

"I think you will find me a breath of fresh air if you give me a chance." Thingol captures a leaf on the wind and holds it gently, carefully between his long fingers, "I mean you no harm; I mean this world no harm. If I can help it avoid its end, I will do so to the best of my ability. But -" he interjects, "I must follow a path that makes sense to me."

Elves are old creatures and changing habits is difficult, yet he has every reason to try.

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[Open: To the homeless, a haven.]

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