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WHO: Fenris and OPEN
WHAT: Catch-all post! Reading, drinking, stalking slavers, shopping unsuccessfully
WHEN: July/Solace
WHERE: Around Kirkwall
NOTES: No warnings

Reading Practice: Library

It’s at least nice and quiet at the library. Though he’s still not exactly the most comfortable in this place, it has that going for it. Fenris paces around uneasily, until he finds a good spot to settle. Once there, he opens the book he has with him, sighing heavily as he gets back to the page where he’d left off.

Slowly, he traces a finger along the page, mouthing each word one by one. It’s a laborious process for someone who’s still getting down the basics. He’d gone over this section together with Bethany, and while it had seemed fine at the time, it’s always a little more challenging on his own. But at least he's made some progress.

He also has a piece of paper and quill and ink with him. Every so often he - just as deliberately- copies down a word he finds interesting, to work on those writing skills as well. Some of it makes sense. Some words are also just outright baffling, not at all how one would assume them to look. So far, the paper reads, in very scribbly handwriting:

foul

mine

drink

sla ug hte r (??)

evade

open

distress

an d ras t a e andraste Andraste (?)

"Who invented this?" he murmurs grumpily. It's as if they wanted to make it as deliberately inconsistent as possible.

Hanged Man

Fenris quietly sips drink after drink, hanging back for a while as people come and go. Finally, he turns to whoever’s near him at the bar, cards in hand.

“Why don’t we have an exchange? I’ll teach you a game I know, if you’ll do likewise for me.”

He’s never thought to find out what sort of card games rifters play, or possibly games from lands here that he knows little about. With a few drinks in him, he’s certainly interested in finding out. It’s a question he’ll have to pose to more people, later, he thinks.

Slaver Hunting: Kirkwall Alley, Night

Taking down slavers is still something Fenris does on the side… he just can’t help it, when he catches wind of something going on, he needs to do something about it. Such as right now. It’s late and dark, as he makes his way quietly from the docks, slowly stalking the one who he’s been keeping track of lately. But as he creeps along, he’s getting the distinct feeling of being followed or watched…

Soon enough, he heads down an alley, turning to confront whoever else is out there. With his blade drawn, he steadily advances on the person.

“What brings you out here?” And why are you interrupting his important business, damn it!

Armor Shopping: Lowtown

The merchants in Lowtown tend to have the best deals, so that’s where Fenris is now, strolling through the area, eyeing what’s for sale. He’s considering picking up something new, potentially, if he can find something that’ll suit his preferences.

“Is it true? Do you really cast a spell that can rip out a man’s heart?”

Oh, no, here it goes. Fenris turns to the merchant who’d spoken and glares. “Do I look like a mage to you?”

The merchant looks uneasy, but soon enough, they’re interrupted by a woman selling flowers. She comes along, and upon seeing Fenris, promptly places a crown of pretty pink flowers on his head, quicker than he can react. The woman giggles. “It suits you! Consider it a token of appreciation. You’re that friend of the Champion’s, aren’t you?”

“And he magicked the heart clean out of the Arishok, I heard it, it’s true,” the merchant chimes in.

“I heard it was the whole Qunari compound that he fought, single-handedly!” another flower girl emerges out of nowhere, and suddenly there’s a pretty yellow and blue flower both being added to his hair.

The last thing he wants is a scene, not here among the merchants. Sigh. He's just going to start backing away, now, ok. It's clear he won't be able to talk sense into any of these people. The pretty flowers in his hair are largely forgotten as he works to step away.

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There's a certain amount of caution that creeps in anyway, even knowing all of the good she's done. He just... wants to keep a wary eye on her, no matter what may be going on. What's her true intent, being here with the Inquisition, after all? Wouldn't someone like her have ulterior motives? Well. Everyone has their own motives, he supposes, but he does wonder about hers a great deal.

"You were fortunate in that regard, then. Well. In a manner of speaking." At least, as far as an education was concerned. Who knows if you could consider being brought up by Flemeth all that lucky. "However they teach them in the Circles, you can't deny they do- did- teach them... which is more than some might have ever gotten, living in the slums. Or worse conditions." But anyway, he doesn't actually mean to dwell on certain stances about Circles, even if he couldn't help it. "Is there anything in particular that you'd recommend?"

Morrigan smiles but her face is her face so it edges closer to a smirk anyway as she brushes past him, smelling of all the wild places that there are to be found beyond Kirkwall. Do you remember Sundermount, Fenris, did you ever meet her mother or question those who did about her? Of course she's been there and on the prowl.

"I do wonder, Alistair, after all, was raised in a Chantry for a good long spell and the education cannot be so very different in some ways yet he blinks as stupidly as a calf." Cows have ever struck Morrigan as particularly dim-witted and slow creatures, and as much as she gets on with Alistair now it always pays to make sure people think there's still that friction there between them to stop them glancing too closely between the trio the two of them and her son make. "There are other things they do not teach however, such as how to survive; I know how to make teas after a fashion from near every plant I come across for a variety of ills and knew every plant I would use to poison a man in the Wilds. But you were reading, and this," her hand rests upon a volume of poetry with a spine so cracked that old leather flakes off in her palm as she hefts it down, "is a rare and valued thing. Once they would only ever be read aloud, you see, all the better that they have a rhythm by which you might remember."

Think Thedosian Beowulf Fenris.

The animosity between Morrigan and Alistair is pretty well-known... just as much as for himself and Anders, he would imagine, even if there are plenty of differences in why they hold resentment toward one another. Still, he understands grudges and holding them, so he doesn't remark about her attitude toward Alistair.

"So you think they were too sheltered within the Circles?" He himself knows nothing of a sheltered life and what that would even have entailed. It suddenly strikes him how different his own life might have been, had he been born elsewhere, or not an elf at all. Would he have the same sort of ability to survive on his own as he does now? He had to adapt to some extreme situations, after all. But he is no mage. That thought again circles back to him. "But what about learning to defy demons, to strengthen one's mind against their assault? Don't most mages need proper training for that? They don't all have what you did. Some mages may be strong enough to develop that on their own, but... surely not all." Maker damn you, Anders.

He looks the book, fascinated by its apparent age and how worn out it is. "It appears to have been a popular selection over the years. I wouldn't mind giving it a try. I've never heard much poetry outside Tevinter." And that only being snippets of things as he was made to go to and fro carrying out orders... but there were definitely occasions where a bard would have recited something at a special fancy dinner or along those lines.

What a person does in private and what they do in the light of day with all the eyes of the world upon them are markedly different things and there are a great many hours and minutes and shades between all of that still. Even she and Anders for all that she has snapped, snarled, and bared her teeth have a more easy understanding. (If it came to it, she would rip his throat out without hesitating, there's living and surviving and Morrigan damn well knows the difference.)

"What did they know in the Circles? Taught only to fear themselves and then what happens when the demons come? When they are not strong enough to resist?" Morrigan doesn't give an inch because everyone expects apostates to consult so freely with terrible things, her more than any other once they know that yes, she's the daughter of that Flemeth, with the words blood magic and maleficar trailing behind her same as her long dark skirts did in Orlais but there were none, not even dear old mother. "The Chantry teaches only that which it deems fit to be taught; I asked a Templar once not so very long ago, could not all magic be deemed blood magic if magic runs in so many bloodlines. He had no answer for me."

Because he's a Templar. Because he's lived a life as leashed to the Chantry as any mage. Because Morrigan will never do anything less than stiffen her spine in the presence of such men and women all of her days.

Yet for how old and worn such things are, whatever truths that were in it have been lost, that she knows. "'Tis a tale they told round fires, if this is as the one I was taught from, the same pauses are written in, the emphasis to have the listeners gather close. A good book for reading aloud." Is that a hint of encouragement? It can be ignored if he so chooses, she's just used to how she had to raise Kieran with only the parts of her own childhood that worked and that didn't hurt her because there was so little else in the earliest of years. Talk of Tevinter catches her interest though, brow rising. "I have never heard Tevinter poetry, does much come from reciting their glory days and old spoils?"

He raises an eyebrow, not able to understand how the Circles are so terrible. It’s a way of containing something that to him is utterly dangerous and unpredictable. “Aren’t they taught to build up that strength? On their own, they hardly have a chance to learn such skills… aside from rare examples.” Morrigan herself, for all that there’s an unsettling wildness to her, she seems very well in control of what she’s doing. Bethany, too, has never been a weak mage, but she’s again, only one person. “You would hardly want to let fire spread free and uncontained, why should magic be allowed the same?”

They're never going to agree on this, he's all too aware.

"I hadn't considered that blood magic notion, but it's all too unsettling to ponder, if you think of it. I see no clear answer, either." Except that all magic is dangerous and powerful, and in the wrong hands... it's a destructive force.

He nods, opening the book and flipping through for a moment before a familiar word catches his eye. He ought to practice more anyway, so... it may be a good idea. But first... "Yes, Tevinter poetry is as bad as you would imagine. Full of praise for the glory days, of their old religion and blood magic... and little else. There's always a harshness to its cadences, too... I'm sure it's quite distinct compared to other forms." Only one way to find out, though! He turns his attention to the poem that's caught his eye.

"The accounting of the Fifth Blight is a dry tale compared to the deeds of the Champion but it was not without a Circle in chaos. I saw bodies that fell where they stood, where they had done foolish stupid acts for they had no other thing for they had not been taught." Easier to say it now when she isn't the angry girl ready to abandon them to their fate and for all her words even now, they have a chance to not be sheep, to be something so much more than what they are. "A demon feeds and grows fat upon those who stumble into its domain. What say you of the sleeping minds of mages in a Circle? A veritable feast or banquet I would wager. Fear, anger, hunger, desire; they creep in the dark and they may fight but they have not the strength. They know not what they might be. How many bodies I have seen upon the sides of roads, same as boys and girls taking up the sword thinking that they too might be a soldier under their lord or make their name by the blade.

"I had my mother but I watched. I learned. I made mine own errors and believe me when I say I learned well from them. To live is not easy, to live in a Circle is to be a sheep. Perhaps here they might face the wolves but they are free to run rather than to wait for the blade to come down." After all, isn't it only ever a matter of time? Wasn't that the way the world was turning? Morrigan who has never had a great stake in mage politics but has her stake in freedom and power, and damn well knowing to take it where you find it, and that there is no one that belongs in a cage. How else do you stride through Orlesian politics the way she had that even the great Madame de Fer did not? Because you know those rules because you learned them, because you have never known the cage yourself but have known of it, and that allows you to navigate around all the places where the rules and lines and limits are.

But she's said much, she allows herself a smirk, to look up instead through lowered lashes as she lets the notion sit with him to settle, to simmer. "There are a great many things in the blood. For some, there is only ever violence and conquering in them. How many wars has Thedas seen? What will the Qunari do if they come?" There is more than just magic to cause destruction. There is the sword, there is the bow, there is the siege engine, there is hot oil set aflame by non-magical fire just as easily. There is also intent and motive, those ugly things people would rather not examine too closely.

Morrigan is Flemeth's daughter after all, there are times when her eyes are older than her, older than the world, old as the one who gave her knowledge and the tools to make her way on her own. A woman who taught Morrigan to listen close now, prick up your ears girl. "I do wonder what they might record there of Arlathan. What wonders they must have seen - if there are those who would keep records? Who would bother to write it even in bloodied verse of conquest it would be Tevinter."

"And free to become possessed, with no way to resist, free to use magic in dangerous, unrestrained ways. Not to mention... well, you need only look to Tevinter to see what else can come of allowing mages full freedom without any barriers. Blood magic, and other dark uses are all too common." It unsettles him more to think of all mages now being out there, without any sort of restraint upon them. But had the Circles really done what they were supposed to? He doesn't want to admit it, but they do seem to have their flaws. "At the very least, I would argue that mages need to be taught about the dangers they could face... or cause."

Not all of them could get lucky and have the right upbringing or personality to make them strong, after all. It's something they'll never fully agree on, he knows that much, but she has given him... a few things to at least consider.

"I'm sure there would always be violence, with or without magic." Ok, so they can agree on that much, anyway. He's always had a cynical outlook about people as a whole, so he can't deny that war would still exist, either way. "But magic enhances that destructive potential... or the destruction is enhanced by magic. There's constant threat of demon possession, for one thing. Not to mention the ways in which the more inventive mages can twist magic for their own malevolent ends."

He frowns a little. As if they would care about elven history. There are undoubtedly records, somewhere, surely, but still... "The history of such places are of little interest to the magisters, as you might imagine. Other than those tales of conquest, of course." Not that it matters, right? It's all too far in the past for him to feel any connection to it, himself. Just as he feels no connection with the Dalish or even the city elves of these more southern nations.

"I have seen Templars given over to demons. I have fought sylvans in the Brecilian Forest. Once even a cat spoke with a demon's voice, biding its time to possess but a simple girl not even a mage that it might walk in this world as you or I. Do you think yourself above temptation? Do you think us all so weak-willed and spineless? There were no demons or abominations in my childhood or teaching, not once have I ever given in if a demon has come, I have sent it on its way." The hackles are up at his words because this is always what it is and will be ever since the mess of a war unleashed upon the world that she has to deal with when she wished no part in it. "There is teaching then there is bludgeoning."

There's also giving a person a cup of poison after they've been thirsty so long they'd drink anything, when they're a child looking for trust but Morrigan will say nothing of that. Perhaps not yet.

A scoff comes out of her at that. Malevolent ends. "There was a woman in the Deep Roads who allowed all of her number to become Darkspawn to claim the Anvil of the Void, the last survivor one we met with in that dark miserable place." Her voice is quiet but not lacking in steel for it. "What say you of Orlais? Of that mess with Gaspard, Celene, Briala, the burning of Halamshiral for it all? Do not believe that magic is the sole cause, tis always intent, the darkness that might lie in the heart of any man or woman, for I have seen things touched not by magic that would chill you to the very bone."

Morrigan raises an eyebrow at that, wonders perhaps if what he thinks of magic and mages colours too much of his other opinions as well. "Tis surprising, Tevinter is a place that has pored long over all facets of its history as I have heard. If there were things of import, they might be of benefit to the Inquisition." Celene's influence reached only as far as her own nation after all, there were many places Morrigan couldn't go to find more.

“Then what do you recommend? What’s the best course of action for mages to strengthen themselves? Anyone can become possessed, that’s true… but mages are in more danger, regardless, you can’t deny that this is a fact. Letting mages go around unprotected entirely is still a dangerous prospect. They still need training, even without the Circles.” He sighs, looking down toward the pages in front of him, frowning a little. “I've met both weak and strong mages. They all face the same increased risk of danger. Perhaps some are fine on their own… but not all. Those who are weaker stand a better chance if they’re taught how to resist.”

Magic still seems tied up in all of the worst things he’s experienced and witnessed. True, enslavement in itself doesn’t require magic, after all. But the ones who happened to be enslaving others in Tevinter were all magisters, which… says something to him.

“Perhaps... it’s not the sole cause.” It takes a lot to get even that far, but that’s as far as he’ll go, in admitting that. The years with Hawke may have improved his attitude… somewhat… but at his core he can’t stop distrusting magic fully. “Perhaps not in the case of Orlais, and perhaps not in… certain other cases. But if it’s there, it can make only things worse. Believe me, I’ve seen things myself. I’ve seen individuals who would be corrupt regardless of their power… but that power allows them to do even more unspeakable things that they otherwise couldn’t.”

It’s true, he may be a bit dismissive toward all things Tevinter. “They absolutely have a great interest in history, and a great many scholars… But they have a tendency to make that history their own. One must be prepared for the biased interpretations of events. Still, there’s plenty there to learn of, if only to avoid repeating their mistakes...”

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