faderift | [OPEN] A dwarf out and about

WHO: Kit and OPEN
WHAT: Kit recovering from the injury he sustained in the Deep Roads, and then exploring the Gallows a bit.
WHEN: The latter half of Solace/July.
WHERE: The Gallows
NOTES: This post is open to anyone who might have reason to drop by the infirmary, or interact with a slightly lost looking, ripped a f dwarf limping around the Gallows after his convalescence.

Kirkwall has changed since Kit was last in it.

He'd landed in the City of Chains the first time 'round the same summer the Arishok's warship ran aground and the Qunari themselves were camped out in their compound by the docks like dread sentinels. The dwarven mercenary band he'd been a part of at the time had been serving as a guard retinue for a Merchants' Guild caravan, and business had brought them into the city to settle old debts, and generate some new ones, all in the name of profit. The city had looked like a right shithole then, with the poor, the dead, and the dying right under the noses of the nobility, sitting pretty in their decadent Hightown estates. Chantry Templars and priestesses could be found at nearly every level of the city--save Darktown, of course, where they never set foot except in pursuit of apostates.

It still looked like a shithole--but at least the Gallows had a forest right in the middle of it now.

I. THE INFIRMARY

The cot he's been laid up in for the past couple of days is clean and comfortable; the blanket is a bit scratchy, and obviously cut for someone about a foot and a half taller than your average dwarf, but it gets the job done and keeps the chill out. A competent physicker has seen to his wounded leg, though after many failed attempts at cajoling Kit into accepting it, she finally accepts that he's just not going to tolerate a mage healer taking a look at the wound.

It means his leg still aches terribly days after his misadventure into the Deep Roads... but all things considered, he's definitely had worse.

It's a cool, early morning when he takes the crutch that has been left at his bedside and limps his way just outside the infirmary to roll himself a cigarette and have a smoke. Leaning against the doorframe, he squints his eyes against the morning light and enjoys the quiet, interrupted only by the drowsy sounds of the Gallows personnel as they wake, and the cries of seabirds.

II. THE LIBRARY

He's never been in a library before.

No, really. The casteless dwarves certainly weren't allowed into the Diamond Quarter back in Orzammar, let alone into the hallowed halls of the Shaperate with her many mysteries and memories of the dwarves who came before. As a dead-eyed duster kid looking up at the Diamond Quarter from the stifling ruins of Dust Town, Kit liked to imagine that there was, at one point, a Gandir dwarf who'd had a name, a caste, and a life recorded in those memories. Before he'd been reviled, and then forgotten, and then reviled again.

It was a stupid thing to waste energy daydreaming about, when he had no idea where his next meal was going to come from. And with the Legion, the only books he read were the ones that his fellows used to teach him his letters.

So it's not academic curiosity that brings Kit and his crutch limping into the Gallows library, each awkward step resonating with embarrassing noisiness throughout the cavernous chamber. He grimaces, and tries to peg-leg along more discreetly; does this place have anything on dwarven history? Probably not. He looks anyway.

III. WILDCARD

[got a better idea? go for it, man, I'll roll with anything as long as it's set in the Gallows]

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

"I prefer potions and poultices too," Nari replies, lowering herself into a squat with a brief wince as the movement stretches some stiff muscles. "Magical healing is wonderful, fast, and sometimes the only way, but having something outside yourself telling your flesh what to do is..." she finishes the thought by way of an unnerved expression.

As far as the forest--well. Nari looked at the dwarf sidelong at the mention. If Kit wasn't keen on magical healing even on a small scale, what would he think about mass rejuvenation of land? His expression seemed to be one of genuine interest, however, so she judged it safe and nodded.

"I don't know exactly what it was she did, or how, but the herb garden here was corrupt beyond mention. Not much grew, and what did manage to grow I wouldn't want to use for anything. So she... fixed it."

"...but having something outside yourself telling your flesh what to do is..."

Shudder. Yeah. He feels that.

As for the rest, the more Nari explains, the higher his eyebrows climb. "She fixed it," he repeats. He scratches the crown of his head, looking as confused as anyone would be over hearing that one sleepy little elf had 'fixed' a forest.

"...like. All of it?" Huh.

"Like all of it," Nari confirmed. "When she was brought out unconscious I stopped paying much attention to anything else, but I've gone back since then and yeah," the elf nods slowly with a generous measure of wonder, "the entire space looks like it's been untouched forest for decades. Right to the borders of the old Chantry, and no farther. It's..."

She trails off then, and shrugging helplessly. The hunter didn't really know what to think yet. For the first time, she was thinking of Sina as a true First. Not that Nari hadn't respected her position before, but she'd always been a little sister first, her position in the clan secondary to that.

Realizing she'd stopped talking and started considering a nearby rock very intently for an unknown amount of time, Nari looks back at her companion with a quick sheepish smile.

"...It's hard to fathom."

Kit doesn't begrudge her her spell of introspective silence; he hasn't been in her shoes, precisely, but it's easy enough for him to empathize. They clearly have a close bond, and Sina's abilities must be shifting and shaking the foundations of it.

"Yeah," he agrees, then sucks in a quick breath and taps the cigarette to get rid of the ashes again. He grimaces at what's left; the embers had singed his fingertips. Dropping the nub into the dirt, he squashes it with his toe to put it out.

"Well I'm no physicker, and magic is a tier or two above my paygrade," he admits, "but I can keep an eye on her while I'm laid up here. Let you know if anything changes."

She opened her mouth to say that wouldn't be necessary, then closed it instead. Despite knowing him for the span of a single short conversation, the dwarf seemed a down-to-earth [ha] sort who wouldn't offer something out of mere courtesy.

And it wouldn't do for Sina's first view of her to be while she was so out of sorts.

"I'd... appreciate that. I'm usually helping with construction or doing some drafting in the Gallows."

He gives his shoulders a small shrug, and frowns in a 'no trouble,' sort of expression while almost waving off her thanks. It's fine, it's fine; that kind of thing.

"You do masonry, then? Sounds like important work," he asks her, both to change the subject a little as well as to give her an avenue out of the conversation if she needs to be on her way.

"Starting to," Nari says with a genuine smile--she does love her work. "I did mostly woodcarving with my clan. Ironbark weapons and armor, little trinkets, boxes, statues, other trade goods. We're nomadic, so there was little use for structural work." She plucks a blade of grass from nearby, idly rolling it between her fingers.

"When we went to Skyhold, it was fascinating. I'd seen elven ruins before, of course, but nothing so well preserved. I could see the lines in it the same way I see them in wood. I started paying attention to shem'len houses too. Keeps and castles. They're different, but the bones are the same." The grass thoroughly rolled, she flicks it away.

"I like it. It makes sense. There's little enough that does that these days. And it helps," she says, turning her small crooked smile back towards the dwarf.

"And you? On the front lines?" A little mischief flashes in her green eyes, "Or did you get overwhelmed by nugs?"

"And you? On the front lines? Or did you get overwhelmed by nugs?"

Well, technically, they both like the Deep Roads an awful lot...

"Yeah, a big one," he says, chuckling, and mimes with his hands. "Kind of ogre-shaped, come to think of it. Big teeth, mean right hook." He's kidding. About the nug part, anyway. (he did get gored by an ogre tho.)

He gives his injured leg a cautious stretch, flexing it just to make sure the muscle doesn't tighten up and start to atrophy. Picking up the threads of the conversation, he suggests, "I used to have a... friend..." Yeah, we'll go with that. "...who used to be a Smith--that is, from the Smith caste, in Orzammar. Castes are normally permanent, don't find many dwarves who 'used to' be one, but once you join the Legion of the Dead, you leave that stuff behind. Anyway," he waves a hand, as if in apology for his tangent, "he brought these little stone icons of the Paragons with him into the Deep Roads. I think I still have one of them, hold on.."

He pats his pockets a bit and eventually comes up with a tiny rendering of the Paragon Hrildan, rendered in exacting, stylized detail. "Here it is," he says, and offers it out for Nari to look at. He almost seems loathe to part with the figurine, as if it is precious to him.

Rather than take it, Nari scoots herself over to peer closely at the figurine in his hands. She knows what it's like to have something like that from a friend you used to have... especially one that she gathered had passed through the Veil.

"I don't know too much about the Paragons," she murmured slowly, the bulk of her concentration going to appreciating the fine details, the intense and exacting geometry of the dwarven art--so different than the smooth curving lines that dominated Dalish carving. "Are they like the Creators? Each having dominion over an aspect of the world? Teaching your kind their skills?"

The stone Paragon Hrildan is carved from comes from some deep, ancient part of the Deep Roads; riddled throughout the figurine are streaks of glittering silver. By anyone's measurement, it's excellent craftsmanship. Kit smiles with some private pride at Nari's appreciation for the skill of the craftsman; someone should be proud of his work, since he isn't here anymore to be proud of it himself.

When she asks about the Paragons, he shakes his head. "Not quite," he says, his smile growing wry, and takes the figurine back to examine it. How to explain it to a surfacer? "The Paragons didn't create us, they're... they're supposed to be the best of us. We elect them. They could be any one of us, from any caste--even the casteless, like me. Like--" He wracks his brain for a better explanation. It's hard.

...Aha. He snaps his fingers. "Take Paragon Orseck Garal. He moved the capital of the old dwarven empire from the thaig of Kal Sharok to Orzammar, where it's at now. So... he was made a Paragon." He raises his eyebrows, hoping he made at least some sense.

[OPEN] A dwarf out and about

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