[open] we ask that life be kind

[eolasemah]

WHO: Sina, the greater Kirkwall populace (including you)
WHAT: dealing with the magic forest backlash
WHEN: early August
WHERE: the steps of the former Chantry
NOTES: with regard to this fiasco

It's early morning, but past sunrise, so many people are still on their way to their daily occupations when a small Dalish elf takes up residence on the steps of what used to be the Chantry and is now a very condensed forest. She's brought with her supplies to see her through the day: a few snacks and plenty to work on, mainly grinding herbs and creating poultices and tea blends, unremarkable and nonmagical activities to put people at ease.
Sina has paid little mind to the guards around the garden's perimeter, apart from offering each of them a bit of dried fruit for their trouble, and she has more of the same for anyone who comes to talk to her. To each, the message is the same: it was me, I did this for you, and there is no reason to be afraid.

Of course, there is a reasonable contingent of those who prefer to shout and carry on, some simply grieving over their chantry and their lack of control in repurposing it, some insisting this is Dalish trickery that should be punished. To both, she listens and says little, with apologies to the former group and polite deflections to the latter.

Over the course of the day she finds herself joined by an assortment of people from the street, who come and go in their efforts to make coin or simply occupy themselves: the occasional musician, bored children, beggars. Sometimes they interact with Sina and sometimes they don't, but regardless, she hold her vigil and, to a degree, actually enjoys it.

Perhaps it doesn't help at all. But whatever the case, the people of Kirkwall who care to look will find a face and a voice connected to the sudden forest, as well as a pointed listening ear and a giving hand.

[Feel free to approach sometime during the day, or we can arrange an interaction after!]

Comments

[eolasemah]

Sina feels very small looking up at the Templar, but recent events have instilled in her a certain calm. There are still things in the world that can hurt her, and will, but her fear of them has dwindled.
She stands carefully, nudging her basket and its tools toward whatever friend or associate is nearest, silently asking them to guard it, and begins her ascent toward what used to be the Chantry.
Even after they've entered the forest, Sina doesn't speak a word, waiting for Wren to begin. She idly runs her hand along the trunk of a tree in the meantime, looking up at it, admiring it; despite being the cause of all this, she hasn't actually gotten to go within and get a good look at everything since the incident.

[limier]

"Thank you."

It's remarkable how quickly shade grows overhead, the high cast of trees dimming even Kirkwall's hot summer sun. The girl trails in some degree of wonder, as though she hasn't seen it —

Perhaps she hasn't. The other one described things going too far.

"I've had one account of what transpired," Had that not ever been a frustrating exercise. "I would sooner have yours, as well."

We found the blood, Not a statement to lead with. Not a warning to pursue idly, yet this close to listening ears.

[eolasemah]

Sina takes her time, wandering further into the forest, looking around as though inspecting it to ensure it meets her standards. "We had a garden, and it was sick," she explains, "nothing we did could make it healthy. Nothing save magic, and because this is my area of expertise, I felt responsible for it." She stops by a tree and tugs a wild plum from a low-hanging branch. She squeezes it lightly, feeling for ripeness, and then takes a bite without a second thought-- it results in the involuntary 'mmh' of someone finding great unexpected enjoyment in something eaten.

Finishing her bite, she continues. "The spell I cast was ancient elvhen magic, passed between generations of Keepers as a skill to keep our clans alive and thriving. We work with the life around us to keep our People safe." Munch, munch. "I knew I could do it, and that it would help. I didn't intend for it to get this big, but really the more advanced it is, the better it will provide for the citizens of Kirkwall."

[limier]

"The more advanced it is," It's not quite gentle, but she's cautious to hold it neutral, to strain the judgment that threatens to seep. A misstep with the other girl, however necessary it had seemed — there is pride here, and if to raise one's voice is to be heard, too it risks entrenchment. Her hands fold behind her back. "The less they understand its presence."

"I have been asked to enquire whether it might be reversed," One palm unpeels, splays in a gesture of pre-emptive pacification. "To its original intent, only. A forest is not easily-tended within a city's bounds."

Or tolerated, but if Sina's come here, she's had an earful of that already.

[eolasemah]

It's an argument Sina has heard several times now, and one she's not quite certain how to address. Wren's inquiry, however actually causes a small laugh of surprise.
"Only as well as I can reverse an adolescent into a child," she replies, taking a second bite, her smile fading back into a more dignified expression. "Fortunately, a forest needs to tending. Gardens can be ruined by insects or rabbits, little plants struggling to grow picked off at the beginning of their lives, blighted by parasites. Gardens are a manmade thing that need tending. Forests came before us and will remain after." She's thinking aloud as much as she is explaining, peering around and above at the cathedral of trees.
"I don't think it likely to grow outside its current boundaries, but all that need be done if so is a cutting back of branches and picking up seeds to make sure they don't sprout. Fewer gardeners would be required for that than for trying to yield crops from dead ground."

[limier]

She resists the urge to rub a temple. As though every inch of this place weren't itself manmade —

"You will need to make your case to the Seekers," Her voice is low. "Or men will be hired to cut it back."

"You will need to do so carefully." A sharper glance now; Wren tries to find Sina's eyes, hold them. "More than gardeners were required for this."

[eolasemah]

Elfmade, to be sure, but Sina would beg to differ: she didn't create anything that wasn't already there. Under Kirkwall, the nature it replaced waits to grow again.

She meets Wren's gaze squarely, with a small tilt of her head that suggests both interest and, in her quiet, subtle way, stubbornness. "Then I will," she answers politely, "you're right, more than gardeners did this. Mages did, three of us, wielding the magic that has kept our People safe and fed for all the many generations we've wandered. I make no pretense otherwise."
Her demeanor is calm and still as the surface of a pond, steady and without bravado. "I have nothing to hide, and I do not fear the Seekers." She did, once. Before she realized they're just frightened people too, doing their best, trying to make sense of the chaos. Not omnipotent murderous shem'len, not untouchable. Just people.

[limier]

"Blood did this." Quietly as she can pitch the words. "And you would be wise to pretend upon that count."

"If the Inquisition had not found this —"

If anyone else had. If Daesun hadn't been so quick to clear it, had spread the word just a little more widely. Wren shakes her head, jaw hard. They’ve been fortunate. How much this might have undone,

They’ve been fortunate. May fortune remain.

[eolasemah]

Sina blinks, more from the suddenness of the words than the accusation itself. Blood is, after all, not uncommon in some Dalish rituals, including the applying of sacred lines to their faces. Blood magic is a delicate matter among Sina's inner circle, not to be used in abundance, but certainly a tool like any other. She doesn't say as much, estimating that it wouldn't be well-received.

"I..." Sina begins, about to argue that she won't lie, that there's nothing to fear, but even she can see the wisdom of it. Mages, elves, or both could suffer greatly for it. "...will."
She seems to deflate a little, looking around with a new weariness. The blood was as symbolic as it was a focus, a secret hope that some part of her may continue to live and to create life even after...
Well. This.

"I'm trying, Ser Coupe," she says softly, in a near-whisper, her tone an almost complete reversal from the strong certainty of before. "Will it matter, that I'm sorry? That I robbed the people of something meaningful in my desire to give them something meaningful?" There's no bitterness here, no sarcasm. The awfulness of it has been eating at her, along with certain other things, and she abruptly realizes how drained she's become.

not sure how shitty sina's looking so if this is too much of a leap just lmk and i'll edit :V

[limier]

It would be a lie to say it's easy to forget Sina's youth. It's not: The girl's practically a parody of it, all eyes and certainty and fire. But fire eats, and doubt creeps in,

(She looks so poorly now. Had it been this obvious before?)

Wren lifts a hand at last to one of the branches, lets the leaves shake over her skin in the slight breeze.

"Perhaps." It's not a good answer, not a kind one; it would be more of an unkindness to lie now. "Your intentions will matter to some. Others will not wish to hear them,"

But Sina knows that already, has heard it all morning — that's not what this is really about. She looks down at last, back over to her. Will it matter that I was ever here?

"How long do you have?"

she ain't looking great, it's fine!

[eolasemah]

SIna blinks, and when her eyes open again, there are tears in them. She rests back against the trunk of a tree, one hand pressing against its rough bark, savoring it. She turns her gaze from Wren, looking instead into the middle distance.
"I don't know," she whispers, her voice trembling, "I feel it in me like... frost. Creeping over soil. Stifling one small root at a time." A tear falls. "But it won't thaw." She shakes her head, her composure slipping, her voice becoming higher and more strained like a child's. "No one can make it thaw."

[limier]

Tears. Oh, shit.

Where do the Dalish go? Back to their gods, back to the ground? She's sent enough away that she ought to know, but the survivors have never exactly been inclined to share details. You plant a tree over the body — this much, she’s seen. Perhaps that's what this is, however premature, however disproportionate. A memorial garden.

Wren crouches low, to draw fingers through the dirt, to force some of the tension from her shoulders, her skull. This city bruises the nerves; no time for that now.

"Come to me," A small bidding. She beckons down to the soil, the stones. "Look to this."

A worm crawls sluggish between her hands. Warm earth, soft. Unfrozen.

"What do you feel in it?"

[eolasemah]

Wiping her sleeve across her eyes, Sina steels herself before crouching next to Wren, oddly comforted by the summoning. It's a tone not unlike what Keeper Thalia would use to redirect her attention as a younger child, and Sina finds she's able to focus, at least for the moment. Her own slender fingers push into the soil, her concentration interrupted only by the occasional wet sniff.
"Everything," she whispers, curling her fingers slightly. "The making of the world."

[limier]

The instinct to calm a panicked mage isn't particularly selfless, no matter how the girl’s hurt tugs at something more familiar.

"How did they build it? The People,"

Not hers; ashes taint the ground you bury them in. But stories are ever a means to speak of that which one might not.

[eolasemah]

"Build what?" Sina asks, lifting her gaze, her eyes still shining with tears despite the small smile that threatens to twitch onto her lips. "The world?" It occurs to her that this is a question for Nari, if that is indeed what Wren is asking.

[limier]

Something tugs at the edge of her mouth,

(The wetness of her eyes, it's uncomfortable. The girl looks so young when she doesn't look half a corpse,)

"You tend to it, no? How did they?"

[eolasemah]

Taking Wren's meaning, Sina nods and drops her gaze to think.
"In much the same way," she decides, "gardens aren't often useful to us, when we move too often to cultivate them well. But what we do grow, we maintain by..." She pauses. "...just... allowing it to live. Returning to it periodically, to harvest, and also allowing the forest to use it, feeding its creatures and spreading its seeds."
Straightening, Sina begins to walk again, a thoughtful stroll as she continues. "The word 'build' confused me. We build very little, apart from the aravels we use to travel. ...if anything, we're what's built." She laughs mildly, casting a furtive glance at Wren, hoping she's taking the trip with her.
"But sometimes this sort of thing is necessary." She gestures to the forest around them. "My clan spent several months on the run from a band of mercenaries sent by a village. We took refuge in a burnt-out patch of forest, and wouldn't have lived if we hadn't been able to speed up the growth process of new life. For those who know these magics, choosing when and why is an important responsibility."