faderift | Nothing to eat but fears in the back seat

WHO: Yngvi; open
WHAT: Yngvi takes a moment to reflect on Asher's passing
WHEN: August 14th, evening onwards
WHERE: A quiet spot, the fringes of Hightown
NOTES: Discussion of character death, general state of the Yngvi given previous outings

Today creeps up on Yngvi. That must be what keeping busy does to you, makes you notice the days passing but not the dates until it lies heavily on him with the letter thats that they've all been dancing about. Funny how him and the rest of the Boneflayers can talk about death, joke about it, even laugh about it until it was Asher's. Maybe it was how. Maybe it was just how unfair it was.

The whole day he can't settle. Feels himself pulled from one thing to the next or sitting and watching time stretch out impossibly; minutes crawl by the way hours do on a stake out, his heart beating so loud everyone must be able to hear it.

So when he leaves coin for the meat he 'borrows' from his lady's kitchen (he's left the coin, he'll go with whoever has to buy more) he doesn't feel guilty because she was there, she'd understand, and the Avvar do their death thing and that's fine, that's grand, time doesn't mean much but if Asher is off with his Lady of the Skies and the birds took him--

"Stupid," he mutters to himself as he bundles the wrapped meat close and sets off, Avvar mead and a cup in the other hand to a spot that looked like the last place someone would go find him. No Chantry remains, no stupid fucking weird garden that makes him itch like the tree he hit in Halamshiral, no Darktown and Carta, no Gallows and red lyrium ghosts, no one.

Just Yngvi and the meat he unfolds from the waxed paper, weighed down on one corner with a cup of Avvar mead and another cup he drinks himself in silence for a long time as the sun starts setting until the words come out.

"Wish you were here mate, could really do with you here now. Wasn't right. None of it was right." Quiet. There's a dark bird with glossy feathers watching from a rooftop across from him; they gave Asher to the birds to give him to the Lady, this is all he can try to cobble together just now.

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Christine is used to keeping her failing Andrastian faith to herself -- or to Church, who won't judge her for it. But when someone comes along who thinks it's all a pack of lies, she tends to sit up and listen.

"My father," she begins, not expecting to get into this but here she is, "died in the civil war. They burned his body on a pyre with the rest of the dead. I cannot visit a tree, or look to the sky and see the birds who carried his soul. There is... nothing left but the ring he wore." Some might say the memories remain, but she barely has any memories of him. She was hoping to form new ones. "It is hard to say goodbye when there is nothing to say goodbye to."

So Aura has become a spirit warrior. Yngvi has spoken of this before, and Christine was confident then that Gjurd would set her down the right path. It sounds like Asher flies over her and his soul guides her now.

"Maybe he will visit me in dreams," she says, though after the words leave her lips, she doubts he will. Instead she focuses on the crow before them now, looking for a sign in its eyes.

"See," and this is territory that's nebulous (another of those words Yngvi wouldn't claim to know, he's just a dwarf from the gutters serah what's a word like that tripping out of his mouth?) but Asher cared about her and Christine has been decent - has been better to Yngvi than several others - so with Asher's ghost laid out between them he can offer her this. Asher was generous wasn't he? Even on his deathbed he tried to keep up his act, keep the face on.

He tries again with a dry throat but the mead isn't for him, that's an offering he can manage. "Right, way I see it is, maybe your old man if you care and there is some place they go 'cause I dunno 'bout all that stuff but say there is, then he'd know? Because there-" and he nods, the crows come down, the first one comes right up to tear a bloody strip off the meat Yngvi took from his lady's kitchen with coin left in its place. What he means is things maybe Asher told her or she might know: Andraste was what the Avvar were before they were Avvar and the Lady of the Skies is the wind and the birds, so all things get carried off and borne aloft in the end. Perhaps not what she wanted but this is life and we seldom get what we want so we make do with what we have.

It's a sight she won't soon forget. Ever since leaving the Circle, Christine has been drawn to birds flying free over her head, never caged like she had been. She's loved watching them, and it's become a well-known fact about her. But right here at this moment, she's seeing these crows with different eyes. She's seeing Asher and her father approaching her -- two important men in her life that had died around the same time. Christine decides that Asher is the one who took the meat because he was never a man to shy away from what he wanted. From her mother's accounts, her father was selfless and sacrificing. He would be a bird to hang back and wait. She feels drawn to one and she stares at it longingly, wanting to say so much, but holding her tongue. There will be another time for that. Her nose burns with unshed tears and she nods subtly, so as not to scare the crows away.

"Thank you, Yngvi. I see him now."

How do you respond to people saying that when you haven't done anything, when there isn't an edge to it, isn't some sort of bite or sarcasm or just something that can trip you up? A bubble of panic threatens to burst but the crow hops over again (Asher, it's Asher, you know it's Asher and Aura will write because Aura will know; Yngvi knows that in the marrow of his bones same as he still has the stone sense Orzammar swears he's lost for his forebears leaving it and him being born to the light and the sky) with more meat in its beak.

Go out in the wild and wild things sit about on you, he's not some ranger but watches were passed that he got used to them and the nugs are bolder than any nug has a right to be, pet or not.

"Don't need to thank me." He's uncomfortable with it because how often do those words come. Instead he strokes the soft feathers of the crow as it digs sharp nails into his thigh. "See? You're well-remembered, sorry it couldn't be at the Blooming Rose but even I can't swing that with my connections you'd need to shit on Melisende and Liadan's heads for that so y'know, they're off westwards if you're spreadin' the word. Didn't know if any of this'd work but reckon this would've been approved by you either way, seems like your sort of thing right?" That's not just to Asher, Christine has an interest he saw her sloping off and she asked after Gjurd he remembers that much too.

Christine watches in silence because she needs a moment to collect herself. Having someone present that you can actually talk to about your grief feels like a gift, and there's plenty she should say to Asher, yet the words don't leave her mouth. This was Yngvi's plan and she just stumbled into it all.

"Would you like me to leave you two alone?" she asks, and again there is not an edge to her voice. So often this sentence is said mockingly, but she means it. Maybe he has things to tell Asher that he doesn't think she should hear.

"I know it works now."

Cobbled together from watching what happened and Asher's explanations of sky burials and it all worked so he can do this again if he ever needs to. Not enough to be a habit but it'd be good, he thinks, to know that if he really wants to he could just lay out the meat, sit and talk.

"Think that's what I needed most, that this at least would work," he adds quietly as he gets the bird to hop into his hand because small boys in Kirkwall had some time to cultivate to doing weird things and then time as a lookout you just sit and learn to deal with birds. He offers it out to her if she wants, ignores the nails drawing blood because well his hands are always going to be a disgrace and that's just Asher's way.

What he needed most. She looks over at Yngvi and the subdued nature he's exhibiting today. While she'd prefer it if he was subdued more often, not if this was the cause of it.

The offer to have the bird switch over to her is worth a try, so she slowly extends her arm towards it. She wears long sleeves and offers her forearm, the way falconers do. Hopefully the claws won't dig through as painfully there.

"Asher," she greets quietly, waiting to see what he'll do.

When you're at war with yourself you don't get to have any measure of peace because who teaches a surface dwarf carta child a thing about ceasefire?

The bird - Asher - moves but being that it is who it is, it doesn't want the forearm because excuse you, who do you think this crow is and also who do you think you are Christine Delacroix?

Forearm?

Asher Hardie?

No.

Not that shit, fuck that noise. Shoulder or bust. Hey. Hey girl. Hey.

When he doesn't move over to her, Christine lowers her arm, letting out a sigh of exasperation. Even in bird form, Asher has to be difficult.

"Oh, fine. Be that way. See if I bring you any food next time." Ungrateful beady eyed asshole. She's Christine Delacroix. Do you think she puts up with your attitude, Asher? No, she does not. This is the woman who happily tied a gag around your mouth, and don't you ever forget it.

Nothing to eat but fears in the back seat

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