The Dragon (Sarkan) (![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png)
fireandsmoke) wrote in ![[community profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/community.png)
faderift2017-08-16 08:40 pm
fireandsmoke) wrote in faderift2017-08-16 08:40 pm
Entry tags:
[Open] Weary/Hungry/Hunched Over Labwork or Irritable and Lost, Take Your Pick
WHO: The Dragon (Sarkan) & You
WHAT: In which the Dragon is splitting his time amongst the Gallows library, the alchemy labs/herb gardens, and the Darktown Clinic (first time venturing out there!).
WHEN: Throughout August
WHERE: Various locations around the Gallows and Kirkwall
NOTES: Includes references back to his agreement with Kit. Also seeking out the Darktown Clinic to personally introduce himself to Anders.
WHAT: In which the Dragon is splitting his time amongst the Gallows library, the alchemy labs/herb gardens, and the Darktown Clinic (first time venturing out there!).
WHEN: Throughout August
WHERE: Various locations around the Gallows and Kirkwall
NOTES: Includes references back to his agreement with Kit. Also seeking out the Darktown Clinic to personally introduce himself to Anders.
THE GALLOWS, ALCHEMY LABS
The herb garden and alchemy labs have been seeing a lot of activity lately.
Astute observers and wanderers may have noticed for, oh, the past week or so, plentiful flickering flames and brightly flashing lights emanating from a cracked door into the most isolated vacant lab. Lyrium blue, orange, gold, pale blue, back to gold… for a full day the blue-gold tone swells and ebbs but never extinguishes completely, a sustained and steady light show in a relatively quiet section of the Gallows. Then comes the noises: high-volume chants, eerie, lyrical whispers, an hour-long song in an unrecognizable language that could give even the least magic-sensitive pinpricks to their necks.
And just as suddenly as the preternatural activity began, it quits and silences, reduced to the flicker of unadulterated lamplight deep into the night.
It is after a few hours of relative quiet when a voice snaps curtly to an invisible presence, “I need you to come to the alchemy labs.”
A peer into the lab's cracked door would reveal a tall, youthful man bent over a lab table, turning something about the size of a small coin over and over again absently in his palm, testing its weight and other invisible attributes with the pensiveness of a fine jeweler. It is a highly weary Sarkan, the one called the Dragon, hovering over a tangle of alembics, flasks, flames, and vials, finally finished with his self-imposed quarantine. While he considers and carefully encircles the small object, he shovels a half-consumed hunk of bread slathered in thick, luscious, fatty cheese with a shocking lack of grace for such a refined and well-dressed individual (and even he would be disgusted with himself, if he were not beyond caring at this point in his efforts). He does not appear terribly aware that he is being observed -- if he's being observed -- and actually looks very much like he could use a bigger feast than he's got, followed by a nice glug of fine wine and a soft bed...
HERB GARDENS AND HALLS AROUND THE LABS, OUT AND ABOUT EARLY IN THE MORNING AFTER THE SCENARIO ABOVE
Out and about the Gallows, the Dragon walks around with a palm cupped close to his left ear, a look of concentration etched into his cold face. He doesn't appear to notice or care if he passes anyone; the most they will get is a pause and a quick glance over the shoulder, his cupped left ear tilted in their general direction. It's a strange sight, to be sure, and one probably couldn't help but wonder if he were going a trite deaf in that ear, or if some sort of pesky fly had bitten him in the lobe...
DARKTOWN
Imperiousness has a habit of sticking out like a sore thumb when it’s the slums you’re walking. It does not matter how thickly the Dragon buries his rich clothes under a heavy, drab cloak, he still manages to stand out, whether it is the nature of his strong and aristocratic gait, or his disdainful glances to the puddles of filth muddying his boots, or the gentle clinking of elixir-bottles and magical artifacts in his hip pouch, or just a combination of the entire package. Even the air smells thicker with decay and destitution to his senses. It is something Sarkan did not miss about his youth in the capital city; he much preferred to tuck himself away from prying, fearful, squealing eyes and surround himself with handsome effects, things that weren’t painful to look at.
Darktown definitely isn’t his taste, to say the least. Beleth’s warning to him about a trek to the Clinic absolutely holds true, and he heeded it wisely, keeping an eye and an ear out for any ruffians that dare to obstruct his path. Anders, skilled mage that Sarkan hears he is, is a strange one, choosing the grittiest reaches of the city to set up a respectable magic school. Was the real estate cheaper?
Though the Dragon was very careful and thorough in requesting directions from the Inquisition and a few guards on his way out, he has not yet had a chance to master his sense of direction in this accursed realm. And now he finds himself referencing his parchment of hastily-scrawled instructions with a deep, irritated frown. He made it this far. Did he miss the last turn-off for the Clinic? What a profound waste of time…
"You over there!" Yes, that is an edge of superiority and disdain in his voice. Mostly impatience, sure, but there is a definite dash of ungraciousness in that tone. "I'm looking for the Clinic. The directions I've got are absurdly useless. Which way is it?"
WILDCARD
For any scenario outside the two described above. He is most likely to frequent the libraries. You may also run into him fielding some of his ‘rifter’ magic in quiet, secluded areas or gardens (like creating little mist-sentinels which he can theoretically send out to spy and listen in on other people, like certain Tevinter in the dungeons, but obviously his range will be much poorer than he’s used to). Any other ideas, you’re welcome to just surprise me or hit me up at
NOT AT ALL! So excited to see you again!
"Thankfully I didn't have to resort to weaselly bribes. More than half of what you see were flung through the rift with me," he snorts at last. He kicks at a trunk stowed beneath the lab table, and alongside a hollow thud, there's a very light rattle jingling from within. "Remarkably intact, thanks to my half-decent, if rushed, packing job. The rest were gathering dust amongst the cobwebs, and so I helped myself. Doubtful that anyone will miss them."
Rushed. Well, whatever he rushed for, it wasn't a mad dash to fall through a tear in the space-time continuum, that's for certain. The Dragon looks up from his modest plate and peers inscrutably at her through the dark, flickering lamplight and the gentle glow of... various unidentifiable substances.
"You're out wandering late." Implied: Need something?
no subject
Another shrug.
"I couldn't sleep, so I thought I'd get some work done. You having any luck with yours?" It's not that she misses the clear dismissal, exactly. It's that she suspects he can be carefully pushed, a little, and he has an interesting mind. Science is collaborative, and she wants to see how much he can be encouraged to at least discuss his investigation in a setting other than a formally submitted report.
no subject
The Dragon opens up his left palm, where the small copper earring rests. It looks innocuous enough, hammered into shape, nothing too flashy or ornate to muck it up. He draws out a small velvet pouch from his pocket and drops it inside, where it settles snuggly with a faint, unnatural hum.
"It's a commission. A personal project," the Dragon explains shortly to ward off any questioning glances. "You'll certainly hear about it if there are applications to rift research. If."
Which implies that he suspects there might be, if all works out as he guesses. The Dragon sets the pouch carefully aside.
"By the way, for your glass," he resumed finally, a weary, mildly impatient, bored note to his tone, "shatter-resistant cantrips will keep them functional through a small beating. I can't help you with a microscope."
Seeing as he's never heard of one, naturally.
no subject
She almost visibly decides not to press about the commission. Instead, she adds, "As far as I know, I can't do cantrips, but I can describe a microscope, if you're interested." She'd be curious in his place but, on the other hand, she doesn't want to actively alienate him by forcing him to endure her company against his will.
On the other other hand, he seems to be at a pausing spot anyway.
no subject
"I'm not a stranger to failed experiments," says the Dragon with the exasperated weight of all 150 years of his work. At the very least, though, his failures at 'home' were ones conducted with his full, unbridled abilities, and not through a dense magical fog that hinders his every move.
He cannot help but roll his eyes skyward as Cosima ventures to keep on talking. She sounds suspiciously close to an outright request, but he'd be lying if he insisted he wasn't interested in hearing more about the sort of equipment she uses in her line of work. He is a man who enjoys knowledge for knowledge's sake, after all.
Sarkan pulls an extra chair up to the table and waves her over offhandedly.
"Well, sit, if you're going to chatter at me until the small hours. I won't promise you I'll last until then, but you'll at least have until the wine runs empty. Lirintalem."
So it turns out that he won't outright reject Cosima's company after spending so much time alone, without an opportunity for half-decent company this past month. Even he has some limits to total solitude. In any case, that low incantation manages to conjure two goblets of wine into existence, one for Cosima if she so chooses to partake, and one for himself. At least now he has something to lubricate his parched mouth as he sits and eats, but that's about the last trick he'll allow himself to do for the day.
"Are you talented with diagrams for your microscope, too, or will I have to make do with a description?"
no subject
So she settles into the next chair and gamely takes the magically summoned wine. "I can totally sketch you a diagram, as long as you don't mind using the parchment on it. I'm not a microscope maker myself, obviously, but the principle's probably easier to explain with some visual aids."
She has a brief flashback to 7th grade intro biology, and enjoys the brief thought of making him label a blank diagram to test his comprehension of her explanation. (She won't, but it'd be funny.)
"So, to start - do you understand the basic theory of using curved lenses to magnify things? Sorry if that's insulting, but I don't know what common knowledge we're starting out with."
no subject
"Of course I do. Spectacles and spyglasses use curved lenses," he answers at last, helping himself to a languid sip of wine. "They're more common in people without ability in sorcery. Some wizards--" like Solya, the Falcon, "or mages, whatever you want to call us, prefer using their magic to magnify or manipulate their Sight. But those abilities are notoriously difficult to master and singular to the magician's talents."
no subject
She carefully sketches out a very simple compound microscope - she's not an artist, but she's precise with diagrams, going carefully from memory.
"This is a compound microscope, which is probably the most common kind -- there are even simpler ones, but these are the ones you'll find in schools and laboratories, unless you need a special kind for something particular. Here," she indicates, "is the eyepiece, the ocular lens. And here," a new spot, "is where you can alternate between different levels of magnification. These are the objective lenses, since they're near the object you're studying."
A second, even simpler sketch of a typical slide. "You prepare a slide by suspending the material you want to view in liquid, usually purified water, and covering it with a very thin protective slip to keep it in place. Then it goes here, and you can move the objective lens up or down using a knob to bring what you're looking at into focus. Down below there's a flameless light source that illuminates the whole setup."
no subject
"For what applications do you use something like this?" he asks outright as he mulls it over with a decent swig of wine. "You're talking about looking at biological matter under glass. What does that tell you, what do you use that information for?"
Perhaps the difficulty lies in not quite understanding just how closely a microscope magnifies. Studies at the cellular level are currently unfathomable to him.
no subject
She sits back. "I'd be fascinated, for instance, to see what a scraping from the anchor shard looks under a microscope. Are the host's cells somehow infected, or is it truly a foreign substance displacing them? We might get closer to some answers that way."
no subject
"A jeweler or some other craftsman -- maybe a builder -- might be able to put something like this together." He rolls his eyes skyward, frowning. "The flameless light source is bothersome, though. Lyrium has some glow but I don't know if it's enough to suit the device." His voice falls to a self-directed murmur, considering the options. "An enchanted stone or glass, perhaps. Or you might need a mage plastered to your side whenever you work the thing, if that's not possible...."
no subject
She smiles, crooked. "Or, you're right, a really patient mage."
no subject
"Don't look at me." Unless Cosima really thinks that the Dragon is the absolute paragon of patience. "I won't wed myself to a tedious project like that until I've found an effective way to use Thedosian magic alongside my methods." And even then, only if he can also experiment with shrinking or damaging anchor shard material with his purification techniques. "As you can guess, I've only made some headway. Some."
He swirls his goblet absently.
"So have you learnt anything worth mentioning? I want to know how quickly disease sets in, and if --" an image of the gardener-girl whose name he never requested flashes in his mind's eye, "where shards are located on our bodies makes a difference."
no subject
As to his question, she shrugs. "The biggest challenge is a frustratingly small data set. There just aren't enough of us, and the phenomenon didn't exist until a couple of years ago as far as anyone seems to know. It doesn't seem like anyone's ill from it right now, so onset is somewhere between now and five years in the future theoretically." She worries at her thumbnail, absently. "Have you met anyone with it somewhere other than one of their hands? I haven't, so far."
no subject
Sarkan frowns absently and presses his palm along the length of his breast.
"It was enormous, embedded straight over the heart. Certainly she must be dying. If I hadn't seen it, I wouldn't think she'd be capable of walking." The corner of his mouth twitches. "I suppose I regret not catching her name, but I was working." Not to mention it was a relatively awkward circumstance which involved stepping on a bunch of flowers and exchanging some uncomfortable, snarky words to bury his own unsettled thoughts. She ended up flitting away, the little irritating witling, while he completed testing on Kit's custom-made enchanted device.
"She was especially concerned about a few flowers I carelessly crushed in the courtyards." He crooks a brow. "If you want to ogle her for yourself, you'll probably find her tending the gardens."
no subject
He probably did. Still. For the record.
no subject
It's a herbology tome, of course: a catalog of Thedosian flora and fauna and their alchemic properties.
"Yes, I'm eminently aware of that."
The dryness vacates his tone for what he suggests next.
"I should like to know about it if you learn anything from that girl's case." As it is, all he can imagine doing with his constrained magic is watch how quickly the shard saps that girl's life away. Any attempt at purging her shard was more likely to result in a painful death -- or worse -- than not. "If you find her."
no subject
"Are you making much progress? Figuring out how Thedosian magic works with yours. It's an area I don't even really know enough about to ask good questions, but I'm interested anyway."
no subject
He flashes a wry twist of the corner of his mouth.
"I would rather not be the clumsy fool that blows himself and the herb gardens sky-high in a reckless, poorly-thought-out experiment."
Sarkan gives a small huff, and refers with a vague wave to the alembics, flasks, and flames around him.
"All that aside, I've obviously had much better luck applying alchemic principles to the local elements."
no subject
She sounds thoughtful. It certainly puts her thoughts on spirit healing in a new context. "Or maybe it varies between types. Alchemy isn't so far off from my world's unmagical chemistry. Same with herbology and botany."
no subject
After all, Cosima's descriptions of science and flameless light sources are not so far off from a close study of magic or alchemy.
"Some magic is similar, but there is a striking difference in mechanisms here compared to what I know. Thedosian mages draw power from the Fade. Where I'm from, you are either born with magic, or you're not. Abilities are entirely innate, no reliance on some mysterious outside force necessary."
no subject
More seriously curious: "Does magic tend to run in families, in your world, as far as people know? It seems like that varies widely between worlds where magical talent is inborn." She supposes that it doesn't really matter, for what Sarkan is trying to achieve, but it's interesting all the same.
no subject
"Somewhat," he says. "No one else with my blood was plucked from the streets and shipped to the capital for apprenticeship, and none of the witches or wizards I knew had any children directly with the same gifts." He pauses thoughtful. "Magic does have an annoying tendency to pop up in later generations," such as Alosha's --The Sword's--grandchildren, great-grandchildren, great-great-grandchildren... "but not in all lines. There's never a certainty."
no subject