[OPEN] you don't have to catch on, lay it out and be gone

[paladingus]

WHO: Simon Ashlock
WHAT: Catchall post.
WHEN: Throughout Kingsway.
WHERE: Various places.
NOTES: Starters for Cade, Kattrin and Myr, and open prompts for everyone else!

CADE

Simon should probably have come to visit sooner. Either after the first night of Callum's visit, or after the bar fight he'd heard rumors of, or...really, at any point before now, but better later-than-ideal than never. He's heard snippets through the grapevine about how Cade's doing, but it's still no substitute for checking in on him in person.

Only as he's being shown up to Cade's room at the inn does he wonder if he should have brought some kind of peace offering, or small token, or...something. He's never quite sure how Cade's going to feel about seeing him.

KATTRIN

Even without the intervention of the spirits, Kattrin's herbal salve had done wonders for Simon's shoulder strain, and he hasn't needed anything further in the way of healing since then--though Simon could be missing three quarters of his limbs and still insist on trying to walk it off, so this does not say a great deal. On the rare occasions when their paths have intersected since, he's never had time for more than a friendly greeting, but today, he'd found himself scraping the bottom of the liniment jar and he has the afternoon free to do something about that.

It takes some searching to find her, but another healer eventually recalls where she'd last seen Kattrin and directs Simon that way (after offering to help him herself, which he politely declines.) He sets off, scanning the ground for the fennec along the way.

MYR

It has somehow not occurred to Simon that Myr has a very good reason to want to stay Gallows-side and avoid too much wandering around by the ferry dock. It's only on the day they've arranged to begin Phase One of their card-sharking plan, when he's about to send a crystal message and suggest they meet up, that he realizes his friend might perhaps like some accompaniment to the city proper.

The mage quarters aren't foreign to him, exactly--he can remember patrolling them as a fresh recruit, years ago. But he hasn't had reason to set foot in them since his return to Kirkwall with the Inquisition, and his memories of them are not ones he would like to dredge up. He hastens to follow the trail of glyphs and knock on Myr's door.

*****

I. BATHS

Simon is a man of few creature comforts, and he has accustomed himself, after long years of communal living, to bathing in cold water. Privacy has always been a rarer and more precious commodity than a hot bath.

Since Cade moved out, though, he's had more of that than he knows what to do with, and today has been a long day of extensive physical exertion. Maybe he can deal with the evening hot water rush tonight, if he comes in near the tail end of it when people will be mostly done.

Of course, if everyone else has that same idea, then he's no better off. But he'll just have to make do.

II. FOREST

How much longer the forest is going to be here, Simon doesn't know. He's well aware of the talks in progress about cutting it down, and more than a little dismayed about them even if he shouldn't be, but...he's found himself too often in opposition to his fellow templars and Chantry liaisons lately. He's got to pick his battles, and he can't afford for this to be one.

The best he can do is enjoy the little bit of nature within the city walls while he can, and maybe if people see a templar basking in the shade of an apple tree along its borders and eating one just tinged with the beauty of approaching autumn, they'll see that it doesn't have to be an act of blasphemy.

III. LIBRARY

Guarding one prisoner is easier than guarding two, and Simon appreciates this. As tasks go, he doesn't particularly mind standing around while Vedici conducts his research, not least because Simon's pretty sure by now that the man's not going to try anything stupid. There's always the possibility that he's simply trying to lull them all into complacency, thus the need for continued templar presence, and Simon can't let himself get too distracted--

--but still, as the time wears on, there's only so much meditative prayer and light daydreaming he can do. He casts a longing eye toward the nearest bookshelf, wishing he could get away with keeping one eye on a book and one eye on the prisoner.

He can't, he knows, even if nobody's looking, but he reaches discreetly for one nonetheless just to peek inside the cover and see what it's about.

IV. WILDCARD

Make my day.

Comments

[faithlikeaseed]

"--been to Ansburg? No, but I hope to witness the sock-devouring Veil tear myself one of these days."

It's surely a more plausible explanation than socks being some kind of Fade spirit. More plausible still is Ansburg's First Enchanter was going out of his mind with boredom, but that's more tragic than funny and doesn't bear dwelling on. Not when they're having such a good time as it is--

Something in Simon's reply catches Myr exactly wrong, a shade of that tectonic lurch of the solid world being pulled out from underneath his feet. "You would?" He's taken aback, that much is clear, eyebrows creeping toward his hairline with the force of his surprise. But he's a templar-- And that was a joke, like they've been trading all along, and the sudden spasm of anxiety dissolves. "Though there's not many better ways to retire than becoming the villain of a Tethras novel and going out in a blaze of glory. If you do--," bring me along, he wants to say, I can be properly sinister; can't, even for the sake of the joke, now that people are listening, "--you've got to get me some of that powder they make. For, uh, research purposes."

Research purposes the same way detonating the entire trash heap back at home with a grease fire was "research". Although he'd had the backing and supervision of Senior Enchanter Amsel for that one... "It is damned strange. Might be there's some kind of trick it needs they haven't been able to replicate. Or an ingredient they can't get their hands on--no matter how much effort you put into learning a custard recipe, you'll never figure it out if you haven't got eggs."

---
From gaatlok and Tethras and custards the conversation wandered onward, twisting and forking as a forest path, until they stumble over the important question of where they're actually going. (It turns out neither of them had thought this quite through in its entirety.) The barracks in the Viscount's Keep in Hightown are right out, and there's few other places but the taverns where the guard might be found when they're off-duty. Of course, they'd ruled the Hanged Man out entirely as unsafe for what they had in mind, and the establishments in Hightown weren't in the business of letting elves in through the front door, which narrowed their choices somewhat...

So here they are outside the Unicorn--the nicest of Lowtown's drinking houses, the one that's got pretensions--and while Myr's not about to back down from a challenge he's had long enough to think about this to develop a case of nerves. Damned if he'll let that show, though, beyond the way he taps his fingers against his staff in an unconscious rippling gesture. "Still up for this?" he inquires of Simon, half-teasing, as they pass through the entrance to the common room's smoky, chatterous interior.

By some grace of the Maker--or simply long-established habit--there's a knot of men and women in the russet of the city guard holding down a table near the back. They've got cards and a game of Wicked Grace between them, and cagey looks to cut at any outsiders who get too close.