[open] when you talk to me I'll hear you out

[altusimperius]

WHO: Benedict, anyone who isn't on the Rivain trip and/or banned from visiting the dungeons
WHAT: Bene's out of solitary and ready for friendly visitors!
WHEN: vaguely during the current plot, but kind of whenever
WHERE: the Gallows dungeon
NOTES: There will always be a Templar guard present, so murder attempts will unfortunately be thwarted.

Benedict has been once again granted the basic human dignity of being able to see and hear what's going on around him, at least as long as it's within the walls of the Gallows dungeon. It's a place built for mages, and the shackles he still wears keep his magic muted alongside the magebane that keeps him lethargic and unable to cast.
Sharp objects are out of the question, so his normally pristine lower face is stubbled in a way that would look quite ruggedly handsome on someone less haughty and miserable. And he's been wearing the same prison shift he was put in after his clothes finally became too unbearable, which is an insult in itself. Unlike Atticus, he no longer goes to the library, or outside at all, unless for a very good reason decided by someone other than himself.

He's still not a pleasant conversation partner, but Benedict is here and at the disposal of any visitors who might want to see the less cordial captive Vint.

Comments

[altusimperius]

Now that Bene can tell the joke's been turned back on him, he doesn't like it anymore. "Oh shut up," he mutters, halfway between sulky and disgusted. "He's a shit instructor, and I don't need some eyeless knife-ear coming in and making demands." Seeing as Benedict still has eyes, he rolls them.

[faithlikeaseed]

"Who disliked you enough to stick you with him?" There's a note of weird sympathy in Myr's tone; the slur apparently bounced off him completely.

[altusimperius]

Benedict is tone-deaf to any sympathy, currently acting on defense regardless of the question's tone. "He was supposed to be tutoring me in spirit magic," he says with a curl of his lip, "and was, apparently, the most competent candidate available. And now we see how that turned out."

[faithlikeaseed]

There's many ways to keep someone talking, and Myr's not averse to playing on resentment to that end. "So we do; he's made a fucking hash of any tutoring he was meant to do. Is spirit the school you're most inclined to, or just popular in Tevinter these days?" Wouldn't be the first time some poor apprentice got pigeonholed into a magic they didn't want to study.

Though that didn't usually land the unfortunate sod in jail.

[altusimperius]

"My whole family practices it," Benedict points out, "even if I wanted to study something else, I wouldn't have." His mother, incidentally, is known to be quite the persuasive sort. Perhaps it's not all natural charisma.

[faithlikeaseed]

"What would they have done, if you'd refused?" Myr settles into a more comfortable hipshot lean against his staff; it's of a casual piece with the curiosity in his tone. "And if they're all students of it, why have you study under Vedici in the first place?" He doesn't know from Tevinter nobility but in the academic sense--half-remembered ideas of political alliances and how they're maintained float to mind--but this would seem to make the folly of the whole system evident.

[altusimperius]

"I don't know, because I didn't," Bene scoffs with a shrug, but seems caught slightly off-guard by Myr's next question. It clearly causes him some insecurity, based on how he folds his arms and pretends he isn't upset about it. "They have too many responsibilities," he explains, likely in the same words his parents used, "in the magisterium. Neither one could spare the time."
Wrinkling his nose, he scowls at the ground. "...anyway, only lowborns teach their own children. That's what tutors are for."

[faithlikeaseed]

He can't see Bene's defensive posturing, but he can hear the shift of weight and the slide of skin against fabric, and make an inference or two. "So they farmed you out," he says, thoughtful, and that weird sympathy's back. Feeling sorry for an altus brat over parental abandonment? Perish the thought. "And you didn't have any say in it at all?"

What a fun way that would be to resume their argument they'd left off a month ago. Myr thinks better of it. "That's a miserable thing," he says instead. "Putting your fate in the hands of a monster. What'd he even hope to teach you, dragging you this far south?"

[altusimperius]

"Farmed?" Benedict repeats, but Myr has already moved onto a topic he finds much more agreeable. "It is. It was." He sniffs haughtily. "I don't know, maybe he was trying to kill me. Maybe he wants something from my parents." He narrows his eyes. "...or maybe he wasn't thinking about it at all."

[faithlikeaseed]

"Awfully long way to go to get you killed," Myr observes, thoughtful. "Same for getting something from your parents, so far from the Imperium. So you might be right there--he wasn't thinking." He drums his fingers against his staff, idly.

"Irresponsible of him. That the usual sort of thing he does, plunge into things without thinking?" It's an odd thought to hold about Vedici, when the man gives every impression of being in perfect control of his situation. Even as a prisoner. But there were things about him that didn't add up...

[altusimperius]

It's actually worse, to imagine that Atticus wasn't thinking, but that's the way it looks. Benedict sneers and looks down, hating the man all the more, for simply existing. For not caring.
"No," he grumbles in response, "but he wasn't thinking about me."

[faithlikeaseed]

"Does anyone?"

It's an honest question, not cruel in tone or intent. (Even if there is a nasty little whisper of what's he so upset about, he's had everything handed to him in the back of Myr's head.)

[altusimperius]

Myr might as well have just punched him in the face. Bene stares for a moment in affronted silence, the words weaseling their way through his mind, which has become much more pliant lately, inviting all manner of doubt. No one has rescued him yet. Maybe no one will.

"...fuck off," he murmurs, almost as an afterthought, and fully without the usual venom.

[faithlikeaseed]

...Well. That's an answer.

Myr chews at his lower lip as he considers it, then says quietly, "I'm sorry." Spoiled brat or not, a child deserved consideration from his parents--or his mentor--or someone. Trust Tevinter to screw that one up.

[altusimperius]

"Just go away," Benedict mutters, and even if Myr can't see him turn away, surely he perceives it by the change in the boy's voice. The conversation is over, whether Myr wants it to be or not.