[open] a little truth arrives in the dying of each day

[eolasemah]

WHO: Sina and you
WHAT: here we go
WHEN: mid-Harvestmere
WHERE: Hightown and then the Gallows
NOTES: All Sina logs from this point onward will involve discussions/dealing with death and illness, so if you're sensitive about those topics I recommend passing these by.

I. Just outside the Forest Garden [single thread please, 1-3 people max]

Sina still looks like Sina, but if Thedas had photographs, and the ability to compare a person's image of two years ago to their image today, only then would it become achingly clear how much mass she's lost. As the weather grows chill, she has to bundle up more and more just to go to work in her gardens, and even then is constantly cold. But she's been all right, all things considered; she's still upright, at least.

Until she isn't. Having felt a little strange since they found the elf children in the warehouse, Sina has chalked it up to the usual business and the gut-wrenching trauma of what they found. Her chest has felt a little heavier, her step a little slower, her hands a little colder, nothing worth calling a healer about until today: she's nearly down the stairs of the former Chantry when she abruptly loses consciousness.

Crumpling like a doll, Sina scrapes her leg on the last few steps and collapses to the ground, basket of herbs on its side, its contents splayed everywhere. She wakes up at once, but with bleary confusion, disoriented and burning with fever.


II. The Infirmary [ota]

Those who spent any significant time with the rescued elven children may also have caught what ails Sina now, but with a body already so ravaged by weakness, fighting it is clearly difficult for her. She's asleep most of the time, coughing when she's awake, and unable to keep food down.
It's not the first time she's been in this position, but it may be the last.

Comments

[eolasemah]

Even then, in the heat of summer, Sina had been cold. It's been hard to see, with the way time passes, but she's spent the past year wasting down to the wisp she is now, always cold, always shivering, like the runt of a litter who can't feed and won't last the night.
And she's known, at least for a while. She knows now more than ever, and it would all be so much easier if she just felt better, if she could be clear-headed and unimpeded by pain as she says goodbye. But that's not to be, and that's what upsets her so profoundly.
She listens to Araceli with deep sadness in her eyes, unable to agree or disagree, only wanting the words to suggest it won't stop, that it wasn't in the past tense.
She was going to be Keeper.
"Te amo," Sina whispers, her expression pained. It's the first time she's said the words in a language other than elvhen, mimicking the phrase as she's heard her friend say it, gathering its meaning by context. Somehow, from their completely separate worlds, she and Araceli have managed to converge in at least one small way.

[foxsays]

They can say goodbye. Martel was a shock enough that Araceli still hasn't let go, and Sina will still be part of her but this way she can have that moment to sit. Not to make any easier because how can it ever be easier to know that your friend isn't ever going to be with you again, that you aren't going to come back from your own adventures with things in your pocket for the other, that she'll still try to get hold of her on the sending crystal to invite her for dinner only to remember after that no, she's not there now. There's just a little time to breathe and maybe try to pretend that they're grown-ups.

(Children pretending to be grown-ups, girls and young women, still making mistakes, learning and fumbling and how was Sina married--)

"I know. I love you too," and her elvhen isn't good but she's picked up a little here and there (Leliana told her to learn all she could, elves outside the Dalish use some of the phrases too in passing), "ma vhenan."

That feels like what they're going to lose. A heart. Araceli cares, lies awake, worries herself raw at the edges about things but in a way that's a thief's way, a queensguard's way, a heart all tucked up in thinking it through, turning it over and over in her head until it fits. Sina cares. Sina loves. Sina's always been honest about her feelings. What happens when someone like that isn't there anymore?

"I should let you get some sleep, I can come back with Korrin. And Lux, he sleeps in the bed with us because he's so warm he'll curl up with you. And anything else, anything you need," she promises, voice barely above a whisper as she brushes Sina's hair from her face so she can kiss her cheek.

[eolasemah]

Though still tearful, Sina's smile blossoms when Araceli speaks to her in elvhen. It wasn't that long ago that she might have been offended by a human using the language, but Araceli is different. Besides, rifters can't be held to the same standards as native Thedosians. Araceli has become, in her way, Clan.

About to protest, Sina thinks better of it, since even she knows that working herself up too much right now would be a mistake; after all, she worked the healing tents and infirmary as much as any other nurse when she was still on her feet.
"I can't wait," she whispers, and closes her eyes to receive the kiss.