[closed AND open??] I'm not sick, but I'm not well

[onlyhymns]

WHO: Cade & you, starters for specific people
WHAT: He's back from Rivain and doing terribly!
WHEN: Harvestmere
WHERE: Kirkwall
NOTES: the usual Cade stuff, there's always a chance it'll come up

I. Gwen's Household

He hadn't had time to begin training before the mission to Rivain, so Cade has only recently become a frequent visitor to Casa Vauquelin. He doesn't quite understand her relationship to Wren, but Cade wasn't raised in a barn and knows how to enter a person's home without making a nuisance of himself, so he always knocks and waits to be let in before he'll proceed to the room where Wren will be waiting.
Whomever opens the door gets to deal with him. This happens several times a week.

II. Wren

Cade is easily upset and even whiny on his worst days, but when he's training, he's all business. There's been a nervous energy underlying his every motion, which might be chalked up to just who he is, but also may be a result of just how incredibly tits-up things went on the mission to Rivain. Each session he does exactly what's expected of him, but something about his demeanor indicates he's about to reach a breaking point. It might be bad.

III. Simon

The worst part about not being a Templar anymore is the continued addiction to lyrium, which Cade has learned pretty quickly he can't ignore. Every week he meets with Simon to procure their allotted dosage, and though he doesn't need an escort, having a friend-- is Simon his friend??-- nearby at least makes the process a little more bearable.
It's still degrading as all get out, but Simon is big and blocks Cade's view of most people who might cast him judging glances, so that's a blessing.
"The Commander started going off lyrium," he murmurs to Simon as the line inches forward, "he didn't die from it." ...wait, where is the Commander again? "...I think."

IV. Beleth

Cade couldn't have left the ship any faster when they got back, and if Beleth hadn't seen him leave someone might have thought he'd fallen overboard in transit. He vanished for several days, but has reappeared with a knock at her office door.

V. Open

Feeling that the Inquisition army barracks would be more secure (and cheaper) than staying in an inn forever, Cade has moved his limited belongings in to stay with the assortment of soldiers and scouts from the area. Surprisingly, it's been a nice way to start over; he never talks, so he might as well be a new intake, which means nobody knows his history. He's just some guy, and that's exactly the way he prefers it: blended into the mass, forgettable, forgotten. Invisible.

He can often be found practicing archery with the soldiers, or helping out down at the docks, or reading in a pub, now that it's gotten too chilly to do so outside.

Comments

i.

[elegiaque]

Each time Cade arrives, it's the same routine; the same servants who answer the door, who are courteous and who keep their opinions of the various assorted individuals who trek from the Gallows to the Vauquelin home to themselves in light of, presumably, rather wanting to keep their jobs. If there are murmurings behind him about why he isn't sent to the service entrance, they happen behind closed doors, when he isn't about to hear them.

But Gwenaëlle appears at the stairs, one afternoon as he's leaving-

“Mssr Harimann.”

(Not ser, any longer, but he lives to be addressed at all, so that's a win.)

[onlyhymns]

As if the words themselves are an incantation, Cade stops dead and bends at the waist with a quick, deferent "my lady." Seeing as he's leaving and not approaching a session, he's rather less on-edge than normal, and his mannerisms are almost those of a normal person capable of casual conversation.

[elegiaque]

Even to see it briefly is somewhat promising: a hint of what might be, underneath, and the changes that might be wrought in him with patience. Patience requires time, though, and there's no guarantee they have it-

still.

It's not nothing.

“You've found the afternoon productive?” after a moment. It's a bit awkward, a bit blunt - not her business, really, except that she stuck her oar in once and made it her business, and now he comes to her house and she isn't entitled to ask but she has the luxury of very few people here being in a position to tell her so.

And it's well intentioned. Or well enough, anyway.

[onlyhymns]

"Yes, my lady," he answers automatically, with a slight incline of his head. Cade has been having limited results, but someone of higher status is addressing him, which means he'll respond to her satisfaction. "I hope you've... you haven't been inconvenienced."

[elegiaque]

No more than she ever is by Coupe's existence-

She keeps that to herself.

"Not at all. The space should get more use than I can give it, especially with Thranduil relocating."

v.

[faithlikeaseed]

Simon once suggested--bitterly, guilt-stung--that Myr look in on Cade if he were so concerned about the ex-templar's fate; and while he's still not sure if it was wholly serious or a reflex meant to get him off Simon's back, Myr's nevertheless taken the advice to heart. In the weeks leading up to the expedition he'd been an infrequent visitor to Cade's rooms in the inn, bringing food--sweet rolls, sometimes, or wild honey or almond cookies--and no expectation of conversation. The visits were meant simply as a point of contact, a you're not alone out here in the midst of trial Myr can only guess at by analogy.

It's taken him a little while to get back in the habit now that Cade's returned--and moved out--but one day, sure as clockwork, Myr shows up in the pub Cade's made into his reading room. Asking after an unassuming quiet blond fellow gets him pointed in the general direction of Cade's table; he can follow the lightning-strike scent of lyrium once he's near enough the other man to pick up on it.

He knows better now than to pop up at Cade's elbow, better than to be surprising. Instead, he stops a respectful few feet away and clears his throat. "Afternoon, Cade."

[onlyhymns]

Luckily, Cade actually sees him coming, and marks his place in his book before Myr has arrived to say hello. "Afternoon," he greets, a bit guardedly as usual, but without the dark cloud of despair he seemed to wear the first time they met. He's managed to carve out an existence for himself that is able to function with the understanding that he doesn't think or talk about the Templars. Or the Chantry. It's difficult, but not impossible.

[faithlikeaseed]

It's heartening to hear Cade in better sorts, enough to bring a hint of a smile to Myr's face. "How've you been?" he asks, approaching the table with his usual care to set a small bag atop it. Something inside shifts with a dull click. "Heard the weather was pleasant and the locals weren't so much, up in Rivain." A little more than he's accustomed to saying to the other man, but bursting right out with his other reason for coming here seems rude.

[onlyhymns]

Even if Myr can't see it, Cade mirrors the smile, however hesitantly. His eyes flit to the bag, which he regards with slight wariness before looking back to the elf. "It..." he begins, and his demeanor chills as he grows uncomfortable. "...yes." He won't go into it, not in polite company, not when he'll just make an arse of himself.

that icon. THAT ICON. ;w;

[faithlikeaseed]

Ah--pushed too far. Still, Myr keeps the smile. "I'm glad you're back in one piece," he replies, as if he'd gotten a much more detailed answer. (Everyone else he'd spoken to hadn't been shy about the sea monsters or the jungle cats or-- He can fill in a little of what had happened.)

He considers a moment, before edging his way around the table to find a chair, take a seat. "Got a proposition for you, if you're interested and have the time for it. Have you done much scribing before?"

meeee

[arlathvhen]

Beleth had briefly entertained the notion that Cade had decided that it was the sailor's life for him after all, after figuring out that most crews don't have to deal with unfathomably monstrous creatures of the deep. It would probably be a happier life for him than sticking around the Gallows, really. Or maybe he really did fall overboard, though the same could possibly be said of that option, too. Maybe he'll meet some friendly dolphins and go live with them.

So it's with slight surprise that she opens the door to reveal Cade, neither sailor nor adopted dolphin.

"Cade! I was beginning to worry." She swings open the door, stepping aside so he can come in. "I'm so glad to see that you're alright." At least...he's alive, which is something.

[onlyhymns]

Cade will never live with dolphins. Have you heard about dolphins? Their lifestyle is depraved. How dare you.

He doesn't actually step in, since he's wearing muddy boots and very much dressed for the outdoors, and he doesn't want to ruin any fancy rugs she might have as the fancy head of scouts. "Oh, um... you don't have to," he murmurs, "worry, that is." He shifts awkwardly, a motion which displays the bow slung over his shoulder.
"...do you want to go hunting?"

[arlathvhen]

Fine, he can be prince of the manatees.

Beleth looks startled for a few moments, glancing between Cade's face, his boots, and the bow. She's not sure what she was expecting, but it certainly wasn't this. She pauses a little longer to glance behind her, at her desk of paperwork, before nodding firmly. She only pauses to grab her backup bow by her desk (the one that doesn't shoot lightning, that wouldn't be very good for hunting) and quiver, and the steps into the hall and closes the door decisively.

"Of course, Cade." In case he couldn't figure that out by her actions. "Did you have a particular place in mind?" While she speaks, she pulls a key out and locks the door, and with a motion, returns it to...somewhere on her person. Who knows.

[onlyhymns]

FINE, maybe he WILL.

Cade starts to blush when Beleth pauses to look him over, already clearly beginning to regret the question until Beleth surprises him by taking him up on it. "Oh, um," he says, startled and stepping back to allow her passage, "...um... I don't know. There's a lot of forest around. ...I never got to see much of it, before." When he lived here in the Gallows and kept mages imprisoned all day. "...not Sundermount."

[arlathvhen]

FINE!!

Beleth nods as he speaks, then stops to shake her head. "No, not Sundermount," She agrees, a dour look on her face. "That place is cursed. Few Dalish would be willing to go there." Almost like people don't like going where lots of their kind have been killed. Like other places nearby. That they're in. Right now.

"Well, if there's lots of forest around, then I say we just pick a direction and go. I trust you to guide me wherever you think is best." She pauses for a moment, because Beleth is not particularly good at doing impulsive things. "...Should we get food? For the trip there? Something we can eat on the trail."

[limier]

She does pay attention. Truly, she tries.

But today it's been strained, split across a half-dozen different concerns; if she's noticed he's more unsettled than usual, that information hasn't yet been flagged as important,

(There's Simon to think of. Yngvi. Vedici, and Ilde Sauvageon, and secretive neighbours, and skeletons to scry by, and new faces to sow trouble —)

It's all and well to work through a routine, but it wasn't a routine that put Rhona on her back in that hallway, and it won't be the next time that Cade's surprised. So when she breaks the pattern of their motions, drops the stick she holds to charge him,

She's paying attention. Just not enough.

[onlyhymns]

It's a low-burning tension that holds Cade when he's watching Wren shut the door to the room, when any attention whatsoever is called to their being alone together for his improvement. He's been a bit unusually dour today, glancing constantly to the door while becoming increasingly irritated by his doing so, and Cade is successfully distracted by Wren's sudden feint.
He's nearly knocked over, but catches himself just in time to give her a violent shove away and follow it with a swift punch right to the face, a split-second reaction of panic that doesn't conclude until he's got Wren on the ground. It's not that he's that much bigger or stronger than she, but the ferocity and desperation of his motion does half the work, and only when Cade is looking down on her does he realize what's happened.

[limier]

The crunch of cartilage, a burst of blood,

She's on the floor. Her arm thrusts up on instinct, slamming for his throat — she catches it (catches herself) in time to pull low, from neck to chest, from attack to a cheap attempt at bracing him back.

"Cade," Nasal, wet. It's difficult to quite make out: "Easy,"

[onlyhymns]

By the time she speaks, Cade has already figured out what's happening, but based on his look of abject terror, that's not at all comforting. "I'm sorry, ser," he says quickly, his voice equally frantic and timid, "Maker, I-..." He almost takes a step forward, but falters, not wanting to crowd her or make things worse. It's an episode in action: the initial outburst, the panic, the overzealous desire to make it better without knowing what that entails.
Cade steps away instead, pacing a small circle, the meltdown playing out as though by routine.

[limier]

"Cade," She repeats, half to hack out a clotted stream of — something — half, for the sake of saying his name. If she says his name she won't say something nastier. The words are as calm as she can make them, but they're wincing and inarticulate. "It is alright. Breathe."

To her side, her knees. She holds place a moment there, head hung low enough to hide a little of the grimace that ripples across it (not too deep, deep hurts worse). To her feet, a hand held out low, palm open.

"Cade, will you walk me to the wall, please?"

It sounds a lot more like: Whilg ghu whalg me thu tha walh pleegh. She doesn't need the help, but the energy in his step shouldn't be left to spin.

[paladingus]

Positioning himself between Cade and any judgmental stares is a duty Simon takes seriously, convinced as he still is that Cade should still be entitled to the armor and the sword as well as the lyrium ration. Even if their peers disagree--surely they can't think Cade's offense was so serious as to merit slow, agonizing, potentially fatal withdrawal as a punishment, can they? Simon highly doubts they really do. Only Darton would argue that much, or so Simon assumes.

That the withdrawal would likely be fatal is something he takes as a given, but if Cade has hope that that's not necessarily the case--

--well, his evidence is a bit lacking. Simon hasn't seen Cullen around lately either, and isn't really privy to the details of his assignments.

"We'd have heard if anything had happened to him," he says, a bit uncertainly. "They wouldn't be able to keep that hushed up. Are you sure he really went off the lyrium, though? He always seemed perfectly fine..."

[onlyhymns]

At the very least Cade is still fully allowed his lyrium ration, but it rings sour when it has become simply an addiction instead of part of his job. Perhaps Cullen doesn't have such a bad idea. Didn't? It's true, he hasn't been around.

"Right," he agrees with a furtive nod-- they'd have heard something. "He told me he was," Cade continues in a hushed tone, "seems to think it's possible."
The word is nearly halted by surprise as a larger Templar, recognizable as one of Kirkwall's veterans, steps brusquely in front of them and cuts the line.

[paladingus]

"I know he wasn't the lying sort, or...isn't; it just seems--"

His musing aloud on the subject of Cullen's trustworthiness is cut abruptly short by Ser Whatsisface, and Simon narrows his eyes.

"Hey," he protests, with a none-too-gentle tap on the man's shoulder. "We're all here for the same reason, mate. You don't need it any sooner than the rest of us. The queue ends back there."

[onlyhymns]

Ser Gareth isn't a cruel sort, but he makes his opinions known. Cade has stepped back and out of his line of sight behind Simon when he turns, eyebrow raised, and shrugs a shoulder. "Some need it more than others," Gareth points out, and turns forward again, unbothered.
"Don't," Cade whispers behind Simon, already beginning to wish he had the Commander's fortitude.

[paladingus]

Simon isn't ordinarily a fight-picking sort, not when it can be avoided, not when it would cause more trouble than it could ever solve, when it would be on behalf of someone who doesn't want it and he has Cade at his back urging moderation besides. At any other time, he would let it go, because it doesn't matter.

You might as well be anyone else, he hears, brusque and Orlesian-accented in his head, never mind that Wren hadn't said it in so many words, and his blood seethes with a sudden tidal surge of don't ignore me, you son of a bitch. It isn't Cade's fault. And it isn't about Ser Gareth.

"You may be right," he says, all tense tight faux-concession. "If you can't remember how common decency works, you must be in bad shape indeed. It's a wonder you even know where you are."