get ready everybody 'cause here we go

[dashing]

WHO: Saoirse, Herian & open.
WHAT: a combined birthday hangout.
WHEN: 30th Haring.
WHERE: The Hanged Man.
NOTES: Drink up now and turn up hungover to the Firstday feast. Open invitation over here, no need to reply to the network post or even have prior cr in order to attend. Please add any warnings to subject lines if they come up.

"Party" would be an extreme word for it; the more accurate word would be "casual gathering of people with liquor readily available." It is The Hanged Man, though, so who knows what shenanigans could unfold.

They've taken over a corner of the inn, and though there isn't much in the way of decorations - making sure the place could be easily accessed after all that snow was work enough - there are a couple of strings of bunting.

Don't get too wild; it'd be unfortunate if Herian had to interrupt her own (shared) birthday celebration in the sake of preserving the Inquisition's reputation. (Or do get wild, and simply shrug it off as The Hanged Man's influence. Whatever.)

Be sure of one thing, though - at least one round is one Herian. Maybe. If you're a close friend, or look particularly glum.

Comments

[tar_minyatur]

To be fair, Thranduil is Sindar, where everyone else is Noldor (except Elros, who is basically a mutt), and although the divisions between the elven kindred in Arda are in some ways less than they are here, they are, in some ways, much worse, exacerbated by long elven memory and some rather dramatic cultural differences. And two kinslayings, can't forget that.

He nods, slowly. "Loosing your home and everything you once knew..." He says, and for a moment he doesn't look like the cheerful young man, but old and bitter, and there is the memory of fire in his eyes.

"Yes. That would rather give one a different perspective." He smiles at her, a little grimly, maybe. "Thank you for being able to use that loss to look out to others - and I don't think it's that small really. It might not have been a literal world that you lost, but still..."

[dashing]

The fire she recognises it. The fire is what she feels, near constantly, eating away at her even as it fuels her. She dreads that one day she will buckle with it, like a log followed out by flame, even as she knows it is what has helped drive her forward, on the days when nothing else seemed able to keep one foot moving before the other.

"A knight is no true knight if they cannot look to others with kindness and compassion." And perhaps that casts her worthiness into question, when her first instinct is always to look upon the Dalish with dread and disdain. Perhaps that is simply a sign that she is human, but it is a flaw better remedied than allowed to fester. She exhales, and sips her ale. "Have you been told much of the Circles? I— I will not lecture, if you've not desire to hear of them, but so much is said against them that I feel it would be remiss not to offer a counter to that perspective."

And, a little more gently: "We all of us need to learn our way in this world anew. I hope we can make it a kinder place for rifters, as well as for those born and bred here."

[tar_minyatur]

A smile and the old pain is banished - Elros doesn't like to dwell, doesn't want to dwell. One of the advantages of mortality is the blurring of memories, the further back they are. As far as he's concerned, that's all to the good.

"Well said! Many could stand to learn from you, milady!"

He shakes his head.

"Some. But the politics of this world are to me even worse than those of my own, and I have had to negotiate with folk who would start a inter-tribal war over a bride-price! I have had far too many folk disdain me for lack of knowledge that I cannot see how I could have known to have much wish to ask further. If you would teach me anything, my lady Herian, I would be in your debt."

That last he offers her formally.

[dashing]

"There is no debt," she assures, quietly. "I simply... I wish to offer more understanding."

She may seem cold, at times; removed, aloof, detached, unfeeling. She may seem a great many things, but what has always driven her was the wish to protect. Herian exhales slowly, weighing up where to start.

"The Chantry teaches us that magic is to serve, not to rule. As mages, we are dangerous in ways other people cannot be - we might set a house alight in our sleep, or lash out with our emotions. My magic was made public when, as a child, I was scared and accidentally struck a city guard with my magic. Though some mages do not struggle from this lack of control, and even have magic that is very minor by comparison, we can prove a risk, even against our own wishes. Or, there are those who use their magic maliciously, and there are people without magic who react to it with such fear that they would lash out at those even suspected of being mages. The Circles, at their best, provide a place for mages to learn where they will not endanger others, and where we are not in danger of being attacked by those afraid of us."

At their best, of course, leads to: "Of course, they... were not always their best. Though I greatly benefitted from being in the Circles, I have come to learn more and more of those who suffered terrible abuses, where the power of the Chantry was used not to protect, but to control and to punish mages simply for having the responsibility of magic thrust upon them. I dread to think what abuses I was blind to, in my devotion."

Herian shrugs, just a little. "I believe there was a great value in the Circles, and that there could be again, if they were better administrated."

[tar_minyatur]

"No debt but that between friends." He says gravely to her and nods, listening quietly.

"There are always two sides to every story." He says softly. "Or almost always, anyway. But in things of this world, remember, the shadow runs through all things, and it may taint even the best of intentions, so be kind, if you can." He quotes.

"That's what I was taught. I can see how they would be good places, to hone the skills you had, to make sure you knew enough not to accidentally hurt another. But equally, I can see how easy it would be to turn inward." He grimaces. "I have seen it in my own world."

[dashing]

"I am sorry."

Her jaw clenches and unclenches as she weighs how to proceed, if she should ask, if she should let the matter slide. She knows enough of herself to realise that she is not always... the best conversation partner, and perhaps not the best at articulating concern and empathy, no matter how strongly she feels it. For a moment, Herian seems almost to study the grain of the bar, rather than be paying attention to Elros, simply because staring at him as she thinks seems impolite.

"If— if it would help you to speak of it then please consider me an attentive ear, but I will not press you to speak of that which wounds you."

[tar_minyatur]

He shakes his head.

"Don't be! None of it directly impacts me except so far as every side of my family is in some way involved. How would you be expected to know? The tale is long and complicated in full - I suggest you seek out Maglor, if you want a full retelling. But very briefly....in my world, there is something of a history of hidden kingdoms who turned everyone away as a means of protection bringing their own doom into their gates. Galadriel could tell you of one that she lived through, Maglor the other."