[OPEN] i will be your true companion

[wheretheferngrows]

WHO: Fern + various starters, and OPEN
WHAT: Life keeps going, even when you lose someone you care about.
WHEN: Early through mid-January.
WHERE: The Gallows, Kirkwall
NOTES: None currently, will update as necessary.

I. HERB GARDEN (OPEN)


This was not how Fern had ever hoped to take on the mantle of Head Gardener--but with Sina gone and no one else in the base operations project possessing the same skill set, she steps into the role without complaint. Besides, some part of her cherishes the opportunity to familiarize herself with what would have been Sina's old routine.

She's bundled up against the cold one early morning, eyes still a little heavy from recent sleep and her expression tired and neutral, and is at work clearing out some of the remaining bits of dead brush that weren't gathered before the snow and ice storm arrived. Some of the brush is set aside to be used for kindling or mulch later.

It's simple work, tedious, but it helps to keep the lingering grief at bay.



II. BELETH & SORREL


Fern is cautious to approach them at first, even with Sina's promise in the back of her mind. The burial and funeral are over, and it would of course make sense for the two of them to put their own families and the needs of their clan ahead of some silly farm girl who may not realize she's overstepping their boundaries.

Eventually, she summons up her courage and seeks them out in the garden... waiting for the right time, of course, so as to not interrupt them in the middle of a private conversation.

She clears her throat and peers into their peripheral vision, hoping to catch Beleth's eye, or Sorrel's. "Um," she starts gracefully, "hello. I don't... know if you remember me--"

Sorrel surely does. Beleth may not.



III. MESS HALL (NELL)


It has been a bit easier for Fern to focus on her spellcasting since returning from the Plains--a bit, at any rate. Gaining closure in one respect doesn't mean she has a solution to her other most recent problem, namely Finch's arrival and all that that entails. Still, she's desperately afraid of disappointing Nell, and so perhaps tries too hard to focus on the lessons as they are described to her. Too much concentration means burnout, which means more mistakes.

She's trying not to dwell on them while they sit in the mess hall together eating lunch, but it's difficult not to get discouraged. And in the back of her mind, she's toying with another thought, one that Anders brought up to her when he reached out to her with a message the other evening.

In spite of whatever else it is they're discussing, when there's a pause, Fern looks across the table at Nell and asks, "Do you know Anders very well?"



IV. ELVEN ARTIFACTS OFFICE (PEL)


It's a bit of an adventure for Fern to find her way to the Elven Artifacts research offices, just because she spends very little of her day in this part of the Gallows--but find it she does. After a moment spent straightening out her shirt and tucking some loose strands of hair behind her ears, she knocks on the door and waits.

Comments

[wheretheferngrows]

"Oh--I know," Fern adds hastily, suddenly embarrassed, because of course, of course she should be asking her mentor these things before the others. But they'd been so focused on perfecting her work with spellcasting, and on ensuring she learned her letters with Casimir, and... well, what's a nice way to tell your mentor that you're just a little bit afraid of her intensity?

There isn't one, is there?

She fiddles with her spoon and worries her lower lip, looking from the bowl to Nell again. "What was the Circle like? Your Circle, I mean," she adds. "I know there were lots of different ones."

[galvanising]

Nell's mouth quirks, sideways. "I mean you don't have to if you don't want to." She scrapes the side of her fork through the last crumbs, shoving them into the gravy puddle and then sucking it clean as she considers her answer.

"It was about as good a Circle as there was," she says, "It was a beautiful place. Sunny rooms around garden courtyards, a huge library. Better kitchens than these. Nothing like the horror stories you hear about this place." She gestures up, a twirl of her fork taking in the Gallows themselves. "No daily beatings, no 'mysterious' disappearances, no mages made Tranquil left and right. They taught me to read, and speak Nevarran fluently, and do sums. I got three whole meals every day for the first time in my life. New clothes. Shoes. Fireplaces in every room, wood for the fire in winter." She shrugs, smile small and rueful. "Best case scenario, in every way. I was very lucky to be placed there."

[wheretheferngrows]

There's a 'but' coming. There has to be. Fern can see it in the way Nell shrugs and smiles and talks about these creature comforts; in some small way, she's reminded of her own memories of her home, of the comfort of her mother's hearth and the sound of her eldest brother cleaning off his boots after a long day on the road. There were good things about home, even if she chafed against the limitations.

But there's something different here, and she isn't sure how to talk her way around it.

"But you don't like them," she ventures quietly, still watching her mentor's face. "The Circles, I mean. Even though you lived in a nice one."

Her question is simple and innocent, not judgmental; she's trying to learn, but stumbling in her steps, looking pensive after each word spoken.

[galvanising]

"I did. For a long time, I did. Like I said, they gave me everything I needed. Provided for me in a way I'd never had with my family, gave me a life I couldn't have dreamed of before. They gave me a purpose, and told me I had potential, and they taught me how to reach it. They took a shy, scrawny little runt of a girl with no hope of a future, who probably would have been dead by twenty one way or another, and they made a Knight-Enchanter. And I loved them for it. I loved the system that had made that possible. I followed all the rules, and I was rewarded. I worked with Templars every day, and they were my comrades and my friends. I trusted them with my life."

Nell pauses, to let that sink in, and, truth be told, for dramatic effect. It's plainly a pregnant pause, one that invites suspense, not questions, yet. Her fork is set down, forearms rested on the table top so she can lean forward.

"And then, one day, one of the Templars I'd worked side by side with for years made a mistake and nearly got the whole team killed because of his big drunk mouth, but I saved them. And when our superiors demanded to know what had gone wrong, do you know what he did? He blamed me. And every other Templar on that team backed him up. He'd made the mistake, they all knew it, but it was me they turned on, without a second thought. And every other Templar went along with it, even though they all knew Renard's reputation. They all knew he'd become a problem, but they were more concerned about preserving the record of a dangerous Templar than about a mage who had served faithfully with them for years.

"And when I wouldn't lie for him and agree that it was my fault, they came after me and made my life hell. Men I'd traveled with and fought with and laughed with, whose families' names I knew, whose lives I'd saved. At the end of the day, despite everything I'd done, despite everything I thought they'd done for me, they didn't give a shit. I wasn't a friend or a teammate, I wasn't even a person to them, I was a tool. There to be used as long as convenient, and discarded as soon as I wasn't anymore. And that was, honestly, the best case scenario. In other circles they probably would've murdered me, but because Nevarra was a good circle I was just betrayed and beaten and humiliated and demoted.

"That's the problem with the Circles. People think the only mages who had trouble in the circles are the ones who wouldn't behave, who tried to escape, or were practicing blood magic, or antagonizing Templars. Or they think it was just a few bad apple Templars who were abusive monsters. But it's not. It's not a few isolated problems, it's the entire system. The only way to survive is by being perfect in their eyes, doing everything they ask, but even if you do everything right, you still can never win. There is no point where they trust you enough to let you out, where they let you have a real life of your own choosing. There's no point where you can stand up for yourself without risking your life. There's no point where they will value you as much as they value each other. No matter how much you think a Templar is a good person, how kind and reasonable and trustworthy they seem, you have to remember that they have been taught since childhood that mages are not really people, not the way they are. They can be friendly, when it's easy. But when push comes to shove they will always choose their own over you."

[wheretheferngrows]

"No matter how much you think a Templar is a good person, how kind and reasonable and trustworthy they seem, you have to remember that they have been taught since childhood that mages are not really people, not the way they are. They can be friendly, when it's easy. But when push comes to shove they will always choose their own over you."

Can she know how her words affect Fern? Maybe she has some idea--there's a reason why she chose to share this much of her trauma with the young girl she's come to mentor after all, isn't there? Still, Fern sits very still, very quiet, as she hears a life described to her that, perhaps under other circumstances, could have been her own. She could have gone to the Circle as a child, received the upbringing and education that Nell describes to her now--and she knows her own heart well enough to know that, had she been given the chance, she'd have leapt at the opportunity to be a Knight-Enchanter. (Somewhere, deep in her heart, there's still the idealistic young girl who came to the Inquisition intending to join the Grey Wardens.)

"...they will always choose their own over you."

In something approaching shocked silence, Fern sits across from Nell and doesn't say anything at all. She presses her lips into a thin line and looks down, self consciously arranging her napkin in her lap, then fiddling with the end of a lock of hair.

"I'm--" she tries to start after a moment, her eyes searching and finding no purchase on the table in front of her. Eventually, she looks up to Nell, her expressive eyes full of so much conflict and sadness it's hard to place where one begins and the other ends. "I'm--so sorry that happened. That you were beaten, and..." Her words taper off.