[closed] it's not the long walk home that will change this heart

[onlyhymns]

WHO: Cade, Nari, a healer at the end (Sam?)
WHAT: a camping trip turned awkward family reunion
WHEN: sometime in Guardian w/e
WHERE: the easternmost edge of the Planasene forest
NOTES: warning for violence, discussion of self-harm and sexual abuse of a child

Between the flu, the fire, and Kit's passing, things have been rough lately. One of the few boons of Cade's excommunication from the Templars has been an abundance of freedom, with which, until recently, he had no idea what to do.
But sometimes one just needs to get out of the city. Not on a special mission or anything serious, just a little hunting trip, a pocket of time spent in the quiet isolation of nature. It's the one thing he missed from his time in the Hinterlands, and perhaps it's time to do it again.

Nari is invited, for her particular losses, and for her help throughout the flu. She looked out for him, and he's worried what she might do if left alone in the wake of her grief. Perhaps it's best if they both remove themselves for a while.

In separate tents, of course.

It's on the edge of the Planasene where they finally make a less temporary camp, setting up to stay for a few days by a small creek in a grove well-insulated from the still sharp winter winds. It's early morning, and the horses are lazing tethered to a tree, content to spend the day eating grass and rolling in whatever dust is nearby.
Cade is preparing for the day, sitting by the fire and sharpening his arrows, waiting for Nari to join him so they can cast out.

Comments

back in jerkwall

[nadasharillen]

Seeing the city walls grow upwards had had the precise opposite effect on Nahariel that the rising branches of the Planasene had effected. Kirkwall, and the casual way its denizens looked at her with anywhere from disregard to actual enmity, settled on her like a weighted cloak; even moreso now that she had, held to her chest, whatever small vulnerable sprout of honest connection that had emerged between Cade and herself on their trip. Whatever it is, she imagines it would be about as well received here as it had been by her family.

After a brief quiet conversation with Sam before entering the city proper, she leads Cade through the streets of Lowtown to her friend's home and raps on the door.

[onlyhymns]

The horses are put away (thankfully Cade was able to hand off Lady Patience to someone who saw how badly he's doing), and the rest of the walk is made on-foot, Cade's gait becoming more and more sluggish as the day wears on.
He's bled through the bandage on his leg several times now, and though the one on his shoulder seems to be doing better, he's chilled and white-faced and exhausted by the time they reach Sam's door. If Cade has to stand here long, he's going to collapse.

[el_tybs]

The knock at the door comes within the hour as Nari had said. There's perhaps just a few breathes of time before it is carefully pulled open, clearly Sam having been waiting with nervous patience for him to answer so quick. There's a moment of him taking in the two before him, mostly Cade who looks close to falling over.

"There's a cot in the living area," he instructs, stepping off to the side to allow them entry, ready to close it and lock up once they've passed.

The hallway is short and opens into the living room, warmed and alight with the hearth freshly fed. The furniture has clearly been moved to make for more space for a impromptu infirmary.

[nadasharillen]

Nari nods, worriedly feeling Cade’s half-slump against her becoming more weighty.

“The stitches must have popped,” she says tersely, struggling to aid him over to the cot. “We should have stopped, I knew it was too long a ride.” Not that it mattered now. They were here, Sam was here, Cade was white as a sheet but better off than he’d been at the camp. She was just fretting.

[onlyhymns]

Riding isn't kind to leg wounds in general, walking even less so. Cade shambles through as directed and lies down on the cot with a sigh of relief, his eyelids fluttering closed. He won't die from this, but he's ready to sleep for a good twelve hours.

[el_tybs]

The cot probably was less forgiving and comfortable then the couch would have been, but it was easier to maneuver around it for treatment. Not only that but he didn't want to ruin the couch since he didn't know how bad Cade's wounds actually were. It would also be difficult to try and explain blood stains, and it was one of few things he had bought with Kirk and to remember him by.

"Where did he get shot?" he asks Nari as he joins them, since she seemed more talkative then his patient at the time.

[nadasharillen]

Nahariel points on herself: shoulder and mid-thigh opposite it. “We got the arrows out and sewed them up initially, but it was only a couple of days ago, and the forest is a full day’s ride from Kirkwall,” she says guiltily. As far as treatment went... “I’m... sure he’d appreciate us not destroying a second set of clothing.”

She bends briefly at the head of the cot, touching his uninjured shoulder gently. “Cade? Can you lift this arm?”

[onlyhymns]

Reluctantly, Cade lifts his arm for her and makes a clumsy attempt to withdraw it from the sleeve. He's lying on his side, so it takes a great deal of effort to hold himself up. He ends up needing help for most of this process, but at least seems a bit too woozy to care that much.

[el_tybs]

Sam gives a sigh when he's 'shown' where the arrows had been, and continues to listen intently as Nari further explains on what they did for immediate treatment. "Full days ride on fresh stitches..." he mutters, shaking his head. That must have been rough.

For the undressing Sam mostly helps with keeping Cade from flopping around and maneuvering him so that they can get the clothes off him. It's certainly more difficult especially with him like this, but he's not against trying to save him clothes in the process.

Once they manage to get him undressed Sam retrieves the blanket he had to the side and lays it over him, to offer a semi-balance of privacy. He then bunches up the blanket away from the wound on Cade's leg so that he can take a look at it. "Nari, I have some scissors on the table over there. Mind grabbing those for me?"

[nadasharillen]

Nari looks back and forth for a moment, searching out the tool and then moving to retrieve it. She holds the scissors out within Sam’s reach for him to take at his leisure.

“You’ll tell me when there’s something I can do for you, yes?” she asks while he works, “Besides fetching things?”

skip me after this unless someone forcibly wakes him up!

[onlyhymns]

Though still barely conscious, Cade isn't of much help anymore. He's pretty much dead weight in their arms, occasionally mumbling something unintelligible and otherwise letting the others do their thing.

zzzzz

[el_tybs]

"Thanks," he says as he takes the scissors before looking back at the stitches. They're decent, but clearly a quick patch for the situation and it certainly looked like they pulled during the ride.

"Well, you could probably tell me exactly why Cade was being shot at while I do this." As he says that Sam starts to snip away at the stitches carefully, getting them out of the way since it would be more problematic to take them out after healing it up. "But you could also just keep on eye on him while I do this." Generally make sure Cade is still breathing while he works since he did lose a lot of blood it seems.

[nadasharillen]

If it were anyone else, she’d choose the latter, but it’s Sam. Nari chews at her lip for a moment and then settles down to lean against a nearby chair.

“It was meant to be just a quiet hunting trip. I thought it was safe enough, we weren’t near even the edge of where I remember patrolling, but the winter was leaner than usual and the hunters had to come farther east than I’d thought.” She pulls one of her knees up to rest her chin on and turns her head to watch the light but regular breathing of the man on the cot. “Dahlasanor has a ...history, with humans.” Putting it lightly. “We got caught out by two of the least merciful of my clanmates, and I barely got a word out before Sedi’d shot him twice. It was very nearly worse than that.” Nari tilts her head so that her cheek rests on her knee instead. “For the both of us.”

[el_tybs]

Hearing the story slowly brings a frown to Sam's face, but he keeps working diligently in removing the stitches. Once they are out he gives the wound a quick clean up with the water he had set nearby to get a better look. Once he was satisfied that there wasn't anything left in the hole he begins the process of healing, calling on Fortitude to help quicken the process.

"And I'm guessing you came to me outside of the infirmary because you didn't want to make this publicly known." It's a guess, but word getting out that there were elves about shooting humans... it wouldn't matter who the elves were, it would just cause more problems.

[nadasharillen]

“That’s... yes. We can’t afford any more ill will between humans and the People... especially between humans and these People. Ashara and Dahlasanor are joined now.” Nari shakes her head slowly, her lips thinning. Feeling like her clan was a liability was more than a little uncomfortable. “We can’t have the Scoutmaster of the Inquisition associated with something like this,” she says ruefully.

After a pause she speaks again, more quietly this time. “...He can’t afford it either, Sam. Cade’s been too close to too much trouble, and I won’t be the reason they decide it’s one time too many. It would...” It would kill him as sure as any arrow. Nahariel turns her face into her knee briefly, and then back to watching Cade sleep, something odd and fierce in her gaze. “That can’t happen.”

[el_tybs]

"No, we can't have any of that, but... you can't stay quiet about it either." Sam sighs as the light dims from his hand and he inspects what was once the wound. It was patched and looked like nothing had ever been there, but it was still a quick heal so they would have to go over it several more times to make sure it was fully healed. With that done he moves the blanket back down to cover Cade and relocates to do the same to his shoulder.

"You're going to have to tell someone, like the Scoutmaster. If the Clan is shooting people on sight only an hour out from Kirkwall, someone else is going to get hurt or killed. Something has to be done to prevent that."

The comment about 'too much trouble' has the mage pausing, looking down at Cade then at Nari. "Hardly his fault in this case, but I see what you mean. I won't say anything."

[nadasharillen]

She shakes her head. "I called you an hour out, but the fringes of the forest are a day's ride away at least. It's..." Nari whuffs out a sigh. "No, you're right, it's still a problem. Beleth already knows, but I'm going to go find her and speak further. Tomorrow, maybe."

Running both hands through her hair, Nari looks up at Sam with a thin crooked smile and a face that says she's just about given up trying to keep a handle on anything. "Thank you," she says, and means it. "Really."

[el_tybs]

"Ah," he hums at the correction. He had misunderstood the distance. A day's travel didn't put anyone in the direct vicinity at risk, but even so, close enough that travelers coming/going from Kirkwall and hunters would be affected. It was easy keeping something this small and isolated quiet, but not so much if it became a regular occurrence. Especially with those who weren't fans of elves, or at least the Dalish.

By now the wound on Cade's shoulder was in similar shape, healed with no sign of a wound being there, but it would need more mending just like his thigh. That being done Sam checks to make sure that Cade was still responsive in some way before letting him rest on the cot.

"He should be fine now, but he shouldn't move for a while, not until he's more stable; he lost a lot of blood it seems. So I suppose... he can stay here. For now. Plus it would probably look bad if it looked like either or both of us were carrying a body around." He's joking, but seriously, that would look bad.

[nadasharillen]

Nari snorts a laugh through her nose at the jest and tugs the chair she's leaning on around so she can rest her arm on it, her head on her arm, content to relax now that danger's past.

"What about you, Sam?" she asks, peering up at him seriously, "How are you holding up?"

[samahl]

Cyril happens to come back home at this moment so the front door opens and he enters. He usually seeks out Sam when he comes home to see what the mage is doing, and this time he happens upon this interesting scene.

He pauses, looks between Nari and Sam, and then to Cade who is very unconscious.

He puts down his bag. "What happened and how I can help?" he asks. It looks like Sam is already got things handled but he still doesn't want to be a bother. Even if helping is staying out of the way, he wants to do what he can.

[el_tybs]

"How am I doing?" he repeats, letting out a huff as he considers that. He supposes the last time they had talked there was lightning crashing down and shocking them. Fun times. "I'm-"

The thought is lost though when the door opens, and judging by how easily it had mean that it was Cyril. Sam sort of freezes where he is as his lover comes walking onto the scene, not sure how he's going to take it.

Well it seems.

"We'll need to make a place for Cade to sleep?" Probably down here where it would be easier to get to the washroom and not having to worry about Cade falling down stairs if he managed to get up on his own at some point. As for 'what happened', Sam looks at Nari on that.

[nadasharillen]

Nari, for her part, looks up at Cyril with a weary half-smile and the same ‘I give up’ look on her face that she graced Sam with earlier, wonders how many more times she’ll have to say: “One of your new clanmates, who is now no longer your clanmate—albeit not because she got at a shem’len—shot him twice. He’s okay. Or he will be. Just needs rest.” And then, somehow both genuine and droll, “Thank you for your hospitality, lethallin.”

Shifting to look back at Sam, she says “I’m sure the cot would be fine. We could move him to the couch now that he’s not like to bleed on it, but that’d mean waking him up, and I’d soon as let him sleep. He’s had a couple of days.”

So had she, to a far lesser degree, but Nahariel wasn’t in the business of caring for herself.

[samahl]

Cyril comes closer and puts a hand on Nari's shoulder, trying to give her some comfort. He has a lot of questions but he doesn't voice them just yet. He also bites back the knee jerk reaction to point out that he isn't sure he has a clan anymore. He doesn't want to make this about him. Instead, he makes sure she's uninjured and looks between them again.

"If he wakes and can be brought upstairs, he can have my bed." A pause. "Though I'm not sure how comfortable with that he will be."

[el_tybs]

Sam sighs and rubs the back of his neck as he considers their current situation.

"We'll keep him on the cot for now and let him sleep. Eventually we can move him to the couch where it's more comfortable; it's warmer here by the fire. If he ends up needing to stay here for an extended stay... we'll figure the bed situation at that point based on Cade's comfort level." In general Cade might not be comfortable with either of their beds.

"And what about you, Nari?" he asks. "We have space if you want to stay."

[nadasharillen]

Nari angles her head to touch Cyril’s hand with her cheek to acknowledge the comforting gesture. “I’m... I’ll be fine here,” she says. From the floor. “I can sleep anywhere,” she continues, twisting slightly where she is to stretch. “A gift. Isen used to make fun of me.”

Sam and Cyril seemed the type to insist on further hospitality, however, which meant that her attempt to be less trouble would cause more consternation than she’d like, so she casts her eyes around the room. “If you’ve an extra blanket I’ll take the couch.”