OPEN | We don’t have to fall from grace

[keenly]

WHO: Colin, with a few closed starters for Nathaniel
WHAT: Open/catch-all log for May
WHEN: Bloomingtide
WHERE: Kirkwall
NOTES: Starters inside. Let me know if you want something.

General Store

Colin has come to love this place. After six months here, it has come to smell like cloves and cedarwood. All the spices he uses in cooking have seasoned the wood panels. It really feels like it belongs to him now, even if the property belongs to the Inquisition courtesy of the City of Kirkwall.

At the moment, he is baking rather than cooking, this time more for therapy than anything else. There is something meditative about kneading dough. It's impossible not to slow down when doing this, be in the moment, stop worrying. A simple life is all he ever wanted, and that's what making bread means. It is a staple--easy and simple to make but vital to the function of one's house and therefore empowering. This is important work.

Gallows Garden

In one of the gardens, Colin sits on a patch of grass with his face turned upward toward the sun, eyes shut. He breathes deeply and evenly, and neither peeks nor starts when footsteps are heard. He knows you're there, but he's not thinking about you. He's emptying his mind. Somehow, the feel of sunlight works like a mantra, a white noise he can feel. His mother would say it's the Antivan in him that makes him love sunlight. Colin thinks it's the mage in him. For ten years, he wasn't allowed very much sunlight. Now, he can have his fill of it. He can hoard it all greedily and no one will know the difference. No one has the right to stop him or demand for him to justify this indulgence, or ask who said he could spend so much time sitting and doing nothing in the sunlight.

So his brown skin gets browner by the day, dark hair developing faint caramel highlights, but most importantly, some of his nervous mannerisms are being smoothed out. He can be seen leaving the garden looking, and feeling, lighter than air.

The Market

"I want the one that spit at me," Colin can be heard saying. It makes sense because he's at a clam stall. It's about five o'clock in the morning and he has just decided what lunch will be today. A merchant takes a scoop and digs through the clams. Several spit in different directions, each stream of water two or three feet long.

"You want to eat that one?" the merchant laughs, dumping clams into Colin's outstretched bag.

"Oh yes," Colin says firmly, smiling wickedly.

When all is done and paid for, Colin starts back to the Gallows. After a few paces he stops, looking at a shirt hanging at another merchant's stall. It is beautiful--bright, hand-painted silk. It is also expensive. Far less expensive are the tiny bits of jewelry at the same stall. He starts looking over a tray with numerous earrings, clearly distracted from his task. One clam gives one final, defiant spit before resigning itself to its parched fate.

Darktown Clinic

Maybe you are a volunteer here. Maybe you are a patient. Either way, Colin is here after work several times a week, and he isn't just here giving out potions. Here, he practices real healing magic, as someone who barely practices magic at all otherwise. This month, Colin is giving out Adalia's rain boots to every scavenger presenting with trench foot.

Of course, Darktown's shady reputation comes from somewhere. Today, a man sidles up to Colin as he works and claps an arm around his shoulders, starting to talk about how good a man he is and how he's making a real difference. He talks loudly, and as soon as Colin knows what he's up to (and he lived in Denerim--it doesn't take long), he shoves him away.

"Don't touch me," he growls, patting down his own pockets and finding--yes. Yes, that is his purse gone. He shouldn't have brought it here.

Annnnnd the man is already running away. Colin follows as far as the door with a sigh. Using magic to stop a pickpocket seems excessive, and there wasn't that much money in there, and...sigh.

Okay. He's over it.

Comments

Anders

[pinprick]

Nathaniel called ahead to let Anders know he was docking--Maker bless the sending crystals--and now he climbs off the jolly boat to the dock itself. As he picks his way through the crowd of departing passengers, he looks for Anders. Being gone from him for so long has been maddening. Heartbreaking. Once he sees his face, all of that will go away.

[justice_is_blond]

Sometimes everything is exhausting. A lot of times, really. He wishes he could keep out of matters, that he didn't care as much as he did about far too many things, but he can't stop. Doing it alone is the hardest part, though. There's nothing to keep him from his darker thoughts and fears and moods.

And then Nate calls, and everything seems better.

He'd wrapped up his current project quickly and made his way to the docks with haste... though not too much haste. There are enough people around here who know who he is that if he was to run, it might start a panic. His progress feels far too slow but then he's there and so is Nate, looking around, and Anders' world shrinks down to pushing through people and throwing his arms around his husband. This is where he feels belonging and like things might actually be okay in the end.

[pinprick]

If he doesn't crack one of Anders' ribs, it's not for lack of trying. It's like he's trying to absorb the man into his body, as if the distance they've spent can be erased by present closeness. But he does release him enough to kiss him passionately, uncaring of who sees them. They're not the only lovers kissing in reunion on this dock.

After, he takes Anders' hand and sets off in the direction of the ferry to the Gallows. "Let's go. I need a bath, you, and dinner in that order."

[justice_is_blond]

Thankfully they manage to leave the docks without injury. Anders likes having his ribs intact nearly as much as he likes having Nate around. Soon they're in the ferry and he's curled up against Nate's side for the ride across the water.

"Everything you need, you'll have," he says warmly. "I've missed you. There's been politics, and more Darkspawn in the Deep Roads, my favorite, but at least we got in and out with everyone surviving. I can't say uninjured, it wasn't just Darkspawn down there, there were traitor Wardens, but everyone's whole enough. How was training the little Wardens?" Maybe not so little, exactly, but 'little' feels better than 'baby.'

[pinprick]

"I don't want to talk about work," Nathaniel sighs, dropping his cheek against Anders' head. Then he contradicts himself by launching into it. "Matters of poor morale leading to poor discipline. Just having someone visiting to look into matters helped, and there was a great deal of cooperation. I'm confident I left everything on the right track."

[justice_is_blond]

He snickers as Nate talks about it anyway, giving his husband a little squeeze around the waist.

"I won't push. And you're already changing morale for the better here, I'll have you know." It's a little scary, every now and then, when he realizes how desperately he needs Nate. His trust of his husband eases that, though. "There's... There's a few people who I definitely prefer to have around. It's not the most, mm. Comforting? Safe? I don't know what word to use. I'm more vulnerable because I care, but I want to care."

He shrugs as if he's talking about something as simple as weather.

"I'd not stop if I could, but it does mean I'll always be a little afraid. I don't know how people with large families manage."

[pinprick]

"Oh?" Nathaniel finds himself toying with Anders' hand, running his thumb up and down the back of it. Anders' hands are always so soft. "If you had to choose who would be in our lives forever, then, who would you take with us?"

[justice_is_blond]

Nate's playing is almost hypnotic, and Anders almost misses the question. He blinks a moment later and looks up at his husband with a faint smile.

"Certainly not take with us, they'd not thank us for that... but..." Language is a challenge when it comes to affection. He can express hatred a thousand different ways, easily. Quantifying how he cares about someone when it's not romantic love is still on the newer side. Belonging is still on the newer side even though he's had some of these friends for over two years now.

"Loghain and Teren. I know you're not the fondest of Teren. But they, there's... It's... Maybe it's not accurate, the words I'd pick, I certainly don't remember enough of my original ones to say, but they feel... parental. In a positive way. I'm certainly not saying Loghain's about to run off and betray me to Templars like my father did. And Teren would probably throw a shoe at me sooner than make me a pillow." He chuckles self-consciously, reaching up to rub the back of his neck with his free hand. "It's just a feeling."

[pinprick]

"You have it quite backwards," Nathaniel reminds him a bit ruefully. "Teren hates me. She has hated me since well before she'd any cause to do so, and is going to keep hating me till I'm dead and she can dance on my grave. Nothing I do pleases that woman." And he didn't mean this to become a rant against someone Anders is very close to. Okay maybe Teren does bother him more than he thought. Time to get back on track. His fingers comb between Anders' before he sandwiches that hand between his own and keeps fussing.

"I understand what you mean, though. Some people are better parents to us than our parents. Or worse, or different altogether."

[justice_is_blond]

His expression gets a little wry. Sure, Teren is the only one with a problem there. He won't call Nate out, though, because he loves his husband and doesn't need to prod at that.

"I think my mother loved me. I believe she did. And I don't exactly see Teren as maternal, but... Well. You understand and it's hard to put into words. If my parents are still alive I doubt I'll ever see them, I doubt I'd even recognize them if I did, and I have... I don't need them. I need you, and it's nice to have this feeling toward Loghain and Teren though I'm not about to breathe a hint of it in their direction." It would probably sound very odd, and Anders doesn't want to chase them off with him being odd.

"It's nice to have people I care about even as I'm terrified by it. They both got injured in the Deep Roads, and Teren hates magic so I'm limited sometimes in what I can do for her..." He sighs and shakes his head, leaning back against Nate and completing the handstack as their boat bumps up against the Gallows dock. "She hates it about as much as I hate this place. Andraste's asscheeks, I hope there's a day I get to say goodbye to this place for good."

[pinprick]

"So do I." Nathaniel leans in for a chaste kiss. "We'll keep it in mind, as part of the beautiful and ideal future awaiting us both once we have saved the world."

It's not sarcasm, it's simply a more blatant and verbal version of the coping mechanism everyone has to use in times like these.

"Soon, love, I promise you. We can't save the world slowly, though some days it feels like we are. It will happen soon, or not at all."

[justice_is_blond]

"I thought you were supposed to be the optimist of us," he teases lightly before returning the chaste kiss quickly and getting up from the boat.

Anders waits until they're clear of people before continuing to talk. "If we fail to save the world, can we at least run somewhere remote for a week, or even a few days, just us and the cats and Lady, before dashing in for the noble sacrifice? I don't care if it's snow-covered. Or spider-covered."

He's only about half-serious.

[pinprick]

"Yes." One way or another, they will live out the rest of their lives together in peace. "But we will save the world. There is no doubt about it. We have a great deal more to fight for than Corypheus and his followers. But maybe while we're at it, we can give this tower some good memories to counter all the bad."

He threads their fingers together, taking solace in the touch.

[justice_is_blond]

Yes. Even if all else goes wrong, he'll have at least a little peace with Nate. It's something he wants so very much, possibly more than anything else save freedom.

Anders leans a little against his husband as they head into the Gallows and up. "Save the world, save my people, save you, there's a great deal of saving to do. But you make it seem possible. And worth all of the work."

He takes a breath before lifting their joined hands to his lips. "I missed you so much. I know there's no helping it, we've duties to attend to, but I don't like being apart, especially for weeks."