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WHO: Cole & Several (includes OPEN THREAD for Rifters)
WHAT: Compassion returns to Skyhold.
WHEN: Early-Mid Haring
WHERE: Skyhold
NOTES: Cole works best with individualized threads rather than completely open ones. Please don't be afraid to contact me (Plurk or PM) if you'd like to set something up! Prompts will be posted in comments.

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"Thank you." His gratitude was genuine, and came with a small smile.

"Is there something else you're wondering about? I could try to explain."

The number of times Ariadne was chided for asking too many questions far outweighed the occasions when she was given free rein. So she knew she had the very real potential to go overboard.

But, of course, if she didn't ask questions, how was she going to learn?

"What's a Circle?" she asked. She'd heard the word thrown around enough to know it was important.

"A place for mages. Walls and a locked door with a templar standing guard. A school, a cage. A home, for some." For many, it was the only home they had ever known, which was not quite the same thing.

"Many of the mages here came from Circles."

"That doesn't sound very pleasant." At least, to Ariadne's sensibilities. She didn't like locked doors. Which was part of the reason why she was so very good at opening them, she supposed.

One more reason to be thankful, she supposed, that she had no magic.

"A lot of them didn't want to live there anymore. That's why they started to fight." And why things between mages and templars were often so visibly tense.

"I can't really blame them for that. If you're unhappy, you should find a way to make yourself happy again." She paused a moment, a scowl marring her face. It wasn't a natural or easy expression for her, and the lines that formed around her mouth showed it. "But wasn't there any way to leave besides fighting?"

Violence was never the answer. Unless it was the only option left to you.

"Some tried to escape. Some of them succeeded. Getting caught meant capture, or worse. Death, imprisonment, Tranquility. They take their dreams." As for negotiating a way out peacefully... he couldn't even begin to explain Chantry politics or history. It was tangled in a way that had too much to do with pettiness, or strategy, or happenstance, and not enough to do with pain and honesty.

"It's dangerous to be a mage. Some of them cause trouble. So all of them were watched. Except the apostates."

It was a sentiment she understood. Ariadne was sure, somewhere down the line, some Alastrian once wronged an Elf. And that was the beginning of the end for her kind.

Humanoids went to extremes to make examples of people who were different.

"What's an apostate?"

"A mage not from a Circle." He spoke the sentence with deliberate care, as if putting things in such simple, direct terms took effort on his part. "The Dalish mages are apostates: they wander without walls. So is Solas."

Edited 2015-12-14 21:59 (UTC)

There would be no end to questions, it seemed. But Ariadne didn't feel terribly guilty.

After all, he'd offered.

"Who's Solas?"

"An elven mage. He's been away for some time... But he knows about the marks. He'll come back soon."

One might think Cole was trying to remind -- or convince -- himself.

The tone was familiar. The refugees used it when speaking about their loved ones left behind. And it immediately activated Ariadne's innate sympathy.

"I see," she said gently.

He gave her a smile. Like he knew something she didn't -- or like he'd succeeded in convincing himself.

"Nobody else thinks so. Or they don't think about him at all. They forget."

"That's no good," Ariadne said. "You can't just forget about people. That's like forgetting you have a left arm. Or a right foot. Or..."

Or wings.

Ariadne never forgot that she'd once had wings. But sometimes, she would forget that they were gone.

Well, it was right there. On the edge of her mind and the tip of his tongue.

"Or wings." There was sympathy there, too. He knew how she felt. He could hear it.

Ariadne's eyes widened in surprise. Even if he'd surmised that she was a demon, she didn't know how he'd figured that last part out. Unless there were Alastrians in the realm. And she didn't think there were.

"Are you reading my mind?" she asked.

It was hooked into him now. The memory pulled at him, compelling him to speak. An old pain stirred back up to the surface.

"Take the wings to save the scalp. The scars take weeks to heal, and it still hurts."

She stared at him, not sure to be afraid or not. Maybe not, she decided. Ariadne preferred to believe the best in people. She knew it was important to be afraid of too many people knowing her secret but...

People were good at heart. And he'd certainly saved her life.

But still...

"How are you doing this?"

"You miss them. What they could make you do. Sometimes the memory feels more like freedom."

She was feeling it, so he heard it. It surprised him, a little, to realize that she didn't understand, given how well they'd been getting along so far... but then, she wasn't from this world.

"It's just something I do. I hear hurt the same way I can hear magic. It lets me help."

He heard hurt.

At once, that seemed like both the most extraordinary gift in the world and the saddest. There was so much you could do with a power like that. You could help people in need. You'd know it when someone was hiding their pain and be able to help them through.

But in a world like this, or like her own, such a power could get overwhelming. Because the fact of the matter was that everyone was hurting in some way.

Her heart went out to poor Cole. And she knew not to be afraid any more.

"I'm sorry," she told him gently. "You shouldn't have to hear that from me. I wish I could stop it for you."

"You shouldn't." There was a steady, quiet confidence in that statement. "It would be harder to help if I couldn't do it. Although I... can't help you get your wings back."

Just in case she was starting to think so. Disappointment was bad, but squashing false hope would be worse.

In all honesty, the idea of getting her wings back was the last thing on her mind. Ariadne had resigned herself to her choice years ago. There were plenty of dark times when she missed her wings and yearned for the brush of the wind on her face again. But she didn't have room for regret.

There was too much at stake.

"What I really want," she said, "is to go home. But I'm guessing you can't do that either."

"No. I can't." Even if he could... he wasn't certain it would be the best idea. Not without extracting the mark, somehow.

"But it's better having the marks here. We may still be able to save everyone."

"Maybe. But there are people I need to save."

Truth be told, the situation back home was getting desperate. So desperate that Lysia and Princess Amanda were starting to come up with some crazy ideas. Ariadne had run the probabilities. There was a chance they would work.

The harder part would be selling them to her task force.

...a task force she was currently far away from.

"I'm sorry." He was, truly. "You're right: I can't do anything about the marks. I can't even go back to the Fade myself." But Solas could. Solas would be able to solve this. At least he'd have some ideas.

The best he could offer her, for now...? He looked away, toward the larger common area of Skyhold.

"Lots of people here have lost their families. Or gotten lost, away from them. Sometimes, sorrow seeks itself. Sometimes it holds people together."