open

[bouchonne]

WHO: Byerly and Kitty and thou or even you
WHAT: Open post!! open post
WHEN: The month of KINGSWAY
WHERE: EVERYWHERE but mostly in Kirkwall and in the Gallows
NOTES: Warning: chatterboxes

[ Starters in comments!! Feel free to tag in or start your own thread it's groovy ]

Comments

[degenere]

A letter. And, before you ask: it is being delivered to a professor of the University.

[rathercommon]

And will I get in trouble for delivering it.

[degenere]

[Val actually laughs.]

Of course you will not! What a thing to say.

[rathercommon]

[ Skeptically: ]

You swear.

[degenere]

Often.

And to this, yes. I would put nothing in a letter that would endanger you.

[smile smile smile smile]

[rathercommon]

[ A long, considering pause - ]

I don't trust you.

[degenere]

[Val heaves a sigh, disappointment written clearly across his face. One need not travel all the way to the University to be able to read it.]

Ah. Yes, how had I forgotten your affliction. Of course it is your lack of curiosity, that would keep you from the great bastion of learning that is the University library. To seek justification and object to any means that would get you beyond its hallowed threshold--yes, the signs are all here.

I am heartily sorry for you, mademoiselle. Please, your name. I will write it to the librarian, that she might know to pray for you, too.

[rathercommon]

[ Her lips go thin, and her voice goes sharp, but: ]

Apparently, you do think I'm stupid, given how completely transparent that attempt to manipulate me was. Does that ever work for you?

[degenere]

Often.

[Blithely, like he's not just been caught out. And his despairing frown has utterly transformed to a little smile again.]

You argue, then, that curiosity is not what keeps you from the University? That you would let unfounded distrust bar you from her halls of knowledge and her stacks, the likes of which you will never behold otherwise? That seems a small block. I would not allow such a thing to hold me from true knowledge.

[rathercommon]

[ She shakes her head. ]

In my experience, schools are only good for one thing: ensuring you conform to what other people think is proper behavior. They're there to train you to be good citizens, not free thinkers.

[ A slight hesitation, and then, less firmly, she admits: ] I mean - yeah. I'd like to see the library. I'd really like to see it. But - [ Fierce again: ] I'm not putting myself in debt to anyone to do so. Especially not to anyone who's as shady as you are. I'll find my own way in.

[degenere]

[Now, at last, Val looks insulted.]

Shady? Mademoiselle-- [And he casts a look around, as if seeking someone to bear witness to this absurd accusation. There is no one but the mabari, and Val appeals to it with a gesture toward Kitty, like, can you even?

The mabari's ears lift, and then fall again, presumably when no treat follows the gesture. Not exactly the support Val would have liked.]

I am anything but. I am well-known at the University. I have undergone scholarly missions and performed field research that has enriched the University. I have published dozens of papers, under my own name, Val de Foncé. I have been consulted for dozens and dozens more. Of all the members of the Inquisition here, indeed I am likely among the least shady. One can hardly receive better commendation to visit the University's great library than one that comes from me. Why, I lived within the walls of that library for nearly a fortnight.

And it is a cruel accusation, to bundle the University in with whatever poor excuses of schools it is that you know. The University has long stood for free thought. For knowledge. I would not waste my time within its halls had it stood for anything else.

[rathercommon]

Or they've just shaped you to believe you're a free thinker, when in fact you only believe what you've been taught to believe.

[ Kitty, absently, scratches the mabari's ears. And then, abruptly, she asks - ]

Why are you here, anyway? Like, the real reason.

[degenere]

[No, that was his education before the University--but before Val can respond to that, she's asked a question that makes his nose wrinkle.]

Where else should I be?

[rathercommon]

[ A look. ]

Your university.

[degenere]

[Oh. Val makes a dismissive gesture.]

I have long preferred field work to anything in the classroom. Indeed I am ill-suited for it. And in any case, the real work is here, is it not? The work that makes the difference. Prior to our involvement with the Inquisition, my friends and I had already heard tell of its exploits and its involvement. What true soul would turn down the chance to be involved with such an organization, as one that might claim to have saved all of Thedas?

[rathercommon]

Uh huh.

[ Bullshit. ]

[degenere]

[Wow excuse.]

I sense unfounded skepticism. But I tell you, that is the truth of it. You can ask Freddie or Jehan and they will confirm it as true.

[rathercommon]

Your friends, who've got vested interests in keeping all your secrets? Thanks, they sound reliable.

[degenere]

They are, extremely. Sound and reliable witnesses both. Jeannot is much blessed and sanctified, too. He scarcely can lie. And Freddie is honest to a fault. Sometimes in deeply cutting ways.

Must I produce some other character witnesses to satisfy you? And why would I do that?

[rathercommon]

I don't believe you'd willingly leave your precious university behind. Not without something else driving you.

[degenere]

Oh, if that is your point of contention, you might write to the University directly and ask for the mailing address of Professor Perreault. My first fellow. I drove him to early retirement. The last I heard, he was taking rest in a large garden and had screaming fits if someone said the words "field research" and "extended sabbatical" in his presence.

A funny man. Hair like a horse-bristle brush.

[rathercommon]

[ Kitty doesn't know what a sabbatical is and now she assumes from the term "field research" that he also works in agriculture. ]

What's that got to do with my question?

[degenere]

Well, if you could maneuver around the screaming, he would tell you that I have done everything in my power to be away from the University. Since about my fifth year there, I would say.

[rathercommon]

What? Then why the hell are you constantly drumming on about how grand it is and how everyone's got to see it and all that?

[degenere]

Because it is! It is the finest university in all of Thedas. There is none that could hold even a candle to it. And I spent many happy years there--indeed, some of my happiest--and I believe, truly, that everyone should see it.

But I love my research too well to be confined by classrooms and corridors. A book is a marvelous thing. One learns much from it, and there are many that I love, more than I love most people. But a book, she is static. She cannot change. The world, it is ever changing. No classroom can contain it, and looking upon it from a window, or upon the page of a book, it is like eating a boiled pigeon and saying it is as good as duck confit.