onlyhymns: (Default)
Cade Harimann ([personal profile] onlyhymns) wrote in [community profile] faderift2015-12-13 02:35 pm

[open] where I go

WHO: Knight-Lieutenant Cade Harimann and you
WHAT: A jumpy templar is out of the dungeon and getting his bearings on Skyhold. What horrors will he face? (by horrors I mean other people)
WHEN: Early Haring
WHERE: Skyhold
NOTES:If your character met him during speed dating, feel free to assume that conversation happened IC (except Nerva) and that they're already acquainted.




Finally unleashed upon his new home, and wearing his traveling leathers with the unmistakeable flaming Templar sword emblazoned on the chest, Cade made his way around Skyhold with the intention of finding a purpose for himself.

1. The battlements. Cade was unnerved by crowds and limited sightlines, so he had taken to spending a good chunk of time up in the battlements. It gave him an opportunity to watch, listen, and grow accustomed to life below, which was so very different than how he'd come to understand the world.

2. The training grounds. Although he had first been seen in his heavy Templar plate, wielding a sword, left to his own devices Cade was more likely to use the archery range. He was an exceptionally good shot, and spent hours shooting targets with the single-minded concentration of one who was trying not to think about anything at all.

3. The chapel. He could often be found alone in the small chamber just off the cloistered garden, on his knees and with his head bowed to the altar of Andraste.

4. Anywhere! Give me a place and I'll find a reason that he'd be there.

byblow: (38)

[personal profile] byblow 2016-01-25 12:50 am (UTC)(link)
"I'll come with you," Alistair volunteers, since he can't say yes to a question that hasn't properly been asked. He takes another bite of the chicken he's been neglecting. He isn't a very good actor, but he's pretty good at faking oblivious nonchalance, because it's his natural expression—so maybe he doesn't look a little bemused.

Cade being odd isn't that strange, though, in the scheme of things.

"Sorry," he adds, just in case. "You must have lost friends during the rebellion. I shouldn't have joked about it."
byblow: (23)

[personal profile] byblow 2016-01-25 03:24 am (UTC)(link)
"Not everything," Alistair says, pauses, and adds, "anymore. Usually."

He follows; at some point it might turn into leading, because that's--well. That's not what he does, usually. But it's what he did relative to Cade, anyway, back when they were sort of friends, arguably, in a way. (They were friends. But it's been minimized and recategorized, now.)

"But you probably don't want to talk about it."

There's the barest questioning lilt; it's more of an offer not to talk about it than an invitation to do so.
byblow: (Default)

[personal profile] byblow 2016-01-26 06:36 pm (UTC)(link)
"During the Blight."

And directly after it, long enough for Eamon to be the one to deliver the news that Alistair wasn't being thrown out of the country, no, of course not, but it might be better if he left for a while. But Alistair doesn't sound sad or bitter; he mostly sounds relieved. He hates long silences, unless he's using them to sulk, and doubly so now that long silences are in fact long uninterrupted stretches of the Calling.

"Eamon isn't an Arl now," Alistair says, for the sake of making conversation about something less touchy than informal exile. "He's in Denerim, advising the Queen. It keeps him busy. But his brother, Teagan, has the arling now. We write sometimes." He pauses to peer over the edge of the wall, not at anything in particular. Heights never stop being a little impressive to stare down no matter how familiar the landscape is. "Do you talk to your family at all?"
byblow: (7)

[personal profile] byblow 2016-01-27 12:49 am (UTC)(link)
"That's good," Alistair says offhand, still looking down the wall and the steep slope of the mountain beneath it, but when he lifts his head he gives Cade a more thorough look. Not piercing--he's no good at piercing--but searching, at least. "I'd apologize for not keeping in touch, but--you know."

They weren't really friends at the end, and there was the Blight thing, then Orlais, and Cade off in Kirkwall. Of all places.
byblow: (1)

[personal profile] byblow 2016-01-27 01:19 am (UTC)(link)
"Well," Alistair says, "you were never much fun."

He's joking. No literal elbow in the ribs to try to make Cade cheer up, but the verbal equivalent, with a smirk that's meant to include him in the joke instead of make him the butt of it. Effective? Maybe not. But he's trying.
byblow: (32)

[personal profile] byblow 2016-01-27 01:52 am (UTC)(link)
There's nothing quite like a joke that falls flat, no matter how many times it happens to Alistair, which is a lot. A lot of times. There's some awkward shuffling on his end, readjusting his feet in his boots, smile fading, and he has his chicken leg back to his mouth to give it something better to do than talk when Cade mentions the Wardens.

Mouth full, he only nods at first, then rears back and throws the bone and remaining gristle over the wall and down the mountain.

"We're fugitives, actually," he says, sounding nearly cheerful about it, "because everyone else has gone mad. We'll probably be here for a while." On the plus side, that gives him more time to try to crack Cade's sad-eyed shell. "How are you at drinking?"
byblow: (49)

[personal profile] byblow 2016-01-27 02:15 am (UTC)(link)
"Not at all?"

Alistair, obliviously, squints at Cade like something must be wrong with him.

"I'm pretty sure that's bad for your health."
byblow: (20)

[personal profile] byblow 2016-01-27 03:17 am (UTC)(link)
"Good man," Alistair says, and steps forward with one foot to give Cade a bracing, friendly clap on his shoulder. "That's all I do now--" No, it isn't, but he feels like he's trapped and useless and it's easier to make fun of himself for it than to let anyone else do it first. "--so you should come by the tavern in the evenings. I'll introduce you to my friends. I have those now."
byblow: (47)

[personal profile] byblow 2016-01-29 02:42 am (UTC)(link)
Alistair's smile dries out and then fades. Being looked at like he's a crazy person is plenty familiar; so is a lack of enthusiasm. "You don't have to," he says. It's less sullen than the fine I don't care anyway tones of his childhood, but still in roughly the same categories. "So many arrows, so little time, I get it."
byblow: (41)

[personal profile] byblow 2016-02-03 12:42 am (UTC)(link)
Alistair's eyes narrow while Cade circles. Not in a mean way, necessarily; more in a what is happening way. But it makes what he says next that much more believable.

"I don't have that many friends," he says. It's only a token protest. Not personal, all right. Cade has just become weirder. "How about you practice your archery, and I'll come drink and heckle you." You know. "In a nice way."