shri: (» i'm a princess cut from marble)
lakshmi· ɴᴀᴛᴜʀᴀʟ ᴅɪsᴀsᴛᴇʀ · bai ([personal profile] shri) wrote in [community profile] faderift2018-10-30 05:08 am

04 | CLOSED

WHO: Lakshmi Bai & Wren, Herian, Thranduil, Araceli, Ioverth, Kitty, Solas and Teren - ( Also: Flint & Vane )
WHAT: Telling Some Whole Truths.
WHEN: Post-Fade Adventures, some time after her house arrest.
WHERE: The Gallows
NOTES: Probably really extra.




She sends them just the one note:

I require your presence, together this evening, for a matter of serious urgency in regards to the Inquisition.

महारानी,
Lakshmi Bai

katabasis: (or more freedom from trouble)

[personal profile] katabasis 2018-11-10 10:21 pm (UTC)(link)
He takes it from her without ceremony, snaps it shut, and places it alongside the unsheathed dagger.

"Sit." It really isn't an invitation. If she wants to have a conversation here, in the dead of night, she will either give him his due or live with him keeping a knife to hand for the entirety of their meeting. "You can say whatever you came to while I dress."

It's a poor hour for theatrics.
katabasis: (he was going to attack)

[personal profile] katabasis 2018-11-13 07:11 am (UTC)(link)
There are grounds on which he might brook some argument - consider, madame, that if you'd found him at some reasonable hour in some normal place, we could have saved ourselves all this trouble and cut straight to the bone on whatever you mean to discuss -, but those too go on the shelf.

At the very least, he keeps his thoughts to himself - a mercy, he thinks, for is own benefit more so than it is for her. He gets the feeling they might talk in circles if he opened the door to semantics.

So she's left with the company of the desk, the small stack of books there - (one must be a ledger and the other has no name on its spine and the third is called The Sermons of Divine Rosamund vol.III and matches at least one other on the shelf built into the nearby bulkhead) -, a series of papers made anonymous in the low light, the shifting shadows as the lamp swings from the overhead hook, the murmur of the harbor's black water at the Walrus' stern, and the low shuffling of clothing being traded.

Eventually, he comes back around the desk looking less human by far in a dark shirt and breeches. He sets the closed pen knife before her as he rounds to take his seat.
katabasis: (let no act be done without a purpose)

[personal profile] katabasis 2018-11-15 10:54 pm (UTC)(link)
He thinks, distantly, that he'd rather she remain seated and on the far side of that desk. Then she stabs herself in the hand.

Does the picture of them in this room look as strange and false as it feels? He imagines it more clearly than he lives in it: all bathed in speckled moonshine through the mottled glass of the stern windows, the light of a single lantern painting shifting highlights on the pommel of the pen knife and her hand where it's pinned, and something uncomprehending in his own expression as she drinks from the heavy silver phial on the chain about her neck. The air is cold thanks to the open window and the breeze whispering through it.

At her behest, he pulls the knife free.

Two thoughts: What's the fastest way to usher a lunatic out of one's cabin without drawing attention to it? And, her blood is going to stain his goddamn table top.
Edited 2018-11-16 03:55 (UTC)
katabasis: (to enjoy)

[personal profile] katabasis 2018-11-20 04:31 pm (UTC)(link)
It's not blood magic. Not hers anyway. That much he's instantly certain of.

It may be the only thing he is sure of. Her hand planted there in the wet handprint of her blood and the sheen of the knife are simple enough. Even the knitting muscle and flesh and bone are-- a large enough question to be displaced from the immediacy of the room. But the rest-- there, she has him. If not for that pledge, it would be easy to find some reason to usher her right back out that window, off the back of the Walrus and be done with it. But.

It begs questions, doesn't it?

"That sounds like a generous offer." He lays the penknife on the table, though his hand lingers over it. She's no mage, she isn't corrupted - both easy things to say, the inverse of which speaks to some ingrained, self-preserving caution. Who believes the first thing someone tells them about magic and blood? Certainly no one from the North. "Is there a reason you're giving it to me?"

Allow him to say it again in a more genteel fashion: What the fuck are you doing here, Lakshmi Bai? What do you want?
katabasis: (he was going to attack)

surprise

[personal profile] katabasis 2019-02-19 12:46 am (UTC)(link)
Someone, he thinks, has been running their mouth.

Which is no surprise. They have been these many months in Kirkwall harbor, the crew of the Walrus allowed their liberty as he frankly has no option but to give it. He should be glad that this is the version of events that has propagated far enough for it to catch her ear. These are people with good intentions, those rumors say. It's better by far that 'Captain Flint will appear in the middle of the night, slit your throat and steal your children.' It's far preferable to the death knell murmurings of, 'We've come all this way, and for what?' that he might reasonably have feared.

The question then becomes-- "Who else knows about this?"
katabasis: (what is the nature of all sensible thing)

[personal profile] katabasis 2019-03-03 04:34 pm (UTC)(link)
He gestures to the blood smeared onto the desk. It's a dark black spot in the swaying light.

"Who else have you told."

The rest is-- not something he needs to hear from her. Questions will need to be asked along the wharf and in Kirkwall's taverns - What have you heard of the ship in the harbor? What has its men been saying about what they came from? How discontent are they really? -, but not of her and not out of his mouth directly. Appearing unconcerned is a necessary part of keeping control of the situation.
katabasis: (monstrous giants present themselves)

[personal profile] katabasis 2019-03-03 10:26 pm (UTC)(link)
And she's told him, as equal a form of leverage as all the rest. Give a piece of a thing to everyone in the room and suddenly they'll all be too stricken by the consequences of using it to actually do it. Who moves first? Who looks the worst by doing it? Who risks their neck? Who--

"Do they know you're telling me?"
katabasis: (he was going to attack)

[personal profile] katabasis 2019-03-04 12:29 am (UTC)(link)
If there's a flicker of irritability over mention of Vane, it dies just as promptly as it appears. Fine. If half the world knows it, why not Charles Vane as well? That they've been squabbling while trapped at anchor makes no great difference to the truth in that.

"If that was your interest, I can't imagine what you could possibly have gained by being honest about your--" Hm. "This."

And here, finally, he pivots to ask a proper question that has nothing to do with his part in this, this has nothing to do with her climbing through the Walrus' stern windows. That has everything to do with the knit of muscle and bone and the how of why that is possible. "Where does it come from? Your blackwater that you've agreed to surrender to them."
katabasis: (warning him that they were windmills)

[personal profile] katabasis 2019-03-07 01:12 am (UTC)(link)
The look he's adopted remains pointedly neutral, arranged into such careful flatness that there's no mistaking it for real disinterest. This too is a kind of survival technique: a stillness that's both prey and predatory all at once. It isn't so different from those coy looks she's so fond of deploying. Not really.

"We do."