faderift | MOD PLOT ↠ NONE TO RETURN

WHO: All characters signed up to participate in the Battle of Ghislain
WHAT: The Inquisition regroups and heads home
WHEN: Covers the period immediately post-battle (11.28) through the journey back to Kirkwall (11.29-12.1)
WHERE: North of Montfort, Orlais, and on the road to Val Chevin
NOTES: This is Post #2, covering the immediate aftermath of the battle and the journey back to Kirkwall. It's a free-for-all. Post #1 covers the battle itself. More info on the OOC post.

The Inquisition and Orlesian armies eventually limp to a halt along the Imperial Highway north of Montfort, where wide fields and gentle hills offer clear lines of sight and a sparsely equipped fortress provides some shelter and fortification. It's a soundly strategic location—if Ghislain is lost, Montfort is the last major city between the invaders and Val Royeaux—but among the rank and file there may be too much chaos to appreciate it.

For the remainder of the day and well into the night, the fortress and surrounding land are a frenzy of activity. The wounded who were not left on the field must be triaged and tended to with limited supplies, while many healers and surgeons out of commission themselves and the remainder worked to the bone. Scouts, soldiers, and even support staff in sturdy enough condition to keep working may be tasked with assembling camp from the few remaining supplies, taking reports on known casualties or acquired intelligence, or further fortifying the new location. The Orlesian army sends one of its battered cavalry units toward Ghislain to attempt to provide some warning, and from the Inquisition's number a few patrols are sent back toward the battlefield or toward Ghislain, with stern orders not to re-engage, only to watch for signs of pursuit, and to direct any stragglers.

Those who remain in the fortress are in for a long, miserable night, with meager rations and makeshift bedding, if any of either, while the wind shifts directions and grows colder. By morning a number of the wounded have died, but attempts to build a pyre are hampered by the sudden swell of a storm that starts with freezing rain and then transitions to early and unpredicted thick, heavy snow.

For a few hours that morning the two armies attempt business as normal, but it soon becomes clear that the storm is getting stronger, and they risk being snowed in with more people than they can feed. Many, including the Inquisition's Gallows contingent, are ordered to disperse. Many crowd into wagons, with any transportable wounded receiving further attention en route and neighbors hunching close to preserve heat whether they like one another or not, while those able to do so follow on foot or horseback over the rough, flash-frozen highway toward Montfort and then west toward Val Chevin. The storm doesn't abate until they've nearly reached the city, but once there they're able to stop, eat, and spend a few hours indoors thawing out before proceeding home.

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

She moves across the space in a rush, so her hand meets his chest as he tries to push up. The lean, the touch, is very slow and very careful compared to the speed she crossed to the bed in. For someone so good at killing, she is very careful. Maybe because she knows how to be careful, or maybe because she values it more than most. She doesn't know, just knows that the sight of some people hurting makes the hurt mirror in her heart.

"You are giving yourself pains, Hanzo." Her hand is still resting on chest, which she seems to realise with a an awkward blink, and then... does nothing about. His heart beats, his body is solid and strong, still, even with hurts. "Do not make enemies work easier for them."

The touch has him stopping almost immediately, tense for a brief moment before his shoulders relax and he relents. He trusts Helena, that's what he tells himself. He thinks of her against the Venatori, violent and dangerous before them as she rips them apart for threatening him, and it soothes him a little. She is safe, she is good, she is calming. The fear of his legs and the fear of blood loss does not concern him when she is nearby.

His hand lifts to hers, wrapping around her fingers, holding it in place. He is wrapped in bandages, but her touch is warm and he does not want it to go, his eyes flicking to find hers, soft and tender in a moment that he cannot quite describe.

"I am always in pain," he scoffs quietly and then sighs. "But I will stop moving. Are you unharmed?"

Edited 2018-12-03 18:43 (UTC)

A momentary freezing, eyes wide. Hand holding. She is not sure what to do with this moment.

"Then maybes you should be being more careful always." She shrugs with on shoulder, and with her free hand gestures very vaguely to her back. "Bruisings, only."

Even so, she chews at her lip, looks unhappy and guilty. "My sestra took hurts, again. She was joining Scouting because of me, and now she has been hurt on both her missions she has gone on." A darkspawn the first time, a spear this time. At least the first time she had been at Sarah's side, but this time? And what could happen the next time?

She wonders if she should try to make Sarah join the researches, with Cosima. Sarah is clever, even if she likes to hide it and be cunning with her cleverness. Always Sarah is treating it as more useful, Helena thinks, if people don't know about it. That is how she has often been going. On the other hand: imagining Sarah in research is blergh.

His fingers brush over hers gently, tender and soft, and his eyes flick over her body. Hanzo wants to make sure she is safe, that she is healthy, that she is not in any pain. He doesn't want her to be suffering too much, not if there's something he can do... Not that he can do much in this state.

"Perhaps I should. It was for good reason." He was defending mages raising an undead army. It seems an appropriate reason to put himself in danger, even if it means he might need an extended rest. "But I will be more careful. If it will please you."

She doesn't look happy, though, and Hanzo finds himself concerned, finds himself caring. His fingers curl around hers and they stroke over the bones of her knuckles, careful and soft. He wants to make her feel better but he isn't sure what the right words are - he has never been good at this kind of thing. He has never been very good at making other people feel better.

"Perhaps I can watch over her too." His head tilts to look at her again, eyes drinking her in. He wants to soothe her, he finds. "I am scouting as well. You and I can make sure that she is not in trouble as often as I am."

She does not know what to do in this situation. He is very handsome and very kind, and in this moment he seems very, very— not frail. Hanzo is not being frail, even with injury. Vulnerable, maybe? Needing protecting.

"It would please," she says, a little stilted, as her gaze flickers away.
She isn't very sure what to do with her hands, or her gaze, and she gulps in a surprised brath when he takes her hand. (In another world, another time, a part of her life that she has not yet experienced, a handsome man would take her hand. It would be for dancing and not because they were both injured and nursing hurts.) Carefully, she squeezes his hand. It isn't like when they wrestle and fight, where she might wrench his wrist to bring him down to his knees, or when he caught and deflected one of her strikes. It is a moment where she can appreciate the gentleness of his hands, even with calluses and the roughness that comes with archery.

Part of her wants to kiss him, but— he is hurting. And her sestra is hurting, and she needs to be watching over Sarah, and—

Helena looks back to him, and smoothes his hair away from his faces, looking at him carefully. That is something so often done in stories, carefully brushing back hair, but that was not why she was doing this. No, more than that it was— sometimes that was the sort of affection that was the most comforting, and most precious. She smiles then, gently taps the centre of his forehead. "I will be keeping eyes on both of you. And you will be keeping eyes on both of you, not just Sarah."

The urge to prove himself as being someone capable of taking care of himself, of proving himself able to withstand anything. He will heal from this as he has healed from everything else, but the uncertainty he feels and the depth of his own personal confusion means he stares at Helena for longer than might be strictly acceptable.

"Then I shall take more care."

There is a tenderness about them now, Hanzo thinks, feeling his eyes drink her in without pause. He swallows back the urge to pull himself away, the vicious reminder that he is unworthy of this, that there is nothing in him that deserves her tenderness or her warmth, instead letting himself bask in this intimacy. His thumb presses into the palm of her hand, wanting to draw it to his lips, and he feels overwhelmed, suddenly, by the urge to be soft, to be kind. He is neither of those things, and surely Helena deserves better.

The two of them fight and war, the two of them twist and battle one another, but there is no pause, no hesitation. Hanzo cares for her and he cannot deny it, even if he is coward enough to know he would never do anything to encourage this. It would be cruel to her, cruel to demand that she offer any intimacy to a man who is a danger above all else.

But she touches his face. Her fingers are in his hair. He reaches to bring that hand close, letting his mouth press soft kisses against the skin, resting her knuckle by his mouth before he breathes out, soft, sure, letting his fingers fall away. That is the intimacy he can offer, the best he can give. There is little else he can do when his heart is a burden for himself - he cannot burden her as well.

"I will do what I can." Soft, his eyes flicking to look at her, drowning in her features. "For myself and for her."

MOD PLOT ↠ NONE TO RETURN

very unwise tbh

rip my heart

B)

:*

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