faderift | Scallop the breastbone

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Scallop the breastbone

WHO: Morrigan, open;
WHAT: Morrigan (and Kieran) join the Inquisition earlier than planned; she looks for tutors, tale of the Warden's companions present and assistance with her research
WHEN: mid-Haring
WHERE: Skyhold
NOTES: Kieran is an npc and as such shall be shuffled off elsewhere quickly. Feel free to spot her anywhere around Skyhold looking suitably disgusted.

With one small boy practically dead on his feet, it had been easier than it might have been elsewise to arrange for suitable quarters for a woman and her son, perhaps easier than it might have been had she come in a rather more official capacity. True, the eluvian might have been with her then but things were rather less organised than she would have hoped and the rumours filtering into Orlais hadn't been wrong about the utter chaos. Even when Orlesian theatrics were taken into account. No matter, they were here, the last of her things that were too much for the two of them to transport safely would arrive shortly and doubtlessly she would be able to find a safe place for them.

For now, her priorities are getting the lay of the land as it were and it's not long before yet another mage is prowling through Skyhold though this one will look any Templar in the eye until they look away first if challenged, a woman clearly on a mission.

Tutors for her son for a start, she won't have him neglecting his studies. Seeking old companions or word of them next when she heard talk on the road that she'd have the truth of. And lastly, help with her own research and the not inconsiderable stash of very old, and very rare magical books she's lugged all the way here from Orlais, with two volumes kept always on her person lest they be lost again.

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"You think I have forgotten long marches?" There are good things about growing up in the wilds and being moved the way a wolf moves her cubs, the sort of way she's reared Kieran. The lad never complains but for the early starts when the sky remains dark.

Kieran goes where she goes, he's known wandering since before his own legs can carry him.

"On the contrary, last we were in parts such as these he was too young to remember them well, though I imagine he shall sleep for at least a whole day unless his stomach wakes him first. It gives me time to make arrangements. And you - I had wondered if you were on your way to some mission on behalf of those in charge."

Don't mention Alistair, not yet, she still needs more time.

"Scouting for resources and demons, little else." He shrugs and offers her his hand- Alistair he will embrace gladly, Lelianna he will tease- Morrigan? He greets on her own terms, however she chooses to dictate them. They've been of a mind before during the Blight, eyeing one another and marking their plans, their supposed or actual machinations.

Far from cursing her for them, every twist in the web made Zevran respect her all the more.

"What arrangements need to be made? Somewhere to sleep where you and your boy shall not be troubled, I suppose?"

A handshake is still about as far as Morrigan is comfortable with personally so she takes it with a firm grip. "Were you away when everyone apparently managed to miss what must have been obvious signs?"

The Circle had been less than subtle, that had been obvious from the notes they had found and from when Jowan had been encountered in the dungeons of Redcliffe for if such a fool as him could learn blood magic so easily then the signs had been there in Kinloch Hold. With a small sigh of disgust, she pinches the bridge of her nose a moment and nods, deciding that yes, the eluvian will be a need to know basis only, once she gets word of the progress it makes in the snow.

"A room we can share, a place where I can work in peace - Kieran can study in our room. Suitable tutors in the things he should know. To investigate this council of magi, a Circle by any other name."

"Most circles do not have apostates sit on them and speak in their interest- but I know little of it, alas." Not his circus, not his monkeys. Someone else can worry about it; and Morrigan will likely have opinions enough without his input. No need to speak more on the matter.

"The wing in which I rest has a few rooms left that aren't taken- mostly due to holes in the ceiling but that, I think, is not so great a deterrent to you and your boy. You can tell him it's a bit like camping. He enjoys that, yes?" Most children have some love of camping. If they were not raised in the city.

"Most apostates are wise enough to leave the Circles and the Chantry at their back to find their own fortune," or their ruin, more often than not seeing as so few of them actually know anything of surviving and making a life without drawing attention to themselves. Far too many of the ones who run find blood magic and do all mages a disservice each and every time.

His suggestion pulls a laugh from her; they're no strangers to such hardships and well, Kieran isn't put off by anything much really. Surely she can find someone to order about quickly. "If I can find a place for my books safe from damp and sticky fingers," other mages or templars, not her son, "then a hole or two is little problem, I remember well the damp creeping in through mother's hut and how the smoke had no place to go. Though it does make it all the more easy for the lad to pester you with questions."

"I warn you, Alistair has taken to rooming with me. You might pass one another in the hall." And won't that be great fun? He has so missed their little sniping matches. Of course it would also force Alistair to acknowledge the boy's existence. "It'll also put you in close contact with someone that does not mind the boy, his questions, or watching him should you need some time with yourself."

He spreads his hands gladly. "I find myself somewhat fond of him, I must say."

“You must be able to make him bathe more regularly than Jonas ever could.” There’s the briefest of hesitations first though, because it’s been ten years and she knows Kieran’s face, has watched it change, has found every feature of hers that he shares and she did tell him that his father was a good man, that had been enough. Now this. Now someone else trying to find their own face in his and vice versa. “You will likely take his questioning with more grace than some, but nothing terrifying before bed, a boy needs his sleep and at least one person here should sleep soundly.”

Only she’s heard about his dreams come morning or night if he’s woken. Not terrifying but too vivid, a sign that he’s different to so many others.

“He has that effect on people.” On me, she thinks but doesn’t say. It wasn’t in the plan to love him. “And how is Alistair? Have you warned him yet?”

"And rob you of the satisfaction of surprising him? I would never." On the one hand it would be a horrible shock and it was not at all a kind trick to be playing. On the other he'd thought Alistair had been dying for the better part of a month and said terribly sentimental things that he'd rather ignore. And slept with dogs all the while.

That more than anything else earns this punishment.

"Do you intent to tell Kieran which strapping man is his father- or leave that to Alistair to decide? I'm certain after a period of time he'll get over his issues and make a token attempt to at least speak with the boy. Probably gift him something terribly noisy in an effort to vex you." Ah, their needling, it was like music to him.

"True, tis like as not that the whole of Skyhold will hear him." Whether or not it causes an avalanche such as the ones at Haven remains to be seen but she lives in hope. Somehow though, it makes her almost nostalgic for Jonas appearing too, if only so he gets to witness the awkwardness of two people meeting outside of battle for the first time since what was...well, a night should suffice.

Things might seem less dire with someone who cobbled together enough to defeat a Blight so quickly at their side.

"As I said, I have told him he is a good man. I will have to speak with Alistair first, if all three of us are here, we will need to come to some arrangement. If he gives that boy a dog when we will either return to Orlais or travel then I shall feed him to it first." No one needs to know she was actually happy to see that big smelly brute of Jonas' okay, no one else who knew her was even there then.

"It'll get terribly awkward otherwise." Which he does not mind normally and he did n't mind in the past but now? Now they've less time and higher stakes. He wasn't going to go so far as to say that Alistair ought to have a hand in the boy's life but- he would want to once he got over himself. Morrigan could do worse than to allow it.

"...So you are saying I should return the pup to the stable?" Not that he had but- the color Morrigan's face would make when vexed was a fond enough memory.

"All his life I have done what I can so that what is said about me does not touch him." They tell legends of Flemeth that she has to hear, tales to give a girl nightmares and it's not that Alistair is needlessly cruel - she knows that if there was one in their party who could ever be called that then it would be her, or would have been - but there are things that slip out. Things you say and forget about and Alistair has never raised a child from a tiny screaming thing to something fast approaching manhood, sooner than she might want.

Zevran should understand that, given his own upbringing.

But that can wait as her eyes widen right before her brows draw together, painted lips a moue of distaste. "If you have some beast that will drop maggot infested animals in my underthings then so help me there is no place you will be safe Zevran."

"He is not so thoughtless a man as that any longer Morrigan. Believe it or not our little Warden has grown up. He even answered a few questions the other day without cracking a single joke or attempting to evade it." A few being three before habit and temptation caught up with him, but Zevran understood well enough. There are things not meant for children; even strange little children such as Kieran.

They've nothing in common save Morrigan and he still felt some shade of responsibility for him. There are too few in Thedas that do not know of it's horrors. Letting Keiran keep his wonder was no burden. "I will remind him of what he says- and amend my tales in the tavern accordingly. While they have not been unkind they have been...thorough in your skills in battle. I do not think the boy needs to know that of you, yes?"

Ah, and there it is. There is the face. "My dear Morrigan, I would never."

"It only takes one careless remark, and we can agree that he is prone to them, as prone as he is to blundering into traps even when warned of them. Tis likely to be an uncomfortable situation and Kieran is...a special boy." Better to talk to Alistair first if she can hunt him down and trap him somewhere, if only so he'll actually be forced to talk through it until it's done. As amusing as tales of his own childhood might be to him, it's different to say it and she's sure he's imagined some sort of monstrous creature, either because of her, because of the soul of the Old God, or both.

It's the talk of Wardens too, when there's a griffin emblem stitched on the front of many of his clothes, when they're heroes to the very young.

"Oh no, Kieran knows well what I am capable of; magic is magic, there is nothing to fear with it and he has had to learn far more, far quicker than any Circle mage, any apostate. He must be ready, he must understand what dangers there are with it. He studies the theory, the history. Twas never magic that gave me pause as a girl." It was what Flemeth did with magic, with her Chasind men. Morrigan has absolutely no plans to get up to any of that and even crude folk are better about keeping such talk from children.

Zevran she will actually set you on fire, or the suspicious look implies that she's really considering the possibility. "See to it that you do not, I would not want for things to become strained between us." Like spiders. So many spiders. And swarms of flies so thick nothing can be seen through them.

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Scallop the breastbone

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