there is beauty in surviving,

[hornswoggle]

WHO: long john silver & YOU
WHAT: casual catch-all for the month.
WHEN: throughout guardian, post-ghosts, but very flexible
WHERE: kirkwall
NOTES: Content warnings, OOC notes, links to other relevant posts, etc.

( i. the library )

Setting foot in this library still carries an air of transgression. John is aware of what he is. His very presence at one time or another would have been forbidden. Or at least, heavily monitored. It would have come with strings and chains. John lingers in the arch of the entryway for a long moment, considering the implications and the necessity of what he's concealing, and weighing it against the research he intends to do.

He is not a learned man. John's education has been haphazard and snatched at intervals; it comes with large gaps and secondhand. He seeks instruction on the use of what beats in his blood, but he knows that instructional texts are likely under lock and key. He's grasping at straws, trying to understand something that has been instinct since the earliest days he's know it. But still, John has never been one to ignore his own curiosity or pass up an opportunity that stands available to him.

So he spends his time here, picking through the collection of books at a leisurely pace. Circulating through the shelves, the quiet tap of his crutch against stone marking his progress. He can be found in the library in the evenings, though there's no rhyme or reason to which days he appears.

( ii. tavern )

During the day, John conducts his business from a scummy tavern in Lowtown. This is familiar terrain. Regardless of the current need to appear respectable, old habits guide him inevitable towards one of the very few places within Kirkwall he can find some familiarity.

And gossip. His current role is so very far from the way he'd carved out a place for himself within the crew. But there's pleasure to be found in listening to loudly traded barbs, even if they are of little value in the moment. With a tankard at his elbow and a few stray pieces of parchment in front of him, half-scratching out notes and half simply listening and absorbing the atmosphere, John holds court. Walrus crewmen circle in and out of his orbit. John always makes it his business to be approachable, but this is perhaps the best moment to seek his attention.

( iii. wildcard )

[ hit me up @ pogonophile or just drop whatever you want in here, i'll roll with it. ]

Comments

8(

[swordproof]

Her hand twitches as soon as his fingers brush over it.

She's not used to anyone attempting to comfort her; this part of her heritage, of her life, is something she had never shared with anyone. Even Adrian had only ever heard the whispers, echos from her dreams and the memories she shared with him. It's clear that she is desperate for this conversation to be over; it's been the same for each and every single time this has come up in Thedas, people stealing her secrets from her without of her control.

"It was still... Something that ought not be seen, by anyone."

Somehow this is worse than her conversation with Isaac. At least he had not borne witness to any of it; he had just seen the effects, had just felt the clash of her gauntlet against his cheek. John had seen the worst of her memories painted in front of him.

"It is still something to apologise for." She shakes her head. "And I am sorry for it."