am I free now, am I at peace?

[rowancrowned]

WHO: Thranduil, Casimir
WHAT: Arranging an escape.
WHEN: mid-Eluviesta/Cloudreach
WHERE: Provost's Office
NOTES: Discussions of Tranquility.

He calls Casimir into his office late on a rainy afternoon. It ought not to be out of the ordinary—Casimir has been here a half-hundred times or more, though less frequently now that he is once more himself.

The afternoon’s heat had dropped off in the wake of the storm, so there’s a chill in the stone but a fireplace swept clean of ashes, and where Thranduil is known to ply with sweets, extra rations, finer wines, there is nothing today. Just Thranduil himself, lingering near the window, the curtain half drawn back as he peers at the harbor.

“Close the door,” he says. “I will be brief.”

Comments

[aestivation]

The idea tastes dry, or maybe that's only his mouth, void of counterpoint.

"The Inquisition has contacts in Orzammar," He's written to a few; hasn't since — well. "It would be natural to look."

Second only to his sister (Maker keep her from that news). The words sound distant the further he speaks them; not yet far enough. Eyes shut, hidden by the pinch of his nose. All the will in the world can't flatten them back to emptiness, that smooth, hollow before.

An Avvar hold. Ludicrous.

"I've never," Something burns beneath his eyes. His hand flattens over them: No thank you. We aren't doing that right now. "I have lived in a Circle for twenty years."

Twenty-five. Forget the brand, he can't pass for else than a mage.