faderift | [open] the way it feels to be just anyone

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[open] the way it feels to be just anyone

WHO: Benedict and you
WHAT: catch-all
WHEN: Bloomingtide
WHERE: Kirkwall
NOTES: will give warnings as needed. hit me up if you want a starter!

I. The Library

Performing his chamberlain duties in the daytime and studying magic in the evenings doesn't leave Benedict a lot of time for leisure, and in fact the hours he would have spent drinking or playing cards are now occupied in the little office he sets up every night at one of the library tables. It's here that he writes letters, several scrolls weighted down in front of him which list Tevinter's major families and their relations, spread all across the country and ripe for persuasion.

Sometimes he can be found writing fervently, a cup of tea sitting untouched and forgotten beside his scribbling quill; more than once he's fallen asleep there, his face smudged with ink as it rests atop the desk.

II. The Gallows Courtyard

On the rare occasion that he's out of real work to do, Benedict can sometimes be found sitting on the steps of the tower with his parchment board and a quill or stick of charcoal, idly drawing the surrounding architecture. The sketches are loose, but hone in with great detail on things like the flourish in a column or a specific pattern of tilework; he shows little interest in the denizens going about their day, and in fact makes a little face of irritation if ever someone steps in the way.

III. Wildcard

do ur worst

for Solas

With the warming weather, Benedict has felt more comfortable taking his magical studies outside to practice in the open. Well, semi-open-- still afraid of being heckled at the proper training grounds, he opts instead for the herb garden in the evenings, where he can take his time and maintain a relatively low level of anxiety.

The barrier is something he mastered ages ago, but Benedict's skill in it has weakened with his resolve; he can't seem to keep it going under duress, which has led him to try a visibly stronger method: the Rift barrier, as he saw Solas conjure when Kirkwall was besieged by ghosts.
Benedict is able to draw a brief form: a slab, part of a wall, which remains for several seconds and then disintegrates, much to his aggravation.

If he can't make a simple barrier work, no matter its material, he can't protect himself.

for Kitty

It's been more than a few days, but the Inquisition is like that: people get busy and stay busy, with less time than they hoped for side projects. So it's more like several weeks later when Benedict next visits Kitty in the library, walking in with his posture straight and his eyes bright, hopeful.

"Any luck?"

for Marcoulf

There's been no reason to talk to the little ferret-face, save perhaps for a gnawing conscience that rears its head every time Benedict remembers that awful night and the subsequent conversations. Perhaps he was too unkind to him-- perhaps he's afraid of Marcoulf still, even after everything. But he can't have this nonsense hanging over his head, not when anxieties are at an all-time high and the whole world seems unbalanced.

So he approaches Marcoulf one night, sauntering up next to him and leaning against a nearby pillar, where he lights a cigarette and just... stands there. One of them will speak first. Maybe.

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Coming back from the window, Benedict smiles in that confident, vaguely snobby way that comes so easily to him. "It's a sort of pipe," he explains, picking up a pitcher of water so he can begin to prepare it, crouched on the ground where he talks.
"It's smoother than smoking something rolled up, and more of a..." He thinks a moment, standing, then goes to a chest of his belongings to remove a second hose. "...a group activity. You know, I've never had a reason to attach this."

He bends again to do so, then places a coal, lighting it with his finger as he's done before and blowing lightly on it, directing the heat. Once satisfied with its behavior, he sits back on a pillow and takes one of the hoses, beginning to puff a bit oddly on it as he watches the pipe.
After an interminable period of this, he finally inhales deeply, blows the smoke out through his nose, and beckons Marcoulf to sit on the other pillow.

"Now it's ready."

There's perfectly good furniture in the room worth sitting on, he doesn't say. Instead, he unclips the sword from his belt and carefully folds himself down onto the second pillow. The rapier, all silver and fine, gets set near to hand. His narrow legs get arranged into a semblance of comfort and then--

Then there should be questions. What are we smoking?, at the very least. Instead, Marcoulf simply unwinds the coil of cloth hose, uses his sleeve to wipe some dust from the mouthpiece, and takes his own draw from the pipe. It's all done easily enough.

On exhale, he makes a low noise - hm - and nods in what must be approval.

Furniture is for southern degenerates-- not that there isn't any in the room, obviously, but one can't lounge properly on a boring stiff wooden chair.

The smoke is fragrant and tastes lightly of cinnamon, hanging in the air around them as the pipe bubbles and the conversation stalls. Before too long, their muscles begin to relax somewhat, their thoughts drifting: they're still lucid when they need to be, but there's no hurry.

"I spent half a year in the Gallows dungeon," Benedict says after a while, smoke billowing from his mouth and nose, his head resting languidly on an upturned hand, "isolated and threatened with Tranquility. Then I agreed to be helpful, and they let me go."
A smirk twitches onto his face, and though it's not entirely happy, there's definitely an amusement bubbling up through the smoking of the herb. "If I could do blood magic I sure as shit wouldn't be here."

Edited 2019-05-07 06:59 (UTC)

Somewhere in there, Marcoulf has rearranged the angles on his scarecrow limbs into something more closely resembling comfort. The smoke has, however, done very little to make him an easier partner in conversation - but at least he's listening, head cocked toward the sound of Benedict speaking as he inhales another lungful of smoke.

At length, following a deeply contemplative pause and subsequent exhale, he says: "I thought that business was standard." And-- "Does your family not keep slaves either?"

"Blood magic?" says the woefully misinformed son of a blood mage, making a little face as he shakes his head, "not if you value your reputation. The Ancient Magisters-- like Corypheus-- aren't the most stellar example for people trying to run a country now." He inhales deeply, then exhales, thinking. "Besides, it probably gets everywhere."

Directing his gaze back to Marcoulf, his head lolls slightly to one side. "...they do keep slaves though. Everyone does. Everyone who..." Catching himself before he can be too loudly offensive, he glances away, then down, mumbling "..matters, anyway."

Cue one knowing noise and a long sidelong look that more or less translates to, 'Naturally.' He follows it by taking an equally extended, judgemental draw of smoke through the mouthpiece.

Edited 2019-05-08 03:34 (UTC)

Knowing that look well no matter who it's coming from, Benedict rolls his eyes and casually blows a breath of smoke back in Marcoulf's face. So There.

Huffing, he waves the smoke away with an easy turn of his hand. Tips his face away.

Anyway.

--Anyway what? Even all loose limbed and sitting on the ground, the pipe's cloth hose folded over his knee, he doesn't have much to say, does he? The room feels dense, the door thick, all of it removed somehow from the space past it in a way that isn't... it's not comforting, but it is fine. He thinks he doesn't mind the detachment of it, but it doesn't change that neither of them has much at all to say. Not really.

"It doesn't seem like you'd really need blood magic to be away from here if you felt like going."

Bene seems to mind far less that there's little to say-- in fact, rather than give an actual response to Marcoulf, he just giggles, tosses his head, and loses his balance. Slumping over, that only makes him laugh harder, but in the silent, restrained way of someone who's used to trying to be quiet.

Sitting back up being too much of an effort right now, instead he rolls onto his stomach, his face dangerously close to Marcoulf's lap, the end of the hose in his mouth and his head propped on one hand.
"I don't want to talk about that," he says, almost sweetly.

It's an effect somewhat ruined by the mouthpiece still in Benedict's mouth. Hard to sound like much of anything other than ridiculous around it. But, sure. He's apparently in a charitable mood, all flexing meandering points as he turns back to look at him. The lines of his face say, 'Oh, now you have opinions?' and 'Go on then.

"Not that you ever talk about anything," Bene continues, blowing the smoke out and not yet replacing the hose. "Big strong weasel man with his knives and his judging. Have you ever enjoyed anything in your life?"

He doesn't give Marcoulf time to respond. "I bet I could make you say something." Both hands are under his chin now, his feet up and crossed at the ankles like a little girl waiting for a bedtime story, his eyes fixed on Marcoulf's face.

Setting the mouthpiece betwen his lips, he sucks down a long breath of cool, cinnamon smoke. Yes, he's enjoyed things. But it feels like an abstract, unimportant point to contest and if he's certain of nothing else today it's that he's tired of fighting. All the want for it has drained out of him, water from a bucket with a hole punched into its side.

So instead of mounting any objections, he regards Benedict - all preening and useless coy smiles - and breathes out a lungful of smoke. "I'm don't doubt it," he says, all the connective tissue of this conservation leading in a direction he can't quite parse.

(If you care to punch him again then at least don't do it with your right hand, Marcoulf thinks dimly.)

There's just something about smoking this way that's different from tobacco: when the high kicks in, it makes one so marvelously languid, so sensitive, like the skin itself craves touch. And when one is young and full of anxiety, with few outlets for even friendly expression, let alone romantic or sexual, the effect can push a person into overdrive.

"Lean back then," Benedict instructs, giving Marcoulf a little push as he casually settles the top half of himself in the other man's lap, then begins to undo his pants with clumsy but pointed concentration.
Listen, some things get more difficult.

He sharpens, the shift of weight hacking abruptly through the mild haze of the smoke. All at once, his hand - not the one carefully coddled, salved and wrapped, and habitually fussed over in the long walk up from the Inquisition's would-be clinic - closes on Benedict's wrist. It's a vice grip. The line of his arm is all rigid behind it.

A series of questions: What are you doing? Do you think I'm an idiot? What's wrong with you? Only, those are all questions he's certain he knows the answer to. There's no point in asking any of them. He's a stupid boy used to the whole world being frightened of him, far from home in a place where no one seems to have the common sense to be. And, Yes, you're an idiot. There's no one who doesn't know it. And--

He forces the hand from his laces. It isn't at all physically difficult to do, and in the aftermath he's meant to say something - how bone tired he is, how he should be away, how he'd rather they never speak to each other at all actually -, and instead he simply does the work for him. Undoing his own pants and leaning back onto one elbow, Marcoulf does as told.

With a small gasp, Benedict freezes, even flinching unconsciously when Marcoulf grabs his wrist; he's in far better shape than he was the moment after he was struck, but the recent memory of it permeates the high and allows a pang of fear to rise.
But when no violence comes, he relaxes, albeit cooled on his intentions. His gaze drops-- perhaps this was a bad idea-- but when Marcoulf continues to unlace his trousers, it takes Bene somewhat by surprise. He looks up at him again, confused, a bit wary, in a way that suggests he's asking permission.

Which-- startles him just as effectively. Marcoulf stills, some prey animal gone quiet in the taiga shocked not by the prospect of the arrow but by the bowman first asking, 'Do you mind if I murder you here?'

No. Yes. The impulse toward either slews around incoherently, independent of the hum of the smoke murmuring under his skin. This is a bad idea - never mind all the right reasons like don't fuck mages, there's something repulsively familiar in this -, occurs to him at the same time some absurd thrill over being consulted does.

"Are you going to tell anyone about this?"

A rough, balking question.

A furrowed brow and shake of Bene's head is his answer. Why would he tell anyone? Though his wits are off gallivanting in a field of flowers somewhere, he senses the gravitas of the question and knows he would probably rather be dead than have anyone know this is happening.

It's almost enough to kill his mood, but he's still lying half-strewn in Marcoulf's lap, so close he can smell him, feel the man's bony legs, and he yearns so terribly for closeness.

Testingly, he moves his hand towards its target.

Some insane relief finds him then and digs its hooks in. Not that it changes the mortified parts, it just makes them less-- keen. It's fine, says something practiced at saying it. You wanted something for yourself; well, here you have it.

There's no trace of easing under Benedict's weight - he's wired bowstring tight, some muscle in a thigh held tense beneath him -, but Marcoulf moves his own hand away from where he'd wrenched open the lacings. He doesn't jump when touched, either.

Fine. Good. Just put him out of his misery already.

So be it then.

The drug-driven libido takes over, and after a few cursory strokes with his hand for positioning and a testing of the waters (as it were), Benedict begins his ministrations with a practiced flair.

It occurs to him several times throughout that the person currently in his mouth is probably the last man in the world with whom he'd want to be seen, let alone what's actually happening: Marcoulf is strange-looking and not in a flattering way; he's surly, taciturn, weaselly, and has a generally poor, unwashed appearance about him that would make him repulsive on any other day, in any other time.

But he wouldn't have followed Benedict up to his room if he hadn't wanted to spend time with something, and until a few moments ago Bene had no idea how badly he just wanted to touch someone, to be recognizably good at something.

And he is. Wouldn't Mother be proud.

And thank the Maker for it, because otherwise where would they be? As it is, Marcoulf's all taut and brittle right until he starts to give - all quiet until his breathing shifts short - all mindful of his hands where they're set snarled against the edge of the cushion his own side. How much more stilted would any of this be if Benedict weren't so awfully keen?

And Marcoulf does say something after all - 'Easy, easy,' like he's trying to temper something only it's already slid through his fingers by the time he thinks of it. And there's an instant where his right hand, bandaged and dressed in that leather thick glove and too stiff to feel, hovers restlessly near without touching. And he isn't sure where any of it ranks among the witless things he's done lately, but he's certain it's all on the list.

He's still sure after. It also occurs to him that the mouthpiece of the forgotten pipe has somehow wandered into jamming against his hip. With a small noise of breathless irritation, Marcoulf blindly wrenches the metal out from under his side and discards it elsewhere with a heavy thump.

Letting himself get lost in the process, there's a part of Benedict that wishes for more: a rough hand in his hair, a more forceful reaction in general, but Marcoulf is almost suspiciously restrained.

Pulling away before anything ends up in his mouth that he doesn't want there (or on his face, or anywhere else unsanitary), Bene snatches the handkerchief from his pocket and catches the result of his labor, only to wad it up and discard it on the floor about a foot away as he rolls off the man's lap and picks up the hose again.

He's lying on his back now, taking another drag from the pipe, his eyes glassy as he stares at the ceiling. Well, that just happened. Nobody seems any better or worse for it.

Which is fine. Not everything has to be about something or for any reason. It's fine, he thinks as he lays out in the quiet after, to just do something. Anything. It's fine not to think much about anything after - the study the ceiling and think about the no-feeling buzz in his fingertips, and not much else.

At length, he says: "Do you want--" and then stops, realizing he isn't sure what he's asking. Me to touch you? To say something? A proper cigarette that stings?

Lolling his head back to look at Marcoulf, Bene shrugs one shoulder, expelling a breath of smoke as he does so. "No," he muses flatly, fidgeting around until he's lounging more comfortably, "...and that didn't happen."

There's a restlessness beneath his artificial torpor, he can feel it trying to claw its way out. He must have made a mistake, doing something like that with someone who didn't even seem to care, who maybe hadn't even wanted it. If it gets out that Benedict Artemaeus will go down on anyone, his reputation will be ruined-- at least, what's left of it to ruin.

It's not like he's disappointed.

"All right," he agrees, after a fixed moment of quiet. What else is he meant to say? Eventually, he begins to relace his trousers.

It's almost as though he were never there. Benedict continues to stare at the ceiling, smoking contemplatively and making no move to get up or do anything else. What else is there to do, even? Kiss? Hardly. Talk about their feelings? That moment, if it were ever going to happen, has come and gone.

Now it's time to languish in-- and simultaneously try to ignore-- how sad this is.

[open] the way it feels to be just anyone

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cw: wow, everything

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