faderift | III. SEMI-CLOSED.

The fight appears to leave him visibly, although perhaps not all of it; the squaring of his shoulders slack a little and his glance past Adelaide is indirect. If there's a genuine apology waiting for her or the assistant, it's knotted up in pride and whatever other trappings exist within him, and perhaps not yet fully quickened.

"You didn't," he concedes, after a moment.

Sure enough, the assistant returns with a leather-bound folder, of kinds, containing loose leaf parchment, which does indeed seem to be a little haphazardly stored away, but not without care. Dorian takes it from her, flipping it open, and though his jaw tenses in irritation, he doesn't renew the verbal lashing the girl appears to brace herself for. He glances at her and sort of sees it, and forces out a prim, dismissing, "Thank you," and closes it again.

She sort of looks to Adelaide to see if it's well and good to leave again before she'll do so, gladly.

There is a tense moment as Dorian flips through the ledger- but it is honestly better than Adelaide expected. Some care was given to the storing of his research and while finding every book he'd seen fit to pull from the shelves before he'd left may take some time, the bulk of it could be dome without harassment. He manages to be civil, Adelaide motions for the girl to move along. She has this.

What it is, precisely, she has? She isn't all that certain. But half of authority is pretending you know well enough what it is you are doing even if you do not; the rest is following through on that assumption.

Once they are alone she murmurs, low and not quite chiding. "Dorian."

That was inappropriate, you know better, what in Andraste's name crawled up your ass and died, this is a public facility not your personal salon- a myriad of options and precious few of them would end in anything but an argument. "What is this about?"

He has no particular desire to resume his research immediately, judging by the way he buckles the ledger closed again, but he is also reluctant to answer that question. If Adelaide hadn't shown up, it's probable he would have continued on his day and then reflected during a rare moment between 'hungover' and 'drunk' that his behaviour had been unworthy, and maybe wordlessly gifted the girl a pot of ink or a new pen, or something, and called it done.

Here, the mood motivating his behaviour still bristles through his nerves, and Dorian has to concede he does know better now rather than later.

"The short answer? I terrorise innocent library assistants for sport," he says, droll and sarcastic, a slightly caustic return to the usual. It's what will circulate, and it's what Dorian will let circulate. "The long, well-- I'd need a drink first." The invitation is so casual and flippant that it could just not be one at all, as if giving Adelaide an excuse to ignore it and end this cleanly. (Not that it might prevent Dorian slinking back to her later; he can feel the source of his personal misery like a wound that needs purging.)

"I am going to have to give you a low score for a distinct lack of amusing insults. You can do better than that." She's heard it, his talent for the wickedly and creatively perverse is nothing short of astounding- but it only truly works when there's some humor behind it that isn't malicious. Irritation breeds contempt and the last thing he or anyone in this library needs is a brooding Altus scowling at the library assistants.

Unless, of course, she left him with one of the Tranquil but that doesn't seem terribly wise.

"..." She could very well walk away, leave him to his misery- the situation has been diffused, she's done her due diligence, there is no cause for her to tend to his bruised whatever it is that gnaws upon him like a needling beast. He is not her student, not her responsibility but he is... a friend. After a fashion. That more than anything else has her sighing and motioning for him to follow her. "I may have one good bottle left."

This feels a little like he's following her with his tail between his legs, but he can't very well do much else when she meets him halfway and ushers him to follow with the word good appending promise of wine. Dorian keeps his notes with him to prevent further library mishap, and follows.

(If Felix weren't dying, perhaps this burden would fall with him. If Evelyn were still alive, perhaps the same could be said of her. Hopefully, Benevenuta doesn't fall off a rampart any time soon, or Adelaide trip into a volcano.)

It is a short walk to the room- her students within settling in for the day- Roul takes one look at her and one look over her shoulder before reaching behind a wooden case and offering her a leather bag. Within? Three bottles and two glasses. From there it's on to the vault- at this time of day it is quiet enough to earn them some privacy, with warmth they wouldn't have gotten in the garden.

Without further comment or question she pulls out two of the chairs usually reserved for meetings, motions for him to sit, and uncorks the first bottle. The glasses she fills a bit more than one normally would but- well. This seems like a particular sort of day.

There's a soft laugh slithered out between closed lips as the arrangement settles, but Dorian doesn't complain or comment in a way that might insinuate he is remotely capable of feeling awkward; he sits down with the languid possession of a large cat, tossing the leather-bound notes onto a flat surface nearby.

He takes the generous helping of wine in hand.

"I oscillate between being two kinds of drunk," he says. "Maudlin, and libertine. Given my proclivities, you'll only have to withstand the former."

"How good to know I shall only have to fear for Raoul's virtue rather than my own." Such things were not quite so uncommon in Orlais, nor were they terribly uncommon in the Spire. But perhaps there is a reason he opened with such a statement? She settles back in her chair, sipping from her glass of wine. "I had thought perhaps you and Benevenuta..."

They are often in one another's company, it is not so far a stretch of the imagination to assume the Northern mages of the Inquisition would find comfort wherever possible.

It would be impossible to exist in Skyhold and be unaware as to the difference in standards surrounding matters of sexual preference -- that being, no one seems to care. It's not an alien concept. Indeed, no one seems to care in Tevinter, either, save for if you're of a certain caste, save for if you insist on not keeping it in private, save for if you have no desire to live a life of lying, save for a great many other qualifiers that makes Dorian still feel a twinge when he outs himself to a woman who, like so many southerners, doesn't care.

He does have to smile, though, at this last part.

"She's a lovely woman, who'll terrify whatever man her family finally herds her into wedlock with. My family would still object to such a union, even with her titles. Bloodlines--"

He pauses. "It's difficult to explain to southerners, even ones with noble breeding. Especially, even, because you'd likely think you already understand. Marriage as a duty, good breeding, wealth and inheritance. Tevinter is another animal. I have my reasons for getting away, and this past trip to Redcliffe-- well, there, it caught up with me. I didn't expect it."

She could speak. Attempt to ask after the specifics as she, for all her noble breeding, is terribly removed from that entire world by the dint of being a mage; something that Dorian isn't spared in the slightest. Apparently it only makes things all the more complicated. But this seems difficult enough without her offering the opportunity for tangents and she sits back instead; listening. Much as she would for one of her troubled students in the Spire, though with a great deal more sympathy and wine.

There hadn't been wine for those conversations.

"An unpleasant shock?"

"My father had claimed to have sent a retainer to meet me in Redcliffe, and bring me to him. He'd asked Benevenuta to lead me there in ignorance, although of course, she told me. I expect that he had partway counted on that, because there wasn't any retainer. He was there in person. I might have been just as unpleasantly shocked if he'd arrived at the gates of Skyhold."

Dorian pauses, there -- maybe musing over that mental image, allowing himself a twinge of an almost-smile -- and takes a generous pull of wine. "I'd lost my temper, but endured the rest. To answer your question more directly, I suppose I'd been looking for an excuse to do it again."

His tone seems to recognise the shittiness inherent of that, even if the actual words don't shape out an apology. A vein of irritation still present.

"If you are going to snipe and harass someone after enduring that you may as well do so to someone that is more or less required to endure said harassment out of some misplaced fondness for you." And at the moment it truly is misplaced; she's been accused of being prickly and ill tempered in the past but at least she'd never had the gall to lash out at those that truly couldn't help it or had no means of snapping back.

Appearances, after all, matter. Even in the Spire.

Still. She tops him off before he's finished his first glass as that? Sounds like less of an 'unpleasant shock' and more 'ugly family reunion.' "Benevenuta had asked if I'd spoken to you; I suppose this is why."

"That's one way to look at it."

Losing his mind in the library hadn't exactly been a calculated choice, but he doesn't want to speak to it directly if he doesn't have to. Dorian tips his glass obligingly at the top up, watching the dark red trickle from bottle to glass rather than the woman doing the pouring. "Funny thing, he said we were alike. Too much pride." He looks back up at her, taking back his glass. "Once, I'd have taken that as a compliment." And sipping again, swift on the back of the last.

Not just any compliment. He'd have been stupidly happy. "I've disappointed you," he adds, a sudden shift of attention.

"I am often disappointed." She doesn't bother corking the bottle. Either he or she will have need of it and likely the other two before this conversation is over- another reason to have this talk in the vault. Less likely for them to be seen or heard before, during, or after their conversation. Gentler, in as much as she has the capacity for social gentleness and as much as Dorian would care for it (he doesn't), she adds. "As I have impossible standards, do not hold it as a badge of honor."

It doesn't make him particularly special, disappointing her, nor is it so great a failure that she'll hold it against him. He is human. A fascinating, wildly intelligent and charming human, yes, but still only human.

"Why is it, precisely, your father attempted to ambush you in Redcliffe?" As a Magister he couldn't very well come to Skyhold, that much she knows. But what had his business been?

Not so terrible, then. He can often recognise when he's gone too far with someone, usually when he's already sped across that line and waving them goodbye. Her humour is brisk and hard edged and Dorian is reminded immediately that it's among the things he likes about her. He can feel, a little, his own bridling loosen.

Especially as she eases the already difficult path and asks the question.

"He wanted to talk to me," he says, low, a little cynical in his mild disbelief. "And go so far as to ask for my forgiveness."

Which he hasn't given, if the pause that follows is to be of any indication, a pause punctuated by another sip of wine. "Bloodlines," he says again, looking at his glass of wine again rather than at her. "I've had a betrothal since I was born, a woman picked not for her assets but her breeding, to cultivate continued perfection." There's no trace of ego, there; a hint of distaste, if anything. "That's an old argument, and not why I fled south. When he thought I might make something of myself despite forever ducking that obligation, the letters littered with hints and suggestions tapered off.

"When he thought I was only going to bring about disaster for the Pavus legacy, he took matters into his own hands. The last I saw of him -- prior to Redcliffe -- was after his disastrous attempt to fix me."

She has students, here. Those she is beholden to, those she must stand before as a fixed point in this chaotic storm. Dorian has never been one of those people. Even at his urging for her to step forward and be reasonable he has only ever seen her at her most human. The fight, the garden, dealing with Felix. It is not so long a list of those she can be human around that she'd gladly drop one.

Aside from that he's terribly charming, in his way, and thoroughly intelligent. When he's not giving her some manner of headache he's more than good company and a source for decent wine.

She remains silent while he speaks- waits him out with the barest gesture that yes, she's aware, she's attentive. The weight of words is heavy in the air, the taste of them bitter- twisting to absolute rot at that last bit. 'Fix him.' The avenues by which such a thing can be attempted are few and far between but the most common-

"Blood magic. Your own father intended to use blood magic to fix you?!" She'd met his ire and he's seen her frustrated. Seen her angry with grief and fear; but this? A whole new shade- the temperature in the Vault plummets- frost coating her fingertips, winding her breath in thick clouds between them for the moment her temper well and truly spikes. It passes soon enough, but- "That absolute sack of shit."

Dorian has a famously good opinion of himself, never slow to inform people of his talents, his charm, his looks, his intelligence, and yet, while he doesn't so much as startle at the edge of her ire, the look he does lift back at her does seem a touch surprised. It should not be -- he knows how repugnant that southerners especially view such magics -- but

he's only ever told one person, and Benevenuta channels her passions differently.

His magics run naturally warmer, and with a little touch of good humour despite himself, he dances the fingers on his free hand, little flames encircling his knuckles as the warmth winds through the blanketing chill, even as said frostiness is on its way out, a strange sort of acknowledging mingling of one spell with the other. His mild show of magic dims too.

"He hadn't always been. He had always taught me that it was a low form of magic. A last resort of the desperately weak."

And he falls silent, at that, the hand he'd summoned warmth with closing into a loose fist as if literally taking reins of whatever turmoil is brewing beneath the surface. If only anger wasn't so exhausting, he could just be angry all the time, and not this. Conflicted in a way he likely would not be if he was the one listening to this, rather than the one being listened to.

"And he would be so desperate to change you to suit his own desires? Does he not know the risks involved- no. He is a Magister, of course he does, and he thought them acceptable." That does not do well for her opinion of the man. There are cultural notes here she doesn't understand, the emphasis on bloodlines, the perfect child; politically there is a bit of that in Orlais but the matches are made about influence rather than offspring more often than not and even then-

She is a mage. Such things are not her concern.

Jaw locked and teeth grinding she slips through her exercises, breathing slow and steady to center herself and draw in that chill. "He is the worst sort of fool."

The desperately selfish sort. Nothing good ever comes of them.

It's strange -- had Adelaide not understood, or attempted to defend Halward, well, Dorian would likely be angry and say the things she's saying now. As it stands, there is a curious urge to defend him. To parrot the unlikely claims that he had acted in Dorian's interest only. He manages to stop himself with a strange, abortive sound in his chest that might have been a laugh if he'd been in the mood for laughing.

"Better dead," he agrees, as to the risks, the knowledge thereof. "Or a drooling vegetable. Most men like me are content to do their duty, keep everything else behind closed doors. It's one thing to bed another man, but not done to love one."

He is silent, for a moment, then; "I didn't think I'd ever see him again. And I was prepared to fight whatever retainer he'd sent for me if necessary -- I'd been unprepared, the last time."

"...last time." There is a story there- the fact that he was prepared to fight it? She-

No. Wine. More wine. For both of them. She tops off their glasses and takes a deep swig of hers, somber and silent in her protective outrage. When Dorian became someone she would feel this for- she's not quite sure. Somewhere between the garden and Felix and sniping in the library, most likely.

It's not a story he desires to recount in avid detail, just another humiliation to add to his impressive list. So, Dorian's explanation is short; "I refused to go home, and so he arranged to remove the element of choice from the equation. This, and then his attempt with blood magic. I'll tell you, it made for delicious scandal -- although, as far as I can tell, no one caught on to the bit about the ritual. I imagine my father bought that silence with an impressive sum.

"Still. Stories abounded. What will the wayward Pavus scion do next? What new disgrace can he possibly bring about this time?"

A slight gesture of his wine adds to the affect of lower house gossip.

And his hand lowers, that feeling of emptiness settling once more after joke is done. "I don't have to ask you don't repeat it. It's not anything I'm proud to have experienced."

"Why do I get the feeling he made some manner of commentary on the work you are doing with the Inquisition?" Because Dorian's father is, apparently, an ass. And it is the sort of bullshit she expects from such men and their temperaments; their disapproval as much a blessing as a wound. This is an ache she and Compassion cannot mend with magic- to be certain some mages can ease the hearts of those around them.

Adelaide is not in their number. But she does have wine, quite a bit of it, and a free afternoon.

"You have my word." And if there are a few things she's kept of her noble upbringing- it is that LeBlancs keep their word. "None shall hear it from me."

"You'd think I'd joined the circus," Dorian confirms, a little wry, in a way that for today has become increasingly sad. He had warned her. Maudlin.

He drinks.

And takes her seriously at her word in that he scarcely nods confirmation. "He thinks I'm only continuing to avoid responsibility, or him personally, but then, the Imperium at large thinks we're all a bunch of fearmongering fanatics. I came to do what I believed was right. If I wanted to run away from my father, I could do it in a manner that doesn't involve mountaineering."

"...To be fair, we have our moments." The fighting, the mischief, the songs in the tavern. She does not envy those that must mind the entirety of the Inquisition one bit. "And you do have the dramatic flair for it."

Watching him cast is one part show and two parts exasperation- she personally prefers quick, efficient gestures- not all this twisting and flourishing. But that, all of that is beside the point. "Somewhere a good deal warmer as well, I should think, if all you wished was to be away. There is all of Thedas to vanish to if you wished to be away."

This first part gets a sketch of a smile, but no comment. How seriously he takes the Inquisition is practically embarrassing and doesn't warrant closer analysis, but there's no denying simple truths. The things he does, and the friends he's made.

"I was staying with someone when he sent people for me," he confesses, a little further. "There was a scuffle, people died. What friends I had left in Tevinter, well, they don't want to get on the sharper end of the Pavus dynasty now that there's blood on the ground. But I still managed a level of comfort before Felix contacted me with what his father was doing in Redcliffe, with the southern mages, the Venatori, all that rot. I gave up everything I had to follow."

He tips his glass, dismissive of his own words. "I don't expect to be played even the smallest violin. People show up penniless at the gates of Skyhold every day. But it can, occasionally, begin to chafe when only a scattered handful of people seem to remember that about me, and to hear it from him, like I'm going through yet another phase. And he thinks he knows me."

III. SEMI-CLOSED.

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