[open] far from my mother's home

[altusimperius]

WHO: Benedict and you
WHAT: October catch-all
WHEN: throughout Harvestmere
WHERE: Kirkwall dungeon/gay baby jail
NOTES: will add if necessary

For Riftwatch members in good standing, there's a built-in captive audience residing in a cell below the Kirkwall mage tower. One barred window peeks out onto the dreary courtyard, and on the opposite wall an interior door opens onto a dark, torchlit hallway, a bench placed on the wall facing in for the comfort of guests and interrogators.

Inside the cell, every day is the same. Sometimes Benedict is sleeping on the little bed supported by chains from the wall, sometimes he's pacing, sometimes he's standing on his toes to rest his chin on the windowsill, hands gripping the bars to keep himself upright, starved for any form of stimulation whatsoever.

Increasingly, he can be found sitting or lying on the floor of his cell, staring at the ceiling or fiddling with the straw scattered on the floor, bending and twisting it in such a way that, on closer inspection, he might be trying to figure out how to weave it.

Visitors will find him quite receptive, even excited to see them. Unless they're Flint.

Comments

[altusimperius]

That name is like a dash of cold water, and Benedict’s expression reflects as much.
“Leander,” he repeats in a hiss, “what— what does he want with it?”

Some part of him already knows, and it turns his stomach.

[keenly]

Colin gives a little shrug. "He gets off on having a little power. My suggestion is we don't go looking for it. If he takes it out in front of you, don't react. Things like that. Eventually it'll get boring for him, I hope. Meanwhile I'll...try to think of something better. Something he wants more than that."

[altusimperius]

A little power: that’s the understatement of the year. Gripping his upper arms, Benedict hunches forward, his stomach twisting in knots.
He had to know, somehow, how precious it was. He took the simplest object of the lot- the lot of Benedict’s things, things he had no intention of forfeiting, things he didn’t even get to see when he came back.
Things bought and traded by the people he knows. And this one—

He’s filled with a rage so powerful but so impotent that he simply buries his face in his hands, quivering from the effort it takes to suppress an outburst.

[keenly]

That's a surprise. Colin reaches out to try to console Benedict with a touch on the shoulder.

"I'm sorry." He doesn't know if he's making Benedict upset, or Leander. "But I don't...what's with this box?"

[altusimperius]

At first inclined to pull away, Benedict lets Colin touch him, but only barely.

“Did you ever know Kit?” he asks, parting his hands enough to speak through them.

[keenly]

Colin shakes his head. "I think I've heard of him. He was...treated in the Darktown clinic."

[altusimperius]

“Treated,” Benedict repeats bitterly, and shakes his head, lowering his hands.
“He couldn’t be saved. He was stabbed by some random fuck and bled to death like a rat in the gutter.”
There’s vehemence in his tone, a stage beyond his occasional self-pitying whine.

“When he was alive, he would come to visit me here. I’d just arrived, caught up with the wrong people, people who didn’t care if I lived or died. He had no reason to, but.”

His words take a turn for the melancholy, and he folds his hands, watching them wearily. “He would play cards with me, and share his cigarettes, and he made me a box so I could roll and keep my own. It’s. ...it was. The only thing I had to remember him by.”

He turns away, looking toward the window, or perhaps just hiding his face from Colin, not wanting him to see the actual emotion behind his upset.
“Now I’ve fucking lost it.”

[keenly]

There's a long pause as Colin processes this. He remembers how it felt to stumble through the streets of Denerim only to see a new house replacing his family's, and hear the news that they had been dead for years, the house burned down by darkspawn. He didn't have one thing to remember them by. He lets out a breath.

"His memory doesn't belong to that box," he says gently. It just seems like a terrible idea to keep playing Leander's game. Things are things, and Colin doesn't like being in the middle. He had quite enough of that earlier this year, with Alexandrie and Byerly.

[altusimperius]

Having no such context of his own, it’s difficult for Bene to see Colin’s reassurance as anything but callous; he’s the one in the cell, after all, and by now there’s no hope of returning to his home even if he is ever allowed to leave.
There was the one meaningful, attainable object, and now to find out that Leander has it is like a kick in the gut. A very purposeful one.

“It had to be him,” Benedict grumbles, as if Colin hadn’t said anything, “I wonder if he knew about it, before-...”
Screwing up his mouth, he silences himself. There’s a lot to unpack in what happened that morning, and he isn’t sure Colin needs to hear about it. For his own sake?

[keenly]

Colin's brows tic upward. "Before?"

If Benedict knows something that could help, he would like to know. Even if it somehow gives context to this increasingly hopeless-seeming task.

[altusimperius]

“Before he.”
Benedict halts, clearly deliberating. Colin is his friend, yes, he has learned by now not to question that.
But allegiances can shift, and there are some things too humiliating to entrust even to a friend, as far as he’s concerned.

But now he’s already half-said it, and if Colin perceives him to be lying about anything, he’ll be down the one friend he’s managed to make.
Since Kit, that is.

“...found me.” He tucks a strand of hair behind his ear, oily and unpleasant to the touch.

[keenly]

Leander found Benedict? Found him where? Found him and then did what? The last thing Colin should do is fill in blanks or make guesses.

"He found you?"

[altusimperius]

With a deep sigh, Benedict nods.
“I was... afraid to come back, so I just. Hung around Kirkwall for a while.” Go on, his tone seems to say, call me a pathetic idiot, I already know.

“He saw me, one night. And followed me.” He remembers how sweetly Leander had implored that he stay, how genuine his concern had been. Seemed?
“He put me up in an inn room. Gave me food, let me take a bath, let me sleep. Left clothes out for me.”

He folds his hands between his knees, a nervousness overtaking him. He isn’t certain anyone would disagree with what Leander chose to do next, but that doesn’t make it easier for him to accept, not in that deep and instinctive part of his psyche that knows what decent people do and don’t.
He chews the inside of his cheek, reluctant to finish the story. The only thing more horrible than what happened is the likelihood that he deserved it.

[keenly]

A honey trap. Colin suspects it, especially given the way Leander controlled their conversation. His hand reaches out to nudge Benedict's.

"It's all right," he urges. "What happened next?"

[altusimperius]

The touch elicits a light shiver.
“In the morning, we were— he was lying next to me,” he mumbles, feeling all the more rotten for relating this to Colin, someone with whom he’s shared a bed.
“Then he. Held me down, and forced me to drink magebane.” His skinny shoulders hunch nearly past his ears.

Perhaps anyone would have done the same, but that same part of him as before doubts that the average person would have bothered to cultivate trust first, to make the betrayal so total instead of simply doing the job.

[keenly]

The story makes Colin feel cold. It's only a word away from things that have happened to him, similar enough that his hands are already shaking. So this is about more than a dead friend's gift. It's also about Leander, of all people, possessing the last thing Benedict treasures. That cigarette box is far more loaded than Colin imagined.

"And then?" he asks in a faint whisper, gaze distant, sensing old memories and trying not to look.

[altusimperius]

Shrugging one shoulder, Benedict doesn’t look up.
“Left me there. Until Lex— Lady de la Fontaine arrived and gave me a bit of lyrium, so i could move again.”
A mercy.

“She let me turn myself in.”

[keenly]

Colin stands up from the bench, carding fingers through his hair as he paces the length of the cell, digesting, trying to keep memory from overtaking present reality. It could have gone much, much worse for Benedict, for which Colin is relieved, but just knowing what could have happened is muddling things. Leander remains both petty and cruel. How much did Lexie know of this? She knew enough to carry lyrium with her. Occasionally he is reminded that she is accustomed to the cutthroat antics she tries to protect him from, and none of those reminders before now have chilled him so. It would be easier to think Leander downplayed the manner in which the poison was administered, but Colin can't be certain of it unless he hears the words from Lexie.

He thinks, and thinks, and fervently thinks his way out of the way of the dark pit in his mind, following the trail of clues toward epiphany so that the thing making him shake won't make him need to find an isolated space to ride out that terrible storm again. He finally stops pacing, hand on his forehead and two tears trickling down his face.

"We'll get that box," he says. "I've known worse bullies than this one, and I've made deals more dangerous."

[altusimperius]

Colin's reaction isn't what Benedict would have predicted, but he doesn't know how to respond to it: he doesn't even know how to respond to his own, to be fair. He's never had any reason to perceive himself as imperiled in any way that isn't mortal or just, to a much lesser extent, humiliating; being put in a cage and having no autonomy over his own life falls into the latter category, but will never come close to the kind of violation Colin is imagining, or that Benedict would have experienced had his assailant's intentions been different.

He watches Colin pace, notes his tears, and considers that this may have perhaps gone deeper than he thought possible.
"You're..." he begins to observe, utterly unused to asking after people's emotional state, "...why are you..?"

[keenly]

"Nothing. I'm not." Colin briskly scrapes the tears away with his hands, tucks his hair behind his ears, and forces a smile at Benedict, feeling so incredibly stupid. The smile fades quickly. He doesn't think he should make Benedict aware how much danger he might have been in, though he doesn't think Leander is anything so base as a rapist. It's less what might have happened to Benedict than what did happen to Colin, and that's what makes him feel stupid. This isn't about him, and here he is, making it about him without knowing how to stop.

"I'm just really glad you're safe," he concludes at last.

[altusimperius]

There’s something else in play here, but Bene can’t put his finger on it. Still furrowing his brow at Colin, he stands, going towards the bars to wrap his fingers around them and peer out.

“I’m not,” he says, without rancor, “and I don’t think I ever will be. But.” He raises an eyebrow.
“What is it?”

[keenly]

This is a side to Benedict Colin didn't expect to see. By all appearances, he has looked away from his navel long enough to be concerned for a friend. Colin wishes it was about anything else, but the more he fights it, the more he'll wind up pushing Benedict away. He shuts his eyes for a moment to collect his words.

"What he did was wrong," he begins. He doesn't want to downplay that just because he's had worse experiences. "The way you described it just. Brought back some old memories."

[altusimperius]

Colin is being weird and cagey, and he's not even the one in the cage. Benedict extends one long arm to tug at the fabric of Colin's sleeve through the bars, a small bid to get his attention and make him open his eyes.

"What old memories?" he asks, as easily as if they're discussing their favorite food. It occurs to him he doesn't know that much about Colin at all.
"In the Circle?"

[keenly]

Colin knows he mentioned this to Benedict before they slept together, but only in the vaguest terms possible. He nods and opens his eyes. The hand attached to the sleeve Benedict tugs at tenses but doesn't pull his arm away. He doesn't want Benedict to think he's being rejected before he explains.

"Yes. In the Circle." Maker, most people are self-interested enough not to pursue it like this, but he supposes Benedict literally has nothing else to do. "A Templar, in the Circle. Remember, before we went to bed together, I said it had only ever been cruel before. For a second, I wondered if Leander might have been cruel to you in the same way."

The tears are back, but Colin isn't overreacting to them. He simply dabs at them with his other sleeve.

[altusimperius]

It takes Benedict an embarrassingly long time to realize what Colin means. He lets go of his sleeve, his eyes widening in an expression of mild shock.

"Oh."

That's something that happens to unfortunate slaves at the hands of bored Altus men who get drunk and brag about it to their equally drunk friends; Benedict never liked the sound of it, has never enjoyed cruelty for its own sake. Even against a slave.

It makes him wonder what he'd have done, what he would be feeling now, if Leander had been that evil. He shudders and pushes the thought from his mind, already certain it'll haunt him later.
"What happened to the Templar?" he asks, and fears he already knows the answer. But mages, though they're historically treated poorly here, aren't slaves. They have some rights.