[Open] Hello, my name is Elder Sara

[okayimin]

WHO: Sister Sara Sawbones and YOU
WHAT: The Chantry meant to send a nun to check up on all you sinners, but accidentally sent a doctor instead.
WHEN: Late Harvestmere, before Satinalia
WHERE: All over Kirkwall
NOTES: may or may not add leech hunting as a prompt at some point

i. Kirkwall Docks

Sawbones has largely managed to avoid boats since coming to the surface. Boats and large bodies of water. Two equally unnatural things that topsiders aren't even a little bothered over. She almost misses the Deep Roads.

Almost.

Currently, she's more concerned with avoiding the bustle of sailors and merchants while coping with how inexplicably different the ground feels once one gets off a ship. The clean white and bright red of the Chantry habit at least makes her clearly visible to anyone glancing around, but she's also about half the height of everyone else and can't seem to manage a straight line of movement.

"Pardon," she says with a grim set to her decidedly green face, not especially paying attention to whose knees she's run into so much as staying on her feet and moving forward.

ii. The Gallows

a. Library
Of course there's another boat. Because topsiders are obsessive with living on every surface that stays still long enough to build a foundation. But the Gallows are less depressing than the name implies and it has the most important thing any building could have: a library. Sawbones does the perfectly reasonable thing and heads straight there with a single minded sort of purpose. This is the first time she's had access to a library that isn't Chantry controlled and she means to get an idea of what volumes they have.

Which is why there's quite suddenly a tiny Chantry sister in full regalia standing on a stool that's been set on a table and pushed up to one of the taller bookcases. Don't worry about it.

b. the Gallows' Chapel
It is entierly possible the whole reason Sawbones was chosen to act as a more visible representative of the Chantry within Rift Watch is simply because the scattered members of the Kirkwall Chantry didn't want to keep staffing the Gallows' little chapel.

Their loss. It's a tidy little space and Sawbones likes it more for the amount of exposed stonework on the walls. The pews are the perfect height and width for when she's too sleep fogged to recall how to get back to the group quarters with the added bonus of not having a Reverend Mother showing up to yell at her.

She doesn't actually know how many faithful are in Rift Watch and how many of that number bother going to the little chapel at all, but it feels like a more secure spot than accidentally dozing off at a Dining Hall table.

iii. A Case of the Rattles

Unsurprisingly, the chill damp of dawn and dusk bring sickness. Particularly to those without the means to stay properly warm and dry. An excess of phlegm followed by a rattling cough in the chests of those with particularly weak constitutions is more than enough reason for to worry. It leaves those who practice a nonmagical form of medicine feeling the war time scarcities more keenly than ever. Sawbones in particular is especially bad tempered with anyone who's not a patient as she makes her rounds to and from High Town and Low Town.

a. High Town

Almost in spite of the chill weather, the gardens of High Town are still immaculately maintained. A few especially are having particular good luck with their roses. Sawbones has been making special visits to those gardens and has given up any pretense of subtlety. It is amazing what the Chantry habit and an air of knowing what's best can allow one to get away with, even if one isn't an especially accomplished liar.

For instance: "My, what lovely roses, Sister Eloise will love them." delivered in an almost monotone to no one in particular, as Sister Sara fits on a pair of gloves and immediately starts to snip off lengths of blooms and leaves with a pair of shears she pulled from her habit.

b. Low Town markets

Honey is another problem all together. "You're absolutely mad," Sister Sara says, with a significant pause that suggest she's trying very hard not to call the merchant worse, "It's honey, not liquid gold. We need it for medicine."

"Times are hard, Sister," the merchant says with an enormous amount of sympathy for someone selling tiny jars of honey at three times the markup, "There's a high demand for all manner of goods. I've got a family to feed, you know."

Anyone close at hand will see the incredibly novel sight of a dwarven Chantry Sister clearly contemplating acts of violence against the honey seller.

iv. Kirkwall Taverns

On any given night, there's a brawl. And on any given night, she can be found wading through the aftermath. She's tending a group of dwarves tonight, stitching closed the ugly gash on one's arm while he drinks liberally from a bottle. They all share the same snake like brand on their left cheeks.

"This would take half the time if you nug fucked dust heads would just go and see a fucking mage," she says, wiping away pooling blood so she can see her work more clearly.

"Mages is freaks, Sawbones," slurs one of the dwarves cheerfully, shaking a jar full of water and glistening black sludge.

"Mages don't need leeches. Now put those down before I decided to let them have a go at that shiner of yours." She is entierly ungentle when she finishes the stitches and starts wrapping the injury before turning her attention to whoever made the mistake of wandering to close, "Right, what do you need?"

WILDCARD

Comments

i

[doneisdone]

The knees belong to an unusually tall human woman, who looks down with the swift and certain air of someone about to unleash justice on a handsy idiot-- but the truth is about as far from that as she could have imagined.

She stares down at the dwarf for a moment, eyes narrowed. A Chantry dwarf?
There are weirder things, perhaps.

"Come for Riftwatch," she asks in a measured monotone.

[okayimin]

The staring is to be expected. At least whoever this is isn't given to ridiculous jokes or pet names the way Orlesians are. The question isn't expected at all.

"Yes," she says, gathering herself to look up (and up and up) at the woman without swaying too much, "My name is Sister Sara. I've been sent by the Reverend Mother Lucia to assist Kirkwall's Chanty and the faithful within Rift Watch."

There. At least she remembered the official line.

[doneisdone]

There couldn't be a living person farther than the type for ridiculous jokes or pet names.

Watching the girl levelly as she introduces herself, Teren can't help but give a little snort at her intentions-- well, good luck with that.

"Teren von Skraedder," she replies, extending a hand down. "I oversee the Grey Wardens in Riftwatch."

[okayimin]

Her eyes widen briefly and she hesitates before reaching up to shake the woman- the Grey Warden's hand.

"It's an honor to meet you, Warden von Skraedder," Sawbones says with a great deal of sincerity, "I've met two of your number before. I owe them a great deal." Her life, for whatever that was worth. For the good it would do them, likely dead themselves.

[doneisdone]

An honor. Well, now she has a good guess as to the girl’s origin.

“Orzammar?” Teren asks with the arch of an eyebrow. It’s the only place anyone ever really seems glad to see them, these days.

[okayimin]

"Formerly, yes," she says, the clarification important, "I met them in the Deep Roads."

Because there was only one reason the Grey Wardens went to the Deep Roads.

[doneisdone]

Teren simply nods at that, since she'd guessed as much.

"What brings you to the surface?" Based on what she knows of dwarves, certainly nothing good, but it's up to the girl whether or not she wants to answer.

ii; library

[taxonomy]

While not the tallest man about - certainly not within Riftwatch where he has spotted Qunari strolling about and something something expectations and reality, that one time he had to hustle out of Seheron and will not speak of it thank you very much good day - he's respectable. Taller than the average person and given the lankiness, Tavin no doubt comes off just a smidge taller again.

A small lizard is resting atop his head. He does not contribute much to the height department beyond a tired but regal bearing, eyes swivelling independently.

Growing up the middle child of three, there were always schemes, always something going on and Tavin's returning a volume that falls firmly into the complete disgrace category when a cry of alarm escapes. Just sort of slips out his mouth before he can catch it, not unlike the upsetting noises deer make that destroy any illusion of grace or majesty or whatever else someone has in mind when they stick deer on things.

"Are you-- I don't mean to intrude but I've seen this before, well, not with you obviously but from where I am now and as the one in the chair and it's ended painfully. The ego worst of all but not always the most easily fixed." A thick Nevarran accent, hands fluttering with the urge to do something without encroaching upon the space but reaching for something in grandfather's study and I'll catch you Tavin and did Bogdan catch him not he did not, a crushing betrayal.

[okayimin]

Here's something Sawbones has never quite gotten used to: nervous chatter. You just didn't see it in Dust Town. Not for long anyhow, not before it sickened into something else. Still novel to find it on the surface, in full grown adults.

Full grown adults with lizards on their heads. Sawbones eyes the both of them with a slight curl to the corner of her mouth.

"Easy," she says, more instruction than anything, "I'm an old hat to this stuff. You lot build things too tall." And for his sake, she'll plop down on the stool and slide off the little table to the floor, not especially graceful, but she lands on her feet anyway.

[taxonomy]

"I have to claim the opposite, I mean, well," he gestures to himself since there's plenty of him after all so sometimes a chair is uncomfortable after a time, certainly pews in the Chantry.

Sometimes smack your head off a doorway if you're staying in rustic little taverns where the villagers tend to be on the shorter side (villagers always are, you just tend not to say because that's impolite, isn't it?) or condemn yourself to cold legs in the bed or a sore back the next morning depending on how you sleep.

"We've ladders for some collections though I'd imagine they're also built for a certain height and build so finding your way up, fine, on the way down with books, less use of the hands when you miss a step? Oh the way the heart drops faster than a stone down a dark well." He laughs, jostling the lizard who is removed from his perch back to his shoulder. "Ah forgive me, Tavin Sokolov, zoologist and draconologist, you must be Sister..."

There's a lack, after all, at least here in Kirkwall in Riftwatch for all that this sprang from the Inquisition and to see a Sister even if she can only be dwarven is a comfort.

[okayimin]

Definitely a talker. Her slight smile has a bemused cast to it. Most people don't throw that many words at her at any given time.

"The steps are a bit far apart for me, yes," she says, holding out her hand, "Sister Sara. I was sent by the Chantry. It's good to meet you, Msser Sokolov. If you don't mind me asking, why do you have a lizard?"

Topsiders were strange and Sawbones has accepted that for the most part, but she's mostly sure that carrying about lizards is not a standard practice.

[taxonomy]

File under: widowed grandfather's doted upon favourite.

"Orzammar's Chantry or elsewhere, I wouldn't want to assume but it's been-- honestly longer than I planned last time I went to Orzammar but trying to get these things to line up and have everything in order when they're doing a good excursion into the Deep Roads...it happens. And please, call me Tavin? No one calls me Sokolov." Actually some people do but those are usually people doing financials and scholarly things and that Tavin is not the fun Tavin, that's business Tavin who has to remember that yes he is very much good Nevarran stock.

Whatever that means.

"Oh, my friend here? He's a bit of a stowaway who got into some of my kit back in what I'm guessing was Seheron and I didn't realise until we were on the boat. I couldn't pass up the opportunity for long term study and he's not bad company. I say he, bit hard to tell with lizards."

A fly buzzes past. A huge tongue shoots out, snatches it. The chewing is exaggerated for such a tiny beast as Tavin smiles, as if this is a perfectly normal thing in his life.

[okayimin]

More words, all at once. Almost shocking ones, except she wouldn't be even a little surprised if any Ozammar Chantry division was also looking into the Deep Roads. Even now in the bare aftermath of the dissolution of the Circles and perhaps especially because of Corypheus, the Chantry was hungry for lyrium.

She doggedly picks out the things to respond to from the deluge of sentences. "I'm with the Orlesian Chantry, though I am from Ozammar. I didn't realize they were doing scholarly expeditions into the Deep Roads." She sounds grim and there's not really any getting around that. More importantly, the lizard... "He's a strange looking creature. I'm still very unfamiliar with surface creatures. Are reptiles your specialty, Tavin?"

III

[gottakeeponejumpahead]

"Y'know what's funny? Those signs change."

Came the calm and yet utterly cheeky reply from an elf who just seemed to appear at the corner. An apple at his lips, and he took a big juicy bite. He beamed at the Chantry sister, before he nodded to the little jars of honey.

"Just depends on who asks."

[okayimin]

A loaded silence stretches after he speaks, Sawbones' gaze boring into the merchant before she rounds on the elf.

"Really?" It's not actually a question. "Who needs to ask to get a jar of honey at a reasonable price?" That is and there's even a great deal of strained politeness over the irritation that's radiating off her.

[gottakeeponejumpahead]

"Oh, that's simple."

Adasse takes another bite of his apple. In his days before the Inquisition - and now Riftwatch - he would have charged a copper or two for this information. Since he's a Much Better Moral Elf who is Married and all, he just cuts right to the quick to help out another Riftwatcher.

"You just need to go to Guard Captain Aveline." He gives a baleful look to the merchant. "Who, if memory serves, has been laying it down pretty hard on price gauging. Considering there's still a war on, and all."

[okayimin]

Well, that does the trick nicely. Sawbones buys five jars at the normal price from the suddenly deeply irritated merchant. She does not tell him it serves him right or call him a bronto kicked stone deaf nug fucker. Wanting to be a good Chantry representative and all.

She gives the elf who assisted her a grave nod, "Thanks, I owe you." She sounds entierly too serious for it to be a throw away line.

[gottakeeponejumpahead]

"S'all right, Sister. We're all on the same side, anyways."

Adasse tipped an invisible hat, with a breezy smile. Honestly, small tricks compared to what he usually does.

"You need anything else from around here?" He can't let this nice lady get duped twice.

[okayimin]

"This was all I needed for now," she says, adjusting the basket of honey jars, "But if you hear about anyone selling blankets at a decent cost, I'd appreciate you finding me. Good blankets, mind you."

If she saw another moth eaten rag getting passed off as a decent blanket, she really might fight someone.

ii chapel

[nonvenomous]

Dick Dickerson’s appearance in the chapel is as inevitable as it is strangely set. He’s here late at night, alone, seated in a pew near the rear of the arrangement. His robes are dark and conservative; a leather journal occupies the seat next to him, currently closed and bound.

He has an elbow hooked over the back of the bench, at comfortable odds with his otherwise impeccable posture. His focus is forward, lost in a middle distance mix of the hour and the faint stink of wine about him.

He has the air of someone who might belong in a church.

Just not this one.

[okayimin]

She very much would like to sleep. Up early and more than half the day spent running all over Kirkwall, attending to all the little errands of being an initiate sister without a centralized Chantry. And of course, there was a brawl, which she was called to deal with the aftermath.

She's already composing a list of things that ought to be done before sunrise (leeches, she really does need to get leeches) when she realizes there's someone actually in the chapel.

Sawbones represses a sigh and scuffs her feet on the bare stone of the floor to announce her presence before she speaks, "Good evening, brother. What brings you here so late?"

[nonvenomous]

His ear turns to the scuff of her feet, but he waits for her voice to lean into a look back at her, allowing her the pretense of a chance to shuffle “unnoticed” back away into the night.

“Hello,” he says. His eyes are clear, the crook of his brow apologetically friendly.

“I’m here to learn about your lord and savior.”

[okayimin]

Ah nug shit, he would be.

Once again, Sawbones doesn't sigh or draw away. She knows her duty. Sawbones steps forward, bowing her head politely to the man. Topside titles are, as always, an utter misery, Sawbones errs on the side of piety: "Then welcome, brother. I'm afraid we don't currently have a Reverend Mother in attendance at this chapel-" Or Kirkwall, for that matter. "But I will help how I can. How've you come to never have heard of the Maker?"

Presumably it would be rude to ask if he's one of those so called Rifters, though she does hope he is. That would at least be far more interesting than whatever bits of the Chant she'll have to conjure up.

[nonvenomous]

“Yes,” he cranes to face her more fully. “As far as I’ve been able to suss out, I’m speaking to the only attendant.”

Brother Richard has a peculiar way of sizing people down -- a kind of all over inspection that accounts for everything from weariness in the shoulders to any trace evidence of a bar brawl that might still be clinging to her shoes. The way she holds herself, the form of her mouth around manners at this hour. As introductions go, it’s more polite than getting up and peering in at her teeth, but only just.

Instead, he lifts the hand he has over the back of the chair, palm turned to expose the splinter of green pierced into the heel.

A pause, and he adds: “I'll understand, of course, if you have more pressing duties to attend to.”

[okayimin]

"Yes. Kirkwall doesn't have much in the way of a proper Chantry building currently." Her voice is crisp Orlesian tones that want very much to slide into the careless drawl of Dust Town. She is at least trying to appear the good and decent Chantry representative.

She does not care for the once over, but she gives the palm he shows her the same sort of scrutiny in return. "Since you're here, I would like to ask you about that mark. I can answer any questions you have about the Maker or the Chantry."

Phrased as a trade, because that's exactly what it is.