open.

[luaithre]

WHO: Marcus Rowntree and some random happenstances personified.
WHAT: Covering off Marcus' arrival to Riftwatch, and whatever interactions may occur immediately after.
WHEN: Throughout Firstfall.
WHERE: Many places!
NOTES: Some open prompts beneath the text. I will also use this post as a catch all for specific threads so let me know if you'd like to do anything else.

THE DOCKS AND STABLE; ARRIVAL.

It's a vague hour of the morning when a man and his horse arrive at the Gallows, made vaguer thanks to the heavily overcast nature of the sky obscuring the sun's position within it. It's late enough that the frost is melted, and horse hooves impress deep tracks in the slush that's already accumulated in the path leading from the docks to the compound where Marcus has been informed are also the stables.

The horse is large, and grey like churned snow, and sedate. The stranger leading it is of a medium build and dressed in a similar palette and also sedate, though as he moves, his gaze inevitably drags back up to the hulking shadow of the Gallows proper.

Within the stables, he doesn't seek help -- he directs the large gelding towards the likeliest looking stall, unloads saddle bags, finds a secure place to stash saddle and all the rest of it, tends to feeding and watering and a brush down. He doesn't speak out loud to the animal as some might, no soothing humming or praise, but his actions are all gentle and attentive. Although Marcus does not seek interruption, nor let it stop him from going about his tasks, he isn't actively deflecting it, taking note of every person and animal that move through the stables.

THE GALLOWS; FINDING A ROOM.

[ ooc ; limited to one. and taken! ]

The fortress feels very empty.

And it isn't, of course. The sconces have been tended to and the floors seem more or less swept, and where they don't, fresh bootprints glisten on worked stone, indicative of people passing through. But the Gallows are immense in dimension compared to most constructions, and the last time Marcus was here, it was borderline crowded.

He takes himself to the mage tower without much thought behind it, but explores both it and its Templar twin as he peruses for a place to stay, taking his time. Along with his staff strapped across his back, his other worldly possessions are contained to a compact set of saddlebags he hooks over his shoulder, held in place as he walks the rows of doors.

Noting those that are taken as well as those that aren't, Marcus touches his hand to one door with just a seam showing between it and the frame, pushing. The hinges creak and the door swings and-- opens up to a furnished room with firelight, and a person in it.

"Oh," he says, standing still, hand hovered. "Pardon me."

DINING; LETTERS AND CARDS.

If Marcus eats among with everyone else, he normally chooses a time less crowded, and brings something to do with him.

Here, he has a few loose pages of inexpensive parchment, and he uses some extra implements to keep the corners down -- an empty candle holder, a heavy fork -- and writes while his food cools. His handwriting is neat and without particular elegance, and he concentrates on completing a section or even a whole page before he sets his pencil down and returns to his meal.

On another evening, he has set an empty plate aside and filled his cup from a pitcher of dark wine, and is laying out cards in front of himself. They don't look like any kind of conventional set of playing cards, with painted images in fine colours that wash out too easily under the golden light of the hearth, the candles on the table.

He offers to whoever catches his eye or is sitting at the same table, "Care to play?"

KIRKWALL; ASKING SIRI.

"Excuse me."

It's getting late, and if you don't start for the docks soon, the last few ferries will be leaving for the Gallows without you. Not to lean into an awkward second person narrative situation, but you are stopped by a voice from your blindspot, belonging to a man you may or may not recognise as a new arrival. A man pushing into his late thirties, manner calm and collected as he stands still in the bustle of the street, apparently impervious to people pushing by. Dressed neatly and warmly, hands in gloves of fine leather, and his expression is mild in some contrast to the innate severity that pale eyes have, and the squiggled scar running down one cheek.

Marcus has a quick smile ready, which resettles to fade as he speaks in an accent that pegs him as originating from the nearbyish Starkhaven. "I don't mean to intrude, but I believe you're with Riftwatch. By any chance were you heading back that ways for the evening?"

WILD CARD; THRILL ME.

[ ooc ; stock standard riftwatch mission, a ferry ride to kirkwall, requesting help to lift something heavy, trapped in an elevator, whatever you like. ]

Comments

finding a room | former templar tower.

[ipseite]

A person—a woman—and an aging, enormous hound, the latter draped across the end of the bed (which looks as if it might be two, pushed together) and the former standing beside a desk that looks too fine to have been original furnishing to the room, her fingertips resting against a teapot, against a glyph upon it that ceases to glow when she brings her hands together and clasps them in front of herself, momentarily too startled to answer him.

And then, instinct kicking in— “Of course,” with a smile that has been practised in ballrooms and salons and has been polished so well as to be unreadable except to say that the person wearing it is very good at doing so. “I do not believe we've met, and I shall presume that you are...a new arrival to us? Monsieur?”

The accent isn't quite Orlesian; one of the hands over her heart glows dull green where the anchor-shard that embedded itself in her emergence into Thedas rests.

“Were you looking for someone? Perhaps I can help.”

She is very relieved not to be undressed, but she does feel undressed, with her hair loose and the outer jacket of her dress draped over the back of her chair where she would have tidied it away once she'd undone herself and settled in.

[luaithre]

Marcus himself is not as presentable as he would prefer, if given a choice. His hair is brushed back and recently retied, but there is trace evidence of travel still on his clothing and under his nails, in the fact he is a day out from being clean shaven. Still, neither his state or hers stops him from flicking his attention off of her to look about the room from where he stands. The dog, the glyph, the decorations, the furnishings.

Curious. He can't help that. He returns his attention when it's his turn to speak, allowing a slight smile to happen when she offers her assistance.

"Aye, I've arrived today," he confirms. "Too soon to know who I ought to look for. Just a room, I mean."

There had been a prompt back there, he thinks, for a name, so he circles back to. "Enchanter Marcus Rowntree," he says, a hand going out to sketch the partway bow he might have executed if he wasn't burdened.

[ipseite]

It's tellingly automatic, the way she mirrors his part-bow with a similarly sketched dip; she doesn't break thoughtful eye contact to do it, offering, “Madame de Cedoux,” in turn, habitually refraining from providing her given name.

The room is both warm and lived in and somewhat sparsely decorated—it shows signs of cohabitation, a man's boots sitting alongside finer slippers, and the desk looks the most lived in of anything, books and papers and work in organized chaos. Not disarray, but the way that overwork looks when it's by willing inclination.

A moment, and then: “Welcome to the Gallows, Enchanter. And to Riftwatch. We are, as you have doubtless recognized, not presently lacking for accommodation.”

It would be a welcome problem to have at this point.

[luaithre]

"The Gallows I know a little," Marcus says. Her name filed away for later inquiry, as well as, like. How it's good to know people's names. "The Riftwatch is new."

And there's a crinkle at his brow, articulating a little apology since his initial and very reflexive pardon from before. Lots of empty rooms and he happens to intrude on one of the few taken, while the lady has her hair down and everything. His hand wanders out to go ahead and grip the handle of her door so that he might start on a graceful exeunt.

But now that he's quit scoping the place, his eyes dart to the green light emanating from her hand, and apology vanishes from his expression in place of an interest at remove, movement hesitating. He says;

"I have a rude question. Seeing as I've already transgressed." May as well make it a twofer.

[ipseite]

Her eyebrow rises, very slightly. Lord knows that might very well mean just about anything, under the circumstances. From his demeanor, from the staff that he carries on his back and the way he has approached this thus far—in all likelihood, not something disinteresting, though there is room for her to have violently misjudged.

She says, “I may have a rude answer,” which based on about thirty seconds acquaintance with her he might reasonably conclude is unlikely.

It is permission, all the same. At least to ask.

[luaithre]

It might be disinteresting.

If only because certain realities are likely very pedestrian for most of Riftwatch but are very fascinating, maybe frightening, for those that are not of Riftwatch. Marcus has heard of people who wander too close to a Fade rift getting lanced with magic and bound to it, or however that actually goes, and it seems like a likelier guess than the alternative.

But he's been around enough Orlesians for her accent's subtleties to move him to guess at the unlikelier thing. Her response is-- unexpected, in a fun way, even if he doubts that she will in fact have a rude answer.

"Are you not from this world?" is the phrasing he lands on, standing in the doorway with a hand on the handle. If this is awkward, he doesn't seem to notice.

[ipseite]

All it takes to see the pedestrian as something fascinating again is to stand in a slightly different place to look upon it. It is a professional obligation to not tire of this, particularly; she does less direct, outward facing diplomatic work than she once did, but not none. If the loudest voice is the one that carries, then she had better not be silent.

So her expression says ah, but that's all.

“There are several schools of thought on the most precise technical answer,” she says, which means yes. “An argument might be made that I am now, as I am now, very much of this world. But the life I remember before Riftwatch is not, no. Not of Thedas.”

Kirkwall; Do You Wanna Catch Some Leeches~

[okayimin]

Sawbones is, as a matter of fact, heading back to the Gallows, though her night is far from over. At the moment she was wrestling with trying to carry a large earthen pot nearly half her size in her arms, the soft clinking of smaller jars coming from inside.

She'd very nearly bumped into the man standing in the middle of the blasted street and had to set down her burden to save it from falling. Her habit had been abandoned at some point during the day, sacrificed to supplement a new baby's swaddling, and her hair was in danger of coming out of it's neatly pinned braids.

"I am," she says in response to the man's question, returning is smile with a scowl, "And if you are as well, you best come with me before we miss the last boat."

it doesn't have to be some leeches~

[luaithre]

Her habit, repurposed though it is, as with her diminutive stature and air of busy-bodied activity that feels taller than she actually is, were more than enough to draw Marcus' focus as someone he'd seen about the Gallows to stand in as something of a. Well, a guide.

And he needn't even inquire further as she invites him along. Invitation possibly something of an interpretation, sure, but it amounts to the same.

"Certainly," he says. Maybe he can cut a quicker path than she. But first-- "Do you need help with those?"

it's probably going to be leechesss

[okayimin]

She eyes the big earthenware jar with a glare and then a resigned sigh. This Duster is tall at least, with arm length to spare.

"I do," she says grimly, shaking out her arms, "Blasted things are heavy and they'll be heavier by the time I'm done." Not to mention woozy from the bloodloss. Sawbones eyes her new companion, "Say, you got any business that needs tending to?"

[luaithre]

Marcus obligingly steps forward and picks up the pot in the interest of expeditious movement and something like a fair trade, help for help, and insufficiently curious about its function by the time Sara has come around to ask him as to his business.

He pauses to think about that, and admits, "Beyond a ferry ride and a nightcap, no," while bracing against someone pushing past him where they stand in the midst of the foot traffic. That person earns a glance their way, one that lingers as he adds, "I shouldn't wish to steer you off yours, of course."

[okayimin]

"You wouldn't I've got business at the Gallow's docks that I can't put off is all," she says, setting off with a glance back to make sure he follows. She adds by way of explanation: "The weather's starting to turn cold, you see."

Which makes an unpleasant chore even more so, for everyone involved. There was very little worse than tromping through freezing water and only getting two or three leeches for your troubles.

[luaithre]

There is a mental missed step, there, following along after her, where Marcus has not factored in further engagement with this small woman beyond getting to one set of docks, likely sharing a ferry and making pleasant conversation or perhaps sitting in awkward silence, that's fine too, but then realising that he is perhaps being hooked into some extra errand, erroneous to his own task. Where lifting the heavy thing expedited his own progress, lingering about the Gallows docks does not.

And the weather's starting to turn cold.

Nevertheless--

"What business is that?"

--as he keeps up with a few feet of distance. His boots splash through shallower puddles without much mind, and occasionally, his attention catches on something besides the Chantry sister in front of him -- usually fast movement, or a loud noise -- but never for long. He's fairly sure he could lose her easily if he's not careful.

dining.

[dutyful]

Ashen is still growing accustomed to what it means to be part of Riftwatch; he's too used to being a Warden, too used to that kind of brotherhood, and the mixture of people here is strange after being alone for so long. He's baffled by it, especially when he feels that awkward homesickness for the Avaar and Bran, hand hovering at the ring around his neck.

It's enough that he is distracted more often than not, unfocussed on the food in front of him.

It takes him a moment to jerk back to reality, and then his eyes land on a stranger.

"Play?" Head tilted, he leans forward, looking at the cards. "What would you have me play?"

Not that he is likely to refuse; he enjoys a game, as long as he does not have to risk too much. Isn't life dangerous enough already?

[luaithre]

Marcus obligingly spreads a few cards out nearer to be observed, observing the stranger in kind as he does. The images are painted and have been handled with enough care to preserve their integrity, depictions of people and environments, style over detail. A baying wolf before a full moon; a female hunter with a spear and long elven ears; a young boy with lightning emanating from raised hands. These last two have numerical indicators, with a 'five' sketched into the corner of the elven huntress card, and a 'two' in the other.

"It's named Muster," he says. "A war game, of kinds. The deck is split, and we draw nine cards each to begin with. The game is three rounds, with two new cards drawn on the second and third. We play them against each other--" And he illustrates by placing the two numerical cards opposite one another. "--like so. Here, the play is won by three."

He reaches for his wine to recharge his cup. "Rounds finish when one side decides he is defeated, or will certainly win, and draws no more cards. The victor is he who has won two rounds."

[dutyful]

The cards are handsome, Ashen thinks - the kind of thing his mother would have liked to have for the sake of having it, much like children. It makes him all the more interested in settling down, tucking his chair in and paying attention, wanting to see more of the cards and the artwork. Each one must have a story, and he has always loved stories, the nature of them and telling them, a whisper of the life he might once have had.

"It sounds novel enough," Ashen says, leaning forward, "and I would be glad to play with you, ser, even if it is just to learn the rules. My mother only dared to teach me Wicked Grace once and I believe she lived to regret the choice. I was quite the master at thieving treats from her by besting her in games."

A villain indeed, which makes him grin as he makes himself comfortable.

"Do go easy on me."

kirkwall;

[inkindled]

"Uh," Matthias says blearily, "that's, ye-ah--"

There's a hitch in his voice, and a sway to his steps that lingers even when he's stopped walking and tried to get a look at the man that's spoken to him. Might look like sea legs but for the fact that they're on solid ground, and for the fact that Matthias smells as if he's been dipped in a barrel of ale. Takes a moment to fix on the man's face, and even once Matthias has managed it, he can't be sure. Does he know him?

"New, are you." The pleasant tint that the abundance of drink had given the tavern has not transferred well to the open streets of Kirkwall. It's loud out here, too full of people or too empty of them by turns, depending on which street you're walking. And it smells, and it's all over gray, and damp, and now there's something talking at him. One, someone. Matthias scrubs a hand over his face, and scratches at his hair. Trying to be normal, and steady. "D'you really not yet know where the ferry is?"

[luaithre]

"Well, I'd get there eventually."

There is a patient sort of humour to his tone, recognition having settled already in his features as he gives the younger man-- no, boy, really-- an open and frank assessment as to his state. Upright in spite of the way he seems to be adjusting his feet and stance as though the solid earth beneath them were shifting like a ship deck, so that could all go to pot as soon as they start moving.

Still, Marcus continues to address him as he has been, which is, as though he were sober and capable, sharp focus couched in bland pleasantry. "But perhaps not in time for the last ferry back. So if you'd be kind enough to let me join you your way there?"

[inkindled]

"Oh, yeah--"

Mild judgement swings immediately toward inclusiveness. Even if Matthias wasn't sure he knew who he was talking to (or rather, sure that he knows that he's talking to someone he knows), he'd still have warmed to such a request. Doesn't at all mind being the one that knows what's going on. There's authority to it. Something brilliant. Like being on the inside.

Right, only how does he know this fellow? If he could get a real focus on him that would help, but his attention keeps sliding off. To help himself, Matthias grabs blindly for the arm he can see just in the edge of his vision, intending to pull him along and escort him.

"S' this way," he says, loosely, pleasantly. "Helps to memorize the landmarks. And all. There's a, erm, like, a statue... there. Ahead. See it?"

[luaithre]

Marcus bridles in the very first instance of a grab to his arm, but it is a subtle thing, and he steps in the direction he is being tugged a little like he is indulging what’s happening as opposed to being helped. It's tempting to put a hand out to help shepherd the boy along and ensure he doesn’t collide with anyone, but—

Well, the advice is fair. Marcus lifts his eyes to note the statue, as if picking it out from the rise of buildings hadn’t occurred to him completely. The idea of lifting his gaze above his head to orient himself at all, at that.

"I see it," he confirms. "Just." It's getting darker, and everything looks a lot stranger than it did during the hazy daylight he'd been exploring under a few hours ago.

Rain starts in fits, the kind where it feels like an intermittent shaking of droplets from a canopy. It doesn't spur Marcus on much faster than he's already going, and he is none too careful about the puddles they traipse through either, save for any that seem particularly deep or polluted. He's saying, as they go, a little like explanation for his poor sense of direction; "Starkhaven hasn't anything like a Lowtown, from what I recall of it. Kirkwall feels like something that grew out from itself."

[inkindled]

Shuffling alongside him, Matthias sloshes through puddles, stubs his boots on cobblestones that have askewed over years and the passage of history, and slumps his shoulders so the rain will roll off of him and, you know, because he is tired and because his arms feel like they have been pumped full of ale. He can feel it, nearly, sloshing around inside of him. And his hands feel sort of hot as well. Hot ale.

"Never been t' there. Starkhaven." Matthias stretches his right hand out in front of him so he can look at his fingers. They do not look particularly ale-y, but then, he hasn't got them held up before a light. Always helps to try to see liquid through light. He looks about for some--torchlight, maybe, or the light of some house that's not closed up shutters just yet. Everything has a kind of haze to it, a little like fog. Has it gone foggy? If it is, he won't be able to see anyways.

Anyways. He drops his hand. "But you're onto it, yeah? 'Cause, 'cause Kirkwall, and like... it grew up, right? Like... a shell, sort of. A snail. That's its history, all the mines and things. That's Darktown, and Lowton, all there on the bottom, so that makes Lowtown, it's its softie bits, the snail's. Or," and Matthias frowns, and rubs a hand over his face, "maybe... well, how do shells grow, d'you reckon? Maybe it's all shell. Softie bits inside. Can we stop a moment?"

He's dragging to a stop on his own. Up to his companion if he walks on without him.

[luaithre]

"I think you might be right."

That it's all shell, anyway. Protecting something, brittle, all anyone sees, strangely organic in a spiral that grows out of itself instead of in. But Matthias is stopping and Marcus stops as well on a slight delay, giving pause to a metaphor he was quite enjoying, drunkenly inspired or not -- mostly so that he can lazily pivot around and reach a hand out to touch the boy's shoulder in the interests of steadying him.

There are some he'd be fine with leaving in the gutter if he were impatient enough. He feels impatience now, but it's tempered with concern. "You're alright -- let's take a moment, then, aye?"

wounded coast. ilias fabria.

[luaithre]

[ continued from ]

'Far' is a word choice that has the corner of Marcus' mouth upturn. Like it is measured in distance, the time and distance between his first, and these rough men laying on the ground. It could be.

"Necessarily."

Marcus stands, reaching back to bring about his staff, sharp edged at one end, hefty but balanced. Some are made hollow, designed only to tear through the ephemeral barrier of the Veil and dance lightly in the hands of the mage who wields it. Some are heavier things, that could crack skulls as well as draw magic. This is one of those, even if he doesn’t quite look like the sort of man, or mage, given to a lot of skull cracking.

"Did you wish to say last words for them?" On paper, this could be some sort of near-mockery, but Marcus offers this mildly, with a polite kind of indifference. He imagines one could pray over their ashes too, but he hasn't a lot of knowledge as to how Nevarrans conduct these things. Now seems as good a time as any to find out.

[libratus]

Necessarily. Ilias gives a dip of the chin. As much as there are good answers to that question, that is one. For a mage, at least. For a rebel.

"If they are Marchers, they may not appreciate that." A Nevarran, a mage, and a necromancer at that, singing the Chant over their funeral pyres.

But if they wanted to be particular, the subsequent straightening of his spine seems to say, perhaps they ought not have died trying to rob a Riftwatch convoy.

"Draw your last breath, my friends," he recites with the raise of a palm, the sort that might draw power from across the Veil but presently draws nothing but air. No spirit need pave the way for these souls. "Cross the Veil and the Fade and all the stars in the sky. Rest at the Maker's right hand, And be Forgiven."

The line of his hand swings down again in an ushering motion; all yours.

[luaithre]

There'd been a moment of interested staring to see if the other mage would cede to the imagined desires of the dead bandits, and when he doesn't--

Well, it doesn't go remarked upon, but his silence can be taken as support. Marcus waits patiently, with his eyes first on the bodies, and then as Ilias speaks, he lifts his attention up towards the sky. He think: it's going to rain soon, and so he best summon a good enough fire to burn fast and hot, and that the uphill portions of their return to the Gallows will prove to a nuisance.

At the familiar closing words, he glances aside to catch the gesture, and moves. A step forward, raising the staff, and in the cool air, subtle steam begins to rise off the blade as runic inscriptions glow brightly, a volcanic red.

He brings the blunt end of his staff down to the packed earth ground without flourish, and from the earth beneath the corpses, fire rises, quick and hot and without force, engulfing them entirely. It has a life of its own, consuming what there is for it to feed from. The smoke that rises is as grey and fitful as the ocean beyond. The unique variety of smells is fast to follow, and Marcus turns to move back for where his horse is without another glance in Ilias' direction.