faderift | [open]

Entry tags:

[open]

WHO: Teren, Barrow, and Benedict, and YOU
WHAT: catch-all
WHEN: Haring
WHERE: Kirkwall
NOTES: shirtless dilf enclosed

Teren

She crashed a dragon into a tower. And though she lived, Teren was flung from the beast and came to land somewhere in the rubble below, where an aptly remembered healing potion was enough to keep her from expiring on the spot, but moving her body in any meaningful way has been a struggle since then.
Incredibly fortunate to have had no significant internal damage (at least that the potion didn't handle), and with any broken bones splinted and healing, Teren is simply far too sore to move from her bed. After all her big talk about the Wardens not getting into any situations that couldn't be solved without Anders or Inessa...
...here she is.
A captive audience, if perhaps not a happy one.

Barrow

The air is brisk, the day is fine, and Barrow is swinging a hammer around in the sparring range. He's been learning to use it since first arriving in Kirkwall, rather liking the idea more than the usual boring old sword and shield, but having never had the opportunity to play with one until now.
He cuts quite a figure in doing so, and should be approached with caution unless alerted first. He's also only wearing a shirt about half the time, since even in the Haring chill, physical exertion takes its toll.

Benedict

I. (open) There's a certain anxious industriousness to Benedict these days, and if the growing pile of writing-filled parchment he keeps carefully resting on the bench is any indication, he's got a project.
He's also made some pretty decent headway with in weaving a screen for the window with straw from the cell floor, which both prevents the cold wind from coming in and bathes the little room in a pleasant sepia light. It's clearly the work of an amateur, but one can almost mark how much his skill has improved from the start to where his progress currently lies.

He can often be found working on either project, or perhaps painting or reading, swathed in both of his blankets for warmth and powered by nervous energy.

II. (one thread please, first come first serve) On the night of the strange dreams that grip the denizens of Riftwatch, there comes a cry of abject panic from Benedict's cell, followed by the sounds of someone in terrible emotional distress.

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

That much is clear. Colin immediately comes as close as he can, reaching for Benedict where he huddles under the bench.

“What’s wrong? What happened?”

"Everyone knows about the box," Benedict says in a distant voice, unmoving. "They'll think I orchestrated it."

Colin sighs and makes himself comfortable on the floor, as close as he can get to Benedict.

"So you've been questioned about it?"

He's sat on this thing for all this time so he won't get Athessa in trouble. Benedict, however, has rather a lot more to lose than she does.

"Leander came down," he murmurs, the blanket pulled up to his nose, "he says Athessa stole it. And threw it."
He cuts his eyes to Colin finally, despairing.
"Why would you tell her? Why would--..." He squeezes his eyes closed. "You shouldn't have done anything."

Colin takes in this information. Processes. Determines the threat to Benedict is minimal. He gives another, smaller sigh, this one containing a little relief.

"I didn't," he says patiently. "I wanted her opinion about what Leander might trade for it. Then from what she told me, it was less a theft and more a temper tantrum. Take a deep breath."

His expression becomes intent on Benedict's face. "If no one of import has come down to question you, you're not suspected in anything. Leander is just trying to stir things up that have long since settled, as far as I'm aware. I don't think the division heads are very interested in implicating you in the interpersonal problems of two other members. You can relax."

"He was planning to give it back to me," Benedict replies in a tone that verges on curt, sitting up and tugging the blanket around himself. "The box-- I-- it was all I wanted and now nobody has it, and if anyone gets in trouble over it, it'll be me."

He's angry, but containing himself to a far greater degree than he managed with Athessa, perhaps remembering too clearly how that panned out. He can't push Colin away as well, or else he'll have no one visiting him at all.
"I can't relax." Truth be told, he looks more miserable than usual.

Colin shakes his head gently. "Of course he'll say that. He's the innocent victim and would have you forget otherwise."

Of course Colin knows the box is safe and sound, and if Leander is still raising a stink about it, it's more likely than not to wind up on its way back to him. He glances away and sighs.

"He visited you to upset you. He had one thing he was able to hold over you, and now that he doesn't have it anymore, he wants to make you believe he still has power. He doesn't. He just knew you would panic and help him stir things up again. The best thing you can do right now is the very opposite. If he's going to muddy the waters again, let him be the one who has to sweat for it, not you. You're innocent in this."

Edited 2019-12-30 05:05 (UTC)

Perhaps if he weren't in his current state, Benedict would be more inclined to believe this out of hand. But being in a cell, blind and deaf to everything that happens outside of it, is taking its toll; Leander had all but apologized when he visited, but Colin has made his feelings about him plain, and saying so seems like it could stir up more disaster.
Benedict doesn't even know what his own feelings are on the matter.

"I'm not stirring anything up," he says weakly, "I don't want to be involved at all. I don't-- I don't like that people talk about me." It's inevitable, but there it is. He hunches up his shoulders, in a posture that would be a sulk if there weren't also fear in his expression.

Colin's feelings about Leander are, indeed, informed less by the man himself and more by that irresistible instinct to protect both himself and those he cares for. Whether he is picking up on toxic similarities between Leander and others or reading them into him, even he isn't certain, but he knows what is safe. What is safe is to keep distance and assume the worst, as always.

After a few moments of silence, Colin lets out another sigh. It's resigned this time.

"Tell me what you want to happen," he says softly, "and I'll do everything I can to make it happen."

Because ultimately, no matter what comes of it, he can't keep still while Benedict suffers like this. If there's a way to return the box without implicating either of his friends, he'll do it, though he doesn't feel good about the odds.

Drawing his knees up to his chest, Benedict rests his chin on them. He looks exhausted, and doesn't even entirely know how he wants to answer that; is there a good answer?
He opens his mouth as if to give one, but then simply closes it again, pressing it on his knees with his brow drawn.

Colin reaches out to touch whatever he can; he manages a foot.

"It was almost two months ago. If something bad was going to happen, it would have happened by now."

"Or they'll get tired of me," he murmurs, "or--" He sighs out through his nose, squeezing his eyes shut. Focus. He has a task now, and he can't blow his own good fortune by fretting.
Still despondent, but at least a little more open now, he gives his foot a little twitch of acknowledgment against Colin's hand.
"I dreamt that I was made Tranquil," he sighs, knowing Colin knows, but saying it aloud nonetheless. "...I can't... I'll never forget how that felt."

Colin offers a wan, but encouraging, smile. "No one wields the brand here. If they did, they would have a riot on their hands no matter who it was used on. Not to mention Athessa and I won't allow this incident to compromise the progress you've made. We fucked up, not you. We won't let you take the fall for it."

Benedict nods again, but something Colin said triggers a little shudder, and his face goes faintly red. It wasn't the same kind of brand, but...
"Did you, um." There's a sheepish little tug at the corner of his mouth, like he's near about to smile in a placating way, but also knows he shouldn't. "...did you hear about what happened when... those Templars were taking me back to Tevinter?"

Colin shakes his head.

Welp, time for all faith in him to be lost.
"We got captured," he says to the floor, "Coupe, Ashlock, Norrington, Hanzo and I. The former three were taken and branded." He points to the back of his hand, indicating that's where they got it. Then, in the same motion, he pushes his hair back out of his face, uncomfortable.
"...it wasn't until later I saw what the sigil was. My mother had set the whole thing up. She thought I'd..." He chews his cheek, the shrugs wearily. "I don't know what she thought I'd do. But suddenly I had three Templars who were my legal property on Tevinter soil. Ashlock and Norrington got taken in when we were there as the Inquisition. I had to go get them out." Which he definitely did of his own volition and didn't have to be practically dragged there, of course.

"...what a mess." He gives a faint, uneasy chuckle.

It takes a moment, but Colin smiles.

"That's pretty terrible," he says with a chuckle, in a tone that makes it clear that, while he's being sincere, he also isn't really judging Benedict. The past is the past, and Benedict has changed. "More so on your mother's part, obviously. What could you have really done, though?"

That moment doesn't escape Benedict's attention, and he seems relieved when it results in a smile.
"I mean," he says with a little shrug, "...I could've... maybe not... waited so long to tell anyone about it." He scratches behind his ear with a wince.
"--not that you're the first. Don't get me wrong. Anders helped me remove the brand off one of them." A magnanimous gesture, considering.

"Coupe, I'm guessing." Anders couldn't give a shit about Norrington and even less about Simon. "Why would your mother do that, though? Seems like it gave you the means to retrieve them."

"Norrington," Bene corrects with a knowing wince. "Would you think less of me if I still hate him?" Purely hypothetical.

"I think she wanted me to take matters into my own hands. Or." He frowns. "...maybe she wanted me to die and have it look accidental." He's still got a lot to unpack regarding their relationship.

Colin shakes his head at the question. He'd been sort of friends with Simon for a while before learning he was a Templar, and took a long time to warm up to him again after finding out. He can't judge anyone.

Well. He can judge Benedict's mother.

"You're out of that life now," he reassures him soothingly. He nods toward the papers Benedict has been writing. "Is any of that about her?"

He looks toward them, then shrugs one shoulder dismissively. "Some of it." Based on the evasiveness of his expression, he doesn't look too inclined to give more information than that. It's for Flint.

Giving a shudder, he draws the blanket more tightly around himself. He's no longer in the state he was earlier, but there's still a marked gloominess about him that he's unlikely to shake. "I wish..." he mumbles, and thinks better of it.

"You wish...?"

"...I wish I could talk to her." He purses his lips, hoping it won't be taken the wrong way, like he's about to turn back the other direction again.
"I just. I want to know what she was really thinking about. What her plan was, for me. Why it's never seemed to bother her, when I've been hurt." He twists his mouth in a frown.
"It's... I wonder if she even knows I'm missing."

She's his mother. That doesn't go away just because he's realized how bad she is. To the contrary, Colin rather thinks it would drive someone battier once they do realize.

"You wonder if you were imagining the bits of love you saw in her?" he supposes gently. He looks away. "Wondering if something changed to make her stop loving you, or if she never loved you to begin with. Or just...didn't love you enough to change."

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject