open.

[byblow]

WHO: Alistair or Bastien or Kostos & Other People
WHAT: A Rather Blustery Day. Or rainy. Or both.
WHEN: Mid to late Drakonis
WHERE: Kirkwall & Surroundings
NOTES: Feel free to wildcard me instead, or hit me up if you would like something different and specific.

i. alistair in the project office with the dog statues

Alistair hasn't yet made good on his threats to decorate the Project Sashamiri office with dog paraphernalia. But he has brought in a half-dozen little wooden mabari carvings, reminiscent of the statues littered across Ferelden, to hide in drawers or behind frequently-used books or on top of the door frame, to see if it's possible to make Enchanter Julius crack.

It's possible to catch him at it, standing up on his toes to try to put one on top of a shelf where it can stare at Julius while he works. Equally likely to catch him frowning at his desk, though, holding a dagger to candle light and turning it this way and that, or with his chin down on his folded arms to glare at a book that he definitely can't read at that angle.

Regardless, someone will only have to pause in the doorway for him to beckon them closer and say, "You. Come here."

ii. alistair in the mountains with the mud bath

"You'd think the darkspawn would mind the rain," Alistair says, squelching through mud. "Wouldn't you? They spend so much time underground, they should be like the dwarves. Scary sky water, oooh."

It hasn't stopped raining since they left the Gallows--so several hours ago, at this point. But waiting for better weather is only a viable option when better weather seems like it might happen at some point. And the darkspawn, who do not mind the rain, are apparently sneaking in and out of a crevice newly opened by a mudslide in the Vinmarks.

So here they are. Alistair and whoever. He's been dealing with the rain pretty well, himself, despite what it's doing to his hair. But, maybe as comeuppance for teasing dwarvenkind, that's the moment where he loses his footing on a slick incline and splats flat on his back in the mud.

iii. bastien in the courtyard with the crushing sense of futility

If Bastien were telling a story about someone else, he'd have them crack and cry all over somebody, or spend so many days in bed that someone decided they ought to do something, or take some sort of dramatic lifelong vow, or clean out their room and disappear in the middle of the night and never be heard from again.

He comes closest to that last one. He packs a bag. Then he puts it under his bed, leaves it there, and goes about his business, mostly as usual. His smiles are just as quick but a little more muted, the cello sounds from his room become short and irregular and confined to rote scales, he's harder to find, and he lets small talk die small. But he's fine, right up until the point a gust of wind funnels through the Gallows' walls and smacks his armful of letters and notes out of his arms to scatter across the courtyard.

In another mood he'd take it in stride and run to catch them. In this one, he sits down heavy on the stairs and watches a few sweep out of sight down a stone corridor. Maybe they're important. He should probably be more worried about the possibility they'll end up puddles.

iv. bastien by the canal with the naked antivan

The problem with how Bastien works is that so much of it rests on letting people have their way and arranging the scene around them to make it useful. So when he's meant to be charming a wealthy visitor whose inclination is to get utterly smashed and a bit high, because what happens in Kirkwall stays in Kirkwall and can Bastien even imagine how dull life becomes once one is married with children--that's what he does.

Meo Fiesi, not Bastien.

And when he--Meo Fiesi--is then inclined to strip off all of his clothes and jump into a Lowtown canal because he's never been swimming naked, in the rain, on a public street, and apparently that specific combination is a personal dream, that's, you know. Great.

Bastien has called for back-up. Just in case the man starts to drown. Back-up can find him sitting in the drizzle with a pile of Antivan Merchant Clothing beside him, his feet dangling over the dirty canal, while someone in it says, with an Antivan accent, "This one is called the Butterfly!"

v. kostos in a cave with the incomplete deck of cards

A partial list of things Kostos hates and/or is bad at: Being stuck in a small space for a long period of time. The outdoors. People. Cold weather.

So having a sleepover in this cold, shallow mountain cave Northwest of Kirkwall, to monitor the reported potentially-suspicious comings and goings through the mountain pass that forms the shortest route from Nevarra City--he's handling it really well.

For example, the deck he brought along is apparently missing three cards, and he's decided the solution to that is to throw the remaining forty-odd cards off the edge of the cliff and into the distant river below, one at a time, while he silently watches the dark road for any bit of firelight.

vi. kostos in the market with the teddy bears

Mummies probably don't care about stuffed bears--at least not more than the wisps residing in their bodies care about anything novel. But the wisps probably don't care about enormous underground crypt-mansions, either, and they have those. Kostos has already told several imaginary people passing imaginary judgment to fuck off, in his head, while he picks through the contents of a stall in Hightown.

He could have gone to Lowtown. Even if mummies care a little bit about stuffed bears, they certainly don't need them to be newly made and neatly stitched.

It's for his own sake that he's tossing aside the ones with loose button eyes or frayed stitching. He's perfectly aware.

"Please stop touching everything," the seller says when his sifting knocks a few plaidweave tuskets out of their pyramid formation.

Kostos doesn't look up to counter, "Stop selling garbage," which is maybe not the best thing to say to someone you want to give you a good price.

Comments

[maidit]

"Living," Ashey repeats in turn, not quite managing to hide her dubious tone. She risks a glance back to Monsieur Fiesi. "I can't imagine he'll go on living for very long if he insists on swimming naked in canals."

But then she also imagines Bastien isn't having much say in the matter. So. "Would you like help getting him out?"

[cozen]

"I would love it," Bastien says.

He's very damp. Not soaked—it's been raining lightly, for the past stretch of hours, when it was raining at all—but damp. His hair is escaping the various primped-and-preened shackles that keep it straight and starting to wave. It isn't his favorite.

But he leans back on his hands without any particular urgency and gives Mlle. Pelt a conspiring sidelong look, voice low enough that an intoxicate man splashing around several feet away won't be able to hear him.

"He will probably cooperate best if we think of something new to entice him with," he says, "instead of telling him that he has to stop."

[maidit]

"Mmm, let me think." And she considers the scene before her, particularly the steepness of the canal. Then she stoops down and, rummaging through the pile of discarded clothes, produces the canal gentleman's hankerchief.

"I've an idea that might work, or at least divert him. Would you happen to have a knife on you?"

[cozen]

Bastien shakes his head first—he's not the sort of person who needs knives, though the sort of person who needs a knife in Lowtown is a very broad type, so maybe he should have one, maybe that would be wiser. But then he makes an ah sound of reconsideration and pats around his clothing until he comes up with a penknife. The kind actually used for sharpening nibs. It's very small. But he unfolds it for display.

"Would this work?" he asks.

In the canal, Meo Feisi takes an enormous breath and tries to dive for the bottom.

[maidit]

"It will perfectly, thank yo- Oh dear." She catches sight of the flashing white bottom of Meo Feisi. Better hurry before the distinguished gentleman managed to drown himself. She takes the penknife and cuts a few small slits into the edges of the handkercheif.

Quick as you please, she undid one of the plain ribbons holding her hair back, threading it through the slits. Then she undid the simple apron over her clothes, cutting off the ties and tying those to the end of ribbon, finishing her makeshift fishing line.

"Right... We'll see if this works," she says, throwing the handkerchief down into the canal as best she could. The night hid the long string of the repourposed apron tie, the end of which she handed to Bastien, "Have you ever gone fishing? It should be similar." And then she leaned over and called out in a very bad accent that could only be described as an Fereldan pretending to be Nevarran, "Oh dear! My handkerchief! Please, good sir, will you help me?!"