[OPEN] : Keeping Up With the Dahlasanors

[nadasharillen]

WHO: Nari and Sina Dahlasanor, and you!
WHAT: Various and sundry activiities with some clan-sisters.
WHEN: End of Haring
WHERE: Skyhold!
NOTES: Sina and I are missing big group fun times, so we're hoping to run this one slightly differently. Everyone in the pile! :D If someone else is responding where you are, assume you can see and interact with them. If multiple posts happen at the same time, well... they both happened simultaneously!

[Note: Exceptions for anyone who'd prefer a private conversation Wildcard will be granted. :D]

[Bonfire]

As the day fades to dusk, Nahariel is piling all the cleared foliage and dead branches from the restoration of the garden in the courtyard to burn it, while Siuona sits beside the proceedings laughing quietly, a mug of tea in her hands. The steam curls up, then disperses into the sunset. From the exaggerated movements, and the hunter "riding" one of the larger branches around, it seems as if Nari is telling the story of the capture of the Bog Unicorn. They'll both raise a hand in greeting at any approach, welcoming help with the fire, audience, or perhaps another storyteller.

[Sparring]

It's midday, and Nahariel really doesn't think they ought to be doing this with Siuona's health the way it is, but when the First says jump, you say "...Okay, fine, how hard do you want me to go?"

The two are squaring off in one of the practice rings; Nari with two wooden practice daggers, and Sina with a quarterstaff. They haven't even begun yet, and the hunter keeps looking around twitchily for any excuse to postpone or halt the exercise. Sina, on the other hand, looks quite determined despite her slight protective hunch and intermittent cough.

[Wildcard]

For whatever reason, from the tip of the Rookery tower to the dungeons below Skyhold, it seems as if any time you run into one of them, you run into them both. Sometimes arm-in-arm, sometimes a few steps away, sometimes kicking each others feet as they sit on a bench in the sun weaving flowers from the garden into garlands and crowns, but always together.

Comments

[arlathvhen]

Beleth nodded politely to Varric as he approached, apparently just as curious as she was about the tale that Nari was telling her sister. She turns to the other two Dalish, first introducing herself to the one she hadn't met. "It's a pleasure to finally meet you, Nahariel. Sina told me a bit about you--only good things, I assure you." She smiles warmly, putting her hand to her chest, and ducking her head.

At learning about what the conversation had been about, Beleth's eyebrows rose. "Oh, I heard about it. What did they call it? I can't remember the name, but Master Dennet put up a big fuss about it when it came to him." She sank down onto the ground, turning to Sina and giving her a nod, as well. "I haven't seen it in the stables, though."

And back to Varric, woo.

"I would like to hear one of your stories. No one's told my any of them. Except the one I was reading. Um, the Champion one. I liked it." Certainly not Swords and Shields. What are you talking about. Shut up.

[eolasemah]

Sina grinned, nodding along to Nari's explanation. "I wish I'd been there to see it," she remarked, "although I'd have worried, so it's probably better I wasn't." At Beleth's question, she looked to Nari, her grin growing brighter. "You've been calling it Boggy, haven't you?"

[nadasharillen]

"Only good things?" Nahariel grinned at Beleth, "she's left most of it out, then. As far as the name, I have indeed been calling it Boggy. I'm not sure it has an official name. I'm not even sure what it is. I haven't been by to visit it since I tried to curry its coat and a patch came off in the brush." The hunter ran a hand through her short hair with an embarrassed smile, then turned to Varric.

"Even though we're from the forest west of Kirkwall, we weren't all that knowledgeable about everything that happened there." The corner of her mouth twitched, eyes dipping to the ground briefly--they'd heard about the Sabrae, of course. "I hear you've a book running around about it, so I won't ask you to recount it all." Nari smiled again, eyes flickering mischeviously, "Tell us something you didn't put in?"

[hugeinorlais]

"What? And incriminate myself?" Varric asked, his expression and tone both passably aghast. He shrugged as he got more comfortable--as comfortable as one could get while seated on a log, really--and glanced at the three elves. Beleth had read the Tale of the Champion, Sina wished she'd been in Kirkwall (that was something Varric was not going to comment on), and Nahariel wanted something juicier than historical accounts.

"Well, so long as you promise not to tell the Seeker," Varric agreed idly and leaned forward to rest his arms on his knees.

"No shit, there I was, just standing in front of the Black Emporium," Varric began in his best and most dramatic writer's voice. "Just minding my own business, waiting for Hawke to come around, when this mage plows straight into me. Knocks us both clean off our feet and both his pointy hat and staff go sailing right through the front door of the Emporium."

Varric paused, but not for effect. Even he still had trouble believing this part had happened.

"The guy was frantic, rambling about luggage and pear trees and tourists," Varric continued. "I figured he'd probably gotten mugged, maybe hit on the head a little too hard, but there was no getting the guy off of me until Hawke and Fenris showed up and finally pried us apart.

"He must have been desperate, I realized, because he started grabbing at Broody for help. That didn't pan out, unsurprisingly, and he tried grabbing for Hawke. Shit, he even turned to Aveline, babbling something half-intelligible about losing two flowers and appointments with death. We couldn't make sense of him.

"Broody figured it was demons, Aveline thought he was drunk, and Hawke didn't really care, at least not until we heard the ominous, rapid pitter-patter of feet. Lots of tiny feet."

He held a hand aloft and shook his head as he swore an oath to Andraste. He described a brief, frantic battle with an unseen, swift moving animal, told how they'd all had to flee into the Black Emporium of all places, and how they'd ended up knocking over enough relics and breakable artifacts that whole civilizations had probably been lost to the dustbin.

"I've never seen anything like it, not before or since. The mage made for the door. He almost got there too, but when he reached for the handle, it got him. Out of the smoking hole in the shop floor, a trunk--an honest-to-the-Maker traveling trunk--with teeth and a hundred tiny feet jumped clear out of the basement and swallowed him whole. Its lid snapped shut and, just like that, the mage was gone and the trunk arced gracefully back toward the floor. When it fell back down--well, not one of us heard it hit the ground."