open and closed.

[luaithre]

WHO: Marcus Rowntree and various.
WHAT: Activities.
WHEN: Kingsway
WHERE: Mainly the Gallows
NOTES: Some open prompts in the comments, but also works as a catch all for planned things. Let me know if you'd like to do something specific, or if we have CR, feel free to just hit me with a wild card honestly.

Comments

college au go

[tender]

Guiding the mare into a stall, Derrica is free to cross over into their direction to greet Kevin. A soft pat to his shoulder, tipping around so she can smile over at Marcus.

"Have you been busy elsewhere?"

The impulse to offer her assistance comes and goes. Could she handle Kevin? Maybe, maybe not. Kevin's a formidable horse. Another, light pat, before she returns to her own mount to begin unsaddling her.

[luaithre]

Marcus watches her move back towards the mare, seeing to her, tugging at the buckles and straps. It's impossible to not immediately remember the dream that Derrica already recalls, the mechanical certainty that he'd at first been trying to save her from something he'd have himself set into motion, and then that blind fury. It's still all oddly shameful, tempting to flinch from.

That he doesn't go to help her is almost that. He says, "No," and sets aside the brush he'd been working over Kevin's hide. Inspects his hands, dusts them off. "But it seems dangerous to stray far for no good reason.

"Have you had many questions?" is an inelegant pivot, but who needs elegance. "From our newer arrivals."

[tender]

The shift in topic doesn't seem to trouble her. Derrica's rubbing her hand fondly over the mare's chest, and the soft, coaxing hum trails into quiet as she considers Marcus' question.

She'd meant to speak of it to him regardless.

"I've spoken to Holden," she tells him. "And to Ellie and Astarion. And Abby."

Maybe they'll be familiar names to him. Maybe not. But the names matter less than—

"Holden has been here longer, so he's less...it wasn't such a jarring thing for him to consider. But the newer ones are frightened. Some of them think they can run and hide, but I don't know if that's possible for a rifter."

How hard would the Chantry hunt for them, if it came to that?

[luaithre]

Marcus emerges from the stall, leans against a post across from where Derrica tends to her mare. Behind him, Kevin has drifted forward in his wake as if to see if there is more brushing imminent in his future, and his nose bumps Marcus' shoulder. Without looking, Marcus raises a hand to pet him up under giant horse head.

His expression thoughtful. He says, "The rifters seem to express a common sentiment against Circles," a little like he's sounding out a new thought. "Not only because of what it means to them, but when they come to understand the type of world this is. I've never heard a rifter say it's a good thing, to lock mages away."

Intellectually, he understands they've never confronted an Abomination, never considered a Harrowing, or met a Tranquil, but there is something to that instinct. The response to plain injustice.

"I considered myself, and the rest of us," and there is really only one 'us' he can mean, "more apart from them than I realised."

[tender]

"It's understandable."

Because yes, Derrica does understand it. There had been moments when she does feel far apart from Rifters. And they are less so now, with their common cause so clearly highlighted.

"That aspect of the negotiations hadn't been on my mind," Derrica tells him. "I'd thought so often of what we might have to do afterwards, but I hadn't thought very much about..."

It feels a little shameful, in a way. All these Rifters she's grown to care for, and her worry hadn't stretched quite far enough.

"Marcus? Could you give me your opinion on something? Considering what you've said, about realizing how close we are to the rifters?"