WHO: Fitcher, Flint, Wysteria, Cassius & Co WHAT: Ye olde catch all WHEN: Now-ish WHERE: Various NOTES: Don't have anything open, but feel free to snag me OOCly if you want to do anything and I'm happy to slap something together.
It's one of those lovely little sounds entirely defined by its context. Wishing to be appealingly mysterious or intriguing? Underscore the thing with a raised eyebrow or a coquettish head tilt and the shameless bat of dark lashes. Short on more articulate threats? Accompany it with the glint of a knife's point. There is nothing Fitcher appreciates more than versatility.
Take for example this moment in the darkened study of an Antivan merchant prince, long past the hour in which respectable guests have retired to the rooms graciously afforded them by their generous host.
"Hm," Fitcher says, as between their four hands and the clever application of a few picks and wedges, the hidden compartment in Ramondo Caliara's desk finally falls open with the tell-tale lyrium whiff of an enchantment activating. In that context, it sounds very much like 'Well, fuck me.'
And then the glyph on the base of the compartment glows red hot and the papers inside the compartment begin to catch fire.
The answering hiss of dismay through Silas’ teeth fails to resolve into a swear, his flinch caught out in the flush of firelight through the gap. He’s quick, at least, pick dropped in exchange for the dagger at his back so that he might rake burning papers pell mell out onto the floor between them. The updraft from within the compartment carries a few burning sheets further, sparks swept adrift.
“Is it just the fire?”
Are there even alarm spells in this world? He asks while smothering his boot over licks of flame, quiet, terse, sacrificing speed for stealth.
"That a very good question," is light and breezy. In that tenor under these circumstances, it must mean, 'I wouldn't bet on it.'
Fitcher has twisted to get a better look at the sweltered interior of the compartment, allowing the softened stamp of Silas' boot to continue unabated for a moment. The residual heat is already fading, the red hot brand of the glyph deteriorating—
"There's something else here."
A plate lodged at the top of the compartment. She can see the switch to release it, warmed hot by the expulsion of magic. Caliara, you clever little weasel.
Fitcher straightens abruptly. From one of the evening's hip pouches, she produces two things: a sturdy pair of gloves and a skein of trip wire with a sharp peg at either end. She passes this second one to Silas.
They might also give the window and its modest drop to the paved veranda below some consideration here shortly. Surely between them it would be easy enough to drop down, leave some sign that the intruder had slipped off into the grounds, then double back into the villa and there make themselves snug in their beds once more.
A thief in the night? You don't say, makes for fine gossip over breakfast.
A good question but not one he’s thrilled to contemplate, tension bristled up the back of his stoop, smoking papers snatched, glanced at, and folded over to tuck away with his pick.
There’s a phantom pang in his glance to the hall as his fingers curl through the offered skein, reaching for feedback from a cat who’s out of touch halfway across the continent and currently a finch besides. Instead he has to listen, the lighter leather of his own glove smearing over a burning scrap that’s threatening to set an end table alight.
Then he’s gone, out the door.
The further away any eventual encroaching thump, the more time they’ll have to slither out the window.
When he returns, after a glance to check her progress, he’s swift to cross the office to unlatch it, careful this time to feel around for hidden switches as he goes. Business, business.
The latch has stuck. Fitcher waits until Silas has slipped back into the room to strike it once with the butt end of her knife, the sound muffled by its position inside the compartment. When the plate reveals itself to not be a plate at all but a fist sized suspended lock box which falls heavy and hot out of its niche, Fitcher only just manages to catch it in her gloved hand. Pitching it out onto the thick carpet where it may smolder and scorch a square into the fibers is more quietly done than allowing it to fall with a crack to the compartment's bottom would have been.
Still, she pauses after—listening hard. Waiting for a thump or the soft sound of careful footfalls. Watching for the hint of a light in the corridor as the glow from the compartment's security features dims, flickers, and at last dies.
(A glyph would need refreshing, she thinks in the softened dark. Caliara must have someone hired someone on.)
There is a dented tin flask in her hip pouch. Standing very straight and watching the door with a quiet sense of expectation, Fitcher gently hinges back the stopper and splashes a measure of the flask's contents onto her knife.
Pressure lifted carefully into the hinge stifles the start of a rusty squeak; Silas’ breath smudges into steam when he leans just across the threshold to see.
He’s still as a log for a long moment, no movement past the brisk stir of salt air at his hair and through his breath. The family claim-to-fame is a veil of shadow sprawling across the yard to blot out neighboring properties at a distance, towering, hard-cut hedges sizzling in waves with the breeze.
“Clear.”
When he tilts back in, it’s with the start of half a grin, crooked on the order of suggestive in the dark. Fitcher’s found a secret box. They’re making good time. The house is quiet.
Maybe they don’t have to go straight back to separate beds when this is done.
As if in reply to the slow beginning of that grin: the soft creak of a step nearby. Or maybe it's the gentle scrape of a latch being shifted. Or—
In rapid succession, the life sized portrait of a historic Caliara swings away from the wall to admit a tall, slim figure to the study. And then Fitcher throws her knife, still dripping with magebane. If there is a wet thwack as it pegs somewhere below the shadow's ribs, it's swallowed by the liquid flash of some half formed and entirely reflexive casting gone wild, a tongue of mage fire spilling ineffectually hot across the stone ceiling of the narrow hidden passage as the largely unseen mage stumbles back into the dark.
Fitcher snatches the still smoldering box off the rug and scrambles to join Silas in the window. Time to go.
That lash of mage fire picks Silas’ eyes out like coals against the gape of the window behind him, confusion for the painting’s slow pivot sublimated into -- not animal fear. More a rapid practical recalculation of the survivability of this mission, sudden clarity clicked cold into place.
Hm.
Here comes Fitcher -- his hand twitches up as if in offer before he turns to monkey himself over the sill first instead.
Easier to offer to dampen the hit to her knees from below than to dangle her over the edge, surely -- he's already craning a look up after her, jaw grit against the protest of his own bones against a hard landing.
It will be the mage who set the glyph, woken by the awareness of its triggering. Maybe they noted the trip wire and had rerouted on account of it. Or maybe that little back corridor had always been their intended approach. What does it matter? They'd had time enough to get something dangerous in their hands and the window open, and the magebane will give them a running start even if the knife hasn't planted itself somewhere especially delicate. It will be good enough, she decides (which is not optimism but experience) as Silas goes out the window ahead of her.
The heated lockbox is jammed unceremoniously in her hip pouch as she steps up onto the sill after him. It's only because he hasn't yet fully dropped down onto the veranda and found his footing (—that leg of his was given such a lashing at Satinalia—) that Fitcher glances back over her shoulder at all.
Silas is looking but given the waning moonlight, it's hard judge exactly the rate at which the color drains out of Fitcher's face. But there is something to her expression which is not well reasoned confidence held rigidly in check when she comes down after him with a flap of her dark coat's long tails.
The night itself is still peaceful beyond the manor walls, scattered trees rattling their last leaves, the countryside awash in shades of blue. The air is crisp and clear and cold -- he’s warm for the beat he’s close enough to mark the box kept at her hip, the look on her face.
Then there are options to consider: following the hedge line to the carriage house, an open dash for the property fence line on foot, the bulk of the building behind them to circle around.
He’s keen enough on the carriage house to break that way without much more than a glance to her for consensus. There’s an opening in there, a flicker of a dare. They can turn and fight, but he’s run the numbers and it seems very unwise.
They aren’t getting out of here alive without a ride.
The sound of their footsteps is strikingly loud across the veranda. And then they are slicing down the lovely marble stair with its scrollworked end cap columns, each topped with a stone basin in which is planted a miniature corkscrew topiary. Here is the darkened lawn. The looming hedgerow, the moon shining at such an angle that the shadow at its foot is too narrow to secret themselves into.
He'll be in the window shortly. She's certain of it—can feel the tingle under her skin. An itching instinct between her shoulder blades. How far can he reach? It will depend on how well she buried her knife. If he was wearing his night clothes, or was had come ready for a fight. If, if, if.
She should have brought her crossbow along, silly cover story be damned.
"We need to break his line of sight," she says before one of the basins with its little tree still in it is ripped from its post and hurled after them. It narrowly misses, scouring a seam into the lawn at such force that it outpaces them.
There’s a break in the steam of Silas’ breath, a catch at his calf that sees him planting a hand down to keep his momentum. And then the impact, displaced earth, a trench channeled out of the lawn ahead of them --
Breathless, he cuts her another glance. He’s already hurting -- it’s nickel bright in his eyes, coarse in his voice:
“If I’m killed, I trust you to make the report more dignified than the reality.”
Dismembered in a hedge maze has more the makings of a funny footnote than an in memoriam. But there’s a break in the hedge just ahead, and with it the promise of cover. They even took a tour of it earlier.
She doesn't reply, the dark and the nature of their pursuit having swallowed up that natural spark of humor. Instead, from that half step behind, she zags after him for the break in the hedge.
And instantly catches him by the elbow to steer them left into the pitched shadows of the maze and to insistently check their pace down to a brisk walk. She's breathing high. They can't run the whole way, and their pursuit may very well guess at them fleeing like loons at speed. If they are patient and lucky, what are the odds that he will course far past them and they may simply double back and make their way back across the lawn like sensible cat burglars?
"It's Ramondo Caliara. I marked him before jumping down," is an even whisper. Fitcher has clapped her spare hand down on her hip pouch to keep its contents from shifting or jangling. "He saw me."
Inconvenient—to give the man such excellent motivation to pursue them.
He’s all too ready to be caught, stinging breaths stifled to a whistle behind his nose and then through his teeth, spent fog whirling over the high turn of his collar as they walk. Briskly. The pull to his gait has hitched up into a limp while he can enjoy the luxury, the hood of his brow pinched hard over his shoulder, craning back until they’re deep enough in that it makes more sense to listen.
He registers the news about Caliara late accordingly, resistance to the common sense of it lending a crust of salt to his next exhale.
Of course.
With one hand free, he threads the misericorde from its place at his back.
But no sooner has he answered the question than he’s set to plucking invisible chords around the grip of his dagger -- a ritual carried out in miniature while they walk that seems to iron some of that unevenness out. She’ll have seen the evidence before if not the open act of his casting, knife wounds and the like touched up in transit.
Speaking of knives: the number of them he has secreted on his person is as egregious as she may have grown to expect.
"If I want to be rid out you, I'll just kick your knee in," has the shape of good humor if not the tenor. Her large hand with its long fingers hasn't left his arm.
They've arrived at a point where the path diverges. Here, a brief halt to listen to the sway of the evening around them. For the crunch of footfalls or to see if its possible to taste the ozone burn of magic under the salt of the air. After a long beat of quiet, quiet, quiet—
"A shame Barrow isn't here. We might try that trick of feeling each other up in a corner again."
Fitcher flicks a sidelong look at him, reaching with her open hand to delicately fetch free one of the bundled trip wires.
He scoffs warm over her ear as she draws them up short to listen, the only soft sound amidst the sandpaper rustling of world-renowned hedgework. His gasping has slowed into a steadier flow and ebb of steam, something something about this particular snake feeling more secure in a close space with plenty of shadows to secret into.
He’s never seen a Thedosian mage fly.
The sidelong look she sends him is returned in kind, a slant at his brow inclined to agree for all that he’s otherwise short on scenarios that might be improved by the presence of Ser Barrow.
“I can take the box.” Slide it into his waistcoat, close beneath the muffle of silk and the jacket over that. Free her hands for further scandal.
"I'll trade you for the papers," is agreement and prudence all at once. There are interior pockets of her coat better suited to those than the lockbox. If one of them is going to get splattered all over this maze, then the other one had better be able to slip away with something to show for it.
After a brisk exchange of prisoners, Fitcher releases him to uncoil the trip wire and stretch it across the marginally more moonlit direction of the forked path. A little spit applied along the length of it makes it gleam unobtrusively. If Caliara follows this way, then he may as well be made confident of their chosen route.
"We should only need to lead him along a little longer. He'll return to the villa for reinforcements once he feels his connection to the Fade wane past use."
It’s a deal, unspoken agreement in his reach to shuffle folded, blackened filings from within his coat. Bits of ash and soot tatter after them. He’ll have to trade her a knife to make room for the box in turn, eyes and ears turned alert to the bend in the path at his back. There’s a wide notch in one of them for stars to dust through, marking shrapnel’s exit trajectory across his turned cheek.
Provided they survive, this might be his last outing as a no one of note.
In the meanwhile, she’s the expert -- he nods, assured by her assurance, turns the dagger in his grasp, leather wrap silent under glove.
Listening, ready.
Edited 2021-11-29 20:18 (UTC)
i know you're on hiatus/god this is old as hell judges @ myself
With his loaned dagger in hand, the papers from Caliara's desk comfortably wedged against her side within her coat, and confidence that they need only be both patient and a little lucky (two things she excels at), Fitcher gives him a last sidelong look—'Oof, what a day'—and then moves softly down the branching path opposite the tripwire. She keeps to the more shaded portion of it, trending as closely to the hedge can be managed without dragging against and rustling the greenery. The shells which have been used to line the pathways are less dense there and marginally less crunchy under her boots.
(In her head, she is doing a series of figures. They will go a little ways into the maze and then wait for the tell-tale sound of pursuit, and if they're fortunate the labyrinth will simply do it's work. They can double back easily then. And if all else fails? The whole hedge maze is peppered with little nooks and crannies, pathways with open to secret courtyards with statuary and what have you. If they could reach one of those, they might have the opportunity to get Caliara in the open and—
It's usually a matter of speed and a certain willingness to forego negotiation which wins the day in any fight with a mage.)
For all that, it feels like both an eternity and only scant moments before the night air is punctuated by the sudden sound of hurried footsteps. The gait is faintly uneven. Someone's breathing is ragged.
The Butchered Lamb is a particularly rowdy public house deep in the heart of one of Lowtown's many boroughs. One in a series of cramped, overlapping structures which share walls and floors as they zig-zag up the steep back roadway, the Lamb no doubt derives its name from the slaughterhouse that it's wedged nearly over top of.
It is not a place to go for peace and quiet. It does however offer the psuedo privacy of a table and benches built directly into an awkwardly shape niche at the rear of the room, and an excellent selection of fresh cuts to anyone willing to pay for them. Any conversation that might drift beyond the cramped corner with its rusty hanging lamp and dripping array of candles will no doubt be obscured by the boisterous activity currently carrying on in the rest of the room.
A girl is standing on one of the long tables, with both hands cupped around her mouth so she can shout over an argument between a cadre of tanners— 'The next question is, 'Which legendary artifact features prominently in Varric Tethras' Hard in Hightown?' —No, Lowell you bint! Write the answer down, don't shout it.'
And so on.
In that little niche, with the scant leftovers of their dinner yet to be swept away but their second bottle of port wine on hand, Flint breaks the seal and unfolds another paper pull tab. A brief review of the contents reveals the slip of paper to be functionally useless, and so off it goes into the pile of duds growing between them.
"I'm beginning to suspect we may not recover our investment."
There go his ambitions to get rich off a few coppers worth of gambling chits.
"How shall weather the loss?" John deadpans, reaching to snag the latest discard between two fingers and draw it over to examine. Not second-guessing Flint's assessment, but briefly admiring the lightly-smeared printing of symbols, tipping it towards the single, fat candle set on the table. "It's quite the blow."
Ha, ha.
Letting the chit fall to the table, John leans forward to take hold of the bottle and top off their cups. Flint's first, then his own, while an aggressively off-key attempt at The Bottle Let Me Down is drowned out by a chorus of shouts from the cluster of tanners.
"There's likely still time to persuade our fellows below to let us in on their game," John suggests as he returns the bottle to the table and lifts his own cup. "I heard something about winnings."
"I can't say that I'm very familiar with Tethras' fiction," is drawled back. Another pull tab is peeled open. This one too is flicked onto the top of growing molehill of discards.
From where the game is being conducted, the girl is hollering again. She's moved on to, 'The next question is, Name the Rivaini city currently occupied by the Qunari—' In the little niche, Flint makes a face at Silver.
"As I said," John continues, with a minor gesture of the hand unoccupied with his cup. "A small fortune awaits us."
An overstatement of the pot, perhaps. Judging by the condition of the bar and the presentation of the clientele, the sum cannot be more than modest. Below them, a minor argument between the prospects of Ayesleigh and Kont-aar is escalating towards good-natured shouts.
For a given definition of good-natured.
"Let me open the next one," is a more actionable proposal. John stretches a hand across the table, palm tipped up. "We'll see if fortune favors one of us."
"It's entirely possible the house printed no winners."
Because which is more likely—that his luck is so sour, or that someone is cheating? Nonetheless, Flint shovels the half dozen remaining chits across the table. It's fine. Passing off tabs duty allows him to turn his attention to the refreshed contents of his cup.
The answering hum of agreement comes after John breaks the first chit, shakes his head over the contents.
"That's one way to turn a profit," has no heat behind it. And for all John's light proposals as to winnings, he does not care so very much whether they leave this place with coin or no.
Instead, working the seal off a second chit, John leans back in his chair to watch Flint from across the table.
"Do you suppose we've enough coin to beg a room for the night?" John asks, mock-serious.
Below them, a pitched shout of Your next question, which brothel did Lady Marielle conceal herself in during the fifth installment of—
"Doubtful," is hummed across the lip of his cup. It's more concise than noting that the rooms, if they even exist, probably stink of butchery regardless of how thoroughly they've been whitewashed or how clean the sheets are.
He drinks down a measure of the wine, vaguely aware that he is anticipating it's effect in addition to the faint buzz humming just there at the tips of his fingers, the restless clip of his thoughts lulled to a more modest pace between it and the familiarity of the company to hand. Maybe they'll split another bottle and linger for a further hour or two before rolling back down to fetch seats on the last ferry to the Gallows.
"Surely by now you've a short list of innkeepers and madames who owe you a favor should our fortunes fail to change."
"I can think of several," is hardly a surprising answer. "Though I think we might wait until the new year to prevail upon Veikko at the Fennec's Paw. He's yet to hire a competent laborer to patch that roof and I don't favor waking up half-frozen."
The second seal cracks apart under gentle pressure. John tips it towards the candle, hums over the contents.
"Remind me, is it partial winnings for three dragons and a Chantry sun?" John asks, turning the slip around on the table. "Or is that only a copper's worth of congratulations?"
The real question is whether or not they care to risk a return to the Gallows and discovering whatever fresh cacophony has run its course in their time spent off the island. John has yet to invoke the possibility, but it lurks at the corners of the conversation, as his thumb drums at the smooth-worn handle of his mug.
"There's a key here somewhere," precedes the shifting of the various detritus they've collected over the course of dinner between them. He hadn't paid much attention to the rules or odds of the game, only that the buy in had been spectacularly cheap and the act of tearing paper as the city is plunging into a shortage of it cheerfully wasteful.
(The chits must have all been printed weeks ago.)
No shuffling uncovers the little guide, however. All signs point to it having stuck to the bottom of a since whisked away plate or cup.
Giving up said key for lost, John surmises, "We might hold out hope for some small victory," and sets the chit in question off to one side.
Not that it's a particularly secure place, as they've demonstrated.
"Speaking of, I had a hog properly roasted for the men, and an extra case of rum sent aboard."
Which may lead to some form of chaos aboard the Walrus but John can only assume it'll be a far more contained than anything that's gone on in the Gallows. At least the crew can limit themselves to minor property damage and some brawling when they attempt any kind of revelry.
"You're spoiling them," might more easily be an assessment of Silver's care for a particularly beloved dog or an unruly child more so than for two dozen able bodied men on a ship anchored in the Kirkwall harbor. And yet—
It takes very little effort to drain his cup. And then (counter-intuitively), more soberly: "How are they? The men."
It's no secret that his duties with Riftwatch have all but ripped him away from the day-to-day management of the Walrus and her crew. In some respect, it must be a relief to those men who understand it to be their home. But in another, it has all but a designed breeding ground for resentment. They've been plucked from one life of dangerous monotony that they'd at least chosen, and thrust into another by forces that must at this point seem very like coincidence or ill-fate with no whiff of the end they'd once been promised in sight. And here is one of the men who orchestrated it all, locked away in some island tower. That the Walrus hasn't disappeared unexpectedly in the night is a small miracle, entirely attributable to the man across from him.
John is aware of the contents of Flint's desk, items requiring his attention piling high enough that even halved still far outnumber what any man could work through in the course of a day. And it is, admittedly, tricky to frame the business of a Division Head in ways that impress and inspire the crew.
Hence, the pig. And the rum. And—
"The profiteering is the best thing we've done for them," John relates. "It makes it far easier to involve them in any other manner of business we need the ship for."
Perhaps it doesn't need to be said that Nascere's erasure helps. Perhaps they might take themselves to Llomerryn, and start fresh. But they had long years to establish themselves in Kirkwall now. Circumstances have shaken out in such a way that there is more here to abandon than just their ship.
If John reminds them of this from time to time in the winding weave of a story, well.
"Emlyn gives them a discount. They've some measure of connection in Lowtown. I believe it is enough to satisfy them, so long as we keep them at their preferred work."
It doesn't sound like a question, but it is. Or it's a word of caution—the specter of words spoken a lifetime ago by the likes of Charles Vane who'd asked what the fuck they were doing here, in Kirkwall, with the accusatory tenor of someone under the impression that he'd identified a waste of time. Eventually, Flint is certain (even in this jovial, lamp-lit atmosphere), that they will arrive at some crossroads where the men's loyalty is required and he would prefer them to follow rather than ask themselves whether they might be more satisfied simply working out of the Kirkwall harbor under the Viscount's nose rather than chasing whatever object Flint (Silver) puts before them.
Between his fingers, Flint tears open another chit. This one, with its simple depiction of a tankard, is more easily deciphered; they've earned a drink on the house.
"Comfortable enough that they aren't tempted to find better lodging to the north."
Which is the very fine line John has been threading for years now: to convince them Kirkwall is a fair place to spend time when not at work on the water. Emlyn has been obliging in sweetening all John's persuasion with some reliable, tangible benefit.
"But the winter gives them more than enough to complain about."
Though there is always some grievance. John could spin them out right now if they cared to spend the night hearing of the men's many sufferings. Instead, he drains his cup.
"Well done," and then, "How many more do you have in that stockpile?"
Key or no key, they've a paltry sum of winnings amassed between them. Flint turns the winning chit over between his fingers. The image of the tankard rotates—spins up and then over out of sight, then rises again. The cheap cardstock is rumpled from the stress, warped from some spot or other of moisture on the table.
"Are they satisfied enough, do you think, not to run were we to pay Llomerryn a visit?"
A question presents itself immediately: Llomerryn, when, what shall they—
But that's not what John has been asked, so he lets that line of inquiry spin out, trusting an answer in due time as he considers the state of their crew.
"We might lose one or two," John says, fingers questing across the table to find a scattered piece of coin they'd used earlier to scratch wax from one of the earlier cards. John now scratches it against the tabletop, expression thoughtful. "Our odds will be better if you give me some time to arrange a few very good nights."
Surely there is no need for particular details. They are both aware of the existence of the Blooming Rose, and John has by now met the right people to acquire discounts and liquor, everything necessary to assemble a very satisfying evening to see the men off.
Though, that being said, John adds, "They have been putting down roots here. And recruiting out of Kirkwall has helped with that."
Which leads to John's look, expectant, carrying the question over: When?
Even now, there must be rare instances in which the exact trajectory of Flint's thoughts obscure themselves from the man who now sits across from him. Or maybe Flint's mind is fully opaque only only in rare instances such as this one, where he has yet to fully reach a resolution and is speaking on the half formed rather than the carefully measured. Before he answers that unspoken question, the wrinkled chit is turned a few more cycles between his fingertips. A dual roar of triumph and outrage rises from the nearby tables—scores have been tallied. One of the groups has taken their prize.
"The concerns of the Orlesian navy will by with the Waking Sea, and in rebuilding their grip on it now that Val Chevin is back in their hands." This is not an answer to the question of When. "But it seems clear to me that something must be done to the secure the Amaranthine and the mouth of the Minanter, lest Tevinter use their toe-hold there. Were they allowed to throttle the flow of trade past Brandel's Reach, it could be disastrous. Llomerryn is well positioned to discourage that if we can find the right words to convince them of that fact."
The scrape of coin against stained wood is utterly lost by the clash of voices from below them. John's interest is brief but incisive, leaving Flint's face to sweep over the assembly below, mark the fortunate and unfortunate parties, and realign to the matter at hand.
So.
"I've been considering that we might find our proposal to the crew to be as effective there as it was here."
Profit. Can they anoint all of Llomerryn privateers? Perhaps. Regardless, John considers less if they can convince enough of Llomerryn to follow their example and more when, which leads him to the obvious question of—
"We might consider who of ours we could station there," follows that thought, because they all benefit from having someone close at hand to pose reminders. "Someone we can spare, but capable of saying all the right things when it becomes necessary. You and I will not be able to keep hold of things that far north as securely as we'd like with things as they are now."
Does Llomerryn give a single fuck about the legitimacy afforded by a privateer's license? Doubtful. Or at the very least, only the weakest of the crews would (Flint pointedly ignores the direction the reversal of that logic takes, and what it might say about the nationless ship in the harbor allegedly under this command). Yet there must be something Llomerryn and whoever has taken charge of her does want, even if it's simply to continue being rich enough to spit in the eye of any nation who would think to leash the likes of that island or Estwatch.
Regardless, the suggestion of an envoy warrants the wrinkling of Flint's nose.
"And we might consider wishing for a unicorn while we're at it."
Three taps of the coin against the table, John's leg stretching further beneath as he slants a grin across the table.
Yes, well.
"I'll find someone," John assures. "Dooley, perhaps."
It will not be the same. But the fact remains: neither of them could be on hand to have those arguments. If they could be in several places at once, many things about their situation will be different.
"And we might want to start having some conversations here," follows after, a suggestion that comes with John's gaze cast down at the crowd below. "See what the talk is from those sailing in from Llomerryn, so we don't arrive without any sense of the geography."
We blurring between them; John will have those conversations. They'll dissect them together after.
Dooley. That name warrants a labored look, but whatever remark it must naturally precede is judiciously checked in favor of turning the chit a few more times between his fingers.
"If this is to be viable and not just seen as pirates recruiting pirates, it would benefit us to try folding in some of the merchant captains into the same service."
There's nothing quite like the stench of hungry tradesmen to legitimize an enterprise.
The expression John slants back is similarly put upon, colored with amusement. They have men who have followed them this far, and upended their lives in service, but the Walrus boasts only two great orators among its crew and both of them are seated at the table.
They must make do.
The look on John’s face turns thoughtful. The tapping of the coin grows rhythmic, settling into a groove as they turn this thing back and forth between them.
“We might start with those who conduct their business out of the ports in the Marches,” John suggests. “There’ll be resentment there for the disruption, and that’ll do half the work for us.”
Disruption. John’s voice bends over this word in grim humor. But he’s spent enough time hammering at Antiva to know that disruption is exactly what many view the rolling pressure of war as until it touches them directly.
"Conveniently," he says, for the time being laying aside the topic of who will play as their understudy (fucking Dooley; John may take that humor off his face and eat it). "We happen to be in such a harbor."
Who knows. Maybe they'll get lucky and find some Kirkwall barely-not-a-smuggler capable of stringing a few sentences together.
"I'll ask after what contacts we've to hand in Ostwick and Hercinia. Byerly and Yseult are bound to have a few on the hook."
The coin raps a muted trio of beats against the tabletop.
"And if they ask after the purpose?"
They had said, hadn't they? No masks, going forward. There had been humor in that as well, but this question carries genuine curiosity. How much will Yseult and Byerly be told of this? Stark is an outlier, and so far disinterested, removed from much of the business.
But Yseult and Byerly might make this very difficult. More difficult than deciding upon a proxy to set loose in Llomerryn.
"We've discussed the merits of privateers before now."
And had wrestled so strenuously over the semantics that the idea had been all but smothered in it's crib. But that was before, with Tevinter's sights on Val Chevin—not an ideal target, certainly, but one which might be choked out by raising the Kirkwall chain or some other drastic action if fundamentally necessary. With the reverse on the table—if Tevinter manages to throttle trade along the Minanter as well as on the Waking Sea, what means will they have to stop it?—surely they can be motivated to see the reason in urgency.
Flint pauses, the blank back of the wrinkled chit face up between his fingertips. Hoping to win anything of real value against the house in these games is pure foolishness.
"When we were in Hasmal, Yseult asked after Nascere. She wanted to know what we'd intended for it."
Not a topic John had been prepared to see raised between them. The tap of the coin ceases as John looks back at him, taking in the whole of his expression.
"Did you answer her?" is half a question. What John is asking after is the nature of the thing. How much of an answer did Yseult receive, and how much of it was rooted in truth?
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silas.
It's one of those lovely little sounds entirely defined by its context. Wishing to be appealingly mysterious or intriguing? Underscore the thing with a raised eyebrow or a coquettish head tilt and the shameless bat of dark lashes. Short on more articulate threats? Accompany it with the glint of a knife's point. There is nothing Fitcher appreciates more than versatility.
Take for example this moment in the darkened study of an Antivan merchant prince, long past the hour in which respectable guests have retired to the rooms graciously afforded them by their generous host.
"Hm," Fitcher says, as between their four hands and the clever application of a few picks and wedges, the hidden compartment in Ramondo Caliara's desk finally falls open with the tell-tale lyrium whiff of an enchantment activating. In that context, it sounds very much like 'Well, fuck me.'
And then the glyph on the base of the compartment glows red hot and the papers inside the compartment begin to catch fire.
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“Is it just the fire?”
Are there even alarm spells in this world? He asks while smothering his boot over licks of flame, quiet, terse, sacrificing speed for stealth.
This is only a stage 1 disaster so far.
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Fitcher has twisted to get a better look at the sweltered interior of the compartment, allowing the softened stamp of Silas' boot to continue unabated for a moment. The residual heat is already fading, the red hot brand of the glyph deteriorating—
"There's something else here."
A plate lodged at the top of the compartment. She can see the switch to release it, warmed hot by the expulsion of magic. Caliara, you clever little weasel.
Fitcher straightens abruptly. From one of the evening's hip pouches, she produces two things: a sturdy pair of gloves and a skein of trip wire with a sharp peg at either end. She passes this second one to Silas.
They might also give the window and its modest drop to the paved veranda below some consideration here shortly. Surely between them it would be easy enough to drop down, leave some sign that the intruder had slipped off into the grounds, then double back into the villa and there make themselves snug in their beds once more.
A thief in the night? You don't say, makes for fine gossip over breakfast.
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There’s a phantom pang in his glance to the hall as his fingers curl through the offered skein, reaching for feedback from a cat who’s out of touch halfway across the continent and currently a finch besides. Instead he has to listen, the lighter leather of his own glove smearing over a burning scrap that’s threatening to set an end table alight.
Then he’s gone, out the door.
The further away any eventual encroaching thump, the more time they’ll have to slither out the window.
When he returns, after a glance to check her progress, he’s swift to cross the office to unlatch it, careful this time to feel around for hidden switches as he goes. Business, business.
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Still, she pauses after—listening hard. Waiting for a thump or the soft sound of careful footfalls. Watching for the hint of a light in the corridor as the glow from the compartment's security features dims, flickers, and at last dies.
(A glyph would need refreshing, she thinks in the softened dark. Caliara must have someone hired someone on.)
There is a dented tin flask in her hip pouch. Standing very straight and watching the door with a quiet sense of expectation, Fitcher gently hinges back the stopper and splashes a measure of the flask's contents onto her knife.
"No one waiting on the veranda?"
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He’s still as a log for a long moment, no movement past the brisk stir of salt air at his hair and through his breath. The family claim-to-fame is a veil of shadow sprawling across the yard to blot out neighboring properties at a distance, towering, hard-cut hedges sizzling in waves with the breeze.
“Clear.”
When he tilts back in, it’s with the start of half a grin, crooked on the order of suggestive in the dark. Fitcher’s found a secret box. They’re making good time. The house is quiet.
Maybe they don’t have to go straight back to separate beds when this is done.
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In rapid succession, the life sized portrait of a historic Caliara swings away from the wall to admit a tall, slim figure to the study. And then Fitcher throws her knife, still dripping with magebane. If there is a wet thwack as it pegs somewhere below the shadow's ribs, it's swallowed by the liquid flash of some half formed and entirely reflexive casting gone wild, a tongue of mage fire spilling ineffectually hot across the stone ceiling of the narrow hidden passage as the largely unseen mage stumbles back into the dark.
Fitcher snatches the still smoldering box off the rug and scrambles to join Silas in the window. Time to go.
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Hm.
Here comes Fitcher -- his hand twitches up as if in offer before he turns to monkey himself over the sill first instead.
Easier to offer to dampen the hit to her knees from below than to dangle her over the edge, surely -- he's already craning a look up after her, jaw grit against the protest of his own bones against a hard landing.
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The heated lockbox is jammed unceremoniously in her hip pouch as she steps up onto the sill after him. It's only because he hasn't yet fully dropped down onto the veranda and found his footing (—that leg of his was given such a lashing at Satinalia—) that Fitcher glances back over her shoulder at all.
Silas is looking but given the waning moonlight, it's hard judge exactly the rate at which the color drains out of Fitcher's face. But there is something to her expression which is not well reasoned confidence held rigidly in check when she comes down after him with a flap of her dark coat's long tails.
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Then there are options to consider: following the hedge line to the carriage house, an open dash for the property fence line on foot, the bulk of the building behind them to circle around.
He’s keen enough on the carriage house to break that way without much more than a glance to her for consensus. There’s an opening in there, a flicker of a dare. They can turn and fight, but he’s run the numbers and it seems very unwise.
They aren’t getting out of here alive without a ride.
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He'll be in the window shortly. She's certain of it—can feel the tingle under her skin. An itching instinct between her shoulder blades. How far can he reach? It will depend on how well she buried her knife. If he was wearing his night clothes, or was had come ready for a fight. If, if, if.
She should have brought her crossbow along, silly cover story be damned.
"We need to break his line of sight," she says before one of the basins with its little tree still in it is ripped from its post and hurled after them. It narrowly misses, scouring a seam into the lawn at such force that it outpaces them.
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Breathless, he cuts her another glance. He’s already hurting -- it’s nickel bright in his eyes, coarse in his voice:
“If I’m killed, I trust you to make the report more dignified than the reality.”
Dismembered in a hedge maze has more the makings of a funny footnote than an in memoriam. But there’s a break in the hedge just ahead, and with it the promise of cover. They even took a tour of it earlier.
Maybe they’ll remember the way through.
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And instantly catches him by the elbow to steer them left into the pitched shadows of the maze and to insistently check their pace down to a brisk walk. She's breathing high. They can't run the whole way, and their pursuit may very well guess at them fleeing like loons at speed. If they are patient and lucky, what are the odds that he will course far past them and they may simply double back and make their way back across the lawn like sensible cat burglars?
"It's Ramondo Caliara. I marked him before jumping down," is an even whisper. Fitcher has clapped her spare hand down on her hip pouch to keep its contents from shifting or jangling. "He saw me."
Inconvenient—to give the man such excellent motivation to pursue them.
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He registers the news about Caliara late accordingly, resistance to the common sense of it lending a crust of salt to his next exhale.
Of course.
With one hand free, he threads the misericorde from its place at his back.
"Is he poisoned?” he asks. What was that?
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Or maybe he'll bleed to death. And then they'll have a Merchant Prince's corpse to contend with. Wouldn't that be nice.
"Your leg?"
There are two skeins of wire left in her hip pouch. The unused contents of the flask. A wicked dagger jammed down her boot—
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Who could have foreseen this.
But no sooner has he answered the question than he’s set to plucking invisible chords around the grip of his dagger -- a ritual carried out in miniature while they walk that seems to iron some of that unevenness out. She’ll have seen the evidence before if not the open act of his casting, knife wounds and the like touched up in transit.
Speaking of knives: the number of them he has secreted on his person is as egregious as she may have grown to expect.
“Do you always carry magebane?”
If they’re going to die --
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They've arrived at a point where the path diverges. Here, a brief halt to listen to the sway of the evening around them. For the crunch of footfalls or to see if its possible to taste the ozone burn of magic under the salt of the air. After a long beat of quiet, quiet, quiet—
"A shame Barrow isn't here. We might try that trick of feeling each other up in a corner again."
Fitcher flicks a sidelong look at him, reaching with her open hand to delicately fetch free one of the bundled trip wires.
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He’s never seen a Thedosian mage fly.
The sidelong look she sends him is returned in kind, a slant at his brow inclined to agree for all that he’s otherwise short on scenarios that might be improved by the presence of Ser Barrow.
“I can take the box.” Slide it into his waistcoat, close beneath the muffle of silk and the jacket over that. Free her hands for further scandal.
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After a brisk exchange of prisoners, Fitcher releases him to uncoil the trip wire and stretch it across the marginally more moonlit direction of the forked path. A little spit applied along the length of it makes it gleam unobtrusively. If Caliara follows this way, then he may as well be made confident of their chosen route.
"We should only need to lead him along a little longer. He'll return to the villa for reinforcements once he feels his connection to the Fade wane past use."
Promises, promises.
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Provided they survive, this might be his last outing as a no one of note.
In the meanwhile, she’s the expert -- he nods, assured by her assurance, turns the dagger in his grasp, leather wrap silent under glove.
Listening, ready.
i know you're on hiatus/god this is old as hell judges @ myself
(In her head, she is doing a series of figures. They will go a little ways into the maze and then wait for the tell-tale sound of pursuit, and if they're fortunate the labyrinth will simply do it's work. They can double back easily then. And if all else fails? The whole hedge maze is peppered with little nooks and crannies, pathways with open to secret courtyards with statuary and what have you. If they could reach one of those, they might have the opportunity to get Caliara in the open and—
It's usually a matter of speed and a certain willingness to forego negotiation which wins the day in any fight with a mage.)
For all that, it feels like both an eternity and only scant moments before the night air is punctuated by the sudden sound of hurried footsteps. The gait is faintly uneven. Someone's breathing is ragged.
silver.
It is not a place to go for peace and quiet. It does however offer the psuedo privacy of a table and benches built directly into an awkwardly shape niche at the rear of the room, and an excellent selection of fresh cuts to anyone willing to pay for them. Any conversation that might drift beyond the cramped corner with its rusty hanging lamp and dripping array of candles will no doubt be obscured by the boisterous activity currently carrying on in the rest of the room.
A girl is standing on one of the long tables, with both hands cupped around her mouth so she can shout over an argument between a cadre of tanners— 'The next question is, 'Which legendary artifact features prominently in Varric Tethras' Hard in Hightown?' —No, Lowell you bint! Write the answer down, don't shout it.'
And so on.
In that little niche, with the scant leftovers of their dinner yet to be swept away but their second bottle of port wine on hand, Flint breaks the seal and unfolds another paper pull tab. A brief review of the contents reveals the slip of paper to be functionally useless, and so off it goes into the pile of duds growing between them.
"I'm beginning to suspect we may not recover our investment."
There go his ambitions to get rich off a few coppers worth of gambling chits.
10/10
Ha, ha.
Letting the chit fall to the table, John leans forward to take hold of the bottle and top off their cups. Flint's first, then his own, while an aggressively off-key attempt at The Bottle Let Me Down is drowned out by a chorus of shouts from the cluster of tanners.
"There's likely still time to persuade our fellows below to let us in on their game," John suggests as he returns the bottle to the table and lifts his own cup. "I heard something about winnings."
Ha, ha.
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From where the game is being conducted, the girl is hollering again. She's moved on to, 'The next question is, Name the Rivaini city currently occupied by the Qunari—' In the little niche, Flint makes a face at Silver.
Well, all right. He knows that one.
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An overstatement of the pot, perhaps. Judging by the condition of the bar and the presentation of the clientele, the sum cannot be more than modest. Below them, a minor argument between the prospects of Ayesleigh and Kont-aar is escalating towards good-natured shouts.
For a given definition of good-natured.
"Let me open the next one," is a more actionable proposal. John stretches a hand across the table, palm tipped up. "We'll see if fortune favors one of us."
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Because which is more likely—that his luck is so sour, or that someone is cheating? Nonetheless, Flint shovels the half dozen remaining chits across the table. It's fine. Passing off tabs duty allows him to turn his attention to the refreshed contents of his cup.
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"That's one way to turn a profit," has no heat behind it. And for all John's light proposals as to winnings, he does not care so very much whether they leave this place with coin or no.
Instead, working the seal off a second chit, John leans back in his chair to watch Flint from across the table.
"Do you suppose we've enough coin to beg a room for the night?" John asks, mock-serious.
Below them, a pitched shout of Your next question, which brothel did Lady Marielle conceal herself in during the fifth installment of—
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He drinks down a measure of the wine, vaguely aware that he is anticipating it's effect in addition to the faint buzz humming just there at the tips of his fingers, the restless clip of his thoughts lulled to a more modest pace between it and the familiarity of the company to hand. Maybe they'll split another bottle and linger for a further hour or two before rolling back down to fetch seats on the last ferry to the Gallows.
"Surely by now you've a short list of innkeepers and madames who owe you a favor should our fortunes fail to change."
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The second seal cracks apart under gentle pressure. John tips it towards the candle, hums over the contents.
"Remind me, is it partial winnings for three dragons and a Chantry sun?" John asks, turning the slip around on the table. "Or is that only a copper's worth of congratulations?"
The real question is whether or not they care to risk a return to the Gallows and discovering whatever fresh cacophony has run its course in their time spent off the island. John has yet to invoke the possibility, but it lurks at the corners of the conversation, as his thumb drums at the smooth-worn handle of his mug.
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(The chits must have all been printed weeks ago.)
No shuffling uncovers the little guide, however. All signs point to it having stuck to the bottom of a since whisked away plate or cup.
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Not that it's a particularly secure place, as they've demonstrated.
"Speaking of, I had a hog properly roasted for the men, and an extra case of rum sent aboard."
Which may lead to some form of chaos aboard the Walrus but John can only assume it'll be a far more contained than anything that's gone on in the Gallows. At least the crew can limit themselves to minor property damage and some brawling when they attempt any kind of revelry.
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It takes very little effort to drain his cup. And then (counter-intuitively), more soberly: "How are they? The men."
It's no secret that his duties with Riftwatch have all but ripped him away from the day-to-day management of the Walrus and her crew. In some respect, it must be a relief to those men who understand it to be their home. But in another, it has all but a designed breeding ground for resentment. They've been plucked from one life of dangerous monotony that they'd at least chosen, and thrust into another by forces that must at this point seem very like coincidence or ill-fate with no whiff of the end they'd once been promised in sight. And here is one of the men who orchestrated it all, locked away in some island tower. That the Walrus hasn't disappeared unexpectedly in the night is a small miracle, entirely attributable to the man across from him.
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John is aware of the contents of Flint's desk, items requiring his attention piling high enough that even halved still far outnumber what any man could work through in the course of a day. And it is, admittedly, tricky to frame the business of a Division Head in ways that impress and inspire the crew.
Hence, the pig. And the rum. And—
"The profiteering is the best thing we've done for them," John relates. "It makes it far easier to involve them in any other manner of business we need the ship for."
Perhaps it doesn't need to be said that Nascere's erasure helps. Perhaps they might take themselves to Llomerryn, and start fresh. But they had long years to establish themselves in Kirkwall now. Circumstances have shaken out in such a way that there is more here to abandon than just their ship.
If John reminds them of this from time to time in the winding weave of a story, well.
"Emlyn gives them a discount. They've some measure of connection in Lowtown. I believe it is enough to satisfy them, so long as we keep them at their preferred work."
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It doesn't sound like a question, but it is. Or it's a word of caution—the specter of words spoken a lifetime ago by the likes of Charles Vane who'd asked what the fuck they were doing here, in Kirkwall, with the accusatory tenor of someone under the impression that he'd identified a waste of time. Eventually, Flint is certain (even in this jovial, lamp-lit atmosphere), that they will arrive at some crossroads where the men's loyalty is required and he would prefer them to follow rather than ask themselves whether they might be more satisfied simply working out of the Kirkwall harbor under the Viscount's nose rather than chasing whatever object Flint (Silver) puts before them.
Between his fingers, Flint tears open another chit. This one, with its simple depiction of a tankard, is more easily deciphered; they've earned a drink on the house.
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Which is the very fine line John has been threading for years now: to convince them Kirkwall is a fair place to spend time when not at work on the water. Emlyn has been obliging in sweetening all John's persuasion with some reliable, tangible benefit.
"But the winter gives them more than enough to complain about."
Though there is always some grievance. John could spin them out right now if they cared to spend the night hearing of the men's many sufferings. Instead, he drains his cup.
"Well done," and then, "How many more do you have in that stockpile?"
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Key or no key, they've a paltry sum of winnings amassed between them. Flint turns the winning chit over between his fingers. The image of the tankard rotates—spins up and then over out of sight, then rises again. The cheap cardstock is rumpled from the stress, warped from some spot or other of moisture on the table.
"Are they satisfied enough, do you think, not to run were we to pay Llomerryn a visit?"
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But that's not what John has been asked, so he lets that line of inquiry spin out, trusting an answer in due time as he considers the state of their crew.
"We might lose one or two," John says, fingers questing across the table to find a scattered piece of coin they'd used earlier to scratch wax from one of the earlier cards. John now scratches it against the tabletop, expression thoughtful. "Our odds will be better if you give me some time to arrange a few very good nights."
Surely there is no need for particular details. They are both aware of the existence of the Blooming Rose, and John has by now met the right people to acquire discounts and liquor, everything necessary to assemble a very satisfying evening to see the men off.
Though, that being said, John adds, "They have been putting down roots here. And recruiting out of Kirkwall has helped with that."
Which leads to John's look, expectant, carrying the question over: When?
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"The concerns of the Orlesian navy will by with the Waking Sea, and in rebuilding their grip on it now that Val Chevin is back in their hands." This is not an answer to the question of When. "But it seems clear to me that something must be done to the secure the Amaranthine and the mouth of the Minanter, lest Tevinter use their toe-hold there. Were they allowed to throttle the flow of trade past Brandel's Reach, it could be disastrous. Llomerryn is well positioned to discourage that if we can find the right words to convince them of that fact."
So.
"Sooner rather than later."
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So.
"I've been considering that we might find our proposal to the crew to be as effective there as it was here."
Profit. Can they anoint all of Llomerryn privateers? Perhaps. Regardless, John considers less if they can convince enough of Llomerryn to follow their example and more when, which leads him to the obvious question of—
"We might consider who of ours we could station there," follows that thought, because they all benefit from having someone close at hand to pose reminders. "Someone we can spare, but capable of saying all the right things when it becomes necessary. You and I will not be able to keep hold of things that far north as securely as we'd like with things as they are now."
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Regardless, the suggestion of an envoy warrants the wrinkling of Flint's nose.
"And we might consider wishing for a unicorn while we're at it."
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Yes, well.
"I'll find someone," John assures. "Dooley, perhaps."
It will not be the same. But the fact remains: neither of them could be on hand to have those arguments. If they could be in several places at once, many things about their situation will be different.
"And we might want to start having some conversations here," follows after, a suggestion that comes with John's gaze cast down at the crowd below. "See what the talk is from those sailing in from Llomerryn, so we don't arrive without any sense of the geography."
We blurring between them; John will have those conversations. They'll dissect them together after.
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"If this is to be viable and not just seen as pirates recruiting pirates, it would benefit us to try folding in some of the merchant captains into the same service."
There's nothing quite like the stench of hungry tradesmen to legitimize an enterprise.
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They must make do.
The look on John’s face turns thoughtful. The tapping of the coin grows rhythmic, settling into a groove as they turn this thing back and forth between them.
“We might start with those who conduct their business out of the ports in the Marches,” John suggests. “There’ll be resentment there for the disruption, and that’ll do half the work for us.”
Disruption. John’s voice bends over this word in grim humor. But he’s spent enough time hammering at Antiva to know that disruption is exactly what many view the rolling pressure of war as until it touches them directly.
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Who knows. Maybe they'll get lucky and find some Kirkwall barely-not-a-smuggler capable of stringing a few sentences together.
"I'll ask after what contacts we've to hand in Ostwick and Hercinia. Byerly and Yseult are bound to have a few on the hook."
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"And if they ask after the purpose?"
They had said, hadn't they? No masks, going forward. There had been humor in that as well, but this question carries genuine curiosity. How much will Yseult and Byerly be told of this? Stark is an outlier, and so far disinterested, removed from much of the business.
But Yseult and Byerly might make this very difficult. More difficult than deciding upon a proxy to set loose in Llomerryn.
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And had wrestled so strenuously over the semantics that the idea had been all but smothered in it's crib. But that was before, with Tevinter's sights on Val Chevin—not an ideal target, certainly, but one which might be choked out by raising the Kirkwall chain or some other drastic action if fundamentally necessary. With the reverse on the table—if Tevinter manages to throttle trade along the Minanter as well as on the Waking Sea, what means will they have to stop it?—surely they can be motivated to see the reason in urgency.
Flint pauses, the blank back of the wrinkled chit face up between his fingertips. Hoping to win anything of real value against the house in these games is pure foolishness.
"When we were in Hasmal, Yseult asked after Nascere. She wanted to know what we'd intended for it."
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"Did you answer her?" is half a question. What John is asking after is the nature of the thing. How much of an answer did Yseult receive, and how much of it was rooted in truth?