open | full circle pt 1

[exequy]

WHO: Concerned mages/rifters/others
WHAT: An emergency meeting!
WHEN: Solace 20
WHERE: The Gallows
NOTES: Explanation in the OOC post. Please tag this like a network post. There are top-level comments to provide a little chronology/structure, but threadjack to your heart's content.

Before and during dinner on an otherwise unremarkable Wednesday, there's a chain of whispers (or notes, or perfectly audible comments from the particularly unsubtle) about an emergency meeting, at an evening hour, in a basement room, regarding a matter of concern to rifters and mages.

The basement part is probably unnecessary. It's certainly ineffective; the organization is too small, the Gallows too contained, and the halls too echoey for something arranged with this much finesse-wrecking haste to truly remain a secret. They could have done it in an empty office or the recreational dining hall, probably, and sat on chairs instead of storage crates. But Kostos picked the location, and he's dramatic. If nothing else it signals a clear intention to do this as unofficially as necessary.

Anyone who accepts the invitation (or just decides to come see what the fuss is about) will first encounter Marcus Rowntree, posted up outside the door like a bouncer, letting mages and rifters move through undisturbed but stepping in to question and likely bar the arrival of anyone else. Inside, Kostos is nothing but a dark scowl in the room's far corner, picking at a splinter of wood on a crate and not mustering a word of greeting for anyone who comes in. Derrica has parked herself within arm's reach of Kostos, a long gold-edged shawl spilling over one shoulder. Her diplomacy pin gleams from the front of her tunic. The worried pinch to her brow is the only outward sign of anxiety; otherwise, she is tightly contained, watching people enter. Julius–notably not in robes–is serious but calm as people come in, standing next to the ever-composed Madame de Cedoux.

Once as many people have arrived as seem likely to, Marcus closes the door, remaining beside it, and they explain what the problem is.

Comments

[tender]

Yes. It does. And their committee is weighted in favor of the Chantry. We would be outvoted, if it suited.

[luaithre]

[ Agreeing— ]

There won't be a vote.

[tender]

No. We shouldn't allow it. And I think we have the means to circumvent it, if we are able to stall long enough for Grand Enchanter Fiona to arrive.

[luaithre]

[ A pause, and then, quieter; ]

You should speak of your Circle's way of living, and its annulment. Of what could be gained and lost. Most of those convening will be heart-hardened against such stories, but not all.

Some could be swayed, and we can begin to speak of an alternative to what the rest of us have had.

[tender]

[ Painful. However— ]

I will. I think it will help Madame de Cedoux's case, to know that it is not only this generation. It was possible before.

[ Unspoken: And it was destroyed. ]

[luaithre]

[ Marcus nods. Aware of the pain that comes with unearthing such things, but knowing no prettier way of asking. ]

If we're to buy time, we might as well pay for it with something worth listening to.

[tender]

Alright.

[ She can steel herself on the journey. Marcus is right, she must speak. And if she doesn't, who else will? Who else is left from Dairsmuid to make clear what was done? ]

I don't understand why they would choose these things. Why any mage would want everything returned to the way it was, knowing how much cruelty it permitted.

[luaithre]

That ought to be among our first questions.

[notathreat]

I don't get why there are loyalist mages.

[Given what she's heard about the Circles, from her perspective in Kirkwalls and the Gallows.]

Were they just... top dogs around, and nobody messed with them, and they want to go back to that?

[exequy]

People messed with us.

[ Ex-Loyalist reporting for duty. ]

[notathreat]

[Confusion.png]

So what's their angle? Can we lean on that to scatter 'em?

[exequy]

If you can believe it,

[ flatly, like it’s not that difficult a thing to believe, ]

some people earnestly think the Chantry’s way is the best solution to the problem we present.

[notathreat]

[A low whistle. And then a pause.]

Maybe that's it. Maybe they should make their own Circle, live their lives how they want. Then if anybody wants to join 'em, they can. With the agreement that they leave the rest of us the fuck alone.

Who says that they have to speak for anybody but themselves?

[exequy]

[ A frustrated, jerky sort of shrug. He doesn't want to play Loyalist Interpreter. He doubts he's doing the right thing often enough without having to argue the opposite. ]

I don't know.

[ But then, actually, you know what: ]

They will say they do not intend to. That it is their right to keep the institutions we built, over eight hundred years—the College of Magi. The Circles. They will say we had just as little right to speak for them when we chose to go to war. You all assume they will declare every mage dangerous, and—I think you are right. Not now, but later. They will. Because we are dangerous. But right now, what it says, [ inarticulate gesture here, ] they do not propose to round us all up. They propose to take responsibility for their people. The children whose parents can't handle them. The mages who can't or won't control themselves—no city guard is equipped for that, and if we are waiting for abominations before the Templars can act, we are sacrificing a dozen bystanders' lives every time, minimum.

The Circles were our solution. We negotiated for them to end an age of being hunted and killed—the Chantry did not create Templars, [ though they weren't known by that name at the time, etc. ] It leashed them. That is what the Loyalists believe we are risking.

[ This is the most he has said at once in a very long time. He's looked more miserable the more he's gone on, but he manages to muster up a few more words: ]

The ones who are not complete bastards on power trips.

[inkindled]

We should do more than circumvent it.

[luaithre]

We'll get to Cumberland faster than the rebels can be rallied. We owe it to them to reserve a seat at the table. And then whatever comes after, we'll be stronger for it.

[inkindled]

If we're allowed to. They don't have to give any of us that seat.

[luaithre]

[ An acknowledging sound, but says, ]

We'll take it, if they don't. But—

[ A beat, then, ]

They're being underhanded, but they'll care about legitimacy, the Loyalists. And we are all still mages, on any side of the fraternity lines.

[tender]

We're owed that seat, Matthias. And there will be enough of us there that it won't be so easy for them to ignore us.

[inkindled]

They can ignore anything they like. They're more or less ignoring us now, aren't they--and if we're there, it'll be more difficult, yeah, but even so. 'Cos they can't like me any more than I like them, and for myself I can't hardly think of them as mages--so that means they likely can't think much of me as a mage either. So what do they care about me, if I'm standing in the way of their legitimacy?

[luaithre]

They'll care about what mages like us represent. The measures we've taken before, and will again.

[inkindled]

Yeah, they ought to care. And we ought to remind them of that in some way when we get there, and not just by standing around.

[luaithre]

[ A sharpening of focus, a shift in body language that gives Matthias his full attention. He does not protest the implication of any of them only meaning to stand around, asks instead; ]

How do you wish to remind them?

[inkindled]

[Having that focus be narrowed entirely to him is unsettling, and he even likes Marcus Rowantree. Matthias takes a moment to wrestle his heart back into its normal place.]

By force.

[luaithre]

No.

[ There's no flash of anger, just calm denial. ]

We don't start this with dead mages. We don't begin these negotiations like Templars, cutting down those that we think too dangerous to live. We go to Cumberland and we listen to their cowardice and we prove to them, if we can convince them of nothing else, that we intend to finish what we began.

[ He tips his head to wherever the focus of the conversation has shifted, in the room. People talking. ]

They need a chance at this.