faderift | SATINALIA

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SATINALIA

WHO: Everybody!!
WHAT: SATINALIA!!
WHEN: Backdated to the first day of Firstfall
WHERE: Gallows courtyard
NOTES: Drunkenness and shenanigans. HALLOWEENMAS!!

This Satinalia is, perhaps, less grand than in years past. Blockades are still limiting access to luxury goods, after all, so the fine liquors and dainty foods that have been featured before are nowhere to be found. And Tertia, the temporary Morale Officer, doesn't have the connections or deft touch of organizers past, so things are rougher than they've been before - the musicians are less polished, the ale a little more watered-down, the decorations somewhat haphazard.

But you know what? It's still Satinalia. Nothing can really screw up Satinalia. Especially because there are some rather lovely touches, the best of which might well be the ice skating rink. A section of the Gallows Courtyard has been roped off and frozen over with magic, leaving a (largely) smooth sheet of ice covering it. Skates are available to borrow if you don't have a pair. Of course, some injuries are definitely going to result (if you skate off the edge, you're smacking into stone instead of a soft snowbank, which can be disastrous), but hey, it's fun.

Other perks are the bonfires, with mulled wine and cider being served out of cauldrons around them, where people might sit and reflect while watching the flame. There's also dancing, of course, with the musicians basically being any band that's been recommended by members of Riftwatch - so there are lots of half-competent cousins-of-friends playing here. What they lack in skill they make up for in enthusiasm; this is the first gig for a lot of them, and they're thrilled to be here.

One thing that's missing is the Satinalia fool being named ruler. Tertia wasn't familiar with this tradition and didn't arrange it - so there's a last-minute campaign being held, in which people can either nominate others or self-nominate to be named Riftwatch's greatest fool to be celebrated.

Enjoy yourself. Exchange presents. Get drunk. Have a blast. Don't lose any teeth.

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More than willing. I didn’t want to raid the shelves myself for reference material without knowing what was outdated, what’s the most reliable, and so on.

[ When she asks about germ theory, though, there’s a flicker of surprise across the man’s face — then smoothing over, before she thinks he’s laughing at her. ]

Great timing. This actually came up in the town of Cledwyn the other day. [ It did not go well. People hadn’t been receptive to Strange’s scientific explanations. But she’s asking, so: ]

The germ theory of disease is— I know this sounds daft and imaginary as hell, but there are these micro-organisms too small for the eye to see without magnification. Pathogens and germs can grow and reproduce and cause disease in their living hosts. It might be as simple as a sick person coughing on someone else, which can transmit germs in their breath, their saliva.

Germs proliferate in unhygienic environments especially. So, for example, if you’ve noticed that washing your hands with soap before surgery will help the wound heal better and reduce the chance of infection. Boiled water kills germs, and so is less likely to make you ill. Alcohol, too, actually, which is why beer might be safe to drink even when the local water isn’t.

[ Finally, Strange stops. A faint touch of sheepishness as he says, ] I went on for a bit. Magical healing’s all well and good, but it’s just nice to have a question from an actual colleague.

[ Even to this day, he still thinks of himself as doctor right alongside the sorcery. ]

There is a great deal of knowledge here that seems accurate, but there is less willingness to perform proper dissections and the desire to learn more of the human body. I sought to remedy that.

[ Imagine if she actually told people the story of how she met her husband - bonding over the sharing of dead bodies. It would leave the Chantry in a state of shock and horror, she thinks, which is amusing enough.

Sidony, at least, is willing to learn a little more of the world, especially when Abby had not been able to give her a great deal of specifics - so she is already rather thrilled at the notion of speaking to someone who seems to have their head attached properly. ]

Is there a way for us to produce that level of magnification here? I am willing to give you the benefit of knowledge from other worlds, but I would like to see the evidence of it. Then, perhaps, I can conduct my own studies.

[ She waves her hand - the one missing fingers, forgetful of her - absently. ]

I do not mind the notion of talking more. I am not a particular fan of magical healing myself, so any practical knowledge is a welcome thing.

There’s a thought. If the townspeople had been able to see what I was talking about, with a compound microscope, then they’d probably have been more readily convinced. [ He considers. ] I’m not a glassmaker so I’m not sure on the process. But I know a couple people who might have some ideas, and it’s really just a stronger, inverted spyglass, so I presume we might be able to build one… and yeast — you know, for baking bread? — is alive, too, and should be easier to see under magnification. Enough to prove the theory, at least.

[ His gaze is caught by the flutter of movement, and those missing fingers. But familiar with his own self-consciousness about his own hands, Strange knows enough to not just bluntly ask a total stranger, What happened there? even if there’s that nagging little seed of curiosity, now planted in the back of his skull.

How does Riftwatch’s foremost surgeon work with missing fingers?

(How does New York’s foremost work with broken ones?)

Instead, he skirts the question. Half-smiles at her last sentence: ]

It does feel a bit like a cheat, doesn’t it? We study for all these years and then someone just does the equivalent of waving a magic wand. Admittedly, I’m a mage, but I was a surgeon long before. I still consider myself a doctor first. Old habits die hard.

They are more likely to trust something they can see with their own eyes, especially if linked to some measure of logic. I cannot promise they will want to believe you, given the nature of the common folk and their mistrust of magic, but it may be a better attempt. I do not know what many people think of Rifters nor their knowledge of other worlds, but I cannot imagine it is an entirely positive one.

[ It is easier to focus on some science, some real knowledge, then it is to dwell on what she can and cannot, and she leans back as she considers, thoughtful.

Rifter knowledge may be as fantastical to some as Thedas' own magic, and that lends itself to its own conversation. And yet... ]

It feels somewhat akin to that, yes. I have spent many years learning the body and studying to be as proficient as I am and yet I still feel as though mages are able to do more with a single moment than I could in a lifetime.

No, not entirely positive. [ He sounds dry and almost bemused. Riftwatch had been a way of easing into it, since they were accustomed to people like him. Whereas the superstitious countryside — ready to heft torches over the very idea of wayward mages — was quite another experience. Still, though… ]

That said. Magic can’t do everything. Presumably a broken bone still needs to be re-set in order to heal straight. Science and magic are simply two sides of the same coin, two different ways at getting to the same truth beneath all things.

[ Contemplatively, then, and a little light: ] Also, I went into extreme amounts of student debt for my medical degree, so I like to think it still served a purpose.

Magic is something that people here can barely wrap their mind around, even those who have that gift. [ And the way she says 'gift' makes it very clear just how she feels about that particular present might be. Sidony remains without fondness for magic, no matter how it might have been used around her in the past. It's a sore spot.

Shifting her weight a little, she nods. ] Magic is like... The rush of feeling in your body after a fight. The rush. I am not sure of the technical term that you Rifters might use. [ Adrenaline. ] But it does not fix everything. It does not completely overwrite what the body does naturally.

[ Her lips twitch a little. ]

I tracked across the country and was disinherited for my studies.

[ Gift, Sidony says, like it’s a curse word, and Strange makes a mental note of that scalpel-sharp twist to her mouth as she enunciates that word. He’s spent a few years now to get accustomed to juggling those contradictions in his own life: his belief and love of magic existing elbow-to-elbow with his cold, rational side. Finding some way to juxtapose the two and have it make sense.

And his cool blue eyes track over her, sizing her up, trying to guess at the reasons behind it. He can imagine a few different ones, but… ]

So you must have really wanted it, [ Strange says, with the sound of like recognising like. He’s familiar with obsession and drive. He’d subsisted on it for most of his life. ] At the risk of getting too personal, why the disinheritance? Is studying medicine unpopular here?

[ Trying to map Thedas to Earth’s past has never really worked; it’s not a clean one-to-one comparison to medieval times, so he’s trying not to assume. ]

[ It is a disappointment that she has learned to get over, that is true enough, but she cannot escape the still present sourness of it. She doesn't want to dwell, doesn't want to think too hard about what she is missing, but it is hard not to. It stings all the more with the loss of her fingers, the knowledge that she could still heal without additional support and practice if she had magic.

Her eyes snap back to him, a little glaring, before she adjusts her weight and settles a little. ]

I did. But I am growing well accustomed to my lot. [ Some of the tension bleeds eventually, but she is still sharply on edge. ] It was not only the study of medicine. It was the refusal to return home and wed the person they had chosen for me. I was rather unpopular for that decision.

[ She huffs a little laugh, waving her hand. ]

I chose Byerly, and they were most disapproving.

Byerly? Oh, he’s the, [ Strange makes a moustache-twirling gesture to indicate the other man’s very dapper facial hair; which is saying something, considering his own neatly-trimmed moustache and goatie. Maybe that’s why he noticed. ] I ran into him earlier by the fire, but only very briefly.

[ Too brief to form a real idea of him besides cheerful guy, maybe?, but he decides quickly enough to not offer up a fleeting impression. Not with the wife. ]

Arranged marriages sound like hell. I don’t blame you for running. And I imagine the frontlines of a war ought to give you more than a few people to treat. Lots of opportunities to work the trade.

[ That, at least, makes Sidony laugh out loud. ]

That is he, yes. I am sure that you will get to know him quite well over the time that you are here. He has become rather important to Riftwatch in recent months.

[ And it's very clear just how proud of Byerly she is, as his ever loving and gentle wife. ]

That was the hope, yes. I am able to help people and I am able to develop my craft in a way I would never have been permitted at home.

Nothing like continual trial by fire to learn. If I ever need a leg chopped off, I’ll be sure to come to Riftwatch’s foremost surgeon.

[ It might sound a little tongue-in-cheek, but it’s meant as a compliment; easy enough to dole out, when Strange is simply so glad to meet another surgeon in this new, unfamiliar setting. He misses having colleagues, an order to belong to, fellow sorcerers he’d studied alongside. God help him, he misses peer-review. ]

I don’t— [ a quick amendment, verb choice is important, ] can’t practice with the knife any longer, so it’s not like I’m going to be permanently installing myself in the infirmary, but consider me available for consultation. Diagnosis, a helping hand, a second pair of eyes if you ever need it. I’d like to chip in where I can.

I have some experience with the removal of limbs, if that helps.

[ It used to be, after all, that amputation was the one and only way to deal with things like infection and serious wounds. It is only recently that things have begun to improve with medical treatment, and Sidony refuses to be sitting it out.

She glances up and she is smiling, for what it is worth. ]

I would be more than happy to have you join us whenever you would like. Now that I have learned more about these... Germs I would like to do whatever possible to make sure that the infirmary is the best possible place for medicine. For anyone, magical or otherwise.

Oh, please, yes. [ Because few things had been quite so frustrating as that helplessness in Cledwyn — Strange feeling like some sort of Cassandra, knowing the truth and speaking it and no one believing him — but at least here, she’s open-minded. She’s listening. ] I didn’t have “lecture on germ theory” on my bingo card for the year, but there’s a first time for anything. I suppose that’ll be a goal for 9:49.

[ There’s a brief pause, a random musing occurring to him, with that frosty nip to the air and Satinalia and the feeling of a year drawing towards its close: ]

Do people do new year’s resolutions here? At the beginning of Wintermarch, making a list of goals for the next year, aspirational but [ tongue-in-cheek, ] unlikely to be fulfilled?

I am glad to have brought some measure of surprise to the new year, then. It will never stop being so as a member of Riftwatch, I'm afraid.

[ Looking up, she pauses, considering, before she hums a little. ]

I have never made the attempt myself, but I suppose there is some justification for doing it. A fresh start, or something of it. It is a nice enough thing.

[ She tilts her head. ]

Do you intend to make some?

I hadn’t really thought about it until now, but I could. [ Strange is one of the few people who had a pretty good track record with resolutions; the man was just stubborn and obsessive enough that when he did purposefully set his mind to something, then he typically followed through.

But unhelpfully, his first thought is: Find a way to get home. He wisely bites down on that instinct, though. It’s useless. Instead, he muses aloud: ] Work in the infirmary. Get in shape enough that climbing the Central Tower doesn’t leave me out of breath anymore. Maybe learn how to ride a griffin. How about you?

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SATINALIA

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