player plot: the battle for starkhaven.

[luaithre]

WHO: All
WHAT: Riftwatch and the rebel mages come to the aid of Starkhaven
WHEN: Last week of Wintermarch
WHERE: Starkhaven and outlying territories
NOTES: Open to all, with instructions/suggestions below for what your character can do, dependent on skillset and division. Violences within.



The news has been the same for seemingly endless months: the Tevinter Imperium stays encamped, entrenched, at the doorstep of Starkhaven. The Free Marches city is long besieged, strangled and dying, and its proud stone walls that keep Corypheus' forces out also entomb its own citizens as supply dwindles fast over the winter.

The Exalted March has not come. The scattered militias and militaries of the surrounding territories have not rushed to its aid. Riftwatch has done all it can with the personnel it has, sabotaging enemy movement, collecting information, supplying villages and redirecting refugees, but it seems as though all it can do for Starkhaven is stand vigil to its collapse.

That is, until some hasty conversations were had.

A trio of Riftwatch agents approached Grand Enchanter Fiona, ad hoc leader of the rebel mage forces currently under the Inquisition's banner, with a question: what would it take, for the rebel mages to lend aid to Prince Sebastian Vael?

23 Wintermarch: Stoneweale Fort

Closed: The Division Heads, Derrica, Fenris, Julius, Marcus Rowntree, Petrana de Cedoux

It rains for the entirety of the ensuing negotiations, ice wet winter striking the impassive walls of Stoneweale Fort and the tents erected within its walls. The fort stands south of Starkhaven at the edges of Tevinter's influence, and contains the entirety of Prince Sebastian's available forces and, newly, Grand Enchanter Fiona, several rain-swept griffons, and a collection of Riftwatch agents.

Not all of them take up space in the war room (for instance, the griffons don't need to be there), but those that do bear witness to a deal being struck:

Prince Sebastian speaks plainly: the situation is beyond dire. They are at the precipice of surrender, and between himself and his commanders, they've been preparing for a last-ditch effort to save as many of his subjects as he can spare. By directing his forces in a (likely suicidal) full-scale attack against the enemy, he has hope that this will distract them for long enough so that a select few of his soldiers can fell the far gate and evacuate as many citizens as they can. He welcomes any assistance the mages could offer.

Fiona, understanding the lethality of what Prince Sebastian and his men are going to attempt, first states that the rebel mages can be mustered to assist in this evacuation by destroying the wall and shepherding Starkhaven's people to safety. She also pledges to personally join the Prince and his men in their attack on the main force.

It's with gratitude that Prince Sebastian accepts her offer.

And there is little time to prepare.

23-29 Wintermarch: The Minanter River

In the coming days, Riftwatch redirects its focus towards the preparation of Starkhaven's last stand. The movement of a small army of mages from the Orlesian frontline to deep into the heart of the Free Marches is the kind of logistical effort that one would hope to have plenty of time to organise, particularly in the interest of evading the Imperium's notice for as long as possible, but time is a luxury, and there are few of those available these days.

To ensure a swift and relatively stealthy travel time, the rebel mages are broken up into still sizeable detachments – they ride on horseback, or travel on merchant vessels that have been acquisitioned for the war effort, quietly coursing down the Minanter. They camp in thatches of forest or huddle within long emptied warehouses in semi-abandoned trading settlements.

Riftwatch agents of any combat capability join them, ride with them, and stay in contact through crystals to ensure coordination.

In the sky, griffon riders are tasked with keeping close monitor of any Tevinter detachments that might push close to the small army of mages moving in from the west. The going is often lonely, long hours, solo flying with reportage over the crystal network, before gathering together in small camps to feed their mounts, themselves, and sleep in hastily erected tents that protect them from the winter-time rain.

When necessary, members of Forces and Scouting will be deployed to run interference and push back and redirect Tevene scouts or soldiers and Venatori. Sometimes, larger groups of Imperial forces threaten to intercede, in which event, Riftwatch agents may find themselves working together with rebel mages to not only prevent the enemy from interfering with their people, but killing them so as to ensure there is no reporting back of a sudden influx of mage activity.

Members of Research may find themselves based at Stoneweale Fort. After some convincing, Prince Sebastian allows his various commanders to coordinate with Riftwatch to identify locations and pressure points within Starkhaven and its defences for the purposes of sabotage in preparation for Tevinter's taking. Now is the time to plan, analyse maps, prepare explosives or enchantments, and try not to look too excited about it.

Meanwhile, those within Diplomacy, if not hovering helpfully around Stoneweale Fort, are sent to make ready for Starkhaven refugees by speaking to villages further south, negotiating for supplies and accommodations, rallying any militia that are willing to assist in their protection. It's all a little thin on the ground, but if there was ever a time to cash in some of Riftwatch's local goodwill, it's now.

30 Wintermarch: Starkhaven

The wall

A horn sounds out, long and mournful. Voices and horse hooves and sword clashing and magic casting beneath the stormy sky is reduced to a dull roar as Prince Sebastian, accompanied by Grand Enchanter Fiona, leads his forces in a frontal assault against the overwhelming Imperial presence at his gates.

As a result, the far gate has been left undefended.

Slaughtering the remaining unit of Tevinter soldiers guarding it is borderline perfunctory, but there is much still to do. The majority of the rebel mages (less those volunteers who have joined Fiona in Sebastian's host), along with any mages of Riftwatch who choose to join them, gather en masse upon the stone bridge and the shallows of the river – a small army of men and women in robes or in armor, but all holding a staff to mark them for what they are. As they begin to draw from the Fade, the air takes on the scent of bitter-storm, energy crackling and prickling across exposed skin, ruffling hair and clothing in unseen winds.

Stone cracks and wood splinters under gouts of raw magic and white-hot bolts of summoned lightning, slamming in unison against walls that have remained previously unbroken all this time. Beneath them, the ground rumbles and shivers, and debris spills where cracks form and open and widen from the base of proud walls to the ramparts.

A small group within the rebel mage forces then move together in coordination, and the stone wall before them all at once comes apart. Giant broken slabs of stone and support lift into the air as if in an explosion slowed in time, drifting away from one another as magic carries it in shimmering green-tinged telekinetic influence.

The ground shakes, again, as pieces of Starkhaven's walls land safely, if heavily, on the mud-thick river on either side, leaving a yawning opening where once were sealed closed gates of oak and iron.

On the other side, where rain beats down the rising dust, gathered citizens of Starkhaven, frightened and war-worn, stare out at an army of mages.

The sky

In the sky, over the chaos, Riftwatch uses the distraction of battle to send swift-flying griffons over the walls and into the city proper to enact acts of sabotage to Starkhaven's infrastructure. Below them, civilians flood the streets, pressing in a constant stream of bodies towards the crumbled wall. Up here, the sounds of a raging battle drift clearer from the front.

Everyone in the sky knows where they are going and what they are doing, under strict orders to avoid any harm coming to civilians. Either as a passenger or on their own, members of Scouting (and some non-Scouting mages) carry with them precise instructions from Research and the means to enact them in the form of alchemical explosives and enchanted grenade-like items that will detonate in bursts of raw Fade magic (or their own magical ability). Common targets include: the defensive weaponry and ballistae posted up on the ramparts, the chains that man the major gates of the city, certain storehouses and administrative buildings indicated on maps. Likewise, there are wealthy estates to pillage and deprive Tevinter of any coin they might find there.

But soon the city will be overrun, and those on griffonback may find themselves under assault of arrows and magic as they make their escape.

The retreat

On the ground, floods of Starkhaven citizens, soon to be refugees, flow through the crumbled wall, staggering across the bridge and through the shallows of the river that surrounds the city, helped along by mages and Riftwatch alike. It is a lengthy and exhausting process as hundreds of ordinary people, wide-eyed and terrified, are herded out of the valley and onto solid ground, streaming south for where villages have been fortified and prepared to receive them.

Then, the sound of cavalry.

Racing across the rocky plain, under Imperial banner, a horde of dracolisk and their riders come galloping at a furious pace towards civilians, mages, Riftwatch alike. Their presence does not speak well for the main battle, but they arrive all the same. Reptilian screeches and hisses pierce the rumble of thunder above, and frightened cries from the refugees begin to sound out as panic grips them, turning to run in panicked stampede at the sight of Imperial soldiers upon their poison-spitting mounts.

It was enough of a likelihood that the Forces members who have been deployed to ensure the security of the evacuation are prepared to move with the rebel mages to meet them. The battle is quick, bloody, magic crackling through the air in time with clashes of shield and flying arrows. Searing poison sprays across skin and armor and flame ripples across scaly hide as a brutal skirmish ensues.

But the battle breaks when the worth of continued harassment weighed against the potential cost. By order of Itaeus Ferra, astride his own beast, the dracolisk cavalry withdraws, tiding back towards Starkhaven, now lost to the forces of Corypheus.

31 Wintermarch: Southwards and Vallomire

Men, women, children march through the cold and into the night, but blessedly, the rain eases itself to an icy misting of constant damp instead of the driving downpour from earlier that day.

It becomes clear that among the refugees, there had been those prepared for this journey. Temporary campsites, guarded by mages and Riftwatch alike, strike up so that all may take a few hours of rest. There is some food passed around, if not very much, and as the sun rises on a new day, the procession resumes, if no less wearily.

Eventually, all arrive at the half-abandoned township of Vallomire, chosen for its largely empty barnhouses and warehouses on the shores of a distributary from the Minanter. It is not large enough or manned enough to permanently house so many of Starkhaven's people, but it will do for the next few days of recovery and rest.

There is food, gathered in from as many corners as was willing to part with it, and warm blankets, and, just as important, a reduced sense of impending doom amongst those that had lived under its shadow for so long.

Spirits are not high, but they are tired. Mournful, but alive. As the day lurches into the evening, as the rain finally withdraws and bonfires are lit, and mages and ordinary citizens of the Free Marches mingle in this moment of necessity, news finally trickles in from Starkhaven.

It is as feared: the city has been claimed by the Tevinter Imperium. Much of Starkhaven's military has been destroyed, giving their lives to buy this opportunity for escape. And, in murmurs that spread from campfire to campfire, two names in particular are spoken in low, reverent tones: Prince Sebastian Vael, and Grand Enchanter Fiona, have fallen.

Stories of prince and mage charging side-by-side into a wave of enemy soldiers, fighting back-to-back against overwhelming odds after all their fellows had fallen, rising again and again from the mud to continue the fight, to hold back the inevitable tide until the city was emptied. Toasts are raised and tears shed for the saviors of Starkhaven—its people, if not its stones.

Smoke rises in the north, a black mark in the sky, as the sun begins to set.

Comments

loxley.

[charmoffensive]

over starkhaven. closed to yseult.

[charmoffensive]

Loxley takes no issue with heights. An almost reckless lack of issue, really, a fan of high up places, narrow ledges, and flying, when he's ever given the chance.

He's not great with animals, though, and where he sits in the saddle behind Yseult, he's going to pull a muscle in his thigh for clinging on so tightly in his saddle, deeply conscious of animal form being powered under independent will—both Yseult's and the griffon's, and he being simply astride it. It is, at least, not his first time playing passenger, and as they lift off over the city, there's more to think about than whether the griffon may simply choose to throw them or something.

Strapped across his back is a light-weight crossbow, readily brought to bear as needed. Pertinently, he also has a satchel of small handheld devices that he is given to understand will explode into Fade energy on impact. A flask of alchemical fire which will burn and burn. His own magic, in a pinch. His sword, just in case.

He thinks of certain companions back home, who'd have been well keen for some purposeful property damage. (As if he is not a little anticipatory for quasi-legal breaking and entering, lockpicks stashed on his person for anything in need of a finer touch than explosions.)

Nothing spoken immediately, save for a quiet 'fuck me' as he watches the streets swarm with people. Glad to not be caught in that.

[hassaran]

Yseult at least seems quite confident in the griffon's intentions. The Scoutmaster and Pockets--as she'd been introduced, and who immediately lived up to her name by attempting to nick a stray bit of string out of Loxley's pocket with surprising deftness for such a large creature--seem to have a firm bond, and it requires little visible effort to steer her to their intended destination. The difficulty comes from below, and already Loxley has been called upon to lay down covering fire as enemies on the ground take aim at their white-feathered mount.

"Northwest storehouse first," Yseult says over her shoulder, head turned to direct the words back at him lest the wind whip them astray. They'd talked the targets through on the ground once already, but the order was left up to circumstances. "They should have fewer stationed up there. Then we can circle back once they're fully occupied."

[charmoffensive]

"Let's."

There's a rattle as he brings his crossbow into his hands, happy enough to rely on his own sense of balance, Yseult's piloting skills, and whatever tethers and stirrups are in place to use both his hands on something other thing not falling from a great height. A bolt readied, cranked into position. Manages not to make any embarrassing sounds at the next downwards (albeit smooth) lurch of wing.

A griffon is not a subtle thing, and certainly, Tevinter soldiers know well to look up as well as down. Magic first, then, with its better range, no need to worry about the wind, and he spares a hand to summon it. In Yseult's peripheral vision, it appears as a gathering of light in his palm, shaking and vaguely unstable, before magic spears fourth some hundred feet, a shivering rainbow streak that strikes one of the figures guarding the storehouse.

Whatever he's hit with, he staggers backwards, clawing at his face. The second, aimed passed Yseult's shoulder, strikes another, and just visible is the gust of flame that engulfs him in a flash, exploding out from his chest.

[hassaran]

Even if Loxley's attention were not distracted by the need to aim spells at the enemies below, it would be difficult to tell that the wielding of magic in such close proximity bothers Yseult. She's already tense for obvious reasons: a grip on the harness as they fly through the air, the occasional projectile whipping past, the noise of the battle joined below. Her shoulders inched minutely closer to her ears is the only sign of the crawl of her skin at the crack of a spell and the whiff of ozone that follows. It makes no difference to their path, except that he's cleared the way and she steers the griffon into it with a touch of knees, the three of them winging northwest.

"What was that?" she asks, "That light? Nine o'clock, base of the tower," she adds before he can reply, spotting another group of guards loading crossbows and raising staves.

[charmoffensive]

He doesn't notice.

Will, later, wonder if it was what the Scoutmaster anticipated, and then naturally go on to wonder if it was a fuck up, actually, and how it is that Richard always remembers to whip out things like unnatural magics in the right time and place and with the right people, but this is only because Yseult is a Thedosian whom he has yet to get a read on, and not because the span of his focus clocks flinches or withdraw.

But not right now. She speaks, and for a moment, he crosses the two things together, a light at the base of the tower, but he sees people instead, readying a volley. He swings an open hand around, sending that glimmering light on a quicker draw, and whatever energy is settles into in impact, it sends his target slamming backwards, off his feet.

"Fuck," is quick, more like he'd spilled his wine as opposed to in response to the arc of arcane light flung their way, scorching over head.

banks of the minanter. closed to abby.

[charmoffensive]

They range ahead of the group of rebel mages they'd been tasked to guard, like a pair of sheepdogs there to nip at the heels of cattle who can set you on fire with a thought. As important as it is to stay with them, though, it's fundamentally true that this sort of group can defend themselves.

Reportage over crystal says: sign of a campfire further east.

And so they go to check it out, moving at a steady gallop to range well ahead of the mages. To their north, the Minanter river flows by peaceably, completely oblivious to the territorial war that has ripped these lands apart. They slow to rest their horses, keeping an eye on the sky to see if they can spot this foretold camp smoke for themselves.

Loxley manages his horse alright. A necessary mode of transportation both here and where he is from, but rests uncomfortably in the saddle, tensing ever so when his horse twitches in a way he doesn't anticipate. Lashed at his side is his rapier, and across his back, a light crossbow and a small quiver of bolts.

They're playing a game, by the way. It is less fun for the absence of drinking, but—

"Never have I ever," he says, drawing out the thinking time, and holding up a hand with two fingers down, three splayed, having done at least two things so far, "won an arm wrestling contest."

Seems like cheating, but the stakes are low.

[armd]

Abby sighs, "You're a dick." But she puts a finger slowly down, her first. She supposes he wanted to drag her into the game after she managed to escape question one and two unscathed, which, fine. Sore loser vibes, though.

Her other hand is curled into the reins. Her horse is, thankfully, patient, because Abby is not well-versed in long distance horse riding. Like Loxley she moves awkwardly, finds it difficult to let her weight naturally sway with the movement of the horse because she's too used to holding herself tense and at the ready. Her legs will be so sore tomorrow.

But that's tomorrow. Right now, she clears her throat, casting about for something that isn't about horns growing out of her head. "Never have I ever got a Satinalia present I didn't like." Ooh, the potential for gossip.

Should they be paying full attention to the matter at hand? Probably. Have they been doing that all day and Abby's getting so bored, though? Yeah. Yes. So.

[charmoffensive]

Airship would be nice. Teleportation circles. Flying potions.

No, just the swaying march of a horse and the sense of no progress whatsoever as they range ahead. To Loxley's credit, he keeps his eyes on the sky for sign of rising smoke, where he can imagine a campsite might make use of brief reprieve from the winter rains to cook or dry something.

Accusations of being a dick get a minor shrug (fair, at least this time), before tipping his head in wait of the question. When it comes, he goes, "ohh," for it's a good one indeed. The next finger that would be folded down if he, indeed, has ever, wiggles in place.

"In the interest of fairness," he says, "and good sportsmanship, are we counting gifts that I may have appreciated on a comedic level, but have yet to actually use? Or gifts I did use, because they were useful, but boring? Because I can't say I've outright disliked a gift."

[armd]

While Loxley looks forward Abby rocks her weight to one side in the saddle to check over her shoulder at the rebel mages trailing them at a comfortable range, close enough for a warning shout to be easily heard. They look the same as their guardians do: tired, bored. Some stare straight ahead in grim anticipation.

Abby, turning back to face the front, finds her horse has slowly drifted left. She guides it back alongside Loxley's, pats the heel of her hand against its sweaty neck.

"Since when were we doing good sportsmanship?" Mr. won an arm wrestling contest, "But yeah, we're counting those, so it sounds like you don't have to put a finger down." SIGH, "Really thought I'd get you with that one."

[charmoffensive]

Loxley's score-keeping hand splays momentarily in a gesture of offense at the suggestion he has been unsportsmanlike, but the smile at the corners of his mouth never dissipates.

"I'm very easily impressed by material things given freely," he confesses, anyway. "Sorry. My tragic backstory meant it didn't happen very often way back when, you know how it is."

In response to Abby's horse drifting and realigning, Loxley's horse goes ahead and drifts in the opposite direction, corrected with a gentle tug at the reins.

"Never have I ever," he says, slowly, thinking, "kissed anyone in the heat of battle."

He wishes.

[armd]

Abby does actually know how it is, so. Shrug. He can have it.

She stares out into the middle distance for a moment, considering his question. Finally, "People actually do that?" Kiss, in the middle of a battle. Outside of stupid romance novels, that is. "Kinda seems like that's the best way to get your head chopped off."

Not romantic, even though she can understand the appeal. It may be obvious that she is not putting a finger down. There's no need to draw attention to that.

[charmoffensive]

"I don't know," Loxley confesses, free hand pressing to his chest (as in, the hand he considers free is holding the reins of the live animal he is riding, and the occupied hand has the important task of keeping score). "But I've read about it, you know," probably in stupid romance novels, or similar, "and I think you'd have to be either very certain that you're about to win or very certain you're about to die."

A shame, then. Abby won't be giving him any insight.

Looks back at the sky. "Don't ask if never have I ever seen this smoke column we're meant to be finding," he advises. "You'll be disappointed."

[armd]

"And you have to be actually living in a book." Her mouth is curling, "So that the music swells at the perfect moment, and all of the fighting magically stops around you." But hey, she kinda likes that dumb trope in books? It's romantic. She's ragging on them with the utmost fondness (good to know Loxley is also a fan).

Maybe they can both put a finger down, here. In the interest of equality: "We-ell, I was gonna say 'never have I ever not had a sore ass after a full day of riding', so.

The ground is so fucking uneven, dude.

on the way south. closed to derrica.

[charmoffensive]

He'd never really seen this sort of thing in Tassia.

In his time, in his country, he'd live through no wars, no mass displacement or cities in turmoil. Only the start of the end of the world, which had been a different kind of chaos, and his view of it from a markedly different angle from this: being flown over rocky landscape, squinting against the onslaught of rain, and watching the mass gathering of ordinary people stream into camp as the sun starts setting.

But he's seen it now in Thedas, a few times, and certainly not so much as to be unmoved. No, just familiar, this queasy churn of feeling the world he's in change underfoot, and the people here change with it.

Striking, now, tall in the crowd of mostly humans, some elves, grey skinned and brightly dressed, a patch over one eye of shining black leather and fine stitching. He ignores some of the startled glances he attracts as he roams through the crowd in search of one person in particular.

i made it.

[tender]

One person in particular is not so hard to find.

Or only difficult to find because of her stature, shorter than the ebb and flow of crowd around her. There are cuts and scrapes and bruises presented to her to be eased away, soothed with a passing of a chilly, green-tinged palm. As she works, all the while she is glancing up, looking through the spaces between bodies to mark out members of Riftwatch moving through the crowds beyond her.

Vallomire is hospitable enough now, because they are all desperate to be underneath a roof. To sit down. To mourn. Derrica is so tired. She feels the chill in her bones. As happy as she had been to settle alongside moving water, she also wants nothing more than to trail along with the people passing out of her company into the barns and warehouses.

When she looks up again, hands still clasped in a small boy's tight grasp, she catches sight of Loxley at last. Straightens, so desperately relieved that she can't move just yet.

Says his name anyway, in a rush: "Loxley."

Only to have it repeated for her by her pint-sized customer, enamored by the arrangement of syllables and happy to make a sing-song repetition of it.

[charmoffensive]

Relief weighs his shoulders, but his smile is bright, symmetrical and white in all the gloom as he lays eye on her. A light jog, then, stepping neatly through the slow pace of the crowd, slowing only when he sees she has a small charge with her.

Something he hasn't shared: the way, in Tassia, small children in particularly used to shrink at the sight of him. Adults, too, but they were easier to dismiss and ignore, to think condescending thoughts about the signs of protection against evil they might make should they find themselves sharing a street corner with a tiefling.

But children reacting with fear had always been a little stinging. As if they knew something he didn't.

Here, now, Loxley reflects on this for scarcely a moment at the way this does not occur, smile sobering as he looks from her to the child, and when he looks again to her, there's a hasty assessment, trying to catch anything he ought to know about her mood and health than simple weariness. "The very same," he says, meanwhile. "And who's this?"

[tender]

"Asif," Derrica tells him. Some tight, terrible vise grip of uncertainty has loosened in her chest at the sight of him, whole and hale and smiling as he walks toward her.

There is a great scorchmark sparked up her side, a slash of dark blood at a slant across her chest. Asif swings her hands, unperturbed by both, and the height of the man joining them. Lox-ley, sung again, a little stomp of feet, and Derrica bends to lift him with a groan.

Asif is a little too big to be lifted. But it has been a very long day for small charges.

"His mother is fetching blankets," she tells Loxley, reaching already for his hand as Asif is obliged to balance over her hip. "Are you alright? Hurt?"

[charmoffensive]

"I'm fine."

Worry sets back in, having only briefly burned off. Loxley steps nearer, letting her take his hand. Up close, there's the evidence of his work in the form of oily soot dark on grey skin, where rain and sweat have mingled to cut clear paths through it. A tear at a sleeve. No sign or scent of blood, no bruises.

He leans in and kisses her on the cheek. "Are you alright?" he says, unmindful of the sleepy child she has secured in her arm, before it occurs to him to ask right after, "Do you want me to take him? Honestly I've been sitting down most of the day."

In Yseult's griffon saddle, but still.

[tender]

"I don't think that's as relaxing as you make it sound."

Without knowing fully where he had been, what responsibilities he'd taken on.

Her hand lifts to the tear in his tunic, fingers dipping beneath the fabric to find unblemished skin underneath. It's a brisk inspection, quick because she is more interested in leaning into him than passing off the child. Asif swings one foot, skimming Loxley's hip in the process.

By and by, the answer to his question manifests:

"I helped bring down the wall," by which she means to say, "Once things are more settled here, I'd like to sit down."

A concession for little ears; what she would really like is to lay down with Loxley somewhere quieter, if such a place existed in Vallomire.

[charmoffensive]

There's a fond crinkle at the corners of his eyes when he feels her fingers seek out injury in the tear of his tunic. His other hand gently blocks tiny kicky feet as his other arm pulls her in nearer, encouraging her to rest some weight there.

He kisses her temple, knowing this is probably a high concentration of kisses per moment, knowing it may get worse. He can smell smoke in her hair, burned things. Storm.

"I recommend it, the sitting," he agrees. "Somewhere dry, perhaps. Imagine, being dry."

[tender]

"We've been thinking more of being warm," Derrica informs him.

Or maybe this was Derrica, quietly miserable at the tailened of Marcher winters. It is so cold atop the misery of the circumstance, of what's been lost. All these lives—

Asif's weight shifts over, grasping for Loxley. Perhaps wanting a handful of that fine stitching along his tunic for himself. Derrica's free hand cinches around his waist, exhales a quiet laugh.

"He isn't worried about anything."

A blessing, maybe.

[charmoffensive]

"Warm?" Loxley queries, a skeptical raise of his eyebrows. "We're dreaming big over here, I see."

He allows for grabby child hands to inspect the edge of his sleeve, where geometric patterns in golden thread decorate the warmly cream cotton. Rather nice to be worn under armor, dirty in patches from smoke and sweat, but most of his things are nice, and why not show up to work in style?

"For the best," Loxley adds, a little quieter. "But the Venatori are down a few storehouses, now, regarding their latest acquisition."

Also known as, the entire city of Starkhaven. His tone has a slightly whimsical 'that'll show them', for all that he does believe the risk to be worth it.

[tender]

"I wish it had turned out differently."

Even though she had been one of the hands to set all this in motion. She had stood with the mages, and brought down the wall.

And still, she feels something close to regret. Uncertainty that what they had wrought was the best thing for Starkhaven, or the rebel mages.

Asif's loose-swinging foot knocks against Loxley's thigh. His father's voice calls from a few feet away, people swirling between them. Covetous little hands tighten over Loxley's cuff in sulky rebellion against Derrica's loosening grip.

[charmoffensive]

Her tone catches him, a deeper sense of something than his dry flippancy, and his free hand finds a chance to rest against her jaw. Then, someone is shouting out, and there are kicky feet and grabby hands. Loxley allows his sleeve to be caught for the amount of time it takes Asif to become more preoccupied with his father's arrival.

"This one yours?" he tells the man, with a rekindling of his smile that had started to fade. His hand rests, now, at Derrica's back, prepared to usher her against him as soon as this latest burden has been lifted.