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player plot: the battle for starkhaven.
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?
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:
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.
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.
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.
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.
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.
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.And there is little time to prepare.
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.
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.
no subject
The sensation is as unique as it is painful, fresh blood tearing through clots, searing into starved organs, the bizarre reversal of venom-lysed slurry draining inky dark up out of the wound and into open air. It can’t be more than a few seconds before Richard’s locked it back under a glass case of dissociation, jar over spider.
Doubtless it feels like much longer for everyone in this tent.
Distrust, dislike.
Richard stifles a shudder in his breath and looks hard back over to Julius with his knife.
“Through the root of the tongue,” he recommends. “Or wherever you think a scar would be most handsome.”
The fist-sized mess he’s drawn out already defies gravity, answering instead to the call of his free hand. A flare of his fingers sees it burned through to dust, dead cells and venom desiccated in a burst of flame. And there’s still more coming.
“Don’t worry about spilling it.” He’ll pull it out of the mud if he has to. Germs aren’t real. “I won’t let it go to waste.”
no subject
Ow.
It passes. Quick breaths again, after not quite breathing at all. In recovery, he misses rude comments about tongues being cut out which spares him the labour of trying to mount a defense or show of affront (or a vote—handsome scars only for everyone, please), all energy spent in gathering back some sense of self while blood and venom turn into cinder in the air above him.
His fingers loosen from Richard's arm, stiffly straightening out from his palm, a tremor twitched from wrist to knuckle. Apologetic, nearly. Certainly, some sense of sorriness in some direction.
no subject
no subject
“Please take hold of him.”
without mention of where or how or for what purpose. He is distracted, whispering terse between stirs of his hand while Marcus retches and leaks beneath him.
Even accounting for the crumbling chunk of ash he’s caked another blob of venom into, one might begin to understand this to be typical of his bedside manner. He smears his bloodied hand closer to the site of the bite, and in so doing muddies loose soot into the mess they’ve made.
“Near to the wound.”
no subject
Marcus grits his teeth against further complaint as Dickerson's hand inches nearer to that point, closer to the radial pulse of damage and hurt around which the whole world feels like it spins. Lifts his chin away and aside, as if there's somewhere else to go.
And in whatever is happening to him, Julius is about to be bound into it too. There is nothing he can do. Marcus does not, actually, want to die, the edge of this fact grating sharp and ragged against also hating the process of preventing it.
Nothing more or less complex than that. His hand will find a place to land on Julius if and when the other man does as told.
no subject
To get close without getting in Dickerson's way, Julius ends up standing at the head of Marcus's cot, reaching out to press his hands gently but unhesitatingly to the side of Marcus's neck and against his unwounded shoulder. The right hand isn't strictly necessary, he assumes, but if nothing else, it gives Marcus something to hold on his uninjured side.
(There's a moment where Julius almost imagines the scars on his own shoulder ache, but that is purely stress, and he puts it out of his mind.)
no subject
Affirmation may be a kindness, it’s hard to say. It’s certainly an indication that Julius should not pull away or adjust, now that the neon glow running down his wrist has eddied into the darker mix of sweat and gore and ash Richard and Marcus are already bleeding into. Marcus is cool to the touch, pale. All the wet isn’t much warmer, but there is a distinct flash of steam in the lamplight when Dick mutters to begin his spellwork anew.
It’s not painful.
Julius’ heartbeat is stronger between the pair of them, an off-rhythm tickle from Marcus’ pulse kicked into matched step after a missed beat. Even the tugging sensation of blood being siphoned into a thicker stream out of Julius’ system isn’t terrible. Easy for him to see the way spirals into an open fanghole for five seconds, ten, fifteen. Easier for Marcus to feel.
Warm.
The mess around it will dry as magic does its work, cold blood burnt off of skin and armor into steam, all the way into a last spit of mist from the trail Marcus left in the mud on the way in. Dirt, ash, and sweat stay behind.
The flow of fresh blood from Julius thins; the glow fades and so does their connection.
Richard wipes the soot on his hand down Marcus’ near pant leg, inside and out, before he steps away.
no subject
Recognised only when it flips around, when he feels only sudden and keen gratitude at warm hands placed gently on him. The next exhale out of him is almost a sigh, a relief for the clarity of that, and Marcus reaches up and back with his workable arm to wrap his hand around Julius' wrist.
On the other side, something horrifying is happening. Feels it in the tug at his heartbeat, put to a different rhythm. His mouth twitches at the strange, not-so-uncomfortable pressure of blood finely funneled into him, bleary eyes focused upwards at Julius as firmly as the anchor of his grip. Slowly, easy, drifting steam, the idle illumination of brilliantly glowing blood only just in his view.
He breathes easier. His skin is warmer, losing that deathly grey. The hold on Julius' wrist has less weak desperation, more calmed strength, thumb rotating a circle in silent communication. Fang marks in his flesh are still there, oozing sedately, but the shiny swelling is reduced.
He shifts the arm he was holding paralysed, brow tensing at the predictable twinge of injury, but his hand lifts, fingers curl in. On the edge of awareness, he feels that brush to his leg, senses Richard stepping away.
Makes a noise, feet drawing in, the beginnings of sitting up and out of the mess.
no subject
His grip on Marcus's shoulders shifts when he can feel the other man start to move. "I'm not sure it's a good idea to sit up just yet," he says, looking at Richard. For all the wariness that's evident (and perhaps something a bit sharper that's not), Julius is clearly looking for input on the point from someone who knows more than he does on the subject.
no subject
He pinches a rolled joint from the tin and is already on his way to lighting it when Julius looks to him. Grubby fingerprints mottle the paper.
“He’ll be fine,” he says, to the point. “Provided there wasn’t any nerve damage."
no subject
Marcus spares a second for his grasp on Julius' wrist to shift and collect up his hand, a clumsy but nevertheless affectionate tangling of fingers that removes the hold on his shoulder as he goes to sit up. A rasp of a sound from him at the uncomfortable peeling away of the oozy wounding at the back of his shoulder from blood-smeared cloth.
Not soaked. The ways in which he is filthy is battlefield dirt, soot, ash, a thin film of fever-sweat. Up off his back, he can breathe even easier, and spends a few moments doing so. Clean, chilly air, no stifling stuffocating.
"Thank you," on the back of one such exhale, looking to Richard. It's not an entirely unalloyed thank you, but there's no resentful simmer or grudging heel-drag to it. He is not dead. Someone would have to have led a very charmed life not to experience real gratitude.
no subject
Instead, he lets Marcus up, reluctant to remove his hands entirely as if he's still waiting for the other shoe to drop. Instead, the one Marcus isn't holding lingers on his back, ready to support him if he finds sitting up harder than anticipated.
He can't quite bring himself to thank Richard too, despite the fact that one of the complicated things he is feeling is, in fact, gratitude. Instead, he nods, a silent yes, me too. It's the best he can do at the moment. Marcus isn't dead, and it's the thing Julius needs to focus on for the time being to keep one foot in front of the other.
On that note, he says to Marcus, "If you think you'll manage for a few minutes, I should go find some clean water so you can clean up." Or, probably, so Julius can help him clean up, but there's no reason to belabor how much help Marcus will or won't need.
no subject
There is a distinct pause before Richard says so.
He uses it to toke, skeletonized manners underscored by a thin, wheezing cough. The stink is immediately overpowering, cloying in the chill and the damp. After eyeing down Julius’ nod, he’s no longer interested in looking at either of them.
There’s a bucket in here somewhere full of filmy water for him to douse his hands in instead, cold enough to make him flinch. Not clean, per se.
“I’ll stay with him until you return.”
no subject
There is a taut feeling of worry, an invisible spiderweb-fine thing that hooks between himself and Julius. His impulse is to pursue it, wind it in, draw Julius out of protocol, but on the other hand, there is just breathing a minute. Water.
He squeezes their tangle of fingers, then loosens them. A breath of sound that communicates agreement, a glance that's meant to add: he'll be fine. Because of or in spite of Dickerson, but fine nonetheless.
no subject
Instead, he briefly touches Marcus's shoulder, reassuring either or both of them that he won't be long and that probably nothing very important will happen in the meantime. If they were alone, he might have kissed him too. Then again, maybe he's too preoccupied regardless. As it is, he doesn't, a brief, affectionate squeeze in its place before he lets Marcus go and ducks out of the tent.
no subject
A lick of flame passes between his hands instead, a sizzle of Fade green fueled by a dribble of blood running watery thin down his elbow to his wrist. He closes the cut with a murmur.
His coat is over -----> there.
Richard crosses to collect it, shrugs it on while still smoking, cuts a wordless glance to Marcus while turning his collar up at the back of his neck. Outside, his borrowed mule stands with its ears pinned in the drizzle.
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But he feels well, in a peculiar way. Bright, alert. Vivid. Sits there at the edge of the cot, hands gripping its edge, and any element of haggardness has more to do with the length of the week up until this evening than any failings of Richard's purging.
And Richard passes him by, glancing up in time to meet glance in return, his own catching, holding. Far it be from him to feel moved to fill a silence, and it's with a perceived necessariness that he offers, "He'll be discreet," voice rough and quiet. It sounds more factual than a promise.
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He has a knife to swipe clean across a wad of cloth bandage he cuts free of its roll. The scuff of him testing the blade across the back of his knuckle is quiet between tokes, the joint unspooling smoke between paired fingers.
He doesn’t offer it.
“What’s the worst that could happen.”
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Marcus is quiet, first, watching the ribbon of smoke form, disperse.
"Then," he says, "I'd ask you for your discretion." As if realising his focus had dipped, he returns it to Richard's face, and a tip of his head towards where Julius moved through the tent flap. "About him."
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“Of course.” He puffs short to keep the cherry aglow in all the damp, standing idle now as he looks back at Marcus in his bed. Mild, gentle, cool in the eyes. The tent flap stands open to the darkness behind him. He said he would stay until Julius returned. “I live to serve.”
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In truth, Marcus seems like he doesn't know what to do with it, a study across at Richard that scours over him before breaking away. To say he is content to just wait in silence until Julius returns would be an overstatement, but it is what he will see fit to do.
He doesn't ask for a smoke, if Richard has any to spare, or a length of bandaging if not for his shoulder than Julius' arm. He leaves it at that one request, while his body acclimates to new blood in his veins.
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Time passes; Julius’ stride is easy to clock for its direct approach.
A glance to meet his eyes, a tuft of ash flicked to the floor, and Dick turns to make his exit without a word. Leather creaks, tack rattles, he clucks his tongue. Four hooves track away through the mud at a leisurely pace.
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As Richard leaves, Marcus doesn't spare him another glance, but does seem to more apparently relax once it is just the two of them again. A long breath out, and then minor impatience for Julius to set down the bowl, before he's reaching.
A reeling in, snagging Julius by the elbow. The other hand (spike of pain up that shoulder, ignored) then hooking into shirt fabric further up. Marcus isn't getting to his feet so Julius will simply have to come down here, bluntly clawed into an embrace that is at least gentle once it's achieved.
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Cleaning Marcus up can wait a moment, as long as both of them need to feel the warm solidity of the other.