[CLOSED] This is not my beautiful house

[katabasis]

WHO: Pariahs, Scoundrels, and Heretics
WHAT: A catch-all log for Riftwatch's satellite office in Kirkwall for the duration of Mother Pleasance's visit.
WHEN: Fantasy!March
WHERE: Hightown, the de Foncé haunted mansion
NOTES: Related to Mother May I; additional IC Assignments/OOC info.

Is the timing of this remote Riftwatch installation in Kirkwall perhaps too conveniently in step with a Chantry Mother's visit to the Gallows? And are the particular individuals assigned to temporarily work out of the gloomy Hightown mansion more or less the exact roster that someone might wish to avoid having engaged in prolonged conversation with the aforementioned woman?

No. And if anyone were to suggest such a conspiracy theory, there would be more than a half dozen perfectly reasonable points with which to counter such a paranoid claim.

As far as anyone need know, this posting is derived entirely out of a sense of prudent caution; with Tevinter's forces comfortably ensconced in the recently captured city of Starkhaven, it is only sensible to make any potential assault on Kirkwall by that same force less straightforward than the Venatori might expect.

The de Foncé Mansion

The mansion crammed into the corner of an otherwise reasonably respectable, albeit small, square of Kirkwall's Hightown has long been considered a nuisance and an eyesore by its neighbors. Long before Wysteria de Foncé started blowing things up in the mansion's basement and her companions began to curate a barnyard in its little garden, the house was held in the possession of a particularly curmudgeonly old man whose sole ambition in the years prior to his death seems to have been to stuff as much hideous old furniture, moldy books, and ominous paintings in the house as possible in addition to harassing his neighbors with threats of baseless litigation.

Suffice to say, this particular square in Hightown is well acquainted with this corner mansion being a source of what might be delicately referred to as 'some bullshit.'

Despite the outfitting done to make the place function as a secondary office for Riftwatch (much to Madame de Foncé's extreme distress; this is an infringement on her third amendment rights! Which she knows about because maybe she read the constitution while visiting New York, 20xx!!) and Wysteria's own efforts to renovate on a Riftwatch stipend, the house remains in a state of extreme dreariness. While a majority of the rooms have been organized and scrubbed down to their battered floorboards and peeling wallpaper, still others have been piled full to bursting with the hoard of ephemera left in the house by its previous owner with their doors shut tight and narrow windows shuttered, but otherwise surrendered to a thick collection of dust. The few rooms that have been fully refurbished have a faint air of desperation to them—gay wallpaper in bright Antivan styles, the best of the house's old furniture made to look slightly less shabby and so on.

It's a shame the weather is so miserable. The side garden—which must be very charming in spring and summer—might offer up a welcome relief from the morose interior. Alas, the grim forecast has managed to flood most of the planting beds and cast even that space in hues of drab grey.

Anyone who finds themselves quartering in the de Foncé house will be fortunate enough to have their very own gloomy bedroom which may either be nearly bare of furniture or so cramped with it that it's difficult to navigate. At least all the bedding has been brought over from the Gallows, so no one is sleeping on some dead guy's old sheets, and the expansive servant's kitchen has been stocked appropriately for cooking in. Just don't go down into Wysteria's cellar; she's growing something nefarious down there. With Wysteria's maid quitting on the spot when faced with the prospect of attending to all these guests, everyone will be fending for themselves when it comes to cooking and cleaning.

In addition to suspect fungal experiments, those living and working in the mansion will find themselves companion to: six chickens, an Avvar goat who lives indoors, a large brown dog who resembles a mop (who takes her job safeguarding the house very seriously), a small white dog resembling a nuisance, and an alarmingly large dog-sized Donark ant who may or may not be poisonous (it's fine! she's never bitten a person!), and a sullen poltergeist who takes exception to visitors. Luckily most of the breakable objects it enjoys flinging at people have previously been flung, so while ducking may be at a bare minimum there's no telling when a door will lock shut or a painting will attempt to fall off the wall onto someone while they pass.

The Work

Two of the least miserable rooms in the mansion have been converted into temporary working space for the duration of Riftwatch's quartering there. The library has been converted into a shared office space, containing a few worktables and chairs, a desk for Flint's use, and so on. What is likely meant to have been some kind of dining room is currently acting as a temporary armory.

For the duration of the time that this secondary Riftwatch office exists, those assigned to it will be expected to quarter within Kirkwall (be it in the mansion or otherwise) and report to these offices rather than traveling to the Gallows. Anyone who doesn't already frequent the mansion is barred from it. While those assigned to report to it may still attend to work in Kirkwall and beyond with their colleagues still living out of the Gallows, they are similarly barred from actually traveling to the fortress.

In the mean time, the work everyone will be turned to typically involves coordinating with the Kirkwall Guard to assist in reviewing, repairing, and bolstering the city's defenses should any attack occur. There are also refugees to herd, Tevinter supply lines in the Marches to disturb, and rifts still in need of closing. More than likely, those working out of the division will personally receive their orders directly from Flint rather than having them dispensed in any other fashion.

Everyone is very busy, and the house is very drab, and there should be little reason to think much at all about the Chantry Mother visiting the Gallows.

Comments

[propulsion]

Someone tips a look identical to this icon back at Flint, and as Yseult follows up with her question, Tony spreads a hand.

"Not like that," re gilded carriages, appearances at Halamwherever. "I mean it sounds like being the bestest diplomat's an easier thing when you've got the biggest office and biggest title, and it's like the running a division part and having normal non-fuck-around conversation with the people he has to work with instead of impress is the big ask."

That spread hand flips, dismissive. "I'm suggesting it's on purpose and not brand new information we just need to deliver."

[katabasis]

Somewhere in there: a palm baring tilt of the hand from up off the table; a cant of brows toward the suggestion of Flint's hairline. All right, peace. Tough fucking crowd.

"Let's say you're right. Now what?"

[propulsion]

The tilt of Tony's hand is close to a mirrored gesture, not exactly on purpose. He doesn't have an answer. He'd hedged at one, a permanent kind of one, some weeks back, and maybe tempers have cooled. If anger is actually the thing he'd felt.

"He said he hates it," he says. "And you, and me, and the stuff we do and say." Something like that. "Did that instill anyone with confidence?"

[hassaran]

"No. The tone more than the content." Yseult checks the next chit in her neat little stack and eyes the competitors as they're led to the starting gates, picking out the mottled-black one with ears laid back and teeth bared. Definitely Flint's choice. "Hating it is understandable, but the pleading." There's a twisting twitch of her upper lip that suggests distaste.

She returns the chit to the stack, neatening it with fingertips, then sets forearms down on the table in a way that somehow suggests the pivot that follows. Anyway.

"Rutyer is not a man settled in himself. We," a twirl of a finger encompasses the three of them, "Each know what we are, for good or ill. He doesn't see himself clearly, and it warps his view of others. He cares too deeply about the good Riftwatch can do to neglect the work, but still abhors the idea of people placing trust in him, so continues to play the fool here. I admit I'd expected him to shed all that given time to grow into the role, but he's clung to it past reason. We either finally shake him loose now or else concede that it cannot be done."

jk let's try this again I can definitely read

[katabasis]

A low grunt of acknowledge to the point sounds just faintly skeptical despite himself. It's one thing to sit across from Rutyer in a shit tavern and watch the man talk himself around in some new direction and an entirely different one to actually see him do it. That Byerly Rutyer has a track record (present locale related pun not intended) for lapsing into old habits need not be stated.

Then again, he has managed to keep from being liquored up.

At the thought—or maybe in preparation for the race about to begin, the field now fully chalked into the board and the last of the animals being wrestled into their starting boxes—, Flint begins to lift his own tankard.

"Do we know what Bastien's opinion on any of this is?"

Is for Yseult. But fuck it, maybe for Tony too. He and Bastien are both gregarious. They both have mustaches. Maybe there's some passing friendship there.

[propulsion]

Something in Yseult's answer seems like it aligns well enough with the stuff Tony was saying that he lets it stand. Something crux-like in it, something that matches with the shifting, mercurial vibe that is maintaining a conversation or a working relationship with the guy. He drinks, checks out the goats, marks which one he bet on.

A small brown goat that is currently screaming and, maybe, peeing? Peeing on the wrangler? Maybe that's a good sign. He will choose to take it as one.

And he and Bastien may be in a band together (definitely), but he shrugs at this. Beats him.

[hassaran]

"No." is definite, and accompanied by a reach for her beer, "I do my best to avoid any discussion of their relationship."

[katabasis]

The further beat in which Flint hesitates to drink from his cup is probably the brief measure of time in which he restrains himself from passing a withered look about the table. Given that moment to check himself, and the pause afterward to actually drink from the tankard—

"Do any of us believe we're the right voice to convince Rutyer to come to his senses?"

[propulsion]

"I think we have to be."

Another jolt of a shrug.

"Right? If we're not the right voices then we're not the right team. But, whatever, fine," as if aware he's exclusively stacking problems onto the table rather than helping them out, there's a pivot in energy, "let's say no. Does Bastien actually know what the problem is, here? How little the guy wants to cooperate when he's in the room with a person who happens not to think the sun shines out of his ass?"

He has hung around the pair enough to form an opinion on that dynamic. "I do wanna give him a shot, I just think he needs to want to be given one. What does a Rutyer come to his senses look like?"

[hassaran]

"It does need to be us," Yseult agrees. There is a sense in her tone and the furrow of her brow that this is a point Tony has just persuaded her of, rather than the answer she'd been about to give before he spoke. "And it couldn't be Bastien. He must either see Rutyer differently than we do or else value what he sees differently." Or both? "And whatever influence he may have plainly has not brought him to his senses yet."

The ale they serve here is not meant for savoring, but Yseult takes her time in drinking anyway, and then lifts her chin to look over the crowd to the track as the next race is whistled.

vital goat content

[katabasis]

Beside her, some line in Flint's face narrows by a half measure—a considering squint for this argument that is eclipsed by the sudden bang of the gate being raised and the immediate howl of competition that goes up in the warehouse. If the goats make any noise as they race (at best) along, their various ears and furry coats and little tails flapping, the sounds are as lost in the racket as the voice of the man stood on the higher platform near the finish line who one must presume is hollering the present state of affairs through a speaking trumpet.

A roar goes up. The mottled black goat has reached over and seems to have bitten its neighbor. The immediate tussell has created a pile up in the race lane and already spectators are leaning in over the rail and reaching with switches to break up the fight. They're accomplishing very little except to egg on the majority of the animals.

Stark may have a point.