closed.

[cozen]

WHO: Bastien + Byerly & Gwenaëlle; Redvers + Barrow
WHAT: Working hard or hardly working
WHEN: Winter/Spring 9:50
WHERE: Various
NOTES: Catch-all for a war table mission + some jobs. Eternally available to plan additional things! Just hit me up.

CONTENTS
I. Byerly & Bastien deal with an Antivan problem (and take a detour).
II. Gwenaëlle & Bastien escort a Chantry Mother.
III. Barrow & Redvers fetch jellied pigs feet.

Comments

→ duelist

[cozen]

In the inn half an hour down-road from the crossing where their Antivan target has established his post, a bleeding Ostwickian curses Giovacchin de Albertis, who has killed him, he's done for, he'll die of infection within the week. But for five pennies, a poultice, and a tip that some magical healers reside in Kirkwall if he can hold on long enough to get there, he's willing to describe the duel.

He's also willing to part with some of his bloodstained bandages. Bastien carefully rolls them up to avoid touching the blood and tucks them away before he and Byerly retreat from the communal bedroom, down the stairs, out into the brisk sunny day.

"In case we need to pretend some better duelist has already bested us," he explains about the bandages while he transfers them to Spotty Horse's saddlebags. A compromise, for Byerly's dislike of long rides: one of Riftwatch's sturdier horses, a brown fellow named Clopper, pulling a rough-hewn cart with room for two, and Spotty Horse walking alongside with their gear. "But sending him off on a wild goose chase will only work as long as it takes him to realize there's no goose."

[bouchonne]

"And it'll depend on him thinking the goose is sufficiently fat," Byerly says, and casts a wry smile over at Bastien. "Which, I'm not entirely certain that he'll decide that the man who defeated us is the greatest swordsman of all time. We're not the fearsomest duo."

This is all good fun, really. It's all rather nice. This isn't life-or-death (no matter what the Ostwickian is moaning about); it's just a strange little problem presented to them by a strange little man. (Or big man, as the case may be.)

"Perhaps we should recruit someone burlier than us."

[cozen]

Bastien bares his teeth fearsomely—speak for yourself—but it is necessary to point out that baring his teeth fearsomely creates deep dimples on either side of the snarl.

Fearsome dimples, though, maybe? Dimples that would strike fear into the hearts of men?

No.

"That's a good point," he says. "Definitely. And I wonder if there is a way to point him at Tevinter."

[bouchonne]

"Maker, I could drink water from those dimples," Byerly laughs. "And quench my thirst on them quite well."

But -

"It's a charming idea, though. Have him block a road coming south? The fellow will end up slaughtered eventually, of course, but it does seem like he deserves it."

[cozen]

"Or he will surprise us and cut his way through the Tevinter army, all the way to Corypheus."

Wouldn't that be nice—though it is hard to believe that the death of Corypheus would really be the end of anything, now. The time for the end to come so tidily was years ago. Before the other darkspawn magisters emerged to join his cause. Before cities had been razed and leaders slain and a very good excuse for an Exalted March on the entirety of Tevinter provided.

His death wouldn't fix the Veil, either.

Still. It'd be a problem off the list.

He offers Byerly a hand up into the cart as he would a lady. This is nice. It's what he'd hoped for, when they talked about Byerly stepping down. Going. Solving. Doing. Not a stack of papers in sight.

"Maybe we could convince him that establishing himself as the finest duelist in the Marches here would be pointless, because the finest fighters have gone to war, and he will only be proving he was the best among the weak or cowardly who did not go."