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

I'm delighted

[bouchonne]

"Ferelden," Byerly says.

Don't change. That chastisement lingers in Byerly's ears. It likely wouldn't be enough to draw honesty out of him, though, if it weren't for Amani's manner. But Amani is so calm in the face of stories of Bards and warfare and all the madness that had been Bastien's life; if that story didn't shake her, why would Byerly's?

"We met when we were young, Ba- Laith and I. Then parted for a while, and met again in Riftwatch. I'm in service to Queen Anora as an intelligence agent - a spy - but - well - " He smiles wryly over at Bastien and offers a shrug. "There is a greater good, beyond our own agendas and our own national loyalties. It's what we fight for."

Perhaps there is a bit of an agenda in saying that. Perhaps he's building a bit of a wall against the mother's disapproval by telling Amani in no uncertain terms that Bastien is a good man.

But he suspects that practical, clear-eyed Amani will also smell bullshit if it's laid on too thick. Not that this is bullshit (high-quality fertilizer, if anything), but it wouldn't help to cut the stuff a bit.

"That and a steady wage. And the cook there does a good job, actually. The grub's better than you'd think."

[cozen]

Byerly says Laith, and Bastien looks at him sidelong with a furtive, half-bewildered warmth. Byerly is so careful with him; Byerly asked him what he should be called and accepted it and never pushed or teased. So this, three years later, is the first time Bastien's heard Byerly call him that. And he imagined it would make him feel like a cat being pet in the wrong direction, but instead it makes him feel like a cat being skritched carefully beneath the chin—that's the bewilderment.

A small thing. He has to focus on the small things right now, little pieces he can chew on one at a time. He watches the way Amani watches Byerly when he explains himself: first with calm credulity, then a gentle wave of eye narrowing-skepticism that washed over and recedes again as she does the calculations and arrives at why not. Why not a spy in a Fereldan Queen's service. It's not stranger than the fabled tear in the sky, the blight and corpses and griffons, the return of a long-lost brother.

She smiles wide at the grub—her teeth are straighter than Bastien's but not much smaller. Her smile is aimed first at Byerly, then at Bastien, who smiles back mostly with his eyes, pleased she's impressed, proud of who he's managed to ensnare.

"He's there for the greater good. I'm there for the food—"

Amani says, "Of course," playing along.

"—and the men."

"Mmhm. You know, he looks kind of like that boy you liked. What was his name?"

Bastien opens his mouth to argue about how little Byerly looks like him, aside from them both being tall, then recognizes the trap she's laid out and manages to swerve to, "I don't know who you're talking about," in time to prevent losing a twenty-year-old argument about whether or not he liked their gangly, spotty neighbor.

Amani beams at him. The breath she heaves in and out could be an exasperated sigh if she didn't look so happy.

"I want to hear about it," she says around him, to Byerly. "All of it." But not this moment. Her walk is slowing as the snow-coated houses above them get smaller and less well-kept. She says, quieter, "She's worse than she was. You don't have to..."

Second guessing whether this is worth it after all—and Bastien understands, for the first time and all at once, that he got off easy compared to her.

"I'll be fine," he says. "And By was raised by dragons."

[bouchonne]

"Growl," Byerly contributes helpfully.

He finds that - painfully, with the ache of a stiff knee being unbent - he loves Amani. He loves her for the easy way she talks about the boy he liked, teasing and warm. He loves her for big-toothed smile. It is always difficult, finding a new person in your heart, because they hurt when they slot in there.

And it hurts to think of Bastien living a life without her. Who might Bastien have been, if he'd always had this nosy, loving, teasing sister beside him? Less hurt, to be sure. Less scarred. Maybe less willing to pretend. But Byerly, selfishly, knows that this is the Bastien who loves him, and so in some ways, he is grateful for Bastien's sisterlessness.

Still. Distracted though he is by the ache, he still does hear that warning. And so he scratches his cheek and asks in bard-sign: Are you lying? A neglectful mother, worse than she was, doesn't sound like a recipe for being fine.